Further, the study aims to understand how project-based organizations evaluate their large complex projects and explains the logic, criteria, perspective and methods of their evaluation process. Moreover, the study has relevance to the field of project management because the literature has overlooked how complex projects are evaluated. It appears that there is no agreement about how to evaluate complex projects. Thus, this research is expected to make a significant contribution to the project management evaluation field by improving our understanding about the logic used by different organizations to evaluate complex projects.
Such understanding will guide the researcher towards providing an improvement in the large complex project evaluation process. The findings will assist key stakeholders to manage large complex projects more effectively and efficiently.
• Approach to the Study The systematic literature review focused on project complexity and project evaluation. …show more content…
It identified the gap in project management research regarding the logic, criteria, perspectives and methods for the evaluation of complex projects. The key research components include the linking project complexity to project evaluation. This qualitative perspective adopts the social constructivism paradigm to provide a more effective and appropriate mode by which to answer the research questions. The social constructivist paradigm is most appropriate for the current research with its subjective epistemology, inductive reasoning as the strategy to theory development, qualitative methodology including: multiple case studies, narrative inquiry and constructivist grounded theory, and focus on understanding social and historical construction and theory generation. The multiple case studies research design is expected to identify the different ways project-based organizations evaluate complex projects. In particularly, I will be connecting project complexity dimensions to project evaluation criteria and methods, so as to create a better understanding of why and how organizations evaluate complex projects. The Actor Network Theory (Latour, 2005) will be used as a sensitizing concept tool through which to understand the roles and significance of the both human and non-human actors in the large complex projects evaluation process. The data analysis methods used will be based on the Narrative Inquiry (Czarniawska, 2004), the Textual Analysis (Czarniawska, 2014), and the Discourse Analysis (Silverman, 2011). This approach will provide a better understanding of the logic involved in the large complex project evaluation. To facilitate the data analysis process the Nvivo 10 software considered popular software for qualitative research, will be used. A grounded theory method, based on Charmaz’s (2014) constructivist approach will be adopted to understand the logic, perspectives, criteria and methods for the evaluation of complex projects. Eight project evaluation reports, generated by two international development organizations (the World Bank and DFAT), will be used in the data analysis phase, to provide the empirical components of this study. An integrated design research approach framework is adapted to provide an appropriate roadmap for investigating the ‘How’ and ‘What’ research questions. This integrated approach encompasses the subjectivist epistemology of the researcher, which supports the social constructivist paradigm used in this research. This ontological and epistemological approach is aligned to the researcher’s decision to adopt a qualitative methodology. The methodology will utilize a combination of multiple case studies, narrative inquiry, and constructivist grounded theory as the research methods. At the analysis level, the Actor Network Theory (ANT) as the
Such understanding will guide the researcher towards providing an improvement in the large complex project evaluation process. The findings will assist key stakeholders to manage large complex projects more effectively and efficiently.
• Approach to the Study The systematic literature review focused on project complexity and project evaluation. …show more content…
It identified the gap in project management research regarding the logic, criteria, perspectives and methods for the evaluation of complex projects. The key research components include the linking project complexity to project evaluation. This qualitative perspective adopts the social constructivism paradigm to provide a more effective and appropriate mode by which to answer the research questions. The social constructivist paradigm is most appropriate for the current research with its subjective epistemology, inductive reasoning as the strategy to theory development, qualitative methodology including: multiple case studies, narrative inquiry and constructivist grounded theory, and focus on understanding social and historical construction and theory generation. The multiple case studies research design is expected to identify the different ways project-based organizations evaluate complex projects. In particularly, I will be connecting project complexity dimensions to project evaluation criteria and methods, so as to create a better understanding of why and how organizations evaluate complex projects. The Actor Network Theory (Latour, 2005) will be used as a sensitizing concept tool through which to understand the roles and significance of the both human and non-human actors in the large complex projects evaluation process. The data analysis methods used will be based on the Narrative Inquiry (Czarniawska, 2004), the Textual Analysis (Czarniawska, 2014), and the Discourse Analysis (Silverman, 2011). This approach will provide a better understanding of the logic involved in the large complex project evaluation. To facilitate the data analysis process the Nvivo 10 software considered popular software for qualitative research, will be used. A grounded theory method, based on Charmaz’s (2014) constructivist approach will be adopted to understand the logic, perspectives, criteria and methods for the evaluation of complex projects. Eight project evaluation reports, generated by two international development organizations (the World Bank and DFAT), will be used in the data analysis phase, to provide the empirical components of this study. An integrated design research approach framework is adapted to provide an appropriate roadmap for investigating the ‘How’ and ‘What’ research questions. This integrated approach encompasses the subjectivist epistemology of the researcher, which supports the social constructivist paradigm used in this research. This ontological and epistemological approach is aligned to the researcher’s decision to adopt a qualitative methodology. The methodology will utilize a combination of multiple case studies, narrative inquiry, and constructivist grounded theory as the research methods. At the analysis level, the Actor Network Theory (ANT) as the