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Owing to inadequate implementations of project management (PM) procedures and processes, many large information technology systems (ITS) projects failed to deliver its promises. Also, many of the failures in the implementation of large ITS projects around the world have been attributed to inadequate PM action. This criticism encompasses e-government project initiatives which have attempted ambitious program change, major innovations, large transformations, enterprise wide solutions, collaboration across organisations, governments and private sectors, and the implementation of unprecedented (or ambitious) solutions. The purpose of this paper is to examine these issues. This paper forms part of an ongoing research of a PhD degree to describe, critically evaluate and examine the underlying barriers and challenges in large e-government initiatives. Also, this paper examines change in organisations due to the change in the global economy and global information society as new technology is changing the nature of work. It identifies and examines the current and foreseeing problems with large e-government projects and describes how a sociotechnical approach which takes into account, technical, business, citizen, economic needs in the creation of a sociotechnical ITS for future citizens. In addition, the paper offers a technology-enabled enhancement to the project-initiation phase, the area identified as being particularly weak and inadequate in addressing initial requirements of e-government initiatives. The paper proposes that technology can be incorporated into the professional practice of PM. It can also be a part of a passable solution as opposed to being distinct and separate from it. The PM supporting tools, as opposed to merely reporting actual versus plans have to increase the novelty (art and science) of PM through human interaction, empower the project manager and in aiding his capacity in delivering the expected outcomes. The paper demonstrates the value of effective project managers within the wider context of PM in transformational e-government initiatives. It believes that this research will have an impact on three important areas, namely project management practice (PMC), e-government projects and the transformation process of large projects in the public sector. This paper is about changing culture and practice of PMC in handling and managing large projects when different parties involve including outsourcing. This paper investigates and addresses, not only the transformation process of e-government projects, but also, the transformation of PM professional culture (i.e. PMC) that delivers and works. This research paper contributes to the existing literature of PM of large e-government transformational processes. The paper addresses a number of e-government challenges, by critically analysing and summarising a list of e-government challenges and barriers arising from an e-government survey administered on behalf of the World Information Technology and Services Alliance which represents the national technology associations in 70 countries. It compares these challenges to the project management body of knowledge (PMBOK), which is the North American standard in PM methodology. Also, it highlights the weaknesses in PMBOK to address these challenges and offers a technology-enabled enhancement to the project-initiation phase. This is the strength of this paper.

Purpose – While few recent studies have paid attention to the relationship between organizational culture (OC) and individual readiness for change (IRFC), there is still a lack of systematic and empirical studies regarding the influence of all OC types on the IRFC components within the change management literature. This study aims to fill this gap in the literature by empirically examining the influence of all four organizational culture types of the competing values framework (CVF) on the components of IRFC regarding TQM implementation, within the context of manufacturing organizations operating in Syria. Design/methodology/approach – A total of four hypotheses were proposed for testing. A questionnaire was developed and distributed to 350 Syrian manufacturing organizations (SMOs) in order to measure the level of IRFC and to identify the cultural profiles and characteristics of these organizations. Findings – The analysis of the data collected shows that certain types of organizational culture are conducive to fostering IRFC. In particular, the findings of an empirical investigation revealed that group culture and adhocracy culture are the most supportive culture types for IRFC. Originality/value – This paper contributes to the existing literature of change management by providing empirical evidence leading to advancement of knowledge and the understanding of the relationship between OC types and IRFC components. Furthermore, the paper adds value via its contextual originality; being the first study that empirically examined the Syrian cultural context, and hence contributing to the scarce body of literature of both OC and IRFC, and in particular the developing countries.

Purpose - The purpose of this paper is to discuss in depth the factors that lead to misalignment between the project management (PM) and the business strategy by investigating four case studies in the telecommunications industry in Saudi Arabia. Design/methodology/approach - Due to the limited research on the subject of the alignment of PM and business strategy, the methodology used in this research was a case study in depth interview. Findings - The paper highlights the important factors that affect the process of aligning the PM to the business strategy. The companies that have strong alignment between the business strategy and the PM show successful projects outcome while the companies that have mismatch alignment show less successful projects outcome. Research limitations/implications - The paper has investigated four telecommunications companies only. However, more companies will be better to compare the finding. Due to time constrains, the research has studied one project in each company. Each project was supporting one of the company's business strategies. More projects and business strategies will lead to clear picture of the alignment. Access to executives' managers and CIO's was difficult. Several meetings were cancelled without short notice. Practical implications - This paper helps the companies to implement their business strategies with embedding their projects in the overall strategy. Also, helps the PM team to execute the projects in a strategic way. Originality/value - This paper contributes to the literature with a clear explanation of the concept of the alignment and provides a framework to ensure the alignment between the large PM process and the business strategy is achieved.

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to discuss in depth the factors that lead to misalignment between the project management (PM) and the business strategy by investigating four case studies in the telecommunications industry in Saudi Arabia. Design/methodology/approach – Due to the limited research on the subject of the alignment of PM and business strategy, the methodology used in this research was a case study in depth interview. Findings – The paper highlights the important factors that affect the process of aligning the PM to the business strategy. The companies that have strong alignment between the business strategy and the PM show successful projects outcome while the companies that have mismatch alignment show less successful projects outcome. Research limitations/implications – The paper has investigated four telecommunications companies only. However, more companies will be better to compare the finding. Due to time constrains, the research has studied one project in each company. Each project was supporting one of the company's business strategies. More projects and business strategies will lead to clear picture of the alignment. Access to executives’ managers and CIO's was difficult. Several meetings were cancelled without short notice. Practical implications – This paper helps the companies to implement their business strategies with embedding their projects in the overall strategy. Also, helps the PM team to execute the projects in a strategic way. Originality/value – This paper contributes to the literature with a clear explanation of the concept of the alignment and provides a framework to ensure the alignment between the large PM process and the business strategy is achieved.

Purpose - Owing to inadequate implementations of project management (PM) procedures and processes, many large information technology systems (ITS) projects failed to deliver its promises. Also, many of the failures in the implementation of large ITS projects around the world have been attributed to inadequate PM action. This criticism encompasses e-government project initiatives which have attempted ambitious program change, major innovations, large transformations, enterprise wide solutions, collaboration across organisations, governments and private sectors, and the implementation of unprecedented (or ambitious) solutions. The purpose of this paper is to examine these issues.Design methodology approach - This paper forms part of an ongoing research of a PhD degree to describe, critically evaluate and examine the underlying barriers and challenges in large e-government initiatives. Also, this paper examines change in organisations due to the change in the global economy and global information society as new technology is changing the nature of work. It identifies and examines the current and foreseeing problems with large e-government projects and describes how a sociotechnical approach which takes into account, technical, business, citizen, economic needs in the creation of a sociotechnical ITS for future citizens. In addition, the paper offers a technology-enabled enhancement to the project-initiation phase, the area identified as being particularly weak and inadequate in addressing initial requirements of e-government initiatives.Findings - The paper proposes that technology can be incorporated into the professional practice of PM. It can also be a part of a passable solution as opposed to being distinct and separate from it. The PM supporting tools, as opposed to merely reporting actual versus plans have to increase the novelty (art and science) of PM through human interaction, empower the project manager and in aiding his capacity in delivering the expected outcomes.Social implications - The paper demonstrates the value of effective project managers within the wider context of PM in transformational e-government initiatives. It believes that this research will have an impact on three important areas, namely project management practice (PMC), e-government projects and the transformation process of large projects in the public sector. This paper is about changing culture and practice of PMC in handling and managing large projects when different parties involve including outsourcing. This paper investigates and addresses, not only the transformation process of e-government projects, but also, the transformation of PM professional culture (i.e. PMC) that delivers and works.Originality value - This research paper contributes to the existing literature of PM of large e-government transformational processes. The paper addresses a number of e-government challenges, by critically analysing and summarising a list of e-government challenges and barriers arising from an e-government survey administered on behalf of the World Information Technology and Services Alliance which represents the national technology associations in 70 countries. It compares these challenges to the project management body of knowledge (PMBOK), which is the North American standard in PM methodology. Also, it highlights the weaknesses in PMBOK to address these challenges and offers a technology-enabled enhancement to the project-initiation phase. This is the strength of this paper.

Our work will be mainly concerned with improving the crucial first stage (the requirements stage) of any system development methodology in order to improve requirements. A framework has been developed, called \"knowledge requirements framework (KRF)\" to help customers and system developers bridge the knowledge and understanding gaps at the initial requirements stage of the Information Technology System (ITS) development process. Unclear business requirements, mismatch of knowledge and understanding are among the major factors that contributes to some ITS failures worldwide. The aim is to capture functional requirements at the initial stage of the system development process and to integrate systems and people use them in the development process. Multi-surveys are conducted, capture and highlight the criteria of initial requirements exactness and executability. Knowledge and understanding gaps, which occur in the development process, are described. These gaps constitute the problem at the invisible architecture in the initial requirements stage, as they expose mismatch of both knowledge and understanding problems (Requirements/Specifications). A notation to describe this framework is elaborated, novel techniques and tools for the construction and application of customer requirements in systems development are developed and used in KRF to facilitate bridging these gaps. The resulting prototype KRF is developed and used against some example problems in retail organisations, and so shown to be sufficient in principle of handling all the negotiation problems at the initial requirements stage, singly and in combination. Also, it is shown how KRF sub-process can be combined and used to elicit information and knowledge mining between both the customer and the system developer using human communication and interaction capture as an example. Systems these days are living systems, changeable, in business and the human factor in developing them cannot be excluded. It is further shown how these techniques and tools can be augmented with established methodologies rather than inventing new ones and to enable management to react as quickly as possible to global changing market conditions. This proposed framework is also evaluated and tested against the original criteria of initial requirements, exactness and executability.