Making Sense of Hospital Project MisPerformance: Over Budget, Late, Time and Time Again—Why? And What Can Be Done About It?

Hospital projects worldwide often experience misperformance, showing a tendency to exceed their estimated cost, miss their deadline, suffer quality problems, and yield benefit shortfalls. Considering this ubiquitous problem, this paper aims to make sense of this phenomenon by addressing the followin...

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Main Authors: Love, Peter, Ika, L.A.
Format: Journal Article
Published: 2022
Online Access:http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/90145
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author Love, Peter
Ika, L.A.
author_facet Love, Peter
Ika, L.A.
author_sort Love, Peter
building Curtin Institutional Repository
collection Online Access
description Hospital projects worldwide often experience misperformance, showing a tendency to exceed their estimated cost, miss their deadline, suffer quality problems, and yield benefit shortfalls. Considering this ubiquitous problem, this paper aims to make sense of this phenomenon by addressing the following research question: How can we make sense of hospital project misperformance, and what can be done to mitigate its occurrence? We use an illustrative case study approach and the analytical lens of sense-making to examine the misperformance of three mega-hospital projects. Our research reveals issues such as scope changes, an inability to adapt and respond to risk and uncertainty, ineffectual project management and governance, and optimism bias, which combine to impact project performance adversely. We suggest that the two prominent theoretical perspectives dominating the literature in this field fall short of adequately explaining hospital project misperformance. We provide suggestions for improving the procurement process of hospitals and submit there is a need to develop a robust and balanced theory of project misperformance.
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spelling curtin-20.500.11937-901452023-02-14T07:03:59Z Making Sense of Hospital Project MisPerformance: Over Budget, Late, Time and Time Again—Why? And What Can Be Done About It? Love, Peter Ika, L.A. Hospital projects worldwide often experience misperformance, showing a tendency to exceed their estimated cost, miss their deadline, suffer quality problems, and yield benefit shortfalls. Considering this ubiquitous problem, this paper aims to make sense of this phenomenon by addressing the following research question: How can we make sense of hospital project misperformance, and what can be done to mitigate its occurrence? We use an illustrative case study approach and the analytical lens of sense-making to examine the misperformance of three mega-hospital projects. Our research reveals issues such as scope changes, an inability to adapt and respond to risk and uncertainty, ineffectual project management and governance, and optimism bias, which combine to impact project performance adversely. We suggest that the two prominent theoretical perspectives dominating the literature in this field fall short of adequately explaining hospital project misperformance. We provide suggestions for improving the procurement process of hospitals and submit there is a need to develop a robust and balanced theory of project misperformance. 2022 Journal Article http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/90145 10.1016/j.eng.2021.10.012 http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ fulltext
spellingShingle Love, Peter
Ika, L.A.
Making Sense of Hospital Project MisPerformance: Over Budget, Late, Time and Time Again—Why? And What Can Be Done About It?
title Making Sense of Hospital Project MisPerformance: Over Budget, Late, Time and Time Again—Why? And What Can Be Done About It?
title_full Making Sense of Hospital Project MisPerformance: Over Budget, Late, Time and Time Again—Why? And What Can Be Done About It?
title_fullStr Making Sense of Hospital Project MisPerformance: Over Budget, Late, Time and Time Again—Why? And What Can Be Done About It?
title_full_unstemmed Making Sense of Hospital Project MisPerformance: Over Budget, Late, Time and Time Again—Why? And What Can Be Done About It?
title_short Making Sense of Hospital Project MisPerformance: Over Budget, Late, Time and Time Again—Why? And What Can Be Done About It?
title_sort making sense of hospital project misperformance: over budget, late, time and time again—why? and what can be done about it?
url http://hdl.handle.net/20.500.11937/90145