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

The analysis of struck-by accidents at construction sites in Johor

Malaysia’s construction industry has been categorized as the most hazardous industry due to its high risk in causing construction accidents compared to the other industry. Among the various reported accident fatality cases to the Department of Occupational Safety and Health (DOSH) from the year 2010 to 2018, ‘struck-by object’ is among the most accounted fatal accident types. This study aims to analyse the struck-by accidents at construction sites in Johor and investigate the significant contributing factors of this type of accident. It was carried out by computing the contributing factors of struck-by accidents from the DOSH website, which was later designed as questionnaire questions. The questionnaire was distributed to 150 respondents that comprise of safety personnel who are working at construction sites, and about 116 answered questionnaires were received. From the questionnaire survey, the most significant contributing factor to struck-by object accidents is due to lack of training. Whereas for the analysis of the real cases, the significant contributing factor to struck-by object accidents is due to inadequate safe operating procedures. Using Spearman’s rank correlation, it was found that there is a variation in the respondents’ perceptions with the real fatal cases reported in the DOSH website. This results from this study create major eye-opening on the weak correlational relationship between the safety personnel’s perceptions and what actually the cause is. This study provides awareness on the issue and further actions should be taken to ensure the fatality rate of struck-by object accidents could be reduced

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

Observation of temporary accommodation for construction workers according to the code of practice for temporary construction site workers amenities and accommodation (ms2593:2015) in Johor, Malaysia

The Malaysian government is currently improving the quality of workers temporary accommodation by introducing MS2593:2015 (Code of Practice for Temporary Site Workers Amenities and Accommodation) in 2015. It is in line with the initiative in the Construction Industry Transformation Programme (2016-2020) to increase the quality and well-being of construction workers in Malaysia. Thus, to gauge the current practice of temporary accommodation on complying with the particular guideline, this paper has put forth the observation of such accommodation towards elements in Section 3 within MS2593:2015. A total of seventeen (17) temporary accommodation provided by Grade 6 and Grade 7 contractors in Johor were selected and assessed. The results disclosed that most of the temporary accommodation was not complying with the guideline, where only thirteen (13) out of fifty-eight (58) elements have recorded full compliance (100%), and the lowest compliance percentage (5.9%) are discovered in the Section 3.12 (Signage). In a nutshell, given the significant gap of compliance between current practices of temporary accommodation and MS2593:2015, a holistic initiative need to be in place for the guideline to be worthwhile

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

A Qualitative Comparison on Guidelines for Construction Workers Accommodation and Facility

Construction industry in Malaysia covers almost 1.3 million workers. Thus, realizing the importance of human-centred trait, a long-term plan that is led by the Construction Industry Development Board Malaysia (CIDB) has been designed to improve accommodation and facilities of workers at construction site. In conjunction to that, the Institute for Industrial Research and Standards Malaysia (SIRIM) has developed Malaysia Standard (MS 2593:2015) as the guideline for improvement of accommodation and facilities for workers which is able to contribute to the achievement of the target in the Construction Industry Transformation Programme (CITP). However, a phenomenon that is centred on the level of itscorroboration compared with other similar guidelines has been voiced by some practitioners of construction, especially when the guideline are likely to be the basis of a new related act. Therefore, based on MS 2593:2015, this introductory research is conducted to qualitatively analyse the corroborative level of the guideline compared to its counterpart guidelines. By using a comprehensive document analysis method which anchored to frequency approach and assisted by NVivo v.8 software, the report found out that the Malaysia-based guideline is on par to the restwith some introduction of new variables (especially towards leisure and social aspects). Thus, further research on gauging industry’s willingness and existing compliance rates is deemed appropriate in order to inculcate positive impacts towards the objectives of MS 2593:2015, and subsequently contributes to the formation of the forthcoming corresponding act

Determining the Technical Competencies of Construction Managers in the Malaysia’s Construction Industry

It is a common conviction that project management, construction management, and site management are the tools for improving the performance of the construction project as a whole. Notwithstanding the similarities and differences between all of them, construction management which consists of off-site and on-site activities is deemed to have the major influence on the succession of a project. Consequently, a competent construction manager is required throughout the particular phase to shape the construction stability and geared up to complete the proposed development as according to several common objectives. Nonetheless, a competent construction manager will not just appear “out of the blue”, they need to be teach, train, and develop in order to equip them with comprehensive competency sets. For that reason, education, training, and continuing professional development (CPD) are in place to provide the required knowledge, skills, and abilities. However, the debates on the inadequacy and problems on current construction management programs are continued to impede Malaysia’s construction environment. It has been observed that lack of term of reference on the technical competency for construction manager is became the major setback. Hence, this paper tries to unfold the circumstances by offering a preliminary countermeasure to alleviate the situation through analysis of literatures. It was found that, the associated central phenomenon is believed to be explored holistically with the inclusion of multi layered thematic analysis as a tool to assist the exploration processes. Then, the respective outcomes from the analysis are deemed to be ready for subsequent phases, for instance the validation phase

Determining the Technical Competencies of Construction Managers in the Malaysia’s Construction Industry

It is a common conviction that project management, construction management, and site management are the tools for improving the performance of the construction project as a whole. Notwithstanding the similarities and differences between all of them, construction management which consists of off-site and on-site activities is deemed to have the major influence on the succession of a project. Consequently, a competent construction manager is required throughout the particular phase to shape the construction stability and geared up to complete the proposed development as according to several common objectives. Nonetheless, a competent construction manager will not just appear “out of the blue”, they need to be teach, train, and develop in order to equip them with comprehensive competency sets. For that reason, education, training, and continuing professional development (CPD) are in place to provide the required knowledge, skills, and abilities. However, the debates on the inadequacy and problems on current construction management programs are continued to impede Malaysia’s construction environment. It has been observed that lack of term of reference on the technical competency for construction manager is became the major setback. Hence, this paper tries to unfold the circumstances by offering a preliminary countermeasure to alleviate the situation through analysis of literatures. It was found that, the associated central phenomenon is believed to be explored holistically with the inclusion of multi layered thematic analysis as a tool to assist the exploration processes. Then, the respective outcomes from the analysis are deemed to be ready for subsequent phases, for instance the validation phase