Addressing Existing and Changing Roles in the Construction Industry. Current and Future Transformations of Professional Roles toward Fulfilling Industry Demands.

Abstract

The Construction industry is currently buffeted with continuous transformative processes and demands, the like that has never been experienced before. The subject of the resulting change in literature has been explored relatively sparsely, the introduction and evolution of digital technologies and sustainability thinking and their increased propulsion for the AECO in terms of upgrading existing skills, responsibilities, and competencies to meet new norms and recommendations made by society, clients, and regulatory organizations in the industry. In addition, there has been existing research speculating how the construction practice would be in the future, including outcries of new engineering competencies that would be needed in the near future. Nonetheless, there has sparsely been in-depth work to determine how individual professional roles are being altered through their adaptation to the various industry change processes. This study provides a foresight of how professional roles in the construction industry will be developed. In addition, the study will help ascertain from a historical viewpoint through literature and experience of active professionals the trends and changes in their work experience in the Swedish AEC industry over the years and the various drivers influencing these changes. Following a comprehensive literature review combined with deductive analysis of the empirical data from interviews, a mind map was developed to demonstrate findings and analyze how professional roles are perceived to develop in the future. Through the findings of this study, we could redefine the development of roles as a progressive process that is first depicted by new ways of working and new responsibilities, upon which the growth on either of these fronts would require that a new entity become accountable for the new responsibilities, and independent of existing roles. The findings show that digitalization, sustainability, and collaborative working practice have contributed to future role development. Meanwhile, achieving the industry goal of being more efficient, enabling digitalized systems, adopting more sustainability solutions, and becoming data-driven serves as drivers of change that influence professional roles in the industry. The study’s conclusion will provide insight into the future expectations of stakeholders and policymakers for managing change processes in the Swedish AEC industry. Especially by implementing strategies to upskill professionals’ IT competencies, automate routine tasks, increase sustainability or circularity engagements, share common operating databases, and facilitate interaction between these development pathways.