RESEARCH METHOD AND ADMINISTRATION

The primary objective of the research was to examine how PPP operational phase partnership, performance and risk management practices can be improved to achieve better VfM outcomes. This involved developing a generic conceptual integrating model as a tool (that could support a contract administration manual) to assist government decision-makers to allocate and make better use of public sector resources during the operating phase of PPPs that may have significant and/or long-term consequences for achieving strategic public policy objectives.

The research methodology is phenomenological, and divides into two main phases using qualitative mixed methods, commencing with literature review to facilitate the initial conceptualisation of the proposed model. Semi-structured interviews were then used to gather primary data. From this data analysis, a second iteration of the model was prepared and presented to an expert focus group for scrutiny and comment. Feedback from this group was used to refine the final iteration of the model.

This paper focuses on the interview findings, relating to partnership, performance and risk management, used in the development of the second integrating model.

The interviews were conducted between October 2012 and March 2013 to explore the presence and nature of the issues identified by literature review findings. Purposive sampling was used to distribute invitations to fifty people, from the public and/or private sectors, with experience in PPP. Thirty-four (68% response rate) agreed to participate in the interview process. Two thirds of the participants were from the public sector and one third from the private sector. Two of the public sector participants were interviewed as a 'pilot study' to confirm the completeness of the semi-structured interview format.

The adequacy of the sample size for this research was determined retrospectively through identifying the 'saturation point' i.e. whereby saturation occurs when no new significant issues and diversity of answers are revealed during subsequent interviews. This point was revealed through categorisation and analysis of the interview transcript data, e.g. by comparing and contrasting the content to reveal the possibility of developing new issues.

The majority of the public sector interviewees were project directors. They have responsibility for the long-term administration of the public partner's interests in a PPP. Others included senior executives from central agencies, government departments and statutory authorities; a commercial manager; as well as a small number of PPP contract managers and a contract administrator. The purposive sample was drawn from eligible persons from the Australian Government, three Australian state jurisdictions and the UK Government.

Selected private sector participants included senior executives and managers responsible for PPP service delivery; project engineers; and partners from top-tier advisory and legal firms. Many of these participants have substantial experience working in Australian and international PPP markets.

The interviews comprised 15 meetings (40%) dealing with partnership management, 10 meetings (26%) about risk management and 13 meetings (34%) for performance management: 38 interviews in total. The difference between the number of interviewees and the total number of interviews arises because some participants agreed to be interviewed twice. Although risk management was initially treated as a separate area of management for PPP, the risk-related interview material was subsequently subsumed into partnership and performance management, given that risk is pervasive for all aspects of PPP.

For the public sector, 11 interviewees (29%) spoke about partnership management, six (16%) about risk management and nine (24%) about performance management. From the private sector, 12 (30%) participants spoke about their experiences (four interviews each per management discipline).

The interview administration demographics, comprising interviewee identification code, interview duration and distinction between public and private sector PPP representation, are shown in Table 1. Abbreviations in identification codes are as follows: pilot study (PS); partnership management focus (PT); risk management focus (RK); and performance management focus (PF). Over 42 hours of interviews were conducted and recorded, with an average interview length of 67 minutes.

Table 1: Interview administration demographics

^PS03 and PS04 -Transcripts for these pilot interviews were included as part of the partnership management data set.

*Two additional interviews were conducted immediately after the primary interviews took place, in a single session, hence the shorter duration.

The NVivo version 10 software application was used to conduct a thematic analysis of transcript data to identify important themes, using a hierarchical data coding process of 'parent' nodes (open codes); and 'child' nodes (axial codes). See Appendix 1 for the nodes created for each of the issues and sub-issues. This presents an overview of partnership, performance and risk management categorisation and provides the basis for developing the main themes for these topics.