Public demand is emphasized as a major driving force for environmental innovation addressing societal transitions. In 2007, the European Commission adopted the ‘lead market initiative’ to tackle grand societal challenges across several industrial sectors, of which construction has the greatest sustainability impact. To study how public clients can create lead markets for environmental innovation in construction, we build on recent advancements emphasizing market-shaping strategies as critical for societal transitions. The paper investigates how public construction clients proactively use and combine market-shaping strategies to create lead markets for environmental innovations. Our empirical findings, from a multiple-case study of three public construction clients in Sweden, illustrate how the clients use and combine a broad range of market-shaping strategies related to seven groups of lead market advantages. We contribute to theory by cross-fertilizing market-shaping and lead market literatures and showing how market-shaping strategies interplay in achieving combinatory effects, which incentivize creation of lead markets for environmental innovation towards sustainability transitions.

Purpose

This purpose of this study is to explore how the public client, the engineering consultant and the sub-consultant perceive and address innovation outcomes and processes in the planning and design phase of infrastructure projects.

Design/methodology/approach

An explorative single-case study of a public infrastructure project was carried out. A multi-dimensional innovation framework, including innovation outcomes and processes, was applied.

Findings

Innovation outcomes in terms of products and processes from the engineering consultant’s work in the planning and design phase hold untapped potential for enhancing innovation in construction projects. Additionally, findings indicate that sub-consultants from outside the construction industry (i.e. external knowledge resources) play a crucial role in introducing more radical innovations based on adaptation.

Originality/value

The findings provide an empirical illustration of a further developed innovation framework that can be used by both scholars and practitioners to analyze and discuss the multi-dimensional concept of innovation in the construction context. Additionally, the findings highlight the importance of capturing perceptions of various actors regarding innovation outcomes and processes to facilitate innovation in an inter-organizational context.

This paper examines the gap between macro-level calls for innovation and the micro-level enactment, by exploring the discrepancies between a public client’s pursuit of innovation and the actions taken at the project level. Through empirical analysis of four infrastructure operation and maintenance projects, we identify discrepancies within and between procurement strategies and project-level practices. Taking a strategy-as-practice perspective, our study shows how procurement strategies are adapted and enacted by inter-organizational project actors, shedding light on why macro-level innovation intent may not translate into expected outcomes at the project level. Our findings underscore the importance of aligning macro-level directives with micro-level actions to drive innovation in construction projects effectively. This research contributes to a better understanding of the dynamics shaping innovation in construction projects, highlighting the critical role of procurement strategies in bridging macro and micro contexts to achieve sustainable development goals.

Previous research has shown that client organizations’ decision-making about new-build creates individual-level and organizational-level barriers to the adoption of Swedish industrialized building (IB). However, it has been proposed that clients may overcome barriers on both levels by allowing multiple meanings and conflicting interpretations to surface and interact with their decision-making. The aim is to test this proposition. Based on the theoretical fields of decision-making and organizational information processing, a framework for analysis has been developed. In the framework, three decision-making approaches are operationalized: rational, judgments and managing multiple meanings. Data were collected using in-depth interviews with key decision-makers from four Swedish professional clients differing on when and if they adopted IB: one early-adopter, two late-adopters and one non-adopter. The empirical findings support the proposition and show a relationship between how clients manage multiple meanings in their decision-making and their adoption of IB. The research adds to the understanding of how clients may overcome barriers to the adoption of IB on both individual and organizational levels. Moreover, it increases understanding about how clients might better cope with radical changes and innovations.

The role of clients in construction innovation is receiving increasingresearch attention due to their perceived tendencies to adhere to conventional practices preserving the status-quo. The aim of this thesis is to improve understanding of construction client organizations’ behaviour that affects their ability to overcome organizational lock-in in their new-build decision-making processes, and thus their ability to adopt innovation. A more specific aim is to compare and contrast the behaviour and decision-making processes of innovation adopters and non-adopters. The theoretical frame of reference integrates organizational information processing and three discrete, but mutually dependent decision-making schools of thought. The methodological approach acknowledges the importance of human interpretation. Most of the empirical data are qualitative, and were collected mainly through in-depth face-to-face interviews with key decision-makers of professional Swedish multi-dwelling client organizations with a property portfolio, both private and public. The research addresses clients’ practices for information processing and new-build decision-making, and their impact on their adoption of more radical innovation, as well as their perceptions and behaviour when facing the radical innovations of industrialized construction of timber-framed multi-dwelling buildings (IB) that extends beyond their frames of reference. The results show that Swedish clients’ perceptions about IB innovations are affected by both uncertainty and equivocality (i.e. the human problem of managing multiple meanings of information and conflicting interpretations). Thus, managing equivocality appears to be essential for making judgments about radical innovation alternatives. Both individual- (cognitive) and organizational-level barriers to the adoption of IB innovations are identified. These barriers create an organizational lock-in to conventional a lternatives because they lead to decision-makers not recognizing the need to revise their heuristics, question given meanings and make different interpretations that would enable them to reach different conclusions. Finally, the results show that the behaviour of innovation adopters differs from that of non-adopters in terms of how they manage uncertainty and equivocality in their new-build decision-making processes. The conclusion is that to overcome the organizational lock-in that hinders radical innovation adoption, organizations must manage equivocality through information-processing practices that allow for multiple meanings and different interpretations to surface and interact with their new-build decision-making. The research findings show that practices that support decision-making on conventional alternatives can simultaneously present organizational lock-in. These findings indicate that the current research assumptions regarding the negative impact of uncertainty and positive impact of experience may have to be reversed in decision-making about radical innovation. They also encourage application of an interpretative approach. The research may contribute to further understanding of means to overcome barriers to the adoption of other types of radical construction innovations, such as sustainable building.

Beställarnas roll för innovationer inom byggsektorn har fått ökad uppmärksamhet inom forskningen på grund av deras tendens att hålla sig till konventionella byggmetoder och därmed bevara status-quo. Syftet med denna avhandling att bidra till ökad förståelse för den påverkan som beställarorganisationers beteende har på deras förmåga att bemästra organisatorisk inlåsning till status-quo (som motverkar innovationer) i deras beslutsfattande, och därmed deras förmåga att acceptera innovationer. Ett mer specifikt syfte är att jämföra och kontrastera beteende och beslutsprocesser hos dem som har accepterat (adopters) och inte accepterat innovation (non-adopters).Den teoretiska referensramen integrerar informationsprocessande i organisationer och tre separata, men ömsesidigt beroende, teoribildningar inom beslutsfattande. Den metodologiska ansatsen erkänner vikten av tolkningar. De empiriska data är till största del kvalitativa och samlades in främst genom djupintervjuer med beslutsfattare inom professionella svenska fastighetsbolag, både privata och kommunala. Forskningen behandlar beställares praxis för informationsprocessande och beslutsfattande vid nybyggnation av flerbostadshus och dess inverkan på deras acceptans för mer radikala innovationer, samt deras uppfattningar och beteenden när de möter den radikala innovationen industriellt byggande av flervånings- flerbostadshus med trästomme (i denna avhandling förkortat IB) som går utanför deras referensramar.Resultaten visar att svenska beställares uppfattning om IB påverkas av både osäkerhet och mångtydighet; ”equivocality” som är det mänskliga problemet att hantera en mångfald av betydelser och motstridiga tolkningar. Således verkar det nödvändigt att hantera equivocality för att kunna göra bedömningar om alternativ som utgörs av radikala innovationer. Både individuella (kognitiva) och organisatoriska hinder mot acceptansen av IB har identifierats. Dessa hinder skapar en organisatorisk inlåsning till val av konventionella alternativ eftersom de leder till att beslutsfattarna inte upptäcker behovet av att ändra sina tumregler, ifrågasätta givna betydelser och göra andra tolkningar som skulle möjliggöra att andra slutsatser kan dras. Slutligen visar resultaten att beteendet hos ”adopters” skiljer sig från ”non-adopters” gällande hur de hanterar osäkerhet och equivocality i sina beslutsprocesser. Slutsatsen är att för att bemästra den organisatoriska inlåsningen som hindrar acceptans av radikala innovationer, bör organisationen hantera equivocality genom informationsprocessande som möjliggör för att medvetandegöra olika tolkningar genom att de kommer upp till ytan och interagerar för beslutsfattandet.Resultaten pekar på att praxis som stöder beslutsfattande om konventionella alternativ samtidigt kan utgöra hinder mot innovationer utanför referensramen. Dessa resultat indikerar att de rådande antagandena inom forskningen, om de negativa effekterna av osäkerhet och den positiva inverkan av erfarenhet, kan behöva vändas på när det gäller beslutsfattande om radikala innovationer. Resultaten uppmuntrar också tillämpningen av en tolkande ansats. Forskningen kan bidra till ökad förståelse för praxis som kan övervinna hinder mot andra radikala bygginnovationer, såsom hållbart byggande.

Purpose – Humans tend to rely on beliefs, assumptions and cognitive rules-of-thumb for making judgments and are biased against taking more uncertain alternatives. Such inertia has implications for client organizations' decision making about innovations, which are inherently more uncertain than conventional alternatives. The purpose of this paper is to contribute to furthering the understanding of barriers to overcoming inertia in client decision making in new-build. Design/methodology/approach – A descriptive behavioural decision-making perspective is combined with an organizational information-processing perspective. To identify and discuss individual and organizational barriers that potentially distort clients' decision making on innovation, the analysis addresses aggregated data from four studies. The analysis focuses on inferences and interpretations made by decision makers in Swedish client organizations, their information-processing practices and the subsequent impacts on perceived meanings and judgments about industrialized multi-storey, timber-framed building innovations, which are perceived by Swedish clients as new and different building alternatives. Findings – Cognitive and organizational barriers maintain status-quo decisions. Clients are inclined to make biased judgments about industrialized-building alternatives because non-applicable cognitive rules-of-thumb, based on their experiences of conventional-building alternatives, are used. Furthermore, client organizations' information-processing practices do not allow different meanings to surface, interact and potentially suggest different conclusions, at odds with established beliefs. Originality/value – The paper's conclusions highlight how inertia is sustained in client decision making in new-build. They illustrate the limitations of a common engineering approach, i.e. supporting decision making about innovations by focusing on providing more information to the decision maker in order to reduce uncertainty, as well as managing multiple meanings by reductionism.

While risk and uncertainty management have received much attention within construction management research, management of information interpretation remains unexplored. Situations that are generally overlooked are those where increased amounts and flow of information are not the solution to the human problem of managing multiple meanings of information and conflicting interpretations, i.e. ‘equivocality’. The aim is to identify and differentiate between construction clients’ uncertainty and equivocality about industrialized construction in Sweden, and, in the light of those findings, to evaluate clients’ current information processing practice on investment decisions in new-build in order to assess and discuss clients’ ability to manage uncertainty and equivocality. Based on information processing theory, analysis of aggregated data from three previous studies shows that there is a need to manage both uncertainty and equivocality. At the same time, clients’ ability to do this is found to be limited. Consequently, when industrialized construction moves clients beyond their current frame of reference, clients’ information processing practice does not support decision making. It is also proposed that differentiating between uncertainty and equivocality will enable a more profound understanding of the sequential order for information processing, i.e. that one must define questions (reduce equivocality) before one can find answers to the questions (reduce uncertainty).

Construction clients have the position to continuously improve new-built from a life cycle perspective. Furthermore, they can contribute to advancement and improved competition in construction by putting more explicit and distinct requirements and by a willingness to try new, non-local contractors and new construction methods (Statskontoret 2009). Conventional construction is argued to constitute a barrier to change (Dulaimi et al. 2003). Industrialised building, with its off-site characteristics and process-orientation, is seen as a means to attain advancement in construction (e.g. Statskontoret 2009). Industrialised multi-dwelling timber framed (ITF) housing entail all of the identified advantages of industrialisation. Nonetheless, clients are not actively driving change towards industrialised construction (e.g. Engström et al. 2009) and it was indicated that one possible explanation could be that clients are uncertain (Höök 2005). The aim of this thesis is to identify client organisations' uncertainties concerning ITF housing and property, find mechanisms for why they arise and propose measures to manage uncertainty within clients' organisations. The thesis is based on three appended papers and a detached technical report (Levander 2010). Empirical data consist of interviews, economic data, documentation and a questionnaire, they have been collected from in total 27 Swedish client organisations and on 44 ITF properties, and are analysed in two case studies and one field study.The results show that the great majority of client organisations' uncertainties are a matter of equivocality. The mechanisms for the high equivocality are the high complexity and uncertainty in construction in conjunction with the novelty encompassed by ITF housing and property. The current information processing practice within the studied client organisations does not support resolving equivocality.The general conclusion is that ITF housing and property is a radical change seen from clients' perspective and represents novelty in construction technology. Thus, the ITF alternative challenges and goes beyond clients' known frame of reference and thereby causes equivocality. In order to manage and resolve equivocality, client organisations need to enable translation and transfer of frameworks and their activities must constitute challenges to their normal practice. Thus it is proposed that in order to manage uncertainty and equivocality, and thereby contribute to advancements in construction, client organisations need to work with uncertainty management.

Fastighetsägare har i rollen som beställare möjligheten att ständigt förbättra nybyggnation från ett livscykelperspektiv. Dessutom kan de bidra till utveckling och ökad konkurrens inom byggbranschen genom ett tydligare kravställande och med en vilja att prova nya, icke-lokala entreprenörer och nya produktionsmetoder (Statskontoret 2009). Traditionellt byggande hävdas utgöra ett hinder för förändring (Dulaimi et al. 2003). Industriellt byggande, med byggande i fabrik och processorientering, ses som ett sätt att nå framsteg byggandet (ex Stadskontoret 2009). Industriellt byggande av flerbostadshus med trästomme för med sig samtliga fördelar med industriellt byggande. Trots detta är inte beställarna en aktiv kraft (Engström et al. 2009), en möjlig förklaring är att kunderna är osäkra (Höök 2005).Syftet med forskningen är att identifiera fastighetsägarorganisationernas osäkerheter om den industriella träbyggnadsprocessen och om industriellt byggda flerbostadshus med trästomme (ITF-alternativet), hitta mekanismer för varför osäkerheterna uppstår och föreslå åtgärder för att hantera osäkerhet inom kundorganisationer. Avhandlingen bygger på tre bifogade artiklar och en fristående teknisk rapport (Levander 2010). Empiriska data består av intervjuer, ekonomiska data, dokumentation och en enkät som har samlats in från totalt 27 svenska fastighetsägarorganisationer och på 44 ITF fastigheter, och sedan har analyseras inom två fallstudier och en fältstudie.Resultaten visar att kundernas osäkerheter främst är en fråga om tvetydighet (equivocality). Mekanismerna bakom denna är den höga komplexitet och osäkerhet inom byggbranschen generellt, tillsammans med det nya och annorlunda som ITF-alternativet medför. Det nuvarande sättet att hantera information och kommunikation inom de studerade fastighetsägarorganisationerna stödjer inte hantering av tvetydighet.Den allmänna slutsatsen är att ITF-alternativet är en radikal förändring sett ur kundernas perspektiv och representerar nyhet i flera dimensioner. Således går ITF-alternativet utanför kundernas kända referensram och medför därigenom tvetydighet. För att lösa tvetydighet krävs att kundorganisationerna möjliggör överföring av referensramar och aktivt utmanar sina nuvarande arbetssätt. Det föreslås därför att kundorganisationer behöver arbeta med osäkerhetshantering, detta för att kunna hantera och lösa både osäkerhet och tvetydighet, och därigenom bidra till framsteg inom byggandet.

In the construction sector, the rate of innovations is perceived to be low. Stakeholder pressure has been identified as an important trigger for innovation. But do Swedish construction clients positively respond to, and thus drive, innovation? The purpose of this paper is to increase understanding of the client's role, as a decision maker, for improving the rate of innovation in construction. This by learning from the case of industrialised construction (IC) in Sweden. Swedish construction clients are generally positive to the expected benefits of IC, but are not actively driving the change towards industrialisation. IC challenges common practice as well as stakeholder expectations and schemata on which decisions are made. Case studies addressing Swedish clients' response to IC show that the uncertainties related to potential future regret are prominent issues. Empirical evidence also indicates high levels of equivocality which, according to information processing theory, cannot be reduced by simply increasing the amount of information. To enable client-driven change, improved information processing capability is suggested. Clients that gather and process information on innovation can reduce bias in decision making. Early adopters of innovations such as IC must also manage high levels of equivocality as the amount of information is low and common practice is challenged. A higher involvement of clients in innovation development is advised.