• Journal of Construction Engineering and Project Management
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• v.10 no.1
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• pp.16-32
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• 2020

Cost and time control of projects is important in preventing project failure. However, achieving effective cost and time control in practice is often challenging. The challenges of project cost and time control in practice are investigated by carrying out a questionnaire survey on the top 150 construction contractors in the UK followed by in-depth semi-structured interviews of practitioners from 15 construction companies in the country. Quantitative analysis reveals that design change is the most important factor inhibiting the ability of UK contractors from effectively controlling both the cost and time of construction projects. Four of the top five factors inhibiting effective cost control are also the top factors inhibiting effective time control albeit in a different order. These top factors-design changes, inaccurate evaluation of project time/duration, risk and uncertainty, non-performance of subcontractors and nominated suppliers were also found to be endogenous factors to the project. Additionally, qualitative analysis of the interviews reveals 16 key challenges to prevent for effective project cost and time control in practice. These are classified into four categorised based on where they stem from as follows; from the organisation (1. Lack of integration of cost and time during project control, 2. lack of management buy-in, 3. complicated project control systems and processes, 4. lack of a project control training regime); from the construction management/project management approach (5. Lapses in integration of interfaces, 6. project control not being implemented from the early stages of a project, 7. inefficient utilisation and control of labour, 8. limited time devoted to planning how a project will be controlled at the outset); from the client; (9. Excessive authorisation gates, 10. use of adversarial and non-collaborative forms of contracts, 11. communication problems within client set-up, 12. obstructive client representatives) and; from the project team (13. Lack of detailed/complete design, 14. lack of trust among the project partners, 15. limited time devoted to project control on site, 16. non-factual reporting). The study posits that knowledge of these project control inhibiting factors and challenges is the first step at ensuring they are avoided and enable the implementation of a more effective project cost and time control process in practice.

• International conference on construction engineering and project management
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• 2009.05a
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• pp.173-183
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• 2009

Knowledge management (KM) is one of the useful management tools in today's project management (PM) practice, such as construction projects. Nobody can deny the importance of "useful knowledge" always helps organizations and project managers shaping a decision. Due to the trend of globalization, it is now very common that an organization may comprise employees from different countries of distinct national-cultures working together. It is also not uncommon that different projects, within an organization, may have their own organizational-cultures which influence its knowledge repository, transfer process and knowledge strategy. Therefore, it is extremely difficult to align all these cultures and consolidate them to benefit the KM process and PM practice. Organizations and project managers understand that different national-cultural and organizational-cultural factors will create impact on the philosophy of KM process which will subsequently affect PM practice. Those factors may affect interpersonal relations and exchange of knowledge between projects and amongst staff. Systematic KM process can utilize the goodness of different employees from distinct cultures which can eventually drive the organization and projects to success. The purpose of this paper, based upon a case study of a Hong Kong construction company, is to discuss how those cultural factors are linked to KM and what organization and project managers can do to improve the KM process and PM practice.

• Proceedings of the Safety Management and Science Conference
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• 2005.05a
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• pp.137-146
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• 2005

This paper describes web-based construction project management and project document information flows within the construction industry. This study is to consider the practice for process improvement including reengineering and the engineering project practice. CCPM based on TOC is introduced.

• Journal of Construction Engineering and Project Management
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• v.9 no.3
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• pp.1-21
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• 2019

The management of mega construction projects which incorporate a large number of stakeholders, technologies, data, work culture etc., is cumbersome. The experts in the construction arena advocate that interface management serves as a precise tool in resolving these conflict points due to the intricate nature of the construction projects. Interface management is a current trending management practice in the construction industry which is also a beneficiary to mega/fast track projects in enhancing the project performance. The main objective of this study is to validate a model for assessing the relationships among interface management, IT applications, project performance & project benefits. The mediating effect of interface management in relationship between project performance & interfacial factors was also investigated. The research model was validated using PLS-SEM (Partial Least Square-Structural Equation Modelling) approach. Data were collected from clients, contractors, consultants in large scale projects through questionnaire survey and smart-PLS software was used to analyse the conceptual model. The research model comprises eleven hypothesis and the significance of these hypothesis were tested using T- statistics values. The research implies that people/participants factor is greatly influenced by interface management with the path coefficient of 0.608 and also enhancement of project's schedule performance due to the interface management is strongly appealing (Path coefficient = 0.711). The results also reveal IT application is significantly associated with interface management practice (Path coefficient =0.723) and also the effect of IT application on project performance (schedule, cost, quality & safety) is successfully mediated through interface management practice. The practical application of this validated model was done through case study. The case study aims at measuring the impact of interface management on interfacial factors and role of interface management in improving the project performance in the construction organisations.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute of Building Construction Conference
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• 2010.05a
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• pp.207-211
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• 2010

As mega-sized and complex building construction projects are increased, the importance of project scheduling and control is emphasized. Project scheduling and control technic is not used widely yet in Korea, but interests in it is progressively increased. By now, most research projects mainly have focused on scheduling issues. Project progress management is also as much important as project scheduling issues. Current state about project progress management in Korea is analysed and way for improvements are suggested in this paper. At first, research projects undergone and practice are analysed and fields experts are survey about current state about project progress management. This study suggests the progress management method for quantitative and qualitative project progress analysis.

• Architectural research
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• v.7 no.2
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• pp.69-79
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• 2005

There are no formal decision tools or guidelines to assist owners and contractors in choosing delivery systems and project strategies that would allow for a radical reduction in project cycle time - from the preplanning phase through project start up. Therefore, it is important to identify the state-of-practice and the state-of-art on methods of achieving radical reduction defined as a reduction of 25% or more in overall project cycle time. A comprehensive literature review, three questionnaire surveys, and the seven case studies were conducted and the data obtained from them were analyzed to establish the state-of-practice and state-of-art for project cycle time reduction techniques.

• Journal of Agricultural Extension & Community Development
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• v.8 no.2
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• pp.245-261
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• 2001

The consulting industry had enjoyed growth rates over the past 20 years which show no signs of slowing in their momentum. Since 1995, it began to discuss institutionalization of consulting in the agricultural sector in Korea. Rural Development Adminstration has launched farm management consulting project by means of benchmarking for farming innovation in 1988, which consists of establishing consulting team, developing standard diagnosis form of sixty crops and materials, training consultants, having various public relations, and making information systems. Until October, 2001, sixty seven thousands of farmers have benefited on this project. It is now appreciated as a alternative for new agricultural extension approach. Analyzing the changes of farm management practice level through consulting shows improvement, which data have been stored in web database. It is expected that farm management consulting project be main stream of agricultural extension in this country.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute Of Construction Engineering and Management
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• 2004.11a
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• pp.216-219
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• 2004

Construction clients are the key player in that they initiate construction projects and are in a position to influence the efficiency and productivity of the projects. Construction projects by nature require team-working so clients's leadership is the crux of project success. The objective of this paper is to suggest characteristics of construction clients' leadership in terms of best practice based on the analysis of project success cases. Four key elements of construction clients' leadership are identified and best practice from the case studies were related to the elements.

• International conference on construction engineering and project management
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• 2015.10a
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• pp.241-244
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• 2015

Within the building industry, building information modelling has been widely applied among different organizations, disciplines and project phases. In order to achieve coordination and synergy collaborative effort, it demands organized information flow and communication for effective implementation of project management through the construction process. Although many BIM researches provides solutions for project management, few efforts have involved the whole life-cycle process of project. In this article, BIM-based project management relying on a series of applications of BIM technology was introduced by coupling management requirement of a project with BIM. Through adopting BIM to the life-cycle management of the project and incorporating BIM applications to project management practice, we have developed a BIM-based project management approach that specialize in integrated BIM chain and interface-supporting system. At the end, the developing process of BIM-based project management approach is concluded.

• International conference on construction engineering and project management
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• 2007.03a
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• pp.169-178
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• 2007

This paper has investigated the cultural practices influencing business performance and integrity in selected Malaysian contractors and has discussed culture related issues to improve the management of cultural capitals in the Malaysian construction industry. Issues of current enterprise culture and applicable cultural practices, leadership styles, enterprise axiology and integrity, cultural practices and loyalty, and identification of organizational culture are discussed during the semi-structured interviews and questionnaire survey. Conclusions has been drawn that the people oriented and task oriented management style have a similar quantity of supporters in Malaysian contractors. The integrity and profit are respectively identified as the enterprise axiology in the ethical and economic perspective. The monkey culture is considered as the most applicable type for the cultural practice and the current enterprise cultures applied in the Malaysian contractors are mostly positive to both the organizations and society.