Petro, Yacoub2013-07-172013-07-172012-10100123http://bspace.buid.ac.ae/handle/1234/284DISSERTATION WITH DISTINCTIONThe purpose of this study is to investigate the factors that make project portfolios more efficient. This study takes on the business units that operate in the private sector and considers them as project portfolios due to the number of external revenue generating projects which run under them. The research investigates portfolios/ business units that belong to the engineering and consultancy industry only; however, this does not deny the possibility to generalize the results of this research to other similar industries. The literature review concludes that the effectiveness of a project portfolio in the private sector consists of: the average projects success in that portfolio, economic success of the portfolio, client satisfaction, the ability to prepare for the future and the ability to balance priorities among the projects that constitute the portfolio. The research results concludes that it is the degree of the authority that is given to the project manager towards his team members’ status and personal matter that have the most of the influence on making an efficient business unit. The degree of involvement of a steering committee had shown a significant positive correlation with the efficiency of business units as well followed with the technical responsibility of the project manager. On the other hand, the relationship of the IT governance has been investigated and the research did not find any statistical proof for its correlation with the effectiveness of the portfolio/ business unit, and if any, it was only negatively correlated with the “preparing for the future” part of the portfolio management.enProject Portfolio EffectivenessProject SuccessProject Manager AuthorityEconomic SuccessDissertation