Early Contractor Involvement

In Australia, the Commonwealth alongside the states and territory governments are committed to
delivering effective and efficient infrastructure projects across the country. To date, over 340
economic infrastructure projects valued at $20 Million or more, account for almost two-fifth of the
total value of capital expenditure on major projects. The majority of these projects are delivered
under a relationship-based procurement (RBP) method. Amongst various types of relational contracts,
Early Contractor Involvement (ECI) is seen as one of the delivery systems and contracting
arrangements that owns a number of these projects. Furthermore, the South Australian’s Department
for Transport Energy and Infrastructure (DTEI), and the Queensland’s Department of Transport and
Main Roads (TMR) have published a number of documents in an attempt to standardise the ECI
contract as practiced in Australia. Despite the evident documents indicating the ECI as a form of
binding contract, many academic and industrial professionals use the term as a concept too. From
their perspective, ECI refers to engagement of the contractor at the early stage of project development
and can happen through a wide range of methods. This paper, therefore, studies different delivery
systems that incorporate the concept of ECI into their implementation process through a literary
analysis on the existing scholars and contractual documents.

The use of a relationship based procurement method is promoted by many authors in the past few years. The construction industry is encouraged to adopt a relational contract in an effort to overcome its perceived problems prevail in the industry. Despite a number of benefits proposed for the adoption of a relationship based delivery method, the decision to select such a method should be made wisely, and clients should have adequate understanding about the strength and weakness of the method they intend to employ. There are several examples that incorrect selection of a procurement method resulted into value not delivered during the project and the outcomes were below of what it would have achieved by using a traditional type of delivery system. For this reason, this paper focuses on ECI procurement system as one of the relationship based procurement methods. This paper aims at identifying and analysing the particular characteristics of ECI that attract clients to opt for using this method and analysing these drivers in more details.

In recent years, many countries have employed Early Contractor Involvement (ECI) delivery system mostly for their big, complex projects with a relatively high risk profile; however they customise this method based on their needs and situations. Some countries such as UK adopted a relationship-based approach throughout the whole life of the project while the ECI being used in some other countries such as Australia is distinctly different from its UK version and more adopts a hybrid model where the contract starts with a collaborative approach and moves on to a more conventional type of contract such as Design and Construct (D&C). ECI as an emerging procurement system is still very much in its embryonic stage and there is lack of knowledge in the concept of ECI and evaluating its effectiveness when it is used. This paper, therefore, aims to contribute to this under-developed area by comparing different types of ECI as carried out in different countries to help understand implementation process and the characteristics of ECI in each context. This paper is part of the literature review of a PhD research study under progress by the first author.

Advocates of lean construction recommend early contractor involvement (ECI) to further reduce waste. Waste reduction and flow, value generation and sustainability can be improved if some of the companies on a project use lean principles and methods. However, if the contractor is organizationally integrated in the early phases, there is a better chance that the product and process designs are consistent with one another. ECI can ensure better value for money by organizationally integrating contractors`knowledge to early phases of projects. This paper contributes to the knowledge about how to implement ECI in public projects. In addition to a literature study, a document study as well as fourteen semi-structured in-depth interviews with key informants from eleven Norwegian public bridge projects were carried out. The EU public procurement directive represents a challenge for public owners when they consider ECI in their projects. However, the studied bridge projects have used various approaches to implement ECI without violating the EU directive. Thirteen approaches are identified in this study. The conclusion is that there are several approaches to implement ECI in public projects, though the contractors' contribution varies a lot depending on which approaches that are implemented.

"A successful partnering should begin early, prior to contract award or the procurement selection process in order to deliver the best value to a project. The benefit will be maximised if during the planning and design stages, the construction knowledge is introduced. Early contractor Involvement (ECI), a form of relationship-based delivery system fosters the involvement of contractor in the preliminary stage of a contract and allows the
contractor to contribute its construction knowledge to planning and design. A trust-based relationship between owner and contractor is also realised as the foundation for achieving
successful partnering. Factors affecting the degree of trust include intention, ability, competence and motive. The more one party believes that another party will fulfil the commitments to the relationship, the more that party will trust the other one. Although there is wealth of literature about ECI and its benefits for all project participants, few paid attention to the impact of trust development between parties on implementing an ECI contract. This paper therefore aims to investigate how trust can improve the innovation and encourage the contractor to share his construction knowledge in the early stage of project based on contextualisation and review of existing literature. The conclusion drawn is that since trust is one of the significant factors in facilitating knowledge sharing and increasing innovation, it should not be treated as a shot in the dark proposition and similar to other aspects of the project, a successfully developed trust-based relationship can be the result of proper management of the entire trust building process."

It is widely accepted that contractor involvement in the front end can influence the outcome of the project in a positive way. However, in the traditional project delivery method of construction projects, the design and construction process are separated and sequentially. As a consequence of this, it is difficult to integrate construction knowledge in the front-end of projects. The evolving project methods are designed to remove such typical challenges by involving contractors early in the process. The purpose of this paper is to explore the success factors for early contractor involvement (ECI) in public infrastructure projects. In addition, the paper aims to propose suitable approaches to implement ECI for public owners in future projects without violating the EU public procurement directives. In addition to a literature study, multiple case studies on eleven projects selected from the Norwegian public bridge projects were carried out. The majorly identified ECI success factors are timing of ECI application, proper compensation, trust, contractors`qualification, owners`competence, and risk distribution. The paper concludes that public owners can implement ECI by using various approaches without violating the EU public procurement directive. Furthermore, based on the identified success factors, effective practical strategies for the successful implementation of ECI may be generated.

Advocates of lean construction recommend early contractor involvement (ECI) to further reduce waste. Waste reduction and flow, value generation and sustainability can be improved if some of the companies on a project use lean principles and methods. However, if the contractor is organizationally integrated in the early phases, there is a better chance that the product and process designs are consistent with one another. ECI can ensure better value for money by organizationally integrating contractors knowledge to early phases of projects. This paper contributes to the knowledge about how to implement ECI in public projects. In addition to a literature study, a document study as well as fourteen semi-structured in-depth interviews with key informants from eleven Norwegian public bridge projects were carried out. The EU public procurement directive represents a challenge for public owners when they consider ECI in their projects. However, the studied bridge projects have used various ...

The type of contract model may have a significant influence on achieving project objectives, including environmental and climate change goals. This research investigates non-standard contract models impacting greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) in transport infrastructure construction in Australia. The research is based on the analysis of two case studies: an Early Contractor Involvement (ECI) contract and a Design and Construct (D&C) contract with GHG reduction requirements embedded in the contractor selection. Main findings support the use of ECIs for better integrating decisions made during the planning phase with the construction activities, and improve environmental outcomes while achieving financial and time savings.

The type of contract model may have a significant influence on achieving project objectives, including environmental and climate change goals. This research investigates non-standard contract models impacting greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) in transport infrastructure construction in Australia. The research is based on the analysis of two case studies: an Early Contractor Involvement (ECI) contract and a Design and Construct (D&C) contract with GHG reduction requirements embedded in the contractor selection. Main findings support the use of ECIs for better integrating decisions made during the planning phase with the construction activities, and improve environmental outcomes while achieving financial and time savings.