Project-IPEC Erasmus Project

Project Title

Project-IPEC

Project Key Action

This project related with these key action: Cooperation for innovation and the exchange of good practices

Project Action Type

This project related with this action type : Strategic Partnerships for vocational education and training

Project Call Year

This project’s Call Year is 2015

Project Topics

This project is related with these Project Topics: Enterprise, industry and SMEs (incl. entrepreneurship); Pedagogy and didactics; New innovative curricula/educational methods/development of training courses

Project Summary

Private enterprises make substantial use of projects to manage internal innovation, development projects and external work for clients. Established, larger companies often use a formal project management methodology. In contrast, SMEs are rarely able to employ dedicated project managers, find formal project methodologies, such as Prince2, too sophisticated, too costly and too time intensive for their needs. Cost, time overruns and the ineffective execution of projects have a significant impact on the performance of SMEs. A PricewaterhouseCoopers study of 10,640 projects from 200 companies found that only 2.5% of the companies successfully completed 100% of their projects. With micro and small enterprises accounting for 98.8% of all enterprises and employing 50% of the workforce in the EU28, the ineffective execution of projects is impacting negatively not only the performance of their company, but also on national and European economic performance.

The project aimed to contribute to improving the performance of micro and small enterprises at both a national and European level. Partners brought together two different bodies of knowledge (i.e. Project Management and gamification) and synthesised a new micro-lite Project Management methodology using the IPEC project cycle: Initiate, Plan, Execute and Close. By adopting best Project Management practices, ‘state of the art’ gamification technology and the latest blended learning techniques and practices, partners aimed to ‘exemplar’ this project that can act as a ‘demonstrator’ project for future VET products utilising gamification.

The project involved participants from the target group: new business start-ups and small enterprises trading for less than three years and set up by Generation Y individuals. They implemented the micro-lite Project Management methodology in their business as part of the piloting phase. They were supported by IPEC Coaches from each project partner trained to deliver on-line business coaching and to facilitate execution of results-driven business projects.

Project-IPEC results (the app) tried to stimulate a national and European debate with VET and SME policy makers regarding the wider use of gamification, on-line business coaching and the micro-lite Project Management methodology as a mechanism for improving the performance of Europe’s SMEs. Partners published a policy paper called, ‘The Wider Use of ICT, Gamification and Micro-lite Project Management within VET’. The paper was presented at a series of national seminars and a final conference at ITT. The project aimed to demonstrate the potential impact on economic performance and job creation resulting from the adoption and widening of the project up to and beyond 2020.

EU Grant (Eur)

Funding of the project from EU: 414271 Eur

Project Coordinator

INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY TRALEE & Country: IE

Project Partners

• Poslovne storitve, Bogdan Sovinc s.p.
• AVACA TECHNOLOGIES CONSULTING, INFORMATICS AE
• STICHTING BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT FRIESLAND
• Exponential Training & Assessment Limited
• Cyprus Project Management Society
• emcra GmbH
• EUROCREA MERCHANT SRL