Journal of Financial Management of Property and Construction, 2018
Purpose The intra-organisational relationships of through-life support services providers are com... more Purpose The intra-organisational relationships of through-life support services providers are complex, especially given the multifaceted nature of the provision required. For example, capabilities within the UK highways maintenance arena must support engineering design, routine maintenance and the on-going management of the network. While collaboration in construction projects has formed a major research focus in recent years, there is a paucity of work examining collaboration in-flight. Design/methodology/approach Through a micro-practices approach, two contracts delivering highway infrastructure maintenance and renewal services are examined to explore the intra-organisational relationships that determine the quality of service delivered. Findings Despite the rhetoric of collaboration and integrated working that pervades the contemporary project discourse, there was a clear focus on addressing immediate technical and commercial concerns, rather than on creating the conditions for i...
The ability and willingness of individuals is a prerequisite to innovation. These traits are not ... more The ability and willingness of individuals is a prerequisite to innovation. These traits are not unique to innovation in construction, but are universal amongst all innovative firms. Innovative behaviours depend on organisational resources and their deployment via managerial action. Organisational slack is forwarded as an enabler of innovation, as it makes a pool of unallocated resources available to connect ability to innovate and willingness to innovate. The authors posit that researchers and practitioners alike have failed to appreciate this enabler of innovative behaviour causing the principles of slack to be improperly overlooked. The case for slack resource allocation as a precursor to innovation is developed and the need to survey the attitudes towards slack organisational management held by construction organisations established. Institutionalism is identified as an analytical framework capable of explaining the interactions within the firm that differentiate between innovat...
The state of health and safety on construction sites in Ghana was investigated using first hand o... more The state of health and safety on construction sites in Ghana was investigated using first hand observation of fourteen
Purpose – The intra-organisational relationships of through-life support services providers are c... more Purpose – The intra-organisational relationships of through-life support services providers are complex, especially given the multifaceted nature of the provision required. For example, capabilities within the UK highways maintenance arena must support engineering design, routine maintenance and the on-going management of the network. While collaboration in construction projects has formed a major research focus in recent years, there is a paucity of work examining collaboration in-flight. Design/methodology/approach – Through a micro-practices approach, two contracts delivering highway infrastructure maintenance and renewal services are examined to explore the intra-organisational relationships that determine the quality of service delivered. Findings – Despite the rhetoric of collaboration and integrated working that pervades the contemporary project discourse, there was a clear focus on addressing immediate technical and commercial concerns, rather than on creating the conditions...
The ability and willingness of individuals is a prerequisite to innovation. These traits are not ... more The ability and willingness of individuals is a prerequisite to innovation. These traits are not unique to innovation in construction, but are universal amongst all innovative firms. Innovative behaviours depend on organisational resources and their deployment via managerial action. Organisational slack is forwarded as an enabler of innovation, as it makes a pool of unallocated resources available to connect ability to innovate and willingness to innovate. The authors posit that researchers and practitioners alike have failed to appreciate this enabler of innovative behaviour causing the principles of slack to be improperly overlooked. The case for slack resource allocation as a precursor to innovation is developed and the need to survey the attitudes towards slack organisational management held by construction organisations established. Institutionalism is identified as an analytical framework capable of explaining the interactions within the firm that differentiate between innovat...
The ability and willingness of individuals is a prerequisite to innovation. These traits are not ... more The ability and willingness of individuals is a prerequisite to innovation. These traits are not unique to innovation in construction, but are universal amongst all innovative firms. Innovative behaviours depend on organisational resources and their deployment via managerial action. Organisational slack is forwarded as an enabler of innovation, as it makes a pool of unallocated resources available to connect ability to innovate and willingness to innovate. The authors posit that researchers and practitioners alike have failed to appreciate this enabler of innovative behaviour causing the principles of slack to be improperly overlooked. The case for slack resource allocation as a precursor to innovation is developed and the need to survey the attitudes towards slack organisational management held by construction organisations established. Institutionalism is identified as an analytical framework capable of explaining the interactions within the firm that differentiate between innovat...
After a short delay, I am delighted to bring you another retro-spective issue of Value World. In ... more After a short delay, I am delighted to bring you another retro-spective issue of Value World. In this issue, we present selected papers which have been identified by the Value World editorial board as key contributions to the recent development of our disci-pline. In the last issue of Value World we presented historical pa-pers from the roots of our discipline, authored forty years ago. At that time, we were excited by the principles of our new knowledge and were just beginning to realise the opportunities for its applica-tion through new methods. In the papers presented in this edition of Value World — authored some twenty years later — we had be-come more sophisticated in our understanding we were beginning to appreciate the nuances of its application. This raises the ques-tions: Where are we now as a discipline? How would we characterise the state of our knowledge and its application? What are doing to ensure that it is not stagnating? In his 1992 paper, Charles Bytheway shares t...
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the risks of building defects associated with ... more Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the risks of building defects associated with rapid advancement of “green” construction technologies. It identifies the methods adopted by the sector for the determination of pre-construction defects that are framed within the context of, traditional; scientific; and professional design approaches. These are critically evaluated and utilised in attempts to mitigate defects arising from diffusing low carbon construction innovations. Design/methodology/approach – The paper takes the form of an evaluative literature review. Polemic in orientation, the paper critically compares two periods of time associated with rapid advancement of innovation. The first, the post-Second World War housing boom is synonymous with a legacy of substandard buildings that in many cases rapidly deteriorated, requiring refurbishment or demolition shortly after construction. The second, is today’s “green” technology “shift” with its inherent uncertainty and in...
Journal of Financial Management of Property and Construction, 2018
Purpose The intra-organisational relationships of through-life support services providers are com... more Purpose The intra-organisational relationships of through-life support services providers are complex, especially given the multifaceted nature of the provision required. For example, capabilities within the UK highways maintenance arena must support engineering design, routine maintenance and the on-going management of the network. While collaboration in construction projects has formed a major research focus in recent years, there is a paucity of work examining collaboration in-flight. Design/methodology/approach Through a micro-practices approach, two contracts delivering highway infrastructure maintenance and renewal services are examined to explore the intra-organisational relationships that determine the quality of service delivered. Findings Despite the rhetoric of collaboration and integrated working that pervades the contemporary project discourse, there was a clear focus on addressing immediate technical and commercial concerns, rather than on creating the conditions for i...
The ability and willingness of individuals is a prerequisite to innovation. These traits are not ... more The ability and willingness of individuals is a prerequisite to innovation. These traits are not unique to innovation in construction, but are universal amongst all innovative firms. Innovative behaviours depend on organisational resources and their deployment via managerial action. Organisational slack is forwarded as an enabler of innovation, as it makes a pool of unallocated resources available to connect ability to innovate and willingness to innovate. The authors posit that researchers and practitioners alike have failed to appreciate this enabler of innovative behaviour causing the principles of slack to be improperly overlooked. The case for slack resource allocation as a precursor to innovation is developed and the need to survey the attitudes towards slack organisational management held by construction organisations established. Institutionalism is identified as an analytical framework capable of explaining the interactions within the firm that differentiate between innovat...
The state of health and safety on construction sites in Ghana was investigated using first hand o... more The state of health and safety on construction sites in Ghana was investigated using first hand observation of fourteen
Purpose – The intra-organisational relationships of through-life support services providers are c... more Purpose – The intra-organisational relationships of through-life support services providers are complex, especially given the multifaceted nature of the provision required. For example, capabilities within the UK highways maintenance arena must support engineering design, routine maintenance and the on-going management of the network. While collaboration in construction projects has formed a major research focus in recent years, there is a paucity of work examining collaboration in-flight. Design/methodology/approach – Through a micro-practices approach, two contracts delivering highway infrastructure maintenance and renewal services are examined to explore the intra-organisational relationships that determine the quality of service delivered. Findings – Despite the rhetoric of collaboration and integrated working that pervades the contemporary project discourse, there was a clear focus on addressing immediate technical and commercial concerns, rather than on creating the conditions...
The ability and willingness of individuals is a prerequisite to innovation. These traits are not ... more The ability and willingness of individuals is a prerequisite to innovation. These traits are not unique to innovation in construction, but are universal amongst all innovative firms. Innovative behaviours depend on organisational resources and their deployment via managerial action. Organisational slack is forwarded as an enabler of innovation, as it makes a pool of unallocated resources available to connect ability to innovate and willingness to innovate. The authors posit that researchers and practitioners alike have failed to appreciate this enabler of innovative behaviour causing the principles of slack to be improperly overlooked. The case for slack resource allocation as a precursor to innovation is developed and the need to survey the attitudes towards slack organisational management held by construction organisations established. Institutionalism is identified as an analytical framework capable of explaining the interactions within the firm that differentiate between innovat...
The ability and willingness of individuals is a prerequisite to innovation. These traits are not ... more The ability and willingness of individuals is a prerequisite to innovation. These traits are not unique to innovation in construction, but are universal amongst all innovative firms. Innovative behaviours depend on organisational resources and their deployment via managerial action. Organisational slack is forwarded as an enabler of innovation, as it makes a pool of unallocated resources available to connect ability to innovate and willingness to innovate. The authors posit that researchers and practitioners alike have failed to appreciate this enabler of innovative behaviour causing the principles of slack to be improperly overlooked. The case for slack resource allocation as a precursor to innovation is developed and the need to survey the attitudes towards slack organisational management held by construction organisations established. Institutionalism is identified as an analytical framework capable of explaining the interactions within the firm that differentiate between innovat...
After a short delay, I am delighted to bring you another retro-spective issue of Value World. In ... more After a short delay, I am delighted to bring you another retro-spective issue of Value World. In this issue, we present selected papers which have been identified by the Value World editorial board as key contributions to the recent development of our disci-pline. In the last issue of Value World we presented historical pa-pers from the roots of our discipline, authored forty years ago. At that time, we were excited by the principles of our new knowledge and were just beginning to realise the opportunities for its applica-tion through new methods. In the papers presented in this edition of Value World — authored some twenty years later — we had be-come more sophisticated in our understanding we were beginning to appreciate the nuances of its application. This raises the ques-tions: Where are we now as a discipline? How would we characterise the state of our knowledge and its application? What are doing to ensure that it is not stagnating? In his 1992 paper, Charles Bytheway shares t...
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the risks of building defects associated with ... more Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to evaluate the risks of building defects associated with rapid advancement of “green” construction technologies. It identifies the methods adopted by the sector for the determination of pre-construction defects that are framed within the context of, traditional; scientific; and professional design approaches. These are critically evaluated and utilised in attempts to mitigate defects arising from diffusing low carbon construction innovations. Design/methodology/approach – The paper takes the form of an evaluative literature review. Polemic in orientation, the paper critically compares two periods of time associated with rapid advancement of innovation. The first, the post-Second World War housing boom is synonymous with a legacy of substandard buildings that in many cases rapidly deteriorated, requiring refurbishment or demolition shortly after construction. The second, is today’s “green” technology “shift” with its inherent uncertainty and in...
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Papers by Derek Thomson