Personality profiling and project success factors: a study in the transportation and operations department of an organisation

The use of personality profiling in various fields, industries and sectors has increased over the last decade. The applications of profiling vary and include assessments as to whether a candidate is suitable for a work opportunity to whether a team's personalities are conducive to achieve their objectives. In the discipline of project management, personality profiling has been used to match project managers to projects as a means to contribute to project success. The organisation in focus in this case study have implemented personality typing in 2012 and the results have shown that since the inception of personality typing there has been improvement in health, environment and safety project success metrics. However, the results have also shown that the implementation of personality typing has had no effect on other project success metrics such as project cost and schedule attainment. This research study addresses the questions of which factors affect the project managers' ability to achieve project success and how personality profiling affects these factors. This study is conducted as a case study in the Transportation and Operations department of the organisation. Literature on the origin and details of personality typing is discussed, its prevalence in the work place and which personality types are more likely to achieve project success. Furthermore, literature on the factors which typically influence the ability to achieve project success are presented. The research design was based on Maxwell's qualitative interactive research design model and the justification for case study methodology is provided. The primary means of data collection was semi-structured interviews. The data generated was analysed using qualitative data analysis using the compare and contrast principles of grounded theory. Consideration of research validation or trustworthiness and ethics were provided. Six factors were found to influence the project manager's ability to achieve project success. These were: the effect of the organisational policies and procedures; the project manager's leadership abilities; the contractor's performance level; the health of relationships with stakeholders; the planning effectiveness and compliance; and the effect of external factors. Secondly it was found that personality typing has mostly a positive influence on these factors and project success. This dissertation concludes with a review of the findings and its implications, the limitations of the study, practical recommendations for the organisation and recommendations for further studies.

Grantor dc:publisher.institution

Department of Mechanical Engineering

Year dc:date.issued

2017

Author dc:creator

• De Vries, Franco

Advisor dc:contributor.advisor

• Shaw, Corrinne

Language dc:language.iso

eng

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/11427/25016

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:open.uct.ac.za:11427/25016