This Master’s thesis is written by Hákon Jónas Ólafsson as a part of the Management in the Building Industry course in Aalborg University, Department of Civil Engineering.
After working in the building industry as a mason for almost a decade, the author of this thesis has developed an interest in construction planning, particularly in the management of manpower, resources and waste reduction in construction processes.
This thesis will consider a small size construction company. Their planning is based on activity’s based scheduling, which is the generally used scheduling technique in the construction industry these days. The method has been criticised by scholars, when implemented in construction projects.
It will investigate how the company conducts its planning, scheduling and control in its projects. Thereafter, a reflection is given on how it would be performed through the Location-Based Management System (LBMS), by investigating the possibility of optimizing the use of the workforce, resources and reducing waste by implementing the LBMS, through theoretical suggestion, by considering different articles and books written on the subject. Furthermore, the thesis will explore what kind of integration barriers can be found within the company.
The data used to analyse the internal factors of the company were collected through interviews and documents from the company. For the external factors, a questionnaire was formulated and sent out to professionals within the Icelandic AEC industry.
The findings reveal that considerable benefits can be achieved by implementing the LBMS within the company. Production is aligned and set in a continuous manner, which brings further optimisation in the use of resources and manpower. Furthermore, shortening of the project’s time frame occurs, from 6.9-15%.
Barriers of integration were found to be the lack of knowledge about location-based scheduling theory and lack of skills in location-based software applications, within the company and the Icelandic AEC industry. Furthermore, Vico Office was found not to be in common use within the industry. It was found that the main application used for planning and scheduling among the respondents is MS Project and MS Excel. The internal barriers were found to be possible resistance to changes among the company´s employees.
For the LBMS to be properly integrated into the company, it was concluded that all parties involved in the production need to work together, both the company’s employees and the subcontractors. Furthermore, all parties need to receive training which is suitable for their role in production.