There are several differences between project-driven and non-project-driven organizations, including:
- Project Management in project-driven organizations is mature and respected. On the other hand, in non-project-driven organizations, Project Management is still in its infancy, and is often looked at with skepticism.
- Project-driven organizations make the lion’s share of their income through projects, non-project-driven organizations mainly make their income through production.
- The Project Manager is responsible of the profitability and loss in project-driven organizations. In non-project-driven organizations, the responsibility for profitability and loss is ambiguous.
- Project-driven organizations adopt either fully projectized or matrix organizational structures. Non-project-driven organizations usually adopt a functional organizational structure.
- Project-driven organizations have flexible career paths, where one can ascend quickly to higher positions. Non-project-driven organizations have traditional career paths, where moving upwards in the company ladder is very difficult. Quite often, one has to wait for his manager to get fired/resign/retire/die to ascend the company’s ladder and assume a better position.
Examples of industries where project-driven organizations are predominant include:
- Construction
- Aerospace
- Research
Examples of industries where non-project-driven organizations are predominant include:
- Manufacturing
- Services
- Farming
- Send Money Internationally
- Natural resources
IT (Information Technology) organizations (that fall under the services industry) are considered to be hybrid, where parts of such organizations are considered to be project-driven (such as the development of a new software), while other parts are considered to be non-project-driven (for example supporting applications).