Identifying and positioning construction supply chain planning problems

The construction industry struggles with an ineffective supply chain. A literature review, in combination with an empirical study aims at identifying and positioning perceived supply chain planning problems. The empirical part is a series of semi-structured interviews with construction site managers, purchase coordinators, and a project leader. Most site managers are responsible for mid-sized turnkey contracts, which enable comparison. Findings show that most of the supply chain planning problems relate to lack of coordination between actors, and that many of the problems discovered on-site originate from the supply process or the design process. Through proactive coordination of the actors in the supply chain planning process and the actors in the construction process, the problems on-site causing Òfire-fightingÓ-activities could be reduced.