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This paper aims to evaluate the current level of knowledge about lean construction (LC) practices in construction companies, universities and class organizations in Brazil and identify the barriers to implementing LC in the Brazilian construction industry and prioritize them through comparison with global challenges.

This multiple case study was carried out through a questionnaire answered by 56 construction companies, 15 universities and 10 professional associations. The questionnaire evaluation allowed the authors to determine the level of knowledge about the LC, its adoption and barriers to its adoption in the Brazilian industry. The results were statistically analyzed using the weighted average (MIS) of results using the Kruskal–Wallis test, which compares sample distribution among groups, and Cronbach’s alpha test to measure the questionnaire reliability.

This study points to universities as the main ones responsible for the low adoption of LC in Brazil and points to the need for an integrated action among construction companies, universities and class organizations to overcome the traditional project management culture and raise the level of knowledge about LC.

This study evaluated the current LC situation in an emerging country, Brazil, and compared it with the principal international challenges observed in studies of other developing countries – China, India, Morocco, Saudi Arabia and Singapore – least developed countries – Bangladesh and Nigeria – and developed country – UK. These studies evaluated construction companies located in the listed countries. Based on that, 22 international challenges were established for the LC adoption. Additionally, this research also evaluated universities and working-class organizations in addition to construction companies. This addition can contribute to a better result understanding that can be explored by Brazil and other countries.

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.

Under the trend of global economic integration and the new context of stagflation, frequent fluctuations in international interest rates are exerting far-reaching impacts on the world economy. In this paper, the transmission mechanism of the impact of fluctuations in international interest rates (specifically, the American interest rate) on the bankruptcy risk in China's pillar industry, the construction industry (which is also sensitive to interest rates), is examined.

Using an improved contingent claims analysis, the bankruptcy risk of enterprises is calculated in this paper. Additionally, an individual fixed-effects model is developed to investigate the mediating effects of international interest rates on the bankruptcy risk in the Chinese construction industry. The heterogeneity of subindustries in the industrial chain and the impact of China's energy consumption structure are also analysed in this paper.

The findings show that fluctuations in international interest rates, which affect the bankruptcy risk of China's construction industry, are mainly transmitted through two major pathways, namely, commodity price effects and exchange rate effects. In addition, the authors examine the important impact of China's energy consumption structure on risk transmission and assess the transmission and sharing of risks within the industrial chain.

First, in the research field, the study of international interest rate risk is extended to domestic-oriented industries. Second, in terms of the research content, this paper is focused on China-specific issues, including the significant influence of China's energy consumption structure characteristics and the risk contagion (and risk sharing) as determined by the current development of the Chinese construction industry. Third, in terms of research methods a modified contingent claim analysis approach to bankruptcy risk indicators is adopted for this study, thus overcoming the problems of data frequency, market sentiment and financial data fraud, which are issues that are ignored by most relevant studies.

This study is devoted to examining the peer effects of engineering enterprises’ internationalization from the viewpoint of industry subdivision and how information and competition alter peer effects. Furthermore, the heterogeneity of peer effects is analyzed based on manager characteristics.

In this study, multiple regression analysis was conducted on a sample of 38 Chinese engineering enterprises listed in the Engineering News-Record’s top 250 international contractors over the period of 2013–2021. This study collected the paired data from the enterprise annual reports and the China Stock Market & Accounting Research database.

The results reveal that (1) there exist peer effects within the subdivided industry of the engineering field; the quality of information disclosure of peer enterprises and degree of market competition moderate the peer effects; (2) the peer effects of internationalization are more pronounced in engineering enterprises with managers who have lower ability, hold greater power or are older.

The findings of this study contribute to understanding the peer effect in the process of internationalization of engineering enterprises, and help enterprises to effectively supervise the irrational behavior of top managers, so as to develop better internationalization strategies.

The results extend peer effects to the subdivision industry of the engineering field. Furthermore, this study also enriches the relevant research on peer effects among enterprises by empirically supporting the moderating role of information and competition as well as analyzing the heterogeneity of the peer effects from the perspective of manager characteristics.

Lean construction (LC) is an innovative approach in the construction industry that has shown significant success in developed countries. Although LC has potential in the construction sector of Pakistan, it has not been extensively explored. This study aims to address this knowledge gap by identifying and predicting current lean practices and assessing the strengths and weaknesses of LC implementation in Pakistan.

Using robust statistical methods to analyze 92 valid responses, the study reveals that approximately 54% of lean practices are currently in use in the construction industry of Pakistan, with a population mean ranging from 52.7% to 55.6%.

Surprisingly, the research identifies instances where some construction firms in Pakistan are implementing LC practices, even though they have only a limited understanding of its underlying principles. Notably, certain subprinciples, such as visual management, top management commitment to change, employee training, process cycle time reduction and production optimization, are less integrated within the construction industry. Exploring the possibility of implementing LC, recommendations for strategies to implement LC in Pakistan are suggested, aligning with the conceptual model proposed by the researchers.

The novelty of this work offers insights that can serve as a comprehensive guide for developing nations. It provides a structured approach to assess and benchmark LC practices, which, in turn, can contribute to a more efficient and effective construction industry. Moreover, the strategies proposed in this research can aid developing countries in the efficient implementation of LC. This will have a positive implication for both economic and developmental outcomes.

Data represents a critical resource that enables construction companies’ success; thus, its management is very important. The purpose of this study is to assess the benefits of construction data risks management (DRM) in the construction industry (CI).

This study adopted a quantitative method and collected data from various South African construction professionals with the aid of an e-questionnaire. These professionals involve electrical engineers, quantity surveyors, architects and mechanical, as well as civil engineers involved under a firm, or organisation within the province of Gauteng, South Africa. Standard deviation, mean item score, non-parametric Kruskal–Wallis H test and exploratory factor analysis were used to analyse the retrieved data.

The findings revealed that DRM enhances project and company data availability, promotes confidentiality and enhances integrity, which are the primary benefits of DRM that enable the success of project delivery.

The research was carried out only in the province of Gauteng due to COVID-19 travel limitations.

The construction companies will have their data permanently in their possession and no interruption will be seen due to data unavailability, which, in turn, will allow long-term and overall pleasant project outcomes.

This study seeks to address the benefits of DRM in the CI to give additional knowledge on risk management within the built environment to promote success in every project.

This paper seeks to understand kaizen in practice as it travels through time and space in the organisational setting.

A qualitative case study was carried out at a multinational company using mainly interviews for the data collection that were analysed from an actor-network theory (ANT) perspective.

This paper finds that the company deals with a series of paradoxes while managing the kaizen process. Efficiency and quality paradoxes are the basis for starting kaizen projects. Furthermore, intrinsic, and extrinsic motivation, emerge in these processes, and paradoxes relate to how spontaneous ideas emerge in a deliberated context of cost-saving objectives. The supply chain finance team coordinates kaizen projects with the collaboration of plant managers, promoting the paradox of autonomy and control. In addition, as kaizen mobilises and enrols the actors, some trials of strength emerge, showing actors who oppose the kaizen network and create competing networks that mutually exist in the firm.

This study presents valuable insights for professionals to successfully implement kaizen methodologies that take advantage of developing a network for problem-solving in organizations.

This study highlights the supply chain finance team's role in enrolling the actors within a network built by practitioners engaged in kaizen projects. Usually, engineers, quality, or manufacturing teams lead kaizen projects, and only occasionally, accounting and financial teams participate, including multidisciplinary teams.

This study aims at examining the effect of total quality management (TQM) practices on the financial performance ISO 9001:2008 certified manufacturing companies in Ethiopia with a mediating role of operational performance.

A cross-sectional survey research was conducted to meet the purpose. Data used for the study were solely primary data and were collected from the top and middle-level managers of different departments and senior experts working under the production/operation and quality management units of the target organizations. Data were obtained from 302 participants working in 73 companies using a self-administered questionnaire. Structural equation modelling (SEM) technique was applied to test the hypotheses positing the structural link between TQM practices, operational performance and financial performance.

The findings show that TQM practices had a significant direct and positive effect on both operational performance and financial performance and that operational performance significantly affects financial performance. The bootstrapping output of the mediation analysis also established that operational performance partially mediates the causal link between TQM practices and financial performance.

The empirical evidence provided by the present study provides helpful insights and guidance to managers to make a good deal of investment in maintaining enhanced performance outcomes under the operations stream that eventually would lead to better financial outcome.

Being one of the first attempts to empirically examine the structural linkages among TQM practices, operational performance and financial performance in Ethiopian manufacturing organizations, this paper provides strategic insights on the importance of implementing TQM practices in a holistic manner for the achievement of better performance outcomes.

The construction business is widely recognised for its inherent complexity and dynamic nature, which stems from the nature of the job involved. The industry is often regarded as one of the most challenging industries globally in terms of implementing environmental, health and safety (EHS) practices. However, in the absence of EHS, the construction industry cannot be considered sustainable. Therefore, this study aims to identify the trends, knowledge gaps and implications of EHS research to enhance construction activities and knowledge.

The study adopted a science mapping approach involving bibliometric and scientometric analysis of 407 construction EHS publications from the Scopus database with the VOSviewer software. The study is based on journal articles from the Scopus database without restriction to any time range.

The main focus of construction EHS research identified in the study includes sustainability-related studies, risk-related, environmental issues, EHS management, integrated management systems studies, health and safety related and EHS in the construction process. Some emerging areas also identified include productivity, design, culture, social sustainability and machine learning. The most influential and productive publication sources, countries/regions and EHS publications with the highest impact were also determined.

Documents published in the Scopus database were considered for analysis because of the wider coverage of the database. Journal articles written in English language represent the inclusion criteria, whereas other documents were excluded from the analysis. The study also limited the search to articles with the engineering subject area.

The research findings will enlighten stakeholders and practitioners on the focal knowledge areas in the EHS research domain, which are vital for enhancing EHS in the industry.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this review-based study is the first attempt to internationally conduct a science mapping on extant literature in the EHS research domain through bibliometric and scientometric assessments.