| The traditional expectations of the project team are for the processes of engineering, procurement, construction, and start-up to be expertly administered. However, these performance criteria can be satisfied yet still not meet the ultimate business needs of the owner. The purpose of this thesis was to determine ways to improve the likelihood of achieving owner's business objectives. Fifty-one questionnaire survey forms were analyzed to obtain data for thirty-three pre-project planning activities. A data analysis concluded with a degree of statistical significance that for thirteen of the thirty-three activities, the more successful projects, as defined by the satisfaction of the business objectives, expended more time and/or more resources when performing the activities. Further, statistically significant differences were uncovered with respect to the extent an activity was successfully executed, the extent of activity complexity, the respondent's perception of activity efficiency, and the extent to which the information was available. |
