Integration of ISO 45001 and Project Management Institute’s Project Management Body of Knowledge in Construction Project Management

Abstract

The integration of Occupational Health and Safety (OH&S) management and project management is not a new topic. However, with the new ISO 45001 international standards for OH&S management recently launched in 2018, a structured literature review is timely to assess the available body of knowledge, develop new ideas and deliberate future research inferences between ISO 45001 and Project Management Institute’s (PMI) Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK). A structured literature review was conducted using OH&S management keywords (ISO 45001, OSHA 18001, OHS, OH&S) against project management keyword (PMBOK), where the articles search was further refined, classified and analysed. This paper hence aims at appraising the conceptual integration of ISO 45001 and PMBOK in construction project management by investigating conceptual approaches on how ISO 45001 and PMBOK can be integrated and examining the current status of the existing literature on ISO 45001 and PMBOK. It was found that ISO 45001 is easier to overlay on PMBOK rather than the inverse. The paper also found that there is a lack of published literature on the integration of ISO 45001 and PMBOK and the inclusion of its predecessor which is OSHA 18001 was required. However, it is noted that even with a larger number of papers reviewed, the findings were largely inconsistent (heterogeneous) in terms of objectives, methodologies and results. Additional research into relationship model(s), as well as application of new technologies and digital application is recommended to complete the outlook for the integration of both systems.