Degree of Criticality of Monitoring and Control to Project Success

Research work on construction project success has been of steadily considerable interest to a number of industries, including that of engineering and construction. The objective of the research reported in this paper was to investigate the significance of project controls as a critical success factor (CSF), with the aim of validating the continued need for improving on the current practices related to putting in place effective project control processes. The research methodology involved undertaking a scrutinized review of project controls research studies reported on—over the last three decades—in the related reputable literature, followed by a synthesis of the factors cited as critical to the success of various types of projects. Fifteen headings ended up being adopted for describing factors reported in the reviewed studies as critical to project success. The findings revealed that the semantics used in the literature in relation to an adopted broad heading of “effective project monitoring and controls methods” come with the highest frequency (62 citations), as compared to the citations (ranging from 12 to 51) in respect of the other adopted 14 headings. The distribution of the various research methodologies relied upon in the encountered studies is presented, showing “questionnaires” as the dominant means for collecting CSF-related information. In addition, the full range of encountered “project controls” semantics and their categorization are offered. The paper concludes with a brief analysis of the ranking assigned to project controls as a CSF, with medium and high ranks inferred for more than 50% of the studies dealing with construction projects.