Exploring the impact of stakeholder management strategies on managing issues in PPP projects

Public Private Partnerships (PPPs) involve many stakeholders whose individual interests may not be in agreement, leading to conflicting objectives. In such situations, stakeholder management (SM) can play a decisive role in project success. To understand the pre-emptive SM strategies and their links in managing the issues in PPP projects, a hierarchical conceptual model was established. The developed theorical model proposed that suitable SM strategies would help to manage the prevailing issues in PPP projects. Using a Structural Equation Modelling technique, 34 SM strategies and 12 SM-related issues are explored. The results confirm that the stakeholder engagement related strategies are a key to manage the issues in PPP projects. Further, stakeholder monitoring has a positive and significant relationship with PPP management issues, suggesting that more the stakeholder monitoring might lead to more issues. The findings confirm the importance of stakeholder engagement in mitigating the issues in PPP projects and its related strategies. Further studies are recommended to explore the reasons behind the positive relationship between stakeholder monitoring and the issues in PPP projects.