Strategies to Increase Adoption Rate of Lean Construction

Abstract

Despite its enormous potentials for increasing efficiencies of the construction process, lean Construction (LC) has not been adopted into the majority of the construction industry yet. Furthermore, barriers and strategies for implementing LC have not been adequately studied by past and current research that can lead to the rapid uptake of LC within the construction industry. This study is to identify barriers that are hindering the construction industry to adopt LC and to further recommend suitable measures to overcome these barriers. In this study, a systematic literature review was carried out by reviewing theoretical/analytic papers, case studies and conceptual papers on the subject. After careful examination, eighty-seven (87) papers are kept for further analysis. Analysis indicated that approximately 80% of existing research studies are focused on identifying the implementation barriers only, whereas only 20%, presented barriers that hinder the adoption of LC. As a result, fifty-eight (58) barriers towards adopting LC and sixty-nine (69) strategies to overcome them were identified and classified under three population groups within the construction industry, based on their familiarity and implementation level of LC. The outcome of this study will potentially assist the construction industry in taking measures for increasing awareness and boosting the adoption rate of LC, along with the successful implementation of this innovative change management philosophy that ultimately will lead to optimized construction solutions.

Implementation of lean for small- and medium-sized construction organisational improvement

“…In terms of teamwork and stakeholder engagement, the analysis revealed that all the respondents have established frameworks for teamwork and that their client base is expanding due to prioritising their customers' satisfaction. This is in agreement with the first lesson of lean leadership, which is putting customers first (i.e customer focus is paramount to lean implementation (Gao et al, 2020;Hines, 2012). Meanwhile, all interviewees' responses to the study imply that less than 50% of their employees started with them and grew through rank.…”

“…Although crises are not necessary to turn a company around, they may prompt a lean movement to improve company operations. Meanwhile, Gao et al (2020) submitted that despite the immense potential of lean thinking to increase construction process efficiencies, it has still not been embraced by most of the construction industry. However, the recent economic difficulty resulting from the disruption to construction activities has called for a reduction in operating costs while increasing profit margins.…”

Barriers to Adopting Lean Construction in the Construction Industry—The Case of Jordan

“…The literature includes numerous studies about barriers that face the adoption of lean construction [3,21,28,34,55,59,60,[63][64][65][66][67][68][69][70][71][72][73][74][75][76]. However, there is no study about this topic in Jordan.…”

Development of Stakeholder Engagement Strategies to Improve Sustainable Construction Implementation Based on Lean Construction Principles in Indonesia

“…[33,40] Enhance collaboration between stakeholder groups and project teams to develop integrated building designs using BIM. [33,46] The organization needs to establish a joint development and training system with other stakeholders. [33,36] End-User Needs Develop a standardized measurement of stakeholders' needs, interests, and understanding of the implementation of sustainable lean construction.…”