Project accountability: An exploratory case study using actor–network theory

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ScienceDirect International Journal of Project Management 35 (2017) 1024 – 1036 www.elsevier.com/locate/ijproman

Project accountability: An exploratory case study using actor–network theory Ruben Burga ⁎, Davar Rezania University of Guelph, 50 Stone Road East, Guelph, Ontario N1G 2W1, Canada Received 7 September 2016; received in revised form 29 April 2017; accepted 2 May 2017

Abstract Enacting accountability in the management of a project is a dynamic process that involves social interaction. We conducted a case study of the enactment of accountability in the renovation project of a historical building at a public university. We used the concept of accountability and actor–network theory to guide data collection and analysis. Using a graphical mapping syntax of the actor–network relationships at three episodes in the life of the project, we find that artifacts are important actors in translating accountability through the disclosure of information. We also find that accountability in this project is distributed at the outset, goes through stages of enactment through ‘translating’ actors and is ultimately reconstructed through the fulfillment of the project objective. Furthermore, accountability is often being enacted spontaneously, not by design. © 2017 Elsevier Ltd, APM and IPMA. All rights reserved. Keywords: Project management; Actor–network theory; Accountability; Governance

1. Introduction It is generally agreed that effective project management enables organizations to carry out large-scale projects on time, on budget and with minimal disruption to the rest of the business. Given the impact of effective project management on organizational performance, there is a focus on understanding factors that are necessary conditions for project success (Jugdev and Müller, 2005; Jugdev et al., 2013; Turner, 2004). Factors related to project governance, such as the effective management of stakeholders, and effective control and monitoring systems are identified as necessary ingredients for project success (Maldonado et al., 2010; Tiwana and Keil, 2009; Turner and Zolin, 2012; Rezania and Ouedraogo, 2013). Furthermore, research in the academic literature is shifting the description of projects from instrumental processes to showing projects as multi-dimensional social processes that integrate elements such ⁎ Corresponding author. E-mail addresses: [email protected] (R. Burga), [email protected] (D. Rezania).

http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.ijproman.2017.05.001 0263-7863/00 © 2017 Elsevier Ltd, APM and IPMA. All rights reserved.

as the management of multiple project portfolios, the consideration of cultural and national diversity, and a greater concern for ethical behavior (Müller and Jugdev, 2012). Accountability is one of the social processes that relate to the effective governance and control of individual and organizational behavior (e.g. Messner, 2009). The notion that accountability can influence the behavior of project managers and project stakeholders is intriguing because it offers much needed insight into some of the factors that are important to the governance of projects. Following Bovens (2007), we argue that accountability arrangements dictate the availability of information about project management practices and project status. They can stimulate internal reflection and a resulting learning process in project managers and organizations in which those projects are executed (Bovens, 2007). The construct of accountability entails instructions (i.e. policy), feedback pathways, rewards and punishments, monitoring, and a means for adjusting or modifying a system (Baker et al., 2012; Bovens, 1998, 2007; Laughlin, 1987). Consequently, accountability arrangements can prompt project steering committees and other administrative functions to disseminate learning from projects (Bovens, 2007).

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Yet, the role of accountability in the management of projects is an under-researched area. Leong (1991) presents two accountability arrangements for project management; process accountability versus outcome accountability. He discusses their consequences on project management practice, but offers no empirical data. A review of academic and industry journals (using Web of Science, EBSCO, and ProQuest citation and bibliographic indices) resulted in 95 unique peer-reviewed articles that included both terms of ‘accountability’ and ‘project management’. None of these articles contribute to our understanding of how accountability is enacted in a project. This is especially surprising because organizations are being advised to articulate their own specific high-performance culture, inculcate accountability at all levels and create a culture of ongoing feedback and learning (e.g. Klimoski and Inks, 1990; Lunney, 2011). In this study, we contribute to the literature on project accountability in two major ways. First, we offer an informed description of the accountability arrangements in the context of managing a single project. To our knowledge, this will be the first empirical study of the enactment of accountability in relation to managing projects. Second, we offer an informed understanding of how accountability is enacted in this project. These contributions have direct implications for improving project management practices, project governance, and increasing the success rate of projects. 2. Literature review 2.1. Accountability as a general concept Agency theory explains that agents will maximize their own utility to the extent permitted by the constraints imposed on them, and thus constraints are necessary to control the agents effectively (Jensen and Meckling, 1976). Accountability, as the obligation of account giving (Roberts, 1991) to a party with the power to impose rewards or sanctions, is such a constraint. While there are multiple discipline-specific uses of the notion of accountability (Dubnick and Justice, 2004), they share the generic sociological meaning that denotes the exchange of reasons for a particular conduct (Messner, 2009). Accounts are given to justify what one did or did not do (Roberts and Scapens, 1985). As a constraint on an agency relationship, accountability influences and shapes both individual and organizational behavior. To be held accountable imposes an implicit or explicit constraint on everything people do (Tetlock, 1985). Furthermore, accountability relationships not only impact behavior, but also how people interpret and think about events (Tetlock, 1983). This is because accountability produces an image of ourselves and our activity (Roberts, 1991). It is a morally significant practice, for the reason that “to demand an account from someone is to ask this person to enact discursively the responsibility for her behavior” (Messner, 2009, p. 920). This generic sociological meaning of accountability underlies both the notion of disclosing accounts to external constituencies such as a forum (e.g. financial accounting or public accountability), and the exchange of accounts within an organization between a forum and a party (e.g. reporting and control routines in which management-related information are communicated)

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(Ahrens, 1996; Messner, 2009; Roberts and Scapens, 1985; Sinclair, 1995). The generic accountability process consists of (1) an information phase in which information is provided about conduct and performance by one party, (2) a debate phase in which questions by a forum are answered by that party, and (3) a judgment phase by the forum and the possibility of the imposition of sanctions or offering of rewards (Bovens, 1998; Mulgan, 2003). The issue of accountability during the conduct of a project is important to consider as it implies reporting and enforcement processes for individuals as they complete their tasks (Leong, 1991). Accountability, in the context of the governance of an organization, has been widely studied from multiple viewpoints (e.g. Ahrens, 1996; Bovens, 2007; Crawford et al., 2008); sometimes as a process, as an outcome or as a predictor in an organizational context (Burga and Rezania, 2015). The project management context, however, differs from an organizational one as interactions in a project occur in the context of a temporary organization (Lundin and Söderholm, 1995; Söderlund, 2012) where relationships are also expected to be temporary. 2.2. Accountability in project management Leong (1991) considers the mutual benefits of considering the concepts of accountability and project management together. This is because accountability “provides a foundation from which the performances of the project participants and, more importantly, the management function can be addressed” (p. 240). Accountability provides an integrated view of project management and project outcome. In Leong's (1991) view, the project implementation process is essentially an accountability process. The accountability framework distinguishes between performance guarantees and project-outcome guarantees. In other words, accountability for the process of project management runs in parallel with the accountability for the project outcome. Accountability for simply meeting the project outcome within the typical project constraints of time, cost, and functionality is rare. A project manager, however, runs a process that can be measured in some way, independent of the project outcome. This provides a mechanism in which a forum can hold the project manager accountable for their work. Since Leong's (1991) article, others are recognizing the importance of accountability for the success of projects. We searched peer-reviewed, English language, academic literature using the Boolean search expressions ‘“Project manag*” NEAR10 accountability’. Including “project manag*” as part of the search expression returned only the articles that were related to project management. The operator “*” was used to include variations of project management or project manager. Adding the term “accountability” limited the search to articles that were more concentrated on accountability. Using ‘NEAR/ 10’ for the ABI/INFORM database and ‘N10’ for the Business Source Complete database ensured that the papers were mentioning accountability within 10 words of project. After removing duplicates, there were 95 articles. The mentioning of project management and accountability, either jointly or individually, were incidental to the central theme of several

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articles. Review of the remaining articles indicates that agency theory is often used to consider the outcome of accountability or the process that underlies accountability relationships. The research mainly uses agency theory to explore why projects fail (e.g. Mahaney and Lederer, 2003; Ika et al., 2012; Patel and Robinson, 2010). Lakhe and Mohanty (1994) consider accountability crucial for the successful implementation of Total Quality Management projects. Lummus et al. (1998) consider the definition of accountability relationships as an important step for projects that implement strategic supply chain management. Pitagorsky (1998) proposes that the clarification of accountability and collaborative relationship between functional managers, and project and program managers is critical for effective project performance and to the well-being of any organization. Côté and Daugherty (2000) note that a successful re-engineering project requires greater accountability measurement and control. Walker and Maune (2000) in their case study of safety behavior during the commissioning of an oil refinery facility deem the definition of accountability for safety as an important step for success. Agency theory provides a framework for understanding issues relating to the relationship between project stakeholders and project managers and suggests ways to manage the accountability relationships. Baird (1991) considers to whom the project manager is accountable and the concept of multiple accountabilities. Often, parallels are drawn between accountability and responsibility (e.g. Ika et al., 2012; Mengel, 2008) which reinforces the idea that project managers must have adequate authority and access to the necessary resources to be held responsible for their tasks. Parris (1996) offers a prescriptive model of accountability that advocates accountability as a proactive continuous process of exchanging accountings and consequences. By reporting what a team has done, is doing, or has planned to do, the team can exchange explanations of why the reported action makes sense with the project stakeholders who provide feedback, in the form of information, help, resources, restrictions, rewards, or punishment. Accountability in this case focuses on the performance-to-plan process and the change management process. These processes aim to bring the best knowledge and resources of all stakeholders and team members together to identify weaknesses in a plan and agree on corrective actions. The prerequisite for this accountability is the identification of stakeholders and their needs. This model of accountability aims to clarify what the stakeholders' needs are and to adjust the project plan and implementation plan accordingly. Even though these studies consider the importance of accountability in project management, they do not explain how accountability is enacted. In this paper, we consider the case of a construction project and we aim to explain how accountability is enacted, which leads to our research question: how is accountability enacted in a construction project? 2.3. Actor–network theory We choose to use actor–network theory (ANT) as it provides a research framework that enables the examination of dynamic and socially constructed phenomena and their

interactions (Latour, 1987, 1996). Callon's (1986) four stage method of analysis within the ANT framework is used by Sage et al. (2011) in their archival study of a major construction project, the Skye bridge project and in Callon's own study of the development of a conservation strategy by marine biologists in St. Brieuc Bay (1986). Floricel et al. (2014) describe the use of ANT in projects as more reflective of the dynamism and process orientation of project management. Indeed, the social complexity of project management (Cicmil et al., 2009) fits well with the tracing of associations between human participants and objects or processes at all levels of the project (Aubry, 2011; Er et al., 2013; Floricel et al., 2014). ANT states that relationships exist between actors (also referred to as actants in ANT) and that these actors are not necessarily individuals but can also be inanimate objects or processes (Latour, 1987). In the ANT framework, project management is considered a complex situation where relationships are enacted with an aim to achieve stability (Callon, 1986; Latour, 1987; Sage et al., 2011). An important feature of ANT is that the actants play an important role in the ‘translation’ of processes (Callon (1986) considers translation to be an actant effect which we interpret to be the enacting of the accountability process). Some of the defining points of ANT are that humans, objects, and processes play a part in the struggle to achieve resolution in the conflicts within a project, and that actors are defined by their network (Sage et al., 2011). Callon (1986) describes four stages of ANT in the course of a project. The description for these stages is adapted from French terminology and named as ‘problematization’, ‘interessement’, ‘enrolment’, and ‘mobilization’. These four stages are viewed as overlapping rather than sequential in order to reflect the complexity of the translations (Callon, 1986). From the viewpoint of the process of accountability, Sage et al. (2011) frame problematization as the initial stage in project management where relationships are initially defined and charters are established. Interessement is the stage in project management where operationally the project exists and relationships among actors are dynamic in their enactment of accountability. Enrolment in a project management context (Callon, 1986) defines the stage when relationships are translated successfully by actors through the use of power described as “trials of strength” (Sage et al., 2011, p. 276). In effect at the enrolment stage, actors successfully enact accountability. Parties call other parties to account for their actions and use their power to enforce compliance from one party to another. Finally, the mobilization stage in project management is the stage when the actors can use occurrences within the project as generic examples generalizing specific relations among actors to be used in future projects by the actors (Callon, 1986). In our parlance of the enactment of accountability, this would be the packaging of methods of accountability that can be mobilized or translated to other similar projects. It is important to note that ANT does not imply just the use of socially constructed networks, but instead assumes that each actant is in itself an actor–network; who, through its own translations involves the participation and involvement of other actors. Latour (1996) specifically states that “actor–network theory (hence ANT) has very little to do with the study of social

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Table 1 Data sources for the case study analysis. Data source

Explanation

Participative observations of meetings One of the co-authors participated in 4 project meetings during the initiation phase of the project Walk-throughs One of the co-authors participated in 3 walk-through site visits, during which the progress of the construction project was discussed. Interview with the project manager Two interviews were conducted with the project manager Interview with project owner Project owner was the Dean of the faculty Interview with project stakeholders One stakeholder was the Assistant to the Project Owner and executed daily communications with the project manager and other stakeholder. Another stakeholder was a future user of the building. Project documentation Project charter, plans, and progress reports were provided by the project manager. Other documents such as standards and procedures were from the department (Physical Resources) that was responsible for all construction projects within the university.

network” (p. 369). Actor–networks do not have firm socially constructed links but instead will create translations based on their project stage and on the requirements placed on that actor–network. In our context we desire to observe the enactment of accountability with these actor–networks. We expect to see that the project of renovating a historical building will follow similar stages as those described by Callon (1986). Accountability relationships should be translated through well defined charters and relationships and proceed along defined stages. Instead of imposing these stages on the narrative, we observe how defined episodes match the characteristics of Callon's (1986) stages. This expectation of well-defined accountability relationships derives from institutional frameworks for project management that are found in guidance documents such as the Project Management Book of Knowledge (PMBOK, 2013). We expect that ANT provides a framework to study and verify how accountability relationships are enacted in a particular project. 3. Research methodology and background 3.1. Methodology Methodologically, ANT approaches a phenomenon “in the making” (Latour, 1987), i.e., micro-level studies of the places where something comes into being. As such, ANT studies, follow actors, and look to the network builders through whose eyes they attempt to interpret the process of network construction (Latour, 1987). We, therefore, use a single case study to research the accountability enacted between participants in the renovation of a building (for anonymity this building is henceforth referred as HB). Yin (2003) states that using a single case study is appropriate when studying a representative case. Although a detailed description for the enactment of accountability has not previously been empirically reported in the academic literature, the renovation project that we are studying is representative of similar public projects (e.g. Sage et al., 2011). Single case studies have also been used in other studies of ANT (e.g. Callon, 1986; Elbanna, 2010, 2013; Sage et al., 2011; MacNeil and Mills, 2015; De Albuquerque and Christ, 2015). The strength of this single case study comes from the examination of the actor–network translations that exist at the outset, and how they evolve or devolve throughout the life of

the project. The results viewed in that context satisfy Hirschman's (1986) requirement for transferability in a qualitative research study. In addition, Yin (2003) states that an exploratory case study does not specifically require propositions but broad directions to guide the research. Eisenhardt (1989) suggests that biases can be minimized by not assuming specific relationships. Our broad direction arises from our research question of exploring how accountability is enacted in a renovation project. We present the data sources used for this study in Table 1. We had ready access to stakeholders and to objective and recorded information including project charters, meeting minutes, stakeholder charts and other project documentation. One of the authors participated in four project meetings at the project initiation phase and participated in three ‘walk-through’ site visits that served as progress meetings. Supplemental information was taken from the institution's archives1 to verify the accuracy of the events. Access to this information supports the requirement for triangulation of information needed in exploratory case studies (Yin, 2003) and is in line with dependability requirements for qualitative studies (Hirschman, 1986). In addition, Latour (1996) suggests that one of the methodological methods in ANT is to interview subjects that are referred to by a main actant. ANT does not prescribe where to start or to end. Our research objective is to study enactment of accountability in a project. We needed to identify and choose which network and actors to follow in their trajectories. One common approach to picking a thread to follow is associated to Roth (1996). To find some focus, Roth chose what he called ‘tracers’ – specific practices and productions – and followed them over time through the networks in which they participated. His study was about adoption of different types of knowledge resources and how students build bridges with toothpicks. Roth began by observing students' use of things and identified that one of these things (the glue gun) that impacted student community of practice, affected student collective knowledge about building bridges. In following the glue gun as a selected tracer, Roth was able to observe how new knowledge emerged through translations of children.

1 Physical Resources Department documents relating to the HB building renovation project at the university. Accessed in July–August, 2016.

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In a similar way, we observed the importance of the building and traced the people who were closely involved in influencing the shaping of the building and interviewed them to supplement the archival data. The project manager was interviewed and is denoted as ‘PM’. The project owner whose vision initially launched the project was also interviewed and is denoted as ‘PO’. The other stakeholders who were interviewed were a user representative who would move to the new building, and the assistant to the project owner who was responsible for organizing the move to the new building. These stakeholders are noted as ‘S’ in this report. The interviews were prefaced with a clarifying statement to identify accountability as a social relation mechanism that involves an obligation to explain and justify conduct. This definition was taken from Bovens (2007) model of accountability. Some of the initial questions that were used to launch the interviews were: ○ ○ ○ ○ ○

Who was accountable to whom? For what was the agent accountable? How was information provided about performance? How was performance discussed? Was there the potential for formal or informal sanctions in the case of inadequate performance?

As the questions were asked, the participants were encouraged to expand on their answers as they related to accountability relationships. Further ad hoc questions evolved from the framework of the research questionnaire as we focused on the main topic of accountability. This free flow of information is expected by Berg and Lune (2012) as they state “interviewers must develop, adapt, and generate questions and follow-up probes appropriate to…the central purpose of the investigation” (p. 111). There were five interviews that were conducted which generated a total of 7 h of verbal transcripts and over 50 pages of recorded information. All transcripts were reviewed by the participants who confirmed their accuracy and the chronology of events in the project. This satisfies the credibility requirements for a qualitative study (Hirschman, 1986). We conducted our analysis within the ANT framework using the methodology developed by Callon (1986). We interpreted the actors and translation actants using the graphical syntax described by Silvis and Alexander (2014). A graphical syntax such as this one is useful to identify actants and translations at different events throughout the lifespan of the project. The separation of events through the use of episodes is part of the mechanism for visualizing actor–network theory (Silvis and Alexander, 2014). Descriptions of relationships were noted and graphically depicted at each episode. The syntax uses symbols to represent an actor's state or relationship at each episode in the ANT framework. Source and target actors initiate or finish a translation process and are shown as circles. If they are identified by the other actors as focal to a specific episode, then they are shown through two concentric circles. If the actor translates the relationship between a source and a target actor, then they are shown as a quadrilateral symbol (see Fig. 1). In this research, supplementing Silvis and

Alexander (2014), we added arrows to identify the direction of the translation between source and target actors. Actors were described as individuals, groups of individuals, and artifacts such as documents, communication methods, and the actual building. According to ANT these actors are influential and dynamic elements in their relationships and translations with other actors. 3.2. Background The university in this case study is located in a semi-urban campus, with a mixture of historical buildings and new facilities. As with similar institutions in Canada, the university was formed from the convergence of smaller colleges and schools that evolved from the agricultural and rural needs of its populations. One of the newer colleges of the university was formed only ten years prior to the building project. Due to increased enrolment and organic growth, this new college acquired offices located in other buildings on campus. This newest college incorporates four departments that were distributed through different existing buildings. Options that were considered for the physical integration of the departments were to lease from a government institutional location nearby, or to build a new building in an adjacent parking lot on campus. However, a decreased need for on-campus residences among undergraduates resulted in the consideration of changing an existing residence, designated in this article as HB into a multi-purpose building combining faculty offices and separate lecture rooms. Initially 9 million Canadian dollars were allocated for this renovation project with a further 3 million Canadian dollars allocated at the conclusion of architectural estimates. The university's administration subsequently coordinated the management of the funds for the entire project. In summary, the vision of the university and its academic leadership was to repurpose an existing historical building (HB). HB had previously been used for a mixture of student housing and lecture rooms. It was to be renovated as a building incorporating state of the art learning facilities and faculty offices while maintaining its historical façade. A project manager (PM) in the university's physical resources department was assigned the project management role. This project manager is an experienced engineer with over nine years of project management experience in the physical resources department of the institution and with additional experience in managing construction projects at other universities and with the local city's works department. This renovation project was funded, planned and initiated in 2014 with the renovation beginning in 2015 and completed 18 months later. To put the project management and its accountability into perspective, an organizational chart is shown in Fig. 2 showing the accountability of the PM in the university's business governance structure. It is important to note that the university works in a bicameral structure where governance of business and infrastructures projects are separated from the governance of academic affairs. Therefore, the interest of the administrative side of the governance structure is focused on achieving budget and schedule targets while the academic side of the governance structure is focused on achieving a fit for its intended operation as an academic facility. The PM had a direct reporting relationship

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Fig. 1. Legend for the graphical visualization of enacting accountability through the renovation project (based on Silvis and Alexander, 2014).

to the business governance structure but was also accountable to the interests of the academic stakeholders.

actor–network theory (Silvis and Alexander, 2014). This chronology evolves naturally from the project documentation and narrative provided by the participants and has been compiled from reviewing all of the participants' transcripts.

4. Results This project was described by different stakeholders from their own viewpoint. We used a chronological framework of viewing the project in terms of broad episodes, as described in the methodology, as this is a useful method for visualizing

4.1. Episode 1 The first episode is a formalized one where project management is observed to be governed by the establishment of rules, conducts and performance charters. In this episode, there is a universal accountability translation that occurs through the project objective – the renovation of the HB building. However, accountability is individually enacted through pre-established formalized processes. The objective of the project, described through an official document – the project charter – is a translating actor in that every enactment of the accountability relationships, although individually considered, is translated through this actant. For example, the project manager and the various tradespeople are accountable to specific stakeholders (direct supervisors), to the project owner and to the building committee through the actant of the objective of the project. The Project Manager explicitly described the various accountability relationships: “…there's an architect for instance, we also manage all the consultants and the contractor…there's a huge umbrella of people under us…between the university stakeholders, the client and user stakeholders and the consulting team…” (PM). In particular, the Project Manager took ownership of the project and its accountability through the project objective that he defines as the ‘scope’: “I am accountable that the building is delivered to [PO] within the parameters of the scope that was agreed to within the document…” (PM). Based on the narrative of the interviews, we viewed the accountability relationships in episode 1 as shown in Fig. 3. For the project manager, accountability in this episode is understood to be mainly about keeping to the budget that is established for the project. 4.2. Episode 2

Fig. 2. Governance structure showing the accountability path for the PM. (Corporate documents publicly available through the institution was used to create this chart.)

The second episode occurs during the actual renovation work on the HB building. The enactment of accountability is

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viewed once again through the lens of the ANT framework. Individuals form actor–network relationships with specific accountabilities. However, this distributed accountability is enacted through the HB building and translated through artifacts such as site visits that we designate as ‘walk-through’ meetings and the ‘project objective’ itself. Based on the narrative from the interview participants, the HB building is observed as a main research actant. The HB building as a historical building is expected to impact the renovation work but it was not known how much it would act as a translating actor for accountability. The PM was reflective on its impact as he said in our interview: “[HB] is an interesting one because it's one hundred fourteen years old this year and it's not typical because every week there was something structural that was coming up, some were simplistic, some were not” (PM). The project manager is both a source and target actor since accountability for completing tasks and actions is enacted through the HB building back to the project manager. The project manager's accountability through the project objective is translated by the HB building and back to the building committee. In addition, the enactment of accountability to the project owner and other stakeholders, which was initially translated through the project charter/objective, is now translated through an artifact of ‘walk-through’ meetings. We defined these walk-through meetings as meetings that informally occurred as the PM walked with various stakeholders through the on-going renovations in the building. The PM specifically notes that this informal mode of communication was beneficial from his viewpoint as it happened frequently and so the walk-through meeting was a translating actor for the enactment of accountability by the PM. As he states: [PO] is very, very busy so we have meetings with her on a regular basis as she can meet. It's mostly if there's issues that come up, I guess a beneficial thing we've had so many tours that usually once or twice a month we're going through with her with issues and I can bring up little things as we're walking around. It's kind of informal… (PM).

Similarly, the PO used the translating action of the walk-through meeting to be updated on the progress of the project. The PO says: I would book tours…I would know what's going on and [PM] and I have this standing joke that every time I would come on a tour I′d be going ‘oh what about this’ or ‘what about that’ because it was an old building and full of surprises…(PO). In addition, these walk-through meetings refer to physical and visual interactions as the project manager walks through the building with stakeholders and discusses progress of the project. Notes are not usually taken as the informal interaction forms the basis for the project manager accounting for the progress of the project. This was a concern with one of the stakeholders as she stated: The one thing that I would prefer, sometimes when we're meeting at the building there's no written agreement of what was discussed and when you have so many balls in the air… you know, there's things that we have discussed that maybe, no have not gone into writing and then come back to saying I have not said that…(S1). The ‘tradespeople’ have their own accountability for completion of their tasks enacted through the HB building and back to the project manager as a target actor. The Physical Resources department continue to enact their accountability through the translating actor of the project objective back to the building committee. The PM's paramount goal was to stay within the project objective's budget. He states; “So once we've established the scope and parameters as a schematic process, it's all approved, a budget's approved then we operate within that budget” (PM). Ultimately, both the building committee and project owners have accountability relationships to the University's board of

Fig. 3. Episode 1 — enacting accountability seen through actor–network relationships at the start of the project.

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directors which is designated as a distant actor in the episode. This relationship was described by the Project Owner: So [PM] is managing the project formally yes but I'm also managing it on behalf of the college and bringing forward our needs and working with [PM] and the architects you know as best as I can to maximize the benefit back to the college within the constraints; and the constraints are real because the Board of Governors approves the project and their expectation is that [PM] brings it in at least on budget if not on time for me. And any sort of changes to the budget, he had to take back to the board. (PO). The reconciliation of all the individual accountabilities that have been described can be seen in the graphical interpretation of episode 2 in Fig. 4. 4.3. Episode 3 We viewed the third and final episode of the project as the final chronological stage of the project — 18 months after its initiation. At this stage, finishing touches are being put on the building. Delays and disputes regarding conflicting objectives and their resolutions are more frequent. New actor–networks emerge that impact the completion of the project such as regulatory agencies and another project manager solely responsible for the physical move. As discussed in the academic literature, ANT is a useful framework to discuss actor–networks when conflicts occur (Aubry, 2011) and from the viewpoint of the enactment of accountability, it is also a model that is useful for viewing the salience of these conflicts. In particular, the individual accountability relationships described in episode 2, (reconciled through a single framework of actor–networks) develops from those informal modes (walk-through meetings) into a hybrid formal and informal mode (emails and walk-through meetings) in episode 3 (see Fig. 4). Individual processes of accountabilities do not always satisfy the account holder or account giver. The PM specifically describes how formalized the relationship with subcontractors has become in this last stage of the renovation project: “last year they were acting on verbal but now they're in trouble and they need the duration to back the reason why they're in trouble” (PM). Consequently, a new translating actor, the email system, becomes the actor–network artifact through which formal expressions of accountability are resolved. This is particularly true in the enactment of accountability from the tradespeople to the project manager where the actant of the HB building no longer provides the accountability translation as much as email communications. The PM recognizes the importance of this formal communication channel but complains of its inefficiency: Okay, under the guideline for changes you have five days to notify us that there's a change…we have five days to issue documents, you have five days to price it, we have five days to respond then you start checking dates…then that took three weeks, this took one week that was good then you took four weeks to price it. So you're three weeks late. (PM).

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The informal walk-through with the project owner and other stakeholders continues to be used by the project manager, but once again the email actant translates the enactment of accountability in key situations while the HB building continues as a main translating actant in the framework. As the time for actual completion draws near, individual accountability relationships change. For example, one of the stakeholders becomes a project manager for the actual physical move of the building's new occupants. She is a target actor for communications on building completion via emails from the project manager. She is also a source actor through the HB building and the project objective to other stakeholders involved in the move. This stakeholder describes the PM: He is fabulous in terms of keeping us up to date and I mean even today for an example he's…you know…he sends us an email; [PO] and [S2] and myself, saying you know things are looking really good they're laying the carpet. You know the first floor and the second floor and he sends a couple of pictures because he's over there and he is showing us the progress as it happens and that…He does that quite often. (S1). Furthermore, as the date for the physical move arrives, S1 who becomes the project manager for the physical move is appreciative of the informal and formal modes of communication from the PM. As she states: It was just; he just would not give anything you know, realistically you know, we were talking some dates; very informal nothing but you know, these dates he actually put in writing in an email so I can guarantee he can pretty much guarantee. (S1). The reconciliation of the individual accountabilities and their enactment can be seen through the graphical interpretations of episode 3 (Fig. 5). At this point, multiple accountability relationships exist. Finally, the Project Owner reflects on the enactment for the project as it nears completion at a later than expected date: So who is accountable?… [PM] is accountable for bringing the project in on budget and as best as he can…working effectively with the architects and they were hired to bring a vision which they did; but they didn't listen and…I don't feel that anyone has treated me as the client on this project. (PO). Although the project objective is a translating actant for the accountability relationships, the Project Owner continues to wonder whether the terms of the accountability requirements were clear from the start: “I think there is… a formal document that exists between the architects and [PM]. But even [PM] has been really surprised by what he's found in the document” (PO). Communication, and particularly its transparency, seems to be important in the enactment of accountability. The graphical

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Fig. 4. Episode 2 — enacting accountability seen through actor–network relationships in the main phase of the renovation project.

syntax describes those modes of communication as informal (walk-through meetings) or formal (emails). Stakeholder S1 describes communication as a way of achieving solutions: So right now if there are issues that arise he either phones me or emails me; probably I have gone over there at least once a week to walk through and come up with, yes, there's not results but solutions to get results. (S1).

The project owner however highlights the challenge of clear communication: I wouldn't say every problem has been communicated with me, like that's what I′m saying, kind of like on a need to know basis, that when there's been really big issues; but there's been a number of times where I've said we need a meeting and we're actually, when I have felt that there was

Fig. 5. Episode 3 — enacting accountability seen through actor–network relationships at the final part of the renovation project.

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divides happening within Physical Resources. I would call that meeting. And I say Okay guys. Yeah right, like we've got to get on the same page. (PO). The project manager discusses communication and its informality and formality through emails as an enforcement tool: So I can look at a change and call the contractor and talk on the phone and go, you know this is three thousand, that's five hundred, twenty-five hundred; or this around five thousand dollars, if they agree, OK go ahead and do the work we'll catch up with the paperwork. (PM). On the other hand, email as a translating actant for accountability can also create confusion and enforce accountability even when it is not required. The PM describes the incident of a computer server outage at the institution. This outage prevented him from seeing an email that copied the architects on an issue that was discussed at the project management level. The architects perceived the act of being copied as an enforcement mechanism and so they actually spent additional time and money to resolve an issue that was ultimately resolved without needing them to get involved: but once we had a problem where on a Monday morning at ten in the morning these huge rolls of drawings showed up at our office; ‘what's this?’ and then I get a phone call; ‘these are all the revised drawings we had six people work all weekend and revised’; and what happened was Thursday afternoon our computer crashed. I couldn't answer back saying this isn't an issue because I never saw the email; the architect took it upon themselves with their team to redesign the whole project and our answer was; don't worry we took care of this, and they were so mad that all these people worked for about six hours on Sunday and eight hours on Saturday to make these changes and they weren't needed and because they acted on the fact that they were ‘cc'ed’, legally they don't; but I'm just saying like now it's a problem…(PM). 5. Discussion ANT, as described by Callon (1986) and also summarized by Floricel et al. (2014), describes four stages that dynamically overlap each other and differ among actor–networks. Using a graphical syntax, it is possible to see that in this case the stage of problematization can be described in episode 1. As described by Floricel et al. (2014), this stage involves the engagement of actors acted on through a translating actant — in our case the main translating actant is the project objective. The stage of interessement in episode 2 includes on-going negotiations between actors and through translating actants like the HB building and the walk-through meeting artifact whilst enrolment at this stage is the “successful translation of interests within a network” (Floricel et al., 2014, p. 1097). Further examples of enrolment can be observed in episode 3 through the HB building and more walk-through meetings. The stage of

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mobilization which is the establishment of formalized communication through the email actant translating common exchanges can also be observed in episode 3. The enactment of accountability is described throughout the episodes as distributed between actor–networks but ultimately reconciled through the translating actors into a socially constructed accountability framework. The use of ANT helps to identify actor– networks and translating actors through which individual accountabilities are shaped. In particular, the HB building in itself was a main research actant working as a source and target actor; the walk-through meeting is an important translating actor directing the accountability of the project manager in an informal manner through to the project owner and stakeholders. In episode 3, the email system artifact is a translating actor through which individual enactments of accountability can be reconciled. For example, tradespeople used emails to account for their progress to the project manager, and the project manager used emails to offer completion dates to the project owner. In the description of the case, the Project Manager describes the building under renovation as a dynamic entity and refers to its visual progress as a visual artifact through which accountability can be enacted. The HB building is prominent, as it is not only an actant around which other actor–networks revolve, but also the collective translation actor for the enactment of accountability. 6. Conclusions 6.1. Theoretical contributions In the tradition of studies that employ ANT, this study makes three main contributions. First, it provides the de-naturalization of the concept of accountability in the management of projects. The analysis of the case demonstrates that project accountability may not be as it is conceptualized in the project management literature. We note that conceptual models of accountability as a process or an outcome are not sufficient to explain for what a project manager is accountable. In this project, the formal systems of reporting and accountability are skewed towards satisfying budgetary needs. The reward or punishment for the project manager is mainly associated with delivering the project within the agreed cost. The project manager deals with multiple accountabilities towards various stakeholders. Accountability is initially enacted through the project scope document. The perception of success, however, varies among various stakeholders. One of the stakeholders views success as maintaining budget constraints, while the Project Owner however, perceives success around the intended use of the final renovated building. The project was ultimately completed and delivered on budget (although individual project component costs needed renegotiation), on an extended schedule and was ultimately fit for its intended use. Various concepts of accountability were enacted in parallel with the cost and schedule negotiations. The enactment of accountability appears to be distributed across the social system rather than as a hierarchically constructed mechanism that depends on formal reports. In this process, various individuals took ownership of project accountability depending on their roles and the episodes in the project. It was not just the Project Manager who felt that he was ultimately accountable, but the Project Owner

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felt some responsibility for achieving the project's objective. Accountability was enacted through the negotiation and resolving of competing objectives by various participants. Second, this study demonstrates that accountability was often being enacted spontaneously, not by design. The project manager conceptualizes accountability as an obligation to meet the budgetary constraints while helping the project owner to realize her objectives. As the project progresses however, this conception changes towards meeting the needs of various stakeholders. This is a result of the assembling and stabilizing of diverse human and non-human entities within this project. Accountability does not just have a functional place in the management of projects. It is part of the processes and practices of organizing and guides the actions of various actors (Bloomfield and Vurdubakis, 1999). The management of the project de facto becomes a collective social activity through the translation of accountability among various actor–networks. This case describes the ownership of the project management role being present among all of the interviewees. Therefore, project management should be conceptualized as a collective activity rather than an individual effort. This again illustrates the need for the development of a new conceptualization for project accountability. Furthermore, the reporting and the discussion phases of accountability happen often in walk-through meetings with the project owner and stakeholders. The case demonstrates that in these walk-through meetings, artifacts are important actants in the enactment of accountability. In this case, accountability is not limited to the disclosure of information through formal reports and discussions associated with them. The building, as a translating actant becomes a dynamic and visual report that discloses information about the progress of the project. It becomes part of the conversation about what was expected and what is achieved. It is worth noting that the HB building was not the only artifact that played an active role as an actant. As an example, the email artifact also acted as a translating actant to resolve conflicts and highlight points of difference. This is an important illustration of the role of ad-hoc objects in the accountability relationship. In another instance that we discussed, an email to the project manager that was copied to the architects caused the architects to work overtime to revise the drawings, while the project manager who had not seen the email did not require any revisions to the drawings. Third, the visualization of the three episodes from the project plan to the artifact of the HB building itself is a contribution to the literature. It embodies an inanimate artifact such as the HB building, translating accountability as an actant through its power of being a visual source of information disclosure.

internal control systems and project governance. Managers involved in the governance of projects should note that reports they receive from project offices and the discussion of those reports with the project managers may not be sufficient for the effective governance of projects. In fact, relying on reports generated by various systems or project offices should not replace the conversations with the project managers. Furthermore, if accountability is distributed across a social network, the discussion of performance should go beyond the performance of the project manager. Managers of organizations who are involved in designing project offices and systems of reporting for projects should be aware that project accountability is distributed across a social system. Project managers should be aware of the role of artifacts in disclosing information in the accountability relationship. Project reports or conversation at the level of the steering committees are not the only mechanisms for reporting. Artifacts, such as the HB building in this case, are actors in disclosing information about the project progress. Project managers should have a plan in place for dealing with such artifacts.

6.3. Limitations and further research In this paper we identify a need for conceptualizing accountability regimes in such a way that encompasses the social space of accountability in a project. We demonstrated through the actor–network graphical description how accountability is enacted in this case and argued that there is a need for a new conceptualization of project accountability. Further studies are needed to propose alternative conceptualization of accountability and indicate consequences of such models for project governance. A limitation of single case studies is that they are sometimes criticized as a research method because of their lack of generalizability. However, the richness of information gathered and analyzed by a single case study reveals patterns of action and informs directions for further research. Our study provides an example of this complexity. We demonstrate, through the actor–network graphical description of this case study, how accountability is enacted in a construction project and argue that there is a need for a new conceptualization of project accountability. Further research is needed to reveal patterns in other contexts and generalize these patterns into a theory of accountability in projects.

6.2. Managerial implications

Funding

Organizations put management control systems in place to guide the behavior of their members. Human behavior is derived from several forces including the individuals' characteristics, their personal relationships, the social structure, and the organizational norms and institutionalized policies and practices. Accountability systems that are put in place are designed to address agency issues and form the cornerstone of

This research did not receive any specific grant from funding agencies in the public, commercial, or not-for-profit sectors.

Conflict of interest The authors declare that there are no conflict of interest.

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