Challenges Faced by Construction Managers: Environmental & Workforce

This report examines the multifaceted challenges confronting construction managers. It delves into two primary areas: environmental sustainability and workforce and labor issues. The report highlights the environmental challenges, such as energy efficiency, land usage, waste management, and the impact of construction activities on natural resources and local communities. It also addresses workforce challenges, including the difficulty of finding skilled labor, the need for effective team leadership, communication gaps, and the impact of seasonal and project-specific work. The report emphasizes the importance of proper planning, technological advancements, and employee training to mitigate these challenges and improve project outcomes. The report also references academic sources to support its arguments.

Challenges Facing
Construction Managers

TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION ..........................................................................................................................1
MAIN BODY...................................................................................................................................1
Environmental Sustainability.......................................................................................................1
Workforce and Labour.................................................................................................................2
CONCLUSION................................................................................................................................3
REFERENCES................................................................................................................................4

INTRODUCTION
Construction refers to the process of infrastructure which includes constructing of
building, malls, flats, hotels, houses and many more. It is a sector in which various construction
companies are running (Trauner and et.al., 2017).
The report will highlight the challenges such as Environmental Sustainability and
workforce and labour which are facing by Construction managers.
MAIN BODY
A construction manager is responsible for the completion of tasks. In order to complete
the objectives, manager has to face some environmental challenges which are related to the
environmental sustainability. These challenges are as follows -
Energy efficiency and environmental performance should be focusing on system
approach on how the individual component will be interacting and building system and
identifying options with greatest potential for improving energy and reducing overall
environmental effect.
Construction is only possible when there is land. For making something on land, they
firstly cut the trees from that land, which creates a lot of opposition from local communities and
also creates a lot of environmental issues such as increase in pollution and increase in usage of
carbon die oxide. Resistance from local communities and environmental activities is one of the
biggest problem which is faced by construction industry so they must be working into
partnership with them.
Waste has a direct negative impact on the sustainability of the environment. Due to
frequent design changes, poor quality of materials, poor planning of construction and poor site
management etc. are the main reason behind the waste of productivity, raw material and time.
This lead to face construction manager as a challenge (Jarkas and et.al., 2015). The company
should be implementing latest technology within with wastage will be minimum and materials
produce will be of better quality. For this company should be having complete knowledge of
technologies which will be helpful for them and thus reducing down wastage of raw material to
lowest.
Improve Poor planning of construction:
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Poor planning of construction can be improved by making proper decision include
building design maps and other things. Planning is based on communication which is quite
beneficial and effective way for improving the poor construction planning. Before making any
plans or strategies constructor need to communicate with its team members that helps to make
plan better than before.
It is believed that construction activity is the most non-environmentally activity. The
reason behind this statement is that because it consumes huge amounts of natural resources and
is a major factor behind the all kinds of pollutions such as air, water, land and noise etc. It also
snatches the earning and living sources of all those local communities who are living around the
site where construction is happening or will happen or happened.
The construction has a huge and negative impact on the natural resources. Due to
construction activities, one-fourth of its timber crop, two-fifths of its energy and physical flow
and one-sixth of the world's fresh water extracts or wastes. Construction activities are alone
enough to impact the areas beyond its direct location, harms the watershed, transport patterns and
air quality. The excessive usage of resources and energy and increasing demand of raw materials.
This lead to lack of natural resources worldwide and increasing global warming. For reducing
the impact of global warming construction industry must try to plant as much trees as they can.
Construction activities not only impact the human beings, they also affect the animals and
birds which are the important part for the sustainability of environment. Due to construction,
companies are cutting trees, using drinking waters, polluting air and lands and snatching their
home and food from them. This lead to increasing the death rate of the animals and birds which
impact the environment negatively. This is a major challenge, manager has to face (Li and et.al.,
2017).
A construction manager is responsible for managing work force and hiring and sustains
the labours. But with this responsibility, manager has to face some challenges which are as
follows -
Construction manager wants to find skilled labour at the right number which is difficult
to find as skilled labour's working style are much better rather than unskilled or semi-skilled
labours. For the better construction and company's future, skilled labour are required. So this
problem could be improved by recruiting best skilled and laboured employees who are having
knowledge about work.
2

Construction managers should be focused on the hiring of the best employees for the
construction project and ensuring that their work is of high quality. for that, they need motivating
and efficient workers who are not any more interest in construction industry as this industry is
not that much suitable as compared to another industries. Giving them proper training and
developing their required skill is one of the best method to overcome challenge of lack of
workforce and labour.
For the project construction, construction manager needs a good team leader who can
handle the team and its workforce. But finding a good team leader is very difficult for the
manager. Also, they find good team leader, leader get the team members who are not enough
skilled or trained so they can't meet the challenges and perform the task for the completion of
project.
Due to unskilled or semi-skilled workforce or labour, managers and employees are not
able to communicate with each other properly which creates communication gap between them
and this gap not only affect the project but also affect the whole organization.
Due to nature of construction work such as seasonable, custom-oriented, lack of technical
adoption, process is too long, time consuming and highly costs and difficult to manage the
resources etc., it is difficult for the manager to select, hire and retain the work force in the
organization as well as industry (Rostami and et.al., 2015). Poor workforce and lobar is one of
the biggest challenge that can faced create many difficulties for construction industry as whole. It
can be improved by conducting training and coaching session based on work or performance.
With the help of training workforce and lobar can improve their skills and knowledge that
contribute to accomplish project or task as soon as possible on time.
Lack of contract is also major factor in workforce challenges facing by Manager. As lack
of contract lead to unsecure employees due to no fixation of employment and payments.
Employment and payment is not fixed which lead employees not to do work for the manager and
company.
Managers don't find good contractors and subcontractors for the materials and resources.
This lead managers to face challenge for finding the suitable contractors for the company. If they
find suitable contractors, then contractors chargers high payments and commissions which
reduce the profits of the company.
3

Anything 100% in the construction never happens easily and smoothly. When there is a
bad quality in the construction which cause to deconstruction of the project, the blame game
start. Like general contractor blames the manager, the homeowner blames the general contractor,
the project manager blames the owner or owner blames the employers or employees. Thus, this
blame game stop the newcomer into construction industry which lead manager to face a
challenge regarding workforce and labour (Ogunde and et.al., 2017).
CONCLUSION
From the above study, it has been summarised that Construction industry is facing many
problems in current time like environmental sustainability and shortage of workforce and labour.
For this industry should be planning properly which will be helpful in reducing problem of
sustainability like usage of correct technology and innovating new ideas. Then for shortage of
skilled labour and workforce they should recruit professionals and expertise for it and training
the existing one.
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REFERENCES
Books and Journals
Jarkas, A.M., and et.al., 2015. Determinants of construction labour productivity in
Oman. International Journal of Construction Management. 15(4). pp.332-344.
Li, S., and et.al., 2017. A study on the evaluation of implementation level of lean construction in
two Chinese firms. Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews. 71. pp.846-851.
Ogunde, A., and et.al., 2017. Challenges confronting construction project management system
for sustainable construction in developing countries: Professionals perspectives (a case
study of Nigeria). Journal of Building Performance. 8(1). pp.1-11.
Rostami, A., and et.al., 2015. Risk management implementation in small and medium enterprises
in the UK construction industry. Engineering, Construction and Architectural
Management. 22(1). pp.91-107.
Trauner, T.J., and et.al., 2017. Construction delays. Elsevier Science & Technology Books.
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