The purpose of the study is to investigate how project managers in the public sector perceive working with the three sustainability aspects economic- social- and ecological sustainability in projects that collaborate with the private sector. The study was conducted using a qualitative approach and used semi-structured interviews for the data collection process. Nine project managers within the public sector were interviewed, and a thematic analysis was conducted to process the collected material. The thematic analysis resulted in the following three themes: Economic or non-economic gain, Compromises for sustainability, and The project team's role in sustainability. The results of the study showed that the project format constrains the sustainability work that is possible, from the procurement phase to execution and evaluation. Project managers are often limited in their sustainability work as established frameworks must be followed, in cases where they could influence sustainability work, there was rarely time or resources for it. There was a shared experience that the economic perspective took priority in projects, sometimes at the expense of the other sustainability perspectives. A majority of project managers experienced that the private and public sectors had the same project goals, but despite this, a lot of different goals were presented that needed to be balanced between the parties. This balance was perceived as a major challenge and could affect the project's sustainability. In projects involving both the public and private sectors, communication is very important for the project's sustainability, the absence or poor communication can directly impact the project's sustainability. Project managers also feel that they do not possess all the knowledge about sustainability and that other colleagues often have more knowledge than them, therefore, to create an environment where everyone shares their knowledge, communication and relationships need to be worked on.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA1/oai:DiVA.org:kau-99814 |
| Date | January 2024 |
| Creators | Sandström, Alexander |
| Publisher | Karlstads universitet, Handelshögskolan (from 2013) |
| Source Sets | DiVA Archive at Upsalla University |
| Language | Swedish |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Student thesis, info:eu-repo/semantics/bachelorThesis, text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
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