Deliberate ignorance in project risk management

The management of project risk is considered a key discipline by most organisations involved in projects. Best practice project risk management processes are claimed to be self-evidently correct. However, project risk management involves a choice between which information is utilized and which is deemed to be irrelevant and hence excluded. Little research has been carried out to ascertain the manifestation of barriers to optimal project risk management such as ‘irrelevance’; the deliberate inattention of risk actors to risk. This paper presents the results of a qualitative study of IT project managers, investigating their reasons for deeming certain known risks to be irrelevant. The results both confirm and expand on Smithson’s [Smithson, M., 1989. Ignorance and Uncertainty. Springer-Verlag, New York] taxonomy of ignorance and uncertainty and in particular offer further context related insights into the phenomenon of ‘irrelevance’ in project risk management. We suggest that coping with ‘irrelevance’ requires defence mechanisms, the effective management of relevance as well as the setting of, and sticking to priorities.     

Knowledge entrainment and project management: The case of large-scale transformation projects

An increasing number of change processes and initiatives are organized and implemented as projects, often through the formation of ‘large-scale transformation projects’ (LST), involving a great number of specialists, departments, partners, development work, and knowledge bases. The theoretical foundation that supports the choice of managing change as projects and, in effect, the role of project management has received surprisingly little attention in the current literature. In this paper, we present a model where the success of change initiatives is explained by the quality of project management, which in turn is determined by the quality of knowledge integration. The outlined model highlights knowledge integration as a process determined by the scope and speed of change, which typically result in problems with synchronization of activities within an LST project. Our model draws on the idea of ‘knowledge entrainment’ to explain the fact that different parts (organizations, teams, individuals) tend to develop different time orientations and hence rely on different cycles of knowledge processes. This has important effects on the absorptive capacity of the involved parts of the project and the amount of information and knowledge that the project can digest. This paper discusses different knowledge-entrainment mechanisms and their effects on the role and practice of project management. Empirical data from an LST project in Posten, one of Northern Europe’s largest messaging and logistics operators, illustrate the model. The paper contributes to the analysis of the relationships between knowledge integration and time, particularly in LST projects.     

Managing quality in projects: An empirical study

The purpose of this paper is to establish the key role of quality in the ‘iron triangle of cost, time and quality’ and highlight the importance of implementing the people related ‘organisation quality’ amongst key stakeholders to deliver the success criteria of a project.     

Facilitating project management education through groups as systems

Project management education is currently facing several challenges to help people deal more effectively with the complexities of their future work. Students' exposure to ‘real’ project situations in which they can use, develop, and reflect on their skills as well as learn from each other has become essential and in need of further improvements. This paper presents a group-based approach to project management education which uses the notion of a ‘group’ as a system in order to develop students' individual awareness of and abilities to deal with both expected and unexpected project situations. The approach aims at nurturing and fostering students' involvement in project situations whilst challenging them to go beyond their own learning comfort zones. Reflections from our experience of using this approach in several courses in UK higher education institutions lead us to identify its benefits, different strategies that students use to respond to challenges, and new possibilities to continue improving project management education.     

Complex project management as complex problem solving: A distributed knowledge management perspective

Traditional project management (PM) privileges planning and downplays the role of learning even in more complex projects. In contrast, this paper draws inspiration from two organisations that were found to have developed complex PM expertise as a form of complex problem solving (CPS), a practice with implicit learning because complex projects are unable to be completely specified in advance ( Hayek, 1945). Central to this view of complex project management as a form of complex problem solving is the governance challenge of knowledge management under uncertainty. This paper proposes that the distributed coordination mechanism which both organisations evolved for this contingency can best be characterised as a ‘common will of mutual interest’, a self-organising process that was fostered around project goals and paced by the project life cycle ( Kogut and Zander, 1992). The implications for theory, research, and practice in complex PM knowledge management are examined.     

Analysis of architects' demotivating factors in design firms

The overall aim of this study is to identify factors that influence architects' demotivation in design firms. After a review of extant literatures in design management, project management, and organisational behaviour, a list of 43 demotivating criteria was produced and used in a questionnaire survey. Analyses included reliability analysis, Mann–Whitney U and Kruskal–Wallis tests, demotivation severity index (DSI) computation and exploratory factor analysis. Results show an underlying factor structure of seven demotivating factors that include ‘organisational injustice’, ‘project induced stress’, ‘dysfunctional design team’, ‘poor interpersonal relationships’, ‘perceived career decline’, ‘negative leadership behaviours’ and ‘poor organisational culture’. Comparing these demotivational factors with motivational factors identified from previous related research, this study confirms that demotivation and motivation are on the same pole. In addition, what causes motivation or demotivation is a function of individual frame of reference. This implies that the presence or absence of a factor might cause motivation or demotivation depending on an individual frame of reference. Positive attention to the identified factors in relation to individual personality differences therefore helps to remove impediments that could affect employees' well-being such as being downcast, dispirited, depressed and despondent. The study would help directors and managers of design firms to develop a healthy workforce through recognition and eradication of the identified demotivating factors using some of the suggested solutions.     

A study on subjective preference to daylit residential indoor environment using conjoint analysis

This paper reports a study of the subjective preference to daylit indoor environment of a residential room using conjoint analysis, which is a highly reputable method used to analyze the mutual relationships among different attributes. Seven influential attributes were selected in the view of daylight performance assessment. They include ‘general brightness’, ‘desktop brightness’, ‘perceived glare’, ‘sunlight penetration’, ‘quality of view’, ‘user friendliness of shading control’ and ‘impact on energy’. Each of them has two levels. A total of eight combinations (profiles) of attributes with various levels were established by adopting fractional factorial design. Subjects were asked to rank-order the eight profiles according to their preference in terms of daylit environment of a residential room. The study aims at finding out the relative impact of the seven selected attributes to the overall daylight performance and seeking an organized assessment method for a residential daylit environment. Conjoint analysis found that the seven attributes have importance level in the order of ‘quality of view’, ‘general brightness’, ‘impact on energy’, ‘user friendliness of shading control’, ‘perceived glare’, ‘desktop brightness’ and ‘sunlight penetration’.     

Succeeding programmes,failed projects: A lexicographical analysis of a disputed semantic terrain

This paper proposes that projects and programmes can be empirically distinguished by the way in which they are associated with expectations and evaluations of success and failure. Support for the proposition is grounded in analysis of over sixteen hundred examples of occurrences of the terms ‘project’ and ‘programme’ with ‘success’ and ‘failure’ derived from the Oxford English Corpus (OEC). The OEC is a structured and coded database of over two billion words of naturally occurring English collected from the World Wide Web. The analysis highlights that project and programme are each modified by the terms ‘success’ and ‘failure’ in significantly different ways, indicating that they are conceptually distinct phenomena. These findings imply that academics must be cautious in their use of language in investigations of project and programme evaluations, and that practitioners should consider the implications of considering programmes as ‘scaled‐up’ projects, given their propensity to different evaluation outcomes.     

Critical learning themes in project management education: Implications for blended learning

This research examines the underlying reasons why students taking project management courses emphasise skills that are transferable and the utilisation of e-learning environments as critical to their learning experiences. Students' opinions are expressed through a series of focus groups. We found that the underlying reasons for students' emphasis on these two factors as crucial to learning and teaching project management could be classed under five higher-order themes. The implications of our findings are that in order to develop desired human, conceptual and technical skills, a teaching approach based on a blend of learning that resides at the intersection of the ‘transferable skills’ and ‘e-learning environments’ construct is required for the effective teaching of project management. For effectiveness, this blended form of andragogy (learning focused on adults) must be flexible enough to cater for the vast variations in the profiles of students, and their individual learning preferences.     

Application of the analytic hierarchy process (AHP) in multi-criteria analysis of the selection of intelligent building systems

The availability of innumerable intelligent building (IB) products, and the current dearth of inclusive building component selection methods suggest that decision makers might be confronted with the quandary of forming a particular combination of components to suit the needs of a specific IB project. Despite this problem, few empirical studies have so far been undertaken to analyse the selection of the IB systems, and to identify key selection criteria for major IB systems. This study is designed to fill these research gaps. Two surveys: a general survey and the analytic hierarchy process (AHP) survey are proposed to achieve these objectives. The first general survey aims to collect general views from IB experts and practitioners to identify the perceived critical selection criteria, while the AHP survey was conducted to prioritize and assign the important weightings for the perceived criteria in the general survey. Results generally suggest that each IB system was determined by a disparate set of selection criteria with different weightings. ‘Work efficiency’ is perceived to be most important core selection criterion for various IB systems, while ‘user comfort’, ‘safety’ and ‘cost effectiveness’ are also considered to be significant. Two sub-criteria, ‘reliability’ and ‘operating and maintenance costs’, are regarded as prime factors to be considered in selecting IB systems. The current study contributes to the industry and IB research in at least two aspects. First, it widens the understanding of the selection criteria, as well as their degree of importance, of the IB systems. It also adopts a multi-criteria AHP approach which is a new method to analyse and select the building systems in IB. Further research would investigate the inter-relationship amongst the selection criteria.     

Towards an organizational culture framework in construction

Organizational culture gives identity to an organization. Notwithstanding the individuality of the staff members, their actions are collectively bound by the organizational culture. A review of the literature in this topic reveals that despite a number of organizational culture models have been developed, these are mainly for generic business settings and there has yet one developed for construction contracting organizations. This paper reports a study for this purpose conducted in Hong Kong. Firstly, artifacts of organizational culture were long-listed through a literature review. Construction professionals working for developers, consultant offices and contractors assessed the appropriateness of using these artifacts to identify organizational culture in construction. Through a principal component factor analysis, these artifacts are arranged into a seven-factor organizational culture framework. The seven factors are ‘Goal settings and accomplishment’, ‘Team orientation’, ‘Coordination and integration’, ‘Performance emphasis’, ‘Innovation orientation’, ‘Members’ participation’ and ‘Reward orientation’. The ANOVA result suggests no significant difference in the rankings across respondents working for developers, consultants and contractors. The relative importance rankings among these factors were also assessed according to their significance scores. The findings of the study suggest that the construction contracting organizations in Hong Kong favor culture of clear goals with stability. They are less externally focused with a relatively lower emphasis on innovation. These findings suggest construction maintains a local industry mentality.     

Project-ending competence in premature project closures

Project management literature tends to focus on the early phases of a project and on the associated generic project management competences, such as planning, scheduling, budgeting, resourcing and motivating. Only a small fraction of the discussion is devoted to project closure and to the competences needed when a project fails to reach the goals and so needs to be closed prematurely. The purpose of this paper is to develop an understanding of project-ending competences needed in premature project closures. Two cases of premature project closure are analysed in different contexts: in the car industry and the aircraft manufacturing industry. The key findings concern the managerial challenges that are present in premature project closures: the need for involvement of senior and also project managers, the need to understand the often changed role of internal and external project stakeholders, and the need to understand that the ‘future matters’ in premature project closure.     

Local experiences of urban sustainability: Researching Housing Market Renewal interventions in three English neighbourhoods

Ideas and thinking about sustainability and sustainable development have permeated over the last decades into most disciplines and sectors. The area of urban studies is no exception and has generated an impressive body of literature, which aims to marry ‘sustainability’ and ‘urban development’ by grounding the many interpretations of sustainability in an urban setting. This has taken many forms and inspired a range of initiatives across the world including ‘healthy cities’, ‘urban villages’, ‘millennium communities’ and the ‘mixed communities’ movement. Moreover, urban regeneration has come under considerable scrutiny as one of the core mechanisms for delivering sustainable urban development. At the most basic level, it can be argued that all urban regeneration contributes to a certain extent to sustainable development through the recycling of derelict land and buildings, reducing demand for peripheral development and facilitating the development of more compact cities. Yet, whether urban regeneration bears an effect on urban sustainability is an underresearched area. In addition, little is known about these impacts at local level. This paper aims to extend our understanding in these areas of research. We do so, by taking a closer look at three neighbourhoods in Salford, Newcastle and Merseyside. These neighbourhoods underwent urban regeneration under the Housing Marker Renewal Programme (2003–2011), which aimed to ‘create sustainable urban areas and communities’ in the Midlands and North of England. Approximately 130 residents from the three areas were interviewed and a further 60 regeneration officials and local stakeholders consulted. The paper looks at the impact of urban regeneration on urban sustainability by examining whether interventions under the Housing Market Renewal Programme have helped urban areas and communities to become more sustainable. It also discusses impacts at local level, by probing into some of Housing Market Renewal's grounded ‘sustainability stories’ and looking at how change is perceived by local residents. Furthermore, it re-opens a window into the Housing Market Renewal Programme and documents the three neighbourhoods within the wider context of scale and intervention across the whole programme.     

On-line parameter estimation and optimal control strategy of a double-skin system

To reduce the potential problems of window systems such as undesired heat gain (loss), glare, and thermal discomfort due to asymmetric radiation, double-skin systems have been introduced. The current problem with double-skin systems is that their operation requires an adequate simulation model to realize optimal control of the system. The estimation of the parameters in the lumped model developed in a previous study [1] was based on ‘laborious’ off-line calibration procedure. This effort has to be repeated for every different size, different type, or differently oriented façade system. Different façade components are characterized by different thermal and optical properties of glazing and blind slats, system configurations [height, width, depth], other simulation variables, etc. For each type the parameter set in the lumped model has to be established through a calibration procedure. In view of micro climate variations even same type systems within one façade but on different heights may have to be calibrated separately. In order to avoid the laborious off-line calibration of every single façade component, an on-line self-calibrating procedure is developed in this paper. The true advantage of the technique is that every component can be pre-wired and ready to be hooked to the calibration set-up when it is brought to the site. The paper will explain the simulation model, selection of calibration parameters, and the process of on-line self-calibration, model validation and application of optimal control. It is shown that the on-line self-calibrating simulation model far outperforms the off-line calibrated model. Consequently, the plug and play self-calibration technique will render the current in-situ ‘laborious’ off-line calibration process obsolete.     

Evaluating schedule delay causes for private participating public construction works under the Build-Operate-Transfer model

Project delivery method of Build-Operate-Transfer (BOT) increases the commencement probability of public construction works through private investments. Public construction works worldwide that adopt the BOT model as their project delivery method are increasing gradually. Although many BOT projects have been implemented at various stages, some projects encounter major obstacles for advancement. This study attempts to identify the delay causes in various stages of BOT projects. Opinions of BOT participants’ replies are solicited using two questionnaire surveys. Those outcomes are analyzed using by traditional statistical methods and structural equation modeling method. Study results reveal that the stage of ‘negotiation and signing of concession agreement’ is the most essential stage, in which ‘improper contract planning,’ ‘debt problem’ and ‘uncertainty on political issues and government-finished items’ are the most significant delay causes. Identified causes of delay can be used to prevent the postponement of future BOT projects.     

Restructuring and repositioning Shenzhen,China's new mega city

Shenzhen, a new mega city founded under China's ‘open door’ policy, has experienced dramatic urban development over the past 30 years. From humble beginnings as a fishing village before the 1980s, it benefited from locational advantage next to Hong Kong, an autonomous city with a global role in finance and trade. Shenzhen was first among cities in China to adapt the capitalist world's urban development practices to an indigenous, centrally controlled land management system. As a new city, Shenzhen may best represent the role of planning in a time of economic transition. Urban planning in Shenzhen was ambitious in its reach, using ‘experimental reform’ as a vehicle for institutionalising changes in management of the land resource. These reforms became generalised in China, leading to a recent decline in academic investigation of Shenzhen. While the city as ‘reformer’ seems to have run its course, new challenges upset the old assumptions and call for more research. Today, as industry moves inland away from increasingly costly coastal areas, the city is grappling with the need to restructure its economic base. The city has undertaken major infrastructural projects in a bid to secure its role as a major transhipment hub and logistics command centre, while also developing a rail-based mass transit system. The regeneration of disused industrial land and ‘urban villages’, built up to accommodate at low cost a huge factory workforce, are important ongoing city programmes. While the city extends its infrastructure to connect more effectively with the rest of the Pearl River Delta (PRD) and with Hong Kong, more fundamental questions surround its role within a restructuring regional economy. Ambitions for international stature, bolstered by a large and young population base, a world-class port and modern facilities are challenged by a rapidly evolving regional economy.     

The effects of schedule-driven project management in multi-project environments

Prior work has affirmed the importance of studying project management in multi-project environments. A challenge in these settings pertains to the need to share skilled resources across concurrent projects when project management is schedule-driven and resource capacity is fully committed. To probe into this problem, we use a system dynamics simulation grounded on in-depth fieldwork with a high-performance truck developer. We simulate the effects of capturing resources allocated originally to one project so as to speed up another product development project that started late. Our central contribution is to illuminate how a schedule-driven project management policy can lead to a vicious cycle that degrades the organization's capability to meet the planned project milestones in the long-term. Whilst capturing resources can ensure that a tardy but ‘business-critical’ project is delivered on time, if the organization has no free resource capacity and is also not recruiting more staff, this practice harms the schedule performance of the projects deprived from resources. Further, the workforce's productivity gradually deteriorates as the frequency with which staff switches back and forth between projects increases. These effects compounded cause delays in all the subsequent projects, irremediably degrading the organization's capability to deliver projects on time reliably.     

An experimental study on the appraisal of the visual environment at offices in relation to colour temperature and illuminance

Colour temperature and illumination level have affected the subjective impressions at an office setting. 2000 lx was preferred to 500 lx for impressions of comfort, spaciousness, brightness and saturation evaluation. A 4000 K colour temperature was preferred to 2700 K for impressions of ‘comfort and spaciousness’, while 2700 K was suggested for ‘relaxation’ and ‘saturation evaluation’. Test results indicate that, task–background contrast is more important and shall be studied for ‘perceived brightness’ evaluation. Participants liked the ‘mixed colour temperature mood’, the remote control and the flexibility in the lighting system and the majority offered to use it at offices.     

Source apportionment of heavy metals and ionic contaminants in rainwater tanks in a subtropical urban area in Australia

Due to prolonged droughts in recent years, the use of rainwater tanks in urban areas has increased in Australia. In order to apportion sources of contribution to heavy metal and ionic contaminants in rainwater tanks in Brisbane, a subtropical urban area in Australia, monthly tank water samples (24 sites, 31 tanks) and concurrent bulk deposition samples (18 sites) were collected during mainly April 2007-March 2008. The samples were analysed for acid-soluble metals, soluble anions, total inorganic carbon and total organic carbon, and characteristics such as total solid and pH. The Positive Matrix Factorisation model, EPA PMF 3.0, was used to apportion sources of contribution to the contaminants. Four source factors were identified for the bulk deposition samples, including ‘crustal matter/sea salt’, ‘car exhausts/road side dust’, ‘industrial dust’ and ‘aged sea salt/secondary aerosols’. For the tank water samples, apart from these atmospheric deposition related factors which contributed in total to 65% of the total contaminant concentration on average, another six rainwater collection system related factors were identified, including ‘plumbing’, ‘building material’, ‘galvanizing’, ‘roofing’, ‘steel’ and ‘lead flashing/paint’ (contributing in total to 35% of the total concentration on average). The Australian Drinking Water Guideline for lead was exceeded in 15% of the tank water samples. The collection system related factors, in particular the ‘lead flashing/paint’ factor, contributed to 79% of the lead in the tank water samples on average. The concentration of lead in tank water was found to vary with various environmental and collection system factors, in particular the presence of lead flashing on the roof. The results also indicated the important role of sludge dynamics inside the tank on the quality of tank water.     

Relationships between air-tightness and its influencing factors of post-2006 new-build dwellings in the UK

Addressing air leakage of dwellings is important to improving energy efficiency and thermal comfort. This paper reports on the air permeability test results of 287 post-2006 new-build dwellings in the UK. The paper explores the relationships between air-tightness and its influencing factors including build method, dwelling type, management context, design target, season, number of significant penetrations, and envelope and floor area. One-way ANOVA analysis was utilised to compare means of air permeability in relation to the individual factors, and two- and three-way ANOVA analyses were applied for examining the interactions between them. The air-tightness of the dwellings averaged 5.97 m³/(h m²) at 50 Pa, which has improved from UK historic data. Dwellings built using precast concrete panels were significantly air-tighter than those built using timber frame, whilst those masonry and reinforced concrete frame dwellings were most leaky. Greater extent of innovative practice and ‘self-build’ procurement led to achieving superior air-tightness. Interaction was observed between ‘build method’ and ‘dwelling type’ and between ‘dwelling type’ and ‘management context’. A modest positive correlation was noticed between air permeability and design target, which became weak in relation to the number of significant penetrations and envelope area. Applying the linear regression technique a predictive model is developed for estimating air permeability of dwellings. This model integrates the influencing factors and their significant interactions. The findings should contribute to future research in predicting impacts of controlling the influencing factors on achieving air-tightness of dwellings more consistently.