Cultural transformation in construction partnering projects

In recent years there has been a growing interest in the use of partnering in construction. Since partnering is seen as changing behaviours and attitudes, cultural transformation cannot be forgotten in the process. Much of the literature tends to presume that cultural alignment is a prerequisite for partnering. Furthermore, the existing research fails to adequately address the complex relationship between individual or group behaviour and organisational culture which, nevertheless, lies at the heart of many prescriptions for improving collaboration within the industry. This paper initially reviews the major cultural and behavioural challenges and their root causes in construction partnering projects. Many commentators place considerable emphasis upon the importance of changing attitudes and cultural transformation to address various challenges in construction partnering. As the first step, this paper proposes a cultural web to understand organisational culture and to identify a substantial range of the elements which must be managed if a strategic and cultural change is to be successful

Partnering with Faculty through Liaison Activities

Anything worthwhile requires time and effort. Such is the case in building effective working relationships between librarians and teaching faculty. This article discusses collaborating and partnering with teaching faculty through library liaison relationships and shares experiences of the authors partnering with faculty at their institutions. This article is an outgrowth of a panel presentation at the 2007 ACL Conference by liaison librarians representing libraries in the Southeast, the Midwest, and the Pacific Northwest. While partnering with faculty is both challenging and time consuming, it can be one of the most gratifying and productive activities in which librarians can be engaged

The determinants of successful partnering: a transaction cost perspective

Support is emerging for the assertion that partnering can have a significant beneficial influence on project relationships and project outcomes. However, not all of the evidence bears this out: there are some examples of less-than-successful experiments with partnering approaches. Questions quite naturally arise as to whether any particular elements or aspects of partnering have differed in some of the documented examples, thus giving rise to their relative success or failure. In order to answer such questions there is a need for a theoretical framework against which to analyse the relative performance of partnering projects. In this paper, the authors propose an approach based upon aspects of Transaction Cost Economics (TCE) theory. It is argued that two main factors, contractual incompletedness and opportunism, are fundamental in determining whether project relationships are adversarial or not. The validity of the approach is examined by applying it retrospectively to a strategic partnering agreement involving more than 80 individual building projects. This agreement had been the subject of a four-year study and had been found to produce benefits in a number of areas, not least in the avoidance of conflict and disputes. After analysis, evidence for the reduction of contractual incompletedness was mixed, however the opportunistic inclinations of the participants (specifically, the contractors) were effectively attenuated by a clearly observable combination of factors, which included preselection criteria, and the use of appropriate management and commercial frameworks in which to operate. The case study suggests a prima facie validity to the analytical approach that was adopted, which merits further testing: the next stages being to develop and refine the framework, and to carry out comparative multi-case research on a number of different partnering projects

Partnering with Intermediaries

The purpose of this paper is to explore the dimensions of foundation-intermediary partnerships in order to inform future philanthropic strategy and practice

Admiralty: Contribution and the Federal Employees Compensation Act

During the nineties, a lot of criticism was aimed at the construction industry. Partnering emerged as a way to tackle the problems. The principle of partnering is that the parties agree to jointly achieve common project goals by mutual trust and understanding of each other's values and expectations. Although partnering has existed for nearly three decades, the meaning of the concept is still illusive and what advantages it entails. However, the concept is nevertheless used by the industry. The paper aims to improve the understanding of the motives for implementing partnering by examining why partnering is implemented by HSB Bostad AB and what motives exists for its usage. Empirical data was collected by using a case study of HSB Bostad AB, and analyzed on the basis of economic theories and models. The results show that partnering primarily is used in projects which are; complex, have big scope and where there is limited competition among contractors. Partnering is also used as; a risk-balancer in the project portfolio (because HSB Bostad’s risk exposure varies in different contract forms), an educational medium and a platform for a more enjoyable work-environment.Under nittiotalet riktades skarp kritik mot byggbranschen. Samverkan kom fram som ett sätt att angripa problematiken. Principen med samverkan är att parterna förbinder sig till att tillsammans uppnå gemensamma projektmål genom en ömsesidig tillit och en förståelse för varandras värderingar och förväntningar. Trots att samverkan funnits i snart tre decennier är det fortfarande inte klarlagt vad samverkan som koncept innebär och vilka konceptets fördelar är. Men konceptet tillämpas trots detta fortfarande av aktörerna på marknaden. Arbetet syftar till att öka förståelsen för motiven till att samverkan tillämpas genom att undersöka varför samverkan används av HSB Bostad AB. Empiriskt material samlades in med hjälp av en fallstudie av HSB Bostad AB, som analyserats utifrån ekonomiska teorier och modeller. Resultatet visar att samverkan framförallt fyller en plats i komplexa projekt med stor omfattning och där konkurrensen mellan entreprenörer är begränsad. Samverkan fungerar även som en riskbalanserare i projektportföljen (på grund av att HSB Bostads risktagande varierar mellan olika kontraktsformer), ett utbildningsmedium och en plattform för roligare arbetsklimat

The development of a partnering assessment tool for projects

Many firms in the construction industry claim to be working in a ‘partnering’ or even in an ‘integrated’ way. It is, however, very difficult to verify these claims with the tools currently available. The purpose of this study was to collect and refine existing work on integrative and collaborative working, so as to develop a quick and simple tool that measures the degree of integration with which firms are working. First, the concepts of ‘Partnering’ and ‘Integrated Working’ are discussed and, for the purposes of the work a major supposition is adopted: that the difference between these concepts is that companies that are partnering only share project-related information, while companies working in an integrated way share much more of their available information, knowledge and experience. Secondly, the development of the Partnering Assessment Tool is explained and its application to four cases is recounted. The companies’ overall scores are presented and discussed as to whether these scores might reflect their actual levels of integration and cooperative working. These scores are presented on a scale that contains the categories ‘Cooperative Working’, ‘Partnering’ and ‘Integrated Working’. It is concluded that the application of the tool can provide a useful insight in the nature of the relationships between companies that work together in construction projects. Finally, it is recommended that the tool be tested in more cases and companies, and in a variety of different contractual contexts

Credit Where Credit Is Due: The Legal Treatment of Early Greenhouse Gas Emissions Reductions

Det finns ett stort behov av att effektivisera byggbranschen i Sverige och partnering ses ofta som ett möjligt arbetssätt för att uppnå bättre resultat. Uppfattningen om vad partnering i ett byggprojekt innebär skiljer sig dock åt. Trots detta genomförs forskning runt om i världen i syfte att belysa skillnader mellan traditionella byggprojekt och partneringprojekt. Resultaten är inte tydliga och forskningen har fått kritik för att vara partisk genom att främst fokusera på fördelarna och inte på svårigheter och nackdelar. Med syftet att fördjupa kunskapen om partnering har två tillsynes likvärdiga byggprojekt jämförts. Det är Stockholms två nya arenor som har studerats; Friends Arena och Tele2 Arena. Jämförelser har baserats på vilka partneringprocesser och dimensioner av partnering som använts. Studien har även sökt efter andra projektpåverkande faktorer för att få en mer komplett bild av den miljö som partneringprojekt agerar i. Telefonintervjuer har genomförts med representanter från respektive part och projekt och resultatet visar på stora skillnader mellan projekten. Slutsatserna är att branschen bör enas om en grundnivå av partneringprocesser och dimensioner av partnering som ska användas för att ett projekt ska få kalla sig partneringprojekt. Vid rekrytering av nyckelresurser till projekt eller vid jämförelse av produktivitet och kostnader samt även vid erfarenhetsåterföring från andra partneringprojekt, baseras informationen på dagens breda flora av s k partneringprojekt. Det innebär risk för att felaktiga slutsatser dras som i sig ligger till grund för de beslut som fattas.There is a need to increase productivity within the Swedish construction industry and Partnering is often seen as a possible way to achieve higher result. Though the understanding of Partnering varies, research is made, around the world, with purpose to compare Partnering projects with Non-partnering projects. There are no clear results and the research has been criticised for being partial by enhancing the advantages and not looking at problems and disadvantages. With purpose to deepen the knowledge of Partnering, a study of two equal construction projects has been made, using Stockholm’s new arenas as cases Friends Arena and Tele2 Arena. The study has been carried out by comparing processes and dimensions of partnering in addition to looking for other variables that has affected the projects, in order to achieve a better understanding of the nature of projects. Interviews have been made with representatives from each actor and project. The result shows great differences between the two projects. The conclusion is that the construction business needs to agree on common ground regarding processes and dimensions that shall take place within a project in order to be called a Partnering project. When recruiting key-competence to projects or comparing productivity and cost as well as handling feedback from other Partnering projects the information is based on today's large variety of so-called partnering projects. This comes with the risk that wrong conclusions underlie decision-making

Partnering Strategies for Fitness Evaluation in a Pyramidal Evolutionary Algorithm

This paper combines the idea of a hierarchical distributed genetic algorithm with different inter-agent partnering strategies. Cascading clusters of sub-populations are built from bottom up, with higher-level sub-populations optimising larger parts of the problem. Hence higher-level sub-populations search a larger search space with a lower resolution whilst lower-level sub-populations search a smaller search space with a higher resolution. The effects of different partner selection schemes for (sub-)fitness evaluation purposes are examined for two multiple-choice optimisation problems. It is shown that random partnering strategies perform best by providing better sampling and more diversity

'On the Application of Hierarchical Coevolutionary Genetic Algorithms: Recombination and Evaluation Partners'

This paper examines the use of a hierarchical coevolutionary genetic algorithm under different partnering strategies. Cascading clusters of sub-populations are built from the bottom up, with higher-level sub-populations optimising larger parts of the problem. Hence higher-level sub-populations potentially search a larger search space with a lower resolution whilst lower-level sub-populations search a smaller search space with a higher resolution. The effects of different partner selection schemes amongst the sub-populations on solution quality are examined for two constrained optimisation problems. We examine a number of recombination partnering strategies in the construction of higher-level individuals and a number of related schemes for evaluating sub-solutions. It is shown that partnering strategies that exploit problem-specific knowledge are superior and can counter inappropriate (sub-) fitness measurements