A review of critical success factors and performance metrics on construction projects

Owners make several important project delivery decisions in early planning and design phases of a project that impact project performance. Ideally, these decisions should be based on objective consideration and empirical evidence, but they are frequently based on an owner’s level of comfort or prior experience. Due to the importance of making informed decisions, several academic studies have investigated the relationship between project performance and potential predictive variables including delivery method, contract type and procurement strategy. Many of these earlier studies have begun losing relevancy in a changing industry, through the introduction of new concepts such as team integration, teaming tools, building information modeling (BIM) and sustainable design.

To address this growing knowledge gap, a study was conducted to: (1) identify key project success criteria from the owner’s perspective; (2) determine suitable metrics for reliably measuring performance outcomes related to the established success criteria; and (3) consider new concepts such as project integration, BIM, team behavior and sustainability. The research team conducted an extensive literature review on studies exploring the relationship between project delivery and outcomes to generate a comprehensive listing of statistically relevant predictors of success and tested performance metrics. Validation of this compiled listing was performed through an advisory board of industry experts. The advisory board provided critical feedback and assisted in the development a survey instrument for collecting project-specific data. The results of this study will enhance our current understanding of project success criteria and tracking metrics to support decision-making processes. More importantly, it provides a basis for further study, data collection and the creation of a project performance database.