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Achievements and Support

Achievements and Support

It is the policy of Asia Pacific International College to encourage individual staff members to be at the forefront of their fields and to engage in research and or cutting edge practice, as we believe that teaching and learning at our College should be based on research and meaningful practice.

Achievements

Below are major Conference presentations and participation by key academic staff in recent times.

FEBRUARY 2007

Professor Jaafari presented the Plenary Keynote Lecture to the IPMA International Symposium on Project Management: State, Society, Business. 14-17 February 2007, Nizhny Novgorod, Russia (organised by Russian Project Management Association in cooperation with Government of Nizhny Novgorod region). The title of this lecture was:

"Re-engineering Government Services to Become Citizens- and Results-Oriented Through Project and Program Management"

In addition, Professor Jaafari made the following presentations:

Holistic Solutions for Transforming a Whole Industry Sector: Framework, Tools and Results
Competencies for Professional Leaders and Managers of 21st Century

In addition, Professor Jaafari was invited to present a lecture to staff and students of academic institutions in Nizhny Novgorod on 12 February 2007 at the invitation of the Rector of Nizhny Novgorod University of Civil Engineering and Architecture. The title of presentation was:

"The Making of Professional Managers and Leaders: How to Succeed on the Face of a Fast Changing World"

SEPTEMBER 2006

APIC was the co-host of the 3rd International Conference on Project Management (ProMAC2006) that was successfully held on 26-29 September 2006 in Sydney with delegates from some 20 countries of the world attending.

Professor Jaafari, was the Conference Co-Chairman, and the Chairman of the Technical, Scientific and Programme Committee of this Conference. Both Professor Jaafari and Adjunct Professor Ted Tooher were members of the Organising Committee of this Conference. For full details please view

In addition, Professor Jaafari, Ms. Nooshin Z. Jabiri, his PhD Student, Dr. David Gunaratnam and Ms. Cathy Cown-Sahadath (Project Manager, Hydro One Networks Inc., Ontario, Canada) presented a number of papers as follows:

Rethinking Project Management. Jaafari and Cown-Sadahath
Accelerating Project Performance By Applying Project Diagnostics. Jaafari and Jabiri
Holistic asset management through project-based management approach: Theory, application and case study. Jabiri, Jaafari and Gunaratnam

In addition, Professor Jaafari presented a special keynote presentation to the special session of the Conference titled:

"Education & Enculturation of Project Managers and Executives"

JUNE 2005

Professor Jaafari was an invited speaker at the PM-Days´ Education and Research Conference where he held a major workshop titled:

"Project Management Competencies in the Age of Complexity and Change"

During May-July 2005 Professor Jaafari was a Visiting Professor at Helsinki University of Technology. He also visited Berlin University of Technology and Friedberg University of Applied Sciences, where he gave a major seminar. At Berlin TU he gave a major seminar and acted as one of the moderators of an International Doctoral Seminar, held on 30 June - 2 July 2005 at Berlin University of Technology.

OCTOBER 2004

2nd. International Conference on Project Management Opening up a New World of Opportunities Through Advancement in Project Management (ProMAC2004). Major Conference, 11-14 October 2004, Tokyo, Japan. Professor Jaafari will present a major paper to the Special Plenary Session on 11 October as well as co-presenting 4 other papers co-authored with Dr.s David Gunaratnam and Hemanta Doloi and Doctoral students Nooshin Jabiri, Nicole Hensman, Karel Valenta and Pramote Suvimolteerabut.

SEPTEMBER 2004

Engineering Leadership Conference, 23-24 September 2004, Sydney, Australia. Mr. Ted Tooher presented a talk to one of the sessions on 23 September and Professor Jaafari presented a paper on 24 September. Professor Jaafari's paper was titled:

"Complexity, Mindset, Competencies, Leadership: The Emergence of Creative-Reflective Professionals"

The paper argued for a paradigm shift in terms of the underpinning model of professionality from the current normative approach to that of a creative-reflective model.

AUGUST 2004

IRNOP VI Conference held on 25-27 August 2004 in Abo Akademi University, Turku Finland. Professor Jaafari presented a major paper to this Conference . In addition, Professor Jaafari co-authored 2 additional papers (one was a poster presentation with Pramote Suvimolteerabut and the other one was presented by Doctoral students Ms. Nicole Hensman and Karel Valenta).

JULY 2004

PMI Research Conference, 11-14 July2004, London, UK. The following paper was presented to this Conference: Jaafari, A., Doloi, H. and Gunaratnam, D. (2004). Life Cycle Project Management: A Platform for Strategic Project Management. This paper was subsequently selected by Project Management Institute to be developed as a Chapter of a Book to be published by PMI.

The Book Chapter has already been written and accepted for publication. This chapter is a major research presentation that underpins strategic management of large complex projects. Professor Jaafari has pioneered this strategic research work in 1996 and supervised a number of numerous research grants, graduate research theses and post-doctoral work conducted at the University of Sydney over the last 8 years.

JUNE 2004

The following paper was presented to the 18th World Congress on Project Management, held in Budapest, Hungry: Hensman, N., Valenta, K. and Jaafari, A. (2004). State of Play and Trends in Public and Private Sector organisations - Critical Success Factors for Organisational Performance in a Complex World.

This paper was received well and Professor Jaafari and his Doctoral Students Nicole Hensman and Karel Valenta at the University of Sydney received numerous request for the information on this work including permission to be published in other media.

MAY 2004, CHINA

Professor Jaafari made the following key presentation to the Second International Conference on Project Management of China (ICPM 2004), 21-24 May, Beijing, China.

"Measuring the Performance of IT and Business Transformation Projects: Framework, Criteria and Assessment Methodologies"

This presentation provides a comprehensive framework, criteria and methodology for assessing the strategic alignment and implementation status of major IT/IS projects and was received well.

MAY 2004, USA

The following paper was presented to a major Systems Thinking Conference held in the US: Suvimolteerabut, P. and Jaafari, A. (2004). Management of IT/IS Projects as Business Transformation Programme with Emphasis on System Dynamics Application. The 3rd International Conference on Systems Thinking in Management (ICSTM, 2004). 19-21 May 2004. Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, USA. Organised by the University of Pennsylvania.

This paper generated a lot of interest and led to the start of collaboration between Professor Jaafari, his PhD student Mr. Pramote Suvimolteerabut and a number of research professors on systems thinking in the US.

APRIL 2004

Seminar on Transformation of Taiwan Military Academies, 29-30 April, 2004. Professor Jaafari was invited to present a major part of the above seminar (organised by Georgia University Asia Pacific of Taiwan) that aimed at providing a sound basis for the 4 military academies in Taiwan to merge into a military university, including relocation of 3 campuses, staff redeployment, training and accreditation, curriculum design, campus redevelopment and other strategic issues. Prior to this Professor Jaafari had met the senior officers of one of the major academies in late March to better understand the strategic planning of this major project.

JANUARY 2004, CANADA

IT Leadership Development Course, 26-29 January 2004, Toronto, Canada, organised by Ryerson University´s School of Information Technology Management and CIO Summit. Professor Jaafari was the main lecturer for the Session on performance measurement and what really works and what doesn´t. The participants in this course were senior IT professionals (some CIOs) from various Canadian public and private sector organisations.

JANUARY 2004, EUROPE

Between 16 to 24 January 2004 Professor Jaafari was invited by the Division of Business Processes & Project Management of University of Applied Sciences, Vorarlberg, Austria to teach a one-week intensive graduate work on advanced risk and uncertainty management in Vorarlberg, Austria. This course had a student satisfaction rating of over 95%.

AUGUST 2003, FINLAND

On 26 August 2003 Professor Jaafari participated and presented a paper in a major Seminar in Helsinki jointly organised by Stanford University and Helsinki School of Economics, supported by Helsinki University of Technology.

JUNE 2003, RUSSIA

Professor Jaafari presented the following major papers to June, 17th IPMA Congress on Project Management, 3-6 June 2004, Moscow, Russia:

Jaafari, A. (2003). Project Management in the Age of Chaos: A Study of Professionalism in 21st Century.

Jaafari, A. and Gunaratnam, D. (2003). Making Environmentally and Socially-Responsible Decisions With the Help of an Intelligent Project Management Information System.

Jaafari, A. and Doloi, H. (2003). Managing Complex Assets Using Project Management.

OCTOBER-NOVEMBER 2003, EUROPE

PM-Research Conference, PM-Days 28 October 1 November 2003, Vienna, Austria. Professor Jaafari was the keynote speaker in this conference. In addition 2 of his Doctoral students took part and presented their papers, including Mr. Pramote who won the 2003 PhD student award for his Doctoral research undertaken at the University of Sydney under Professor Jaafari´s supervision.

Training & Support

We are committed to continuous training of our Course Convenors and Tutors as well as our mentors and academic support staff. We hold regular briefing sessions, have established a forum for our teaching staff to communicate their experiences with each other and have a process of continuous development of our tools and support facilities.

© 2004 - 2008 Asia Pacific International College.