Study to investigate relationship between planning fallacy, over confidence and self esteem

Abstract

Planning fallacy is a phenomenon that plagues human life in all forms. In professional environment, planning fallacy is not only undesirable but also severely dangerous. Planning fallacy is the tendency to underestimate the time that is budgeted for completion of a project. This leads to schedules going haywire, deadlines being missed and hence it is of interest amongst academicians and professionals alike to understand the planning fallacy. There has been considerable literature on planning fallacy, which has proposed several models to explain why the fallacy exists. They range from simple inside-outside models to extended ones. However, this study examines if planning fallacy is, in any way, connected to overconfidence, self-esteem and/or professional experience of project planning. To begin with, it would be appropriate to define planning fallacy, over-confidence and selfesteem. Also, a brief review of the existing literature on planning fallacy is included to set the context for this study.