ACTA Structilia · Acta Structilia 2017:24(1) Tydskrif vir die fisiese en ontwikkelingswetenskappe...

Vol 24 No 1 2017

Tydskrif vir die fisiese en ontwikkelingswetenskappe

Journal for the physical and development sciences

ACTA

Structilia

http://dx.doi.org/10.18820/24150487

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http://dx.doi.org/10.18820/24150487/as24i1




Acta Structilia2017:24(1)Tydskrif vir die fisiese en ontwikkelingswetenskappe

Acta Structilia is ’n Suid-Afrikaanse geakkrediteerde tydskrif, wat publikasie geleenthede bied vir onafhanklik gerefereerde artikels deur plaaslike en buitelandse navorsers op die terreine van die fisiese en ontwikkelingswetenskappe. Elke gekeurde artikel word as sodanig aangedui. Die redaksie oorweeg Afrikaanse of Engelse artikels oor onderwerpe binne studie velde soos: argitektuur, stads- en streekbeplanning, bourekenkunde, konstruksie- en projekbestuur, bou-ekonomie, ingenieurswese, die eiendomsbedryf en die ontwikkelingsveld rondom gemeenskapsbouprojekte. Acta Structilia verskyn twee keer per jaar onder die vaandel van die Universiteit van die Vrystaat. Die tydskrif word gelewer aan die betrokke navorsingsinstansies, Suider-Afrikaanse universiteite met bogemelde navorsings-departemente, Suid-Afrikaanse navorsingsbiblioteke, geselekteerde buitelandse instansies en intekenaars. Menings en kritiek in die tydskrif is dié van die outeur(s). Publikasie daarvan is nie ’n aanvaarding dat die Redaksie of die Universiteit van die Vrystaat verantwoordelikheid daarvoor aanvaar nie.

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Journal for the physical and development sciences

Acta Structilia is a South African accredited journal for independently adjudicated research articles on any topic in the field of the physical and development sciences. Each peer refereed article is indicated as such in the journal. The editorial staff considers articles in English and Afrikaans, written from any responsible point of view on subjects in any applicable field of scholarship, i.e. architecture, urban and regional planning, quantity surveying, construction management and project management, building economy, engineering and property or community development. Acta Structilia is published biannually by the University of the Free State. The journal is forwarded to all relevant research units and universities, Southern African research libraries, selected research institutions and libraries abroad, and to subscribers. Views and opinions expressed in this journal are those of the author(s). Publication thereof does not indicate that the Editorial Staff or the University of the Free State accept responsibility for it.

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Redaksie • Editorial Staff

Redakteur • Editor Emer Prof. JJP Verster Director: VersterBerryVerster QS

Adjunkredakteur • Deputy Editor Prof. K Kajimo-Shakantu Department of Quantity Surveying and Construction Management (UFS)

Prof. JJ Steÿn Department of Town and Regional Planning (UFS)

Mr HB Pretorius Department of Architecture (UFS)

Assistentredakteurs • Assistant Editors Prof. HJ Marx Project EnSci (UFS)

Mrs AE Beukes Department of Quantity Surveying and Construction Management (UFS)

Redaksionele medewerkers • Editorial Associates Emer Prof. D Holm Environmental Design and Management (UP)

Dr P Smith Program Director, of the Construction Project Management

in the School of Building at UTS Australia

Redaksionele Raad • Editorial Board

Dr S Ramabodu (Chairperson) (QS-online Quantity Surveyors, Bloemfontein, South Africa)Emer Prof. WJ van H Botha (Practising urban and regional planner, Bloemfontein, South Africa)Prof. MJ Maritz (Department of Construction Economics, University of Pretoria, South Africa)Prof. G McLachlan (Department of Architecture, Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University, South Africa) Prof. G Crafford (Department of Quantity Surveying, Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University, South Africa)Prof. JJ Smallwood (Department of Construction Management, Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University, South Africa)Prof. C Vosloo (Department of Architecture, University of Johannesburg, South Africa)Prof. O Joubert (Affiliated Professor at the University of the Free State, South Africa)Prof. TC Haupt (Director, Pinnacle Research and Development Solutions, Kuilsriver, South Africa)Prof. K London (Property Construction & Project Management, RMIT University, Australia)Prof. J Tookey (Programme leader in MCM, AUT University, New Zealand)Prof. G Ofori (School of Built Environment and Architecture, London South Bank University, London, United Kingdom)Prof. G di Castri (Italian Institute of Chartered Engineers, Milan, Italy)Prof. BG Zulch (Department of Construction Economics, University of Pretoria, South Africa)Dr JA Fapohunda (Construction Management and Quantity Surveying, Cape Peninsula University of Technology, South Africa)Mr B van den Heever (Bert van den Heever QS Incorporated, Quantity Surveyors and Project Managers, South Africa)Mr A Kerin (President, Slovenian Project Management Association (ZPM) Slovenia)Mr MA Aladapo (Chief Executive, Murty International Limited, Nigeria)

Acta Structilia Jaargang 24 Volume

Nommer 1 Number Junie 2017 June

Inhoud • Contents

Navorsingsartikels • Research articles

Ownership and care in culturally significant Gerhard Bosman 1 architecture: Three case studies

A sequential mixed methods research approach Guinevere Gilbert 27 to investigating HIV/AIDS intervention management Keith Cattell by construction organisations in South Africa Peter Edwards Paul Bowen

An investigation into cost overruns for ongoing Ibrahim Saidu 53 building projects in Abuja, Nigeria Winston Shakantu

Volhoubare fasiliteitsbestuur in winkelsentrums Jaco van der Merwe 73 in Pretoria Bouwer Kleynhans Chris Cloete

Characteristics of the safety climate in teams Douw Boshoff 99 with world-class safety performance on Chris Krugell construction projects in South Africa Hennie van Heerden

Inligting aan outeurs • Information for authors 128

The South African Council for the Quantity Surveying Profession endorsesActa Structilia

The South African Council for the Quantity Surveying Profession (SACQSP) has simplified the submission and assessment of Continuining Professional Development (CPD) requirements of registered persons. CPD submission now requires disclosure of the number of hours invested meaningfully in activities in two main categories. Category 1 activities are those arranged or presented by or to ‘external’ organisatins such as participation in conferences, congresses, workshops or seminars, presentation of lectures, external examination for academic programmes, publication of articles in journals or magazines, other similar activities. Category 2 activities are less formal ‘internal’ activities such as in-house training or seminars, small group discussions, self-study of journals, magazines, articles on web pages, etc.

To assist registered persons with access to journal articles related to quantity surveying and, more generally, built environment issues, the SACQSP at its meeting in March 2007 adopted a recommendation to endorse the journal, Acta Structilia, which publishes quality, peer-reviewed articles and is accredited by the Department of Education.

Council encourages registered persons to peruse Acta Structilia and similar peer-reviewed journals as one of the alternative options to accumulate CPD credits in Category 2 activities. For a limited period, Council will encourage the circulation of Acta Structilia to registered persons.

Professor RN NkadoPresident

Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) supports Acta Structilia

Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) supports the aims and objectives of Acta Structilia and welcomes the efforts being made to improve our knowledge and understanding of the built environment, particularly in an African context.

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Ownership and care in culturally significant architecture: Three case studies

Peer reviewed and revised

AbstractPublic buildings are not permanent, but at most durable and robust enough to outlast a few generations. Earth-constructed buildings, as soft architecture used for public buildings, need more care and maintenance than buildings in brick, stone, concrete and steel. The ownership and care of private and public buildings reflect social attitudes and sustainable means. The attitudes towards the durability and technical performance of building materials can lead to the rejection of earth architecture, due to the high maintenance required. Negative attitudes discourage the use of traditional earth-constructed buildings in Africa. Case studies show the ownership and care in maintenance as temporal reflectors of the communal well-being. This care or no care becomes a celebration or rejection of the built environment. The argument is that, without ownership, public buildings constructed in conventional building materials can deteriorate faster than well-accepted maintained earth-constructed buildings of cultural significance. This phenomenon should be considered if public buildings are built in contemporary earth construction.Keywords: Attitudes, cultural significant archi-tecture, earth architecture, temporal ownership

AbstrakPublieke geboue is nie permanent nie. Dit is hoogstens duursaam genoeg om ’n paar generasies te oorleef. Grondkonstruksie-geboue as sagte argitektuur, gebruik as publieke geboue, het meer sorg en onderhoud as geboue van baksteen, klip, beton en staal nodig. Die eienaarskap en sorg van privaat en publieke geboue toon die sosiale houdings en volhoubaarheidsvermoë aan. Houdings teenoor die duursaamheid en tegniese handhawing

Gerhard Bosman

Dr Gerhard Bosman, Earth Unit, Department of Architecture, University of the Free State, P.O. Box 339, Bloemfontein, South Africa. Phone: 051 4012332, Email: <[email protected]>

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.18820/24150487/as24i1.1ISSN: 1023-0564e-ISSN: 2415-0487Acta Structilia 2017 24(1): 1-26© UV/UFS

mailto:[email protected]

http://dx.doi.org/10.18820/24150487/as24i1.1



Acta Structilia 2017: 24(1)

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van konvensionele geboue verwerp publieke grondkonstruksie, weens die hoë onderhoud daaraan. Negatiewe houdings ontmoedig die gebruik van tradisionele grondkonstruksie-geboue in Afrika. Gevallestudies van eienaarskap en sorg (onderhoud) van publieke geboue dui op tydelike gemeenskaplike welvaart. Die argument is egter dat publieke geboue in konvensionele boumateriaal sonder eienaarskap vinniger kan verweer en agteruitgaan as aanvaarde goed onderhoude grondgeboue van kulturele belang. Hierdie verskynsel moet in gedagte gehou word indien publieke geboue in kontemporêre grondkonstruksie gebou word.Sleutelwoorde: Houdings, grondkonstruksie, kultuurbelangrike argitektuur, houdings, tydelike eienaarskap

1. IntroductionThe human body needs buildings for protection in the same way as the human spirit needs architecture. To maintain body and spirit, human beings will often go to great lengths to nourish, protect and care for the body. To maintain buildings, human beings often show the same care. This care can become more complex and cultivated, and even experienced as cultural ownership, especially if the building is considered to be architecture that holds and protects memory, time, culture and identity. Holl, Pallasmaa & Peres-Gomes (2006: 34) support the notion that dwellings are the refuge of the body, memory and identity. Furthermore, architect and scholar Fidel Meraz (2008: 2-12) views conservation as the collective endeavour that compels temporal consciousness of cultivated care about architecture as space. The first space that human beings experience as dwelling space is in the female body. The womb is a container that expands and retracts as space (Figure 1). This space is the physical and temporal space that later opens up into a bigger dwelling, shared by more individuals. Dwellings form a settlement, settlements grow into cities, and cities into a metropolis. The womb is the most fragile space and the metropolis the most robust space. The same can be said about soft and robust building materials. Raw earth-building materials, stabilized with natural materials such as straw, bitumen and lime, can be considered soft architecture (Houben & Guillaud, 1994: 150-161). Raw earth-building materials were often and are still used for dwellings to form resilient envelopes that can be changed, remoulded or reshaped (Frescura, 1981: 25-30). This can result in soft architecture that needs more human care. Over time, private buildings globally have continuously been built in earth-construction techniques.

Bosman • Ownership and care in culturally significant architecture

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Figure 1: Alexandra Florschutz, Womb of the world, 2011, oil and mix media on canvas, private collection

Source: Florschutz, 2011

On the other hand, contemporary public buildings and monuments are seldom built in earth. More durable, robust and dense building materials are traditionally reserved for more important or significant buildings.


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Figure 2: The medieval castle and cathedral surrounded by timber structure dwellings Source: Frampton, 2001: 5

If a public building as institution is built in earth, it will often be stabilised or protected in order to make it more robust and durable (Taxil-Wardell, 2015). Monumental architecture built in earth seldom survived the onslaught of time. Monuments built in stone and, in later years, in steel and reinforced concrete are easier to maintain and conserve. It can also be illustrated that social influence as well as social norms and values dictate what building materials are used. Frampton (2001: 5) illustrates the solid and thick stone walls with carved openings (stereotomic) of the medieval castle and cathedral, built in stone masonry, in contrast with the more fragile infill work of wattle and daube with straw, covered with the plaster work in clay, within the timber structure (tectonic) houses (see Figure 2).

Dagmar Weston reminds us that significant architecture is the deep expression of a physical and cultural context that can sustain human activities in a living setting with a durable embodiment (Emmons, Hendrix & Lomholt, 2012: 5). People will show either care or no care towards their public buildings. This care influences the temporality of architecture.


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The aim of this article is to show that socially accepted public buildings in raw or stabilised earth-constructed building material can be maintained and conserved if embedded in the accepted cultural context of the community. The argument is that, without ownership, public buildings constructed in robust conventional building materials can deteriorate faster than well-accepted and maintained soft earth-constructed buildings of cultural significance. The next section relates to the temporality of earth-constructed buildings. This is followed by the care and ownership of culturally significant architecture. To illustrate this, the influence of culture, climate and available building material, with references to the vernacular architecture from the early colonial epoch in South Africa, will be discussed. Two South African case studies and one West African case study, visited by the author, will be used to illustrate the presence and absence of ownership on the maintenance of public buildings that hold elements of cultural significance.

2. Literature review

2.1 Temporality of earth-constructed buildings

Architects do not want to see their well-designed, successful buildings being removed or destroyed, but buildings do deteriorate. The functions of buildings often change or old buildings get a second life with a new use. This is beyond the architect’s control, as stated by Rapoport (1969: 1), who believed that the designer does not control the physical environment of man (as built environment).

Public buildings are temporal and do not last forever, but some are more enduring than others. To own and care for buildings, things and objects, somewhere in time, reflects context. According to Meraz (2008: 20), context is “founded on the notion of architectural heritage conservation being understood as the preservation of buildings, places, sites and cities with special cultural value from deterioration and disappearance”. This conservation of buildings also reflects cultural resources and time. Jokileto (1999: 199) refers to historicity in the modern sense of “significance in cultural heritage [as] a creative and unique expression by a particular artist or community … [that] represents the relevant cultural context”.

Buildings constructed in sustainable earth material, which uses very little energy to construct, can be considered soft architecture that reflects culture and temporality, but they can last longer than buildings constructed in conventional building materials. Guillaud (2010: 7-17) reminds us that earth construction, as a discipline,


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addresses social economics, the physical and chemical composition of matter and materials, the anthropology of habitat, and the conservation and management of built heritage. To this, Fontaine & Anger (2009) add the technological and architectural innovations that earth construction holds in contemporary architecture.

The many advantages of earth as building material are well known: availability in large quantities, low price and ease of use by all; good fire resistance, as well as thermal and acoustic insulation properties that contribute to the interior comfort of dwellings. The shortcomings are mainly low mechanical characteristics, unsatisfactory resistance to weathering, and liability to volume changes. Clay soils can be corrected by physically changing their texture (grain-size distribution), as well as their chemical and mechanical action (Siyan Siwe, 1983: 43). Local experience has indicated the move to modern, environmentally unfriendly building materials (Steÿn, 2009). Furthermore, the contemporary use of earth and building material is well documented worldwide (Fathy, 1973; Houben & Guillaud, 1994; Kennedy, Smith & Wanek, 2002; McHenry, 1984; Seth & Seth, 1988; Ngowi, 2001). Besides the usefulness of earth as building material, there is a legacy of vernacular and cultural traditions reflected in contemporary architecture and substantial heritage of well-conserved earth-constructed buildings in Africa.

2.2 Care and ownership of culturally significant architecture

Earth construction, as a discipline, presents the opportunity for the application of technological and architectural innovations in contemporary construction. There is also an increasing need for research on the cultural values of earth construction (Guillaud, 2010: 17). The basic maintenance that few communities show towards their public buildings should be considered, since the upkeep of the private dwelling is primarily the responsibility of the home owner. Institutional buildings in the community are in the public domain and the maintenance thereof is the responsibility of a local, regional or national body or council. Other aspects such as culture, taking ownership, shared values and religion should be considered in order to explain why communities will share these responsibilities for the maintenance of their public buildings, or why buildings will be left in disrepair.

The concern is not simply about how people embrace or reject concepts of building culture and building material; it is also about the whole experience of people being in, and interacting with their built environment. Culture and religion provide shared concerns,


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values and beliefs, and keep human beings together as groups (community) in places (settlements). In his reflection on Cesare Brandi’s (1906-1988) paradigmatic Theory of restoration, Meraz (2008: 21) refers to culturally significant architecture (hereafter CSA). The question should be asked as to whether the physical care and ownership of public buildings reflect on the values and belief of the communities that currently or at one time occupied a public building they considered to be CSA. CSA often becomes concrete holders or containers of ideal life on earth. In the words of Holl et al.:

The timeless task of architecture is to create embodied existential metaphors that concretize and structure man’s being in the world … architecture materializes our image of ideal life (Holl et al., 2006: 37).

Furthermore, being-in-the-world, according to Heidegger, is to live in a particular place and its things connected with the place as the comprehensive “somewhere” (De Beistegui, 2005, cited in Meraz 2008: 13). Human beings are absorbed in their own interests, social intercourse and practical tasks. These human concerns (care) are world based. Care reflects human concern towards the world, just as Heidegger’s explanation of temporality also relates to care (Meraz, 2008: 13). The founder of phenomenology Edmund Husserl, in reaction to “being aware of streaming through time”, explained temporal as the character of objects that are developed in time (Moran, 2005: 139). CSA are thus temporal buildings.

2.3 The influence of culture, climate and building material on architectural typology

According to Rossi (1982: 41), typology in architecture is “‘[t]he analytical moment of architecture’, through which a formal constant in a ‘study of types of elements that cannot be further reduced’ can be recognised”. The physical characteristics of these types of building structures such as loadbearing stone or brick masonry work are in contrast with non-loadbearing infill building materials in between column and beam building structures. The use of these types of structures are connected to a regional or vernacular building culture that reflects and is influenced by the available building material of the context (Frampton, 2001: 5-7). Architectural typology, in available materials, also reflects on the building skills at a specific time. The way in which communities care for their public buildings is also connected with the time when, and the place where building materials were available for the first time. This is evident in Africa as well as on other continents. Building typologies,


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influenced by materials such as corrugated iron, can be illustrated as in western American building styles. The climate dictated the use of two architectural typologies for territorial-style adobe houses. The two traditional types of buildings were the “flat-roofed building of one or two stories with [a] brick coping at the top of the wall”, and the pitched roof mountain style in colder regions where “snow accumulation made flat-roofed structures impractical” (Seth & Seth, 1988: 59). The length and proportions of roofing timbers in western America dictated the pitch of the roof that served as the traditional guideline for vernacular building globally (Seth & Seth, 1988: 60). The same roofing limitations were evident at the seventeenth-century Cape of Good Hope, where early settlers changed their building patterns and type of structure to suit their new environment (Pearse, 1968). This change involved moving away from using earth to using other materials.

With the arrival of the Dutch at the Cape in the mid-seventeenth century, new forms of building styles evolved in response to local conditions. The Fort (later replaced by the Castle) was the first building, followed within a few years by the construction of houses and other types of buildings. In his book, Rural shelter in southern Africa (1981), Frescura shows that using earth for constructing walls was mainly done in the drier areas of South Africa. The environment or the availability of materials typically determined the type of material used for wall construction in different areas.

Jan van Riebeeck’s arrival and the availability of European com-modities soon influenced the preferences of the indigenous people. On 22 November 1652, Van Riebeeck noted in his diary that the price of a sheep was paid in copper wire (of the sheep’s length), while tobacco and pipes were distributed as gifts (Schoeman, 2002: 26). New needs were established in the traditional cultures of the indigenous people. Not only did the European arrivals have an impact on the indigenous people, but they also had to adjust their own building standards in the new environment. The Fort was built with sod walls (Potgieter, 1970a: 506), which gradually disintegrated with each succeeding rainy winter. The half-baked or sun-baked bricks were easily affected by moisture, so they had to be plastered and whitewashed with lime (Kench, Goldblatt & Courtney-Clarke, 1990: 11), thus needing less maintenance.

The walls of the houses often had no foundations and were built directly onto the ground, with a thicker base that tapered towards the roof. Roof beams of local timber supported the reed brandsolder, a ceiling made of Spanish reeds bound together and covered with a


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layer of clay as fire insulator. The roof was finished with a thick layer of the abundant local dekriet (Dovea tectorum). Outside Cape Town, house walls were generally built of undressed stones, or sometimes of sun-baked bricks, with clay mortar. Lime mortar was rarely used.

After searching for clay, Van Riebeeck established his first brickyard. He described the first bricks manufactured as “fine red bricks like Leyden bricks”. They proved to be of poor quality, with a “limited life of about nine years” (Potgieter, 1970a: 506). The bricks were porous and did not weather well (De Bosdari, 1971: 20). The gateway and the residential buildings within the Fort were built with bricks imported from the Netherlands.

Figure 3: Details of a gable and timber roof structure of Spier outbuilding Source: Pearse, 1968: 19

In terms of climate and technical performance, a combination of fire and driving winds proved a forceful argument against the use of thatched roofs in seventeenth-century Cape Town (Frescura, 1989: 39). In place thereof, the earth-covered, flat-roofed technology (brakdak) was not entirely waterproof, and needed constant maintenance. By 1660, the fear of fire led to the use of burned roofing tiles (Potgieter, 1970a: 506).

The climate was harsher than that of Holland. The driving rain, together with the sudden change in temperature, affected the bricks


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and tiles. By the end of 1663, most of the buildings were covered with plaster. They were also whitewashed with lime burned from sea shells, while thatch was reintroduced (Potgieter, 1970a: 507). The typical Cape buildings (see Figure 3) reveal the community’s detail and care toward their buildings.

3. Case studiesCase studies were selected based on public buildings that were socially accepted by the local communities at one stage, and on the question as to why these buildings lasted longer than some public buildings in more robust materials. The three case-study buildings are at opposite ends of the African continent, and one case study is juxtaposed to promote the use of earth architecture in contemporary South Africa. The Genadendal Mission buildings, constructed in raw sun-dried earth blocks on the Mission square of Genadendal in the Western Cape Province and the cement masonry constructed at the Steinkopf Community Centre in the Northern Cape Province, both in South Africa, will be compared with the raw sun-dried earth blocks-constructed Great Mosque of Mopti in Mali, West Africa. The importance of ownership and care of earth-constructed buildings will be illustrated to show how this impacts on the temporality of public buildings. The ownership and care of public buildings in earth construction reflect the general well-being of the community they serve and support the importance of the vernacular heritage of Africa.

3.1 Case study one: Genadendal Mission buildings, Western Cape Province, South Africa

The Genadendal Mission buildings were founded in 1737 by the Moravian Mission in the Baviaanskloof, also known as the Riviersonderend Valley east of Cape Town (Potgieter, 1970b: 138). George Schmidt started with a small Khoisan Christian congregation that later constructed the first sun-dried earth-block buildings. Over time, more buildings with earth walls were constructed.


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Figure 4: Photos of heritage earth-construction public building on Church Square in Genadendal

Source: Newsferret, 2013: online


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Figure 5: Plan of earth-constructed buildings of the Moravian Mission around Church Square in Genadendal

Source: Fransen, 2004: 431

By 1813, the town had 1 157 inhabitants and, by 1970, there were 3 091 inhabitants (Potgieter, 1970b: 138). Currently, 25 of these buildings, in styles such as Cape Dutch, Victorian, Neo-Classical, Neo-Renaissance and East European Baroque, are declared national


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monuments (see Figure 4). Sixteen of these buildings, dating from 1737 to 1899 and built around the church square (see Figure 5), are still well maintained and cared for (Newsferret, 2013: online). These buildings can be considered CSA, built using the same earth-building techniques described in Section 2.3.

The same locally sourced reeds are used for the maintenance of the original thatched roofs. Repairs to the earth walls are done with sun-dried earth blocks made from local clay soil (Potgieter, 1970b: 138). Clay plaster, stabilized with 10% lime, was used over the past few years, although some of the original exterior plaster work was not lime stabilised. Other recent changes were done to the interior layout of a few of the smaller buildings, in order to accommodate new uses, such as tourist accommodation. The character of the building complex has not changed a great deal over the past few decades (Fransen, 2004: 431). Oil-based paints and timber varnish are new products used on the majority of exterior timber surfaces. Some compacted earth floors have been replaced by concrete floors and impermeable floor finishes. This created problems with rising damp in most of the earth walls as a result of the rise of water around the packed stone foundations. The problems should be supervised over time to prevent permanent damage to the earth-constructed walls.

Figure 6: Photos of earth-construction private building around Church Square in Genadendal

Source: Newsferret, 2013: online


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3.2 Case study two: Steinkopf Community Centre, Northern Cape Province, South Africa

Figure 7: Steinkopf Community Centre, planSource: Beck, 1985: 13

In the Namaqualand district, approximately 50km north-west of Springbok, a Nama settlement was established near a water source in a sheltered valley. In 1818, the London Missionary Society sent Heinrich Schmelen there to found a mission station. By 1840, the town Steinkopf was well established with a church, a small school and some houses. By 1973, the settlement had 1 800 inhabitants. The discovery of copper in the area brought some infrastructure development (Kokot, 1970: 265). During 1979, a mining company commissioned the Cape Town-based architects Uytenbogaardt and Rosendal to design a community building for the extreme semi-arid climate of Northern Namakwaland (see Figures 7 & 8).

Figure 8: The context with the Steinkopf Community Centre in the foreground and another community centre in the background

Source: Wolff, [n.d.]: online


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The small town had modest brick and corrugated roof dwellings with few real public buildings. According to the architects (Beck, 1985: 13), the programme was confirmed by the local community and the site established on a former communal vegetable garden. The building was designed from the basic need for place and shade on a featureless site. The building was designed for a hall to be used as gathering space. This place creates shade in the form of a colonnade along access routes (Beck, 1985: 13). The architects utilised the local building culture of masonry skills. Local bricklayers completed the brick construction of the massive walls and arches.

Figure 9: No maintenance on the cement brick-constructed Steinkopf Community Centre in the Northern Cape Province, South Africa

Source: Author, 2007

Lithuanian-born American architect Louis Kahn often mentioned efforts in his buildings to show how the buildings “speak” of the way in which they were put together (Leslie, 2005). Kahn’s work was the inspiration for Uytenbogaardt’s Steinkopf Community Centre building and design approach, since he studied for two years with Kahn in the 1950s (Beck, 1985: 13). Both architects refer to the integrity of a building’s structure and material use within the nature and best properties of the material; bricks that work best in compressive strength; to celebrate bricks as arches built into load-bearing cement brick walls. Reinforced concrete elements were used, exposing the function within the structure. A suspended ceiling was avoided to show all the services within the spaces.

Most of these efforts are visible in the Steinkopf Community Centre building. Marcus (2009: 32-40) points out Khan’s consideration of the performance of the room as a place of the mind: “… a room is not a


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room without natural light … architecture comes from the making of the room”. This can be observed in the hall as a communal room with curved ceilings to filter the harsh semi-desert light, reflected by this concern of natural light. This space with washed light was cathedral-like at some point in time (see Figures 8 & 9). Even nowadays, the architectural fraternity view the building’s influence from Kahn, localised as a significant South African architectural gem.

Figure 10: Steinkopf Community Centre, cross-sectionSource: Beck, 1985: 13

Bell (2012) believes that “it remains arguably Uytenbogaardt’s most pure design”. But, even though this is an architectural masterpiece, over time the community stopped using the building. The joinery work in the building is now dilapidated (see Figure 11). The local council does not maintain it. The local community uses it as a public space for meetings:

… with all its joinery gone and just the walls, the roofs and the landscape of terraced floors remaining, the building is breathing much better than before. The urban space of the building is now used to traverse through, ride bikes, sell drugs, make art and socialise (Wolff, [n.d.]: online).


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Figure 11: Steinkopf Community Centre, photo taken in 2007 (top) compared to recent photos of interior space in 2012 (bottom)

Source: Author; Bell, 2012

3.3 Case study three: The Great Mosque of Mopti, Mali, West Africa

The development of building material and its application in public buildings in the rest of Africa happened at a different pace. The cases of earth-constructed mosques in West Africa illustrate the argument of care and ownership. The architecture in Mali is as diverse as that in South Africa. Both countries were former colonies, and both are very poor to relatively poor developing countries with many socio-economic and cultural challenges. However, the Great Mosque of Mopti reveals a different approach to the current care, ownership


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and maintenance of a public building constructed in earth. The same can be said about other well-known and documented mosques in Timbuctoo and Djenne visited by the author in early 2008.

Figure 12: Interior spaces of the Great Mosque of Mopti, Mali, West Africa Source: Author, 2008

The Great Mosque of Mopti, also known as the Komoguel Mosque, was constructed between 1933 and 1935 in a Sudanese architectural style (Mopti, [n.d.]: online). The small 100m² building is diagonally placed on an irregular shaped site, surrounded by an average


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2 500mm-high boundary wall. The roof is supported by massive earth-constructed sun-dried block columns (see Figures 12 & 13), parallel to the qibla wall (indicating the direction of Mecca).

Figure 13: Great Mosque of Mopti, plan showing the main tower and mihrab and qibla wall

Source: Mopti, [n.d.]: online

Although much smaller, the design of the mosque is based on that of the Djenne mosque model (Mopti, [n.d.]: online). The city Mopti is a city at the heart of the Niger River. The area around the mosque is densely populated and, with its vibrant markets and private dwellings, forms a central, economic and cultural focus.

Figure 14: Architect Gisele Taxil-Wardell explains the construction process and conservation work done in the building of the Great Mosque of Mopti


The mosque was restored between October 2004 and June 2006, with conservation funding from the Aga Khan Trust (Taxil-Wardell, 2015). The buildings received cement-coping elements during previous restoration attempts in the 1970s. These efforts created more damage


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to the earth clay plaster walls and structure. Project architects Gisele Taxil-Wardell and Wilfredo Caracas proposed an intervention of deep insertions to remove damaged structure and rebuild walls with the same earth material (banco noir and banco blanc) used decades earlier. This conservation effort also included the training of young apprentices in masonry, plastering and carpentry (see Figures 14 & 15). On completion of the project, approximately 30 apprentices received comprehensive training in related fields of caring, maintenance in the original materials of black and white earth mixes with straw and timber work (Mopti, [n.d.]: online).

Figure 15: The restored rooftop with minarets, tower and facade of the Great Mosque of Mopti


4. DiscussionThe notion that everybody’s work is nobody’s work is often true. A community that shares the responsibility of caring and maintaining their buildings reflects its ownership and shared interest, values and beliefs.

For over 80 years, large numbers of faithful inhabitants of Mopti still unite in their prayer times, especially during Friday prayers. This weekly unifying character makes this worship ceremony an instrument for maintaining and strengthening social ties (Mopti, [n.d.]: online), while simultaneously giving historical and architectural importance within a touristic, cultural and spiritual space.

The combined efforts of the earth building complex in Genadendal shows that the community and the Moravian Mission in Africa are not only repairing, but also maintaining the rich cultural history of Genadendal as a place within the community. Du Plessis (2002: 29)


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mentions the “strengths [of sustainable settlements] are [the] labour-intensive construction methods, locally sourced materials and highly structured, internally networked and mutually supportive communities”. This combination of efforts, ownership and care are not visible in Steinkopf.

By contrast, the community or the local council of Steinkopf has struggled to care for and maintain their building for the past 36 years. It is possible that the attitude towards the building could have changed over the years. The more fragile parts of the building were neglected into the current state. It is also possible that the height of the curved plaster board ceiling made maintenance difficult or that limited skills made the maintenance problematic. The steel and brickwork stood the test of time, but broken windows and doors indicate that the community has not owned the building for the past few years. A thorough survey will need to be conducted in order to establish the reasons for the current state of the building. If the building was not accepted from the start, it could have been totally destroyed, but this is not the case. The nearby second community centre building can be considered a more successful building, despite its poor architectural quality. Nowadays, the first community centre building by architect Uytenbogaardt cannot be considered CSA, since the community currently experiences the building in a different light. The building is at most only significant to students in architecture and South African architects. The local Steinkopf community does not experience the same care and ownership as, for example, in the Genadendal Mission buildings. The use of the Steinkopf building has changed for whatever unknown reasons. It is important to illustrate that care and ownership are vital for public buildings to survive.

There has been an influx of modern and postmodern styles into South Africa, despite the poor climate and technical performance of the stylistic elements, or the lack of practical climatic elements such as verandas and louvres. It has also been influenced by issues of aesthetics, style and status. Consequently, Frescura (1989: 38) argues that those architectural styles are often not a matter of individual style, but are strongly related to the values of dominant groups. He questions the role that climate and technical performance played in predetermining man’s choice of his own built habitat. It should be asked at what stage these choices cease to be guided by pragmatic factors and are “overtaken by consideration of aesthetics, style and status”. It should be considered that architecture stopped being a matter of individual choice and is strongly connected with the values of a larger group.


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The current community of Steinkopf is not aware of, and does not relate to the vision of Uytenbogaardt’s idea of dwelling space in the landscape. In the harsh semi-desert landscape, even robust materials such as the shell or container could not hold the softer, more fragile parts from disappearing over the past 36 years. The fact that cheap material is not available near the site can be considered. The political climate of the 1980s, when the community was conceptualized and constructed, could have played a bigger role in the social acceptability at that time, but this is now lost. It is possible that, at the time the building was built, the generation living around the centre did experience ownership.

Efforts can be made to both promote the architectural value of the building and involve the current community to again experience ownership. In the case of the Mopti Mosque, new interest and generous funding for conservation have created a renewed interest that adds value to the building and the surrounding community. The attitude of the community has changed since they were involved in skills transfer and job creation over a period of three years during the restoration process around the Mosque. The community plasters and maintains the Mosque after the rain season. The current community has new skills to take care of the building. However, this value can change in future, placing the Mosque in harm’s way for future generations.

5. Conclusion and recommendationsThis article discussed and illustrated the effect that ownership and values have on the general care and maintenance of public buildings. Public buildings in conventional building materials are as fragile as earth-constructed public buildings. The way in which human beings go about in a day-to-day relationship with buildings reflects the cultural values towards that building and the community’s ability and means to create and care for CSA. The example of the Great Mosque of Mopti shows how monumental earth buildings as soft architecture are taken care of by the users within the tradition of annual festivities and religion.

The Genadendal Mission buildings, as monumental earth buildings, have changed, but the character and structures had enough value for the community to care for over the past 250 years. The cultural significance of this complex has been celebrated since 1980 (as historical heritage site) to create CSA within the church square as cultural holder.


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The Great Mosque of Mopti and the Genadendal Mission buildings are currently considered to be CSA, due to the continued community involvement in between generations in the form of skills transfer and job creation; an understanding of building materials and building techniques used to care and preserve its character, and a sense of ownership experienced by communities at opposite ends of the African continent.

The Steinkopf community building, as iconic modernist architecture in robust steel and masonry work, currently does not have the same status, since the community does not hold the building in the same high regard as is the case with Mopti and Genadendal. In the absence of community involvement, understanding material and techniques, and a sense of ownership, the Steinkopf community building, as a poetic piece of architecture, will not become significant for the community. Architecturally significant buildings are temporal and are connected to current communities’ values and sustainable means.

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Marcus, G. 2009. The making of a room. Journal of Architectural Education, 34, p. 141.

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A sequential mixed methods research approach to investigating HIV/AIDS intervention management by construction organisations in South AfricaPeer reviewed and revised

AbstractSequential mixed methods research is an effective approach for investigating complex problems, but it has not been extensively used in construction management research. In South Africa, the HIV/AIDS pandemic has seen construction management taking on a vital responsibility since the government called upon the private sector to play a greater part in combating HIV/AIDS. However, the South African construction industry has been slow in responding to this call, and many organisations are not fully aware of what such involvement might mean. A sequential mixed methods research approach was used to investigate this problem. As the research is ongoing, it is described in this article as a research journey; the findings of each stage have determined the best method for the next. Findings of each stage are not presented in detail, since the main purpose of this article is to show the effectiveness of the research method. The approach commenced with a quantitative survey to establish base-line information. Semi-structured interviews then yielded richer qualitative data before quantitative datasets were revisited to exploit their potential for more complex analysis and modelling. Findings to date show that corporate knowledge about HIV/AIDS is inconsistent, that intervention management may miss the population most affected, and that the stigma of being HIV+ is a major barrier that frequently prevents disclosure and thus misses the benefits that employer organisations can bring. The construction industry needs to find better ways to promote disclosure and minimise stigmatisation. The applied example shows that the adoption of sequential mixed methods has responded to individual stage data needs and

Guinevere Gilbert, Keith Cattell, Peter Edwards & Paul Bowen

Dr Guinevere Gilbert, School of Property, Construction and Project Management, RMIT University, GPO Box 2476, Melbourne, Victoria 3001, Australia. Phone: +61 3 9925 3452, email: <[email protected]> (corresponding author).Prof. Keith Cattell, Department of Construction Economics and Management, Level 5 Snape Building, Upper Campus, University of Cape Town, Private Bag, Rondebosch 7700, Cape Town, South Africa. Phone: +27 (0)21 650 2452, email: <[email protected]>Adj. Prof. Peter Edwards, School of Property, Construction and Project Management, RMIT University, GPO Box 2476, Melbourne, Victoria 3001, Australia. Phone: +61 3 9925 2230, email: <[email protected]>Prof. Paul Bowen, Department of Construction Economics and Management, Level 5 Snape Building, Upper Campus, University of Cape Town, Private Bag, Rondebosch 7700, Cape Town, South Africa. Phone: +27 (0)21 650 3443, email: <[email protected]>The authors declared no conflict of interest to this title or article.














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provided essential flexibility for the research. It is an effective approach where end outcomes are not sufficiently clear at the outset of the research.Keywords: Construction industry, HIV/AIDS, intervention management, sequential mixed methods research

AbstrakOpeenvolgende gemengde metodes-navorsing is ’n doeltreffende benadering vir die ondersoek van komplekse probleme, maar is nog nie op groot skaal in kon-struksiebestuurnavorsing gebruik nie. Die Suid-Afrikaanse regering het die privaat sektor gevra om ’n groter rol te speel in die hantering en betrokkenheid van MIV/VIGS, maar organisasies is nie bewus van wat hantering en betrokkenheid behels nie. Die Suid-Afrikaanse boubedryf is traag om te reageer. ’n Opeenvolgende gemengde metodes-navorsingsbenadering is gebruik om die probleem te ondersoek. Die proses word genoem ’n navorsingsreis, aangesien daar huidiglik steeds navorsing gedoen word. Die resultate van elke stadium voorspel die relevante metode vir die volgende navorsingsmetode. Die opeenvolgende gemengde metodes-navorsingsbenadering het ontstaan as gevolg van kwantitatiewe navorsing om basiese inligting te verkry. Kwantitatiewe datastelsels is verander om ’n meer ingewikkelde komplekse analise en modellering van gedeeltelik gestruktureerde onderhoude te verseker en het gelei tot beter kwalitatiewe onderhoude. Resultate tot op datum het bewys dat kooperatiewe kennis van VIGS nie konsekwent is nie. Inmenging het tot gevolg dat die meerderheid geaffekteerde mense nie geraak word nie en dat die stigma van MIV+ onttrekking veroorsaak. Werkgewers se invloed word gevolglik ondermyn. Individuele data behoeftes en buigsaamheid ten opsigte van navorsing het gelei tot die aanvaarding van opeenvolgende gemengde metodes. Dit is ’n effektiewe benadering wanneer die eindresultaat nie duidelik genoeg is tydens die verslaglewering van die navorsing nie.Sleutelwoorde: Boubedryf, ingrypingsbestuur, MIV/VIGS, opeenvolgende gemengde metodes-navorsing

1. IntroductionThe South African Department of Public Works (DPW, 2004: 3) reported that the construction industry ranked third in terms of the economic sectors most adversely affected by the HIV/AIDS pandemic. Given that the government cannot combat the pandemic alone (Gilbert, 2006: 309; Wouters, Van Damme, Van Loon, Van Rensburg & Meulemans, 2009: 1177), it is recognised that civil society (Kelly & Van Donk, 2009: 135) and the private sector (George, 2006: 179; Overseas Development Institute (ODI), 2007: 2) have to play an increasingly important role. In this sense, the private sector is expected to ‘intervene’ in the managed responses to HIV/AIDS in the workforce – businesses are called upon to help the government with the ‘heavy lifting’ needed to combat the spread of HIV/AIDS and treat the disease. However, the South African construction industry is the least responsive sector in this regard (Bureau for Economic Research/South African Business Coalition on HIV & AIDS (BER/SABCOHA), 2004: 52; Rosen, Feeley, Connelly & Simon, 2006: 12; Meintjes, Bowen & Root, 2007: 255 [JP2007.1]. More recent research has not found any

Gilbert, Cattell, Edwards & Bowen • A sequential mixed methods ...

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substantial improvement in this situation (Bowen, Cattell, Edwards & Marks, 2010: 997 [JP2010.1]; Harinarain & Haupt, 2014: 291).Businesses that depend largely on casual and migrant labour are likely to be seriously affected by HIV/AIDS (Whiteside & Sunter, 2000: 140), as HIV prevalence is considerably higher among workers who travel for employment (Interagency Coalition on AIDS and Development (ICAD), 2004: 2; Bowen, Dorrington, Distiller, Lake & Besesar, 2008: 828 [JP2008.1]). Other aspects driving risky lifestyles and hence disease vulnerability for such workers include substandard living environments, absence from stable family environments for long periods, high rates of alcohol abuse, and promiscuous sexual activity (ICAD, 2004: 3). The construction industry is vulnerable to all these factors; research was thus needed in order to better understand its situation and improve its HIV/AIDS intervention management practices.The research journey described in this article commenced with a policy-positioning paper (Meintjes et al., 2007: 255 [JP2007.1]), following the official reports of poor industry response, despite evidence of increasing prevalence of HIV/AIDS infection. By 2009, the disease was regarded as pandemic, and the question arose: Had the construction industry’s awareness of, and responses to HIV/AIDS improved? This stimulated the commencement of a small research project at the University of Cape Town in 2009 to investigate the construction industry’s awareness and management of HIV/AIDS. For logistical and financial reasons, the initial research was confined to the Western Cape. The scope of the project has since expanded, but this development has brought with it a recognition of the need to adopt different methods to service the data-collection needs of such expansion. The ‘umbrella’ approach to this need falls with the methodology known as Sequential Mixed Methods Research (SMMR).While reporting some of the more important findings, the main purpose of this paper is to demonstrate the use of SMMR in the HIV/AIDS intervention management research project, by presenting it as a staged, and as yet unfinished, journey.

2. Research method and designThe research journey set out by asking:

• How aware are construction firms about the long-term threat of HIV/AIDS to the workforce?

• What HIV/AIDS intervention management activities are construction firms engaged in?

• Do construction firms regard management interventions as financially viable?


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The staged journey to date is shown in Figure 1. Institutional ethical clearance was obtained for each stage of the research. Journal and conference papers emanating from the research are labelled in the diagram by type, year and sequence in the year (e.g., CP2010.2; JP2016.2). They are also identified in the narrative text and endlist of this article in square parentheses following the conventional references. Timelines are not to scale in the diagram, and the later, as yet un-travelled parts of the journey are condensed in a panel on the right-hand side. The stages of the research are discussed in the article in terms of their design and outcomes, with conclusions offered for both aspects as well as for the research process.

2.1 Mixed methods research

Since construction is as much a social as a technical process, it is inappropriate to attempt to force-fit construction management research into a unitary, purely quantitative paradigm in terms of investigative methods. The variability and uncertainties associated with human perceptions, attitudes and behaviours in the management of construction processes are not best dealt with by a purely quantitative approach.

On the other hand, wholly qualitative approaches may suffer from other deficiencies. The outcomes from either approach, if undertaken in isolation, may be a lack of completeness in the research (Tashakkori & Teddlie, 1998: 39).

If unitary approaches to construction management research are inappropriate or inadequate (or both), then alternative hybrid or multiple methods may be needed. The latter approach is better known as ‘mixed methods’ research (MMR), with a productive history now spanning several decades (Cresswell, 2013: 61).

Integral to the use of MMR is the collection of both qualitative and quantitative data, where data is collected either sequentially or concurrently (Tashakkori & Teddlie, 1998: 18). Used sequentially (SMMR), the analysis of quantitative or qualitative data collected in the first phase then informs the nature of quantitative or qualitative data collection in the second phase, and so on (Myers & Oetzel, 2003: 436). By contrast, concurrent (or parallel) MMR encompasses a holistic view of the research field through the different perspectives whereby both types of data are collected simultaneously (Bak, 2011: 77), and is perhaps more akin to a hybrid research model where similar data can be collected through both qualitative and quantitative means (or a combination thereof). As SMMR allows the research process to reflect the practical and contemporary


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theoretical circumstances of each stage, it also allows the researcher to adopt variable, but appropriate world views. This approach is predominantly pragmatic, but, as Morrow (2007: 209) argues, the research needs to focus on the outcome and should not be constrained by one single perspective. From a methodological viewpoint, the adoption of MMR brings characteristics thought to be advantageous over research conducted using a single method of data collection and analysis.

Arguably, the most valuable benefit is the ability to maintain a focus on the research problem and outcome (Creswell & Plano Clark, 2011: 17) rather than being distracted by explaining and attempting to avoid the limitations of adopting a single method (Canales, 2013: 7). However, the multiple methods must be integrated; the ‘flow’ of the research should be encompassed within an over-arching aim. A further benefit of MMR is that it can be adapted to suit the research problem being investigated. Where the research is exploratory, this flexibility facilitates the adoption of an appropriate method as more becomes known about both the context and the preliminary findings (Hanson, Creswell, Plano Clark, Petska & Creswell, 2005: 229). Combining qualitative and quantitative data is recognised as providing a more complete and ‘richer’ picture than a single method used alone (Tashakkori & Teddlie, 1998: 40; Johnson & Onwuegbuzie, 2004: 21; Mertens, 2012: 810). The same arguments apply to research that is more explanatory than exploratory in intent.

In addition to combining methodological rigour with flexibility, indirect benefits are realised. Mertens (2013: 215) finds MMR to be a better approach in research where it is difficult to reach the population, both geographically and psychologically. Chilisa (2005: 680) gives an example of a shortcoming of single-stage data collection in a culturally sensitive environment, describing particular HIV/AIDS research in Botswana as inaccurate because of the culturally insensitive survey used. Had the cultural context first been ascertained, the survey design could have been more appropriate. Quantitative data-collection tools used alone may not give sufficient regard to the cultural context or beliefs (Creswell & Plano Clark, 2011: 8), as, for example, in surveys about alcohol use where convenient standardised instruments exist (e.g., Saunders, Aasland & Babor, 1993: 791; Bloomfield, Hope & Kraus, 2013: 18). In this instance, adopting a qualitative data collection as part of a mixed methods approach would allow the relationship between researcher and participant to become closer than typical forms of quantitative data collection usually allow. Sequential MMR satisfactorily addresses the frequently encountered situations where the findings from an


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investigation designed to answer particular research questions inevitably raise further questions of interest.

As a flexible research strategy, MMR has enjoyed a growth in popularity over the past ten years, as evidenced by an informal scan of the number of books published on the topic (15 in 2009, compared to five between 2003 and 2007) and the appearance of a journal dedicated to MMR since 2007 (see, for example, Alatinga & Williams, 2016). Given the exploratory nature of the HIV/AIDS research and the context of the South African construction industry, mixed methods research using a sequential staged design was adopted.

3. Stage 1 research designThe benchmark South African research into HIV is the South African National HIV Prevalence, Incidence and Behaviour Survey, conducted jointly by the Human Sciences Research Council (HSRC) and the Medical Research Council (MRC) (see Shisana, Simbayi, Rehle, Onoya, Jooste, Zungu, Labadarios & Zuma, 2014). Using survey data to investigate HIV attitudes and behaviour issues in South Africa is much more established and widespread than qualitative research methods, arguably because the sampling design permitted by surveys enables proper estimates of incidence and prevalence, a critical consideration in a country with rates of current and new infections among the highest in the world. The research questions presented earlier derive from the results of the survey referred to above. The opening stage of this research journey thus employed a questionnaire survey to establish base-line information specific to the construction industry.

Using literature relating to HIV/AIDS intervention management in other industries, a sectioned questionnaire was designed with a mixture of closed, dichotomous, declarative and multiple-choice questions. Rating type questions used 5-point frequency scales for indicators of importance. Open response options were made available for some questions. The seven-part survey questionnaire sought demographic information from respondents (e.g., category and size of firm, and number of permanent employees); explored company perceptions regarding HIV/AIDS as a long-term threat; ascertained the presence of an HIV/AIDS policy within the company; determined the existence and nature of HIV/AIDS awareness, prevention, and treatment campaigns or programmes; explored the relationship between HIV/AIDS and employees (e.g., disclosure of status, participation in treatment programmes); investigated any additional involvement in addressing HIV/AIDS issues within the organisation (e.g., support


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provided to HIV+ employees, presence of medical aid benefits); sought perceptions of what constitutes success for a management intervention programme, and solicited opinions regarding the financial viability of management intervention action.

The sampling process for Stage 1 identified contracting firms of sufficient size to support the likelihood that they would have given serious consideration to the issues. Onwuegbuzie & Collins (2007: 286) recognise this adoption of purposive sampling as one option for SMMR. The Construction Industry Development Board’s (CIDB) (Western Cape) database and the Western Cape Master Builders’ Association (WCMBA) membership list were used to identify potential respondents. Since contractors may belong to both organisations, a genuine and commercially active total population for this region is difficult to determine, but is likely to be approximately 5 000. Contractors registered in Grades 6 to 9 inclusive on the CIDB list (an indicator of capacity to undertake project work within a given monetary value range: Grade 6 = >ZAR6.5 million project cost) were randomly telephoned and asked to participate. This sub-population totals about 300. Twenty-one firms agreed (over four different grades). Similarly, 21 members of the WCMBA agreed to participate after being randomly telephoned. Once contact with an individual had been established, that person was emailed, given a URL where the questionnaire could be accessed online, and formally asked to participate. A stratified purposive sampling approach was thus adopted. Data collection took place from May to November 2009, with participation from 42 construction firms (a 14% response rate representative of the sub-population).

Survey response data were subjected to quantitative analysis. Descriptive statistics formed the main analytical tool, with some use of inferential analysis.

3.1 Stage 1 outcomes

The survey findings (Bowen et al., 2010: 997 [JP2010.1]; Bowen, Edwards, Cattell & Marks, 2010: 9 [CP2010.2]) revealed that respondents held no universal view about the long-term threat posed by HIV/AIDS to the construction industry. The majority of the organisations had developed HIV/AIDS ‘policies’, but few went beyond promoting worker awareness and providing preventative information and condoms. Widespread doubt was expressed about the financial viability of more extensive involvement. The size of firms (in terms of employee numbers) did not influence the adoption of awareness and prevention campaigns, but was moderately associated with


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the running of voluntary counselling and testing (VCT) programmes, and significantly related to the provision of treatment programme interventions. Larger firms tended to deliver more services. ‘Worker sensitivity’, confidentiality risks, and fear of further stigmatising HIV+ persons were cited as barriers to involvement.

The open response data elicited by the survey were subjected to further thematic analysis during 2011 as a means of validating the approach for the second stage of the research. From this analysis, five themes were identified: understanding the problem of HIV/AIDS in relation to the firm; interventions by the firm; barriers to interventions; success of interventions, and future intentions (Bowen, Edwards & Cattell, 2013: 7 [CP2013.1]; Bowen, Edwards, Simbayi & Cattell, 2013: 17 [JP2013.2]). Deeper investigation into these issues was planned for the next stage.

4. Stage 2 research designA case-study approach, employing qualitative semi-structured interviews, emerged as the method best suited to conduct more detailed investigation. The strategy adopted was a collective (multiple) case-study approach (Creswell, 2013: 101), whereby individual construction firms comprised the cases, and the units of analysis were the processes and procedures adopted by firms for HIV/AIDS intervention management (Yin, 2014: 31). Purposive and convenience sampling of construction firms was adopted; purposive in the sense of selecting cases to meet differentiation criteria, and convenient in that several firms from the earlier survey had expressed their willingness to participate further.

The conceptual design proposed eight case organisations, comprising two construction firms in each of the micro, small, medium and large employment and turnover categories used to categorise economic data in South Africa (Stats SA, 2008: 18). Twelve Western Cape construction firms participated, comprising ten respondents from the earlier online survey and two firms identified from personal contacts. The sample was thus purposive and comprised 4% of the original sub-sample. Resource constraints associated with the field interview logistic requirements for data collection precluded the use of a larger sample, and generalisation of results to a total population was not essential, since the focus was on the type and effectiveness of HIV/AIDS management intervention activities undertaken by individual construction firms.


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Compliance with the proposed size categories proved difficult to achieve, since employment and turnover sizes did not necessarily correspond. Given that different firms use different employment strategies, it was also difficult to make consistent comparisons between employment categories; the findings of the case-based Stage 2 research largely relate to the permanent workforces of the interviewed firms. Where available, documentary evidence (organograms, policies, procedures, posters, reports) was gathered from the participating organisations. Interviews provided the primary data.

A semi-structured interview protocol was designed to guide the interview process, following replication logic for each case (Yin, 2014: 146). The issues identified in the earlier survey findings informed the topics covered by the protocol. While sub-questions were proposed under each topic, the protocol was intended purely as an ‘aide memoire’ for the interviewers, and all questions were regarded as ‘open’ for interviewees. Organisational information was also collected. Ethical considerations included informed consent to the interview and the recording thereof; the absence of deception; privacy and confidentiality safeguards, as well as accuracy confirmation (Christians, 2011: 65).

An interview was also conducted with a private company offering HIV/AIDS-related management and clinical services to the construction industry. Since the purpose was to explore HIV/AIDS intervention management practices from the ‘employer-to-employee’ perspective, interviews were not planned for construction workers at this stage. However, one large firm indicated that an HIV+ employee had volunteered to ‘tell his story’ and this opportunity was taken up.

Interviews were conducted during February 2011 at the head office (or regional head office) locations of the participating firms, generally in the Cape Town metropolitan area. At least two interviewers were present on each occasion; one being a postgraduate student focusing only on treatment programmes. Interviewees comprised directors or senior (HR) managers from each of the twelve construction companies; a director of the service provider company, and the HIV+ construction worker. The majority of the interviews lasted approximately one hour and all were digitally recorded and subsequently transcribed. The interviewers also made handwritten notes. Interviews were conducted in English, with the exception of the interview with the HIV+ employee, where an interpreter was present. In this instance, the interviewers posed questions in English. Where the


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interviewee did not fully understand a question (obvious by his body language in turning to look towards the interpreter), the interpreter translated it into isiXhosa (an indigenous African language). A mixture of English and isiXhosa answers ensued. The English responses (and the English translation of the worker’s responses) were transcribed from the digital recordings. The edited interview transcripts were returned to the participants (or the interpreter) for confirmation of content and accuracy (‘member checking’: Lincoln & Guba, 1985: 373; Poland, 2001: 643).

A post-interview debriefing session was conducted between the researchers and the interviewers. The debriefing included comparisons of interviewers’ notes as well as recalling any strong emphases detected in the conduct or views of interviewees.

Thematic data analysis examined the qualitative interview data (using the unedited transcripts: Poland, 2001: 630) and the documentary evidence to identify emergent themes (Stake, 1995: 49; Ritchie, Spencer & O’Connor, 2003: 219), thereby confirming and extending those found in the Stage 1 research.


The following major concerns emerged from the Stage 2 research findings: fears about employees’ stigmatisation and their reluctance to disclose with respect to HIV+ status (thus making it almost impossible for employers to reach them with treatment programme help) and communication issues associated with these concerns. The findings from the thematic analysis of the case-based data were reported as a journal paper (Bowen, Allen, Edwards, Cattell & Simbayi, 2014: 377 [JP2014.1]), in which guidelines were proposed (in the form of an ‘A-Z’ checklist of questions) for construction organisations to consider when developing and implementing HIV/AIDS intervention management policies. The guidelines address many of the concerns about lack of knowledge, on the part of construction organisations, about HIV/AIDS intervention management.

Stage 3 of the journey was planned to address employee concerns about stigmatisation and communication in greater detail. Two other issues identified through the interviews included the lack of reach into the informal sector of the South African construction industry, and the difficulties arising from the employment structures of the formal sector. However, resource and budgetary constraints placed these outside the remit of Stage 3.


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5. Stage 3 research designGiven the sensitivity of the proposed focus upon stigma (prejudice and discrimination), disclosure and communication for the Stage 3 research, and better generalizability of findings were considered an important strategic objective. Furthermore, the focus, in this instance, would be on construction workers themselves. This meant accessing a larger sample frame and reverting to quantitative methods of data analysis. The first two issues (stigma and disclosure) would involve direct participation by construction workers, since their views would be important. The communication aspect would be explored from both worker and organisation perspectives, and was subsequently established as a separate strand, commencing in mid-2012, conducted initially by Honours-level students to establish a literature-based context of theory and practice, and followed by postgraduate Masters research (ongoing).

HIV/AIDS stigma and disclosure issues intrinsically relate to the ways in which people respond to the testing processes for the disease (i.e., their testing behaviour). The nature of worker participation required, and the socio-economic status of the majority of workers precluded the use of online data-collection methods. Instead, a field-administered quantitative survey of construction workers was proposed, consistent with procedures adopted by the HSRC (Kalichman & Simbayi, 2003: 443).

Design of the data-collection instrument was finalised by mid-2013. The item catalogue for the questionnaire included demographic details, lifestyle risk information (relating to condom use, information about alcohol consumption and drug use), and questions designed to determine the participants’ knowledge about HIV/AIDS, their feelings towards HIV+ persons, and whether or not they fear HIV/AIDS testing (attitudinal fear of testing). Additional questions, directed specifically at HIV+ persons, sought information relating to internal and external stigma and discrimination, social support systems, and disclosure. The questions, mostly with dichotomous or multiple-choice answer options, were drawn from the measures of Kalichman & Simbayi (2003: 443; 2004: 574); Kalichman, Simbayi, Jooste, Toefy, Cain, Cherry & Kagee (2005:137), and Simbayi, Kalichman, Strebel, Cloete, Henda & Mqeketo, (2007: 1825). The survey questionnaire was made available in three of the eleven official languages of South Africa, namely Afrikaans, English and isiXhosa, since these are the most commonly spoken languages in the Western Cape region.

From June to September 2013, the survey was administered to site-based construction employees, comprising unskilled and skilled


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workers, and site office-based supervisory staff. Participants were drawn from 18 construction sites in the Western Cape, involving the willing co-operation of six construction firms from the Stage 2 research (again, a purposive sample frame). Resource constraints, particularly those associated with the need to collect data in field settings, limited the number of sites that could be visited within the available time frame. The questionnaires were administered in supervised settings, generally in on-site container offices, each equipped with chairs and a large table. The nature of the study was explained and participants were assured about the voluntary, anonymous, and confidential nature of the survey. Care was taken to ensure that workers had sufficient individual privacy to complete their questionnaires. For each site visit, at least three researchers were present to cope with relay batches of participants, to ensure proficiency in all three languages, and to provide assistance where requested. The completed questionnaires totalled 512. In terms of minimum sample sizes required in research to achieve a satisfactory level of generalisability, above a population of more than N=5000 a sample size of 400 is adequate (Lucko & Rojas, 2010: 130). Preliminary data analysis yielded descriptive statistics. Bivariate analysis was then used to explore relationships within the data. Subsequently, regression analysis and Structural Equation Modelling (SEM) were used to test conceptual predictive models of the HIV/AIDS testing regime behaviour of construction workers, as well as feelings of prejudice towards, and discrimination against HIV+ persons.


The findings of the Stage 3 research to date, along with psychometric scale validation assessment, are reported in Bowen, Govender, Edwards & Cattell (2014: 1106 [JP2014.2]); Bowen, Govender, Edwards & Cattell (2015a: 04015040-1); Bowen, Govender, Edwards & Cattell (2015b: 1150) [JP2015.1, JP2015.2]; Bowen, Govender, Edwards, Cattell & Street (2015: 04015014-1 [JP2015.3]), and Bowen, Govender, Edwards & Cattell (2016a: 92; 2016b: 1; 2016c: 1 [JP2016.2, CP2016.3, CP2016.4]). The survey results highlight the complex interrelationship between HIV/AIDS knowledge, prejudice, discrimination, and attitudinal fear of testing. They suggest that more carefully nuanced training for peer educators (a component of existing HIV/AIDS workplace intervention management) is important, along with more finely tuned and culturally sensitive awareness campaign targeting and media (e.g., site posters). The communication strand of the Stage 3 research confirms this (Akita, Baloyi & Gumede, 2012: 86).


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The SEM analyses (see, for example, Bowen et al., 2016a: 92 [JP2016.2]) have revealed pathways between the factor variables that should provide more strategic targeting for management interventions; these will inform the Stage 4 research. Techniques involving Classical Test Theory (exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses) and Item Response Theory (Embretson & Reise, 2000: 65) were used to validate survey catalogue items and measures, with the aim of ensuring robust and culturally appropriate survey instruments (Bowen, Govender & Edwards, 2016: 1 [JP2016: 1]; Govender, Bowen & Edwards, 2016: 12 [JP2016.5]).

Additional data analysis, relating to condom use among construction workers, has led to two further journal papers, each currently in the process of publication. All this work has led to a new quantitative survey design (Figure 1: Stage 4).

6. Stage 4 research design and beyondThe next stage of the HIV/AIDS research will include the administration of a new quantitative survey field administered on more construction sites. The extensive data-collection process is planned to take place in mid-2017 and will explore alcohol and drug use among construction workers in greater detail, using standardised quantitative screening surveys such as AUDIT (see Babor, Higgins-Biddle, Saunders & Monteiro, 2001) and DUDIT (see Berman, Bergmann, Palmstierna & Schyler, 2002), for alcohol and drug usage, respectively, augmented with Likert-type HIV/AIDS-related questions. Substance use is known to affect the efficacy of anti-retroviral (ARV) treatment medication, and may influence workers’ decisions to remain compliant with treatment programmes (Tetrault, Fiellin & Sullivan, 2010: 1; Braithwaite & Bryant, 2010: 280). Much of the AIDS pandemic in South Africa occurs in the context of substance use (Parry, Myers, Morojele, Flisher, Bhana, Donson & Pludemann, 2004: 437). Alcohol abuse has also been linked to inconsistent condom use (Shisana et al., 2014: xxvii). The findings of this research will inform the development and testing of appropriate management intervention tools, and higher level policy development work (Figure 1: Stages 5, 6 & 7). These tools will initially focus on techniques to improve construction workers’ HIV/AIDS testing behaviour by improving workers’ knowledge, minimising stigma, and encouraging testing and disclosure. This represents a shift in the research strategy, from “What is ...?” to “What should be ...?” Beyond that, the question becomes “how can that be addressed and implemented ...?”, and eventually to “how effective is that ...?”. Thus the forward strategy will move from


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investigating the current situation to exploring the effectiveness of management interventions, proposing guidelines, influencing policy development, and encouraging industry best practice. Action research – undertaken at the construction organisation level – appears to be an appropriate method to explore the practicality of employing such tools and assessing their effectiveness (Reason & Bradbury, 2009: 1). In action research, the researcher plays an active role in the investigation, as distinct from the more usual detached observer position. The purpose of action research is to effect change in specific contexts. With the willing consent of the stakeholders, the researcher introduces a change in practice in an organisation, prior to examining its effects. The technique is commonly associated with practice-based research. It is participative and collaborative, following an iterative cycle of plan, act and observe, reflect and refine. Workplace drama (or ‘theatre for development’) may be one action research medium for management tool development and application, thus embracing the communication and stigma strands of the research (Durden & Nduhura, 2011: 91). The adoption of action research methods within a SMMR umbrella approach is not explicated in the SMMR literature, so this approach could potentially make a valuable contribution to the general methodological discussion. Appropriate focus groups will advise this research design as it progresses. Stage 7 should then draw much of the entire research journey together in a contribution towards HIV/AIDS policy development for the construction industry at a national level.

Further ahead (Figure 1: Stage 8), an attempt is envisaged to engage with the informal construction sector in South Africa; ascertain its special HIV/AIDS management needs, and explore ways to deliver appropriate help. This will not be easy. The formal sector will first have to provide an effective response model for the entire industry, and then promote mentoring opportunities between formal and informal builders. On another front, government, industry groups (contractor representative associations and unions) will have to address issues relating to industry employment structures and their impacts on effective HIV/AIDS intervention management.

7. Discussion of research findings to dateThe staged MMR approach to HIV/AIDS intervention management in the South African construction industry has delivered several important findings, and opened up further areas for investigation. The Stage 1 quantitative survey findings showed that knowledge about HIV/AIDS and the long-term threat that it poses is patchy


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across the industry. While organisational policy development was found to be fairly common, more often than not it was very limited in both scope and implementation. Realistic understanding of the cost implications of intervention was rare, as was involvement beyond passive prevention counselling. Firms were cautious about the risks in terms of confidentiality and stigmatisation. The latter concerns were re-confirmed in the qualitative case study interviews in Stage 2, but, on a more positive note, the intervention practices of some organisations could be regarded as world-leading in terms of the nature and extent of their involvement in treatment programmes and family support. However, the reach of these interventions was limited mainly to full-time permanent employees in each organisation, thus missing the large number of workers who are casually employed or engaged on limited short-term contracts. By extension, the substantial informal sector of the South African construction industry is unlikely to have been reached at all.

In Stage 3, a reversion to quantitative surveys, aimed specifically at construction employees, showed that reluctance to disclose their HIV zero status is a major concern for construction workers. Fears of discrimination and stigmatisation fuel this anxiety. The relationships between these factors, knowledge about HIV/AIDS, level of education, and life-style risk behaviours (alcohol and drug use, sexual practices) are complex, especially in the context of different ethnic cultures. This complexity has many implications for HIV/AIDS intervention management, particularly with regard to management/worker communication and organisational policy development. Since the research is management-oriented, as distinct from HIV/AIDS clinical practice, the ongoing and future research must embrace behavioural and communication objectives with a normative intent to improve management effectiveness.

8. Discussion of the SMMR approachAt the outset of the HIV/AIDS intervention management research journey, the end destination was not clear, other than a general desire to invigorate the construction industry with respect to its response to the pandemic. The research project thus demanded flexibility in terms of how it would proceed (i.e., the exploratory/explanatory design sequence). The adoption of each subsequent method of investigation has been decided by the outcomes from the preceding stage, their implications for the nature of the issues to be explored in the following stage, and thus the type of data to be collected. This follows the caveat for an integrated perspective (Canales, 2013: 18).


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The HIV/AIDS research journey continues to yield more complete pictures of the research problem (Mertens, 2012: 810). The overall multi-stage design is clearly evident, but transformational design (in the sense of exploring, implementing and assessing change) has yet to become a major feature.

Literature review was an essential prerequisite for primary data collection. It was particularly important to know the relevant terminology; the nature and extent of the extant research; its findings and contribution to knowledge; its applicability to the construction industry, and how the research had been carried out. This informed the justification for the research; guided the methodological decision-making, and assisted the subsequent research design and development of primary data-collection instruments. As Figure 1 shows, the literature review was not confined to the start of the journey, but has continued to be re-visited and extended as deeper issues have emerged in later stages.

Importantly, a suitable ‘reach’ and sample frame for survey participants was required, and online administration in Stage 1 solved issues of administration costs normally associated with questionnaire surveys. Sufficiency of response is considered later in this section. For the Stage 1 HIV/AIDS intervention management survey, the regional construction organisation associations provided the sample frame, and the researchers adopted sampling techniques documented by authors such as Kemper, Stringfield & Teddlie (2003: 273) and Onwuegbuzie & Collins (2007: 286). Stage 1 provided a supplemented nesting sample whereby Stage 2 used the same sample with the addition of two more organisations known to the researchers. The transition from Stage 2 to Stage 3 used a parallel sample, in which the sample is drawn from the same “population of interest” (Onwuegbuzie & Collins 2007: 281), in this instance the workers on various sites administered by six of the organisations involved in Stage 2. The investigators were careful to avoid generalising the results beyond the capacity of the data. In fact, the nature of construction management is sufficiently universal to render many of the findings credible in the majority of contexts.

The research journey has progressively adopted more complex data-analysis techniques. It commenced with descriptive statistics (Stage 1). Inferential statistics then explored factor relationships between category groups, followed by bivariate analysis and, eventually, multiple regression analysis and structural equation modelling to examine predictive pathways among contributory variables (Stages 3 & 4). In Stage 3, item response theory was used to


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examine the robustness of scale measures at the level of individual items within scales (for the quantitative survey questionnaires). Thematic analysis of open responses to survey questions (Stage 1) and interview transcripts (Stage 2) has added qualitative richness and depth to the research journey.

While the research journey began with an organisational focus (effective HIV/AIDS intervention management by construction firms), it has subsequently paid attention to individual construction workers. Future research plans to revert to firms when it is then likely to engage at a higher level with industry and government, while also engaging at the worker level again through action research. This research used SMMR to facilitate such deliberate shifts in perspective, while the proposal to adopt action research methods may well be novel for the methodology.

Survey response rates are a continuing aggravation for a great deal of construction management research, a field that has not yet settled on what constitutes response adequacy. While sample insufficiency manifests in a clear inability to state any findings conclusively, unconsidered insistence upon the adoption of target frames and response rates deemed essential to other areas of research (e.g., medicine) may be counterproductive. More important than response rates for this research is the capacity of the data to service the desired nature and levels of analysis. Surveys are a useful means of identifying relevant issues, ascertaining the strength of their importance, and examining the significance of differences between category groups. However, simply one instance of a construction organisation failing to provide an acceptable duty of care towards its employees, from the perspective of HIV/AIDS intervention management, would suffice to warrant investigation at a case-study level.

Managing multiple strands of a SMMR research project (together with other projects not reported in this article), each with additional student involvement, has been remarkably free of major difficulties. Keeping abreast of developments in the research area (substantially large when considered beyond a construction industry context) initially proved difficult, but has been substantially resolved through access to relevant publication-alerting services. A great deal of the contemporary literature is now brought to the researchers’ desktops.

The research journey began with a general desire to improve industry practices, but (with the exception of the guidelines produced for HIV/AIDS intervention management) that aim is not yet fully achieved. Developing and testing effective human resources management


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tools for the construction industry is a worthwhile, but certainly not a ‘quick fix’ endeavour.

This article has demonstrated the use of SMMR in a multiphase longitudinal project in the human resources area of the construction management domain. The main focus of the article is the methodological debate, and it is acknowledged that this inevitably limits detailed presentation and discussion of the research findings. However, these findings are disseminated elsewhere.

9. ConclusionsA research project journey to explore HIV/AIDS intervention management among construction firms was used to demonstrate the use and appropriateness of sequential mixed methods within a multiphase design. The journey demonstrated the importance of an informed sequence for the research design, a natural ‘building-blocks’ approach to knowledge generation that becomes almost self-selecting as the research journey unfolds. So far, SMMR provided sufficient flexibility for the research: first targeting organisations and individuals, and then potentially rising to industry level and beyond that to government.

The driver for adopting SMMR is shown to be ‘data demand’ flowing from the research questions: What data are needed at each stage? How can they be sourced? The collected data must be appropriate and adequate for spanning the relevant issues and for permitting suitable analysis. SMMR is ideally suited to longer term staged research, especially where end outcomes are not sufficiently clear at the outset. The approach may be less suitable for the typically constrained shorter term nature of postgraduate research, unless that is based on a clear topic ‘slice’ carved from a larger (institutional) research project. Concurrent (parallel) MMR might be better for students working independently. For academics with competing work priorities and commitments, SMMR offers a measured and satisfying approach to undertaking research. It is also helpful in deciding the nature, direction and extent of research that is often vulnerable to precarious funding. It can yield meaningful, but not necessarily complete outcomes at each stage. However, SMMR is unlikely to be attractive to competitively funded research grant-approving bodies if they lack a full understanding and appreciation of its benefits or if they cannot engage with its longer term implications. Grant applicants proposing the use of SMMR must be prepared to argue their case strenuously and craft their research proposals carefully. In addition, SMMR exposes researchers to a variety of techniques,


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some quite complex, thus broadening and extending their research and research management skills. It also delivers good answers to research questions.

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Bowen, P.A., Edwards, P.J. & Cattell, K.S. 2013. HIV/AIDS interventions by construction firms in South Africa: A mixed methods study. In: Proceedings of the ‘COBRA 2013’ The Construction and Property Conference of the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors, University of Ulster in collaboration with the Indian Institute of Technology, New Delhi, India, 10-12 September. ISBN 978-1-78321-030-5. [CP2013.1].

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An investigation into cost overruns for ongoing building projects in Abuja, NigeriaPeer reviewed and revised

AbstractThe total amount of cost overruns for any construction project can be fully determined once the project is completed. Estimating the amount of cost overruns at different stages of ongoing construction projects is important for project success. There is, however, a dearth of research for this exercise. This article reports the results of an investigative study on cost overruns for ongoing building projects in Abuja. The quantitative technique was adopted in this study. The investigation included ongoing building-construction projects within Abuja, from which a sample of 30 building projects (public and private) was purposively selected (project value of ZAR100 million and above). The data were sourced from the archival records (drawings, bills of quantities, project progress reports, and specifications) on the issues relating to the costs and duration of building projects. The data were analysed using descriptive (percentages) and inferential methods. The results revealed that the percentage of cost overruns ranged from a minimum of 5.56% with 90% project completion, and within 88% of the estimated time limit, to a maximum of 216.08% with merely 5% project completion, and within 8.3% of the estimated time limit. The entire projects had average cost overruns of 44.46%, with an average project completion of 52.4%, and within 91.4% of the average estimated time limit. Based on these findings, it can be concluded that continuous investigation into, and analyses of cost overruns at stages of building projects would encourage professionals to apply the best mitigation measures, in order to achieve a significant reduction in the total cost overrun at the completion of a project. Construction professionals should be well informed of these consequences (cost overruns) at an early stage, in order to evaluate the extent to which these consequences could be minimised.Keywords: Actual cost, cost overrun, estimated cost, Nigeria, building projects

Ibrahim Saidu & Winston Shakantu

Dr Ibrahim Saidu, Department of Construction Management, Faculty of Engineering, the Built Environment, and Information Technology, Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University, Eastern Cape, Port Elizabeth, South Africa. Phone: +27 810916224, +23 48037796321, emails: <[email protected]>, <[email protected]>, <[email protected]>

Prof. Winston (M.W.) Shakantu, Department of Construction Management, Faculty of Engineering, the Built Environment, and Information Technology, Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University, Eastern Cape, Port Elizabeth, South Africa. Phone: +27 785147492, email: <[email protected]>The author(s) declared no conflict of interest for this title and article.











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AbstrakDie totale koste-oorskryding van enige konstruksieprojek kan ten volle bepaal word nadat die projek voltooi is. Koste-oorskrydingberamings op verskillende stadiums van deurlopende konstruksieprojekte is belangrik vir ’n projek se sukses; maar daar is gebrekkige navorsing daaroor. Hierdie artikel gee die resultate van ’n ondersoek oor koste-oorskryding van voortgesette bouprojekte in Abuja. Die kwantitatiewe navorsingmetode is in hierdie studie gebruik. Die ondersoek sluit deurlopende bouprojekte binne Abuja in, waaruit ’n steekproef van 30 (openbare en private) bouprojekte doelgerig geselekteer is (projekwaarde van ZAR100 miljoen en hoër). Die data is verkry uit die argiefrekords (tekeninge, wetsontwerpe van hoeveelhede, projek-vorderingsverslae en spesifikasies) oor die kwessies wat verband hou met die koste en duur van bouprojekte. Die data is ontleed met behulp van beskrywende (persentasies) en inferensiële metodes. Die resultate het getoon dat die persentasie van koste-oorskryding gewissel het van ’n minimum van 5.56% met 90% projekvoltooiing, en binne 88% van die beraamde tydslimiet, tot ’n maksimum van 216.08% met net 5% projekvoltooiing, en binne 8.3% van die beraamde tydslimiet. Die hele projek het ’n gemiddelde koste-oorskryding van 44.46% met ’n gemiddelde projekvoltooiing van 52.4%, en binne 91.4% van die gemiddelde geskatte tydslimiet gehad. Op grond van hierdie bevindinge, kan daar afgelei word dat deurlopende ondersoek en ontleding van koste-oorskryding by stadiums van bouprojekte professionele persone sal aanmoedig om die beste versagtingsmaatreëls toe te pas, ten einde ’n aansienlike vermindering in die totale koste-oorskryding op die voltooiing van ’n projek te bereik. Professionele konstruksiemense moet goed ingelig wees van hierdie gevolge (koste-oorskryding) op ’n vroeë stadium, ten einde die mate waartoe hierdie gevolge geminimaliseer kan word te evalueer.Sleutelwoorde: Beraamde koste, bouprojekte, koste-drempeloorskryding, Nigerië, werklike koste

1. IntroductionThe construction industry contributes to the socio-economic growth of any nation by improving the quality of life and providing infrastructures such as roads, hospitals, schools, and other basic facilities. Hence, it is imperative that construction projects be completed within the scheduled time, within the budgeted cost, and meet the anticipated quality. However, being a complex industry, it is faced with severe problems of cost overruns (Abdul-Rahman, Memon & Abd Karim, 2013: 268). Cost overrun is a common problem in both the developed and the developing nations, making it difficult to complete many projects within budget. Being a common problem, Allahaim & Liu (2012: 2) reported that cost overruns were found across 20 nations and five continents. Cost overruns affect 90% of completed projects (Flyvbjerg, Holm & Buhl, 2004: 7; Memon, 2013: 1; Abdul-Rahman, Memon & Abd Karim, 2013: 268). However, the majority of developing countries experience overruns exceeding 100% of the initial budget (Memon, Abdul-Rahman, Zainun & Abd Karim, 2013: 1970). The argument in the construction industry on how to reduce or totally remove cost overruns from projects has been

Saidu & Shakantu • An investigation into cost overruns for ongoing ...

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ongoing among built-environment professionals, project owners, and users for the past 70 years (Apolat, Alinaitwe & Tindiwensi, 2010: 305; Allahaim & Liu, 2012: 1). There is, however, no substantial improvement or significant solution in mitigating its detrimental effects (Allahaim & Liu, 2012: 1).

Consequently, studies from different countries have revealed that cost overruns represent a large percentage of the production costs. For instance, 33.33% of the construction project owners in the United Kingdom are faced with the problem of cost overruns (Olawale & Sun, 2010: 511; Abdul-Rahman, Memon & Abd Karim, 2013: 268). The Big Dig Central Artery/Tunnel project in Boston could not be completed within its budgeted cost, and it had an overrun of 500%. The Wembley stadium in the United Kingdom had a 50% cost overrun, and the Scottish parliament project, which had a time overrun of over three years, also experienced a cost overrun of 900% (Love, Edward & Irani, 2011: 7).

Over the years, research interests in addressing construction cost overruns across the world have resulted in a large number of publications. However, research evidence has shown that previous studies from different parts of Nigeria have centred on the investigation into the total amount of cost overruns for completed works; identification of causes of cost overruns, as well as the control measures for mitigating cost overruns in the construction industry (Ogunsemi & Jagboro, 2006: 253; Olatunji, 2008: 1; Ameh, Soyingbe & Odusanmi, 2010: 51; Olawale & Sun, 2010: 511; Ubani, Okorocha & Emeribe, 2011: 74; Kasimu, 2012: 775; Malumfashi & Shuaibu, 2012: 21). Nonetheless, these studies have failed to objectively investigate cost overrun for ongoing building projects in Nigeria. Therefore, this led to the development of the problem posed in this study that data on the amount of cost overruns for ongoing building projects are minimal in the Nigerian construction industry. On this basis, this article reports the findings of an objective investigation into cost overruns for ongoing building projects in Abuja, Nigeria. The recommendations of this paper, if properly implemented, would achieve the best value for money to the client, as it would encourage professionals to explore possible ways of minimising the rate of cost overrun on site.

2. Literature review

2.1 The concept of cost overrun in the construction industry

Cost overrun is referred to as “cost increase” or “budget overrun”. It involves unanticipated costs incurred in excess of the budgeted amounts (Shanmugapriya & Subramanian, 2013: 735). Saidu &


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Shakantu (2016: 125) view cost overrun as simply an occurrence, where the final or actual cost of a project surpasses the original or initial estimates. Cost overrun is defined as a percentage difference between the final completion cost and the contract-bid cost (Shanmugapriya & Subramanian, 2013: 735; Shrestha, Burns & Shields, 2013: 2; Saidu & Shakantu, 2016: 125). Cost overrun has also been referred to as the percentage of actual or final costs above the estimated or tender cost of a project (Ubani et al., 2011: 74). Nega (2008: 48) defines cost overrun as an occurrence, in which the delivery of contracted goods/services is claimed to require more financial resources than was originally agreed upon between a project sponsor and a contractor.

2.2 Cost overruns worldwide

The history of the construction industry worldwide abounds in projects that were completed with a significant amount of cost overrun, despite the use of modern technologies and software packages (Memon, 2013: 16). In the United States of America, only 16% of the 8 000 surveyed projects in 1994 could satisfy the following requirements: timely completion within the budget, and maintaining a high standard of quality (Ameh et al., 2010: 51). In Canada, 50 road-construction projects were investigated, and the results revealed a cost overrun of up to 82% in 2006 (Odeck, 2014: 71).

Cost overruns were slightly lower in Europe compared to North America and other geographical areas (Brunes & Lind, 2014: 3). In the United Kingdom, Barrick revealed, in 1995, that almost one-third of the clients complained that their construction projects generally overran budget (Memon, 2013: 16).

Cantarelli, VanWee, Molin & Flyvbjerg (2012: 87) noted that the Dutch construction projects were reported to have an average cost overrun of 10.6% for railways, 18.6% for roads, and 21.7% for fixed links. In Portugal, construction projects face, on average, a minimum of 12% of cost overrun (Abdul-Rahman, Memon, Abdul-Azis & Abdullah, 2013: 1964). These results of cost overruns are not different in the developing countries.

In Bosnia and Herzegovina, Abdul-Rahman, Memon & Abd Karim (2013: 288) reported that, in a study of 53 building projects, 29 new construction projects experienced a cost overrun of 6.84% on average, while the remaining 24 re-construction projects had a cost overrun of 9.23% on average. In Pakistan, the minimum amount of cost overrun was reported to be approximately 10% for small-sized firms, 40% for large construction firms, and this percentage could


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increase to 60% for medium-sized firms (Azhar, Farooqui & Ahmed, 2008: 506). Aziz (2013: 54) surveyed 15 different projects in Kuwait, and the results revealed that only one project had been completed without a cost overrun. Aziz (2013: 52-53) also reported that 70% of the building projects in Oman experienced a delay and were completed with cost above the initially estimated budget.

Moreover, a study conducted on 359 projects (308 public and 51 private projects) in Malaysia revealed that only 46.8% and 37.2% of public sector and private sector projects, respectively, were completed within the budget, with an average cost deviation of 2.08% (Endut, Akintoye & Kolley, 2009: 244).

In Nigeria, Olawale & Sun (2010: 602) conducted a survey on cost overrun and found that 41% of the respondents had experienced a cost overrun of less than 10% of their projects, while 59% of the respondents had experienced a cost overrun of 10% or more on their projects.

In South Africa, Baloyi & Bekker (2011: 53) reported that the construction of FIFA 2010 World Cup stadia in different cities was completed with cost overruns ranging from 5% to a maximum of 94%.

In Uganda, Apolot, Alinaitwe & Tindiwensi (2011: 310) reviewed 30 projects of the Civil Aviation Authority of Uganda and found that 535 of the projects, although not fully completed, experienced cost overruns; 40% of these projects were within the budgeted cost, and 7% of the projects were still below the budget. A total of 84% of the cost overruns were occasioned by changes in the scope of the work, while the remainder were largely attributed to material-price inflation.

In Zambia, Kaliba, Muya & Mumba (2009: 523) revealed that road projects also faced over 50% of cost overruns as a result of delay and other factors.

2.3 Causes of cost overruns

The causes of cost overruns are critical to the success of any project (Allahaim & Liu, 2012: 2). Hence, it is imperative to comprehend the main causes of cost overruns for different projects. Therefore, cost overruns have been attributed to a number of sources, including technical errors in design or estimation; managerial incompetence; risks and uncertainties; suspicions of foul play; deception and delusion, and even corruption (Ahiaga-Dagbui & Smith, 2014: 683). According to Flyvbjerg, Holm & Buhl (2004: 7), the two main causes of cost overruns in a project are optimism bias (systematic tendency of decision-makers to be more positive about the results of planned


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action) and strategic misrepresentations (confusing or misleading actions to ensure that projects succeed). Allahaim & Liu (2012: 2) contend that the practical causes of cost overruns are the lack of experience among the project team; contract size/complexity, and design error. Other surveys have identified the following four major factors that cause cost overruns for a project: variations in design; insufficient project planning; inclement weather conditions, and building materials’ price fluctuation (Allahaim & Liu, 2012: 2). Love et al. (2011: 7) opined that design error at the pre-contract stage of a project is the major cause of cost overruns for hospital and school buildings.

In India, Subramani, Sruthi & Kavitha (2014: 1) surveyed the causes of cost overruns, and the results indicated that the major causes of cost overruns are slow decision-making at the planning stage of a project; poor project schedules and management; increases in the prices of materials and machines; poor contract management; poor design/delay in producing design; rework due to mistakes or wrong work; land-acquisition problems; poor estimation or estimation techniques, and the long time taken between the design and the time of bidding/tendering.

In Egypt, Aziz (2013: 51) examined the factors causing cost overruns in waste-water projects and concluded that the major causes of cost overruns are lowest tendering procurement method; additional works that are not included in the original work; bureaucracy in tendering or offering methods; wrong cost-estimation methods, and funding problems by client.

In Nigeria, Ameh et al. (2010: 49) concluded that the significant factors causing cost overruns in the telecommunication projects include the contractor’s lack of experience; the high cost of importing materials, and the materials’ price fluctuation. Kasimu (2012: 775) found that “fluctuations in materials prices”, “insufficient time”, “lack of experience in contracts works”, and “incomplete drawings” were the major causes of cost overruns in building-construction projects in Nigeria. Malumfashi & Shuaibu (2012: 19) conducted a study on the causes of cost overruns in the infrastructural projects in Nigeria. The results revealed that the major causes include “improper planning”; “material-price fluctuations”, and “inadequate finance from the project’s inception”.

In South Africa, Baloyi & Bekker (2011: 61) conducted a study on the causes of cost overruns for the 2010 FIFA World Cup stadia. The results revealed that the main causes of cost overruns are project complexity; increases in labour costs; inaccurate quantity estimations; differences


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between the selected bid and the consultants’ estimates; variation orders by clients during construction, and manpower shortage.

In Zambia, Kaliba et al. (2009: 524) concluded that the problem of cost overruns was caused by inclement weather conditions; changes in the size of projects; the cost of environmental sustainability; delays in the work programme; civil unrest; technical constraints, and increases in material prices.

Other studies have identified a variety of causes of cost overruns, including technical factors such as the lack of experience; the project size; errors in design; price fluctuations; wrong estimates, and scope changes (Love et al., 2011: 6; Memon et al., 2011: 59).

2.4 Mitigation measures for cost overruns

Project cost overrun is minimised and mitigated when maximum attention is paid to well-developed technical skills in modern projects (Doloi, 2013: 267). Olawale & Sun (2010: 513) noted that a critical investigation into cost overrun mitigation measures would result in their categorisation according to the broad function they perform. Thus, Olawale & Sun (2010: 513) identified the top five leading causes of cost overrun for a project and recommend a total of 90 mitigation measures for them. These mitigation measures were further categorised into four major classes, namely preventive, predictive, corrective, and organisational. Some of these measures (categories) are fluid and can sometimes appear as though they could be classified into more than one category, depending on their actual usage during the project. They include corrective-preventive and corrective-predictive measures.

Similarly, Abdul-Azis, Memon, Abdul Rahmann & Abd Karim (2013: 2627) identified and categorised cost overrun mitigation strategies into three major classes, namely proactive, reactive and organisational strategies. The proactive and organisational approaches are similar or almost the same as the preventive and organisational measures recommended by Olawale & Sun (2010: 513). The reactive strategies, however, are adopted to mitigate the effect of the factor that actively contributes to cost overruns, while the organisational strategies are the normal measures put in place by an organisation, which must not be specific to one project, but would normally affect all projects. Some of these measures are classified in more than one strategy. For instance, proactive and organisational; reactive and organisational; pro-active and reactive, as well as pro-active, reactive, and organisational-control measures. The issues in each control measure are detailed in Figure 1.


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Proactive-Organisational Measures

Proactive-Reactive-Organisational Measures

Pro-active Measures:

Pro-active-Re-active Measure:

Re-active Organisational Measures:

Re-active Measure: Organisational Measures:• Effective strategic planning• Project planning and

scheduling• Effective site management

and supervision• Systematic control

mechanism• Use of appropirate

construction methods

• Use of up-to-date technology

• Clear information and communication channels

• Pre-construction planning of project tasks and resources

• Frequent coordination between parties

• Human resource development in the construction industry

• Comprehensive contract administration

• Emphasis on past experience

• Use of experienced subcontractors and suppliers

• Improving contract award procedure by giving less weight to prices and more weight to the capabilities and past performance of contractors

• Frequent progess meetings

Figure 1: Cost overrun factors from each mitigation measureSource: Researcher’s construct adapted from Abdul-Azis et al., 2013

Flyvbjerg (2008: 6-7) suggested two main concepts for minimising the cost overruns on construction projects, namely reference-class forecasting and increased public sector accountability through more involvement by the private parties.

Brunes & Lind (2014: 5) suggested three key areas on how cost overruns could be reduced in a project:

decentralization of budgets, where cost overruns in one project in a region lead to less cost overruns in other projects in the specific region … It should be easy to see when and where cost overruns occur, and who was primarily responsible … ensuring a systematic use of external reviewers at the different stages of a project.

Peeters & Madauss (2008: 81) recommend a five-step approach to mitigating the effects of cost overruns in a project: realistic cost


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estimation; considering the project’s life-cycle cost; appropriate contractual framework; cost control and risk management during the project phase, and a communication-managed insurance approach. Memon et al. (2013: 1970) concluded that site-management factors are the important factors causing cost overrun. They thus suggest that improved site management and supervision of contractors could result in better control of cost overruns. In conclusion, the magnitude of the cost overrun was reduced after a mandatory quality assurance process was introduced in Norway (Magnussen & Olsson, 2006: 286).

3. Research methodologyThe mode of inquiry in this research is the quantitative method that is rooted in the positivist research paradigm, because the data were generated from the numeric measurement of the estimated costs of projects, estimated time and actual time for projects, estimated cost and actual costs of work completed, as well as the amount of cost overrun for each project.

The study covers “ongoing” building-construction projects in Abuja, the Federal Capital Territory of Nigeria, from which a sample of 30 projects was selected. The sample comprised both public and private projects, with a value of 1.6 billion Naira/ZAR100 million and above, using purposive sampling techniques. The rationale for the selection of purposive sampling is that building-construction projects of ZAR100 million and above are likely to generate a huge amount of cost overruns, when compared with projects of less value. In addition, it is possible to have more experts (experienced professionals) than in smaller sized/lower valued projects.

Abuja was selected as the geographical case-study area, because it is one of the metropolitan cities in Nigeria with the highest population of professionals within the built environment, and many ongoing construction projects. This study focused mainly on the primary data, which included the archival records and project progress records in Abuja, Nigeria.

3.1 Projects’ archival and progress records

The data on Estimated Cost of project (EC), Estimated Time for project (ET), Cost Now/actual cost (CN), and Time Now/actual time (TN), the percentage of the Work Completed (%ofWC), the Estimated Cost of the Work Completed (ECWC), and the Actual Cost of Work Completed (ACWC) for different projects were all collected from the


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archival records (bills of quantities, specifications, and drawings) and the project-progress records compiled by the Quantity Surveyor for individual projects. The collected values of “ACWC” were deducted/subtracted from the values of “ECWC” to determine the project’s cost overruns. The percentage amount of cost overrun for each project was determined by dividing the amount of cost overrun by the estimated cost of work completed and multiplied by 100.

3.2 Data analyses

Both descriptive and inferential analyses of the data were employed in this study. The descriptive analysis included the percentage distributions (percentage amount of cost overruns for each project). This included describing and comparing the percentages of cost overrun to the percentages of work completed for projects. The linear regression (inferential) analysis available from the Statistica software package was performed to determine the relationships between the following variables: Estimated Time (x) and Actual Time (y) of projects; Estimated cost (x) and Actual cost (y) of projects; Percentage of work completed (x) and amount of cost overruns (y), as shown in Table 2.

The results of this research are presented in tabular form.

The linear-regression equation was used to determine the relationship between the variables.

For a linear regression equation: y = a + bx, and x = a - yb ,

b = n∑xy - (∑x)(∑y)

n∑x2 - (∑x)2

Where “y” is the dependent variable (Volume of waste); “x” is the independent variable (volume of material used); “b” is the coefficient of “x” and “a” is a constant.

The approximate conversion rates used as at the period of data collection were: Nigerian Naira to US dollar = ₦200 = 1USD; Nigerian Naira to South African Rand = ₦16 = ZAR1.

For the purpose of anonymity, the names of the firms and the projects are not disclosed in this research, but are represented by project numbers.

4. Results and discussionIt is apparent from Table 1 that all the building projects visited had attained an average percentage completion of 52.4%. Approximately 15 out of the 30 projects were 50% completed and


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only seven were 90%-99.9% completed, because the constructions were ongoing as at the period of data collection. These findings are reliable, because the average percentage of project completion is above 50%.

Moreover, research results from Table 1 also show that the percentage amount of cost overruns ranges from a minimum of 5.56% up to 90% project completion, and within 88% of the estimated time limit. This rose to a maximum of 216.08% with merely 5% project completion, and within 8.3% of the estimated time limit. All the projects had an average cost overrun of 44.46%, with an average project completion of 52.4%, and within an average estimated time limit of 91.4%. These results confirm the findings of Flyvbjerg, Holm & Buhl (2004: 7); Ameh et al. (2010: 49-53); Memon (2013: 1-3), and Abdul-Rahman, Memon & Abd Karim (2013: 268) that cost overrun is a common problem in the construction industry, because a huge amount of cost overrun has been noticed in a project with merely 5% completion.

Table 1: The research data

Proj

ect N

o.

Estim

ated

Cos

t of

Proj

ect

in(₦)000

Estim

ated

Tim

e (Month)

Act

ual T

ime

(Mon

th)

Perc

enta

ge o

f wor

k co

mpl

eted

(%)

Estim

ated

cos

t of

wor

k co

mpl

eted

in

(₦)000

Act

ual c

ost o

f wor

k co

mpl

eted

in (₦

)000

Am

ount

of c

ost

over

run (₦)000

Perc

enta

ge a

mou

nt

of c

ost o

verru

n (%

)1 3,200,000 24 11 17% 544,000 800,000 256,000 47.06%

2 14,000,000 24 15 47% 6,580,000 8,540,000 1,960,000 29.79%

3 1,650,000 20 36 59% 973,500 1,155,000 181,500 18.64%

4 6,000,000 24 12 35% 2,100,000 2,400,000 300,000 14.29%

5 5,880,000 22.5 54 43% 2,528,400 3,609,400 1,081,000 42.75%

6 1,800,000 16 11 63% 1,134,000 1,632,321 498,321 43.94%

7 15,900,782 36 13 30% 4,770,235 5,678,313 908,079 19.04%

8 7, 300,000 24 32 30% 2,190,000 3,285,000 1,095,000 50.00%

9 1, 800,000 24 21 68% 1,224,000 1,681,100 457,100 37.35%

10 6, 000,000 24 16 23% 1,380,000 1,800,000 420,000 30.44%

11 1, 650,000 24 23 65% 1,072,500 1,451,300 378,800 35.32%

12 1, 900,000 18 9 25% 475,000 600,000 125,000 26.32%

13 2, 580,333 18 7 15% 387,050 5,805,745 193,525 50.00%


64

Proj

ect N

o.

Estim

ated

Cos

t of

Proj

ect

in(₦)000

Estim

ated

Tim

e (Month)

Act

ual T

ime

(Mon

th)

Perc

enta

ge o

f wor

k co

mpl

eted

(%)

Estim

ated

cos

t of

wor

k co

mpl

eted

in

(₦)000

Act

ual c

ost o

f wor

k co

mpl

eted

in (₦

)000

Am

ount

of c

ost

over

run (₦)000

Perc

enta

ge a

mou

nt

of c

ost o

verru

n (%

)

14 40,000,000 36 3 5% 2,000,000 6,321,562 4,321,562 216.08

15 20,940,557 48 19 17% 3,559,895 5,152,850 1,592,955 44.75%

16 3,450,000 24 11 23% 793,500 1,293,512 500,012 63.01%

17 1,666,346 18 8 31% 516,567 833,732 317,165 61.40%

18 2,300,000 24 10 25% 575,000 805,000 230,000 40.00%

19 2,300,000 24 21 90% 2,070000 2,185,000 115,000 5.56%

20 15,031,448 40 5 11% 1,653,459 1,935,632 282,173 17.07%

21 1,880,000 20 14 48% 902,400 1,534,000 631,600 69.70%

22 1,686,921 17 39 99.9% 1,670,052 3,100,000 1,429,949 85.62%

23 1,635,000 24 18 56% 944,693 1,265,324 320,631 33.94%

24 1,800,000 26 16 68% 1,224,000 1,364,562 140,562 11.48%

25 1,686,951 24 54 99.9% 1,670,082 2,700,000 1,029,918 61.67%

26 1,700,000 68 92 60% 1,020,000 1,360,000 340,000 33.33%

27 2,860,000 24 36 88% 2,516,800 3,162,831 646,031 25.67%

28 2,635,001 18 21 95% 2,503,251 2,985,333 482,082 19.27%

29 1,931,622 24 24 98% 1,892,989 2,161,313 268,324 14.18%

30 63,000,000 60 96 90% 56000,000 62,333,222 5,333,222 9.52%

Average = 27.25 24.90 52.4% ==24.9/ 27.25*100== ===91.4% Average cost

overrun= 44.46%

4.1 Regression analyses

The result of the linear-regression analysis for 52.4% average project completion reveals the following.

It was observed from analysis No. 1 (relationship between the ‘estimated time’ and the ‘actual time’ of projects) that the probability value (0.000355) was less than the 0.05 (5%) significance level, and an R-square value of 37.08%. Therefore, it is inferred that the relationship was statistically significant. The result implies that, on average, the actual completion times (months) for projects are moving in line with


65

the estimated times. This result differs for some individual projects, as further explained in Tables 3 and 5.

Analysis No. 2 (relationship between the ‘estimated cost of work completed’ and the ‘actual cost of work completed’) revealed a statistical significant relationship between the variables with a probability value of 0.00000 less than the 0.05 (5%) significance level, and a very strong R-square value of 98.9%. This implies that, on average, the ‘actual costs of work completed’ are in line with the ‘estimated costs of work completed’ for all the projects. However, this is different for some individual projects, as further explained in Table 1.

Analysis No. 3 (relationship between the ‘percentage of work completed’ and the ‘amount of cost overrun’) shows that the evidence is not statistically significant, because the probability value (0.854496) was greater than the 0.05 (5%) significance level. This implies that the ‘amount of cost overruns’ does not necessarily depend on the ‘percentage of the work completed’. In other words, cost overrun could occur at an early stage of a project with a small percentage of project completion. This result is further explained in Table 3.

Table 2: Results of the linear regression analyses

Sn

VariablesType of analysis

Observation Inference

x y R square

Adjusted R2 R P value Remarks

1Estimated

Time (Month)

Actual Time (Month)

Linear regression 37.08% 34.8% 0.6089 0.000355 Statistically

significant

2Estimated

cost of work completed

Actual cost of work

completed

Linear regression 98.9% 98.85% 0.994 0.000 Statistically

significant

3Percentage

of work completed

Amount of cost overrun

Linear regression 0.122% 0.021231 0.0349 0.854496 Not

significant

4.2 Building projects that have high cost overruns of 50% and above

Table 3 shows the results of the projects that have high cost overruns (50% and above). It is obvious from Table 3 that Pn14 recorded a maximum of 216.08% cost overrun with merely 5% completion, and


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within the first three months of the project commencement. This could not be as a result of delay, because the project was not delayed in any way, but could be occasioned by other factors such as mismanagement of resources, poor planning, or even corruption.

Both Pn22 and Pn25 had an additional 22 and 20 months, respectively, to attain 99.9% completion level. They recorded a cost overrun of 85.62% and 61.67%, respectively. These could have been as a result of extension of time and other related factors. However, Pn8, which was to be completed within 24 months, instead took an additional eight months, was only 30% completed, and had a cost overrun of 50%.

Table 3: Projects with high (50% and above) cost overruns

Project No. from Table 1

Estimated Time

Actual Time

(Month)

Difference in time

(Month)

Percentage of work

completed

Percentage of cost overrun

Pn8 24 32 +8 30% 50%

Pn13 18 9 -9 15% 50%

Pn14 36 3 -33 5% 216.08%

Pn16 24 11 -13 23% 63.01%

Pn17 18 8 -10 31% 61.40%

Pn21 20 14 -6 48% 69.70%

Pn22 17 39 +22 99.9% 85.62%

Pn25 24 54 +20 99.9% 61.67%

4.3 Building projects that have ‘low percentage of work completed’ and ‘high cost overruns’

It is apparent from Table 4 that Pn14 had the highest cost overrun (216.08%), and that only 5% of the work was completed within the first three months of the estimated 36 months. Moreover, both Pn1 and Pn15 had percentage completion of 17%. They were both within their estimated time limits (13 and 29 months left), but had cost overruns of 47.06% and 44.75%, respectively. Pn13, which had only 15% rate of completion had a cost overrun of up to 50%. This implies that, unless the management of the projects is tight, these projects can continue to overrun their initial budget.


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Table 4: Projects that have ‘low percentage of work completed’ and ‘high cost overruns’


Estimated Time

(Month)

Actual Time

(Month)

Difference in time

(Month)

Percentage of work

completed

Percentage of cost overrun

Pn15 48 19 +29 17% 44.75%

Pn14 36 3 +33 5% 216.08%

Pn1 24 11 +13 17% 47.06%

Pn13 18 7 +11 15% 50%

4.4 Building projects that have ‘high percentage of work completed’ and ‘low cost overruns’

It is clear from Table 5 that Pn25, which was 90% completed, had the lowest cost overrun of 5.56%, although the project had an extension of 30 months. This is followed by Pn30, which was 90% completed, had an extension of 33 months, and recorded a cost overrun of 9.25%. These percentage amounts of cost overrun could probably have been as a result of the extension of time and other related factors.

Moreover, Pn24 was 68% completed, had a cost overrun of 11.48%, and the project is still within its normal estimated time limit (10 months left). However, Pn29, which was almost completed (98%) within the estimated time limit, also had a cost overrun of 14.18%. Pn28, which had a cost overrun of 19.27%, had an additional three months’ extension to be completed at 95%. These results confirm the findings of Ameh et al. (2010: 49-53) who believed that the history of the construction industry worldwide abounds in projects that are completed with significant cost overruns. Despite the high percentage of work being completed, these projects still recorded low amounts of cost overruns between 5.56% and 19.25%.

Table 5: Projects that have ‘high percentage of work completed’ and ‘low cost overruns’


Estimated Time

Actual Time

Difference in time

Percentage of work

completedPercentage of cost overrun

Pn30 60 96 -36 90% 9.25%

Pn29 24 24 0 98% 14.18%

Pn28 18 21 -3 95% 19.27%

Pn24 26 16 +10 68% 11.48%

Pn25 24 54 -30 90% 5.56%


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5. Conclusion and recommendations Estimating the amount of cost overrun at different stages of a construction project is important, but the total amount of cost overrun can only be determined once a project is completed. The dearth of research that determines the amount of cost overruns for ongoing building projects necessitated this study. The aim of this research was to report the results of cost overruns for ongoing building projects in Abuja, Nigeria.

The relationship between the ‘estimated time’ and the ‘actual time’ and ‘estimated cost’ and the ‘actual cost’ of projects was statistically significant. The results imply that, on average, the actual completion times (months) and the actual cost for projects are moving in line with the estimated times and the estimated costs, respectively, although the results differ for some individual projects that recorded high cost overruns. Conversely, the relationship between the ‘percentage of work completed’ and the ‘amount of cost overrun’ was not statistically significant. This implies that the ‘amount of cost overruns’ does not necessarily depend on the ‘percentage level of the work completed’ to occur. In other words, cost overrun could occur at an early stage of a project with a small percentage of project completion.

The results also revealed that the percentage amount of cost overruns ranged from a minimum of 5.56% with 90% project completion, and within 88% of the estimated time limit, to a maximum of 216.08% with merely 5% project completion, and within 8.3% of the estimated time limit. The projects had an average cost overrun of 44.46%, with average project completion of 52.4%, and within the average estimated time limit of 91.4%.

The projects that had high cost overruns ranged from a minimum of 50% to a maximum of 216.08%. Similarly, the project that had high percentage completion and low cost overruns ranged from the minimum of 44.75% cost overrun, with 17% completion to a maximum of 216.08% cost overrun, with 5% completion. However, the projects that had a high percentage of completion time and low cost overruns ranged from a minimum of 5.56% cost overrun, with 90% completion to a maximum of 19.27% cost overrun, with 95% completion. Based on these findings, it can be concluded that continuous investigation and analyses of cost overruns at stages of building projects would encourage professionals to apply the best mitigation measures, in order to achieve a significant reduction in the total cost overrun upon completion of a project.


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It is recommended that construction professionals be well informed of these consequences at an early stage of a project, in order to enable them to evaluate the extent to which these consequences could be minimised.

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Abdul-Rahman, I., Memon, A.H. & Abd Karim, A.T. 2013. Significant factors causing cost overruns in large construction projects in Malaysia. Journal of Applied Sciences, 13(2), pp. 286-293. https://doi.org/10.3923/jas.2013.286.293

Abdul-Rahman, I., Memon, A.H., Abdul-Azis, A.A. & Abdullah, N.H. 2013. Modeling causes of cost overrun in large construction projects with Partial Least Square-SEM approach: Contractor’s perspective. Research Journal of Applied Sciences, Engineering and Technology, 5(6), pp. 1963-1972.

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Volhoubare fasiliteitsbestuur in winkelsentrums in Pretoria


AbstrakAlhoewel volhoubare fasiliteitsbestuur toenemend erkenning in ontwikkelende lande geniet en in veral nuwe geboue geïm plementeer word, is daar min inligting beskikbaar oor volhoubare praktyke in fasiliteits bestuur wat plaaslik in Suid-Afrika, en veral in Pretoria, toegepas word. In hierdie artikel word vyf belangrike gebiede vir volhoubare fasiliteitsbestuur in winkelsentrums ondersoek, naamlik ener-gieverbruik, watergebruik, mate riaal- en hulp-bronbestuur, interne omge wings kwaliteitbestuur en liggingsbestuur. Verder is daar vasgestel watter volhoubare fasi liteits bestuurstrategieë en -metodes tans op hierdie gebiede toegepas word asook watter persepsies by eiendomsbestuurders oor volhoubare fasiliteitsbestuur in winkelsentrums in Pretoria bestaan. Vir doeleindes van hierdie studie was alle winkelsentrums in Pretoria met ’n handels-oppervlakte van 10 000m² of groter geïden-tifiseer. ’n Totaal van 69 winkelsentrums het aan die vereiste minimum grootte voldoen. Vraelyste asook een-tot-een onderhoude met eiendoms- en sentrumbestuurders is gebruik om die toepassing van volhoubare fasiliteitsbestuur te karakteriseer. Waar die winkelsentrums deur die eienaars self bestuur word, is onderhoude ook met die eienaars gevoer.Voltooide vraelyste is van sowat ’n kwart van die totale steekproefpopulasie, verteenwoordigend van ’n verhuurbare oppervlakte van 765 835m2 en 1 663 winkels terug ontvang. Byna 90% van die respondente het aangedui dat die ‘eiendomsbestuurs’funksie intern uitge-voer word, teenoor meer as 94% wat die ‘fasiliteitsbestuurs’funksie intern bestuur.Daar is bevind dat volhoubare fasiliteits-bestuurspraktyke wel toegepas word in winkelsentrums in Pretoria, maar dat daar ’n duidelike voorkeur bestaan vir praktyke wat lei tot finansiële besparings, welke praktyke dan ook algemeen toegepas word. Praktyke wat bydra tot sosiale en omgewingsdoelwitte

Jaco van der Merwe, Bouwer Kleynhans & Chris Cloete

Mnr Jaco van der Merwe, MSc (Eiendomswese)-student, Departement Konstruksie-Ekonomie, Universiteit van Pretoria, Hillcrest, Pretoria, 0002, Suid-Afrika. Telefoon: +27 12 991 7305, e-pos: <[email protected]>Mnr Bouwer Kleynhans, Departement Konstruksie-Ekonomie, Universiteit van Pretoria, Hillcrest, Pretoria, 0002, Suid-Afrika. Telefoon: +27 12 420 2554, e-pos: <[email protected]>Prof. Chris Cloete, SACSC Leerstoel in Winkelsentrumstudies, Departement Konstruksie-Ekonomie, Universiteit van Pretoria, Hillcrest, Pretoria, 0002, Suid-Afrika. Telefoon: +27 12 420 4545, e-pos: <[email protected]>The authors declared no conflict of interest to this title or article.












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word tot ’n veel mindere mate toegepas, as gevolg van die persepsie dat sulke praktyke nie lei tot finansiële besparings of bydra tot die bestuur van die sentrums nie en dus as minder belangrik geag word.Trefwoorde: Volhoubare fasiliteitsbestuur; eiendomsbestuur; volhoubaarheids-kriteria; winkelsentrums.

AbstractAlthough sustainable facility management is increasingly gaining recognition in developing countries and is implemented in new buildings, in particular, hardly any information is available regarding sustainable practices in facility management that are applied locally in South Africa, and particularly in Pretoria. In this article, five key areas for sustainable facility management in shopping centres are investigated, namely energy consumption, water consumption, materials and resource management, internal environment quality management, and location management. This study also established which sustainable facility management strategies and methods are currently being applied and what perceptions property managers in shopping centres in Pretoria have regarding sustainable facility management.Questionnaires and one-on-one interviews with property managers and centre managers and owners were employed to obtain qualitative information such as the perceptions and knowledge of the respondents, as well as quantitative information such as quantities and percentages. The sample and data collected for the study are limited to shopping malls in Pretoria with a commercial area of 10 000m² or more, which yielded a total of 69 shopping centres.Completed questionnaires were returned by approximately a quarter of the total sample population, representing a lettable area of 765 835m2 and 1 663 stores. Nearly 90% of the respondents indicated that the ‘property’ management function is done internally, compared with over 94% that internally manage the ‘facility’ management function.It was found that sustainable facility management practices are being applied in shopping centres in Pretoria, but that there is a clear preference for widely applied practices that lead to financial savings. Practices that contribute to social and environmental objectives are applied to a much lesser extent, due to the perception that such practices do not result in financial savings or contribute to the management of the centres and are, therefore, regarded as less important.Keywords: Sustainable facilities management; property management; sustain-ability criteria; shopping centres.

1. Inleiding Suid-Afrika se kleinhandelsmark is die grootste in sub-Sahara Afrika en 20ste grootste ter wêreld. As gevolg van ongewone hoë ekonomiese groei in die periode tussen 2006 en 2007 het uitgebreide ontwikkeling van winkelsentrums in Suid-Afrika tussen 2007 en 2011 plaasgevind. Tydens hierdie periode is 43 nuwe sentrums met individuele vloeroppervlaktes van 30 000m2 en groter ontwikkel, teenoor die 30 sodanige sentrums wat tussen 1999 en 2007 ontwikkel is (Muller, 2011: 13). Volgens die Suid-Afrikaanse Raad vir Winkelsentrums/South African Council of Shopping Centres (SACSC) is daar tydens 2011 en

van der Merwe, Kleynhans & Cloete • Volhoubare fasiliteitsbestuur ...

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2012 ongeveer 530 nuwe winkelsentrums toegevoeg tot die reeds bestaande 1 899 winkelsentrums in Suid-Afrika. Die waarde van die totale kleinhandelseiendom in Suid-Afrika was geraam op R534 miljard in 2015, teenoor ’n waarde van R340 miljard in 2012 (PSCC, 2016). Met ’n totale beraamde handelsarea van ongeveer 23 miljoen m² is dit duidelik dat die impak van hierdie geboue op hul omgewing, asook die verbruik van water en elektrisiteit, wesenlik moet wees (SACSC, 2012: 3). Dit is inderdaad die geval. Die elektrisiteitsverbruik van ’n tipiese winkelsentrum beloop ongeveer 27 kWh per vierkante meter per maand (Visagie & Cloete, 2012), terwyl die waterverbruik sowat 100 liter per vierkante meter per maand is (Van Wyk, 2015). Dit impliseer dat die beraamde 23 miljoen vierkante meter van winkelsentrums in Suid-Afrika meer as 600 miljoen kWh elektrisiteit en 2 500 miljoen liter water per maand verbruik. Dit het uiteraard ’n aansienlike impak op die totale verbruik van skaars hulpbronne in die land. Die bestuur van hierdie hulpbronne in geboue is tipies die verantwoordelikheid van die eiendomsbestuurder en (veral in groter geboue en eiendomsportefeuljes) die fasiliteitsbestuurder.

Talle definisies van fasiliteitsbestuur kom in die literatuur voor (sien bv. Barrett, 1995: 167; Becker, 1990: 6; Finch, 1992: 196; Binder, 1988: ix; Owen, 1993; Park, 1994). Alhoewel daar klemverskille in die verskillende definisies voorkom, is die gemeenskaplike kenmerke van die definisies dat fasiliteitsbestuur streef na die optimale passing tussen mense en die bou-omgewing waarin mense werk, leef en speel (Cloete, 2002), deur die toepassing van ’n geïntegreerde benadering tot die instandhouding, verbetering en aanpassing van die geboue van ’n organisasie ten einde ’n omgewing te skep wat die primêre doelwitte van daardie organisasie sal ondersteun (Barrett, 1995: 167). Uiteraard oorvleuel hierdie rol met die rol van die eiendomsbestuurder met betrekking tot ’n aantal aspekte, maar die eiendomsbestuurder se rol word tipies gesien as meer omvattend as die rol van die fasiliteitsbestuurder. Hierdie artikel fokus op die rol van die fasiliteitsbestuurder met betrekking tot volhoubare fasiliteitsbestuur.

2. Volhoubare fasiliteitsbestuur Die proses om volhoubare fasiliteitsbestuursmetodes te implementeer, kan vereenvoudig word deur te konsentreer op die sleutelelemente wat wêreldwyd as basis dien vir die meeste sertifiseringsprogramme vir geboue (Hodges, 2009). Die vyf sleutelelemente van volhoubaarheid is energie, water, materiaal en hulpbronne, binnenshuise omgewing, en ligging. Binne hierdie vyf sleutelelemente kan veelvuldige inisiatiewe en metodes deur fasiliteitsbestuurders geïmplementeer word ten einde ’n volhoubare fasiliteitsbestuursprogram te ontwikkel.


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2.1 Die vyf sleutelelemente van volhoubaarheid

2.1.1 Energieverbruik

Die mees algemene sigbare teiken vir volhoubare praktyke is besparing van energie en die meer effektiewe gebruik daarvan. Hierdie aspek het die afgelope aantal jare toenemend belangrik geword in Suid-Afrika as gevolg van die steeds stygende koste van elektrisiteit en die verreikende impak van kragonderbrekings op verskillende terreine, insluitende winkelsentrums.

In ’n tipiese groot lugverkoelde gebou kan die koste van energie sowat 40% van die totale bedryfskoste uitmaak. As die gebou swak ontwerp is of swak bestuur word, kan hierdie persentasie selfs hoër wees. Sowat 40% van die energie word vir beligting en ’n verdere 40% vir lugversorging gebruik (Cloete, 2015).

Benewens die kritiese ontleding van elektrisiteitstariewe, die beperking van die maksimum aanvraag en die toepassing van kragfaktorkorreksie, is daar vier hoofareas waarop gefokus moet word om meer effektiewe energieverbruik in geboue te implementeer, naamlik die skedulering van toerustinggebruik, foutiewe sensors, gelyktydige verhitting en verkoeling, en buitelugverbruik (Doonan, 2011).

Na aanleiding van ’n aantal bestaande gevallestudies kom Ramesh, Prakash & Shukla (2010) tot die gevolgtrekking dat ’n gebou 80-90% van die totale lewensiklus-energieverbruik1 tydens die ‘bedryfsfase’2

1 Die lewensiklus-energie-analise is ’n ontleding wat rekeningskap gee van alle fases van energieverbruik in ’n gebou se lewensiklus. Die bestudering van ’n lewensiklus-energie-analise help om die energievloei van geboue te kwantifiseer en te evalueer sodat strategieë ontwikkel kan word om energieverbruik te kan beperk. Aangesien geboue energie direk of indirek gebruik gedurende hul bestaan, is dit nodig om ’n ontleding te doen vanuit die oogpunt van ’n lewensiklus. Die drie fases in die lewensiklus van ’n gebou word onderskei as die konstruksiefase, die bedryfsfase en die slopingsfase (Ramesh e.a., 2010: 1593). Fasiliteitsbestuurders is tipies gemoeid met die bedryfsfase.

2 Operasionele energie verwys na die energie wat benodig word om daaglikse instandhouding te doen en die gemaksomstandighede in die gebou te handhaaf. Dit behels energie wat gebruik word vir die hitte, ventilasie en lugversorgingstelsel, warm water, verligting, sekuriteit en die werking van alle masjinerie en toebehore in die gebou. Eksterne klimaatsomstandighede en tot watter mate die temperatuur in verskillende dele van ’n gebou gehandhaaf word, het ’n beduidende invloed op die energieverbruik. Die slopingsfase van ’n gebou — wanneer ’n gebou aan die einde van sy leeftyd afgebreek en die afvalmateriaal weggery en soms ook herwin word — verbruik ook energie. Die som van al dié energie in die onderskeie stadiums van ’n gebou se leeftyd is die gebou se lewensiklusenergie.


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en slegs 10-20% ‘vergestalte energie’3 verbruik in die konstruksie- en instandhoudingsfases. Sowat 1% of minder van ’n gebou se lewensiklus-energie word verbruik om die gebou te sloop (Ramesh e.a., 2010: 1594). Hieruit kan afgelei word dat die ‘bedryfsfase’ die belangrikste fase is om strategieë en prosesse te implementeer om energieverbuik te bespaar aangesien ’n gebou tydens hierdie fase die meeste van sy energie verbruik.

2.1.2 Watergebruik

Water is ’n beperkte hulpbron. Slegs 3% van die aarde se water is vars water en slegs ’n klein persentasie hiervan is vir watertoevoerbehoeftes geskik. Waterbronne word maklik beïnvloed deur besoedeling en klimaatsveranderinge en, namate die aarde se bevolking toeneem, neem die vraag na vars water vinnig toe (Cosaboon, 2010: 8; Turton, 2016).

Die primêre waterverbruik in geboue behels binnenshuise water, verwerkte water en water vir besproeiing.

Binnenshuise watergebruik sluit kombuise, ruskamers, badkamers, drinkwaterpunte, water vir skoonmaakdienste en wasmasjiene in. Volhoubare praktyke wat binnenshuise waterverbruik kan verminder, vereis dat loodgieterwerke, pype en krane wat waterbesparing bevorder en meer doeltreffend is, geïnstalleer en gebruik word. In badkamers kan meer doeltreffende toilette met lae-spoel stelsels en waterlose urinale gebruik word. Outomatiese kraansisteme voorkom dat krane nie oop gelos word nie en lae-vloei stortkoppe beperk oortollige gebruik.

In kombuise verminder verlugtingskoppelings (aerator) waterspat en die hoeveelheid water wat verbruik word. Behalwe water-besparingstoebehore bestaan die moontlikheid ook om nie-drinkbare gryswater te hergebruik vir onder andere die spoel van toilette en besproeiing van tuine. Verdere volhoubare waterbestuurspraktyke wat toegepas kan word, sluit in die deeglike isolasie van pypleidings, waterherwinningstelsels in geboue, reënwaterherwinning, die

3 Energie wat gebruik word in die konstruksiefase van geboue, word beskryf as vergestalte energie en behels alle energie wat verbruik word in die konstruksie van die gebou. Vergestalte energie kan verder verdeel word in aanvanklike vergestalte energie en herhalende vergestalte energie. Aanvankilke vergestalte energie is die energie-inhoud van die materiale, tegniese installasies en oprigting van die gebou, asook die vervoer van die materiale en tegniese installasies. Herhalende vergestalte energie behels die energie-inhoud van die verskillende materiale in ’n gebou wat gereeld gediens, onderhou en vervang moet word gedurende die lewensiklus van die gebou, asook die energieverbruik betrokke by die jaarlikse instandhouding (Ramesh e.a., 2010: 1593).


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gebruik van (inheemse) plante met lae waterbehoeftes, deeglike personeelopleiding, en wasgoeddienste.

Strategieë vir waterbesparing kom tipies in vier kategorieë voor, naamlik doeltreffende gebruik van drinkbare water deur beter ontwerp, tegnologie en instandhouding, opvangs van gryswater en gebruik daarvan vir besproeiing, opvangs en gebruik van stormwater, en die gebruik van herwonne water.

Toepassing van hierdie strategieë kan binnenshuise watergebruik met meer as 30% verminder en meer as 50% van watergebruik in tuine bespaar (Cosaboon, 2010: 8; Pereira, Cordery & Iacovides, 2009).

2.1.3 Materiaal- en hulpbronbestuur

Regulering van die in- en uitvloei van materiale en produkte wat in geboue verbruik word, is van die mees effektiewe metodes om die impak op die omgewing te beperk. Programme wat voorskryf dat slegs omgewingsvriendelike produkte in fasiliteite gebruik mag word en die afval en herwinning van produkte aanspreek, kan tot ’n groot mate ’n positiewe invloed hê op volhoubare gebruik van produkte en afval wat deur geboue gegenereer word.

Die primêre doel van ’n volhoubare skoonmaakprogram is om die impak van die skoonmaakproses op die natuurlike omgewing en gebou te verminder, sonder dat dit ’n negatiewe effek op menslike gesondheid sal hê. Die gebruik van omgewingsvriendelike of groen skoonmaakmiddels en produkte, is ’n goeie begin vir meer volhoubare skoonmaakpraktyke. Hierdie praktyke kan egter uitgebrei word deur gebruik te maak van omgewingsvriendelike gereedskap, toerusting en papiermateriaal. Volhoubare skoonmaakdienste behels nie net die tipe produkte en materiaal wat verbruik word nie, maar sluit ook aspekte in soos beter gesondheid en veiligheidsregulasies vir die personeel wat verantwoordelik is vir skoonmaakdienste en die inwoners van die gebou. ’n Deeglike groen skoonmaakprogram behoort nie net omgewingsfaktore in te sluit nie, maar ook sosio-ekonomiese aspekte in ag te neem (Corbett-Shramo, 2011: 7).

Deur middel van verbeterde skoonmaaktoerusting word minder chemikalieë in die skoonmaakproses gebruik en kan slytasie op matte en ander vloerbedekking verminder word. Verbeterde toerusting stel skoonmakers minder bloot aan gevaarlike chemikalieë en verbeterde ontwerpe van toerusting kan die inspanning op sekere liggaamsdele van die gebruiker daarvan, verminder. Skoonmaaktoerusting met minder geraasvlakke maak dit moontlik dat skoonmaakdienste gedurende die dag kan geskied. Die


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kansellering van skoonmaakdienste wat snags werksaam is, dra ook by tot verbeterde sosio-ekonomiese toestande (Corbett-Shramo, 2011: 17).

2.1.4 Interne omgewingskwaliteitbestuur

Aangesien huurders die meeste van hul tyd binne ’n winkelsentrum deurbring, kan die kwaliteit van die binnenshuise omgewing ’n groot invloed op produktiwiteit hê en ook huurders se kwaliteit van lewe en gesondheid beïnvloed. Sleutelaspekte wat omgewingskwaliteit beïnvloed, sluit onder meer in luggehalte en die insluiting van buitelug in die ventilasiesisteem, die beheer en toelaatbaarheid van rook in ’n gebou, die gebruik van chemikalië en van groen skoonmaaktegnieke (Hodges, 2009: 12). Verskeie studies (sien bv. Edwards & Naboni, 2013; Kibert, 2016) dui ook op die positiewe invloed wat goeie ligkwaliteit en die gebruik van natuurlike lig op produktiwiteit het. Die korrekte gebruik en bestuur van lig dra by tot ’n meer omgewingsvriendelike en produktiewe werksomgewing.

2.1.5 Liggingsbestuur

Alhoewel die fasiliteitsbestuurder nie beheer het oor die fisiese ligging van die fasiliteite wat hulle bestuur nie, is daar tog sekere aspekte rakende ligging waar die fasiliteitsbestuurder volhoubare praktyke kan toepas. Fasiliteitsbestuurders kan wel ’n invloed hê op die energie- en diensteverbruik van ’n perseel en die produktiwiteit van die okkupeerders. Energiebesparingstrategieë van toepassing op ’n gebou se ligging behels die gebruik van afstandswerk (persone word toegelaat om van hul huise af te werk) en werkers wat gebruik maak van openbare vervoerstelsels. Alhoewel openbare vervoerstelsels grotendeels die verantwoordelikheid van die plaaslike owerhede is, is toegang tot sodanige stelsels ’n faktor wat in ag geneem behoort te word wanneer die konstruksie van fasiliteite beplan word (Hodges, 2009: 12). Alternatiewe werkplekstrategieë is nie ’n baie praktiese maatreël om in ’n winkelsentrumopset toe te pas nie, aangesien meeste werkers se dag-tot-dag aktiwiteite fisiese teenwoordigheid by hul werkplek vereis. Die implementering van meer effektiewe werksvloei of meganisering van sekere funksies kan moontlik die vermindering van personeel help bevorder, wat weer energieverbruik sal verminder. Die gebruik van voertuie met doeltreffender energie- en brandstofverbruik by geboue lewer ook ’n bydrae tot die omgewing en bevorder volhoubare gebruik. Die gebruik van elektries-aangedrewe voertuie kan aangemoedig word deur die voorsiening van herlaaipunte by die winkelsentrum.


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2.2 Die rol en belangrikheid van volhoubare fasiliteitsbestuurspraktyke

Die potensiële bydrae van fasiliteitsbestuurders tot die bereiking van volhoubaarheidsdoelwitte is goed gedokumenteer (Wood, 2006; Shah, 2007). Die ontwikkeling van volhoubare fasiliteits-bestuurspraktyke is aangespoor deur die behoefte om ’n bydrae tot die vermindering van die impak van beboude omgewings op die omgewing te maak (Ikediashi, Ogunlana, Oladokun & Adewuyi, 2012). Die fasiliteitsbestuurder beskik oor die potensiaal, maar ook die verantwoordelikheid, om die impak van eiendomme op die omgewing te beperk. Deur toenemende omgewingsbewustheid en nuwe wetgewing wat hulpbron- en energieverbruik reguleer, toe te pas, kan fasiliteitsbestuurders ’n groot bydrae lewer tot die volhoubaarheidsagenda (Elmualim, Shockley, Valle, Ludlow & Shah, 2009: 58; Tippett, 2010; Yudelson, 2010).

In 2007 het die International Facility Management Association (IFMA) ondersoek ingestel na die belangrikste neigings wat fasiliteitsbestuurders na verwagting in die daaropvolgende paar jaar sou beïnvloed (IFMA, 2007). Volhoubaarheid, wat aspekte soos energiebestuur, groter omgewingsverantwoordelikheid, doeltreffende geboustelsels en binnenshuise lugkwaliteit insluit, is as ’n belangrike nuwe neiging geïdentifiseer. IFMA het inderdaad aanbeveel dat volhoubaarheid ’n fundamentele vereiste is wat in alle industrië vereis behoort te word.

In die toekoms sal dit ook van fasiliteitsbestuurders verwag word om kennis te dra van graderingstelsels soos LEED (Leadership in Energy & Environmental Design), ENERGY STAR en “Green Star” Suid-Afrika asook van ander inisiatiewe wat volhoubaarheid bevorder. Fasiliteitsbestuurders sal toenemend oor die vermoë moet beskik om volhoubaarheid te kan bestuur sodat dit ’n verskil sal maak aan die opbrengs en waarde van geboue as beleggings. Programme om gebruik te verminder en om hergebruik en herwinning aan te moedig, sal ontwikkel moet word en bestuurders sal bykomende tegniese vaardighede en kennis moet bekom vir die toepassing van hierdie stelsels (IFMA, 2007; vgl. ook Appleby, 2013; Muldavin, 2008; Then & Hee, 2013; Wilkinson, Sayce & Christensen, 2015).

Volgens Elmualim e.a. (2009) bestaan daar ’n aantal tekortkominge in die huidige fasiliteitsbestuursbedryf en ’n aantal hindernisse wat verhoed dat volhoubare praktyke ten volle geïmplementeer word. Eerstens is daar ’n tekort aan professionele en wetenskaplike opleiding van die arbeidsmag in die fasiliteitsbestuursbedryf. Tweedens beskik fasiliteitsbestuurders dikwels nie oor genoegsame


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kennis oor volhoubaarheid en vaardighede om gewenste praktyke te implementeer nie. Derdens is die volhoubaarheidsagenda en tendense wat meer fokus op die omgewing plaas ’n relatiewe nuwe verskynsel in die bedryf, met ’n gevolglike tekort aan ervaring van nuwe volhoubare praktyke (Elmualim e.a., 2009).

Alhoewel volhoubare fasiliteitsbestuur in ontwikkelende lande toenemend aandag kry en veral in nuwe geboue geïmplementeer word, is daar min inligting beskikbaar oor volhoubare fasiliteits-bestuurspraktyke wat plaaslik toegepas word. In die huidige ondersoek is ’n aantal volhoubare fasiliteitsbestuurstrategieë en -metodes in winkelsentrums in Pretoria geïdentifiseer wat as die mees effektiewe en doeltreffende beskou word. Verder is daar bepaal watter volhoubare fasiliteitsbestuurstrategieë en -metodes tans toegepas word asook watter persepsies by eiendomsbestuurders oor volhoubare fasiliteitsbestuur in winkelsentrums in Pretoria bestaan.

3. Metodologie Die opinies van bestuurders van winkelsentrums in Pretoria met betrekking tot die omvang en toepassing van volhoubare fasiliteitsbestuurspraktyke is getoets deur middel van vraelyste asook een-tot-een onderhoude. Waar die winkelsentrums deur die eienaars self bestuur word, is onderhoude ook met die eienaars gevoer. Die vraelyste is so gestruktureer dat kwalitatiewe inligting (soos die persepsies en kennis van die respondente) sowel as kwantitatiewe inligting ingewin is.

Die vraelys het bestaan uit 20 vrae. Benewens inligting oor die winkelsentrum self en die aard van die fasiliteitsbestuurskontrakte, is bepaal of volhoubare praktyke volgens die opinies van die bestuurders toegepas word by die sentrums. Indien wel, is bepaal waarom die praktyke toegepas word asook tot watter mate bestuurspraktyke toegepas word ten opsigte van die vyf sleutelelemente van volhoubaarheid, te wete energie, water, materiaal en hulpbronne, binnenshuise omgewing, en ligging. Die mates van toepassing is bepaal deur middel van ’n 5-punt Likert-skaal.

Die vrae in die vraelyste en onderhoude was daarop gemik om die volgende aspekte te bepaal:

• Die huidige kennis van fasiliteitsbestuurders oor volhoubare fasiliteitsbestuur.

• Watter volhoubare fasiliteitsbestuursmetodes geïmplemen-teer word.


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• Die redes vir die implementering van die volhoubare fasi li teitsbestuursmetodes.

• Die redes waarom volhoubare fasiliteitsbestuursmetodes nie geïmplementeer word nie.

• Die invloed van volhoubare fasiliteitsbestuurstegnieke op die bestuur en instandhouding van die eiendomme.

• Persepsies en sieninge oor volhou bare fa sili teits be stuurs metodes.

• Faktore wat die implementering of nie-implementering van volhoubare fasiliteitsbestuursmetodes beïnvloed.

• Die invloed wat volhoubare fasiliteitsbestuur op die waarde of omset van die eiendom het.

3.1 Steekproef opname metode

Tshwane het die hoogste formele winkelsentrum digtheid van alle Suid-Afrikaanse stede, met 955m2 formele kleinhandeloppervlakte per 1 000 persone (Broll, 2016).

Winkelsentrums in die Pretoria-omgewing met ’n handelsoppervlak groter as 10 000m2 is vir hierdie studie geïdentifiseer, aangesien ’n groter waarskynlikheid bestaan dat hierdie sentrums van volhoubare fasileitsbestuurspraktyke gebruik maak. Kleiner sentrums (tipies buurtsentrums) is nie in die ondersoek ingesluit nie.

3.2 Ondersoekgrootte

Uit die totaal van 178 winkelsentrums in Pretoria, is die ondersoek beperk tot die 68 winkelsentrums in Pretoria wat aan die minimum handelsoppervlakte van 10 000m² voldoen het, met ander woorde sentrums wat tipies as gemeenskapsentrums en groter geklassifiseer word.

3.3 Data insameling

’n Gestruktureerde vraelys is elektronies versprei via e-pos na die bestuur van die winkelsentrums. Waar terugvoering nie verkry is nie, is die belangrikheid van die navorsing aan die potensiële respondente per telefoon gekommunikeer in ’n poging om die reaksiekoers te verbeter. Die volhoubaarheidspraktyke wat opgesom is uit die tersaaklike literatuur het gelei tot die formulering van ’n vraelys wat bestaan uit twee dele, naamlik die respondent se profiel, en die vlak van belangrikheid van volhoubaarheidspraktyke wat in die winkelsentrums gevolg word. Om partydigheid van die respondente te verminder, is geslote-respons vrae verkies (Akintoye & Main,


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2007: 601). Aangesien die studie ook poog om vas te stel tot watter mate volhoubare fasiliteitsbestuurspraktyke toegepas word en watter persepsies hieroor bestaan, maak die vraelyste onder andere gebruik van die Likert-skaal. Die Likert-skaal is ’n graderingsmodel waar vrae beantwoord word volgens ’n skaal van 1 tot 5. Die stel van vrae op hierdie metode stel die navorser in staat om persepsies te toets en om vas te stel tot watter mate sekere tegnieke geïmplementeer word.

3.4 Terugvoer

’n Totaal van 17 voltooide vraelyste is terug ontvang, dit wil sê verteenwoordigend van sowat ’n kwart (24.6%) van die totale steekproefbevolking. Alhoewel teleurstellend, verteenwoordig die response verkry vanaf die 17 winkelsentrums wat aan die studie deelgeneem het, wel 765 835m2 handelsoppervlak en 1 663 winkels. Volgens Moyo & Crafford (2010: 68), wissel die reaksiekoers in kontemporêre bou-omgewingopnames tipies tussen 7% en 40%, terwyl die gemiddelde reaksiekoers vir studies wat data versamel van organisasies, 35.7% is met ’n standaardafwyking van 18.8% (Baruch & Holtum, 2008).

Die 17 voltooide vraelyste uit ’n bevolking van 68 wys op ’n betroubaarheidsvlak van 95% met ’n foutmarge van net minder as 20% (Survey Monkey, 2017).

3.5 Data analise en interpretasie van die resultate

’n 5-punt Likert-skaal is gebruik om die menings van die respondente te verkry en om die resultate te ontleed. Likert-tipe of frekwensieskale gebruik vaste keuse responsformaat en is ontwerp om houdings of menings te meet (Burns & Grove, 1997; Page & Meyer, 2000). Hierdie ordinale skale meet vlakke van ooreenkoms/verskil. Vir die doel van ontleding en vertolking, is die volgende skaal gebruik met betrekking tot gemiddelde tellings waar 1 is nie belangrik (> 1.0 & ≤ 1.8), 2 redelik belangrik (> 1.8 & ≤ 2.6), 3 belangrik (> 2.6 & ≤ 3.4), 4 baie belangrik (> 3.4 & ≤ 4.2), en 5 uiters belangrik (> 4.2 & ≤ 5.0). “Geen” het “nie gereageer het op die vraag” aangedui. Die “geen” antwoorde is nie in ag geneem by die berekening van die gemiddelde nie. In ooreenstemming met Vagias (2006), is die 5-punt skaal gebruik om reaksies te anker, en nie ’n 4-punt of 7-punt skaal nie.

3.6 Beperkinge

Die steekproef is beperk tot winkelsentrums in Pretoria. Aangesien daar sowat 2 000 winkelsentrums landswyd bestaan met ’n totale handelsoppervlak van sowat 23 miljoen m2 (Broll, 2016), behels


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hierdie monster slegs sowat 3.5% van die totale grootte van winkelsentrums landswyd.4

4. Ontleding van dataDaar is eerstens bepaal of die eiendoms bestuursfunksie asook die fasiliteitsbestuursfunksie intern uitgevoer word of uitgekontrakteer word. Bykans 90% (88.2%) van die respondente het aangedui dat die ‘eiendoms’bestuursfunksie intern gedoen word, teenoor 11.8% waar hierdie funksie uitgekontrakteer word. Daarteenoor het ’n totaal van 94.1% van die respondente aangedui dat die ‘fasiliteits’bestuursfunksie intern behartig word. Meer terugvoer is dus verkry vanaf respondente waar die fasiliteitsbestuursfunksie intern behartig word as vanaf winkelsentrums waar hierdie funksie uitgekontrakteer word. Moontlike redes hiervoor kan wees dat bestuurders van winkelsentrums waar die funksie intern behartig word ’n meer betrokke benadering tot die bestuur van hul eiendom het en dus moontlik ’n groter bewustheid het van die impak van hul gebou op die omgewing, terwyl kontrakteurs waarskynlik meer op die finansiële resultate van eiendomsbestuur fokus.

Tweedens is bepaal tot watter mate volhoubare fasiliteitsbestuur wel toegepas word. Analise van die vraelyste toon dat 82.4% van die respondente aangedui het dat daar reeds ’n volhoubare fasiliteitsbestuursbeleid in plek is en dat volhoubare praktyke wel toegepas word. ’n Totaal van 88.2% van die respondente het aangedui dat die fasiliteitsbestuurders daarna streef om volhoubare praktyke te implementeer en 76.5% het aangedui dat hulle volhoubare praktyke aan eienaars voorstel en bevorder as ’n diens waarby die eiendom kan baat. ’n Mens kan dus aflei dat die oorgrote meerderheid van respondente oor genoegsame kennis van volhoubare praktyke beskik. Verder kan daar afgelei word dat volhoubare praktyke wel toegepas word en dat die fasiliteitsbestuurders hierdie praktyke aanmoedig en bevorder.

Alhoewel die oorgrote meerderheid terugvoer op ’n hoë vlak van kennis oor volhoubare praktyke dui, is dit opmerklik dat daar nie ’n volhoubaarheidsoudit op die meerderheid (58.8%) van hierdie eiendomme onderneem is nie. Die twee hoofredes wat aangevoer was vir die uitvoer van ’n volhoubaarheidsoudit by respondente wat dit wel onderneem het, was dat dit die bedryfskoste help beperk en dat

4 Die opinies kan egter as heelwat meer verteenwoordigend van die winkelsentrums in Suid-Afrika beskou word, aangesien die eienaarskap en bestuur van groter winkelsentrums in die hande van ’n beperkte aantal rolspelers is - ’n totaal van slegs 31 bestuursmaatskappye is byvoorbeeld in die studie geïdentifiseer.


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respondente dit beskou as deel van hul sosiale verantwoordelikheid aan die gemeenskap. Daar is ook, in ’n mindere mate, aangedui dat ’n oudit onderneem is vir akkreditasiedoeleindes en om die reedsbestaande volhoubaarheidsbeleide en -strategieë te hersien.

Derdens is die omvang van toepassing van volhoubare praktyke in die belangrikste areas van fasiliteitsbestuur bepaal. Vyf sleutelareas van volhoubare fasiliteitsbestuur is geïdentifiseer, naamlik energieverbruik, waterverbruik, materiale- en hulpbronbestuur (insluitende afvalbestuur en hergebruik), interne omgewingsbestuur (bv. lugvloei en chemiese besoedeling), en liggingsbestuur (bv. openbare vervoer). Figuur 1 bied ’n opsomming van die mate van implementering van hierdie sleutelareas. Die verspreiding dui op die aantal respondente wat die betrokke praktyk gradeer as ’n 5 op ’n skaal van 1 tot 5 (waar vyf die hoogste mate van implementering aandui).

Energie-verbruik

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Figuur 1: Sleutelareas wat tot ’n omvattende mate toegepas word

Uit hierdie ontleding is dit duidelik dat die meeste respondente volhoubare bestuurspraktyke van materiale en hulpbronne toepas. Die moontlike redes hiervoor kan wees dat die implementering van


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beleide oor die tipe skoonmaakmiddels en ander materiaal wat gebruik word, asook die herwinning van afval, nie so kapitaal-intensief as die ander elemente is nie. Hierdie waarneming is in ooreenstemming met Corbett-Shramo (2011: 7) se bevinding dat volhoubare praktyke in verband met materiaal en hulpbronne van die doeltreffendste praktyke is om toe te pas. Dit is ook duidelik dat energieverbruik die tweede meeste deur respondente toegepas word, gevolg deur waterverbruik. Hierdie verskynsel kan waarskynlik toegeskryf word aan die stygende koste van energie en water en gepaardgaande kostes. Verder blyk binnenshuise omgewings- en liggingskwessies die mins belangrike aspek te wees vir respondente van hierdie studie.

Die mate van toepassing van ’n aantal spesifieke praktyke binne elkeen van hierdie sleutelareas is deur middel van die vraelyste bepaal. Verder is daar ook deur die vraelyste vasgestel wat die persepsies van respondente is ten opsigte van die belangrikheid van elkeen van die praktyke in elkeen van hierdie sleutelareas. Die respondente se persepsies word dan vergelyk met die mate van implementering van die onderskeie spesifieke praktyke.

4.1 Energieverbruik

Figuur 2 dui op die implementering van individuele fasiliteits-bestuurspraktyke in terme van energieverbruik teenoor die persepsie van die belangrikheid daarvan by respondente.

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Persepsie van belangrikheidImplementering deur respondente

Figuur 2: Volhoubare praktyke geïmplementeer in terme van energieverbruik en die persepsie van die belangrikheid daarvan


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Addisionele terugvoer van respondente dui daarop dat slim meting (“smart metering”) en deeglike maandelikse elektriese meterlesings by bykans alle winkelsentrums gedoen word. Betreffende energiebesparing, is die algemeenste praktyke die gebruik van energiebesparingsverligting en -gloeilampe, tydskakelaars, dag/nag-skakelaars en ge-outomatiseerde lugreëlingstelsels in die gemeenskaplike areas. Van die repondente het ook uitgelig dat hul sentrums ontwerp is sodat natuurlike lig en ventilasie in die wandelgange voldoende sal wees gedurende die dag. Slegs 11% van die respondente het aangedui dat daar van alternatiewe volhoubare energiebronne gebruik gemaak word. Moontlike redes vir die lae implementering van alternatiewe volhoubare energiebronne kan wees die hoë kapitale uitleg en die lang tydperk wat dit neem vir die kostebesparing om met die kapitale uitleg gelyk te breek (Elmualim e.a., 2009).

Die bestudering van hierdie vergelykende analises wys dat daar ’n verband bestaan tussen respondente se begrip van die belangrikheid van sekere volhoubare bestuurspraktyke en die implementering daarvan. Dit kan egter ook waargeneem word dat die toepassing van sekere praktyke die begrip van die belangrikheid daarvan vêr oorskry en in ander gevalle vêr tekort skiet. In Figuur 2 kan daar byvoorbeeld gesien word dat die gebruik van algemene energiebeparingspraktyke en elektrisiteitsmeting as belangrik beskou word en ook toegepas word. Die toepassing daarvan oorskry egter die persepsie van belangrikheid daarvan. Die gebruik van alternatiewe energiebronne word as die mins belangrike gesien en ook die minste toegepas, maar op ’n vlak heelwat laer as die persepsie van die belangrikheid daarvan. Dit kan ook hier opgemerk word dat die meting van elektrisiteit, wat as die tweede belangrikste bestuurspraktyk in hierdie verband gesien word, waarskynlik vir die meeste winkelsentrums ’n meer algemene praktyk is wat nie noodwendig aan volhoubaarheid gekoppel word nie en dus ’n baie hoë implementeringsfaktor het.

4.2 Water

’n Opsomming van die resultate verkry vanaf vraelyste in terme van die toepassing van spesifieke waterbesparingspraktyke asook respondente se persepsies hiervan word in Figuur 3 aangedui.


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Persepsie van belangrikheid

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Figuur 3: Mate waarin verskillende tipes volhoubare waterbesparingspraktyke in winkelsentrums geïmplementeer word teenoor respondente se persepsies van die belangrikheid daarvan.

Die herwinning van gryswater word deur respondente as die mins belangrike element gesien en is derhalwe besonder laag. Weereens is die koste teenoor die voordeel van die implementering hiervan ’n moontlike rede.

4.3 Materiale en hulpbronne

Figuur 4 dui aan hoe belangrik die verskillende komponente van materiale- en hulpbronverbruik geag word, asook tot watter mate bogenoemde praktyke by respondente voorkom.

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Implementering deurrespondente

Figuur 4: Implementering van volhoubare fasiliteitsbestuurspraktyke van materiale en hulpbronne teenoor die persepsie van die belangrikheid daarvan


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Bykans alle respondente (94.1%) het aangedui dat hulle herwinning in hul fasiliteitsbestuursproses toepas. Hierdie verskynsel kan waarskynlik toegeskryf word aan die oorvloed van herwinningsinligting in die media asook die beskikbaarheid van kontrakteurs wat herwinningsdienste gratis of vir ’n minimale fooi toepas. Die implementering van volhoubare konstruksiemetodes word veel minder geïmplementeer as die relatiewe belangrikheid daarvan. Hierdie verskynsel kan verklaar word in terme van die koste verbonde aan alternatiewe konstruksiemetodes.

Die relatiewe hoë opname van groen skoonmaakmiddels kan dui op die algemene beskikbaarheid van sodanige produkte wat ook koste-effektief is. Die hoë opname van hierdie drie klasse van materiaal- en hulpbronbestuursaspekte verduidelik die analise van hierdie klas van bestuurspraktyke wat in Figuur 1 as die hoogste aangedui word. Die lae koste asook die eenvoud van toepassing van hierdie bestuurspraktyke maak die hoë gebruik daarvan moontlik. Verder gaan hierdie praktyke nie gepaard met hoë kapitale uitleg nie en kan dit geïmplementeer word sonder groot verandering aan ’n sentrum se werkswyse en fasiliteite.

4.4 Binnenshuise omgewing

Die implementering van verskillende praktyke vir die volhoubare bestuur van die binnenshuise omgewing word in Figuur 5 aangedui.

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Implementering deurrespondente

Figuur 5: Mate en tipe van implementering van volhoubare fasiliteitsbestuurspraktyke in terme van binnenshuise omgewing teenoor die persepsie van die belangrikheid daarvan.


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Verreweg die meeste respondente het aangedui dat ’n toepaslike rookbeleid bestaan en toegepas word en dat chemiese middels verantwoordelik gebruik word, maar die implementering van groen skoonmaaktegnologie en bestuur van binnenshuise lugkwaliteit skiet heelwat tekort teenoor die persepsie van die belangrikheid daarvan.

4.5 Liggingsaspekte

Die implementering al dan nie van praktyke wat met liggingskwessies verband hou, word in Figuur 6 aangedui. Dieselfde tendens in terme van persepsie teenoor implementering wat by ander maatreëls opgemerk is, geld weereens in terme van liggingskwessies.

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Persepsie van belangrikheidImplementering deur respondente

Figuur 6: Implementering van volhoubare bestuurspraktyke met betrekking tot die ligging van winkelsentrums teenoor respondente se persepsies oor die belangrikheid daarvan

Ten spyte van die lae toegang tot publieke vervoerstelsels, bied slegs 17.6% van sentrums ’n pendeldiens vir werkers aan. Twee respondente meld egter dat van hul huurders sodanige dienste aan hul eie werkers bied. Die gebruik van energie-effektiewe voertuie deur fasiliteitsbestuurders is ook baie laag – slegs 5.9%. Een respondent het egter aangedui dat hul sekuriteit van Sedgway battery-aangedrewe voertuie gebruik maak. Die gebruik van sodanige voertuie is ook opgemerk by die fasiliteit van nog ’n respondent, alhoewel dit nie so op hul vraelys aangedui is nie. Die sekuriteit van hierdie respondent is egter uitgekontrakteer en vorm dus nie deel van hul interne fasiliteitsbestuurstrategie nie.

Uit die ontleding van die data kan dus afgelei word dat eiendoms-bestuurders nie aandag daaraan gee om inherente probleme in


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verband met die ligging van hul sentrums op te los nie en dat dit nie deur bestuurders as ’n belangrike kwessie gesien word nie. Hierdie persepsie kan toegeskryf word aan die kostes verbonde aan die verskaffing van vervoerdienste en meganisering van prosesse en word dus nie as koste-effektief of as ’n prioriteit gesien nie.

5. Bespreking van resultate en gevolgtrekkingsUit die data-ontleding kom dit na vore dat materiaal- en hulpbronnebestuur die meeste in winkelsentrums in Pretoria toegepas word, gevolg deur energiebesparings- en waterbesparingsmetodes. Respondente van hierdie studie gee die minste aandag aan volhoubare praktyke met betrekking tot die binnenshuise omgewing en liggingskwessies.

Uit ’n meer gedetailleerde ontleding van die onderskeie onderafdelings van elkeen van die bogenoemde kategorieë blyk dit dat die spesifieke metodes wat gebruik word om die onderskeie fasiliteitsbestuursdoelwitte te bereik, grootliks afhanklik is van die koste van implementering daarvan asook die moontlike kostebesparings wat aan elke strategie gekoppel is. Verder kan daar opgemerk word dat die bestaan van wetgewing wat sekere praktyke vereis, byvoorbeeld rookwette asook wette met betrekking tot die gebruik en verwydering van chemikalieë, die implementering daarvan drasties verhoog. Baie aandag word gegee aan die meting en besparing van elektrisiteit as gevolg van die stygende kostes van munisipale dienste. Respondente meet dan ook elektrisiteit om sodoende die koste direk aan spesifieke huurders toe te skryf en so te verhaal. Dit blyk uit die ontleding dat alternatiewe, volhoubare energiebronne vir respondente te duur is in terme van kapitale uitleg en dat die koste-voordeel daarvan nie die installering daarvan regverdig nie. Hierdie siening kan natuurlik in die toekoms verander as implementering van alternatiewe energiebronne goedkoper word. Dit dien verder gemeld te word dat die benutting van energie grotendeels die besluit van die huurder in die sentrum is, nie die sentrumbestuur nie. Die dryfveer vir meting is kosteverhaling, nie energiebesparing nie. As gevolg van die struktuur van sogenoemde driedubbele netto huurooreenkomste, is die sentrumbestuur tipies slegs geïntereseerd in die energieverbruik in openbare areas van die sentrum.

Waterbesparingstrategieë wat nie ’n groot kapitale uitleg verg nie, byvoorbeeld die implementering van lae-vloei koppelings aan krane, word redelik wyd geïmplementeer, in teenstelling met die


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gebruik van gryswatersisteme (wat ’n substansiële kapitale uitleg vereis) wat bykans glad nie geïmplementeer word nie.

Ontleding van die terugvoer vanaf respondente met betrekking tot hul persepsies van volhoubare fasiliteitsbestuurspraktyke het aangetoon dat respondente se persepsies oor die belangrikheid van sekere volhoubare praktyke ’n direkte invloed het op die implementering daarvan. Dit kan egter ook opgemerk word dat die toepassing van sekere bestuurspraktyke die relatiewe persepsie aangaande die belangrikheid daarvan ver oorskry. ’n Voorbeeld hiervan is die geval van elektrisiteitsbeparing en -meting wat op ’n vlak ver bo die belangrikheid daarvan geïmplementeer word. Hierteenoor is die gebruik van alternatiewe, volhoubare energiebronne baie laag, alhoewel dit as belangrik geag word. Hierdie tendens kan regdeur die verskillende klasse van volhoubare energiebronne opgemerk word en kan verduidelik word aan die hand van die redes wat respondente aanvoer vir die implementering van volhoubare praktyke al dan nie.

Die algemeenste redes wat respondente aanvoer vir die implementering van volhoubare praktyke blyk die vermindering van diensterekeninge en die verminderde verbruik van dienste te wees; hierdie twee aspekte loop hand aan hand. Etiese en sosiale kwessies blyk minder belangrik te wees. ’n Moontlike rede hiervoor kan wees dat daar tans nog nie voldoende erkenning aan volhoubare praktyke gegee word nie.

Figure 7 en 8 dien as bevestiging van die gevolgtrekking dat finansiële oorwegings die hoof beweegrede is vir die implementering al dan nie van volhoubare fasiliteitsbestuurspraktyke.


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Die meeste respondente het aangedui dat die kostebeperking van dienste, met ander woorde die winsmotief, as die belangrikste rede beskou word vir die implementering van volhoubare praktyke. Die beperking van verbruik en gepaardgaande beperking van


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kostes word as tweede belangrikste rede vir volhoubare praktyke aangevoer. In Figuur 8 word aangetoon dat aspekte soos sosiale verantwoordelikheid, etiese oorwegings en huurdervereistes as die mins belangrike redes beskou word vir die implementering van volhoubare praktyke. Dit blyk dus duidelik dat ekonomiese voordele, soos die verlaging van diensterekeninge soos elektrisiteit en water, steeds as die grootste motivering vir volhoubare praktyke beskou word. Soos in die bostaande figuur blyk, word finansiële beperking as die grootste rede vir die nie-implementering van volhoubare praktyke beskou. Verder is dit opmerklik dat die tweede grootste motivering vir nie-implementering die beskouiing is dat volhoubare praktyke nie bestuurskostes verminder nie.

Volgens die terugvoer van respondente kan daar afgelei word dat volhoubare fasiliteitsbestuurspraktyke wel in winkelsentrums in Pretoria toegepas word, maar dat daar ’n definitiewe voorkeur is in terme van praktyke wat finansiële besparings ten doel het, welke praktyke grootliks toegepas word. Praktyke wat tot sosiale en omgewingsdoelwitte bydra, word tot ’n mindere mate toegepas deur respondente, vanweë die persepsie dat dit nie tot finansiële doelwitte van die bestuur bydra nie en dus as minder belangrik geag word.

Alhoewel die studie aantoon dat sekere volhoubare eiendoms-bestuurspraktyke wel in winkelsentrums in Pretoria toegepas word, is dit duidelik dat daar nog baie ruimte vir verbetering is. Die Green Star SA – Existing Building Performance Tool wat einde 2013 deur die Green Building Council of South Africa (GBCSA) geloods is, poog om erkenning te gee aan reedsbestaande geboue wat volhoubare bestuurspraktyke implementeer. Dit sal in die toekoms duidelik word of die toepassing van hierdie maatstaf wel eiendomseienaars en -bestuurders sal aanmoedig om meer aandag aan alle aspekte van volhoubare fasiliteitsbestuur te skenk.

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Characteristics of the safety climate in teams with world-class safety performance on construction projects in South Africa


AbstractAccidents and incidents in the construction environment are not reduced or eliminated effectively, despite numerous efforts made to improve health and safety in the industry. An extensive field of research has been conducted on how teams in the construction environment interact to deliver a project successfully in terms of cost, quality and time. Previous research exists on how team dynamics interface with safety, but is found to be of different focus or markets than this study. This study aims to determine the characteristics of the safety climate that exists in construction teams in South Africa in terms of world-class safety performance, when compared to teams with poor safety performance. An adaptation of the modified safety pyramid (Zohar, 2010) provides a useful conceptual model to investigate the link between safety performance and safety climate related to construction teams. By combining observations from literature and predominantly adapting the Safety Climate Questionnaire (SCQ), a number of directly measurable factors are identified that can be correlated with safety performance and utilised in this investigation to identify the unique characteristics of safety climate in construction teams with world-class safety performance. The characteristics of the safety climate in construction teams were divided into eight groups, namely work pressure, incident investigation, adequacy of procedures, communication and training, relationships, personal protective equipment, spares, and safety. The framework developed in previous studies is used for assessing the responses of safety users to that of safety performance observations. It is found that relationships within an organisation are a major contributory factor

Douw Boshoff, Chris Krugell & Hennie van Heerden

Dr Douw (D.G.B.) Boshoff, Department of Construction Economics, University of Pretoria, South Campus, Pretoria 0002, South Africa. Phone:, +27 (12) 420 3781, email: <[email protected]>Mr Chris (J.C.) Krugell, University of Pretoria, Secunda 2302, South Africa. Phone: 084 556 3003, email: <[email protected]>Hennie (A.H.G) van Heerden, Department of Construction Economics, University of Pretoria, South Campus, Pretoria 0002, South Africa. Phone: 012 420 4150, email: <[email protected]>











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in safety performance, but also the way in which the safety climate is enforced in an inclusive management style through proper procedure, training and communication. This also supports the results of Cohen (1977). Keywords: Construction teams, safety climate

AbstrakOngelukke en voorvalle in die konstruksie-omgewing word nie verminder of effektief uitgeskakel nie, ten spyte van talle pogings wat reeds aangewend is om die gesondheid en veiligheid in die bedryf te verbeter. ’n Wye spektrum van navorsing is gedoen oor hoe die spandinamika in die konstruksie-omgewing werk om ’n projek suksesvol te voltooi ten opsigte van koste, kwaliteit en tyd. Vorige navorsing is ook gedoen oor die invloed van spandinamika op gesondheid, maar daar is gevind dat die fokus of mark op die studies verskillend was. Die doel van hierdie studie is om die eienskappe van die bestaande veiligheidsklimaat in konstruksiespanne in Suid-Afrika te bepaal in terme van wêreldklas veiligheidsprestasie, in vergelyking met spanne wat swak veiligheidsprestasie het. ’n Voorstelling van die gewysigde veiligheidspiramide (Zohar, 2010) verskaf ’n nuttige konsepmodel om sodoende die verband tussen veiligheidsprestasie en veiligheidsklimaat wat verwant kan wees aan konstruksiespanne, te ondersoek. Deur gewaarwordings van literatuur te kombineer met die hoofsaaklik aanpassende Veiligheidsklimaat Vraelys (VV) kan ’n aantal direk meetbare faktore geïdentifiseer word wat met veiligheidsprestasie gekorreleer word en in hierdie ondersoek gebruik word om unieke karaktereienskappe van veiligheidsklimaat in konstruksiespanne met wêreldklas veiligheidsprestasie te identifiseer. Die eienskappe van die veiligheidsklimaat in konstruksiespanne is in agt groepe verdeel, naamlik werkslading, voorvalondersoek, geskiktheid van prosedures, kommunikasie en opleiding, verhoudings, persoonlike beskermende toerusting, onderdele, en veiligheid. Die raamwerk wat ontwikkel was in vorige studies is gebruik vir assessering deur die terugvoering van veiligheidsgebruikers te vergelyk met fisiese veiligheidsprestasie-waarnemings. Die bevindings dui daarop dat verhoudings ’n groot bydraende faktor is tot veiligheidsprestasie, maar die manier waarop dit afgedwing word in ’n inklusiewe bestuurstyl deur middel van behoorlike prosedures, opleiding en kommunikasie speel ook ’n belangrike rol. Hierdie bevestig dan ook die resultate soos bevind deur Cohen (1977). Sleutelwoorde: Konstruksiespanne, veiligheidsklimaat

1. IntroductionThe construction industry started as early as 40 000 B.C. and is one of the oldest industries dating back to the start of civilisation. The first evidence of safety regulations was found to date back to 2 200 B.C., when king Hammurabi of Babylon passed a law stipulating penalties for houses collapsing and causing death and injury to the inhabitants (Pérezgonzález, 2005: 7).

Although the global trend of accidents has steadily decreased in recent years, due to the constant effort of industry (Hallowell, 2011: 203), the construction industry remains one of the most hazardous industries at present (Pinto, Nunes & Ribeiro, 2011: 216).

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The construction industry contributes to a sizeable portion of the majority of countries’ Gross Domestic Product (GDP). Zou & Sunindijo (2013: 605) state that the construction sector employs 7% of the world’s workforce, but contributes 30% to 40% of the global fatalities. According to the Global Construction Perspective and Oxford Economics (2011), the construction industry worldwide accounts for over 11% of the global GDP. Vilnius (2008) also states that more accidents occur on construction sites than in any other European economic sector. The construction industry has a unique characteristic when compared to other high-risk industries with small-scale accidents occurring at high frequency and from diverse hazard sources in construction (Hallowell, 2011).

When the South African construction industry is scrutinised, it is found that, since 2008, the industry contributed approximately 9% of the GDP and employed roughly 884 000 workers in the formal sector and a further 450 000 workers in the informal sector (CIDB, 2015). From this it is apparent that the construction industry significantly contributes to the local economy and provides the necessary infrastructure to sustain growth and social upliftment. Drever & Doyle (2012) estimated the overall United Kingdom construction workforce at roughly 1 994 746 and accounting approximately 10% of the GDP (Vilnius, 2008).

The South African construction industry is the third most hazardous and only exceeded by the agricultural and manufacturing sector with R287 million paid during 2013 alone (PWC, 2013). Construction injuries and fatalities are unacceptably high and seem to be on the increase, with 50 fatalities reported in 2011 and 80 fatalities reported in 2013 (Marx, 2014). A similar trend was observed in the Hong Kong construction industry, with an increase of 26.3% in fatalities for 2012 compared to the previous five-year average (HKSAR, Labour Department, 2013). This also seems to be the case with other leading countries, as indicated in Table 1.

Table 1: The status of construction safety management in leading countries

Country Description of the status of construction safety

United States

The census data from the U.S. Bureau of Labour Statistics (BLS) showed that a total of 774 workers died from injuries they suffered on construction sites in 2010, accounting for 16.5% of all industries. The fatality rate (9.8 per 100 000 full-time equivalent workers) ranked the fourth highest among all industries (BLS, 2010).

UnitedKingdom

One third of all workplace fatalities occurred on construction sites. It was a fatal injury rate over four times the average level of all industries and was the cause of the largest number of worker fatalities (Health and Safety Executive (HSE), 2009).


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Country Description of the status of construction safety

China The number of fatalities was 2 538 in the construction industry in 2007 (Zhou et al., 2008).

Australia There were 30 fatalities recorded in 2012. This number of fatalities equated to three deaths per 100 000 workers, which was the fourth highest fatality rate of all the industries.

Singapore There were 24 fatalities in the construction sector in 2006, which occupied 39% of the total 62 workplace fatalities (Ministry of Manpower, 2007).

Korea The construction sector occupied the highest percentage of fatalities among all sectors (Yi et al., 2012).

Source: Zou & Sunindijo, 2013

To ensure that the construction industry is sustained and expanded, it is crucial that safety be improved. In spite of safety statistics that seem bleak, the private sector, government and unions have shown their commitment in addressing the matter with the Construction Health and Safety Accord signed in August 2012 that aims to improve the status of health and safety in the construction industry (PWC, 2013).

Previously, the success of a construction project was measured by its performance in terms of cost, safety and quality, and safety should be added as a measure of performance (Smallwood & Haupt, 2005: 2). Identifying the characteristics of teams with world-class safety performance will be of tremendous assistance in this process.

Preliminary investigation suggests that, in some incidents in construction, accidents are not reduced or eliminated effectively, despite numerous efforts made to improve health and safety in the industry. Previous research has been conducted on understanding the team dynamics of role players in a construction project and their influence on health and safety that can potentially reduce the incidents of a construction project. However, this is different from this research in that the current study investigates the perception and performance of workers, rather than the perception of clients (Smallwood, Haupt & Musonda, 2009), clients and consultants (Kikwasi & Smallwood, 2016), as well as architects’ perceptions (Smallwood & Haupt, 2007). This research focuses on workers, in general, while previous research was gender based (English, Haupt & Smallwood, 2006). This research also focuses on South African workers as opposed to previous research that focused on other countries (English et al., 2006; Chiocha, Smallwood & Emuze, 2011).

It is important to determine the characteristics of the safety climate of a construction project team with world-class safety records, in


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order to assess what contributions these characteristics make to health and safety and how this could benefit the industry as a whole.

2. Safety climate and culture characteristics in project teams

Safety climate is defined as referring to a set of attributes that can be perceived about particular work organisations and that may be induced by the policies and practices imposed by those organisations upon their workers and supervisors (Niskanen, 1994; Sinclair, Martin & Sears, 2010: 1478). Safety climate is regarded as a manifestation of safety culture in the behaviour and expressed attitude of employees (Cox & Flin, 1998).

Safety culture is important, because it forms the context within which individual safety attitudes develop and persist, and safety behaviours are promoted (Zohar, 1980). In the literature, there seems to be confusion regarding the distinction between the concepts of safety culture and safety climate (Schneider, 1975; Schein, 1984; Cooke & Rousseau, 1988). In their study, Schneider & Gunnarson (1991) found that climate reflects the attitudes and behaviour of organisational members, which are directly observable to outsiders, whereas culture is about assumptions, expectations, and outlooks that are taken for granted by organisational members and, therefore, not immediately interpretable by outsiders’ notions in their analysis of the psychology of the workplace through organisational climate and culture. Schneider & Gunnarson (1991: 542-551) argue that climate tells us “what” happens in an organisation, whereas culture helps explain “why” things happen in a particular way.

Hinze, Hallowell & Baud’s (2013: 139) study aimed to determine the best practices to be implemented in order to improve health and safety. The study found that not a single initiative was responsible for the firms having world-class safety, but rather a combination of different initiatives. The authors listed the 22 most important practices for safety management improvement, of which a significant portion is dependent on the safety climate, such as safe behaviour reward and recognition, and workers’ involvement in job hazard identification, to highlight but a few. Regardless of these best practices, there is no consensus on a common set of underlying factors for this conceptualisation of the safety climate, due mainly to the complexity of the safety climate not being fully understood nowadays (Guldenmund, 2000: 216). The Safety Climate Questionnaire (SCQ) developed by Glendon, Stanton & Harrison (1994) lists safety climate questionnaire items that tend to be behaviour anchored or that


104

deal primarily with respondents’ perceptions, making it a distinct conceptual instrument to identify possible factors to measure the safety climate of a construction team with world-class safety records.

To assess the impact of safety culture and safety climate on a construction team, the two concepts will be differentiated and an attempt made to find links to safety performance that may exist and if measures on these concepts can be used to predict safety performance.

2.1 Linking safety climate and safety performance

The purpose of measuring safety climate is to identify areas for inquiry or change where improvements in safety performance can be realised. Industrial organisations will be the major beneficiaries of safety climate improvements. It is thus critical that the safety climate factors should reflect the needs for improvement in these industrial organisations.

Reason (1997) developed the first conceptual model that linked safety climate and safety performance. Zohar (2010) elaborated on this model by linking organisational culture and climate (Zohar, 2010: 1520) (see Figure 1). Although the pyramid represents the original model developed by Reason (1997: 54), it does so by progressing from individual to group and organisational level of analysis, by focusing on the targets of climate perception at each level (Zohar, 2010: 1521). The conceptual method developed by Zohar (2010) as a modified safety pyramid to measure the impact of the safety climate on safety performance of construction teams was used to investigate the linkage between safety climate and safety performance in construction teams in South Africa.


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Chance Variations

Unsafe Conditions

Latent Pathogens Investigation

Unsafe acts

Departmental Priorities (Speed vs. Safety)

Organisational Policies (Espoused vs. Enacted)

Symbolic Social Interaction (Sense-Making)

Enacted Organisational Policies and Departmental Priorities provide cues that employees use to discern shared safety climate perceptions

(Social/Technical Hazards)Near MissesCumulative Exposure Injury Rate

Figure 1: Conceptual model for safety climateSource: Zohar, 2010

The upper section of the safety pyramid explains the established theory that the likelihood of occupational injuries is a joint outcome of unsafe conditions at the workplace, unsafe acts, and chance variations (Heinrich, 1959). This part of the modified pyramid refers to immediate causes of injuries, while the bottom section labours with the more distal layers of injury causation. The bottom section of the pyramid represents the organisational level policy, focusing on the distinction between espoused and enacted policies. The middle layer represents team priorities for competing operational demands, focusing on safety versus speed/productivity. The upper or surface layer refers to workers’ practices while performing high-risk operations, focusing on the prevalence or likelihood of unsafe acts among relevant employees (Zohar, 2010: 1521).

The original model aimed to uncover latent factors that increased the likelihood of an injury through the promotion of unsafe working conditions. However, incorporating the safety climate domain in the lower section of the pyramid adds an important dimension: incorporating employee shared perceptions of their organisation


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with the objective targets of such perceptions. With the fact that the safety climate perceptions predict safety behaviours and subsequent safety outcomes (Christian, Bradley, Wallace & Burke, 2009: 1104), the modified model has an additional set of arrows suggesting the effect of the safety climate on the immediate injury factors.

3. MethodologyThe conceptual method introduced earlier provides a framework to investigate the linkage between safety performance and safety climate of construction teams in South Africa. Glendon et al.’s (1994) Safety Climate Questionnaire (SCQ) was used to measure the eight safety climate factors identified as work pressure, incident investigation, adequacy of procedures, communication and training, relationships, personal protective equipment, spares, and safety. Specifically the linkages between these factors and safety performance were investigated in a structured manner. A behaviour sampling technique was used to measure the safety performance of each team member. This method is a reliable and sensitive method for evaluating safety performance (Fitch, Hermann & Hopkins, 1976; Tarrants, 1980: 285). This method involves observing behaviour at random intervals in order to determine safe performance.

3.1 Data collection

As this study explores the safety climate dimension and not the safety culture, it was important that a qualitative approach be followed (Guldenmund, 2000: 220). Data-gathering was performed using a survey consisting of behavioural observation, followed by a questionnaire completed by personally interviewing respondents. This was done, employing the SCQ and following a discreet nominal data set, in which the respondents answered either “yes” or “no” to the 46 questions in the SCQ. The questionnaire comprises eight factors and the question numbers correspond with the questionnaire used in this research:

1. Work pressure (questions 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33) = 7.2. Incident investigation and development of procedures

(questions 9, 10, 11, 12, 13,) = 5.3. Adequacy of procedures (questions 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44) = 6.4. Communication and training (questions 7, 8, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18,

19, 20, 21) = 10.5. Relationships (questions 22, 23, 24, 25, 26) = 5.


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6. Personal protective equipment (questions 34, 35, 36, 37, 38) = 5.

7. Spares (questions 45, 46) = 2.8. Safety (questions 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6) = .

The questionnaire was distributed to, and collected from the respondents by the researcher. Respondents were told that the questionnaire results would be used to improve safety.

The safety behavioural observation was divided into two separate categories, use of Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) and Safety Behaviour. Compulsory PPE included for Group A & C were: hard hat, safety shoes, hearing protection, gloves, glasses; for Group B: hard hat, safety shoes, hearing protection, gloves, glasses, reflective vest; for Group D: hard hat, safety shoes, gloves, glasses. The key behaviours observed were: using the correct tools for a specific task, i.e. chisel to break a brick, not other piece of steel; ensuring that protective plastic caps are installed on exposed ends of reinforcing steel; using safety harness when working on scaffolding; abuse of scaffolding, i.e. standing on rails; carrying metal sheeting without protective gloves; working underneath an operating crane; whether support is provided underneath both ends of steel being cut, and whether electrical extension cords are fixed to avoid tripping.

Workers’ behaviour was only observed when work was performed. No audit was performed on aspects such as evaluating the housekeeping, transport to and from site, preparation before work (such as toolbox talks) or other non-operational task of the construction site.

3.2 Sampling method

The study was conducted at Secunda, which falls under the Goven Mbeki Local Municipality, Gert Sibande District in the Mpumalanga province (South Africa).

Of the 39 possible construction companies on SASOL Secunda’s vendor list, the four largest locally based companies were sampled. The sample size can be calculated as per equation 1 (Krejcie & Morgan, 1970):

S =X2NP(1-P)

d2(N-1) + X2P(1-P) ……………………………………….............................. 1

where:

S = Required sample size


108

X = Z value

N = Population size

P = Population proportion

d = Degree of accuracy.

A convenient sample of four construction teams from the sample companies was used, consisting of between eight and 17 members; in total, 53 respondents could be included. The total population of construction workers in Secunda is unknown. However, Statistics SA (2017) provided the working age population of Secunda as approximately 40 000, as per the 2011 census. If it is thus accepted that the population of construction workers should be between the sample size and the total population of Secunda, that population should be between 53 and 40 000. For a population size of 53, the sample size indicates a degree of significance (significance) at 99%, whereas a population of 40 000 indicates a degree of accuracy (significance) of 89%. It could thus be said with all probability that there is between a 89% and 99% likelihood that the outcome of this research predicts the true situation of all construction workers in Secunda. Although the 89% level of significance is slightly low, it still indicates that the outcome would probably be true, rather than not be true.

The four teams, each with a different number of members involved, i.e. Team A (8), Team B (11), Team C (17) and Team D (17), respectively, all operated in the Goven Mbeki Local Municipality. Participants and members of the construction teams had to meet the following criteria in order to be included in the sample. They should:

• Work in teams.• Work in the construction environment.• Work in a specific team on a regular basis.• Be 18 years or older.• Preferably be multiracial of either gender.

3.3 Response rate

All of the 53 respondents that formed part of the sample participated and completed the questionnaires, ensuring external validity and a response rate of 100%.


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3.4 Data analysis and interpretation of findings

Unsafe behaviours by members in each team were observed in order to obtain safety performance levels. The researcher then identified the compulsory PPE for each site and noted the number of respondents. By multiplying the number of compulsory PPE items required by the number of respondents in the team, a maximum score was determined for each team. From this, a percentage of PPE adherences could be determined for each team.

The measure for safety behaviour was more challenging. The total time spent observing the team was multiplied by the number of respondents in the team to give the total amount of man-hours observed. Due to the limited observation, the man-hours were reverted to minutes. This was then divided by the number of unsafe behaviours or activities observed on site in order to provide a frequency for the unsafe behaviour of each team.

Having collected and processed the data from the questionnaire by means of SPSS software, the feedback from respondents was measured by applying Cronbach’s alpha to test the reliability of all responses. This is also compared to the feedback from individual groups and individual criteria for safety performance, in order to identify the unique characteristics of safety climate in construction teams with world-class safety performance.

3.5 Limitations

External validity may be limited, due to all construction teams studied being located in the Goven Mbeki local Municipality, and more specifically in the Secunda area. The results might, therefore, only be relevant to construction companies in the Secunda area and are not tested for validity beyond this area.

4. Results

4.1 Safety performance

The safety performance was measured by observing the construction teams for 20 minutes before they answered the questionnaire. From this observation, the safety performance was rated and the teams ranked accordingly.

The safety performance observation was not a safety audit, but merely served as a measure to rank the safety performance between different teams. The safety performance was divided into


110

two separate categories, use of Personal Protective Equipment (PPE) and Safety Behaviour.

4.1.1 Personal protective equipment

The researcher identified the compulsory PPE for each site and noted the number of respondents. By multiplying the number of compulsory PPE items required by the number of respondents in the team, a maximum score was determined for each team. From this, a percentage of PPE adherences could be allocated to each team, using equation 2. In terms of this, the percentage of PPE adherence is calculated by multiplying the number of respondents by the number of compulsory PPE items. The total number of violations was then subtracted from this and the result divided by the original number. For example, if two members of a team both did not wear safety hats and shoes, the violations would be the two members multiplied by the two PPE items that they did not wear, thus four violations.

% PPE adherence =(Number of Team Members x Compulsory PPE Items)-Violations

Number of Team Members x Compulsory PPE Items ..... 2

The findings are summarised in Table 2.

Table 2: Group adherence to PPE requirements

Groups No. of respondents

Compulsory PPE items

Total observations

Total violations

Percentage adherence

Percentage violations

Group A 11 5 55 5 91% 9.1%

Group B 17 6 102 0 100% 0.0%

Group C 8 5 40 17 58% 42.5%

Group D 17 4 68 26 62% 38.2%

Total 53 265 48 82% 18.1%

Source: Author calculations

According to Table 1, Group B had 100% PPE adherence; Group A was ranked second with 91% adherence; Group D third with 62% adherence, and Group C last with only 58% adherence. It is also necessary to compare the results of PPE adherence to the results of safety behaviour and then to feedback from questionnaires in order to draw conclusions regarding the safety climate in these teams.


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4.1.2 Safety behaviour

The measure for safety behaviour was determined using equation 3. The total time spent observing the team was multiplied by the number of respondents in the team to give the total amount of man-hours (converted to minutes) that was observed. This was then divided by the number of unsafe behaviours or activities observed on-site within this time frame to provide a frequency for the unsafe behaviour of each team. For example, Group A had 11 members and was observed for 20 minutes, resulting in a total of 220 minutes of observation, during which five unsafe behaviours were observed. By dividing 220 by 5, the frequency of unsafe behaviour was rated as one unsafe behaviour every 44 minutes for Group A.

Unsafe behaviour frequency =Observation Time x Number of Team Members

Number of Unsafe Behaviours Observed …..…. 3

These findings are listed in Table 3.

Table 3: Group safety behaviour frequency

GroupsNo. of

respondents (N)

Time observed

(mins)Total

Number of unsafe actions

Frequency of unsafe

behaviour (mins)Unsafe actions

per hour

Group A 11 20 220 5 44 1.36

Group B 17 20 340 0 Indefinite -

Group C 8 20 160 11 15 4.13

Group D 17 20 340 10 34 1.76

Total 53 1060 26 41 1.47


According to Table 3, Group B is ranked first with no unsafe behaviour observed; Group A is second with one unsafe behaviour observed on average every 44 minutes (1.36 unsafe actions per hour); Group D third with one unsafe behaviour every 34 minutes (1.76 unsafe actions per hour), and Group C last with the most frequent unsafe actions observed at an unsafe behaviour on average every 15 minutes (4.13 unsafe actions per hour).

4.1.3 Safety performance ranking

When comparing the results of Table 2 and Table 3, it is evident that the ranking of the different groups is in the same order within the two tables’ results. Team B had an outstanding safety performance, with


112

Team C being identified as having the worst safety performance, followed by Team D and then Team A (see Table 4).

Table 4: Group safety ranking

Groups Safety ranking (1 best and 4 worst) Questionnaire ranking (1 best and 4 worst)

Group A 2 4

Group B 1 1

Group C 4 3

Group D 3 2


If the percentage PPE violations is compared to the unsafe behaviour violations per hour, as displayed in Figure 2, a trend line comparing the increase in behaviour violations to PPE violations reveals that Groups A and C’s behaviour violations are comparatively higher than PPE violations, whereas Group D has a relatively higher level of PPE violations than behaviour violations. In order to investigate this, it is necessary to refer to the feedback from the survey answers in order to draw conclusions.

A; 9.1%; 1.36

B; 0; 0

C; 42.5%; 4.13

D; 38.2%; 1.76

-

0.50

1.00

1.50

2.00

2.50

3.00

3.50

4.00

4.50

0.0% 5.0% 10.0% 15.0% 20.0% 25.0% 30.0% 35.0% 40.0% 45.0%

Beha

viou

r vio

latio

ns p

er h

our

% PPE violations

Figure 2: PPE violations compared to safety behaviour violationsSource: Author


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4.2 Results: Survey answer

The total number of respondents was 53, with 46 questions posed to each, resulting in a total number of 2 438 observations.

Table 5: Safety climate survey answerSa

fety

clim

ate

fact

or

All

Gro

up A

Gro

up B

Gro

up C

Gro

up D

NM

ean

Yes

No

NM

ean

Yes

No

NM

ean

Yes

No

NM

ean

Yes

No

NM

ean

Yes

No

Ad

equa

cy o

f pr

oced

ures

318

0.86

4827

543

660.

7121

4620

102

0.95

1097

548

0.95

8346

210

20.

8333

8517

Com

mun

icat

ion

and

trai

ning

530

0.81

5143

298

110

0.46

3650

6017

00.

9000

153

1780

0.80

0064

1617

00.

9647

164

6

Inci

den

t in

vest

igat

ion

265

0.89

0623

629

550.

7636

4114

850.

9059

778

400.

9250

373

850.

9412

805

PPE

265

0.82

6421

946

550.

7273

4015

850.

9294

796

400.

7750

319

850.

8118

6916

Rela

tions

hips

265

0.78

8720

956

550.

4545

2431

850.

8235

7015

400.

7750

319

850.

9765

832

Safe

ty31

80.

8239

262

5666

0.81

8254

1210

20.

9020

9210

480.

8125

399

102

0.75

4978

24

Spar

es10

60.

8679

9214

220.

5909

1210

340.

9412

322

160.

8750

142

340.

9706

331

Wor

k pr

essu

re37

10.

7035

261

110

770.

3506

2651

119

0.88

2410

514

560.

7500

4214

119

0.73

1187

32

Tota

l24

3819

8645

250

629

321

378

270

577

368

304

6478

267

910

3

Source: Author primary data collection

114

Tabl

e 6:

Re

liabi

lity

test

resu

lts

Gro

upA

llG

roup

AG

roup

BG

roup

CG

roup

D

Que

stio

n ty

peVa

lue

Cro

nbac

h’s

alph

aN

Valu

eC

ronb

ach’

s al

pha

NVa

lue

Cro

nbac

h’s

alph

aN

Valu

eC

ronb

ach’

s al

pha

NVa

lue

Cro

nbac

h’s

alph

aN

All

0.81

50.

902

450.

712

0.75

036

0.95

10.

924

360.

958

0.28

226

0.83

30.

850

33

Ad

equa

cy o

f pro

ced

ure

0.86

50.

777

60.

712

0.91

35

0.95

10.

521

40.

958

-0.6

003

0.83

30.

773

6

Com

mun

icat

ion

and

trai

ning

0.

815

0.83

09

0.46

40.

541

70.

900

0.81

58

0.80

0-0

.859

50.

965

0.07

55

Inci

den

t inv

estig

atio

n 0.

891

0.06

95

0.76

4-0

.222

20.

906

0.73

63

0.92

5-0

.533

20.

941

-0.4

003

PPE

0.82

60.

698

50.

727

0.85

84

0.92

90.

863

50.

775

0.75

14

0.81

20.

419

5

Rela

tions

hips

0.

789

0.71

55

0.45

50.

131

50.

824

0.87

84

0.77

5-1

.043

30.

976

-0.1

332

Safe

ty

0.82

40.

285

60.

818

0.24

54

0.90

2

50.

813

-0.3

482

0.75

50.

737

4

Spar

es

0.86

80.

301

20.

591

-0.7

002

0.94

1

0.

875

1.00

02

0.97

1

Wor

k pr

essu

re

0.70

40.

731

70.

351

0.21

57

0.88

20.

667

60.

750

0.58

55

0.73

10.

640

7

α ≥

0.9

Ex

celle

nt

0.9

> α

≥ 0

.8

Goo

d

0.8

> α

≥ 0

.7

Acc

epta

ble

0.7

> α

≥ 0

.6

Que

stio

nabl

e

0.6

> α

≥ 0

.5

Poor

0.5

> α

Un

acce

ptab

le

Sour

ce:

Aut

hor c

alcu

latio

ns


115

The respondents were requested to respond to all questions as either affirmative or negative (1 = Yes, 0 = No). The analysis was then compared within the different groups interviewed and for each separate safety climate factor. The results are summarised in Table 5, where N shows the number of observations per category.

In order to determine whether the answers on the survey are reliable, the Cronbach’s alpha is used to validate the results. The Cronbach’s alpha is calculated for all questions on the whole sample of respondents, within each safety climate group of questions, for all questions, but distinguished between the different groups of respondents, and within each safety climate group of questions for each group separately. This is displayed in Table 6, where N shows the number of questions per factor and Value shows the mean between “yes” and “no” questions posed.

The overall analysis revealed a Cronbach’s alpha of 0.902, which is considered an excellent result for the whole survey. The average feedback is an affirmative value of 0.815 for all questions posed. The number of questions is displayed in Table 6 as 45, as opposed to the actual 46 questions asked, due to question 20 being affirmative by all respondents and having a zero variance in the variable, and thus excluded in the calculation of the Cronbach’s alpha.

Comparing this to the Cronbach’s alpha for the individual groups, Group B has the highest level of reliability, with an excellent score of 0.924. Although Group C has the highest affirmative score of 0.958, it has the lowest reliability on the survey answers at 0.282, with only 26 questions contributing to the Cronbach’s alpha and the balance being excluded based on zero variance. Due to this low level of reliability in the questions, it might seem that Group C did not quite make an effort to answer the questions correctly, or did not quite understand the questions. This is also evident in the results of all the individual safety climate factors, with most of them having an unacceptable level of reliability, except three of the factors. This will be discussed later. This is further evident from the unacceptable reliability of answers to communication and training questions posed to Group C, although this is indicated as having a good reliability for all respondents together. Therefore, it seems that there is questionable quality of communication and training, due to the unreliable feedback on this for Group C. It is interesting to note that Group C has the lowest level of reliability in the survey results, and scored the worst on the safety behaviour and PPE observations, whereas Group B has the highest reliability test on the very close to highest affirmative results for all questions.


116

On the Cronbach’s alpha for each safety climate factor as calculated for the whole group of respondents, three sets of questions were indicated to have unacceptable feedback, namely Incident investigation, Safety, and Spares. On Incident investigation, Group B is the only group that had an acceptable level of reliability in the survey answers. The questions relate to more complex principles of safety behaviour and incidents, as they also relate to general work activities. This might explain why Group B, being the best on safety compliance, is the only group to provide reliable feedback pertaining to Incident investigation.

On Safety questions, Group D was the only group to provide reliable feedback, albeit being the group with the lowest average affirmative value on the set of questions. Group D confirmed that safety rules do not conflict with established work practice and are practical to implement in all situations. However, they had the lowest affirmative result on the question as to whether safety policy can be implemented under high production pressure. It therefore seems that Group D is safety conscious, which is also evident from their better score on safety behaviour compliance, relative to PPE compliance. Group D is undisciplined, as is evident from their higher relative level of PPE compliance and confirming the tendency to neglect safety policy under production pressure. Group D also indicated that there is a high level of opportunity to express their views on operation problems, but there is a lower level of consultation pertaining to policy development and change in work practice. This top-down management style, one of open communication, is also reflected in Group D’s score on relationships. Three of the five questions under relationships are excluded, due to all respondents in Group D having a positive response. On the remaining two questions, only one negative response each was obtained. With this in mind, the zero variance on three of the questions resulted in them being excluded from the calculation of the Cronbach’s alpha, with the remaining two resulting in a very low score. The high score on the relationship questions might also explain the positive attitude towards safety behaviour and consciousness.

The last safety climate factor with an unreliable Cronbach’s alpha as measured for all respondents is Spares. This consisted of only two questions and resulted in all but Group C having unacceptable reliability. Group C had a Cronbach’s alpha of 1.00, due to only one respondent’s negative answer to both questions, and being the same respondent, resulted in a perfect correlation between the two questions, hence a perfect Cronbach’s alpha. The fact that there are only two questions and that they produce unreliable results from all


117

other Groups, and within Group C it is one of only two results to have an acceptable level of reliability (also refer previous discussion on Group C’s overall survey results), would be an indication to discard the question as overall unreliable.

One of the safety climate factors as measured for all respondents had questionable reliability, although it is below an acceptable Cronbach’s alpha value of only 0.002. This is for PPE questions. Group A and Group B had a reliability score considered to be good, while Group C is in the mid-acceptable range (the only acceptable reliability score, given previous discussions), and Group D having an unreliable score, resulting in the overall Cronbach’s alpha score to be reduced well below that of Group A’s and Group B’s individual results. Within Group A and Group B, all respondents but one indicated that PPE use is enforced, and all but three respondents indicated that personnel are trained in the use of emergency PPE. Questions relating to the consulting of PPE users, monitoring of PPE use and acting upon findings, were largely affirmative in Group B, with a large component of negative responses in Group A. This results in the average affirmative response value to be 0.727 for Group A and 0.929 for Group B, although their reliability score is similar. It could be deduced from this that Group A has a larger component of top-down management with hardly any communication at lower levels, whereas Group B is experiencing more of an inclusive management style with visible actions and feedback on PPE use. Group C had a lower affirmative value on PPE use enforcement, but confirmed that personnel are trained in the use of emergency PPE. There is a lower result on consultation of PPE users, although there is a high level of affirmation in monitoring and action upon findings. This confirms the top-down style of management in Group C, as discussed previously, but also points out that PPE use is not heavily enforced, explaining the relatively higher PPE violations of Group C, as discussed earlier. The confirmation of top-down management in Group C might also explain the overall unreliable feedback, which could point to a negative attitude towards cooperation. Group D had a fairly high affirmative value for the questions, but had an unacceptable reliability score. This is based on some uncertainty in the individual questions that seems to be slightly contradictory. There is, however, a bias towards enforcement of PPE use, with some evidence of top-down management style.

Three of the safety climate factors had acceptable Cronbach’s alpha values, being Adequacy of procedure, Relationships, and Work pressure. The questions relating to Adequacy of procedures


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posed to Group A had the highest Cronbach’s alpha value of all questions posed to all groups, safe for the disregarded questions on Spares to Group C. This confirms that there is, in fact, substantial evidence of procedure in place. The affirmative value for these questions is, however, the lowest from all the groups, with questions relating to identification of procedure, i.e. own effort to be very high (100% affirmation), while other procedures and communication, i.e. view of management and the group’s feeling of inclusivity, are lower, again confirming the top-down management style, with possible negative consequences to staff’s attitude to management.

This is especially evident in the questions relating to Relationships, where Group A has the lowest score in confirming positive relationships, but also evidenced in uncertainty on this, due to unreliable results. It, therefore, seems that there is some contradictory feedback; uncertainty among staff on their belonging in the company appears evident. This is based on the fact that the question specifically asking if good working relationships exist, has a high level of affirmation, but staff do not trust management; there is a fairly low feeling of trust from management to staff; there is a very low level of confidence about staff’s future in the company, resulting in a low level of morale among staff. This could be interpreted as that staff have good relationships among each other, but that there is not a good relationship with management. The result is that Group A had the lowest response towards work pressure questions and the lowest reliability on these questions. The unreliability of the feedback is cause for concern, with contradicting statements within the questions. This might point to an aspect of staff feeling that there is a problematic work pressure, but cannot really confirm this by concrete fact. The low feedback might be due to real unacceptable work pressure, but might also stem from an attitude towards the level of work, due to relationship issues. Group B indicated that there is an adequate level of procedures, with an average affirmative value of 0.951. The Cronbach’s alpha is, however, indicated to be poor. This might be due to the fact that the majority of the respondents were in agreement of the questions, with two of the six questions a 100% affirmation. However, in three cases, one person had a negative response, of which two of these questions were the same respondent. The last question had two negative responses, of which the one was the same respondent as in the previous two stated questions and the other respondent is different from the previous questions. It could thus be said that the feedback is overall positive, but the 0-1 scale of the research feedback might provide some uncertainty on the reliability; however, it appears to be acceptable.


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The feedback on questions relating to relationships also provided a very high level of feedback, with 82.4% confirmation of positive relationships at a Cronbach’s alpha of 0.878. This is the highest Cronbach’s alpha for all safety factor questions posed to Group B and second after the questions on procedures posed to Group A, i.e. second highest of all questions to all groups. The reasonably high affirmation value of this, in combination with the high correlation among respondents, as indicated by the Cronbach’s alpha, might explain Group B’s high performance on both safety behaviour and safety performance. It is evident that Group B respondents are satisfied with job security, relationships with management, as well as among each other; this satisfaction seemingly has a positive influence on safety behaviour.

Questions relating to Work pressure to Group B have the highest affirmation value, with a questionable Cronbach’s alpha. This is interpreted, similar to that of Group A, as there being some uncertainty. In contrast to Group A, it is a positive uncertainty, rather than a negative one. Respondents are mostly of the opinion that work pressure is acceptable, but it is uncertain whether this feedback stems from the positive relationships and, hence, a positive attitude towards work obligations, or whether Group B’s work pressure is indeed lower than the others. Group C had fair to high response values, but the Cronbach’s alpha coefficients range from very high negative to poor. It is, therefore, again questionable whether these results have any interpretation value and are disregarded. Group D had a high level of positive response towards Adequacy of procedures, with an acceptable level Cronbach’s alpha. The group also had the highest level of positive relationships response of all groups, but the Cronbach’s alpha is unacceptable for reasons discussed earlier. The Work pressure questions also revealed a fairly positive attitude, albeit with a questionable Cronbach’s alpha value.

5. Conclusions and recommendations

5.1 Research conclusion

This research proposed a conceptual framework that identified the characteristics of construction teams with world-class safety records by linking the safety performance with the safety climate.

The importance of safety in the construction industry and what factors contribute to the safety performance of construction teams were extracted from the existing literature. From this, a framework was developed to determine the characteristics of the safety climate


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in construction teams and their influence on the safety performance of the teams.

The safety climate questionnaire was used to evaluate the safety climate in construction teams and observations on-site done to evaluate the safety performance of the teams on-site.

From the results obtained, the framework developed during the literature review was used for assessment, using correlations between the research questionnaire and safety performance observations.

The findings revealed that one of the highest reasons for good safety behaviour and performance is good relationships. A positive relationship between staff and employer influences staff to react better to safety requirements. A high level of procedure also revealed good safety performance, but if this is not communicated well, it could result in poor relationships, causing a poorer response in safety behaviour. The enforcement of PPE equipment is necessary in order to ensure that employees adhere to requirements, but if this is performed within a top-down management style, it might hamper relationships and cause poor behavioural response. On the other hand, an inclusive management style without proper enforcement can improve behavioural responses; however, without the necessary enforcement, employees might take shortcuts on safety compliance when work pressure increases.

5.2 Areas of concern

The questions that received the lowest confirmation from the respondents were the trust between management and work teams as well as the question as to whether the employees had a future within the company. These questions formed part of the relationship factors. It is evident that management needs to set clear guidelines on what behaviour is deemed satisfactory and how this will be rewarded, within an inclusive management style with open communication opposed to a top-down prescriptive management style.

The management needs to be consistent in how behaviour is rewarded from one project to the next in order to develop trust in the organisation. Construction teams work almost independently from the organisation, due to their working off-site. This requires greater effort from management to ensure that the values of the organisation support an excellent safety climate, since it is clear that the team members’ perception of management is a major contributing factor to the safety climate and, ultimately, to the safety performance.


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From the research, it was found that the safety climate factors that contribute predominantly to safety performance are relationships and how it is communicated through Adequacy of procedure, Training and Positive communication. This also confirms Cohen’s (1977) findings, whereby the six factors influencing the success of an occupational safety programme were identified as:

• Management commitment;• Management-Supervisor-Worker interaction (team dynamics);• Workforce stability and industrial relations;• Housekeeping and environmental control;• Training, and• Conventional safety practices.

5.2 Further research recommendations

From the surveys, it was found that the construction teams’ perception of safety performance did not reflect the actual performance, more specifically the area of adherence to the use of PPE. This is an important aspect that could contribute to the improvement of safety performance, since some teams were under the impression that they were adhering to the safety requirements, but were only complying by 58%, whereas other teams perceived that they were not complying, although they had a 91% adherence.

Eliminating such inaccurate perceptions could improve the safety performance within a team, since the safe behaviour of the team relies heavily on the perception of what is safe behaviour among the team members.

It is suggested that further research be conducted on the perception of safe behaviour related to the actual safety performance in a team could be aligned, as well as the perception of work pressure related to industry norms. In the latter case, this study did not test specifically to what extent work pressure directly influences safety performance, i.e. comparing actual “time-on-the-task” results within different groups. This could provide further insight into the question as to whether work pressure responses, as identified in this study, are based on actual higher levels of work pressure or whether it is only a perception by employees, due to relationship concerns within the organisation.


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Appendix A

Stanton & Harrison (1994) safety climate questionnaire items were modified for this study and are listed below.

1. Safety rules are adhered to, even under production pressures.2. Safety rules can be implemented without conflicting with

established work practices.3. Safety rules are practical to apply in all situations.4. There are adequate opportunities for staff to express their

views about operational problems.5. There are adequate opportunities to discuss important

policy issues.6. Consultation is adequate when changes in working practices

are proposed.7. Meetings take place where causes of operational problems

are openly discussed between engineers and management.8. An effective system exists for communicating plant changes

and their implications for safety to operating personnel.9. Users are involved in developing the incident investigation

systems.10. Members of investigation teams are trained to identify factors

that influence the causes of error.11. There are clear and well-documented procedures for

developing specific remedial actions on the basis of identified causes of incidents.

12. The procedure development system used job and task analysis to ensure that the contents of procedures reflect actual working practices.

13. Explicit guidance is provided on human factor aspects of procedure layout (language, format, etc.).

14. Effective training is provided on skills specific to individual tasks and equipment.

15. Potential errors, consequences and recovery points are identified in training.

16. Training includes effective skills practice for normal operations.17. Training includes skills practice for emergency (e.g.,

fault conditions).


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18. Individuals with relevant operational experience carry out training.

19. Provisions are made to minimise the isolation of one employee from others.

20. Employees are encouraged to support and care for each other’s wellbeing.

21. Aspects of company policy are effectively communicated to individuals.

22. Staff trust the management in this organisation.23. Management trust the staff in this organisation.24. Staff are confident about their future with the company.25. Good working relationships exist in this company.26. Morale is good.27. Staff has adequate time to carry out individual and concurrent

tasks.28. There is sufficient staff to carry out the required work.29. There is sufficient “thinking time” to enable staff to plan and

carry out their work to an adequate standard.30. Frustrations that arise from factors beyond staff control can

be accommodated without adversely affecting work.31. Time schedules for completing work projects are realistic.32. Workload is reasonably well balanced.33. Workload adjustments that have to be made on short notice

can be accommodated without adversely affecting work.34. PPE use is systematically enforced.35. Relevant personnel are specifically trained in the use of

emergency PPE.36. PPE users are consulted for suggested design improvements.37. PPE use is monitored to identify problem areas.38. Findings from PPE monitoring are acted upon.39. Operators can easily identify the relevant procedure for a job.40. An effective documentation management system ensures

the availability of procedures.41. Procedures are technically accurate.42. Procedures are complete and comprehensive.43. Procedures are written in clear, unambiguous language

appropriate to users’ needs.


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44. Written procedures match the way in which tasks are done in practice.

45. Critical spare parts are available from stock.46. Good availability of spares ensures that staff fit correct rather

than substitute parts.

The questionnaire comprises eight factors and these question numbers correspond with the questionnaire used in this research:

1. Work pressure (questions 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33).2. Incident investigation and Development of procedures

(questions 9, 10, 11, 12, 13,).3. Adequacy of procedures (questions 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44).4. Communication and training (questions 7, 8, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18,

19, 20, 21).5. Relationships (questions 22, 23, 24, 25, 26).6. Personal Protective Equipment (questions 34, 35, 36, 37, 38).7. Spares (questions 45, 46).8. Safety (questions 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6).

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INFORMATION FOR AUTHORS

Referente en konsultante • Referees and consultants

Prof. Das Steÿn (Department of Urban and Regional Planning, University of the Free State, Bloemfontein, South Africa)

Prof. Theo Haupt (Director: Pinnacle Research and Development Solutions, South Africa)

Prof. John Smallwood (Department of Construction Management, Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University, Port Elizabeth, South Africa)

Dr Adamu Anita Dzikwi (Department of Quantity Surveying, Federal University of Technology, Niger State, Nigeria)

Dr Abimbola Windapo (School of Construction Economics and Management, University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa)

Dr Benita Zulch (Department of Quantity Surveying and Construction Management, University of the Free State)

Dr Nishani Harinarain (School of Civil Engineering, Surveying and Construction, University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, South Africa)

Dr Spencer Lazarus (Consultant: Facilities Management and project management, SL management consultants cc, Port Elizabeth, South Africa)

Dr Stephen Allen (School of Construction Economics and Management, University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa)

Dr Innocent Musonda (Department of the Quantity Surveying and Construction

Management, University of Johannesburg, South Africa)

Dr Tim Frois (Department of Construction Management, University of the Free State, Bloemfontain, South Africa)

Mr Marius Eppenberger (Eppen-Burger & Associates, Construction health & safety agents, Cape Town, South Africa)

Mr Johann Eiselen (Director & Head of Academy for Facilities Management, South Africa)

Inhoud • Contents

Navorsingsartikels • Research articlesOwnership and care in culturally significant Gerhard Bosman 1 architecture: Three case studies

A sequential mixed methods research approach Guinevere Gilbert 27 to investigating HIV/AIDS intervention management Keith Cattell by construction organisations in South Africa Peter Edwards Paul Bowen

An investigation into cost overruns for ongoing Ibrahim Saidu 53 building projects in Abuja, Nigeria Winston Shakantu

Volhoubare fasiliteitsbestuur in winkelsentrums Jaco van der Merwe 73 in Pretoria Bouwer Kleynhans Chris Cloete

Characteristics of the safety climate in teams Douw Boshoff 99 with world-class safety performance on Chris Krugell construction projects in South Africa Hennie van Heerden

Inligting aan outeurs • Information for authors 147

Acta Structilia 2017:24 (1) ISSN 1023-0564 e-ISSN 2415-0487

Acta Structilia is endorsed by the South African Council for the Quantity Surveying Profession (SACQSP) for promoting research and Continuing Professional Development (CPD).

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