Towards satisfying the client: optimizing, satisficing or disappointing?

Abstract

The construction industry is criticized extensively for poor performance. Despite the widely expressed objective of project participants to ‘satisfy the client’, clients tend to be disappointed with both process and product performance. A functional perspective of construction clients and examination of how the desires and demands of clients are determined and operate as drivers for construction projects facilitates a critical view of the issues involved. The conceptualization of satisfaction is investigated in the context of determining client values and value perspectives and their aspirations for performance. On the supply side, competitive advantage is examined and its relationship to business performance. The structure and structural changes in the industry are considered in relation to the common processes employed to realize projects and their impacts on participants. Means by which decisions are made, including common techniques and human factors are investigated to suggest what may be adopted to enhance the usefulness and accuracy of forecasts. The themes emerging from the critical review of theory and literature are drawn together to yield a number of conclusions and to produce a draft agenda for further, empirical investigation with a view to amending processes to secure more integration through acknowledging interdependence amongst participants and their performance and, especially, to achieve enhanced levels of client satisfaction.