Transferring projects to their final users: The effect of planning and preparations for commissioning on project success

This paper examines the relationship between planning and preparing the project for transfer to its final users and project success. Four planning and preparation aspects are considered (development of operational & maintenance requirements, customer participation in the development process, developer's preparations for turning over the project to its final users, and final user preparations for introduction into operational use), along with three measures of project success (project efficiency, customer benefits, and overall success). The study is based on data from 110 defense projects performed in Israel and includes regression and correlation analysis between the two sets of variables. The findings suggest that customer participation in the development process and final user preparations have the highest impact on project success. Customer participation in the development process is highly correlated with project efficiency (0.45), while final user preparations are highly correlated with customer benefits (0.46).