Safety Management in High-Rise Construction

High-rise buildings are the current trend in construction nowadays because of its convenience, advantages, architectural design, grade and luxury. Not known to many, it has many safety risks for occupancy. Mr. Nguyen Phu Hoi made a case study which mainly focused in safety aspects to come up with the solutions on how to control risk and to prevent accidents as much as possible as well as to foresee/handle emergencies/contingencies during the construction duration.

The most frequent problems/accidents related to safety in high-rise construction often include:

1. Ladders

2. Falling Debris

3. Falling From Heights

4. Electrical shock & Machinery

5. Trips and Slips

6. Crane and hoist operation

Due to time and resources constraints, Mr. Hoi’s study focused only in the following objectives:

1. To study SMS (Safety Management System) at a high-rise construction project in Vietnam

2. To study safety risk in construction of high-rise building in Vietnam

3. To analyze strength, weakness and propose recommendations for improvement of safety in high-rise construction in Vietnam

Conclusion

Throughout the core basis of safety literature and actual high-rise tower now under construction, the main important issues can be summarized as below:

(1) Summary of Safety Management System (SMS)

           

The SMS is a must for every construction project, especially for high-rise construction because this area is consisting of many latent hazard and risk. Without SMS, the owners, developers, investors, shareholders, and managers cannot reach the goal and target as expected. On the other hand, the contractors, suppliers, installers, and workers cannot fulfill and complete their mission.

In overall, without SMS, the construction of a high-rise will become very dangerous and the casualty/damage cannot be prevented. The SMS must be set up and strictly implemented and it should comprise of the main frames:

-          - Safety Policy

-          - Safety Organization

-          - Safety Plan & Program

-          - Hazard & Risk analysis and identification

-          - Safety Documenting & Recording

-          - Safety Review & Upgrading

In addition, high-rise construction project should also have strong and powerful PM/CM team who will monitor, control, and handle the safety matters (e.g. review and approval of safety plan/program submitted by the contractors and sub-contractors). It is also their duty to strictly implement these safety plans which normally and basically include the following: 

- Safety management/hierarchy/organization

- PPE availability, use and condition

- Scaffolding (fixed and mobile) including ladders & platforms

- Electro-mechanical activities and controls

- Site status

- Temporary power supply and tools

- Health & welfares

- Storage condition

- Fire prevention

- Waste/pollution control

- Monitoring and control of working on height

- Aid/first aid and evacuation

- Emergency plan for unanticipated circumstances

It is recommended that for bid and high-rise construction project, the owner should seek and hire a professional project management team usually PMC companies (project management consultancy), as the project & construction manager and their representative as well. The PM/CN then will be enthusiastically and heartily dedicated to the multi-goal completion of a high-rise construction project: schedule reached, within budget, quality achieved and also well perform the high safety requirements/demands.    

The PM/CM as the owner representative should have strong and effective ways to force all contractors and their subs at site to totally and absolutely comply with safety rules. It is necessarily to cleverly apply the method of fine and reward to guarantee the safe situation at site workplace.

(2) Summary of Hazard/Risk Identification:

This is the most important portion of every specific SMS especially for high-rise project. Depending on the specific condition and particular situation, the PM/CM should:

(i) Thoroughly analyze all aspect of the project: geographical, structure, sub-water, vicinity, surrounding inhabitants

(ii) Far-seeing and fore-seeing for all possible causes/reasons may lead to hazard/risk

(iii) Focusing in the most would-be hazard/risk of high-rise construction: fall/falling, trip/slip, fire, electrical shocking/flashing, tower crane/hoist, lift/elevator, scaffolding, PPE

(iv) Periodically and frequently (weekly/bi-weekly) conduct site-safety check carefully and thoroughly. The same for site-safety audit

(v) Evaluation the site-safety check/audit and requires improvements

(vi) Always available for an emergency plan to cope with an unanticipated circumstance (drill of evacuation…)

(vii) Always keep best relationship for availability of a hot-contact with nearest local authorities and utilities

(viii) Frequently review, analyze and search for other possible hazards and identification of its risks

(3) Strength & Weakness of the actual SMS at Pullman Saigon Center project

Strength:

-    - Strong and powerful: the PM/CM monitor, control and force the contactors & their subs to execute the safety rules.

-    - Standardized & professional: the safety rules & items based on the advanced standards/norms of site-safety and implemented by a long-history PMC like Turner.

-    - Sufficient: the SMS and its rules/items comprising the most frequent issues in high-rise construction

Weakness:

-     - Lack of identification of hazard/risk from some potential possibilities such as: glass wall, lift, sub-water, overhead power line

-     - No considering on the role of 3^rd safety party for audit/verification

-     - Only involving the actions in construction phase.

-     - No mentioning the other phase: commissioning and delivery

-     - No mentioning on safety training, especially for induction training

-     -Take much time much, paper for meeting and inspection so the time schedule may be impacted.

           

(4) Suggestions & Recommendations

-     - Build-up a comprehensive safety plan and extensive safety programs: the plan should involve all factors that possibly cause risks and hazards of unsafe conditions.

-    - Strictly abiding and complying with local code and governmental regulations and stipulations.

-    - Build and maintain very good relationship with local authorities and utilities.

-    - Pay special attention on the geographical, geological, environmental, hydro-geological characteristics of the area, to foresee/ anticipate suitable counter measures and actions.

-    - PLAN – DO – CHECK – ACT: strictly and thoroughly executing the established safety plan/program; frequently review and improve for better outcomes.

-    - NO COMPROMISE on safety especially in high -rise construction.

-    - Ready for safety egress in site for rescue and emergency exit

-    - Emergency Action Plan: ready for reaction plan/scenarios to any unexpected circumstance/contingency; prepare plan, scenarios and evacuation method for readiness and coping with even the worst case might be happened: fire, collapse, seismic, terrorism

-     - Periodically organize training, re-training for emergency drill/rehearsal and contingency scenarios of evacuation.

-    - Check and review design for specific items which may cause risk of un-safety by professional 3^rd party.

-    - NO SMOKING at construction site: so no hazard and no risk for fire occurrence. Of course we should strictly control and monitor all possible causes and reasons may lead to fire and explosive from materials and chemicals and from interaction among themselves.

-    - Increasing safety awareness: although we have rules, notices, regulations, fine sufficiently but the hazard/risk/accident are still be possible to occur. In order to avoid and prevent more and more the possibility of hazard, risk and accident, the awareness/perception on safety in high-rise construction of every involved people must be increased and enhanced.  

This can be got by education level of every worker, person participated on site. This can be increased by frequently training/re-training them on safety subject by various type: oriented safety, 15-minute tool-box meeting every morning, safety inspection daily, weekly safety audit, safety signs/panel/billboards/notice on site, safety lunch for every 100,000 safe-working hours.

-     - Motivation and incentives: similar to job and wage, performance and bonus; safety in high-rise construction needs to have encouragement to the people who are good examples for well-performed of safety on site. There are various ways/forms to enhance and support safety goal: safety lunch, safety lottery, safety award to the best-performed worker, bonus, pay-rise, promotion etc.

-    - More attention – less occurrence: the more attention on safety the less accident and problems occurred.

-   - Strengthen functions of employers and supervisors: employers and supervisors must ensure compliance with the provisions of the OHSA and its regulations. Key requirements for employers include:

(a) Employer

(i) instruct, inform and supervise workers to protect their health and safety

(ii) appoint competent persons as supervisors

(iii) take every precaution reasonable in the circumstances for the protection of a worker

(iv) prepare and review at least annually a written occupational health and safety policy, and develop and maintain a program to implement that policy if the workplace has six or more full-time employees

(v) post a copy of the occupational health and safety policy in the workplace, where workers will be most likely to see it

(b) Supervisors

(i) ensure workers work in compliance with protective devices, measures and procedures required by the act and regulations

(ii) ensure workers use or wear any equipment, protective device or clothing required by the employer

(iii) advise workers of any potential or actual health or safety dangers known by the supervisor

(iv) if required, provide workers with written instructions on the measures and procedures to be taken for the workers’ protection

(v) take every precaution reasonable in the circumstances for the protection of workers

* Frequently carry out preventing methods/measures for safety:

* Periodically check and verify crane/hoist by 3rd independent parties.

* Frequently training and certificating operators

* Review and amendment/adjusting safety plan/program from safety audits

-                      Frequently TRAINING on safety to all workers. Make sure them always to keep in mind that safety does not depend on luck or destiny but it depends on themselves. 

His thesis abstract is copied and pasted below.

Abstract

Construction is indispensable for the growing up of any country and cities. The more development of society/community, the more projects are going on. Construction industry brings up the new picture of country/city; attracts investors to come in and provides more jobs/incomes to people/community; especially for the under-developing countries.

However, construction industry is one of the most dangerous/risky economic sectors. In Vietnam, in the year 2011, official reports recorded that 5896 accidents occurred in construction led 6154 injuries included 504 severe cases with 574 deaths. (SG newspaper dated 26-June-2012). Note that 2011 is the year which construction was depressing nationwide due to the problems of high inflation and high interest rate. Further a certain accident amount was not put in the above official report.

 Accident cases from machines/tools always being a major percentage but deaths are mainly by falling and electric shocks. In most cases, the control of safety management at sites is not strictly, frequently slacken while the owner and contractors only focusing on completion schedule and profits; insufficient interest to safety for people on sites. Another part is from the lack of understandings/perception on safety of the workers themselves.

Everyone is aware on the important of safety, everyone is told about the preciousness of human being and many losses comes from the accidents; but casualties still be recorded. How to find out and apply an effective manner to minimize and – may be - eliminate all unsafe conditions and possible causes /risks of the would-be hazards?

World Bank Tendering and Contract Administration Procedure

Contract administration is very complex which sometimes lead to cost overrun and delay of the construction project. It is extremely difficult to verify the authenticity of the contract and it requires skillful human resource to control and evaluate the process to ensure the transparency especially in the procurement. Documentation in the bidding stage must be written accurately so that contractors can fully understand the owner’s preferences. All pertinent documents must be monitored, diligently recorded and filed before, during and after construction for auditing.  If these processes are not done well, the project will be delayed, suspended or even terminated.

Mr. Ngo Viet Hoang made a case study on Trung Son Hydropower Project aimed to: (i) study the World Bank contract requirements and procedures; (ii) analyze strengths and weaknesses of 2 packages of entire project; (iii) study the practice of owner contract administration in Trung Son hydropower project; and (iv) discuss the lessons learned from the strengths and provide recommendations to improve the weaknesses.

Conclusion

The contract administration is perceived to start from simple to the complex. Its processes are of importance and how problems had been happened in case. The World Bank contract requirements and procedures recognize the basic similar theory, but World Bank focus on fair, transparent, anti-fraud and incorrupt bidders.

Furthermore, analyzing the strengths and weaknesses of the 2 packages of the entire project, it was found out that the difficult thing is in contract administration. The manager or the project team has no capability and experience as well as ethics to handle the project very well. The Trung Son Company is using the guidelines of the World Bank and coordinates it with some tools that are created by the company to improve the contract administration process. Summarizing these, it is recommended to verifying the step to make the framework perfectly suited for the other future project in Vietnam.

Recommendations

Based on the case study, it is revealed that the World Bank funded projects are being performed with commitments financially, environmental development sustainability, and socially by making the pre-feasibility study using a lot of program such as Environmental Impact Assessment and Supplemental (SESIA), Resettlement, Livelihoods and Ethnic Minorities Development Program (RLDP), Policy Framework for Compensation, Ethnic Minorities' Planning Framework and Environment Guidance under the Transmission Line Component, Trung Son Hydropower Project, Final Resettlement Action Plan (RAP) for Bridges and Access Road under Trung Son Access Road work item.

Furthermore, the borrowers also commit to have a skillful, ethnic and experience human resource. In addition, the borrowers must follow the World Bank’s guideline in procurement tightly. Another important thing behind a successful project is the finance.  In construction, the contractors cannot finish the workload on time if they do not receive the payment based on schedule. However, not all guidelines are suited for some areas especially in Vietnam where contract administration is unprofessional. There are still problems in corruption and fraud leading to wrong bidding result and choosing contractors. The author opined that the World Bank should allow the borrower to propose the adjustment suitable for their countries in terms of policies, economy, and social but still keeping the core things of World Bank guidelines.

His thesis abstract is copied and pasted below.

Abstract

The economic growth over several years is at the root of many of the issues in Vietnam’s energy sector. It lead to the government must have a plan to develop the power generation .

Vietnam’s options for power generation include a hydropower, sizable resources of coal and gas, renewable energy potential of possibly as well as some nuclear power.

From an emissions standpoint, every source that displaces coal from the generation mix would reduce emissions of both local pollutants including sulfur dioxide, oxides of nitrogen and particulates and global pollutants, especially carbon dioxide (CO₂). And Development of hydropower could have a decisive impact on Vietnam’s future emissions path, since it will avoid building new coal fired plant.  Hydropower represents one of the lowest cost sources of new power supply and Vietnam is constructing the Son La (2,400MW) and developing the Lai Chau (1,200MW) large plants on the Da River, adding to the current facility at Hoa Binh (1,920MW).  Besides these large projects, the main focus is on medium-sized projects (typically 100-600 MW each) distributed throughout the country. About 22 such projects are under construction or are planned to enter construction over the next decade, providing a total of about 4,800 MW.

 Trung Son hydropower project is the first hydropower project that’s funded by World Bank, and its processes must follow the World Bank guideline. It’s the challenge for entire member of Trung Son hydropower company. Especially, in contract administration. How to avoid the threat of delay(time), over budget(cost), uncetain risk of construction(quality) is the big question. 

Through this final report,the author hope everyone, who read it, can find out their own way to solve the edges related to contract administration problems in the difference projects.

MANAGEMENT APPROACH AND TOOLS FOR CONSTRUCTION PROJECT QUALITY ASSURANCE AND IMPROVEMENT

invitation

AIT SEMINAR

MANAGEMENT APPROACH AND TOOLS FOR CONSTRUCTION PROJECT QUALITY ASSURANCE AND IMPROVEMENT

It is widely known that many projects have problem related with customer satisfaction, defects and others things related with quality. Quality is one of the most important objectives in project management together with cost and time management. Low quality of a construction project is frequently caused by unclear project management process and mistakes in identifying project requirements.

Project owners wish to complete a project according to his or her quality objectives. Inexperience project owners have difficulties in developing an effective project management approach which can assure the quality. Factors affecting project quality will be discussed in a seminar “Management Approach and Tools for Construction Project Quality Assurance and Improvement” organized by Professional Master Program in Project Management in Construction of AIT.

The discussion also covers on how project management life cycle and activities will affect quality of construction projects and best practices to obtain a good quality result. The best practice includes design process, tendering and construction process.

Date & time:  9:00-12:00; Sun 17 March 2013

Location:        45 Dinh Tien Hoang Str., Ben Nghe ward, District 1, HCMC (Opposite to HTV broadcast station)

Language:      English

Entrance fee:  Free of charge

We are pleased to invite you or representatives from your organization and company to this seminar. You are kindly requested to confirm your attendance not later than 14 March 2013 to Ms. Nguyen Le Tuong at (08) 39107423 (ext:117); email: ngletuong@aitcv.ac.vn. Fax: (08) 39107422.

We look forward to meeting you all at the seminar and thank you for your cooperation.

 Best regards,

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 AGENDA

 

08:45 - 09:00	Registration
09:00 - 09:15	Welcome speech AIT/MPM Introduction
09:15 - 11:15	Presentation: Management Approach And Tools For Construction Project Quality Assurance And Improvement Dr. Hadikusumo – MPM/CEIM Coordinator Construction, Engineering and Infrastructure Management Asian Institute of Technology
11:15 - 11:45	Discussion

Working condition plays important role to people and society. In fact, workplace safety and occupational health is always associated with a good and clean working environment where employees are defended and hold from harm and damage. Therefore, safety and health management program is the most important factor in operations of any Vietnam oil and gas companies in term of HSE due to the dangerous working environment in oil and gas industry with high rate of accident and influence to employees’ occupational health.

Although many companies have established and developed the health, safety and environment management system to provide personal health protection and safe working environment for their employees, as well as to meet the strictly safety requirements and laws in Vietnam, international convention and standards, there are still remain many problems with regards to occupational health and safety at workplace such as the following:

1. High incident risk on offshore facilities (such as hydrocarbon release, working overside, etc.)

2. High injury/ fatality risk to worker while expose to incident.

Mr. Nguyen Quang Thuong made a study of PTSC Production Services JSC, a subsidiary of PetroVietnam Technical Services Corporation to (i) identify risks in oil and gas service company; and (ii) study the effectiveness of the safety improvement program for the company, weakness of the program and suggestion in improvement.

Conclusion

Safety improvement program has been developed in Vietnam oil and gas industry for many years. It is useful tool to mitigate accident at work site and improve safety performance. The management has been also applying the program to achieve good effect in cost control and quality control for projects. Many companies have also been successfully applying safety improvement program in their business development and HSE management. The safety improvement program is getting all management and employees into HSE responsibility; it helps project team to identify and assess hazards in their work, manage and prevent the risk of accident which can cause damage to property, injury to people and pollution to environment.

The program sets up action and implementation procedures for achieving HSE objectives and targets for the Company and projects and requirement in commitment by all staff to continuous improvement. When building a safety improvement program, the Company should consider the following:

- Legal requirement/ regulation (comply with national rules, international regulations which are enforced in the nation and HSE standards).

- HSE performance (included for office and all work sites).

Effectiveness of the program in the Company

When the program is well implemented, Company can gain the following achievement and result:

- Minimize/ prevent accident.

- All hazards/ risks are identified and well controlled. This is a major HSEMS objective in every project.

- All levels of staff are assigned with HSE roles and responsibilities, HSE performance is continuously improved in all operations and projects.

- Eliminate injury to employee by providing risk mitigation process at work site such as reporting and rectifying all unsafe conditions / unsafe actions which may lead to an accident (Unsafe Act Unsafe Condition report, Near Miss report).

- Meet legal and other HSE requirements that are applicable to the operations of the company.

- HSE performance responsibility will be assigned to all company staff especially with the management.

- HSEMS has provided HSE framework to manage all risks arising from projects and operations.

Weakness of safety improvement program in the studied Organization

- The program requires a strong and continuous commitment from the Management who must also understand clearly all the operation and adequate HSE requirement. This is sometime not achievable due to the Management being too busy for business.

- Strict safety requirement may obstruct the operation; whole work could be stopped for resolving some minor HSE issues. It may also increase cost and time for the work/ project. Therefore this conflict may cause difficulty for small organizations and projects.

- Long program and repeated daily HSE action may cause boring to the workers, then resulting negligence. HSE requirement is still complied with but the effectiveness may loss. This may even lead to more serious consequence. The Organization had recognized this weakness and has prevented bad affect by continuous improvement and refreshing programs. Some good programs were built up such as Unsafe Act/ Unsafe Condition Report, KAISEN (encourage employees to submit any improvement idea).

Recommendations

- Implementation of safety improvement program must be continuously in the Organization to indentify and mitigate risks and hazards in all projects and operations, as well as future works/ projects. The Organization should build it to become safe behavior and culture in all operation. For targeting new level of achievement, the accumulating behavioral observation data is one of the most important sources of information for continuous improvement (Thomas R. Krause, “The Behavior-Based Safety Process - Managing Involvement for an Injury-Free Culture”, Second Edition)

- The performance of safety improvement programs must be committed and involved by top management and all staff.

- The Organization must frequently organize safety training courses for its staffs to improve their knowledge and capability on risk mitigation and accident prevention when working offshore.

- To avoid serious accident which may happen at work site, the Organization shall review HSE procedures periodically with contribution from direct workers. The review shall also include the assessment of system’s effectiveness.

- Safety incentive must be maintained with adequate and in-time appreciation to employees (Thomas R. Krause, “The Behavior-Based Safety Process - Managing Involvement for an Injury-Free Culture”, Second Edition).

His thesis abstract is copied and pasted below.

Abstract

Working condition and environment are the utmost importance for people and society. All labor contracts, terms of employment are always included requirement for occupational health and safety, requested for a good working environment. Occupational health, safety and environment has the main objective of developing and maintaining workplace’s safety, health and environment (HSE) management program and employee’s work ability , also preventing accident and illness in work.

Occupational health, safety and environment should have been ensured in the planning stages of the work. In additional, risks and hazards shall be monitored continuously and necessary safeguards shall be implemented to solve and prevent working accidents, occupational illness, environment pollution and other risks.

An occupational health and safety improvement program would be essential for all companies, especially in oil and gas industry. The program provides a framework for developing management system for health, safety and environment (HSE), identifying safety problems and methods to maintain and improve HSE management system to the target of zero lost time accident, zero occupational illness, zero pollution too the environment.

Project Organizational Structure of Highway Contractors

The transport project has specific characteristic, thus, project organization structure in the highway construction is more specific than any other projects. At present, almost transport projects have many problems in quality, delay, over budget, environmental impact, traffic safety, etc. Some of the major causations come from the project organizational structure. Project cannot run smoothly and efficiently in case its structure is not effective. In fact, there are some common problems relating to project organizational chart as follows:

·  The project organization structure is not flexible enough for project staff some employees did not meet the assigned requirements.

·   Role and accountability were not clear and detailed enough. In many cases, the staff members are ambiguous about what issue they needed to solve by themselves and had accountability for their decision making. Besides, some decisions were not made in timely manner. These affected so much to the efficiency and effectiveness of the project.

·   Sometimes, the coordination within the company department; or the communication between the company and the project management office (PMO) on site are not close and smooth. It takes risk of interruption and brought the potential risks for the project.

·    There are some traffic accidents happened on the construction site because the PMO only focused on the construction safety, and did not pay attention to the traffic safety. When the traffic accidents happened, a lot of legal issues arise and affected so much to the company as well as project.

·   The reward system and training program are not given importance. This limits the staff motivation and competence enhancement.

Understanding the organization issues and finding out the appropriate solutions are the best ways for enhancing the project's success and the employee's competence as well as contributing to the sustainable development of the company.

Mr. Pham Hai Chien made a case study on National Highway No.51 Project aimed to: (i) study organization and project structure for a highway construction project; and (ii) Make recommendations for improvement of weaknesses, problems and obstacles.

Conclusions

By focusing in in-depth analysis of the organizational structure of the contractors, who undertook to deliver the 13^th and 14^th packages of the national highway No.51 project, ​​the report demonstrated the importance of organizational structure to the project performances. Simultaneously, the report clarified the key factors affecting the project structure and the specific solutions that managers need to keep in mind when designing an organizational structure as follows:

1. Roles and accountabilities.

The report indicated that the role and responsibility are the fundamentals in organization structure. The organizational structure can only work perfectly based on the roles and accountabilities which are clarified in detailed, comprehensive and clear. If not, many conflicts might happen during the operation of the organization and project. Thus, the goals and objectives of the company and project cannot be achieved.

2. Coordination and cooperation.

Coordination among departments and between the staff members always matters, which the company must concerned about. There are many factors affecting the coordination and cooperation, and one of the factors is the organizational structure. Each organizational structure has its own strengths and advantages. Therefore, depending on the characteristics of each project, the organizational structure needs to be designed and set up in order for the departments and individuals to coordinate and cooperate most effectively. The report demonstrated why the matrix structure is a typical example that is often

3. Project governance.

Beside a good project structure, the project governance is also very important to ensure the success of the project. The report pointed out that transparency, clear structure, clear role and accountabilities are the important factors in the project governance. Additionally, it is necessary to apply four key principles of project governance to ensure that project governance is more effective and efficient.

4. Problems and obstacles occurring within the structure.

Based on the weaknesses of the project structure, the report analysed in-depth the core problem occurred. These are typical problems which the traffic projects often encounter. Beside some solutions are supported by the theoretical framework, some other solutions come from the experience of the PMO. The traffic contractors can apply these experiences to manage the future project more successfully.

5. Lessons learnt from the strength and weakness.

There are many other lessons learned during the construction process, but this report only focuses on the basic lessons relating to organizational structure has been and will happen in the key traffic projects such as the national highway No.51.

Recommendations

The construction companies need to pay special attention and must consider the following recommendations when designing an organizational structure of own business in order to achieve the agreed strategic objectives.

1. Set up the good structure according to the right policy and strategy.

When the economy falls into a spiral of crisis, the companies often tend to change the business strategies in order to adapt with the crisis and to overcome difficulties by restructuring the organizational structure following the new business strategy. This is because the structure is the skeleton of an organization or a project. In case that is a good project structure but does not match the right policy and strategy of the company, the structure cannot run smoothly. In contrast, a good structure in accordance with a failure business strategy of the enterprise does not still ensure the project success. Two factors always interact and complement each other as a precondition for the success of the project.

Set up the project structure based on characteristic of each project with careful consideration. The previous project structure is only a consultation, not a final choice. After that, analyzing in-depth, incessantly monitoring and revising the project structure to ensure that it always follows the current policy and strategy of the company.

2. Appoint the right person to the right position.

People are the heart of all issues. Until now, the personnel activities are never easy for any enterprises. While choosing a good staff is too difficult, appointing them to the right position for maximizing his ability is never simple.

Based on a good recruitment process, the advanced training programs, the clear, detailed and comprehensive personnel policies, transparency, and the effective enforcement of the personnel policies, the firms will hold a huge advantage in the operational activities and the project delivery.

3. Set up and enforce effectively and efficiently the project governance.

i. Jean-Daniel Gerber (2004) stated that “Good governance doesn’t fall from the sky; it must be learned, practiced and enforced”.

ii. A successful project needs the effective project governance. There are many perspectives, approaches, and structures in the project governance. Base on the organizational structure and policies of the company, the firms should set up an appropriate project governance structure, then apply and enforce them effectively to achieve the required objectives.

4. Attach special importance to the traffic safety.

i. Vietnam is one of the countries with the higher rate of traffic accidents in recent years due to severely degraded transportation infrastructure, while the awareness of the traffic participant is still poor. Moreover, the contractors of the traffic project usually do not pay attention to traffic safety for vehicles circulated on the project. Therefore, most of the traffic projects often occur some serious common traffic jams and traffic accidents. Many contractors have been sanctioned, even prosecuted criminal.

ii. Setting up a good safety team; establishing a detailed and comprehensive project safety plan; and enforcing efficiently the safety plan are the best solution that the traffic contractor needs to follow in order to achieve more the project’s success and avoid the legal issue because of the traffic accidents.

5. Doing right at the beginning makes a good ending.

i. In the field of management, doing right at the beginning, doing right from the smallest things are the key to success, however it is not easy to take. For instance, in all stages of project implementation, or in case the important issues need to be executed immediately, the commencement meeting is extremely important. The opinions and reviews in this meeting are as a basis for doing right at the start, minimize the potential risks during the implementation in the future. The final reported meeting is also essential to assess the results of implementation and draw experience for the upcoming projects.

ii. Trying to do right at the commencement, trying to do right from the smallest are the best way for the companies and the project managers towards the fully satisfactory results.

Finally, there are no any theoretical frameworks, or solutions to be accurate in all cases of the organizational structure. However, the analysis and recommendations in this report that are fundamental approach for any construction companies can be applied in a flexible manner through the specific characteristics of the business, or the projects. Understanding this approach, the firms will be easier and more successful in designing their own organizational structure.

His thesis abstract is copied and pasted.

Abstract

Vietnam has maintained an impressive growth in infrastructure and its services since the early 1990s, especially in transport network development. After becoming a member of the World Trade Organization, the Vietnamese firms face to not only their domestic competitors but also the foreign companies. One of the most critical factors decreased the competitive competency of Vietnamese firms came from organization structure and design. This final report focused on the project organization structure of the highway contractor. According to the organization theory from literature review, this report analyzed how the organization theory is applied in the real project of Vietnam national highway No.51 as well as addressed the problems and obstacles occurring throughout the project. Some lessons learnt from project and recommendations are discussed in order to help the project managers to improve their project management competency in term of the organizational structure.

Contract Project Risk Management Strategy in an Unstable Market Situation in Vietnam

Based on the preliminary data of the market research company property (real estate) in HCM City, more than 90% of real estate projects in HCM City are behind schedule, in which, an estimated 70% of the construction project stopped. The provinces and cities such as Hanoi, Da Nang, Can Tho, Binh Duong, Dong Nai, BRVT, and Long An have the same situation as in Ho Chi Minh City because of lack of investor, while customers demand decreased significantly due to the decline of the economy and markets. Therefore, investors opted to stop the project until the market and customer needs restoration while some chose to slow down the construction to complete the project as the market and customer needs recovery.

Mr. Nguyen Truong Hung made a case study on the Canary Resident Phase 2 Project in the Proposed Guocoland Mixed Development at VSIP I Thuan An District, Binh Duong Province which aimed to: (i) use research data of the contractor, and build in aspect of contractor’s perfective; (ii) study the behaviour of project owners during slow construction market; (iii) study risks of contractor affected by Owner and market; (iv) study risks management (in term of solutions and strategy); (v) discuss the strengths and weakness of the solutions; and (vi) propose recommendations on risks and solutions.

Conclusions

Risk management is an integrate part of project management. Therefore, risk management should be executed immediately at the commencement of the project and must maintained throughout the course of the project implementation process. Risks can occur in any phase of the project. Contractor cannot avoid risks; however, if the contractor strictly implemented the risk management system, risk can be minimized, transferred or retained. There are several ways to deal with risk such as transfer the risk to another party, avoiding the risk, reducing the negative effect of the risk, as well as accepting some particular or all of the consequences of a particular risk. The active and early identification, analysis and evaluation of risks can reduce its impact and will ensure the feasibility and efficiency of the project. The benefit of risk management as well as effectiveness of project management is to save time, avoid cost overrun, ensuring project completion as planned schedule and with good quality.

This report listed the behaviours of investors occurred in construction projects in Vietnam when the economic and market declined leading to Owner’s economic risks, and unstable market situation in Vietnam. This report also identifies the major risks that construction contractors have occurred in the construction projects, many risks occurred in the construction phase, especially in the economic and slow market situation period. However, the report only give particular serious risks occurred for construction sector in Vietnam due to impact of economic difficulties and sharp market decline which really affected the contractors.

As a result, the report described how contractor analyses manage the risks, and their strategy to overcome the risk. This also highlighted strengths and weakness of contractors when they implemented the risk management system, and suggest solutions as well as give recommendations to manage risks as shown in the tables below.

In order to minimize the risk in each specific case, the main contractor used a lot of negotiation strategy, particularly the cooperation among the parties including investor, main contractor, suppliers and subcontractor which are important in the chains. They must cooperate; share the risks and work together to overcome the risks in order to overcome the market difficulties.

His thesis abstract is copied and pasted below.

Abstract

Construction business and Real estate business began to face difficulties since the first Quarter 2010 due to European economic downturn has affected foreign investment FDI in Vietnam to decrease, and interest bank rate is too high , and significant GDP decline has direct impact on the construction on the construction sector and real estate business. Investors face many risks in the project and this has indirectly affected to contractors, suppliers of projects. Therefore, risk management, especially risk management due to difficulties economic and slow market situation as to be appreciated in order to minimize the risks.  

Risks cannot eliminated, however, if contractor implementation of strict risk management system, risk can minimized, transferred or retained, There are several ways of risk dealing such as transfers the risk to another party, avoiding the risk, reducing the negative effect of the risk, as well as accepting some or all of the consequences of a particular risk. The active and early identification, analysis and evaluation, with control measures and reduce the impact of risk is urgently needed to ensure the feasibility and efficiency of the project. The benefit of risk management as well as effectives of project management is save time, avoid cost overrun, ensuring is project complete on schedule as planned, and good quality.

This study listed Owner behaviours often occur in construction projects when they encounter difficulties in the market, and contractors in risks management strategy to overcome the risks due to operating through the construction projects.