Significant and top ranked delay factors in Arabic Gulf Countries

Most construction projects are challenged with delays which have substantially negative impacts to any country. Previous studies had been conducted to identify the causes of delay and their ranking in these countries. The objective of the current study is to identify the common significant causes of delay in all Gulf Countries (GCC) and to check their similarity. Previous research works differed in the number of delay factors used. A procedure is proposed and is applied to re-rank and regroup the results of all previous research. ANOVA test technique is applied to verify the results obtained from previous studies for similarity and commonality of delay factors and causes in GCC. Spearman Correlation Coefficient is utilized to evaluate the level of agreement between delay factors. The analysis carried out showed that fourteen delay causes are common in the gulf area. The majority of delay factors include shortages of resources, inefficiency of management teams and governmental regulation. Analysis showed that significant correlation exists between delay causes rankings in Qatar, Kuwait and KSA, while Oman is differing. This study is a contribution to the efforts required to mitigate construction industry delays in the Arabic gulf countries and other countries with similar conditions.