Human resource management practices

and project success, a moderating role of

Islamic Work Ethics in Pakistani project-
based organizations

By: Muhammad Mustafa (MPM171003)

Submitted To: Dr. Sajid

Bashir
Introduction
From a past decade Project Management and its efficacies gained more focus of
the researchers. Researchers around the globe progress in elaborating the
concerned phenomena of project management and its knowledge areas. These
researchers are least rewarded just because in spite of a lot of research on
project success the number of successful projects is alarmingly small.

The main reason is that the basic or the fundamentals which is key for successful
projects are not being followed or not standardize as a guideline. Those
fundamentals of Project Success can depend upon an Internal or External
environment of the organization.

These two factors are categorized into further & there are two types of successes
related to projects.

1) Project Success
2) Success of Project Management
These two categorization have 1 thing in common that they both are heavily
dependent on Human Resource HR.

In current situation of Pakistan the Importance of project based organization

cannot be neglected. HRM role in emerging economy of Pakistan go back to
sixties when only institutional development was focused by the govt. A lot of
problems have been faced regarding the slow pace of improvement in the
development of successful organization. There are several factors of that slow
pace but the main reason was not to give importance to Islamic Work Ethics in
a Muslim country like Pakistan.

Literature Review
In the last half of century the HRM appeared as a methodical style of
management. HRM have numbers of models and studies which shows the strong
connection between effectiveness of HRM Practices on Performance of an
organization. A studies shows that the success of the organization depends upon
a commitment of its employees. So it is clear that HR Practices has also an
impact on Project success in project based organization. Study Suggest that
there is 2 essentials of the project success.

1) Satisfaction
2) Completion
Hence a Project is unique and have a time constraint so it requires more focus on
HR practices. In spite of a complete chapter in PMBOK on the Importance of HR
still the strategies in Project Based Organizations needs a lot of improvements.

A set of HR Practices Including ERS (Employees Recruitment & Selection), ETD

(Employees Training & Development), EPA (Employees Performance Appraisals)
and ECS (Employee Compensation System) out of a Harvard Model Have
been selected for this study in line with Universalistic Perspective.

Having some discussion on above 4 chosen HR Practices following arguments

have been built in Perspective of Pakistani Project Based Organization.

ERS (Employees Recruitment & Selection) influences Project Success

in project-based organizations of Pakistan.
ETD (Employees Training & Development doesn't influences Project
Success in project-based organizations of Pakistan.
EPA (Employees Performance Appraisals) influences Project Success
in project-based organizations of Pakistan.
ECS (Employee Compensation System) influences Project Success in
project-based organizations of Pakistan.
Pakistan being a developing country can do a world of good to herself by
adoption of best HR practices for ensuring optimal utilization of available human
resource which is over 170 million including 49.19% of female population as
reported by World bank

It is important to evaluate the impacts of above short listed HR practices

following Universalistic Perspective on project success in Pakistani project-
based organizations.
Word Ethics generally drawn from the religion so the Islamic Work Ethics relates
to Ethics drawn from Islam. In the framework of an organization the HR Practices
is influential in terms of Organizational Commitments.

The findings in the context of IWE effecting in an organizational setting, where

they recommend that every individual employee distinguishes between success
and failures in his/her own perspective as regards the prevailing working ethics
in respective organization.

To find out whether the Islamic Work Ethics has influence on Project success or
not in relation to the 4 Selected HR Practices following Hypothesis Has been
developed.

The relationship of ERS (Employees Recruitment & Selection) and

Project Success is moderated by IWE in project-based organizations of
Pakistan.
The relationship of ETD (Employees Training & Development) and
Project Success is moderated by IWE in project-based organizations of
Pakistan.
 The relationship of EPA (Employees Performance Appraisals) and Project
Success is moderated by IWE in project-based organizations of Pakistan.
The relationship of ECS (Employee Compensation System) and Project
Success is moderated by IWE in project-based organizations of Pakistan.

Conclusion
This research focused on highlighting the importance of selected HR practices for
project success in project-based organizations. It was also concluded that the
role of Islamic Work Ethics is not very significant in the context of Pakistani
project-based organizations, moreover; interestingly it was found that Islamic
Work Ethics and Protestant work ethics have commonalities in their concepts in-
spite of apparently present huge differences. Lastly the research effectively
communicates the fact that every employee has his/her own perception of PS
which needs to be standardized with the development of uniform measures of
units to be developed by experts