Investigation of Risk Management in Iranian Construction Industry

ABSTRACT: In recent years, managing risk in construction projects has been extremely examined in the field of project management. Many industries established their risk management approaches in order to enhance performance and benefit from advantages. But still structured approaches and methods are not commonly used and also absence of knowledge is another issue, which must be considered to managing risk. In this thesis, Iranian construction industry was selected as the case study in order to investigate how risk management is perceived and practiced in this specific area. Implementation of risk management in construction projects is thus presented in this study. A questionnaire survey was administered among a number of construction companies. Probability and impact matrices were calculated for identifying potential risks and also analyzing them respectively as qualitative technique. As a result twenty-three potential risks were found and apart from political issues and international sanctions, those risks are mostly related to the individuals and lack of sufficient experience in a field of risk management. Similar to previous studies, this research shows that Iranian companies most commonly use past experience, discussions, checklists and brainstorming to identify potential risks. However, they still use those methods for risk assessment rather than formal ones like qualitative or quantitative techniques and that is because of lack of education and training. At the end obstacles and drives for effective risk management are focused upon. Keywords: Iranian construction industry, Qualitative method, Risk, Risk management process. …………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………