Integrating ABC into project overhead management

Construction is one of the oldest and most complex industries in existence. Today, performance on construction projects is influe nced by external, inter-organizational, intra-organizational, and project specific issues. The external factors involve the prevalent social habits and cultural norms, values, and beliefs that significantly impact built facilities. They also include the effects of politics on construction and the economic conditions, which have a notable effect on the intensity of activities within construction (Woudhuysen and Abley 2004). As for the interorganizational factors, they comprise excessive fragmentation of the construction industry that weakens communication, inhibits the proliferation of good practice in the industry, and yields adversarial working relationships (Woudhuysen and Abley 2004). The intra-organizational influences include competition for limited resources among projects and departments, conflicts regarding responsibility and authority issues relating to project personnel, difficulties in communication among personnel within the organization, and internal politics. Finally, the project specific factors that affect performance involve the continuity problem relating to staff turnover, the temporary nature of projects and their complexity, and the difficulty of effectively integrating all project facets.