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Received 28 June 2001; received in revised form 19 September 2001; accepted 27 September 2002
Abstract
Delay and cost overruns are common in construction projects and groundwater construction projects in Ghana are not an
exception. The paper presents the results of a questionnaire survey conducted to identify and evaluate the relative importance of the
signicant factors contributing to delay and cost overruns in Ghana groundwater construction projects. Respondents of this survey
included personnel from owners, consultants and contractors involved in groundwater projects in Ghana. The results of the study
revealed the main causes of delay and cost overruns in construction of groundwater projects included: monthly payment diculties
from agencies; poor contractor management; material procurement; poor technical performances; and escalation of material prices.
Hence, eective project planning, controlling and monitoring should be established to enhance project performance in order to
minimise or avoid delay and cost problems in groundwater construction projects.
# 2003 Elsevier Science Ltd and IPMA. All rights reserved.
Keywords: Project management; Groundwater projects; Construction; Overruns; Ghana; Developing countries
1. Introduction
Project success can be dened as meeting goals and
objectives as prescribed in the project plan. A successful
project means that the project has accomplished its
technical performance, maintained its schedule, and
remained within budgetary costs.
Project management tools and techniques play an
important role in the eective management of a project.
Therefore, a good project management lies in the management tools and techniques used to manage the project. Project management involves managing the
resourcesworkers, machines, money, materials and
methods used [1]. Some projects are eectively and eciently managed while others are mismanaged, incurring
much delay and cost overruns.
A construction project such as groundwater comprises two distinct phases: the preconstruction phase,
* Corresponding author.
E-mail address: yawfrimpong@hotmail.com (Y. Frimpong).
0263-7863/03/$30.00 # 2003 Elsevier Science Ltd and IPMA. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/S0263-7863(02)00055-8
322
4. Methodology
In order to evaluate and analyse the causes of delay
and cost overrun in groundwater projects, a wide range
of personnel involved in groundwater construction in
project Ghana were targeted. Personnel were randomly
selected from Ghanaian project managers, consultants,
contractors, clients representatives and construction
managers. A questionnaire of 26 factors was carefully
designed from previous preliminary investigations conducted in groundwater drilling projects between 1970
and 1999 in Ghana. It was organised in the form of a
priority scaling (1=very low, 2=low, 3=medium,
4=high, and 5=very high).
The questionnaire was directed towards three groups
in both public and private organisations: owners of the
groundwater projects, consulting oces, and contractors working in the groundwater works. The questionnaire was distributed to a random sample of 55
owners, 40 contractors and 30 consultants. The sample
selected for each of the three groups is described below
as:
Owners comprising the government agency (key
decision-makers) responsible for the projects,
private organisations (industries), and individual
owners.
Consultants working in the groundwater construction projects.
Contractors who are involved in the groundwater drilling project.
5. Data analysis
The procedure used in analysing the results was aimed
at establishing the relative importance of the various
factors responsible for project delay and cost overruns.
The score for each factor is calculated by summing up
scores assigned to it by respondents. Therefore, the level
of importance as indicated by the owners, contractors
and consultants were used to measure the relative
weight of each factor. The relative weight was computed
using the following equation:
Relative Importance Weight (RIW)=
5
P
323
12U 3m2 nn 12
m2 nn 1
where:
U
n
X
SR2
j1
ai ni
i1
N
P
100
xj
j1
for
for
for
for
for
a
a
a
a
a
response
response
response
response
response
of
of
of
of
of
very high
high
medium
low
very low
a1=5
a2=4
a3=3
a4=2
a5=1
Questionnaire
distributed
Number of
respondents
Percentage of
responses
55
40
30
28
25
19
38.9
34.7
26.4
125
72
57.6
324
Table 2
Rank of all the factors responsible for project delays and cost overruns according to contractors, consultants and owners
Factors
Owners
Contractors
Consultants
Overall
RIW%
RANK
RIW%
RANK
RIW%
RANK
RANK
4.52
4.29
3.75
3.67
2.97
3.48
2.97
4.44
4.02
3.48
3.09
4.44
4.91
4.09
4.13
3.94
4.71
3.82
4.21
4.48
2.96
4.36
3.98
3.71
4.29
4.25
3
8.5
18
20
24.5
21.5
24.5
6
14
21.5
23
5
1
13
12
16
2
17
11
4
26
7
15
19
8.5
10
4.17
4.13
3.78
3.87
3.22
2.96
2.87
4.48
3.65
3.65
3.57
4.96
4.30
3.78
4.70
4.13
4.78
3.74
4.09
4.57
2.81
4.70
4.17
3.26
4.22
4.26
10.5
12.5
16.5
15
23
24
25
6
19.5
19.5
21
1
7
16.5
3.5
12.5
2
18
14
5
26
3.5
10.5
22
9
8
4.60
4.14
3.62
3.62
3.45
3.50
3.22
4.48
3.85
3.79
3.45
4.88
4.77
4.08
4.65
3.96
4.31
3.91
4.02
4.37
2.78
4.48
4.02
2.81
4.37
3.68
4
10
19.5
19.5
22.5
21
24
5.5
16
17
22.5
1
2
11
3
14
9
15
12.5
7.5
26
5.5
12.5
25
7.5
18
8
10
19
18
24
22
25
7
16
20
21
1
2
15
5
14
3
17
11
6
26
4
13
23
9
12
325
326
8. Recommendations
Based on this study, and with developing countries in
mind, some recommendations are given as follows:
Appropriate funding levels should always be
determined at the planning stage of the project so
that regular payment should be paid to contractors for work done.
In order to improve contractors managerial
skills there is need for continuous work-training
programs for personnel in the industry to update
their knowledge and be familiar with project
management techniques and processes. have
eective and ecient performances.
Eective and ecient material procurement systems should be established within projects.
Material procurement has the potential to cause
major delays to construction projects. Therefore,
material procurement process should be executed
properly by improving procurement process in
order to avoid supply delays.
Developing eective and ecient technical performances in the groundwater industry through
dierent types of training programs. The training should cover project planning, scheduling,
time and cost control, and the information
systems.
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