Incorporating contractual incentives to facilitate relational contracting

Abstract

Construction projects are undertaken by many parties, all with their own goals and motivations which may not always be aligned. Furthermore, they are governed by contracts, which do not necessarily produce win-win outcomes. The aims of this study are (1) to compare the views of contractors, clients, and consultants on factors facilitating and deterring relational contracting (RC); and (2) to investigate the use of contractual incentives to increase the effectiveness of RC. Structured questionnaires were sent by post to randomly selected construction industry players in Singapore to find out factors that enable RC and the barriers that impede the formation of RC. The results show that RC can be facilitated by having top management support, alignment of project objectives, relationship building, and most importantly, appropriate contractual incentives. In most instances, contractors gave a lower level of importance to many of the factors than clients and consultants. It is concluded that more contractual incentives should be provided in contracts in order to evoke the desired relational approaches. © 2006 ASCE.