European Project Management: A Systematic Literature Review

The benefits of implementing European Project Management (EPM) have been studied in various contexts, as achieving objectives through EPM holds significant potential for organizations, governments, and society. Although researchers have been paying more attention to this topic recently, there is a current need for more systematic work that depicts how management is applied to successfully European-funded projects in general. Moreover, being Romania's primary funding source, it is vital to analyze and assess the factors that lead EU projects to success. The originality of this paper consists of systematically identifying, critically evaluating, and synthesizing relevant studies and publications on EPM, using semi-automated and manual filtering, both exclusionary and inclusionary, while analyzing and assessing critical success factors of national relevance. This research significantly contributes to knowledge of the factors affecting the success of Europeanfunded projects in Romania and offers practical approaches that can be applied in this field. Our results can be used to address Romania's current weaknesses and challenges in accessing EU funds, such as reducing bureaucracy, fighting corruption, and strengthening administrative capacity. Moreover, this paper can serve as a manual for training and coaching programs to improve project teams' competencies and knowledge.