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This study aims to identify the trends that have changed in the field of construction management over the last 20 years.

In this study, 3,335 journal articles published in the years 2000–2020 were collected from the Web of Science database in construction management. The authors applied bibliometric analysis first and then detected topics with the latent Dirichlet allocation (LDA) topic detection method.

In this context, 20 clusters from cluster analysis were found and the topics were extracted in clusters with the LDA topic detection method. The results show “building information modeling” and “information management” are the most studied subjects, even though they have emerged in the last 15 years “building information modeling,” “information management,” “scheduling and cost optimization,” “lean construction,” “agile approach” and “megaprojects” are the trend topics in the construction management literature.

This study uses bibliometric analysis. The authors accept that the co-citation and co-authorship relationship in the data is ethical. They accept that honorary authorship, self-citation or honorary citation do not change the pattern of the construction management research domain.

There has been no study conducted in the last 20 years to examine research trends in construction management. Although bibliometric analysis, systematic literature reviews and text mining methods are used separately as a methodology for extracting research trends, no study has used enhanced bibliometric analysis and the LDA topic detection text mining method.

This paper aims to review the latest management developments across the globe and pinpoint practical implications from cutting-edge research and case studies.

This briefing is prepared by an independent writer who adds their own impartial comments and places the articles in context.

Big data analysis in the world of construction management has become a necessity after the discovery of how much time, energy, and money can be preserved. By the investigation of big data in construction, the deduction was made that data analysis, data mining, and Building Information Modeling are the future for construction management. If properly applied to future construction management processes, big data analysis methodologies could eliminate mistakes, setbacks, and wasted resources for projects

The paper provides strategic insights and practical thinking that have influenced some of the world’s leading organizations.

The briefing saves busy executives and researchers hours of reading time by selecting only the very best, most pertinent information and presenting it in a condensed and easy-to-digest format.

Smart contracts using blockchain technology (BCT) is a tool that decentralizes authority and makes it easier to upgrade the contract administration process by providing an efficient system. Current literature provides a good overview of contracts in the construction industry; however, the specific details of BCT's smart contracts applications in the three categories have not been addressed adequately: (1) information quality, (2) enhancing project schedule and progress payment time and (3) reducing conflicts among project stakeholders. Thus, this study aims to analyze smart contracts using BCT by creating a computerized contract model, specifically evaluating its impact on the three identified categories.

In this paper BCT-SmContract was developed through an automated program that utilizes blockchain to define the contractual agreements between different parties in a construction project. BCT-SmContract model provides a new technique to overcome the current challenges associated with factors identified in this study, i.e. (1) information quality, (2) enhancing project schedule and progress payment time and (3) reducing conflicts among project stakeholders. Afterward, the model was tested to ensure validity and reliability through a construction project.

The findings indicated that BCT-SmContract was approximately 90% faster to execute the contract and 100% accurate in reflecting the correct information about the project status, resulting in reduced conflicts.

This study has contributed in upgrading the traditional contracting method in construction by developing an automated smart contract model to enhance the processes and achieve higher accuracy.

The applications of multi-agent systems (MASs) are considered to be among the most promising paradigms for detailed investigations and reliable problem-solving methods, and MAS applications make it possible for researchers and practitioners to better understand complex systems. Although a number of prior studies have been conducted to address complex issues that arise from construction projects, few studies have summarised the applications and discussed the capacity of MASs from the perspective of construction management. To fill the gap, this paper provides a comprehensive literature review of MAS applications from the perspective of construction management.

Web of Science and Scopus are the most commonly used international databases in conducting the literature reviews. A total of 86 relevant papers published in SCI-Expanded, SSCI and Ei Compendex journals related to the application of MASs from the perspective of construction management are selected to be analysed and discussed in this paper.

Based on the 86 collected publications, the utilisations of MASs to support the management of the supply chain and the improvement of project performance are identified from the perspective of construction management, the characteristics and barriers of current MAS applications are analysed, a framework for developing agent-based models to address complex problems is proposed, and future research directions of MAS applications are discussed.

This review can serve as a useful reference for scholars to enhance their understanding of the current research and guide future research on MASs. The proposed framework can help build agent-based models to address complex problems in construction management.

Current processes to manage changes are subject to failure since they are heavily dependent on human discipline. The purpose of this paper is to evaluate and quantify the difference between levels of automation of change management processes and to provide input for determining the use of automation systems for change management.

Three generations of change management processes are defined to represent progressive practices used in major capital projects over the past few decades. Discrete event simulation was used to model these processes to capture their behavior and compare their performance according to time and compliance metrics. An oil and gas megaproject served to validate the findings of this modeling and analysis.

The results showed that automated processes can bring more compliance and real-time traceability, but not a significant time reduction in the change process. This contributes to the understanding of the impact of workflow-based automation on construction process performance. The validity of the conclusions are limited by the breadth of sectors studied and the inability to capture off-line time allocations of the personnel involved. Future research may build on the work presented here by studying additional processes such as requests for information, project change notices, requests for scaffolding, and interface management in various industry sectors.

A new approach for modeling and evaluating construction management process automation is contributed and the specific results of the paper indicate that automated workflow-based change management processes should be implemented in megaprojects.

The construction industry is affected by the technologies of Industry 4.0 as the buildings are transforming into complex productions. Integration of innovative technologies, such as virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR), in construction management is an emerging area to increase efficiency and effectiveness. With an aim of determining the current situation, this study evaluates the literature on VR and AR within construction management research.

The methodology of this research is based on descriptive and bibliometric analyses to understand and state the current relations between VR-AR technologies and construction management research. According to the meta-analysis (Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses [PRISMA]) protocol of reviewing, 143 papers between 2010 and 2021 from Scopus, Web of Science (WoS) and Science Direct have been retrieved, and then analysis has been applied on these papers. Descriptive analysis contains increment of publications throughout the years, rates of papers according to countries and content of the publications. The bibliometric analysis involves the analysis through Excel and VOSviewer: co-occurrence of keywords, country-based, source and citation.

The results of this study emphasize the increasing interest in the adoption of VR-AR technologies in construction management research. As the number of publications has been continuously increased, this trend indicates the strength and growing interest in the topic. Another significant finding is VR-AR implementation studies are mostly based on building information modelling (BIM). In this study, the results of analyses have been discussed in terms of learning, knowledge areas and digital technologies as part of construction management.

This study contributes to providing a significant theoretical reference for the potentials of VR-AR in construction management research. VR-AR technologies mostly attract the interest of researchers from architectural design studies; however, there is a gap to investigate their potentials in terms of construction management. Additionally, this study focuses on the last 11 years, which indicate the latest trends.

The purpose of this paper is to present an exploratory study which aims to assess the potential use of 3D mapping of buildings and construction sites using unmanned aerial system (UAS) imagery for supporting the construction management tasks.

The case studies were performed in two different residential construction projects. The equipment used was a quadcopter equipped with digital camera and GPS that allow for the registry of geo-referenced images. The Pix4D Mapper and PhotoScan software were used to generate the 3D models. The study sought to examine three main constructs related to the 3D mapping developed: the easiness of development, the quality of the models in accordance with the proposed use and the usefulness and limitations of the mapping for construction management purposes.

The main contributions of this study include a better understanding of the development process of 3D mapping from UAS imagery, the potential uses of this mapping for construction management and the identification of barriers and benefits related to the application of these emerging technologies for the construction industry.

The importance of the study is related to the initiative to identify and evaluate the potential use of 3D mapping from UAS imagery, which can provide a 3D view of the construction site from different perspectives, for construction management tasks applications, trying to bring positive contributions to this knowledge area.

Construction conflict should not be simply defined as a functional or dysfunctional element in the management process. The second generation conflict management investigates the effect of various conflict types and conflict resolution strategies to project outcomes in detail. The paper aims at investigating the complicated construction conflict management within the goal setting process in construction projects.

In order to collect the generalized data from the construction professionals in the industry, a questionnaire survey was considered suitable for establishing the component elements of research variables. Samples were randomly selected from membership records of various professional institutions in Hong Kong with direct experience in the project management processes involving the client, project manager and other project team members, and they must have experience in a (perceived) successful project. A total of 75 questionnaires were fully completed and returned finally.

The findings in the questionnaire survey indicate that moderate level of conflict can improve satisfaction until a certain point whereby the satisfaction diminishes as conflict escalates. To yield an optimum level of satisfaction, conflicts have to be stimulated in the goal setting process and solved among the project participants by adopting the integrated style, neutral attitudes towards emotional‐rational dimension and task‐relationship dimension of conflict.

This study cannot definitively state the causal direction of the hypothesized relationships. Further research such as case studies and qualitative data analyses are recommended in order to investigate these causal relationships as is relevant to construction projects.

Integration is the most appropriate method for solving construction problems, as it concerns both self and others in the management process. Project participants have to balance their conflict resolution approach between the task and relationship and their subjective emotion with objective rational system for solving conflicts when using integration style.

The study shows that both conflict and conflict resolution in the goal setting process are essential components influencing the final outcome (satisfaction) and that solving conflict using the integration style would mean arriving at the best value (goal) in the decision process as well as improving the level of participant satisfaction

Recent interest in the UK construction sector in innovative management practices such as partnering, continuous improvement and benchmarking have raised long‐standing questions about the transferability of new management ideas from other industrial sectors into construction. Informed in part by the author's own research into partnering in the UK, this paper sets out to explore the problems of transferring and applying new management ideas to the construction industry. However, rather than simply restricting the discussion to the perennial (and perhaps unanswerable) question of whether or not the construction industry actually is different, this paper goes much further by examining the nature of knowledge diffusion and application processes. Three main themes are highlighted and their implications assessed. First, the many inherent problems and limitations associated with relying on models of ‘best practice’ drawn from other industrial sectors. Second, the highly socialized and politicized nature of supposedly rational processes of knowledge diffusion and implementation. Third, the impact that institutional factors have on the diffusion and application of knowledge via the creation of particular industry agendas and frames of reference.

This study explores the use of Blockchain technology as a new solution to many current problems in construction information management. The study shows that Blockchain has the potential to address several issues such as confidentiality, provenance tracking; monitoring channel and ledger metrics; disintermediation; non-repudiation; change tracing; multiparty aggregation; traceability inter-organizational recordkeeping; and data ownership.

A systematic analysis of a paper published, “Potentials of Blockchain Technology for Construction Management,” is offered. The structured results are provided for the purpose of contributing to the discussion of the topic.

The results of this study shows that the suitable position for the integration of Blockchain is the interface-points of the transaction processing component of the Building Information Modeling server. This technology also can help in controlling and fingerprinting all information exchanges and communication. The conclusion drawn from the study provides a foundation from which further research can be developed.

The findings of this study will help construction project managers and senior executives with a deeper understanding of Blockchain technology and its long-term implications for the construction industry; coupled with knowledge of its relationship to other emerging technologies such as BIM. Propositions for smart contracts deployment and further research are suggested.