The relationship between conflict management style and construction project effectiveness

This thesis explores the conflict handling behaviours of Client and Contractor construction professionals executing construction project for the General Directorate of Military works at the Ministry of Defence and Aviation (GDMW/MODA) in the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. The five examined behaviours are integrating, avoiding, compromising, dominating and obliging. Two hundred thirty-three construction professionals were surveyed. The data covered professionals' backgrounds and perceptions of effective conflict management styles, project nature, conflict intensity, and sources of significant conflicts. The analysis focused upon respondents' assessment of effective conflict handling behaviour and sources of significant conflict. The research results indicate that an integrating style followed by compromising style were preferred methods of handling conflict. The least frequently used styles were avoiding and obliging. The most frequent sources of significant conflicts were project specifications followed by contract conditions, while project costs and staff were the least frequent sources of significant conflicts. In the thesis, the relationship between project managers' integrating conflict management style and construction project effectiveness was tested through the analysis of structured interviews with 70 project managers executing 35 current publicly funded building construction projects. The thesis discovered a relationship between project managers' usage of integrating conflict.