TY - CONF

T1 - Cooperation in construction

T2 - Annual Research Conference of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors, COBRA 2006

AU - Anvuur, A.

AU - Kumaraswamy, M.

PY - 2006/9/7

Y1 - 2006/9/7

N2 - Over the last decade numerous research and industry reports have highlighted the importance of cooperation to construction project success. Cooperation is routinely cited for good performance and its absence blamed for poor performance of construction projects. Yet most of these studies have not directly measured cooperation and where this has been attempted, the measures used have lacked a unifying theoretical framework. Instead, researchers have relied on project performance measures (e.g. time, cost and quality) as indicators of the level of cooperation, if any, which existed. Important as they are, these project performance measures provide information about the past and any lessons learned can only influence the next project. These measures also confound the effects of a number of other input factors (e.g. procurement methods, project contextual conditions). As such, they do not provide realtime and accurate information to aid project managers in making proactive decisions to influence the outcomes of their projects. A definition of, a theoretical framework for, and the defining aspects of cooperation are set out in this paper. Since cooperation at any level must ultimately be reduced to cooperation between individuals (e.g. managers from different organisations), a micro-level perspective is required in a thorough study of the antecedents of cooperation. Such understanding is necessary to improve both the predictability and quality of construction project performance.

AB - Over the last decade numerous research and industry reports have highlighted the importance of cooperation to construction project success. Cooperation is routinely cited for good performance and its absence blamed for poor performance of construction projects. Yet most of these studies have not directly measured cooperation and where this has been attempted, the measures used have lacked a unifying theoretical framework. Instead, researchers have relied on project performance measures (e.g. time, cost and quality) as indicators of the level of cooperation, if any, which existed. Important as they are, these project performance measures provide information about the past and any lessons learned can only influence the next project. These measures also confound the effects of a number of other input factors (e.g. procurement methods, project contextual conditions). As such, they do not provide realtime and accurate information to aid project managers in making proactive decisions to influence the outcomes of their projects. A definition of, a theoretical framework for, and the defining aspects of cooperation are set out in this paper. Since cooperation at any level must ultimately be reduced to cooperation between individuals (e.g. managers from different organisations), a micro-level perspective is required in a thorough study of the antecedents of cooperation. Such understanding is necessary to improve both the predictability and quality of construction project performance.

KW - Cooperation

KW - Measurement

KW - Motivation

KW - Organisation

KW - Project management

M3 - Conference paper

AN - SCOPUS:84859063276

Y2 - 7 September 2006 through 8 September 2006

ER -