Corporate factors influencing sustainable construction enterprise

While many studies are still focusing on sustainability in construction in terms of greening or resource consumption reduction, the construction industry (CI) has been struggling more with the sustainability of construction firms in terms of survival. For example, more than 1,500 construction firms went bust at the start of 2012 alone, with the industry leading the liquidated companies in England and Wales chart at the end of 2013. Despite many studies into the causes of failure of firms, the firms in the CI have continued to perform poorly. On the world scale, the CI has consistently been the second worst industry in terms of corporate failure. The objective of this study is hence to identify the key factors that determine/affect the sustainability of a construction enterprise. The methodology used is mainly phenomenology. Phenomenology, otherwise known as interpretivism, is known for its suitability for discovering root causes of events comprehensively. Ten comprehensive unstructured interviews were carried out to identify the factors using convenience and snowballing sample methods. The target respondents were mainly managerial level employees, directors and owners of failed construction firms. Target construction firms were only small and medium enterprise (SMEs). The interviews were analysed qualitatively using Nvivo. The results showed that cash flow; investment in operation/assets; immigration; over reliance on certain source(s) for project; multiple responsibilities; lack of construction business knowledge; bid pricing; and firm’s age are the most important factors affecting the sustainability of construction firms.

Corporate Factors Influencing Sustainable Construction Enterprise (PDF Download Available). Available from: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/284454105_Corporate_Factors_Influencing_Sustainable_Construction_Enterprise [accessed Jan 29 2018].