Identifying the Driving Factors for Mega-Event Project Success: A Case Study of the Olympic Games

Mega-events are an opportunity for a country to demonstrate its economic and social strength and enhance its international status. The success of mega-events has a profound impact on the economic and social development of a country. Currently, mega-event projects face noticeable challenges in terms of cost overruns and schedule delays, which indicates that the project management of such mega-event remains under-researched. Existing studies reveal that the lack of a sufficient study of the drivers of mega-event projects has become one of the most critical factors hindering project success. To address the issue, this paper selected the six Olympic Games projects as the objects of the case study, adopting the grounded theory to develop a theoretical model of the driving factors of project success. The study obtained six crucial driving factors, i.e., ‘government support', ‘atmosphere relationship' and ‘consciousness culture' are the external driving factors of the Olympic Games project success, while ‘leadership', ‘resource allocation' and ‘organizational management' are the internal driving factors. The research findings can provide new insights and approaches to enhance the effectiveness of project management for such mega-events during the life cycle process.