CRITICAL SUCCESS FACTORS IN MANAGING GOVERNMENT FUNDED R&D PROJECTS IN ABU DHABI

The purpose of this dissertation is to investigate the critical success factors affecting the research and development projects funded by Abu Dhabi, UAE. Abu Dhabi particularly began to adopt innovative and internationally accepted standards and practices in its public administration. Therefore, it is a challenge to develop public projects, which require time to implement, cost, and as well as smart objectives to achieve. It is necessary the great ability to manage such development, instead of traditional methods. research and development projects funded by the governments have been very challenging while trying to clarify various factors contributing to their success. Design/Methodology/Approach: The conceptual model that was built for the study purpose was used and constructed based on a literature review. Hypotheses were identified to be tested quantitatively. Next, a questionnaire is built and used to measure the perception of the participants in public organizations about the critical success factors and the research and development project success criteria. Quantitative methodology is used in this study, as structural equation modelling is utilized to analyze the collected data. Findings: The factors that contribute to the success of research and development projects were mainly identified, which strategic and tactical factors in supporting cost and objectives achievement. However, operational factors had a minor effect in determining the research and development succession. The most influencing for organizational culture has come from strategic and tactical factors which enhanced the successor state of research and development projects (i.e. achieving cost and timeline of projects). Finally, the moderating effect of organizational culture in achieving the cost, timeline and objectives achievement of projects were mainly via strategic, and tactical factors. Limitations: This study was conducted in public organizations in Abu Dhabi among 300 participants only. For this reason, the results cannot be generalized to other contexts. Originally/Value: This study contributes to the literature by providing an insight into the factors that make research and development projects successful. There is a gap in the literature with regard to evaluating such a model, and this study explored the factors that make the research and development projects successful from the perspective of employees. These factors are strategic factors, i.e. its goal and the relevance of its content and material to the success of research and development projects. The tactical factors, and the operational factors. This study looked at research and development projects success from three different factors (i.e. Cost achievement, timeline achievement, and objectives achievement). This study looked at the effect of the organizational culture as the mediator factor for the relationship between strategic factors, tactical factors, and operational factors with cost, timeline, and objectives achievement. As well as, this study looked at the effect of the critical success factors on research and development success projects