Drivers of Professional Service Model Innovation in the Chinese Construction Industry

Qinying Fang,Liwen Chen,Lin Zhang,Dalin Zeng

doi:10.3390/su11040941

Qinying Fang, Liwen Chen + Show 2 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.3390/su11040941

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Abstract

Professional service in China is facing challenges due to the rapidly changing built environment. The environment forces the construction industry to reconsider professional service model for thriving, while the life cycle professional service model has significant implications for value addition in professional system. However, literature that provides quantifiable information for practitioners and researchers to better understand drivers of professional service model innovation (PSMI) is scarce. Based on innovation diffusion literature and institutional theory, this study examines how PSMI is influenced by institutional pressures (including coercive, mimetic, and normative pressures) in the construction industry. The researchers conducted an industry-wide survey in China using structural equation modeling to analyze the acquired data. Data analyzing demonstrates that both coercive and mimetic pressures prominently influence the life cycle of PSMI. However, this study reveals that normative pressure does not significantly influence PSMI. Results indicate that the owner’s cognition plays an important mediating role between institutional pressures and PSMI. The findings contribute to understanding how different types of institutional pressures can be better steered to facilitate PSMI in the construction industry and furthering knowledge on PSMI mechanisms for new professionalism cultivation in the industry to realize sustainable development of professional system.

Highlights

With the rapid changes of built environment, professional development has been attracting increasing attention in recent decades
Professional service as a part of the construction industry is facing challenges with regard to how its business model can be changed to adapt to the changing environment, as EDGE (Edge was established in 1995–1996 in England as the result of an initiative by Jack Zunz, former Chair of the Ove Arup Foundation, with the purpose of improving connections among professional institutions working in the construction industry) reported:Few in the industry believe that it is organized in a way that works well for clients and the full depth of the supply chain
These outputs validate the fitness of measurement of professional service model innovation (PSMI) by the six listed items to reflect the process integration (PI) and organizational integration (OI) constructs

Summary

Introduction

With the rapid changes of built environment, professional development has been attracting increasing attention in recent decades. There is little or no integration between design, product manufacture, construction, operation and asset management; no feedback loop that increases the chances of a completed asset performing as it should, and of future projects learning from the past; and no alignment of interests both within the supply chain and between the supply chain and the client. This fragmentation of interests destroys value [4] This fragmentation of interests destroys value [4] (p. 8)

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