Survey to determine how project managers lose control

A survey supported by the Australian Research Council will set out to investigate the causes of project blowouts, compare governance systems and practices that may contribute to or mitigate blowouts, and develop a model to predict and avoid project blowouts.

Conducted by the Centre for Management and Organisation Studies at the University of Technology Sydney (UTS) in collaboration with the Strategy, Organisation and Society Group (University of Newcastle Upon-Tyne, UK) and the Centre for Institutional and Organisational Studies (University of Newcastle, Australia), the survey asks project managers about their experiences of project blowouts to determine the causes and find connections with possible solutions.

The aims of the proposed ARC Linkage Research Project are to:

• Establish why project blowouts occur by identifying antecedent factors that cause loss of project control.
• Evaluate key comparative differences in project management, governance systems and practices that different types of organisations use in order to control project blowouts.
• Develop a model describing practices best able to predict and avoid major project blowouts.

“The survey will result in practical insights around how specific project governance mechanisms influence the successful completion of projects,” said Associate Professor Shankar Sankaran of the UTS School of the Built Environment.

Lessons learnt from the survey respondents will also “inform the design of project management courses at the tertiary level,” he said, and grant partner Helmsman International will use the survey results “to shape their work with organisations to help improve governance practices”.

The insights discovered through the anonymous survey will be disseminated via reports to the Australian Research Council, presentations at UTS and conferences organised by professional associations and by publishing papers in leading industry and academic journals.

If you are a practising project manager, the researchers invite you to participate in the survey, which closes 31 July 2012.