Zidane & Andersen - The Top 10 Universal Delay Factors in Construction Projects

International Journal of Managing Projects in Business
The top 10 universal delay factors in construction projects

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Top 10
The top 10 universal delay factors universal
in construction projects delay factors
Youcef J.-T. Zidane

Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering,
Norges teknisk-naturvitenskapelige universitet, Trondheim, Norway, and
Bjorn Andersen Received 29 May 2017
Department of Production and Quality Technology, Revised 23 November 2017
Accepted 29 November 2017
Norges teknisk-naturvitenskapelige universitet, Trondheim, Norway
Abstract
Purpose – Projects often face delays and unnecessary use of time due to various factors and reasons, and
hence suffer from unfavourable consequences. The purpose of this paper is to identify the universal delay
factors from an intensive literature review, complemented by delay factors in major Norwegian construction
projects based on empirical data.
Design/methodology/approach – The study in which this paper is based includes an intensive literature
review, and semi-quantitative open survey questionnaires. This paper addresses frequency and type of delay
factors in construction projects, in Norway based on the survey, and worldwide based on the previous studies.
Findings – From the study, the causes of delays facing the Norwegian construction industry are: poor
planning and scheduling; slow/poor decision-making process; internal administrative procedures and
bureaucracy within project organisations; resources shortage (human resources, machinery, equipment);
poor communication and coordination between parties; slow quality inspection process of the completed
work; design changes during construction/change orders; sponsor/owner/client lack of commitment and/or
clear demands (goals and objectives); late/slow/incomplete/improper design; office issues; and users’ issues.
And the top 10 universal delay factors are: design changes during construction/change orders; delays in
payment of contractor(s); poor planning and scheduling; poor site management and supervision; incomplete
or improper design; inadequate contractor experience/building methods and approaches; contractor’s
financial difficulties; sponsor/owner/client’s financial difficulties; resources shortage (human resources,
machinery, equipment); and poor labour productivity and shortage of skills.
Research limitations/implications – When it comes to the identification of delay factors in major
Norwegian projects, the research is based on a sample of 202 respondents from an open survey questionnaire.
It should be noted that analysing a large population of respondents that have been asked open questions can be
challenging due to the vague findings it might lead to. Also, when it comes to the identification of the universal
delay factors, there were different methods used by different authors, within different context. Similar future
studies in Norway based on qualitative and quantitative methods will give better verification for the findings.
Practical implications – This paper has documented the critical delay factors/causes in Norway.
The results of this study will help project managers, in Norway and elsewhere, to be aware and know about
the potential causes of delay in their construction projects, which will help to identify the possible risks in the
early phases of the project. Another practical implication is to make project managers and policy makers
conscious that delays are quite universal, making it necessary to identify them as a first step.
Social implications – The identification of delays factors and causes can permit projects to implement
mitigation actions to avoid delays, thus allowing delivering schools, hospitals and other necessary
infrastructure on schedule or ahead of schedule to society.
Originality/value – This paper highlights most (almost all) of the studies in the literature, including to the
study done in Norway, concerning the delay factors in construction projects and large construction projects in
general. This wide review of relevant literature will save time other academicians from having to conduct
similar studies. This study will assist both academic and professional experts providing more insight about
the delay causes in large-scale construction projects.
Keywords Norway, Construction projects, Delay causes, Delay factors, Top 10, Universal
Paper type Research paper
1. Introduction
The construction industry is one of the major industries which contributes significantly to International Journal of Managing
Projects in Business
the growth and economy of any country. Among the substantial problems in the © Emerald Publishing Limited
1753-8378
construction industry is time overruns. Construction delays play a key role in the success or DOI 10.1108/IJMPB-05-2017-0052
IJMPB failure of a project. There are many factors contributing to delays in construction projects.
Delays occur in most construction projects, and the magnitude of these delays varies
considerably from one project to another. It is essential to define the actual causes of delay in
order to minimise, mitigate, and avoid delay in any construction project. The delay factors
are crucial within a construction project, and it is vital that all organisations have certain
knowledge regarding this issue in order for the project to be completed effectively and
satisfactorily (Wong and Vimonsatit, 2012).
Delay in the construction industry is a “universal” phenomenon, and it has become a typical
part of the project’s construction lifetime (Sambasivan and Soon, 2007; Sweis et al., 2008).
Assaf and Al-Hejji (2006) defined it as “the time overrun either beyond completion date
specified in a contract, or beyond the date that the parties agreed upon for delivery
of a project”. Trauner et al. (2009, p. 25) defined delay in construction projects as: “to make
something happen later than expected; to cause something to be performed later than planned;
or to not act timely. It is what is being delayed that determines if a project or some other
deadline, such as a milestone, will be completed late”.
Most of the construction projects are frequently behind schedule due to various reasons.
Unfortunately, even nowadays, with all the advanced technologies and the good
understanding of project management and engineering techniques, the problem of delays
has not been solved (Sweis et al., 2008; Yang et al., 2013). A study done by Sweis (2013) shows
that 81.5 per cent of construction projects in Jordan experienced delay during the period
1990-1997. According to Assaf and Al-Hejji (2006), 76 per cent of the contractors indicated that
the average time overrun is between 10 and 30 per cent of the original planned duration, while
about 56 per cent of the consultants specified the same percentage. In addition, a study from
Faridi and El-Sayegh (2006) revealed that 50 per cent of the construction projects in the UAE
encounter delays and they were not completed on time. Similar research investigated the delay
factors and their effects in the literature from a total of 45 countries worldwide.
Over the last 40 years, significant attention has been paid to identify possible causes of delays
(Yang et al., 2013). To identify these causes, some authors (e.g. Doloi, Sawhney and Rentala, 2012;
Kazaz et al., 2012; Sambasivan and Soon, 2007; Assaf and Al-Hejji, 2006; Faridi and
El-Sayegh, 2006; Chan and Kumaraswamy, 1997; Chan and Kumaraswamy, 1995) have used
semi-quantitative methods like surveys and questionnaires, whilst others like Asnaashari et al.
(2009) have employed purely qualitative methods like interviews to identify causes.
This paper aims to highlight the theories around delay factors in construction projects in
general; among all considerations, we particularly included the delay factors in the
Norwegian construction projects based on an empirical study. Therefore, the research
questions covered in this paper are:
RQ1. What are the delay factors in major Norwegian projects based on an empirical study?
RQ2. What are the top 10 delay factors for each study done in 45 countries worldwide?
RQ3. What are the top 10 universal delay factors based on 46 countries and 103 studies?
This study represents a compilation of the multiple studies done in different countries
worldwide about the causes of, or factors in, construction delays. Few studies have been
done in Europe, and thus we hope this tiny work will also contribute to a better
understanding of time and flow problems in projects, since we contributed in this paper also
by an empirical study regarding delay factors in Norway.
2. Literature review
2.1 Delay in construction projects
According to Al-Khalil and Al-Ghafly (1999), delays can undesirably effect project
stakeholders. To the client, delays can be perceived as implying loss of revenue due to a lack
of rentable space or a lack of production facilities. On the other hand, to the contractor, Top 10
delays can mean higher overhead costs, plus higher material and labour costs, because the universal
project takes longer than was planned. The possibility of delivering projects on time can be delay factors
marked as an indicator of efficiency, but the construction activities involve many
unpredictable factors and variables which arise from various sources (Assaf and Al-Hejji,
2006). These variables may include environmental circumstances, availability of resources,
stakeholders’ performance, and contractual relations. Nevertheless, Trauner et al. (2009)
stated that a construction project is hardly ever finished within the planned time.
Projects running behind schedule may serve as an indicator of poor productivity and
bad project performance (Ramanathan et al., 2012). Any delay in a project may lead to
cost and time overruns, and these two are often related (Sambasivan and Soon, 2007).
Delays can also cause increased cost, plus loss of competitive advantage and market
share. Additional costs may be incurred through disputes and claims between involved
parties (Odeh and Battaineh, 2002). When projects are delayed, they are either extended or
accelerated, and therefore incur additional costs. It is common practice to keep a
percentage of the estimated project cost as a contingency allowance in the contract price
(Ramanathan et al., 2012). For the project owner, delays may lead to a loss of revenue
through the lack of production facilities, rentable space, or shortcomings with present
facilities. For the contractor, delays may result in cost overruns due to the longer period
of project work, penalties incurred, and higher material and labour costs (Assaf and
Al-Hejji, 2006; Khoshgoftar et al., 2010).
2.2 Existing studies about delay factors by countries

Many studies have been carried out worldwide to determine the delay factors in
construction projects. From the existing studies, we found 104 articles covering 45 countries
worldwide; Table I summarises the existing studies based on countries and authors.
Sambasivan and Soon (2007) have identified the ten most important causes of delay in
Malaysia through a questionnaire survey. The questionnaire survey was carried out with
clients, consultants, and contractors. A similar study in Malaysia was carried out by
Alaghbari et al. (2007), resulting in a list of 31 delay factors. Al-Momani (2000), in a research
on construction delays in 130 public projects in Jordan, found that weather, site conditions,
late deliveries, economic conditions, and an increase in quantity are the critical factors which
cause construction delays in the Jordanian construction industry.
The study of Abd El-Razek et al. (2008) was carried out to determine the causes of delay
in building construction projects in Egypt. A questionnaire survey was carried out to
confirm the causes and identify the most important delay factors. Based on the survey
results, the top 5 delay causes were: financing by contractor during construction, delays in
contractors’ payment by owner, design changes by owner or his agent during construction,
partial payments during construction, and non-utilisation of professional construction
management. Sweis et al. (2008), in a similar study carried out in Egypt, also concluded that
financial difficulties faced by the contractor, and too many change orders by the owner, are
the leading causes of construction delay. Both research outcomes showed that financial
difficulties were important factors causing delays in Egypt.
Based on all the studies, we counted the highest number (by study and separately) of
delay factors/causes for each country and presented them in Figure 1.
Most authors agree that delay is an inherent risk in most project work, and that it should
be addressed in a similar fashion to other risks. Generally, risks can be managed, shared,
minimised, or accepted, but overall, they must not be ignored (Asnaashari et al., 2009).
More specifically, the risk of delays can only be minimised when the causes are recognised,
and actions required to prevent delays are implemented (Yang et al., 2013; Pourrostam and
Ismail, 2011).
IJMPB Country Authors
Afghanistan Gidado and Niazai (2012)

Australia Wong and Vimonsatit (2012)
Bangladesh Rahman et al. (2014)

Benin Akogbe et al. (2013)
Botswana Adeyemi and Masalila (2016)
Burkina Faso Bagaya and Song (2016)
Cambodia Durdyev et al. (2017), Santoso and Soeng (2016)
Egypt Aziz and Abdel-Hakam (2016), Marzouk and El-Rasas (2014), Ezeldin and Abdel-Ghany (2013),
Aziz (2013), Abd El-Razek et al. (2008)
Ethiopia Zewdu (2016)
Ghana Amoatey et al. (2015), Fugar and Agyakwah-Baah (2010), Frimpong et al. (2003), Frimpong and
Oluyowe (2003)
Hong Kong Lo et al. (2006)
India Doloi, Sawhney and Iyer (2012), Doloi, Sawhney and Rentala (2012)
Indonesia Alwi and Hampson (2003), Kaming et al. (1997)
Iran Saeb et al. (2016), Abbasnejad and Izadi Moud (2013), Fallahnejad (2013), Pourrostam and
Ismail (2011, 2012), Khoshgoftar et al. (2010)
Iraq Bekr (2015)
Jordan Sweis (2013), Sweis et al. (2008), Odeh and Battaineh (2002), Al-Momani (2000)
Kenya Seboru (2015)
Kuwait Koushki et al. (2005)
Lebanon Mezher and Tawil (1998)
Libya Shebob et al. (2011), Tumi et al. (2009)
Malawi Kamanga and Steyn (2013)
Malaysia Mydin et al. (2014), Tawil et al. (2013), Alaghbari et al. (2007), Sambasivan and Soon (2007),
Abdul-Rahman et al. (2006)
Nigeria Akinsiku and Akinsulire (2012), Aibinu and Odeyinka (2006), Omoregie and Radford (2006),
Odeyinka and Yusif (1997), Mansfield et al. (1994), Dlakwa and Culpin (1990), Okpala and
Aniekwu (1988)
Oman Ruqaishi and Bashir (2013)
Pakistan Gardezi et al. (2014), Rahsid et al. (2013), Haseeb, Lu, Bibi, Dyian and Rabbain (2011), Haseeb,
Lu, Hoosen and Rabbani (2011)
Palestine Mahamid (2013), Mahamid et al. (2012), Enshassi et al. (2009)
Portugal Arantes et al. (2015), Couto and Teixeria (2007)
Qatar Gündüz and AbuHassan (2016), Emam et al. (2015)
Rwanda Amandin and Kule (2016)
Saudi Elawi et al. (2015), Al-Kharashi and Skitmore (2009), Assaf and Al-Hejji (2006), Al-Khalil and
Arabia Al-Ghafly (1999)
Singapore Hwang et al. (2013), Ayudhya (2011)
South Africa Oshungade and Kruger (2017), Aiyetan et al. (2011), Baloyi and Bekker (2011)
South Korea Acharya et al. (2006)
Syria Ahmed et al. (2014)
Taiwan Yang et al. (2010, 2013), Yang and Wei (2010)
Tanzania Kikwasi (2013)
Thailand Toor and Ogunlana (2010), Ogunlana et al. (1996)
Turkey Gündüz et al. (2013a, b), Kazaz et al. (2012), Arditi et al. (1985)
UAE Motaleb and Kishk (2013), Ren et al. (2008), Faridi and El-Sayegh (2006), Zaneldin (2006)
Uganda Muhwezi et al. (2014), Alinaitwe et al. (2013)
UK Elhag and Boussabaine (1999), Nkado (1995)
USA Tafazzoli (2017), Ahmed, Azhar, Castillo and Kappagantula (2003), Ahmed, Azhar,
Table I. Kappagntula and Gollapudil (2003)
Countries and authors Vietnam Kim et al. (2016), Luu et al. (2009, 2015), Le-Hoai et al. (2008)
of the existing studies Zambia Muya et al. (2013), Kaliba et al. (2009)
on delay factors Zimbabwe Nyoni and Bonga (2017)
Construction (General) Construction
Building
Construction
Building
Construction
Building
Building Oil and Gas
Top 10
120
Infrastructure
Road
Infrastructure
113
Infrastructure
Oil and Gas universal
100
99 delay factors
85
83 83
80
80 73 75
72
64 65 64
60
52 50
48 49 48 47 48
45 43 44 44 44 46
41 43 40 42
40 35 35 35 35 33
31 33
28 27 30 28
Figure 1.
25 22 25
21
20
10 The classification of
0 delay factors/causes
by countries and
Afghanistan
Australia
Bangladesh
Benin
Botswana
Burkina Faso
Cambodia
Egypt
Ethiopia
Ghana
Hong Kong
India
Indonesia
Iran
Iraq
Jordan
Kenya
Kuwait
Lebanon
Libya
Malawi
Malaysia
Nigeria
Oman
Pakistan
Palestine
Portugal
Qatar
Rwanda
Saudi Arabia
Singapore
South Africa
South Korea
Syria
Taiwan
Tanzania
Thailand
Turkey
UAE
Uganda
UK
USA
Vietnam
Zambia
Zimbabwe
their numbers
3. Methodology
This study builds on past studies when it comes to the identification of universal delay
factors, by investigating the most important delay factors identified by other researchers
worldwide. For the writing of this paper, we used two main sources of data:
(1) first, findings from semi-quantitative survey questionnaires; and
(2) the second source of data is an intensive systematic literature study.
Thus, we explain each method separately, starting by presenting the data from the survey as
they will be combined with the results from the other studies to identify universal delay factors.
3.1 Survey to identify delay factors in major Norwegian projects

The identification of delay factors in Norwegian projects is based on semi-quantitative
method and using survey questionnaires. The researcher will typically use some kinds of
multiple choice, semi-structured questionnaires, or more open-ended questions where the
respondent can state their own opinion (Kvale et al., 2009; Marshall and Rossman, 1995).
There are two main types of survey: the descriptive survey and the analytical survey
(Kvale et al., 2009; Marshall and Rossman, 1995). Descriptive surveys are concerned with
identifying and counting the frequency of a particular response among the survey group,
as in our case. Analytical surveys are concerned with analysing the relationship between
different elements (variables) in a sample group.
An open questionnaire survey was designed to draw on the work experiences of
practitioners in the construction industry in Norway (see Figure 2). In total, 300 practitioners
from companies involved in an ongoing research project were selected, based on their
having had active involvement in the planning and follow-up of construction projects.
This survey was developed to assess the perceptions of clients, consultants, and contractors
on the relative delay factors in the industry. The types of projects involved are buildings
(hospitals, schools, hotels, offices, facilities, etc.), renewals of existing buildings, and road
and railway projects.
The open questionnaire survey was designed to consist of these main parts:
(1) Background data about the respondents and their company (name of company,
public or private sector, years of project experience, and role in projects).
(2) Delay factors, asking the respondents to name the most important delay factors
from their experiences in the last projects they had been involved in.
We received completed questionnaires from 202 respondents out of 300 participants.
This gives a return rate of approximately 67 per cent. Most of the respondents (53 per cent)
IJMPB
Figure 2.
The survey
questionnaire
have more than ten years of construction industry experience; a further 25 per cent have five
to nine years of experience. Most of the respondents are project managers (54 per cent) and
team members (40 per cent). In total, 60 per cent of the respondents are from public
organisations, and 40 per cent from private companies.
The participants represent clients, owners, sponsors, contractors, subcontractors, and
suppliers. Years of working experience of the participants and their role in the projects play
an important part in answering the survey; by drawing on respondents in all layers of the
construction project, we will have a more complete picture of all the different perspectives of
delay factors.
With the exception of the background data, the questions were formulated as open-ended
questions, allowing the respondents to write their answers in free text. The analysis of the
data was performed through these steps:
(1) Coding the collected data, assigning high-level category labels to all free-text
responses. The categories applied were based on more or less agreed-upon
categories from the extant literature, but creating new categories where factors from
the survey did not fit such pre-existing categories.
(2) First-pass analysis: grouping of identical or near-identical responses and assigning
frequencies of response to each delay factor. The affinity of the factors to the
categories was assessed through parsing the free-text formulations of delay factors,
but ultimately this relied on the researchers’ insight into the topic and ability to
correctly interpret the factors.
(3) Second-pass analysis: grouping-related responses and identifying the dominant Top 10
delay factors. universal
(4) Third-pass analysis: looking for differences in response across project role, length of delay factors
experience, and sector.
Following the analysis of the data collected, the authors grouped commonly identified delay
factors into 11 groups; each group had sub-groups with the same interpretation (e.g. poor
planning and scheduling, which is the sum of the five sub-groups; last minute tasks; unclear
demands from project manager; poor project planning; lack of or no delegation; and
poor project management performance). A similar approach was used on the remedies that
were suggested by the respondents. Finally, the results emerging from our data were
compared with the existing literature to verify whether the identified delay factors are in
accordance with previous findings, or if they supplement them.
When it comes to the validity of the findings, validity refers to whether a research is
really measuring what it claims to be measuring (Saunders et al., 2012). The findings are
based on using a clustering analysis of qualitative survey data, where the study is based on
self-reported perception of delay factors by project parties (namely clients, owners,
sponsors, contractors, subcontractors, suppliers) which tends to vary, and may not always
be reliable. Furthermore, the study did not distinguish between ranking by individual
project parties. However, the findings are consistent with similar studies assessing the
causes of delay in construction projects.
It is important to state that the findings from this survey cannot be generalised, since it
represents reported respondent experiences involved in sample of projects based. It should
be noted that analysing a large population of respondents that have been asked open
questions can be challenging due to the vague findings it might lead to. As shown in
Figure 2, the open question is a single question, which asks about the delay causes in the
last projects that the respondent had been involved in. However, this kind of approach to
collecting data does not permit high validity compared, for example, to semi-structured or
unstructured interviews, where these are conducted carefully and allow the possibility to
clarify the questions and to be able to explore responses and themes from a variety of angels
(Saunders et al., 2012).
3.2 Systematic literature study

According to Petticrew (2001), systematic reviews are not just big literature reviews, but
address specific issues. Being systematic reduces bias in the selection and inclusion of
studies. It is a scientific, replicable, and evidence-based methodology which minimises bias
(Tranfield et al., 2003; Cook et al., 1997).
An intensive literature review was conducted based on more than 500 different sources
in the first iteration. A wide variety of books, journal articles, and professional reports was
considered. Most of the journal articles were found through resources given by the
university database like SCOPUS (Elsevier) and Web of Science (ISI). We extended our
search to the reference lists provided in the search results (reference lists of the relevant
articles). We extended the search using Google Scholar. All countries worldwide and the
authors were considered in this study, without any exception.
Once we selected the most relevant sources (mostly journals articles, where their number
exceeds the 150 articles); we proceeded to extract the top 10 delay factors based on each study.
The results were classified in a table based on the country as the first criterion and the authors
as the second criterion. We excluded studies with weak research methods (i.e. studies where
they presented findings and results without explaining the source, the methods used, or the
context of the study); studies with a low number of respondents (i.e., small samples) or very
small-scale projects were also excluded. Additionally, we excluded the studies where there
IJMPB was no ranking of the delay factors, and the studies where they identified fewer than ten delay
factors (e.g. Chan and Kumaraswamy, 2002). While extracting the delay factor in each study,
we avoided repetitions in listing the factors (e.g. “poor subcontractor performance”,
“late presence of subcontractor on site”, etc., will all be in the category “problems related to
subcontractors”). Or we used similar factors when it may reflect the same meaning between
one study and another (e.g. “complex project seen from contactor perspective”, “inexperienced
contractor”, “poor building methods”, etc., will all be in the category “inadequate contractor
experience/building methods and approaches”). The result of this intensive literature study is
a list of the top 10 delay factors for 45 countries worldwide, where Norway is the 46th in the
list based on the findings presented in this paper. The number of sources and research studies
used is 104 research articles, the 105th article is this study (there are 103 results presented in
the findings section because we grouped Doloi, Sawhney and Iyer (2012) with
Doloi, Sawhney and Rentala (2012), and Ahmed, Azhar, Castillo and Kappagantula (2003)
with Ahmed, Azhar, Kappagntula and Gollapudil (2003), since they presented the same
results and were based on the same research). The number of delay factors which appeared by
repetition is 33 delay factors. To identify the “top ten universal delay factors”, we considered
the frequency of the 33 repeated delay factors in the 103 studies, then based on the original
ranking, we calculated the new universal ranking.
The calculation of the overall ranking index for the 33 delay factors is based on this equation:
10
1 X10 X Ni
ORI ¼ ðN i Þ
F i¼1 i¼1
i
where ORI is the overall ranking index; the number F is the number of rows (the total number of
studies, which is equal to 103); the number i is the actual ranking (from 1 to 10, since all the
rankings are about the top 10); Ni represents the frequency of each rank in one column (e.g. from
the results in Table III. column 1 for the delay factor “sponsor/owner/client’s financial
difficulties”, and for the value of the rank i ¼ 1, we will have N1 ¼ 10; column 8 for the delay
factor “design changes during construction/change of orders”, and for the value of the rank
i ¼ 7, we will have N7 ¼ 12, etc.). The overall ranking is based on the value of the ORI; the higher
the ORI, the better the ranking of the delay factor. We used ORI to distinguish it and avoiding
confusing it with the relative importance index (RII). RII is used to rank the delay factors based
on quantitative survey; many studies used it – e.g., Abd El-Razek et al. (2008).
The results obtained from this intensive literature review cannot be fully generalised,
since it complements previous studies on the same topic done executed different methods
with no normalised unified measure for all of those studies. The data used can be considered
as secondary data, and the problem with secondary data, especially when brought to use
from multiple sources (103 studies in the case of this paper), is the measures used, which do
not quite match each other. This may cause a problem when undertaking the analyses
believing that we have found a direct relation between all the results from previous studies.
Unfortunately, there is no solution to this situation, beyond checking the robustness of the
studies and try to use their classifications and normalise for all of them.
4. Findings
Our findings, as discussed in the methodology chapter, come first from a survey conducted
in Norway, and second, from an intensive literature review.
4.1 Major delay factors in large Norwegian projects

The data collected through the questionnaire surveys from the 202 respondents were analysed
and ranked based on their frequency. This survey presents a total of 44 delay factors,
clustered into 11 major groups of delay factors. Each group has sub-groups which can be Top 10
considered to have corresponding similarities. The major delay factors in the Norwegian universal
construction industry are listed in Table II. delay factors
4.2 The universal delay factors in construction projects

Based on the conducted intensive literature review, the top 10 rankings of construction
delay factors in various countries and based on different studies are summarised in Table
III. The reason why there are 33 delay factors in Table III is because, after extracting the top
10 delay factors in each study (separately), the overall overlapping of all the studies gave
those 33 delay factors. On the other hand, this does not mean that those 33 factors are major
in each country. Ramanathan et al. (2012) proposed that there is no universal root cause.
On the other hand, reviewing the body of literature, factors causing delays in construction
projects are mostly identical across developing countries, but with different rankings in
terms of importance (Toor and Ogunlana, 2008). Analysis from Akogbe et al. (2013) shows
that factors such as the country income and the growth of GDP have a great impact on
project delay; comparisons between developing countries and developed countries show
that financial difficulties are the common factors of delay. Other causes of delay are very
similar for developing countries, and are related to the lack of technology, management,
skills, and competencies of project participants (Akogbe et al., 2013).
Our review of the literature shows that causes of delays differ from one country to
another. The causes of delays may differ because of the different situations present, such as
the environment, working cultures, management style, methods of construction,
geographical condition, stakeholders, government policy, economic situation, availability
of resources, and political situation of the specific country. The different perspectives of
researchers can also affect their views on what factors impact on projects and cause delays
(Yang et al., 2013; Khoshgoftar et al., 2010; Asnaashari et al., 2009). Even within the same
country, the causes of delay may differ from one study to another. At the extreme, it varies
within studies done by similar authors (e.g. Haseeb, Lu, Bibi, Dyian and Rabbain (2011);
Haseeb, Lu, Hoosen and Rabbani (2011).
We emphasise that the number of studies about delay causes is not limited only to those
listed in Table III, but our filters about the choice of the selected studies to include in this
paper resulted in the list as it is given in this paper, the filters were used to reduce the
invalidity of the results.
Another remark is regarding the countries listed in Table III. There was no any filter
regarding the choice of the countries. All the countries were considered without any
exception; of course, the studies still had to meet the conditions listed in the methodology
section of this paper. Someone may notice that the only study done in a European continent
is Portugal, in the study of Arantes et al. (2015), and the one of Couto and Teixeria (2007).
And, of course, the study presented in this paper, which is conducted in Norway.
There are many other studies which are not mentioned in Table III because of the
reasons listed in the methodology section of this paper (related to the validity of the results).
Some authors have studied, for example, the magnitude of construction project delays and
their place within the organisational culture (Arditi et al., 2017). Aibinu and Jagboro (2002)
made an empirical study about the effects of construction delays in project delivery in the
Nigerian construction industry and the possibility of minimising their negative effects.
Some authors have studied construction project delays and the various aspects of
delay analysis methods (Arditi and Pattanakitchamroon, 2006, 2008; Kim et al., 2005;
Shi et al., 2001). Enshassi et al. (2010) studied the causes of variation orders in construction
projects in the Gaza Strip, which they consider to be one of the major delay factors.
The study by Gould (2012) was more about the responsibility of contractors for any delay,
as well as the study done by Keane and Caletka (2015).
IJMPB Delay factors in the Norwegian construction
Ranking Major delay factors (Grouping) Frequency industry
1 Poor planning and scheduling 189 Poor project planning

Last minute tasks

Poor project management performance
Unclear demands from project manager
Lack of or no delegation
2 Slow/poor decision-making process 123 Late decisions
Wrong decisions
Re-play on decisions
3 Internal administrative procedures 109 Administrative demands – hour list – file
and bureaucracy within project list- accountability
organisations Unnecessary or unclear reporting
Search after documents for archives
Annual budgeting – political management
agendas
Administrative systems – access –filing system
4 Resources shortage (human 107 Lack of tools or equipment
resources, machinery, equipment) Lack of personnel
Lack of structured subcontractors
Too many projects
Work load – project management level
Work load – engineering level
Shortage of human resources
Lack of senior/key players
Absence and sickness
5 Poor communication and 103 Poor interdisciplinary communication
coordination between parties Bad or wrong communication (by e-mail,
phone, etc.)
Unstructured colleagues
Unstructured meetings/too many and useless
meetings/irrelevant meetings
6 Slow quality inspection process of the 85 Slow control of production
completed work Slow quality check
Slow internal QA
Slow external QA
7 Design changes during construction/ 60 Unnecessary changes and many change orders
change orders
8 Sponsor/owner/client lack of 51 Unclear demands from client
commitment and/or clear demands Lack of delegation from owner
(goals and objectives) Unclear demands from sponsor/owner
9 Office issues 41 Software troubles
Working conditions
Office noise and disruption
Too much travelling
10 Late/slow/incomplete/improper 29 Poor/incomplete documentation (designs,
design engineering documents)
Missing information or errors in
documentation during construction
Error and mistakes in engineering part
causing changes
Table II. Poor quality in designs and materials causing
The major delay changes
factors in Norwegian 11 User issues 13 Short questions from users
construction projects Late/new demands from users
Top 10
universal
delay factors
and
and
and Song
and
Table III.
Major delay factors
classified by countries,
(continued) then by authors
IJMPB
Table III.
The last row of Table III represents the results of this study based on the major Norwegian
construction industry. Since we had all the top 10 delay factors of 103 studies worldwide
and based on the equation in the methodology section of this paper, we calculated the
“Overall Ranking Index” and the final ranking of the 33 factors is in Table IV.
From Table IV, some of the delay factors, even those with high frequency compared to
the precedent delay factor, are ranked lower (e.g. 6 – “Delays in payment of contractors”,
with a frequency of 61, and 16 – “Poor planning and scheduling”, with a frequency of 64),
and the reason for this is that the calculation of the “Overall Ranking Index” takes into
consideration both the frequency and the original ranking of the delay factor.
5. Analysis and discussion of the results

Comparing the major delay factors in Norwegian construction projects to the delay factors
present in other countries listed in Table III, we found that there is a close similarity in the
overall critical delay factors with the study findings of Al-Kharashi and Skitmore (2009)
Overall Overall
Top 10
Delay factors Frequency ranking index ranking universal
delay factors
8 – design changes during construction/change orders 77 17.7593 1
6 – delays in payment of contractors 62 15.09632 2

16 – poor planning and scheduling 64 12.57883 3
17 – poor site management and supervision 61 9.352581 4
9 – incomplete or improper design 58 9.03697 5
13 – inadequate contractor experience/building methods and approaches 52 7.171937 6
14 – contractors’ financial difficulties 46 7.030791 7
1 – sponsor/owner/client’s financial difficulties 37 6.76337648 8
22 – resources shortage (human resources, machinery, and equipment) 50 6.18566 9
18 – poor labour productivity and shortage of skills 47 5.416879 10
11 – poor contract management/bidding process 44 5.130621 11
21 – shortage of materials 39 4.453988 12
4 – optimism (unrealistic estimation of project duration and cost) 38 3.548336 13
10 – slow quality inspection process of the completed work 41 3.507651 14
15 – poor communication and coordination between parties 37 3.208349 15
5 – slow decision-making process 32 3.044044 16
26 – economic problems (e.g. inflation, fluctuation) 29 2.979215 17
24 – weather condition 30 2.236362 18
7 – late/slow delivery of materials 28 1.814455 19
25 – difficulties in obtaining permits and excessive bureaucracy 21 1.28835 20
20 – problems related to subcontractors 26 1.133318 21
19 – equipment failure/equipment less productive than estimations 22 0.985406 22
23 – unforeseen geological conditions 21 0.8661 23
29 – security and/or unstable political situation 12 0.849653 24
27 – external stakeholders 13 0.52008 25
12 – slow progress/underestimating of deadlines/many projects 15 0.458738 26
3 – site handover/site change 6 0.09473 27
2 – interference by sponsor/owner/client 7 0.093069 28
28 – corruption/fraudulent practices 5 0.082524 29
30 – major forces/Acts of God 4 0.034951 30
33 – sponsor/owner/client lack of commitment/clear demands
(goals and objectives) 2 0.012136 31 Table IV.
31 – internal bureaucracy within project organisations 2 0.008414 32 Ranking of the
32 – office issues (IT troubles, noise and disruption, many useless universal delay
trips, etc.) 1 0.000971 33 factors
done in Saudi Arabia. There were six critical delay factors in common within the list of the
first 10 in both studies. However, the delay factor “Poor planning and scheduling”, which is
number one in this study, was classified among the lowest in their list. Another similarity
was observed to the study of Rahsid et al. (2013) from Pakistan, which showed five similar
delay factors from the top 10 lists in each of the two studies. Again, the number one delay
factor of our study was not in their critical delay factors, however several were, including
the third and the fifth from our study.
Most of the delay factors/causes in Norway are similar to other studies’ results in other
countries. To avoid a lengthy discussion, our comparison is oriented towards the
most critical delay factors of other studies (typically the top 10 major delay factors) of
other similar studies. The similar delay factors are discussed in relation to our findings
as follows:
(1) “Poor planning and scheduling”, this is cited in the top 10 critical delay factors
in 64 studies and classified number one in six studies, which are: Adeyemi and
Masalila (2016) in Botswana; Sweis et al. (2008) in Jordan; Mezher and Tawil (1998) in
Lebanon; Tumi et al. (2009) in Libya; Alaghbari et al. (2007) in Malaysia; and
Aiyetan et al. (2011) in South Africa.
IJMPB (2) “Slow/poor decision-making process”, listed as one of the top 10 delay factors in
32 studies, where it is number one in three of them. The authors of the studies ranking
it number one are: Ezeldin and Abdel-Ghany (2013); Alwi and Hampson (2003);
and Gündüz and AbuHassan (2016).
(3) “Internal administrative procedures and bureaucracy within project organisations”

appeared as a delay factor in the study done by Abdul-Rahman et al. (2006) in
Malaysia. In their study, this delay factor was ranked 10th on the list. Bureaucracy
was mentioned in many other studies, if not in most of them; however, this referred
to the excessive bureaucracy within the authorities’ administration and difficulties
in obtaining all kinds of permits.
(4) “Resources shortage (human resources, machinery, equipment)”, which is mentioned
in 50 studies as a critical delay factor, and ranked as first delay factor in the three
studies done by Assaf and Al-Hejji (2006); Al-Khalil and Al-Ghafly (1999); and
Baloyi and Bekker (2011).
(5) “Poor communication and coordination between parties” is mentioned in 37 studies
as one of the top 10 critical delay factors, and as the number one delay factor in a
study done by Luu et al. (2015) in Vietnam.
(6) “Slow Quality Inspection process of the completed work” was cited in 41 studies as
top 10 critical delay factors, and as the number one delay factor in the study of
Muhwezi et al. (2014) from Uganda.
(7) “Design changes during construction/change orders” is mentioned in 77 studies,
and classified number one in ten of them (Tafazzoli, 2017; Ahmed et al., 2014;
Yang et al., 2013; Kikwasi, 2013; Motaleb and Kishk, 2013; Muya et al., 2013;
Yang and Wei, 2010; Zaneldin, 2006; Abdul-Rahman et al., 2006; Koushki et al., 2005).
(8) “Sponsor/owner/client lack of commitment and/or clear demands (goals and
objectives)” had appeared in only one previous study, done by Abdul-Rahman et al.
(2006) for the Malaysian construction industry, among the ten first. Here, we should
distinguish between the “lack of commitment” resulting from the conclusion of the
study by Abd El-Razek et al. (2008) and confirmed by Doloi, Sawhney and Iyer
(2012); both considered the lack of commitment as the most critical delay factor.
However, it is probably not justified grouping multiple factors from multiple
stakeholders and considering them all in a single group called “lack of commitment”.
The lack of commitment we mentioned here is more related to the stakeholder
driving the project, i.e., the client.
(9) The “Office issues” delay factor appeared nowhere in all the studies mentioned as a
critical delay factor. Our study regarding the delay in Norway is, therefore, an
exception when it comes to this special critical factor.
(10) “Late/slow/incomplete/improper design”, which is mentioned as top 10 critical
delay factors in 58 studies, and as the number one critical delay factor in the
studies done by Zewdu (2016); Arantes et al. (2015); Couto and Teixeria (2007);
Toor and Ogunlana (2010); Faridi and El-Sayegh (2006); and Elhag and
Boussabaine (1999).
(11) One of the major delay factors appeared only in our study as critical, namely that of
“User issues”; but this only appeared with a small frequency (13 out of 202, and
ranked as the last one, the 11th). This last factor appeared because in some types of
construction projects (e.g. hospitals, office facilities, etc.), the end users are more
concerned about the final delivered product than its sponsor/owner/client.
The number one universal delay factor is “Design changes during construction/change orders”. Top 10
It suggests that the clients are always responsible for delay because of changes during universal
construction. This delay factor appeared in many studies, even those not listed in this paper. delay factors
On the other hand, many studies regarding design changes and change orders show the strong
association between delay factors and causes of changes. However, after slight comparison
between the topics of “Delay factors in construction projects” with “Change causes in
construction projects”, we may have a special reflection. Almost certainly, we will have a feeling
that “delays” and “changes” are generated from the same causes (e.g. the studies where we can
see the strong overlap between the two topics are Wu et al. (2005) and Sun and Meng (2009)).
However, this does not mean equivalence; changes are one of the delay factors, but delays are
not systematically causes of changes. Very few examples of the same causes of changes and
delays from this study compared to Wu et al. (2005) and Sun and Meng (2009) are: slow
decision-making process, unforeseen geological conditions, poor planning and scheduling, poor
site management and supervision, incomplete or improper design, etc.
If we have a close look at the delay factors with a frequency higher than 20, the list of the
23 top critical delay factors may be in any country and any project case; these are standard
and are not tailored to a specific country or a special context. However, regarding the
remaining ten factors, some of them fit only a special context and country (e.g. 29 – “Security
and/or unstable political situation”, and 28 – “Corruption/fraudulent practices”, etc.).
Another observation regards the delay factors with a frequency higher than 30.
These top 16 delay factors may be described as the universal internal delay factors; the
reason behind calling them internal is because the type of the stakeholders behind the origin
of these delay factors are internal to the project (i.e. mostly sponsor/client/owner,
consultants, designers, contractors).
We may say that if the list was extended to the top 20 or 30 delay factors for each study, the
final list would certainly exceed the 33 delay factors. However, the number of studies would be
reduced almost by half, since there were many authors who limited their list to ten delay factors
or slightly higher. As an example, in our survey we generated only 11 delay factors groups.
Based on the literature study, the delays have serious effects on project objectives. Some of
the effects are schedule and cost overrun of the project. It also creates other negative effects,
which even sometimes means abandoning of the project. It should be pointed out that the
next logical step is to identify possible mitigation actions to deal with the identified delay
factors/causes; this will be presented in another paper based on part 2 of the survey.
Most of the studies in Table III give indications how to reduce construction delays. The main
message of all the studies is that all the internal stakeholders of the project should know about
the delays they are causing (sponsor, client, owner, contractor, consultant, subcontractors, etc.).
Thus, having a database of delay causes within each organisation is more than a necessity, this
database should be updated progressively after evaluation of new delay factors/causes, and the
changes of the context, which lead to a change of the root causes of the delays.
6. Conclusion and further research

Delay is one of the risks that any project may face; delays are frequently encountered in
large-scale construction projects in all the countries worldwide.
We investigated the causes of delays facing the Norwegian construction industry.
An open semi-quantitative questionnaire was designed and distributed among the groups
of participants (clients, consultants, contractors, subcontractors, and suppliers). We
identified the following major causes of delay: poor planning and scheduling; slow/poor
decision-making process; internal administrative procedures and bureaucracy within
project organisations; resources shortage (human resources, machinery, equipment); poor
communication and coordination between parties; slow quality inspection process of the
completed work; design changes during construction/change orders; sponsor/owner/client
IJMPB lack of commitment and/or clear demands (goals and objectives); late/slow/incomplete/
improper design; office issues; and users’ issues.
As a second important contribution, we also did an intensive systematic literature study
on the critical universal delay factors based both on our study and on 103 existing studies
that cover 46 countries worldwide. Based on the findings, we ranked the most often cited
delay factors (which total 33 delay factors) and came up with the top 10 universal delay
factors in the construction industry, which are: design changes during construction/change
orders; delays in payment of contractors; poor planning and scheduling; poor site
management and supervision; incomplete or improper design; inadequate contractor
experience/building methods and approaches; contractor’s financial difficulties; sponsor/
owner/client’s financial difficulties; resources shortage (human resources, machinery,
equipment); and poor labour productivity and shortage of skills.
The study in this paper including the intensive literature review related to all the listed
studies show that the factors/causes of delays differ between countries for various reasons
(e.g. project type, project context, political situation, government policy, environment,
working cultures, management style, methods of construction, geographical condition,
stakeholders, the economic situation, perspectives of researchers, etc.). It will be interesting
to check the causes’ roots for delay causes based on those few listed various reasons.
We believe that the results of this study can be of immense help to the practitioners
(sponsors/ owners/clients, contractors, subcontractors, and consultants) and especially to
academics. The practitioners can better understand the dynamics of managing projects and
make efforts to reduce the incidences of delays. The academic researchers can conduct
similar studies in other countries and identify causes delays. As mentioned earlier, some
causes may be unique to certain countries (e.g. security and political stability).
The results of this study will help project managers in Norway to be aware and know
about the potential causes of delay in their construction projects, which will help to identify
the possible risks in the early phases of the project. Another practical implication is to make
project managers and policy makers conscious that delays are universal. The identification
of delays factors and causes will permit seeing their effects and also mitigation actions if
these delays are harmful to the benefits of the society.
Besides the limitations stated in the methodology section, this study did not discuss the
103 different methodologies of the previous completed studies nor try to classify them based
on their robustness to answer the question related to the identification of the delay factors/
causes. Therefore, examination of varies methodologies used in the identification and
classification of delay factors/causes to find the most appropriate methods is a prospective
area for further study. Knowing that the methods used are mostly quantitative, it would be
relevant to apply qualitative methods in some studies.
Based on the results of the survey in Norway, it would be interesting to conduct a
qualitative study based on semi-structured or in-depth interviews with some of the
respondents. The choice of respondents should cover different stakeholders and preferable
from management, since they are those who can see the whole picture of what happened in
their projects. The aim of this would be to confirm the grouping of the delay factors, since
initially the grouping was done by the researchers after analysing the data.
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Corresponding author
Youcef J.-T. Zidane can be contacted at: youcef.zidane@ntnu.no
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International Journal of Managing Projects in Business

The top 10 universal delay factors in construction projects

Youcef J.-T. Zidane, Bjorn Andersen,

*Related content and download information correct at time of download.

Youcef J.-T. Zidane

2.2 Existing studies about delay factors by countries

Afghanistan Gidado and Niazai (2012)

Bangladesh Rahman et al. (2014)

3.1 Survey to identify delay factors in major Norwegian projects

3.2 Systematic literature study

4.1 Major delay factors in large Norwegian projects

4.2 The universal delay factors in construction projects

1 Poor planning and scheduling 189 Poor project planning

Last minute tasks

5. Analysis and discussion of the results

6 – delays in payment of contractors 62 15.09632 2

(3) “Internal administrative procedures and bureaucracy within project organisations”

6. Conclusion and further research

a Korean perspective”, Korean Journal of Construction Engineering and Management, Vol. 7

impacts”, International Conference on Industrial Engineering and Systems Management, IEEE,

(Ed.), Proceedings of the 24th Annual ARCOM Conference, Association of Researchers in

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