| Abstract: | It is imperative that construction projects play vital roles in the improvement of the socio-economic growth of any nation. Conversely, the construction industry frequently encounters problems of delay and cost overrun. These problems are also prevalent in the construction industry of Ethiopia in general, in Oromia in particular. Therefore, this thesis focused on investigating the causes for delay and cost overrun in construction projects of Oromia Water Works Construction Enterprise (OWWCE). Data utilized for the study were both from primary and secondary sources. Data collection method and tools employed for this study were survey questionnaires for gathering data from relevant respondents and observation of the researcher for primary data sources; while review of documents from the archive of OWWCE office for the secondary source. Variables of causes of delay and cost overrun were gathered from literatures for preparing questionnaires that were distributed to respondents so that their responses were captured using likert scale of 1 to 5 response scales. The questionnaires for the data collection from responds were designed such that both variables namely delay and cost overrun had 48 and 37 factors respectively. All technical staffs having experience more than one year were provided questionnaires, that is a total of 33 respondents from OWWCE. In order to carry out reliable analysis, all the distributed questionnaires were collected with 100% response rate. Data analysis was carried out using descriptive statistical technique after entering responses of respondents from questionnaires into SPSS v 20. Cronbach’s alpha coefficient 0.93 was achieved justifying the reliability of the data gathered for further analysis. Relative importance index (RII) was used to rank the factors while severity index (SvI) was used to categorize the factors into severity level (SvL) ranging no severity to extremely high severity to identify the most sever factors of delay and cost overrun in construction projects of Oromia Water Works Construction Enterprise (OWWCE). Accordingly severity index (SvI) of more than 60% was used for selecting sever factors causing delay and cost overrun in OWWCE construction projects. Accordingly the study identified 35 highly sever factors causing delay among which the top five (5) factors were: underestimate project duration during design stage, consultant makes frequent design changes, consultant makes frequent design changes, consultant makes errors in design that is found after commencement of construction process. Similarly the study identified 27 highly sever factors causing cost overrun in OWWCE construction projects among which the top five (5) factors were: underestimate project duration, delay in payment, lack of coordination and communication at design phase, fluctuation in price of raw materials while significant effects of the two issues were inability to deliver value for money, inability to secure project finance or securing it at higher costs due to added risks arising from bad reputation. |
