Formalizing the information requirements for decision-making of field managers during indoor construction activities

Abstract

Purpose

Information technology provides important support for on-site decision-making of field personnel. Most literature focuses on the technological aspects of decision-support systems, without fully understanding the information required for effective decision-making. This study aimed to formalize decision-makers’ requirements in terms of the major goals, decisions and information.

Design/methodology/approach

The situation awareness (SA) approach was applied through the goal-directed task analysis (GDTA) method, narrowing the scope to field managers’ decision-making during indoor construction activities. This method was based on a series of interviews to define, revise and validate the decision-making requirements for the given scope.

Findings

The study yielded 1,056 highly interrelated elements. The results indicate that the field manager’s overall goal is to execute and handoff work within the established deadlines, with the required quality, maximizing profits, within a safe work environment. The overall goal construes into five main goals regarding work progress, quality, costs, safety and communication. These goals include subgoals, decisions, and the information necessary to attain them, depicted in diagrams.

Practical implications

The findings allow enhancing the design of decision-support solutions by identifying information required for future developments and showing the interrelations between goals and information requirements that need to be addressed to present interfaces for effectively assisting on-site decision-making. Moreover, the results allow for the assessment of solutions regarding the sufficiency of information.

Originality/value

This is the first effort to fully understand the information required by field managers for on-site decision-making during indoor construction activities.

Citation

Pillajo, E., Mourgues, C. and González, V.A. (2023), "Formalizing the information requirements for decision-making of field managers during indoor construction activities", Engineering, Construction and Architectural Management, Vol. ahead-of-print No. ahead-of-print. https://doi.org/10.1108/ECAM-07-2022-0674