INTEGRATED DIGITAL DELIVERY (IDD): DEVELOPMENT OF A SYSTEMATIC FRAMEWORK TO ASSESS LEVEL OF DIGITALISATION IN IDD PHASES OF PROJECTS

Abstract

Integrated Digital Delivery (IDD) has been increasingly prevalent in Singapore’s construction industry since its introduction under BCA's Industry Transformation Map. As the government further promotes its adoption in local construction projects, it is timely to investigate ways to support its implementations. Industry professionals should be able to evaluate and understand their organisations’ digitalisation implementation levels to position themselves in the industry and work towards improvements. Hence, this study aims to investigate digital activities within IDD phases, examine the status quo of digitalisation in the industry, and develop a framework which translates into a tool to assess organisations' digitalisation implementation levels. Through extensive literature reviews and pilot interviews, 85 digital activities classified into 4 activity groups were identified and validated. These established a framework for developing the IDD Digitalisation Assessment Tool (IDD-DAT). A questionnaire was disseminated to collect data on IDD implementation among organisations and respondents. Descriptive and inferential analyses performed on the responses found that the current IDD implementation status among organisations is 68.3%. In analysing activity groupings, Stakeholder Engagement (AG1) was identified as the most important in influencing organisations’ implementation of digitalisation, followed by Process Optimisation (AG2), Quality Monitoring (AG3) and Smart Initiatives (AG4). Each digital activity was assigned weights based on questionnaire respondents' ranking of it importance. Thereafter, IDD-DAT was developed and validated by three industry professionals, reflecting their organisations' digitalisation implementation levels. Despite limitations, this study provides academia and practical contributions in presenting IDD insights and highlighting importance of technological advancement to remain competitive in this digital era.