Evaluating the level of stakeholder involvement during · PDF fileEvaluating the level of stakeholder involvement during the project planning processes of building projects Amirhossein

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International Journal of Project Management xx (2015) xxx–xxx

JPMA-01720; No of Pages 13

Evaluating the level of stakeholder involvement during theproject planning processes of building projects

Amirhossein Heravi a,⁎, Vaughan Coffey a, Bambang Trigunarsyah b

a Science and Engineering Faculty, Queensland University of Technology, GPO Box 2434, Brisbane, QLD 4001, Australiab College of Environmental Design, King Fahd University of Petroleum and Minerals (KFUPM) Dhahran, Saudi Arabia

Received 27 August 2014; received in revised form 11 December 2014; accepted 16 December 2014

Abstract

The purpose of this study is to examine the current level of stakeholder involvement during the project's planning process. Stakeholders oftenprovide the needed resources and have the ability to control the interaction and resource flows in the network. They also ultimately have strongimpact on an organisation's survival, and therefore appropriate management and involvement of key stakeholders should be an important part ofany project management plan.

A series of literature reviews was conducted to identify and categorise significant phases involved in the planning. For data collection, aquestionnaire survey was designed and distributed amongst nearly 200 companies who were involved in the residential building sector in Australia.Results of the analysis demonstrate the engagement levels of the four stakeholder groups involved in the planning process and establish a basis forfurther stakeholder involvement improvement.© 2014 Elsevier Ltd. APM and IPMA. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Stakeholder involvement; Planning process; Building projects

1 . Introduction

Many stakeholders, individuals and groups are involved inthe provision and delivery of construction projects and each hastheir own role, requirements and objectives. So, becausestakeholders of construction projects are numerous anddifferent, this introduces a level of complexity to the conceptof stakeholder involvement (SI) within the industry (Bal et al.,2013). However, depending on the type of the project beingundertaken and its specific requirements, only certain groupsmay need to get fully involved in all phases of a project.

To meet the differing demands of different stakeholdergroups, and in order to increase the effectiveness and efficiency

⁎ Corresponding author. Tel.: +61 411255411.E-mail addresses: [email protected],

[email protected] (A. Heravi), [email protected] (V. Coffey),[email protected] (B. Trigunarsyah).

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijproman.2014.12.0070263-7863/00 /© 2014 Elsevier Ltd. APM and IPMA. All rights reserved.

Please cite this article as: A. Heravi, et al., 2015. Evaluating the level of stakehoManag. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijproman.2014.12.007

lder in

of the decisions that are made during the construction projectlifecycle, project managers need to develop comprehensivestakeholder involvement plans (Saghatforoush et al., 2010).Previous research studies in the construction sector (Bal et al.,2013; Bosher et al., 2007; Olander and Landin, 2005a)highlight that stakeholder involvement is important in improv-ing the effectiveness of project outcomes (Yang, 2010). Thequality of a construction project is also largely dependent on theappropriate performance management of diverse stakeholders,especially contractors and consultants (Low Sui and Ke-Wei,1996). This means that, if major parties of a contract are notcommitted to properly carrying out their responsibilities, it islikely to adversely affect the final project quality level.

Furthermore, the level of ability to impact the final projectcharacteristics is at its highest at the beginning of the projectand reduces as the project progresses. It is widely advocated inthe project management and infrastructure project literature(IFC, 2007) that the project preparation and planning phase is

volvement during the project planning processes of building projects, Int. J. Proj.

mailto:[email protected]




http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijproman.2014.12.007





Source:(Walker 2003)

End Users

Client Organisa�on

External Team Members-Suppliers

Project Sponsor

Invisible Team MembersPeople whose co-opera�on and support are vital for project

Community and External IndependentConcerned Group

Project Leader (PM) Core Team Members

Fig. 1. Stakeholder mapping.

2 A. Heravi et al. / International Journal of Project Management xx (2015) xxx–xxx

the stage where stakeholders with various demands and objectiveshave the highest possibility to affect the project and its outcomes(Kolltveit and Grønhaug, 2004; Miller and Lessard, 2001).Improving effective stakeholder involvement, will not only helpproject stakeholders to efficiently collaborate with each other, itwill also facilitate the possibility of a decrease in negativeenvironmental impacts and increase the economic sustainabilityand quality of the project. However, no major studies have beenundertaken to date to precisely examine how more effectivestakeholder involvement can be facilitated to contribute to theultimate delivery of construction building projects. On the otherhand, a significant step to be taken to facilitate improvedstakeholder involvements to determine the current levels ofstakeholder involvement since according to Yin and Heald(1975), it is essential to evaluate an existing provision within themain research area before establishing a framework. Thisresearch therefore focuses on assessing and evaluating the extentto which key stakeholders are currently involved within theplanning processes of residential building projects.

This paper starts with a discussion on the elements of projectsuccess (Section 2) and stakeholder management in the construc-tion industry (Section 3). Section 4 evaluates the influences ofproject participants on project quality outcomes and clarifies therelationship between stakeholder involvement in different phasesof the project life cycle (PLC) and project quality. Section 5 thendiscusses the significance of the initial and planning stages in thePLC. Following that, Section 6 describes the methodology anddata collection process. Data analysis and findings are thenpresented in Section 7. Based on the analysis adopted, Section 8discusses the findings and clarifies the relationship between thefindings and the research question. Section 9 outlines a summaryof the major findings, describes the significance of the researchand its theoretical and practical implications and makes recom-mendations for future research projects.

2 . Project success

Success has always been the ultimate purpose of each activityof a project including construction and building projects (Yuet al., 2006). Project success has been extensively discussed in theconstruction and project management literature, however it is noteasy for a variety of authors to get to a full agreement regardingproject success criteria (LU et al., 2005). Most studies havefocused on the scope of project success which means the way tomeasure success of project and factors affecting project success.Westerveld (2003) states that one of the most common ways ofmeasuring project success is the well-known iron triangle of cost,time and required quality. Some studies have extended projectsuccess criteria into new aspects, such as stakeholder'sparticipation and satisfaction, customer's benefit and upcomingprospective to organisation (Shenhar et al., 2001). Morris andHough (1986) applied a number of concepts to measure projectsuccess such as: project function, project management, andcontractor's business performance. Other researchers examineproject success by make use of micro and macro criteria (Lim andMohamed, 1999). In their examination micro criteria encompasstime, cost, quality, performance and safety, and the macro criteria

Please cite this article as: A. Heravi, et al., 2015. Evaluating the level of stakeholder inManag. http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijproman.2014.12.007

consist of project's actual benefit in the operation phase as well astheir micro criteria. Baccarini (1999) identifies two componentsof project success as “project management success” and “productsuccess”. The project management success deals with the projectprocess and primarily the successful achievement of project interms of meeting cost, time and quality objectives whereas theproduct success focuses on the impacts of the ultimate product.The key point is that both of these success components mustmeet stakeholder's satisfaction where there is a link betweentheir interest and these components (Baccarini, 1999). Inaddition, as stated by Atkin and Skitmore (2008), enhancedstakeholder involvement can help with managing their needs,decreasing unanticipated risk and reducing unconstructiveactions or reactions that have possible impact on projectsuccess. According to the comprehensive statement by theproject management body of knowledge (PMBOK) guidepublished by the Project Management Institute (PMI, 2013),project success criteria consist of the golden triangle (time,cost, quality) and key project stakeholder's satisfaction andtheir incorporation to the project.

Despite these arguments, the two elements of quality andstakeholder management, in many cases, have been regarded astwo major success factors, and therefore are the focus of theresearch.

3 . Stakeholders in the construction industry

The stakeholder theory concept was initially developed fromacademic research being undertaken in the US in the 1960s thatdefined stakeholders as those groups having high enoughimpact in an organisation to cause it to stop existing withouttheir (the stakeholders) support (Li et al., 2013; Stoney andWinstanley, 2001). Later, Freeman (1984, 52) extended thisdefinition and described “a stakeholder in an organisation” as“any group or individual who can affect or is affected by theachievement of the organisation's objectives”. A helpfulillustration by Walker (2003) shown in Fig. 1, provides awidely accepted mapping of project's main stakeholders:

Amongst the most important aspects of the above ‘map’ arethe inclusion of community and external independent concerned



3A. Heravi et al. / International Journal of Project Management xx (2015) xxx–xxx

groups, and an identification of invisible team members. It isadvocated that project success can be critically affected by theactivities of these two recognised groups. The importance ofstakeholders can also be determined by examining the needs of abusiness and the degree to which an organisation is in need of aparticular stakeholder (Leung et al., 2013; Olander, 2007). Incertain instances, some stakeholders can be more important thanothers and the project leader should carefully analyse theirrequirements and attributes at different times during the projectlife cycle. Phillips (2003) stated that stakeholder theory shouldfocus on the groups who can input into decision-making processas well as who are affected by the outputs of such decisions. It isargued that an organisation's advantages are basically dependanton its capability to adequately manage stakeholders (Verbeke andTung, 2013). On the other hand, stakeholder management as atask is specific to context and therefore any strategies andmethods applied should reflect this context (Bourne and Walker,2005; Jones and Wicks, 1999).

In the construction industry, during the different stages of aproject from the initial planning through to the final operationand maintenance, specific parties get involved whose expecta-tions can affect the outcomes of, or may be affected by, bothnegatively and positively the implementation of the project(Olander, 2007). These groups include:

• Client• Project Management team• Consultant and designing team• Contractor• Subcontractor• Supplier• Employees• Local communities• Funding Bodies• Government authorities

These groups as stated by many scholars (Olander and Landin,2005a; Newcombe, 2003; Atkin and Skitmore, 2008; Yang, 2010)are the major stakeholders of construction building projects. Atkinand Skitmore (2008) signified that successful implementation andcompletion of the project largely rely on addressing the needs andexpectations of those who are involved and failure to correctlyaddress their requirements can result in many project issues(Bourne and Walker, 2005). This idea is reinforced by Johnsonand Scholes (1999b) who state that it is not adequate to simplyidentify stakeholders, rather managers and owners need toevaluate each stakeholder's interest in order to articulate theirexpectations on project decisions. Olander (2007) advocated that itis the key responsibility of project leaders to respond to therequirements and needs raised by their stakeholders and to be ableto carry out, control and manage the project decision-makingprocess. Inappropriate management and supervision of stake-holders can cause problems in the technical and managementmechanisms of a project. In addition, Bourne and Walker (2005)highlighted that conflicting and unseen stakeholder agendas, if notwell managed, can lead to many project failures. These issueshighlight the need for having a systematic approach to identifying


key project stakeholders, examining their needs and assessing theimpact and probable risks that they can impose on the project.

4 . Influences of stakeholder involvement on constructionprojects and their quality

Brian and Martin (2008) and other scholars (Bosher et al.,2007; Cole, 2005; El-Gohary et al., 2006; Olander and Landin,2005b) studying construction sector stakeholder issues, haverealised that the activities and practices undertaken by majorparties have undeniable impacts on project outcomes. There-fore, identification of the important roles of key members onprojects has therefore developed more in recent years. As notedby PMI (2013) in order to obtain project success, a projectmanager needs to facilitate the contribution of stakeholders invarious project phases. However, in the view of Joaquin et al.(2008) using the effective interaction mechanism with stake-holders to improve project outcomes and achieve success is notparticularly evident in the construction industry practices.

Different stakeholders can be a part of a large project'sexecutive team and depending on how they get involved and whattheir roles are, they might have different interests in, impacts onand ambitions for a project (Kolltveit and Grønhaug, 2004).Therefore a significant part of the project management processshould be to precisely evaluate the importance and influence levelsof these groups and their potential orientation towards the project(Olander, 2007; Winch and Bonke, 2002). According to someauthors (Johnson and Scholes, 1999a) stakeholder analysis can becategorised into four steps of: (1) identifying key stakeholders(2) assessing stakeholder's interests and the potential impactsof the project on these interests (3) assessing stakeholderinfluence and importance and (4) outlining a participationstrategy. It is noted that, stakeholders and projects have abilateral impact function that means while stakeholders caninfluence projects; a construction project can sometimes affectstakeholders. For example, providing a higher quality of life byincreasing the quality of facilities of the final project are theadvantages of implementing a project. On the other hand,destruction of the environment is an example of the negativeimpacts of a project on some stakeholders (Olander, 2002;Olander and Landin, 2005a).

Many factors can influence the quality of a project. Neverthe-less, the apparent role of key stakeholders as an important factor indetermining quality levels has not to date been widely examined inthe literature (Joaquin et al., 2010; Low Sui and Ke-Wei, 1996;Olander, 2006; Soetanto et al., 2001; Wang and Huang, 2006).According to Low Sui and Ke-Wei (1996), the quality of aconstruction project is largely dependent on the attitudes ofdifferent stakeholders. Hence, if major parties of the contract arenot committed to properly carrying out their responsibilities, thiswill adversely affect the final project quality level. Deming (1986)declares that the customer's (stakeholder's) perspective of qualitylevels is critically important, and therefore inclusion of the mainstakeholders during the important stages of project lifecycle shouldbe a key feature of any framework aiming to improve the quality(Joaquin et al., 2010).



Source: (Adapted from Bubshait 1994)

Proj

ect Q

ualit

y

The extent of

implementation of the project in conformity

with:

- terms

- duration

- budget- appearance

- operation

Overall Satisfaction

Planning

Design

ConstructionStak

ehol

der

In

volv

emen

t

Fig. 2. The interaction between project quality and stakeholder involvement.


A project management team can improve its effectivenessand the efficiency of its control and management processes andas a result, improve project quality. This requires that theypossess important information about the project and be capableenough to accurately analyse that information and outlinerelevant project strategies. Contractors, subcontractors andsuppliers are those who might not get engaged in very earlystages of projects, however, since they provide materials,equipment and on-site labour, they can still greatly impact onthe final asset quality. Low Sui and Ke-Wei (1996) stated thatone essential step in establishing a total quality culture is todevelop a construction team of main contractors and subcontrac-tors who commit to the quality process and create a productivequality attitude at the earliest time. Contractors in the competitivemarket with a reputation for producing poor quality constructedoutput will not generally be awarded many future projects. Suchcontractors should therefore be encouraged to improve the qualityof their work in order to increase their chance of winning tenders(Arditi and Murat Gunaydin, 1997). On the other hand,contractors with a good quality reputation are expected to deliverprojects within the specified time and budget and to the desiredlevel of quality (Aje, 2012).

In addition, owners (clients) and developers play an importantrole in the accomplishment of the desired project outcome qualitylevels. These groups are not only accountable for preparing clearand complete specifications, but they should also monitor andcontrol the actual on-site work of both contractors andsubcontractors (Jha and Iyer, 2006). In a recent investigation onthe role of quality using the perspective of the ‘iron triangle ofcost, time and quality’ Basu (2014) highlighted that there is astrong correlation between organisational quality and criteriasuch as stakeholder management, project leadership and topmanagement support. However according to Walker(2000)there is a gap in previous studies and he affirms that theimplementation of quality efforts is often hindered by a lack ofattention to the expectations and views of the stakeholdersregarding exactly what quality means in the constructionindustry. Yang (2010) emphasised that there are severalstakeholders whose expectations and influences must be includedin the project management process. More importantly, it has beenunderlined that if the project's stakeholders are not satisfied withthe quality of the ongoing project management, or projectoutcomes, the project team will as a result be required to adjustscope, time and cost in order to meet the stakeholders'expectations on quality issues. Bubshait (1994) provides a clearinteraction between project quality and stakeholder involvementshown in Fig. 2.

The above figure shows that project quality can be measuredby determining the degree to which the implementation of theproject is in conformity with terms (i.e., specifications), duration,budgets, aesthetics, operation, and the stakeholders' overallsatisfaction with project quality. It affirms that stakeholderintegration in different phases of a project lifecycle is in direct andmutual relationship with the project quality. However, the currentresearch mainly focuses on examining SI level in the planningphase of projects as the majority of the vital decisions arecompleted during this stage and the ultimate success of the


design, construction and post construction phases highly dependson the appropriate decisions being made during the earlierplanning phase (Abdul-Kadir and Price, 1995; Toakley andMarosszeky, 2003).

5 . The planning phase

The importance of conceptualisation and planning is relativelyprominent compared to other phases in the project lifecycle andthey both have remarkable influence on project success (Meyerand Utterback, 1995; Zwikael, 2009; Globerson and Zwikael,2002). While the final aim of a company is to improve the successof a project, each process during the planning phase, followsparticular objectives. For example, although appropriate costplanning will help to achieve success in the project (Belout andGauvreau, 2004; Yu et al., 2006), it is particularly necessary toensure that a realistic cost limit determined by factors such asavailability of money and market demand is established.According to PMI (2013, p.64), “A cost estimate is needed for acontingency plan involves integration of the planning process.”Similarly, quality planning is necessary to ensure that the qualityobjectives that meet the requirements of key stakeholders areachieved.

5.1 . Quality planning process

According to Applebaum et al. (2004) quality management andimprovement should start from the beginning of the planningphase, not when the customer receives the project. One advantageof beginning quality improvement practices in upfront projectphases is that higher quality ‘planned-in’ early in the projectfront-end development work will ensure fewer issues are createdin the later stages of the process, hence resulting in better finalquality delivery (Leszaka et al., 2002). Many organisationscurrently concentrate their efforts on quality improvementprogrammes (Senaratne and Jayarathna, 2012), nonetheless, theliterature shows that these programmes are not always generatingthe expected quality improvements (Lam, 1997). This is possiblydue to a key reason stated by Juran and Blanton Godfery (1999),that is the absence of an effective quality planning process before




implementing quality practices. Hence, repeatedly the extant andcurrent literature highlights that quality planning is the mostimportant phase in a business quality management process andtherefore requires more investigation and consideration (Senaratneand Jayarathna, 2012). Quality planning is a disciplined processdesigned to make sure that the structured set of quality assuranceand control activities is complete. These activities will ensure thatan organisation can implement a high quality project on time andto the satisfaction of customers and stakeholder's needs andspecifications (Juran and Blanton Godfery, 1999). Juran andBlanton Godfery's (1999) grouping of quality planning, which isused specifically in this research, has been applied to a number offields of study including the construction sector. They (Juran andBlanton Godfery, 1999) grouped the main steps of qualityplanning into five phases that are illustrated below in Fig. 3.

In this planning process, the purpose of the first phase (EP) is toprovide clear goals and correct directions of the project. Some ofthe major tasks of this step include: identify the projects to fulfilthe organisation's strategy, clarify the mission of each project,allocate project team members and prepare a complete projectplan. The next phase (IS) provides a systematic identification andcomplete understanding of all project stakeholders and their needs,expectations and requirements. By identifying customers andexplicitly assessing their expectations, the understating andperception gaps can be avoided.

The specific project/product, quality planning tools, tech-niques and technology for the industry are required to beapplied to produce an effective design, conforming fully tostakeholders needs. Identifying and implementing the activitiesthat result in delivering the final project that conforms to suchrequirements and without deficiencies are main purposes ofphase 3 (DP1) (Juran and Blanton Godfery, 1999). Phase 4(DP2) ensures that the whole process and its elements are madecapable enough to deliver the project as it was planned anddesigned. It also monitors that the process is consistent withproject strategic objectives. Lastly, the operational gap can beclosed in phase 5 (CO) by developing and efficientlytransferring the plans over to the operational team. Accordingto PMI (2013), one of the important outputs of the quality

Phase 1: Establish the Project (EP)

Phase 3: Develop the Project (DP1)

Phase 2: Iden�fy Stakeholders and Collect their Needs (IS)

Phase 4: Develop the Process (DP2)

Phase 5: Control and Opera�on

The Quality Planning Process Main Steps

Fig. 3. The planning process phases to achieve quality requirements.


planning process is the quality management plan, which defineshow the project management team should implement theperforming company's quality policy. It (PMI, 2013) alsostresses that a key consideration to be borne in mind is thatproject planning and quality planning should not be treated asseparate processes since they include many similar activitiesthat interact with each other as well as with other processes ofthe planning phase.

6 . Study method

6.1 . Research aim and methodology

The main objective drawn this research study is:

- To evaluate the extent of current stakeholder involvement inthe planning process of construction building projects.

This study used a questionnaire-based survey to facilitate theachievement of the main research objective. Two maincharacteristics describe the purposes of a survey. Firstly,surveys aim to produce some descriptions about the distributionof phenomena in a population (Ling et al., 2008; Pinsonneaultand Kraemer, 1993). Therefore, a survey analysis may beconcerned with comparing the relationship between variables,or with demonstrating the finding, descriptively (Zikmundet al., 2000). Secondly, surveys are used to collect informationfrom research population through use of structured questions.Additionally, a survey provides a means for collection of alarge amount of data from a substantial population in a highlyeconomical way and it also operates on a foundation ofstatistical sampling to protect a particular representative dataset(Fellows and Liu, 2008).

The survey used in this study focuses on the perceptions offour key stakeholder groups including:

• Owner/developer• Construction/project management• Designer• Contractor,

who are/have been involved in medium and high-rise residentialbuilding projects. These stakeholder groups as stated by manyscholars have the highest influence on the project and its finaloutcomes (Hwang and Lim, 2013; Joaquin et al., 2010; Low Suiand Ke-Wei, 1996).

6.2 . Grouping questions and survey distribution

To design and setup the survey questionnaire, enquiryquestions were grouped from the general to the more specific.The first section of the questionnaire was developed to collectinformation about the demographic characteristics of stake-holders in terms of work experience, roles in their projects andthe type of projects they were involved in. Since this studyfocuses on residential building projects, it was important thatthe respondents were/are involved in these types of projects.



Table 1Feedbacks from pilot survey.

Draft Respondents Method Comments and Suggestion

First draft 6 Academics7 Industry practitioners

Face to face interviewEmail

–A few of the factors in the planning process and some of the quality issues werefound unreasonable or unnecessary–Some factors should be reworded–Add some more information about the purpose of the survey to the cover letter–Include a section where the respondents can add more comments

Second draft 3 Academics2 Industry practitioners

Email Rephrase some statements


Information about their organisational roles is also importantfor comparing different levels of stakeholder involvement. Inthe second section of the survey, questions were designed toanswer the main research question which is;

“What is the current level of stakeholder involvement in theplanning process of construction building projects?”

As mentioned in Section 5.1 the quality planning process isdivided into five phases. Each phase contains a number ofcorresponding factors that constitute the objectives of thatphase. These factors were derived from the quality planningprocess proposed by Juran and Blanton Godfery (1999). Inorder to adapt the process with the project management context,it was then completed with the concepts of planning and qualityplanning derived from PMBoK (PMI, 2013). The questionnairewas reviewed, revised and validated by adding, removing andchanging some items originally presented in the pilot test. As aresult 37 questions were presented to evaluate the current levelof stakeholder involvement in the five phases of the planningprocess. Respondents were asked to demonstrate the level ofinvolvement by answering to the following question; “Pleasetick the box which best describe your involvement level to thefollowing activities of the planning process of the project”. Afive point Likert scale with a range from 1 representing “NotInvolved/Very Low” to 5 “Very High” measured the respon-dents' perceived levels of involvement.

6.3 . Method of analysis

The data collected from questionnaire were analysed using apopular statistical analysis software, the Statistical Package forSocial Science (SPSS) version 19.0 (2010). To ensure the

Table 2Reliability test (Cronbach's Alpha).

Alpha Phase Items N

0.77 Establish the project 5 770.80 Identify stakeholder/customer 4 770.90 Develop the project 15 770.86 Develop the process 8 770.85 Control and operation 5 77


consistency of the quantitative data and to make the interpretationof results more meaningful, several initial processes wereundertaken. These processes include categorising data, editingdata, coding data and creating data files. Descriptive statisticalanalysis, particularly the measurement of central tendency (mean,median), and the measurement of variation (standard deviation)was undertaken for the following reasons:

• To profile the respondents in terms of position, work experienceand their role in projects in which they were involved.

• To examine the current level of stakeholder involvement indifferent phases of the planning process.

The required results to answer the research question wereachieved through a comprehensive descriptive analysis (shownin Section 7.2); however, in order to statistically test whetherorganisational roles have an influence on stakeholder involve-ment levels a parametric analysis of variance (ANOVA) testwas also conducted.

6.4 . Pilot study

Questionnaires are typically designed to collect data fromcertain groups of respondents. The pilot study is necessary toimprove the validity and efficiency of the experiment before theactual data collection starts. A pilot study is usually smallcompared to the main data collection process. Althoughimplementing a pilot study does not assure success in themain study, it does enhance the probability of success. It issuggested that in construction and project managementresearch, a draft of questionnaire should be tested to ensurethat all questions are logical and understandable (Yang andPheng, 2008). Respondents from both academia and industrywere selected to participate in the pilot test. Academic experts

Table 3Dispersion of respondents/sampling results.

Types of stakeholders Number Required number ineach group (stratum)

Owner/developer 260 22Construction and project management 290 24Designer 195 16Contractor 205 17Total 970 79



Table 4Stakeholder profile analysis.

Position indicated Percent Organisational role Percent Years of experience Percent

Project manager 24.7 Construction/project management 32.5 6–10 years 5.2Job manager 15.6 Owner/

developer27.3 11–15 years 29.9

Project coordinator/director 23.4 Contractor 22 More than 16 years 64.9Job manager 11.7 Designer 18.2Lead architect 6.5Lead project planner 9Other 9Total 100 Total 100 Total 100


from the construction and project management discipline wereselected to provide their opinion on the theoretical aspects ofthe questionnaire. Six academics provided useful feedback andtheir knowledge and experience assisted to improve theshortcomings of the initial survey draft. The industry groupwere practitioners who were/are involved in the residentialsector such as project managers, contractors and designers.Seven respondents finally participated and made practical andvaluable comments that could help to improve the quality of thequestionnaire. From the 13 people who agreed to participate inthe pilot survey, six people preferred a face-to-face interviewand seven people chose to provide their feedback andcomments by email. The major feedback obtained from thepilot survey is outlined in Table 1.

6.5 . Reliability analysis

A number of methods are available for determining theconsistency (reliability) of multiple item scales. To examine thereliability of data, Cronbach's alpha was used to consider theinternal consistency (Bryman and Hardy, 2009). Items with avalue equal to or greater than 0.7 were considered reliable.According to Sekaran and Bougie (2009), the value of alpha (α)greater than .80 is considered to be good, between .07 and .08 isacceptable and below .07 is poor. Table 2 shows that each ofthe planning items is reliable as the alpha coefficients were allgreater than 0.77.

Table 5The level of involvement in the “EP” phase.

Groups of stakeholders Value Std. error

Owner/developer Mean 3.5 .093Median 3.25SD .43

Construction/projectmanagement

Mean 3.5 .124Median 3.5SD .623

Designer Mean 3.1 .149Median 3.25SD .56

Contractor Mean 2.2 .109Median 2.25SD .45


6.6 . Sampling and response rate

It is often hard economically, and also infeasible and lengthy tocollect the data from every member of the population (Levy andLemeshow, 1999), therefore a sample of population has becomepractical to survey so that generalisation can be contingent fromthe sample to the entire population (Rea and Parker, 2005). Itinvolves the selection of a small number of people and it isimportant they are adequate representatives of the wholepopulation.

To facilitate sampling for this study, the list of stakeholdersaccording to their organisational roles was gathered from reliableand valid resources such as Brisbane City Council and MasterBuilder Associations of Queensland. Around one thousandcompanies were found that related to the context of this researchand these were divided into four main groups. Two methods ofsampling were applied to determine the required number ofresponses, “random sampling” and “stratified sampling”. Ran-dom sampling was first used to calculate the required amount ofpopulation for the actual data collection stage. Then, using astratified random technique, the required number of responsesfrom each group of participants was determined. The first step toapply this technique is calculating the size of the whole samplethrough simple random, or systematic sampling techniques andthen dividing the result by size of the population, and finallymultiplying the results by the size of each group (stratum).Table 3 shows the final results of sampling.

To facilitate the number of responses, approximately 200questionnaires were distributed during the months of April and

Table 6The level of involvement in the “IS” phase.



Construction/project management

Mean 3.7 .126Median 3.75SD .634





Table 7The level of involvement in the “DP1” phase.



Construction/projectmanagement





May 2012 and 85 responses were returned of which 77were validfor data analysis. This represents a response rate of 31%, whichaccording to Yehuda (1999) is a satisfactory number of responsesfrom an overall population sector. Eight responses were found tobe unacceptable because the respondent's current or previousemployment status, based on the criteria of this research, was notsuitable or many questions were left unanswered and resulted insome incomplete sections.

7 . Survey analysis

7.1 . Analysis of stakeholder profile

Investigating the general profile of the research population isimportant to be considered prior to analysing and interpretingthe findings (Egemen and Mohamed, 2006). Table 4 summa-rises the respondent's profile in terms of their position,organisational role in the project and years of experiences.

Using an open-ended question format, respondents wereable to identify their position on their projects, or within theircompanies. Results indicate that more than 90% of therespondents were from the top and middle management levels.Since this research focuses on the strategic management level,the results of this section confirm that appropriate people wereapproached. It is shown, the highest return rate was fromconstruction/project management companies with 25 respon-dents (32.5%), whereas owner/developers have 21 responses

Table 8The level of involvement in the “DP2” phase.








(27.3%) and 17 respondents (22.%) are contractors, closelyfollowed by 14 designer respondents, (18.2%). Considering thenumber of each group in the sampling list, this percentageconfirms that appropriate number of responses was received.

Results of the work experience indicate that nearly 65% ofthe participants have been working more than 16 years in theconstruction industry. 29.9% of respondents had 11 to 15 yearsof work experience in the industry and only 5.2% involved lessthan 10 years in the industry. This profile signifies the highlevel of experience on which the results of this survey werebased.

7.2. The analysis of stakeholder involvement level

The primary aim of the analysis in this section is todetermine the current level of four groups of stakeholder'sinvolvement in five phases of the planning process. Each ofthese phases includes items corresponding to the objectives ofthat phase.

7.2.1 . Stakeholder involvement level in five phases of theplanning process

It was found that owner/developer (O/D) and construction/project management (C/PM) groups were highly involved in theproject establishment phase. This can be observed from the meanand median scores shown in Table 5 which are around 4.Designers on the other hand, do not contribute so highly in theactivities of this phase. The lowest involvement is found amongstthe contractor group, where the mean score of the responses isaround 2.4 representing below average engagement.

Results shown in Table 6 indicate that the level ofinvolvement is above average for both O/D and C/PM groupsin the IS phase. This can be concluded from the mean score of theresponses. Since the important decisions in relation to collecting,assessing and unifying stakeholder's demands are completed bythese two groups, they need to adopt a common approach toimproving their levels of involvement and contribution in thisphase. The mean and median scores are close to the value of 3representing average involvement of designers. Finally the lowestdegree of contribution is for contractors with a mean score of 2.2.

Results shown in Table 7, demonstrate a fairly similarsituation for the three groups of O/D, C/PM and designers in

Table 9The level of involvement in the “CO” phase.


Owner/developer Mean 2.9 .083Median 3SD .381


Mean 3 .187Median 2.8SD .936

Designer Mean 3 .261Median 2.6SD .978




Table 11The results of the ‘Kruskal–Wallis’ test ranking.

Ranks

Organisation role in the project N Mean rank

Establish the project Owner/developer 21 50.86Construction/project management 25 46.62Designer 14 39.21Contractor 17 12.97

Identify customers Owner/developer 21 46.69Construction/project management 25 46.60Designer 14 42.21Contractor 17 15.68

Develop the project Owner/developer 21 46.38Construction/project management 25 47.64Designer 14 43.82Contractor 17 13.21

Develop the process Owner/developer 21 43.48Construction/project management 25 47.22Designer 14 47.25Contractor 17 14.59

Control & operation Owner/developer 21 46.14Construction/project management 25 40.26Designer 14 39.54Contractor 17 27.88


the ‘Developing the Project’ phase. This is perceived from themean score representing an above average (but still less thanhigh) degree of involvement in this phase of the planningprocess. Because many important activities such as groupingstakeholder's needs, developing the project schedule, developproject goals and features, and identifying acceptance criteriafor project deliverables are implemented in this phase, a higherlevel of contribution of key project members is generallyexpected.

The mean and median scores shown in Table 8 demonstratethat C/PM and O/D group levels of involvement are close tohigh in the ‘Developing the process’ phase. In contrast, thecontractor's level of involvement in this phase is belowaverage. Compared to the contractors, designers are moreinvolved as their mean score is above the average.

It was found that the O/D and C/PM groups, compared to theother phases, are slightly less involved in the ‘Control andOperation’ phase. This can be observed from the mean andmedian scores (presented in Table 9), which are around 3,indicating an average involvement level. Even though contrac-tors are less involved than other groups, the median score of 2.6shows their higher engagement in this phase compared to otherphases of the planning process.

7.3 . Comparing levels of stakeholder involvement

This section compares the levels of stakeholder involvementin the planning process, based on their organisational roles inthe project and using the ‘Kruskal–Wallis’ and ‘Mann–Whitney’ non-parametric tests. Both methods are designed toidentify whether two or more samples come from the sameunderlying population, or to test whether the medians betweencomparison groups are different. However, the main differencebetween these methods is that while the ‘Mann–Whitney’ testis applied to compare scores between two groups, the‘Kruskal–Wallis’ test (also referred to as the “distributionfree” test) can accommodate the comparison between more thantwo groups (Bryman and Cramer, 2009). The ‘Kruskal–Wallis’test is appropriate for data at ordinal level (Sadiqi et al., 2013)and is used in this research because the data-sets are ordinal andmeasured using a Likert scale. This test was conducted todetermine if the involvement levels amongst the four stake-holder groups in the planning process were significantlydifferent. Table 10 illustrates the overall results of the‘Kruskal–Wallis’ test. It suggests that a significant differenceexists in mean ranking of ratings in EP, IS, DP1, and DP2

Table 10The results of the ‘Kruskal–Wallis’ test statistics.

Test statistics a,b

Planning phases Establish the project (EP) Identify stakeholder (IS) Develop

Chi-Square 32.319 24.371 29.364df 3 3 3Asymp. Sig. .000 .000 .000a Kruskal–Wallis test.b Grouping variable: what is your organisation role in the project?


(p b 0.05). This means that SI level is significantly different infour of the five phases of the planning process. Findings,however, do not demonstrate any statistically significantdifference in the mean ranking of the CO phase.

Table 11 provides a ranking summary of the data. Itdemonstrates the lower scores of mean ranking of contractorscompared to the other stakeholders in four phases of EP, IS,DP1 and DP2 of the planning process.

To follow-up the findings from the ‘Kruskal–Wallis’ test,the ‘Mann–Whitney’ test was conducted to determine where asignificant difference exists amongst stakeholders in the meanranking of their responses. The ‘Mann–Whitney’ test is alsorelevant for data-sets at ordinal level. It tests the hypothesis thatthe median of the two groups are equal (Ho, 2006). By default,the statistical software used in this research calculates thesignificance of the ‘Mann–Whitney’ and ‘Kruskal–Wallis’using the ‘asymptotic’ method. This method is considered to bemore reliable for use with large samples, but less so withsmaller samples. However, in both large and small samples, the‘exact test’ is the most precise way to determine significanceand therefore is used in the analysis in this section.

A ‘Bonferroni Correction’ is a multiple-comparison correctionmade to P values when some statistical tests are being performed

the project (DP1) Develop the process (DP2) Control and operation (CO)

26.515 6.5203 3.000 .089



Table 12The results of the ‘Mann–Whitney’ test.

Stakeholders Establish theproject (EP)

Identifystakeholder (IS)

Develop theproject (DP1)

Develop theprocess (DP2)

Control andoperation (CO)

Owner-contractor Mann–Whitney U 5.000 19.000 5.500 25.500 73.000Exact Sig. [2*(1-tailed Sig.)] .000 .000 .000 .000 .001

Project manager- contractor Mann–Whitney U 34.000 60.500 60.500 40.500 154.500Exact Sig. [2*(1-tailed Sig.)] .000 .000 .000 .000 .139

Designer-contractor Mann–Whitney U 28.500 34.000 5.500 29.000 93.500Exact Sig. [2*(1-tailed Sig.)] .000 .000 .000 .000 .316

Owner-designer Mann–Whitney U 91.500 129.500 125.500 115.500 141.500Exact Sig. [2*(1-tailed Sig.)] .061 .561 .474 .293 .855

Owner-project management Mann–Whitney U 242.500 247.000 223.000 235.000 223.500Exact Sig. [2*(1-tailed Sig.)] .659 .741 .387 .548 .391

Project manager-designer Mann–Whitney U 143.000 152.500 150.500 169.000 162.500Exact Sig. [2*(1-tailed Sig.)] .361 .515 .478 .874 .718


concurrently on a single data set. To apply this method, the Pvalue (α) is divided by the number of comparisons being made. A‘Bonferroni Correction’ was applied (6 comparisons were madebetween four stakeholder groups) and all effects are reported asbeing at a 0.008 (0.05/6 = 0.008) level of significance. Resultsshown in Table 12, suggest that there is a significant difference inthe mean rankings between contractors and other stakeholders infour phases of EP, IS, DP1 and DP2. However, no significantdifference was found between O/D, CP/M and designers' level ofinvolvement.

Fig. 4 provides a visual summary of the involvement level ofdifferent stakeholder groups in five phases of the planning

Fig 4. Compare stakeholder involvem


process. It indicates that the C/PM group, compared to others, hasthe most efficient levels of incorporation, especially in the EPphase where the median score is above 4. Although involvementlevels of the O/D and C/PM groups are nearly the same, the boxesshow a wider dispersion of data amongst the C/PM group,especially in the DP1 and DP2 phases. Compared to the O/D andC/PM groups, designers are generally less involved. However,this discrepancy is very low in the DP2 and CO phases. While thefigure illustrates that there is no significant difference amongstthe first three groups of respondents, contractors are demonstrat-ing a considerably lower level of involvement in all phases of theplanning process.

ents in planning process phases.




8 . Discussion

This study culminates a comprehensive evaluation of currentlevel of stakeholder involvement in project planning phases. Itwas determined that designers and contractors are not highlyinvolved in establishing the project where the key objectivesare normally to identify the projects, determine the scope, goalsand objectives and establishing a mechanism to achieve theidentified objectives, selecting the project team and definingproject resources and their limitations. This can be attributed tothe lack of attention paid by these groups to the importance ofunderstanding the role of key stakeholders and the significance oftheir inputs into the decision-making (DM) process. Arditi andMurat Gunaydin (1997); Marosszeky et al. (2002) reinforced thisview, stating that even though project performance depends oncreating a team relationship between contractors, designer and theowner in the project initial phases, it has not been evidenced muchin the residential building sector. Additionally, the type of projectdelivery adopted by project owners, in many cases, determines thestages where both designers and contractors can get engaged inproject planning. Therefore, they (the owners and developers)need to carefully select the right contract type to improve theeffective involvement of these former stakeholder groups.

In spite of the fact that correctly identifying key stakeholdersand analysing their needs and requirements, is a necessary partof the planning phase, and that the ability to correctly identifyand manage stakeholders can mean the difference betweensuccess and failure (PMI, 2013). This study determined thatowners and developers are not highly engaged in a systematicidentification process. This issue may be the result of certaincauses; for instance, lack of knowledge and information aboutthe project and its features can be a major barrier to effectiveinteraction between the owner and the project. Olander (2007)suggested that poor client knowledge can negatively influenceboth the project and its stakeholders. The quality planning ofmost projects will be challenged by the large number ofstakeholder needs, and therefore the project team shouldclassify and assess those needs and demands properly.

The project development (DP1) phase is where the project isactually operationalized. Activities such as grouping of relatedstakeholders' needs, determining the method of identifying projectfeatures, identifying the quality expectations, are all completed inthis phase. In spite of the significance of this phase, it was foundthat owners/developers and designers do not contribute greatly tothe successful achievement of the phase objectives. One of thereasons for this may be due to the lack of full commitment of thesetwo groups to accurately implement the activities related to thisphase. This lack of full commitment can be the result of poorawareness of both the significance, and the advantages, ofapplying these activities towards achieving success in a project.As discussed in the literature review section, appropriatemanagement and involvement of stakeholders as well as meetingquality requirements (that are included as major activities in thisphase) are two main project success factors. If, therefore, keyproject members can expand their awareness and contribute to theachievement of objectives of this phase, this could help to attainproject success.


Once the project has been developed, it is essential todetermine and establish the processes by which the project willthen be developed and delivered. The level of team involvementin developing the process (DP2) was found to be less than high,but still above average and this can be related to many factors.Sometimes, a project has varying degrees of complexity and itwas determined that establishing and monitoring the variousprocesses for complex projects requires a substantially higherlevel of competency. Aje (2012) confirms that in the constructionindustry, where many companies are involved, the process ofdetermining participants must place an emphasis on theirtechnical, practical and managerial skills. But finding a stake-holder, especially a contractor with a high enough level ofproficiency is not always easy. In addition, deciding on the mostaccurate methods to implement the processes needs a perfectunderstating of the project and its specific features. Indeed whenparticipants do not possess adequate and correct information, orare not expert enough, implementing such processes cannot befully facilitated.

Analysis of the survey data revealed that the contractors'involvement in the planning phase of projects was considerablylower compared to other stakeholders. In many cases, contractorsare attributed simply as builders and they are assigned only forthe execution of the project. Therefore they get engaged when theplanning and design is almost complete, the scope, objectives andstakeholders are identified, the acceptance criteria are determinedand the project process is established. However, depending on thetype of the contract, they may get involved prior to the designphase, but after the planning is mainly completed. It was foundthat in such situations, the contractor involvement level is lowand that can negatively impact on subsequent project quality.Low Sui and Ke-Wei (1996) confirm that the quality of theconstruction project is largely dependent on the attitudes ofcontractors. Sometimes the contractor's objectives do not alignwith the strategic project objectives, which might result inconflict amongst different parties and affect the final qualityoutcomes. However, interacting with contractors in the earlyphases of a project can help prevent such conflict. Contractors aresometimes assigned to carry out the project from beginning to theend. In that case they will get engaged in the conceptual andplanning phases but they are more a developer in this instance,rather than a contractor. Another reason for the low level ofcontractors' contributions could be the issue of competitiveness.Involving contractors in the very initial stages might result in theproject losing the competitive edge during the tendering process.Such early involvement can also create a misconception amongstcontractors that they have already been pre-selected to be thecompany finally undertaking the construction phase.

9 . Conclusions

This study has evaluated the current level of SI duringdifferent phases of the planning process. It highlights theweaknesses and strengths of the four stakeholder groups indifferent phases of the process. It was found that the O/D groupand C/PM groups were more involved than the designer group.Results revealed that contractors have the lowest level of




contribution within early project stages. The low level ofcontractor involvement suggests the need to engage them asearly as possible through, for example, use of an integratedproject delivery method.

Results of this study could provide project managers andowners with the required information and a direction as towhere SI improvement plans should begin. Although theimportant activities of the planning process require effectiveengagement and great contribution of major parties involved inthe project, according to the outcomes of this research, suchengagement is not fully evident in the residential buildingsector. Findings from this research affirm that project leadersand owners should adopt improved decision-making strategiesand design a plan to enhance the effectiveness of SI from thebeginning of the project to its completion stages.

The survey conducted in this research used only the perceptionsof four stakeholder groups including ‘owner, developer’, ‘con-struction/project management’, ‘designers’ and ‘contractors’.Taking into account the perspectives of other project memberssuch as, subcontractors, suppliers and surrounding social environ-ment could provide a more complete picture of involvement levelin the whole community of stakeholders. This research providedsome valuable understanding about the issue of poor stakeholderinvolvement during the decision-making process, and as a resultlow level of contribution in other phases of the PLC. However,further investigations are still required to improve the solutions tothese complex problems. Furthermore, outcomes of this researchprovide a basis for further development of a framework whichaims to improve and enhance the involvement of stakeholders inthe project. It has been revealed from this research that seriousconsideration should be given to facilitating the more effectiveincorporation of different project members during the project lifecycle.

The main focus of this research was on high-rise andmedium-rise residential building projects. It is suggested thatfurther research is undertaken using the outputs of this study, toincorporate results from an examination that includes other typesof building projects. This study also collected data from projectsin Brisbane, Australia. Further studies may be undertaken to testthe findings in other locations in Australia, or globally.

Conflict of interest

The authors declare they have no conflicts of interest.

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