The challenges of managing stakeholder requirements in a urban regeneration project

Traditional project management approaches have been criticised in recent years for being inadequate for the growing complexity of construction projects. Among the main criticisms are the inadequacy to deal with a social and political context, the dynamics of the environment and the need for further judgment during project implementation. Within this context, studies are looking at alternatives to move beyond this traditional view of project management. This paper presents the results from a case study carried out in an urban regeneration project in Brazil. The aim is to illustrate the challenges of dealing with myriad requirements that result from different stakeholders groups involved in complex construction projects. In such complex projects, there is a wide range of stakeholders, which change over time. This is partially due to long periods of project development and implementation. Moreover, their influence cannot always be predicted from the outset. Thus, despite the contributions in the literature regarding the need to manage stakeholder expectations and influences, this empirical study shows that in practice many challenges remain, and alternative solutions are still lacking in the project management literature.