eThesis - School of Business electronic theses

Objectives  of  the  study:

The  main  objective  of  this  study  is  to  improve  IS  project  risk  management  understanding  by   testing  existing  theories  in  real  case  context.  The  study  focuses  on  the  risk  identification  phase  in   the  beginning  of  a  case  project.  It  compares  the  risks  that  have  been  identified  by  the  project   organization  with  the  risk  identification  frameworks  from  the  literature.  The  secondary  objective  is   to  develop  chosen  theories  using  the  results  from  analysis  and  provide  a  risk  identification      

Theoretical  background  and  methodology:       Theoretical  background  of  this  study  is  in  IS  project  and  ISM  risk  management  studies.  The   literature  review  focuses  on  the  different  IS  risk  management  research  streams  and  concludes  with   the  three  different  risk  identification  frameworks  that  were  chosen  to  be  tested  in  case  project?s   context.  Study  is  conducted  as  a  qualitative  single  case  study.  The  case  material  includes  22   interviews  that  were  conducted  by  Riitta  Hekkala  as  part  of  her  research  to  understand  IS  project   issues  better.  These  22  interviews  are  comprehensive:  they  cover  the  whole  project  organization   and  they  took  place  in  the  spring  of  2013,  at  the  beginning  the  implementation  phase.      

Findings  and  conclusions:   The  main  finding  of  this  study  is  that  the  risks  that  were  identified  from  case  material  do  not  differ   much  from  the  tested  frameworks.  However  the  case  material  and  theories  emphasize  different   risks  in  a  very  different  manner.  The  case  material  is  focused  on  the  risks  that  are  related  to   relationships  and  cooperation,  whereas  in  the  chosen  risk  identification  frameworks,  different   aspects  of  risks  are  more  evenly  divided.  The  literature  has  a  very  comprehensive  view  on  possible   risk  factors  that  IS  project  faces,  but  understanding  of  cooperation  and  relationship  related  issues   needs  to  be  improved.    Especially  when  it  comes  to  complex  projects  such  as  the  case  project   where  the  number  of  involved  organizations  and  personnel  is  high  and  level  of  structure  is  low.