Success Criteria of Major Architectural Projects in Iraq

Project success is a challenging idea to describe since it goes beyond standard metrics and project efficiency. The evaluation of project success is necessary for enhancing project management abilities. Organizations, clients, and investors are working diligently to secure the success and prevent failure of their major projects which cost the economy billions of dollars each year [1]. In recent years, academic and business research has given a lot of attention to several challenges, including project success. Project management professionals have debated the idea of what characteristics make a project successful for a long time, but they haven't been able to identify a definition that is now generally recognized as accurate.

Many studies had attempted to define the complex terminology associated with project success, but there is no consensus on what the phrase means [2].

“Project Success” is the cornerstone for “Managing and Controlling” existing projects as well as for planning and directing upcoming projects [3].

According to Khan [4], the project's success depends on the early identification and specification of success features and criteria. Researchers and practitioners differentiate between the following success-relevant themes: -

A-“Project Success Criteria” and “Project Success Factors”

“Project Success Criteria” are conditional variables that assess how effectively a project will turn out, whereas “Project Success Factors” are independent project components that may rise the chance of success. Simply said, “success factors” help people achieve success while “success criteria” are used to quantify it. Project success criteria, according to Cooke-Davies [5], serve as the measure by which a project's success or failure will be judged. Besides, these criteria are considered as a set of rules or benchmarks that must be adhered to deliver desired results within a specific period [6].

B- “Projects Success” and “Project Management Success”

Success should be determined by whether the output met the project's requirements and provided the anticipated advantage in the months and years that followed the project’s completion. According to Shenhar et al. [7], “Project Success is determined over time”.

The main focus of measuring project performance has always been on tangibles; however, some directions recent thoughts suggest that clients/stakeholders, particularly the key sponsors are ultimately the best arbiters of project success [8]. The impact on client satisfaction becomes increasingly important after the project is completed.

Many researchers linked the success to its management success in achieving the project within the cost and time stated in the agreement between the owner and the executing firm. Others believed that maintaining project quality and scope are crucial success factors. However, it is not necessarily that all successful project management leads to project success. The project may be seen as a success or failure depending on the opinions of the many stakeholders, “Owner, Contractor, Project manager, Client, User, and Community”. According to Freeman and Beale [9], the impression of project success differs depending on whom you ask. "Success" might mean various things to different individuals. A human resources manager may measure success in terms of employee happiness, while an engineer may measure success in terms of technical proficiency and quality achievement. Benefits of “Project Success Evaluation” include, but are not restricted to: increased ongoing monitoring survival; the ability to monitor key project result areas; enabling project managers to make adjustments, development; and promotions commensurate with the level of success achieved.

As a result, establishing project success criteria provides the significant benefit of boosting both the ongoing project and subsequent developments. A technique for achieving continuous advancements through experience-based learning is the use of success criteria. Success Criteria differ according to project type, clients’ objectives, and contextual factors. Major architectural projects may have their priorities for success criteria for their significant impact and role in the society and built environment. To increase the major projects' success chances, professional project management can be applied from the early start of the projects.

“Project Management Success” can be assessed using the widely used and accepted metrics of performance against “Scope, Quality, Cost, and Time”, or the project objectives; however, “project success can also be assessed using the project's main goals, or the business objective. According to Kloppenborg et al. [10], the conventional components of time, money, and performance are present in all measurements of success. Project objectives are what the project organization and owners expect to get from utilizing the project results after the project has been delivered to them since success may be measured against a range of different sets of goals, scope, quality, cost, and time [11].  

Project success may not necessarily emerge from project management success; however, feasibility studies, professional planning, and application of the professional project management methodology can drive the project to a safe line, meet project “cost and time”, and increase the chances of project success. The local community expects the project to achieve social and environmental goals before, during, and after project completion. According to Turner and Zolin [8], the completion of the project's scope within the specified budget and time limits, as well as the delivery of the project's output under the specifications, should serve as indicators of the project's success. According to Serrador and Turner [12], project success may have several dimensions: -

• Achieving under project Schedule and budget;
• Development of team skills; achieving functional and environmental requirements; meeting the quality standard.
• Meeting client requirements and satisfaction;
• Business success by making new markets, and new products, developing new technology, and achieving considerable market share. According to the conventional view, completing a project on schedule, within budget, and under specifications ensures its success.

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Figure 1. Empire State - New York

The Empire State Building shown in (Figure 1.) is evidence of this. It was constructed in the thirties of the last century and can be considered one of the typical successful major projects which met the “Time, Cost, and Quality” of the project. Despite the non-precedent technical challenges of the project, it had been managed in the design and construction properly and precisely to the extent that the output became an iconic building and landmark for New York City many decades later.

The scope has the most significant of the three traditional project efficiency factors "Time, Cost, and Scope" as it also has an impact on the customer and their satisfaction [7].

It had been argued that “Some projects were completed on time and within budget, yet they did not bring much value to their organizations or customers [13]. In the dynamic world of business-related projects, abiding by the triple constraint is no longer sufficient, and a new model is needed.”

Sidney Opera House, shown in (Figure 2), is clear evidence of a project exceeding its time and costs however it was successful. With a five-year timeline, the project's anticipated budget was around 7 million Australian dollars.

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Figure 2. Sidney Opera House

Its total cost was above $100 million, and it took 16 years before the doors could be opened. One may infer that the “Sydney Opera House project was a reference example of project failure” if they only looked at how well it performed in terms of schedule and budget. The Opera House continues to be one of the most intriguing projects in the world and is viewed by everyone as a success story. Project effectiveness, team satisfaction, customer impact, company success, and future planning are suggested as a model of success and examined throughout a range of timelines. (Ibid). A framework for categorizing the success factors into "four categories related to the project, related to the project manager and team, connected to the organization, and related to the external environment" is proposed [14].

A factors study carried out identified "five project success criteria dimensions" as follows: “Project efficiency, Organizational benefits, Project Impact, Future potential, and Stakeholder satisfaction” [4]. Different variables come under these five criteria dimensions such as: completed on time; completed within budget; the lowest amount of scope adjustments; and activities completed according to plan; met the predetermined quality criteria; followed environmental rules; satisfied the sponsor; met the client's criteria., and satisfied corporate objectives.

Management-related important challenges were recognized [15]. According to their findings, "coordination within the management team and cooperative efforts by the customer, contractor, and consultant are two crucial factors in a project's success”. When defining “Key Success Factors (CSFs)” for project management, divided them into five categories [16]: “External environment, Organization, Project management, Project, and Sustainability”.

“Critical Success Factor has seven dimensions: Design-related factors; Project management-related factors; Contractor-related factors; Business and Work Environment-related factors; Client-related factors; Procurement-related factors; and Project Managers-related factors” [17]. According to Ika [18], the traditional framework for project success assessment typically contains the following success criteria: time, cost, quality, and customer satisfaction. Success criteria according to Mukhtar and Amirudin [19], are client satisfaction, project completion on schedule, project completion to a specific quality standard, absence of disputes, safety, and accomplishment within budget.  Success criteria are “Time, Cost, Quality, Safety, Client Satisfaction, Employees Satisfaction, Cash-flow Management, Profitability, Environment Performance, and Learning and Development [20].”

From the aforementioned literature, different success criteria had been specified by many researchers as shown in Table 1. Traditional factors: “Time, Cost, and Quality are effective [8, 10, 21-24]. However, new success factors such as stakeholder satisfaction, safety, and future visions had been added over the years as a result of the growing need to broaden the definition of success, especially for major projects which are characterized by complexity, risk, ambiguity, multi-disciplinary systems societal and cultural influence [26, 27].

Table 1. Projects’ Success Criteria by different researchers

The final questionnaire was fixed on proposing nine criteria that are expected to represent the features of Iraqi major projects. These criteria are shown in Table 2.

Ninety-five questionnaires had been distributed to engineers in various positions in contracting companies, consulting firms, and clients of several major projects in Iraq to collect their feedback on the “Success Criteria” of the major architectural projects they had participated in.

Engineers who responded were invited to share their ideas regarding the importance of each of the nine criteria of success included in the questionnaire distributed to the selected engineers. A “Five-point Likert scale” was adopted to classify the level of importance or influence for each criterion, which is expressed as follows: - “Very low importance, Low importance, Medium importance, High importance, and Very high importance”.

Eighty-three responses were received, six of which were incomplete. The complete questionnaires received were seventy-seven questionnaires sent from (19 architects, 40 civil and structural engineers, 11 mechanical engineers, and 7 electrical engineers) where the percentages of the respondents' specializations are shown in Figure 6.

The collected data were processed through the SPSS statistical program, and the “Relative Importance Index” is relied upon to define the significance of each criterion.

The “Relative Importance Index (RII)” is the statistical tool used to determine the relative importance of quality factors identified in a project. The levels of influence and their weights assumed in research are denoted by a value (W) where the following equation shows how to get the RII:

$\mathrm{RII}=\frac{\sum W}{(A * N)}$

where:

“RII – is the Relative Importance Index”

“W – is the weight given to each factor by the respondents ranging from 1 to 5 in five levels”

“A – is the highest weight (i.e., 5 in this case)”, and;

“N – is the total number of respondents.”

Accordingly, RII shall be found as per the following:

$\mathrm{RII}=\frac{5(\mathrm{n} 5) 4(\mathrm{n} 4)+3(\mathrm{n} 3)+2(\mathrm{n} 2)+\mathrm{n} 1}{5(n 5+n 4+n 3+n 2+n 1)}$

Other indexes used to assess the importance of the variables are the “Mean and Standard Deviation”. They can be calculated as follows:

Mean Equation:

$\bar{X}=\frac{\sum X}{N}$

“ $\bar{X}$  = Mean of all values in the data set”,

“X = each value in the data set”,

“N = number of values in the data set”.

“Standard Deviation Equation”

$\mathrm{S}=\sqrt{\frac{\sum(x-\bar{X})^2}{N}}$

S = Standard Deviation

Based on the “Relative Importance Index (RII)” and the Mean ranking analysis, the results show that the main “Success Criteria” of major architectural projects in Iraq are:

(1) Achieving the strategic objectives of the project and organization (RII 86.20%); (2) Completion within the contractual cost (RII 84.10%); (3) Completion within the contractual period (RII 82.00%); (4) Achievement within the required quality (RII 80.50%); (5) Achievement in compliance with owner and stakeholder satisfaction (RII 76.30%); (6) Meeting the expected economic value (RII 74.20%); (7) Getting societal satisfaction (RII 71.60%); (8) Creating symbolic and moral value (RII 69.30%); (9) Contributing to the creation of a more safe and sustainable environment (RII 66.70%).

Table 2. The ranking of the success criteria of major architectural projects in Iraq

R- Rank

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Figure 4. “Relative Importance Index” of project success 

Criteria of major projects in Iraq

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Figure 5. “Mean and Standard Deviation” of project success

Criteria of major projects in Iraq

Figure 5 shows the “Mean” as an indicator of each Success Criterion value obtained from the sum of the values given by respondents ∑)W) divided by the number of respondents. It reflects the importance of each Criterion.

The Standard Deviation (SD) is used as a measure of the amount of “Variation or Dispersion” of each Criterion value. It is found that the (X2, X9, X3) Criteria are of the lowest (SD) values respectively which means that these values tend to be closer to the “Mean” and are of more accuracy and less “Dispersion”.

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Figure 6. Percentages of professional respondents

The criteria data and measures presented in Table 2, Figure 4, and Figure 5 can be used to assess the importance of each success criterion in measuring project success and management success of Iraqi architectural major projects. Creating the symbolic and moral value criterion in this research showed a certain level of importance according to respondents’ assessment which can be created through some of the major architectural projects and can add significant added value for the clients, society, and country.