Building Collaborative Trust in Construction Procurement Strategies

Jason Challender, Peter Farrell, Peter McDermott

• Publisher: Wiley-Blackwell
• Year: 2019
• ISBN:
  9781119492290
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Architecture
• Subtopic: Architecture General

Provides a practical framework and toolkit for improved construction project outcomes based on trust and collaboration

This book explores the concept of trust as a tool in improved construction procurement strategies, and provides important insight into the influence of trust on the success of construction projects and redevelopment programs. It is a practical guide that offers readers a solid outline and expert strategies for improving project outcomes through collaboration—ultimately proving that teamwork can really make the dream work.

Building Collaborative Trust in Construction Procurement Strategies: A Practical Guide incorporates a toolkit, complete with flowcharts, to introduce certain trust building interventions within projects. It shows how initiatives and factors that influence collaborative trust can be easily implemented and embedded in construction management for improved practice. It also covers potential challenges, risks, problems, and barriers when it comes to trust. In addition, the book looks at the influences for collaborative trust in the construction industry as well as implications in practice for it in construction. It finishes by looking at the future of collaborative trust in construction procurement.

• Teaches the importance and influence of trust on collaborative working and partnerships principles
• Examines to what extent trust within collaborative working arrangements influences the success of collaborative working practices
• Covers the effect that certain factors and trust building mechanisms have on collaborative working and partnerships and how they can be embedded into procurement of projects
• Discusses what constitutes best practice and how trust in collaborative procurement practices influences the success of construction projects

Building Collaborative Trust in Construction Procurement Strategies: A Practical Guide is an excellent book for construction management professionals, including clients, consultants, and contractors. It will also serve as a helpful text for undergraduate and postgraduate students and academics.

1
Introduction

Sir Michael Latham was told ‘there is no trust in this industry anymore’.

Latham (1993)

Latham in titling his interim report to government ‘Trust and Money’ (Latham 1993) was signalling the importance he attached to the lack of trust in the UK construction industry. In Constructing the Team (Latham 1994), he described trust as being the gatekeeper to any real progress in improving contractual relations in the United Kingdom. Other commentators, such as Cox and Townsend (1997) were of the view that cultural change would not be easy:

… it is unlikely that trust (based on dependency) will be volunteered in such a deep‐rooted traditionally adversarial culture as that of the construction industry.

(Cox and Townsend 1997)

The progress since these observations by Latham is the focus for this book. The intent is to describe the state of development and to attempt to change current working practices and improve project outcomes in the construction sector. The meaning of trust has been re‐enacted on many construction projects over the years according to professional practitioners, and therein typifies the need to consider measures to improving practice through trust generation. In this regard, the book explores the extent to which trust is a viable tool in collaboratively procuring successful construction projects. In addition, it will provide an important insight into the influence of trust on the success of construction strategies and redevelopment programmes. Trust will be considered in this context from an inter‐organisational rather than individual perspective. The terms ‘collaborative working’ and ‘partnering’ will be used interchangeably through the book, and both are intended to promote mutual benefits of cooperation, team working, and problem‐solving (Larson 1997, p. 190; Wong and Cheung 2004). Their definitions and meaning are more fully explained in Chapter 3. Furthermore, the book investigates current partnering arrangements that exist within the global construction industry, to create a comprehensive understanding of problems of trust which are hindering its overall effectiveness. The book also reviews the overall commitment of organisations to partnering philosophies. The main focus of the book is, however, intended to provide a suitable context for paradigm shifts in practice with measures to increase collaborative trust and act as a catalyst for increasing the success of construction procurement strategies. Calls for changes in working practices have been predicated by perceptions that partnering, within the construction industry, is not being fully committed to through lack of trust. The book identifies those factors and constructs that influence trust in partnering in an effort to create a framework for potential improvements in practice through strategies specifically linked to motivational, organisational, ethical, and economical trust‐building initiatives.

The book provides the framework of a ‘partnering toolkit’ for improved project outcomes. From this perspective, it is intended as a practical guide to raise awareness of best practice and instil more trust in construction contracting. The lack of trust in the construction industry has been documented by authoritative sources over many years. The book will seek to address this ongoing dilemma and recommend improvements to collaborative procurement processes and encourage more successful team integration and collaborative ways of working. This is a deliberate attempt to improve construction practices, which have arguably not been delivering the impact, and benefits that were intended in terms of successful collaborative project outcomes. Various government reports have reinforced this dilemma over the years. Early work in this respect included the Simon Report, Emmerson Report, Banwell Report, and Potts Report (Simon 1944; Emmerson 1962; Banwell 1964). These were followed by Constructing the Team, Latham (1994), Rethinking Construction, Egan (1998), and Accelerating Change, Egan (2002). All the aforementioned reports highlighted the deficiencies with construction‐related business approaches in terms of low performance, failure to meet client satisfaction levels, and need for efficiency measures. Another recent example includes Construction 2025, Industry Strategy: Government and Industry in Partnership (HM Government 2013) which identifies that fractious qualities are embedded in the UK construction industry. The report stresses that collaboration and trust across the entire supply chain are crucial to deliver successful projects. More recently, this dilemma has been reiterated and become a major feature of Modernise or Die: The Farmer Review of the UK Construction Labour Market (Farmer 2016). Furthermore, findings from the Low Carbon Construction Final Report (HM Government 2010) confirm the growing need for increased collaboration and integration across the industry, especially between supply chains and clients, in order to make greater contributions to the pursuit of efficiencies.

The mentioned emphasis on the need for improvements in collaboration and integration are especially crucial given the low achievement of UK construction projects, when compared with other sectors. The UK Industry Performance Report, (Construction Excellence 2016) based upon a survey of projects, analyses a number of construction key performance indicators (KPIs). The survey shows that when considering both design and construction phases, ‘just’ 65% of projects meet budget requirements and 66% meet time predictability targets. Whilst these figures are reported positively by NBS (2018) to be improvements on previous years' performance levels, clients may wish to read them in terms of projects that do not complete successfully; 35% over‐budget and 34% late. In terms of satisfaction levels, Construction Excellence (2016) also reports on the percentage of projects or responses that achieve a rating of 8 out of 10 or better. Clients rated their ‘overall satisfaction with the finished product’ as 90%; ‘service received from contractors’ 81%; ‘value for money’ 80%; and ‘condition of the facility in respect to defects’ 78%. In terms of ‘contractor satisfaction with the performance of clients and consultancy teams’, 77% rated performance as 8 out of 10 or better. Whilst this 2016 report suggests there are improvements on previous years, questions need to be asked. Why only 8 out of 10 and not 10 out of 10? If clients rate ‘condition of the facility in respect to defects’ as 78% in 8 out of 10 cases, what about the other 22%? Imagine taking a new car from a showroom, and 22% of customers' rate defects on their cars at less than 8 out of 10 – perhaps 4 or 5? Even with these improved figures, the margins for improvement in construction seem substantive.

In light of the aforementioned satisfaction levels, the book is intended to assist academics, construction‐related practitioners and clients in their awareness, understanding, and breadth of knowledge of the issues around building trust between contracting parties on projects. This objective has the overarching aim of delivering projects that are more successful. This is felt to be particularly important as in previous studies into collaborative working, very little attention has been focused on trust‐building processes. In addition, scant attention has been paid to the role and development of trust in the practice of construction procurement (Thorgren et al. 2011). There is also a need to address calls for greater insight into how trust is created, mobilised, and developed (Huemer 2004) and for more understanding of the effects and impact of other factors interacting with trust (Huang and Wilkinson 2013). The book has sought to address gaps in the literature gaps through examination of trust‐building constructs and mechanisms, and the influence of these on generating trust in construction relationships. For this reason, early chapters are focused on theory and literature from academic sources. Case studies and practical examples have, however, been included to assist readers on how theoretical perspectives can be applied to real‐life construction projects and scenarios. The book has also addressed academic calls for greater insight into how trust is created, mobilised, and developed and for more understanding of the effects and impact of other factors interacting with trust. There is frequent reference to construction practitioners' views and opinions throughout, and these have been sought through research carried out in 2015 from a small sample of semi‐structured interviews. Participants in these interviews included clients, design consultants, main contractors, and subcontractors. The sample size for participants is not intended to represent fully the population at large, owing to constraints on the study, but it was designed to attract more widespread insights than if only one or two specific participant groups had been targeted.

There have been few books which have been written on the specific subject of incentivising trust in construction specifically through interventions. T...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Table of Contents
• Author Biographies
• Foreword by Mark Farmer
• Foreword by Emeritus Professor Peter Brandon
• Preface
• Acknowledgements
• List of Figures
• List of Tables
• 1 Introduction
• 2 Context of the Lack of Trust in the Construction Industry
• 3 The Theory of Trust: Concept, Components, and Characteristics
• 4 The Challenge of Trust Initiation and Formation
• 5 Introduction and Background to Collaborative Working and Partnering
• 6 The Importance, Reliance, and Influence of Trust in Construction Partnering
• 7 Potential Problems, Barriers, and Risks for Trust in Collaborative Working
• 8 Factors Which Influence the Development of Trust in Construction
• 9 Developing a Framework of Trust‐Building Mechanisms for the Partnering Toolkit
• 10 A Partnering Toolkit Based on Integrated Trust‐Building Mechanisms
• 11 Implications in Practice for Collaborative Trust in Construction
• 12 Reflections and Closing Remarks
• Appendix A: Glossary of Terms
• Appendix B: List of Abbreviations
• Appendix C: Collaboration Champion/Facilitator Services
• Appendix D: Partnering Charter (Details of project removed for confidentiality)
• Index
• End User License Agreement