Investigating Critical Factors for Project Success and the Impact of Certification/Training: The United Nations Context

This paper investigates via a survey methodology, project critical success factors (CSFs) of a UN organization as perceived by computer and information technology trained and certified professionals. James Wan and Raafat Saade adopt their CSFs from three seminal studies done at different times. They provide a critical analysis of those factors for the 21st century United Nations context facing today an increasing need for agility in a fast-changing global environment. The authors investigate project CSFs in this study with two goals in mind: Firstly, to test the applicability of well-studied CSFs in the United Nations context, and secondly, to assess the influence of certification/training on these factors. Results show that 5 out of 13 factors differ in the United Nation's context and that certification is not perceived as important while training is. Results are discussed bringing forth insights into the nature of UN-type organization project management. Results have shown that close to 40% of the CSFs previously studied do not apply to the United Nations context. At the same time, correlation analysis shows that training in project management knowledge areas are more important that actual certification.