Strat-CON - Strategic Actions for Realising the Vision of ICT in Construction

Status

completed

Summary

Background

The construction sector is characterised by delivery of one-of-a-kind product and service delivery through competence sharing between different organisations (some of which may be unknown to others). ICT usage in the sector is limited and lags far behind other manufacturing sectors. The ROADCON project offered a vision for ICT in construction in addition to a set of roadmaps across 12 thematic areas. ROADCON while providing the vision and roadmaps did not however offer any action plans or project ideas whose realisation would lead to achievement of the vision. This task of identifying strategic actions for realising the vision of ICT in construction is the main goal of Strat-CON.

Scientific Objectives

Strat-CON has three main scientific objectives as follows:

1. Refine and validate ROADCON vision and roadmap for ICT in construction
2. Identify strategic actions for realising vision of ICT in construction
3. Validate strategic actions and provide guidelines for implementation

Stakeholder Interaction

The stakeholders (industry, ICT vendors, research institutes, etc.) of Strat-CON will serve as the main validation instrument for the vision, roadmap, and strategic actions that are refined and/or developed within Strat-CON. Stakeholder interaction will be mainly through focuses workshops, interviews, questionnaires, etc. Relevant members from the ROADCON support group of 293 organisations from 30 countries will be contacted where possible for sharing their experience and validating the findings of Strat-CON.

Workplan

The work in Strat-CON is structured around five workpackages. Of these, three are technical workpackages contributing to the achievement of the scientific objectives of Strat-CON, one workpackage dedicated to stakeholder interaction and dissemination, and one workpackage for project management.

Deliverables

There will be five main public deliverables resulting from Strat-CON:

• vision and roadmap for ICT in construction (D1);
• strategic actions for ICT in construction (D2);
• Guidelines for implementation of strategic actions (D3);
• stakeholder workshops (D41);
• Strat-CON website (D42).

In addition to these five public deliverables, a project progress report (D5) will be issued.

Results

Given the fact that Austria does not yet have any national communication partners for the focus areas ICT (IT) and building and construction industry, in-depth research to this effect was undertaken at the outset of the project. The procedure described in more detail below made it possible to identify an appropriate number of people working or having already been involved in developments in the interface area between ICT (IT) and the building and construction sector. As a next step, future research projects and/or themes, designated as "project ideas" in this context, were identified. Further attention was devoted to collecting and processing this information and matching it with the simultaneous modifications of the twelve (eight, resp.) theme-focused roadmaps. Processing of project ideas and targeted contacts with suitable representatives of interests aimed at underpinning the visions described in the roadmaps with tangible references and validating them within the framework of meetings and workshops in support of the projects.

Conclusions

In principle it must be noted that despite far-reaching IT basic training at national level and despite a brisk construction market, research in the pertaining area (construction and ICT) has been relatively underrepresented to this date. At any rate, the country has not yet seen a genuine culture of (subsidised) research emerge in this area. It must be observed that company-level (self-financed) research rarely contributes to enlarging the knowledge bases in the sense of "knowledge sharing". During a theme-related workshop the two project streams (supplying project ideas and interaction with representatives of interests) were strategically merged and validated.

Project leader

ao.-Univ.-Prof.Arch.Dipl.-Ing.Dr.techn. Bob Martens
Weiterbildungszentrum der TU Wien

Project partners

• Centre Scientifique et Technique du Bâtiment
  84, avenue Jean Jaurès, 77447 Marne la Vallée cedex 2, Frankreich
  Kontaktperson: Alain Zarli
  E-Mail: alain.zarli@cstb.fr
  Homepage: www.cstb.fr
• VTT
  Lämpömiehenkuja 2A, FI-02044 VTT Espoo, Finnland
  Kontaktperson: Dr. Abdul Samad (Sami) Kazi
  E-Mail: Sami.Kazi@vtt.fi
  Homepage: www.vtt.fi

ao.-Univ.-Prof.Arch.Dipl.-Ing.Dr.techn. Bob Martens
Operngasse 11/017, A-1040 Wien
Tel.: +43 1 58801-41750
Fax: +43 1 58801-41799
E-Mail: martens@cec.tuwien.ac.at
Homepage: http://cec.tuwien.ac.at, www.strat-con.org