Co-determination and participation in project management. Experiences from the construction of a hospital building in Norway

Abstract

Changing the physical structure of a workplace has long-lasting organizational consequences. When managing building projects of this type, it is crucial to involve stakeholders in a way that ensures project success. This study uses a stakeholder perspective and examines how co-determination and participation among hospital employees was managed in the process of extending a hospital building in Norway. Based on input from stakeholder theory, the analysis focuses on the question of whether the employees and their representatives were subjected to management of stakeholders or management for stakeholders. Project documents have been analyzed in order to detect who was involved in the decision-making process during the planning of the project, and in what way. The findings show that individual employees, union and safety representatives took part in the decision-making process, thus, corresponding well with a management for stakeholders-approach. However, their stakeholder interests were not fully integrated and assessed in all parts of the process, and the project goal of creating a good place to work was only to a limited degree followed up in practice. Hence, it appears that they were mostly subjected to management of stakeholders during the process despite their formal participation and representation in the decision-making process.