【作者】 范永芳；

【导师】 戚桂杰；

【作者基本信息】 山东大学 ， 管理科学与工程， 2013， 博士

【摘要】 项目投资已经成为国民经济的主要驱动力之一,对我国经济发展的速度和质量起到非常关键的决定作用,提升项目绩效不但可以提升资本使用效率,还可以推进我国企业转型升级,逐步跨越中等收入陷阱,实现新一届政府两个百年目标所承载的中国梦。现有研究对企业绩效有较多研究(张梅,2011；周环,2012),但是企业绩效很多是已有产品尤其是成熟产品决定的,尚不能有效反映项目投资的绩效,需要专门针对项目绩效进行研究,以往研究也有通过资金使用效率等侧面做过相关分析(范永芳,2011),但是还不够全面,对项目绩效的关注也大多停留在经济产出,忽视了非财务指标,不利于全面评估项目绩效。同时,关系嵌入已经成为企业获得高水平绩效的关键因素之一,关系嵌入中不同类型对项目绩效的影响如何?在建筑等基建类行业中,这些关系间对项目绩效影响大小有何不同?这些问题都是理论研究中尚需深入探究,实践中急需解决的核心问题。由于中国属于典型的新兴经济体,处于经济转型期,市场经济体制逐步完善,但政府在国民经济发展中依然起到十分重要的作用。国家相关政策的出台可能会对企业的外部环境造成较大影响,如国家的4万亿投资、铁道部撤销、高速公路节假日取消收费、国五条、房产税、银行利率等宏观调控措施对企业的项目绩效影响十分明显,因此通过关系嵌入来稳固各种合作关系,降低新兴经济体不确定性带来的负面影响就显得十分重要。以往对项目绩效的相关研究,多从企业的核心竞争力对绩效的影响等方面展开,但是研究关系嵌入的不同维度对项目绩效的影响尚有不足,而且外部环境对两者关系的调节作用也比较欠缺。基于以上研究背景,为了进一步确定研究问题,本研究通过研究相关文献,并结合笔者多年的建筑企业项目投资工作经验进行了实地调研。发现企业对项目绩效的考量忽略了非财务绩效,对外部关系对项目绩效有影响有所了解,但是并不了解关系嵌入不同维度对项目绩效的影响,同样不太了解外部环境不确定性对两者关系的调节作用,不利于企业通过关系嵌入及外部不确定性的感知来采取具体措施提升项目绩效。在此背景下,如何通过关系嵌入、外部环境不确定性来提升项目绩效已经成为实践和理论界关心的主要问题之一,这也是本文的主要关注点所在。根据上述研究问题,本文确定了主要的研究内容：1)对关系嵌入对项目绩效的影响进行研究,探索企业与供应商关系、金融机构关系以及政府机构关系三个重要的关系嵌入因素对企业项目绩效的影响,根据调研结果和相关文献,将项目绩效分为财务绩效与非财务绩效两类；2)对环境不确定性对关系嵌入与项目绩效间关系的调节作用进行研究,探讨政策法律不确定性及行业环境不确定性这两个重要的环境不确定性维度对关系嵌入与项目绩效间关系的调节作用。针对以上主要研究内容,本论文共分为六章,具体章节内容如下：第一章为绪论。主要从管理实践和理论需求两个层面介绍有关的现实及理论背景,指出现有管理实践和相关研究中存在的问题,进而得出本文的主要研究问题,同时说明本研究的理论及现实意义,对相关研究对象的概念进行界定,介绍本文的研究内容,并提出本文研究的思路和框架,以及本文研究的主要创新点。第二章为文献综述。重点阐述国内外关系嵌入、项目绩效和环境不确定性等相关文献,同时回顾了关系交换理论和资源依赖理论等相关理论。在此基础上,通过对现有研究不足之处的分析,提出本研究的总体思路和框架。第三章为建筑企业项目绩效现状。本章将从我国建筑业发展的现状出发,分析建筑企业的优势和劣势,然后提出建筑企业项目绩效亟需解决的实际问题。根据现实总结了关系嵌入、环境不确定性等方面对项目绩效的影响,指出了实践中仍然需要厘清关系嵌入与项目绩效间关系,同时需要理清楚环境不确定性的角色,以便在管理实践中制定相应对策。第四章是研究设计。通过访谈,提出了概念模型和假设,并收集了相关数据,对指标进行了量化分析。根据提出的总体研究思路和框架,针对典型企业典型项目展开访谈,考察影响项目绩效的主要因素,用以检验所提出的研究思路和框架是否符合项目管理实践,同时根据调研结果进一步细化研究框架。然后根据相关理论和本文的研究目的,界定关系嵌入和环境不确定性等构件的内涵,勾勒出本研究的具体概念模型,并提出相关假设。详细阐述了用于实证分析的数据收集过程,包括问卷设计、样本选取,问卷收集、数据特征等。本研究于2012年4月至5月,根据研究需要设计和测试了问卷,并大规模发放问卷,共回收有效问卷303份。此外,还对论文所涉及变量的测量指标和依据进行了说明,最后扼要介绍了用于验证概念模型和假设所采用的统计学方法。第五章为数据分析与研究结论。本章对论文所收集的数据进行了描述性统计分析,对使用的变量进行了信度和效度检验,包括了收敛效度和判别效度。随后,利用适合于检验调节作用的偏相关回归软件Smart PLS2.0对论文提出的假设进行了验证。为了进一步对相关关系进行分析,本研究使用IBM SPSS21.0通过回归分析对主效应的系数进行了对比,采用古扎拉蒂的系数对比方法(Gujarati,1995),得到研究结果,揭示了主效应强弱及方向比较,并采用方差分析的方法对该结果进行进一步验证。同时总结了三方面的研究结论,并给出了管理建议。第六章为结束语。本章对论文所做工作进行了总结,包括背景分析,文献梳理和现状分析,以及在此基础上的理论模型构建,假设提出,实证检验,以及研究结论和管理意义。并阐述了研究存在的不足之处及未来的研究方向。针对以上研究内容,本文总结了10个主假设,得出以下三大方面的主要研究结论：(1)关系嵌入是获得项目绩效提升的重要途径。通过三种不同类型的关系嵌入对项目绩效影响的分析,进一步说明,任何企业都不是独立地进行原子式的决策和行动,而是在受社会因素影响的情况下做出符合自己主观意愿的行为决策。具体来说,与供应商之间的关系对项目投资的财务绩效有正向影响；与供应商之间的关系对项目投资的非财务绩效有正向影响。与金融机构间关系对项目投资的财务绩效有正向影响；与金融机构间关系对项目投资的非财务绩效有正向影响。与政府间关系对项目投资的财务绩效有正向影响；与政府间关系对项目投资的非财务绩效有负向影响。(2)环境不确定性显著地强化了关系嵌入对项目绩效影响的重要性。企业之所以不独立地进行原子式的决策和行动,而是充分考虑社会因素的影响,意味着外部环境的力量是非常重要的。根据环境依赖理论,企业如何理解自身的外部环境、以何种方式融入自身的环境、通过什么方式从所在环境中获取和处理信息,这些行为都会影响外部环境对企业产生的影响程度。具体来讲,研究发现环境不确定性对供应商关系对项目绩效的正向影响有正向调节作用,对金融机构关系对项目绩效的正向影响有正向调节作用,对政府关系对投资的财务绩效的正向影响有正向调节作用,而对投资的非财务绩效的负向影响有负向调节作用。通过相关研究,我们可以看到,外部环境对企业的影响并非一个独立的外生变量,其同时也是企业可以改变的一个内生变量。企业要努力控制和改变外部环境因素,例如政治、法律和行业环境等。环境不确定性的出现其实是直接影响到了关系嵌入,使得企业与外部环境间关系的平衡收到新的挑战,因此企业要根据环境不确定性的影响,预判和应对相应的问题。(3)建立有利的关系嵌入类型组合,才能统筹长期短期项目目标,兼顾财务非财务绩效,实现项目绩效的持续提升。从中我们可以发现,从提升代表企业未来中长期发展前景的非财务绩效的角度来看,企业应该减少与政府机构关系,但是政府机构关系对财务绩效贡献最大,减少政府机构关系,将会危及到财务绩效。同时,仅仅对于政府机构关系而言,也并非每一个政府促成的项目盈利都能达到企业设定的投标标准,但是大量的政府参与或支持的项目就可以成为企业稳定的项目来源,可以消除经济周期性的影响,并且依靠此类项目中的溢出效应,从资金、技术和声誉上获得关联优势,最终获得较好的财务绩效。可见三种不同类型关系嵌入应该加以适当组合,来获得更好的项目绩效,这就需要企业做好未来项目的投资结构等问题。具体而言,从研究结果可以看出其对财务绩效的影响作用强弱关系为：供应商关系<金融机构关系<政府机构关系；其对非财务绩效的影响作用中,供应商关系>金融机构关系,而政府机构关系对非财务绩效的影响为负,表明政府机构关系的影响与其他类型关系的影响为方向上的差异。且可以看到,当因变量从财务绩效变为非财务绩效的过程中,供应商关系的影响强度属于稳中有升,金融机构关系的影响强度属于稳中有降,而政府关系的影响从最强变为最弱,由正向转为负向。本文的研究结论进一步地丰富和发展现有的关系嵌入和项目绩效相关文献,并对投资管理实践提出借鉴意义的结论。与以往相关研究相比,本文的创新点与贡献主要体现在如下三个方面：首先,本文理清了不同关系嵌入类型对项目绩效的不同影响,且将项目绩效从财务和非财务两个角度区分研究,得出了与以往研究仅关注财务绩效而不同的研究结论,发现政府关系对项目非财务绩效有负向影响。其次,对比了不同类型关系嵌入对项目绩效影响的相对强弱,从理论上揭示了不同类关系为企业带来的资源不同,因而对项目绩效有不同影响,同时从实践角度,帮助企业建立有利的关系嵌入类型组合,统筹长期短期项目目标,兼顾财务非财务绩效,实现项目绩效的持续提升。最后,分析了环境不确定性对上述关系的调节作用,发现环境不确定性对政府关系与财务绩效、非财务绩效间关系的调节作用不同。这一结论,从资源依赖的观点,解释了环境不确定性对关系嵌入作用的强化作用,尤其对于转型经济、新兴经济阶段的中国企业而言,更应该充分利用关系嵌入,平衡企业与其他组织及外部环境间关系,获取资源抵御风险,以提升项目绩效。更多还原

【Abstract】 As one of the main driving forces of national economy, project investment plays a key role in guaranteeing the speed and quality of China’s economic development. Improving project investment efficiency can not only promote capital use efficiency, enhance the transformation and upgrading of China’s enterprises, gradually avoid the middle-income trap, and eventually realize the Chinese dream as reflected in the two one-hundred-year goals promoted by the new government. The existing research studies have emphasized more about business performance (Zhang Mei,2011; Zhou Huan,2012), most of which tends to be decided by existing products and mature ones in particular; the performance of project investment, however, is often overlooked. Some preliminary analysis has been done on capital usage efficiency (Fan Yongfang,2011), which is far from comprehensive enough. Concerns about project performance have largely stayed with economic output, and ignored the non-financial indicators, which is not conducive to the comprehensive evaluation of project performance. At the same time, as China turns into a new emerging economy, relational embeddedness has become one of the key factors to obtain high performance in enterprises. How do different types of relational embeddedness influence project performance? In construction and other infrastructure sectors, how do the influences caused by the different types of relations differ from one another? All these issues call for thorough studies in theory and urgent settlement in practice.As a typical emerging economy, China is in an economic transitional period when market economic system is gradually improving, and the government plays an important role in the national economic development. Relevant national policies may lead to great influence on the external environment where enterprises operate. Such policies include the national4trillion investments, the transformation of the Ministry of Railways, the cancellation of highway toll on public holidays, the implementation of national Article Five, the levying of property tax, fluctuation of bank interest rates and other macroeconomic regulation and control measures, all of which have evident impact on project performance. Therefore, it is fairly important to strengthen cooperation relations through relational embeddedness and reduce the negative impact caused by uncertainties associated with emerging economies. Previous research on project performance has largely focused on the influence of core competitiveness on enterprise performance, while the influence of different dimensions of embedded relations on project performance has been neglected. Research on the regulatory role of external environment in the relationship is insufficient as well.Based on the study of relevant literature and on-the-spot investigation, this thesis argues that when assessing project performance, enterprises have neglected non-financial performance; though with some knowledge of the impact of external relations on project performance, they do not understand the impact of different dimensions of relational embeddedness on project performance, nor do they know much about the regulatory role brought about by the uncertainties in external environment, which fails to enhance project performance through perceiving relational embeddedness and uncertainties in external performance. In this context, how to improve project performance through relational embeddedness and reduce the negative impact of uncertainties in the external environment has become one of the major concerns of practice and theory, which is also the focus of this thesis.In accordance with the above research questions, the main research contents of this thesis are as follows:Study of impact of relational embeddedness on project performance, and examination of the impact of the three important relational embeddedness factors of relations between enterprises and suppliers, financial institutions and government agencies on the performance of enterprise project perfomance. Based on the research results and related literature, project performance is divided into two categories of financial performance and non-financial performance. Analysis of the regulatory role of environment uncertainty on the relationship between relations embeddedness and project performance in terms of the two dimensions of policy and law uncertainty and industry environment uncertainty. Based on the above research agenda, this thesis is divided into the following six chapters:Chapter One is introduction. In this chapter practical and theoretical backgrounds are analyzed. The problems with existing practice and related research are raised according to managerial practice and theoretical needs. Subsequently, the main research issues of the thesis are put forward. The theoretical and practical significance of this research is discussed. The concepts of the relevant objects of study are defined. An introduction to the research contents of this thesis is also included as well as the research framework and innovative points.The second chapter focuses on literature review. Emphasis is put on relevant home and foreign literature on relational embeddedness, project performance and environment uncertainty. In addition, related theories such as relation exchange theory and resource dependence theory are reviewed. On this basis, through the analysis of the deficiencies in the existing research, the underlying thought and framework of this study are put forward.The third chapter presents the status quo of construction enterprise project performance. This chapter begins with an introduction to the present situation of construction industry development in China, and analyses of the weaknesses and strengths of construction enterprises, followed by the raising of practical problems calling for immediate solution in construction enterprise project performance. The impacts of relational embeddedness and environmental uncertainty on project performance are summed up. The chapter proceeds to point out that in practice it is important to clarify the relationship between relational embeddedness and project performance and determine the role of environmental uncertainty in order to formulate corresponding measures in managerial practice. Chapter Four focuses on research design. Based on the findings of interviews, conceptual models and assumptions are put forward. Relevant data are collected followed by quantitative analysis of indicators. In accordance with the underlying thought and research framework, interviews are carried out on typical enterprise projects. The main factors influencing the project performance are studied to examine whether the underlying research thought and framework are in line with the project management practice. In addition, according to the research results, the research framework is further specified. Furthermore, according to the related theory and the purpose of this study, the connotation of relations embeddness and environmental uncertainty are defined. The concrete research conceptual model is outlined, and relevant assumptions are put forward. The detailed data collection process for empirical analysis is elaborated including questionnaire design, sample selection, questionnaire data collection, and data features. Subsequently, in April and May,2012, a questionnaire was designed and tested in accordance with the research needs. The questionnaire was distributed on a large scale and a total of303effective ones were returned which have been used to verify the research hypotheses. Finally, the measurement indexes and variables adopted in the thesis are explained, and the statistical methods used to verify the conceptual model and assumptions are briefly presented.Chapter Five focuses on data analysis and research conclusion. Descriptive statistical analysis of collected data is carried out in this chapter. Reliability and validity of the variables are tested, convergent validity and discriminant validity inclusive. Partial correlation regression software Smart PLS2.0is then used to verify the assumptions put forward in the thesis. In order to further analyze the correlation, IBM SPSS21.0regression analysis is adopted to compare the major effect factors. With Gujarati’s coefficient comparison method (Gujarati,1995), the results are obtained, revealing strength and direction comparison of major effects; the variance analysis method is adopted to further verify the results. Finally, three aspects of the research conclusion are concluded, and managerial advice is put forward. Chapter Six is the conclusion. The thesis is concluded with a summary of the background analysis, literature review and the analysis of the status quo as well as the theoretical model building, hypothesis raising, empirical testing, research conclusion and managerial significance. The deficiency of this research is elaborated and future research agenda is outlined.Based on the above research contents, the thesis has come to ten chief assumptions and drawn the following three major conclusions.Relational embeddedness plays an important role in improving project performance. Through analyzing the impact of three different types of relational embeddedness on project performance, the thesis argues that no enterprise is willing to opt for independent decision-making and action-taking; instead decisions conforming to their own subjective intention are often made under the influence of social factors.Specifically, the relationship with the suppliers has positive effects on financial performance of project investment; the relationship with the suppliers has positive effects on non-financial performance of project investment. The relationship with financial institutions has positive effects on financial performance of project investment; the relationship with financial institutions has positive effects on non-financial performance of project investment. Relationship with the government has positive effects on financial performance of project investment; relationship with the government has negative effects on non-financial performance of project investment.Environmental uncertainty significantly strengthens the impact of relational embeddness on project performance. Instead of opting for independent decision-making and action-taking, enterprises take into full account of the impact of social factors, which demonstrates the significance of external environment. According to dependency theory, such behavior as how to understand and integrate into the external environment, and how to acquire and process information from the external environment, will determine the way the external environment affects the enterprises. To be specific, according to the research findings, the uncertainty of environment has positive regulatory effects on the positive impact of relationship with suppliers on project performance; it has positive regulatory effects on the positive impact of relationship with financial institutions on project performance; it has positive regulatory effects on the positive impact of relationship with the government on financial project performance while it has negative effects on the negative impact on non-financial performance.Through relevant research, we can see that the impact of the external environment on enterprises is not an independent exogenous variable; instead, it is also an endogenous variable. Enterprises should strive to control and change the external environment factors, such as politics, legislation and industry environment. The emergence of environmental uncertainty has immediate effect on relational embeddedness and gives rise to new challenges for balancing relationship between enterprises and their external environment. Therefore, enterprises should anticipate and respond to the corresponding problems according to the impact of environmental uncertainty.Establishing constructive relational embeddedness cooperation relations is essential to integrate long and short-term project goals, take account of both financial and non-financial performance, and eventually improve project performance. It is safe to draw the conclusion that to improve the non-financial performance which reflects the medium and long-term development prospects, enterprises should reduce the interaction with government agencies. However, government agencies play a major role in determining financial performance. Less interaction with government agencies will lead to negative impacts on the financial performance of enterprises. In terms of relations with government agencies, not all government-supported projects produce due profits, but government involvement or support can contribute to a stable source of the project, and eliminate negative periodic impact. Besides, the spillover effects of such programs will bring about advantages in terms of capital, technology and reputation and eventually produce good financial performance. Thus, to integrate effectively the three different types of relations will lead to better project performance, which requires enterprises to do better in the future project investment structure. Specifically, the research findings reveal the following effects on financial performance: the impact of relations with suppliers, financial institutions and government in proper order on financial performance of project investment increases; the impact of relations with suppliers is stronger than with financial institutions on non-financial performance of project investment while relations with government agencies have negative effects, which shows the impact of relations with government agencies are different in direction from the other relation types. Besides, as the dependent variable changes from financial performance to non-financial performance, the impact of relations with the suppliers steadily rises while the impact of relations with financial institutions steadily drops, and the impact of relations with government agencies changes from the strongest to the weakest, and from positive to negative.This study has further enriched and developed the existing related literature on relational embeddedness and project performance, and therefore provides constructive reference for investment managerial practice. Compared with previous research, the innovative ideas and contribution of this thesis can be seen from the following three aspects:First, it further clarifies the impact of different embedded relations on project performance; the study of the project performance is conducted from two dimensions of financial and non-financial performance and differs from previous research which emphasizes on financial performance only. A different conclusion that relations with government agencies have negative effects on non-financial performance has been drawn.Second, the study contrasts different relations in terms of the strength of their respective impact on project performance and reveals in theory that different relations bring about different resources for enterprises and hence have different impacts on project performance. In addition, in terms of practice, the study helps enterprises establish constructive cooperation types of different relational embeddedness, integrate short-and long-term project goals, take into account both financial and non-financial performance, and realize continuous enhancement of project performance.Finally, the regulatory role of environmental uncertainty on the above relations is analyzed. The study reveals that uncertainty in external environment plays a role different from that of relations with government agencies on financial and non-financial relations. This conclusion explains the reinforcing effect of environmental uncertainty on relational embeddedness in terms of resource dependence. Enterprises in China in the course of economic transformation and emergence should make full use of relational embeddedness to balance the relationship between enterprises and other organizations and the external environment, and to obtain the access to resources to withstand risks in order to enhance project performance.更多还原