Analysis of a Construction Innovative Solution from the Perspective of an Information System Theory

AbstractWith about $10 trillion spent on construction-related goods and services every year worldwide, advancing the construction industry, one of the largest sectors in the world economy, becomes crucial. Diffusing building information modeling (BIM), one noticeable advancement in construction process modeling, has been the objective of many academic studies as well as state-of-the-review literature. Deviating from approaches of other studies, this research paper presents a novel conceptual analysis and a critical review of the barriers to BIM adoption in the construction industry. This study looks first at the mechanisms of BIM diffusion by performing comparative analyzes between various construction innovative solutions (lean construction, Six Sigma, and IPD) to identify the similarities and the differences in their adoption approaches. Then, BIM barriers are analyzed based on the sociotechnical theory which categorizes the influencing factors along four dimensions: people, tasks, structures, and organization. The results highlight substantial resemblance among the adoption approaches of various innovative concepts mainly in two aspects, people and tasks, pointing out that spreading the knowledge of a new methodology, examining the participants’ attitude and mindset towards it, and deciding on the adoption process based on the financial recourses and the human skills necessary for the adoption of any concept. Additionally, the study shows that BIM barriers are established mainly by the social behavior of practitioners and the social measures of the construction sector, indicating that social variables (people and structure) are responsible for the largest portion of implementation failures due to the cruciality of human decisions. Moreover, the study clearly demonstrates that the impact dimension of a limitation is not identical to its root cause dimension.