The Importance of Collaboration in Construction Industry from Contractors’ Perspectives

AbstractCollaboration is essential to the success of construction projects; the project participants are realizing that sharing of knowledge and information is one of the key elements of a successful contractual relationship. There appears to be no clear guide on the process of collaboration between main contractor and subcontractor; therefore making it difficult to effectively interact and achieve a common project goals within the bounds of cost, quality and time. The purpose of the paper is to identify the views of contractors on the importance of collaboration in construction supply chain. The results of a survey on the importance of collaboration in the construction industry will be supported by the results of semi-structured interviews. The structured questionnaire surveys was participated by 160 delegates at a National Forum of Malaysian Malay Contractors 2011. Next, the semi-structured interview on the challenges on collaboration in the construction industry was conducted. The units of analysis was a contractor and subcontractor organization. Six important factors were found that lead to willingness to collaborate among contractors are; (i) collaboration encourages teamwork; (ii) similar racial collaboration develops cooperation between team members; (iii) stimulate information sharing; (iv) improves quality and timely project completion; (v) enhance service quality; and (vi) better communication among project members. These findings should not be considered as universal, as the geographical or cultural differences can affect their application is a different set up