MSC PROJECT MANAGEMENT RESEARCH PROPOSAL

To analyze the significance of communication in project management to increase the

success rate of the project in the construction industry – UK
Contents
1. Title..............................................................................................................................................3
2. Introduction.................................................................................................................................3
3. Aims and Objectives....................................................................................................................3
4. Literature Review.........................................................................................................................4
5.Research Methodology.................................................................................................................5
Data Collection: Survey................................................................................................................6
Data Analysis: Survey..................................................................................................................6
Project Timeframe:......................................................................................................................6
6. Limitation.....................................................................................................................................6
7. Conclusion and Recommendation...............................................................................................6
9. References...................................................................................................................................8
1. Title

To analyze the significance of communication in project management to increase the success

rate of the project in the construction industry – UK

2. Introduction

Benjamin Franklin said, “The difference between failure and success is the difference between
something almost right and doing something right”. In project management communication
skills does just that. If the project is planned properly and a team is selected with all the right
resources. However, in spite of doing everything else right the difference between success and
failure will depend on how well communication flows between the team members.
In today’s world one of the key success factors for project managers is the development of
communication skills. PMI (Project Management of Institute) also suggests that 90 percent of
the time spend by the project managers should be in communication. One of the conclusion of
the research conducted by PMI was that one out of five projects failed due to infective
communication.[CITATION PMI \l 1033 ].
Construction projects are complex projects, [ CITATION Chi15 \l 1033 ] writes that construction
project success is measured in terms of time, cost, and quality. All three variables are directly or
indirectly are dependent on effective communication. Taking the United Kingdom into
consideration, In 2012 the construction industry contributed £90 bn to the UK economy and is
expected to be a $12 trillion industry in 2025,since the project values would increase so would
the standard and hence would increase complexity in a project.
Stakeholders for any projects are key resources to the project and there should be proper
communication between the project manager and stakeholders so that the team morale as well
as the efficiency will be maintained and hence resulting in better time management and
optimal utilization of resources.
This research aims to analyse the role that communication skills play in the project
management and how it relates to the success of the project, what are the best communication
methods that are used and what stakeholders think about the communication skills in the
project in the construction industry.
For the purpose of research, we will use case studies of past construction projects, to
understand which areas of communication are important in project management and need
further analysis. By way of a questionnaire we will conduct a survey of applying the testing of
knowledge we have gained in our literature review against current construction projects of
varied sizes to understand if it is still valid.
3. Aims and Objectives

The purpose of this research is to analyse the role communication skills play to increase the
probability of project success in the construction industry in the United Kingdom and how it
helps to increase efficiency. This research will be conducted through these aims and objectives.

I. Role of Communication skills in Project management.

 Look at how communication skills in project management play an integral part to
ease the process of execution of the project through the survey (Questionnaire).
II. Investigate the key areas of communication skills that can play an essential role in the
success of project management through case studies.
 Study of the making of Heathrow terminal 5 to understand how vital
communication plays an essential role in the execution.
 Study the Construction Programme for the London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic
Games and understand how different types of communication skills were used to
manage the project.
III. Evaluate which communication method are more effective in increasing the rate of
success of the project in the construction industry.
 Analyze which type of communication skills is most effective in the project
through the survey (Questionnaire).
IV. Examine the relation of communication skills to project success in the construction
industry through the project stakeholder’s perspective.
 Evaluate how different stakeholders prefer a different type of communication
they wish to receive to execute their task towards the projects.

4. Literature Review

[ CITATION Sam07 \l 1033 ] Discusses the skills that are required for project management. The
author in his article stated that project management has changed over a period of time.
Samson concluded that the requirement of project management skills can be split right down
the middle namely 50 percent of the traditional hard skills such as risk management,
scheduling. The remaining half i.e. 50 percent consists of soft skills such as leadership,
interpersonal communication, and that both skills are interdependent, and the project cannot
succeed without using both types of skills.
Similarly [ CITATION ZIe05 \l 1033 ] discusses the importance of soft skills by stating that if 5
years ago the project management gurus would have been asked which would be the most
important skill that a project manager should have? They would have responded with technical
skills. Now most of them would be listing communicating or negotiating skills at the top of their
list. The authors do not deny the importance of technical skills. However, he has given equal
importance to communication skills.
[CITATION UKe18 \l 1033 ] Discusses the making of Heathrow terminal 5 in which they had
studied the construction of the terminal and the role of communication in the project. On risk
assessment analysis it was found that there was a significant risk of impact on the project if
there is lack of proper communication, so they proposed the communication plan that includes
different category to be filled for each job to create the checklist which contains Phase, who,
type, purpose, how, when, whom and deliverables which shows the importance of
communication in the project.
[CITATION The12 \n \l 1033 ] In their case, the study discusses the making of the London 2012
Olympic and Paralympic Games construction Programme in which they have written about the
various ways communication skills were going to contribute to the project. Communication
plays a vital role during the planning process to the stakeholders, media, and other employees
of the project, during monitoring, Problem resolution, and change management which could
only be tackled by the proper chain of command and flow of communication for the project to
be efficient and successful.
[CITATION Lea14 \l 1033 ] Discuss the different types of communication, which are necessary
for the project manager. They must play the role of leader for the stakeholders, who is going to
guide the stakeholder to the project objective and for efficiency. They need to be focusing on
the following communication skills that include corporate, managerial, and core communication
and by which mode of communication skills they are going to communicate that will not act as
a further hindrance in the project.
[CITATION Gil \l 1033 ] Discusses that team may consist of members from the diverse field,
diverse location, employees or external contractor, and a multitude of stakeholders with
different or conflicting interests. Therefore, the job of the project manager is very difficult and
complex and has to communicate with an individual member of the project differently and at
level, they can perfectly understand and perform their tasks correctly to improve the chances of
the success of the project.

5.Research Methodology

Secondary research data on importance of communication in project management will be

collated through a comprehensive literature review. Based on the conclusions of the literature
review we will be able to understand the importance of the communication skills and methods
in project management and the key role it plays in maintaining stakeholder relationship and the
success of projects in the construction industry. Theoretical analysis (Objective 2) will help to
define the gap and how it can be reduced by the communication in two case studies namely
Construction of Heathrow terminal 5 and London 2012 Olympic and Paralympic Games projects
to increase the probability of the success of the project.

The Primary research data will be collected by way of Survey. Below are the methodologies for
the data collection and analysis. The proposed time frame for the research with the milestones
that need to be completed is featured in the appendix 2.

Data Collection: Survey

The data for the survey will focus on the objectives (1,3, &4) will be collected by responses to,
Likert scale and Multiple-choice questions, questionnaire. The survey will be created by using
survey monkey and link for the form will be sent via social media, LinkedIn, and other various
communication platforms to the various respondent. The specific group for the research is the
various stakeholders of the construction industry (Project manager, Investor, Middle-level
manager, Architect, Low-level worker, etc.).
The data collection survey will be using Probability sampling in which random sampling will be
used and after that snowball sampling will be used to gather more data so that the reach of the
survey can be increased. In the Questionnaire, there will be 14 questions as guided by the
Literature review.

Data Analysis: Survey

The data will be analyzed by using descriptive statistics. The resultant data will be further
analyzed through Tendency, Frequency, and variation in the responses. The concluding data will
be summarized by graph and table for each question.
The hypothesis to be tested through the survey
H1 = Communication skills are an essential skill for project success in the construction industry.
H0 = Communication skills are not essential for project success in the construction industry.

The questionnaire is in Appendix 1

Project Timeframe:
The research will take place in over two and half months. (see appendix 2 Activity plan).
6. Limitation

The objective of the present study is to research the significance of communication skill role in
construction projects.
However, currently there are not any projects of the size and complexity compared to
Heathrow terminal 5 or and London 2012 Olympics. So, the survey will be conducted from
project team members part of project which are diverse both in term of complexity and scale.
Since the advent of COVID – 19, the communication practices/ methods have changed
drastically compared to those before the pandemic. Hence there may be deviation in result
wised comparing with the secondary data.

7. Conclusion and Recommendation

This research project will analyze how communication plays important role in increasing
probability of the success of the project, followed by which type of communication skills/
methods are most effective according to the stakeholder.
The case studies (Objective 2) will allow analyzing the importance of communication that has
been played in the two major construction projects in the United Kingdom. Survey questions
will be helping to analyze the Objective (1,3, and 4).
All the results will be disclosed in the findings to ensure full transparency on how data has been
analyzed and clear interpretation will be shown.
It is recommended to collect responses as many different types of the responses to get better
analysis, snowball and random sampling can be used for gathering large data from the survey.
Analysis of data from the survey must be done through descriptive statistic so that tendency
and deviation.
9. References

APM (2012) The construction programme for the London 2012 olympics and Paralympic Games,
APM.
Gillard, 2005. The competencies of effective project manager. A conceptual analysis of
international journal of management , 22(1), pp. 48-53.
PMI, P. m. o. i., 2013. THE HIGH COST OF LOW PERFORMANCE:THE ESSENTIAL ROLE OF
COMMUNICATIONS, s.l.: s.n.
Sampson, B., 2007. Get with the project. Professional engineering, Volume 20, pp. 41-21.
Sons, C. J. W. &., 2015. Project management in construction. Sixth ed. s.l.:Wiley publisher.
UKE, U., 2018. Heathrow Terminal 5. [Online]
Available at: www.ukessays.com/project-management/heathrow-terminal.php
[Accessed 10 April 2021].
ZIelinski, D., 2005. How trhe project management discipline is rediscovering the power and
importance of old fashioned people skills. Soft Skills, Hard Truths, Volume 42, pp. 18-23.
Zulch, B., 2014. Leadership communication in project management. Procedia- Social and
behavioral sciences, Volume 119, pp. 172-181.
Appendix 1

This following questionnaire will be featuring question within the survey for this project
research.

1. What is your occupation?

 Project manager
 Architect
 Builder
 Engineer
 Other
2. Do you think project management plays crucial role in completing a projects in
construction industry?
 Strongly agree
 Agree
 Neutral
 Disagree
 Strongly Disagree
3. Do you think soft skills are as important as traditional hard skills in a project?
 Strongly agree
 Agree
 Neutral
 Disagree
 Strongly Disagree
4. Do you think communication skills is one of the most important skill that a project
manager should have?
 Strongly agree
 Agree
 Neutral
 Disagree
 Strongly Disagree
5. Does proper communication ease the process from planning to execution in the project?
 Strongly agree
 Agree
 Neutral
 Disagree
 Strongly Disagree
6. Does construction project require detailed observation and critical assessment of each
task and further communication of result after completing each milestone?
 Strongly agree
 Agree
 Neutral
 Disagree
 Strongly Disagree

7. For a project manager does communication skills play an important part in enhancing
Team coordination and interpersonal skills, and hence increase their competence?
 Strongly agree
 Agree
 Neutral
 Disagree
 Strongly Disagree
8. Are Hard skills objective difficult to fulfilled if the communication between project
stakeholders and project manager is not fluent?
 Strongly agree
 Agree
 Neutral
 Disagree
 Strongly Disagree
9. Construction projects in U.K. have stakeholders from different skills, cultures,
nationalities, and beliefs which makes proper communication crucial to the project
success?
 Strongly agree
 Agree
 Neutral
 Disagree
 Strongly Disagree

10. Are Risk management, change management and Conflict management are dependent
on ideal communication and are essential key to the success of project?
 Strongly agree
 Agree
 Neutral
 Disagree
 Strongly Disagree
11. Do the communication skills of the project manager go a long way to motivate the team
and make them effective in executing the project?
 Strongly agree
 Agree
 Neutral
 Disagree
 Strongly Disagree
12. Are different types of communication skills required when communicating with
different stakeholders in project management?
 Strongly agree
 Agree
 Neutral
 Disagree
 Strongly Disagree
13. Which type of communication is ideal in the project management in the construction
industry?
 Interactive communication
 Push Communication
 Pull communication
 All the above

14. Does communication play critical factor in project management?

 Strongly agree
 Agree
 Neutral
 Disagree
 Strongly Disagree
Appendix 2

Timeframe of the project

Sr. No Activity March April May Jun Jul Aug

1. Planning
1.1 Decide Dissertation topic            
1.2 Decide Aims and Objective            
1.3 Begin Draft project Proposal            
1.4 Find appropriate Literature review            
1.5 Decide major construction project case in UK            
1.5 Decide appropriate methodologies            
1.6 Anticipate results            
1.7 Determine survey question            
1.8 Prepare survey for distribution            
1.9 Submit finalised Project proposal            
2. Literature review
2.1 Find relevant literature to document            
2.2 Analysis of literature            
2.3 Comparison and analysis of literature review            
2.4 Conclusion of literature review            
2.5 Add reference of literature review            
3. Research
3.1 Distribute survey            
3.2 Cases studies for relevant projects            
3.3 Close survey            
3.4 Gather results            
4.Analysis
 4.1 Analysis for the case study of project            
4.2 Analysis of the responses from the survey            
4.3 Descriptive analysis of survey            
4.4 Making charts and table for survey results            
4.5 Final analysis on finding            
5. Conclusion
5.1 Discuss the thoughts from Literature review            
5.2 Discuss the thoughts from Research            
5.3 Final review            
5.4 Final conclusion            
5.5 Offer recommendation            
6.Report Finalization
6.1 Check reference            
6.2 Insert survey results into appendix            
6.3 Insert cover page            
6.4 Insert Content            
6.5 Proof read            
7. Submission to the concern authority  

  Milestone
  Task duration