Reassessing design priorities: Critical success factors (CSFs) and the disconnect between building design assumptions and project delivery

• Proposes a novel framework for CSFs and systematically ranks them using the design stages of the RIBA 2020 Plan of Work. • Results identify compliance and stakeholder engagement as more decisive than traditional design priorities in shaping project delivery. • Results reveal underrepresentation of Strategic Engineering & Design within AEC practice. • Provides actionable guidance for aligning building design with delivery outcomes in complex, large-scale building projects. The design stage is often celebrated as the central stage of architectural creativity yet remains weakly integrated into project-delivery frameworks. This study addresses this enduring gap by advancing the first systematic prioritization of design-stage Critical Success Factors (CSFs) within the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) Plan of Work 2020. Using the Analytic Hierarchy Process (AHP), expert judgements from 26 architects, engineers, and project managers in Dubai’s high-growth construction sector evaluated eight CSF categories and thirty-two sub-factors. Findings reveal that regulatory-compliance and stakeholder-engagement factors dominate, surpassing traditional design-centric priorities such as strategic engineering and creative authorship. This outcome reflects a reorientation relative to disciplinary expectations, with experts placing greater weight on coordination and procedural performance than on artistic or design-intent considerations. The study introduces a novel RIBA-based CSF framework that empirically links design intent with delivery outcomes and redefines the interface between design management and project performance. The results contribute theoretically by conceptualizing design–delivery integration and misalignments as a quantifiable hierarchy of success factors, and practically by offering actionable benchmarks for regulators, consultants, and design leaders seeking to rebalance creativity and compliance in performance-driven construction environments.