• International conference on construction engineering and project management
• /
• 2009.05a
• /
• pp.1414-1418
• /
• 2009

International construction projects typically manifest difficult, complex, and varied types of risk exposures; because of this, there is a need for accurate evaluation of risk-integrated performances during the timeframe of project execution. Given the financial crisis currently affecting the world economy recession, risk management has become a more crucial part for the success of international project management. However, the majority of risk management approaches, particularly for overseas projects, are focused primarily on simple forms of checklists, formalization of risk variables affecting project performance for a specific phase, or more complicated computational methods that restricting practical utilization in real-world projects; moreover, these methods lack the conceptual basis to broadly visualize the level of risk over all phases of a project. This study suggests an efficient, yet simple risk-integrated total index to successfully assess the risk levels of overseas construction projects. To this end, this paper first investigates the life cycles and key processes of decision-making for a given project and then derives formulas to represent the total risk index (TRI) along the key decision-making processes. In addition, the study examines the relationships between TRI and performance levels based on the analysis of 126 real-world project samples. Validations using the proposed TRI showed a high correlation to project performance, signifying the usefulness of the proposed approach for construction firms when investigating the level of risks and key areas for management focus.

• Journal of the Korea Institute of Construction Safety
• /
• v.4 no.1
• /
• pp.1-8
• /
• 2021

COVID-19, which is currently in vogue, is a pandemic with the largest number of deaths since the establishment of the "World Health Organization". It is also expected to have a significant impact on countless construction projects. After COVID-19 hit the construction industry, the risk that they needed to cover, decreased every year. However, the prolonged COVID-19 increased the risks of air delays, material supply, and economic losses. The exact measurements will be needed to be identified and the risks of the current construction projects must have a mitigated risk with a greater proportion. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to analyze and identify the risks that have influenced construction projects to the domestic construction companies due to COVID-19. Based on the risks of the previous construction projects, risk case studies, and risks related to COVID-19, are extracted through surveys, weights. Each risk factor are calculated based on the AHP analysis technique. Thus, it is expected that the results of the risk research on construction projects will change due to COVID-19. It will be presented to cope with the current situation and later pandemic situations.

• Journal of Construction Engineering and Project Management
• /
• v.5 no.3
• /
• pp.1-9
• /
• 2015

Project cost is an important concern in any construction project. Although there has been a lot of studies on factors affecting the cost of construction projects, there seems no consensus as what cost factors have direct influence on the cost of civil engineering projects. This study therefore aims to bridge the current knowledge gap by examining quantity surveyors' perception of the factor structure among nineteen costing attributes identified based on literature review. Questionnaire was used to elicit responses from quantity surveyors working in the Hong Kong construction industry. Principal component analysis is conducted to extract the factor structure of the cost attributes and the attributes are grouped into three factor components, namely the contract management factor, the project management factor and the monetary value factor. Understanding these cost impact factors could be crucial in managing civil engineering projects, since it allows the project stakeholders and quantity surveyors to take precautionary steps to identify the cost management problems and areas for improvement and could even help to avoid cost deviations in engineering projects.

• International conference on construction engineering and project management
• /
• 2011.02a
• /
• pp.364-367
• /
• 2011

The levels of unemployment and poverty are extremely high and two of South Africa's most pressing problems. There is also a widely acknowledged need for housing and municipal infrastructure (water supply, sewerage, streets, storm water drainage, and electricity, refuse collection). From a theoretical perspective supported by experience elsewhere in Africa, there are reasons for considering that properly formulated employment creation programmes based on the use of labour-intensive methods could be established to construct and maintain the required physical infrastructure, thus creating employment, skills and institutional capacities. Over the past 30 years several projects have been initiated in South Africa to counter unemployment and poverty. Given the socio-economic conditions and political objectives (regarding development, employment creation and alleviation of poverty), it is anticipated that future large-scale construction projects will be proposed by the public sector (National, Provincial and Local Government). The paper will first examine the main tenets of the implementation of development projects through the use of labour-intensive construction and a description of progress elsewhere in Africa and their potential contribution which public works programmes could make to alleviate the poverty and unemployment problems. The research will then analyse the successes and challenges that have been experienced in South Africa in relation to the implementation of development projects over the past 30 years. The paper closes with recommendations and lessons for the future.

• Proceedings of the Korean Institute Of Construction Engineering and Management
• /
• 2007.11a
• /
• pp.3-8
• /
• 2007

"The world is flat" as the popular author Thomas L. Friedman declares in his best belling book about the progress of business globalization in the $21^{st}$ century [3]. Construction projects and related businesses have been global since the 1800's, but it has never seen such rapid transformation in both scope and depth as in the past decade. Construction projects today often bring together international design talents, construction management firms, local and international labor forces, and global suppliers. On a visit to Dubai in the United Arab Emirates on the Persian Gulf, a person will experience the complexity of globalization of modern construction projects- with Arab owners, European engineering and design companies, American construction management teams, Korean general contractors, Jordanian subcontractors, and labor forces from Thailand, Indonesia, Turkey, and Sri Lanka. A count of material suppliers reveals over 60 countries involved, covering all continents. Indeed construction projects are getting more and more complex and competitive, as is the project execution. The trend toward globalization poses both challenges and opportunities to construction and engineering companies competing on a global scale. While global competition may be a threat to many companies, there are, however, many opportunities for synergistic collaborations that can create win-win scenarios for construction business, research, and education. This paper presents some of the opportunities between the U.S. and Asia in business integration, research collaboration on technologies, and educational development, which may mutually benefit countries on either side of the Pacific.

• Journal of Construction Engineering and Project Management
• /
• v.5 no.2
• /
• pp.1-10
• /
• 2015

There is a high confidence based on scientific evidence that climate is changing over time. Now climate change is considered as one of the challenges facing the construction industry. As no project is risk free and climate change has a strong impact on the different phases of the construction project lifecycle. This research aimed at providing a platform of knowledge for the construction management practitioners about the impacts of climate change on the construction projects lifecycle, identify the most dangerous climate change factors on the construction project lifecycle, and identify the most affected phase by climate change factors through the construction projects lifecycle. The study depended on the opinions of civil engineers who have worked in the construction projects field among the reality of Gaza Strip. Questionnaire tool was adopted as the main research methodology in order to achieve the desired objectives. The questionnaire included 127 factors in order to obtain responses from 88 construction practitioners out of 98 representing 89.79% response rate about the influence of climate change on the generic lifecycle of construction projects. The results deduced that the most significant influence on the construction project lifecycle was related to the extreme weather events, rainfall change, and temperature change respectively. There was a general agreement between the respondents that the most affected phase by temperature, rainfall, and extreme weather events is the execution phase. The results also asserted with a high responses scale on the need to alternative procedures and clear strategies in order to face the climate change within construction industry.

• Journal of the Korean Professional Engineers Association
• /
• v.42 no.5
• /
• pp.23-28
• /
• 2009

BIM technology has been introduced in various fields of the construction industry recently. The owners of the public construction projects are already interested in BIM technology and they started to apply BIM technology in their projects. This paper introduces the successful BIM cases of overseas and domestics projects and shows how to introduce and apply BIM technology in the architectural design firms and construction companies and how to train their engineers with BIM technology.

• International conference on construction engineering and project management
• /
• 2009.05a
• /
• pp.212-217
• /
• 2009

Strategic alliance is a proactive management process that integrates and optimizes value-added services of each party to best achieve business objectives of all parties within the relationship. Under the current competitive global environment, strategic alliance can produce a "Win-Win" situation and thus change paradigm that has resided in the construction industry. While many studies revealed the significance of alliance relationship in the industry, its impact on project performance has rarely been analyzed. Using the data obtained from 661 construction projects in the Construction Industry Institute database (359 projects from 38 owners and 302 projects from 29 contractors), this study first diagnoses the implementation status of strategic alliance at both project and company levels. Then, its impact on project performance is quantified and discussed. The descriptive analysis performed in this study revealed that an average of 79% of owner companies and 69% of contractor companies have ever implemented strategic alliance into at least one of their projects. However, both owner and contractor companies did not always use the strategy for all or their projects. Only 33% and 30% of projects reported by owners and contractors have been completed under alliance relationship, respectively. Analyzing the alliance impact on project performance, this study also establishes that strategic alliance positively affects project performance of both owners and contractors while owners should consider and control the level of its use for their projects. Recognizing and understanding the benefits from strategic alliance will be a starting point to produce mutual success among project participants, ultimately allowing the construction industry to go forward to a sustainable industry that transfers success from one project to the other.

• Journal of the Korea Institute of Building Construction
• /
• v.8 no.4
• /
• pp.61-69
• /
• 2008

The size of the construction projects become huge and complex, and the depth of excavation for the underground structures become deeper. Also the working area is not enough for loading materials and temporary facilities. This is the most case of recent construction projects in downtown area. Top-down is the most useful method for this kind of construction projects. Top-down construction method consists of supporting method, retaining wall type, foundation type and construction direction such as up-down or up-up. construction managers have to select sub-elements for top-down construction method in planning phase. This study is to suggest the sub-elements selection model for the top-down construction method, and the case study is conducted for evaluating this model.

• International conference on construction engineering and project management
• /
• 2009.05a
• /
• pp.949-955
• /
• 2009

Managing knowledge effectively is a critical factor for the competitive power of a company. There are efforts to use knowledge as an important resource in many industrial areas and likewise the interest in knowledge management is growing in the construction industry. Nevertheless, there are limitations in the current capture and reuse of knowledge in the construction industry owing to the unique characteristics of the knowledge created during the processes of projects. The knowledge produced during the processes of construction projects is project-oriented, experiential and context specific and due to these characteristics the reuse of knowledge is difficult. In this research, we focus on capturing and identifying the characteristics of construction knowledge and propose a method to apply these characteristics in developing an ontology based construction knowledge retrieval system to improve construction knowledge retrieval and enhance knowledge reuse.