Malik M.A. Khalfan

Building trust in construction projects

Purpose – The objective of this paper is to present different perspectives on building “trust” among supply chain participants working on construction projects.Design/methodology/approach – A case study methodology was adopted; with five construction projects selected as five case studies for the trust in construction project on the basis a selection criteria devised for the research project. Over 40 interviews were conducted with participants operating at different levels in their respective organisations and at different point in the supply chain.Findings – The information provided by the multiple informants was, to a large extent, consistent with much of the academic literature relating to the importance of and barriers to trust. Specifically, the case studies highlighted: what people within the construction industry understand by trust, reliance, and honest professional relationship; the key factors that contribute towards building trust and factors that result into breakdown of trust; and organisatio...

Innovating for supply chain integration within construction

The dream of better relationships among different supply chain partners; trust and transparency during different construction activities; integrated supply chain; completion of projects on time, within the agreed cost, with promised quality products and services, and so on, have now been achieved within the UK construction industry due to innovation within the project procurement processes and activities. There has also been a growing realisation that the promotion of innovative thinking, in procurement processes for supply chain integration, offers all the involved parties some key benefits in terms of more flexibility and adaptability, commercial growth, and improved quality of products, and delivered service. This paper highlights the benefits of, and the motivation towards innovative procurement through two case studies done as part of a supply chain integration project at the SCRI research centre. The case studies demonstrate how organizations involved have promoted innovative thinking across the supply chain through innovative procurement. The case studies also highlight some of the critical factors that motivated people within those firms to move from traditional way of procurement, and search, innovate, and implement the new procurement thoughts and models. The paper concludes that these studies offer transferable learning opportunities and motivation for the staff of other construction firms seeking to promote integration within their supply chains through innovative procurement routes.

Mutual objective setting for partnering projects in the public sector

– The use of partnering has grown within the public sector of the UK construction industry. Central to partnering is the use of the partnering charter. The charter establishes the mutual objectives of the project team. The purpose of this paper is to investigate the types of objectives that are identified and the potential reasons for them., – A number of partnering workshops have been undertaken through one of the University of Salfords Enterprise Units, the Centre for Construction Innovation. Each of these generated a workshop report, which captured the discussions during the day. These have been analysed in order to establish the different mutual objectives that have been identified for different projects., – The results show that while the key issues of time, cost, quality and safety are still central to what teams identify as successful project delivery, issues surrounding management of relationships including external stakeholders, such as the public, are also prevalent. In addition, there is an increase in identified objectives surrounding sustainable development issues, covering social and environmental goals., – The findings provide strong indications that construction is moving towards a more complex regime of objectives in the context of value procurement and partnering arrangements. The objectives identified by the different project teams show that construction projects are now considering both soft management issues and sustainable development as central to the successful delivery of projects.

Construction project procurement routes: an in‐depth critique

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to examine different categories of building project procurement routes based on organisational, contractual, financial and technical issues.Design/methodology/approach – The paper is based on review of literature and conditions of contracts. The UK construction industry serves as a general frame of reference. The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors survey of Contracts in Use from 1985 to 2004 is used to probe the share and value of contracts along different procurement routes and across different conditions of contracts in the UK. The logic is that the value and the share of contracts will indicate the behaviour of different procurement routes in the UK construction market while the in‐depth analysis of conditions of contracts will show the gaps and relationships between the general definition/categorisation and contractual context (conditions of contracts) of each of the procurement routes.Findings – The preliminary result of the analysis shows that traditional...

Measuring knowledge retention: A case study of a construction consultancy in the UAE

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to develop a model that can be used to assess the knowledge retention capabilities of an organisation, and suggest opportunities for improvement. A model to fulfil this aim is developed and validated on a construction engineering consultancy.Design/methodology/approach – A knowledge retention model was developed drawing on a thorough review of the literature. The developed retention model was validated through a case of a construction engineering consultancy. Semi‐structured interviews were used to elicit relevant information during the case study.Findings – A four‐stage knowledge retention process has been presented. These four steps are socialisation, codification, knowledge construction, and knowledge retrieval. The paper also describes four levels of maturity for the knowledge retention model. The first level demonstrated the extent of knowledge sharing in the organisation, the second level measured the extent of knowledge shared being documented, the third level...

Emergence of green building guidelines in developed countries and their impact on India

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to identify the characteristics of green building guidelines in developed countries and to analyze their influence on the evolution and adoption of similar guidelines in India.Design/methodology/approach – This research reviews the green building guidelines in the developed as well as the developing countries such as Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design guidelines for new construction (LEED® NC‐USA), Building Research Establishment Environmental Assessment Method (BREEAM)‐UK, Comprehensive Assessment System for Building Environmental Efficiency (CASBEE)‐Japan, and LEED®‐India and further performs a comparative analysis of these guidelines.Findings – Based on the comparative analysis of LEED® NC‐USA, BREEAM‐UK, and CASBEE‐Japan, the characteristics that might have affected their current acceptance were identified. The catalysts and hindrances associated with the acceptance of LEED‐India in India were identified based on the comparative analysis of LEED® NC‐US...

Off-Site Construction of Apartment Buildings

AbstractThe populations of major cities in Australia are increasing rapidly and facing an acute housing shortage. Traditional apartment procurement techniques involve lengthy lead times, and therefore, factory-based, or off site–constructed (OSC), multistory apartment buildings may offer the opportunity to help fulfill the need by significantly reducing build times and potentially offer good economic value. Other advantages of OSC may include superior quality, low weight ratios, economies of scale achieved through repetition of prefabricated units, use on infill sites, sustainable design standards, and better occupational health and safety. There are also positive labor and training implications, which may help to alleviate an industrywide shortage of skills through use of semiskilled labor. Previous uncertainties about the adoption of OSC because of the high capital costs and perception issues were generally based on precast concrete structures, which are a quite different building type in terms of flexi...

State of green construction in India: drivers and challenges

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to present the findings of a workshop organized in New Delhi to assess the current state of green construction in India and highlight the major drivers and challenges faced by the construction sector.Design/methodology/approach – The data collection for this paper is conducted through two sources; a survey and a facilitated brainstorming session. The survey provides an opportunity to compare practices in India to global trends and the facilitated sessions provides a platform to collect data on more subjective, experiential knowledge about green construction in India.Findings – Some of the major findings of this endeavour are: there is an awareness about green construction in India; It is primarily driven by the governmental and international regulations; with the current energy crisis customers in India are actually willing to pay extra for going green; and there is a lack of accurate lifecycle cost assessment models which results in misconceptions about associated c...

Knowledge management in construction supply chain integration

Knowledge Management (KM) is becoming increasingly important for organisations across a wide spectrum of industry sectors, especially for the naturally fragmented construction industry. There has been a growing realisation that it is very important for each project participant to effectively capture, share and utilise strategic knowledge and project knowledge, as well as process knowledge within the construction supply chain for better performance. This paper highlights the benefits of integrated construction supply chain management through effective KM. The paper reviews the general literature in construction supply chains and KM and presents some initiatives in the abovementioned area, followed by a full theory analysis and case study. The case study was conducted with a public sector client organisation in the UK. It explored their strategies for an integrated construction supply chain through KM, knowledge capture and knowledge sharing. It also studied the reuse by their employees as well as by the other organisations they worked with to deliver construction projects in north-west England. The paper concludes that KM would effectively improve the integration of construction supply chains and thus improve overall production performance.

Methods used to procure infrastructure projects in Pakistan: an overview

In Pakistan, the need for infrastructure is immense while resources and capital are scarce commodities. The government estimates the public exchequer cannot even meet half of the funds required for infrastructure development. This paper investigates the methods used in Pakistan to procure infrastructure projects. This paper is a part of doctoral study of procurement practises of developing countries. Through literature and archival analysis, it discusses the project approval and procurement process in public sector in Pakistan. With the help of in depth case interviews and in light of the literature it discusses the advantages and disadvantages of the methods used in Pakistan. The findings reveal that there are two distinct methods of infrastructure project procurement in public sector in Pakistan, i.e., the traditional method and the non-traditional method, i.e., public private partnership (PPP). It is also found that there are constraints in project approval process hence causing problems in implementation. The driving forces for the non-traditional method in comparison to the traditional method are also limited.