A best practice framework for training UK construction site managers.

Training has long been recognised as one of the fundamental processes to assist the UK construction industry meet the increasing the demand for adequately trained and qualified construction site managers. However, inadequate commitment by organisations to training, coupled with the recognised fragmentation of the industry perpetuates major hurdles to achieving this objective. Whilst the site manager's role has evolved over the years through changes within the industry, their training at the industry level continue to be provided along the established mode offered by the Chartered Institute of Building's Certificate and Diploma Site Management training (CIOB C/DSM) and the National/Scottish Vocational Qualifications Site Supervision and Site Management (NVQ/SVQ SS/SM) training schemes. This have led critics to argue that the difficulties of meeting the industry's need for trained site managers are associated with inadequacies within the training provisions offered by these schemes. This research was undertaken in recognition for the need for a critical appraisal of their training provisions with a view for improvements. It was developed on the concepts of training best practice which advocates improving the training provisions concurrent with change through the process of re-learning the whole training process. The effectiveness of the training provisions offered by the training schemes and the impact of variables on the site managers' training needs were critically investigated. 'Gaps' within the training provisions were identified, approaches to bridge these 'gaps' were investigated and proposed for improvement. The substantial contribution of the research is the expansion of the knowledge of the factors that impinge on the effective provisions for training site managers. The research findings propounds the conviction that the current training provisions needs to be expanded to be more effective and this can be achieved with the best practice framework for training site managers identified by the research

Sustainable education: an assessment of carbon footprint at UCSI University and proposed green campus initiative framework / Keoy Kay Hooi and Padzil Hassan

As the interest of green business sustainability is generating a lot of interests in the higher education institution, this paper evaluates the implementation of Green Campus Initiative (GCI) at the Unwavering Commitment to Serve Intentionally (UCSI) University Malaysia by evaluating their carbon footprint emission. The carbon footprint calculation and proposed framework presented in this paper aims to encourage other higher Education Institutions in Malaysia to implement the GCI. In order to reduce the environmental impact at UCSI University, the measurement of the CO2 emission was a very important starting point. The paper starts with the literature review about the sustainability and implementation of GCI in other countries outside Malaysia to give an overview regarding the concept. The next section is the calculation of carbon footprint emission of UCSI University with the primary data collected from Logistics and Marketing Department during the year 2008. These primary data were processed with the formulas had been developed earlier and resulted the total carbon footprint produced by UCSI University in one year. Later on, the results of these calculations become the basic concept of developing the proposed framework to be used by higher education institution in Malaysia. Supported by the secondary data (i.e. literature review), a proposed framework of GCI implementation was developed to be tested and empirically validated in future studies. It is hope that result obtained from this paper will provide guidelines for policy maker and management of the universities to acknowledge the importance of GCI to create a sustainable and profitable business application

Challenges in Education and Training to Develop Malaysian Construction Workforce

Education and training have been central to the development of the Malaysian construction workforce. Notwithstanding the various initiatives introduced to promote education and training, critics are arguing that these have been ineffective. This paper critically reviews the phenomenon and identifies the causal factors. Throughout three key areas; (i) the context of the industry, (ii) the education and training provisions offered, and (iii) the challenges, meta-data analysis of literature was undertaken grounded on the concepts of strategic management ecosystems. Since it is crucial to ties several variable clusters in order to reach a comprehensive finding, the analysis was helped by the multi-layered thematic processes. The findings show that nine key factors at the construction industry level (external ecosystem), and two key factors in the education and training provisions (internal ecosystem) that are interrelated to each other have significantly affected the effectiveness of the education and training to develop the Malaysian construction workforce. These factors need to be addressed in a holistic and integrated manner to improve the predicament which resides in a public strategic management field. Aside from the context-centric findings, the paper posits for subsequent empirical exploration as validation is of concerned. However, it may open up education and training literature to recognised possible multidisciplinary research, education, and practice while addressing challenges such as law, government policy, and standards’ development

Construction manager’s technical competencies in Malaysian construction projects

Problems of Malaysian construction industry have often been associated, in part to incompetent construction manager (CM) when managing the construction projects. Although various education and training provisions have been introduced, critics argue that the provisions have not been effective. Central in the debate on the adequacy of the CM education and training offered is the answer to the question of “what constitutes the technical competency of the CM?” The purpose of this paper is to present the study that identifies the technical competencies required by the CM to address the question. Design/methodology/approach – Multi-layered thematic analysis of literature was first carried out to identify the technical competency elements. Then, interviews were undertaken to confirm the elements of competencies. It was followed with questionnaire surveys to test the validity of the technical competencies against different contractors’ category and grade/size. Findings – The findings suggest that the technical competencies of CM are generic, regardless of the size of construction organisation or the types of projects they undertake. A total of 16 CM technical competencies were identified which include the ability to manage: staff, materials, labour, plant, sub-contractors, safety, money, quality, time, environment, site administration, pre-construction activities, project closeout and handover, third parties, computer literacy, and construction contract. Originality/value – The findings suggest that generic education and training is possible to develop technically competent CM. It also provides insights to the CM technical competencies which the industry is expecting

Vexing issues of knowledge sharing: The case study of the wiki initiative in a Malaysian public organization

While many organizations have benefited from the existence of Internet-based web applications such as wikis and blogs as tools for knowledge sharing , many others have failed. In the end, wikis and blogs are reduced to just as the facilities to provide one-way information about the organization. Gone is the exuberance when the wiki or blog was first launched.Failures of wikis in promoting knowledge sharing are mostly not because their poor design.Many fail because of poor understanding of the ecosystem within which effective wikis operate.To emphasize, this paper presents a case study of a wiki initiative mooted by a public organization to manage and share knowledge.Notwithstanding the many initiatives introduced to encourage active knowledge sharing participation, maintaining a sustainable knowledge sharing culture within the organization can be very complex.The case study provides useful examples of this and lessons that can be learnt.The findings suggest that that the variables surrounding the organization can be unique.It is necessary to endeavor and continuously learn to determine the critical success factors and the ecosystem before successful and sustainable wiki portals for knowledge sharing can effectively be promoted

Factors Affecting Quality in Construction Project Life Cycle (CPLC)

Quality is among the critical element in managing a construction project. Unfortunately, according to several established documents, issues related to quality in the Malaysian construction project are still rampant. Therefore, to delve deeper into the predicament, understanding the factors affecting construction quality was deemed essential. This even more vital given the minimal number of manuscripts looking into the matter accordingly with the generic construction project life cycle (CPLC). Thus, to operationalise the initial research, a mixed methodology endeavour was selected. This by carrying out a Multi-layered Thematic Analysis (MLTA) to determine factors affecting the quality in the CPLC and questionnaire survey to validate each factor's agreement. Through the MLTA, the results show several similarities in factors, especially in the off-site phases. Whereby in the on-site phases, factors related to 4 M's (money, material, manpower, and machinery) were found to be common. Then, through the questionnaire survey, each factor's mean and median values indicate that the majority of respondents were agreed (scale of 4 to 5) with the dedicated phase of each factor. To sum up, there is evidence that different CPLC has different factors affecting construction quality. In the current form, the findings are valuable as a basis for subsequent research undertaking, e.g. focusing on the micro perspective of quality within each phase and parties involved in the construction project

Factors affecting quality in Construction Project Life Cycle (CPLC)

Quality is among the critical element in managing a construction project. Unfortunately, according to several established documents, issues related to quality in the Malaysian construction project are still rampant. Therefore, to delve deeper into the predicament, understanding the factors affecting construction quality was deemed essential. This even more vital given the minimal number of manuscripts looking into the matter accordingly with the generic construction project life cycle (CPLC). Thus, to operationalise the initial research, a mixed methodology endeavour was selected. This by carrying out a Multi-layered Thematic Analysis (MLTA) to determine factors affecting the quality in the CPLC and questionnaire survey to validate each factor's agreement. Through the MLTA, the results show several similarities in factors, especially in the off-site phases. Whereby in the on-site phases, factors related to 4 M's (money, material, manpower, and machinery) were found to be common. Then, through the questionnaire survey, each factor's mean and median values indicate that the majority of respondents were agreed (scale of 4 to 5) with the dedicated phase of each factor. To sum up, there is evidence that different CPLC has different factors affecting construction quality. In the current form, the findings are valuable as a basis for subsequent research undertaking, e.g. focusing on the micro perspective of quality within each phase and parties involved in the construction project

Importance Level of Construction Managers’ Technical Competency Across Different Contractors’ Demographics in Malaysia

It is undeniable that construction managers play a significant role within construction phase, especially when they are representing construction contractor, one of the key stakeholders within construction project’s realm. Reliance towards their technical competency is very much needed for a successfulness of a construction project. Unfortunately, a lot of recurring issues pertaining to their technical incompetency are shrouding the industry. Non-existence of term of reference for construction manager’s technical competency profile is dictated as a major setback. Thus, a dedicated and comprehensive research exploration is conducted in order to bridge the gap through establishment of particular competency. Hence, in this instalment, the authors postulated a question of ‘how?’ which pillars on items’ importance level and correlation among different contractors’ demographics. Initially, data screening processes over outliers test, reliability test, and normality test were conducted. After that, the importance of technical competency for construction manager was analysed based on their central tendency (i.e. means). Finally, Spearman correlation analysis is directed towards observed ranks from diverse contractors’ demographics. In a nutshell, data was free from any extreme outlier and reported high reliability value. However, data was measured as non-normal in nature. Meanwhile, through means, majority of macro items (16 items) were in a range of important (4.00) to very important (5.00). Towards the end, findings for Spearman correlation analysis were mostly leaning towards moderate and strong association’s strength across different clusters of diverse contractors’ demographics. Nevertheless, there were evidences that major variability of findings for both tests is exhibited through contractors’ grades. Therefore, succeeding in-depth quantitative analysis is paramount in order to pin-point significant values onto each individual item

Importance Level of Construction Managers’ Technical Competency Across Different Contractors’ Demographics in Malaysia

It is undeniable that construction managers play a significant role within construction phase, especially when they are representing construction contractor, one of the key stakeholders within construction project’s realm. Reliance towards their technical competency is very much needed for a successfulness of a construction project. Unfortunately, a lot of recurring issues pertaining to their technical incompetency are shrouding the industry. Non-existence of term of reference for construction manager’s technical competency profile is dictated as a major setback. Thus, a dedicated and comprehensive research exploration is conducted in order to bridge the gap through establishment of particular competency. Hence, in this instalment, the authors postulated a question of ‘how?’ which pillars on items’ importance level and correlation among different contractors’ demographics. Initially, data screening processes over outliers test, reliability test, and normality test were conducted. After that, the importance of technical competency for construction manager was analysed based on their central tendency (i.e. means). Finally, Spearman correlation analysis is directed towards observed ranks from diverse contractors’ demographics. In a nutshell, data was free from any extreme outlier and reported high reliability value. However, data was measured as non-normal in nature. Meanwhile, through means, majority of macro items (16 items) were in a range of important (4.00) to very important (5.00). Towards the end, findings for Spearman correlation analysis were mostly leaning towards moderate and strong association’s strength across different clusters of diverse contractors’ demographics. Nevertheless, there were evidences that major variability of findings for both tests is exhibited through contractors’ grades. Therefore, succeeding in-depth quantitative analysis is paramount in order to pin-point significant values onto each individual item

Challenges in education and training to develop Malaysian construction workforce

Education and training have been central to the development of the Malaysian construction workforce. Notwithstanding the various initiatives introduced to promote education and training, critics are arguing that these have been ineffective. This paper critically reviews the phenomenon and identifies the causal factors. Throughout three key areas; (i) the context of the industry, (ii) the education and training provisions offered, and (iii) the challenges, meta-data analysis of literature was undertaken grounded on the concepts of strategic management ecosystems. Since it is crucial to ties several variable clusters in order to reach a comprehensive finding, the analysis was helped by the multi-layered thematic processes. The findings show that nine key factors at the construction industry level (external ecosystem), and two key factors in the education and training provisions (internal ecosystem) that are interrelated to each other have significantly affected the effectiveness of the education and training to develop the Malaysian construction workforce. These factors need to be addressed in a holistic and integrated manner to improve the predicament which resides in a public strategic management field. Aside from the context-centric findings, the paper posits for subsequent empirical exploration as validation is of concerned. However, it may open up education and training literature to recognised possible multidisciplinary research, education, and practice while addressing challenges such as law, government policy, and standards‟ development