Six decades of project management research: Thematic trends and future opportunities

Project management as a discipline possesses a rich body of literature characterized by early determinism and later expansion to broader contexts aided by paradigmatic, thematic, and methodological diversity. The dynamic nature of research entails many parallel streams of enquiry under differing perspectives without convergence to parsimonious theories. We argue that an integrated view of project management research in terms of its thematic evolution and trends is necessary for an understanding of future directions. Our study fills this gap by tracing the evolution of themes in project management research, trends, and future opportunities through a systematic review of literature. We find the research to be dominated by empirical and deterministic perspectives while non-deterministic research enquiry remains weak and sporadic. We contend that stronger focus on non-deterministic perspective and a methodological convergence is necessary for the research to meaningfully advance towards theory building, and discuss potential avenues for further research. •Determinism and themes of scheduling and related project methods have dominated the early research enquiry.•The dynamic nature of research entails many parallel streams of enquiry without convergence to parsimonious theories.•A new bibliometric formula, the Effective Annualized Citation Rate (EACR), to order various themes by strength of their research influence.•An integrated view of project management research in terms of its thematic evolution and trends for predicting the future directions.