PROJECT MANAGER �S COMPETENCY IN GREEN CONSTRUCTION PROJECTS : CHALLENGES, KNOWLEDGE AND SKILLS

Abstract

Having a competent project manager is vital to project success and many studies have been carried out to identify essential attributes of project managers. With the mounting global concern of negative impacts of human activities on the environment, many industries are steering towards sustainable development and implementing green measures into their projects. Henceforth, Singapore has also shifted its focus into sustainable development and it is evidently shown in the construction industry with the increased number of green mark certified buildings in Singapore from 17 in 2005 to more than 750 in 2011. While many studies on project manager’s competency have been carried out, few studies have been conducted to analyze requirements of project managers in the context of green construction. Therefore this study aims to understand the critical attributes of project managers and identify areas to be strengthened which would otherwise have undermine the performance of project managers.

Essentially, a total of 20 knowledge areas and skills were determined from various literatures and were ascertained through a pre-survey questionnaire. 36 challenges were identified from various literatures and interviews with professionals, which were further grouped into 7 major categories. The top 5 challenges that project managers face in green construction project include: longer time required during the pre-construction process, difficulty in the selection of subcontractors in providing green construction service, uncertainty with green material and equipment, high cost in green material and equipment, a lot of meetings and alliance required with several team members such as green consultant. The results of analysis also suggested that the critical knowledge areas and skills that are essential to the challenges include: knowledge on schedule management and planning, stakeholders’, communication, cost and human resource management, analytical, decision making, team working, delegation and problem-solving skill. Further analysis showed that there is an overall disparity in the ranking of the knowledge areas and skills of the project managers between traditional and green construction project. The critical knowledge areas and skills that have to be strengthened in green construction project were identified and subsequently serve as a basis for future research on the enhancement of these critical attributes of the project managers.