This paper was presented to the 2001 Group Decision and Negotiation Conference,

in La Rochelle, France on 4-7 June 2001. We are grateful to them for their permission to
to reproduce this paper on our site.

THE ROLE OF “WIDE-BAND” GDSS IN

INCREASING VALUE FOR MULTI-
ORGANISATIONAL GROUPS: THE CASE OF THE
UK CONSTRUCTION INDUSTRY

L. Alberto Franco
Kingston Business School, Surrey, UK
a.franco@kingston.ac.uk

Jonathan Rosenhead
London School of Economics and Political Science, London, UK
j.rosenhead@lse.ac.uk

ABSTRACT

This paper provides some insights about the development and implementation of
a “wide-band” group decision support system a series of case studies within the UK
construction industry. The authors reflect upon the applicability of wide-band GDSS
for project review and learning generation within multi-organisational groups, and
describes the design, implementation and evaluation of a Cross Organisational
Approach (COLA) to support the multiple stakeholders within construction activities,
recognising the distinctive inter-organisational nature of the project team.

1. INTRODUCTION

Multi-organisational groups are the usual form of arrangement in the construction

sector, where project-based teams typically include one or more members both of the
client organisation and of the main contractor, and will also include architect(s),
designer(s), project manager(s), quantity surveyor(s) and other specialist sub-
contractors. Due to its transient nature, a construction project-based team has come to
be known as a Temporary Multiple Organisation (TMO) [Cherns and Bryant 1984].
The TMO membership will often change during the life of a large construction
project.
Given the inter-organisational nature of the TMO, group decision-making can be
very difficult and thus the need to accommodate the multiple perspectives of the
group members is paramount. In the UK, there are a number of Problem Structuring
Methods (PSMs) or “wide-band” GDSSs [Rosenhead 1989; Eden 1995] that have
been developed to help members of multi-organisational groups to work with each
other across organisational boundaries, and which seem appropriate for the TMO
case. These facilitator-driven systems focus on developing effective group problem
handling rather than on increasing the productivity of group meetings through the use
of computers [Eden 1992; Ackermann and Eden 1994]. Examples of well-established
wide-band GDSSs are Soft Systems Methodology (SSM), Strategic Options
Development and Analysis (SODA) and the Strategic Choice Approach (SCA).

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 This paper discusses the applicability of wide-band GDSSs for project review and
learning generation within TMOs in the UK construction industry, and describes the
design, implementation and evaluation of a system to support the multiple
stakeholders involved in construction activities. The paper starts by describing the
context in which such a system was developed (i.e. the UK construction industry),
and then goes on to present some of the research findings from its application in three
case studies. The lessons learned should be relevant to TMOs in non-construction
contexts.

2. THE UK CONSTRUCTION INDUSTRY

The UK construction sector has been characterised by high construction costs,

relative to other EU countries, despite having almost the lowest hourly labour costs
[Commission of the European Communities 1994]. It has also been criticised for its
low profitability and low investment in both capital and research and development
[Egan 1998]. A related issue, which is widely acknowledged, is the difficulty that
clients have in expressing their needs in ways that construction companies can meet
efficiently and effectively, particularly during the briefing stage of a project [Green
and Simister 1999]. As a result, clients find themselves devoting substantial effort
into micro managing projects throughout their life, which make the construction
investment less valuable. At a broader level, industry groups have recognised the lack
of learning across contractual boundaries, between individual construction projects,
within construction project teams and across the sector as a whole [Latham 1994].

2.1 The B-HIVE project

Against the above background, a move from adversarial contractual agreements

with the TMO, based on competitive tendering, to partnership arrangements based on
continuing relationships between clients and selected contractors so as to increase
mutual value was proposed [Latham 1994; Bennet and Jayes 1998]. In addition, a
number of research initiatives aimed at finding ways for increasing value in
construction were launched. The B-HIVE project was one of these initiatives, and
involved two universities and 5 industrial partners in a jointly academic-industry
effort to develop models, practices and collaborative infrastructures to support
construction TMOs which are embedded within partnership arrangements.
B-HIVE focused on the study of TMO project reviews at pre- and post-completion
stages. Initial observation of TMO project review meetings indicated that although
participants formally recognised the concept of “partnering” as well as the goals it
was designed to serve, there was an explicit lack of trust among them. That is, there
was a mismatch between “espoused theories” and “theories in use” [Argyris and
Schon 1978]. In addition, participants were seen to hold different understanding of
interconnected issues and often to have multiple competing goals. Finally, it was
noted that some of the issues discussed in TMO project reviews appear to be the same
and recurrent. All of this suggested that any mutual value obtained from a partnership
arrangement between TMO participants was subject to the consideration of project
review as a process or negotiation and learning.
The research team considered the use of a PSM or “wide-band” GDSS as a basis
for a review process of construction projects. A Cross Organisational Learning
Approach (COLA), based on Strategic Choice [Friend and Hickling 1997] was thus

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developed and applied in a number of real TMO project reviews. A full description of
COLA can be found elsewhere [see Cushman 1999]

3. COLA APPLICATION

COLA is a process that adds value to TMOs by improving the quality of feedback
and increasing multi-organisational knowledge as well as resolving immediate
concerns. COLA achieves this by organising and managing learning-focussed, value-
enhance TMO project reviews. The full value of COLA is gained within a partnering
environment, for it is designed to help organisations both learn form each other and
work together more productively in the future.
The insights of three post-completion COLA reviews for major building and estate
renovation projects under a partnership arrangement within one of the research
industrial partners will be discussed here. Each COLA review involved 9 to 12 TMO
participants representing a variety of stakeholders including the client’s property
division and operational management, the main contractor, project management
consultants, quantity surveyors, architects/designers and specialist trade contractors.
The main part of the COLA review was a Strategic Choice-based workshop co-
facilitated by an industry member of the research team and a research academic. The
workshops were held at or close to the site of the project under review.
Another important part of the COLA reviews included the completion of a pre-
workshop questionnaire by TMO participants, covering the ranking of different
aspects of the project under review including the management of time, team relations
and profitability. The questionnaire also included space for free comments and asked
for details of innovations, critical incidents and lessons learned. Analysis of
questionnaire responses made it possible to build a profile of the project under review
(and hence to formulate preliminary “decision areas” in advance), and this
information was then circulated to TMO participants before the workshop
The nature of the issues and incidents explored in the three COLA review
workshops did not generally exhibit the high degree of interconnectivity that Strategic
Choice was designed to handle. However, Strategic Choice’s focus on moving
through problems, and its techniques for reaching consensus on prioritisation,
exploration and action provided a valuable basis for the approach developed.
Also, and in spite of the limited number of actions (with their responsible actors
and tentative deadlines) that were produced in the workshops, change on issues long
considered to be major obstacles to the efficiency of the TMO partnership was
achieved. One successful COLA review led to changes implemented within a very
short period of time. A gained commitment to a review that had been long resisted
was observed in another COLA review. Finally, one COLA review led directly to the
review of the whole partnering process within the TMO’s client organisation. At the
end of the B-HIVE project, COLA was fully adopted by one of the industrial research
partners.

4. SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS

The research identified and addressed the lack of any processes for the routine
inter-organisational review of construction projects for learning and value, as well as
the absence of any expectation that such an activity will happen. It showed that
discussion of tacit understandings and knowledge that underlies people’s expertise is
possible and can be positively received by construction professionals. It also provided

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a process by which a programme of commitment to change become shared by TMO
members through making explicit the links between incidents at the site level and
organisational procedures that support or inhibit value enhancing initiatives.
The development of COLA enabled the tailoring of a PSM/wide-band GDSS (i.e.
Strategic Choice) to a novel situation, using it explicitly for reflective project
evaluation to develop knowledge and increase managerial competence and capacity. It
was interesting to note that TMO participants discarded quantitative project data as
criteria for project evaluation in spite of having requested it before the workshops.
Participants expressed their belief that the provision of detailed quantitative data
would have been unhelpful because: (a) they had other opportunities for reviewing
this kind of data within their companies; and, (b) they did not want to divert attention
from debating the managerial and businesses processes in the workshop
Attention to rational and just procedures as well as the cyclic nature of group
problem solving has been cited as one of the determinants of the political feasibility
(i.e. “implementability”) of the outputs of PSMs/wide-band GDSSs interventions
[Eden 1992]. This requires the need for pre-designed flexibility in GDSSs processes.
The case study findings support this view, as the flexibility with which proposals for
change and learning opportunities were generated and formulated during the
workshops appeared to have had a significant influence on their rhetorical power and
thus political feasibility. In one of the workshops, for example, new issues had arisen
since the questionnaires had been completed and these later emerged half way
through the workshop. Strategic Choice’s mode switching between shaping,
designing, evaluating and choosing of issues ensured that the new issues were
included and tackled during the workshop.
The client in the three case studies showed full support to both the partnership and
the development of COLA This suggests that the role that construction clients play
within a partnership environment is crucial to the successful development of change
and value initiatives, particularly knowledgeable clients responsible for a continuing
programme of work. This extends previous work on the role of the client with
construction TMOs under traditional contractual arrangements [Cherns and Bryant
1984].

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