the architecture of success and failure in construction

Kreiner & Frederiksen

D:\home\data\Artikler mv\2007\CLIBYG 2007 conference\The Architecture of Success in Construction-final.doc

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Preliminary and incomplete draft!

Comments are invited!

THE ARCHITECTURE OF SUCCESS AND FAILURE IN

CONSTRUCTION

By Kristian Kreiner and Mette Løth Frederiksen Copenhagen Business School Center for Management Studies of the Building Process

Abstract

How are project achievement and project success related?

The paper builds on research conducted on successful projects. It is

observed that successful projects do not necessarily end on time, on budget

and on targeted utility. If this is a fact, how can we explain that some

projects are being scandalized on the basis of such underperformance, while

other projects are perceived as being successes with similar outcomes?

A case study is analyzed to show that the project process may be as

important a determinant of success as is project achievements.



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1 INTRODUCTION

In this paper we sketch an analysis of the relationship between project

outcomes and project success. We will argue that, contrary to the received

wisdom, outcomes and successfulness are loosely coupled phenomena, and

we will search for alternative explanations of project success.

The paper is built on empirical observations that suggest that success is not

simply another word for projects achieving what they set out to do. It is

commonly assumed that projects are social mechanisms for task

achievement and that the legitimate expectations of owners, funding bodies,

users and other interested parties are negotiated and folded into the project

goal. Success, it is claimed, is earned by meeting such legitimate

expectations. However, it is also commonly observed that projects succeed

in spite of miserable achievements. Mega projects, like the Sydney Opera,

the Turning Torso, and the Copenhagen Metro, are receiving public acclaim

in spite of having failed to comply with dramatically inflated estimates of

utility and fundamentally unrealistic budgetary and scheduling constraints

(Flyvbjerg, Bruzelius et al. 2003). In-house projects are pursued and

continued long after it has become clear that they will not deliver the

promised outcomes (Beckman and Persson 1979). Even if these authors

frame their argument around the presumption that project outcomes and

project success should be causally related, their studies show that in practice

they are not.

At the level of the individual actor the separation between achievement and

success is more often recognized. Modern literature on anomia (Cohen

1972) suggests that no sense of success will necessarily be derived from

even excellent and persistent achievements. People may succeed on their

knees, so to speak, and fail on their feet – a viewpoint similar to

Senancour’s (quoted in March xxx).

The dynamic nature of expectations is noted in the literature. In between

projects, aspirations are updated according to own or others’ achievements



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(March 1994), and project goals may be redefined as information about the

true conditions are amassed (Kreiner 1995). Also, the possibility of

cognitive biases entering into ex post assessing project achievements has

been noted (March and Sutton 1999).

From all these sources inspiration may be drawn for the exploration of the

loose coupling between project achievement and project success. The

presumption of a loose coupling means that sometimes, but not always and

not necessarily, success will be determined on a strict assessment of the

project’s achievements along the stipulated task parameters. But such

linkages cannot be taken for granted, and therefore we need to explain when

and why they materialize. For the same reasons, we need to explain when

and how success is determined on other things than project outcomes.

To complicate matters, and especially to complicate the empirical studies of

these phenomena, we have to assume that no matter how success is

determined it will eventually be rationalized in terms of outcomes. It is

possible, and possibly even likely, that the assessment of project outcomes

will not be immune to the prevailing sense of project success or failure.

Thus, we end up with a model in which the assessment of project outcomes

influences the sense of project success, at the same time as the sense of

project success influences the assessment of project outcomes.



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Figure 1: Modelling the Relationship between Project Outcomes and Project Success

We hypothesize that somehow there is a sequencing issue in the evaluation

of projects that matters for the eventual ascription of success. Will the

assessment of outcomes influence the perception of success, before the

perception of success will influence the assessment of outcomes? We are

looking for factors that may influence this sequencing in practice, and we

are suggesting that the project process may be the place to look for

explanations.

Since we are assuming that bad assessments of outcomes may be neglected

or rationalized as good assessments, we need to demonstrate how this is

possible in practice. We assume that there are limits to such rationalizations,

but in this paper we will not explore these limits. We will instead focus on

demonstrating that indeed rationalization and oversight are important

aspects of determining project success.

2 METHODOLOGY

Part of the generally scandalous image of construction projects may

originate from sample biases. In the public press, as well as in the research

Project Outcomes

Project Success

Experiencing Project Processes

Measuring Project Outcomes



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literature, cases of failure attract more attention than cases of successes do.

Failures, and the hunt for villains, offer better opportunities for moralizing;

and often it is assumed that there will be more learning to be gained from

failures than from successes.

But in a straightforward sense, learning from a biased sample of only project

failures will likely lead to biased learning. The strategy of the research

project from which this paper originates is to correct this bias by collecting

cases of successful projects.

The learning from failure projects builds on the conjecture that they are

different from succeeding projects. It is the deviance from such features

which are assumed to be the determinants of successfulness that becomes

the focus of analysis and the target for blame and intervention. Our effort is

to investigate whether such differences between successful and less

successful project actually exist. For example, if less successful projects can

be shown to underperform in terms of planned achievements, can it be

assumed that successful projects will be characterized by achieving planned

outcomes? By taking a fresh look on projects that succeed we hope to be

able to problematise the common presumption that successful projects are

negative images of failing projects.

We approached the empirical field in the following manner.

First, we have identified a number of construction projects which by

common consent were success stories. We were interested in completed

construction projects that e.g. clients, contractors, architects as well as users

were all happy with in terms of the project achievements. It proved not to be

difficult to find such cases.

Secondly, from multiple sources we collected data on the processes and the

outcomes of these construction projects. We were surprised to find that

these success projects were not characterized by finishing e.g. on budget, on

schedule and on targeted quality and use value. We will relate a case study



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below to prove the point that success is not deterministically linked to

performance on standard criteria of success. A success project that exceeds

its budget, finishes late, and/or deviates from the targeted quality and utility

constitutes a “black swan” in our analysis.

Thirdly, we have analyzed the accounts of the project process to find

answers to the pressing and fundamental question: If performance is not the

sole determinant of project success, what is? The answers that we provide

are our answers, not the answers of the field. We construct our answers by

providing explicit interpretations of the practitioners’ accounts.

3 THE CASE: THE BEST R&D FACILITIES IN THE WORLD

This is the story about a R&D unit’s move to a new domicile. The R&D unit

belongs to a producer of electronic devises with a strong position on the

world market. The initial location was close to the City center and

considered very attractive. But with the success of the company also the

R&D unit had grown. The current 400 employees were cramped into far too

small a space and a move to larger facilities was inevitable.

The management has been pondering the issue for some time when

suddenly a suitable building became available. Another high-tech company

had built it for its own use, but had subsequently decided not to move in. It

was large (15,000 m2) with an attractive layout. But its location was causing

concern. Relative to the current address it was located off the beaten track in

a much less prestigious area. How would the employees react to the

prospect of a longer commute to a place of little glamour, the management

worried? In spite of such worries, the management jumped on the

opportunity and rushes to buy the building in front of other potential buyers.

To compensate for the location the management promised to build the “best

R&D facilities in the World”. Shortly after, the employees were taken on a

tour to their future work site. The hesitant reaction among the employees



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seemed to indicate that the notion of world-class R&D facilities was

somewhat lost on them initially.

To further ease the transition the management promised that the new

building would be ready in little more than half a year, and that the

employees would be invited to take part in decisions on interior design and

layout. It was indicated explicitly that funds for this ambitious project would

be available. A steering group for the project was created with the corporate

HR director in charge.

3.1 Staffing the project.

The corporate management had little prior experience with construction

projects and may have underestimated the complexity of such a task. They

soon realized that they needed to spend more time on managing the project

than they had expected and consequently decided to hire a project manager.

One of the corporate directors knew of an external consultant who was said

to be good at managing processes. However, he had no prior experience

with construction projects. Without further ado he was brought on-board

and was given responsibility for managing the project. The project manager,

the HR director and the corporate CFO formed an informal steering group

with the HR director formally responsible for the project as a whole. Being

without prior experience with construction projects, it is likely that the R&D

projects with which they were in fact familiar formed the mental model

behind the approach chosen. User-involvement and focus on value creation

(rather than cost minimization) were values that may have been impressed

on the project from the corporate culture.

With the project manager in place, priority was given to hiring an architect.

A large number of well-reputed firms were invited to a screening interview,

and subsequently three of them were invited for an extended interview about

work practices and personnel to be assigned to the project. Notice, that the

interviews were not focus on the candidates’ ideas about the architectural

solutions. The steering committee assumed that all well-reputed firms were



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able to produce a proper architectural design. Instead, the architect was

chosen on the basis of his collaboration skills and commitment to the

extremely compressed time schedule of the project.

The engineering firm was chosen on similar criteria. It turned out that the

engineer who had done the engineering design when the building was

originally built was chosen for the project. His intimate foreknowledge of

the building was perceived to be of great value to the process.

The main contractor was chosen by a panel consisting of the steering

committee, the architect and the engineer. Three contractors were invited,

two of whom were well-known actors on the Danish construction scene.

The third one was a small contractor and was invited on the

recommendation of the engineer who knew the contractor from previous

jobs. The two large contractors rejected to commit to the time schedule for

the project which they considered to be unrealistic. The smaller contractor

promised to do what was possible, admitting that it appeared to be difficult

to meet the deadline.

3.2 The Project Process.

The process involved 40 employees in the work of defining the

requirements that the new building should meet in order to satisfy the needs

of the both work and people. This process, along with the selection of

professionals for the project, lasted longer than expected. Soon it became

clear to all parties that that the original time table would not work. The

deadline was extended with several months, in some respects proving the

disqualified contractors right on this count. Even with the extension of the

deadline, the time pressure on the process was very high. Speed seemed to

be the overarching concern of everyone involved. The steering committee

organized a workshop with the project participants and announced the rule

that the contractor was allow to initiate appropriate work on his own without

prior written authorization. Such lack of control is unconventional in

construction and was met with disbelief by the contractors. However, it was



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justified by the HR director with reference to the time pressure that

demanded cutting bureaucracy to the very minimum. When tested in

practice during the construction period the steering committee honored the

rule by willingly granting extra pay for extra work already done.

The budget was explicitly given less priority than time in this project.

Funds had been promised to be granted to build the best R&D facilities in

the World. On a number of occasions new funds had to be allocated. The

process consultant had some authority to grant extra funding, and when

larger sums of money needed the OK of the HR director a decision was

normally received promptly, normally within one hour! To nobody’s

surprise, by the end of the process the budget exceeded the original

estimates significantly.

To ease communication and to ensure easy access across the project

members the architect, the engineer and the contractor all co-located on the

construction site. The contractor was consulted before design decisions.

Whenever the steering committee had to be involved in issues concerning

the budget and/or the utility of the building, its members made themselves

available on short notice.

In the end of the process when things became really difficult, the contractor

arranged tours of the building site with the project manager, the architect

and the engineer. Such site-walks took place at 6 am a couple of times a

week. In this way a common understanding of the project and its challenges

was established – and whatever was agreed during these site-walks could be

implemented immediately.

3.3 The Project Outcomes

After an intensive and focused effort the new deadline was successfully met.

The building was delivered on the stipulated date. It was somewhat later

than originally demanded and envisioned. Yet, it was still considered a

major achievement.



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The original commitment to build the best R&D facilities in the World was

also a commitment to allocate the necessary funds. We do not know what

the expectations concerning total expenditures were. All we know is that

additional funds were continuously allocated to the project when required.

This is not to say that economic constraints were not present. The parties

claimed to be very economical in the sense that they repeatedly asked

themselves if they would spend the money were it their own house and their

own money. Thus, the value (or utility) of the proposed solutions were

limiting funding, not budgetary constraints.

In terms of employee commitment, seemingly the best R&D facilities in the

World did compensate for the unattractive location of the new domicile. At

any rate, only a little more than 2% of the 400 employees left the company

in connection with the move.

3.4 Expressions of the Success of the Project

The steering committee was very pleased with the process and with the

outcomes.

… being the first time we collaborated we couldn’t have asked for more, that’s for sure. It was excellent (the client).

All parties expressed mutual appreciation; especially, the role played by the

main contractor was praised by everyone:

He has been absolutely unique in this project, primarily due to his personality, his immense experience, his style and his extreme dedication and focus. He is absolutely crucial for the success (project manager).

It is beyond doubt that everybody involved in this project considered it a

great success. When asked to explain how the success was made possible,

the following examples of statements supplement the above appreciation of

the main contractor.

… [The] client, unlike most professional clients in our business, showed an incredible trust in us all. We are not



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used to have that – they believed in it, and they didn’t even ask if we would be done in time (main contractor).

The spirit was good all along, because everybody agreed to the commitment to [achieve the task] in due time. … Everybody was interested in making it … and everybody was enthusiastic about the project (architect).

3.5 Unconventional Features

As already indicated, the way this successful project was governed did not

correspond to the received wisdom of how to design and manage projects.

The project was started in a helter-skelter manner without much more

bearing than the acute need for a new domicile and a commitment to build

the best R&D facilities in the World. The client committed the services of

both designers and contractors on weak contractual ground, relying instead

on an assessment of their collaborative skills and commitment to the task.

Had the project failed, such unconventional project features would no doubt

have been highlighted as causes.

To persevere in the claim that the project was designed and managed

unconventionally, let us point out two more features which contradict most

conceptions of “best practice” in project management.

a) Written communication was forbidden.

The client and the main contractor agreed that all grievances

and disagreements were to be handled in face-to-face

interaction on the construction site. Not even email

correspondence was acceptable on any issue that potentially

involved a conflict of interests or interpretation.

b) The main contractor was the main organizer.

Not only did he plan and direct the work of his own

responsibility (e.g. by starting early on the site to prepare

optimal working conditions for his teams). He also organized

the work of the project manager, the architect and the



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engineer: “… he kept them all on their toes, and he was

always prepared” (architect).

We come to recognize some of these features as resembling the high-

reliability organizations (Weick and Sutcliffe 2001), while deviating

strongly from the prescripts of conventional project management. For

example, the sensitivity to the construction processes, the extensive face-to-

face communication at the expense of written documentation, the license to

improvise in the situation before authorization, and the deference of

authority to the contractor seem all to fit the prescriptions for managing the

unexpected (Weick and Sutcliffe 2001).

4 ANALYSIS

The case story portrayed a project which, by common consent, turned out

successfully. The client, the architect, the engineer, the project manager, the

contractor and, as long as we were able to determine, the users were all

pleased with the project experience. They all agreed that the outcomes of the

projects were worth the money, the toil and the effort. Thus, it is beyond

question that the project was perceived by all interested parties as a success.

But did it deserve to be perceived in this way – or more correctly, could it

have been perceived differently? We have no desire to pass moral

judgments, nor do we suggest that a hidden truth waits to be uncovered. We

ask these questions in order to analyze if outcome and successfulness are

loosely coupled phenomena. Is it conceivable that the success of the project

was (or might have been) achieved in spite of, or irrespective of the outcome

assessments of the project? We think the case demonstrates that the answer

may be “yes”.

To substantiate the claim, let us specify the questions that we need to

address. First of all, we need to argue that the manifest outcomes of the

project might have co-existed with the perception of the project as a failure.

Secondly, we need to model what determines the consensual perception of



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projects as successes if the determinants are not the actual outcome

assessments.

4.1 Might the Project Outcomes Also Be Consistent with a Perception of Failure?

The facts are indisputable. The project did not meet the original deadline.1 It

only appeared to be done in time because the deadline was postponed. Also,

the budget increased during the project implementation. A budgetary target

was not announced from the start, but the piecemeal adding of financial

funds suggests that the financial constraints were somewhat adrift in the

course of the project implementation.

Finishing late and above budget would be quintessential features of project

failure. Had the interested parties adopted the conventional focus on success

criteria, the conclusion about the successfulness of the project might

credibly have been the opposite.

The fact that all interested parties came to the conclusion that the project

was an undisputable success may be explained in one of two ways. Both

explanations build on the fact that the project is known to be successful.

Hindsight may play an important role.

4.1.1 The Assessment of Outcomes

The assessment of project outcomes is conventionally done with reference

to expectations or aspirations. Performance above expectations or

aspirations will be positively assessed; performances below will be

negatively assessed. The delivery date could be measured against the time

schedule and the assessment would depend on whether the original or the

adjusted schedule was used as criterion. Depending on this decision, the

project outcomes would be assessed as negative or positive.

1 To make things clear, we are not suggesting that the delay was a serious concern to the

organization and the steering committee. On the contrary, and that is the whole point! We claim that the lack of seriousness of such delays is a sign of the success of the project. Had the project been considered a failure delays and other deviances might have been made serious as justifications for the negative assessment.



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However, what determines the choice of expectations or aspirations on

which the assessment of the actual outcomes will be made? Clearly, if we

allow expectations and aspirations to adapt dynamically to the actual level

of performance, on the margin all outcomes will be positive. In most of the

project literature the expectations and aspirations are fixed at the time of

commissioning the project. The project is said to be accepted and funded on

the premise that a certain delivery can be assured. It is claimed that in all

fairness outcomes should be assessed against such assurances. However,

subsequent events may demonstrate that promises were given on false

premises and insufficient information about the conditions under which the

project was implemented.

In retrospect, there is an implicit choice between maintaining the original

promises as expectations and aspiration, or to update the expectations and

the aspiration to reflect a better informed judgment as to what would be fair

and reasonable assessment criteria. In our case story, knowing the pressure

and efforts of the project members, extraordinary achievements were

claimed in spite the fact that delivery was several months delayed relative to

the initial commitments and promises.

4.1.2 The Assessment of Relevance

While the discussion above concerns the assessment of outcomes, in the

present section we consider the possibility that unequivocal assessments

may not count. The contention is the following: A project may

systematically underperform on one or more criteria and still be conceived

as a success to the extent that the underperformance in the scheme of things

doesn’t matter. The project may be late and exceed budget in significant

ways. Yet, sometimes nobody really cares, while at other times, the project

and its participants are scandalized for such underperformances.

In our case story, the budget was creeping upwards in rapid succession, and

the time frame was extended. Nobody seems to be concerned by such facts

and to begin considering the project a failure. In other projects we see the



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same pattern. Underperforming projects may succeed! In the big picture the

cost and time overrun seemed minor details in view of the fact that the

project provided the best R&D facilities in the World. This achievement,

and the fact that it made the employees stay with the company, was worth

much more that the additional costs of construction. When the focus was on

the value creation of the project, the costs and delays seemed insignificant.

However, it was a choice to focus on the value creation. In other situations,

focus might have been on the costs and the delays, with the value creation in

the role of an irrelevant circumstance. World architecture has many times in

history been scandalized on such bureaucratic counts, while its true value

only surfaced much later. On smaller scales, great achievements may fail to

earn the project success because of manifest problems on certain details – a

parallel in the case of assessment to the floor-carpet syndrome (Olsen).

Unaligned panels and dripping water taps annoy users and owner to the

extent that sometimes the perception of the quality of the facility as a whole

is coloured disproportionally. In short, sometimes manifest

underperformance is neglected as unimportant for the appreciation of

success, while at other times deviances on small and minor counts ruin the

appreciation of overall achievements.

4.2 The Determinants of Success

The previous discussion has pointed out that assessment is more

complicated than the request for evidence based evaluations seem to

suggest. The measurement of over- or underperformance hides a choice of

which expectations and aspirations to calibrate actual performance against.

And the assessment of success or failure hides another choice, namely a

choice of the weight and importance to give to actual performance

assessments.

In this section we will speculate over the criteria on which the

abovementioned choices are made. It would be easy to claim that the

amount of value creation that the project has occasioned would determine

the implicit assessment choices. However, as depicted in the model our



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fundamental dilemma is that assessment outcomes determine the perception

of value creation as much as the perception of value creation determines the

assessments of performance. It is a chicken and egg problem. The issue can

now be rephrased in the following manner: What comes first in the minds of

clients and participants, the perception of success or the perception of

performance? Whatever comes first will have a better chance of colouring

the other before being coloured itself in return – to the effect of being

reinforced.

We want to develop the hypothesis that the success of projects is more

determined by process than by achievement. The hypothesis is related to the

abovementioned issue of timing and attention. We know that value creation

is highly uncertain until the project is completed. Or course, the mere

proclamation of the intention to build the best R&D facilities in the World

may have been perceived as half the achievement already. However, it may

be difficult completely to ignore the struggle and toil of realizing

construction projects. The widespread experience of constantly being on the

brink of collapse and fiasco may likely plant a seed of doubt and fear in the

minds of the participants. The hypothesis is that only at a great distance

from the actual project process will the expected outcomes remain a mirror

image of the proclaimed intentions and goals of the project.

But the same struggle and toil during the project implementation that may

unsettle the trust in the intended value creation may at the same time

sediment other types of assessment on a more personal level. In our case

study, the process provided the project manager, the architect and the

engineer with repeated experience of the main contractor as a dedicated,

reliable and competent collaborator. When more funds were required and

the time schedule came under pressure, it could hardly be blamed on the

main contractor, and it was rather understood to reflect the nature of the task

and a necessary investment in the realization of the vision of creating the

best R&D facilities in the World. E.g. when on one occasion a subcontractor

suddenly presented an unexpected and unannounced bill of several million



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DKK the steering committee decided not to hold the main contractor

responsible. The expense was deemed legitimate and only the reporting was

inadequate and late, not due to bad intentions, but to an oversight. What

threaten to raise a serious conflict was mended swiftly and peacefully, but

only because the main contractor was under no suspicion of acting

opportunistically.

The repeated experience of a collaborative, dedicated and competently

managed project process gave the participants a disposition to perceive the

actual performance (also in terms of the budget and time) as a reflection of

the value creation. It fostered a fundamental sense of achievement and

success that may have coloured the assessment of outcomes as well. It is our

hypothesis that the project became a success in terms of achievement

because it was a success in terms of collaboration and process. We can

easily imagine that another project with exactly the same outcomes might

have ended up being perceived as a failure if the implementation process

had been less collaborative. Conflicts would leave the participants with a

disposition to recognize failures and to insist on formal assessment criteria

irrespectively of the actual conditions experienced during the

implementation. The experience of a conflict-ridden implementation would

have given the parties repeated opportunity to reinforce the budget and the

time schedule as assessment criteria. And the disappointing outcomes on

such criteria would blind the participants to the actual value created by the

project.

It remains a conjecture that the process experience plays a significant role in

the ascribing success or failure to projects. Some people will claim that

performance assessments cannot legitimately be manipulated and coloured

in the way suggested. But we believe that it is more fruitful to conceive of

assessments as harbouring an implicit choice of assessment criteria and

relevance. We have difficulties accepting that the empirical evidence

presented above should not suggest that such choices are in fact exercised,

and that such choices can be made legitimately. After all, in the longer run



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the value created in terms of the best R&D facilities in the World may very

likely have more relevance than even significant cost and time overrun in

the short run.

5 CONCLUSIONS

Our study of project successes indicates that the framing of evaluations may

be as important as measuring achievements. Perceived project outcomes

depend not only on the outcomes, but also on the assessment of their

importance and relevance. Other things than project goals may determine

the assessment criteria in use. Focus may shift from one set of criteria to

another and change the assessment of success radically. Changes in the

perception of success may radically shift the importance and relevance of

specific achievements. Such shifts and changes may occur repeatedly.

The present era renders increased importance to competition for primacy.

Under such conditions, success depends as much on the performance of

others as it does on own performance. Instability and unpredictability of

successes must be increasing, a phenomenon that ought to preoccupy the

research community. By and large, it does not! Much research is still

conducted on the premise that success criteria are stabilized through prior

negotiations and contracts. The case story above suggests that this may not

always be the case. We indicated that especially in contexts characterized by

complexity, uncertainty and ambiguity, it is very difficult to predict the

actual conditions for the project. As a consequence, the commitment to

specific outcomes must legitimately (and rationally) be tentative. And if

explicit commitments are mandatory nonetheless, it may be a good strategy

to prepare the ground for favourable interpretations of deviances from plans

and agreements. In our case, the main contractor did not necessarily achieve

the things expected from the very start of the project, and yet he was praised

for his performance and the success of the project. Certainly, we do not

claim that he did not deserve the praise. What we are suggesting, however,

is the possibility that he – and any other main contractor – might have



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achieved the same things and still be considered a failure. In our

explanation, the stream of positive collaborative experiences during the

implementation primed all interested parties to focus on what was achieved,

as opposed to what was not, and on things that worked and succeeded, as

opposed to things that did not. But nothing in the achievements themselves

would ensure such favourable foci.

The loose coupling between achievement and success in the context of

construction projects need much more careful studies and analyses in the

future. Rather than insisting that the aim is a tight coupling between

achievement and success we should explore the possibilities and benefits of

looser couplings. In construction work, as well as in research, it may be a

social benefit that things can succeed without being predictable in terms of

outcomes. If projects are working in complex, uncertain and ambiguous

realities, managing the unexpected becomes crucial (Weick and Sutcliffe

2001). One element in managing under such conditions is the reluctance to

simplify interpretations. Reducing the phenomenon of success to a matter of

expected outcomes would violate such a prescript.

In this paper, we may not have found the right answers; nor may we have

given them in an appropriate form. However, we claim to have raised some

pertinent questions that should motivate further speculations and empirical

studies.



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6 REFERENCES

<partial and incomplete>

Beckman, S. and B. Persson (1979). Immunization - in Defense of Status Quo. Surviving Failures. Patterns and Cases of Project Mismanagement. Anonymous. Stockholm, Almqvist & Wiksell.

Cohen, H. (1972). "The Anomia of Success and the Anomia of Failure: A Study of Similarities in Opposites." British Journal of Sociology 23(3): 329-343.

Flyvbjerg, B., N. Bruzelius, et al. (2003). Megeprojects and Risk. An Anatomy of Ambition. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.

Kreiner, K. (1995). "In Search of Relevance. Project Management in Drifting Environments." Scandinavian Journal of Management 11(4).

March, J. G. (1994). A Primer on Decision Making. How Decisions Happen. New York, Free Press.

March, J. G. and R. I. Sutton (1999). Organizational Performance as a Dependent Variable. The Pursuit of Organizational Intelligence. Anonymous. Oxford, Blackwell: 338-354.

Weick, K. E. and K. M. Sutcliffe (2001). Managing the Unexpected. Assuring High Performance in an Age of Complexity. San Francisco, Jossey-Bass.

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