Search results

The purpose of this paper is to empirically investigate the effects of a major disaster on the management of human resources in the construction sector. It sets out to identify the construction skills challenges and the factors that affected skills availability following the 2010/2011 earthquakes in Christchurch. It is hoped that this study will provide insights for on-going reconstruction and future disaster response with respect to the problem of skills shortages.

A triangulation method was adopted. The quantitative method, namely, a questionnaire survey, was employed to provide a baseline description. Field observations and interviews were used as a follow-up to ascertain issues and potential shortages over time. Three focus groups in the form of research workshops were convened to gain further insight into the feedback and to investigate the validity and applicability of the research findings.

The earthquakes in Christchurch had compounded the pre-existing skills shortages in the country due to heightened demand from reconstruction. Skills shortages primarily existed in seismic assessment and design for land and structures, certain trades, project management and site supervision. The limited technical capability available nationally, shortage of temporary accommodation to house additional workers, time needed for trainees to become skilled workers, lack of information about reconstruction workloads and lack of operational capacity within construction organisations, were critical constraints to the resourcing of disaster recovery projects.

The research findings contribute to the debate on skills issues in construction. The study provides evidence that contributes to an improved understanding of the industry’s skills vulnerability and emerging issues that would likely exist after a major disaster in a resource-limited country such as New Zealand.

From this research, decision makers and construction organisations can gain a clear direction for improving the construction capacity and capability for on-going reconstruction. Factors that affected the post-earthquake skills availability can be considered by decision makers and construction organisations in their workforce planning for future disaster events. The recommendations will assist them in addressing skills shortages for on-going reconstruction.

Although the study is country-specific, the findings show the nature and scale of skills challenges the construction industry is likely to face following a major disaster, and the potential issues that may compound skills shortages. It provides lessons for other disaster-prone countries where the resource pool is small and a large number of additional workers are needed to undertake reconstruction.

The purpose of this study is to develop a new hybrid method that combines interpretative structural modeling (ISM) and matrix cross-impact multiplication applied to classification (MICMAC) to investigate the influencing factors of sustainable infrastructure vulnerability (SIV).

(1) Literature review and case study were used to identify the possible influencing factors; (2) a semi-structured interview was conducted to identify representative factors and the interrelationships among influencing factors; (3) ISM was adopted to identify the hierarchical structure of factors; (4) MICMAC was used to analyze the driving power (DRP) and dependence power (DEP) of each factor and (5) Semi-structured interview was used to propose strategies for overcoming SIV.

Results indicate that (1) 18 representative factors related to SIV were identified; (2) the relationship between these factors was divided into a five-layer hierarchical structure. The 18 representative factors were divided into driving factors, dependent factors, linkage factors and independent factors and (3) 12 strategies were presented to address the negative effects of these factors.

The findings illustrate the factors influencing SIV and their hierarchical structures, which can benefit the stakeholders and practitioners of an infrastructure project by encouraging them to take effective countermeasures to deal with related SIVs.

The purpose of this paper is to identify critical factors that affect labour turnover in the New Zealand construction sector and develop a framework for addressing this issue.

A mixed-method approach was adopted. A questionnaire survey combined with interviews was used to capture the personal experiences and views of 157 construction workers regarding labour turnover.

The statistical analysis revealed that level of pay, employment relationships, employee welfare, opportunities for career development, commuting distance to work and domestic relationships were the top five factors considered as primary determinants leading to the turnover decisions of most of those surveyed. Factor analysis further categorised the critical factors in three categories, namely, (1) nature of the job, (2) employee satisfaction and (3) employer commitment to staff retention and development.

While high labour turnover rates take a toll on many construction businesses, the findings from this research will hopefully provide guidance on areas of improvement to create a sustainable construction workforce at both organisational and sectoral levels.

Although the study is New Zealand-focused, it increases understanding of the factors affecting labour turnover in the construction sector, and the framework developed will provide construction organisations with directions in workforce retention and development to reduce the effects of labour turnover on organisational performance.

Despite extensive academic research related to digital technologies (DT), their integration into architecture, engineering and construction (AEC) projects lags in practice. This paper aims to discover DT deployment patterns and emerging trends in real-life AEC projects.

A case study methodology was adopted, including individual case analyses and comparative multiple-case analyses.

The results revealed the temporal distribution of DT in practical AEC projects, specific DT products/software, major project types integrated with digital solutions, DT application areas and project stages and associated project performance. Three distinct patterns in DT adoption have been observed, reflecting the evolution of DT applications, the progression from single to multiple DT integration and alignment with emerging industry requirements. The DT adoption behavior in the studied cases has been examined using the technology-organization-environment-human (TOE + H) framework. Further, eight emerging trend streams for future DT adoption were identified, with “leveraging the diverse features of certain mature DT” being a shared recognition of all studied companies.

This research offers actionable insights for AEC companies, facilitating the development of customized DT implementation roadmaps aligned with organizational needs. Policymakers, industry associations and DT suppliers may leverage these findings for informed decision-making, collaborative educational initiatives and product/service customization.

This research provides empirical evidence of applicable products/software, application areas and project performance. The examination of the TOE + H framework offers a holistic understanding of the collective influences on DT adoption. The identification of emerging trends addresses the evolving demands of the AEC industry in the digital era.

With growing concern about sustainable development and increased awareness of environmental issues, digital technologies (DTs) are gaining prominence and becoming a promising trend to improve productivity, sustainability and project performance in the construction industry. Nonetheless, the uptake of DTs in the construction industry has been limited and plagued with roadblocks. This study aims to identify critical barriers for construction organisations to adopt DTs and to demonstrate relationships between organisational characteristics and the perceived DTs adoption barriers.

This study adopted an explanatory sequential design by combining the advantages of quantitative and qualitative data. Data collection methods include literature review, a pilot study, questionnaire survey, and semi-structured interviews. Questionnaire data were analysed by using SPSS and multivariate regression technique. The interview data were processed by using content analysis to validate and supplement findings from the questionnaire.

Based on the survey and interview results, eight critical barriers were identified: the three top critical barriers are (1) “status quo industry standards”, (2) “lack of client interest” and (3) “lack of financial need/drive for using DTs”. The eight critical barriers were further classified into technical, environmental, and social dimensions to determine the major constructs that hinder DTs adoption. A theoretical framework articulating critical barriers with underlying components and root causes was also proposed. Furthermore, by using multivariate regression analysis, a model was developed to link the organisational characteristics with barriers to DTs adoption.

By referring to the framework and the model developed, academics, industry practitioners, and decision makers can identify pivotal areas for improvement, make informed decisions and implement remedial measures to remove the barriers to digitalisation transformation.

This study contributes to the literature on construction innovations by investigating barriers to DTs adoption holistically as well as perceptions of the impact of organisational attributes on these barriers. It establishes the groundwork for future empirical research into the strategic consolidation of movement of DTs adoption and diffusion.

With interest in modern construction methods and new technologies on the rise, construction companies globally are increasingly looking at how to embrace new ideas and engage with new approaches to do things better. A significant amount of work has been carried out investigating the use of individual technologies in the construction sector. However, there is no holistic understanding of the new and emerging technologies that have had proven benefits for construction projects. To fill this gap, this paper aims to provide a landscape of technologies that have been implemented in the construction industry and the benefits associated with their implementation.

A systematic review approach and PRISMA guidelines were used. A total of 175 articles published between 2001 and 2020 were identified and thoroughly reviewed.

The results show that a total of 26 technologies were identified from the literature, and these can be categorised into five groups in terms of their functionality in construction process, namely: (1) data acquisition, (2) analytics, (3) visualisation, (4) communication and (5) design and construction automation. Digital technologies, especially for data acquisition and visualisation, generally appear to underpin and enable innovation in many aspects of construction. Improvements in work efficiency, health and safety, productivity, quality and sustainability have been cited as being the primary benefits of using these technologies. Of these, building information modelling (BIM) appears to be the single most commonly used technology thus far. With the development of computer technology, BIM has constantly been used in combination with other technologies/tools such as unmanned aerial vehicles/systems (unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV)/UAS), geographic information systems (GIS), light detection and ranging (LiDAR) and multidimensional modelling to realise a specifically defined benefit.

The findings from this review would help construction practitioners identify the types of technologies that can be implemented in different stages of construction projects to achieve desired outcomes, and thus, make appropriate decisions on technology investment and adoption. This review also suggests that to reap the full potential that these technologies offer, aside from construction companies changing their culture and business models, corresponding changes in the construction sector’s operating systems related to building regulation, education and training, as well as contracting and procurement are required.

This paper undertakes a comprehensive systematic review of studies on technology implementation in the construction sector published between 2001 and 2020. It is the first attempt internationally to provide a holistic picture of technologies that have been studied and implemented in construction projects.

Improving the resilience of the construction sector helps countries recover quicker from crises and can assist with improving community resilience and recovery. This study aims to explore ways in which the construction sector might improve its resilience.

This paper examined past disasters and the role construction plays to understand what and how better construction resilience can be built, and the impact this will have on recovery and reconstruction.

The findings showed that after a crisis, the construction sector is called upon to manage building and infrastructure recovery and reconstruction. Construction organisations are needed by the community, as they provide physical resources, people, materials, logistics, management and technical expertise and rebuilding. To ensure that recovery and reconstruction programs are successfully implemented, it is necessary for the construction sector to be resilient. To achieve improved resilience in the construction industry, disaster resilience management needs to become mainstreamed into construction processes.

Although larger organisations have some preparation to respond to crises, including having emergency or disaster plans, smaller companies struggle to achieve a reasonable level of resilience. It appears that senior management and key people in construction organisations are familiar with the procedures but that the majority of staff in organisations lack knowledge and skills.

Understanding the role the construction sector plays in disasters and providing directions for improving construction sector resilience will ultimately improve recovery and reconstruction outcomes.

This paper discusses how communities rely on services provided by construction organisations to enable them to recover from emergencies and crises. Pre-disaster construction company resilience impacts on the ability of construction companies to function post-disaster.

This paper focuses on a number of cases and shows where and how the construction sector has worked in disasters and provides a new analysis of the role the industry plays, and the various disaster stages where the industry has maximum impact.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the literature on resilience factors applied to post-disaster reconstruction projects and to develop a guiding framework to assist in their strategic selection and application.

A systematic review was undertaken on the literature’s account in four major bibliographic databases to elicit resilience factors contributing to improving post-disaster reconstruction projects' robustness. Through summative content analysis and open-coding of research outputs over the past decade, the factors identified informed the development of a conceptual framework that can significantly impact the built environment’s resilience development process.

The review found 24 resilience factors open-coded into five criteria groups: governance, innovations, reconstruction approaches, resource management and stakeholder expectations. While these factors have influenced reconstruction projects, the recently increased participation of clients and end-users in construction management accentuates their strategic selection and applications.

The research focused on English language articles; therefore, any claim to a comprehensive resilience factors listing can be amiss. The framework provides a platform for developing clear measurement indicators for allocating project resources and determining resilience deficiencies.

Results confirm the designs and assessment of a resilient built environment extends beyond the traditional structural characteristics, but includes the ability of the integrated network of buildings and infrastructure to support the continuous delivery of the community’s social and economic services in normal and post-disaster settings.

The review is very specific as it attempts to develop a novel conceptual framework for guiding developers and practitioners in the application of resiliency to post-disaster reconstruction projects.

The purpose of this paper is to elicit the expectations for resilient post-disaster rebuilds from Caribbean project end-users. In anticipation of future climatological, meteorological, hydrological or geophysical disasters disaster, key stakeholders can articulate and incorporate strategies for resilience development, thus leading to improved end-users’ satisfaction and confidence.

This paper engages the results of a systematic literature review that identified 24 empirical resilience factors for post-disaster reconstruction projects. These factors informed a semi-structured questionnaire to elicit the perspectives of Caribbean end-users on a seven-point Likert scale. The quantitative analysis of both factor ranking and principal component analysis was performed to identify correlations and provides further interpretations on the desires of the end-users for resilient rebuilds.

The results presented in this paper highlight the collective perspectives on the Caribbean end-users on what they perceived to be aiding more resilient reconstruction projects. They identified reconstruction designs mindful of future hazards, policies that aid climate change mitigation, active assessment of key structures, readily available funding sources and ensuring stakeholder’s unbiased interest as the top-most empirical factors. Factor analysis suggested collaborations with inclusive training and multi-stakeholder engagement, critical infrastructure indexing and effective governance as the critical resilience development factors.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this paper is first of its kind to explore the perspective of the Caribbean people regarding disaster reconstruction projects. It addresses developmental avenues for measurement indicators towards resilience monitoring and improvement. Additionally, the perspectives can provide construction industry professionals with tools for improved operational resilience objective-setting guidance, for Caribbean construction.

The 2010/2011 Canterbury earthquakes were one of the most devastating events in New Zealand’s history. Due to the large scale of disruption and losses, the central government created a separate body, the Canterbury Earthquake Recovery Authority (CERA), to manage and oversee recovery activities. Working with local authorities and stakeholders, CERA plays a major role in driving the recovery in Christchurch. This paper aims to analyse CERA’s decision-making process and the effects of some of its critical decisions on the recovery outcomes. The paper takes a “build back better” (BBB) perspective to understand the decisions taken and processes used.

The case study adopted a mixed-methods research design (Creswell, 2013) and was conducted by reviewing official CERA documents and publications related to its recovery assessments and by conducting interviews with key officials from CERA. Collecting data from both qualitative and quantitative data sources enabled the process of triangulation.

Lessons learned from the Canterbury experience in terms of recovery best practices are reported. CERA’s recovery policy aimed to give confidence to the community and renew and revitalise the damaged city. Compared with the BBB theory, the community-driven recovery strategy and the multi-stakeholder approach worked well. Other critical decisions aligned with the BBB theory include land zoning, empowering community and integration with existing developmental plans.

BBB can be used as a tool for the implementation of recovery and restoration measures following a large disaster. However, a set of practical indicators to measure the level of BBB is needed.