Achieving Competitive Advantage in Global Construction Management

This report delves into the critical issues influencing competitiveness within the global construction market, specifically focusing on the challenges and opportunities for engineering and construction enterprises, particularly those based in the UK. It highlights key factors such as labor shortages, stagnant production levels, and the imperative of adopting new technologies. The report explores how globalization impacts the construction sector, emphasizing the need for enterprises to prioritize factors like employee working conditions, human rights, and consumer protection. It examines the importance of technological advancements, innovation, and strategic planning, including the application of the Diamond framework to assess factors influencing international success. Furthermore, the report identifies key elements that contribute to competitive advantage, including human resources, organizational structure, costs, and the roles of government and stakeholders. It underscores the significance of strategic planning, human resource development, and research and development in enhancing competitive performance within the global construction industry.

Running head: INTERNATIONAL ORGANISATIONAL MANAGEMENT
International organisational management
Name of student
Name of University
Author note

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Table of Contents
Issues that influence competitiveness within the global construction market....................3
Engineering and construction enterprises striving to achieve competitive advantage in
business......................................................................................................................................3
Factors that influence competitive advantage for engineering and construction
contractors while operating globally......................................................................................6
References.................................................................................................................................9

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Issues that influence attainment of competitive advantage in the construction sector
while operating globally
The major issues that might influence the ability to attain competitive edge over its
competitors within the construction industry globally could be the lack of labour or shortage
in labour, stagnant level of production and failing to adopt new technologies within the global
marketplace. Due to this, often the competitiveness has been hindered, which also affected
the construction market largely. Thus, there have been speculations about how Engineering
and construction enterprises in UK can strive to achieve competitive advantage while at the
same time, operate successfully within the global business environment too (Morschett et al.
2015).
Engineering and construction enterprises striving to achieve competitive advantage in
business
From the perspectives of the economy of United Kingdom, the global business
management or globalisation has represented the increased flow of capital as well as
managed the spreading of free market capitalism to enter new nations and establish business
successfully too. The Engineering and construction enterprises should aim at share and
exchange of values, beliefs and ideas along with prioritising on the major issues including the
working conditions of employees, human rights and protection of consumers so as to manage
international trade relations properly as well as remove trade barriers that might affect the
international business or management of organisation within the competitive business
environment (Poulis et al. 2013 p. 310). The globalization has been built according to the fall
in costs of communication and also because of the deregulations in the market, especially the
capital markets, which has allowed the organizations to restructure the processes and even
adopt new processes for operating successfully in the foreign industries as well as implement

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substantial improvements an changes to achieve competitive advantage in business (Warwick
2014 p. 100).
There have been investigations, which showed that the UK construction industries’
recent trends are the participation of large private sectors in infrastructure management
projects, enhancement in the integration vertically during the packaging of projects associated
with the construction industry and also the increase in foreign participation in the domestic
construction. The Engineering and construction enterprises have emphasized on these trends
so as to polarise the technical, financial as well as managerial superiority and at the same
time, overcome the gap of reducing the increased issues resulting from competition within the
concerned industry (Boxall 2013 p.6).
Considering the fact the major issues include shortage of labour, the engineering and
construction enterprises in UK must consider the availability of global labour supply in the
nation where the operations are to be managed at first, which could allow for resolving the
problem of stagnant production level too. Moreover, the companies must also adopt the new
technologies and implement changes within the construction industry, which could bring
some major improvements (Al Saifi 2015). This would benefit the companies within the
concerned sector to acquire the materials and resources required to manage the production
while at the same time, ensure documentation of project along with management of
procedures to ensure successful management of human resources as well as allow for
integration of new and advanced technologies much more comprehensively.
It has also been found by many that the relationship between competitiveness and
innovation holds special importance and thus to enhance the competitiveness within the
global nation, the construction enterprises should make sure to get involved in continuous
development of technologies and learn to adopt the technologies from the foreign nations and

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acquire the advantage of lower cost along with building new ways to innovate and survive in
the global competition (Zutshi, Ambika, and Andrew 2015 p. 100). The Diamond framework
or theory has been linked with the practical application for not only determining the factors
influencing the international success, but also for gaining knowledge and information about
the factor conditions associated with both physical knowledge and human resources and at
the same time, determine the size, structure and sophistication of the demands within the
global marketplace. This would not only help in meeting the demands within the industry, but
even analyse the context from the business to ensure strategic planning in the construction too
(Balasubramanian, Sreejith, and Vinaya 2017).
Factors that encourage competitive edge over its competitors and create convenience for
contractors while operating globally
The major factors that contribute to the influence of competitive edge over the
competitors for the engineering and construction contractors while operating globally, i.e.,
while setting up business in some foreign nation have been the people or human resources,
organisational structure and culture, costs associated with the business, new technologies, etc.
There are competitive assets such as the factor costs, availability of human resources or
labour, technologies adopted while operating globally, demand conditions as well as the
involvement of Government and regulatory bodies, all of which, have contributed largely to
the influence of competitive advantage for engineering and construction contractors while
operating globally. Also to be noted that the strategic planning is critical, development of
human resources and research and development synergies, which could raise the competitive
performance as well as ensure the maintenance of proper quality of construction and global
business management effectively (Zewdu et al. 2015 p. 185). The engagement of
stakeholders has also been considered as an essential factor that allow for acquisition of good
amount of money for increasing working capital while at the same time, keep the workplace

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diverse with the attraction and retention of new talents from the foreign nation too. This
would help in acquiring new ideas, opinions and feedbacks from the employees, make them
feel as valued assets and even allow them to remain motivated and encouraged to facilitate a
healthy work culture and diverse workplace too (Morschett et al. 2015).
The Government and regulatory bodies and also the community have played major
roles in assessing the place where the construction of buildings would be done, thereby, make
sure to manage the corporate social responsibilities too. This should be essential factor for
preserving the ecological balance in nature, protect the environment and to manage proper
values and ethics while establishing business globally in some foreign nation. The retention
of existing talents and outsourcing the employees to the new location should help in bringing
new talents and learn to communicate, share or exchange ideas, thus make the employees
from the home country and the foreign nation to work together as an unit within the
construction industry and improve the architectural and engineering efficiency while
operating internationally (Boxall 2013 p. 9).

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References
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research." Journal of Knowledge Management (2015).
Balasubramanian, Sreejith, and Vinaya Shukla. "Green supply chain management: an
empirical investigation on the construction sector." Supply Chain Management: An
International Journal (2017).
Boxall, Peter. "Mutuality in the management of human resources: assessing the quality of
alignment in employment relationships." Human Resource Management Journal 23.1
(2013): 3-17.
Morschett, Dirk, Hanna Schramm-Klein, and Joachim Zentes. Strategic international
management. Springer, 2015.
Poulis, Konstantinos, Efthimios Poulis, and Emmanuella Plakoyiannaki. "The role of context
in case study selection: An international business perspective." International Business
Review 22.1 (2013): 304-314.
Warwick, Philip. "The international business of higher education–A managerial perspective
on the internationalisation of UK universities." The International Journal of
Management Education 12.2 (2014): 91-103.
Zewdu, Zinabu Tebeje, and Getachew Teka Aregaw. "Causes of contractor cost overrun in
construction projects: The case of Ethiopian construction sector." International
Journal of Business and Economics Research 4.4 (2015): 180-191.
Zutshi, Ambika, and Andrew Creed. "An international review of environmental initiatives in
the construction sector." Journal of cleaner production 98 (2015): 92-106.