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Purpose-This study explores the impact of cultural values on the importance individuals assign to project success/failure factors.Design/methodology/approach-Themes emerging from 40 interviews of project practitioners based in Brazil, China, Greece, Nigeria, Thailand, the United Arab Emirates, the United Kingdom and the United States are integrated with literature evidence to design a survey instrument. 1313 practitioner survey responses from the eight countries are analysed using multi-group, structural equation modelling. Research limitations -The snowballing method used to gather survey data and analysis of relationships at individual level reduce generalisability.Practical implications -The results reveal insights on how best to match the cultural values of project participants to project characteristics. They also increase knowledge on the likely perceptual differences among culturally-diverse individuals within projects.Originality/value -This research contributes to the literature on culture in project environments by defining a factor structure of multiple-dependent project success/failure indicators and increases insight on how specific cultural values may impact on the perception of the so-defined project success/failure factors.3

Orientation: The article discusses the relationship between enterprise risk management (ERM) and firm value.Research purpose: The purpose of the study is to empirically examine the relationship between ERM and firm value. The study is undertaken within the context of the Chinese insurance industry.Motivation for the study: Recent attempts to link ERM with firm value have been undertaken primarily in the USA and Europe and have produced ambiguous and inconclusive findings.Research design, approach and method: Data was obtained from the China Insurance Regulatory Commission, a government body responsible for regulating insurance products and services in China. The data sample consisted of 135 insurance companies operating in China (in 2010). Regression modelling is employed to analyse the data.Main findings: The results show the relationship between ERM and firm value at first appears statistically significant within a Pearson correlation matrix but then falls below statistical significance on closer scrutiny through regression analysis. Accordingly, it is recommended that insurers in China should not look to aggressive investment in ERM as a strategy for producing quick gains in firm value.Practical/managerial implications: Risk managers should plan ERM development from a risk management maturity perspective, which equates the highest level of ERM development with ERM’s capacity to improve firm resilience to the unknown and serve as a mechanism for strategic decision-making.Contribution/value-add: The study employed return on equity as a proxy for firm value, utilising ordinary least squares regression modelling to test propositions of the relationships between variables.

Driven by an interest in developing a deeper understanding of stakeholder interests, this study undertakes a dimensional analysis of how different stakeholders assess project outcomes. Most importantly, in our analysis, we take into consideration the largely unaccounted-for conceptual difference between project success and project failure. Data were collected over a two-year period (between 2013 and 2015) from 1631 project stakeholders in nine countries. We analysed the survey data using three-way Multidimensional Scaling. We found that most project stakeholders tend to be more specific in their assessment of project success than when assessing project failure. We also found that most stakeholders attached maximal and different levels of importance to different dimensions of project outcomes. In particular, we found that when assessing project "success", project stakeholders appear more focused on project effectiveness. On the other hand, when assessing project "failure", project stakeholders appear more focused on efficiency. Understanding how stakeholders assess and prioritise project outcomes is of particular interest to project managers as it enables them develop a clearer understanding of individual interests of various stakeholders. For stakeholders themselves, such an understanding helps limit possible disruptions to the project emanating from contesting decisions made by the project manager.

This study examines the impact of project manager and practitioner heterogeneity on congruent perceptions of the outcome of service operations projects. More specifically, the study focuses on congruence in the formation and subsequently revision of project outcome perceptions of service operations. Data was obtained from one thousand four hundred and thirteen project management practitioners and subsequently analysed using multi-layered and combined statistical methods. The results suggest that perception congruence, that is relationships or agreements between different stakeholders, may be impacted by age and role heterogeneity of project managers and practitioners, but not gender.