Critical success factors for implementing ISO 9001 in UK construction projects
Numerous challenges face construction companies in today's competitive market, including the complex and contractually varied relationships of those involved; the nature of construction projects producing unique, non-repetitive outcomes; the lack of standardisation; the impact of changes to the project design; and contractual disputes that arise. These challenges lead to late delivery, increased costs and negative impacts on quality, thus eroding client satisfaction and the ability of the project to meet the client's needs and expectations. Therefore, there is strong rationale not only to employ a quality management system (QMS) such as ISO 9001 to create a systematic process for ensuing quality, but also to investigate the perceptions of those who implement such systems in order to gain insights into the critical success factors for implementation and successful project outcomes. This study explored the ISO 9001 QMS in the UK construction project context, investigating those critical success factors that can lead to its successful implementation. First, a literature review was carried out to provide the theoretical grounding for the investigation. The critical success factors and factor components that emerged then formed the basis of a quality management survey, which was completed by UK-based project managers to ascertain those factors deemed vital for the UK construction context. The data was collected and statistically evaluated through SPSS, with the compare means, Kendall's W, Kruskal–Wallis, and Spearman correlation coefficient tests then applied. The results were validated through semi-structured interviews with UK-based project managers in order to explore, corroborate and extend the results from the quality management survey. Content analysis was applied to the qualitative interview data, leading to a greater depth of understanding of the questionnaire results, the rejection of some items, and the inclusion of others. The final outcome of this study comprises 7 critical success factors (i.e. change management, client focus, engagement of people, leadership, the process approach, relationship management, and continuous improvement) and 76 associated factor components found to be vital to the effective implementation of ISO 9001 and successful project outcomes in UK construction projects. Six of these critical success factors are currently established as Quality Management Principles (QMPs) in ISO 9001:2015, thus confirming their continued inclusion, with change management representing a new candidate for inclusion as a QMP. Moreover, of the 3 critical success factors rejected by this study (i.e. evidence-based decision-making, non-standardisation, and skills and training), the rejection of evidence-based decision-making is a surprising finding, given its current inclusion as a QMP in ISO 9001:2015. Therefore, this study encourages further examination of the justification for its inclusion as a critical success factor, given the findings of this research.The researcher hopes that the findings emerging from this study can shed further light on ISO 9001 quality management implementation in the UK context, offering guidance for quality management specialists in the context of construction projects. Furthermore, it is believed that embracing the findings will help to reduce delays while enhancing the projects' overall efficiency, the likelihood of attaining quality outcomes, and most importantly, client satisfaction. In terms of the quality management literature, the findings offer rich insight into project managers' implementation of ISO 9001 in UK construction projects, while offering valuable input for its development, and the potential for the research findings to be harnessed by other QMS
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