Influence of Risk Management on Performance of Government Construction Projects in Kenya

Abstract

Kenya has witnessed a surge in the number of capital-intensive projects being implemented by the Government. There is therefore a need to ensure that these government projects succeed in order to realise the country's dream of transforming Kenya into a newly industrializing middle-income nation providing a high quality of life to all its citizens by the year 2030.However, the performance of government Projects in Kenya has not been wholly successful due to the experienced delays and cost overruns amongst other uncertainties. Risk management is justified in almost all projects. If risk management is set up as a continuous disciplined process of planning, budgeting, cost control, quality and scheduling, surprises that become problems in projects will be diminished because the emphasis will be on proactive rather than reactive management of projects. The specific objective was to establish the influence of risk management on the performance of government construction projects in Kenya. The study adopted a descriptive research design and used simple random sampling to select a sample from the registered Architects/projects managers practicing in Nairobi Kenya and involved with government projects. The unit of analysis therefore was government construction projects while unit of observation was 728 Registered Architects/projects managers within Nairobi. A sample size of 251 was used. The study generated both qualitative and quantitative data. Data was collected using questionnaires and analysed using SPSS. The study results show that risk management statistically significantly influences the performance of government construction projects in Kenya.