Evolving project management competencies for the digital era

lorenaflorian0
Oct 17
5 min read

Digital transformation isn’t just changing the tools we use—it’s reshaping how projects are conceived, governed, and delivered. Yet many of the competencies that guide our profession still emphasise linear planning, control and compliance. When the work itself has become data-rich, AI-enabled, cyber-exposed and largely distributed, that misalignment shows up as lower delivery confidence and unrealised benefits.

In a recent paper, “Evolving Project Management Competencies in the Digital Era: A PracticeBased Framework for Capability Development,” Bawtree argues that project competencies must be reframed as enacted practices—things we do, together, in context—rather than static traits we simply “possess.” Below, are the core ideas and a practical roadmap leaders can use to uplift capability across teams, PMOs and portfolios.

Why the competency gap matters

Most established guides and frameworks (e.g. PMBoK, ICB4, GAPPS, BoK) remain rooted in traditional delivery paradigms. They offer important foundations—technical skills, behavioural competencies, and contextual awareness—but often under-specify the digital-era capabilities now central to project success:

AI and data literacy: interpreting algorithmic outputs, spotting bias, and making evidence-based decisions.
Cybersecurity awareness: anticipating and mitigating risks across cloud ecosystems and supplier networks.
Virtual collaboration: leading distributed teams and keeping engagement high across channels and time zones.
Iterative governance: balancing flexibility with accountability when delivery is incremental and learning-led.

The result? Practitioners frequently rely on informal workarounds to plug gaps that should be embedded in our frameworks, training, and assessments. That’s inefficient for organisations and frustrating for professionals.

A practice-based lens: Young’s 6Ps

To make competency frameworks more relevant, we can adopt a practice-based lens that focuses on how capability is actually performed in the real world. Young’s 6Ps framework offers a simple way to do this:

Praxis – the situated actions we take (micro, meso, macro)
Practices – the routines, tools, and behaviours we enact
Practitioners – the actors and groups involved (project managers, sponsors, PMOs)
Profession – the institutions and standards shaping what “good” looks like
Process – the formal/informal mechanisms that structure work
Performance – the outcomes we deliver and how they align to strategy

So viewing competencies through Young’s 6Ps, we can see where (and how) capability is falling short and what needs to change at individual, organisational, and professional levels.

Six digitalera competency domains and how to use them

The paper proposes six domains that integrate digital realities into core project capability. Think of these as “practice anchors” to embed across governance, roles, and learning pathways:

AI ethics & data literacy
What it is: Understanding model limitations, bias, and data governance; translating analytics into clear stakeholder decisions.
Where to start: Establish project data charters; require interpretability checks for AI outputs; build dashboards that connect delivery decisions to benefits.
Cybersecurity awareness
What it is: Recognising threat vectors, secure-by-design principles, and incident response basics across the project lifecycle.
Where to start: Include cyber risk in delivery confidence assessments; run tabletop exercises; align third-party controls to your organisation’s standards.
Virtual collaboration
What it is: Leading distributed teams, facilitating inclusive digital meetings, and maintaining psychological safety when most interactions are online.
Where to start: Adopt collaboration charters; rotate decision rituals (stand-ups, demos, retros); use asynchronous communication patterns that reduce meeting fatigue.
Iterative development & delivery governance
What it is: Combining discovery, experimentation, and incremental release with transparent controls and clear accountability.
Where to start: Make benefits hypotheses explicit; gate by learning and evidence (not just milestones); track “decision fitness” alongside scope/schedule.
Digital facilitation
What it is: Using tools and techniques to surface assumptions, align stakeholders, and co-create solutions across platforms.
Where to start: Train teams in digital canvases (e.g., impact mapping, option framing); standardise facilitation kits for complex multi-stakeholder decisions.
Strategic foresight
What it is: Scanning for disruption, modelling scenarios, and shaping portfolios that can pivot as conditions change.
Where to start: Build lightweight horizon scans into quarterly planning; use scenario “pre-mortems” to test resilience; align initiatives to evolving strategy through rolling wave prioritisation.

Each domain maps to the 6Ps, tying daily practice to outcomes. For example, AI ethics and data literacy influence praxis (how decisions are made) and performance (benefits realised), while cybersecurity sits strongly in practices, process, and the profession (standards).

Governance archetypes: Tailoring competency to context

Organisation governs projects in different ways and that’s a good thing. The paper draws on governance archetypes to show how competency expectations shift:

Controloriented (collective performance, diagnostic controls): prioritise competencies in compliance, systems thinking, technical discipline.
Valueoriented (collective creativity, belief systems): emphasise collaboration, emotional intelligence, and stakeholder cocreation.
Performanceoriented (individual creativity, outcome focus): strengthen innovation, autonomy, and strategic foresight.
Network-oriented (individual process creativity, boundary controls): develop networking, knowledge sharing, and adaptive learning.

Takeaway: Your competency framework should be adaptable—reflecting dominant governance logics without locking your teams into one way of working. One‑size‑fits‑all models won’t cut it in complex portfolios.

What leaders can do next, a practical roadmap

Whether you lead a PMO, sponsor a portfolio, or manage transformation teams, here’s a step-by-step approach to uplift digital-era capability:

Diagnose the gap: Map current competencies against the six domains and 6Ps. Use delivery confidence reviews and benefit tracking to identify capability constraints.
Embed digital-era competencies in role expectations: Update job descriptions, performance frameworks, and communities of practice. Make AI/data literacy, cyber awareness, and facilitation explicit.
Modernise governance: Introduce iterative controls: learning-based gates, hypothesis-driven benefits, and transparent decision logs. Align assurance to evidence of learning.
Revamp training and certification pathways: Extend existing standards such as AIPM’s RegPM with digital-specific practices. Move beyond checklists toward assessment of practice in context.
Invest in enablement tools: Standardise collaborative canvases, decision dashboards, and risk playbooks. Provide shared “kits” for digital facilitation and cyber risk management.
Measure performance differently: Track delivery confidence drivers (e.g., decision quality, evidence maturity, stakeholder alignment), not just time/cost/scope. Connect data to real benefits.

Why this matters for Australia’s project community

Australia’s transformation agenda across government, education, health, infrastructure, and tech depends on teams who can navigate complexity with confidence. As a Certified Project Management Corporation, PMLogic is focused on ensuring our competencies recognise these digitalera demands while maintaining the strengths of our profession.

Our aim isn’t to discard what works, it’s to extend and enliven it with practice-based capabilities that reflect how projects are truly delivered today.

How PMLogic can help

At PMLogic, we partner with organisations to design and implement capability uplift programs grounded in our principle and award-winning DELIVER method which can be tailored to your governance archetype. Typical engagements include:

Portfolio capability diagnostics mapped to SFIA or AQF competencies
Practice-based learning for AI/data literacy, cyber awareness, and digital facilitation
Iterative governance design to improve delivery confidence and benefits realisation
Role clarity and enablement for PMs, Product Owners, Sponsors, and PMOs