Project Managers’ Cognitive Style in Decision Making: A Perspective from Construction Industry

A large and growing body of literature focuses on the project manager’s technical issues while ignoring theso-called soft project management. This study proposes that there is a need to extend management practices forproject management from a human-related factor by incorporating the cognitive styles in the decision-makingprocess towards the accomplishment of a successful project. The study aims to introduce the concept ofcognitive styles in decision making by project managers. Furthermore, it takes up a discussion on the definitionand types and roles of cognitive styles by linking these styles with project manager’s decision making behaviour.A questionnaire-based survey using Cognitive Style Instrument (CoSI), covering 110 project managers in theconstruction industry, was used to determine the cognitive styles among Malaysian project managers. The paperprovides the empirical findings that reveal that Malaysian project managers used Cognitive Style on a daily basisin their project environment. Planning Style was the most preferred style, followed by Knowing Style andCreating Style. This study is significant both for researchers and practitioners to shed light upon the ways inwhich project managers organise and process information and make judgements from a psychologicalperspective. Moreover, this study contributes more generally to the evolving understanding of the humanintellect process in project management. This paper introduces the concept of Cognitive Styles as an importanthuman-related factor for project managers, contributing to the body of project manager’s soft skills.