Outline
The aim of the research is to investigate factors that would enhance construction project’s success sponsored by the government in Dubai. The researcher developed three objectives for this study as follows.
- To review the initiation of government sponsored mega construction projects in order to understand the processes involved and how they influence success of the project.
- To determine the level of government involvement in construction projects in various stages of project life cycle.
- To identify specific challenges faced by Mega construction projects in Dubai within the past decade.
The previous chapter focused on the review of literatures in order to determine what scholars say about private construction of government projects. In this chapter, the focus will be on methods of data collection used in this study, its analysis and the presentation procedures.
The focus of this chapter will be to define methods that will be used to investigate factors that would enhance success in private construction of government-sponsored projects based on the information collected from primary sources. The first section of this chapter focuses on research philosophy used in this study.
It then proceeds to analyze the research design and its justification. This section explains why the researcher chose a given research design. The third section deals with the questionnaire design. Questionnaire was the main tool used in the process of collecting data.
The next section deals with the interviews used in the study to gather relevant data from the participants. The chapter then analyses sampling strategies used in the study, and data collection techniques. The next section of this chapter is a framework for analysing data before concluding it with a summary.
The researcher seeks to define an appropriate method that will be used to collect and analyse data from primary sources in order to validate findings from secondary sources as discussed in chapter two of this paper.
Research Philosophy
Research philosophy plays an important role in research because it defines the approach taken in the development of knowledge in the study. In quantitative research, deductive reasoning, also known as top down method, will be used. The figure below shows the systematic reasoning based on deductive methods.
Figure 1: Steps in Deductive Reasoning
As shown in the diagram above, this process starts with developing a theory that underpins the research topic. The next step is to develop hypotheses to be used in testing the theories. The following are the two hypotheses developed in the previous chapters.
H1o. Success of mega government projects is not affected by issues such as bribery and favouritism.
H2o. Engaging private players in mega government project through subcontracting is not a key driver of success.
The third step is the observation process where data is collected from the field. The researcher will base the observation on government-sponsored projects that are currently undertaken by private contractors. The observation also involves a detailed collection of primary data.
The final step is the conformation of the set hypotheses (Schwartz-Shea and Yanow 2006, p. 76). Through analysis of the primary data, it will be possible to confirm or reject the hypotheses set in the previous chapters. The researcher will use this deductive strategy in the study.
Research Design and Justification
The nature of this research makes it necessary to use quantitative data analysis methods. The reason for choosing quantitative result is the desire to confirm the research hypotheses through empirical study. The researcher intends to use mathematical tools in order to analyze the data collected from the field.
Structured questions can easily be assigned numerical values, making it possible to compute and analyze them mathematically. Quantitative methods will help the researcher to determine the level of acceptance of each of the set hypotheses.
According to Reis and Judd (2000, p. 34), structured questions are always important when the researcher is interested in capturing specific issues that can be codified for mathematical analysis.
The interviews will be very important in the study because they will allow the researcher to capture the facial expressions of the respondents, which may offer further explanations to some of the questions posed to the respondents.
Questionnaire Design
It is vital to define the questionnaire design used in this research. In order to collect the primary data, the researcher used questionnaires, which we delivered to the participants directly. The questionnaire was divided into different sections focusing on different issues of interest in this study.
The questions delved into specific issues concerning the private construction of government-sponsored projects in the country, and some of the challenges encountered during the formulation or implementation stages.
This research used quantitative methods, and for this reason, the questions used in this research were structured in order to enhance mathematical analysis. The researcher considered it necessary to employ structured questions to capture different aspects of issues under investigation.
The open-ended questions would be good because they give the respondents enough time to think about their response, a fact that makes them feel comfortable when responding to the questions set in the study. This would allow the researcher to understand the position of respondents and the reason why they gave specific responses.
These questions also minimise errors that could have occurred in the course of the research when the researcher has to guess why the respondent has given a specific response. However, the fact that they are not supported by mathematical analysis makes them undesirable for this study.
That is why they were avoided. The structured questions are easy to administer and it is time consuming. According to McConville and Chui (2007, p. 87), respondents are always comfortable with short clear questions which takes a short time to administer. This approach eliminates the possibility that they may ignore some of the questions.
Each response in the closed ended questions is given a statistical value for easy statistical interpretation. According to Rugg and Petre (2007, p. 23), closed-ended questions are compatible with computer package. This approach is more specific, which means that its answers are very consistent.
Achieving this consistency may not be possible when using unstructured questions. Finally, the closed-ended questions took lesser time to administer as compared to the open-ended questions, a fact that was important given the limited time that was available for the study.
The questionnaire was hand-delivered and administered by the researcher in the form of face-to-face interviews. The researcher recorded the responses from the participants personally. This decision was based on the amount of time available for the study. This method may be time consuming, but it is effective.
Besides, the method allowed the respondents to reflect on the set questions and answer them with accuracy. The method is not easily affected by the level of respondent’s literacy skills (Neergaard & Ulhøi 2007, p. 78).
The use of questionnaires enabled the researcher to capture the relevant issues that are unique to the private construction of government-sponsored projects within Dubai.
This was important because there was limited literature with the desired degree of relevance to the subject matter of private public partnership in managing projects in this country.
As the participants responded to the questions, the researcher was keen to capture any facial expressions that would give further clues to the responses beyond what the respondents were stating in words.
The availability of the participants heavily influenced the choice of this approach because most of the respondents were full time employees in the governmental departments and other private institutions, and for this reason, it is not easy to find all of them in one place at a given time.
After data collection, it went through a detailed analysis, which culminated into the discussion and conclusions as discussed in chapters four and five of this report.
Interviews
In order to collect the primary data from the field, the researcher organized interviews with the government officials in the relevant departments and private players who have been engaged in the construction of government-sponsored projects.
Before starting the interview, the researcher took an opportunity to explain to the participants the relevance of the study and the non-disclosure policy. The researcher assured the participants that this study was specifically meant for academic purposes, and that the identity of the participants shall not be revealed.
The face-to-face interview was a good strategy of collecting the information from the participants. It also allowed the researcher to capture the body language of the respondents. The researcher filled the questionnaires as the respondents answered the questions posed to them.
The structured questions required the participants to choose a specific answer from a series of choices presented to them based on their knowledge or personal experiences. The questionnaire used in the study is presented in the appendix.
Sampling
According to Jacobsen (2012, p. 74), a number of factors should be put into consideration when choosing the right method of sampling in any given study.
In this research, the aim was to interview the individuals who are directly involved in the private construction of government-sponsored projects in Dubai, especially those who have been in the industry for the past one decade.
Based on the required sample size, arrangements of meetings and the availability of the target population, the study interviewed clients, consultants and contractors. In total, the researcher chose 90 people to participate in this study.
The research focused on individuals that have the knowledge and strong opinions of this particular market, especially those who are directly involved in private construction of government-sponsored projects.
This relatively large sample size was chosen because it would provide a wide range of views, which increases the reliability and credibility of the study. The researcher felt that the more the interviews, the better the results.
However, the timeframe of conducting this research was a limit to the amount of interviews that could be carried out. In order to capture the participants from the identified groups above, simple random sampling approach was used in each group.
However, the researcher was keen to ensure that participants from these three categories were properly captured in this study. This was important in ensuring that each issue under investigation was responded to from all the possible perspectives.
The researcher made an effort to ensure that personal biases do not affect the process of choosing the participants. That is why simple random sampling was considered appropriate in selecting the participants for this study.
Data Collection
In this study, defining the scope of data collection was important in order to guide its usage. According to Groat, and Groat (2013, p. 56), sometimes one may misuse a given report by applying it in an irrelevant context, making it difficult to achieve the desired results.
For this reason, it was considered necessary to define the context under which the primary and secondary sources of data were collected. The researcher used the secondary sources of data to define the theoretical perspective of this research.
It is important to understand the fact that the information given by the secondary sources captured the topic under varying environmental factors and countries.
The primary source of data was obtained from the employees of the relevant government departments, educationists, and private sector players who are involved, in one way or the other, in the private construction of government-sponsored projects.
The researcher asked the participants about a number of issues relating to these projects within the country. The researcher explained to all the participants what this research is all about and why it was important to the researcher.
Although the secondary data was collected from literatures that focused on various countries, the process of collecting the primary data was restricted to Dubai because of the nature of the research. This means that it would not be appropriate to apply the information from the primary data on a global context.
Framework for Data Analysis
Data analysis refers to the process of transforming raw data into refined useful information that can be of use to people. Willis (2008, p. 86) advises that before settling on a method of data analysis, it is important to determine the approach to be taken by the research. The research can take quantitative, qualitative, or categorical approach.
This research emphasized on quantitative approach, although qualitative methods helped in explaining some of the statistical findings. Depending on the type and accuracy needed, data analysis can take a simple descriptive form, or a more complex statistical inferencing (Bowling & Ebrahim 2005, p. 52).
The technique used in the analysis can be univariate, bivariate or multivariate analysis. In selecting the appropriate method, a researcher should ensure that assumptions relating to the method are satisfactory.
In analyzing the collected data, the researcher will use appropriate statistical data analysis tools such as descriptive and inferential statistics in analyzing the quantitative data.
In relation to the quantitative analysis, Maxfield and Babbie (2012, p. 43) argued that the most commonly used sets of statistics include mean, frequencies, standard deviation, median and percentages. The researcher will code and enter the quantitative data into Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS version 20).
Using the spreadsheet, the researcher will be able to derive various statistical values needed for this study.
The researcher will also use descriptive statistics such as mean, standard deviation, percentage, and frequencies to describe various issues about this topic. The findings of the study will be presented in charts, graphs, and tables to enhance clarity.
Since the research may entail comparison of the performance of some projects that were conducted in the recent past, there will be the need to employ correlation analysis to enhance clarity. Therefore, chi-square tests will be used to test the hypotheses.
Inferential statistics like chi-square tests help to test whether the observed relationships between the variables are genuine or due to chance. The statistical significance level used in the research is 0.05 indicating whether the observed association occurred by chance in 5 out of 100 results.
Chi-square is the most widely used measure of association in social science research, being suitable for use on nominal, ordinal, interval and ratio data. This will be important in accepting or rejecting the two hypotheses that were set in the previous chapters (Barton 2006, p. 45).
Summary of Methodology
This section addresses the research methodology used in this study. It is clear from the above discussion that although this research will be based on quantitative methods, the researcher will also use some elements of qualitative study to explain some of the statistical findings.
It means that the questionnaire will have structured questions. In defining the research philosophy, it is clear that the study will use deductive methods. It means that the researcher will develop hypotheses and use data to confirm it through analysis.
The researcher used questionnaires to conduct face-to-face interviews. The respondents were sampled from government agencies, the private sector, and educational institutions.
Simple random sampling was used to get the right sample size. Primary data collection was restricted to the city of Dubai. The use of mathematical methods enhanced the quality of this research.
List of References
Barton, K 2006, Research methods in social studies education: Contemporary issues and perspectives, Information Age Publishers, Greenwich.
Bowling, A & Ebrahim, S 2005, Handbook of health research methods: Investigation measurement and analysis, Open University Press, Maidenhead.
Groat, L, Wang, D & Groat, L 2013, Architectural research methods, Cengage, New York.
Jacobsen, K 2012, Introduction to health research methods: A practical guide, Jones & Bartlett Learning, Sudbury.
Maxfield, M & Babbie, E 2012, Basics of research methods for criminal justice and criminology, Cengage Learning, Belmont.
McConville, M & Chui, W 2007, Research methods for law, Edinburgh University Press, Edinburgh.
Neergaard, H & Ulhøi, J 2007, Handbook of qualitative research methods in entrepreneurship, Edward Elgar, Cheltenham.
Reis, H & Judd, C 2000, Handbook of research methods in social psychology and personality psychology, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.
Rugg, G & Petre, M 2007, A gentle guide to research methods, McGraw-Hill Press, Maidenhead.
Schwartz-Shea, P & Yanow, D 2006, Interpretation and method: Empirical research methods and the interpretive turn, M.E. Sharpe, Armonk.
Willis, J 2008, Qualitative Research Methods for Education and educational technology, Information age Pub, Greenwich.