Construction management actions: A stimulant of construction accident causation

Human actions are believed to be a fundamental factor leading to accident causation. However, such failures are often ascribed to operatives rather than management. It is necessary to investigate how people in an upstream boundary of project organisation stimulate situations or conditions, which are likely to increase the risk of accident. This will be helpful for developing comprehensive prevention strategies. A study of management actions by all participants in construction projects, in relation to accident causation, is currently being undertaken by the authors at UMIST. As part of this work, this paper introduces construction management actions by builders: contractor or subcontractor, which may induce deficient procedures during the construction phase of a project. Construction management action is defined as constraints and responses by the construction manager or site manager, which may generate deficiencies in planning, control, operation, site condition and operative action. Using the constraint-response model of construction accident causation developed by authors, the detail of these deficiencies is described. Thus, a variety of construction management actions generating these deficiencies are identified as root causes of construction accidents.