Congratulations to Dr Sujuan Zhang on being awarded the Project Management Institute’s (PMI) 2025 Young Researcher Award. Alongside being a member of our Institute, Dr Zhang, is also a Lecturer in Project Organising and Program Director of the Master of Project and Program Management (Online) at the University of Sydney’s School of Project Management.
This prestigious international award recognises emerging scholars whose research has made significant contributions to advancing project management knowledge and practice. Dr Zhang is the first female scholar to receive this Young Researcher award track, marking a milestone for the PMI academic community.
Her research focuses on the owner domain of project organising with particular emphasis on the leading role of infrastructure owner organisation in shaping and delivering complex projects. Dr Zhang’s work examines how owner organisations act as strategic leaders as system integrators, building the capabilities required to deliver major infrastructure projects while responding to the challenges of digital transformation and sustainability transitions. A core contribution of her work lies in advancing the understanding of owner project capabilities, offering new insights into how infrastructure owners can sustain their role as ‘capable owners’ and continually strengthen their governance, commercial, strategic and adaptive capabilities in rapidly changing delivery environments.
These insights are particularly relevant for Australian infrastructure owner organisations, as they navigate increasingly complex project portfolios, ambitious policy agendas, and escalating climate and sustainability risks. Her work highlights the importance of project leadership at the owner level in enabling long-term public value creation.
Selected publications related to her research include:
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0263786323000613
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0263786321000107
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0263786323001060
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/01446193.2023.2235439
This recognition highlights not only Dr Zhang’s research achievements, but also the growing visibility of the Institute and School’s leadership in project organising and infrastructure delivery in the changing environment. It signals strong potential for future collaborations with industry partners and government agencies, and reinforces the School and Institute ’s commitment to shaping the next generation of research and practice in project delivery