IDENTIFICATION OF CAUSES OF RISK IN THE MANAGEMENT OF LARGE CONSTRUCTION PROJECTS IN SPAIN

Large construction projects are complex because they are exposed to many risks; so that only a small percentage of them end up in the cost and time planned. Therefore to avoid failure to meet targets on time, cost, scope and quality of these projects, it is necessary to carry out a proper risk management. But the identification of risks is not all that useful, if its causes are unknown. The project manager can address risks acting on the causes or trying to mitigate their impact. It is always desirable a preventive action, so that the identification of causes of risk becomes a very interesting preventive tool, since knowing the degree to which they are present in our project we know the vulnerability of the project to face risks. The objective of this research is to identify those risk causes that are important and may be present in large construction projects in Spain, which are short those on a budget of more than 50 million euros and an execution period of over two years. The aim of the study has not been to collect all risk causes present in these projects, but to provide managers of such a list that includes the greatest common divisor of them. From this list, task manager will analyze which of these causes of risk apply to his case and explore whether there are other additional causes. The study is based on the opinions collected from a group of professionals involved in some major construction projects carried out in Spain in the last twenty years.