Identifying factors that influence adoption, deployment and optimisation of project management methodologies within the Australian Local Government sector

The public sector worldwide has undergone reform over the past few decades under the influence of New Public Management (NPM). The reform came about by trying to make pre-NPM traditional local governments (LG) operate like a private sector to make them more efficient. Practices like compulsory competitive tendering led to many public services being contracted and outsourced to the private sector and led to downsizing the public service. However, by outsourcing LG’s capabilities, its core technical capabilities and ethics were eroded. Several scandals and episodes of corruption were publicised in countries most involved in implementing NPM, and global trends raised debate on NPM’s effect on public management behaviour. In parallel, the global recession also occurred between mid-2007 and early 2009, and as a result private organisations entrusted with delivery of public services under the NPM banner were collapsing; the services private sector provided to the community suffered. Due to this, the public demanded that government regain its proper role in providing community services. There was an outcry from the public that government should do what it is supposed to do; that is, at a minimum, to maintain security, protect property rights, reduce societal problems, and re-assert its leading role in controlling and steering social development. In light of all these scenarios, public accountability is gaining relevance as a gatekeeper concept for the ethical behaviour of public servants. A corollary of this is an indication of LGs underspending on, and inefficiencies in delivering, capital work projects. This perspective has led to the need for LGs to manage such projects better. The need for project governance through implementing proper project management methodology (PMM) is gaining relevance in LGs. Evidence in the literature shows LGs have found it challenging to adopt, deploy and optimise PMMs. Therefore, there is a need for research to investigate, identify and document the factors that influence the three phases of PMM implementation: adoption, deployment, and optimising in Australian LGs to deliver capital works. The research for this thesis is exploratory and does not seek to prove a theory via conventional deductive research. Research into the available literature did not lead to a hypothesis of significant interest. Therefore, it is inductive research by nature. A qualitative methodology, grounded theory, was chosen.   Grounded theory is a proven method for studying topics of a social nature, and the issues which occupy project management practitioners within the LG capital works project management sphere in implementing a PMM are of a sociotechnical nature. Face-to-face interviews were conducted with 37 project management professionals, middle management, and top management executives from ten LGs across all eight state and territories across Australia. The use oof grounded theory achieved internal validity through a rigorous high level comparative analysis comprising three levels of analysis and coding: open coding, axial coding, and selective coding, until theoretical saturation was achieved. The researcher followed this process and reached theoretical saturation. The methodology allowed emergence of factors that influenced adoption, deployment, and optimisation of a PMM in LG. The research found eight factors influenced implementation phases of a PMM: governance and oversight; top management support and resources requirement; commitment, leadership and buy-in; experience, training, and development; change management and culture; stakeholders, collaboration and sharing; customising the PMM to the organisation; and the importance of producing results. The order and the number of factors varied depending on the need for them in the relevant PMM implementation phases. This outcome that was not envisaged going into the research. All eight factors were found to influence adoption. The deployment and optimisation phases of the PMM implementation had seven factors each. Some of the factors that emerged from the research aligned with those found in the literature. However, factors found through this research were much more in-depth and focused on LG operational contexts. In the PMM adoption phase, the prominent factor was the need for “governance and oversight.” Other secondary yet complementary factors related to strengthening the organisation’s adaptability to implement a PMM by focusing on improving capability of employees and the organisations. All these factors are concentrated on a core factor: “Desire to have better organisational project management capability.” In the PMM deployment phase, the prominent factor was the need for “Experience, training and development.” Other secondary and complementary factors were to build the organisations and employees’ capacity to deploy a PMM. All these factors are concentrated on a core factor: “Commitment to capacity building of PMM within the organisation during its deployment.” In the PMM optimising phase, the prominent factor was the need for “Stakeholders, collaboration and sharing.” The other secondary and complementary factors were to improve the chances of successfully optimising the PMM by continuously improving collaboration, employee competency and leadership. All these factors concentrated on a core factor: “Persevere, collaborate and continuously improve project management capability.” The findings of this research enable future researchers to conduct further research, better modelling and planning for adopting, deploying, and optimising a PMM in LGs. For instance, this research could be expanded to capture other types of projects carried out in LGs, such as organisational change projects, IT projects, and community welfare projects. Since LGs are in government structures worldwide, this research could be extended to other geographies around the world or to other levels of government such as state and federal governments. Further, research could investigate a comprehensive suite of solutions to implementing the influencing factors, and better model and plan for PMM adoption, deployment, and optimisation. This research could influence practice, by informing future policy development and efforts for LG to implement PMM sector wide. Currently, there are no mandated policies to implement a PMM in LGs Australia wide. A policy would encourage LGs to implement PMM across the sector, thereby establishing a standardised and consistent approach to planning and delivering projects in LG. The impact of this research and contribution to future research and practice are further discussed in the conclusion chapter of this thesis.