Surveys of the top 400 US contractors were conducted in 1979, 1983 and 1993 to identify the areas with potential for productivity improvement in the construction industry. The trends in the findings of these surveys are observed and interpreted. The results indicate that cost control,...

Age-dependent failure in the construction industry is explored over two 11-year periods (1973-1983 and 1984-1994) by analysing the age distribution of failed construction companies in each year and computing age-specific failure probabilities over a 10 year period (1985-1994). The conflicting...

Scholars usually agree that small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) active in construction are not very innovative when compared with large-size construction enterprises. This is particularly evident in the case of adoption and diffusion of innovation associated with information and...

ISO 9000 is one of the most important administrative innovations of the last two decades. The Turkish precast concrete industry is an interesting example of the diffusion of this important administrative innovation. Innovation diffusion theory proposes that the diffusion of an innovation is...

This note describes a model that measures the quality of the project service of a D/B firm using quality function deployment (QFD). This model is an add-on to a model developed previously by the authors to measure the corporate service quality performance of D/B firms. The project service...

The design-build (D/B) project delivery system has gained increased market share in the last few years. It is superior to traditional systems in some respects but some claim that it does not lend itself to effective quality assurance and control. D/B construction owners who are in the process of...

The line of balance (LOB) method is not widely used in the construction industry even though it has distinct advantages in repetitive construction projects. Attempts were made in the past to develop LOB systems but no system has met with universal acceptance because of a multitude of problems....

This paper presents several issues related to pricing in construction. First, problems with current pricing strategy in construction are explored. Second, pricing strategies based on a market-based approach are proposed. Third, survey findings of the top 400 US contractors are presented...

Many contractors prefer on-site fabrication of rebar while others find that off-site fabrication is more advantageous. The economics of on-site and off-site fabrication of rebar need to be compared on the basis of several factors that include the project environment, wages, labour...