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The purpose of this paper is to examine the relationship between a number of variables pertaining to core capability, competitive strategy and performance of construction small to medium size enterprises (SMEs) in China.

The paper consists of a quantitative survey. It involves mainly the development of instrument and testing of the hypotheses.

Core capability and competitive strategy are found to influence construction SMEs' performance. Moreover, there are positive relationships between core capability and competitive strategy. This suggests a need to align core capability and competitive strategy as a precondition for superior performance.

The paper has limitations as a result of data collection. A somewhat larger sample would obviously permit firmer conclusions to be drawn from the results of the statistical analysis.

This paper will contribute to the literature on SMEs, strategic management and resource‐based theory. This integration of scope is particularly new to the context of the Chinese construction industry. Similarly, this research will have implications for practice. The research findings help SMEs' managers to understand the impact of the unique resources of their enterprises and competitive strategy.

This study aims to investigate the impacts of procurement strategies on the growing proportion of construction small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) and whether the size of the construction company moderates the effect.

This study adopted a quantitative research approach and a cross-sectional questionnaire survey in achieving its objectives. The survey requires the respondent to identify both the most successful and most outstanding project that the respondent was involved in between 2010 and 2016.

The study found that only traditional and management-oriented procurement strategies ensure the achievement of all growth plans for construction SMEs in South Africa; and that medium-sized construction enterprises achieve social growth such as community empowerment, managerial skills and advancement on the cidb Register of Contractors.

The findings of the study imply that policymakers should base their decisions regarding macroeconomic issues and growth plans for construction SMEs on the internal and external factors such as differences in the sizes of construction SMEs and differences in the suitability of procurement strategies affecting the growth of construction SMEs.

In past studies, the diversity amongst SMEs is often overlooked and SMEs are erroneously assumed to share similar objectives, possess equal capabilities and face challenges of the same magnitude. The original contribution of this study is shown in the investigation of the moderating effect of SMEs’ diversity (in terms of company size) on their growth proportion as influenced by procurement strategies.

Building information modelling (BIM) has had a significant impact on the architecture, engineering and construction (AEC) sector in the past several years. However, not much is published concerning small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) adopting BIM in the construction industry. To address this knowledge gap, a complete and in-depth literature review of the adoption of BIM by SMEs in the AEC sector is conducted in this study. The paper also provides a comprehensive review of the mainstream studies of adoption of BIM in the AEC organisations.

Based on a five-stage literature review, 54 articles on the adoption of BIM by SMEs from the period 2009 to 2019 were critically analysed from the following three perspectives: (1) the number of articles produced; (2) the research focus and (3) the author's contributions. The techniques of the visualisation of similarities (VOSviewer) software were used to analyse the citation networks of the 54 articles as identified.

From the analysis, it was established that the number of studies on BIM adoption by SMEs in the reviewed journals has not been increasing and not many articles are available. The finding makes the argument that BIM adoption by SMEs is not a focus point but rather the adoption and implementation of BIM is generalised in the AEC sector. In addition, the results revealed that most of the published articles come from the United Kingdom (UK). However, this finding is hardly surprising due to the requirements in the UK, which have made the adoption of BIM mandatory on all publicly funded projects and are at level 2 BIM. The other highly ranked countries by origins of studies on the adoption of BIM by SMEs were found to be Australia and the United States of America (USA), all of which are developed nations or economies. Some key BIM in SME research trends (adoption, enforcement, benefits, strategies, skills gap, awareness, education and training, and technology) were identified and evaluated.

The results presented in this journal are only applicable to SMEs in the AEC sector. As a result of little available literature on the adoption of BIM in developing countries, the articles have been drawn from developed countries. The dataset was mainly extracted from the Scopus database for the analysis.

An accomplished series content analysis of the implementation and adoption of BIM by SMEs from international construction journals were reported. The study makes significant and emergent contribution by building on the foundation of BIM research in SMEs as well as providing a reference point for the interpretation of findings, as well as directions for future research.

Quality management barriers have been discovered in construction small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), determining their long-term survival. Despite the recognition of Lean Six Sigma (LSS) as a valuable quality management technique for addressing the barriers faced by SMEs, LSS implementation within the construction SME context is alarmingly low. Therefore, this study aims to investigate the barriers for implementing LSS within construction SMEs and to determine the most effective strategies for overcoming these barriers.

A quantitative research approach was used, and data was collected in two stages: a questionnaire survey with 44 construction professionals and an expert opinion survey with 12 LSS specialists. The collected data was then analysed using the fuzzy TOPSIS method, achieving a higher degree of sensitivity.

The findings revealed the 15 most significant LSS barriers that need to be addressed. In addition, the ten most important strategies to be implemented in overcoming the identified barriers before LSS implementation were discovered and thematised, most notably the hiring of LSS specialists for project monitoring and the formation of a committee for strategic planning through LSS.

Previous research on LSS examined barriers and strategies for SMEs in general, but to the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first of its kind, focusing especially on the construction SME context and involving the unique fuzzy TOPSIS approach.

Small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs), which form a significant portion in many economies, are some of the most vulnerable to the impact of extreme weather events (EWEs). This is of particular importance to the construction industry, as an overarching majority of construction companies are SMEs who account for the majority of employment and income generation within the industry. In the UK, previous research has identified construction SMEs as some of the worst affected by EWEs. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

Given the recent occurrences of EWEs and predictions suggesting increases in both the intensity and frequency of EWEs in the future, improving the resilience of construction SMEs is vital for achieving a resilient construction industry. A conceptual framework is first developed which is then populated and expanded based on empirical evidence. Positioned within a pragmatic research philosophy, case study research strategy was adopted as the overall research strategy in undertaking this investigation.

Based on the findings of two in-depth case studies of construction SMEs, a framework was developed to represent EWE resilience of construction SMEs, where resilience was seen as a collective effect of vulnerability, coping strategies, and coping capacities of SMEs, characteristics of the EWE and the wider economic climate.

The paper provides an original contribution towards the overarching agenda of the resilience of SMEs, and policy making in the area of EWE risk management by presenting a novel conceptual framework depicting the resilience of medium sized construction companies.

Agile methods have proven successful in increasing customer satisfaction and decreasing time and cost to market under uncertain conditions. Key characteristics of agile methods are lean, flexibility and highly iterative development with a strong emphasis on stakeholder involvement. Today construction firms in general and small to medium‐sized enterprises (SMEs) in particular are surviving in a drastic competitive environment in which they are facing more and more challenges. Additional innovation is needed in the construction sector, with increased participation from more competitive SMEs. The main purpose of this paper is to present a model to prioritize available management systems to help SMEs address the challenge of today's market competition more effectively.

The research methodology used is that of interpretative case study and grounded theory based on a strong empirical foundation, on which new theoretical insight into knowledge management as an autonomous action is developed. The paper looks at ways by which SMEs are managed, based on the empirical data collected from 12 case studies. It presents the empirical findings drawn from the case studies. Finally, the adoption of agile methods is subjectively assessed as to its potential contribution for improving the business processes of small and medium construction firms.

It is assessed that agile methods offers considerable potential for application in construction SMEs and that there are significant hurdles to its adoption in the actual phase. Should these be overcome, agile methods offers benefits well beyond any individual company.

Construction firms need to be aware of the advantages of new management paradigms and practices. The analysis shows that SMEs in the construction sector have to internalize agile values into their business processes to reap the benefits of agile methods. It also reveals that existing practices show some kind of agile flavours.

Agile principles and methods are explored, including: philosophy, values, practices and benefits. The management approaches used by construction SMEs are analyzed and discussed. The paper presents recommendations and insights for enhancing the performance and efficiency of SMEs by adopting agile values in their business processes.

The UK experienced a number of Extreme Weather Events (EWEs) during recent years and a significant number of businesses were affected as a result. With the intensity and frequency of weather extremes predicted in the future, enhancing the resilience of businesses, especially of Small and Medium‐sized Enterprises (SMEs), who are considered as highly vulnerable, has become a necessity. However, little research has been undertaken on how construction SMEs respond to the risk of EWEs. In seeking to help address this dearth of research, this investigation sought to identify how construction SMEs were being affected by EWEs and the coping strategies being used.

A mixed methods research design was adopted to elicit information from construction SMEs, involving a questionnaire survey and case study approach.

Results indicate a lack of coping strategies among the construction SMEs studied. Where the coping strategies have been implemented, these were found to be extensions of their existing risk management strategies rather than radical measures specifically addressing EWEs.

The exploratory survey focused on the Greater London area and was limited to a relatively small sample size. This limitation is overcome by conducting detailed case studies utilising two SMEs whose projects were located in EWE prone localities. The mixed method research design adopted benefits the research by presenting more robust findings.

A better way of integrating the potential of EWEs into the initial project planning stage is required by the SMEs. This could possibly be achieved through a better risk assessment model supported by better EWE prediction data.

The paper provides an original contribution towards the overarching agenda of resilience of SMEs and policy making in the area of EWE risk management. It informs both policy makers and practitioners on issues of planning and preparedness against EWEs.

This paper aims to present the effect of innovation on implementing competitive strategies (CSs) and to find their relationships on the survival of construction-related small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in macroeconomic crises.

Data were compiled from construction SMEs in Turkey. The research used structural equation modeling to investigate the relationships between innovation, CSs and firm survival (FS).

Innovative construction SMEs may implement differentiation and focus strategies and survive without CSs, whereas innovation may be obtained through cost leadership strategy. Also, differentiation and focus strategies may play a role to survive. However, the cost leadership strategy may be implemented after survival. Finally, differentiation strategy may be triggered by innovation and focus strategies.

The model may be applied on other construction organizations. Future studies may also examine the difference in findings concerning other industries and regions. Moreover, different factors may be added to the model. However, a larger group of samples could cause different results.

This study may be a roadmap for practitioners to plan their firms’ strategies, considering innovation, CSs and FS. In this context, they may pay attention to innovative production processes to survive.

Survived SMEs may sustain their works through the prevention of crisis-based unemployment. Hence, this benefit may bring a wealthier society.

This research is first to propose a model connecting innovation and CSs for SMEs’ survival in macroeconomic crises. This is convenient for rivalry of SMEs planning to be long-lasting enterprises.

The UK construction sector of small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) has received criticism for a perceived lack of desire to innovate. Previous research has identified attributes such as company size and levels of research and development expenditure as being significant and causal variables determining this response. The purpose of this study was to further explore organisational attributes that determine innovation likeliness within construction SMEs.

Web-based questionnaires were administered to 101 construction professionals. Responses from large companies and SMEs were compared, and data were analysed using descriptive and inferential statistical methods.

The findings indicate that SMEs do implement a substantial amount of innovation to improve profitability. Both organisational maturity and in-house design capability were found to impact SME innovativeness.

The study provides further evidence that the UK construction SME sector is evolving away from traditional to more innovative practices.

Small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) within the construction sector are highly vulnerable to disruptions caused by political and economic decisions or even pandemics. This study evaluated the current operations of selected SMEs providing engineering design and consultancy services against Toyota Production System (TPS) lean tool. The purpose is to juxtapose SME operations and processes with TPS to ascertain the level of their operations conformity to the established TPS lean thinking tool.

This study used a qualitative data collection and analysis approach to evaluate the current processes of participating SMEs against Liker's 14 management principles of TPS. The data collected were analysed using thematic analysis to identify patterns and themes that emerged from the qualitative data.

The analysis revealed that focus on short-term goals, immediate profit and duplication of effort resulting from insufficient collaboration is currently creating waste in participating SMEs' operations. Hence, the implementation of TPS was recommended as a lean tool and a framework based on TPS lean tool was developed for improving the operations of SMEs.

The study is limited to SMEs operating only as consultants providing project planning design within the construction industry. Data collection is limited to qualitative even though observations would improve the outcome of the study.

The study advances contemporary issues in promoting lean implementation in construction sector and developed an improved framework based on the TPS to enhance the performance of SME construction businesses.