The Organization and Management of Construction

Managing the construction enterprise

David Langford, Arkady Retik

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2012
• eBook ISBN: 9781135813901
• Topic: Architecture
• Subtopic: Architecture General

The proceedings of the CIB W65 Symposium on the Organization and Management of Construction conference are presented here and in the companion volumes as state-of-the-art papers documenting research and innovative practice in the field of construction.

The volumes cover four broad themes: business management, project management, risk management, IT development and applications. Each volume is organized to provide easy reference so that the practitioner can speedily extract up to date information and knowledge about the global construction industry.

• Managing the Construction Enterprise (Volume One): Covers the firm and its business environment, markets and marketing, human resource management strategic planning, and quality management.
• Managing the Construction Project (Volume Two): focuses upon productivity, procurement, international projects and human issues in relation to management performance of construction organisations.
• Managing Risk (Volume Two): incorporates discussion of risk away from regulation by government and those safety risks inherent in the construction process.
• Managing Construction Information (Volume Three, published in conjunction with Construct IT Centre of Excellence): incorporates material on information systems and methods, application of IT to the design and construction processes and how IT theory and applications are best transmitted to students and practitioners.

The work represents a collation of wide ranging ideas and theory about construction and how research has contributed to the development of the industry on a global application of research to the problems of the construction industry.

INTRODUCTION TO VOLUME ONE

Managing the Construction Enterprise contains papers concerned with three major sub-themes:

•  The firm and its business environment

•  The firm, its markets and competitors

•  The firm and its resources

The papers collected together in The firm and its business environment’, have been grouped into two sets, those dealing with strategic change in the construction environment and those dealing with strategic management. The first set consider long-term issues influencing managerial activity at the apex of construction firms. Issues such as managing change, industry-based scenario plans and the relationship between firms and environmental movements are placed together to give a forward look to the issues and controversies of the future. In the second part of this sub-theme papers which address the theme of contractors’ strategic response to their business environment are presented. International companies are included in this sub-theme.

‘The firm, its markets and competitors’ is again broken into two sets of papers. One set is contained in an area which deals with marketing in the construction industry. The second explores research in the relatively recent area of partnering.

The third sub-theme focuses upon the resources that firms use to achieve strategic plans and market ambitions. One set of papers uncovers research in the field of human resource management and how the energies of people in construction enterprises can be engaged to realise corporate plans. These papers speak of developing people, equal opportunities, creating learning organizations. The second set tackles the question of building in and managing quality.

The structure of the volumes

To organize the range of topics covered by the W65 Commission the papers have been structured into three volumes. Each volume focuses upon a particular theme. These themes are:

•  Managing the Construction Enterprise

•  Managing the Project

•  Managing Information

Within each theme there are sub-themes which collect together papers around a specialist area of interest and then within each sub-theme there is a further selection to collect together papers on similar topics.

This approach is intended to assist the reader in identifying and consolidating areas of special interest and to link together subjects appearing in each volume.

Maintaining standards

In line with the growing confidence and maturity of the discipline, the papers contained within the volumes have been subjected to exacting standards of refereeing. Of the 241 abstracts received, 183 were selected for development into full papers. All of the full papers received were then refereed and authors invited to incorporate the referees’ comments into their papers. At the time of sending the material to the publishers 161 papers had been accepted. The standards achieved ensure that the papers presented in the volumes are of a standard expected in refereed journal articles.

Acknowledgments

We would like to record our special thanks to members of the organizing committee, the scientific committee and the conference organizers, Meeting Makers, especially Susan Miller and Elaine Bone. Particular thanks are due to Edith Henry of E & FN Spon for the painstaking attention to the detail associated with presenting the papers for the 8th International Symposium of the W65 Commission on Organization and Management of Construction.

Dave Langford

Arkady Retik

Glasgow, June 1996

Part I

The firm and its business environment

1 The firm and strategic change

A FRAMEWORK FOR MANAGING STRATEGIC CHANGE IN THE CONSTRUCTION INDUSTRY

Ben Obinero Uwakweh

Construction Innovation Center, University of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, Ohio, USA

Abstract

The management of change is a dynamic and on-going process. Organizations undergo changes but there is no one defined approach in the management of change. What is proposed in this paper is a model that may be used in the managerial process. This model is based on Technology, Political and Cultural factors. It is suggested that all these factors must be managed for the change process to be effective. The concept of Performing Arts is also used to illustrate that the management process must be continuous and any change in one factor will trigger a response in another area.

Keywords: Change, Political, Technical, Cultural, Organization, Strategic.

Sommaire

La gestion du changement est un processus dynamique et permanent. Toute organisation est soumise à des changements; or, il n’existe pas une façon unique de faire face à ces changements. Le présent papier propose un modèle applicable au processus de gestion du changement. Ce modèle est construit sur des facteurs technologiques, politiques et culturels, dont il est suggéré ici que seule la gestion tryptique aboutit à un processus de changement efficace. Le concept d’arts performants” est utilisé pour illustrer la nécessaire continuité du processus de gestion et la répercussion immédiate de tout changement survenant dans un facteur d’un domaine donné sur un autre facteur d’un autre domaine.

1 Introduction

In the light of the technological innovations in the world today, organizations will also need to undergo changes to remain competitive and profitable in the market place. For example, with advancements in technology, it is possible for firms in Europe to respond to an invitation to bid for a project in the United States or Africa within a day. The implication is that organizations which are not responsive to changes in the environment will miss business opportunities. In recent times, the Construction Industry is undergoing changes in the way it conducts business. In the past, the relationship between Constructors and Designers was very adversarial thus resulting in disputes. However, the emphasis in the industry now is on teams because owners of construction are now taking active role in the project delivery process. Owners are now concerned with not only completing their project on time, but are also concerned with the constructors safety records, quality of projects and the companies management capabilities. This demand by owners are encouraging the various parties involved in the construction process to examine their business practices and management styles.

The objective of this paper is therefore to present a framework for managing change in the industry. This framework is based on the literature in organizational development and research and would be used to illustrate how a midwestern firm in the United States is managing its change.

2 The Need For A Model For Managing Change

There are three dominant views that have guided thinking about organizations and the practice of change. The first tradition views organization and change from a technical perspective and hence prescribe change strategies based on empiricism and self interest (Arygris & Schon, 1978). The focus is upon the acquisition and application of knowledge useful for effective performance of organizational tasks. The technical view is instrumental and rational and the focus is upon the acquisition and application of the knowledge useful for effective performance of organizational tasks.

A second tradition views organizations as political entities which can only be changed by the exercise of power by the dominant group over those with less power or by bargaining among powerful groups. The third tradition, however, views organizations as cultural systems of values with shared symbols and shared cognitive schemes which tie people together and form a common organizational culture. Change comes about by altering the norms and cognitive schemes of the members of the organization.

Practicing managers, students of organizations, and experts on change tend to think in terms of only one of the above traditions. The result of this thinking often leads to unanticipated negative consequences. For example, management scientists and field engineers frequently view work and organization design as an engineering or technical problem. This can lead to problems because the tendency in this approach is to design work such that it will no longer be challenging to workers and hence lead to such unanticipated behaviors as absenteeisms and low motivation. On the other hand, a purely political orientation to organization change is likely to be dysfunctional. It can lead to low levels of trust, cynicism, and a view that all interactions are either win or lose situation. The cultural orientation when overemphasized is also not effective. This is because when based solely on trust, and collaboration, it avoids the problem of power politics of change.

Because the use of any one of these traditions provides results or effects that tend to be dysfunctional, a more comprehensive view is needed. This view acknowledges all three approaches and also recognizes that organizations must make continuous adjustment in order to manage change. Further, this comprehensive view of managing change likens the process to performing arts because there are characteristics exhibited in the management of performing arts that managers perform. These three properties are; particularity, variety and contextuality (Vaill, 1989).

Particularity aims at explaining the uniqueness of any organization. This quality makes it particularly difficult to generalize any situation. The term, variety, refers to the basic heterogeneity of human systems. Each personnel will respond differently to a given stimulus. Thus, the manager must constantly aim at having all the personnel to work as a system and consider how they will respond to each situation. Contextuality, on the other hand, focuses on the culture of the organization. Hence in contextuality we emphasize the fact that individuals have the potential to perform at a much greater potential provided they get adequate support from the environment.

3 The Proposed Model: Technical-Political-Cultural (TPC) Model.

The model that is proposed acknowledges that technical, political and cultural issues facing organizations change continuously and as a result organizations make adjustments in order to resolve these conflicts as they arise.

3.1 Technical problem

All organizations have production problem. This is in the context of environmental threats and opportunities, social, financial and technical resources that must be arranged to produce some desired output. In order to solve this problem, Construction firms are constantly seeking for competitive edge as they try to acquire projects. The leverage may be in financial engineering or their past experience in the engineering of the project. Construction firms may also resort to goal setting, strategy formulation, or designing management systems.

3.2 Political problem

All organizations face the problem of allocating power and resources. The uses to which the organization will be put as well as who will reap the benefits of the organization must be determined. Discussion around these issues are reflected in compensation programs, career decisions, budget decisions, and internal power structure of the organization. Unlike the technical problem where we have the formal tools such as strategic planning and organizational design, the concepts of political allocation problem are less formal and less obvious. In construction firms, as in most firms, there are constant discussions among employees on who gets what position, or who is the next in line to the President or Chief Executive Officer.

3.3 Cult...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Half Title Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• Foreword
• Introduction to Volume One
• PART I The firm and its business environment
• PART II The firm, its market and competitors
• PART III The firm and its resources
• Index