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Let's consider two phrases below:

  • What makes an effective manager
  • What is project management

They both have the same grammar structure: what + verb + noun.

The first phrase can either be a question

  • What makes an effective manager?

or a noun phrase

  • What makes an effective manager is planning skills.

The second phrase can be a question too

  • What is project management?

But how do I make it be a noun phrase, similar to the first phrase's noun phrase?

Applying the same pattern gives

  • What is project management is the application of methods, skills and knowledge to achieve project's objectives.

but I suppose that this sentence is grammatically incorrect.

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  • 1
    'What is project management [and what isn't] is open to debate' / ' "What is project management?" is a question we need to address.'
    – Edwin Ashworth
    Commented Dec 21, 2020 at 19:17
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    No: it's not correct. You need the awful "What project management is is the application ..."
    – BillJ
    Commented Dec 21, 2020 at 19:28
  • @BillJ Why did you change the words order from 'What is project management' to 'What project management is' ? (You don't change it in the first phrase.).
    – Daniel
    Commented Dec 22, 2020 at 12:14
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    What project management is, is the application of methods, skills and knowledge to achieve project's objectives.
    – Lambie
    Commented Jul 23, 2022 at 0:07
  • You are what you eat.
    – TimR
    Commented Oct 19 at 9:11

3 Answers 3

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You could say this. However, it needs to be either the project's objectives or project objectives.

What is project management but the application of methods, skills and knowledge to achieve project objectives.

It might sound better if it also began with For:

For what is project management but the application of methods, skills and knowledge to achieve project objectives.

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-1

You could force it and say

That which a project management is, consists of the application of methods, skills and knowledge to achieve project's objectives.

But this is a rather intricate way of putting things. I would simply say

Project management consists of the application of methods, skills and knowledge to achieve project's objectives.

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1
  • Thank you, but this is a grammar question, not a phrase-request question.
    – Daniel
    Commented Dec 22, 2020 at 12:15
-1

You can put the second example in two ways. You can either make it a noun phrase or a noun clause. For example,

What project management is the application of methods, skills, and knowledge to achieve a project's objectives.

Here the bolded part is a phrase that is the subject of the sentence. (It can be substituted with a pronoun as in the case of every noun phrase as in "It is the application of methods, skills...)

Alternatively, you can keep it as a noun clause by introducing a finite verb in the noun phrase after 'what.' The 'is' in your example is the finite verb to make it a clause. So the full sentence will be:

What is project management [noun clause or Free relative clause by new term] is [link verb] the application of methods, skills, and knowledge to achieve a project's objectives [subject complement]. Here also the noun clause can be replaced by a pronoun.

An example of a noun clause similar to yours with linking verb "is':

"What she said[noun clause] is [link verb] disgusting [subj complement]." If you want to keep it as a phrase, change it to "Her comment[noun phrase] is disgusting." Both can be substituted with "It is disgusting."

Hope that helps!

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    -1 "What is project management" is not 'noun clause'. The sentence "What is project management is the application of methods" is ungrammatical. Your other examples are wrong, too.
    – BillJ
    Commented Jan 28 at 8:39
  • Here are some examples of wh-clause from other writers: "I knew that Jorge was happy, and I thought I knew what was on his mind." (Colm Toibin, The Story of the Night. Scribner, 1996) thoughtco.com/wh-clause-grammar-1692498
    – BumbleBee
    Commented Jan 28 at 9:06
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    In "I knew that Jorge was happy, and I thought I knew [what was on his mind]", the wh- clause is a subordinate interrogative clause (embedded question) functioning as complement of "knew".
    – BillJ
    Commented Jan 28 at 9:15
  • No: Scholarly grammar does not talk of noun clauses. The classification of finite subordinate clauses is based on their internal form rather than spurious analogies with the parts of speech. And in your example, "what she had read" is not a clause at all, but a noun phrase meaning "the thing that she had read".
    – BillJ
    Commented Jan 28 at 9:32

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