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Measuring the readiness of a megaproject

Dinesh Shenoy (FLAME University, Pune, India) (Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur, Kharagpur, India)
Biswajit Mahanty (Indian Institute of Technology Kharagpur, Kharagpur, India)

International Journal of Managing Projects in Business

ISSN: 1753-8378

Article publication date: 9 February 2021

Issue publication date: 20 May 2021

783

Abstract

Purpose

A vast proportion of global megaprojects have not performed up to the expectations of their stakeholders. A failed megaproject has the potential even to derail the economy of a country where it was implemented. Stakeholders must, therefore, ensure that they do not invest in megaprojects that are bound to fail. But, how can stakeholders consistently identify such megaprojects? This paper develops a framework for a metric that can help stakeholders measure the readiness of a megaproject.

Design/methodology/approach

A comprehensive literature review identified 19 critical success factors of megaprojects. These success factors were integrated into a fuzzy-based model to develop the megaproject readiness metric. An assessment team studied the levels of presence and importance of these success factors in a candidate megaproject to derive its readiness.

Findings

The readiness-based model provides stakeholders valuable insights into the strong and weak areas of a megaproject. It can help stakeholders prioritize and systematically eliminate the identified weaknesses and improve megaproject readiness. While the model was tested on a metro rail megaproject, it can be used on any megaproject across domains.

Originality/value

This paper adopts the concept of readiness for the domain of megaprojects. Besides the readiness measurement framework, a vital contribution of this research is its application to a real-life case. Future research can include more granular success factors to improve the estimate of megaproject readiness.

Keywords

Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank the editor and the two anonymous reviewers for their constructive criticism that has enhanced the quality and the readability of this paper.

Citation

Shenoy, D. and Mahanty, B. (2021), "Measuring the readiness of a megaproject", International Journal of Managing Projects in Business, Vol. 14 No. 4, pp. 999-1022. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJMPB-05-2020-0154

Publisher

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Emerald Publishing Limited

Copyright © 2021, Emerald Publishing Limited

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