Sustainability in Civil Engineering
December 19, 2020
Economics
December 19, 2020
Introduction
Change is defined by Concise Oxford dictionary as the demonstration or an adjustment or modification, or an occasion of making or creating difference. Change management in construction projects is an important issue due to the disturbance created as a result of clients’ modifications, design changes / revisions, updated material requirements and human resource management issues. Caledonian LLC is also facing numerous challenge in their construction projects due to such in changes in the construction projects. This paper explored some underlying issues of change management in construction projects and provides recommendations to the company.
Projects in Construction
A project is a short-term work scope commenced to form a distinctive merchandise, administration or result (PMI, 2008). A project is generally planned to accomplish a reasonable and characterized objective and it comprises of an intermittent movement with a non-repeating advancement, described by a coherent grouping of occasions (Atkinson 1999). Any project can be defined through its objectives / goals, performance expectations, cost and the allocated timeline, as illustrated in the figure below
Figure 1; Key parameters associated with a construction project (Source: Atkinson, 1999)
The introduction towards giving due contemplations to project members and partners is a key to acquiring accomplishment from the project (Müller & Turner, 2010). Construction based projects can either be named "one-of-a-kind" in terms of manufacturing, or "unreliable" activities (Atkinson 1999). According to CII (1994), there are some basic issues a construction project faces that are totally different from other industrial projects, and which results in the need for the modifications and revisions to the original plans;
- Construction projects includes numerous stakeholders / teams such as the owners, consultants, designers, constructors, architects etc.
- The development supply chains are transitory and are based on a particular project
- Different systems for product delivery are implied, with distinctive styles of project management and costing frameworks being employed. For example, "traditional" (PMA 2008), "management construction" (CII 1994), and "design-build" contracts all employ a different techniques of construction and project developments, risk allocations and project costs
- One of a kind needs to deal with the included lawful contracts and other related records (for instance change orders)
- Various issues arise at the time of executions of the plans and also in the later phases of constructions, which are needed to be addressed in the real time. These unforeseen revisions can cause disputes to the original contracts
Change Management in Construction Projects
As indicated by high probability of occurrence of changes in the construction projects, the effects and results of these changes on associated teams are important to be investigated. To expand and manage these changes, the progressions of construction activities are to be figured out, and revisions are completed to ensure that project deliverables are not compromised (Lazarus& Clifton, 2001; Cao et al 2004). As per Chipulu et al., (2014), project situations are portrayed by levels of multifaceted quality and vulnerability aspects that frame challenges in distinguishing achievement of project or disappointment variables. Further argued by Kandelousi et al., 2011 and Haughey (2010) that achievement and adversity in projects have been ascribed to components, for example kind of administration, project prerequisites, practices of management, or to the wrong administration of ranges of a task. However, these have disregarded the social and human parts of project execution.
Changes and/or alterations in projects are an unavoidable truth at all phases of structure and development, therefore, they are inescapable at many times, and therefore this fact must be considered at the time of drafting the construction contracts and construction procurement management planning. Sun et al. (2004) referred a report of EPSRC, UK, according to which about 33% of customers are disappointed with performance of constructors, as they most often fail to complete the projects within the given time and costs. Also, Neelamkavil et al (2008) derived that the customers' disappointment is likely created by change requests going through the development project. On the other hand, the exertion of overseeing change requests has forced a tremendous weight on practitioners of the construction industry. Furthermore, negative changes in development of projects likewise cause genuine issues and debate for all stakeholders involved on the projects.
According to Motawa et al (2007), construction management issues occurs at two levels: organizational stage and project stage. Development associated tasks are confronted with numerous progressions in which design changes occurs most frequently during the initial stages of the projects. The focus of this paper is to analyze the impact of such changes in project management. In this aspect, Sun et al (2006) added that project changes occurs even if there had been thorough research conducted amid the development of design, mostly due to the proceedings of the development stage. As per Erdogan et al (2005) the fundamental aim for the project management is the emphasis on attempting to adapt to the progressions that happens during the construction activities, at the project stage, and overseeing how to acquaint a change adequately and proficiently. Hence, Other than taking care of changes at project level, development organizations are at times required to execute changes at authoritative level.
How to handle changes in construction projects?
Lazarus and Clifton (2001) suggests that there are two types of impacts created by a change: direct and indirect impacts during the progression of the projects. Direct impacts are more noticeable contrasted with aberrant impacts. Direct impacts can include the need to undertake audit of the work/activities under progress, updating data (such as quantity surveying) and materials analyses, communicating the revisions to other teams, spending extra time and cost actualizing the changes, redesign and plan their work systems, updating activity schedules and conveyances, revision to the contracts, revising the risk analyses and mitigation plans etc.
The indirect impacts comprise of increased probability of management failures and blunders, expanded wastage in the process from unsuccessful work, lack of team efforts, nature of the item and benefit, reduced profitability, vulnerability failing to meet the objectives of the projects due to lack of project management. A large portion of literature review provides guidance, standard operating practices and rules about the way to oversee / avoid such changes. Following are the standards of powerful CM model developed by CII (1994):
Figure 2; the model to manage changes (Source: CII, 1994)
In view of these standards, this model and the calculation are likewise distributed by Ibbs et al (2001). Also, Lazarus& Clifton (2001) reviewed these standards and algorithms, and proposed separate change management (CM) methods for changes amid improvement of design, serious post fixity changes and non-critical post fixity changes.
A more recent research on change management and construction dependency was funded by The EPSRC, which has established a toolkit that empower clients to deliver a rich portrayal of the change occasion. According to EPSRC (2005), the toolkit blends alters the CM and prediction with the idea of information organization and work flow method. In this context, Love et al (2002) examines the researches in the area of CM through a framework elements point of view and proposes that the progress of a project system should be assessed and supervised by the project supervisor / manager as per the accompanying capacities
Figure 3; Project Change Management. Sources: Adapted from Love et al (2002)
Moreover, role of technology in change management s also highly significant. In order to remove the discrepancies of the clients and construction companies, proper adjustments and design enhancements are effective to support management decisions. The study of Faniran, et al 2001 and Lau et al (2003) indicates that Simultaneous designing and Plan and Manufacture methodologies are accepted to be more effective in reducing the total of changes in design or managing with these changes during the stage of development, as long as that the group have a well-structured system for communication and interest in the client needs. In another study of Issac and Navon (2008), a change control tool (CCT) was proposed to improve the tracking of design changes and to increase the link between clients and the design of projects. In this study, Issac and Navon (2008) concluded that if clients’ requirements are tackled at right time than the number of changes can be controlled. Also, to enhance correspondence system and handle changes rapidly, many other methodologies in literature tend towards the practices of leading organizations. However, from the literature reviewed, it was observed that the design process needs more consideration, since a large number of the project changes are due to design changes, and hence, the configuration procedure requires more consideration.
Impact of leadership and Culture
As per Kouzes and Posner (2007), research on Leadership has concentrated seriously on interpersonal capacities, for example, indicating mindful, imparting, understanding, and keeping up great relations with others, which a pivotal factor when managing multiple teams such in construction projects. According to the study by Turner and Lloyd-Walker (2008), these relationship qualities incorporate extensive communications, monitoring, significant dialog, ready to start discussion and to impart and manage misconceptions, which can significantly reduce the impact of changes in projects (Pless and Maak, 2008).
Research performed by Prabhakar (2006) and Prabhakar and Walker (2005) demonstrate that leadership in projects is a unique challenge as opposed to the leadership of operations. The study of Prabhakar and Walker (2005) was based on 28 nations from which 153 projects were undertaken in total. Because of shifted time, the project leader needed to constantly assess their style of leadership and change as per the necessities of the stage a project is in. Switch management is the capacity to change starting with one style then onto the next in activities. A study conducted by Walker and Prabhakar (2006) recognized that driving multicultural groups is a significant test where the decision of project leader and their group is urgent. The study included 111 projects crosswise over 25 countries. Accordingly in selecting the "right" Project Leader, various issues related to project management can be successfully resolved, as passionate, diverse and interpersonal aptitudes to interface viably and mindfully with distinctive capabilities can resolve difficulties in project supervision (Turner and Lloyd-Walker, 2008).
The project can also be impacted by culture directly, for instance, social contrasts can build group heterogeneity because of globalization, on the grounds that every individual brings their philosophies, convictions and states of mind that whether good leader lead to heterogeneous groups performing superior to anything homogeneous ones (Müller, R., &Jugdev, K. (2012). In another study, Miller et al. (2000) suggested that in diverse project the groups are more imaginative and innovative on account of numerous perspectives that incredibly enhance how project is delivered. The most critical result of this information is that social components were neglected as one critical operator that can frame impact on achievement or disappointment in project (Ramos and Mota, 2015). This partially clarifies why correspondence has been considered as a determinant component since correspondence is connected to how an association cooperates and how the culture of organization of an organization is set up.
Role of Conflict Management
As discussed previously, there can be potential contrasts in a project that includes planning, administrative and authoritative techniques, correspondence, setting objective, asset assignment, system of reward, identities, cost, specialized information, legislative issues, leadership style and vicinity of equivocalness (Kezsbom 1992). The work of Blake and Mouton is a significant part from which the research for project management has been conducted. They distinguished five primary refereeing methodologies, in particular critical thinking, and withdrawal, process optimizations, driving, and sharing. Researchers have used this as basis system with unpretentious changes to wordings, for example, the Kilmann (2007) model which depends on five methods of managing conflict for contending, working together, compromising, avoiding, collaborating, and accommodating.
Recommendations to Caledonian LLC
On the basis of above discussion, following strategies are recommended for better project management at Caledonian LLC.
- Although it is difficult to assess and foresee the changes in construction projects, the company must more accurately analyze the requirements of the project. For this purpose, they may consider utilization of computer aided systems such as BIM, which is well known to reduce conflicts arising in construction projects amongst different teams due to accurate processing in methods in almost all activities of the projects. Such systems have proven capability in efficient and effective change management; as these allow for real time updates in designs, data updates, cost analyzes, risk analyses, presentation of 3D models, live updates in the activity completion, auto generated BOQs, quantity surveying etc.
- The company may consider increasing their project prices for project with high risk / potential of future modifications. The risks assumed by the company can be balanced through financial benefits, which will reduce the conflicts
- Utilization of the optimum project management procurement techniques must be more thoughtfully evaluated, while considering the change management issues. For instance, a tailored construction contract with most suited procurement strategy can befit in change management in construction projects undertaken by the Caledonian LLC
- As a result of the diverse change management issues, employing a multi-cultural project group is proposed to address number of sources of conflict to a considerably more prominent degree. In this manner the multi-cultural project leader can enhance the company’s capacity to handle the contentions successfully keeping in mind the end goal to optimize the group's project execution abilities.
- The Company can use Kilmann’s conflict management styles of collaborating and accommodating with their clients rather than going for avoiding or competing in their projects. Also, compromising on the essential requirements and standards will create severe consequence in future; therefore, company has to negotiate with clients on requirements before making any radical change.
- Impact of leadership is very important at all levels of project management in construction sector. Therefore, the company needs to cultivate leadership behaviors and styles in management to tackle difficult situations faced due to the interference of clients. More convincing styles of participative leadership will suit the company in times of difficult changes.
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