OPINION: Where is the South African Construction industry going?

Construction Professional Prince Lufu shares his sobering food for thought hardhatOPINION on where he thinks the South African construction industry is headed.

The deterioration of standards in the construction industry as a result of many new ill equipped entrants coming in has caused a decline in overall and end user satisfaction. Government departments who are often end clients have all sorts of well meaning documents in place to establish norms and standards for practice but in reality,nobody adheres to that at all. The lack of oversight leads to projects not being monitored in the manner they are supposed to be due to client base lack of intrinsic knowledge.

Therein lies the problem as Human capital with the pre-requisite experience is required to drive such monitoring

Coupled with the exodus via retirement of experienced operators from a bygone era, we are heading into a bleak future if the industry does not close this key skills gap. That lends itself to a lack of key area productivity deliverables monitoring such as your classic TQM arena of Cost, Quality and Health and Safety. Alarm bells should go off and red flags should be raised when prospective contractors come on board and are not executing with those key aspects in place

Hence the rise of incomplete projects often under priced and handed to rank novices to execute on a trial and error basis

To hearken back to Roman Catholic terminology, this Holy Trinity of the Built environment is so vital to be balanced and evenly prioritized so the pot brews steadily. A lopsided 3 legged pot will not cook evenly and one side is bound to suffer.

Another point to note is the trend of a lot of people leaving contracting and entering the client plus professional and consultancy sphere of the built environment without necessarily earning their dues and growing in the industry from grassroots levels. Two decades ago people reveled to be on site where OHS, QMS and costing monitoring and management standards were high.

The on the field result is wool is pulled over their eyes and shoddy workmanship is accepted on the client side and on the operational contractor side, the standards keep falling as barriers to entry and monitoring lapses.

It is a worrisome trend that new entrants (both employees and employers) come with their own expectations into an industry with norms, checks and balances and try to reinvent the wheel to suit their needs. They come in with a mindset of I don't need to read the manual to know how the device works. They are lacking the necessary passion for the processes seeking to fulfill their needs first often due to the fact that they don't fully comprehend the operation cycle and think it is something you learn as you go along

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With the advent of closure of trade schools and a lot of new contractors not willing to procure and remunerate skilled people, the substandard work and shoddy workmanship which is expected to be remunerated rises. What also drives this to be a challenge is the expectancy mindset of often unskilled people chose not do the work, who in their minds have told themselves they have duly performed and demand compensation on time

Unfortunately there are tried and tested methodologies which if done half baked have serious cost implications inter alia as an end result.

Standards are not adhered to and can one attribute that to ignorance or bad attitude?

The key one focused on here is the trend of job satisfaction and an exodus of talent and skill.

As standards deteriorate, one wonders where it will all end. What is discussed in high levels of companies does not trickle down to reality as even they are oblivious to what is right and wrong. The question also begs, what is the content of items discussed at these high levels as well? Is it relevant, well informed or seat of pants ill informed rationale?

There is only an interest in profit margin, no passion for the process mindset, only in to smell the roses and not do the gardening, figuratively speaking.

It is a worrying trend which a seasoned professional consultant who may have the misfortune to encounter such will likely be found in a quandary to protect their names as often unethical practices will be expected to be conducted by them in order for unscrupulous operators to sustain their operations often likely demanding remuneration for substandard work

It is sobering food for thought indeed.

Prince Nqobani Lufu is a BSc Construction Management graduate from Nelson Mandela University with over 18 years experience in both contracting and consultancy. He has a passion for systems in particular ISO 9001 and the other Built Environment related fields. He has done research into ISO 9001 set up at Honours level. Currently he is self employed doing consultancy work in both construction management and project management

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