Program duration: February 6-17 , 2012

Application deadline: November 21, 2011

Program Leaflet (PDF, 107 kbs)

Program Outline ( PDF, 284 kbs)

Background of the Program:

AOTS – the Association for Overseas Technical Scholarship – is a non-profit association run with Japanese government subsidies from the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI). Since its establishment in 1959, AOTS has been conducting various technical and management training programs in Japan for the people of developing countries. The total number of participants in past AOTS training programs amounts to almost 155,000 from about 170 developing countries and regions. These former participants are playing very important roles in industry and contributing greatly to the economic development of their respective countries.

The Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, Japan requests AOTS to organize various training programs in order to enhance Japanese business activities in the field of infrastructure development in emerging markets, particularly in Asian developing countries. In order to support Japanese companies that are developing and/or
bidding for, or have been actually awarded projects related to the infrastructure field (Note 1) in developing countries, AOTS has designed a training program dealing with project management and program management (Note 2) in cooperation with the Project Management Association of Japan (PMAJ), namely the Training
Program on Project & Program Management for Infrastructure Construction and Plant Engineering (PPMI).

Projects in the infrastructure field targeted by this program typically contain such characteristics as:

-  close relation to a country’s national development programs and, therefore, involvement of a variety of stakeholders, both in the public sector (such as government agencies) and the private sector (investors, financiers, contractors, suppliers)

-  unique project development, implementation and business running arrangements such as PPP- public and private partnership, BOT- “build, operate and transfer” that demand contractors or developers to undertake business operation of built infrastructure in addition to engineering, constructing and delivering infrastructure as a traditional contractor

-  requirement of sophisticated financing such as project financing, coupling of government and private loans or investment

-  combination of plural infrastructure elements as a new type of package infrastructure such as in an eco smart city development, water system development, rapid rail way systems, which are increasing year to year in developing countries

-  racing against developing technology as in renewable energy, smart grids, etc.

These profiles of the infrastructure projects require project managers to expand their management knowledge upstream to cover project conception and development; that is to say, acquire knowledge of project management and beyond. Also, because in developing countries projects related to the infrastructure field contain various uncertainties, risk management is a critical issue for contractors. Owners or prime contractors will face the risk of incurring losses out of inferior host country stakeholder relations, quality defects, construction delays and construction cost overruns caused by various risk factors. Among such risk factors, there are many items that can be reduced and managed well if local managers of contractors or subcontractors deeply understand project management and perform their work accordingly.

Therefore, this program is designed to train local managers in order to help them be able to manage projects effectively and contribute the quality assurance of project outcomes by making them master the system and method of project management based on the P2MⓇ (Note 3).

Note 1) Infrastructure Field  —- It typically includes the water industry, traffic management systems, coal gasification and coal-fired power plants, electricity transmission and distribution systems, nuclear power generation plants, railway systems, resources recovery and recycling systems, aerospace industry, renewable energy development and utilization systems, telecommunications systems, urban or small community development, industrial park development and oil and gas plant system area.

Note 2) Project & Program Management —- Project management is a set of management processes for planning and delivering any unique, new value in a project context (mission driven, time and resources, hence, cost constrained) such as the engineering and construction of social infrastructure, production facilities, development of ICT systems, new product development and marketing campaigns for business firms. A project can be initiated on a stand-alone basis (discrete projects) or as an integral part of a program. Program management is a set of management methodologies positioned higher and wid management and places emphasis on conception, design and structuring of a program, na of component projects organically combined to deliver an enterprise’s business strategy.

Note 3) P2MⓇ—- P2MⓇ is the “Guidebook of Project & Program Management for Enterprise Innovation” originally published by the Engineering Advancement Association of Japan in 2001 in response to a commission from the Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (METI) of Japan, of which ownership has been transferred to the Project Management Association of Japan (PMAJ) for the dissemination, enhancement and deployment of P2MⓇ certification, since 2002. P2MⓇ is compatible with globally used project management practices and has also incorporated the concept of visioning, conception and design of value added programs and projects.

Candidates are:

1. Executives, senior managers and/or project leaders who are in a position to manage infrastructure or plant construction projects, or
2. Managers, supervisors or engineers who are responsible for contracts, design, procurement, construction, etc. of infrastructure or plant construction projects, and
3. Their companies, in principle, should have already worked or will work for the infrastructure or plant construction projects awarded or implemented by Japanese companies.
4. If a company is working for infrastructure or plant construction projects awarded or implemented by Japanese companies, executives or managers of secondary or tertiary subcontractors can also be accepted.
5. Public organization officials who are in charge of infrastructure development may also be accepted.