Should I blow the whistles? A system dynamics model for risk reporting during project implementation.

An individual's reluctance to reporting project risks has become a significant issue that hinders project success. To better understand this behavior and facilitate risk reporting decision-making, this paper first clarifies the project implementation entities to project members (i.e., whistle-blowers) and project managers (i.e., whistle-hearers). Then, an evolutionary game analysis is conducted to investigate the behavioral biases of each entity and their behavioral interactions. Five equilibrium solutions of risk reporting strategies have been obtained through the replicator equations. Subsequently, a system dynamics model is constructed to intuitively demonstrate the dynamism and complex feedback structures of the whistle-blowing processes. Different scenarios have been proposed, which can further simulate the evolutionary patterns of risk reporting strategies in multiple contexts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]