Jones, T; Shan, Y and Goodrum, P M (2010) An investigation of corporate approaches to sustainability in the US engineering and construction industry. Construction Management and Economics, 28(9), pp. 971-983. ISSN 1466433X
Abstract
Sustainability involves focusing on a project's impact in three areas: (1) environmental; (2) economical; and (3) societal. In reality, companies' approaches in the three areas are not evenly distributed. A study of current trends in the US construction industry related to the emerging focus on sustainable construction will be of great value for the engineering and construction industry to recognize the differences in corporate approaches to sustainability, for the sake of team alignment. A random cross-section of 300 companies, consisting of 150 owner companies, 75 contractor companies and 75 design firms representing a variety of industries, was selected from annual company data assembled by the weekly construction news publication Engineering News Record (ENR). To identify sustainability-related concepts within the context of these company documents, content analyses and chi-square statistical analyses were performed on the selected companies' publicly available annual reports and mission/vision/values statements. The primary objectives are to: (1) identify concepts of sustainability that are currently being emphasized within the US engineering and construction industry, possibly at the expense of other concepts; and (2) develop an understanding of the relationships between various company and industry groups related to the fundamental concepts of sustainable construction.
| Item Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Uncontrolled Keywords: | content analysis; economic; environment; society; sustainability |
| Index terms: | owner, statistical analysis, design firm, construction industry, investigation, content analysis, annual report, society, sustainable construction, publication, documents |
| Subjects: | professional development, sustainable construction, sociology, communities and social development, industry analysis, business, research dissemination and communication, data collection methods, practitioner, data science, data analysis and analytics |
| Topics: | Information Management, Research Practice, Roles and Professions, Stakeholder Management, Sustainability, Governance |
| Descriptive scope: | 4 PCTA |
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