Management competence and successful completion of projects in Rwanda A case study of Pepaps project in Huye district

Abstract

The Government of Rwanda outlines its vision for the development of the country in "Vision 2020," which elaborates the economic goals the Government aims to achieve. One of the major themes that lies at the heart of the vision is the refurbishment and development of Rwanda‘s core infrastructure projects. World Bank and other development partners have also supported the country by committing large sums of money in infrastructure. Despite the importance of infrastructure and the billions of dollars committed to it, only few projects were successfully completed. The purpose of the present study is to investigate the management competence influencing successful completion of infrastructure projects in Rwanda: A case study of PEPAPS project in Huye District. The study then sought to address the following objectives; determine the role of the management on successful completion of project, examine the relationship between managerial styles and successful completion, and investigate the challenges during the implementation and to analyse the success criteria for PEPAPS project. The study is significant to the project management practitioners who will benefit from this work as it contributes to the body of knowledge. Project management professionals will also appreciate the need to see their profession from the broader view of adapting their expertise to every field of endeavour since all projects are dynamically affected by varying factors depending on the type of projects. The study was designed that both quantitative and qualitative data were collected by the use of the questionnaire and interview to generate respectively quantitative and qualitative data to analyse and understand the relationships between the variables. The target population was 150 from the management staff and the employees of PEPAPS project. The sample population was 45. Data analysis was done by the use of SPSS software for quantitative data and content analysis for qualitative data to analyse opinions, perceptions and views. The instruments used to collect the data helped to reach the following findings: as per Table 4.14, 51.2% of the respondents ascertained the role of the top management to be high in successful completion of PEPAPS project; also 37.2% ranked that role of management to be was very high. The role of the management was also viewed from the attainment of meeting the objectives of the project as per the findings presented in Figure 4. 20 as confirmed by 65.1% of the respondents. Henceforth, the relationship between managerial styles and projects successfully completed was found as per the findings indicated in Figure 4. 28 where 40% and 46% of the participants confirmed respectively that the participative style used was excellent and good. Then, the study findings highlighted some challenges in the course of project; such as political challenges replied by 53.5% of the respondents; cultural challenges by 27.9% and stakeholder challenges as said 18.6% as shown in Table 4.20. Therefore, to keep and enhance the project management process; all project stakeholders, namely government agencies, development partners should set up supervision mechanisms to ensure effective project implementation.