دانلود رایگان مقاله اعمال نظریه های نهادی به مدیریت پروژه های بزرگ

Abstract

This paper contributes to Rodney Turner's initiative to develop a theory of project management from practice. Organizational scholars studying strategy suggest that more attention needs to be paid to practices involved in organizing, as well as the institutional contexts in which these practices are embedded. Taking a cue from strategy-in-practice approaches, it is proposed that institutional theories can be used to address some questions that have not been answered adequately regarding megaprojects. Institutional theories also seem to be gaining the attention of scholars investigating large, global, infrastructure projects as reported in engineering, management and construction journals. Increasingly, it is evident that the problem areas attached to these projects stretch beyond technical issues: they must be considered as socio-technical endeavours embedded in complex institutional frames. The authors suggest that studying how to deal with institutional differences in the environment of megaprojects has both theoretical and practical implications.

8. Conclusions

We conclude that megaprojects may face certain challenges that differentiate them from normal projects, requiring different ways of organizing and managing. Institutional factors must be managed carefully in megaprojects because of the complexity of their institutional fields, the multiplicity of their logics and, on occasion, the duplicity of their entrepreneurs. While some project management scholars have urged researchers to use institutional theory in investigating projects, the take up is so far slight. However, researchers in the fields of engineering, management, construction and organization studies have been more forthcoming. While papers in project management journals may describe how megaprojects have used institutional arrangements, they have not investigated them using an institutional theory lens and have not dealt with the dynamics of dealing with institutional influences, which constitute a key part of project life.

In this article, we identified a few major questions that could be addressed by project management scholars to investigate megaprojects from an institutional theory lens that could be beneficial to project management theory and practice. We also illustrated the use of discourse analysis as a useful method for expanding project management scholarship when using an institutional theory lens. We invite researchers to apply novel methods used by researchers applying institutional theory to fill the research gaps identified in this article. First-hand empirical accounts of projects are likely to be invaluable in this endeavour. However, there is also much that can be gleaned from secondary analysis and expert testimony. For instance, two of the authors of this paper are in the process of organizing a round table to discuss challenges on megaprojects in India. As a part of this process, dialogues have been initiated with key megaproject actors (sponsors, project directors, financiers) in the Indian environment. Discursive analysis of these interactions shows that a multitude of logics are apparent in the shaping, procurement, execution and monitoring stages of projects. Land use regulations, for instance, conflict with project plans. Power plays between planners, politicians and project managers determine the outcome of these institutional conflicts — to what extent will existing land use rules be modified to accommodate plans for developing an infrastructure project, for instance?