MANAGEMENT DISSERTATION PROPOSAL PROFORMA

Student Name: John Constance Student Number: 15880091 Your Classrooms: RM module: Management Dissertation Research Methods DA Classroom: Dr. Samuel Ankrah samuel.ankrah@my.ohecampus.com Student Support Manager (SSM) & Email Address: Name: Rosalind Smith eCampus Email: rosalind.smith@ohecampus.com Time Zone: +4:30 Hrs Kabul, Afghanistan Time How Do We Contact You by Email?
Your eCampus email address: john.constance@my.ohecampus.com

DISSERTATION ADVISOR (and eCampus email): GDI (and eCampus email): Lucia Morales (lucia.morales@my.ohecampus.com) Faculty Manager (and eCampus email): Dr. Athanasios Nikas nasos.nikas@my.ohecampus.com PROPOSED DISSERTATION TITLE: Critical Success Factors for Construction Management: Construction Practitioners Perception
ETHICAL CHECKLIST COMPLETED (Yes)

Degree Programme: Masters in Project Management Other (please specify) Construction and Infrastructure

DATE: 7 November 2012

1.0

Aim, objectives and feasibility

The process of construction management involves the successful inception, feasibility, execution and logical approaches to control scope, time, and cost in construction projects (Halpin, 2006). The construction management process is multifaceted, requiring real-time responsiveness to a wide-range of different people, budgetary, and technical variables. The construction manager is responsible to deliver successful project outcomes, which are the fundamentals for project success. To succeed through continuing challenges, and a difficult job responsibility characterized by overload and disorganized roles, tasks, activities and efforts, construction project managers must be aware of the factors considered critical to succeed in construction management. In addition, often construction projects are unsettled, unstable, and implemented in dynamic environment. This means the construction practitioner must have vital information about the factors critical for success and the necessary tools that can retain focus on critical areas and across the different project element priorities, in order to manage construction projects successfully. The analysis of critical success factors or CSFs is considered the most successful way to identify key factors for succeeding in management (Boynton and Zmud 1984). If critical success factors for construction management can be determined and controlled this can provide assurance that the factors most critical to project lifecycles will be effectively managed to ensure success, and construction managers can also be able to study how the critical success factors can improve construction management. The aim of this research is therefore to determine the critical success factors for construction management from the perceptions of construction practitioners. The research question is as follows: What are the critical success factors for construction management from the perceptions of construction practitioners? This research question is addressed through the following research objectives: Find answer to the question on what are the critical success factors for construction management? Identify the CSFs throughout the project life cycle, Identify the CSFs most critical to all five phases of the project life cycle Explore how CSFs improves construction management,

The research findings would determine what is the general consensus on the ranking of CSFs based on the perception of the construction practitioners. This will provide added information on the relative importance of CSFs, and also help determine the working primacies of construction practitioners for managing construction projects, based on the nature of project, the project owners sector, and the life cycle of the project. The research findings will help construction practitioners become more mindful of their responsibilities and the fundamental importance of the issues of managing construction projects to success, becoming helpful for effective management of all construction projects types, successfully raising productivity levels in the construction industry. In addition, the findings could help determine correlations between construction management CSFs and project types and organizations. Although the feasibility of this research seems a challenge due to limited research on this issue in Liberia, there are many research studies done on the issue of construction project CSFs in several developing countries (for example, Arslan and Kivrak, 2009; Ika, Diallo & Thuillier, 2011; Mahmood, 2012). Also, the necessary resources including participants and data are readily available for collection and analysis. For instance, the researchers

organization has already consented to this research. Also, construction companies in Liberia are urged to improve construction management in Liberia, and the targeted research population is excited about this study and are willing to participate. 2.0 Literature review

Construction management has over the years encountered many philosophies. However all the various philosophies only modified and extended the traditional theories and concepts, of applying logical approaches to control scope, time, and cost. Today these concepts have extended to the control of quality, resources, risk, uncertainty, and performance (Bennett, 1996). Construction projects differ in type, size, and complexity, and expectations of owners and other stakeholders, so there is necessity for even more urbane practices to the way that construction management is organized, planned, executed, and controlled (Halpin and Woodhead, 1980). This indicates that meeting the required CSFs for construction management is crucial for successful construction operations. For this research to have a clear direction on the CSFs for construction management, it is important the differences between success criteria and success factors are understood. This will help to establish relations among the different discernments of construction practitioners regarding CSFs for construction management. Rockart (1979) defined CSFs as the limited number of areas in which satisfactory results ensure successful business competitive performance, underlining the need to ensure these precise areas of activity is continuously and critically managed. Rockart (1982) additionally stressed that CSFs are identified based on the specific conditions of an industry, and differs from country to country, dependent on the business environment, and policies and legal limitation. The author considers CSFs as frequently changing factors based on the industry's environment changes, and how companies' position changes within that industry's environment change. This means it is important to understand that critical success factors are not key indicators that can be lucid to all industries. Also, it is important to understand the differences between the levels by which a project success or failure will be adjudged i.e. the success criteria, and the management system inputs that lead to the success of a project straightforwardly or implicitly, i.e. the success factors (De Wit, 1988; Cooke-Davies, 2002). Success factor can be classified as hard, goal-oriented, physical and measureable, and also soft, subjective, indefinable, and less measurable (Andersen and Jessen, 2000; Anderson et al., 2006; Chan, Scott & Chan, 2004). Success criteria are the yardstick set on time, cost and quality, health, safety, environmental sustainability, and technical performance measurement, and success factors are successful communication, organizational and people relationship, or conflict elimination. Nonetheless, this study accepts the terminologies are about basically the same for definitional purpose. McCabe (2001) stresses CSFs are the fundamental for managers in order to advance their company because through CSF companies can determine progress being made in specific areas. In the construction industry, the focus of this research, for the construction company to remain competitive, means successful management of time, cost, and quality within health and environment restraints, successful management of communication, project participants relationship, and conflict, making both success criteria and success factors key to construction management success. The key factors fundamental to the success of a construction project, considered as factors that determines the success of construction project are called the critical success factors or CSFs (Sanvido et al.1992). Toor and Ogunlana (2008) studied success factors in largescale construction projects in Thailand, considering this increasingly important and to be the

fundamental relations among the factors that provide project success, and deliver important insights for success on future projects, and that project managers can also use these factors to appraise project and compare real success factors for knowledge management practice. Arslan and Kivrak (2009) studied the critical factors important to the success of construction companies in Turkey, arguing that the fundamental goal of every business is to achieve success so as to be able to remain competitive, by identifying the CSFs, or elements considered essential for construction companies to manage themselves and clients and projects. Ika, Diallo & Thuillier (2011) examined the CSFs for World Bank projects, looking specifically at the interrelations between CSFs and the success of projects based on the view of project supervisors of the World Bank, and argues a specific set of five CSFs and their statistical important and constructive link with project success, showing the essential and constructive relationship between CSFs and project success. Ogwueleka (2011) researched critical success factors influencing the performance of projects in the Nigerian construction industry and discovered management of objectives, design, and risk respectively, support from top management, and other technical factors, can assist practitioners of the industry gain better understanding on key areas to improve performance in project delivery. Mahmood (2012) studied the CSFs of construction companies in Islamabad, arguing that construction companies must re-visit their current policies and positions to improve cost-effectiveness, efficiency, compatibility, quality, and progress and success, as well as the sustainability of nationwide economic development and system of the construction industry. Other cited literature on CSFs also include research by authors like Ashley et al. (1987) on the determinants of construction project success, Pinto and Selvin (1988) on the study of CSFs across the project life cycle, Sanvido et al. (1992) on the CSFs for construction projects, and Fortune and White (2006) studied ways to frame project critical success factors by systems model. The global construction industry has over the many years been criticized for not managing construction projects on time, within budget, to extreme quality standard, and critical success factors. Although there is limited recorded data on the issue of CSF for construction management in the construction industry in Liberia, the lack of this information is solely because the issue is limited or not knowledgeable to construction practitioners, and the fact that construction management or project management is not an academic offering in Liberia. This research will also determine if those are some of the reasons why construction practitioners are not very much succeeding in construction management. Liberia is a country pulling itself out of 14 years of civil war (CIA, 2009), and Liberias construction industry is still yet to do research study to improve its performance. And if the construction industry in any country has an impact on the economic sector, gross domestic product, earnings and jobs, and construction activities have both regressive and onward connection effects with several other sectors (World Bank, 1984), it becomes imperative to begin research studies into ways of improving construction management in Liberia. This proposed research study will seek answers from construction project managers and construction managers presently operating in Liberia. Consequently, this research will be limited and focused only in Liberia. However, Liberia construction industry is quite similar to construction industry in other developing countries and determining CSFs for construction project management performance success will overall reduce construction project failures and increase project owners satisfaction. Phua (2012) stressed that individual-level ideas are infrequently taken into consideration in construction management research, and focusing these concepts at the individual level of analysis has noteworthy implications for project performance and CSFs. This means it is important having construction management research integrating individual-level constructs on issues that will support and improve the justice of the field. This is why the research

population is the construction companies in Liberia, who are the sole, make or break for improving construction management in Liberia. Getting the perception of construction practitioners in Liberia on CSFs as it relates to construction project life cycles is the start to improving construction management. 3.0 3.1 Research methodology and methods Research Strategy & Design

The research strategy is to start with a literature review, then identify factors, and prepare a preliminary survey to conduct a pilot study, modify the questionnaire, and mail it out to participants, then do a data analysis, and conduct interviews and finally draw a conclusion to the research. The research will apply both quantitative and qualitative methods. The quantitative method will use the questionnaire survey, to answer the what question, describing and explaining the cause, and effects and the connections (White, 2000, p.46), of CSFs to construction management project lifecycles and phases. The qualitative method will then be used in the approach of structured interviews to follow up on issues arising from the questionnaire survey. This will provide answers to how and why question, using in-depth analysis (White, 2000, p.39-42), on the issues of CSFs, project life cycles, project phases, and how CSFs can improve construction management. This is considered the best way to gather views based on fairness, with balance, reliability, and validity (Creswell, 1994). 3.2 Sample Criteria and Selection

The research is targeting only the construction practitioners from construction companies operating in Liberia. In Liberia construction industry, the project manager manages all the construction companys project types (roads, buildings, boreholes, etc) and the construction manager manages a particular project type (buildings). The sample size will be 50 project managers and 50 construction managers. The questionnaire survey will use the stratified random sampling method to show participation from construction companies from all levels of categorization or all levels of license to construct companies. The interview will use the purposive sampling, so as to quickly access the target sample group, and get involved participants that are well educated and experience in construction project management. This will validate the support required for comparison across situations and enrich outside validity (Voss, Tsikriktsis and Frohlich, 2002), something considered imperative for management thesis. 3.3 Data Collection

Data collected will be from primary source (questionnaire survey and interviews), and secondary sources (approved listed articles and journals). Data collection from the questionnaire survey will be through the quantitative method. There will be a literature review to identify CSF influencing construction management. Then data will be collected through a preliminary questionnaire to collect information on participants knowledge on construction management, project life cycles and phases, and the type of projects and project owners encountered or managed. Feedback from the preliminary questionnaire will be modified and the questionnaire survey will be developed to get answers on what are the CSFs for construction management, which CSFs are critical to and impact the project life cycles and phases, and how these CSFs help improve construction management. The questionnaire survey will be mailed to participants and the response data will be analysed to determine gaps on issues coming out of the questionnaire that can be addressed more

effectively through a discussion or interview. The qualitative method will be used to collect data from interviews, to obtain a degree of flexibility to obtain the answers to the research question, using pre-determined questions that are linked to the questionnaire survey, based on the fact that the researcher has assumed there is limited knowledge on CSF. The data will be coded into smaller analyzable components of categories and perceptions to facilitate conclusions from the interpretations. 3.4 Data Analysis

The research data will be analysed using both qualitative and quantitative methods. The data analysis will show the average of the entire variable data collected and also smoothen any short-term fluctuation (Raedt and Siebes, 2001). Quantitative analysis will be used to analyse data from the questionnaire survey to indicate, issues like the severity of CSFs, frequency of set of CSFs and the importance and ranking based on the severity and frequency (Hoai, Lee & Lee, 2008). To analyse alliances and disagreements among the respondents, Spearmans coefficient of rank order correlation will be used. The quantitative analysis will also show descriptive tables of interpretation of interviews and the percentage distribution of project managers as compared to construction managers, and of the single variable or ranking of CSFs. The data from the interviews will be analysed qualitatively by reducing, displaying and verifying the data before finally drawing conclusions (Miles and Huberman, 1994). This is expected to provide in-depth understanding of CSFs, how these factors can improve construction management, how the CSFs impact construction practitioners, and what is the experience of the respondents involved in the research.

Timing mileposts
Milestone 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 Description Stage 1: Area of interest identified Stage 2: Specific topic selected Stage 3: Topic refined to develop dissertation proposal Stage 4: Proposal written and submitted Stage 5: Collection of data and information Stage 6: Analysis and interpretation of collected data/information Stage 7: Writing up Stage 8: Final draft prepared submission of dissertation Final Deadline9 months from module start date. Due date 7 Nov. 2012 16 Nov. 2012 21 Nov 2012 26 Dec 2012 23 Jan. 2013 20 Feb 2013 20 Mar. 2013 22 May 2013 28 July 2013 Remarks Complete Complete Complete

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