Moderating Influence of National Culture on the Linkage between Project Management Performance and Project Success

Abstract

To spread business strategy across the globe, several renowned offshore organizations have drifted towards collaborative exertion to win and implement international projects for Business gains. However, despite of subsequent improved Project Management practices through the use of state of the art tools and techniques, the number of successfully completed projects does not show a significant increase. A little research has been carried out to explore the linkage between project management performance and project success. No research, however, was conducted in the past to investigate the latent force(s) influencing that relationship. This research, therefore, was an endeavor to find out the hidden cause of lower project success rate by examining the effect of National Culture on the relationship between project management performance and project success. Moreover, it is also one of its kind initiative undertaken in this regard which in itself is a commendable research contribution. The research objectives were achieved through dissemination and subsequent collection, compilation, and analysis of response received for the structured questionnaire survey, adopted/adapted from illustrious research. The result had the backing of 408 responses that equated to 97.84% in terms of response rate. To remove single-informant bias, the targeted respondents were from top management, middle management and project employees having sufficient Business/project management background and field experience. The researcher has examined the influence of National Culture in terms of its five dimensions namely power distance, masculinity, individualism, uncertainty avoidance, and long term orientation. Empirical findings indicate power distance as the factor influencing the linkage between project management performance and project success, and hence, is the cause of low project success rate. The research concluded by suggesting power dissemination across the project as a remedy to increase project success rate