Aspects of Learning and Knowledge in Construction Projects

Abstract

The construction industry is viewed globally as a project-based industry, as project personnel move from project to project upon completion. Society is also becoming knowledge-based, so that knowledge can provide firms with competitive advantage in this age of dwindling resources. As a result, two important issues arise that require our careful attention, i.e. the knowledge and learning aspects in construction projects. These issues influence the working of companies’ employees as well as the quality of service provided to clients. CEOs from 200 top international design firms and 225 top international contractors were selected for this study in June 2004 with a 15.5% response rate. The study emphasizes that project-based organizations face many difficulties in ensuring adequate learning and knowledge sharing within and across projects, as projects themselves do not share experiences with other projects routinely and naturally. Both personalization and codification knowledge-sharing mechanisms should be properly deployed to projects in order to prevent employees from reinventing the wheel and leveraging on companies’ knowledge stocks.