Knowledge and skill requirements in the installation of prefabricated members

International Journal of Civil Engineering and Technology (IJCIET), ISSN 0976 – 6308

(Print), ISSN 0976 – 6316(Online) Volume 4, Issue 2, March - April (2013), © IAEME

156

KNOWLEDGE AND SKILL REQUIREMENTS

IN THE INSTALLATION OF PREFABRICATED MEMBERS

Phatsaphan Charnwasununth 1, TanitTongthong

2, Nobuyoshi Yabuki

3

1(Department of Civil Engineering, Chulalongkorn University,

Bangkok, Thailand) 2(Department of Civil Engineering, Chulalongkorn University,

Bangkok, Thailand) 3(Division of Sustainable Energy and Environmental Engineering, Osaka University,

Osaka,Japan)

ABSTRACT

Nowadays, the competitive environment in construction industry increases the

popularity of prefabricated construction in Thailand and many other countries. The

prefabricated construction is expected for the advantages in terms of construction period,

cost, quality, or consistency of result. However, these expectations cannot always be

achieved. One of the reasons is the lack of personnel, especially knowledgeable and skilled

personnel. This problem leads to prolonged construction, cost overrun, and lower quality of

structure construction. Therefore, this study aims to explore the knowledge and skill

requirements in the installation of prefabricated members.From the explorations and analysis,

the installation of prefabricated members is performed by an installation group composed of

workers (stockman and erectors), a mobile crane operator, and a foreman. The process is

broken down into the three main steps, specifically, checking the available prefabricated

members, making a decision for an installation process, and installing the prefabricated

members. Each of which requires the different knowledge and skills based on the person’s

roles and responsibilities. In addition, the level of knowledge and skill requirements is

elevated by the changes and errors in the installation.

Keywords: Installation, Knowledge, Prefabrication, Skill

INTERNATIONAL JOURNAL OF CIVIL ENGINEERING AND

TECHNOLOGY (IJCIET)

ISSN 0976 – 6308 (Print)

ISSN 0976 – 6316(Online)

Volume 4, Issue 2, March - April (2013), pp. 156-176

© IAEME: www.iaeme.com/ijciet.asp

Journal Impact Factor (2013): 5.3277 (Calculated by GISI)

www.jifactor.com

IJCIET

© IAEME



157

1. INTRODUCTION

Today, the business environment of the construction industry has become increasingly

competitive due to the increasing number of local and foreign construction firms, higher

resource costs, and demand for speedier construction and lower prices from the owner. All of

these tendencies have influenced the construction firms in terms of contract awarding, project

delivery, profit generation, and survival tactics. Therefore, almost all construction firms must

improve their competitiveness by, for example, inventing new construction methods, creating

new materials, adapting better tools and equipment, improving productivity, and raising

collaboration efficiency. Prefabricated construction is a new construction method, which is

expected for the advantages in terms of construction period, cost, quality, or consistency of

result. However, these expectations cannot always be achieved because human resources still

plays a major role in the construction process and significantly affects the construction

outcome in terms of personnel availability and lack of knowledgeable and skilled personnel.

1.1 Prefabricated construction

Prefabricated construction has been widely used in residential construction because of

its advantages in terms of productivity and quality improvement as well as cost reduction [1].

In addition, several prefabricated constructions gain more benefits from just-in-time concept

[2]. However, the prefabrication needs the experts in design, manufacturing, and erection to

achieve the expectations. The following prefabrication’s characteristics increase the

importance of knowledge and skills: up-front design and production, high complexity, high

precision requirements, fragmentation, manually intensive, special technique usage,

sequential construction, and skilled labour requirement. In addition, the personnel have to

cope with some limitations such as traffic regulations of deliver trucks, lack of material, lack

of stocking area, and lack space for installation, which affect the installation process [3 –8].

1.2 Personnel availability

Construction is a labour-intensive industry [9], in other words, an industry that

requires a large number of workers, mainly depending on the economic conditions.

Generally, in good economic times, the demand for the construction of buildings and

facilities is high. Therefore, a considerable number of people working in construction

activities are required [10]. In contrast, during the recession period, the need of construction

structures is decreased and the construction activities are restrained. Thus, the required

number of human resource decreases. However, the construction sector is used for economic

crisis recovery, particularly by allowing the circular flow of spending through construction

activities. Both economic situations lead to the need of human resource in construction

industry. Therefore, the lack of human resource always occurs in the construction industry

and the labour availability is a critical issue for builders and the construction industry as a

whole [11]. The fluctuation of the required human resource does not depend only on the

changing economic condition. In Thailand, the change in workforce depends also on the

agricultural industry, i.e., some labours work in the agricultural sector during the certain time,

and temporarily work in the construction industry for other periods. Thus, the supply of

human resource especially labour drops in seedtime and harvest season.



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1.3 Lack of knowledgeable and skilled personnel

Construction is considered as a human-driven process. Thus, quality of human

resource directly affects the effectiveness and efficiency of the construction processes, which

reflect on construction duration, cost, and quality. According to the embedded knowledge and

intellectual ability in personnel, the personnel are referred as the greatest asset of any

organisation [12]. The quality of human resources is raising its importance since the industry

is considered as a knowledge-based industry and fall between the manufacturing industry and

service industry [13]. Therefore, activities of the construction industry demand an increased

level of knowledge, skills, and learning [14].

The lack of skilled personnel is of considerable concern to industry stakeholders [15].

A shortage of skilled labour is stated in several countries, such as the United States [11, 16],

Singapore [10], and South Africa [17]. The shortage of skilled labour in the North American

industry was predicted in the early 1980s and was confirmed by a survey conducted by the

Construction Users Roundtable (CURT) in 1996, which found that 60% of the respondents

faced skilled labour shortages and 75% of the respondents indicated that the shortage was

worse than the last five years [18]. In Singapore, the inefficient manpower deployment is

caused by a shortage of skilled workers and supervisors, a large unskilled foreign workforce,

and a weakening local workforce base. The most three concerned issues are (1) difficulty in

the recruitment of supervisors, (2) difficulty in the recruitment of workers, and (3) a high rate

of labour turnover [10].

Many reasons lead the construction industry facing a shortage of skilled workers,

namely low wages, the transient nature of work, poor industry image, lack of training, and

lack of a worker-oriented career path [15]. Makhene and Thwala studied the reasons for the

skilled labour shortage in South Africa. The reasons include the retirement of personnel in the

1950s and 1960s and the fact that young people are not interested in working in the

construction industry because of the work conditions, the hours of work, and the flexibility to

travel. In addition, the workers do not get enough training and continual development

because they are hired as temporary employees [17]. The lack of training and development

for personnel often leads to difficulty in closing the barrier between unskilled labour to

skilled labour and between inexperienced labour to experienced labour [19]. The shortage of

skilled workers tends to cause five categories of impact: (1) lower productivity, (2) higher

project costs, (3) lower safety, (4) lower quality, and (5) higher supervision requirement [16].

All of which could greatly affect the overall project performance.

The previous studies indicated the importance of personnel in the construction

industry, especially the knowledgeable and skilled personnel in the prefabricated

construction. For the prefabricated construction, the installation of prefabricated members is

important because it is a major critical path for construction [20]. A prolonged construction

schedule and improper installation of components can be caused by inexperienced labour

[19].However, the details of knowledge and skill requirementshave not been

explored.Therefore, this research aims to explore the knowledge and skill requirements in the

installation of prefabricated members.These requirements can be used for training and supply

the personnel to the industry or even to develop the automation system which reduces the

knowledge and skill requirements.



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2. CURRENT PRACTICES

In order to investigate the current practices, site observations, document reviews, and

interviews were employed in six construction projects. All of them are the residential construction

projects located in the Bangkok Metropolitan and nearby areas. The projects consist of single houses

or row houses with area from 150 to 250 square meters. The current practices focused in four

perspectives as follows: (1) the personnel in the installation process, (2) the installation process, (3)

the changes in the prefabricated member installation, and (4) the errors in the prefabricated member

installation.

2.1 The personnel in the installation process

From the observations and interviews, the installation processes of prefabricated members are

performed by a group consists of workers, a mobile crane operator, and a foreman. The number of

workers in a group varies from two to five workers. The organisation chart of an installation group is

shown in Fig. 1. The inspector and supervisor involve in the installation although both of them do not

supervise or perform the installation directly. They may perform their works with more than one

group during the installation. Each position is assigned the roles and responsibilities to perform the

work, which are summarised in Table 1.

Figure 1 Organisation chart of an installation group

Table 1 Roles and responsibilities of personnel

Position Roles and responsibilities

Worker (stockman) The person works at the stock location or on the delivery truck to find and

hook a prefabricated member.

Workers (erectors) The persons handle a prefabricated member, which is being lifted and moved

by machine, and install at the desired location.

Foreman The person supervises the installation, manages the related resources, and

provides the technical knowledge. The person must recognise the current

condition, perceive the change, and select the proper countermeasures in a

timely manner.

Mobile crane operator The person operates the mobile crane to support the installation and related

processes.

Inspector The person inspects, records, and provides the guidance for the quality of the

prefabricated member installation.

Supervisor The person plans and manages the construction schedule and the production

line to meet the expectations of prefabricated construction.



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2.2 The installation process

The installation process was investigated using site observations and interviews. The

overview of installation is as follows:

After the prefabricated members arrive at the construction site, the members are transferred to

the stock rack or left on the truck. These alternatives are selected based on the policy and management

principle of the supervisor. If the just-in-time concept is applied, the members are left on the truck and

directly installed without transferring to the rack. Or else, the members are transferred and stocked at

the rack.

Foreman begins the installation by checking the available prefabricated members. The related

resources, i.e., materials, tools, and equipment, may be checked for the availability and compared to

the resource requirements. Hence, the list of unavailable resources is perceived including the

unavailable prefabricated members. Next, a decision is made based on the current condition of the

installation process on whether to postpone or continue the operation. In the case of continuing the

installation, the sequence is generated. Then, the work location of the mobile crane is considered and

the machine is set up at the desired location. Next, the prefabricated members are installed by an

installation group based on the selected sequence. Finally, the installed members are inspected.

The process, as described above, was analysed and broken down to the work breakdown

structure. This structure was further categorised into three main steps and four supplementary steps as

shown in Fig. 2. The main steps are always performed in the installation of prefabricated members

while the supplementary steps may or may not be performed based on the practice of the particular

foreman and the installation group.

However, the changes and errors are always found in the installation process. The installation

group has to perform the additional works or adapt the process for coping with these changes and

errors using the additional knowledge and skills.

Figure 2 Work breakdown structure of the installation process



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2.3 Changes in the prefabricated member installation

From the site observations and interviews, many changes occur in the installation process.

Any such changes mean that the current condition at the construction site varies from the planned

condition or documents indicated by the designer or planner before the installation begins. The

personnel, especially foremen, have the responsibility to detect the changes and select the proper

countermeasure in a timely manner. The changes are described as follows:

Unavailability of prefabricated members; the unavailable prefabricated members affect the

installation significantly. Foreman has to decide whether to postpone or continue the installation. The

process is postponed to prevent the double moves of resources and to operate at the structure, which

has complete resources. If the installation process is allowed to continue, the new installation

sequence is considered to avoid the line-of-sight blocking and the difficulty to install a prefabricated

member between the installed members.

Shuffled location of prefabricated members in the rack; the location of each prefabricated

member in the stock rack is always shuffled because of the difficulty to fix the stock location of each

prefabricated member in the rack. The location depends on the delivery schedule, the order of delivery

trucks, the loading prefabricated members on the delivery trucks, the overlap of prefabricated

members on the truck, and the stability of the stock rack. This shuffled location increases the

difficulty for the foreman to check the availability of prefabricated members and for the stockman to

find the desired prefabricated member.

Irrelevant prefabricated members in the rack; various prefabricated members of the different

structures or houses are usually contained in a stock rack for a moment. Therefore, some of members

in a rack are irrelevant for the current installation. The foreman has to perceive the irrelevant members

to prevent the errors of the process.

Unavailability of installation resources; the installation requires the sufficient resources for

the operation. The unavailability of materials or tools always arises in the installation because of the

material shortage or the improper management by an installation group. The installation cannot be

operated or is cut off due to the unavailability of resources. Therefore, foreman has to detect the

unavailability of resources and select the right countermeasures. Otherwise, the installation is stopped

before the process is complete, which results in precious time, money, and effort wasted.

Relative location between house, mobile crane, and stock; this relative location affects the

installation sequence of prefabricated members significantly. The sequence mustbe considered to

avoid the line-of-sight blocking and the difficulty to install a prefabricated member between the

installed members. Moreover, the stock location always varies due to the space limitation and

accessibility at that moment. Thus, the installations are performed in the different sequence based on

this relative location although the installations are performed for the same type of house as shown in

Fig. 3.

Figure 3 Different installation sequences



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2.4 Errors in the prefabricated member installation

From the site observations and interviews, the errors in prefabricated member

installation are revealed as follows:

Errors in prefabricated member marking; these errors include damaged markings,

missing markings, and incorrect markings. The prefabricated member identification using

only the marking tends to be incorrect. With incorrect identification, the chance of error

installation increases.

Errors in the prefabricated member installation; the errors cause from the

manufacturing, transportation, or installation processes. The knowledge and skills are

required to perceive and correct these errors. However, the errors from the manufacturing

cannot be prevented and corrected immediately because the prefabricated members are

produced in advance. The errors are still found continuously and the correction has to be done

later until the backlog of prefabricated members are installed or corrected.

In addition, the installation errors are occurred because of the large quantity and

similar appearance of prefabricated members. Therefore, the foreman and an installation

group need the knowledge and skills to point out and correct the errors.

3. KNOWLEDGE AND SKILL REQUIREMENTS

For the analysis of knowledge and skill requirements, the installation process was

broken down to work breakdown structure. Next, the structure was further broken down for

activities and actions respectively as shown in Fig. 4. The knowledge and skill requirements

were analysed for each action from two parts: (1) the physical work or movements, and (2)

the related data and information. In addition, the requirements were revealed from the

interviews of personnel, who involved in each action. The changes and errors in the

installation were also considered for the analysis of knowledge and skill requirements as

shown in Fig. 5.

Figure 4 Breaking down of the installation process



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Figure 5 Analysis of knowledge and skill requirements

The details of each main step are as follows:

Step 1: Checking the available prefabricated members

The foreman considers the available prefabricated members by selecting the building

component to be installed and considering the list of prefabricated members in the selected

building component. At the rack or on the delivery truck as shown in Fig. 6, the foreman

identifies each prefabricated member by the prefabricated member’s appearance or marking.

In situations of uncertainty or doubt, construction drawings as shown in Fig. 7or

measurement tools are used for the identification of prefabricated members based on

knowledge and skills. After the identification, the available prefabricated member is recorded

and the list of available prefabricated members is compiled. Then, the foreman makes the

decision to stop this checking process in the case that all the prefabricated members have

been verified or cannot be found. The work breakdown structure of Step 1 is summarised and

shown in Fig. 8. According to the work breakdown structure, activities, and actions, the

requirements of knowledge and skills are analysed and shown in Table 2.

Figure 6 Prefabricated members at the rack and on the delivery truck



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Figure 7 Construction drawing

Figure 8 Work breakdown structure and actions of foreman in step 1



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Table 2 Knowledge and skill requirements for checking the available prefabricated members

Activities / Actions Knowledge and skill requirements

1.1 Consider the prefabricated members

1.1.1 Select the building component to be

installed

- Interpretation of construction drawings

- Prefabricated member identification

- Perception of prefabricated members in

each building component

- Consideration of building components for

the installation process

1.1.2 Consider the list of prefabricated

members in a selected building component to

scope the prefabricated member checking

- Perception of prefabricated members in

each building component


1.2 Identify a prefabricated member

1.2.1 Identify a prefabricated member by its

appearance or marking



1.2.2 In situation of uncertainty or doubt,

identify a prefabricated member by other

methods

- Usage of measurement tools


1.3 Compile the list of available prefabricated

members

1.3.1 Record an available prefabricated

member

- Data collection

1.3.2 Compile the list of available

prefabricated members

- Data collection

1.4 Decide to stop checking

1.4.1 If the members in the selected building

component are not complete, find another

prefabricated member by repeating activity

1.2 or try to search at other possible

locations.

- Perception of prefabricated members in the

selected building component

- All knowledge and skill requirements,

which are required in activity 1.2 and 1.3

1.4.2 Decide to stop checking - Decision to stop checking

Step 2: Making a decision for an installation process

After discerning the list of unavailable resources and considering the lack of critical

resources, the foreman makes a decision about the installation process, namely, whether to

postpone or continue the process. The process is postponed if the unavailable resources

significantly affect the installation process or if the resources can be moved for use in another

building component with complete resources. The installation cannot be performed without

the complete of some critical resources such as mobile crane or driller.If the installation

process continues, the foreman considers other related factors that can affect the installation

sequence, i.e., the location of the mobile crane, house, and stock; the effect of unavailable

prefabricated members; and the effect of unavailable resources. Finally, the installation

sequence is generated by the foreman as shown in Fig.9. The work breakdown structure and

the knowledge and skill requirements of this step are shown in Fig. 10 and Table 3

respectively.



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Figure 9 Installation sequences generated by foreman

Figure 10 Work breakdown structure and actions of the foreman in Step 2

Step 3: Installing the prefabricated members

In step 3, the foreman recalls the installation sequence, which is generated from the

previous step. Next, the foreman provides the information to an installation group and

supervises the process while the prefabricated members are being installed based on the

selected sequence. The process in this step is a repetitive loop along with the cooperation of



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the mobile crane operator, stockman, and erectors. The stockman finds and hooks a

prefabricated member in the rack or on the truck and then the member is lifted and moved to

the desired location to be installed as shown in Fig. 11. The mobile crane operator operates

the machine to hook, lift, move, install, and unhook the prefabricated members. Next, the

prefabricated member is handled, installed, shored, and adjusted by erectors as shown in Fig.

12 and 13. Finally, erectors unhook the prefabricated member. These activities are repeated

until the last sequence member is installed. All the personnel in this step communicate and

cooperate with each other throughout the work being performed. The activities and actions of

foreman, mobile crane operator, stockman, and erectors are shown in Fig. 14 to 17

respectively. The knowledge and skill requirements of this step are summarised in Table 4.

Table 3 Knowledge and skill requirements for making a decision for an installation process


2.1 Perceive the list of unavailable

resources

2.1.1 Recall the list of unavailable

resources

- Perception of unavailable resources

2.1.2 Consider the lack of resources

especially the resources that affect the

installation significantly.

- Consideration of the effects of resource

unavailability on the installation process

2.2 Make a decision

2.2.1 Make a decision whether to

postpone or continue the installation

- Decision to postpone or continue the

installation

2.3 Consider the related factors

2.3.1 Consider the location of house,

mobile crane, and stock

- Consideration of the effects of the

house, mobile crane, and stock locations

on the installation sequence

2.3.2 Consider the effect of unavailable



unavailability of prefabricated members

on the installation sequence

2.3.3 Consider the effect of unavailable

resources


unavailability of resource on the

installation sequence

2.4 Generate the installation sequence

2.4.1 Generate the installation sequence

- Generation of installation sequence



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Figure 11 Stockman finds and hooks a prefabricated member

Figure 12 Erectors handle and install a prefabricated member

Figure 13 Erectors shore and adjust a prefabricated member



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Figure 14 Work breakdown structure and actions of the foreman in Step 3

Figure 15 Work breakdown structure and actions of the mobile crane operator in Step 3

Figure 16 Work breakdown structure and actions of a worker (Stockman) in Step 3



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Figure 17 Work breakdown structure and action flow of workers (Erectors) in Step 3

Table 4 Knowledge and skill requirements for installing the prefabricated members


3.1 Recall the installation sequence by

foreman

3.1.1 Recall the selected installation

sequence from the previous step

- Perception of the selected installation

sequence

3.2 Supervise the installation process by

foreman

3.2.1 Perform the work based on an


- Perception of details of the selected


3.2.2 Inform the stockman to hook a

prefabricated member

- Perception of a prefabricated member to

be lifted and installed



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3.2.3 Inform the erector to install the

prefabricated member

- Perception of the location where the

prefabricated member is to be installed

3.2.4 Supervise and cooperate with the personnel

in an installation group

- Perception of the installation procedure

- Perception of the installation specifications


- Identification of the prefabricated members

- Identification the resources

- Usage of materials

- Usage of tools


- Usage of lifting tools, i.e., cable, shackles, and

hooks

- Communication using hand signals

3.3 Operate the machine by mobile crane operator

3.3.1 Control the machine to move between stock

and house

- Operation of the mobile crane to swing between

the stock rack or truck and house

3.3.2 Control the machine to hook, lift, install,

and unhook the prefabricated member

- Operation of the mobile crane to hook, lift,

install, and unhook the prefabricated member

3.3.3 Cooperate with the personnel in an

installation group


3.4 Hook the prefabricated member by stockman

3.4.1 Find a prefabricated member

- Identification of the prefabricated members

- Perception of the prefabricated member location

3.4.2 Hook the prefabricated member - Working at height


hooks


installation group


3.5 Install the prefabricated member by erectors

3.5.1 Handle the prefabricated member to the

location



- Handling of the prefabricated member

3.5.2 Install the prefabricated member - Perception of the installation procedure

- Perception of the installation specifications


- Usage of tools



installation group


3.6 Shore the prefabricated member by erectors

3.6.1 Shore the prefabricated member


- Usage of tools

- Shoring of the prefabricated member

3.6.2 Adjust the prefabricated member - Usage of materials


- Adjustment of the prefabricated member for

inclination, levelling, and alignment using

material, tools, and physical strength



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3.7 Unhook the prefabricated member by

erectors

3.7.1 Unhook the prefabricated member

- Working at height

- Usage of lifting tools, i.e., cable,

shackles, and hooks

3.7.2 Cooperate with an installation

group


4. EVALUATION

After getting the knowledge and skill requirements for the installation of prefabricated

members, the requirements were evaluated by experts with more than three years of

experience in prefabricated construction. The evaluation contained four parts as follows: the

suitability of the work breakdown structure, the importance of each step in the installation,

the completeness of knowledge and skill requirements in each step, and the importance of

each knowledge and skill. The five Likert scale was employed for the evaluations as the

meaning shown in Table 5.

Table 5 Meanings of each Likert scale

Scale Suitable Importance Completeness

1 Totally disagree Very unimportant Very incomplete

2 Disagree Unimportant Incomplete

3 Neutral Neither important or

unimportant

Neither complete or

incomplete

4 Agree Important Complete

5 Strongly agree Very important Very complete

4.1 The suitability of the work breakdown structure

The experts evaluated the suitability of the work breakdown structure. From the

results in Table 6, the average evaluation score was 4.5, which means the experts totally

agreed with the proposed work breakdown structure of the installation process.

Table 6 The suitability of the work breakdown structure

Evaluation Expert Average

1 2 3 4 5 6

Suitability of the work breakdown

structure

5 4 4 4 5 5 4.5



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4.2 The importance of each step in the installation

In this part, the experts evaluated each step in the installation in terms of the importance

for installation duration and errors. The results are shown in Table 7 and 8, respectively. From the

results, the importance rankings of each step for both installation duration and errors are

corresponding.

4.3 The completeness of knowledge and skill requirements in each step

In this section, the experts evaluated the completeness of knowledge and skills in each

step of installation. The results are shown in Table 9. From the evaluations, all of the main

installation steps were evaluated above “complete” scale. The experts did not recommend for

additional knowledge and skills for each person in each installation step.

Table 7 The importance in terms of installation duration

Importance of each step

in the installation process

for installation duration

Expert

Aver

ag

e

Ran

k

1 2 3 4 5 6

Step 1: Checking the available


5 5 5 4 5 5 4.83 1

Step 2: Making a decision for an

installation process

5 5 3 5 4 4 4.33 3

Step 3: Installing the prefabricated

members

5 4 5 5 5 4 4.67 2

Table 8 The importance in terms of installation errors

Importance of each step

in the installation process

for installation errors

Expert A

ver

ag

e

Ra

nk

1 2 3 4 5 6



5 5 5 4 5 5 4.83 1



5 3 3 4 5 5 4.17 3


members

5 3 5 4 5 4 4.33 2

Table 9 The completeness of knowledge and skill requirements in each step

Completeness of

knowledge and skill requirements

in each step of


Expert

Average 1 2 3 4 5 6

(1) Checking the available prefabricated members 5 4 4 5 5 4 4.50

(2) Making a decision for an installation process 5 3 4 4 5 4 4.17

(3) Installing the prefabricated members 5 4 4 4 5 3 4.17



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4.4 The importance of each knowledge and skill

The experts also evaluated the importance of a knowledge and skill of each person in

each step. From the results, the knowledge and skill requirements were ranked. The most

three important knowledge and skills can be summarised as shown in Table 10.

Table 10 The most important knowledge and skill requirements in each step

Installation steps The most important knowledge and skills


prefabricated members by foreman



- Perception of prefabricated members in each

building component


installation process by foreman

- Decision to postpone or continue the installation

- Generation of installation sequence

- Consideration of the effects of resource

unavailability on the installation process


members by foreman







members by mobile crane operator


- Operation of the mobile crane to hook, lift,

install, and unhook the prefabricated member

- Operation of the mobile crane to swing between

the stock rack or truck and house


members by stockman



hooks

- Working at height


members by erectors


- Perception of the installation specification

5. CONCLUSION

Although the prefabrication seems simple and easy to install, its advantages cannot

always be archived. One of the reasons is the lack of personnel, especially knowledgeable

and skilled personnel. The prefabrication requires knowledge and skills for some special

features such as the sequential work, the usage of special materials and tools. In addition, the

requirements are increasingly important in the changed situation because the provided

information may not appropriate for the personnel in order to perceive the actual condition,

make a decision, and select the countermeasure in a timely manner. This issue is of

considerable concern to industry stakeholders and leads to low productivity and errors.

Therefore, the knowledge and skill requirements have to be revealed in order to train the

personnel, increase productivity, increase the number of qualified personnel, and supply

personnel to the industry.



175

From the study, the installation of prefabricated members is performed by a group of

installation which consists of workers, a mobile crane operator, and a foreman. The

installation is broken down into three main steps, i.e., (1) checking the available prefabricated

members, (2) making a decision for an installation process, and (3) installing the

prefabricated members. The work breakdown structure is further broken down into activities

and actions. Thus, the knowledge and skill requirements are analysed individually for each

person in each action. In addition, the changes and errors increase the knowledge and skill

requirements in the installation. Therefore, the knowledge and skill requirements are different

among the personnel and the installation steps based on the person’s roles and

responsibilities.

The knowledge and skill requirements were evaluated by the experts in terms of

importance and completeness. For the importance, the most important step in terms of

installation duration and errors were ranked as follows: checking the available prefabricated

members, installing the prefabricated members, and making a decision for an installation

process. This ranking for both installation duration and errors are corresponding. For the

completeness, all experts evaluated that the lists of knowledge and skill requirements in each

installation step are complete. The experts also evaluated the importance of each knowledge

and skill for each person in each step. However, all knowledge and skills are crucial and

required to complete the installation effectively. The results of this research will be used as

the fundamental in order to train and supply the personnel for prefabricated construction and

develop the automation approach, which reduces the dependency of the personnel’s

knowledge and skills and increases the automation degree in the construction process in the

future.

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