ISM model for assessing critical productivity factors in the Jordanian construction industry post-COVID-19 pandemic

The contribution of the construction industry to the economy and employment is significant for both developed and developing countries. It drives the continuous development of the global economy (Alshdiefat et al. 2023). For example, the construction industry in the UK employs 2.4 million people and is worth over £100bn, (Rhodes 2019). However, the COVID-19 pandemic put massive pressure on productivity in construction projects where the lockdown directly affects the construction process. Sihombing et al. (2020) indicated that the construction phase is the most impacted in the overall project life cycle during the pandemic. It has affected the labourers emotionally, mentally, physically and financially, resulting in a massive impact on their well-being. In terms of productivity in construction projects, the pandemic significantly reduces labour productivity and causes huge losses (Quezon and Ibanez 2021).

Nowadays, after the COVID-19 pandemic, the importance of the construction industry has spurred resulting in to improvement of this sector. According to Bsisu (2020), the construction industry plays a significant role in saving the national economy after the control of COVID-19. It is a vital sector for stimulating the post-COVID economy. The growth of the construction industry after the COVID-19 pandemic requires increased productivity to ensure the successful delivery of new projects (Anditiaman et al. 2019). However, there are limited studies investigating the productivity factors post-COVID-19 pandemic. Thus, understanding the crucial productivity factors after the COVID-19 pandemic will increase the productivity of construction projects by improving the understanding of the professionals who are involved at the early stage of the project lifecycle. In this regard, the COVID-19 pandemic creates a new way of thinking across the globe due to massive and unpredictable socioeconomic consequences. Karin et al. (2020) highlighted the importance of developing an integrated plan for the post-lockdown period. This study complies with this orientation for developing a new plan for productivity within construction projects post-COVID-19 periods by interpretive structural modelling (ISM) approach for the vital productivity factors. It aims to determine the crucial productivity factors post-COVID-19 pandemic for improving the construction industry in developing countries such as Jordan. The study’s findings will help to highlight significant productivity factors in the building sector to improve productivity and be ready for any new wave or new health pandemic that could occur. It identifies the main productivity factors by developing the ISM model which ensures delivering construction projects successfully.

The productivity in the construction industry is considered very weak and does not match the growth where it has grown by only 1% over the last 20 years (Barbosa et al. 2017). Productivity is a significant issue in the construction industry. The high productivity performance reflects rising profits and producing competitive products (Kasih and Adi 2019). According to Kasih and Adi (2019), actors in the construction industry within developing countries must increase their productivity to match the competition in the construction world. So, it is necessary to identify the main productivity factors in the Jordanian construction industry to enhance productivity.

This study was conducted to explore the critical productivity factors post-COVID-19 pandemic in developing countries such as Jordan. Therefore, a suitable procedure for data collection was adopted to generate useful data and ensure achieving a meaningful research conclusion that contributes to the existing knowledge. The mixed method investigations, quantitative followed by qualitative are used to determine the critical productivity factors post-COVID-19 pandemic. The combination of quantitative and qualitative methods is a very powerful way to gain results and draw conclusions related to the productivity factors post-COVID-19 pandemic. This research adopted a mixed methods approach which integers statistical data with focus group discussion. Triangulation improves the validity of research by collecting data from multiple sources to ensure that the data is consistent (Saunders et al. 2016).

A critical literature review for a similar topic covering various developed and developing countries was conducted to explore the main productivity factors within the construction industry. A questionnaire was designed based on the literature review results of productivity factors in construction projects. The obtained results formulated the questionnaire has two parts: the first part contains general information about the participants. The second part asked to determine the critical productivity factors from 50 productivity factors obtained from the literature review analysis. A pilot study was used for the final draft of the questionnaire before being distributed. The researcher asked pilot respondents to answer questions, provide feedback on the questionnaire design and content and show whether the questionnaire produced information related to the research subject. Thus, the questionnaire was pilot-tested for clarity and appropriateness in a self-administrative pre-test with six experts in the Jordanian construction sector. Based on the pilot study, some items were eliminated and others were modified. The respondents evaluated these factors based on their influence on the Likert Scale from 1 to 5, where 1 means the factor is not important and 5 means it is very important. In the subsequent stage, the focus group was conducted to determine critical productivity factors in construction projects post-COVID-19 pandemic and define their interrelationships. The focus group was used to facilitate the interpretation of obtained quantitative results (Stewart and Shamdasani 2014). Several researchers offer views on the number of participants in a focus group such as Krueger and Casey (2014) who suggested five to eight participants which is appropriate to control the discussion and allow participants to present their opinions freely. In this research, the researcher invited seven experts to participate in the focus group used for the validation of the questionnaire results and to develop the ISM model. The number of participants was based on Krueger and Casey (2014) suggestion to facilitate the discussion and let the researcher control the discussion and collect key points. The participants are selected based on their knowledge and experience within the Jordanian construction industry. Seven participants contributed to the focus group as follows: one from academic sectors with 13 years of experience, two contractors with 15- and 17 years of experience, respectively, three engineers with 20-, 19- and 15-years of experience, respectively, and one construction manager from CM company with 25 years experience. The ISM approach is considered an effective technique because of its ability to deal with the complexity of relationships involving many indicators (Mathiyazhagan and Haq 2013). The ISM approach enables to development of a map of the multi-relationship between several factors. The ISM approach is widely used to determine the interrelation between critical factors (Marinelli et al. 2022). Thus, this research uses the ISM approach to determine the critical productivity factors in the post-COVID-19 pandemic in Jordan. The focus group constructs ISM based on the obtained results from analysing the questionnaire. During the construction ISM model, the focus group agreed to use only factors with means three or higher which were considered above the neutral position on the Likert Scale. Thus, 22 factors were used to construct the ISM model for the critical productivity factors in the Jordanian construction industry post-COVID-19 pandemic.

This research provides critical productivity factors in the Jordanian construction projects post-COVID-19 pandemic. Fifty productivity factors were selected based on a critical literature review. A questionnaire was developed based on the outcomes of the literature review and then distributed across the Jordanian construction industry. The respondents, 267, were analysed to rank the main productivity factors. The obtained results determined 22 main factors which have a mean of 3.0 and above. The top five factors are Material shortage, Lack of empowerment (training/seminar), Late payment of salary, Poor communication & coordination and Improper planning & scheduling of work. These factors are quite similar to the main productivity factors pre-COVID-19 pandemic in Jordanian construction projects. Additionally, the COVID-19 pandemic has increased the number of critical factors that affect productivity in construction projects. A focus group consisting of selected experienced participants representing the construction sector conducted an ISM approach for a hierarchy of the productivity factors in construction projects. The ISM approach is an important technique for hierarchy ranking productivity factors and identifying the inter-relationship between these factors. This technique highlighted its efficiency in improving such types of topics by identifying the level of critical factors, barriers and processes and then paving the way for improving productivity in the construction sector by reducing the problems at each level. The ISM establishes a contextual association among six levels of productivity factors in Jordanian construction projects. Thus, to improve the productivity in construction projects, it is essential to alleviate challenges related to the factors in level 1 which are considered the weakest factors and so on. The obtained results distributed productivity factors over six levels. Level 6 contains the significant factors that have the greatest influence on productivity in construction projects. These factors are Lack of empowerment (training/seminar), Poor communication & coordination, Workers adhering to safety measures and infection control policy and Utilising traditional construction methods instead of modern technology. Level 1 included the factors that have the lowest influence on productivity in construction projects. MICMAC principle is used to ascertain the strength of each productivity factor. The factors are classified into four main groups, namely autonomous, dependent, linkage and independent, based on their driving power and dependent power. The results indicated that most productivity factors, 17 factors, were placed on the autonomous cluster which means that the 17 main factors may be strong but they are disconnected from the system. Additionally, the strong productivity factors do not affect each other as linkage factors and only four strong dependence factors are located in the ‘Independence factors’ cluster.