A new orientation to deal with uncertainty in projects

Böhle, Fritz; Heidling, Eckhard; Schoper, Yvonne

doi:10.1016/j.ijproman.2015.11.002

Cited by 54 publications

(44 citation statements)

References 34 publications

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“…This phase requires important economic resources to ensure the optimum and safe conditions of service of the infrastructure. The management of this phase involves minimizing or eliminating the uncertainty to achieve the best results [8].…”

Section: I1 Riskmentioning

confidence: 99%

Review of Climate Risk Analysis in Infrastructures

Sanchez-Matellanes

Rodríguez-Hernández

Castro‐Fresno

et al. 2018

IRECE

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Infrastructures are designed to have a long useful life, being the phase of exploitation the longest period. This phase requires important economic resources to ensure the optimum and safe conditions of service of the infrastructure. The objective of this paper is to review the main research projects carried out in the last years related to natural and climate risk analysis in infrastructures, trying to identify the future lines of research. The need to maintain the functionality of basic systems is clearly. Different international organizations and governments worldwide are taking measures to minimize the impacts that natural events may have on their infrastructures and population. In recent years, the number of research projects aimed at studying the evolution of climate, natural hazards and/or the resilience of infrastructures has increased greatly. 45 research projects related to the study of natural risks and infrastructures was reviewed. Society cannot afford to rebuild a 20-year-old infrastructure that has been built for a useful life of 100 years. This entails a high economic, environmental and social waste. Consequently, it is necessary to validate a methodology of analysis of climatic risks, which also facilitates the decision making on the measures to be established to increase resilience. Copyright

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Section: I1 Riskmentioning

confidence: 99%

Review of Climate Risk Analysis in Infrastructures

Sanchez-Matellanes

Rodríguez-Hernández

Castro‐Fresno

et al. 2018

IRECE

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“…Arguing that the effective management of uncertainty in project settings remains sparsely explored, Böhle et al (, p. 1386) note that “…the question remains open as to how project actors handle uncertainty in practice.” Uncertainty in these tasks arises because outcomes are either unknown or known with limited precision; further, uncertainties become “more known” as additional information is collected on the project/task over time (Ramasesh & Browning, ). Stated differently, there is “discovery through analysis.” However, managers often lack an approach to systematically incorporate emerging task‐related information on a dynamic basis to adjust their task‐related efforts at a micro‐level.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Managing uncertain tasks in technology‐intensive project environments: A multi‐method study of task closure and capacity management decisions

Narayanan

Balasubramanian

Swaminathan

et al. 2019

J of Ops Management

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Engineers working on tasks in technology‐intensive project environments face substantial task resolution uncertainty. This can result in poor capacity utilization as they expend effort on tasks that are not successfully resolved. A deeper understanding of task‐related uncertainty can help the firm optimize effort allocation across tasks by implementing well‐designed task closure policies that facilitate superior capacity utilization and capacity planning. In this article, we characterize the empirical distribution of task uncertainty and demonstrate how the resolution process affects task outcomes in project environments. Using a combination of empirical estimation, and analytical and simulation modeling, we develop insights into task‐related decision‐making and engineer effort allocation. Using real‐world task resolution data from a software maintenance setting, we first model and estimate a beta‐geometric survival distribution which indicates that the likelihood of successful task resolution substantially reduces with the time a task remains in the system. Using analytical and simulation modeling, we then examine the implications of imposing task closure policies to improve engineer effort allocation and increase system productivity. We demonstrate that adopting well‐designed task closure policies can significantly improve engineer resource utilization in capacity‐constrained settings without a substantial negative impact on project outcomes. We discuss the implications of our research for theory and practice.

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“…Instead of uncertainty necessarily having a negative connotation, it could potentially be an opportunity if the identification of information and acquisition of necessary skills to use it for better results [7]. However, Böhle et al [8] studied new orientation to deal with uncertainty and found that planned and experienced base actions of managers were critical strategies to deal with uncertainties in projects. Thus, uncertainty should be revisited beyond the risk management discourse collecting experiences from the industry experts, which may equip them to find opportunities from uncertain situations.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Identification and Assessment of Uncertainty Factors that Influence the Transaction Cost in Public Sector Construction Projects in Pakistan

2018

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Like other kinds of projects, construction projects are exposed to uncertainty, which plays a critical role in determining the transaction cost (TC). This study explores the uncertainty factors that are associated with construction projects that substantially influence the TC. To obtain the opinions of construction professionals, a survey questionnaire was developed after identifying 30 relevant causes of uncertainty from the literature. A survey of 216 professionals was conducted in Pakistan, and the relative importance index (RII) was used to prioritize the significant uncertainty factors that escalate the TC. Based on the responses from various construction professionals, this study determined that the most significant uncertainty factors that influence TC are: competitive tendering, incomplete design and specifications, late payments, conflict management, delayed possession of sites, force majeure, and work acceleration. This study also compared and analyzed the views of project managers and consultants and found that uncertainty from internal sources has a more significant influence on TC than that from external sources. The political and environmental groups do not contribute much escalating the TC. However, uncertainties that arise from the commercial, project site, and technical groups are more of an influence on TC. This research helps practitioners and professionals to adopt integrative systems in most uncertain situations proactively to find opportunities in volatile markets to reduce the impact of uncertainty on the total project cost.

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A new orientation to deal with uncertainty in projects

Cited by 54 publications

References 34 publications

Review of Climate Risk Analysis in Infrastructures

Review of Climate Risk Analysis in Infrastructures

Managing uncertain tasks in technology‐intensive project environments: A multi‐method study of task closure and capacity management decisions

Identification and Assessment of Uncertainty Factors that Influence the Transaction Cost in Public Sector Construction Projects in Pakistan

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