scholarly journals An Analytical Study of Critical Factors Affecting Contractor Efficiency in Construction Projects in Indian Scenario

Author(s):  
Shumank Deep ◽  
Laura Simon ◽  
Mohd Asim ◽  
Ali Rahimzadeh ◽  
Sulala Al-Hamdani

Abstract Purpose: Recent studies show that lowest bidder tech­nique is mainly used in developing countries such as India to award a contract. It has been demonstrated that the lowest bid is not always the accurate one and can lead to cost overruns and time extensions amongst other prob­lems. The aim of this study was to investigate the critical factors impacting contractor’s efficiency in Indian con­struction projects. Research approach: A survey was sent to participants of construction projects awarded by the government with the lowest bidder technique in Uttar Pradesh, India. For further research, snowball sampling was used, and struc­tured interviews were conducted amongst experienced managers and engineers of these projects on both client’s and contractor’s side.Findings: It was observed that, to a greater extent, the delays were caused due to contractor’s opportunistic behaviour. The main findings are that new bidding meth­odologies are to be tested as they can lead to the choice of a more accurate and realistic bidder. In addition, subjec­tive evaluation components, such as schedule and work­force, should be reflected in contract award methods in addition to the cost criteria. Further studies should be per­formed on the choice of contract awarding methodology based on the project size and type. Originality value: The researcher’s focus was to analyze the influence of contracting methodologies and factors affecting contractor’s performance in lowest bid award project, where this is an area of least focus amongst researchers in the Indian subcontinent.

Author(s):  
Mohammed Algahtany

Public construction projects in Saudi Arabia have been suffering from low performance for the past decade. Cost overrun is one of the most important issues in project’s performance and is nearly associated with most of public projects. The aim of this study is to identify and assess the major factors leading to cost overruns in education construction projects in the Northern Province of Saudi Arabia to minimize the risks’ effects in future projects. The research methodology started by identifying cost overrun factors through literature review, project’s documentations, and experts’ interviews. Professionals who worked at the construction projects undertook a questionnaire survey to investigate the importance of the cost overrun factors. The top factors of cost overrun were identified through the analysis of the factors’ occurrence and severity. The study main results included the top causes of cost overrun which are delay in contractors’ progress payment by client, difficulties in financing project by contractor, delays in sub-contractor’s work, additions of quantities such as excavation, backfill, and concrete works, and bid award for lowest price. The investigated risks in the study should be evaluated and mitigated in future projects to minimize their effects and enhance the industry performance.


2000 ◽  
Vol 27 (1) ◽  
pp. 73-83 ◽  
Author(s):  
Karla Knight ◽  
Aminah Robinson Fayek

An interview survey of Alberta-based construction contractors was conducted in July and August 1998. The purpose of this survey was to elicit information on the factors that cause unanticipated project cost escalation during construction, from the contractor's perspective. This paper presents the findings of this survey and a proposed method of modeling the factors identified. The majority of factors identified impact labour productivity, which is a major source of cost overruns. A combination of subjective, objective, and secondary indicators are used to measure these factors and to assess their impact on project performance. The main conclusion of this survey is that many of the factors affecting the cost of construction are evaluated in subjective and imprecise terms and are difficult to quantify. This paper presents a method of modeling these factors using fuzzy membership functions, which capture the imprecision and subjectivity associated with the measurement of these factors. It discusses a basis for the definition of these membership functions and a method of calibrating these functions to make them more widely applicable to suit different contexts. These membership functions are being incorporated in a set of expert rules, which reason about the factors affecting costs, their impact on the project, and the appropriate corrective actions. These expert rules are being developed as part of a fuzzy expert system for construction project monitoring and control. A method of calibrating membership functions to suit individual contexts is currently being developed, which would be a significant advancement in the area of fuzzy logic. Key words: construction, costs, expert systems, fuzzy logic, project control, survey.


2020 ◽  
Vol 13 (9) ◽  
pp. 166
Author(s):  
Sireen Mamoun Arabiyat ◽  
Ayman Hasan Al-Momani

The variations in time and quality are vital to the projects' success. Though the cost variation is the most impacting variation, the objective of this study is to recognise the significance of the cost controls in the construction projects in Jordan. Moreover, it aims to determine the factors that lead to reduce these costs. For the methodology, the study used the questionnaire instrument for the data collection. The study sample entailed 154 respondents who hold the responsibility in relevance positions with experiences in contracting and consultants engineering field in Jordan under first and second-grade classification. The study results revealed that there is a significant relationship between cost reduction and all investigated factors, namely, the demographic variables, the pre-execution conditions and specification, and managerial, technical, or financial dimensions. Further, the results showed a significant impact of proper resource planning. In summary, the key factors affecting the project cost during the pre-execution stage involves the appropriate resources planning (i.e., workforce, funds, data). In details, the most critical factors affecting the project cost from managerial dimension are the project manager assignment and integrity of consultant. For the technical dimension, the elements are the skilled workers, the applied methods, the statements and specifications. Lastly, for the fund allocation dimension, the most critical factors that affect the project cost from a financial point of view. Lastly, a set of recommendations are proposed to the project managers to reduce the cost.


2018 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 49-71
Author(s):  
Jonathan Ndaula

This study explored the reasons for persistence of child marriage among Maasai girl-students in Tanzania. Three research questions guided this study, namely: Why does girl students’ marriage among the Maasai community of Tanzania continue to exist? What is the position of education stakeholders in protecting girls from child marriage? What strategies should be taken to address child marriage in the Maasai community? The study employed qualitative research approach where a case study design was used to explore the problem. It adopted interviews, focus group discussion and observations as research methods. Purposive and snowball sampling strategies were employed to get 39 participants who were involved in this study. Data were analysed qualitatively through thematic analysis strategies. The findings revealed that child marriage is still practiced in the Maasai community where the legible age for marriage of Maasai girls range from 6 to 15 years depending on the number of competing men and the economic status of the family of the boy or girl. Society members employ persuasion and pressure, transfer of students, pregnancy and corruption to enable marriage of Maasai girl students. In addition, the findings revealed that Maasai traditions and customs, fear of early pregnancies, corruption and irresponsibility of leaders, poverty and undervaluing of education are the factors contributing to persistence of child marriage among the Maasai girl students. The study recommends that the government in collaboration with other stakeholders should aggressively implement laws protecting children. A close monitoring of local leaders’ actions by top government leaders to help combating child marriage is also recommended. Moreover, joint efforts are needed to educate society members and girl-students on the negative impact of child marriage and the importance of girls’ education.


Author(s):  
Octavio P.M Marques ◽  
I M. Alit K. Salain ◽  
I W. Yansen

Building project as one of the construction services are filled with varying risks during the construction phase of the project implementation. At the stage of the project implementation, risks may arise either the risk of time, cost and those which affect the quality of the project. Therefore, we need to understand the risks at the construction phase and mitigation to the risks to meet in execution of project based on initial planning. The study was conducted to identify the risks in the implementation of construction projects of government buildings by using survey methods that aim to get the opinion of the respondents regarding the risks at implementation of the government building construction projects in the city of Dili - Timor Leste. Further, it was done a risk assessment to determine the major or main risks. Major risk is controlled through mitigation measures and allocation of risks to the parties directly involved in construction projects such as Project Owner, Technical Supervisor, Consultant Design, Consultant Supervision and Contractor. The analysis used in this study is a qualitative analysis. The results showed 64 risks identified in the implementation of construction projects there are 10 government buildings risks (16%) with an unacceptable category, 18 risks (28%) with the undesirable category, 28 risks (44%) with acceptable category and 8 risks (12%) with negligible category. Ownership of major / main risk to the parties directly involved in the implementation of construction projects such as the project owner, technical supervisor, consultant design, consultant supervision and contractors. The project Owner and Technical Supervision (Department of Public Works) is expected to further enhance the ability to manage projects so not throwing responsibility in managing government projects. consultant design and sonsultant supervision to be more careful in design till supervision during the implementation period so as to meet the cost, quality and time planned. Contractors are expected to further improve the performance of the building construction project.


2016 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 82 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gwahula Raphael ◽  
Augustine Wittonde Phillip

The study objective was “An assessment of critical factors affecting quality performance of government financed construction projects in Tanzania”. The study was initiated as much of government financed construction projects are executed with variations on delivering time, cost and quality. The study identified factors if not considered can lead to poor quality performance of projects. Closed end questionnaire consisting of 20 performance factors were issued to 80 respondents dealing with construction related activities, they were required to rank them on a 5 point Likert scale. Data analysis was done using Statistical Package for Social Sciences version 16 (SPSS). The findings revealed that the critical factors that have direct impact on quality performance of government financed construction projects are; project financing processes, experience of contractors in construction industry, project technology, availability of plant and equipment, procurement system and processes as well as the project manager knowledge and skills. A multiple regression model developed showed a positive linear relationship between project quality performance and the critical quality performance factors. All the critical quality performance factors had positive coefficients with an acceptable level of significance. The study recommends further studies on the economic and social factors that hinder women participation in construction relation activities and how training and learning opportunities for continuous improvement will have positive impact on the performance of construction projects.


2019 ◽  
Vol 258 ◽  
pp. 02027
Author(s):  
Hirijanto ◽  
I Wayan Mundra ◽  
Addy Utomo

Project’s cost is one of important components in project achievement. Because of the uniqueness of construction projects, cost estimation always differs from project to project. The rate of cost components always change over time make difficult to forecast the cost for the upcoming project. The cost component consists of many influencing variables where there is interrelationship each other affecting to the total project cost. This paper objective is to develop a cost prediction model to assist the project planners in cost estimation for future projects. System dynamic is one of the appropriate methods to analyse system behaviour with interrelationship referring to the historic data, so it is able to predict the future project. Developing the model, primary and secondary data are collected from previous studies, interview with the government planner and survey in Malang Regency. The model simulation is Brick work unit with its components. Data from last thirteen years are used to verify and validate the developed model by causal loop diagram as a basic method in system dynamic. The finding showed that the model is closed to real condition through the validation mechanism. The developed system is useful in decision making of budget planning based on work quantity.


2018 ◽  
Vol 2 (2) ◽  
pp. 42-50
Author(s):  
Abimbola Windapo ◽  
Alireza Moghayedi ◽  
David Oliphant ◽  
AbdulRauf Adediran

This study examines the components of construction projects and whether there are construction resources that are the key project constituents. The rationale for the study stems from the unexplained assumptions regarding the primary components responsible for increases in construction costs in South Africa, as South Africa lacks a national building cost database. The study adopts a qualitative research approach that employs a case studies of six new and six refurbished projects in obtaining the necessary data for use in answering the study objectives. The study found that the primary cost constituents of construction projects are materials and sub-contracted work, accounting for 63.69% and 74.6% of the value of renovation and new construction work respectively and on the average, the major materials by value are reinforcement, cement and filling, while Electrical Installation is the primary sub-contracting item by value. Based on these findings, the study concludes that the future levels of construction work can be predicted knowing levels of specialist sub-contractor costs and building material costs. The study recommends that the sub-contractor and material inputs into construction projects are carefully managed, both on the projects and the construction industry, to limit construction cost increases and cost overruns on projects. The study contributes to the literature on resource planning and control in construction. Keywords: Cement, Construction Cost, Electrical Installation, Reinforcement, Specialist Sub-contractor.


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