Owner's Role in Project Success

The successful execution of capital projects depends on the effectiveness of project teams – team members with diverse backgrounds, conflicting goals, and who answer to different employers. Just as the process of design and construction calls for the input of different disciplines and trades at various points, many owners within owner organizations participate at various times over the life cycle of a capital project. With all these players and variables, determining the “right” level of owner involvement is the key to success, which is why it has become the focus of this research.

This situation has led to questions during project planning and execution not being answered in a timely manner. These unresolved issues not only lead to schedule delays and cost additions to a project, but can negatively impact the working relationships among project participants. Owners often fail to establish a system for performing the proper owner’s management of the construction function, which can lead to a void in owner leadership and a lack of mission focus for the project team.

To address this problem, CII established the Owner’s Role in Project Success Research Team to identify management approaches used for different types of projects, delivery systems, and team structures to determine how the owner contributed to project success. The research team also developed the Project Priority Calculator (IR204-2) to assess the value being added by the owner based on recommended roles and responsibilities. Using this software tool will help to determine the key owner functions that will contribute to project success and define the level to which the owner organization can or should be involved in managing the project.

This research recognized that the level of involvement exercised by the owner will vary throughout a project’s life cycle. On the whole, owners must continually evaluate their level of involvement to ensure that it is appropriate for each particular project phase. The owner can accomplish this by soliciting feedback directly from the project team through the use of the tool developed by this research effort. Other CII resources exist for the owner to improve the probability of having a successful project. The best place to start is with CII Best Practices Guide: Improving Project Performance (IR166-3) and CII Implementation Model + Knowledge Structure Guide (IR166-2).