International Project Management - Critical Success Factors (CSF's)

i

INTERNATIONAL PROJECT MANAGEMENT -

CRITICAL SUCCESS FACTORS (CSF’S)

by

David G.V. Ray

A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the

title of

Masters of Business Administration (M.B.A)

From the

Georg Simon Ohm Management Institute

Nuremberg, 31st December 2006

iii

STATEMENT OF AUTHENTICITY (ENGLISH)

Georg-Simon-Ohm Management Institute

Department: Business Administration

Master of Business Administration (M.B.A.)

INTERNATIONAL PROJECT MANAGEMENT - CRITICAL SUCCESS FACTORS

Dissertation submission for the attainment of academic title of:

„Master of Business Administration” (M.B.A.)

at the Georg Simon Ohm Management Institute, Nuremberg

Faculty of Business Management

Master Program – Financial (CMP-F)

Submitted by: David G. V. Ray

Academic Supervisor: Professor Dr. T. M. Kuehlmann

Nuremberg, 31 Dec. 2006

Dissertation Attachment:

Statement in accordance with Section 31 para. 5 RaPo

„I confirm, that this work was independently created by myself and no other person, is submitted for test purposes only and that all sources and aids used in its compilation have been referenced and quoted.“

________________

Signature

v

STATEMENT OF AUTHENTICITY (GERMAN)

Georg-Simon-Ohm Management Institut

Department: Business Administration

Master of Business Administration (M.B.A.)

INTERNATIONAL PROJECT MANAGEMENT - CRITICAL SUCCESS FACTORS

Masterarbeit zur Erlangung des akademischen Grades

„Master of Business Administration” (M.B.A.)

am Georg-Simon-Ohm Management Institute, Nürnberg

Fachbereich: Betriebswirtschaft

Master Programm Intensive (CMP-F)

Früher: Weiterbildung Internationale Betriebswirtschaft (WIB)

Eingerichtet von: David G. V. Ray

Aufgabensteller: Professor Dr. T. M. Kuehlmann

Nürnberg, 31 Dez. 2006

Anhang zur Masterarbeit:

Erklärung gemäß §31 Abs.5 RaPo

„Ich versichere, dass ich die Arbeit selbstständig angefertigt, nicht anderweitig für Prüfungszwecke vorgelegt, alle benützten Quelle und Hilfsmittel angegeben sowie wörtliche und sinngemäße Zitate gekennzeichnet habe“. ________________ Unterschrift

vii

TITLE

GEORG SIMON OHM UNIVERSITY OF APPLIED SCIENCES

“WHAT ARE THE KEY FACTORS REQUIRED TO DESIGN,

IMPLEMENT AND SUCCESSFULLY MANAGE

INTERNATIONAL BUSINESS PROJECTS?”

by David G.V. Ray

Academic Supervisor: Professor Dr. T. M Kuehlmann Chair of Human Resources and Leadership, University of Bayreuth, Germany, EU.

A thesis presented on project success optimization in an international context, commencing with a review of current opinion on project success factors; an overview of applicable project management; human resource and cross cultural theory; exploratory international research of senior decision makers human interactions, motivations and decision making practices and finishing with a summary and discussion. All topics have been visited with a view to potentially improving international project success implementations.

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

STATEMENT OF AUTHENTICITY (ENGLISH) ...................................III

STATEMENT OF AUTHENTICITY (GERMAN) .....................................V

TITLE..............................................................................................................VII

TABLE OF CONTENTS..................................................................................1

LIST OF FIGURES...........................................................................................5

LIST OF TABLES.............................................................................................7

PREFACE...........................................................................................................9

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS............................................................................11

ABSTRACT......................................................................................................13

INTRODUCTION ...........................................................................................15

CHAPTER I: LITERATURE REVIEW......................................................17 STATEMENT OF ISSUE .....................................................................................19 EVIDENCE REVIEW .........................................................................................20 EVIDENCE INTERPRETATION...........................................................................25 RESEARCH TOPIC SELECTION .........................................................................55

CHAPTER II: PURPOSE OF STUDY.........................................................59 PERSONAL OBJECTIVES ..................................................................................61 RELEVANCE TO MANAGEMENT ......................................................................62 ORIGINALITY ..................................................................................................65 CONSTRAINTS .................................................................................................66 STAKEHOLDERS ..............................................................................................67

CHAPTER III: CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK......................................69 CURRENT THEORY..........................................................................................71

Project Management Perspective..............................................................71 Human Resource Perspective....................................................................74 Cross- / Inter- Cultural Communication Perspective...............................83

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CHAPTER IV: METHODOLOGY ..............................................................91 RESEARCH STRATEGY ....................................................................................93

Research Design ........................................................................................95 Methods Available .....................................................................................95 Method Selection........................................................................................95 Selection of Participants and Groups .......................................................96 Method Implementation.............................................................................97

COLLECTION OF DATA....................................................................................98 ANALYSIS OF DATA ......................................................................................101

CHAPTER V: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION........................................109 DESCRIPTION OF FINDINGS ...........................................................................111 CONCLUSIONS...............................................................................................119 RECOMMENDATIONS.....................................................................................120 SUMMARY.....................................................................................................121

GLOSSARY....................................................................................................123

REFERENCES...............................................................................................128

BIBLIOGRAPHY..........................................................................................125

APPENDICE : ....................................................................................................2 I ADMINISTRATION – GSO-MI..................................................................4

GENERAL ADMINISTRATION..................................................................4 Appendix I-G01: Dissertation Guideline (MS Word document)................8 Appendix I-G02: Dissertation Presentation (MS Powerpoint) ...............12 Appendix I-G03: Dissertation Proposal Submission................................26 ACADEMIC DIRECTOR ..........................................................................32 Appendix I-A01: Update - 21/06/06..........................................................32 Appendix I-A02: Extension Request - 22/06/06........................................38 Appendix I-A03: Extension Request - 27/09/06........................................42 ACADEMIC SUPERVISOR ......................................................................46 Appendix I-S01: Agenda - 10/05/06..........................................................46 Appendix I-S02: Supervisor’s Role Review - 10/05/06 ............................50 Appendix I-S03: Update - 08/06/06 ..........................................................54 Appendix I-S04: Update - 07/09/06 ..........................................................60 Appendix I-S05: Update - 07/10/06 ..........................................................64 Appendix I-S06: Update - 04/11/06 ..........................................................68 Appendix I-S07: Update - 21/12/06 ..........................................................72 Appendix I-S08: Update - 26/12/06 ..........................................................78

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RESOURCES .............................................................................................88 Appendix I-R01: Project Plan ...................................................................88 Appendix I-R02: Health.............................................................................92 Appendix I-R03: Computer Replacement .................................................96 Appendix I-R04: Data Sources & Access Points ....................................100 Appendix I-R05: Databases Available....................................................104 Appendix I-R06: Research Design, Methods and Logic

under the Scientific method ........................................116 SOFTWARE .............................................................................................170 Appendix I-SW01: Project Management ................................................170 Appendix I-SW02: Website Hosting – Seedwiki .....................................174 Appendix I-SW03: Brainstorming – Pantha ...........................................178 Appendix I-SW04: Knowledge Management – Dissertation..................182 Appendix I-SW05: Knowledge Management – Research.......................192 Appendix I-SW06: Internet Service Provider ........................................218 Appendix I-SW07: Messaging .................................................................222 Appendix I-SW08: Desktop Software Selected .......................................226 Appendix I-SW09: GSOMI Database Portal Activation ........................230 Appendix I-SW10: Contact Database – klickTel ....................................240 Appendix I-SW11: Statisical Management – StatPac.............................244 SPONSORSHIP .......................................................................................250 Appendix I-SS01: OPP – SWOT .............................................................250 Appendix I-SS02: OPP - Thesis Research Considerations ....................258

II LITERATURE REVIEW ........................................................................268

ARTICLES................................................................................................268 Appendix II-A01: Article Review Search Matrix ....................................268 Appendix II-A02: Final Article Selection................................................282 Appendix II-A03: Master Articles Summary...........................................286 Appendix II-A04: Master Articles Design Analysis Summary ...............288 Appendix II-A05: Articles Objectives Details.........................................290 Appendix II-A06: Articles Hypotheses Details .......................................294 Appendix II-A07: Article General Conclusions......................................298 Appendix II-A08: Articles Subsidiary Conclusions 1 & 2......................302 Appendix II-A09: Articles Subsidiary Conclusions 3 & 4......................306 Appendix II-A10: Articles General & Subsidiary

Recommendations 1 & 2.............................................310 Appendix II-A11: Articles Subsidiary Recommendations 3 & 4 ............314 Appendix II-A12: Articles Definitions.....................................................318 Appendix II-A13: Articles Suggestions 1 & 2.........................................322

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Appendix II-A14: Articles Suggestions 3 & 4.........................................326 Appendix II-A15: Articles Research Strategy Analysis ..........................330 Appendix II-A16: Articles Measurement Instruments ............................334 Appendix II-A17: Articles Research Design Analysis ............................338 Appendix II-A18: Articles Design Validity Analysis ..............................342 Appendix II-A19: Articles Limitations Analysis .....................................346 Appendix II-A20: Master Summary of Article CSF’s

& Their Ranking ........................................................350 Appendix II-A21: Master Summary of Final CSF Rankings..................352

III CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK ..........................................................356

Appendix III-01: Motivational Theory Analysis .....................................356

IV METHODOLOGY.................................................................................360

GENERAL................................................................................................360 Appendix IV-G01: Dedicated Dissertation Research Website.............360 Appendix IV-G02: Initial Questionnaire Proposed................................364 Appendix IV-G03: Target Participant Qualification Criteria ...............384 RESEARCH IMPLEMENTATION..........................................................388 Appendix IV-I01: Press Release – English – Short ...............................388 Appendix IV-I02: Press Release – English – Long.................................392 Appendix IV-I03: Press Release – German – Short ...............................398 Appendix IV-I04: Press Release – Mandarin- Short ..............................402 Appendix IV-I05: Invitation – English ....................................................406 Appendix IV-I06: Invitation – German ...................................................410 Appendix IV-I07: Questionnaire – English.............................................418 Appendix IV-I08: Questionnaire – German............................................436 Appendix IV-I09: Questionnaire – Mandarin.........................................454 Appendix IV-I10: Questionnaire – Spanish ............................................472 Appendix IV-I11: Contacts ......................................................................496 Appendix IV-I12: Respondent’s Data .....................................................498

V FINDINGS & DISCUSSION..................................................................504

GENERAL................................................................................................504 Appendix V-G01: Findings - Qualified Target Respondents .................504 Appendix V-G02: Findings - All Respondents........................................508 Appendix V-G03: Findings - German Respondents ...............................510 Appendix V-G04: Findings - Australian Respondents ...........................514 Appendix V-G05: GDP Comparison (USD)...........................................518 Appendix V-G06: GDP Comparison (PPP) ...........................................522

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LIST OF FIGURES

Figure Number Page

Chapter III: Conceptual Framework

Figure 3.1: Hierarchy of Needs Model (Abraham Maslow’s) ................................ 79 Figure 3.2: Transactional Model of Communication............................................... 83 Figure 3.3: Speech Pattern - German ......................................................................... 84 Figure 3.4: Speech Pattern - Japanese......................................................................... 84 Figure 3.5: Speech Pattern - American....................................................................... 84 Figure 3.6 : Culture Model ............................................................................................ 86

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LIST OF TABLES

Table Number Page

Chapter I: Literature review

Table 1 Existing Knowledge Evaluation Matrix (i.e. literature review search)................................................................21

Table 2 Weighted Summary List of Project Critical Success Factors .......26 Table 3 Article Objectives ...................................................................................28 Table 4 Article Objectives Summary .................................................................28 Table 5 Article Hypothesis Analysis ..................................................................30 Table 6 Criteriea Ranking – Success vs. Critical Factors ...............................32 Table 7 CSF Research Objectives ......................................................................45 Table 8 Interventional Direct Research Design Methods ............................47 Table 9 Non-interventional Direct Research Design Methods...................47 Table 10 Indirect Research Design Methods...................................................48 Table 11 Article Research Design Analysis ......................................................49 Table 12 Validation Methods..............................................................................50 Table 13 Validity Scales Applied ........................................................................51 Table 14 Article Author’s CSF Collation & Ranking .....................................52 Table 15 Validity Analysis....................................................................................54 Table 16 Un-weighted CSF Ranking .................................................................56 Table 17 Weighted CSF Ranking .......................................................................58

Chapter II: Purpose of Study

Table 18 3 Month Annualized Growth Rates..........................................................63

Chapter III: Conceptual Framework

None

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Chapter IV: Methodology Table 19 Research Responses Received Summary .......................................100 Table 20 Response Analysis – Percentage Breakdown

by Culture & Country ........................................................................103 Table 21 Response Analysis – Percentage Breakdown

by Gender & Target Participants.....................................................103 Table 22 United Nations Activity Classifications (ISIC) .............................104 Table 23 Response Analysis – Projects by Main Country,

Secondary Country & Currency Used ...........................................104 Table 24 Distribution of Data Analysis - Median .........................................105 Table 25 Distribution of Data Analysis - Statistical Deviation...................105 Table 26 Distribution of Data Analysis - Mean.............................................106 Table 27 Data Correlation Analysis – Target Participants

(i.e. senior decision makers) ..............................................................107 Table 28 Data Correlation Analysis – All Participants.................................107 Table 29 Data Correlation Analysis – German Participants .......................108 Table 30 Data Correlation Analysis – Australian Participants....................108

Chapter V: Findings & Discussion Table 31 Target Participants (i.e. senior decision makers)...........................113 Table 32 All Participants ....................................................................................113 Table 33 German Participants ..........................................................................114 Table 34 Australian Participants .......................................................................114 Table 35 Correlation Tendencies......................................................................115

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PREFACE

Much to their surprise and a little to their dismay I believe, the leaders of many

western economies over the last 5 years have been rudely and unforgivingly

shuffled into the 21st century by those not so little men from the “east”,

international competition. Those small backwater economies that once were the

pride of many one time colonial nations have been quietly developing at an

exponential rate right under their noses and nobody even noticed. The end result

is that the West finds itself floundering in search of both strategy and direction.

“Made in” somewhere doesn’t cut the mustard anymore because it is now “made

cheaper and at much the same quality” in the east.

With this in mind there has been a natural tendency, but not any real movement

as yet, for the West to “find” it’ s comparative advantage (assuming that it can

remember what it was). This tendency has produced a refreshed focus on

shareholder “ROI” and that thought alone sends shudders down the spines of

many of the worlds largest undertakings, both private and even more shockingly,

governmental.

ROI, in turn, has in turn identified that the natural synergy that results from

working with the East and not against it might be easier and more productive for

everyone concerned. That, of course, probably means doing more things, more

efficiently in more countries apart from your own.

A clear understanding and implementation of all of the factors involved in

bringing projects, particularly international projects, to successful fruition is one

of the ways in which the West is regaining it’ s feet in this maze of change that it

currently finds itself thrust into.

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The author wishes to express sincere appreciation to Professor Dr. T. M.

Kuehlmann, Chair of Human Resource Management & Leadership - Bayreuth

University, and Professor Dr. Werner Fees, Academic Director - Georg Simon

Ohm University of Applied Science, for their assistance in the preparation of this

manuscript.

A special thanks to:

• Ms. Emily Slate, M.A. (Psychology) – Siemens and

• Dr. DeChange, International Project Manager - Ericsson

whose familiarity with the needs and ideas of the class were helpful during

the early programming phase of this undertaking.

and also to:

• Ms. Jian Wu, International Project Manager, MGB Techbelt

Innovations

• Ms. Ying Wang, International Interpreter. Bayreuth University and

• Ms. Tania Gornik, International Interpreter

for their support, particularly with the German, Mandarin and Spanish versions

of the research questionnaires and respective correspondence.

12

Thanks also to following organizations for their support:

• Project Management Institute (USA)

• StatPac

• Seedwiki

• Pantha and

• the members of the GSO Management Institute generally

A huge thanks to my loving partner, Dagmar Rueter, and my close friends and

family whose eternal support and inspiration helped me to bring this work to

completion.

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ABSTRACT

This dissertation focus on the identifying the key factors required to design,

implement and successfully manage international business projects. The

dissertations contain both a literature review and descriptive research. The

literature review was ultimately based on 12 focused articles that were selected

from over 144 identified as potentially relevant via internet. The review produced

a list of 28 variables that the authors, in summary, identified as being critical

success factors for projects.

Of these, the most highly ranked was “human interactions or motivations and

decision making practices” which was held by some authors to be responsible for

up to 47% of the success or failure of projects generally. This result, in

combination with the recommendations of the authors, was then used as the

foundation for descriptive research. A research strategy, design and

implementation were executed across a purpose built research website that was

made internationally available.

Over 200 potential participants and organizations were invited to participate in a

combined demographic and psychographics personality traits questionnaire that

was based on the “Big 5” factor analysis. The results were indicated the nature of

“senior decision makers” involved in international projects and drew

comparisons with the wider business community at large. This research, in

combination with other existing research of a similar nature worldwide,

contributes to an initial basis for more substantial future research with a view to

optimizing international project success rates.

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INTRODUCTION

This dissertation contributes to existing research that is currently focused on what

it is that makes international projects “tick” successfully and how such “ticking”

can be optimized for it’ s stakeholders. Interestingly, it turned up a few surprises

that lead to some unexpected insights into what’s in the international projects

black box and how to get it right in the future.

The dissertation is both orientations:

• theoretical - a critical examination of the international project

management topic and also

• research – an exploratory examination of the quality of human

interactions or motivation and decision-making practices with a particular

focus on “senior decision makers”.

The classic scientific method approach1 has been used throughout the

dissertation in an attempt to establish what the key factors are that are required to

design, implement and successfully international business projects.

An initial review of the current status quo on project management success factors

identified 28 factors that were considered essential. The most highly ranked of

these, “human” factors, was then researched to contribute to the topic and

hopefully add to the international project management body of knowledge.

1 See Appendix I-R05 Design, Implementation and Logic under the Scientific Method

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CHAPTER I: LITERATURE REVIEW

19

S t a t e m e n t o f I s s u e

The overall objective is to identify and “explore, in depth, an area of study which

is of interest and relevance to your career path”2. With this in mind the issue

required a thorough consideration of all GSO-MI requirements as outlined in

Appendices I-G01: Dissertation Guideline and I-G02 Dissertation Presentation

and I-G03 Dissertation Proposal Submission. Regular contact3 with my

supervising professor, Prof. Dr. T. M. Kuehlmann and the Management Institute

was naturally essential to continually refocus on the issue selected and to manage

the resources4 available to achieve the dissertation objectives selected.

2 See Appendix I-G03: GSO-MI Dissertation Presentation

3 See Appendices I-A01 to I-A03 re GSO-MI correspondence and I-S01 to I-S08 re correspondence with Prof. Dr. T.M. Kuehlmann

4 MS Project, Appendix I-SW01, was used to implement the dissertations project plan, see Appendix I-R01. An important resource complimenting this was naturally my health, the management of which can be seen in Appendix I-R02.

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E v i d e n c e R e v i e w

o review the international information sources available for this topic

(see Appendix I-R05: Databases Available) it was important to establish direct

access to the Georg Simon Ohm Management Institute’s (GSO-MI’s) electronic

data sources (see Appendix I-SW09: GSOMI Database Portal Activation). The

GSO’s Library is only one of many access points available worldwide (see

Appendix I-R04: Database Sources & Access Points Available).

Each data source, however, requires payment in the form of a subscription fee

and each organization’s managers subscribes only to the sources that they feel are

relevant. As with all organizations, the GSO subscribes to a comprehensive yet

limited number of data sources.

The data source selection available to GSO-MI participants is, therefore, also

limited. From the selection available, however, the Elsevier information

provider, particularly the Science Direct5 web delivery systems, was found to be

an excellent and directly relevant source.

A number of searches were made in Science Direct under the following range of

themes (see Table 1: Existing Knowledge Research Matrix) as follows:

A. CSF’s & Project Management

B. CSF's & Project Mgt - Personality & Management and

C. CSF's & Project Mgt - Personality & Management – Assessment

5 n.b. Science Direct accesses over one quarter of the western world’s literature on scientific, medical and

technical data and can be found at http://www.info.sciencedirect.com/

21

Within each of these themes a sequence of systematic searches was made.

Each search typically consisted of a combination of phrases such as “critical

success factor” vs. “project management”, however, some particularly wide

searches were carried out using single phrases only such as “critical success

factor” alone.

The criteria for the searches was as follows (see Appendix: II-A01: Article Review

Search Matrix for a detailed overview):

Table 1 Existing Knowledge Evaluation Matrix (i.e. literature review search)

22

The junction between the vertical and horizontal axis for each table above shows

the number of results found that included both phrases e.g. “critical success

factor” vs. “project management” returned 51 new articles that were not

duplicate articles found in other searches.

In addition, the values highlighted in light yellow show the search-subtotals for

each phase used e.g. “critical success factors” appeared in 58 articles, “project

management” appeared in 51 articles overall and, in this case, all 51 articles

contained both phrases simultaneously (i.e. 7 articles contained the phrase

“critical success factor” but did not include the word “project management”).

23

A total of 144 new non-duplicate articles were found (see the bolded framed

yellow highlight box at the bottom of the Table 1 p.22). All of these articles may

have been potentially relevant to the research, however; only 81 were available in

this case i.e. available to the GSO based on its subscription structure.

The details of the 81 articles were downloaded from the Science Direct database

(i.e. exported) and transferred (i.e. imported) into the EndNote 6.06 citation

management system for further analysis and review (see Appendix I-SW08:

Desktop Software Selected for more details re EndNote). On closer review, 33 of

the 81 articles were actually found to be relevant and of these only 12 provided

substantial contributions to the issues being investigated.

6 See http://www.endnote.com/

25

E v i d e n c e I n t e r p r e t a t i o n

Interpretation Summary

he 12 articles (see Appendix II-A02: Final Article Selection) eventually

selected in the literature review were collated and summarized in a table for

analysis purposes (see Appendix II-A03: Master Articles Summary). The goal of

the data analysis was to identify a topic, or topics, that would form the basis of

this dissertation.

With this in mind, the research strategy was to form a summary list of CSF’s

(SLCSF) based on the conclusions drawn by each of the respective article

contributors. The most important CSF identified on that list would automatically

be the dissertation topic.

The SLCSF was created in three (3) stages:

• Stage I - Summarizing the articles.

o Stage IA: Summarizing the articles contents

o Stage IB: Weighting the quality of research applied by the

respective authors in coming to their conclusions (i.e. the articles

individual validity).

• Stage II - Identifying each author’s priority for each of their cited CSF’s

• Stage III, applying the research quality weights to each authors prioritized

CSF list.

26

The end result was a list of CSF’s that were

effectively ranked in accordance with the

opinions and research quality of all article

authors as a whole (see the final summary list

of CSF’s resulting from the literature review

process overall can be seen here on the left).

The literature review process in detail forms

the remainder of this chapter (i.e. Chapter 1:

Literature Review) and includes a detailed

review of:

Stages I - article summary

Stage II - CSF rankings and

Stage III - CSF research quality

weighting.

Table 2 Weighted Summary List of Project Critical Success Factors (i.e. identified independent project success/failure variables)

27

The Evidence Interpretation Process in Detail:

Stage I - Summarizing the Articles.

ach article was summarized individually based on the following criteria,

their:

• objectives • hypothesis, if stated, • conclusions drawn • recommendations • definitions & resources used and any • further suggestions that they made.

n.b. The analysis presented on the following pages is a collection of extracts (i.e.

pieces) taken from a single spreadsheet that can be seen in Appendix II-A04:

Master Article Design Analysis Summary.

STAGE IA: SUMMARIZING THE ARTICLES CONTENTS

Literature Review – Article Objectives Summary:

Eight (8) of the authors had only one objective, however, four (4) authors each

had two (2) or more stated objectives for their research7.

Table 3 “Article Objectives”(see next page), shows a breakdown of the various

author’s objectives.

7 See Appendix II-A05: Article Objectives Details

28

All of the objectives were project related and 40% of these addressed the issue of CSF’s as a whole (i.e. an attainable list of influencing factors). 55% of the remaining objectives focused on one specific CSF that they believed was, or could, have a primary influence on the success or failure of projects.

The last five percent (5%) of objectives focused on establishing or interpreting an overall understanding (i.e. framework) of how CSF’s function or the limits of such systems.

Table 3 Article Objectives

To summarize, the objectives fell into one of four groups (see Table 4 below):

Table 4 Article Objectives Summary

29

Literature Review – Article Hypotheses Summary:

Hypotheses Formulation

Each of the objectives typically gave rise to one or more corresponding

hypotheses (see Appendix II-A06 Article Hypotheses Details for more details).

The hypotheses are formal statements of the author’s beliefs that have been

prepared for scientific testing and as such repeat the objectives above.

Its important to recognize that each hypothesis is expressed in both the positive

(H0) and negative (H1) form for testing purposes i.e. a possible influence or

“variable” may theoretically cause the effect being tested or not.

In reality, however, the testing can only show that a variable either:

• does not cause a particular effect

• supports the possibility that it may cause an effect or

• that the evidence is inadequate in indicating either of the above

No amount of testing can prove, without revocation i.e. 100%, that a particular

variable actually caused a particular effect. It can only continue to indicate that it

may cause such an effect.

30

Hypotheses Testing:

Somewhat more important than the hypotheses themselves are the results of the

testing (see Table 5 below). Approximately one-third (1/3) of all hypotheses were

supported or, better put, approximately two-thirds (2/3) of the influences

believed to effect the success or failure of projects in the articles were found

either:

• not to do so (i.e. H1 prevailed) or

• the article simply did not show any test results at all.

Table 5 Article Hypothesis Analyses

Supported Hypotheses Focusing on the one-third of hypotheses (i.e. 7 from 21) that were supported (see

Appendix II-A06: Article Hypotheses Details and Appendices II-A07, -A08 & -

A09 re Articles Conclusion Details), the evidence shows that the following

variables may significantly influence project success or failures:

31

I. The CSF’s in priority order are:

i. The availability of resources

ii. Top management support

iii. Project managers performance (i.e. skill level)

iv. Client consultation and

v. The early development of sound preliminary estimates (e.g. cost)

II. Thee impact of HR department is not typically significant in

effecting the success or failure of a project, however,

i. effected by the four project life cycle stages

ii. Project structure has a moderating effect

iii. Project activity sectors will have a moderating effect

III. People are the main CSF and that

IV. The importance of the following dimensions varies according to

time and the level of technological uncertainty:

i. project efficiency,

ii. impact on the customer

iii. direct business and organizational success

iv. preparing for the future

In addition, an overall factor that was also supported with testing was the fact

that project success factors are not universal i.e. what makes one project a success

might not necessarily make another project a success.

32

This was clearly demonstrated in the article by Belassi & Tukel8, however, they

also gave a cross industry, statistically representative overview of the CSF

priorities across a range of industries which can be seen in Table 6 (below). Note

that the last two (2) lines have been added to Belassi & Tukel’s table for analysis

purposes. The last line shows that “Available Resources” and “Top Management

Support” form the first and second priorities respectively, across a relatively wide

industry sample tested, from a list of five variables cited by participants in the

study.

Table 6 Criteria Ranking – Success vs. Critical Factors

Rejected Hypothesis

Human resources department’s apparent failure generally to contribute to project

success were reconfirmed by an enthusiastic researcher who seemed to

enthusiastically support the HR. This is both surprising and encouraging.

Given the traditional role of HR in many organizations it’s surprising that it does

not significantly contribute to project success. It’s encouraging in another sense

because it supports the current trend towards “flat” organizations, which is

believed to improve productivity.

8 Belassi, W. and O. I. Tukel (1996) "A new framework for determining critical success/failure factors in projects." International Journal of Project Management 14(3): 141-151.

33

Potential Variables (i.e. Neither Rejected nor Supported)

The remaining variables are believed by the authors to be CSF’s and may well be

so, however, no evidence was tabled in their article(s). This does not mean that

the authors did not carry out scientific research. It does mean that if they carried

it out then they may simply not have included their evidence in their article.

In this sense these are potential variables or opinions without scientific backing.

In the opinion of the some article authors the following are believed to

contribute to project success or failure (repeated factors have been removed for

the sake of clarity):

• Project On-time factors:

o Adequacy of company-wide education on the concepts of risk

management.

o Maturity of an organization’s processes for assigning ownership of

risks.

o Adequacy with which a visible risk register is maintained.

o Adequacy of an up-to-date risk management plan.

o Adequacy of documentation of organizational responsibilities on

the project.

o Keep project (or project stage duration) as far below 3 years as

possible (1 year is better). On the other hand, those that correlate

to on-cost performance are:

o Allow changes to scope only through a mature scope change

control process.

o Maintain the integrity of the performance measurement baseline.

34

• Project on-cost factors:

o F9 The existence of an effective benefits delivery and

management process that involves the mutual

o Co-operation of project management and line

o management functions.

• Consistent Project Success:

o F10 Portfolio- and program management practices that allow the

enterprise to resource fully a suite of projects that are thoughtfully

and dynamically matched to the corporate strategy and business

objectives.

o F11 A suite of project, program and portfolio metrics that

provides direct ‘‘line of sight’’ feedback on current project

performance, and anticipated future success, so that project,

portfolio and corporate decisions can be aligned.

o F12 An effective means of ‘‘learning from experience’’ on

projects, that combines explicit knowledge with tacit knowledge in

a way that encourages people to learn and to embed that learning

into continuous improvement of project management processes

and practices.

• Virtual team challenge Critical success factors for effective global virtual

teams

o Communication

Emphasize continuous communication Set meeting schedules and rules of engagement Conduct periodic face-to-face meetings Engage in team building activities at onset of virtual team

creation

35

o Culture

Instill a sense of cultural awareness Create teams from complementary cultures

o Technology

Utilize multiple computer mediated communications system (CMCS)

Train team members in the use of various CMCS Ensure infrastructure compatibility among geographic

locations Assess political and economic barriers to international

telecommunications

o Project management (leadership)

Set clear team goals and provide continuous performance feedback

Build team cohesiveness Express flexibility and empathy towards virtual team

members Exhibit cultural awareness

• Having clear and realistic goals

• Producing an efficient plan

• That a model known as the “Formal System Model” can improve the application of CSF’s

• That a model known as the “Factor Grouping Model” helps project participants to understand the overlooked dimensions of project success.

36

Literature Review – Article Recommendations Summary:

The following summary recommendations were based on the conclusions drawn

from the hypotheses testing (see Appendices AN & AO: Literature Review –

Recommendations Summaries).

In short:

o CSF’s are relatively unique to each project

o Participant motivation is a CSF. Without it, projects will fail.

o Project managers are the new strategic leaders

o HR is not a CSF i.e. it does not contribute to specific projects

o Existing CSF models don’t consider all influences

A detailed analysis follows:

Based on Supported Hypotheses

• Dvir, D., S. Lipovetsky recommends “project managers must identify

those factors that are critical to their specific project". These types of

findings suggest that some variables are more potent than others in

predicting project success and that the distribution of project success

factors is anything but uniform”9.

9 Dvir, D., S. Lipovetsky, et al. (1998). "In search of project classification: a non-universal approach to project success factors." Research Policy 27(9): 915-935. Pg. 932

37

o “Design considerations seem to have a great impact on almost all classes of projects, except for HW feasibility studies” 10

o The search for a universal theory may be inappropriate given the fundamental differences that exist across projects and innovations Dewar and Dutton, 1986; Pinto and Covin, 1989; Damanpour, 1991; Shenhar, 1993; Shenhar and Dvir, 1996.11

• Lechter T.12 suggested, “that right before the beginning of a project, the

course should be set. In cases where no adequate team is available, or the

project management has no personal interest in the project, it makes more

sense to move the project start to a later time point. Otherwise probability

of failure is too high.” and

• Shenhar, A. J. suggests, “project managers are the new strategic leaders,

who must take on total responsibility for project business results”. 13

10 Dvir, D., S. Lipovetsky, et al. (1998). "In search of project classification: a non-universal approach to project success factors." Research Policy 27(9): 915-935. Pg. 932 11 Dvir, D., S. Lipovetsky, et al. (1998). "In search of project classification: a non-universal approach to project success factors." Research Policy 27(9): 915-935. Pg. 915 12 Lechler, T. (2000). "When it comes to Project Management, it's the People that matter." Projects as Business Constituents and Guiding Motives. 13 Shenhar, A. J., D. Dvir, et al. (2001). "Project Success: A Multidimensional Strategic Concept."

38

Based on the Rejected Hypotheses

• Belout, A. and C. Gauvreau recommend that “It is thus difficult to

establish a direct link between an HR department’s actions and tangible

results, in terms of their impact on a specific program or project [33,34]” 14:

o “This type of personnel management, which is based on the

Charter of Responsibilities in project management, is certainly

recognized as a key to success in this activity sector. From this

perspective, the results of our study give rise to questions about

the importance of traditional HRM practices in a project-based

context and the way they should be measured. Should we perhaps

consider using specific indicators which are adapted to HR

practices during the different stages of a project’s life cycle?” 15

o “...it is understood that top management support is a necessary condition for carrying on with subsequent operations in terms of the operating means to be implemented....It was found that Client Acceptance was an explanatory factor of success in the planning and execution stages of the project. This result confirms the importance of management approaches in which the client is at the centre of the organizational dynamic [35]. The Trouble-shooting variable was identified as the second factor that explains project success in the execution stage. When problems occur while the project is being executed, it is important that the project team rapidly identifies the source and extent of the trouble and solves it. This demonstrates that it is important, to a certain degree, to have an adapted and flexible workforce and environment which can react rapidly and effectively to the problems that arise.”16

14 Belout, A. and C. Gauvreau (2004). "Factors influencing project success: the impact of human resource management." International Journal of Project Management 22(1): 1-11. 15 Belout, A. and C. Gauvreau (2004). "Factors influencing project success: the impact of human resource management." International Journal of Project Management 22(1): 1-11. 16 Belout, A. and C. Gauvreau (2004). "Factors influencing project success: the impact of human resource management." International Journal of Project Management 22(1): 1-11.

39

Based on Opinion

(i.e. neither supported nor rejected – evidence lacking)

Fortune, J. and D. White17 recommend that:

• “Be aware that the CSF approach has reservations“

• “Use of the FSM to overcome the CSF Approach reservations”

• “Recommends a systems model as a framing device (FMS)” 18

Literature Review – Article Definitions Summary

Relatively few definitions were offered throughout the articles (see Appendix II-

A12: Article Definitions). This is seen as a flaw in the research because, in this

sense, the researchers in this area are using no common foundation.

The definitions that were offered, however, were important and were definitions

for:

o critical success factors (CSFs) o project success o project management success o success criteria and o Power

See the glossary at the end of this document for the summary definition details.

17 Fortune, J. and D. White (2006). "Framing of project critical success factors by a systems model." International Journal of Project Management 24(1): 53-65. 18 Fortune, J. and D. White (2006). "Framing of project critical success factors by a systems model." International Journal of Project Management 24(1): 53-65.

40

Literature Review – Article Recommendations & Suggestions Summary

Recommendations Suggestions made by the article authors (see Appendices II-

A13 and -A14: Article Suggestions) are clearly good potential topics for future

research where the research carried out by those authors was scientifically sound.

In essence the areas for future research focuses suggested were on:

o human aspects of encouragement in teamwork, increased abilities, and

motivation

o HR as a CSF:

o success from alternative stakeholder perspectives

o the impact of specific CSF’s should be retested considering

moderating effects

o why client needs in the IT sector don not appear to effect project

success

o overall further re-testing of the impact of HR

o individual project CSF’s vs. the belief that common CSF’s exist

o further CSF model development and refinement.

The “human aspects” matched with the end results of the literature review i.e.

Table 1.2 Weighted Summary List of Project Critical Success Factors. The highest

ranked priority was “The quality of their human interactions or motivation and

decision-making practices” as both the end result and this suggestion formed the

basis of selecting this as the dissertation topic.

41

Suggestions from Authors with Supported Hypotheses With regard to human aspects:

“The results on hand clearly indicate that future discussion about successful project management should focus on the human aspects. The questions must shift from which tools should be used or which way of managing projects guarantees success. The uncertainty of projects sets limits to these influences. More relevant questions about how the conditions of a project have to be designed and which actions have to be taken to encourage teamwork, increased abilities, and motivation of the collaborators need to be addressed.” 19

With regard to the HR as a CSF:

o Re hypothesis 4.2 “They should also measure project success from three viewpoints: sponsor’s view, project manager’s view and sponsor as project manager’s view [4,36].” 20

o Re hypothesis 4.3 “It is recommended that future studies measure the

impact of Project Implementation Factors (PIP i.e. potential CSF’s) factors (independent variables) while taking into account the combined effect of moderating factors on the project success variable.” 13 quoting [3]

o Re hypothesis 4.4 “We believe that more in-depth research should be conducted in order to understand why, in the information technology sector, client needs are not correlated with project success. We might find out that in certain activity sectors—such as information technology, and research and development— client needs are considered and expressed in a different way (found, for example, mainly at the beginning of the contract and based on more standardized norms).” 13

19 Lechler, T. (2000). "When it comes to Project Management, it's the People that matter." Projects as Business Constituents and Guiding Motives. Pg. 11 & 12 20 Belout, A. and C. Gauvreau (2004). "Factors influencing project success: the impact of human resource management." International Journal of Project Management 22(1): 1-11. Pg. 10 quoting [3] Pinto JK, Prescott JE. Variations in critical success factors over the stages in the project life cycle. Journal of Management 1988; 14(1):5–18.

42

Further along the lines of alternative perspectives:

o “Additional studies are needed to further establish the validity of the multi-dimensional concept, and to address additional questions. For example, as we know, success of a project means different things to different people, and so the point of view of the assessor should also be a variable for additional studies.” 21

o “project-specific approach is appropriate for subsequent research into the

practice and theory of project management.” 22 Suggestions from Authors with Rejected Hypotheses

o “Future research should concentrate on overcoming some of the

shortcomings of the PIP instrument and continuing to build the theoretical foundations related to this topic.” 23

Opinions (i.e. neither supported nor rejected)

o “Future research is needed to identify those factors that lead to the adoption and diffusion of technology in virtual team environments.” 24

o “A second research issue has to do with the effect of culture on virtual

team communication patterns and effectiveness.” 17

o “Another issue has to do with team member performance evaluation. Under most conditions, virtual team leaders will be in a position to evaluate other virtual team members even though in a matrix structure they might not have reward power.” 17

21 Shenhar, A. J., D. Dvir, et al. (2001). "Project Success: A Multidimensional Strategic Concept." Long Range Planning 34(6): 699-725.Pg. 699 22 Dvir, D., S. Lipovetsky, et al. (1998). "In search of project classification: a non-universal approach to project success factors." Research Policy 27(9): 915-935. Pg. 933 23 Belout, A. and C. Gauvreau (2004). "Factors influencing project success: the impact of human resource management." International Journal of Project Management 22(1): 1-11. 24 Kayworth, T. and D. Leidner (2000). "The global virtual manager: a prescription for success." European Management Journal 18(2): 183-194.

43

STAGE IB: WEIGHTING THE RESEARCH DESIGN QUALITY

THE VALIDITY WEIGHTING FACTOR:

Overview

Given the variety of research methods used by the various article authors in the

literature review, a weighted validity factor was applied to each of their findings.

The weighting was established based on further research into the topic of

research design (see Appendix I-R06: Scientific Knowledge Generation). The

analysis results were limited to, and by, the information provided in each of the

articles.

The validity factor was seen a paramount in the literature evaluation process and

resulted from an analysis of each authors:

• research strategy • research design and • validity (i.e. limitations)

Literature Review – Article Strategies:

It was assumed that each author was using the scientific method 25 and that

within its limits26 each had a clear understanding of their respective research

objectives and research designs options27 available to them before they had

selected their specific research strategy. Most article authors did not directly

identify their strategy so an overview and evaluation (i.e. weighting) of their

respective research design components led to an overall evaluation of their

respective strategies. A summary of the research strategies can be seen in

Appendix II-A15.

25 David G.V. Ray “Knowledge Generation – Research Design, Methods and Logic within the Scientific Method” Appendix I-R06, 8 “Scientific Method Overview Flowchart” n.b. that all tables in this document connect back to and are extensions of this single flowchart. 26 Ditto - Appendix I-R06, 3-4 see “Subject Nature and Existing Scientific Limitations” plus “Understanding

and Application of the Knowledge Gathering Proceess”

44

Literature Review – Article’s Research Designs:

The research design used should be based on both the nature of the subject being

studied (i.e. is it possible to test it) and the resources available to do so (i.e. the

number of people available, the time constraints, access to data sources, etc).

Each articles design was initially analyzed to identify whether a particular author

considered the topic to be:

• Exploratory 28

• Non-science 18 or

• Scientific 18

The exploratory and scientific alternatives 29 were analyzed but the non-scientific

were not. A detailed analysis was then formed by extending the initial article

summary table created in Stage IA above (see the overview in Appendix II-A17:

Research Article Design Analysis).

Reading the table from left to right, the articles identification reference number

appears in the first column (as listed in Appendix II-A02: Final Article Selection).

27 Ditto - Appendix I-R06, 6 “What are the Various Research Designs Available?” 28 Ditto - Appendix I-R06, 9 see the “Research Design Overview Flowchart” 29 Ditto - Appendix I-R06, Exploratory Research was reviewed against the flowchart on page 18 “Exploratory

Research Design Processes“ and scientific research against page 19 “Scientific Research Design Selection Process” which leads to pages 27 & 26 for non-experimental or 21 where it was research of an experimental nature.

45

Each author’s research

objectives appear in the second

column under the heading

“CSF’s”. Directly under his

header are the sub-headings

(shown left in Table 7). These

broadly categorize the

objectives of each article

researcher as follows:

• “ID” represents all articles that sought to identify a single list of generally

applicable CSF’s.

• “PM” articles focused on identifying project management CSF’s

• “Pi” articles focused on the CSF’s specific to individual projects

• “Pc” articles focused on CSF’s related to consistently successful projects

and

• “Imp” articles focused on the implications of CSF’s on projects generally.

The “Research Design” column in the table is wide and covers the two essential

design approaches available i.e. direct vs. indirect research. Direct research is

applied where subject in question is studied using primary data vs. indirect

research based on secondary data sources.

The “Direct/Applied Research” heading breaks down into “Interventional” or

“Non-interventional” based on whether actual testing of the subject is believed to

effect the results or otherwise. Where not then tests should be carried out and

vice versa (i.e. without testing means that the subjects were simply observed).

Table 7 CSF Research Objectives

46

“Indirect” research is typically carried out where “direct” alternatives are not

available or where the research is “exploratory” in nature and combines a variety

of secondary data sources.

Under this level of the table (i.e. at the Pre/Quasi/Experimental, Descriptive,

Analytic, Content, Combined Info.) each research design has its own specific

research methods. These can be seen as the dotted line boxed alternative forming

the last row in the table’s heading box. The “legend” or “key” to identify each of

these is as follows.

Based on the ability to control the variable being tested in a specific situation or

otherwise “Direct/Applied Interventional” research further sub-divides into:

• Experimental

o Experimental research20 or

• Non-experimental designs

o Pre-experimental 30

o Quasi-experimental 20

Each of the alternative research designs available for these three sub-headings

were analyzed against the alternative designs available as shown below in Table 8:

30 David G.V. Ray “Knowledge Generation – Research Design, Methods and Logic within the Scientific Method” Appendix I-R06, 21 see the “Interventional Research Design” which leads to 22 “Qausi-experimental

Designs” and 23 “Experimental Research Designs”

47

Table 8 Interventional Direct Research Design Methods

Non-interventional direct research designs31 & 32 (see Table 9 below) were used

where it was felt that the actual testing (i.e. experiment) process itself would

influence the results. If this is the case then, no experiment should be carried out

and alternatively the subject could be observed.

Where only

31 David G.V. Ray “Knowledge Generation – Research Design, Methods and Logic within the Scientific Method” Appendix I-R06, page 26 “Design Non-interventional Research”

32 It’s worth noting that non-interventional direct research appears similar to indirect research in some respects because it is often a study of large volumes of existing data e.g. statistics, etc. , however, it is a study of primary data not secondary sources (i.e. not a study of someone’s opinion of data they collected but of the actual data they collected).

Table 9 Non-interventional Direct Research Design Methods

48

one group that contained the subject being studied could be found then a

“descriptive” design was used (see Table 10 below), where two or more groups

could be found then an analytic or “artificial” design was used as shown. The last

main column was used to analyze indirect research designs 33.

These designs use secondary data sources and typically focus on either combining

and analyzing existing data to “explore” new connections that were not

previously made or because no other data sources are currently available or both.

As can be seen from Appendix II-A15: Articles Research Strategy Analysis, the

design of the articles was typically difficult or impossible to evaluate because the

article authors often gave little or no details of the measurement instrument(s)

selected or specifics as to how it they were applied (see Appendix II-A14 Articles

Measurement Instruments).

33 David G.V. Ray “Knowledge Generation – Research Design, Methods and Logic within the Scientific Method” Appendix I-R06, 21 see the “Interventional Research Design” which leads to 22 “Qausi-experimental

Designs” and 23 “Experimental Research Designs”

Table 10 Indirect Research Design Methods

49

For those that did then the final article

design analysis is shown here in Table

11 (below). From a design strategy

perspective, half (i.e. 48%) of the

designs were not based on primary data

sources, which indicated that this area

of research is either „exploratory“,

difficult to quantify, or both. 52% of

designs were direct and 63% of these

(i.e. 33% of all) were interventional

which indicates that of those that had

access to primary data sources or had

specific variables that they wanted to

test there was a general belief that the subjects could be tested without

influencing the results.

To a large degree, the research strategies and corresponding research designs

selected are subjective. However, the validly of those strategies and designs with

respect to how they were translated into effect is not. A validity weighting for

each article was created based on its design validity for use in Stage III.

Table 11 Article Research Design Analysis

50

Literature Review – Article Validity: Validity testing was applied to each article 34. The validity was tested on four

levels:

• Internal 35

• External 36

• Construct 37 and

• Statistical 38

As with the research design methods, each validation test had its own specific

range of research methods as show below (see Table 12 below) and also

Appendix I-R05: Research design, methods and Logic under the Scientific

Method (see the references below for details):

Table 12 Validation Methods

34 David G.V. Ray “Knowledge Generation – Research Design, Methods and Logic within the Scientific Method” Appendix I-R06, p. 37 “Research Design Validation Testing” flowchart

35 Appendix I-R06, p. 39 & 40 “External Validity” 36 Appendix I-R06, p. 38 “Internal Validity” 37 Appendix I-R06, p. 41 “Construct Validity” 38 Appendix I-R06, p. 42 “Statistical Validity”

51

External and construct validation was possible to some extent; however, internal

and statistical validation was not possible because no access to the data sources

was given. The scales shown below in Table 13 were applied:

to weight each element analyzed in each article. The final weights for each article

appear in the last column of Appendix II-A18: Articles Design Validity Analysis.

Literature Review – Article Limitations Recognized:

The limitations of each article were also considered when creating the design

validation weightings (see Appendix II-A19: Article Limitations). Only one (1)

author identified limits in their study i.e. the author for Article 3 39.

Stage II - Author’s CSF Priority & Ranking

Each author’s individual ranking of each of the CSF’s that they had cited was

listed in a table. Twenty-eight (28) potential CSF’s were found to exist after all

CSF’s had been analyzed and summarized. The resulting master list of potential

CSF’s can be seen in Appendix II-A21: Master Summary of Article CSF

Rankings.

39 Kayworth, T. and D. Leidner (2000). "The global virtual manager: a prescription for success." European Management Journal 18(2): 183-194.

Table 13 Validity Scales Applied

52

Each author’s priority for each CSF was noted, if they had one. For examples, see

the extract of that Appendix II-A21 in Table 14 (below). On the left hand side is

the list of potential CSF’s(i.e. variables) and in the green rings are the rankings

that the author of article 1 gave to those particular CSF’s. This author ranked

“The quality of human interactions” as the 1st on their list, and “Good

communications “ as 2nd.

Table 14 Article Author’s CSF Collation & Ranking

53

Stage III – Summary CSF List Collation and Ranking

With the article summary, corresponding research design weighting and the

respective authors CSF priority listing completed, each CSF in each authors

prioritized CSF list was then multiplied by their respective research validity

weighting (i.e. validity factor) created in Stage I – B (see above and also Appendix

II-A18: Article Design Validity Analysis).

All 12 weighted rankings for each CSF were then added together to give a

summary value for that CSF alone. This process was repeated for all CSF’s cited

by each author in all of the articles. The individual ranking for each author’s CSF

was the result of the:

n.b. For calculation purposes the author’s CSF ranking was scaled (shown as the

green boxes in Table 15 on the next page). A greater weight was given to the

most important CSF s e.g. where an author’s CSF priority above was 1 then it

was given a value of 28. Where the CSF priority was 4 then it was given a value of

25, etc. The pink boxes are the author’s research quality weight.

The master CSF Priority & Weighting can be seen in see Appendix II-A21:

Master CSF Priority & Ranking Summary. The final result is the weighted

summary list of CSF in the opinion of the article authors as seen in Table 2 and

also Table 17: Weighted Priority Summary List of Project Critical Success Factors

(p. 25 and 56 respectively i.e. they are same table reproduced at different locations

within the dissertation for convenience).

54

Table 15 Validity Analyses

55

R e s e a r c h T o p i c S e l e c t i o n

ased on the scientific method approach, the dissertation research topic

selected was based on:

• suggestions by authors on areas for future research40 and

• the overall results of the literature review analysis (i.e. “human aspects”

ranked highest in weighted summary list of CSF’s)

Lechler, T.41, suggested that future research should “focus on the human aspects”

after supporting his hypothesis that “people, from the eight factors identified, are

the main CSF on project success”.

The literature review analysis produced a ranked list of 28 CSF’s, according to

article’s authors as a whole (see more detailed CSF breakdowns in Appendix II-

A21: Master Summary of Final CSF Rankings). For comparison purposes the list

was analyzed both before and after weighting. Interestingly, both lists included

“environmental influences” in their top five (5) CSF’s.

Environmental influences were considered to be issues arising due to:

• cultural differences

• the activity sector in which the project was being carried out in and

• geographically dispersed or “multi-site” projects.

This may indicate that projects are becoming increasingly intercultural, i.e.

including more international which seems intuitively sensible.

40 See Appendices II-A10 & -A11: Article General & Subsidiary Recommendations plus II-A13 & -A14

Articles Suggestions (note that the analysis tables have been split into 2 sections i.e. section 1&2 and section 3&4. These are the main and subsidiary recommendations and suggestions respectively)

41 Lechler, T. (2000). "When it comes to Project Management, it's the People that matter." Projects as Business Constituents and Guiding Motives. Pg. 11 & 12

56

The expected result of the literature review was that the summarized list of CSF’s

(i.e. SLCSF) would identify a range of specific technical issues (i.e. variables)

involved, or believed to be involved, in the successful implementation of projects

e.g. the use of technology such as project management and ERP systems.

Un-weighted Summary List of CSF’s

This was partially the case with the un-weighted summary list (see Table 16 Un-

weighted CSF Ranking below), which tended to focus on culture and control. It

identified monitoring and control, organizational adaptability and project size as

major factors. Regardless, this list still identified “environmental issues” as the

primary CSF.

Monitoring and control focused on:

• Trouble Shooting

• Control Systems

• On-site Project Manager

• Monitoring Systems

• Client acceptance

• Effective benefits delivery and management process that involves the mutual co-operation of project management and line management functions.

Organizational adaptability focused on:

• Independent variables whose impact is effected by the four project life cycle stages i.e. conceptualization, planning, execution & completion

• Task vs. Social orientation

• Participation

• Project Team

• Absence of bureaucracy and

Table 16 Un-weighted CSF Ranking

57

Project size issues focused on:

• Project Structure/Phase • Number of people involved (too many) • Types of project output (feasibility study, system improvement, etc)

Weighted Summary List of CSF’s

As can be seen in Table 17 (next page), the first three CSF’s of the weighted

SLCSF highlight a general emphasis on human elements. This emphasizes

continued to include the first seven CSF’s (i.e. over 50% of the authors emphasis

after weighting).

The quality of their human interactions/ motivation and decision-making

practices was found to be the primary CSF. It included:

• Support from Senior Management • Power • Politics i.e.

o Authority, status and Influence

o Understand and acknowledge the political nature of most organizations

o Learn to cultivate `appropriate' political tactics

o Understand and accept `What's In It For Me?'

o Try to level the playing field

o Learn the fine art of influencing

o Develop your negotiating skills

o Recognize that conflict is a natural side effect of project management

58

Good communication/ feedback focused around:

• Emphasize continuous communication

• Set meeting schedules and rules of engagement

• Conduct periodic face-to-face meetings

• Engage in team building activities at onset of virtual team creation

• Make project commitments known Good leadership

• Set clear team goals and provide continuous performance feedback

• Build team cohesiveness • Express flexibility and empathy

towards virtual team members• Exhibit cultural awareness • Goal Commitment • Organize delegate authority

• Clear Realistic Objectives

• Define Goals • Goal Changes

Environmental influences and organizational adaptability are CSF number five (5)

and six (6) and have been outlined above. User/client involvement is the seventh

(7) CSF listed and does not have any further breakdown.

Table 17 Weighted CSF Ranking

59

CHAPTER II: PURPOSE OF STUDY

61

P e r s o n a l O b j e c t i v e s

y primary personal objective for the dissertation is first and foremost to:

• Further my professional skills in the international project management

domain and therefore to

• Meet all of the requirements of the GSO-MI in gaining the MBA title

My secondary objectives are to:

• Learn more generally

• Incorporate the dissertation findings into my daily project management

productivity

• Further my business contacts worldwide

• Promote my business practice and to

• Demonstrate my capabilities, particularly my international skills

62

R e l e v a n c e t o M a n a g e m e n t

hope that the findings of this dissertation are relevant to all organizations

at all levels as a whole i.e.:

• Owners /investors and

• Management and

• Other employees and their

• Families and friends

Given that a better understanding of how each of us function as individuals can

help each of us to optimize our full synergistic potential i.e. when working with

others generally and also when focused as workgroups or teams with specific

goals i.e. as project teams.

I think that regardless of the actual relevance of this dissertations discussions and

findings, the specific motivations of each individual and their existing experience

of workgroups will determine their personal level of application in their specific

context i.e. the findings will probably be either:

• investigated further and to some degree adopted or

• rejected.

Where the focus by a particular individual, regardless of their role, rests genuinely

on the objectives of mutual productivity for mutual benefit then I believe that

they will find the results of this dissertation to be extremely relevant. Where other

motivations are held, or are held in addition to the above objectives, then the

findings could be threatening to that individuals “control” over their environment

and may well be rejected.

63

What is known is that since 1980 the

level of trans-cultural business

activity (see Table 18 below re

Annualized International Economic

Growth Rates), spurred on by the

rapid increase in regional trade

agreements43, has been increasing 44 at

a rate that has not been experienced

since the end of World War II. It

appears as if both the “sleeping

dragon” (i.e. China), and India have

very much found their feet and that

the Middle East, South American and

African blocks are not too far behind.

As demonstrated in Germany over the last six (6) years, owner/investors typically

focus on personal gains and disregard national interests where the two conflict. I

believe that this fact is relatively human, plays a major role in the increased inter-

cultural trade and will continue to do so indefinitely.

42 World Trade Organization, http://www.wto.org http://ddp-ext.worldbank.org/Charts_Ext/784f24af-5a4f-467b-9772-8cc24fbd39f7.png 43 “The vast majority of WTO members are party to one or more regional trade agreements. The surge in

RTAs has continued unabated since the early 1990s. Some 250 RTAs have been notified to the GATT/WTO up to December 2002, of which 130 were notified after January 1995. Over 170 RTAs are currently in force; an additional 70 are estimated to be operational although not yet notified. By the end of 2005, if RTAs reportedly planned or already under negotiation are concluded, the total number of RTAs in force might well approach 300.”

World Trade Organization, http://www.wto.org/english/tratop_e/region_e/region_e.htm 44 Prof. Dr. Uwe Mummert , GSO-MI, Nuremberg, Germany quoting “International Economics” Robert J. Carbaugh (2004, South-Western, Thomson Learning. 4-8 Globalization of Economic Activity

Table 1842 3 Month Annualized Growth Rates

64

The profit motivation may therefore be the overriding factor that inadvertently

circumvents even informal motivations held by individuals and eventually leads to

a genuine adoption of increased productivity through better individual

understanding as indicated in this dissertation and in other more extensive

research efforts of the same nature.

65

O r i g i n a l i t y

his dissertation concept was based purely on:

• My 25 years of business experience

• My Project management experience to date

• My further academic development via my experience with the GSO-MI

• The findings of my literature review

• The support of my academic advisor Prof. Dr. T. M. Cushman and of

course

• My curiosity

Prior to selection of the topic searches linking the “Big 5”, “IPIP “ and

“dispositional traits” against projects; value-decision making; decision-making and

groups simply returned either no results whatsoever or results that were not

accessible. This re-enforced the originality of this dissertation topic.

To the best of my knowledge, this particular concept is the culmination of all of

the above factors. The initial review of over 144 articles finally established this

dissertation topic as being currently unique in the project management domain

and all and any sources have been quoted.

66

C o n s t r a i n t s

he following constraints either existed or were discovered during the

process of completing this dissertation:

• Data sources were limited to those subscribed to by the GSO. Other

sources from existing international libraries, alumni and private data

suppliers were investigated but were prohibitively expensive.

• The research design and applications used by the respective article authors

was typically not available for evaluation.

• Computer resources were initially limited and required further financial

investment to provide resources adequate to the task.

• Time – normal work requirements naturally limited the amount of free

time that was available to invest in the dissertation

• Limited pro-active participation in the research questionnaire – some

individuals found the nature of the questionnaire invading

• Support from sponsors – academic support from some third party

organizations, such as OPP, was not forthcoming. Other’s, however, such

as the PMI (USA) were refreshingly pro-active.

67

S t a k e h o l d e r s

he stakeholders in this dissertation are:

• Myself, I have a vested interest in this project both on personal and

financial grounds

• The GSO-MI has an interest in the successful completion of competent

participants and reputation that accompanies this activity on professional

and financial grounds.

• My academic advisor, Prof. Dr. T. M. Kuehlmann, has an interest in the

academic professionalism of the dissertation produced

• Clients, my existing and future clients have a business interest in securing

advice, consultation and assistance from sources perceived to be

competent and trustworthy

• The federal states of European (i.e. Germany and Ireland) and Australia,

have an interest in the entrepreneurship potential of citizens where that

results in direct benefits for that state such as:

o additional taxable revenue streams and

o increased employment opportunities

69

CHAPTER III: CONCEPTUAL FRAMEWORK

71

C u r r e n t T h e o r y

he literature review (above) indicates that a greater emphasis on

“human” aspects of PM may be required i.e. the “Agile”45 versus the

“traditional” project management approach may optimize project success.

However, in doing so, it may also necessitate current project management

theory46 and practice to integrate and augment a deeper understanding of:

• the quality of human interactions or motivations and

• decision-making practices.

Methods available to give some insight into these areas stem logically from

psychology, specifically:

• Human resources/leadership sciences domain and

• Cross or inter-cultural communications in an international context.

PROJECT MANAGEMENT PERSPECTIVE

roject Management itself is a relatively new domain and, as such, is itself

undergoing relatively rapid development. Its recognition as a specific “science”

varies according to the culture in which you exist i.e. it varies from culture to

culture. Within the American oriented culture, where much of the PM technology

was and is developed, the 1950’s with Henry Gantt is often seen as the

foundation of current PM.

45 Specifically the process-based management form

46 Dr. DeChange International Project Management Theory, GSOMI, 2005

72

At that time Gantt applied Frederick Winslow Taylor’s47 theories of Scientific

Management48 to develop a range of project management tools and resource

allocation techniques.

The current theoretical approaches available are:

• Traditional Approach

Four (4) sequential stages and one (1) constant ongoing process are

recognized throughout the life of the project. The sequential stages are:

1. project initiation stage;

2. project planning or design stage;

3. project execution or production stage;

4. project completion stage.

and the continuous stage, i.e. that runs from inception to completion, is

the:

project monitoring and controlling systems process

This approach relies on two project scheduling models:

PERT49 – Program Evaluation and Review Technique

CPM50 – Critical Path Method

47 Frederick Winslow Taylor, M.E., Sc.D. "The Principles of Scientific Management" 1911

48 Robert Kanigel, 1999 The One Best Way: Frederick Winslow Taylor and the Enigma of Efficiency Penguin

49 Developed as part of the United States Navy's (in conjunction with the Lockheed Corporation) Polaris missile submarine program

50 Developed in a joint venture by both DuPont Corporation and Remington Rand Corporation for managing plant maintenance projects – see Robin Beaumont "Network, Gantt Charts and Critical Paths"2001

73

and were designed in a military environment for typically very large-scale,

one-time, non-routine projects.

• Agile Approach

This approach extends the traditional approach by recognizing human

collaboration as an essential part of the PM process51. It is a concept that

resulted from integration with Business Process Re-engineering (BPM) in

the 1990’s and spawned two current sub-approaches which are, the:

Critical Chain Approach

Multi-project organizations find the traditional approach cumbersome and have sought to extend their flexibility, i.e. to reduce their costs and extend the application of the traditional approach, by developing successor approaches such as:

o Extreme programming:52 & 53 Proponents argue here that ongoing changes to requirements as a natural, inescapable and desirable aspect that is more responsive to customer needs. This approach is often adopted in the IT domain.

o Scrum techniques:54 Proponents argue here that ongoing changes to requirements as a natural, inescapable and desirable aspect that is more responsive to customer needs. This approach is often adopted in the IT domain.

Process-based Management Approach

In this approach also extends the “traditional” approach by using Maturity Models55 to emphasize organizational vision. Vision defines and qualifies the projects “success” and determines the necessary strategy, structure and human resources requirements of any given project. This process has been enhanced, to some

51 The limited extent of the traditional approach’s human collaboration emphasis can be seen in the Project

Management Institutes (PMI) “Guide to the Body of Knowledge” Chapter 9, p.107

52 Kent Beck: Extreme Programming Explained: Embrace Change, Addison-Wesley, ISBN 0-201-61641-6 53 Rob Thomsett “Radical Project Management” Prentice Hall ISBN : 0-13-009486-2 2002 54 "The New Product Development Game" (Harvard Business Review, Jan-Feb 1986)

55 Maturity models such as the CMMI (Capability Maturity Model Integration) and ISO/IEC15504 (SPICE - Software Process Improvement and Capability Determination)

74

degree, by the application of the Total Quality Management methods such as “6 Sigma”56 & 57.

HUMAN RESOURCE PERSPECTIVE

Although current indications are that the HR department may often not be

particularly productive in improving project successes58 & 59, it appears that

project management has already started to dovetail into psychology as a science

i.e. the “agile” process-based management approach of project management

theory appears to stem from psychological motivational theory. The findings of

this dissertations literature review have highlighted two (2) areas within which

psychology can contribute, Human interactions or Motivation and Decision

making

Motivation vs. Personality

otivation60 is distinguished from personality by the fact that it refers to

the “to the initiation, direction, intensity and persistence of behavior” 61.

Personality refers to more or less permanent characteristics of an individual's state

of being (e.g., shy, extrovert, conscientious) and is considered “the emotions,

56 The minimization of “defects” to 0.00034% of all production i.e. defects fall outside of the six standard

deviations (sigma) zone when each item produced is plotted graphically.

57 George Ekes "Six Sigma Team Dynamics: The Elusive Key to Project Success" John Wiley & Sons, 2003 58 Slevin, D. P. and Pinto, J. K. The project implementation profile: New tool for project managers. Project Management Journal 18, 1986, 57-71. 59 Adnane Belout Effects of human resource management on project effectiveness and success: toward a new conceptual framework International Journal of Project Management Vol. 16, No. 1, pp. 21-26, 1998 60 See the glossary for an exact definition

61 Geen, 1995

75

thoughts and behavior patterns that a person has are typically referred to as a

personality”62.

Motivation is founded on the work of Abraham Maslow and his Theory of the

Hierarchy of Needs. Personality, on the other hand, is founded on the findings of

two groups studying Trait Theory, Eysenck and the Three (3) Factor form of the

theory and others such as McCrae and Costa with their the Five Factor (5) form.

62 Kassin, 2003.

76

Trait Theory63

Psychologists believe that they have identified three to five (3 – 5) key factors that

characterize an individual’s personality. The method used to do so is called

“factor analysis” and involves taking statistically representative samples,

categorizing the personality features collected and then analyzing those factors. In

this dissertation the five (5) factor or “big 5”64 were used.

The 3F model tests the traits of:

• "extraversion"

• "neuroticism" and

• "psychoticism"

While the F5 model tests:

• "extraversion"

• "neuroticism"

• ‘openness’,

• ‘conscientiousness’ and

• ‘agreeableness’.

63 See the Cross- / Inter- Cultural section in this dissertation for a detailed analysis of the results gathered

with this method

64 International Personality Item Pool, http://ipip.ori.org/

77

These are defined65 as:

• Openness to Experience - Appreciation for art, emotion, adventure, unusual ideas; imagination and curiosity.

• Conscientiousness - A tendency to show self-discipline, act dutifully, and aim for achievement (spontaneousness vs. planned behavior).

• Extraversion - Energy, surgency, and the tendency to seek stimulation and the company of others.

• Agreeableness - A tendency to be compassionate and cooperative rather than suspicious and antagonistic towards others (individualism vs. cooperative solutions).

• Neuroticism - A tendency to easily experience unpleasant emotions such as anger, anxiety, depression, or vulnerability (emotional stability to stimuli).

The weaknesses of this approach are, however, that:

• “There are no universal traits that predict leadership in all situations

• Traits predict behavior more in “weak” situations than in “strong”

• The evidence is unclear in separating cause from effect

• Traits do a better job at predicting attribution of a factor than in actually

distinguishing between effective and ineffective leaders

• Many of the effects that were related to certain leaders were quite small

and of limited practical value.

• Trait theory ignores the role of the sub-ordinate

• It is not certain whether traits make the leader or whether the leadership

role shapes the traits

• Trait theorists rarely explain how, when and why the traits they stipulate

is necessary and sufficient for the leadership process to be successful.”66

65 Oliver P. John & Sanjay Srivastava

"The Big-Five Trait Taxonomy: History, Measurement, and Theoretical Perspectives"

University of California at Berkeley, March 5, 1999

66 Prof. Dr. T. M. Kuehlmann Leadership in a Global Context” GSOMI 2005, 49.

78

Motivation

otivational psychology focuses on:

• Why human needs change (i.e. a causal/behavioral approach) and

• How human needs change (i.e. a descriptive approach of the mechanisms

involved).

These are respectively known as the theories of:

• Content and

• Process

It is believed that motivation results in particular behavior that is essentially

caused by biological factors. These factors may be either conscious or

unconscious, however, they are internal to that individual (i.e. intrinsic) and range

from low-level physiological/existence factors such as sex, safety and food to

high-level factors such as love, achievement and altruism. It is also believed that

low-level factors must be achieved before high-level factors can be activated.

It’s further believed that motivation can be influenced, but not ultimately

controlled, by external factors (i.e. extrinsic factors) such as punishment, stress,

reward and coercion. The foundations to these beliefs were laid down by

Abraham Maslow who proposed the Hierarchy of Needs Theory (see Table 3.1

below).

79

Figure 3.1: Hierarchy of Needs Model (Abraham Maslow’s)

“Maslow’s basic proposition is that people are wanting beings, they always want

more, and what they want depends on what they already have.”67 The pyramid is

built in layers with lower layers having higher priority i.e. lower layers must be

satisfied before higher layers are activated.

The Physiological Layer is the foundation upon which the others are built and

includes hunger, thirst, need for oxygen, maintaining constant body temperature,

sleep, sensory stimulation, activity and sexual desire. The Safety, Social, Esteem

and Self-actualization needs can also be seen in detail in Appendix III-01:

Motivation Analysis. As the analysis shows, Maslow’s model has been found to

be universal in its application i.e. across cultures and that the model has been

extended and refined by other contributors over time.

The table is split into two halves, intrinsic and extrinsic motivation. Intrinsic

motivation is the “ derivation of personal satisfaction through self-initiated

achievement and behavior. “68 while “extrinsic motivation“ is “the search for

satisfaction, or to avoid dissatisfaction, through non-task aspects of the

environment such as seeking comfort, safety, and security from others or through

the efforts of others.“69These are then subdivided into the “why”(i.e. Content

Theory) and “how”(i.e. Process Theory).

67 Prof. Dr. T. M. Kuehlmann Leadership in a Global Context” GSOMI 2005

68 Biology Online http://www.biology-online.org/dictionary/Intrinsic_motivation

69 Biology Online http://www.biology-online.org/dictionary/Extrinsic_motivation

80

Two-Factor Theory

Herzberg identified two sets of factors that influenced motivation. Curiously, he

felt that one set of factors would result in job satisfaction whereas the other

contributed nothing. If, however, the second factor were absent then it would

cause dissatisfaction. He referred to the factors that contributed to job

satisfaction “motivators” and the others “hygiene factors”. These can be seen to

correspond additional intrinsic and extrinsic factors that augment the Maslow

model.

Cognitive Dissonance

Suggested by Leon Festinger, this occurs when an individual experiences some

degree of mental discomfort resulting from an incompatibility between two

conflicting opinions that they hold. For example, a typical consideration in the

marketing area is client/customer’s post purchase dissonance. Consumer may

seek to reassure himself or herself regarding a purchase, feeling that another

decision may have been, in retrospect, preferable.

Alderfer’s ERG Theory

Clayton Alderfer extended Maslow's hierarchy of needs by placing the

physiological and safety into the Existence category. Love and self-esteem

needs were placed in the Relatedness category. Self-actualization and self-

esteem were also identified as being in the Growth category.

81

McClelland's Achievement Motivation Theory

McClelland’s expanded the middle levels of Maslow’s hierarchy by recognizing

that a person has need for three additional things but people differ in degree in

which the various needs influence their behavior:

• Need for achievement

• Need for power

• Need for affiliation

Goal-setting theory

Goal-setting theory was developed by Locke and is based on the concept that

some individuals have a desire to reach a particular objective and that objective

itself may become the reward. Three features affect a goal’s efficiency:

• Proximity – the time between initiation and attainment should not be

perceived as being too long

• Difficulty – it should be challenging but not perceived to be unachievable

• Specificity – it should be clearly defined.

Expectancy Theory

Vroom's focused on motivation and management with his Expectancy Theory.

Vroom's theory assumes that behavior results from conscious choices among

alternatives whose purpose it is to maximize pleasure and minimize pain.

Vroom suggested that an employee's performance is based on individual factors

such as personality, skills, knowledge, experience and abilities.

82

The expectancy theory states that, in the workplace, individuals have a

variety of goals and that they can be motivated if they believe that:

• There is a beneficial relationship between efforts and performance,

• Favorable performance result in an outcome,

• That they can determine what that outcome is and

• The employees desire to satisfy their need is strong enough to make the effort worthwhile.

Vroom’s equation for motivation (M) is: M = E (I x V) where:

1. E= Expectancy (Employees have different expectations and levels of

confidence about what they are capable of doing). Management must

discover what resources, training, or supervision employees’ need.

Expectancy is measured as a probability insofar as the employee asks,

"What are chances that, given my knowledge, skills, and the resources

available to me, I am able to complete the assigned task?"

2. I= Instrumentality (The perception of employees -- expressed as a

probability -- that there will actually be an outcome associated with

completing the assigned task.). Management must ensure that promises of

rewards are fulfilled and that employees are aware of that.

3. V= Valence: Valence refers to the emotional orientations people hold

with respect to outcomes or rewards. The depth of the want of an

employee for extrinsic (e.g. money, praise, promotion, time-off, benefits)

or intrinsic (e.g. satisfaction) rewards. Not all outcomes possess a positive

valence; getting a promotion, coupled with a transfer to an undesirable

location, may well result in a negative valence. It goes without saying,

therefore, that if you want to motivate an employee then find out what

they value.

83

CROSS- / INTER- CULTURAL COMMUNICATION PERSPECTIVE70

International PM is definitely providing new challenges to participants that are,

sometimes, at best reluctant. If projects are to be optimized then intra-cultural

motivation and decision-making practices will need to be both implemented and

better understood. The questions that stand are:

• What are communication and culture? And

• How can they be optimized?

The “transactional” model gives an insight into the communications process and

an analysis and understanding of “culture” via traits (i.e. dimensions) analysis can

significantly contribute to project success.

Communication

Transactional Model

The transactional model of communication is simply based on two participants

sending and receiving signals in an attempt to exchange information between

themselves. The model appears as follows:

Figure 3.2: Transactional Model of Communication

70 Ms. Emily Slate, M.A., “Intercultural Communication”, GSOMI, 2004

84

• Non-verbal: Body language and its meaning

• Para-verbal: Everything that accompanies speech e.g. volume,

movements, distance, etc.

Speech Patterns:

The speech patterns vary between cultures i.e. the timing and breaks

between the sentences.

For example, in the German culture it is an accepted norm that one stops

speaking (see the high horizontal unbroken line in the diagram below) and

waits for the other to pass the “right to talk” token to the other (see the

first vertical dotted line on the left). Once the token has been received

then the second person may commence talking.

Note. The “token” is not a physical thing. It is simply a signal, often

unconscious, that the other party may proceed.

Figure 3.3: Speech Pattern - German

This can be compared against the Japanese and American cultures. In the Japanese culture a token and a pause occur before the second party may commence speaking.

Figure 3.4: Speech Pattern - Japanese

In the American culture, the second party does not wait for a signal, which can be frustrating if you are Japanese or German.

Figure 3.5: Speech Pattern - American

85

Styleswitching:

Note that individuals have been observed “styleswitching” i.e. once they

have been living and speaking in a foreign culture for some time they switch

their complete communication style from one language to another i.e. they

adopt the features of the other language.

• Verbal: The actual spoken signal (i.e. it’s not what I say it’s how I say it).

• Extra-Verbal: These are unspoken assumptions and values held by either

party i.e. it has nothing to do with any outward behavior.

Culture

Strangely enough, there doesn’t seem to be commonly held definition of

“culture”. The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization

(Unesco) (2002) described culture as follows: "... culture should be regarded as

the set of distinctive spiritual, material, intellectual and emotional features of

society or a social group, and that it encompasses, in addition to art and literature,

lifestyles, ways of living together, value systems, traditions and beliefs".71

A Model of Culture

It is commonly held to have four (4) main components that the transactional

model of communication above:

• basic assumptions and values – extra-verbal

• norms and values – non-verbal

• codified norms – para-verbal and

• concrete manifestations – verbal.

71 UNESCO. 2002. Universal Declaration on Cultural Diversity.

86

Figure 3.6: Culture Model

• Basic Assumptions - the core of a culture is formed by values. The broad

tendencies or preferences of any individual or more typically group of

individuals (good-evil, right-wrong, natural-unnatural). Many values remain

unconscious to those who hold them and are often not discussed or directly

observed by others. Values can only be inferred from the way people act

under different circumstances.

• Norms & Values - Rituals are collective activities that are considered

essential. Sometimes they seem to be unnecessary when reaching particular

objectives or simply carried out for their own sake (ways of greetings, paying

respect to others, religious and social ceremonies, etc.).

• Codified Norms – systems and institutions such as education, law,

government, etc.

87

• Concrete Manifestations – things that have a physical and reflect all of the

above layers such as architecture, heroes may be past or present, etc. Note

that heroes may be real or fictitious, who possess characteristics that are highly

prized in a culture and may also serve as models for behavior.

Cultural Comparison Criteria

• Determinism - people are what they learn.

• Relativism - different cultural groups think, feel, and act differently.

• Ethnocentrism – a belief that one's own culture is superior to that of

other cultures and

• Layers

o The national level: Associated with the nation as a whole.

o The regional level: Associated with ethnic, linguistic, or religious

differences that exist within a nation.

o The gender level: Associated with gender differences (female vs.

male)

o The generation level: Associated with the differences between

grandparents and parents, parents and children.

o The social class level: Associated with educational opportunities

and differences in occupation.

o The corporate level: Associated with the particular culture of an

organization. Applicable to those who are employed.

Measuring Cultural Differences

A variable can be made operational by using either a single- or composite-

measure techniques. Traits have been used extensively in this area.

88

• Kluckhohn and Strodtbeck (Cultural Orientation)72

o Relationships

People’s nature

To Mother Nature

To Others

o Human Activity

Modality - Doing vs. Being

Temporal Focus - Past vs. Future

Personal Space - Public vs. Private

o Critique

Weaknesses

• the authors were not centrally concerned with management studies and did not describe the implications for management

• the orientations and variations are not precisely defined

• interpretations are bound to be subjective Strengths

• cultures can be compared along distinct dimensions

• comparative models apply to cross-cultural management

• analysis of predominant variations within the national culture does not accurately predict

o the values of sub-cultural minorities o the values practiced in different industries

and organizations and the values practiced in exceptional cases.

72 Kroeber, A. L. and C. Kluckhohn, 1952. Culture: A Critical Review of Concepts and Definitions.

89

• Hall, Edward

o Established that an individual’s cultural traits are typically

strengthened by their interaction with another culture.

• Hall, Edward

o High vs. Low Context

o Monochronic vs. Polychronic

o Goal-orientation vs. Relationship-orientation

o Critique:

• qualitative insights rather than quantitative data

• useful in understanding how members of different

cultures develop business relationships

• Hofstede73 (Culture and the Workplace)

o Low Power Distance vs. High Power Distance

o Individualism vs. Collectivism

o Nurturance vs. Achievement (i.e. Masculinity vs. Femininity)

o Low vs. High Certainty Avoidance

o Long Term Orientation

o Critique

Weaknesses • assumes that National Territory are the limits

that culture correspond to • informants also worked within a single industry • technical difficulties

Strengths

• most practical to management problems • comparisons between national cultures possible

highly relevant

73 Geert Hofstede & Robert R. McCrae "Personality and Culture Revisited: Linking Traits and Dimensions of Culture" Cross-Cultural Research, Vol. 38 No. 1, February 2004 52-88 DOI: 10.1177/1069397103259443

90

• Trompenaar’s (Consultant’s Contributions)

o Universal vs. Particular

o Individualism vs. Collectivism

o Neutral vs. Emotional (Affective) cultures

o Specific vs. Diffuse

o Ascribed Status vs. Achieved Status

o Monochronic vs. Polychromic

o Nature is Good vs. Nature as Threat

Success in Other Cultures i.e. Reconciling Cultural Differences

To operate successfully within another culture a high level of cultural awareness,

preferably pro-actively is necessary. An analysis prior to visiting or working with

the prospective culture using techniques such as “clustering” has been highly

recommended i.e. based on this data obtained from past cross-cultural studies,

countries may be grouped by similarities in values and attitudes.

Sage Publications, 2004

91

CHAPTER IV: METHODOLOGY

93

R e s e a r c h S t r a t e g y

he literature review results74 and author’s suggestions75 identified the

primary CSF variable76, in the opinion of the article author’s, as being:

“The quality of their human interactions or motivations and decision-making practices”

and Lechler T. supported this77 when he stated that:

“More relevant questions about how the conditions of a project have to be designed and which actions have to be taken to encourage teamwork, increased abilities, and motivation of the collaborators need to be addressed.”

The strategy selected78 was to identify a potential cause(s) for this CSF variable internationally via the use of non-interventional research designs. The analysis was to be based on current HR theory and methods (see Chapter III: Human Resource Perspectives) and carried out in three phases:

• Phase I: Participants were to be:

o clearly informed about the research objective

o clearly informed about the benefits, both to themselves and other

stakeholders, stemming from the research and then

o invited to participate.

• Phase II: All responses were to be screened after collection against the

target participant qualification criteria (see Appendix IV-G03: Target

74 See Table 1.2 Weighted Summary List of Project Critical Success Factors (see page 6)

75 See page 19

76 See page 32 re Topic Selection 77 Lechler, T. (2000). "When it comes to Project Management, it's the People that matter." Projects as Business Constituents and Guiding Motives. Pg. 11 & 12

78 Based on the flowcharts developed from page 8 onwards of Appendix AG: “Knowledge Generations Designs – Research Designs, Methods and Logic within the Scientific Method„ David G.V. Ray

94

Participant Qualification Criteria) to elicit unbiased responses from

participants and

• Phase III: The resulting responses were then to be used for further

analysis.

In addition, naturally the GSO-MI requirements were foremost in the strategy.

Their specific requirements (see in Appendices I-G01: GSO-MI Dissertation Pre-

requisites, I-G02: Dissertation Guideline; I-G03 Dissertation Presentation and I-

G04 Dissertation Proposal Submission) and resource planning was essential79.

A major component of the strategy resource planning was the selection of

systems and support. The systems selected were often software related (see

Appendices I-SW01 to ISW-11) and establishing sponsorship was considered

desirable where possible (see Appendices I-SS01 and I-SS02).

All knowledge management aspects of the dissertation, including the literature

review and research strategy, design and implementation were carried out using

groupware software (Lotus Notes) designed and programmed by the dissertation

author80.

79 See Appendices I-R01 to I-R06 re project plan, computer upgrade, health management and other

resources.

80 See Appedices I-SW04 and I-SW05: Knowledge Mangement Dissertation and Research respectively

95

RESEARCH DESIGN

METHODS AVAILABLE

on-interventional designs include:

• Descriptive designs and • Analytical designs.

Descriptive designs include the following methods:

• Statistics and

• Categorization of data collected

and Analytical Designs include:

• Cohort studies and

• Case control studies

METHOD SELECTION

Descriptive research designs were selected because of the constraints81.

Specifically:

• it was not possible to rule out extraneous factors with interventional research and

• there were insufficient resources available to carry out analytical studies

i.e. cohort or case-control studies.

81 See page 45 in this dissertation

96

SELECTION OF PARTICIPANTS AND GROUPS

Participants were invited to participate in the optionally anonymous,

internationally available questionnaire via:

• Press releases in:

o Germany

o Australia

o Japan

o Korea

o China

o Singapore

o USA

o UK

• International organizations including:

o The Project Management Institute82

o Alumni

The University of Technology (Sydney, AU)83

SCEGS (Sydney, AU) 84

o GSO-MI 85

o OPP 86

• Contact databases such as klickTel87

82 http://www.pmi.org

83 http://www.alumni.uts.edu.au/contact/index.html

84 http://www.shoreoldboys.org.au/

85 http://www.gso-mi.de/MBA-Mission-GSO-MI_182_2_99.html

86 http://www.opp.eu.com/

87 klickTel AG, Martin-Luther-Str. 1, 46284 Dorsten, http://www.klicktel.de/

97

METHOD IMPLEMENTATION

Questionnaire Design:

Based on the research strategy and design above, a combined MBTI and “Big

Five” questionnaire was originally planned, however, after extensive discussions

with the European MBTI88 representative their support was not forthcoming.

The questionnaire was then culled to include only the “Big Five”89 & 90

dispositional traits questionnaires.

The reason for enthusiastically trying to incorporate both trait measurement

instruments in the dissertation questionnaire was to allow cross checking and

comparisons between the MBTI and Big 5 results. This would have provided a

form of internal validation, as the MBTI classifications are similar in nature to

those of the Big 5/IPIP. A significant conflict between the two measurement

instruments for any given respondent could potentially signal a failure in the

instruments themselves (the originally proposed questionnaire can be seen in IV-

02: Initial Questionnaire Proposed).

88 OPP http://www.opp.eu.com/ 89 “International Personality Item Pool: A Scientific Collaboratory* for the Development of Advanced

Measures of Personality and Other Individual Differences” http://ipip.ori.org 90 “The Big-Five Trait Taxonomy: History, Measurement, and Theoretical Perspectives” Oliver P. John and Sanjay Srivastava, Uniniversity of California at Berkeley

http://www.uoregon.edu/~sanjay/pubs/bigfive.pdf

98

C o l l e c t i o n o f D a t a

he questionnaire was made internationally available and collected via a

dedicated research collection website that was purpose designed and built by the

dissertation author (see Appendix IV-G01: Dedicated Dissertation Research

Website). The questionnaire was made available in four languages:

• Mandarin91

• Spanish92

• English93 and

• German94

The English version was initially made available on the 21/595 and subsequently

temporary withdrawn after testing due to need to add additional questions the

questionnaire. The questionnaire was re-activated on the 28/5 the translated

versions were added over time.

The Mandarin version of the questionnaire proved to be the most challenging to

implement for a number of reasons:

• The individuals assisting me with the translation were frequently under-

way between Germany and China and

• The statistical software, StatPac96, was not capable of dealing with

Mandarin characters.

91 See Appendix IV-I09 Questionnaire - Mandarin

92 See Appendix IV-I10 Questionnaire - Spanish

93 See Appendix IV-I07 Questionnaire - English

94 See Appendix IV-I08 Questionnaire - German

95 See Appendix IV-G02 Initial Questionnaire Proposed

96 See Appendices I-SW11 Statistical management - StatPac

99

The first issue was resolved with:

• use of messaging/IP video-conferencing software and

• a master spreadsheet that was initially translated into English as the

common international language and then passed via email between the

respective translators and the dissertation author until all were satisfied

with it presentation on the web.

The second issue required somewhat more ingenuity:

• after discussions with the StatPac development team it was decided that a

personal redesign of the questionnaire at the internet language level (i.e.

html) was required before it could be made available on the internet and

• recommendations were made to StatPac to redevelop the software in a

version of the computer operating system that could manage Asian

language characters (i.e. a 64 bit operating system, preferably open source

such Debian).

Participants were made aware of the questionnaire’s existence via a press release97

and personal invitations98. Many of the contacts99 were sourced using contact

databases such as klickTel100. To manage the volume of potential questionnaire

participants, a tracking database was developed (see Appendix I-SW05:

Knowledge Management – Research) which was used as a supplementary tool to

the dissertation management system developed earlier (see Appendix I-SW04:

Knowledge Management – Dissertation).

97 See Appendices IV-I01 to IV-I04 for various press release documentation

98 See Appendices IV-I05 & IV-I06 for invitation examples in English and German

99 See Appendix IV-I11: Contacts

100

The total number of responses received was 24 as seen below in Table 19:

Table 19 Research Responses Received Summary

This was well under the targeted 100 or so required to be statistically

representative, however, the results may be indicative.

100 See Appendix I-SW10: Contact Databases - klickTel

101

A n a l y s i s o f D a t a

Post-collation Screening:

he data collected101 was screened to identify target participants i.e.

“senior decision makers in international projects”. Each term in this phrase was

qualified102 and the qualifications were used to identify responses that were

acceptable for this research.

Analysis Methods Used:

A descriptive analysis was carried out on the respondent’s data as follows:

• factors that were influenced by any of the “big 5” traits (i.e. independent

variables that of had a non-series nature) was grouped and expressed as

percentages e.g. respondent’s gender.

• The nature of the “big 5” traits (i.e. the dependent variables - often series

type data) against the project characteristics was analyzed by:

o Comparing how it related to data of the same nature by using

statistical deviations, means and medians e.g. the degree of

extroversion of all participants

o Comparing how it related to other data of a different nature by

using statistical correlations103 e.g. the relationship between

extroversion and project decisions making responsibility.

101 See Appendix IV-I12: Respondent’s Data

102 See Appendix IV-G03: Target Participant Qualification Criteria

103 See the glossary for a definition

102

N.b. how each of the traits correlated with the project variables was subjectively given qualification criteria104 for evaluation purposes as follows:

• “significant” = co-efficient >0.2

• “substantial” = co-efficient >0.5

These analyses were carried out for:

• All respondents

• All major cultural respondent groups i.e. in this case:

o Australia and

o Germany, and

• The target respondents after qualification

Analysis Results:

Information about Single Factors (in Percentages):

Analysis of Response Sources

The predominant culture and country of origin were both Germany and

Australia105 (see Table 20 below).

104 The criteria percentages were based on the International Accounting Standard percentages used to identify

“significant” and “substantial” influence in the control or otherwise of economic entities (IAS 28 R.2). 105 Note that there is a difference between “culture” and “ country” of origin due to the fact that some individuals are currently resident in

one country but “cultural citizens” of another e.g. the Chinese participant here works between China and Germany and completed the

questionnaire in English.

103

Table 20 Respondent Analyses – Percentage Breakdown by Culture & Country

Table 21 (below) shows that 80 percent of participants were make and only 20 percent (approximately) were identified as “target” participants (i.e. “senior decision makers” that met the requirements outlined in Appendix IV-G03: Target Participant Qualification Criteria).

Table 21 Response Analyses – Percentage Breakdown by Gender & Target Participants

Analysis of the Project’s Nature

The organizational activity breakdown (i.e. industry) shown in Table 22 below is

based on the ISIC classifications produced by the United Nations (i.e.

International Standard Industrial Classification of all Economic Activities version

- ISIC Rev. 3.1).

104

Table 22 United Nations Activity Classifications (ISIC)

An analysis of the participant’s origins was carried out as can be seen in Table 23

(below). The “main country” refers to country, other than the home country,

where most projects are currently being carried out. The “second” country refers

to the country after the “main country“ where most projects are currently being

carried out.

Table 23 Response Analyses – Projects by Main Country, Secondary Country &

Currency Used 106

106 Note. I believe that Burkina Fase is a typing error by a participant.

105

Relationships within Variables (Statistical Deviations, Means and Medians): The following project factors (i.e. variables) with respect to project management were analyzed, participant:

1. age

2. number of projects that they were currently participating in

3. the percentage of those projects that were being carried out in foreign countries

4. the percentage of project decisions they made and

5. their decision making level

Tables 24, 25 and 26 show how the individual data samples compare with the average result (i.e. the arithmetic mean) when all of the samples are combined as a whole (i.e. their statistical distribution). The classic measures median, statistical deviation and mean of the distribution have been used as follows:

Table 24 Distribution of Data Analysis - Median

Table 25 Distribution of Data Analysis - Statistical Deviation

106

Table 26 Distribution of Data Analysis - Mean

Relationships between Variables (Statistical Correlations): In addition to the above analysis, a correlation analysis was carried out in an attempt to identify any relationships between:

• each Big 5 trait (see the left most columns or “Y” axis on each graph below)

and the

• five (5) project characteristics identified above (i.e. variables – see the headings

or “X” axis).

For comparison purposes the correlations were analyzed from the perspective of:

• The target participants (Table 27) • All participants (Table 28) • German participants only (Table 29) and • Australian participants only (Table 30)

Such an analysis allows, to some degree, an insight into the impact of the respective culture of each of the groups particularly with regard to essentially genetically identical groups such as those stemming from a Germanic background e.g. the Germans compared with the Anglo-Saxons, etc.

107

Table 27 Data Correlation Analysis – Target Participants (i.e. senior decision makers)

Table 28 Data Correlation Analysis – All Participants

108

Table 29 Data Correlation Analysis – German Participants

Table 30 Data Correlation Analysis – Australian Participants

109

CHAPTER V: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION

111

D e s c r i p t i o n o f F i n d i n g s

General Caveat on the Interpretation of Findings

he research results of this dissertation are only one step amongst many

in clearly establishing the key factors required to design, implement and

successful manage international business projects. It is:

• an attempt to describe the relationships that may exist between

o the key personality traits of

o existing senior decision makers currently engaged in

o international projects and

• is indicative only.

The research:

• does not test to see if all of the factors identified in the literature review

are either national or international project CSF’s,

• does not test to see if the “human” factors, believed by many article

authors in the literature review107 to be the leading CSF, are responsible

for up to 47% of project successes or failures and

• does not give conclusive results i.e. the results are not statistically

representative.

107 Lechler, T. "When it comes to Project Management, it's the People that matter.", Direct from author, 2000.

112

General Findings:

The analysis phase (see page 91) shows that the finding fall into three categories:

• qualified target respondents

• all respondents

• major cultural groups:

o Germany, and

o Australia

The analysis correlation results (see page 102 & 104) and the qualification criteria

(see Appendices IV-G03 page 383) produced108 initial findings that were initially

converted into statements for each of the categories (see Appendix V-G01, V-

G02, V-G03 and V-G04 respectively109). These results were then discussed with

others in small round table forums to help generate some feedback on how the

data could be interpreted.

At a later stage these results were graphed and placed along side each other on

the same page (see tables 31, 32, 33 and 34 for each of the respective participant

categories studied on pages 109 and 110 following) to give a visual overview of

the information patterns that had been formed.

Generally:

o indications drawn from the responses of all respondents were

quite different from those drawn from sub-samples taken e.g.

comparing qualified target respondents vs. all respondents and.

o the range of possible observations was numerous

108 via a programmed spreadsheet

109 In addition, for ease of use these findings are expressed with sentences such as: “X is not effected / increases /decreases as Y increases”.

Please keep in mind that these statements should technically be read as: “X

• “has no co-relationship with” or • “has a positive co-relationship with” or • “has a negative co-relationship” with

113

Table 31 Target Participants (i.e. senior decision makers)

Table 32 All Participants

114

Table 33 German Participants

Table 34 Australian Participants

115

Correlation Tendencies: A broad trend overview of the traits correlation generally against the project variables can be seen in Table 35 below:

Table 35 Correlation Tendencies

The target respondents had a negative correlation tendency between their personality traits and the project variables analyzed i.e. approximately 60% of the time. As a group, the respondent’s correlation tendency was similar. However, the specific constellation of traits was different. The German and Australian cultures had identical tendencies overall, however, the specific traits differed substantially from one another.

116

Specific Findings:

Target Respondents

The target respondent’s correlations as a cluster tended to be:

• Negative with age

• Relatively neutral with the number of projects

• Relatively neutral with the percentage of projects that were foreign

• Strongly negative with decision autonomy and

• Positive with title (i.e. decision making level)

From the graph very strong specific correlations existed between

agreeableness/imagination and:

• Percentage of projects that were foreign

• Project costs and

• Decisions made

Interestingly, the target group was the only group where the conscientiousness

did not have a strong positive correlation with the overall value of the project. So,

senior decision makers tended to be less conscientious as the financial size of

their projects increased.

117

All Respondents

All respondents’ correlations range tended to be the same as that of the target,

however, only occupied about a third of the range that the target respondents (i.e.

“senior decision maker”) did. This group, as with the German and Australian

groups, had a strong positive correlation between conscientiousness and project

value i.e. the greater the value of the project the more hard working and

committed they are.

German Respondents

The German respondents tended to have a similar correlation pattern to the “all

respondents” group except for the fact that the whole pattern tended to be

marginally lower i.e.

• the older

• the more projects they had

• the more foreign projects they had and

• the higher their title then

however, if they had more decision-making autonomy then they were typically

more positive than the norm.

118

Australian Respondents

All three other groups tended to have similar trait patterns, however, the

correlation range of German respondents and target respondents tended to more

extreme respectively.

The Australian correlation pattern was unique. Whereas the others to carrying

degrees tended to experience decreases in all traits with age the Australians

tended to experience a strong correlation.

Similarly, where the others tended to have negative correlations between their

personality traits and the value of their project Australians tended to have positive

correlations.

The other groups also tended to have positive correlations between their traits

and their decision making autonomy, however, the Australians had strong

negative correlations i.e. the more decisions they were responsible for then the

less agreeable, extroverted, conscientious and imaginative they tended to be yet

they tended to be quite stable individuals.

119

C o n c l u s i o n s

he indications are that: senior decision makers, the business

community at large and the German business community share a similar

correlation profile i.e. they share modestly negative relationships between their

personality types and projects with regard to increasing:

• age

• project value

• decision-making autonomy and

• decision-making role (e.g. title)

The main difference between these three groups is the range of their negative

correlations. The “all” respondents category has the most limited range, followed

by the Germans and then the “senior decision makers” group. Of the three

groups, senior decision makers have a relatively positive correlation with the

factors mentioned above.

All three groups share a strongly negative correlation between their personality

traits and increasing value/costs of projects. All three groups also share a

relatively strong positive correlation between their personality traits and their level

of autonomous decision-making.

The Australian respondents, however, have a completely different traits profile to

the other three. Unlike their European counterparts, Australians have:

• a very strong positive relationship between age and all of their traits.

• Also, the Australians have a very strong negative correlation between their decision making autonomy and personality traits. e.g. the more decision making autonomy then the less extroverted, agreeable and emotionally stable they become.

120

R e c o m m e n d a t i o n s

• All of the variables identified in the literature review110 should be tested for their

impact on project success

• The link to success of the Big 5 personality traits variables with project success

needs to be checked i.e.:

• Statistically representative target respondent group needs to be

established

• All stakeholders need to be consulted for definitions and feedback of

success at both the beginning and at the end of the project (s) in question

• The samples need to be international

• To continue collating data and refining the questionnaire over time for future

development, possibly in a doctorate, as is currently being done in the

international GLOBE111 leadership studies.

• Non-profit research whose results are to be made generally available to the

public at large should have unrestricted access to all worldwide information

sources.

110 See p. 6 Table 1.2 Weighted Summary List of Project Critical Success Factors

111 See their website for details http://www.thunderbird.edu/wwwfiles/ms/globe/

121

S u m m a r y

International indicators112 show that economic productivity is:

o slowing in developed countries and

o accelerating in previously under-developed countries.

This has brought an increasing focus on improving productivity internationally

and with it comes a renewed interest in international project productivity.

This dissertation has found the current status quo of many specialists indicates

that there are 28 key variables that are believed to be related to project success

(see Table 2 Weighted Summary List of Project CSF’s). Of these, the most highly

ranked is actually a “human” and not a technical factor (i.e. the quality of human

interactions or motivation and decision making practices”) and it may contribute

up to 50% of any given projects success or failure.

This appears to be a relatively major oversight by the project management

community as it is not currently a concept that is particularly integrated into

project management theory, practice or related organizational body doctrines.

The exploratory research of this dissertation has focused on the nature of the

personality of both the internatational project management community and the

international business community at large. It’s findings have indicated that a

general overall pattern of personality traits exists, however, the traits of specific

cultures can and do differ substantially from the norm.

112 See Appendix V-G05 & V-G06 for GDP Comparisons – particularly V-G06 which indicates the

purchasing power

122

The overall pattern indicates that all of the Big 5 personality traits (i.e.

extraversion, agreeableness, conscientiousness, emotional stability and

imagination) tend to move as clusters with project characteristics or variables. All

personality traits tend to be:

• Negatively correlated with

o Age

o The number of projects worked on simultaneously and the

o Particularly with projects value

• Positively correlated with:

o The level of autonomous decision making

• And have no correlation with:

o the percentage of projects that are carried out in foreign countries

The exception here is the conscientiousness trait, which is strongly positively

correlated to the projects value (i.e. as the project value increases so does the level

of coconsciousness found in individuals making project decisions). This pattern

is generally reflected in the target respondents (i.e. senior decision makers);

however, there are some marked accentuations of the pattern. Decision-makers

personality traits have:

• have very positive correlations with: o The number of projects o The percentage of projects that are foreign and o The level of decision autonomous decision making and

• very negative correlations with:

o The projects value

One culture that is a marked exception from the normal pattern appears to be the

Australian culture overall.

123

GLOSSARY

125

Critical Success Factors (CSFs) 113:

„ . . .the limited number of areas in which results, if they are satisfactory, will ensure successful competitive performance for the organization . . . . . . the few key areas where things must go right for the business to flourish…. . . . areas of activity that should receive constant and careful attention from management… . . . the areas in which good performance is necessary to ensure attainment of [organizational] goals. “ Knowledge 114

1 information and skills acquired through experience or education. 2 the sum of what is known. 3 awareness or familiarity gained by experience of a fact or situation: he denied all knowledge of the incident.

Motivation115

Those factors which cause an organism to behave or act in either a goal-seeking or satisfying manner. They may be influenced by physiological drives or by external stimuli.

Personality116

behavior-response patterns that characterize the individual.

Project Success:

As “measured against the overall objectives of the project” 117.

113 Fortune, J. and D. White (2006). "Framing of project critical success factors by a systems model." International Journal of Project Management 24(1): 53-65. quotes Rockart JF. Chief executives define their own data needs. Harvard Bus Rev 1979(March–April): 81–93. Pg. 50 114 Catherine Soanes & Sara Hawker. The Compact Oxford English Dictionary (3rd Edition) ISBN-10: 0-19-861022-

X Oxford University Press, 2006 http://www.askoxford.com/ 115 Dictionary of Science. Biology-Online, 2006.http://www.biology-nline.org/dictionary/Motivation 116 Dictionary of Science. Biology-Online, 2006.http://www.biology-online.org/dictionary/Personality 117 Cooke-Davies, T. (2002). "The "real" success factors on projects." International Journal of Project Management 20(3): 185-190. quotes [9]De Wit A. Measurement of project success. International Journal of Project Management

1988; 6.

126

Project Management Success:

As “measured against the widespread and traditional measures of performance against cost, time and quality” 10.

Power: “One framework suggests that each of us have available two distinct types of power: Power that derives from our personality (personal power) and power that comes from the position or title we hold [3].” 118

Research 119

Careful, a diligent search, a close searching, studious inquiry or examination. • basic research - intended to extend what we already know • applied research - using what we know to find something new

Scientific Method 120

The universally-accepted, organized approach to the study of science, which consists of the following steps:

1. observation - information or record secured by viewing or noting a fact or occurrence

2. research - diligent and systematic inquiry or investigation into a subject in order to discover or revise; investigate carefully

3. hypothesis - forming a preliminary possible explanation of the data.

4. testing - test the hypothesis by collecting more data.

5. results - interpreting the results of the test and deciding if the hypothesis should be rejected. The hypothesis is rejected if the results contradict it, showing that it is wrong.

6. Conclusion - stating a conclusion that can be evaluated independently by others. A method of investigation involving observation and theory to test scientific hypotheses.The method used by scientists to validify their observations in an experiment by proving (or disproving all other possibilities) a hypothesis that they have made. The hypothesis may change throughout the experiment as new data and evidence is obtained, th.

118 Pinto, J. K. (2000). "Understanding the role of politics in successful project management." International Journal of Project Management 18(2): 85-91. Pg. 86 quotes [3] French JRP, Raven B. The bases of social power. In: Cartwright D, editor. Studies in Social Power. Institute for Studies Social Research: Ann Arbor, MI, 1959: p. 150±167. 119 Dictionary of Science. Biology-Online,2006. http://www.biology-online.org/dictionary/Research 120 Dictionary of Science. Biology-Online, 2006. http://www.biology-online.org/dictionary/Scientific_method

127

Statistical Deviation121

Statistical index of the degree of deviation from central tendency, namely, of the variability within a distribution; the square root of the average of the squared deviation's from the mean. A measure of dispersion or variation used to describe a characteristic of a frequency distribution. The degree of variation in a sample from the mean value.

Success Criteria:

“The measures by which success or failure of a project or business will be judged” 10.

Validation 122

The act or process of making valid.

consensual validation, the confirmation of the experience or judgment of one person by another.

121 Dictionary of Science. Biology-Online, 2006. http://www.biology-online.org/dictionary/Standard_deviation

122 Dictionary of Science. Biology-Online, 2006. http://www.biology-online.org/dictionary/Validation

128

REFERENCES

123

[1] Belassi, W. and O. I. Tukel "A new framework for determining

critical success/failure factors in projects."

International Journal of Project, Management 14(3): 141-151., 1996.

[2] Belout, A. and C. Gauvreau "Factors influencing project success:

the impact of human resource management."

International Journal of Project Management 22(1): 1-11, 2004.

[3] Cooke-Davies, T. "The "real" success factors on

projects." International Journal of Project

Management 20(3): 185-190., (2002) [4] Dvir, D., S. Lipovetsky, et al. "In search of project classification: a

non-universal approach to project success factors."

Research Policy 27(9): 915-935., 1998. [5] Fortune, J. and D. White "Framing of project critical success

factors by a systems model." International Journal of Project

Management 24(1): 53-65., (2006). [6] Kayworth, T. and D. Leidner "The global virtual manager: a

prescription for success." European Management Journal 18(2): 183-

194., 2000. [7] Lechler, T. "When it comes to Project

Management, it's the People that matter.",

Direct from author, 2000.

[8] Lim, C. S. and M. Z. Mohamed. "Criteria of project success: an

exploratory re-examination.". International Journal of Project

Management 17(4): 243-248., 1999. [9] Pinto JK, P. J. "Variations in critical success factors

over the stages in the project life cycle."

Journal of Management 14(1):5–18., 1998. [10] Pinto, J. K.. "Understanding the role of politics in

successful project management.". International Journal of Project Management 18(2): 85-91., 2000.

[11] Shenhar, A. J., D. Dvir, et al.. "Project Success: A Multidimensional

Strategic Concept.". Long Range Planning 34(6): 699-725.,

2001. [12] Umble, E. J., R. R. Haft, et al.. "Enterprise resource planning:

Implementation procedures and critical success factors.".

European Journal of Operational Research 146(2): 241-257., 2003.

[13] Catherine Soanes & Sara Hawker. The Compact Oxford English

Dictionary (3rd Edition) ISBN-10: 0-19-861022-X Oxford University Press, 2006 http://www.askoxford.com/ [14] Dictionary of Science. Biology-Online, 2006. http://www.biology-

online.org/dictionary/

124

[15] "The New New Product Development Game"

Harvard Business Review, Jan-Feb 1986 [16] Robin Beaumont "Network, Ganntt Charts and Critical

Paths", 2001 [17] Geert Hofstede & Robert R. McCrae "Personality and Culture Revisited:

Linking Traits and Dimensions of Culture"

Cross-Cultural Research, Vol. 38 No. 1, February 2004 52-88

DOI: 10.1177/1069397103259443 Sage Publications, 2004 [18] Oliver P. John & Sanjay Srivastava "The Big-Five Trait Taxonomy:

History, Measurement, and Theoretical Perspectives"

University of California at Berkeley, March 5, 1999.

125

BIBLIOGRAPHY

127

[B01] Mark Saunders, Philip Lewis , Adrian Thrinhill.

"Research Methods for Business Students." (4nd Edition).

Prentice Hall. ISBN 0-273-70148-7(2007). [B02] Myers Jerome L.& Well, Arnold

D. "Research Design and

Statistical Analysis." (2ndEdition).

Lawrence Erlbaum Assoc. ISBN 0-8058-4037-0, (2003). [B03] Kaufman, Alan S. N. L. K. "Essentials of Research

Design and Methodology." John Wiley & Sons ISBN 0-471-47053-8 , 2005. [B04] "A Guide to the Project

Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK Guide)"

Project Management Institute, 2000

[B05] Jason Charvat “Project Management

Methodologies: Selecting, Implementing, and Supporting Methodologies and Processes for Projects”

John Wiley & Sons ISBN:0471221783, 2003

[B06] Jason Charvat “Project Management

Nation: Tools, Techniques and Goals for the New and Practicing IT project Manager”,

John Wiley & Sons Wiley, ISBN 0-471-13926-2, 2002.

[B07] Paul C. Tinnirello "New Directions in Project

Management" CRC Press ISBN 0-8493-1190-X, 2002 [B08] Gary R. Heerkens, “Project Management” McGraw-Hill ISBN 0-07-139449-4, 2002. [B09] James P. Lewis “Fundamentals of Project

Management” AMACOM Books ISBN: 0814478352 1995 [B10] Robert K. Wysocki and Rudd

McGary “Effective Project

Management” Third Edition John Wiley & Sons ISBN:0471432210, 2003 [B11] Kim Heldman “PMP: Project Management Professional” Sybex ISBN: 0-7821-4106-4, 2002 [B12] Ralph L. Kleim and Irwin S.

Ludin “Project Management

Practitioner's Handbook” AMACOM Books ISBN: 0814403964 1998 [B13] Michael C. Thomsett “Little Black Book of Project

Management, The” AMACOM Books ISBN: 0814477321 1990

128

[B14] Kent Beck “Extreme “Programming Explained: Embrace Change”,

Addison-Wesley, ISBN 0-201-61641-6,. 1999 [B15] Rob Thomsett “Radical Project

Management” Prentice Hall ISBN : 0-13-009486-2 2002 [B16] Robert Kanigel "The One Best Way:

Frederick Winslow Taylor and the Enigma of Efficiency"

Penguin ISBN 0-14-026080-3, 1999 [B17] George Ekes “Six Sigma Team Dynamics:

The Elisive Key to Project Success”

John Wiley & Sons ISBN:0-471-22277-1, 2003 [B18] Barker, S. "Psychology" (2nd ed.). Pearson Education, (2004). [B19] Hofstede, G. “Cultures and Organizations:

Software of the mind.” McGraw Hill, 1997.

2

APPENDICE :

4

I A D M I N I S T R A T I O N – G S O - M I

GENERAL ADMINISTRATION

6

Prof. Dr. W. Fees from GSOMI distributed two (2) documents to assist MBA

participants with the completion of the masters’ dissertation. Both are included here as

follows:

• Dissertation Guideline (MS Word document) and

• Dissertation presentation (MS PowerPoint presentation).

8

APPENDIX I-G01: DISSERTATION GUIDELINE (MS WORD DOCUMENT)

12

APPENDIX I-G02: DISSERTATION PRESENTATION (MS POWERPOINT)

26

APPENDIX I-G03: DISSERTATION PROPOSAL SUBMISSION

32

ACADEMIC DIRECTOR

APPENDIX I-A01: UPDATE - 21/06/06

34

Summary: 21/06/06

This update covers my:

• research efforts to date • disseration documentation development so far • the resource library that I’ve collated to date and the • potential issues that I envisage

Research: Literature Review:

• my initial research has identified 144 articles of interest from approximately 40 different sources

• of these, I’ve currently selected 24 that I’ve read and am currently referencing in a redraft of my initial dissertation proposal.

Dissertation Documentation:

Proposal Redraft: • I’ve discovered that the dissertation is a much bigger project than I’d expected

and I’m now following the recommendation resulting from my initial research on dissertation preparation.

As a result, I’m currently redrafting my initial proposal to include far more detail with regard to the:

o introduction o literature review o research questions o research design and o dissertation management re:

key resources key risks and barriers to completion quality control key activities stakeholders and costs

Questionnaire: I haven’t completed this as yet.

Resources:

35

Information Source Access:

• Global Database Access (http://rzblx1.uni-regensburg.de/ezeit/fl.phtml?bibid=FHN): I’ve established a direct PC internet connection, via the GSO Proxy Server, to the GSOMI library databases access. Unfortunately GSO doesn’t have access to all of the articles that I find. Therefore, I’ve tried to get access to other sources via: • Bayreuth University (EU) • Bamberg University (EU) • Harvard University (US) and • the University of Technology, (AU - as an Alumni member) To date I can only get additional access to my Alumni University in Sydney (http://www.lib.uts.edu.au) for a fee of $250 AUD.


• BIP Questionnaire: I now have free access to the BIP (Bochuner Inventar zur berufsbezojenen),

evaluation system inclusive. I sourced to assist me in my dissertation questionnaire design from Ms. Sabina Tyczka, practicing psychologist at the Bamberg Hospital.

• Big-Five (Neo-Five): I haven’t located a source for this questionnaire, evaluation system inclusive, as

of yet. • Myers-Briggs: I haven’t located a source for this questionnaire, evaluation system inclusive, as

of yet. • Further questionnaire sources: Ms. Tyczka also recommended that I speak with Prof. Laux, Transformationale

Führung, and Kerstin Schorch (Dipl. – Psychologin, Coaching u. FührungKraften) at the Bamberg University about further access to other questionnaires to assist me in designing dissertation questionnaire.

36

Hardware:

• PC upgrade (http://www1.euro.dell.com/content/products/features.aspx/dimen_9150?c=de

&cs=debsdt1&l=de&s=bsd): My current PC simply can’t manage the research process i.e. downloads,

multiple document and application management, etc. So, after a lot of investigation, I’ve sourced, negotiating and, as of today, have

ordered a replacement from Dell Computers (a Dell 9150). This should substantially accelerate my ability to manage the research process and corresponding information that I’m collating.

• Increased Interenet Access Speed (http://www.arcor.de/privat/index.jsp): I’ve renegotiated with Arcor to increase my internet connection speed from 3

to 6 MB/s and simultaneously managed to reduce the cost (one of my better tricks to date).

Software Tools:

• Bibliographic Manager (http://www.endnote.com) : Based on recommendations from Harvard University (USA), found from further

research on how to carry out the “research process”, I’ve installed EndNote 6.0 • New Information Browser (http://www.firefox.com): Given the need to identify and manage a wide range of information sources

simultaneously, I’ve researched and installed the FireFox internet browser (i.e. replaced the relatively inefficient MS Internet Explorer).

• A Mini Knowledge Manager (http://www.thebrain.com): To help me to tie concepts together I’m experimenting with an application

known as “The Brain”. I’m bringing all of the information from the articles together and it may help to do so and also to present the results, however, it currently collates the information but has no easy output process and may not be applicable.

37

Potential Issues:

Overall, time generally:

• access to more information sources i.e. access to content for the articles that I have already found and continue to find during my research

• configuration of the new computer (due in 8 days) within the time constraint i.e. so that it’s of some practical use

• access to the Big 5 and Myers Briggs questionnaires and evaluation methods

• sufficient time to collate and analyse the questionnaire results • potential need for more regular feedback to my professor

38

APPENDIX I-A02: EXTENSION REQUEST - 22/06/06

42

APPENDIX I-A03: EXTENSION REQUEST - 27/09/06

46

ACADEMIC SUPERVISOR

APPENDIX I-S01: AGENDA - 10/05/06

48

Date: 10/05/06 13:00-14:00 Participants: Prof. Dr. T. M. Kühlmann Place: Universität Bayreuth

Lehrstuhl Personalwesen und Führungslehre Universitätsstraße 30 D-95440 Bayreuth RW-Fakultät, Zi. 2.13

Telefon + 49 (0) 9 21 - 55-2952

Agenda:

• Terms of Reference • Objectives Clarification (from both) • Scope • Overall Approach • Project Tasks/Timetable • Recommended Responsibilities • Research Methods • Table of Contents • Citations Method (Harvard System) • Communication Methods

50

APPENDIX I-S02: SUPERVISOR’S ROLE REVIEW - 10/05/06

52

The role of the supervisor 10/05/06 The role of the supervisor has three aspects: To provide participants with support, advice and encouragement regarding the

process of preparing and completing participant’s dissertation. To give participants advice and direction in terms of the academic content of

participant’s dissertation in relation to participant’s subject discipline. To be responsible for maintaining GSOMI’s academic standards.

Recommended responsibilities of the supervisor are detailed in Table 1 below. The support that will be required will vary from MBA participant to MBA participant and also at differing stages of progression of the dissertation. The relationship between a MBA participant and supervisor is individual and unique to the requirements of participant’s own work and participant’s own prior knowledge and experience. Comparisons between fellow MBA participants in terms of experiences may not be useful due to the very individual nature of the dissertation experience. The journey through participant’s dissertation may be lengthy. Whilst participants are responsible for participant’s own progress, the relationship with participant’s supervisor can be very valuable and important to participant’s progress. Table 1: MBA Participant and Supervisor Responsibilities MBA Participant’s responsibilities Supervisor responsibilities At the start:

• Identify topic area • Identify research problem and

question • Think about research

methodology and methods • Read examples of a good

dissertation • Read appropriate literature • Speak to relevant people with

experience of participant’s topic • Clarify participant’s objectives • Prepare a proposal that meets

the MI accepted standard.

At the start:

• Gives constructive feedback on proposal submission(s)

• Helps the MBA participant to identify and understand the appropriate literature

• Provides guidance on reading • Ensures the MBA participant is

clear about the focus of the work and clarifies objectives

• Agrees research methods, structure and time schedule

• Assists with project design and research questions

• Asks questions and gives participants advice on

53

implementation of participant’s proposal.

In the middle:

• Refine the literature review and finalize the methodology

• Develop outline and objectives for each chapter

• Carry out the research plan accepting possible adjustments

• Identify deviations from the plan/difficulties

• Begin write up and review of chapters

• Keep in touch with participant’s supervisor and take advice.

In the middle:

• Questions and gives advice • Responds to questions relating

to participant’s work and gives written or verbal feedback

• Keeps notes on all contact • Comments on implementation

of participant’s research method and overall progress.

At the end: • Recognise the importance of

the research and drive the plan forward

• Collect data, analysis and interpret

• Formulate conclusions and specify areas for further research

• Sends drafts as the work nears completion (as agreed with the supervisor see section 10.2)

• Submits final draft and be prepared to re-write/edit as necessary

• Keep in touch with participant’s supervisor and take advice.

At the end: • Comments on drafts and

provides written feedback • Is supportive and willing to

provide advice and encouragement

• Is the first marker of the final submission

• Does not do the work for the MBA participant

54

APPENDIX I-S03: UPDATE - 08/06/06

56

Summary: 08/06/06

This update covers my:

• research efforts to date • disseration documentation development so far • the resource library that I’ve collated to date and the • potential issues that I envisage

Research: Literature Review:

• my initial research has identified 144 articles of interest from approximately 40 different sources

• of these, I’ve currently selected 24 that I’ve read and am currently referencing in a redraft of my initial dissertation proposal.

Dissertation Documentation:

Proposal Redraft: • I ’ve discovered that the dissertation is a much bigger project than I’d expected

and I’m now following the recommendation resulting from my initial research on dissertation preparation.

As a result, I’m currently redrafting my initial proposal to include far more detail with regard to the:

o introduction o literature review o research questions o research design and o dissertation management re:

key resources key risks and barriers to completion quality control key activities stakeholders and costs

Questionnaire: I haven’t completed this as yet.

Resources:

57

Information Source Access:

• Global Database Access (http://rzblx1.uni-regensburg.de/ezeit/fl.phtml?bibid=FHN): I’ve established a direct PC internet connection, via the GSO Proxy Server, to the GSOMI library databases access. Unfortunately GSO doesn’t have access to all of the articles that I find. Therefore, I’ve tried to get access to other sources via: • Bayreuth University (EU) • Bamberg University (EU) • Harvard University (US) and • the University of Technology, (AU - as an Alumni member) To date I can only get additional access to my Alumni University in Sydney (http://www.lib.uts.edu.au) for a fee of $250 AUD.


• BIP Questionnaire: I now have free access to the BIP (Bochuner Inventar zur berufsbezojenen),

evaluation system inclusive. I sourced to assist me in my dissertation questionnaire design from Ms. Sabina Tyczka, practicing psychologist at the Bamberg Hospital.

• Big-Five (Neo-Five): I haven’t located a source for this questionnaire, evaluation system inclusive, as

of yet. • Myers-Briggs: I haven’t located a source for this questionnaire, evaluation system inclusive, as

of yet. • Further questionnaire sources: Ms. Tyczka also recommended that I speak with Prof. Laux, Transformationale

Führung, and Kerstin Schorch (Dipl. – Psychologin, Coaching u. FührungKraften) at the Bamberg University about further access to other questionnaires to assist me in designing dissertation questionnaire.

58

Hardware:

• PC upgrade (http://www1.euro.dell.com/content/products/features.aspx/dimen_9150?c=de

&cs=debsdt1&l=de&s=bsd): My current PC simply can’t manage the research process i.e. downloads,

multiple document and application management, etc. So, after a lot of investigation, I’ve sourced, negotiating and, as of today, have

ordered a replacement from Dell Computers (a Dell 9150). This should substantially accelerate my ability to manage the research process and corresponding information that I’m collating.

• Increased Interenet Access Speed (http://www.arcor.de/privat/index.jsp): I’ve renegotiated with Arcor to increase my internet connection speed from 3

to 6 MB/s and simultaneously managed to reduce the cost (one of my better tricks to date).

Software Tools:

• Bibliographic Manager (http://www.endnote.com) : Based on recommendations from Harvard University (USA), found from further

research on how to carry out the “research process”, I’ve installed EndNote 6.0 • New Information Browser (http://www.firefox.com): Given the need to identify and manage a wide range of information sources

simultaneously, I’ve researched and installed the FireFox internet browser (i.e. replaced the relatively inefficient MS Internet Explorer).

• A Mini Knowledge Manager (http://www.thebrain.com): To help me to tie concepts together I’m experimenting with an application

known as “The Brain”. I’m bringing all of the information from the articles together and it may help to do so and also to present the results, however, it currently collates the information but has no easy output process and may not be applicable.

59

Potential Issues:

Overall, time generally:

• access to more information sources i.e. access to content for the articles that I have already found and continue to find during my research

• configuration of the new computer (due in 8 days) within the time constraint i.e. so that it’s of some practical use

• access to the Big 5 and Myers Briggs questionnaires and evaluation methods

• sufficient time to collate and analyse the questionnaire results • potential need for more regular feedback to my professor

60


62

Date: Thu, 7 Sep 2006 08:11:27 +1000 (EST) From: "David G.V. Ray" <[email protected]> Add to Address Book Subject: Termin u. Aktualierte Dokumentation To: "Torsten Kühlmann" <[email protected]> Hallo Torsten,

ich hoffe, dass alles beim Ürlaub schon war.

Ich habe alle meine Dissertationsdokumentation am

folgende Website gesteckt und wurde gerne eine Termin

bei dir vorbereiten, meine Fragenbogen zu beenden:

http://www.seedwiki.com/wiki/kiss/foundation_research_mba_060903

Ich habe mit deine Sekratärin gesprochen und glaube,

dass du von 9/9 weiter im bureau bist.

mit freundlichen Grüße,

David

Phone: +49 (0)951 / 26788

E-Mail: [email protected]

Messengers:

Skype: david_gv_ray

Yahoo: david_gv_ray

MSN: david_gv_ray

63

Date: Fri, 29 Sep 2006 01:59:22 +1000 (EST) From: "David G.V. Ray" <[email protected]> Add to Address Book Subject: Neuigkeiten von David To: "Torsten Kühlmann" <[email protected]> Hallo Torsten,

ich habe zwei Neuigkeiten:

* meine brief an Prof. Fees und

* meine brief an OPP Betr. das Recht des MBTI

instrument zu nutzen.

Das erste Einzelteil wird bereits beendet, danke,

jedoch würde ich deine Meinung und Rückgespräch

bezüglich der Sekunde schätzen vor ich es weiter

schicke.

mit freundlichen Grüßen,

David

E-Mail: [email protected] Fax: +49 (0)951 26788

Messengers:

Skype: david_gv_ray

Yahoo: david_gv_ray

MSN: david_gv_ray

IRC: davidgvray

64


66

Date: Fri, 27 Oct 2006 19:50:44 +1000 (EST) From: "David G.V. Ray" <[email protected]> Add to Address Book Subject: Betr.: Wie sehen die nächsten Schritte aus =3F?= To: "Torsten Kühlmann" <[email protected]> Hei Torsten,

Danke für deine Unterstutzung. Ich habe vor drei

Wochen auf OPP gewartet und dass ist lang genug. Ich

hoffe, dass ich jetzt eine positive antworte bekomme

aber ich muss jetzt weiter arbeiten.

Mein Teilnehmerplan so weit:

* Organisationen zu kontaktieren, Ihre Erlaubnis zu

bekommen und Sie auf meinem Fragenbogen zu

vorbereiten.

Meine Kontakte gegenwärtig stammen von:

- persönliche Kontakte

- Referenzen und von

- eine CD Kontaktsdatenbank, dass Klicktel nennt ist.

Im Moment, entwickle ich ein Einführungskontaktsbrief

dass ich weiter zu Organisationen schicken möchte.

* eine Pressemitteilung

Gleichzeitig, entwickle ich eine Pressemitteilung,

dass ich gerne mit lokalen und internationalen Medien

teilen möchte und

* vor alle meine Kontakte bereite ich mich meine

eigene Kontaktsdatenbank vor.

Ich freue mich auf deiner Meinung.

Gruß,

David

====================================================

68


70

Date: Sat, 4 Nov 2006 01:52:23 +1100 (EST) From: "David G.V. Ray" <[email protected]> Add to Address Book Subject: David's PC Aktualisierung #2 To: "Torsten Kühlmann" <[email protected]> Hallo Torsten,

ich habe eine Sicherungskopie von alle Daten auf

meinem Freundin's Computer installiert und glaube,

dass alle meine MBA Daten dabei ist.

Bei Dell habe ich festgestellt, dass ich alle XP

software auf meinem Computer völlig neu installieren

muss. Danach, kann ich mein Daten wieder laden und

weiter arbeiten.

Meine Website ist bleibt unverändert weil es

unabhängig von meinem Computer ist.

Zeiteweilig, will ich deise zusätzliche Computer meine

Freundin's weiter nutzen und trotzdem weiter arbeiten.

Schönes Wochenende,

David


Messengers:

Skype: david_gv_ray

Yahoo: david_gv_ray

MSN: david_gv_ray

IRC: davidgvray

ICQ: 237438613

Send instant messages to your online friends

71

Hi David,

die Zusammenfassung für Opp ist aus meiner Sicht sehr

gut begründet. Viel Erfolg!

Wie sehen die nächsten Schritte aus?

Gruß Torsten

Prof. Dr. Torsten M. Kühlmann

Lehrstuhl für Personalwesen und Führungslehre

Universität Bayreuth

Universitätsstr. 30

95440 Bayreuth

Tel: +49921552952

Fax: +49921552954

email: [email protected]


Messengers:

Skype: david_gv_ray

Yahoo: david_gv_ray

MSN: david_gv_ray

IRC: davidgvray

ICQ: 237438613

Send instant messages to your online friends

http://au.messenger.yahoo.com

72


78


81

ANALYSIS RESULTS Hi Torsten,

I’ve carried out the following analysis for your review. The table below shows the total number of responses received over time:

There seems to have been a small increase in responses over the Christmas period, however, it appears as if my analysis results will only be indicative and not statistically representative. It’s not much consolation at present, however, I plan to continue my research after the submission of my dissertation and may utilize it in a possible doctorate later. After I collected and re-organized the data for analysis I qualified it. Post-collation Screening: The data collected was screened to identify target participants i.e. “senior decision makers in international projects”. Each term in this phrase was qualified (see Appendix BD: Target Participant Qualification Criteria) and the qualifications were used to identify responses that were acceptable for this research.

82

Analysis Methods Used:

A descriptive analysis was carried out on the resulting data set based on its nature as follows:

• Data about one factor (i.e. non-series data) was grouped and expressed as percentages e.g. data from one culture or one gender such as the percentage of responses received by gender, etc.

• Data that had some relationship to other data collected (i.e. series data) was analyzed by:

o Comparing how it related to other data of the same nature by using statistical deviations, means and medians e.g. the degree of extroversion of all participants

o Comparing how it related to other data of a different nature by using statistical correlations e.g. the relationship between extroversion and project decisions making responsibility.

Information about Single Factors (in Percentages):

Analysis of Response Sources

I started the analysis with a simple breakdown analysis of the respondent sources as follows:

83

Analysis of Project Nature

Here I analyzed the projects by industry, country and currency in percentages.

84

Relationships within Variables (Statistical Deviations, Means and Medians): The following factors (i.e. variables) were analyzed here:

6. age of respondents

7. number of projects that they were currently participating in

8. the percentage of projects that were being carried out in foreign countries

9. the percentage of project decisions that respondents made and

10. respondent’s decision making level

n.b. Just a quick note here, “Target” here refers to the target participants from the post-collation qualification process. The qualification criteria was as follows:

85

Term Definition "Senior" is defined as individuals having ultimate responsibility for a significant

to substantial(25-50%+) number of the decisions taken. "Decision maker” anyone making decisions in any given international project "International" any project that has over 30% of its internal team based in a country

other than the country of project origin

"Projects" any project with a budget of 100,000 local currency (i.e. €/$/£) requiring 10+ internal team-members (i.e. external resources are additional to this)

Relationships between Variables (Statistical Correlations): The relationships between the variables were analyzed here i.e. between the “Big 5” factors ( i.e. left most column) and other variables (i.e. displayed across the top of each table).

87

“Big 5” Interpretation I’ve found the article called “The Big Five Trait Taxonomy” by Oliver P. John in February

2005123 and revisited it to help me with my interpretation of my analysis (please see it attached

to this email). Page 30 is helpful and I’d appreciate your opinion on it or preferable sources if

possible.

Discussion & Suggestions Your opinions would be very welcome. If you would like any other information from me then

just let me know.

Best regards,

David

123 http://ipip.ori.org/

88

RESOURCES

APPENDIX I-R01: PROJECT PLAN

92

APPENDIX I-R02: HEALTH

96

APPENDIX I-R03: COMPUTER REPLACEMENT

100

APPENDIX I-R04: DATA SOURCES & ACCESS POINTS

102

This various colors across the top of the table identify both the type of data that was available

(i.e. documents, databases, electronic journals, etc) and the data source (e.g. BIBSYS, etc.). The

dark green vertical access identifies the locations, i.e. access points, available to me to access

the sources (e.g. via GSOMI’s library, etc.

Each access point has access to essentially the same sources, however, each has paid for

different subscriptions i.e. each has paid only for data sources that they think are relevant or

necessary. I did try to get access to a variety of “access points” in addition to those available

via GSO such as via my Australian university, the Institute of Technology, and via Harvard,

however, the costs were inhibitive and I eventually relied on only German access points only

that I had already paid for.

BIBSYS is a leading supplier in Norway of information systems to libraries and institutions of

higer education. Among our customers are all Norwegian university libraries, the National

Library, all college libraries, and a number of research libraries. For more information about

our customers, see our customer list.

BIBSYS provides the following products:

103

• BIBSYS Integrated Library System (ILS) with modules for managing internal library

routines and for searcing and borrowing documents for end-users with a BIBSYS

patron ID.

• BIBSYS Emneportal, a subject gateway leading students and researchers to quality

assured Internet sites.

• BIBSYS ForskDok, a research documentation system.

• BIBSYS Gallery, a system for storing image collections and displaying them on the

Internet.

For more information about BIBSYS' products, see the brochure BIBSYS Library and

Information Systems.

104

APPENDIX I-R05: DATABASES AVAILABLE

116

APPENDIX I-R06: RESEARCH DESIGN, METHODS AND LOGIC UNDER THE SCIENTIFIC METHOD

118

Research Design, Methods and Logic

within the Scientific Method.

What Research Design to Use, When and Why.

David G.V. Ray

International Master of Business Adminitration (M.B.A.)

Dissertation Research: International Project Management

Georg-Simon-Ohm Management Institute (EU – Germany)

120

This document been compiled for the review and criticism of my supervising professor, Prof. Dr. Torsten M. Kühlmann, Chair for Personnel Management and Leadership, Bayreuth University (Germany). It may also be made available to other selected interested parties. It is a summary of material that I’ve read to date plus my related conclusions with regard to the “scientific method”, “research” and “research design” and is specifically compiled to compliment the completion of my dissertation. For me to be to able to constructively criticize the work of others in my “literature review” phase I found it necessary to:

• understand what research processes they applied, • what processes they could or should have applied and • be able to asses the validity of their results

before I could clearly identify a genuine “problem” in my selected field of study, international project management, for my dissertation. I’m applying the results of this initial research on “how to research” to Step 2 of my dissertation process i.e.:

2.1 Examine the problem 2.2 Collect evidence 2.3 Analyze evidence 2.4 Interpret evidence 2.5 Make recommendations, where appropriate

within the overall dissertation process phases which are : 0. Initiation 1. Create a proposal 2. Structure and carry out an investigation which generates new ideas/data 3. Confirm, consolidate, and test MBA learning, linking theory to practice 4. Select other appropriate information/data sources 5. Exhibit capability to apply conventional research method(s) 6. Demonstrate critical thinking and insight 7. Design, write and present 8. Undertake retrospective reflection Thankyou for your time and effort and I look forward to your feedback with enthusiasm. Best regards,

David G.V. Ray

- 3 -

121

Introduction

“Knowledge is information of which a person, organization or other entity is aware.” [5]. The „Scientific method is a body of techniques for investigating phenomena and acquiring new knowledge, as well as for correcting and integrating previous knowledge. It is based on observable, empirical, measurable evidence, and subject to laws of reasoning. All this evidence is collectively called scientific evidence.” [5]. “Research is often described as an active, diligent, and systematic process of inquiry aimed at discovering, interpreting and revising facts. This intellectual investigation produces a greater understanding of events, behaviors, or theories, and makes practical applications through laws and theories.” [5]. It appears that accurate research is based on excellent research design. The design process, in turn, appears to be determined by two main factors: • the nature of the subject being studied in conjunction with our existing scientific,

ethical and moral limitations plus • an understanding and effective application of the knowledge gathering process

overall.

Subject’s Nature and Existing Scientific Limitations In an ideal research situation, it would be possible to find something that we believe caused the event being studied and then clearlz ascertain that it was, in fact, that “something“ that may have caused it .Each and every event to be studied would be to subjected to the “experimental” research approach i.e. given that the researcher has already identified the independent variable that they would like to test (“something” that may have caused it) the researcher would be able to do two things: • test that variable - be able to control the introduction of that variable to a particular

situation of their choice (typically a population sample) • rule out other variables during testing - be certain that the variable identified

caused the event being studied by ruling out any other potential causes, i.e. to rule out extraneous factors typically by “randomizing” the members in the sample group and by having a “control” group for comparison purposes.

However, unfortunately this isn’t always possible. The current limits of :

• our own existing knowledge, • our ethics and morals and/or • our existing tools e.g. for measurement, etc.

limit the use of the “experimental” approach.

- 4 -

122

We often have to console ourselves with a “watered down” or “best we can do” approach that is as close to the “experimental” approach as possible given the situation at hand. “For example, let’s assume that you want to study the effects of early physical abuse on children’s ability to form secure attachment relationships with significant others. Clearly, it is immoral and unethical to randomly assign children to abusive and non-abusive home environments. In this case, the best you can do is to select children who have already been exposed to abusive early environments and compare their attachment relations to those of children who grew up in non-abusive environments.” [5]

So, the limits (mentioned above) determine which research design is the best available “less than exeriemtally perfect” research design alternative for a given subject. The specific selection of a particular technique within the research design available is determined by the: researcher(s), or their employer’sobjectives re the use of the resulting kowledge at the time.

Understanding and Application of the Knowledge Gathering Process:

A clear understanding of:

• the goals of the researcher or sponsoring parties, • the research process overall, • the research methods available and when to apply them, • the analysis techniques available and when to apply them to the data gathered • data sources and source identification techniques

plus:

• a crystal clear definition of the issue(s) to be researched (which are often based on the results, analysis and criticism of the existing research of other’s).

If any of the above is not applied then a breakdown in the scientific method may

eventuate and result in:

o a poor understanding and constructive criticism of existing research, o unclear research objective(s) identification, o poor quality research design, o poor data analysis, o incorrect potential solution identification and o faulty testing.

- 5 -

123

Each of these “breakdowns” parallel the essential elements of a scientific method being iterations, recursions, interleavings, and orderings of the following:

• Characterizations (Quantifications, observations, and measurements)

• Hypotheses (theoretical, hypothetical explanations of observations and measurements)

• Predictions (reasoning including logical deduction from hypotheses and theories)

• Experiments (tests of all of the above).

The following overview contain explanations as to what research to use, when and why. It includes:

1. pages 7 & 8, to help gain an overview of what the various research design alternatives are and when they’re applied based on the nature of subject being studied, a graphical overview of the overall research design methods is given and includes:

2. pages 9-38, to assist with deciding on which research method could be used and when to use them, a series of logic workflow diagrams are presented re:

1.1. the scientific method and

1.2. a detailed logic flow of the research design process

3. page 39-44, to assist with planning research so that the results are considered to be sound, a “Validation Testing” overview.

4. pages 45-51, an overview of the subjects included in the sciences, humanities plus hybrid subjects resulting from various combinations of both. This can be helpful when making fundamental decisions about the:

4.1. research method to use and when e.g. scientific method vs others

4.2. categorizing the areas in which the research, and it’s results, are being carried out e.g. does the research stem from the sciences, the humanities, etc. and if so, which sub-group of each.

5. page 52, appropriate references

.Note: the flowchart logic moves from the general to the more specific throughout the flowcharts, typically from one page to another, where “terminator”s such as the following are used e.g.

- 6 -

Scientific Research

Design Selection

124

1. What are the Various Research Designs Available?

(a graphical overview of the research process alternatives) :

- 7 -

125

Key/Legend and further detail regarding „indirect“ research techniques available.

- 8 -

126

2. Which Research Method could be used and When to Use Them? (i.e. a workflow of the scientific method & subsequent tesearch design)

Empirical approach (i.e. based on observation vs. Other approaches e.g. „gut feel“, intuition, etc.)

Awareness

Observations

Opertational Defintion(s)

Measurement

Questions

∪ Translate the research idea into an answerable question

∪ Ensure that the question answerable

Hypothesis GenerationGuess about the answer to your research question. Ensure that it

makes a prediction:

∪ Formulate „null“

∪ alternative“ hypothesis.

Analyses∪ Apply statistics (typically)∪ Establish rejection of null

hypothesis or otherwise∪ Check for errors - Type I or Type II

∪ If null hypothesis rejected, are the findings „statistically significant“?

∪ If the results can be replicated then confidence in the „generalizability“ of the findings to other population is high

Replication

Experiments∪ design research∪ conduct experiment

Conclusions

Scientific Method Overview:

ResearchDesign Phase

- 9 -

127

Start/Restart Research Design

HaveI identified

a factor that influences the thing I’m studying i.e. an independent variable for

testing?

"Exploratory Research"

Design

Can I identify independent variable(s) that may

influence the thing being studied?

Stop Research Design

Do I want to

study natural phenomena only i.e.

Natural Science ?

Do I want to study human

behavior and society only i.e. Social Science

?

Do I want to study supernatural phenomena?

Is the topic I want to study a combination of existing

sciences? i.e. interdisciplinary

Can I test an

indentified independent variable in a situation i.e.

can I use the scientific Method

?

Do I want to study aspects of the human condition i.e.

Humanities?

Do I want to study

human expressions i.e, the Arts?

SCIENCES

NON-SCIENCES (i.e. Humanities & Arts)

Design Super-Natural Research

Design Art’s Research

Design Humanities Research

Scientific Research

Design Selection

Did the research resulting

from this design achieve my objective? i.e. answer my question or generate

the required knowledge?

ResearchDesign Phase

Y N

Research Design Process Overview (see Section ( c ) page 31)

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Research Design Overview (and Guide)

As can be seen on pages 8 & 9, the keystone to the development of scientific knowledge is the “scientific method”. It in turn relies on the generation of accurate research based on excellent research design.

This overview chart shown here on page 10 identifies the various research design elements that will be covered in pages 10 – 30 and will also act as a guide map throughout section (b) (i.e. Which Research Method could be used and When to Use Them? ) in this paper.

Logic flowcharts will also be presented for each element in the research design overview above i.e. for the stem of the chart re “Idea Generation”, “Literature Research”, “Research Question” and for the three (2) broad research design types shown:

• “Direct” or “Applied” Research:

o “Interventional” (red), o “Non-interventional” or “Observational” research(green)

which may also be subdivided into either:

o “Analytic” research designs:

• cohort studies • case control studies

o “Descriptive(Statistical)”:

Comparative Developmental Correlational - 11 -

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• “Indirect Research”[3] design styles:

• statistical or • non-statistical

Direct/applied research designs can be “interventional” or “non-interventional”. This refers to the researcher’s ability to add something that they believe causes an event (i.e. an independent variable) to a given situation for testing or otherwise i.e. when they can control it’s addition it’s known as “interventional” and when not it’s known as “non-interventional”.

“Indirect” research has nothing to do with “intervention” because the researcher does not attempt to test anything at all. Alternatively, they concentrate on reviewing the results of existing research to date.

n.b. statistical techniques can be used in all research design forms, for both qualitative and quantitative data, as a tool to describe any results that may eventuate regardless of the fact that some research designs are specifically called “descriptive/statistical”. This name does not mean that statistical techniques are not used in other research designs.

Qualitative data is simply data that we can’t directly measure yet. It is typically related with “data dealing with the human element” [5] e.g. emotions. Quantitative data is data that we can measure directly with existing instrumentation.

“Statistics is a mathematical science pertaining to the collection, analysis, interpretation, and presentation of data.” [5]

“In statistics, qualitative analysis consists of procedures that use categorical data, that is data that concern classifications. An important subfield is the analysis of dichotomous data – that is, data which can take only the values 0 (zero) and 1 (one). These techniques are suitable where events or entities can only be counted or classified rather than measured on a higher level. The techniques themselves are, of course, numerically based.”[5] Qualitative data can’t, by definition, be directly measured but it can be indirectly interpreted by the researcher, categorized and weighted. These interpreted results can then be described via statistical analysis.

“Quantitative analysis” has different meanings in different contexts. In most contexts it is contrasted with an alternative approach that is known as qualitative analysis.

• In social science, quantitative analysis refers to the use of numerical and statistical techniques rather than the analysis of verbal material.

• In finance, a quantitative analyst, is someone who applies mathematics, among others stochastic calculus, to finance.

• In analytical chemistry, quantitative analysis involves the measurements of quantities of substances produced in reactions rather than simply noting the nature of the reactions.” [5]

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Within direct/applied research, therefore: “Interventional” research designs are, by definition, research where the researcher has control over the addition of the independent variable to a given test situation. Interventional research is subdivided into three design sub-types, “experimental”, “quasi-experimental” and “pre-experimental”, based on the representativitity of test situation available.

n.b. the data used in “interventional”designs may be either “qualitative” or “quantitative” in nature but tend to be “quantitative”.

“Experimental” interventional research designs can be used where the researcher:

• has identified an influence, i.e. independent variable, that they believe causes an

event of interest and • has control over the introduction of the independent variable to a test situation in

which the independent variable is to be tested, i.e. typically a “sample”, and further, in the test situation the researcher: • can simultaneously assign a comparison or “control” group and • can ensure that the test situation is representative of the actual event being studied

by controlling the removal of all other possible influencing causes on that event, i.e. by removing all other independent variables referred to as “extraneous factors”.

“Quasi-experimental” interventional research designs can be used out where the researcher :

• has identified an independent variable they wish to study and • has control over the introduction of the independent variable to a test situation and further, in the test situation the researcher: • can simultaneously assign a comparison or “control” group but • can’t ensure that the test situation is representative of the actual event being

studied via the removal of all other “extraneous factors”.

It’s nearly an experiment except for the increased possibility that extraneous factors, in addition to the independent variable being researched, may have also influenced the event being studied.

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“Pre-experimental” interventional research designs can be used out where the researcher :

• has identified an independent variable they wish to study and • has control over the introduction of the independent variable to a test situation and further, in the test situation the researcher: • often can’t simultaneously assign a comparison or “control” group and • can’t ensure that the test situation is representative of the actual event being

studied via the removal of all other “extraneous factors”. “Non-Interventional” research designs are, by definition, research where the researcher does not have control over the addition of the independent variable to a given test situation. Non-interventional research is then subdivided into two design sub-types, “descriptive(statistical)” and “analytic”, based on the researcher’s ability to identify and use a “control” group in test situation available.

n.b. the data used in “non-interventional”designs may be either “qualitative” or

“quantitative”. “Analytic” non-interventional designs can be used where the researcher:

• has identified an independent variable they wish to study but, • does not have control over the introduction of the independent variable to a test

situation i.e. where the variable is believed to naturally occur in a given situation and further, in the test situation the researcher: • can simultaneously assign a comparison or “control” group but • can’t ensure that the test situation is representative of the actual event being

studied i.e. can’t ensure that all other “extraneous” factors are removed . “Descriptive” or “Statistical” non-interventional designs, on the other hand, can be used where the researcher:

• has identified an independent variable they wish to study but, • does not have control over the introduction of the independent variable to a test

situation i.e. where the variable is believed to naturally occur in a given situation and further, in the test situation the researcher: • can’t simultaneously assign a comparison or “control” group and • can’t ensure that the test situation is representative of the actual event being

studied i.e. can’t ensure that all other “extraneous” factors are removed . - 14 -

132

Within “indirect” research designs:

“Indirect” research designs are, by definition, research where the researcher does not directly attempt to control the addition of the independent variable to a given test situation i.e. no testing takes place at all and only the literature and results of other’s research is reviewed. The research investigates any existing research that may exist about an independent variable that may effect an event of interest and typically attempts to summarize that information.

n.b. the data used in “indirect”designs may be either “qualitative” or “quantitative”

in nature.

“Indirect” research designs can be used where the researcher: • may or may not have yet identified an independent variable they wish to study and • does not have control over the introduction of the independent variable to a test

situation i.e. where the variable is believed to naturally occur in a given situation and further, does not directly test the independent variable at all i.e. the researcher: • does study any existing research about the independent variable but • does not attempt to assign a comparison or “control” group and • does not attempt to ensure that the test situation is representative of the actual event

being studied i.e. can’t ensure that all other “extraneous” factors are removed .

If a researcher uses “Indirect” research to:

• identify an independent variable that may cause a particular event of interest then that research is known as “exploratory” research,

• find more data about an independent variable that has already been identified then that research is known as a “Literature Analysis”

n.b. “exploratory” research is typically used at the beginning of any research design to

identify a focus for the research overall.

Indirect research is also subdivided into two design sub-types, “statistical” and “non-statistical”, based on the researcher’s intention, describe or rank results.

Where the researcher wants to: o describe the data e.g. means, medians, correlations, etc. then “Statistical” indirect

research is used on the secondary data collected from the literature reviewed i.e. statistical techniques.

o rank the results given in secondary data then “Non-statistical” indirect research is used

such as“Content/Textual” Analysis. - 15 -

133

It’s also important to realize that the research design process is dynamic and “iterative” i.e. it loops back on itself. This can be seen at the very research beginning of the research design process where “Indirect/Literary/Exploratory” type research is used to assist with initial “Literary Search”. After it has been used to establish a “Research Question” the same option, i.e. “Indirect/Literary/Exploratory” may once again be used as an option for further research. The process starts with the “Generation of an Idea”, which leads to a “Literature Seach” and results in a “Research Question” being generated(highlighted with a blue surround). The “Research Question”, in combination with a number of limits (e.g. moral, ethical, scientific, etc. see page 3) determine which specific research design from within one of the three will form the basis of the research to follow.

The “Idea Generation”:

Its logic and details can be shown as follows:

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The Literature Search:

The Purposes: The major purposes of a literature search are:

• To search for investigations similar to the one you are contemplating

• To search for an established theoretical framework for your study

• To clarify your research idea

• To operationalize your variables or clearly define your terms

• To locate and learn from similar study designs

• To identify useful research instruments

• To identify authorities or significant personalities

• To locate data sources

• To define historical or associational perspectives

• To determine appropriate outcome variables

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The Tools:

Electronic Indexes: Electronic indexes are computer-searchable bibliographic information sources. They typically provide you with information such as:

• Author(s)

• Title of article

• Journal title

• Volume, pages, month, year

• Call number (if book)

• An abstract of the article

• Key words (usually called descriptors), which are frequently useful for searching for other related articles.

Textbooks:

Textbooks are primarily useful when you are just starting to venture into an area you know little or nothing about. Be aware that textbooks are typically written from the viewpoint of only one or two persons, so that they may contain an incomplete or even biased account of the subject area.

The information is generally at least 2 years old and often older. It is therefore important to supplement textbook information with information from other textbooks and, most importantly, journal articles.

Print Indexes:

Print indexes are practically extinct, with the advent of electronic indexes. Electronic indexes, most of them at least, are simply computer-searchable versions of the print index. However, research by information science professionals does indicate that some print indexes are actually more efficient than the electronic counterpart for some types of searches. Your local library should be able to help you with the details of resources available to you locally.

Bibliographies: A textbook that you find particularly useful or an article that seems particularly relevant to your research question(s) can provide a gold mine of information about your topic(s) in the bibliography or references section. A recent review article is even better.

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The Sources:

The major sources for a literature search are:

• Primary Sources: Journal articles that report original work

• Secondary Sources

o Review Articles

o Textbooks

o Alternative Sources, such as government publications, doctoral dissertations, unpublished data

The Procedures:

At this point, you should have:

• A set of terms that are important to the research question you want to answer and their definitions.

• A set of goals and objectives.

You should now be ready to:

1. Decide which literature search tools you are going to use.

2. Compare your terms to the terms used in each search tool you plan to use (e.g., thesaurus for electronic indexes and print indexes, glossaries for textbooks).

3. Refine your terms based on the comparison (but do not discard them - they may yet be useful).

4. Review your goals and objectives.

5. Decide on a preliminary literature search strategy. On to the “Research Question”.

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The Research Question:

As you develop your research question(s), the following considerations may be useful to keep in mind:

• Identify and clearly define the population to be studied. Criteria must be included to determine both inclusion in the study (e.g., specific diagnoses, age, sex, etc.) and exclusion from the study (e.g., past medical history, presence of complications of the disease, contraindications to a certain therapy, etc.).

• Identify and operationally define independent and dependent study variables.

o Independent variables are the components of the study that are manipulated or controlled by the researcher, whether they be the administration of a drug or a placebo, behavioral interventions (e.g., patient education or counseling), or other choices.

o Existing factors that differentiate groups of individuals, such as age, sex, or marital status, may also serve as independent variables. While these characteristics are certainly not manipulated, groups differing in specific factors may be purposefully selected forcomparison.

o Dependent variables are the components of the study that will be observed or measured in the subjects in order to determine whether the experiment has an effect.

Change non-specific variables into specific variables that can be measured.

Determine how to measure each variable. Estimate the resources required to measure each variable.

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• State your research question in an operationalized form that can be studied with your

available resources. In addition, the identification of the knowledge area that your planning to investigate

seems to be obvious. It can, however, be somewhat unclear given the range of subjects available. A broad overview of the knowledge areas and major “building block” subject are given on pages 31 - 36.

Case StudyNaturalistic /

IndirectObservation

SurveysFocus Groups

Am I interested in

variations in human behaviour?

Do I want to

measures and identify the participants’

true behaviors?

Main limitation: ∪ resarcher has no

real control over the setting i.e. can’t control for extraneous factors

Do I want to describe

what people say they think and do? i.e.

perceived bahaviour

Do I want to find

relationships between the characteristics of the

respondents and their reported behaviors

i.e. CorrelationalStudies

Do Iwant to obtain

insight into how various procedures, systems, or products are viewed, as well as the desires

and concerns of a given population

?

Do I want information

on large groups of people, with very little effort or cost?

Main Limitations

Like all nonexperimental approaches: ∪ they merely describe what

occurred but they cannot tell us why it occurred

∪ they are likely to involve a great deal of experimenter bias

∪ the small number of individuals examined in these studies makes it unlikely that the findings will generalize to other people with similar issues or problems

Advantage:

∪ provides an open, fairly unrestricted forum for individuals to discuss ideas and to clarify each others’ impressions and opinions.

Dissadvantages:

∪ because of their relatively small sample sizes and the fact that they are typically not randomly selected, the information gleaned from focus groups may not be representative of the population in general.

∪ Second, although the group format may have some benefits in terms of helping to flesh out and distill perceptions and concerns, it is also very likely that an individual’s opinions can be altered through group influence.

∪ Finally, it is difficult to quantify the open-ended responses resulting from focus group interactions.

Advantage:

Provides informationon large groups of people, with very little effort, and in a costeffectivemanner

Carry out correlational

analysis on data Analysis Summary:potential independent

variables identified

Analyse data collected (non-correlational)

Exploratory Research

Main "Exploratory Research" Design Processes

(i.e. Non-Experimental or Qualitative designs)

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Research Method Selection:

Which of the three design types do I use? Here’s the logic flow.

Can I test the

variable’s influence by controlling it’s addition to a specific situation (i.e.

population or sample)?

Can I study a situation

where this variable is added naturally? i.e.where I can’t

control when it’s added.

"Non-interventional"

Research" Design

„No-intervention“ Research: Literature AnalysisDesign

Scientific Research

Design Selection

Scientific Research Design Selection ProcessTest ability to add variable

to a given situation

Non-experimental Designs

"Interventional Research"

Design

Experimental Designs

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Direct Research: Interventional Designs:

If the design selected is “Interventional”, as identified above, then the following logic flowcharts on pages 21 - 24 can be used to select which specific interventional research design and related validity testing can be applied.

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Can I test the variable only

on samples of the population?

Interventional:design a „census“

Am I interested in the

impact of the selected variable generally on a

population? i.e. and not any other possible

causes

Am I only interested

in certain treatments working on specific

individuals?

Can I make my sample(s)

representative (i.e. control unknown, "extraneous"

factors) via randomization?

Interventional:Quasi-

experimentalResearch

Design

Interventional:Experimental – Sample Based

Research Design

Interventional:Experimental - Single-Subject

ExperimentDesign

Is it morally or ethically right to do so

i.e. to setup a situation where a variable can be added,

i.e.minipulated,

Test the representativity of the situation to which the variale will

be added

N.b. randomization is typically used to assist in the removal of extranoues factors, i.e. to boost

internal validity.

Can a control group be

assigned?

One-Shot Case Study

One-Group Pretest-Posttest

DesignStatic Group Comparison

Can theextraneous factors

be influenced? i.e. can the groups be randomized

?

Interventional:Pre-Experimental

Designs

Can I test this single,

unrandomized sample group before

I introduce the variable?

Interventional:Experimental

Research Design

Interventional:Quasi- experimental

Research Design

"Interventional Research"

DesignInterventional Research Design Validy

Testing

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QUASI-EXPERIMENTAL DESIGNS

Nonequivalent Comparison-Group DesignsDo I

believe that pre-testing the sample

participants will itself have an impact on the results

i.e. cause a bias or

error?

Do I want to improve the

interpretation of the results by analyzing the

variable over time?

Design a „Nonequivalent Groups

Pretest-Posttest“(two or more groups)“

Design a „Nonequivalent Groups

Posttest-Only“ (Two or More Groups)

Interrupted Time-Series Designs

Do I suspect that the

Impact of the variable changes over

time ?

Design „Simple Interrupted Time-Series Design“

Do Isuspect that the

variable causes a result intermitently over

time?

Design a „Reversal Time-Series Design

(ABA)“

Can this variable

be withdrawn from a sample after being

Introduced?

Do I want to rule out

other variables for the observed effect? i.e.

within-group and between-group comparisons

Design „Multiple Time-Series

Design“

Design „Longitudinal

design“.

Cross-Sectional (i.e. because all measurements are taken at the same time this type of research can suggest associations between an intervention and an effect but cannot prove causality.)

Do I only want to

identify an association between the result and

the variable ?

Do I want to

identify if the variable being studied causes

the result ?


Interventional:Quasi-

experimentalResearch

Design

Validy Testing

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145

Am Ionly interested in

the impact of the selected variable? i.e. and not any

other possible causes.

Design a „Factoral“ experiment

Are I interested in other causes (i.e. ind.

variables)?

Do I assume that the

initial randomization process made my sample representative?

Do I believe

that pre-testing the sample participants will itself have an impact on the results

i.e. cause a bias or error

?

Design "Two Group Pretest-

Posttest" experiment

Design a "Posttest-Only Control Group"

experiment

Design a „Solomon

Four-Group“ experiment

Experimental Research Designs


Interventional:Single-Subject

Experiment

Interventional:Experimental

ResearchDesign

Single-Subject Design

Single-Subject Reversal Design

(ABA)

Single-Subject Multiple-Baseline

Design

Single-Subject DesignsDo

I want to rule out other variables for the

observed effect? i.e. for this individual and between-individual

comparisons

Do Isuspect that the

variable causes a result intermitently over

time?

Can this variable

be withdrawn from a sample after being

introduced?

Sample Research Designs

Validy Testing

Validy Testing

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Direct Research: Non-Interventional Designs

The research design logic for this wing can be seen on page 25.

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147

Do I believe that the

variable "causes" the event being studied to occur

?

Do I believe that

the variable is the "result" of other

factors?

Design Case-Control Studies

Design Cohort Study

Analytic or „Artificial Experiment“ Designs

Can I identify one group

that has been unfluenced by independent variable and

another that has not

?

Can I collect descriptive data

about the population I’m studying to help generate

new hypotheses?

Descriptive Designs

Design Non-interventional Research

"Non-interventional"

Research"

Collate Data & Apply Statistical Analysis i.e. measures of dispersion and central tendency e.g. Pearson product-moment correlation

coefficient

Validy Testing

Stop Reseach Design

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“Indirect” Research Design:

The logic overview for the Indirect „Literature Analysis“ is shown below and on subsequent pages 31 - 35.

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Design Literature Analysis

N

Y

„No-intervention“ Research: Literature Analysis

Validy Testing

DoI want to

identify findings from existing data that may

have been overlooked

?

Structured Literature Review

(see pg. 32)

Do I want to

translate information gleaned from the literature,

or from my own research

?

Decision Analysis

(see pg. 34)

Do I want to

describe/summarize the numerical results of

secondary data that I’ve found

?

Do I want to

rank the results of secondary data that

I’ve found?

Design a„Content/Textual“

Analysis(see pg. 35 & 36)

Indirect Research

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Structure Literature Review (Data Synthesis Strategies - Pillemer & Light 1980):

Conducting a combined significance test from summary statistics;Computing an average effect size (e.g. meta-analysis);Investigating interactions between study attributes and outcomes, and;Comparing similarly labeled treatments.

Did the studies

test the same directional

hypothesis?

Are the test

clearly equivalent testsof the same directional hypothesis

(i.e. can any variation in the outcome of the studies be attributed to differences in context, sample characteristics or some

other factor that might logically be expected to interact with the independant

Variable)?

Do several studies

tend to clearly favor one independant variable as the

cause over others (or over the control), but the effect is not

always significant?

Have I got access

to the the sample size and the value of the test

statistic of the studies (e.g., t, z, F)?

Conducting a Combined Significance Test

i.e. z-scores, for example, the z's are added across

studies and then divided by the sqare root of the

combined sample sizes

Do the results

tend to be consistent but varying in

effect size ?

Meta-Analysis: apply the Fitz-

Gibbon and Morris (1987) approach

Do I want to find out for whom, and

under what conditions, the independent variable is

effective?

Investigating Interactions Computing an Average Effect Size

Conducting a Combined

Significance Test

Do I want to combine "similar"

experiments?

Comparing Similarly Labelled indeoendent

Variables

"Clustering" Studies

that report similar outcomes and then

comparing clusters to try to determine why they

are different

Analysis of Variance(ANOVA)

i.e. means are compared by splitting the overall observed variance into different parts -

means, sample sizes, and standard deviations are used to

create mean squares and perform a two-way analysis of

variance

do I want to to

determine the average effect size for an independent

variable under comparable circumstances with

comparable Samples?

Are the independent

variables very similar in effect but different in

other respects (e.g. cost)

?

Structured Literature Review

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Meta-Analysis: apply the Fitz-

Gibbon and Morris (1987) approach

1. Identify the effect size that is to be investigated.

Note: the SD of Y is the pooled standard deviation, the overall SD of experimental and control groups combined.

2. Develop coding sheets.

Read each study, being very careful to take notes anytime you see something that you think

might have an impact on the result of the experimental treatment. Create a table with studies down the left side and factors across

the top. For each study, place a check mark in the factor column if that factor was present in

the study. Select only studies that you consider to be comparable on everything that might

impact the outcome.

3. Extract effect sizes.

If all of the studies report group means and standard deviations, you can use the basic formula above. Otherwise, You can extract it from either the t value:

or the correlation value:

6. Compute a mean effect size.

This can be a simple unweighted mean, or greater weight can be given

to studies with larger sample sizes. The unweighted mean is simply the sum of the effect sizes divided by the number,

1.02 in this case.

8. Relate the effect size findings to the data on the coding sheets.

In this example, you would want to go back to your coding table and take another look at

Study 3. Did you overlook something? Do you need to add something to the coding sheet? This outlier study could merely have been

done better than the other three, or there may have been some condition in the context or participants that led to this larger effect size.

9. Interpret the size of the effect by reference to other information.

You're on your own from this point. It is up to your professional knowledge about the

treatment of interest and anything you know or suspect may be related to it. If you suspect

you know, for example, why the effect size was so much larger in Study 3, you may

decide to perform an experiment to test this suspicion (hypothesis).

7. Test for homogeneity of the effect sizes. The homogeneity statistic is

distributed as a chi-square variable with degrees of freedom equal to the number of studies minus 1. If the computed value is larger than the tabular value for chi-square, then this suggests heterogeneity

(effect sizes not homogeneous). In the example, the chi-square value

for 3 degrees of freedom at the p<.05 level of significance is .781. In other words, our earlier feeling that something different was going on in

Study 3 was probably right.

4. Compute standard errors.

5. Graph and ruminate.

Notice that studies 1, 2, and 4 are similar in effect size, and their effect sizes plus or minus one standard error overlap. Study 3 effect size, however, is larger than the other 3, and it's effect size plus or minus 1 standard error does not overlap with the other 3. This may or may not be meaningful, but it does indicate that you might want to take a very hard look at Study 3 to see if you can find anything about it that makes it different from the other three in terms of moderating factors on the impact of the treatment.

Meta-Analyis Worksheet

(Fitz-Gibbon and Morris -1987)

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Decision Analysis Multi-Attribute Utility Analysis (MAUT) e.g. from Posavac & Carey, (1989)

Have I identified the decision-maker?This is important. The task is to cast the

decision in terms of the perceptions of the person (or organization) actually making

the decision.

Decision Analysis

Have I identified the issue or issues to be

addressed? For example, let's say you have a patient with high cholesterol, and

he or she is interested in your help in bringing it down.

Sum the importance weights, divide each by the sum, and multiply by 100.

This is purely a computational step so that the importance wieghts will sum to 100. It is called

"normalizing".

The sum of these importance weights is 80. Then:

* Minimizing financial cost = (10 / 80 ) * 100 = 12.5 * Maximizing physical comfort = ( 30 / 80 ) * 100 =

37.5 * Minimizing time consumed = ( 40 / 80 ) * 100 = 50

Rank the dimensions in order of importance.

# Minimizing cost in terms of time consumed# Maximizing acceptability in terms of physical comfort

# Minimizing financial cost# Rate the dimensions in importance, preserving

ratios.

The least important dimension is assigned a value of 10. This is arbitrary but empirically a useful starting

point for fine grading of subsequent dimensions while retaining integer numbers. Let's say our patient

assigns the following ratings:

* Minimizing financial cost = 10 * Maximizing acceptability in terms of physical

comfort = 30 * Minimizing cost in terms of time consumed = 40

In other words, physical comfort is three times as important to this patient as is minimizing cost, and minimizing time is four times as important as cost.

Identify the relevant dimensions of value.

In this example, let's say that the relevant dimensions are minimizing financial cost,

minimizing cost in terms of time consumed, and maximizing acceptability in

terms of physical comfort.

Identify the choices or options to be evaluated.

E.g. someone with high cholesterol has three choices (or combination

thereof):

* Diet * Exercise

* Medication

Calculate utilities.

Here is a chart to help you visualize MAUT:

Determine the probability for each option, for each dimension of value, that the option will maximize that

dimension.

E.g. Diet

Minimizing financial cost = .7Maximizing physical comfort = .3Minimizing time consumed = .9

In other words, our patient thinks that going on a diet to control cholesterol is highly likely (subjective probability = .7) to result in minimizing the financial cost of getting his/her choleterol down, not very likely to result in maximum physical comfort (p = .3), but quite likely to minimize the amount of time she or he will have to spend on the project of lowering her/his cholesterol.

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The Process of a Content Analysis [5] According to Dr. Klaus Krippendorff (1980 and 2004), six questions must be

addressed in every content analysis:

1. Which data are analyzed?

2. How are they defined?

3. What is the population from which they are drawn?

4. What is the context relative to which the data are analyzed?

5. What are the boundaries of the analysis?

6. What is the target of the inferences?

According to Zipf's Law, the assumption is that words and phrases mentioned most

often are those reflecting important concerns in every communication. Therefore,

quantitative content analysis starts with word frequencies, space measurements

(column centimeters/inches in the case of newspapers), time counts (for radio and

television time) and keyword frequencies. However, content analysis extends far

beyond plain word counts, e.g. with Keyword In Context routines words can be

analysed in their specific context to be disambiguated. Synonyms and homonyms

can be isolated in accordance to linguistic properties of a language.

Qualitatively, content analysis can involve any kind of analysis where

communication content (speech, written text, interviews, images ...) is categorized

and classified. In its beginnings, using the first newspapers at the end of 19th

century, analysis was done manually by measuring the number of lines and amount

of space given a subject. With the rise of common computing facilities like PCs,

computer-based methods of analysis are growing in popularity. Answers to open

ended questions, newspaper articles, political party manifestoes, medical records or

systematic observations in experiments can all be subject to systematic analysis of

textual data.

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By having contents of communication available in form of machine readable texts,

the input is analysed for frequencies and coded into categories for building up

inferences.

Robert Philip Weber (1990) notes: "To make valid inferences from the text, it is

important that the classification procedure be reliable in the sense of being

consistent: Different people should code the same text in the same way" (p. 12).

The validity, inter-coder reliability and intra-coder reliability are subject to intense

methodological research efforts over long years (see Krippendorf, 2004).

One more distinction is between the manifest contents (of communication) and its

latent meaning. "Manifest" describes what (an author or speaker) definitely has

written, while latent meaning describes what an author intended to say/write.

Normally, content analysis can only be applied on manifest content; that is, the

words, sentences, or texts themselves, rather than their meanings.

Dermot McKeone (1995) has highlighted the difference between prescriptive

analysis and open analysis. In prescriptive analysis, the context is a closely-defined

set of communication parameters (e.g. specific messages, subject matter); open

analysis identifies the dominant messages and subject matter within the text.

A further step in analysis is the distinction between dictionary-based (quantitative)

approaches and qualitative approaches. Dictionary-based approaches set up a list of

categories derived from the frequency list of words and control the distribution of

words and their respective categories over the texts. While methods in quantitative

content analysis in this way transform observations of found categories into

quantitative statistical data, the qualitative content analysis focuses more on the

intentionality and its implications.

Uses of Content Analysis [5] Holsti (1969) groups fifteen uses of content analysis into

three basic categories: make inferences about the antecedents of a communication,

describe and make inferences about characteristics of a communication, and make

inferences about the effects of a communication. He also places these uses into the

context of the basic communication paradigm.

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The following table shows fifteen uses of content analysis in terms of their general purpose, element of the communication paradigm to which they apply, and the general question they are intended to answer.

Uses of Content Analysis by Purpose, Communication Element, and Question

Purpose Element Question Use

Source Who? • Answer questions of disputed authorship

Make inferences about the antecedents of communications

Encoding process Why?

• Secure political & military intelligence

• Analyze traits of individuals

• Infer cultural aspects & change

• Provide legal & evaluative evidence

Channel How?

• Analyze techniques of persuasion

• Analyze style

Message What?

• Describe trends in communication content

• Relate known characteristics of sources to messages they produce

• Compare communication content to standards

Describe & make inferences about the characteristics of

communications

Recipient To whom?

• Relate known characteristics of audiences to messages produced for them

• Describe patterns of communication

Make inferences about the consequences of communications

Decoding process

With what effect?

• Measure readability

• Analyze the flow of information

• Assess responses to communications

Note. Purpose, communication element, & question from Holsti (1969). Uses primarily from Berelson (1952) as adapted by Holsti (1969).

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3. Research Design Validation Testing

Unreliable Experiment (i.e. can’t be sure that the variable studied

caused the result)

Validity Testing Overview

Reliable Experiment (i.e. the variable studied is likely

to have caused the result) Can draw inferences.

Validy Testing

Internal Validity

history maturation instrumentation testing statistical regression selection biases attrition diffusion or imitation of treatment special treatment or reactions of controls

External Validity

sample characteristics,

stimulus characteristics and settings,

reactivity of experimental arrangements,

multiple-treatment interference,

novelty effects,

reactivity of assessment,

test sensitization, and

timing of measurement

Construct(Explanation) Validitiy

do clearly stated and accurate operational definitions of a study’s variables exist.

does a strong conceptual basis for this explanation exist

Statistical Validity

low statistical power,

variability in the experimental procedures and participant characteristics,

unreliability of measures,

multiple com-parisons and error rates

Have all internal validation processes

been successfully completed?

Have all external validation

processes been successfully completed?

Have all construct validation

processes been successfully completed?

Have all statistical

validation processes been successfully

completed?

Were all validity test successful?

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Validation Details - Internal Threats to Internal Validity • History: Global internal or external events or incidents that take place during the course of the study that might have unintended and uncontrolled-for impacts on the study’s final outcome (i.e., on the dependent variable). • Maturation: Intrinsic changes within the participants that are usually related to the passage of time. • Instrumentation: Changes in the assessment of the independent variable that are usually related to changes in the measuring instrument or measurement procedures over time. • Testing: The effects that taking a test on one occasion may have on subsequent administrations of the test. It is most often encountered in longitudinal research, in which participants are repeatedly measured on the same variables of interest over time. • Statistical regression: Statistical phenomenon, prevalent in pretest and posttest designs, in which extremely high or low scores on a measure tend to revert toward the mean of the distribution with repeated testing. • Selection bias: Systematic differences in the assignment of participants to experimental conditions. • Attrition: Loss of research participants that may alter the original composition of groups and compromise the validity of the study. • Diffusion or imitation of treatment: Unintended exposure of a control group to an intervention intended only for the experimental group, or a failure to expose the experimental group to the intended intervention.This confound most commonly occurs in medical and psychological intervention studies. • Special treatment or reactions of controls: Relatively common threats to internal validity in which either (1) special or compensatory treatment or attention is given to the control condition, or (2) participants in the control condition, as a result of their assignment, react or compensate in a manner that improves or otherwise alters their performance.

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Validation Details - External Threats to External Validity • Sample characteristics:The extent to which the results of only to a particular sample.The key question is whether the results can be applied to other samples that vary on a variety demographic and descriptive characteristics, such as age, gender, orientation, education, and socioeconomic status. • Stimulus characteristics and settings: An environmental phenomenon whereby particular features or conditions of the study generalizability of the findings so that the findings from one necessarily apply to another study, even if the other study similar sample. • Reactivity of experimental arrangements: A potentially confounding variable that results from the influence produced by knowing is participating in a research study. • Multiple-treatment interference:This threat refers to research situations in which (1) participants are administered more than experimental intervention within the same study or (2) the same participate in more than one study. • Novelty effects: This refers to the possibility that the effects independent variable may be due in part to the uniqueness or novelty stimulus or situation and not to the intervention itself. • Reactivity of assessment: A phenomenon whereby participants’ awareness that their performance is being measured can alter their performance from what it otherwise would have been. • Pretest and posttest sensitization: These threats refer to that pretesting and posttesting might have on the behavior of study participants. • Timing of assessment and measurement:This threat refers the same results would have been obtained if measurement occurred at a different point in time.

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Validation Details – External (cont.)

Ecological and Temporal Validity

Although the terms “ecological validity” and “external validity” are sometimes

used interchangeably, a clear distinction can be drawn between the two. Of the two,

external validity is a more general concept. It refers to the degree to which research

results generalize to other conditions, participants, times, and places, and it is

ultimately concerned with the conclusions that can be drawn about the strength of

the inferred causal relationship between the independent and dependent variables to

circumstances beyond those experimentally studied.

Ecological validity is a more specific concept that refers to the generalization of

findings obtained in a laboratory setting to the real world.

Temporal validity is another term that is related broadly to external validity. It

refers to the extent to which the results of a study can be generalized across time.

More specifically, this type of validity refers to the effects of seasonal, cyclical, and

person-specific fluctuations that can affect the generalizability of the study’s

findings.

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Validation Details - Construct Threats to External Validity

• In the context of research design and methodology, the term construct validity relates to interpreting the basis of the causal relationship, and it refers to the congruence between the study’s results and the theoretical underpinnings guiding the research (Kazdin, 2003c).

• The focus of construct validity is usually on the study’s independent variable. In

essence, construct validity asks the question of whether the theory supported by the findings provides the best available explanation of the results. In other words, is the reason for the relationship between the experimental intervention (independent variable) and the observed phenomenon (dependent variable) due to the underlying construct or explanation offered by the researchers.

Improving Construct Validity Cook and Campbell (1979) make the following suggestions for improving construct validity:

• Provide a clear operational definition of the abstract concept or independent variable.

• Collect data to demonstrate that the empirical representation of the independent

variable produces the expected outcome.

• Collect data to show that the empirical representation of the independent variable does not vary with measures of related but different conceptual variables.

• Conduct manipulation checks of the independent variable

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Validation Details - Statistical Threats to Statistical Validity • Low statistical power: Low probability of detecting a difference between experimental and control conditions even if a difference truly exists. • Procedural and participant variability: Variability in methodological procedures and a host of participant characteristics, which decreases the likelihood of detecting a difference between the control and experimental conditions. • Unreliability of measures: Whether the measures used in a study assess the characteristics of interest in a consistent manner. Unreliable measures introduce more random variability into the research design, which reduces statistical power. • Multiple comparisons and error rates: The concept that, as the number of statistical analyses increases, so does the likelihood of finding a significant difference between the experimental and control conditions purely by chance.

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4. The Categorization of Knowledge, Research and it’s Results (i.e. subjects included in the Sciences, Humanities and “Hybrids”): Existing Knowledge Areas Overview: When deciding on which knowledge area a particular piece of research stems it can be helpful to understand how the knowledge areas are organized i.e. Sciences – natural and social, Humanities and what I’ve termed as “hybrids”. This graphic represents an overview of the currently known knowledge areas and demonstrates examples of hybrid subject areas e.g. historical geography (underlined in yellow) that exist in areas where the existing knowledge areas overlap. The “bulding block” subjects from each knowledge area can be seen across the top of the pages 48 - Natural Science, page 49 – Social Science, page 50 – Humanities. From these stem the Hybrid subjects, examples of which are I’ve included on page 51. It appears that many subjects, in the foreseeable future, will probably be hybrids.

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163

Sciences

Humanities

Known

Social Science

Natural Science

Astronomy Biology

Chemistry

Earth Science

Physics

Social Policy

Culture

Historical Geography

Geography

History

Psychology

Education

Anthropology

Development Studies

Economics

Political Science

Sociology

Communication

Linguistics

Cultural Studies

Geomorphology

Sociobiology

Legal Sociology

Unknown

Knowledge Areas Map: Subjects & Overlaps

ReligionArchitecture

Classics

Visual ArtsMusic

Languages

Literature

Performing Arts

n.b. A key to this graphic in tabular format is available on the next page.

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Knowledge Area Overview (Known): Tabular Form

The same data from page 21 is represented here in a tabular format for your convenience.

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165

Natural Sciences

Astronomy Physics

Environmental science

Meteorology

Geology

Hydrology

Science-based or Physical

GeographySoil science

Chemistry

Neuropsychology

Hybrids

Social:Social Humanities:HumanitiesNatural

Science:HumanitiesSocial

Sciencel:Humanities SB BA M BP

Hybrid Subjects

* this overview includes all major areas but is not a comprehensive list of all sub-ordinate subjects – representative sub-ordinate subjects are shown for demonstration purposes only

Natural Sciences Overview*:

Earth science

Env. Science

Biology

Gm

Op

Intra-disciplinary i.e. subjects stemming from other subjects within a discipline Inter-disciplinary i.e. subjects stemming from other subjects from seperate disciplines

Multi-disciplinary i.e. subjects stemming from both natural & social science plus humanities simultaneously

Natural Science : Humanities

Social Science : Humanities

Both Sciences: Humanities

Natural:Natural

- 48 -

166

Hybrids

Communication

Cultural studies HistoryEducation

Social policy

Sociology Development StudiesPolitical science

Economics

Anthropology

Geography Linguistics

Occupational Psychology

Social Psychology

LA LS

SB Gm

HG

MBA

Humanities:HumanitiesNatural:Natural

Intra-disciplinary i.e. subjects stemming from other subjects within a discipline

Social Science:Natural Science


Social Sciencel:Humanities

Natural Science:Humanities

Inter-disciplinary i.e. subjects stemming from other subjects from seperate disciplines

N.b. Can be classified as a Humanity depending on how ist taught

Social Sciences Overview*:


Social:Social

Psychology

N.b. considered an „Applied Science“




Hybrid Subjects

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167

Hybrids

Social Science: Natural Science

Religion

Classics Languages

Literature

MusicPerforming Arts

Visual Arts

Law

Ethics

Interpretation

Politics

Social:Social Humanities:HumanitiesNatural:Natural Natural Science:Humanities

LA LS

Culture

Architecture

philosophy

Social Sciencel:Humanities

Humanities Overview*:



Intra-disciplinary i.e. subjects stemming from other subjects within a disciplineInter-disciplinary i.e. subjects stemming from other subjects from seperate disciplines

N.b. considered an „Applied Science“




Hybrid Subjects

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168

Social:Social

Sociobiology

SB

Historical Geography

HG

Biological Psychology

BP

Medicine

MGm

Geomorphology

Natural : Social Sciences

Biological Anthropology

BASocial Sciencel:Humanities

Natural Science:Humanities

Humanities:Humanities

Natural:Natural

Anthropology of Law Sociology of Law

LA LS

Environmental science

Env. Science

Science-based or Physical

Oceanography

Op

Multi-disciplinary i.e. subjects stemming from both natural &

social science plus humanities simultaneously

Inter-disciplinary i.e. subjects stemming from other subjects from seperate disciplines

Intra-disciplinary i.e. subjects stemming from other subjects within a discipline

„Hybrid“ Subjects Overview*:





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169

5. References:

[1] Alan S. Kaufman, N. L. K. (2005).

"Essentials of Research Design and Methodology." [2] Jerome L. Myers & Arnold D. Well (2003)

"Research Design and Statistical Analysis." (2ndEdition) [3] Jim Cacy, PhD (2006)

(http://www.fammed.ouhsc.edu/main_menu/aboutus/faculty/Jimcacy.htm) Medical Informatics [3a] Nunnally, J. C. (1975)

"The study of change in evaluation research: Principles concerning measurement, experimental design, and analysis." Handbook of Evaluation Research vol. 1, .

[3b] Campbell, D. T. a. S., J.C (1966).

"Experimental and Quasi-experimental Designs for Research."

[3c] Kirk, Roger E. (1968). Experimental Design: Procedures for the Behavioral Sciences. Belmont, CA: Brooks/Cole.

[3d] Fitz-Gibbon, Carol Taylor and Morris, Lynn Lyons (1987). How to Analyze Data.

New York: Sage. [4] Boston College

Dept. of Psychology http://www.bc.edu/bc_org/avp/cas/psych/statres/10mod/default.html

[5] Wikipedia, open online enyclopedia

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page

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SOFTWARE

APPENDIX I-SW01: PROJECT MANAGEMENT

172

MS Project http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/project/HA101656381033.aspx

Microsoft Office Project Standard 2007 gives you robust project management tools with the right blend of usability, power, and flexibility, so you can manage projects more efficiently and effectively. You can stay informed and control project work, schedules, and finances, keep project teams aligned, and be more productive through integration with familiar Microsoft Office system programs, powerful reporting, guided planning, and flexible tools.

Effectively track and analyze projects with a better understanding of the schedule and impact of changes. Benefit from better financial control and richer analytics.

• New! Trace the source of issues. Quickly determine factors that are affecting task dates and easily trace the source of issues to promote accountability. Task Drivers help you determine the factor (such as task dependency, calendar constraints, schedule date, or vacation time) driving the start date of the task, so you can follow a chain of factors back to find the root cause of a particular delay.

• New! See the impacts of a change. Office Project 2007 will automatically highlight all items that shift as a result of the most recent change you make. Now, with Change Highlights you gain a better understanding of the impacts of your choices.

• New! Experiment with what-if scenarios. Undo and redo changes to views, data, and options with Multiple Level Undo. You can undo actions or sets of actions from macros too, so you can test several what-if scenarios in order to fully understand the implications of each choice while making scope changes.

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APPENDIX I-SW02: WEBSITE HOSTING – SEEDWIKI

176

http://www.seedwiki.com/wiki/seed_wiki/about_seedwiki?wpid=269089

start your own wiki on seedwiki If you have any questions or ideas about wikis we'd be glad to talk to you. Call +1.510.384.7321 or skype kennethallentyler

We started seedwiki in late 2001. It grew out of our interest in extreme programming and lean web practices. For several years it was a free site. Eventually we introduced paid accounts for content privacy and advanced features.

seedwiki is a wiki, a site where everyone is a contributor. We believe that a wiki's openness to new and expected content from new and unexpected contributors is one of its most important features. If a wik is to really be open to new people showing up and to new content being added it cannot be built around a business plan that changes per-person, per-wiki or per-page. This is why the basic wiki service on seedwiki is free, because "free" access to essential to the power of a wiki. Instead of charging for what you can do on your wiki we charge if you want to restrict what others can do. Our business model charges for restricting this acess. If you want to password a wiki, or only allow certain members to enter, or control the wiki's style or layout, then you have to pay a small fee to be able to exercise these "ownership" rights:

seedwiki is also an environment that can be easily adapted and customized to create almost any kind of website a group of people might need, and the people who are going to use the site can design it and build it themselves. This is how seedwiki itself changes. The people who are using it find new things they want to do and we make the changes that make it possible to do those things.

seedwiki is owned and operated by 8th Fold, a consulting company. As well as adapting seedwiki to be a useful site on the web we help companies and organizations build their own useful applications on the web. We use seedwiki as a platform so that the people who need the application can do most of the work of designing and building it themselves, and so that when their application needs to change they know how to change it. Our experience running seedwiki as a public site helps us offer our consulting clients an ever more powerful and useable environment. Our work with out consulting clients help us to extend and deepen the things that it is possible to do on seedwiki.

Call us

Telephone +1.510.384.7321 from 7am-7pm Pacific Standard Time (GMT -9). Or if we're online, we can also be reached through Skype, a free instant messenger and internet phone. (click here for a direct download of Skype)

8th Fold Ken Tyler 510.384.7321 [email protected] Skype Name: kennethallentyler

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APPENDIX I-SW03: BRAINSTORMING – PANTHA

180

Welcome to Pantha.net http://www.pantha.net

The vision of Pantha.net is to create a platform that people will be able to access with any device & OS of their choosing, from wherever they may be, having the same interface and access to their data at any given place. Pantha will provide users with an alternative solution to the current metaphor of the desktop and will consequently have a tight integration with your device(s) and other applications. It will become your everyday window into the world with which you will organize yourself as well as communicate and collaborate with others. The first product and first stage of Pantha.net is transLucid, an online knowledge management tool that can be used as a simple and easy to use light-weight content mangement system. TransLucid is developed under LGPL and so can be freely distributed and accomodated to your own likes. See here for more on its features and uses. transLucid can also be used in combination with PersonalBrain. You can export your

PersonalBrain structure, including notes, to a lucified website. We are planning for many more

import/ export functions (such as from/to MindManager)!

transLucid is a light-weight publishing system, geared in particular for users of knowledge-management desktop applications such as PersonalBrain, FreeMind and MindManager. Its strengths are its powerful importing & exporting functionality, easy install & editing. Next to its usage as a collaboration-tool for small teams, transLucid is used also a light-weight content-management-system.

• Content can be stored in a web rather than in a strict hierarchy

• AJAX editing interface & incremental search for modifying menu structure

• Integrates two most popular WYSIWYG editors on the planet (TinyMCE & FCKeditor)

• Importing of PersonalBrain XML files into transLucid (download of PBExporter required),

including all notes • Exporting into PersonalBrain from transLucid • Import & Export for FreeMind & MindManager coming soon (!) • No requirement for a MySQL database • Fully internationalized; choose a layout for each language (UTF8 support) • RSS feeds for all transLucid pages so that your visitors can subscribe and stay

informed • Smarty template engine (widely adopted and open-source) allowing for complete

flexibility in creating custom-layouts • Websites that are powered by transLucid are completely searchable, configurable and

XHTML 1.0 compliant

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APPENDIX I-SW04: KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT – DISSERTATION

184

The dissertation process was managed with a knowledge management system known as Lotus

Notes. The system interface under version 5.x is shown below:

The dissertation author established the following database to manage the dissertation to

completion:

• The MBA Dissertation database

• The MBA Document Repository dataset

• The MBA Research Management Database (MDRMS)

• The sister Help system to the MDRMS

• And the KISS Software and Harddware Management Databases

185

These databases work in pairs i.e. the following pair are the overall co-ordinating and storage

centres:

All conact management and workflows (e.g. mail, faxing, letters, etc.) are managed in this pair of datbases:

and any hardware and software issues are managed in this pair.

Here is a brief review of the main databases to get a quick idea of the knowledge management capacity. The Disseratation Management database:

looks like this when opened:

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As you can see, the project management list of activities is contained within. Each component is expandable i.e. you can click on it to open it. Once its opened it revelas more detail on that topic. In this case, as you can see in the view, the topic of interest is articles:

187

You can keep digging down until you come to what you want:

and here it is, a research article was found during the literature review phase of the dissertation. Once here. The article can be opned simply by clicking on it.

188

The sister Document Repository database functions in much the same way. The databse icon must be clicked on to be opened:

A view is presented for your to drill down to what you want:

189

and once the thing you’re aftrer has been located (in this case it’s a spreadsheet):

then it can simply be clicked on to be opened as seen below:

190

The other databases:

Function in a similar fashion, however, are not filled with dissertation management documents or client tracking information. They contain actual technical notes and software for system administration, etc.

192

APPENDIX I-SW05: KNOWLEDGE MANAGEMENT – RESEARCH

195

MBA Disseratation Research Management System (MDRMS) Dissertation Update …………………………………………………….. 3 MDMS Overview:………………………………………………………... 5 What’s in Here? …………………………………………………………..6

Organizations…………………………………………….……… 7 Marketing Code’s……………………………………….……….. 8 To-Do’s…………………………………………………………… 9 Extra Info …………………………………………………………10

Lists ……………………………………………………………………… 12

of Organizations... ………………………………………………. 12 of To-Do’s ……….………………………………… ……………..18 Sorting Lists………………………………………………….…... 20

Add Things.. ……………………………………………………….……. 21

New Contacts…………………..…………………………….….. 21 New Organizations……………..……………………………….. 22 New To-Do’s………………………………….………………….. 22

Calendar…………………………………………..…………………….... 24

Monthly Planner……………………………….……………..….. 24 Bi-weekly Planner……………………………………………..… 24

. more…………………………………………………………………….... 25

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MBA Research Management System (MDRMS) Dissertation Update Information

To date the following has been completed:

• initial proposal

• initial planning and organization

• research and summary on “how to research”

• execution and summary of a literature review

• research sponsorship appeal and press release and

• research data collation website design and implementation

To manage the research data collation process I’ve designed, developed and programmed a

MBA Dissertation Management System or MDMS for short.

Its principle job is to help me to:

• collate client contact and related information

• to manage and organize the research participant identification, contact and

questionnaire collation process

• to streamline the collation of the data collected and

• to streamline the analysis of that data

I specifically designed the product in Groupware (IBM/Lotus Notes in this case) because of

its specific innate ability to manage the knowledge management process i.e. to collate,

collaborate and share knowledge with control. In addition, solutions such as this one are

extremely scalable with Groupware i.e. it’s very, very easy (relatively) to implement these types

of solutions with very, very large groups quickly.

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The MDMS was designed using:

• the IBM/Lotus Designer software, • Notes version 5.x (i.e. the Integrated Development Environment) • The Domino 5.x Server.

The programming languages used were the:

• inherent Notes Formula Language and • LotusScript (i.e. an IBM/Lotus proprietary version of Basic, specifically Visual Basic)

The software can be run on all major proprietary and open operating systems including

• Unix • Linux • Windows, • Apple, • IBM AS400’s, etc.

MDMS is “workflowed” i.e. it has been designed to.

• operate, • manage, • archive, • make searchable and • optimize all relevant document/information flows in the dissertation process

including:

o email, o fax, o word processing, o word-processing templates, o etc.

Although MDMS will undoubtedly develop further it is a very useful MBA dissertation tool in

its current state.

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Overview: MDMS is a Client/Contact Relationship Management System (i.e. a CRM).

The whole system is controlled from two visual panels that are

permanently available to you.

The first is this one to the left. It’s known as the “navigation

pane” and allows you to select how you want to look at specific

sets of information.

As you can see, the sets are:

• Contacts

• Organizations

• Activities

• Calendar and

• Notes that you’ve jotted down sometime

Each of these sets of information is often related to the others

and often appears within the others for presentation purposes.

For example, you’ll notice that Activities appear inside the

“Contacts List” view. This makes sense because it’s good to

know what you have to do for whom.

Within each view you can see the “button bar” below. Once

you’re inside a view you need to do things. The “buttons” help you do what ever it is that takes

your fancy at the time.

We’ll go through each view and show you them, however, lets start with Forms that can appear in views first.

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What’s in Here? Research Contacts The most important ability of MDMS is it’s ability to store a decent profile of relevant

contacts. Each contact has a Contact Form that looks like this when it’s opened:

n.b. various positions on the page are „hotspots“ i.e. they do something like connecting to the net e.g. clicking on the

“KISS Copyright” connects tto the KISS website or clicking on the MBA title takes you to the dedicated MBA Research

website.

In addition to normal contact details each contact’s psychographic and demographic details

can be compiled for marketing and sales purposes.

It’s worth noting that MDMS is international i.e. it supports alternative languages e.g. here

English with German. When a title is in one language and you want to see it in another then

200

simply rest the cursor on that title to get a “popup”. For example, above the title “Contact” in

English has a “popup” in German, “Kontakt".

N.b. It’s also possible, naturally, to have it all simply in German, etc. if required.

You can move through each tab and fill them out as required e.g. Phone/Home, Alternative

Contacts, etc.

Organizations Every “Contact” typically has a corresponding “organization” that they work for. This information is collected in the “Company Area” on the main menu above. The company information gathering sheets built into MDMS look like this:

On the second tab of each Company Form you can find a list of its employees. So, by simply

looking at the company you also get a feel for who works in there like this:

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Marketing Codes MDMS lets you categorize each organization so you always know what type of industry they’re in (international United Nations ISIC Codes)...

To-Do’s… …Contact To-Do’s…

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Organization’s To-Do’s…

This view shows which activities are for which organization. Extra Info …

When you’re in a view you can store any correspondence and results for that person there.

Anything you need for that contact can easily be created, collated, stored, indexed and recalled

or reviewed as required. For example, when you’re in the Contacts by Group view as such:

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The organization/company information for companies can also be reviewed with an emphasis

on either the organization’s themselves or and emphasis on the “group” that they belong to.

For example, Sparkasse Bamberg belongs to the Bamberg Council, however, it’s also part of

the German wide Sparkasse Group as well. The ability to collect information and review it this

way can be strategically useful when gathering information.

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Lists … …of Organizations

Here you’re still working with contacts, however, you can see that the emphasis is now on the

organizations that they work for.

You can also see the activities that are required for each person. These activities are created by

anyone in the research team and can be worked on “collaboratively”. This is the case

throughout all of MDMS.

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Lists….

… of Contacts

Now we need to organize and manage these forms in large numbers. To do this we’ve created

“views”, alternative ways of looking at the forms in summary. The first three “views” are

specifically designed to look at Contact Forms. These are:

• Contact List, • Contacts by Company and • Contacts by Group

These allow you to view your research contacts from a couple of different perspectives. Lets look at the first of these, the Contact List “view”.

As you can see, the ability to identify research participants (or potential participants) and

organize the follow up, etc. on each is an important function. As mentioned earlier, there are a

couple of summary views of all contacts. The last two lists show:

• Contacts by Company and • Contacts by Group

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…by Name…

The ability to create and simultaneously store any documentation is important e.g. research

questionnaire results, emails sent, documents created in MS Word and physically posted, etc.

Here is an example of just one, a note with extra details about a company:

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The next view is the: …by Group…

This view is great if your looking for organizations that with different names that are all owned

by one party. For strategic planning it can be very productive.

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Marketing Codes…

You can update your United Nations industry classification codes (i.e. ISIC codes) whenever

you need to…

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Lists..

Resorting… Do it on the fly! Look at the data any way you like it. Within each view you can also “resort” the lists. For example, this view is sorted by the

person’s surname. If you want all of the contacts in City order then simply click on the column

heading “City” to get the following:

Moving further down the “navigation” menu bar we come across “Activities”.

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of To-Do’s …

My To-Do’s….

Specific To-Do’s… One “neat” feature is the ability to look into a person’s contact profile and see all activities, created by anyone in the research team, under the “Activities” tab (see below):

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Shared To-Do’s!

MDMS is designed for groups of people who collaborate on multiple research projects at

once. Here you can see who has to do what. Unfortunately, I’m the only one working on my

MBA research so I’m he only one in this view.

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…Sorting Lists…

Each view contains columns of information. Where appropriate, these columns have been designed to allow you to sort or resort whenever you like. In this particular view the emphasis is on the company groups that people work for i.e. not just the companies that they work for.

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Add Things.. New Contacts The fourth option from the top left is “Create New Contact”:

which gives you a blank contact form to fill out and looks like this:

You can also do this anytime you’re inside a view by clicking on a “button” like this:

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Most relevant contact information can be gathered in the Contact Form. MDMS is flexible,

new fields can be added by speaking to with KISS. Flexability when you need it.

New Organizations To-Do’s… Activities can be created and managed for any person or organization. The emphasis with MDMS is on research so its possible to review the activities with an emphasis on:

• Task List - just the activities themselves i.e. date, priority, etc., • Activity by Assignment - who has been which activities to do and • Activity by Company – what do we need to do for a specific company/organization.

Each shown earlier, each activity itself looks as follows:

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You can create Activities for that person (see above in the black box). This was created by

clicking on the “Activities” button and looks like this when its open:

Of course, in the end it all comes down to time management. So, in the last couple of views

you can see all activities created presented in a calendar planner format. There are a couple of

ways of looking at the planner:

• Calendar Month

• Calendar Bi-weekly

• Calendar Weekly and

• Calendar Daily

Here are just two of these:

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Calendar … Monthly Planner…

and below:

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…Bi-weekly Planner…

MDRMS is also scaleable. You can have only 1, or 1,000,000, using it simultaneously. Best regards, David

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APPENDIX I-SW06: INTERNET SERVICE PROVIDER

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Arcor

http://www.arcor.de/privat/index.jsp

To gain access to the international databases over the net it was necessary to review and select

a replacement for the Deutsche Telekom connection that we had. This was difficult because

competition in Germany is next to useless.

Deutsche Telekom’s service, support and advice were no less than disgustingly bad. The

contenders in the market were reviewed:

• Freenet.de ( which is a rebadged downmarket Deutsche Telekom subsidiary)

• 1 & 1 and

• Arcor

It was next to impossible to make a logical selection due to equally poor service, sea of

additional charges and what appears to be intentionally obscure promotional material deisgned

to confuse.

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Given the fact that whichever it was it could not be worse than Deutsche Telekom, Arcor was

selected because they offered:

• Half the cost

• Free hardware

• Free telephone support and

• no loss of time in changeover

What they delivered was

• a sea of hidden costs

• hardware without instructions

• free telephone support that was magically withdrawn in the week that our connection

was being installed

• two weeks of lost time and numerous calls and agent visits because ALL telephone

contact was totally lost for two weeks on changeover plus

• technical problems with connectivity at Arcor’s end and an attempt to get extra

revenue by sending out support staff

• a hidden “claw-back provision” requiring three months! termination notice 8 a trick

they obviously picked up from Deutsch Telekom).

With proactive misinformation and no technical assistance from either Arcor, Detusche

Telekom or anyone else, the dissertations author installed a direct access to the ISP (n.b.

without the ISP’s client management interface) and finally initiated research activities.

We are actively waiting waiting for real competition to arrive in Germany so that we can

“rollover” to a new ISP as soon as possible.

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APPENDIX I-SW07: MESSAGING

224

Messaging: Four messaging systems were used:

• Gaim (http://gaim.sourceforge.net/) • Yahoo Messenger (http://messenger.yahoo.com/) • Skype (http://skype.com/helloagain.html) and • MSN Messenger (http://get.live.com/messenger/overview)

Here is a sample of the Gaim website. Each of the messengers have more or less the same

functionality.

The messenger was a major support tool when dealing with others internatioinally, in other

time zones or for echanging information.

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APPENDIX I-SW08: DESKTOP SOFTWARE SELECTED

230

APPENDIX I-SW09: GSOMI DATABASE PORTAL ACTIVATION

232

To access the data sources available via the GSO’s database portal it was necessary to setup an

internet browser . This entailed:

• establishing a logon ID

• establishing a password for that logon ID

• identifying the GSO’s gate-keeper server (i.e. it’s proxy server) that was setup to test

for the logon ID and

• configuring a web browser with all of the above information so that when a internet

link was established with the GSO’s server via a browser then it would be recognized,

approved and given access to the data portals available to the GSO.

The Firefox internet browser (see Appendix M) was selected as the browser of choice because

it:

• has a feature known as “proxy foxy” which allows relatively easy and seamlessly

configuration (i.e. as outlined above)

• is generally more intuitive to use than other browsers

• is free and

• has the inherent advantage of being “open source” i.e. it’s source code is available if

required.

Once configured, the following web address:

http://rzblx1.uni-

regensburg.de/ezeit/searchres.phtml?bibid=FHN&colors=7&lang=de&jq_type1=KT&jq_ter

m1=International+Journal+of+Project+Management

was entered into the browser as such:

233

and the address highlighted in purple on this page was clicked to be connected via the GSO

gateway server (i.e. proxy) to the data source in question. The GSO gateway server then

queried the accessor for logon details as such:

and once approved by the GSO gateway server then access was granted to continue to the

GSO subscribed data sources for searching, in this case the Science Direct databases as

follows:

234

Note: The GSO’s library staff were also contacted for assistance and eventually provided the

following document which was used to help configure the browser:

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APPENDIX I-SW10: CONTACT DATABASE – KLICKTEL

242

http://ag.klicktel.de/en/2214.php

klickTel's vision is to become the leading location-related information and communications platform in the area of the 'local search' for internet and mobile applications. KlickTel's strategic goals are the continuous and market-driven improvement of the quality and innovativeness of its products, as well as the international expansion of the business areas. Business model: subscription and contractual transactions, and advertising One of the leading providers of intermedia white and yellow pages in Germany Since its foundation in 1999, klickTel has successfully positioned itself in only a few years as one of the leading providers of intermedia white and yellow pages in Germany.

• klickTel has provided the data and software for the white pages CD 'D-Info' from Buhl Data since 2003. According to the company's own estimates, its market share with directory CDs amounts to a total of over 75 percent through this collaboration. klickTel is thus market leader in this area, even ahead of Deutsche Telekom. Furthermore, according to a study by the market research institute INRA, the company leads in digital directory information software in the area of business with a 44 percent market share.

• Another widely-used product is the telephone information software developed by

klickTel, KDIS-a B2B solution with which over approximately 50 percent of all voice-information providers with 11 8 numbers work.

With currently around 300 employees at the three locations of Essen, Dorsten, and Hannover, and a sales volume of around EUR 16 million in 2005, the business has continued to expand its market position. klickTel's main sources of sales are subscription and contractual transactions with software licenses, as well as marketing operations through the klickTel infoEintrag. Today, klickTel operates in the two strategic business areas of Software and Advertising. The Software business area is comprised of the four product areas of Desktop Applications, Mobile Applications, Internet Applications and Solutions. The Advertising business area is focused on the product area of the klickTel infoEintrag.

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APPENDIX I-SW11: STATISICAL MANAGEMENT – STATPAC

246

StatPac Survey Software http://www.statpac.com/

The foundation of our survey software is our proprietary survey design and data manager engine. It's included with all of our modules, and you'll use it to design your surveys and to manage the data. These features are standard with every module:

• Accommodates any variable type and any question format

• Spell checks your survey questions (English, Spanish, French, German)

• Allows extra long variable and value labels

• Automatic backup of codebooks and data

• Outstanding data base manager for CATI interviewing and manual data entry

• Form-based data manager with validity checking, and double entry verification

• Large data files: 2,000 variables & 10,000,000 cases

• Comprehensive 400 page user's manual

•

Basic Statistics Module

The Basic Statistics module is the most popular module we offer. It will produce beautifully formatted frequency tables, descriptive statistics, and crosstab and banner tables.

• Complete selection of statistical procedures

• Best crosstab & banner tables in the industry

• Custom design statistical analysis tables and graphics

• Automatically codes verbatim text responses

• Complete import and export capabilities

• Interactive and batch processing

• All reports can be loaded directly into MS Word

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Web Survey Module

The Web Survey module has everything you need to conduct online surveys and e-mail questionnaires. Our Web Survey software contains an extensive set of programs to let you capture, clean, sort, join, split, and serialize e-mails. Use the bulk e-mail program to send thousands of e-mail invitations per hour. Easily create standard HTML pages and automatically upload them to your web site. Once created, HTML pages can be edited with any editor (e.g., Front Page or Dreamweaver).

• Full e-mail list capture and maintenance capabilities

• Handles huge e-mail lists limited only by RAM memory (500,000+ names)

• Bulk e-mailer sends customized and serialized e-mail invitations

• Track who responded and send reminder e-mails to those who didn't

• Create single and multiple-page web surveys

• Online surveys support passwords, branching, and validity checking

• Store respondents' answers in a file on your server or have them e-mailed to you

• Merge information from an existing data base with respondents' answers to a survey

• Automatically upload and download files to and from your server

• Export the data to Access or a tab or comma delimited text file.

Advanced Statistics Module

The Advanced Statistics module is not needed by most of our users. It contains the multivariate statistical techniques used by advanced researchers. If you need statistical analysis procedures like curve fitting, multiple regression, logistic regression, factor, analysis of variance, discriminant function, cluster, and canonical correlation, then you should order the Advanced Statistics module. It can be used with the Basic Statistics module or as a stand-alone module to provide sophisticated mutivariate analytical capabilities.

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System Requirements

StatPac for Windows survey software requires the following environment: • PC with Windows 9x, 2000, NT or XP

• Minimum 64M RAM memory

• Minimum recommended CPU speed: 300 MHz

• 40 megabytes of hard drive space

• Any printer

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SPONSORSHIP

APPENDIX I-SS01: OPP – SWOT

252

Introduction: This summary was requested by Paul Deakin, R&D Consultant, at OPP. It provides a summary and initial analysis of the request for research support received from David Ray, an MBA participant specializing in International Project Management at the Georg-Simon-Ohm Management Institute (Germany). Research Topic: “What are the key factors required to design, implement and successfully manage international business projects?”

Nb. See “A. Proposal” for further details at: http://www.seedwiki.com/wiki/kiss/foundation_research_mba_060903 Literature Review Results Summary: The objective of this literature review was to use the scientific method to establish a focus for the dissertation research to follow. The results of the review established a research focus on the: “quality of human interactions or motivation and decision-making practices”. Over 30 searches were carried out to identify 12 relevant articles whose researcher’s findings and opinions were combined to form a prioritized list of critical success factors or CSF’s. The surprising result was that: ““the factor category 'People', [was identified as ] explaining 47% of the variance in project success” 8

and that …. ”The questions must shift from which tools should be used to which way of managing projects guarantees success” 8.

Nb. See “C1. Literature Review” for further details at: http://www.seedwiki.com/wiki/kiss/foundation_research_mba_060903

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Research Design Strategy: The overall research strategy is essentially to reproduce the “Big 5” originators, Murray R. Barrick and Michael K. Mount i.e.:

• to identify the personal dimensions of “senior management” who significantly influence international projects with a combined questionnaire, gathered in person and across the internet from:


and then to:

• analyze the results of a correlation analysis carried out on the dimension data collated against international project success or failure.

This is a non-interventional descriptive research design where the differences from Barrick and Mount will be:

• the correlation focus will be on international project management and • the data will be drawn from primary data sources only

For the personality dimension identification I propose using a questionnaire of 122 questions based on two of the best internationally recognized personality dimension identification methods available i.e. the Myers-Briggs(MBTI) and the “Big 5” assessments as follows:

• questions based on the MBTI1 inventory assessment and • questions are based on the Big 52, 3.

Nb. See “D. Research Proposal” for further details at:


254

OPP Sponsorship SWOT Summary: The following SWOT analysis (i.e. strengths, weakness, opportunity, threat) and resulting resolutions have been made to date based on correspondence with Mr. John Hackston and subsequently with his assistant Paul: 1) Strengths:

a) the research topic is directly relevant to target clients of OPP i.e. potential to increase OPP’s sales

b) the researchers are of a high caliber: i) is researcher is at the MBA standard ii) a supervising professor is a recognized specialist in human resource management

and leadership c) the research has been soundly based academically i.e. extensive literature research, use

of the scientific approach, ongoing professional supervision, etc. 2) Weaknesses:

a) lack of specific MBTI training - researcher and supervising professor i) the researcher:

(1) is not specific psychology background and (2) has no specific MBTI delivery/feedback training

ii) the supervising professor: (1) is a qualified psychologist (2) is a specialist researcher (3) has extensive experience i.e. holds the Chair of Human Resource Management

and Leadership at the University of Bayreuth, Germany but (4) has no specific MBTI delivery/feedback training

b) no financial return for academic use of the MBTI tools, methodology and OPP’s support

3) Opportunities:

a) increased marketing results based on the strategic targeting of senior decision makers both: i) generally and ii) in the project management community at no cost

i.e. (see below)

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iii) Strategically:

i) advertising:

(1) media: re targeted articles, periodicals, academic papers, etc (2) online: incorporation into the existing website

ii) public relations: Making the sponsorship known to:

(1) the public at large via regular media channels (2) specific target of influential target communities at no cost e.g.

(a) raised corporate awareness amongst senior decision makers (b) the academic community

iii) events:

(1) conferences (2) trade shows

Tactically: iv) personal selling: targeted incorporation of the results into sales presentations for

senior management and decision makers v) direct marketing: targeted project management sales development based on

research participant leads and enquiries vi) sales promotions: senior level sales contacts/lead generation from across the EU

and internationally at no cost

b) quality research services at no cost i.e. the researcher will not receive any salary/wage 4) Threats:

a) abuse of the MBTI tools and methodology re: i) delivery of the questionnaire ii) incorrect or poorly delivered individual feedback iii) further post-research commercial use iv) exposure to other supporting sponsors

256

Resolutions to Date: With regard to the SWOT above, the following resolutions have been made to date:

• re 2) a): o neither the researcher nor the supervising professor will give feedback to

participants on their individual results o OPP will:

• provide a contact to the researcher/supervisor to be passed on to participant’s requiring individual feedback and

• on request, will deal directly with participants requesting individual feedback on their results

• re 4) a) i & ii:

o the OPP assessment system will be used o the assessment will be made available from the OPP website o participants will be directed to the OPP website from the research webpage o all data collected and results will be passed back to the researcher, David, in

electronic form for further analysis.

• re 4) a) iii & iv:

The researcher/supervisor agree:

o to use the MBTI tools and methodologies made available for academic purposes only

o that these will not be used for any future commercial purposes without entering into commercial arrangements with OPP or the relevant MBTI agents at that time

• re 4) a) iv:

The researcher/supervisor agree: o that the MBTI tools and methodologies will be used solely for the academic

purpose outlined and will not be passed on to any other third parties at any time

• Promotion Generally:

o The researcher & supervisor will promote OPP’s sponsorship of the research

and o OPP will clearly identify the researcher and supervisor in any communications

using or referring to the research

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APPENDIX I-SS02: OPP - THESIS RESEARCH CONSIDERATIONS

260

Georg-Simon-Ohm University of Applied Science (Nürnberg) Faculty of Business

Critical Success Factor Identification -

Analysis of International Project Success in the field of

International Project Management

research design considerations contributing to the achievement of the degree of Master of Business Administration

from the

Georg-Simon-Ohm Management-Institute University of Applied Sciences (Nuremberg)

submitted by

David G.V. Ray

Supervisor: Professor Dr. Torsten Kühlmann Postgraduate Master Studies

International Business

the dissertation will be submitted on the

Nuremberg, December 31st, 2006

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This document has been prepared based on the thesis research issues raised for discussion on the 18/09/2006 by:

Mr. John Hackston, Managing Consultant, Research and Development, OPP (http://www.opp.eu.com/) Email: [email protected]

Method of administration.

Your email implies that you wish to put the questions of the MBTI into your

online administration form on your website. Is this correct? Yes, we're planning on using the website because of the international nature of the research. I believe that we can present good evidence that we meet your requirements i.e. that: a) your research has commercial value to OPP,

b) there is no other way in which you can reasonably deliver the MBTI instrument to your intended sample and

We will be collecting data from a range of countries simultaneously so a website is a logical alternative. Whenever a participant requires a hard copy, however, it will naturally be made available.

The MBTI questions will be integrated with the Big 5, but not altered in

any way, for delivery purposes.

An example of the integrated questionnaire proposed is downloadable from the site already, see "D. Research Proposal" at:

http://www.seedwiki.com/wiki/kiss/foundation_research_mba_060903 Re the alternative via the OPP Assessment website - no problem. The

objective is simply to collate the data ready for analysis. The medium is not all that important although it can be beneficial for OPP as an indirect promotion.

For administrative purposes, I would prefer not to use a Word-based questionnaire as it requires data entry afterwards.

I believe that the length of the questionnaire, currently 120 questions

or so, won't be a problem. It only takes 10 minutes or so, particularly across the net, however, I'm certainly open to your experienced opinion.

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c) you have put safeguards in place to prevent misuse and, if appropriate, facilitate charging (for example, a counter which can be inspected).

The questionnaire will be removed from the internet as soon as the planned timeframe has expired i.e. currently planned to close mid-November at this stage. I hope that a representative sample will have been collected by then.

Completion Can you clarify what you mean by this please? Training.

In general, the MBTI instrument is only supplied to people trained its use. In the UK, this typically involves 5 days of training. We have in the past allowed researchers with limited training to use the instrument for research purposes only, but only under the supervision of someone who is so trained. Have you or your professor been trained in the use of the instrument, or do you have a different user in mind? I have not been specifically trained in the delivery of the MBTI instrument, however, I have worked with MBTI via clients e.g. W.L. Gore & Associates, where I first became aware of it. I’m available, of course, for any obligatory training that has to be carried out if required. Prof. Dr. Kuehlmann has also not received any specific training on MBTI delivery, however, he is a qualified psychologist. Is that sufficient for OPP? or have you other recommendations?

Arrangements for feedback. What arrangements had you intended to put in place to give respondents feedback

on their results? In general, it may be better to give no feedback ("this questionnaire is for research purposes only") than inadequate feedback - but we would be interested to hear of your views.

Following the submission of the thesis I'm planning to make a summary copy of the results available to all participants. Each participant will be contacted:

via email with a thank you letter and an invitation to review or collect a copy of the summary (as a .pdf file)

and to give feedback

at their leisure. I'm open, of course, to suggestions and recommendations.

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Methodology and experimental design. We would like to know more about your study, including things like: Sample size:

Target – 120 or more.

Project duration: Start and finish dates Start Date: officially 28.4.2006 unofficially 01.02.2005 Finish Date: 30.12.2006 Attracting respondents: how I intend to do this? I’m contacting individuals that are already identified as “senior decision makers” or “project leaders” in the net, via the media, via job descriptions or via word of mouth. I’m currently using all forms available i.e.:

• Email • Direct telephone contact • Via existing international contacts

Big 5: which big 5 measure am I going to use? I’m basing the Big 5 questionnaire on work carried out by: Prof. John Johnson,

Professor of Psychology, University of Pennsylvania. Email: [email protected] from his site: http://ipip.ori.org/

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Experimental Hypotheses:

I’ll be basing some of my research on the recommendations of: Gardner, William L. & Martinko, Mark J.Y. “Using the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator to study managers: A literature review and research agenda” Journal of Management Vol. 22, Issue 1, p 45-83 http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/B6W59-45FY254-T/2/1d62b88a3c6f2110d1eaa97378f00d71 What exactly are your research predictions?

I predict that the “success” of international projects is strongly influenced by the personalities of the of the “senior management/leaders” involved. This is exploratory research to identify if personalities correlate to international project success/failure, “ceteris paribus”, other things being equal. My literature review to date (pages 3-4 in both the presentation and academic versions) indicates that this may be the case: “the factor category 'People', [was identified as ] explaining 47% of the variance in project success” …“What is surprising, perhaps, is the small influence of project activities such as planning and control on project outcomes.” 8. ”The questions must shift from which tools should be used or which way of managing projects guarantees success” 8

This was also considered by other writers such as Shenhar, Dvir, Levy and Maltz when they state: “Additional studies are needed to further establish the validity of the multi-dimensional concept, and to address additional questions. For example, as we know, success of a project means different things to different people, and so the point of view of the assessor should also be a variable for additional studies.” 13

8 Lechler, T. (2000). "When it comes to Project Management, it's the People that matter." p. 2 Projects as Business Constituents and Guiding Motives. 13 Shenhar, A. J., D. Dvir, et al. (2001). "Project Success:A Multidimensional Strategic Concept." Long Range Planning 34(6): p. 720.

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What are your dependent variables? International project success.

Are they the questions which we can see in the existing research questionnaire on your website, or something different?

They include those identified in the proposed questionnaire, however, they may be refined.

What statistical analyses do you intend to carry out?

A correlation analysis will be used to analyze the data collated.

Publication of Results:

OPP would need your agreement and permission to publicize your results and make use of them in publicity material, etc. No problem. As long as all parties involved are recognized appropriately, including both myself and Prof. T. Kuehlmann as having conceived and executed the research and also including our respective organizations and contacts details.

Data:

We would want a copy of your data - which I believe will already be anonymous.

Of course, no problem. Pricing:

The MBTI questionnaire is a commercial instrument for which materials and reports are normally sold at commercial rates. We do from time to time offer discounts to researchers who can convince us of the value of their research. You should however be aware that while free usage has occasionally be made available, this is very rare. If OPP decides to go ahead then I would be very grateful for their sponsorship. Continued use of the MBTI instrument. In your email, you mention That "I'll be using the website as a "start up" for international project management consulting". Note that any research agreement that we come to will be purely for the duration and the purposes of the research and will not extend to future commercial use. Of course. No problem. No continued use of the MBTI instrument is planned. Any further usage, if it occurs, will be either paid for on a commercial basis and/or require your consultation.

266

Research agreement. If we come to an agreement on all the above points we will incorporate them into a research agreement that we will ask you to sign. Of course. At the appropriate time, I look forward to receiving your proposal.

Other Sponsors:

Please note, other sponsors may also become involved with this project in one form or another. I research the right to include them, however, will consult all parties involved and will not intentionally divulge any confidential material from one to the other at any time.

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I I L I T E R A T U R E R E V I E W

ARTICLES

APPENDIX II-A01: ARTICLE REVIEW SEARCH MATRIX

270

The following tables were used to execute the detailed searched of existing information

suppliers. The legend was used to establish exactly which information was new and was

therefore available for further analysis.

“R” in all cases refers to “results. The reason for the prolific number of “R’s” is that each

search often resulted in the same articles being returned under different search criteria. Articles

that had already been catalogued for further analysis and were re-identified in later searches

were identidifed as “duplicated”.

A portion of the articles that were new and not duplicates were unfortunately not available and

were identified as such i.e. “RU”. Of these portion were not relevant and therefore identified as

“RUI”. The combinations of these factors resulted in the other identifications shown here.

The detailed results of all searches appear in the remainder of this Appendix. The information

is contained in a spreadsheet table that looks like this overall:

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The table has been sliced up into page size pieces for inclusion in this Appendix. Each page is

represented by a red outline with identifier. For example, moving from left to right, the first

search in each of the three search themes appears below in the red outline as is identified as I:

The complete table is therefore subdivided over the following pages as such and each portion

re-displays the headings from the far left of the table for reference purposes:

272

Portion I:

273

Portion II:

274

Portion III:

275

Portion IV:

276

Portion V:

277

Portion VI:

278

Portion VII:

279

Portion VIII:

280

Portion IX :

281

Portion X :

282

APPENDIX II-A02: FINAL ARTICLE SELECTION

284

Final Article Selection (i.e. 12 articles from 144 screened and reviewed)

286

APPENDIX II-A03: MASTER ARTICLES SUMMARY

David G.V. Ray

Note

WEB USERS: This document can be viewed from the link found on the web page because it is printed on a different sized paper (i.e. A3) which could not be included in the PDF form of the dissertation.

288

APPENDIX II-A04: MASTER ARTICLES DESIGN ANALYSIS SUMMARY

David G.V. Ray

Note


290

APPENDIX II-A05: ARTICLES OBJECTIVES DETAILS

292

Literature Review – Article Objectives Details

294

APPENDIX II-A06: ARTICLES HYPOTHESES DETAILS

296

Literature Review – Article Hypotheses & Test Result Details

298

APPENDIX II-A07: ARTICLE GENERAL CONCLUSIONS

300

Table 1.7 Literature Review – General Conclusions by Authors

302

APPENDIX II-A08: ARTICLES SUBSIDIARY CONCLUSIONS 1 & 2

304

Literature Review – Subsidiary Conclusions 1 & 2

306

APPENDIX II-A09: ARTICLES SUBSIDIARY CONCLUSIONS 3 & 4

308

Literature Review – Subsidiary Conclusions 3 & 4

310

APPENDIX II-A10: ARTICLES GENERAL & SUBSIDIARY RECOMMENDATIONS 1 & 2

312

Literature Review – General and Subsidiary Recommendations 1 & 2

314

APPENDIX II-A11: ARTICLES SUBSIDIARY RECOMMENDATIONS 3 & 4

316

Literature Review - Subsidiary Recommendations 3 & 4

318

APPENDIX II-A12: ARTICLES DEFINITIONS

320

Literature Review – Article Definitions

322

APPENDIX II-A13: ARTICLES SUGGESTIONS 1 & 2

324

Literature Review – Suggestions 1 & 2

326

APPENDIX II-A14: ARTICLES SUGGESTIONS 3 & 4

328

Literature Review – Suggestions 3 & 4

330

APPENDIX II-A15: ARTICLES RESEARCH STRATEGY ANALYSIS

332

Literature Review – Article Research Strategy Analysis

334

APPENDIX II-A16: ARTICLES MEASUREMENT INSTRUMENTS

336

Literature Review – Article Measurement Instruments

338

APPENDIX II-A17: ARTICLES RESEARCH DESIGN ANALYSIS

340

Literature Review – Research Design Analysis

342

APPENDIX II-A18: ARTICLES DESIGN VALIDITY ANALYSIS

344

Literature Review – Validity Analysis

346

APPENDIX II-A19: ARTICLES LIMITATIONS ANALYSIS

348

Literature Review – Article Limitations

350

APPENDIX II-A20: MASTER SUMMARY OF ARTICLE CSF’S & THEIR RANKING

David G.V. Ray

Note


352

APPENDIX II-A21: MASTER SUMMARY OF FINAL CSF RANKINGS

354

Literature Review – Article Authors Master list of CSF’s

356

I I I C O N C E P T U A L F R A M E W O R K

APPENDIX III-01: MOTIVATIONAL THEORY ANALYSIS

360

I V M E T H O D O L O G Y

GENERAL

APPENDIX IV-G01: DEDICATED DISSERTATION RESEARCH WEBSITE

362

Dedicated Data Collection Website (built by the author, for details about the technologies used please refer to Appendix: M: Desktop Software Selected )

364

APPENDIX IV-G02: INITIAL QUESTIONNAIRE PROPOSED

382

Sample of Answer Translations – ISIC Code Level A

384

APPENDIX IV-G03: TARGET PARTICIPANT QUALIFICATION CRITERIA

386

Term Definition "Senior" is defined as individuals having ultimate

responsibility for a significant to substantial(25-50%+) number of the decisions taken.

"Decision maker” anyone making decisions in any given international project

"International" any project that has over 30% of its internal team based in a country other than the country of project origin


388

RESEARCH IMPLEMENTATION

APPENDIX IV-I01: PRESS RELEASE – ENGLISH – SHORT

390

FROM

David G.V. Ray

Email: [email protected]

Untere Koenigstr. 19 Bamberg

D-96052 Bamberg Germany

Ph: +49 (0) 951 26788


391

Is the UK’s international success slipping?

Which personalities are internationally successful and what personality do you have?

Those cheeky Germans, as one of the leading export nations in the world, are currently leading research into international business success! And it’s big business.

Research124 has established the fascinating fact that over 47% of international project successes are based on the personality of “senior management”. Are you one of the “goers”? For the first time in history it’s been recognized that, personality, in the form of the quality of your human interactions or your motivation and decision making practices supersede “systems” as the predominant success factor in international projects. Traditional business theory has promulgated a reliance on “systems” and naturally enough. Every society has, at some point in history, carried out projects on a massive scale. However, the two world wars and ongoing globalization have established large-scale international projects, under enormous time and resource constraints, as the norm. Such massive international co-ordination efforts simply would not have been possible or successful without advanced project management (PM) “systems”. “Systems”, however, are no longer the problem. Guess what, just as in aircraft accidents, it’s not the “systems” that typically fail, it’s “pilot error”! Check out the research and ongoing results “live“ at:

http://www.seedwiki.com/wiki/kiss/foundation_research_mba_060903 n.b. Individual results are not made publicly available, however, they are available to you personally. On the same site, the researcher David Ray125 (under the guidance of Prof. Dr. T. M. Kuelmann126) invites you find out your own personality type by completing the free internet questionnaire (anonymously or otherwise). Your results and information on how to establish the implications to you can be mailed to you personally if you wish.

124 Lechler, T. (2000). "When it comes to Project Management, it's the People that matter." p. 2 Projects as

Business Constituents and Guiding Motives. 125 A post-graduate researcher under the International MBA Program at the Georg Simon Ohm Management Institute,

Nuremberg, Germany

126 Chair of HR and Leadership at the Bayreuth University, Bavaria, Germany

392

APPENDIX IV-I02: PRESS RELEASE – ENGLISH – LONG

394

FROM

David G.V. Ray

Email: [email protected]

Untere Koenigstr. 19 Bamberg

D-96052 Bamberg Germany

Ph: +49 (0) 951 26788

395

Are You “Success”?

Research° has established the fascinating fact that over 47% of international project successes are based

on the personality of their leaders. Are you one of the “goers”?

Which personalities are internationally successful and what personality do you have? For the first time in history it’s been recognized that personality, in the form of the quality of your human interactions or your motivation and decision-making practices, actually supersedes “systems” as the predominant success factor in international projects. Deep in the heart of Europe, in the small world heritage town of Bamberg, an enthusiastic MBA researcher127 and his supervising professor128 have been busy reviewing the status quo of international project management. As expected, the traditional scientific approach has been used but the results are not so traditional. The initial thesis proposal129 specifically focused on:

“What are the key factors required to design, implement and successfully manage international business projects?”°

Naturally the expectation was that a deeper understanding of the technical “project management” (PM) processes would ultimately identify a series of so called “critical success factors”, or “CSF’s”, that could improve the project success overall. With this set as the clear focus, internet access was established by the researcher from his office to the “Science Direct” international information database, via the GSOMI University’s library. Over 200 related articles were accessed, analyzed and sorted. From these, 11 articles were then found to be “spot on”. Of course, the quality and type of research carried out by each of the articles authors varied. This made comparisons initially relatively difficult so a study was carried out on exactly what “research” was. Research was then carried out on “what is research i.e. knowledge generation?” 130 and became a mini-thesis in it’s own right. The result, researchers have enormously different understandings of what

127 David G.V. Ray, a post-graduate researcher under the International MBA Program at the Georg Simon Ohm - Management

Institute (GSOMI), Nuremberg, Germany

128 Chair of HR and Leadership at the Bayreuth University, Bavaria, Germany

129 See section “A. Proposal“ at http:// www.seedwiki.com/wiki/kiss/foundation_research_mba_060903 for details

396

“research” is and more disturbing, they all tend to use their own personal interpretations of a “research method”! The sum of their opinions was collated, a set of definitions and methods for the CSF’s131 research was established (particularly Lechler’s article+ ). The results were surprising. The summarized research identified that project success is now, and probably always has been, substantially player and systems based i.e. not just system based! In other words, the personality that leads the project is just as important as the resources and techniques used. Obviously, this highlighted an apparent “hole” in traditional practice and education. A personality manual doesn’t come with MS Project funnily enough. Traditional business theory and practice has always emphasized “systems”. Every society has had some experience with projects at some point in it’s history. Although these have always had “constraints”, the last hundred years have really emphasized enormous international projects, with enormous time and resource constraints. Such massive efforts simply would not have been possible or successful without advanced project management (PM) “systems” so they were naturally the focus of attention. However, “systems”, are no longer the problem, it’s the people involved! Just as with aircraft accidents, it’s not the “systems” that typically fail, it’s the “pilot”! 132 So, the research focus took a somewhat unexpected turn. It’s now squarely focused on “personality” i.e. establishing which “personalities” are involved in international projects, which factors drive them and what impact they have on success. The upshot is, in conjunction with demonstrated project skills, which personality should I place in charge of my projects to optimize it’s success? Fortunately, a number of credible research measurements tools (i.e. research “instrument’s) are available to help in this area and the researcher has selected two of repute, the “Big 5” 133 and “MBTI” 134. Both are really quite impressive and operate in a similar way. They measure specific characteristics in each personality, identify a broad type and then use a generic research based profile to indicate other aspects of that personality. Although no amount of measurement will give a definitive answer as to exactly why someone did something, they can indicate which general personality types should be at the helm. For example, you may be surprised to discover that only 5% of the world thinks like you do. Although both the Big 5 and MBTI can be used, lets look at the MBTI for now. Based on short questionnaires each person is evaluated on four scales:

Dichotomies

130 See section “B. Research Design, Methods & Logic” at http://

www.seedwiki.com/wiki/kiss/foundation_research_mba_060903 for details

131 See section “C1. Literature Review“ at http:// www.seedwiki.com/wiki/kiss/foundation_research_mba_060903 for details 132 Lechler, T. (2000). "When it comes to Project Management, it's the People that matter." p. 2 Projects as Business Constituents and Guiding Motives. 133 A brief overview of the “Big 5” can be found at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_five_personality_traits

134 A brief overview of the “MBTI” can be found at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MBTI

397

Extraversion IntroversionSensing iNtuition

Thinking Feeling Judging Perceiving

When you combine these four (4) scales you get sixteen (16) options i.e. sixteen different personality types as follows:

ISITEJ ISIFEJ INIFEJ INITEJ Inspector Protector Counselor Mastermind

ISETIP ISEFIP INEFIP INETIP Crafter Composer Healer Architect ESETIP ESEFIP ENEFIP ENETIP

Promoter Performer Champion Inventor ESITEJ ESIFEJ ENIFEJ ENITEJ

Supervisor Provider Teacher Field Marshal Each personality has it’s own research based summary profile, e.g. strengths and weakness, motivators, demotivators, etc., which can be used to optimize project team building and potentially project performance. To gather the “personality” based questionnaires internationally the researcher established three important tools:

• criteria re who should participate in the study and • a website that allows questionnaires to be offered internationally • a participant tracking system in a knowledge management system known as Lotus Notes.

The initial literature review indicated that “senior decision makers” had a substantial impact of the success of projects. You’re invited to participate in the questionnaire and the see the results at no cost “live“ at:


n.b. Individual results are not made publicly available, however, they are available to you personally.

398

APPENDIX IV-I03: PRESS RELEASE – GERMAN – SHORT

400

Hat Deutschland international Erfolg?

Forschungen haben die faszinierende Tatsache ergeben, dass über 47% das Erfolges

internationaler Projekte von der Persönlichkeit der leitenden Manager abhängt. Sind Sie eine/r

von den Erfolgreichen?

Welche Persönlichkeiten sind international erfolgreich und welche Persönlichkeit haben Sie? Zum ersten mal in der Geschichte wurde erkannt, dass die Persönlichkeit einer Person (Qualität der zwischen- menschlichen Aktionen, Motivationen und ihr Entscheidungsfindungsprozess) als entscheidender Erfolgsfaktor in internationalen Projekten wichtiger zu erachten ist als „Theorien“ oder „Systeme“. Ein ehrgeiziger MBA-Forscher, David G.V. Ray135, und sein ihn begleitender Professor Dr. T. M. Kuehlmann136, haben den Status Quo des internationalen Projektmanagement -Erfolgs untersucht und überraschenderweise, waren die Ergebnisse137 des traditionellen Forschungsvorgangs nicht so traditionell. Der ursprüngliche Forschungsansatz138 war konzentriert auf:

„Was sind die internationalen Schlüsselfaktoren für die Gestaltung, Implementierung und Realisierung internationaler Projekte?“

135 KISS International, Graduiertenkollegsforscher unter dem International MBA Programm beim Georg Simon Ohm

Management Institute, Nürnberg

136 Lehrstuhl Personalwesen und Führungslehre, Universität Bayreuth, Bayern.

137 sehen Sie “C1. Literature Review“ at http:// www.seedwiki.com/wiki/kiss/foundation_research_mba_060903

138 sehen Sie Abschnitt “A. Proposal”at http:// www.seedwiki.com/wiki/kiss/foundation_research_mba_060903

401

Die Ergebnisse waren überraschend. Es zeigte sich, dass der Projekterfolg jetzt, und möglicherweise schon immer, grundsätzlich „Spieler“ und „System“ abhängig ist, nicht nur Natürlich war die Erwartung, dass ein tieferes Verständnis des technischen Projektmanagement-Prozesses schließlich zur Identifizierung einer Reihe von kritischen Erfolgsfaktoren führen wird, die den Projekt- erfolg verbessern könnten. Mit einem klaren Focus wurden über 200 Artikel analysiert und sortiert. Von diesen waren 11 direkt relevant. System-abhängig! Diese Resultate heben ein mögliches „Loch“ in der traditionellen Praxis hervor. „Systeme“ sind nicht mehr das Problem. Bei einem Flugzeugunglück ist es meist nicht das fehlerhafte System, sondern der Mensch, der den Unfall verschuldet. Das Fazit ist: Welche Persönlichkeit, in Zusammenhang mit technischen Fähigkeiten, sollte ein Projekt leiten, um den Erfolg zu optimieren? Die Forschungsergebnisse werden derzeitig mit Hilfe international anerkannter Persönlichkeitstests++ zusammengestellt und sind „live“ zu beobachten unter: http://www.seedwiki.com/wiki/kiss/foundation_research_mba_060903 Wenn du an deinen Fähigkeiten interessiert bist und denkst, dass du ein internationaler Projektleiter dann bist, möchten wir dich einladen, unseren Fragebogen über die Website heraus oben zu füllen.

402

APPENDIX IV-I04: PRESS RELEASE – MANDARIN- SHORT

404

国商成功存在区际务误吗？我在得国范成功的路上有区们获际围误？

国性的成功需要哪际些特质，你有又哪些特呢质？

作世界出口大国之一为顶级，那些傲慢的德国人，正在引国商研究的成功之路领际务！是件得注的大事情这值关。

研究这项示了显起于鉴一个不可思的数据议：超过的国目的成功有于高管理人士的际项赖层47% 人格特质。你是否也是他的其中一呢们员？人格特有史以来第一次得到公质认，它以人交往互际动量质，因动力动和决策程依据过为水平表形式为现，这人格的培种养取代了替代了“系统，” 同时成在国目中得成功的因素为际项获关键。

的传统，依于赖系统的“ ” 理念已深入人心经营，它的建立在对系统信任上“ ” 的宗旨也被广泛接受。在商域业领中，个社会在不同的史段都曾有令人目的每历阶过瞩业绩。然而，两次世界大和正在生的全球化程生了大量国性合作目战发进产际项，不得不耗大量的和争有限费时间夺的源资。以两次世界大和正在生的全球化代背景战发为时，在广泛的行域中所建的国目在冗的业领设际项长时和窘迫的源的一个商运行准下行间资这样业则进。像如此高密度如此大模规的国合作际目项努力尝试，如没有

先的目管理进项（）系统，是很施并得成功的难实获。PM 而系统也不再是问题。正如航空客机生的事故发，大都不是系统的失灵，而是飞“ ” “ ” “ 行的失员过！”

卷和果如下网址测试问结见： http://www.seedwiki.com/wiki/kiss/foundation_research_mba_060903

注：个人果不会被公测试结开，或作其它用途任何之用，但本人可看到测试在同一上页，研者调由教授David.Ray( Dr. T.

M.Kuelmann指导邀你通完成网上卷请过问（匿名方式）找出自己所属的性格特征型类。)

如果愿意，可通子件得你的果和过电邮获测试结果内容结分析。

406

APPENDIX IV-I05: INVITATION – ENGLISH

408

Ms/Mr Potential Participant XX/XX/2006 Street number & name Suburbtown/City, Post code, State, Country David G.V. Ray 19 Untere Koenigstr. Bamberg D-96052 Bavaria, Germany [email protected]

Invitation to Participate in International MBA Research Dear ., If you, or your colleagues, consider yourself to decision makers in international projects then

I’d* like to invite you to complete a questionnaire over the internet. It typically takes about 20

minutes, can be anonymous, and can be found with ongoing summary research results at:


If you experience any difficulties connecting to the above link (i.e. because of firewalls, etc.)

then connect directly to the questionnaire by using the following link:

http://www.webpoll.org/guest/David_GV_Ray_GSOMI_MBA_Dissertation_Questionnaire_EN.htm

I’m finalizing my International MBA thesis at GSOMI, specializing in Project Management

(PM) and IT, and my activities are purely academic. Curiously enough, my research° has

identified the fact that over 47% of international project success rests on the personality type

of the “decision makers” i.e. not just the PM systems and methods used.

Your details are, naturally, confidential and will never be made public. On request, your

personal results can be forwarded to you by email to you with general information on how

they can be interprested.

If I can be of any further assistance then please don’t hesitate to contact me. Thank you and best regards, David G.V. Ray

410

APPENDIX IV-I06: INVITATION – GERMAN

412

Ms/Mr Potential Participant XX/XX/2006 Street number & name Suburbtown/City, Post code, State, Country David G.V. Ray 19 Untere Koenigstr. Bamberg D-96052 Bavaria, Germany [email protected]

Einladung, an der internationalen MBA Forschung teilzunehmen

Sehr geehrte(r) ,

wenn Sie, oder Bakannte von Ihnen, ein Entscheidungsträger in internationalen Projekten

sind, würde ich Sie gerne dazu einladen , einen Fragebogen im Internet durchzuführen.

Gewöhnlich dauert die Beantwortung ca. 10 Min. und kann anonym sein. Die

Forschungsergebnisse können fortwährend gefunden werden unter:


Ich beende zur Zeit meine internationale MBA-Dissertation an der GSOMI und habe mich

auf den Bereich Projektmanagement (P.M.) und IT spezialisiert. Meine Untersuchung ist

ausschließlich akademisch. Interessanterweise hat meine Forschung bis jetzt aufgedeckt, dass

über 47 % des Erfolgs internationaler Projekte von den persönlichen Eigenschaften der

Entscheidungsträger abhängen, d.h. nicht von P.M. Systemen alleine.

Ihre persönlichen Details werden natürlich vertraulich behandelt und niemals veröffentlicht.

Es können jedoch Ihre persönlichen Ergebnisse und allgemeine Informationen über die

Ergebnisinterpretation auf Anfrage an Sie weitergeleitet werden.

Zögern Sie bitte nicht, mich zu kontaktieren, wenn Sie weitere Fragen haben. Mit freundlichen Grüssen! David G.V. Ray

414

APPENDIX IV-08: IMPLEMENTATION –INVITATION – MANDARIN

416

幼G.V. 射线女士吴剑 XX/XX/2006 中华techbelt 新创 Münchberg D-95123 德国巴伐利亚 Untere Koenigstr. 19 Bamberg D-96052 德国巴伐利亚 [email protected] 邀参与国诚挚请际学研究术课题MBA

的亲爱女士吴剑，

如果您或您的同事正在考您成国目的一位高主管虑为际项级，我将的邀您参与我的网上卷诚挚请们问调查。

一般会占用您大这约分的钟时间，是匿名的测试，并可即看到自己的果时测试结。网址如下：20


如果你遇到任何困难,上述接连线(即因防火墙, 等) 直接接使用下列卷接则连问链

http://www.webpoll.org/guest/david_gv_ray_gsomi_mba_dissertation_questionnaire_en.htm

I我正在在大学行我的国进际文的收尾工作论，文特重目管理论别侧项（）和，所行进GSOMI MBA PM IT的研活均属学需要调动纯术。意外的是，我的研究恰好与一数据吻合项：超过的国目的成功是有于高决策者的人格特际项赖层质，言换47%之，成功不依靠目管理仅仅项（）系和方法统。PM 您的个人信息不被公和作其他所用绝对开。如有要求，您的个人果和的解可通子件的方式测试结结论读过电邮一并得获。如能您提供更多的助必与我系为协请务联。

地诚挚感谢 David G.V. Ray

418

APPENDIX IV-I07: QUESTIONNAIRE – ENGLISH

420

Formularbeginn International Project Critical Success Factors (CSF's)

David G.V. Ray International MBA Dissertation Research

Georg Simon Ohms - Management Institute (Nuremberg, Germany, EU)

Thanks for taking the time to do this for me. It'll take about 15 minutes so bring a cup of something (e.g. tea, coffee) with you. PURPOSE: This unique piece of research is an academic requirement that finalizes my International MBA studies WHAT YOU CAN GET OUT OF IT: Each participant can: *receive their private results, links to information on how they can better understand their own personality type plus access the summary survey results (from this site at a later stage) by including their contact details (e.g. email, name, etc.) in their response * or they can choose to remain completely anonymous and collect the summary survey results from this website if they so wish. ACADEMIC ADVISOR: Please note that this survey is being carried out under the academic guidance of Prof. T.M. Kuehlmann, Bayreuth Uni., Germany. SURVEY OBJECTIVE: Simply to establish what types of personalities are associated with different types of projects and their related decision making functions. TARGET MARKET: *"decision makers" = any decision maker for any activity type in any country DEFINITIONS: * a "project" is defined very broadly as "any temporary endeavor undertaken to create a unique product or service." BACKGROUND INFO: * the classification questions (e.g. category A, B, C, D, etc) below are an attempt to identify the activity of your "organization". If you work independently then pick a category that identifies your personal activities (this is a United Nations code list so just do the best that you can). * the questions are taken from standard measurement questionnaires i.e. they're not developed by me personally QUESTIONNAIRE IMPROVEMENTS: * your feedback is constantly being reviewed so don't be surprised to see improvements in the questionnaire over time.

In which country are you?

421

In which state are you?

In which city are you?

What is the ZIP/postcode of the location where you work?

What is your sex?

Male

Female

What is your age?

In which broad industry area is your organisation?

If your organisation is in Group A, which specific subgroup are you?

Agriculture, hunting and related service activities

�� Forestry, logging and related service activities

If your organisation is in Group B, which specific subgroup are you?

Fishing, aquaculture and service activities incidental to fishing

If your organisation is in Group C, which specific subgroup are you?

Mining of coal and lignite

Extraction of crude petroleum and natural gas

Mining of uranium and thorium ores

Mining of metal ores

Other mining and quarrying

If your organisation is in Group D, which specific subgroup are you?

If your organisation is in Group E, which specific subgroup are you?

422

Electricity, gas, steam and hot water supply

Collection, purification and distribution of water

If your organisation is in Group F, which specific subgroup are you?

Construction

If your organisation is in Group G, which specific subgroup are you?

Sale, maintenance and repair of motor vehicles and motorcycles

Wholesale trade and commission trade, except of motor vehicles and motorcycles

Retail trade, except of motor vehicles and motorcycles

If your organisation is in Group H, which specific subgroup are you?

Hotels and restaurants

If your organisation is in Group I, which specific subgroup are you?

Land transport

Water transport

Air transport

Supporting and auxiliary transport activities

Post and telecommunications

If your organisation is in Group J, which specific subgroup are you?

Financial intermediation, except insurance and pension funding

Insurance and pension funding, except compulsory social security

Activities auxiliary to financial intermediation

If your organisation is in Group K, which specific subgroup are you?

Real estate activities

Renting of machinery and equipment without operator and of personal and household goods

Computer and related activities

Research and development

Other business activities

If your organisation is in Group L, which specific subgroup are you?

Public administration and defence

If your organisation is in Group M, which specific subgroup are you?

Education

If your organisation is in Group N, which specific subgroup are you?

Health and social work

423

If your organisation is in Group O, which specific subgroup are you?

Sewage and refuse disposal, sanitation and similar activities

Activities of membership organizations n.e.c.

Recreational, cultural and sporting activities

Other service activities

If your organisation is in Group P, which specific subgroup are you?

Activities of private households as employers of domestic staff

Undifferentiated goods-producing activities of private households for own use

Undifferentiated service-producing activities of private households for own use

If your organisation is in Group Q, which specific subgroup are you?

Extraterritorial organizations and bodies

In your own words, what is your main task or activity e.g. author, managing people, designing, etc.

With which foreign country are most of your foreign projects carried out in?

After the main foreign country, which is the second most important foreign country in which you carry out your projects?

How many projects are you currently working on?

Approximatly what percentage(%) of these projects is carried out in other countries?

For your cost calculations, which currency are you using?

What is the approximate cost of the projects involved(if multiple projects then rough estimates for each)?

Approximately what percentage(%) of all decisions are you ultimately responsible for?

424

(Optional) What is your title?

(Optional) What is the name of your organisation?

(Optional) What is your organisations website address?

(Optional) What is your international telephone number e.g. +49 (0)951 297 5895?

(Optional) What is your email address?

(Optional) What is your name i.e. firstname and lastname (e.g. David Ray)?

(Optional) What is your date of birth (e.g. 16/06/1961)?

I'm full of ideas.

strongly agree

agree

425

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I'm exacting in my work.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I'm quiet around strangers

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I get irritated easily.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I feel others' emotions.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I use difficult words.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

426

I shirk my duties.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I don't like to draw attention to myself.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I change my mood a lot.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I'm not really interested in others.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I don't have a good imagination.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I often forget to put things back in their proper place.

427

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I have little to say.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I'm easily disturbed.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I'm not interested in other people's problems.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I seldom feel blue.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I sympathize with others' feelings.

428

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I have a vivid imagination.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I pay attention to details.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I feel comfortable around people.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I'm relaxed most of the time.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I don't talk a lot.

429

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I get stressed out easily.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I feel little concern for others.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I'm the life of the party.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I'm always prepared.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I've a rich vocabulary.

430

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I'm interested in people.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I leave my belongings around.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I have difficulty understanding abstract ideas.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I often insult people.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I worry about things.

431

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I keep in the background.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I make a mess of things.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I'm not interested in abstract ideas.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I start conversations.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I get chores done right away.

432

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I have excellent ideas.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I have a soft heart.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I get upset easily.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I talk to a lot of different people at parties

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I like order.

433

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I'm quick to understand things.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I take time out for others.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I have frequent mood swings.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I don't mind being the center of attention.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I follow a schedule.

434

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I spend my time reflecting on things.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

I often feel blue.

strongly agree

agree

neither

disagree

strongly disagree

Thank you for completing this survey!

Click here to f inish

Powered by StatPac survey software.

436

APPENDIX IV-I08: QUESTIONNAIRE – GERMAN

438

Formularbeginn Die kritischen Erfolgs-Faktoren der internationalen Projekte

David G.V. Ray Internationale MBA Dissertationsforschung Georg-Simon-Ohms Management Institute

(Nuernberg, Bayern, DE, EU) Danke, dass Sie sich für mich Zeit nehmen! Es dauert ungefähr 15 Minuten, also nehmen Sie sich eine Tasse Tee oder Kaffee und legen Sie los. ZWECK: Diese einzigartige Forschung ist eine akademische Anforderung, die mein internationales MBA- Studium abschließen wird. WAS SIE DAVON HABEN: Jeder Teilnehmer kann: * seine privaten Ergebnisse erhalten. Wenn Sie in Ihre Antwort Ihre Kontaktdaten einfügen (d.h. Email , Name etc,), bekommen Sie die Links zu den Informationen darüber, wie Sie Ihren eigenen Persönlichkeitstyp besser verstehen können. Außerdem erhalten Sie Zugriff zu den Forschungsergebnissen auf dieser Website zu einem späteren Zeitpunkt. * oder, wenn Sie es wünschen, bleiben Sie komplett anonym und können die Forschungsdaten später auf dieser Website einfach so einsehen. AKADEMISCHER BERATER: Bitte beachten Sie, dass diese Befragung unter der akademischen Leitung von Prof. T.M. Kuehlmann, Bayreuth Universität, durchgeführt wird. ZIELSETZUNG DER BEFRAGUNG: Einfach, um herauszufinden, welche Persönlichkeitstypen mit verschiedenen Arten von Projekten und den dazugehörigen Entscheidungsfunktionen in Verbindung gebracht werden können. ZIEL-MARKT: *"Entscheidungsträger" aus jedem Land , tätig in jedem Bereich DEFINITIONEN: * ein "Projekt" wird sehr allgemein definiert als "jede temporäre Bemühung , die aufgenommen wird, um ein einzigartiges Produkt oder einen Service zu erschaffen." HINTERGRUND-INFO: * die Klassifikationsfragen (d.h. Kategorie A, B, C, D, usw.) sind ein Versuch, die Tätigkeit Ihrer "Organisation" zu kennzeichnen. Wenn Sie selbständig sind, dann wählen Sie eine Kategorie aus, die Ihre persönlichen Tätigkeiten kennzeichnet (dies ist eine Liste der Vereinten Nationen, also machen Sie einfach das Beste draus). * die Fragen wurden Standardfragebögen entnommen, d.h., dass sie nicht von mir persönlich entwickelt wurden.

439

FRAGEBOGEN-VERBESSERUNGEN: * Ihr Feedback wird stetig gelesen .Also seien Sie nicht überrascht, wenn sich der Fragebogen allmählich ändert und verbessert.

In welchem Staat sind Sie?

In welchem Bundesland sind Sie?

In welcher Stadt sind Sie?

Was ist die Postleitzahl Ihrer Firma?

Was ist Ihr Geschlecht?

Mann

Frau

Wie alt sind Sie?

In welcher Industrie- Kategorie ist Ihre Organisation?

Wenn Ihre Organisation in Gruppe A ist, in welcher spezifischen Untergruppe sind Sie?

�� Landwirtschaft, Jagd und damit verbundene Dienstleistungen

Forstwirtschaft, Holzfällen und damit verbundene Dienstleistungen

Wenn Ihre Organisation in Gruppe B ist, in welcher spezifischen Untergruppe sind Sie?

Fischen-, Wasserwirtschaft- und Service-Tätigkeiten der Fischerei

Wenn Ihre Organisation in Gruppe C ist, in welcher spezifischen Untergruppe sind Sie?

�� Steinkohle- und Braunkohlebergbau

00000 Rohöl- und Erdgas-Förderung

Bergbau der Uran- und Thoriumerze

440

Bergbau der Metallerze

Anderer Bergbau und Abbau

Wenn Ihre Organisation in Gruppe D ist, in welcher spezifischen Untergruppe sind Sie?

Wenn Ihre Organisation in Gruppe E ist, in welcher spezifischen Untergruppe sind Sie?

Strom, Gases, Dampf und Heißwasser Versorgungsmaterial

Sammlung, Reinigung und Verteilung des Wassers

Wenn Ihre Organisation in Gruppe F ist, in welcher spezifischen Untergruppe sind Sie?

Aufbau

Wenn Ihre Organisation in Gruppe G ist, in welcher spezifischen Untergruppe sind Sie?

Verkauf, Wartung und Reparatur von Kraftfahrzeugen und Motorräder

Großverkauf und Kommission, ausgenommen von Kraftfahrzeugen und Motorräder

Einzelhandel, ausgenommen von Kraftfahrzeuge und Motorräder

Wenn Ihre Organisation in Gruppe H ist, in welcher spezifischen Untergruppe sind Sie?

Hotels und Gaststätten Transport

Wenn Ihre Organisation in Gruppe I ist, in welcher spezifischen Untergruppe sind Sie?

Landtransport

Wassertransport

Lufttransport

Stützen und zusätzliche Transporttätigkeiten

Post und Nachrichtentechniken Intermediation

Wenn Ihre Organisation in Gruppe J ist, in welcher spezifischen Untergruppe sind Sie?

Finanzen ausgenommen Versicherung und Pension

Versicherung und Pension, ausgenommen obligatorische Sozialversicherung

Tätigkeiten zur finanziellen Intermediation

Wenn Ihre Organisation in Gruppe K ist, in welcher spezifischen Untergruppe sind Sie?

Immobilien

Mieten von Maschinen und der Ausrüstung ohne Operator und Einzelhandel von Haushaltswaren

Computer und in Verbindung stehende Tätigkeiten

441

Forschung und Entwicklung

Andere Geschäftstätigkeiten

Wenn Ihre Organisation in Gruppe L ist, in welcher spezifischen Untergruppe sind Sie?

Allgemeine Leitung und Verteidigung

Wenn Ihre Organisation in Gruppe M ist, in welcher spezifischen Untergruppe sind Sie?

Ausbildung

Wenn Ihre Organisation in Gruppe N ist, in welcher spezifischen Untergruppe sind Sie?

Gesundheit und Sozialarbeit

Wenn Ihre Organisation in Gruppe O ist, in welcher spezifischen Untergruppe sind Sie?

Abwasser- und Abfallbeseitigung, Hygiene und ähnliche Tätigkeiten

Tätigkeiten der Mitglieder-Organisationen n.e.c.

Erholung, kulturelle und sportliche Tätigkeiten Tätigkeiten des Services

Andere Dienste

Wenn Ihre Organisation in Gruppe P ist, in welcher spezifischen Untergruppe sind Sie?

Tätigkeiten in privaten Haushalten wie Putzhilfen,Dienstpersonal etc.

undifferenzierte Herstellung von Produkten für den Eigenbedarf

Undifferenzierte Herstellung von Produkten oder Diensten zur Selbsthilfe

Wenn Ihre Organisation in Gruppe Q ist, in welcher spezifischen Untergruppe sind Sie?

Extraterritorial und Körper

In Ihren eigenen Worten, was ist Ihre Hauptaufgabe oder Tätigkeit z.B. Autor, Manager, etc.

Mit welchem Ausland sind Sie mit Ihrem Aussländischen Projekt meistens beschäftigt?

Abgesehen von diesem Land, welches Ausland ist für Ihr Unternehmen noch wichtig?

An wievielen Projekten arbeiten Sie z.Zt.?

Wie hoch ist ungefähr der Prozentsatz(%) der Projekte, die in anderen Ländern durchgeführt werden?

442

Welche Währung verwenden Sie für Ihre Kostenberechnungen?

Wie hoch sind die ungefähren Kosten (wenn mehrere Projekte, geben Sie bitte eine ungefähre Schätzung für jedes)?

Für ungefähr welchen Prozentsatz (%) aller Entscheidungen sind Sie schließlich verantwortlich?

(Freiwillige Angabe) Wie lautet Ihr Titel?

(Freiwillige Angabe) Wie heisst Ihre Organisation?

(Freiwillige Angabe) Wie lautet die Website Adresse Ihre Organisation?

(Freiwillige Angabe) Wie lautet Ihre internationale Telefonnummer z.B. +49 (0) 951 297 5895?

(Freiwillige Angabe) Wie lautet Ihre E-mail-Adresse?

(Freiwillige Angabe) Wie lautet Ihr Vor- und Nachname (z.B. David Ray)?

443

(Freiwillige Angabe) Wann sind Sie geboren (z.B. 16/06/1961)?

Ich bin voller Ideen.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine

Ich bin anderer Meinung

Ich bin stark anderer Meinung

Ich habe hohe Ansprüche an meine Arbeit.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich bin in der Gesellschaft von Fremden eher ruhig.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich werde leicht gereizt.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich spüre Gefühle anderer.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



444

Ich verwende schwierige Wörter.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich erledige meine Aufgaben nicht.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich mag es nicht, Aufmerksamkeit auf mich zu lenken.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich ändere oft meine Laune.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich bin an anderen nicht wirklich interessiert.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich habe keine gute Vorstellungskraft.

445

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich vergesse häufig, Sachen an ihren korrekten Platz zurückzustellen.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich habe wenig zu sagen.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich fühle mich leicht gestört.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich bin nicht an den Problemen der Leute interessiert.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich fühle mich selten deppressiv.

446

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich sympathisiere mit den Gefühlen anderer.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich habe eine lebhafte Phantasie.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich beachte Details.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich fühle mich in der Gessellschaft von Leuten wohl.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich bin meist entspannt.

447

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich spreche nicht viel.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich fühle mich leicht gestresst.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich sorge mich wenig um andere.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine


Ich bin stark anderer Meinunge

Ich bin ein Partylöwe.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich bin immer bereit.

448

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich habe einen reichen Wortschatz.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich bin an den Leuten interessiert.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich lasse mein Eigentum herumliegen.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich habe Schwierigkeiten, abstrakte Ideen zu verstehen.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich beleidige häufig Leute.

449

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich bin oft besorgt.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich halte mich im Hintergrund.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich mache alles kaputt.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich bin nicht an den abstrakten Ideen interessiert.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich beginne Gespräche.

450

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich erledige meine Arbeit sofort.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich habe ausgezeichnete Ideen.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich habe ein weiches Herz.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich rege mich leicht auf.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Auf Parties spreche ich mit vielen Menschen.

451

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich mag Ordnung.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich bin schnell im Verstehen.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich nehme mir Zeit für andere.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich habe häufige Stimmungsschwankungen.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Mir macht es nichts aus, im Mittelpunkt zu stehen.

452

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich folge einem Zeitplan.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich verbringe meine Zeit damit, Dinge zu reflektieren.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Leute fühlen sich in meiner Gesellschaft entspannt.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Ich fühle mich oft depressiv.

stark zustimmen

zustimmen

keine



Für das Durchführen dieser übersicht danke!

Hier klicken, um zu beenden

454

APPENDIX IV-I09: QUESTIONNAIRE – MANDARIN

456

国目成功因素际项关键 (CSF中的)

David G.V. Ray

工商管理士研究文硕论 (GSOMI--欧盟)

感您拿出做此卷谢时间问。

卷大要占用您问约 15分钟，您可以利用个隙喝杯茶或咖啡这间。

目标

特的卷属学研究需要这项别调查问术，研究者以此束其个人的工商管理结（）研究。MBA

你可从中得到：

个参与者可以每：

得的个人果获测试结，有于如何更好的了解自己的性格特点关，

通回得到的地系信息过复联（地址，

姓名等）可以得到述结论综（在本的后页）。

学术导师：

特需要提及的是别，概是在这项论导师T.M Kuehlmann教授（德国拜伊特大学罗）的指下行完成导进。

课题：

明确什型的性格所的不同型的目和所及的决策功能涉么类关联类项。

*目人群标

"决策者：不限国界，任何型的目对类项，活行决策的人动进。"

定义：

“ 目项：以非常泛的概念定宽义为任何通一定的努力斗而的独一无二的品或服过时间奋实现产务。” “

背景介绍：

下面的分的找出你所属的类问题试图类别。

如果你在做独立性相的工作强对，出你个人活所述的一工作选动类（是合国承的一分这联认项类，一定要尽你所能哟！）

从一些一般性卷中抽取问题问，并非由研究本人设计。

卷改问进：

您的意建始被重见议终视，因此不要惊讶，您将会看到一段后份卷的后改时间这问续进。

457

您在哪个国家?

您所在省是?

您在哪个城市?

您工作地点的是邮编 ?

您的性别?

男

女

您的年龄?

您所在的机构属于哪个行业？

一个农业狩猎和林业

如果您所工作的机构或属于组织组，那具体从事的行是么业？A

农业、打及相服活猎关务动

林业、伐木及相服活关务动

如果您所工作的机构或属于组织组，那具体从事的行是么业？B

捕捞、水殖和捕附服活产养捞带务动

如果您所工作的机构或属于组织组，那具体从事的行是么业？C

458

煤炭采和褐煤开泥炭萃取;

原油采石油和天然气开附服活油气采带务动开除量测; ,

采开铀、石钍矿

金属采矿产开

其他采及采石矿

如果您所工作的机构或属于组织组，那具体从事的行是么业？D

如果您所工作的机构或属于组织组，那具体从事的行是么业？E

力电、煤气、蒸汽、水供热应

收集、化和分配用水净

如果您所工作的机构或属于组织组，那具体从事的行是么业？F

施工

如果您所工作的机构或属于组织组，那具体从事的行是么业G ？

售及修保汽和摩托销维养车车汽燃料零售车;

批和易委会发业贸员除汽及摩托车车,

零售业汽和摩托除外车车, ; 个人及家庭用品的修理

如果您所工作的机构或属于组织组，那具体从事的行是么业？H

店宾馆饭

如果您所工作的机构或属于组织组，那具体从事的行是么业？I

路运陆输透管道运过输;

水运

航空运输

支持及助运活辅输动活旅行社动;

邮电

如果您所工作的机构或属于组织组，那具体从事的行是么业？J

金融中介、保和老基金除外险养

老保基金除制性社会保障强养险

金融中介活来助动辅

459

如果您所工作的机构或属于组织组，那具体从事的行是么业？K

地活产动

机械租设备赁经营、个人及家庭用品

算机及相活计关动

研究与开发

其他商活业动

如果您所工作的机构或属于组织组，那具体从事的行是么业？L

教育

如果您所工作的机构或属于组织组，那具体从事的行是么业？M

生和社会工作卫

如果您所工作的机构或属于组织组，那具体从事的行是么业？N

水和垃圾理污处生及似活卫类动,

如果您所工作的机构或属于组织组，那具体从事的行是么业？O

活成动组织员未考虑 ( )

活成动组织员未考虑 ( )

娱乐、文化和体育活动

其他服活务动

如果您所工作的机构或属于组织组，那具体从事的行是么业？P

活动人私人雇用的家庭住员户

未分化品生活的私人自用产动户

未分化服生活的私人自用务产动户

如果您所工作的机构或属于组织组，那具体从事的行是么业？Q

域外和机构组织

用您自己的话说，您的是职业（例如：作家，理等经）？

哪个国家是您外国合作目接触多的国家项？

460

除重要的国家以外，哪国是您目展次重要的国家项开？

您正在着手几个目项 ?

以近似百分比）算有多少目是在其他国家行的计项进(% ?

您用何核算成本种货币 ?

目及大致用是涉项费如果是多个合目组项，粗略估算个目的用每项费( )?

决策您其中所的份有多少对终负责额（大百分比算约计） ?

（可选）您的是头衔？

（可选）您所工作的或公司名称组织 ?

（可选）您所在机构的网址是?

（可选）您的系是联电话？（例如）: 49(0)9512975895

（可选）您的子箱地址是电邮 ?

461

（可选）您的姓名？

（可选）您的出生日期是例如 ( :16/06/1961)?

我有很多的想法。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我我的工作充情对满热。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我很能与陌生人打成一片。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我很容易火发。

462

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我感得到人的情觉别绪。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我用晦的文字涩。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我推卸任责。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我不喜注自己欢关。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我情化很大绪变。

463

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我他人不是很感趣对兴。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我没有好的想象力。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我常常忘把西放回它在的地方记东该。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我没有什太多要的么说。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我很容易被打搅。

464

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我没趣人的或麻兴过问别问题烦。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我很少会感沮觉丧。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我能体会人别的感受。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我有生的想象力动。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我注重细节。

465

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我和周人在一起感到很舒服围。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我大多都很放松时间。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我不健谈。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我很容易自己解给压。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我很少人心对别关。

466

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我很和群。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我是以待总严阵。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我丰富词汇。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我人感趣对兴。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我是三落四的总丢。

467

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我很理解抽象意念难 .

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我常侮辱人经。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我事情。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我先一个开头谈话。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我常把事情搞糟经。

468

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我抽象意念没趣对兴。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我先一个开头谈话。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我会上把碎的事搞定马琐。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我有很好的想法。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我是个好心肠。

469

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我很容易不心开。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

在聚会上我与很多不同的人聊天。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我喜有序欢。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我的悟力很好领。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

470

我抽出出来人时间给别。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我常情起落经绪。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我不介意成人注意的焦点为别。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我按照安排的表行时间动。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

我花反省事情时间。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

471

我常感到情低落时绪。

烈同意强

同意

既不

不成赞

烈反强对

点此整理

472

APPENDIX IV-I10: QUESTIONNAIRE – SPANISH

474

Investigación crítica de la disertación de David G.V. Ray

MBA del

de los factores del éxito del proyecto internacional (CSF) (GSOMI - EU) Agradece por tomar la época de hacer esto para me. It tomará cerca de 15 minutos así que traer una taza algo (e.g. té, café) con los pares de you. A de definiciones, etc. * que el mercado de blanco para el examen es “responsables” para cualquier actividad mecanografían adentro cualquier country * un “proyecto” se define muy ampliamente como “cualquier esfuerzo temporal emprendido para crear un producto o un servicio único. “ * las preguntas de la clasificación (e.g. categoría A, B, C, D, etc) abajo son una tentativa de identificar la actividad de tu “organización”. Si trabajas independientemente entonces la selección un categorie que identifica tus actividades personales (ésta es una lista de código de Naciones Unidas tan apenas hace el mejor que puedes). * las preguntas se toman de los cuestionarios estándares de la medida es decir que no son desarrolladas por mí personally * tu regeneración se está repasando así que no está sorprendida constantemente para considerar mejoras en el cuestionario en un cierto plazo.

¿En qué país estás?

¿En qué estado o provincia estás?

I¿En qué ciudad estás?

¿Cuál es el código postal del lugar donde trabajas?

¿Cuál es tu sexo?

Varón

Hembra

475

¿Qué edad tienes?

¿En qué sector industrial se encuentra tu organización?

¿Si tu organización está en el grupo A, en que subgrupo específico estás tu?

Agricultura, caza y actividades relacionadas del servicio

Silvicultura, registración y activitiess relacionados del servicio

¿Si tu organización está en el grupo B, en que subgrupo específico estás tú?

Actividades de la pesca, de la acuacultura y del servicio fortuitas a la pesca

¿Si tu organización está en el grupo C, en que subgrupo específico estás tú?

Explotación minera del carbón y del lignito

Extracción del petróleo y del gas natural

Explotación minera de los minerales del uranio y del torio

Explotación minera de los minerales del metal

La otra explotación minera y sacar

¿Si tu organización está en el grupo D, en que subgrupo específico estás tú?

¿Si tu organización está en el grupo E, en que subgrupo específico estás tú?

Fuente de la electricidad, del gas, del vapor y de la agua caliente

Colección, purificación y distribución del agua

¿Si tu organización está en el grupo F, en que subgrupo específico estás tú?

Construcción

¿Si tu organización está en el grupo G, en que subgrupo específico estás tú?

Venta, mantenimiento y reparación de los vehículos de motor y de las motocicletas

El comercio al por mayor y la comisión negocian, excepto de los vehículos de motor y las motocicletas

Comercio al por menor, excepto de los vehículos de motor y las motocicletas

¿Si tu organización está en el grupo H, en que subgrupo específico estás tú?

Hoteles y restaurantes

¿Si tu organización está en el grupo I, en que subgrupo específico estás tú?

Transporte por tierra

Transporte del agua

476

Transporte aéreo

Soporte y actividades auxiliares del transporte

Poste y telecomunicaciones

¿Si tu organización está en el grupo J, en que subgrupo específico estás tú?

Mediación financiera, excepto el financiamiento del seguro y de la pensión

Seguro y pensión que financian, excepto la Seguridad Social obligatoria

Actividades auxiliares a la mediación financiera

¿Si tu organización está en el grupo K, en que subgrupo específico estás tú?

Actividades de las propiedades inmobiliarias

El alquilarse de la maquinaria y del equipo sin el operador y de las mercancías personales y de casa

Computadora y actividades relacionadas

Investigación y desarrollo

Otras actividades económicas

¿Si tu organización está en el grupo L, en que subgrupo específico estás tú?

Administración pública y defensa

¿Si tu organización está en el grupo M, en que subgrupo específico estás tú?

Educación

¿Si tu organización está en el grupo N, en que subgrupo específico estás tú?

Salud y trabajo social

¿Si tu organización está en el grupo O, en que subgrupo específico estás tú?

Disposición de las aguas residuales y de la basura, saneamiento y actividades similares

Actividades del elesewhere de las organizaciones de la calidad de miembro no incluido

Actividades recreacionales, culturales y que se divierten

Otras actividades del servicio

¿Si tu organización está en el grupo P, en que subgrupo específico estás tú?

Actividades de casas privadas como patrones del personal doméstico

Actividades mercancías-que producen de Undifferentiated de las casas privadas para el propios uso

477

Actividades servicio-que producen de Undifferentiated de las casas privadas para el propios uso

¿Si tu organización está en el grupo Q, en que subgrupo específico estás tú?

Organizaciones y cuerpos Extraterritorial

¿Con tus propias palabras, como describirías tu trabajo principal o tus funciones? (p.ej: como autor, gerente, ect.)

¿Cuál es el primer país más importante con el que realizas la mayor parte de tus proyectos ?

¿Cuál es el segundo país más importante con el que realizas proyectos?

¿En cuántos proyectos estás trabajando actualmente ?

¿Aproximadamente qué porcentaje (%) de estos proyectos se realizan en otros países?

¿Qué moneda estás utilizando para hacer el cálculo de tus costos?

¿Cuál es el costo aproximado de los proyectos implicados (si existen varios proyectos, entonces haz un cálculo aproximado para cada proyecto)?

¿Aproximadamente de qué porcentaje (%) de todas las decisiones eres finalmente responsable?

(Opcional) ¿Cuál es tu título profesional?

(Opcional)¿Cuál es el nombre de tu organización / empresa?

478

(Opcional) ¿Cuál es la página web de tu organización?

(Opcional)¿Cuál es tu número de teléfono p.ej. +49 (0) 951 297 5895?

(Opcional)¿Cuál es tu correo electrónico?

(Opcional) ¿Cuál es tu nombre y apellido (p.ej.David Ray)?

(Opcional)¿Cuál es la fecha de tu nacimiento (p.ej. 16/06/1961)?

Estoy lleno de ideas.

convenir fuertemente

convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar

discrepar fuertemente

479

Soy exigente en mi trabajo.


convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


Soy reservado con extraños.


convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


Me irrito fácilmente.


convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


Me pongo en el lugar de otros.


convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


Utilizo palabras difíciles.

480


convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


Evado mis responsabilidades.


convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


No me gusta llamar la atención.


convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


Cambio de humor constantemente.


convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


No estoy realmente interesado en otros.


481

convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


No tengo una buena imaginación.


convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


Me olvido a menudo de regresar las cosas a su lugar.


convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


Tengo poco que decir.


convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


Me distraigo fácilmente.


convenir

482

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


No estoy interesado en los problemas de la gente.


convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


Raramente me siento deprimido.


convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


Me compadezco de los sentimientos de otros.


convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


Tengo una imaginación viva.


convenir

ni unos ni otros

483

discrepar


Presto atención a los detalles.


convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


Me siento bien alrededor de gente.


convenir

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La mayor parte del tiempo estoy relajado.


convenir

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No hablo mucho.


convenir

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discrepar

484


Me estreso fácilmente.


convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


Me preocupo por otras personas.


convenir

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discrepar


Soy el alma de la fiesta.


convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


Estoy siempre preparado .


convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


485

Tengo un vocabulario rico.


convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


Estoy interesado en la gente.


convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


Dejo mis pertenencia por aquí y por allá.


convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


Tengo dificultad que entiende ideas abstractas.


convenir

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discrepar


486

Insulto a la gente.


convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


Me preocupo por las cosas.


convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


Me mantengo en un segundo plano.


convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


Hago un desastre de las cosas.


convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


487

No estoy interesado en ideas abstractas.


convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


Comienzo conversaciones.


convenir

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discrepar


Logro realizar mis actividades diarias muy rápidamente.


convenir

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discrepar


Tengo ideas excelentes.


convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


Tengo un buen corazón.

488


convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


Me molesto/ enojo fácilmente.


convenir

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discrepar


Me gusta hablar con todo tipo de gente.


convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


Me gusta el orden.


convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


Soy rápido entendiendo cosas.


489

convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


Me tomo tiempo para otras personas.


convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


Cambio constantemente de humor.


convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


No me importa ser el centro de atracción.


convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


I follow a schedule.


convenir

490

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


Paso mi tiempo refleccionando sobre cosas.


convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


Hago sentir bien a la gente.


convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


Estar deprimido es algo normal para mi.


convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar




convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


491



convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar




convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar




convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar




convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar




convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar




convenir

492

ni unos ni otros

discrepar




convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar




convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar




convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar




convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar




convenir

493

ni unos ni otros

discrepar




convenir

ni unos ni otros

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convenir

ni unos ni otros

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convenir

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convenir

ni unos ni otros

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convenir

494

ni unos ni otros

discrepar




convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar




convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar




convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar




convenir

ni unos ni otros

discrepar




convenir

495

ni unos ni otros

discrepar


¡Gracias por terminar este examen!

chascar aquí para acabar

496

APPENDIX IV-I11: CONTACTS

497

All contacts for the dissertation were managed via the MDRMS (see Appendix I-SW05). This is a knowledge management system with an integrated CRM that was purpose designed and built by the dissertation author to assist with the execution of his dissertation at the GSO-MI. The MDRMS was populated from a variety of sources (including contact databases such as klicktel – see Appendix I-SW10: Contact Database). All contact details were entered into MDRMS to allow:

• Contact management • Correspondence • Research workflow and • Document management (e.g. questionnaire, etc)

The following organizations or individuals were contacted during either the:

• press release and/or • direct contact phase

International Newspapers • Chinese Daily (CH) • Chinese News Group (CH, also in Korea, Japan, Singapore & Hong Kong) • The London Times (UK) • The New York Times (USA) • The Sydney Morning Herald(AU) • The Financial Review (AU) • The “Berliner Zeitung” (DE) • The „Fraenkischer Tag“ (DE) • The „Nuerenburg Zeitung“(DE) International Organizations • The GSO-MI (DE) • PMI (EU) • PMI (UK) • PMI (Dominican Republic) • Local and international businesses - including EADS, Wieland, Ina, Siemens, etc. and • The University of Technology Alumni (AU)

498

APPENDIX IV-I12: RESPONDENT’S DATA

502

APPENDIX IV-I12: RESPONSE QUALIFICATION CRITERIA

503

Post-collation Response Qualification Criteria Term Definition "Senior" is defined as individuals having ultimate responsibility for a significant

to substantial(25-50%+) number of the decisions taken. "Decision maker” anyone making decisions in any given international project "International" any project that has over 30% of its internal team based in a country

other than the country of project origin


504

V F I N D I N G S & D I S C U S S I O N

GENERAL

APPENDIX V-G01: FINDINGS - QUALIFIED TARGET RESPONDENTS

508

APPENDIX V-G02: FINDINGS - ALL RESPONDENTS

510

APPENDIX V-G03: FINDINGS - GERMAN RESPONDENTS

514

APPENDIX V-G04: FINDINGS - AUSTRALIAN RESPONDENTS

518

APPENDIX V-G05: GDP COMPARISON (USD)

520

International GDP Comparison (USD)

05000

1000015000200002500030000350004000045000

1970

1973

1976

1979

1982

1985

1988

1991

1994

1997

2000

2003

Year

GD

P/C

apita

AustraliaChinaJapanRussian FederationIndiaSaudi ArabiaTurkeyUnited Arab EmiratesUnited KingdomUnited States

139

139 United Nations – Statistics Website http://unstats.un.org/unsd/snaama/resultsGDP.asp?

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APPENDIX V-G06: GDP COMPARISON (PPP)

524

140

140 The European Union - Statistics website

http://epp.eurostat.ec.europa.eu/portal/page?_pageid=1334,49092079,1334_49092794&_dad=portal&_schema=PORTAL

525

Index

i

A

F

G 2

H 3

M

O

P

R

S

T 2

V

International Project Management - Critical Success Factors (CSF's)

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Transcript of International Project Management - Critical Success Factors (CSF's)