This original empirical research was conducted to explore the relationship between business strategies and innovation implementation by project-based firms. The relative importance of five types of business strategies was assessed, concerning: (1) employees, (2) marketing, (3) technology, (4)...

Survey results provide a preliminary assessment of the relative contribution of a range of tactical business strategies to innovation performance by firms in the Australian construction industry. Over 1,300 firms were surveyed in 2004, resulting in a response rate of 29%. Respondents were...

This exploratory paper examines the drivers and obstacles to construction innovation. It is based on a large-scale survey of nearly 400 businesses in the Australian construction industry conducted in 2004, and twelve in-depth case studies of innovation on Australian construction projects between...

The use of financial incentives in construction projects has been seen as a way to improve short term motivation, collaboration and reinforce long term commitment between project stakeholders. Yet, very little empirical research has been conducted into how financial incentives should be applied...

Implementation of financial incentive mechanisms in the contractual arrangements of a construction project can impact significantly on the motivation of contractors and hence project performance. Positive incentives (as a component of the project delivery strategy) aim to motivate contractors to...

Motivation is a major driver of project performance. Despite team member ability to deliver successful project outcomes if they are not positively motivated to pursue joint project goals, then performance will be constrained. One approach to improving the motivation of project organizations is...

The use of appropriate financial incentives within construction projects can contribute to strong alignment of project stakeholder motivation with project goals. However, effective incentive system design can be a challenging task and takes skillful planning by client managers in the early...

Client-side project managers face challenges in motivating project organisations to pursue exceptional design and construction performance. One approach to improving the motivation of project organisations is by offering a financial incentive reward for the achievement of voluntary performance...

Since the 1950s, economic theory has highlighted the ‘central importance of technological progress for maintaining long-term, continuous increases in real national income per head’ (Hall 2003, 498). Empirical work since that time has reinforced the importance of innovation to industry growth...

The dominant economic paradigm currently guiding industry policy making in Australia and much of the rest of the world is the neoclassical approach. Although neoclassical theories acknowledge that growth is driven by innovation, such innovation is exogenous to their standard models and hence...