Cost Information Model for Managing Multiple Projects

Construction companies must deal with several projects at once, but a system to manage multiple projects is not fully developed yet. The first step towards developing such system is to design an information model that is suitable for managing multiple projects. This paper presents the cost-based project modeling (CBPM) method in contrast to the traditional activity-based project modeling methods. The CBPM uses cost as a core of the model along with other project information organized around it. The CBPM serves as a platform for integrating project information from multiple projects. Various types of construction costs are hierarchically modeled to generate corporate-wide information such as project performances, cash flows, and other predictive indicators. Based on the information model, an object-oriented database was developed to contain cost data across several projects. In the model, a module that connects to external systems is built into the model to enhance interactivity with the legacy systems and the industry standards. A prototype system was developed and tested with actual project data to validate the information processing capabilities of the model. The findings from the test indicate construction cost can be an excellent medium that can organize various types of information of multiple projects.     

Best Practices for Integrating the Concurrent Engineering Environment into Multipartner Project Management

The use of the Internet, e-mail, and other technologies has been steadily filtering into the building process, creating a concurrent engineering (CE) environment, and enabling collaborative efforts in the building process. The concurrent engineering environment is established by a variety of tools, including internet accessible servers, e-mail, mobile telephones, and many other existing CE tools. Organizations involved in the construction process recognize the need for assessment of benefits resulting from CE tools, but find the evaluation of these benefits difficult and complicated. The project presented in this paper, “project management and organization in the concurrent engineering environment (ProCE),” is applicable to both researchers and practitioners. The ProCE project developed a measuring model, which may be used by future researchers in this area, attempted to measure benefits derived from using the CE environment in construction design and project management routines, and developed guidelines for best practice implementation by practitioners, based on four case studies. The project included the measurement of both the quantitative and qualitative benefit of CE environment implementation in building construction projects using tools that were readily available through application service providers. Measurement of cost and other quantifiable benefits have been extensively studied. Therefore, the majority of the discussion in the current paper will address the ProCE project’s measurement of qualitative benefits.     

Extended Production Integration for Construction: A Loosely Coupled Project Model for Building Construction

The construction industry is very diverse and consists of businesses that vary in size and ability to adopt information technology. Previous implementations of the project model have been based on information standards that have often adopted closely coupled collaborations. However, it is difficult to take a top down method and require participants to conform to universally accepted standards for the details of their operation. The proposed extended production integration for construction model is a loosely coupled process integration system that allows the participants to maintain a high level of independence as well as the integrity of their existing computer systems. The system is supported by a viable collaboration mechanism. A conceptual model for construction projects is proposed based on the study of events, contract conditions, and their impacts on the collaborations and interactions among participants. Events were identified as the major issue that the system needs to consider in order to conduct the collaboration work. Contract conditions were converted and used as guidelines to create enforceable rules in the system. A prototype system based on the proposed model was developed using Java, CORBA, and UML. A case study involving construction change orders was used to demonstrate the functionality of the prototype system. The factors that impact the efficiency of the system for the case study were determined through sensitivity analyses and comprehensive simulations. The results indicate that the system achieves a high level of efficiency when complicated changes are involved, which cause a higher rejection rate within the system.     

Difficulties and Hindrances Facing End Users of Electronic Information Exchange Systems in Design and Construction

Since information and communication technology (ICT) was introduced into the construction industry over a decade ago, the once fledging technologies have now been well developed. ICT has been commonly adopted, particularly in places where speedy construction is the norm, e.g., in Hong Kong. At the time when ICT is seemingly well developed, this paper aims at identifying the difficulties and hindrances facing the end users of such information exchange systems during design and construction and the consequential effects on project performance. Through literature review, a series of structured interviews, and a questionnaire survey, it is found that industry users welcomed the advancement of ICT, but that the necessary technical and psychological supports from their organizations were insufficiently provided. In addition, significant differences on the hindrances and their consequential effects have been identified between end users in the private sector and those in the public sector. The study findings have also highlighted factors impeding the smooth implementation of ICT systems at the end-user level, which would help organizations to formulate effective strategies to cope with ever-evolving communication technologies and changes in working style.     

Multiperspective Approach to Exploring Comprehensive Cause Factors for Interface Issues

The severity of interface issues and the necessity of interface management (IM) have not received adequate recognition from both industry and academia. The understanding of interface issues is still insufficient and the proposed or employed measures are unilateral, which result in unsatisfactory IM performance in construction projects. After establishing IM’s importance in the construction industry, this paper presents a multiperspective approach that systematically explores comprehensive cause factors for various interface issues. From six interrelated perspectives, namely people/participants, methods/processes, resources, documentation, project management, and environment, hierarchical cause factors are identified and presented in a structured way. These cause factors are further converted into a series of interface management and control elements that allow for the development of an object data model and a systematic model-based IM strategy dealing with all interface issues. The multiperspective approach outperforms other research methods that analyze selected interface issues in a loose and isolated way. The findings contribute a holistic view of what causes interface issues as well as provide a solid theoretical basis for practitioners and researchers to seek all-around IM solutions.     

Development of a Methodology for Live Capture and Reuse of Project Knowledge in Construction

The efforts to share and reuse knowledge generated on construction projects are undermined mainly by the loss of important insights and knowledge due to the time lapse in capturing the knowledge, staff turnover, and people’s reluctance to share knowledge. To address this, it is crucial for knowledge to be captured “live” in a collaborative environment while the project is being executed and presented in a format that will facilitate its reuse during and after the project. This paper uses a case study approach to investigate the end-users’ requirements for a methodology for the live capture and reuse of knowledge, and the shortcomings of current practice in meeting these requirements. A methodology for the live capture and reuse of project knowledge is then presented and discussed. The methodology, which comprises a web-based knowledge base, an integrated work-flow system and a project knowledge manager as the administrator, allows project knowledge to be captured live from ongoing projects. This also incorporates mechanisms to hasten knowledge validation and the dissemination of the knowledge once it has been validated.     

Prototype System for Knowledge Problem Definition

Attitudes to knowledge management (KM) have changed considerably as organizations are now realizing its benefits. Implementation, however, has been facing serious difficulties attributed either to not being able to anticipate the barriers when planning KM strategies or to using inappropriate methods and tools for implementation. These difficulties are more critical in construction due to the fragmented nature of the industry. This paper suggests that proper definition of a KM problem at the early stages of developing the KM initiatives will result in better control over the KM barriers. A methodology for identifying KM problems within a business context is then introduced. The methodology is encapsulated into a prototype software system, which facilitates its deployment in organizations and provides online help facilities. The methodology, development, operation, and evaluation of the prototype are described. The paper concludes that the prototype offers considerable potential for delivering a clarified KM problem and a distilled set of issues for an organization to address. This represents a significant first step in any KM initiative.     

Resistance to IT Change in the AEC Industry: Are the Stereotypes True?

Information technology (IT) change is difficult to implement successfully. Cultural (people) issues are a major barrier to IT implementation in the architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) industry and existing change models have limitations, particularly with respect to cultural issues, which directly affect the ability of companies within the AEC industry to successfully implement IT change. This paper discusses research exploring the relationships between a resistance to change index (RTCI) and the demographics of individuals to understand different AEC participants’ resistance to IT change. Identifying individuals that exhibit different intensities of resistance to IT change efforts and their attendant demographics provides benchmark data to organizations. The ability to identify potential resistors is the first step in helping ensure that new technology implementations succeed. Data was collected from a 156-person sample of the AEC population to determine the relationships among different demographic groups within the AEC population and differences in their RTCI. The data analysis found several demographic groups that were different in their likelihood of resistance, including profession, gender, computer understanding and experience, and awareness of past or future changes occurring in their company. Age and education level were expected to have relationships with RTCI, based on industry stereotypes. The data analysis found that these stereotypes have no scientific basis. Two other stereotypes, gender and computer understanding and experience, were supported by the data analysis.     

Education in Construction Engineering and Management Built on Tradition: Blueprint for Tomorrow

Construction continues to be a significant part of the global economy and shapes the built environment and quality of life for people around the world. In the United States, construction is a multibillion dollar annual enterprise, employing nearly 10 million people. However, it appears that the fragmented nature of the industry continues to hamper productivity and hoped-for gains in efficiency. Issues involve an array of regulatory and legal constructs that: (1) redistribute risk; (2) present only low barriers to entry (making company startup somewhat easy); and (3) fail to provide the quality and quantity of labor necessary. These factors continue to produce overall inefficiencies throughout the construction industry, and ill prepare the industry for the formidable challenges of globalization, sustainability, population growth, and wise use of resources. The purpose of this paper is to review the past and present of construction engineering within the context of civil engineering, and to prescribe practical change to revitalize construction engineering education to meet future demands.     

Project Management Practices and Information Technology Research

Corporations of varying sizes and operations within the construction industry acclaim the contribution of project management applications that assist in business and operational practices. An integrated intelligent construction management application that enables process modeling and algorithmic analysis of construction process planning, interacts with a mainframe-based automated relational database system, and drives the project sequencing, scheduling, decision making and change management processes can introduce dramatic speed, simplicity, accuracy, and collaboration into existing project planning practices. Several research organizations and academic fraternities in concert with industry participation are focusing on the development of such futuristic tools as described above. However, evidence of such computing applications being used by the industry is minimal and a number of reasons have been cited by researchers for this. This study, through a review of the genesis, evolution, and future of computing applications in construction followed by an industry-wide survey, aims to study whether or not concurrent research agendas in construction information technology are truly sustainable from the industry’s perspective.     

Emerging Tools to Enable Construction Engineering

Those working within the domain of construction engineering—the planning and management of the construction of infrastructure assets—today employ a wide range of information technology tools. The vast majority of these tools are used on desktop computers processing tabular information associated with scheduling, tracking, updating statuses, reporting, and similar tasks. In spite of the significant penetration of information technology into construction engineering, there is little direct reuse of the engineering information created during the design phase. Likewise, access to rich engineering information and applications to exploit this information have yet to be extended to mobile workers on the construction jobsite in any significant way. This paper explores a sampling of some of the emerging information technology tools that may be effectively applied to support construction engineering in the field.     

Success/Failure Factors and Performance Measures of Web-Based Construction Project Management Systems: Professionals’ Viewpoint

This paper presents the results of an empirical study conducted to refine the writers’ previous findings on potential factors that may influence performance of commercial Web-based project management systems (WPMSs) and potential measures that might be used to assess performance of such systems. Data used in this study were obtained from 39 professionals who had practical experience with WPMSs in construction projects. The results of the study confirm 42 factors that can potentially affect performance of WPMSs and 36 measures that can be used to evaluate such performance. These 42 factors are categorized into four distinct groups: characteristics of the project, the project team, the service provider, and the specific WPMS system used in the project. The 36 measures reflect performance of WPMSs in six different perspectives: strategic, schedule/time, cost, quality, risk, and communication. Findings presented in this paper can be used by researchers as a starting point for future research in the area of WPMS implementation and performance evaluation and may be used by practitioners in the industry as a useful guide to increase the likelihood of a successful WPMS adoption.     

Implementing Web-Based Project Management Systems in the United States and Japan

This paper reports on results of research conducted at the University of Washington to investigate the means and methods for overcoming barriers to the implementation of Web-based project management systems (WPMS), and to develop a set of best practices in both the United States and Japanese construction industries. The United States and Japanese economies are high-tech intensive and both cultures have embraced technology. However, a relatively small sector of the construction industry in each country has implemented WPMS. The question posed here is why have these drivers not resulted in the industry’s adoption of this new technology, and further, perhaps there are lessons learned from those who have successfully implemented WPMS. This research seeks to broaden our understanding of implementation barriers that are limiting the use of WPMS tools as well as means and methods of overcoming those barriers based on successful implementation in both countries.     

Exploring the Potential of SME Alliances in the Construction Sector

The paper explores the adoption of information and communication technology-enabled alliance modes of operation by small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in the construction sector. It argues that SME alliance modes of operations promote business process innovation and allow SMEs to compete in new ways, get better reward for their work, and gain greater financial strength, which in turn, will give them the financial capability to move forward and develop their products and services. Findings from the multiple case study approach used to conduct the research are discussed, including: (1) the concept of an SME alliance and its key features; (2) business relationships management in an SME alliance; (3) SME alliance viability and sustainability; (4) the role of information and communication technologies in an alliance; and (5) technical innovation management in an alliance regime of peers. Recommendations for future research in the form of open questions to the research community are given.     

Exploiting Knowledge Management: The Engineering and Construction Perspective

Construction companies have always relied on their knowledge assets to provide services to clients. In recent years the terminology “knowledge management” has been introduced. Knowledge management (KM) seeks to formalize the manner in which companies exploit their knowledge assets by harnessing organizational knowledge, promoting greater collaboration between groups with similar interests, capturing and using lessons learned on previous projects, etc. This paper investigates how major United States engineering design and construction firms are implementing knowledge management initiatives in order to identify best practice. It adopts a case study methodology to investigate companies’ strategy and implementation, people aspects, and metrics for performance. The study finds that there is a clear distinction between the knowledge management activities undertaken by large engineering design firms and those of construction firms. There is also a much greater emphasis on knowledge sharing, which is just one component of knowledge management. Moreover, some companies have specific KM initiatives while others have activities that are part of their normal business processes.     

User Interfaces for Complex Engineering Software: Application of Virtual Reality

IT systems for engineers are becoming more numerous and complex and will further proliferate in the future. It is infeasible to expect users to be trained to work with a plethora of systems, especially as many of them will only see occasional use. Therefore, in the near future, systems will need user interfaces that allow intuitive access and usage. This paper examines a new style of user interface based on virtual reality.     

Web-Services Environment for Collaborative Management of Product Life-Cycle Costs

There is an increasing need for effective tools for managing life cycle costs (LCC) of civil products. This paper presents a web-based semantic system for managing products’ life cycle costs. The basic architecture of the proposed system represents costs as a hierarchy of cost elements. Each cost element has a dollar value that could be deterministic, probabilistic, or fuzzy. Several factors (also represented in hierarchies) can have a set of impacts on the values of these costs. Through the analysis of different impact possibilities and probabilities, a decision maker can study various alternative scenarios and define the optimum set of costs and their values. A set of web services are used to capture cost elements, factors, and their impacts. The semantic nature of the system allows for it to be an integral part of a corporate memory system, where decision makers will be able to document and access lessons learned about LCC optimization. Finally, the proposed system includes a framework for a LCC-centered supply chain, where all stakeholders can collaborate in optimizing product LCC.     

Process Model Perspectives on Management and Engineering Procedures in the Precast/Prestressed Concrete Industry

The preparation of detailed models of information and process flow by 14 member companies of the North American Precast Concrete Software Consortium has provided a unique window into the current management, engineering design, and production operations in this industry. The modeling was performed using the authors’ Georgia Tech Process for Product Modeling tool, within the framework of the consortium’s effort to develop a precast concrete product model and to specify new integrated three dimensional modeling software. The paper opens with a comparative economic review of precast construction internationally and in North America, which reveals that the market share of precast construction in North American is relatively low. The models are analyzed and aspects of the underlying management procedures that they reveal are discussed, such as types of contracting arrangements, cost estimating, design outsourcing, engineering design communication, mold design, product diversity, and quality control. The results highlight aspects of precast management processes that may be re-engineered through appropriate application of information technology.     

Collaboration Environments for Construction: Implementation Case Studies

Although emerging technologies offer the construction industry many opportunities for computer supported collaboration environments, the companies adopting these technologies usually fail in achieving the full benefits from their implementations. The reason for this is found to be focusing too much on the technical factors and ignoring or underestimating the factors related to change, implementation, human and organizational factors, and the roles of the management and end users. Each new information technology (IT) implementation involves some change for the organization and the employees, and is therefore a source of resistance and confusion unless special attention is paid to managing this change. This paper aims to review the related theoretical concepts and previous work on success factors for collaboration environment implementations and failure reasons for IT, and to present the current approaches adopted by construction organizations implementing collaboration environments. In order to achieve these aims, the results of an extensive literature review on general causes of failure in IT implementations are presented, and the key areas to focus on during IT design and implementation are highlighted and explained. The results of exploratory case studies are summarized to show the current IT implementation and collaborative working approaches in the United Kingdom construction industry and interpreted using a systems thinking approach. The paper then concludes with some insights into how construction organizations can improve the implementation of collaboration systems.