The Data Processing And Analysis

Published Date: 02 Nov 2017

Chapter 1

Introduction

Background

Risk, is one of those words that is mooted regularly, today. In daily life there are risks such as driving a car, crossing the road, selling a product or manage a store. Almost every activity that one partakes in involves certain risks. Risk can be defined as, the potential that a chosen action or activity will lead to a loss. But, the risk can’t be identified as either good or bad. There are several specific descriptions of risk, which differ with respect to the concerned field, they are composed of more or less the same content. Some examples are given below:

‘’ A risk is a random event that may possibly occur and, if it did occur, would have a negative impact on the goals of the organisation. Thus, a risk is composed of three elements: the scenario: it’s the probability of occurrence; and the size of its impact if it did occur ( either a fixed value or a distribution) ‘’ [1] 

‘’Risk maybe characterized in aggregate for a large population of events ‘’ (macro-risk) ‘’ , or it may be considered on an event by event basis ‘’ (micro-risk) ’’. [2] 

‘’In epidemiology, it is most often used to express the probability that a particular outcome will occur following a particular exposure’’ [3] .

Uncertainty and risk can often be used interchangeably. The understanding of a particular risk as good, bad either neural depends on the risk tolerance of the person facing the risk. Hence, nowadays the construction sector has suffered from poor performance of scheduling and a lack of control in various steps of the process in construction workflow. Construction sector is faced with difficulties such as planning problems and increased cost control of the projects. In addition, in present construction projects may be safer than they were in the past but because of the economic climate the financial risks are much bigger. As a consequence, risk analysis of the project needs to be done successfully at the various stage of the project. Risks of the project and other planning uncertainties might cause losses which can lead to time delays, according to the increased costs and lack of quality control of the construction and the progression of the projects at their end. Taking into consideration various activities, sequences and possible methods for a construction process, the decision making has become more complex as the number of alternatives available have increased a lot, due to many things but mostly technological advancement and every different alternative will have different risks associated with it.

Risk management is a quantitative systematic method used to manage risks faced by events in the project. In other words, risk management is a progression which combines the management and analysis of the risks with a project and the principles of risk management including two strategic points, which are risk control and risk analysis planning. The aim of the risk management is to reduce prospect damage and loss, hence minimize the total expected risk. This process is designed for to eliminate and limit risks which threaten the achievement of the project objectives. The process of risk management deals with both foreseeable as well as unforeseeable risks and the choice of the appropriate techniques for treating those risks in construction projects, there are lots of events and activities which might cause delays or lack of quality.

Risk management system starts with decision making process at various stages throughout the project. At the beginning of the construction stage, risk assessment decisions are taken in order to determine the set of construction activities and methods need for starting the construction work. Risk assessment could have a significant impact on performance and quality of the project. Flanagan & Norman claims that ‘’ Risk management is not synonymous with insurance, nor does it embrace the management of all risks to which a business is exposed. ‘’ [4] 

On the other hand, it is not possible to manage all the risks in the project. For example, weather condition is the one of the fact in construction projects. Hence, weather report could be investigated by weekly reports but sometimes could be wrong as well. Underestimation of the importance of the risks identification process will negatively affect the effectiveness of a decision. Therefore, risk management method can’t identify all the risks in the project but at the various stage of the project by using risk assessment will give more time to cover delay times. In addition, importance list of all risks can make easier to control and cost of the project. Latham states that ‘’ No construction project is risk free. Risk can be managed, minimised. Shared, transferred or accepted. It cannot be ignored. ‘’ [5] 

This project describes a proposed risk based simulation for construction workflow also, it includes a construction workflow model for supporting decision making in construction management, evaluate the risks and costs connected with various alternatives methods to carry out the construction process in buildings. The simulation model that will be presented in this project will be based on risk modelling and possible failure costs in construction.

C:\Users\Arda\Desktop\arda.png

Figure 1. Construction Industry Diagram

Aim and Objectives

The objective of the project is to assess the performance of all feasible construction alternatives while simultaneously taking into account the risks associated with each alternative, the sequence of the activities and the alternative execution methods.

The aims and objectives of this project were set down at the proposal stage, when a construction project is delayed beyond the contract finishing time or beyond the Contractor’s or Subcontractors scheduled finishing time, major additional costs can be experienced by the Contractor’s , Sub-Contractor’s , the owner or both of them. For the reason that, contract schedules are so important also delays can be so costly, more and more projects end up with litigation, arbitration, or some form of dispute concerning time linked questions. According to that, this project will research, how to minimize risks in construction projects by different methods, this project main focus will be using risk assessment modelling effects on the project.

Chapter 2

Methodology

The procedure of the project is illustrated in methodology section as well as data collection and the technique used to survey in investigating delays in construction and risk analysis. Firstly, literature review of the project, following, questionnaire survey with engineers and lastly, the selection of data sources will be demonstrated in this section.

Literature review

The project contains results of a literature research made on the risk analysis, risk management and delays in construction. The study is based on qualitative research which covers the actions experienced by individual professions. Literature review process is depending upon importing articles’ reports and web pages which also include references in the logbook. Afterwards, all sources classified and assigned attribute like author and publication date. The process of the literature review from different sources was useful and valid for all relevant construction projects. A literature research that made on the possible construction delays, stages of risk management and risk analysis techniques can be used to evaluate risks in construction projects. In addition, the future of risk management in construction sector is discussed and computer software for risk analysis used to evaluate.

1.2 Questionnaire and Survey

In this project, questionnaire method was used to carry out the study. The questionnaire is designed to investigate concerning problem of delays in construction and risk analysis. ‘’Good questionnaire design is a key to obtaining good survey results and warranting a high rate of return.’’ [6] Surveyors are selected from different branches of the construction industry. Questionnaire was mailed to individual professions and companies, attached with a cover letter which provides all information that will be private. In addition, questionnaire was sent to different companies to get more accurate data for the research. Depending upon responsibilities, 18 main factors of delays in construction and risk analysis, which formed the questionnaire, were divided into four major categories.

1.2.1 Sampling frame of the study

The questionnaire designed for many building system companies. The survey was distributed amongst contractors, consultants, owners and who were connected to the external problems about building systems of construction projects. In order to accomplish this, the researchers contacted professional institutions, agents and government bodies.

Professional institutions, agents and government bodies were contacted by the researchers to

1.2.2 Questionnaire design

Questionnaire survey categorized delays in 4 groups according to contractors, consultants, clients and external problem. It designed for different sections, namely:

Background information

Experience

Company information

External factors

Contractor factors

Consultant factors

Owner factors

At the beginning of the questionnaire, background information about the respondents’ ages, job descriptions, academic qualifications, working experiences in construction building projects and company backgrounds. Accordingly, it will be continued with the ranking of the delay factors.

Information about the system of the building and its different properties has been gathered in other parts of the questionnaire, mainly focused on delay factors and so forth. Types of the questions were mostly closed type. Designing of the questions were also to evoke qualitative data. In order to obtain the communication of enumerators and respondents in an appropriate way, codes were provided beside the questions.

1.2.3 Population and sampling size

The sample was reduced to building system companies. Contracts, consultants, developers, subcontractors, engineers and architects were the respondents and each had an experience in building system construction projects. 25 samples were collected out of 70 questionnaires distributed. Selection of the sample was made randomly. In selecting the sample, a simple random sampling method was used. Of the 78 questionnaire sampled, 48 per cent were from consultant firms, 32 per cent were from contractor firms, 16 per cent were from Engineering Services and 4 per cent from were quantity surveyors.

1.2.4 Data processing and analysis

In order to prove the accuracy of the information that was gathered from the survey, they were checked. By checking the frequency and descriptive statistics, data cleaning was implemented. In assistance, coding and data entry were also used to carry out the data cleaning. In attaining the frequency, statistical descriptive analysis and variance, the data that were vanished were analyzed afterwards

1.2.5 Ranking delay factors

In order to establish relative importance of causes of delay in building construction projects in Hong Kong, mean score method was found by Chan and Kumaeaswamy for construction delays. In this project, their method was used. The data was gathered from questionnaire survey and analysed to identify significant factors affecting delays in construction. Questionnaire is designed for responding on a scale from 1 (very important) to 7 (unimportant).The seven-point rating used for to increase the sensitivity of the scale. The rating scale was 7 very important, 6 important, 5 some important, 4 less important, and 1 unimportant. The reason that this scale was chosen was to prevent possible neutral answers that will not be useful in the survey. The mean score(MS) for each factor was calculated using the following formula Chan and Kumaeswamy;

Where MS is the mean score,

S = Score given each section of questionnaire by the respondents, ranging from 1 to 7

(1 = Unimportant and 7 = Most Important)

f= Frequency of each rating (1-7) for each section

N= Total number of responses concerning that factor (25)

Chapter 3

Risk Management

This chapter will focus on risks in construction, project risk management system, risk analysis techniques in projects, risk analysis software in construction projects

3.1 Introduction

This chapter consists of board information about construction risk contract risk relationship, project risk management system, risk analysis techniques, risk analysis software and construction risk analysis models. The chapters focus point is to investigate risk management of construction project as well as to approach the subjects as a general management methodology that is further relevant to the projects of other sectors. At the end of the chapter, this new managerial discipline’s future, and risk management perception of Turkish construction companies will be explained.