World Construction Symposium

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Browsing World Construction Symposium by Subject "Academic research"

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    A literature synthesis: is construction industry low responsive to change and development?
    (2012-06) Hadiwattege, C; Senaratne, S; Senaratne, S; Sandanayake, YG
    Construction faces many challenges, but one of its principle challenges is lack of innovation and research. This research tries to understand why the construction sector is slow to innovate and whether the industry needs to innovate. Further it discusses the role of academia as a prominent researching body in such a change. There are many reasons behind the slow responsiveness of the industry and it has been identified that economical characteristics of construction industry could be a major reason which creates lack of performance-based competition. Further, the inherent characteristics of the construction sector influence this slow innovation. Despite this slowness, there is a need for the industry to innovate with the global challenges taking place in the industry. Academia has an important role to play here in merging academic research to industry development needs. However, academics’ choice in research area is mainly driven by the context, availability of funding and personal interest, rather than on industry requirements. It is believed that the Sri Lankan industry could be innovated with the correct cooperation of academia with the evidence from other countries. The PhD research which this research paper is based aims to merge academic research into construction industry requirements to build a better responsive industry. As a preliminary step, this paper reports on the literature findings on whether the industry is slow to innovate and the reasons behind this.
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    Merging academic research and construction industry development requirements: a conceptual framework
    (Ceylon Institute of Builders, 2014-06) Hadiwattege, C; Fernando, NG; Senarathna, S.; Sandanayake, YG; Karunasena, GI; Fernando, NG
    Academic research in built environment consists of cognitive and affective, as well as behavioural components. There is a broad consensus in the literature that successful communication between researchers and research users is crucial for the effective utilisation of research in decision-making in policy and practice. It is argued that academic researchers and the construction industry practitioners do not collaborate closely in construction sector. The need for sharing knowledge between research institutions and industry has become increasingly evident in recent years. Therefore this study aims to uncover the strategies in merging academic research with industry development requirements where this paper presents the literature review findings in a form of a conceptual framework. The importance of transfer, barriers for transfer and way forward for both academia and construction industry is presented within the framework with highlighted inter-relationships. The framework will be developed into a model after analysing findings of a field study which is to be conducted in the future with the use of Delphi technique. In that, the model will be validated with an expert survey where the panel includes both the academics and industry practitioners. Results of the study therefore are expected to serve both academia and industry in merging their interests towards the development of the sector.
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    Role of academic research in sustainable construction practice
    (Ceylon Institute of Builders, 2013-06) Hadiwattege, C; Fernando, N; Senaratne, S; Sandanayake, YG; Fernando, NG
    Higher education is becoming a major driver of economic competitiveness in an increasingly knowledge-driven global economy. A university is a scholarly organism committed to inquiry, investigation and discovery at all levels with an embedded symbiotic relationship between teaching, research and practice. In addition to the primary duty of delivering good quality teaching, universities have another key responsibility: that is to add new knowledge to the wider society through research. Furthermore, the outcome of the research should serve educational needs and the development of the region and its economy. The construction industry being one of the important industries in the economy, it's stakeholders need to adapt complex and changing conditions continuously to sustain and proliferate through innovation. Research and Development acts as a valuable input for the construction organisations innovation in many ways. Therefore, it is important to move beyond the traditional practices in the construction industry to adopt sustainable construction practices arising from research and development activities. This paper argues that the research conducted by university academics in the built environment discipline should be directed towards this industry need of sustainable construction practices. Within this context, the aim of the study is to address the role of academic research in sustainable construction practice. A comprehensive literature survey was conducted through referring to refereed published material in the related area. Study revealed that academic research can play a major role in developing sustainable practices in construction. The paper reports only the findings of the literature review. Field study will be done using case study approach to explore the actual situation in Sri Lankan context.