【正文】 山東建筑大學(xué)畢業(yè)設(shè)計外文文獻及譯文 1 外文文獻： The project management office as an anisational innovation Brian Hobbs *, Monique Aubry, Denis Thuillier University of Quebec at Montreal, Department of Management and Technology, PO Box 8888, Downtown Station, Montreal, Que, Canada H3C 3P8 Received 15 May 2021。 accepted 20 May 2021 Abstract The paper presents an investigation of the creation and the reconfiguration of project management offices (PMOs) as an anizational innovation. The analysis of 11 anisational transformations centred on the implementation or reconfiguration of PMOs is presented. The objective of the paper is to contribute to a better understanding of PMOs and of the dynamic relationship between project management and the anisational context. The aim is also to integrate the examination of PMOs as an anisational innovation into the mainstream of research on the place of project management in anisations and more widely to the ‘‘rethinking of project management.” 1. Introduction Quite often over the last decade, the observation has been made that anisations are facing a new context characterized by increased petition, increased rates of product, service and process innovation and an increasing emphasis on time to market. Organisations have responded to these challenges by developing new, more flexible anisational forms [1] in which projects are both more numerous and more strategically important [2]. As part of the response to these new challenges and as part of the movement to increase both the number and the strategic importance of projects many anisations have implemented a new anisational entity the most mon name for which is the project management office or PMO. The PMO has been addressed extensively in the professional literature [3–5]. However, there has been very little theoretical or empirical research on the topic. In addition, this anisational innovation has not been examined extensively within the literature stream described above. 山東建筑大學(xué)畢業(yè)設(shè)計外文文獻及譯文 2 2. Recent surveybased research on PMOs Arecent surveybased on the synchronic description of a large number of PMOs and their anisational contexts has shown extreme variety in both the form and function of PMOs [6]. Attempts to date to reduce this variety to a limited number of models have failed. In addition, the research showed that in the majority of cases PMOs are unstable structures, anisations often reconfigure their PMOs every few years. This instability can be interpreted as both an illustration of structuring as an ongoing anisational process [1] and as an illustration of anisational experimentation as anisations search for an adequate structural arrangement [7]. Half of the respondents to the survey report that the legitimacy of their PMO in its present form is being questioned. This is consistent with both the interpretation in terms of experimentation and a search for best practices and with the interpretation as an instance of the inherent instability of an ongoing process of structuring. In the surveybased research cited above, correlation analysis found no systematic relationships between the external context in terms of economic sector or geographic region or internal anisational context, on the one hand, and the structural characteristics of PMOs on the other. None of the classic contingency factors from anisational theory correlated strongly with the form or function of the PMOs. A positivist, synchronic approach has provided a rich description of the great variety found in the population but has failed, so far, to provide an adequate understanding of PMOs. The present paper reports the result of an effort to e to a better understanding of PMOs as an anisational innovation based on the indepth investigation of eleven cases. 3. The literature on anisational innovation Four subsets of the literature on innovation are examined to identify alternative approaches relevant to the examination of PMOs as anizational innovations. First, the general literature on innovation is examined. This is followed by an examination of the literature based on evolutionary, coevolutionary and institutional isomorphism approaches. All are sensitive to evolution over time. . The general literature on innovation Early research on innovation had operated mostly from an economic perspective and a general assumption of growth [8]. The interdisciplinary curriculum has developed over time 山東建筑大學(xué)畢業(yè)設(shè)計外文文獻及譯文 3 with the contribution of new knowledge stemming from a variety of sources: economics [9–11], anisational management [12], sociology [13] and social ecology [14]. Others provide a categorization of innovation based on product, process or architecture [15,16].In this perspective, anisations are considered to be very similar, responding to the same incentives. The objectives of research are often to provide anisations with practical solutions determining factors to innovative success. Innovation theory is now shifting to a social innovation approach, broadening the concept of technological innovation to a social system. ‘‘[...]the sociological crucial point is that anisations have not only bee prominent actors in society, they may have bee the only kind of actor with significant cultural and political influence. Yet, recent anisation theory has surprisingly little to say about how anisations affect the society.” [13, p. 148] New questions have emerged which lead to motivation theory and to the context of innovation that rehabilitates history along with innovation, thus introducing the temporal element to the social innovation system [17,18]. This historical perspective was a natural step after the ecological model which demonstrated the usefulness of the biological metaphor with the concepts of evolution and coevolution [19]. This social approa