Farrell, A and Sunindijo, R Y (2022) Overcoming challenges of early contractor involvement in local government projects. International Journal of Construction Management, 22(10), pp. 1902-1909. ISSN 1562-3599
Abstract
Traditional procurement methods are prone to developing adversarial relationships. Early Contractor Involvement (ECI) is a relationship-based procurement model that allows the client, the designer, and the contractor to work collaboratively, which results in improved performance. Previous ECI research has focused on its implementation in private projects and public projects managed by the Federal and State Governments. This research investigates the implementation of ECI in Local Government projects in Sydney, Australia. Interviews revealed that the main challenges are probity, developing principle project requirements document, running ECI workshops, changing the attitudes of project participants, and the time-consuming nature of ECI process. When these challenges are overcome, Local Government projects can reap the benefits of ECI, such as collaborative work relationships, better constructability, innovation, cost certainty, improved risk management, and better value for money. It is concluded that ECI is a suitable procurement model to improve project performance in the Local Government context.
| Item Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Uncontrolled Keywords: | constructability; early contractor involvement; innovation; local government; procurement |
| Index terms: | value-for-money, public project, early contractor involvement, interview, local government, constructability, implementation, project performance, risk management, traditional procurement, designer, Australia, relationship-based procurement, workshop |
| Subjects: | data collection methods, profession, construction type, risk assessment, contractual arrangements, construction integration, Geography, evaluation, project management theory and practice, infrastructure engineering, administrative law |
| Topics: | Value Management, Legal Issues, Design Practice, Construction Technology, Procurement, Risk Management, Roles and Professions, Engineering Principles, Research Practice, Project Management, Geographical Context |
| Descriptive scope: | 3 PCE |
N.B. Descriptive scope is a count of how many of the five facets of empirical research are indicated by the words used in title, abstract and keywords. It is not intended as a judgement on the research; merely a count of the kind of word we would expect to indicate Phenomenon, Concepts, Theoretical framing, Empirical techniques, Analytical techniques. If all five are present, then a code of “5 PCTEA” will indicate this. If you feel the coding for this record is questionable, we welcome discussion around the terms we matched or the way we categorized them. The facet you would expect may not be coded, or a facet may be coded inappropriately. This can also bear on a larger question, of which facets should be treated as defining in construction management research. Please get in touch, and we will look at it. More details here