Purpose – The competitive dialogue (CD) aims to align complex demands of principals with possible solutions that contractors have to offer. It is, however, unclear how formal and informal structures and processes in the CD are interrelated. The purpose of this paper is to provide insights in...

Purpose – The purpose of this study is to provide insights in how formal bargaining and informal sense making interact and solve problems of understanding between principal and contractor during procurement through the competitive dialogue (CD) of a complex construction project....