ASSESSING THE EFFECT OF PROJECT MANAGERS’ COMPETENCIES ON PROJECT SUCCESS IN THE CASE OF FE CONSTRUCTION PLC.

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to assess the effect of project managers’ competencies on project success in the case of FE construction plc. The study used both primary and secondary data to achieve the intended research objectives. A quantitative and qualitative research approach of the data collection was used. The study used explanatory research design and surveyed 50 project managers, site engineers, office engineers and project coordinator (they have direct contact from project manager by work) from the selected projects at Addis Ababa city from FE construction plc. Were distributed to all project sites and head office. The data were analyzed using SPSS and interpreted in percentage. Analyses were done based on three competency variables knowledge, skill, and attitude. Results revealed that Pearson correlation among project managers’ competencies are moderate to high, correlation among project’s success elements are also moderate to high, and correlation between project managers’ competencies and project success are also high to very high. Regression analysis results also showed that all the three project manager competency variables have strong effect on project success, skill has the highest impact followed by knowledge and finally attitude having significant impact. There was 87.0 % change in project success attributed to the combined effect of the independent variables in the model (Knowledge, Skill and Attitude). Overall, project manager competency has strong effect on project success, which means that high project manager competency is likely to bring about higher level of project success. Though the research findings are valuable, limitations in terms of a case of one company only and the use of just some variables may increase risk of respondent bias. Future studies, in order to avoid these limitations, can extend their scope to include a number and range of organizations and more competency variables.