25th Annual Conference of the International Group for Lean Construction - Heraklion, Greece - 2017

https://doi.org/10.24928/2017/0342

Shared Understanding: The Machine Code of the Social in a Socio-Technical System

Christine Pasquire1 & Paul Ebbs2

1Professor of Lean Project Management; Centre for Lean Projects, School of Architecture, Design and Built Environment, Nottingham Trent University, UK. [email protected]
2Research Fellow; Centre for Lean Projects, School of Architecture, Design and Built Environment, Nottingham Trent University, UK [email protected]

Abstract

The emergence of the explicit need for shared understanding as an underpinning flow in lean construction has generated some debate and exposed a need to provide a better explanation. Following an investigation comprising of a total of 27 interviews and several workshops, the data identifies and connects the relationship between inappropriate understanding and constraints to flow - represented through a conceptual model. The research further identified that introducing lean construction concepts associated with the Last Planner® System caused the participants to realise the importance of a shared understanding when previously they had not raised it as a source of constraint or problem. The research concludes that a shared understanding is critical to the social aspects of a sociotechnical system and needs to be precise and project specific to achieve the desired outcomes. In this way, a shared understanding can be considered to be the equivalent of a machine code in an operating system - if the understanding breaks down then so does the project delivery system.

Keywords

8th flow; common understanding; shared understanding; lean construction

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Reference

Pasquire, C. & Ebbs, P. 2017. Shared Understanding: The Machine Code of the Social in a Socio-Technical System, 25th Annual Conference of the International Group for Lean Construction , 365-372. doi.org/10.24928/2017/0342

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Founded in 1993, the IGLC is an international network of researchers from practice and academia in architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) who feel that the practice, education, and research of the AEC industry have to be radically renewed in order to respond to the global challenges ahead.

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