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With increasing choice from a range of programs, improvement project selection within broader supply chain context and resource constraints has become a major research challenge. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the different criteria for selecting Six-Sigma (SS) projects based on previous studies. The study is supported by two grounded theories: resource-based view and institutional norms. The criteria include: first, business drivers for improvement and the common performance metrics deployed; second, the organization’s stakeholders needs; and third, process owner’s needs.

To determine the relative importance of influencing factors, opinions were collected from 30 experienced practitioners including SS champions/master black-belts, company directors, consultants, and process owners through a series of interviews in small, medium, and large organizations including multi-national organizations. The evaluation of criteria is based on analytical hierarchy process.

The results show that impact on customer, financial impacts, and impact on operational goals are the most significant factors in selecting SS improvement project.

This study is a first attempt to determine the relative weight among SS project selection criteria, which help the practitioner to allocate their limited resources in implementing SS project.

The purpose of this paper is to focus on the importance of the project selection process and its role in the successful deployment of Six Sigma within organizations.

A review of the literature is presented, highlighting the importance of project selection in Six Sigma deployment, which is an area of extreme importance that has been less researched in the past. The paper, through a real‐life case study, proposes a hybrid methodology, which combines the analytical hierarchy process and the project desirability matrix to select a project for Six Sigma deployment.

The paper demonstrates the efficacy of proposed methodology by its application in a small and medium‐sized enterprise (SME) manufacturing die‐casting product. The example provided is a real‐life case study conducted by the authors in an organization embracing the Six Sigma business strategy within their day‐to‐day functioning.

The proposed methodology is tested only in a case study SME, which is the limitation of the paper. The robustness of the methodology can be tested by conducting several case studies in organizations and comparing the results with other existing methodologies for project selection such as project prioritisation matrix or the failure mode and effect analysis.

The paper accentuates the importance of the project selection process for Six Sigma deployment, which can have a tremendous effect on the business profitability of an organization. The paper is relevant to both industry practitioners and researchers.

The paper presents a methodology linking the project selection process to successful deployment of Six Sigma within organizations, an important topic that has been neglected in the past. The paper will enable managers and practitioners to emphasize the importance of project selection and to identify and focus on the critical success factors in successful deployment of Six Sigma projects.

The paper aims to review the literature on Six Sigma projects through a broad framework of Six Sigma project selection process. It proposes a process framework approach of six sigma project selection and enumerates various recent tools and methods required for each stage. The review aims to expand the domain of Six Sigma project selection by identifying the importance of project portfolio approach.

The study used a process framework approach and systematic literature review to identify and classify various literature pertaining six sigma projects and its associated tools and methods

The paper provides broad insights about the opportunity and direction to future research in the area of Six Sigma project. Emerging research opportunities exist in the area of Six Sigma project risk management and selecting portfolio of projects.

The study has its own limitations because of its chosen research approach. The process framework developed for classification of literature is based on expert opinion. Further research can be carried out to validate it.

This study will benefit new researchers entering the field of Six Sigma to identify new research opportunities and issues for their research interest. Second, industry practitioners and consultants working in the area of Six Sigma may work towards more successful implementation of Six Sigma.

The paper fulfils an identified gap of review of Six Sigma project selection.

Over the last three decades, construction projects have increasingly been delivered through alternative delivery methods. As a result, many owners have a range of delivery methods to choose from and aim to use the right one for each of their projects. Researchers have developed several tools and decision-support processes to facilitate this selection procedure. The purpose of this study is to review and discuss differences and common themes across selection tools developed by academic researchers and project owners.

The study reviews prominent selection processes and tools used for infrastructure projects by conducting an in-depth literature review and using the content analysis method to elicit findings on the methodologies and criteria presented in the literature.

This study presents three principal findings. First, findings show three common themes emerge within the selection criteria—characteristics, goals and risks. Second, while academic studies most commonly suggest employing multi-attribute analysis, this study reveals that, in practice, selection tools most frequently employ a staged or gated evaluation based on the type of criteria and their importance to the decision. Finally, this review further highlights the importance of institutional context in decision-making.

This work contributes to the body of knowledge by providing guidance to practitioners and opening new directions for researchers around the way selection criteria are categorized in the relevant literature and the institutional context considerations when structuring or evaluating a selection process or tool.

The purpose of this paper is to develop criteria for project manager selection based on desired skills of a project manager and facilitate the selection of a suitable candidate from a pool of potential candidates for the implementation of projects in the Indian context.

The study utilizes three major skills, namely human skill, conceptual and organizational skills; technical skill along with their sub-skills to develop criteria for project manager selection. Based on the responses of project professionals from industry, the study uses analytical hierarchy process to prioritize and identify the relative importance of different skills in the criteria in order to develop a hierarchical structure for project manager selection.

The study finds that at the first level of project manager selection criteria, conceptual and organizational skills are the most important selection criteria followed by human skills and technical skills. At the second level of project manager selection criteria, planning, delegating authority and understanding methods, processes, and procedures are some of the important sub-selection criteria. The weights indicating the relative importance of major selection criteria and sub-selection criteria can be used to evaluate the relative weight of a given candidate for selection as a project manager.

The results in this study are derived from specific demographic conditions in India. Future research with larger samples from other countries is needed for generalizations of the proposed criteria.

The proposed method quantifies the intangible qualitative criteria to select a project manager, which can aid decision-makers in a multi-criteria decision-making environment.

This research paper is focused on the identification of critical skills for the selection of a project manager, which is almost neglected by the researchers.

The purpose of this paper is twofold: the selection of project portfolios through hybrid artificial neural network algorithms, feature selection based on grey relational analysis, decision tree and regression; and the identification of the features affecting project portfolio selection using the artificial neural network algorithm, decision tree and regression. The authors also aim to classify the available options using the decision tree algorithm.

In order to achieve the research goals, a project-oriented organization was selected and studied. In all, 49 project management indicators were chosen from A Guide to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK Guide), and the most important indicators were identified using a feature selection algorithm and decision tree. After the extraction of rules, decision rule-based multi-criteria decision making matrices were produced. Each matrix was ranked through grey relational analysis, similarity to ideal solution method and multi-criteria optimization. Finally, a model for choosing the best ranking method was designed and implemented using the genetic algorithm. To analyze the responses, stability of the classes was investigated.

The results showed that projects ranked based on neural network weights by the grey relational analysis method prove to be better options for the selection of a project portfolio. The process of identification of the features affecting project portfolio selection resulted in the following factors: scope management, project charter, project management plan, stakeholders and risk.

This study presents the most effective features affecting project portfolio selection which is highly impressive in organizational decision making and must be considered seriously. Deploying sensitivity analysis, which is an innovation in such studies, played a constructive role in examining the accuracy and reliability of the proposed models, and it can be firmly argued that the results have had an important role in validating the findings of this study.

This paper aims to propose a new model for project selection using the combined approach of analytic hierarchy process (AHP) and linear programming (LP). The key selection criteria for construction projects are also identified and assessed based on the perception of construction professionals.

Fifteen project selection criteria are identified based on review of related literature. A questionnaire is developed and distributed among construction professionals in the United Arab Emirates to assess the importance of these criteria. The questionnaire was designed to enable pair-wise comparisons using the AHP methodology. Based on the responses of 42 professionals, the weight of each criterion was calculated using Expert Choice software. Selected criteria are then used to compare available projects. AHP is applied first to prioritize the competing projects, in line with owner strategic goals and objectives. Next, the priority ratios (weights) obtained from the AHP model are used as the coefficients of the decision variables in a LP model to allocate the available budget in an optimal way to maximize the owner’s benefit.

Results indicate that project-specific criteria are the most important with an overall weight of 0.48. The top three criteria are profit, financial standing and risk with corresponding weights of 0.161, 0.114 and 0.1, respectively. The proposed model provided more benefit to the owner than using the traditional project selection method.

There are several methods for project selection. However, the optimization techniques do not consider qualitative factors. Other techniques consider both qualitative and quantitative factors but do not consider budget limitations to optimize the selection decision. The model proposed here combines both approaches and takes into consideration unique criteria that are specific to the construction industry.

The purpose of this paper is to identify key project delivery method selection factors to assist water industry decision-makers in selecting the most appropriate delivery method for their water treatment plant projects.

The selection factors were identified by compiling and validating key project delivery selection factors across various industries through an extensive literature review and two industry expert workshops. This resulted in the development of a web-based decision-support tool to facilitate project delivery method selection within the water industry.

The research effort led to the identification of 13 key project delivery method selection factors (seven primary factors and six secondary factors) for water treatment plant projects. These factors were utilized to develop EXPRSS-TP, a pioneering web-based project delivery method decision-support tool for the water industry.

A project delivery method selection process is typically an informal process that may range from days to weeks at a time. Based on this work, the assessment can now be completed in about one hour and provides decision-makers with the most favorable delivery method for their project. And with the new tool that encompasses the new knowledge, not only is the decision reached at an accelerated pace, EXPRSS-TP also documents the entire selection process, allowing for a written and retained record of this key decision and its procedure.

This paper contributes to the exisiting body of knowledge by identifying key project delivery selection factors across numerous industries, assessing and combining them, and finally incorporating them into one comprehensive process. EXPRSS-TP improves the traditional project delivery method selection process and provides evidence-based project delivery method selection recommendations.

This study aims to explore the critical influencing factors that lead to the site selection failure of waste-to-energy (WtE) projects in China under the influence of the “Not In My Back Yard” (NIMBY) effect, which can provide references to improve the decision-making process of similar projects in the future.

The fuzzy decision-making trial and evaluation laboratory (DEMATEL) method was used to propose an analytical framework for exploring the critical influencing factors affecting the site selection failure of WtE projects. The causal relationship between different influencing factors is finally determined on the basis of the opinions of 12 experts from universities, government departments, consulting units, planning and design units, construction units and WtE enterprises.

Results showed that six crucial factors resulted in the site selection failure of WtE projects from the NIMBY effect perspective: “Insufficient public participation,” “Near the place of residence,” “Nonstandard government decision-making processes,” “Low information disclosure,” “Destroys the surrounding environment,” and “Imperfect compensation scheme.”

Results can determine the priorities and causal relationships among the various influencing factors. The decision-making optimization suggestions can provide reference for decision- makers, thereby possibly promoting the scientific and standardization of site selection decision process.

The literature suggests that a key ingredient for the successful six sigma implementation is project prioritisation and selection. The purpose of this paper is to identify what criteria are considered for selecting six sigma projects and how six sigma projects are selected in organisations in the UK.

Using a survey as a method of investigation, respondents were asked what criteria are considered to select projects and how potential projects are identified, prioritised, selected and evaluated.

The results of the survey indicate that UK organisations tend to select projects based on criteria such as customer satisfaction, financial benefits, top management commitment and those projects integrated with the company's strategy. Several tools and techniques such as cost benefit analysis, cause and effect matrix, brainstorming, Pareto analysis are employed to identify and prioritise projects.

This paper is limited to the selection of six sigma in the UK. Further, empirical studies using larger sample sizes and greater geographical diversity may be helpful in validating the results of this study.

The identification of the most commonly used criteria to select six sigma projects can aid practitioners to select projects based on multiple criteria and using tools and techniques identified in this survey.

The provision of empirical data on the criteria used to select six sigma projects and how six sigma projects are selected.