Sten Bonke

Facilitating Client Value Creation in the Conceptual Design Phase of Construction Projects: A Workshop Approach

Abstract If client values are not fully understood in a construction project it is likely to result in either low fulfilment of client expectations or multiple design alterations during the project process which lead to additional costs and frustration among the project participants. However, it is not a straightforward management task to operationalize client value in construction. Within this context, the client group comprises multiple stakeholders, which often have conflicting goals and values that may not be fully realized by the stakeholders themselves. The management challenge is further complicated by the fact that the delivery team, which is responsible for understanding and delivering client value, is made up of even more different parties. The article reports the initial outcome of a joint research project between academics and practitioners, which aims to develop a practical workshop model that incorporates client values into the conceptual design of construction projects. The workshop model draws on value management and lean thinking as underlying principles in an attempt to address the ambiguous concept of ‘value’.

Changes in the Danish construction sector: the need for a new focus

Purpose – It was the aim of the analysis to draw an overall picture of the trends towards change in the construction industry, thereby forming a foundation for further analysis and appropriate future research.Design/methodology/approach – A multi‐method approach was taken to the data collection exercise comprising data collection from published sources, interviews with knowledgeable representatives of the Danish construction industry and direct observation of what was happening on construction projects in Denmark.Findings – The work reported here has shown that there is some benefit in looking at the internal changes in the construction sector from the point of view of the various actors, an approach that has provided contrasting information to the government‐sponsored reports. The understanding of the industry as being backward and locked‐in does not provide an accurate description of the Danish construction sector. The research has shown a dynamic industry that is changing relatively quickly as it respo...

Building defects in Danish construction: project characteristics influencing the occurrence of defects at handover

Defects in construction have gained much attention from both the public and academia. Danish construction is no exception and a number of political initiatives have been established to address the unsatisfying amounts of defects. One of the political initiatives, benchmarking, collects and provides information from building projects on defects at handover to clients and on a number of project characteristics. This article utilizes the substantial amount of data from the benchmarking initiative to examine which project characteristics differentiate building projects with none or few cosmetic defects from those with many and/or serious defects. The article reviews the results from studying two quantitative data sets: (I) benchmarking data from 329 building projects and 621 contracts and (II) questionnaire data from an electronic survey comprising 130 contractors. This study provides in-depth knowledge about correlations between project characteristics and the extent of defects measured at handover. Results show statistically significant differences between building projects characterized by no or few defects compared with building projects with many and/or serious defects. Determining characteristics are the planning of budgetary conditions, time schedules and early, continuous quality control. Furthermore, this study also indicates collaboration between stakeholders plus skills and safety initiatives as having a positive influence on the performance measured as defects at handover.