University of Kentucky UKnowledge Theses and Dissertations--Civil Engineering Civil Engineering 2017 QUANTITATIVE ANALYSIS OF THE IMPACT OF CRAFT LABOR AVAILABILITY ON CONSTRUCTION PROJECT PERFORMANCE Hossein Karimi University of Kentucky, [email protected] Author ORCID Identifier: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-7290-7822 Digital Object Identifier: https://doi.org/10.13023/ETD.2017.368 Right click to open a feedback form in a new tab to let us know how this document benefits ou.y Recommended Citation Karimi, Hossein, "QUANTITATIVE ANALYSIS OF THE IMPACT OF CRAFT LABOR AVAILABILITY ON CONSTRUCTION PROJECT PERFORMANCE" (2017). Theses and Dissertations--Civil Engineering. 56. https://uknowledge.uky.edu/ce_etds/56 This Doctoral Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Civil Engineering at UKnowledge. It has been accepted for inclusion in Theses and Dissertations--Civil Engineering by an authorized administrator of UKnowledge. For more information, please contact [email protected]. STUDENT AGREEMENT: I represent that my thesis or dissertation and abstract are my original work. Proper attribution has been given to all outside sources. I understand that I am solely responsible for obtaining any needed copyright permissions. I have obtained needed written permission statement(s) from the owner(s) of each third-party copyrighted matter to be included in my work, allowing electronic distribution (if such use is not permitted by the fair use doctrine) which will be submitted to UKnowledge as Additional File. I hereby grant to The University of Kentucky and its agents the irrevocable, non-exclusive, and royalty-free license to archive and make accessible my work in whole or in part in all forms of media, now or hereafter known. I agree that the document mentioned above may be made available immediately for worldwide access unless an embargo applies. I retain all other ownership rights to the copyright of my work. I also retain the right to use in future works (such as articles or books) all or part of my work. I understand that I am free to register the copyright to my work. REVIEW, APPROVAL AND ACCEPTANCE The document mentioned above has been reviewed and accepted by the student’s advisor, on behalf of the advisory committee, and by the Director of Graduate Studies (DGS), on behalf of the program; we verify that this is the final, approved version of the student’s thesis including all changes required by the advisory committee. The undersigned agree to abide by the statements above. Hossein Karimi, Student Dr. Timothy R. B. Taylor, Major Professor Dr. Yi-Tin Wang, Director of Graduate Studies QUANTITATIVE ANALYSIS OF THE IMPACT OF CRAFT LABOR AVAILABILITY ON CONSTRUCTION PROJECT PERFORMANCE _____________________________________ DISSERTATION _____________________________________ A dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in the College of Engineering at the University of Kentucky By Hossein Karimi Lexington, Kentucky Director: Dr. Timothy R. B. Taylor, Professor of Civil Engineering Lexington, Kentucky Copyright Hossein Karimi 2017 ABSTRACT OF DISSERTATION QUANTITATIVE ANALYSIS OF THE IMPACT OF CRAFT LABOR AVAILABILITY ON CONSTRUCTION PROJECT PERFORMANCE A shortage of skilled craft labor in the North American construction industry has been an unfortunate cyclic trend since the late 1980s. This shortage has been reported and discussed frequently by numerous past studies in the context of construction industry. The 2008 U.S. recession was at least one period when the craft shortage temporarily improved, as witnessed by spikes in construction unemployment rates above 20% due to the work slowdowns. However, the current economic recovery period is once again experiencing craft shortages in some sectors of the U.S. construction industry. Although the past literature provides wealth of information about influence of craft labor shortage on construction project, less attention has been given to quantifying the impact of craft labor availability on construction project performance. The primary contribution of this study to the body of knowledge is to fill the gap in existing literature by quantitatively modelling and elucidating the influence of craft labor availability on construction project performance as measured by safety, schedule, productivity and cost. Data from 97 construction projects completed in the U.S. and Canada between 2001 and 2014 were collected from two data sources. A number of t-tests and regression analyses were conducted in both databases to examine the significance of the influence of craft labor shortage on construction project performance. The primary analysis shows that projects that experienced craft shortages underwent significant higher growth in cost overrun, time overrun, safety incident and also lower productivity compared to projects that did not. Further analysis on two databases returned the following models: 1) a Poisson regression model that demonstrates a positive exponential relationship between increased craft worker recruiting difficulty and Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) Total Number of Recordable Incident Cases per 200,000 Actual Direct Work Hours (TRIR) on construction projects. 2) a statistically significant correlation between increased craft recruiting difficulty and lower project productivity and higher schedule overruns 3) a multiple regression models that demonstrate a relationship between increased construction cost overrun with two variables of increased actual cost and increased craft staffing difficulty. These models are intended to be used by project management team to perceive the risk that skilled craft labor variability poses on project safety, productivity, time, and cost performance. In addition, understanding the level of impact that craft shortages are having through robust statistical analyses is a first step in developing the motivation for industry leaders, communities, and construction stakeholders to address this challenge. KEYWORDS: Labor Shortage, Safety, Cost, Time, Productivity, Risk Assessment Hossein Karimi Student’s Signature 06/28/2017 Date QUANTITATIVE ANALYSIS OF THE IMPACT OF CRAFT LABOR AVAILABILITY ON CONSTRUCTION PROJECT PERFORMANCE By Hossein Karimi Timothy R. B. Taylor Director of Dissertation Yi-Tin Wang Director of Graduate Studies 06/28/2017 Date To my parents, parents-in-law My wife, Adeleh and my children Elina Zahra and Amir Neekan ACKNOWLEDGEMENT The completion of this work would never have been possible without the guidance and support from a lengthy list of academic faculty members and family. First, I would like to express my gratitude to my advisor Prof. Timothy R.B. Taylor for his incredible supervision, motivation, and continuous assistance. I also must acknowledge Prof. Paul Goodrum for his constant support, encouragement and patience over our past four years research study. A deep understanding of conducting research in construction management beside many invaluable lessons I have learned from these two professors helped me to shift towards a mentoring role. I must also acknowledge and sincerely thank Prof. William Maloney and Prof. Gabriel Dadi for their valuable supervision and advice. My gratitude is extended to Prof. Srinivasan, who spent his valuable time in countless meetings to help me solve the complicated statistical problems in my study. I never forget his kindness, incessant support and encouragement. I would like to sincerely thank my parent, parents-in-law and my wife for their endless support, kindness, and inspiration. It has been my wife’s, Adeleh, infinite patience and support that helped me to pursue graduate study abroad. I also would like to especially thank my father for his invaluable advices and incredible support to me and my three brothers to pursue graduate study. iii Table of Contents ACKNOWLEDGMENTS ................................................................................................. iii LIST OF TABLES .............................................................................................................. x LIST OF FIGURES ......................................................................................................... xiii CHAPTER ONE: INTRODUCTION. ................................................................................ 1 1.1 Background and Motivation ...................................................................................... 1 1.2 Research Objectives ................................................................................................... 2 1.3 Dissertation Organization .......................................................................................... 3 CHAPTER 2: Quantitative Analysis of the Impact of Craft Worker Availability on Construction Project Safety Performance (Paper No.1) ..................................................... 5 1.2 Synopsis ..................................................................................................................... 5 2.1. Introduction and Background .................................................................................... 6 2.2. Craft Shortage Impact on Project Safety Performance ................................................ 7 2.3. Research Methodology .............................................................................................. 10 2.3.1. Data Collection ......................................................................................................