The Use of Collaborative Technologies within SMEs in Construction

Abstract

Collaborative environments have been evolving and effectively employed in large organisations and are believed to have high potential for Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs). This chapter shares the findings of a case study that was conducted on twelve companies in order to assess the use of collaborative environments and their adaptation approaches through interviews with senior level managers and end-users. The need for such case studies has risen from an intensive literature review which revealed that SMEs are key players within the construction industry; however, there seems to be little evidence of their utilisation of IT for collaborative learning environments. Therefore, this calls for the necessity to developing an approach blending the right combination of factors which are believed to contribute towards the improvement and implementation of collaborative environments and may affect their success.