Investigation of the poor-quality practices on building construction sites in Malaysia

Abdul Lateef Olanrewaju; Alice Hui Jing Lee

doi:10.2478/otmcj-2022-0008

Figures & Tables

Relationship between poor quality with rework and maintenance.

Determinants of poor quality in building projects.

Boxplot for type of organisation against the percentage of poor-quality project.

Percentage of projects with poor quality.

Priority of determinants of poor quality in building projects.

Results of a sample t-test for the determinants of poor quality

Determinant	Test value = 3.5						Std. deviation	Std. error mean

	t	df	Sig. (2-tailed)	Mean difference	95% Confidence interval of the difference

					Lower	Upper
Incompetency of labour	1.085	105	0.281	0.075	−0.063	0.214	14.329	1.392
Operative high workload	0.530	105	0.597	0.038	−0.103	0.179	14.651	1.423
Low welfare for workers	−0.845	105	0.400	−0.066	−0.221	0.089	16.099	1.564
Poor site supervision	5.789	105	0.000	0.434	0.285	0.583	15.435	1.499
Poor competency of site supervisor	−0.448	105	0.655	−0.028	−0.154	0.097	13.008	1.263
Poor coordination of subcontractors’ works	−0.621	105	0.536	−0.047	−0.198	0.104	15.647	1.520
Construction method	2.215	105	0.029	0.170	0.018	0.322	15.789	1.534
Poor quality procedure	4.301	105	0.000	0.302	0.163	0.441	14.454	1.404
Design complexity	3.305	105	0.001	0.264	0.106	0.423	16.458	1.599
Incomplete drawings and specifications	−1.944	105	0.055	−0.160	−0.324	0.003	16.990	1.650
Low quality of materials	9.488	105	0.000	0.642	0.508	0.776	13.922	1.352
Improper material storage	−9.736	105	0.000	−0.821	−0.988	−0.654	17.358	1.686
Usage of wrong equipment and plants	−2.324	105	0.022	−0.170	−0.315	−0.025	15.048	1.462
Rework/changes	0.966	105	0.336	0.066	−0.070	0.202	14.080	1.368
Poor communication on site	−1.944	105	0.055	−0.160	−0.324	0.003	16.990	1.650
Variation	−2.595	105	0.011	−0.179	−0.316	−0.042	14.222	1.381
Project duration	−6.627	105	0.000	−0.491	−0.637	−0.344	15.243	1.481
Weather condition	0.000	105	1.000	0.000	−0.139	0.139	14.409	1.400
Wrong information on nature of sites	−0.361	105	0.719	−0.028	−0.184	0.127	16.144	1.568
Poor information on government policy	−10.269	105	0.000	−0.755	−0.900	−0.609	15.134	1.470

Reliability statistics

Cronbach's alpha	Part 1	ValueN of items	0.68610^a

	Part 2	ValueN of items	0.70610^b

	Total N of items		20
Correlation between forms			0.618

Spearman-Brown coefficient	Equal length		0.764
Spearman-Brown coefficient	Unequal length		0.764

Guttman split-half coefficient			0.764

Cross-tabulation between current position and academic background

Current position	Academic background

	PMR	SPM/STPM	Diploma	Bachelor degree	Master	Total
Site engineer	0	0	2	14	1	17
Site supervisor	0	4	12	9	0	25
Safe and health officer	0	0	3	2	0	5
Site quantity surveyor	0	0	2	15	0	17
Quality officer	0	1	1	3	1	6
CM	0	0	1	2	1	4
Site worker/labourer	8	21	2	1	0	32
Total	8	26	23	46	3	106

Correlations Spearman's rho

		Percentage of defects in the project
Number of projects completed	Correlation coefficient	0.329^*
	Sig. (2-tailed)	0.001
	N	106

Cross-tabulation between the type of organisation and number of projects completed in 5 years

Type of organisation	Number of project completed

	0–5	6–10	11–15	Total
Main contractor	49	19	5	73
Subcontractor	17	15	1	33
Total	66	34	6	106

Summary of previous studies on determinants of poor quality

Criteria	Main author
Lack of skilled labour	Ali and Wen (2011), Hoonakker et al. (2010) and Olanrewaju et al. (2021)
Lack of worker empowerment/incentive	Loushine and Hoonakker (2002), Marosszeky et al. (2002), Hiyassat (2000) and Pheng and Wei (1996)
Poor interpretations of client/customer expectations	Loushine and Hoonakker (2002) and Olanrewaju et al. (2021)
Design complexity	Tang et al. (2004), Chan and Tam (2000), Olanrewaju et al. (2021), Olanrewaju (2021) and Olanrewaju et al. (2011)
Inadequate focus on client/customer requirement	Hoonakker (2006) and Olanrewaju et al. (2021)
Employee involvement/altitude	Hoonakker (2006) and Olanrewaju et al. (2021)
Lack of management commitment	Janipha and Ismail (2013), Ogwueleka (2013), Joaquin et al. (2008), Husin et al. (2008), Hoonakker (2006), Jha and Iyer (2006), Hiyassat (2000) and Arditi and Gunaydin (1998)
Poor communication	Mane and Patil (2015), Janipha and Ismail (2013), Ogwueleka (2013), Ali and Wen (2011), Ofori (2006), Hoonakker (2006) and Arditi and Gunaydin (1998)
Tight project schedule	Husin et al. (2008)
Variations	Ogwueleka (2013), Husin et al. (2008) and Joaquin et al. (2008)
Poor coordination between project	Ogwueleka (2013), Tang et al. (2004), Husin et al. (2008), Joaquin et al. (2008), Hoonakker (2006), Jha and Iyer (2006) and Arditi and Gunayalin (1998)
Poor planning/scheduling process	Mane and Patil (2015), Ofori (2006) and Chan and Tam (2000)
Expertise knowledge or training system	Yung and Yip (2010) and Arditi and Gunayalin (1998)
Poor time management	Ali and Wen (2011) and Olanrewaju et al. (2021)
Lack of quality assurance/Quality policy	Ali et al. (2010), Ogwueleka (2013), Joaquin et al. (2008) and Arditi and Gunayalin (1998)
Lack of project supervision	Janipha and Ismail (2013), Ogwueleka (2013), Husin et al. (2008) and Arditi and Gunayalin (1998)
Unavailability of resources	Joaquin et al. (2008), Chan and Tam (2000) and Olanrewaju et al. (2021)
Project environment	Ogwueleka (2013) and Joaquin et al. (2008)
Uniqueness of the project	Ogwueleka (2013), Joaquin et al. (2008) and Husin et al. (2008)
Insufficient project manager	Mane and Patil (2015) and Ofori (2006)
Lack of training policy	Mallawaarachchi and Senaratn (2015), Ogwueleka (2013), Said et al. (2009), Joaquin et al. (2008) and Olanrewaju (2012)

Descriptive statistics of the determinants of poor quality

Determinant	Least agree	Less agree	Agree	Strongly agree	Extremely agree
Incompetency of labour	0	6	41	51	8
Operative high workload	0	7	43	48	8
Low welfare for workers	1	9	48	39	9
Poor site supervision	0	2	29	49	26
Poor competency of site supervisor	0	3	56	41	6
Poor coordination of subcontractors’ works	0	9	50	37	10
Construction method	0	7	35	50	14
Poor quality procedure	0	5	25	62	14
Design complexity	0	6	33	47	20
Incomplete drawings and specifications	0	16	48	32	10
Low quality of materials	0	2	13	59	32
Improper material storage	2	52	34	14	4
Usage of wrong equipment and plants	3	39	41	16	7
Rework/changes	0	6	41	52	7
Poor communication on site	0	16	48	32	10
Variation	0	11	54	37	4
Project duration	1	26	51	27	1
Poor weather condition	0	7	46	46	7
Wrong information on nature of sites	0	14	35	50	7
Poor information on government policy	2	40	48	15	1

Investigation of the poor-quality practices on building construction sites in Malaysia

Figures & Tables

Fig. 1

Fig. 2

Fig. 3

Fig. 4

Fig. 5

Results of a sample t-test for the determinants of poor quality

Reliability statistics

Cross-tabulation between current position and academic background

Correlations Spearman's rho

Cross-tabulation between the type of organisation and number of projects completed in 5 years

Summary of previous studies on determinants of poor quality

Descriptive statistics of the determinants of poor quality

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