Knowledge and technology transfer from universities to industries: A case study approach from the built environment field

Enabling kowledge societies and knowledge based economies is a key policy in the UK. KTP (Knowledge Transfer Partnership) scheme initiated by the Technology Strategy Board is a pathway for collaboration and partnerships between Higher Education institutions and companies to transfer innovative knowledge based solutions from universities to businesses in order to equip them with the leading edge knowledge and technology infrastructure for sustainable long term competitive advantages in both national and international market. The paper explains a KTP project between the University of Salford and John McCall Architects (JMA) in Liverpool in the UK that aimed to identify, map and re-engineer JMA’s strategic and operational change processes through Lean thinking and the implementation of Building Information Modelling (BIM), which is a foundational tool for implementing an efficient process and invariably leads to lean-orientated, team based approach to design and construction by enabling the intelligent interrogation of designs; provide a quicker and cheaper design production; better co-ordination of documentation; more effective change control; less repetition of processes; a better quality constructed product; and improved communication both for JMA and across the supply chain whereas it provided opportunity to increase business relevance of knowledge based research and teaching for the Higher Education. Case Study approach is employed in the paper and the KTP project is assessed for i) how it helped in improving JMA’s knowledge and technology capacity in conducting their practice, and, ii) how it helped the university in improving its knowledge based research and teaching

Building information modelling (BIM) implementation and remote construction projects: issues, challenges, and critiques.

The construction industry has been facing a paradigm shift to (i) increase productivity, efficiency, infrastructure value; quality and sustainability (ii) reduce lifecycle costs, lead times and duplications via effective collaboration and communication of stakeholders in construction projects. This paradigm shift is becoming more critical with remote construction projects, which reveals unique and even more complicated challenging problems in relation to communication and management due to the remoteness of the construction sites. On the other hand, Building Informational Modelling (BIM) is offered by some as the panacea to addressing the interdisciplinary inefficiencies in construction projects. Although in many cases the adoption of BIM has numerous potential benefits, it also raises interesting challenges with regards to how BIM integrates the business processes of individual practices. This paper aims to show how BIM adoption for an architectural company helps to mitigate the management and communication problems in remote construction project. The paper adopts a case study methodology, which is a UK Knowledge Transfer Partnership (KTP) project of BIM adoption between the University of Salford, UK and John McCall Architects (JMA), in which the BIM use between the architectural company and the main contractor for a remote construction project is elaborated and justified. Research showed that the key management and communication problems such as poor quality of construction works, unavailability of materials, and ineffective planning and scheduling can largely be mitigated by adopting BIM at the design stage

Decision Management Process Improvement Project

A Project Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of MASTER OF SCIENCE in Project ManagementIt has become all too common that questions are raised during the execution of a project pertaining to the decisions that were made early on. Without having maintained a concise, accessible record of project decisions, the project manager and team members would find it difficult to provide hard evidence as to how they got to this point and what impacts specific decisions had on the project’s trajectory. This paper introduces the Decision Management Process Improvement Project (DMPIP), which focuses on improving decision management process throughout the lifecycle of a project with the aim of adding value to project performance and helping obtain project success. This new tool was inspired due to a lack of appropriate methods involving complex projects at a local consulting firm. The process along with the tool is being added to the toolset of a local Consulting Firm. This Firm plans to introduce the tools and techniques to clients that will benefit from an increased Project Management maturity level with improvements to its decision-tracking processes and demonstration of downstream effects of important decisions. The final product is a contribution to the Project Management Body of Knowledge (PMBOK) in the form of creating a Project Decision Management knowledge area in the PMBOK format. A decision log that follows a decision throughout the whole process from problem identification and analysis to the eventual outcome is at the core of the created knowledge area.Title Page / Table of Contents / List of Exhibits / Abstract / Keywords / Introduction / Project Purpose / Project Benefits / Research Methodology / Research Results Analysis / Project Management Approach / Final Products / Conclusion and Recommendations / Opportunities for Future Development / Reference

A comparative Test of the Efficiency, focus and Learning Perspectives of Outsourcing

Despite the fact that vertical integration has been a key question of management studies for more than fifty years, we still do not have a unified, coherent view of outsourcing. In particular, multiple theoretical perspectives such as transaction cost economics, industrial organization, and strategy, could explain the outsourcing decision, but the implications of these different streams have neither been theoretically integrated, nor tested simultaneously. In an attempt to disentangle the various causes of outsourcing, we suggest three different rationales for outsourcing: cost reduction, focusing on core capabilities and importing knowledge into the firm. We develop several hypotheses, which we then test on secondary data on French small- and medium-sized enterprises. Results indicate that the learning rationale appears to be the strongest factor influencing the outsourcing decision. Some performance implications of this rationale are also suggested and tested.outsourcing; transaction cost economics; resource-based view; knowledge-based view

Suitability of BIM for enhancing value on PPP projects for the benefit of the public sector

Collaborative integrated working and stakeholder’s interest have been among key drivers that underpin and encourage the use of Building Information Modelling (BIM) within the AEC industry. BIM is becoming a major means to deliver projects with better improved product, and reduced risk within the construction industry. Furthermore, using BIM in areas like buildability, quality assurance, cost and scheduling can be justified through BIM-nD modelling application. What is not so obvious is how the utilisation of BIM visualisation and knowledge embedment will enhance these areas to refine and achieve better value for PPP procurement projects for the long term benefit especially during post-construction phase for the public sector. As of now there is no well-defined guidance with respect to BIM usage incorporating all of the above. Do we really need to revisit the way we specify projects within the contractual framework under PPP? This paper examines the possibility of how BIM can be utilised in the realisation of augmented formal database information management system under the PPP procurement routes with respect to operation and maintenance support. The paper concludes with additional measures that BIM can offer at the post-construction phase for the public sector at learning organisations

Generic crowdsourcing model for holistic innovation management

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