Relationship between project interaction and performance indicators

Researchers and practicing engineers have recently paid considerable attention to alternative approaches to project integration, such as partnering, design-build, constructability, and combinations of these. Each approach may improve a project's integration by increasing the quality and/or quantity of interaction between designers and builders. It is generally accepted that project performance can be enhanced when interaction occurs on a regular basis, beginning early in the project, in an open and trusting environment. This paper presents a method for measuring a project's degree of interaction (DOI), and verifies the relationship between DOI and performance indicators such as cost growth, schedule growth, and number of modifications. The writers apply the analytic hierarchy process technique in weighting criteria for measuring DOI. Data were collected from 25 recently completed public-sector projects using traditional and alternative approaches. The projects with low DOI have a wide range of cost and schedule growth and number of modifications, while projects with high DOI tend to have better and more consistent performance indicators.