Success factors in an alliance contract: a case study in Australia

Many studies have been carried out in relation to construction procurement methods. Evidence shows that there needs to be a change of culture and attitude in the construction industry, moving away from traditional adversarial relationship into cooperative and collaborative relationship. At the same time there is also an increasing concern and discussion on alternative procurement methods, drifting away from traditional procurement systems. Relational contracting approaches have become more popular in recent years, and have appeared in common forms such as partnering, alliancing and relationship management contracts. This paper reports the findings of a survey undertaken with a private organisation based on an alliance project during its design stage, identifying the critical factors that influence the success of the alliance project. Legal aspects focusing on dispute resolution in alliancing are also highlighted.published_or_final_versio

Conceptual Maturity Model for Sustainable Construction

The construction industry has contributed substantially to not only the growth of the economy, but also the development of the environment and society. In past decades, an increasing public awareness on the environmental and social growth has promoted the application of sustainable development in construction. The triple bottom line—economy, society, and environment—has been widely recognized as a significant dimension for measuring the performance of sustainability. Although a number of performance indicator systems are available in the current market, few of them have considered soft systems—culture and human aspects—in measuring the performance of sustainable construction. This paper therefore aims to develop a conceptual maturity model for sustainable construction to gain a deeper and richer understanding of the actual practices on sustainable construction. Five key domains are outlined in the proposed model as the metrics with the description and subfactors of each metric. Apart from contributing to increasing competitive advantage, the proposed model can steer the construction community to improve performance in attaining the goals of sustainable construction. Nonetheless, this conceptual maturity model is still at an early development stage, and it is subject to more empirical testing and research for its practicability and further refinement.postprin

The roles of sustainability assessment systems in delivering sustainable construction

Sustainable development in construction has increasingly gained momentum over the years due to a growing public concern and enforcement of government policy. A variety of sustainability standards and systems have therefore emerged in the current construction industry to provide a means for assessment, ranging from Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED), Building Research Establishment Environmental Assessment Method (BREEAM), National Australian Building Environmental Rating System (NABERS) to ISO14001. In Hong Kong, LEED and Building Environmental Assessment Method (BEAM Plus) are the mechanism preferred by practitioners for their sustainable buildings certification. This paper will review and examine the roles of the sustainability performance assessment standards in delivering sustainability in construction. Interviews were conducted to explore various viewpoints on sustainability rating systems from different stakeholders. Apart from serving as a guideline for practitioners, sustainability systems can help to gauge the sustainable performance of individual buildings by using transparent and objectively comprehensible metrics. Nevertheless, there is a lack of focus on the post occupancy evaluation and soft issues in the current sustainability assessment systems. By taking into consideration soft issues and those performance goals in operational management, a more holistic and comprehensive assessment approach can be provided for evaluating sustainable construction performance. The potential of the green building rating systems being abused for marketing purpose can also be reduced with a series of periodic assessments during the operational life cycle. These improved sustainability assessment systems can therefore help to reframe the expectations and the strategies of construction stakeholders in pursuing the true goals of sustainable development in construction.published_or_final_versio

Conflict Management Climate in Contractor’s Project Team: Conceptualizing its Relationship with Interface Management and Project Performance

Session 2BFunctional heterogeneity symbolizing different “thought worlds” in an organization has a potential to cause intra-organizational conflicts. On construction projects, the general contractor’s project organization is an entity that is tasked with transforming drawings into reality and conflicts at its functional interfaces (execution-safety interface, execution-planning interface, execution-quality interface and execution-commercial interface) could jeopardize a project’s successful completion. Effective interface management therefore seems to be contingent on the successful management of conflicts. This research is built on the long-term perspective of conflict management, which argues for proactive conflict management by introducing structural changes in a system. Climate is a notion which deals with shared perceptions of individuals with regard to distinct phenomena and hence combining the notions of long-term perspective with that of climate will allow researchers to measure shared perceptions of individuals with regard to structural variables theorized to foster collaborative conflict management. The notion of CMC therefore provides opportunity to see how the shared perceptions of individuals with regard to collaborative conflict management influence the notions conceptually linked with CMC. Hence, three notions i.e. CMC, interface management and project performance and the link between them are conceptualized in this paper. Finally the paper concludes by developing three propositions about the nature of relationship between the constructs.published_or_final_versio

An investigation into the Attitude and Relational Behaviour in Relationship Based Procurement (RBP): A Conceptual Framework

Session 1AThe notion of relationship-based procurement (RBP) proposes to address project complexity, uncertain environmental conditions in a project. However, it is constantly challenging roles of project participants, participants assume greater responsibility that require them to strive for excellence in a project. There is frequent critique on participants’ attitude and behaviour that leads to low collaboration in a project, despite of relationship approaches. Thus, the role of attitude and relational behaviour becomes important in projects. Divergent attitude of participants can lead to misaligned behaviour and ultimately to low collaboration in a project. This requires clear understanding of participants’ attitude and relational behaviour that can help improve collaboration in a project. This paper presents a conceptual framework with role of attitude of project participants that guides relational intentions and ultimately relational behaviour for collaboration in a project. The relationship of attitude of project participants, relational intentions and relational behaviour is explained from Theory of Planned Behaviour (Ajzen, 1991). Further, attitudes of project participants are conceptualised in the dimensions that allows collaborative framework in a relation, relational intentions are conceptualised in practices of project participants and relational behaviour in behavioural aspects that emphasize best for project manifesto and resolving issues jointly. The conceptual framework presented here, provide knowledge on attitude of project participants and their behavioural alignment in a project.published_or_final_versio

BIM collaboration: A conceptual model and its characteristics

Relationship management has become an important issue for both academics and practitioners in construction project management. Few study provide a clear picture of what specifically constitute collaboration in a construction project in the existing literature and the practical approach. Limit research focus on developing a collaboration theory in construction management. The advent of Building Information Modeling (BIM) has been proved to be helpful for improving project coordination and productivity. However, widely adoption of BIM does not change the fragmented nature of construction sector. An understanding of how to promote such collaborative relationships in BIM enabled projects is crucial to achieve the full potential of BIM. By analysing the characteristics of collaboration from a management perspective and investigating current BIM implementation strategy, this research develops a conceptual model of collaboration in BIM enabled projects and identifies main factors of collaboration. The model categorizes collaboration into three dimension, they are collaboration team characteristics, collaborative environment, and collaborative process. Model also presents high level of collaboration can result better project outcomes and participants satisfaction. This model can be generalized to construction sector and standardized to collaborative process for future BIM implementation.published_or_final_versio

Models for engaging public-private partnerships in civil infrastructure projects: A case of ‘having your cake and eating it too’?

Session 4Bpublished_or_final_versio

Stakeholder management through relationship management

postprin

Registro geológico holocênico de recifes submersos na plataforma de Abrolhos

Sistemas recifais são feições comuns ao longo de muitos litorais tropicais modernos e as evidências de suas ocorrências durante diferentes níveis do mar têm sido muito estudadas por todo o mundo. A Plataforma de Abrolhos (Brasil) engloba o mais importante sistema de recifes de coral no Atlântico Sul apresentando altos níveis de endemismo, baixa diversidade e morfologia única de crescimento (formações recifais conhecidas como "chapeirões"). O desenvolvimento recifal na plataforma se dá pela presença de dois arcos recifais rasos paralelos à costa, além de recifes afogados ao longo das porções centro-norte e sul da mesma. O principal objetivo deste estudo é investigar o registro geológico do processo evolutivo holocênico de dois ambientes recifais na região da Plataforma de Abrolhos. Para isso foram sondados dois recifes submersos com seus topos a 4 e 15 metros de profundidade, chamados respectivamente de recifes “Shallow Water” (SW) e “Deep Water” (DW), onde foram coletados oito testemunhos distribuídos nas direções vertical (a partir do topo recifal) e horizontal (perpendiculares às paredes do recife). Os testemunhos coletados tiveram recuperação variando entre 0,70 e 2,03 metros de comprimento. Foram observadas significativas formações de corais e de algas (espécies de corais como Mussismilia harttii., Millepora sp., Siderastrea sp., Porites sp., Favia sp. e Madracis sp.; e espécies de algas calcárias como Hydrolithon sp., Lithophyllum kotschyanum, Lithophyllum sp., Amphiroa sp., Mesophyllum erubescens e Sporolithon episporum). No entanto, verificou-se que os organismos mais abundantes na edificação recifal foram os briozoários da família Schizoporellidae. Grandes formações de briozoários incrustantes foram descritas em todos os testemunhos, compreendendo cobertura superior a 15% na superfície longitudinal dos mesmos e podendo alcançar cobertura de até 52,9% em dois deles. Porém, briozoários foram mais representativos nos testemunhos do recife “DW”. Contraditoriamente, a fraca concorrência espacial identificada nos briozoários incrustantes pode ser a explicação para a maior ocorrência destes organismos nos testemunhos do recife “DW”, onde organismos zooxantelados e fortes concorrentes espaciais em ambiente com grande incidência de radiação solar não conseguem se desenvolver. Datações utilizando radiocarbono evidenciaram que o recife “DW” é mais antigo que o recife “SW”, bem como um maior acúmulo recifal (e principalmente no topo recifal) no recife “SW” nos últimos mil anos. Pela presença de corais zooxantelados e algas características de ambientes rasos, sugere-se que toda a estrutura recifal analisada se desenvolveu em ambiente de baixa profundidade (< 30 metros) na plataforma continental.Coral Reef systems are common features throughout many modern tropical coastal zone and the evidence of their occurrence during different sea levels have been studied worldwide. The Abrolhos Shelf (Brazil) encompasses the most important coral reef system in the South Atlantic showing high levels of endemism, low diversity and unique growth (locally known as “chapeirões”). The reef system along the shelf is characterized by shallow reef arcs parallel to the coast, and “give-up” reefs throughout the north-central and southern shelf. The main objective of this study is to investigate the geological record showing the Late Holocene evolution of two submerged pinnacles in the Abrolhos Shelf. Herein, two submerged pinnacles were drilledwith their tops at 4 and 15 m below sea level, called "Shallow Water Reef" (SW) and "Deep Water Reef" (DW). A total of eight cores were collected. Vertical (top down) and horizontal (perpendicular to the pinnacle wall) cores were recovered, ranging from 0.70 to 2.03 m in length. Significant coralgal framework was observed in the cores (corals such species as Mussismilia harttii., Millepora sp., Siderastrea sp., Porites sp., Favia sp. and Madracis sp.; and coralline algae such species as Hydrolithon sp., Lithophyllum kotschyanum, Lithophyllum sp., Amphiroa sp., Mesophyllum erubescens and Sporolithon episporum). However, we found that by far the most abundant framebuilding component were Schizoporellidae bryozoans. Extensive encrusting bryozoans were identified in all cores comprising between 15 - 52,9% of 2D areas. Bryozoans were most representative in the "DW" cores. Paradoxically, the poor spatial competition of encrusting bryozoans must be the explanation for the bryozoan dominance in the "DW" cores, which hermatypic corals can not develop. Radiocarbon dates indicate that the "DW" reef is older than the "SW" reef as well as higher reef accumulation rates occur in the past thousand years is in the "SW" reef. The results show that the both reefs have been developed in a shallow shelf environment (<30 meters depth

Demystifying construction project time-effort distribution curves: a BIM and non-BIM comparison

MacLeamy's time-effort distribution curves are among the most oft-cited sources for researchers interested in mainstreaming building information modeling (BIM) implementation in the architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) industry. Succinctly, the curves offer a clever answer to the question: How can BIM benefit AEC processes? However, despite their significant theoretical and practical value, little previous research has been conducted to elaborate the time-effort distribution curves of any real-life projects. This research aims to demystify the time-effort distribution curves through comparison of a representative BIM project and a non-BIM project. Applying a set of innovative approaches, the actual time-effort distribution curves of two public housing construction projects in Hong Kong are produced and analyzed in-depth. The curves vividly show that BIM implementation increases the effort spent at design stage - that is, throughout the architecture and engineering processes - but the extra effort pays off at the building stage. Further, the curves are found to be a useful graphical analytic tool for other purposes, such as adjusting the fee structure among AEC processes and informing improved BIM adoption.postprin