This fall, Columbia's School of Professional Studies is launching a new M.S. in Project Management, a degree designed to prepare professionals to lead complex initiatives across industries. As Program Director Dr. Evangelia Ieronymaki explains, "While 'project manager' used to be a title primarily associated with construction and infrastructure, today it extends across industries such as technology, sustainability, and sports."
That broader vision shapes the program's four concentrations, including the Construction concentration, offered in partnership with Columbia Engineering’s Department of Civil Engineering and Engineering Mechanics and led by Dr. Ibrahim S. Odeh. For prospective students considering the degree, the question becomes: what does it mean to lead projects in the built environment—and how do you prepare for that level of complexity?
What Is Construction Project Management?
"Construction project management today is bringing together people, technology, capital, and physical assets to deliver projects that shape cities and societies," Odeh explains.
That scope sets construction apart. Unlike purely digital or operational projects, construction requires coordinating large teams, managing physical risks, navigating regulatory constraints, and delivering outcomes that are visible, permanent, and often public-facing. It goes beyond scheduling and budgeting into strategic decision-making, stakeholder alignment, and risk management across every stage of a project.
Who This Program Serves
The concentration is designed specifically for students who may not have formal engineering backgrounds. Embedding construction within a broader project management framework allows non-engineering students to develop strong foundational skills while also gaining specialized expertise in delivering physical assets.
Students often come from business, operations, or other fields, asking questions like: How do I move into leadership roles? How do I manage large-scale projects effectively? How do I differentiate myself in a competitive, evolving industry?
"The ideal student is someone looking to lead complex projects, especially those with less technical engineering expertise," Odeh explains.
Learning Through a Living Laboratory
At Columbia, that complexity isn't taught abstractly. It's experienced directly through New York City itself.
Odeh describes the city as a "living laboratory." As he explains it, "The idea of the living laboratory is more focused on sending the students to do projects associated with the topics being taught in class. They visit the sites where we have a lot of ongoing active construction all around the city, and then they come back, they analyze it, and they present it in the classroom." The exchange runs in both directions, with practitioners from active projects coming to campus to present their own case studies.
"We bring the field to the class and the other way around," Odeh says.
That exchange is grounded in some of the most significant infrastructure and development efforts underway today. Students study projects such as the Gateway Program, which Odeh describes as one of the largest infrastructure efforts underway in the United States, currently budgeted at around $16 billion. "We have a collaboration with all the entities involved in delivering that project," he says, "and we invite them to our program to present how they are approaching the challenges, and what to ask when you are building such an iconic and signature project." Students examine the program at multiple levels, from overall program management down to specialized activities like excavation, de-watering, and scheduling.
The Second Avenue Subway offers another ongoing case. "We've done a lot of site visits to the Second Avenue subway expansion, all the way until today," Odeh says. "The team who built it still comes to the class, and we built a wonderful, valuable case study that we always present." The Bayonne Bridge provides a third. Odeh describes the Bayonne Bridge as a valuable educational example of “how to raise the level of the bridge several feet and keep the traffic flowing while we are doing construction.”
Then there is vertical construction. The JPMorgan Chase headquarters tower, Odeh says, was "not just a signature project, but a challenging project," requiring teams to demolish one tower and build another in its place. "These two processes of not just building, but demolishing—it's also an engineering art, a construction art."
What animates Odeh is how much these projects continue to teach. "Every time we present it, it's like, aha, we learn something new," he says. "The more we enter into new projects in the future, the more exciting it will be. All these examples have a lot of similarities to future examples in other projects."
What Students Learn
The concentration centers on four courses that Odeh and his colleagues selected deliberately. "There are a lot of courses, but we were very picky on what are the four that will equip the students with the most urgent skills," he says.
The first focuses on managing engineering and construction processes. Across the semester, faculty work through planning, scheduling, and cost management, along with the challenges a project or construction manager must learn to anticipate and respond to in the field.
The second centers on environment, health, and safety, a priority Odeh returns to repeatedly. "We are emphasizing over and over the topic of safety: how to be safe in the field, how to go back home safe," he says. "Not just you as an engineer, but all those who are participating in the same project. It's your responsibility." The course also addresses environmental responsibility and the practices students will be expected to implement on site.
The third course tackles construction law. "There are a lot of disputes, conflicts, disagreements—that's typical in our industry," Odeh explains. The goal is to give students the skills to manage those situations early. "We help them understand how to deal with these conflicts so it will not escalate, so you can solve it from day one."
The fourth, principles of construction techniques, builds the foundation: how each construction activity is actually performed, from excavation and foundations to steel erection. Beyond these four required courses, students can take two electives to specialize further from other advanced topics.
Throughout, the program prioritizes principles over tools. "We don't teach software—we teach the principles and the foundation," Odeh explains. "Software is going to keep updating; there will be new software coming left and right. So at Columbia, we focus on the principles and the foundation. Once you understand those, whatever tools come toward you, you understand the basis."
That philosophy shapes how courses are taught. "We depend on bridging between theory and practice," Odeh says. Rather than relying on a single textbook, many classes draw on input from industry professionals alongside course materials. "We mimic the environment in the classroom, so when they graduate, they will not be shocked."
Building Capability, Not Just Experience
For many students, the value of the program lies in what it offers beyond on-the-job learning.
While work experience often provides depth in a specific role or project, the program is designed to build a broader foundation. This prepares students to move across different types of projects and responsibilities.
"We are teaching them ‘how to learn’ in construction," Odeh says. "You have to learn the right fundamentals. After that, whatever change the discipline goes through, you will be ready for it." The aim, he adds, is to give graduates a strong foundation and the right skills so they can keep learning as the field changes.
Students also gain exposure to best practices across different projects and geographies, something difficult to replicate through work experience alone. They develop the ability to step back and think strategically, rather than remaining focused only on day-to-day execution. And they build a network of peers, faculty, and industry leaders that extends well beyond their immediate workplace.
Career Paths and Growth
Graduates of the concentration move into roles such as construction manager, assistant project manager, and project manager, working across contractors, developers, and public agencies. Some choose to specialize further in areas such as scheduling, cost management, planning, risk identification, or safety management, while others follow a more traditional path toward project leadership.
Because the program emphasizes both technical understanding and management capability, graduates are positioned to take on higher levels of responsibility earlier in their careers.
Why Now?
The demand for these skills is growing rapidly. Construction represents 13 percent of the global GDP. "There are still not enough people—workers, engineers," Odeh says. "We need more and more to keep building cities, reshaping cities."
Odeh, who studies construction markets globally, points to four trends reshaping how cities get built.
The first is shifting market needs. "Markets are changing. The client needs are changing," he says. "For example, in the US, we have aging infrastructure, and we need to maintain this infrastructure." The second is sustainability and climate resilience. "We have more and more natural disasters in recent years, increasing in frequency and intensity," Odeh says. Moreover, the industry itself carries responsibility for part of the sustainability and environmental problem. "We are the number-one producer of solid waste in the US. We have to be smarter about how we manage waste and do more recycling from construction projects.” The third is regulatory complexity, and here Odeh offers a striking comparison. "When the Hoover Dam was built in the 1930s, the contract was around 174 pages," he says. "Now a typical public-private infrastructure project—a big bridge or a tunnel—could reach over 13,000 pages." That complexity, he notes, also opens a door. "Computing power is increasing in a way that we can ask: can we utilize AI to leverage the data we are collecting from these contracts?" and last but not least, the fourth is a changing workforce. "The average age of a construction worker in the mid-1980s was around 34," Odeh says. "Currently, it's above 42. You have an aging workforce, which means a challenge of how to find the right talents and skilled labor." Tying the four together, he says: "These trends—markets and needs, resiliency and climate change, politics and regulations, and society changes—are reshaping how we are building cities. We need professionals who can understand and adapt to that."
Technology runs through all of it, and Odeh is deliberate about how he frames its role. "Everyone is saying AI is going to disrupt the way we are building," he says. "I would say it will evolve the way we are building. But construction—you still need labor in the field."
Rather than teaching students how to use today’s tools, the program prepares them to lead in tomorrow’s industry. “We are integrating AI throughout our curriculum to help students understand how it is transforming the construction profession,” says Odeh. “Technology will continue to evolve, but when students understand the underlying principles and the implications for the industry, they have the foundation to adapt, innovate, and lead.”
That same philosophy extends to robotics. “Construction is entering an era where robotics will play an increasingly important role,” Odeh notes. “We introduce these emerging technologies not as isolated topics, but as part of a broader transformation of the built environment. Our responsibility is to ensure that our graduates are ready for what comes next.”
That forward orientation is what energizes him. "I work globally studying construction markets, and I've never been this excited about what's coming next, not just in the US but overseas as well," Odeh says. "There's a need for more and more construction managers and workers in the field. Cities keep changing. It's not going away."
Preparing to Build What's Next
For Odeh, the true value of the program extends beyond technical skills. "It's a mindset shift," he explains. "Learning how to think like a top-tier manager within the construction environment. It's not just about managing projects; it's about thinking outside the box to understand the problem from a holistic point of view."
By combining foundational knowledge, applied learning, and direct exposure to real-world projects, the program prepares graduates to lead in an industry where the stakes are high and the impact is lasting.
As cities continue to grow and evolve, so too does the need for professionals who can deliver the projects that shape them. For those looking to step into that role, the opportunity is both immediate and significant.
About Ibrahim S. Odeh
Dr. Ibrahim S. Odeh is the chair of Columbia Engineering's Construction and Engineering Management Program, founding director of the Global Leaders in Construction Management (GLCM) initiative, and director of the Construction concentration within the M.S. in Project Management at Columbia University's School of Professional Studies.
Over more than 15 years at Columbia, he has built a globally recognized construction education platform grounded in bridging theory and practice, founding GLCM in 2011 to connect top students with CEOs and senior executives on live strategic challenges worldwide, and becoming the first academic in the United States to launch a comprehensive construction management course series on Coursera, which has reached close to a million learners across more than 190 countries.
Beyond the classroom, he serves as an industry expert member of the World Economic Forum's Future of Construction initiative and advises organizations across North America, Europe, and the Middle East on innovation, infrastructure strategy, and digital transformation. His work has earned some of Columbia's highest teaching honors, including the Presidential Award for Outstanding Teaching and the Columbia Engineering Distinguished Faculty Teaching Award, as well as the 2023 McGraw Hill Pathfinder Award.
Learn more on his Columbia Engineering profile
About the Project Management Program
The Columbia University Master of Science in Project Management program equips individuals with the strategic, analytical, and leadership skills essential for a successful career managing complex projects across industries and borders.
Available full-time or part-time, the M.S. in Project Management is designed for professionals who want to advance into leadership roles or formalize their project management experience with a strong academic and practical foundation. Students can opt for the general Project Management program or choose from one of the four specialized concentrations: Construction, Sports Management, Sustainability Management, and Technology Management.
Taught by scholar-practitioners and enhanced by Columbia’s location in New York City, the curriculum integrates emerging digital tools and AI-driven practices to help graduates make data-informed decisions and improve operational efficiency. Graduates will be prepared to lead high-stakes projects with confidence and clarity, and return to the job market with a competitive edge. Learn more about the program here.
