Project management between will and representation

This article challenges some deep-rooted assumptions of project management. Inspired by the work of the German philosopher, Arthur Schopenhauer, it calls for looking at projects through two complementary lenses: one that accounts for cognitive and representational aspects and one that accounts for material and volitional aspects. Understanding the many ways in which these aspects transpire and interact in projects sheds new light on project organizations, as imperfect and fragile representations that chase a shifting nexus of intractable human, social, technical, and material processes. This, in turn, can bring about a new grasp of notions such as value,\ud knowledge, complexity, and risk

Extending the View on Project Performance

The main aim of this study is to gain insights into project management professionals’ perception of how project success can be achieved. The Q-methodology was followed in this research. Based on an extensive literature review and validation through expert judgment, a framework consisting of 33 factors increasing the likelihood of success was developed. A total of 34 practitioners in three different sectors (real estate, urban development, and infrastructure) in the Netherlands were asked to rank the statements contributing to the success of their projects. Four different perspectives of how project success can be achieved were distinguished in this study: “seeking the best match”, “being adaptive and open”, “keeping the team focused”, and “preparing for opportunities”. The perception of different practitioners of how success can be obtained may stem from factors of project context rather than sector and complexity. This highlights further research opportunities in taking a contingent approach when investigating project performance. The study helps to grasp the subjectivity of practitioners’ viewpoints regarding the potential ways to enhance project performance by understanding the similarity and differences of these viewpoints.Integral Design and Managemen

Investigating practitioners’ perspectives on project success factors How performing a Q-study could help professionals: Qualitative Study on Dutch Infrastructure Construction Projects

Integral Design and Managemen

Factors Affecting the Integration of Sustainability in the Early Project Phases in an Integrated Project Management Model

This study investigates the factors affecting the integration of sustainability into the project management of infrastructure projects, specifically highway projects during early phases. The research was drawn upon previous studies in order to develop a sustainability framework for measuring the project success in three aspects of sustainability: People, Planet, and Prosperity (triple bottom line). Next, Critical Success Factor (CSF) framework in the construction sector was extracted through a comprehensive literature review. A qualitative cross-case analysis was conducted on three sustainability-oriented highways projects in the Netherlands. Data were collected through document review and twelve in-depth interviews with different roles of Integrated Project Management (IPM) model. The findings suggest that each IPM role is inclined towards specific sustainability dimension which affects the application of sustainability CSFs. The results reveal that among the sixteen identified CSFs promoting the integration of sustainability, following factors were acknowledged by all the IPM roles: awareness of project external factors, clearly defined scope, clearly defined goals/ambitions. Further, the paper conceptualizes a model for integrating key roles involved in the project management of infrastructure projects. The model is based on the triple bottom line of sustainability bringing all the roles involved in the project management of infrastructure projects together.Green Open Access added to TU Delft Institutional Repository ‘You share, we take care!’ – Taverne project https://www.openaccess.nl/en/you-share-we-take-care Otherwise as indicated in the copyright section: the publisher is the copyright holder of this work and the author uses the Dutch legislation to make this work public.Integral Design and ManagementPublic Commissionin

Asset management of flood defences as a co-production: An analysis of cooperation in five situations in the Netherlands

Flood defences are in practice often multi-used, multi-managed and multi-financed. Flood defence asset management contains technical, organizational and spatial complex issues involving multiple organizations. In the literature, little attention has been given to the conditions for successful cooperation between organizations in flood defence asset management. This paper elaborates on this aspect of mature asset management from a practical point of view. Although the importance of a fit-for-purpose cooperation seems trivial, practice shows that the shape of cooperation is often the coincidental result of implicit or ad-hoc choices and is not deliberately designed. This paper reports on empirical data gathered in a case consisting of five different situations related to collaboration in flood defence management. The management context consists of three main tasks: performance assessment, reinforcement and daily management, and three decision levels: strategic, tactical and operational, resulting in nine different management environments and related interfaces. For effectively achieving desired outcomes, the shape of cooperation has to be explicitly chosen dependent on the complexity of content and organizational context, and relevant external circumstances: situational cooperation.</p

Incorporating Project Complexities in Risk Assessment: Case of an Airport Expansion Construction Project

In today’s construction projects, which are getting more complex as a consequence of especially technical, organizational, and external aspects, complexities are considered a major source of risks. Moreover, risks may turn to complexity-creating elements and propagate additional risks through a bidirectional interaction. Complex construction projects, typically large-scale dynamic endeavors, require the realization of a high number of interdependent tasks through the consumption of various resources such as time, money, labor, and materials. In such projects, while complexities are usually assumed to be given or embedded, due to the subjective and dynamic characteristics of complexities, a tailored approach is required in order to manage them holistically without ignoring their interactions with risks. In this context, the aim of this study is to propose a practical approach that could be utilized to incorporate project complexities in the risk assessment of complex construction projects. The proposed approach entails the integrated usage of risk registers, risk breakdown structures, and complexity-incorporated risk-influence diagrams along with the utilization of a previously developed complexity assessment framework. The underlying basic assumption was that the complexities could directly or indirectly trigger risks, while the risks in turn affect the project objectives. The implementation of the approach in the case of an airport expansion construction project showed that linking the risks to project objectives starting from complexities based on this assumption is possible. In this way, it was shown that multidimensional cause-effect relationships between the complexities and risks, among the risks themselves, and the impact of this interaction on project objectives could be detected and diagrammatically evaluated. Furthermore, it was observed that incorporating complexities in the earlier stages of a project would lead to improvement in the assessment of risks. Considering the results of the case study, the proposed approach has the potential to contribute to improved risk management.Green Open Access added to TU Delft Institutional Repository 'You share, we take care!' - Taverne project https://www.openaccess.nl/en/you-share-we-take-care Otherwise as indicated in the copyright section: the publisher is the copyright holder of this work and the author uses the Dutch legislation to make this work public.Integral Design & ManagementOrganisation & Governanc