Exploring Empowerment in Construction: Discovering Challenges of self-managed Workers

Christopher Görsch, Eelon Lappalainen, Jaakko Riekki, Olli Seppänen, Antti Peltokorpi
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Abstract

Traditionally, production planning and control (PP&C) approaches in construction have been hierarchical and rigid. These PP&C approaches have often been reported to insufficiently provide task preconditions in a dynamically changing production environment, ultimately causing stress and dissatisfaction to workers. Modern organizational and management theory promotes more agile and dynamic decentralized decision-making structures. These support workers’ access to the organization’s resources and provide preconditions to implement their individual ideas. Such empowerment is linked to increased subjective well-being and project performance. However, several studies present workers’ perceptions of their own task responsibility and decision-making as empowered, self-managed, and decentralized, while satisfaction remains low and productivity rates stagnated over the last decades. Thus, this research studies qualitatively factors promoting empowerment of workers and what kind of challenges workers face in perceived decentralized work environments. Semi-structured interviews with 14 mechanical, electrical, and plumbing (MEP) workers were conducted and analysed using an empowerment-level framework. This study suggests that leadership dynamics among MEP workers are contingent on the tasks and their preconditions, transitioning from centralized in design stages to decentralized during execution. Empowerment structures mirror this shift, evolving through actions either delegated or seized based on individuals and groups managing task demands effectively. The findings suggest that the level of leadership and empowerment is tacitly and collectively coordinated by management and workers through informal verbal exchanges and situational cues, which often leads to unclear and chaotic situations. In summary, the study highlights the advantages and disadvantages of undifferentiated empowerment structures and emphasizes the need for advanced in-depth understanding and exploration of dynamically changing empowerment and leadership structures.
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探索建筑业的赋权:发现自我管理工人面临的挑战
传统上,建筑业的生产计划和控制(PP&C)方法是等级森严和死板的。据报道,在动态变化的生产环境中,这些 PP&C 方法往往不能充分提供任务的先决条件,最终给工人造成压力和不满。现代组织和管理理论提倡更加灵活和动态的分散决策结构。这些结构支持工人获得组织的资源,并为实现他们的个人想法提供先决条件。这种授权与主观幸福感和项目绩效的提高有关。然而,一些研究表明,在过去几十年里,工人们认为自己的任务责任和决策是被授权的、自我管理的和分散的,而满意度仍然很低,生产率也停滞不前。因此,本研究从定性角度研究了促进工人赋权的因素,以及工人在认为权力下放的工作环境中面临的挑战。研究人员对 14 名机械、电气和管道工程(MEP)工人进行了半结构式访谈,并采用授权层面的框架对访谈内容进行了分析。这项研究表明,机电和管道工人的领导力动态取决于任务及其先决条件,从设计阶段的集权过渡到执行阶段的分权。授权结构反映了这一转变,通过基于个人和团体有效管理任务需求的授权或夺权行动而演变。研究结果表明,领导力和授权水平是由管理层和工人通过非正式的口头交流和情境暗示进行默契和集体协调的,这往往会导致不明确和混乱的局面。总之,本研究强调了无差别赋权结构的优缺点,并强调需要进一步深入了解和探索动态变化的赋权和领导结构。
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