De Saram, D D (2002) Measuring the quality of contractors' co-ordination activities during the construction process. PhD thesis, Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hong Kong.
Abstract
The objective of this thesis, consisting of four experiments, is to study construction co-ordination to test the two hypotheses: (H1) Multi-attribute quality measurement tools are inapplicable to the construction co-ordination processes. (H2) The Critical Incident Technique (CIT) is a practical method for measuring the quality of construction co-ordination processes. Experiment 1 conducted by questionnaire surveys and interviews, investigated the experiences of the multi-attribute quality measurement systems,‘PASS’ (Hong Kong) and ‘CONQUAS’ (Singapore), in achieving customer satisfaction and continuous improvement. Results showed that their effectiveness as quality improvement tools is flawed because of mandatory enforcement, judgemental use and focus on outputs conforming to specifications instead of customer satisfaction and statistical evidence of quality. It was thus decided that these two measurement models cannot be used for testing H1 and H2. In Experiment 2, a questionnaire containing 64 co-ordination issues was presented to construction co-ordinators requesting to rank the relative importance and the relative time consumed. The 33 responses from Hong Kong and Singapore indicated that ‘identifying strategic activities and potential delays’ and ‘ensuring timeliness of work’ are the most important co-ordination activities. ‘Conducting meetings and reviews’ and ‘analysing project performance, detecting and dealing with variances’ are the most time consuming. H1 was tested (Experiment 3) by interviewing co-ordinators and soliciting in-depth knowledge on the application of a multi-attribute measurement model to the three co-ordination processes: ‘Identifying strategic activities and potential delays’, ‘Ensuring timeliness of work’ and ‘Liaison with client and consultants’. Results revealed how the processes characteristics informality, intangibility, low repetition, co-production, unsolicited service and problem solving work caused great difficulties in applying the multi-attribute quality measurement model. Therefore, H1 was accepted. H2 was tested (Experiment 4) by collecting and analysing critical incidents experienced by customers and stakeholders of co-ordination processes. The 23 incidents collected demonstrated that CIT enables identification of the implicit, explicit and latent expectations of customers and stakeholders, evaluation of the quality of processes and outputs and comprehension of information useful for quality improvement. Therefore, H2 was accepted. The thesis concludes that CIT is a practical quality measurement method for construction co-ordination processes while multi-attribute tools are inapplicable.
| Item Type: | Thesis (Doctoral) |
|---|---|
| Thesis advisor: | Ahmed Michael, S M A |
| Uncontrolled Keywords: | continuous improvement; co-ordination; measurement; measurement method; specification; problem solving; client; consultant; stakeholder; Hong Kong; Singapore; experiment; project performance; interview; questionnaire survey |
| Index terms: | evidence, problem solving, questionnaire, co-production, construction process, measurement method, specification, relative importance, interview, survey, experiment, effectiveness, customer satisfaction, project performance, testing, enforcement, Singapore, variance, Hong Kong, quality improvement, continuous improvement |
| Subjects: | performance management, decision-making and reasoning, performance measurement, project management theory and practice, service delivery, health safety and environment, Geography, contractual condition, measurement and scaling, building construction, risk assessment, data collection methods, evaluation and assessment methods, innovation studies, project delivery, financial and cost management, professional practice |
| Topics: | Risk Management, Health and Safety, Engineering Principles, Project Management, Geographical Context, Quality Management, Stakeholder Management, Cost Management, Business Strategy, Research Practice, Site Management, Contract Administration |
| Descriptive scope: | 4 PCEA |
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