Identifying the critical success factors for relationship management in PPP projects

• PPP practitioners currently lack a general understanding of RM.
• RM is important to improve the performance and business opportunities of PPPs.
• Top four CSFs for RM are identified through questionnaire survey.
• The commitment from senior management is the most difficult factor to improve.

The longer the contract period, the higher the chance that major changes will arise. Thus a greater reliance on the established relationships is needed to maintain the contractual bond in PPP project. Relationship management (RM) can therefore be expected to be even more valuable in the PPP context. This paper aims to investigate current perceptions and experiences of RM in PPP projects and more importantly, to identify the CSFs for RM in PPP projects. By means of an empirical questionnaire survey geared towards PPP practitioners with direct hands-on experience, the opinions were solicited, analyzed and compared in relation to potential PPP RM success factors. The survey findings indicate that industry practitioners currently lack a general understanding of concepts and applications of RM, given that it is relatively new in PPP. However, they do think that RM is very important to improve the present performance of PPPs. Future PPP business opportunities can also be increased by effective RM. The top four CSFs for RM are found to be commitment of senior executives, defining the objectives, integration of the different divisions and a multidisciplinary team. However, the relative importance presently assigned for each of the above factors is insufficient, and commitment from senior management is perceived as the most difficult factor to improve.