Collapse of public buildings, stability checks and the roles of facility managers in Ghana
ISSN: 0263-7472
Article publication date: 29 April 2021
Issue publication date: 9 July 2021
Abstract
Purpose
The study investigated the perceived causes of structural failure of public buildings, frequency of stability checks, stability checking procedures, measures to enhance public building stability checks and the roles of facility managers in the Accra Metropolis of Ghana.
Design/methodology/approach
Following a comprehensive literature review, the study employed a structured questionnaire survey and gathered the opinions of sixty-seven facility managers on the facility management practices. Following statistical pretesting of the dataset for reliability, distribution and agreement among the responses, the study analysed the dataset using mean scoring and weighted analysis.
Findings
The analysis showed that external building inspectors rarely inspect stability checks of the studied public buildings in Accra. It is also found that both reactive and proactive stability checking protocols are implemented in public buildings in Accra, but inadequate knowledge of facility managers limits technical stability checks. The study further revealed that stability checks of public buildings can be enhanced through incorporating site and location conditions into the design early upfront, active engagement of facility managers in the design and construction of public buildings, adequate budgetary provisioning for planned maintenance of public buildings, and encouraging appropriate use of public buildings.
Originality/value
This paper, to the best of the authors' knowledge, represents the first attempt to comprehensively examine the causes of structural failure of public buildings, frequency of stability checks, stability checking procedures, measures to enhance public building stability checks and the roles of facility managers in Ghana, from the perspective facility management.
Keywords
Acknowledgements
The authors wish to thank the Facility Managers and other construction industry practitioners in the Greater Accra Region of Ghana who made time to respond to the questionnaire surveys and interviews. The authors are also grateful to the Editor and anonymous reviewers whose comments will help improve the quality of the paper.
Citation
Kidido, J.K., Wuni, I.Y. and Ansah, E. (2021), "Collapse of public buildings, stability checks and the roles of facility managers in Ghana", Property Management, Vol. 39 No. 4, pp. 546-564. https://doi.org/10.1108/PM-11-2020-0081
Publisher
:Emerald Publishing Limited
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