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The discipline of PM has been applied in several domains to manage change in contemporary organizations, due to its flexibility, quick response and effectiveness in managing uncertainties, risks and complexities (Javed & Liu, 2018; Kloppenborg & Opfer, 2002). Today, where most organizations execute their strategies through projects, achieving project success has become the center of attention for researchers and professionals (Brooks et al., 2014). A recent industry report highlighted the growing adoption of project management standards and practices across large numbers of organizations from different sectors (KPMG, 2013). However, with the increase in project-based management, the complexity and costs have also been growing. Organizations have then sought to identify the causes of failure and the factors that lead to success (Papke-Shields et al., 2010). In fact, the concept of project success is unclear in the PM literature and, for this reason, studies related to this subject have been performed in the PM field in the last decades (Pinto & Slevin, 1988; Hyväri, 2006; Silvius & Schipper, 2015). Following a brief contextualization, our research intended to identify, through a multidimensional analytical model, the extent to which the different knowledge areas and their respective PM practices are implemented and linked to projects success in Portuguese context. This innovative approach in the field of PM was sustained by a quantitative and multidimensional method, using a structural equation model (SEM). The research has been based on the PMBOK Guide v5 (PMI, 2013) which is considered the most popular standard on PM best practices (Ghosh et al., 2012). The following research questions will guide the present study:
- 1.
What is the degree of dissemination of the different PMBOK knowledge’s areas?
- 2.
Are the different success criteria of the projects in competition with each other?
- 3.
What happens behind the traditionally most well-established knowledge areas: scope, time and cost? To what extent other knowledge areas explain the success of the projects?