Construction Innovation

Barriers to implementing lean construction practices in the Kingdom of Saudi

Arabia (KSA) construction industry
Jamil Sarhan, Bo Xia, Sabrina Fawzia, Azharul Karim, Ayokunle Olanipekun,
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Barriers to implementing lean Implementing

lean
construction practices in the construction
practices
Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA)
construction industry
Jamil Sarhan Received 19 April 2017
Revised 23 August 2017
Faculty of Science and Engineering, Queensland University of Technology, 10 November 2017
Brisbane, Australia Accepted 16 December 2017

Bo Xia and Sabrina Fawzia

School of Civil Engineering and Built Environment, Queensland University of
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Technology, Brisbane, Australia

Azharul Karim
Department of Mechanical Engineering, Queensland University of Technology,
Brisbane, Australia, and
Ayokunle Olanipekun
Faculty of Science and Engineering, Queensland University of Technology,
Brisbane, Australia

Abstract
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to identify the barriers to implementing lean construction in the
Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) construction industry and to prioritise the principal factors that constitute
these barriers.
Design/methodology/approach – A literature review was initially used to reveal the global barriers to
implementing lean construction. Subsequently, these barriers were incorporated into a structured
questionnaire, and a convenience sample of 282 construction professionals in the KSA construction industry
was surveyed. The results were analysed using mean item score (MIS), Mann–Whitney U test and principal
component analysis (PCA).
Findings – The findings revealed 22 barriers to lean construction implementation in the KSA construction
industry. Principal factors that constitute these barriers were found to be traditional practices, client related,
technological, performance and knowledge and cost-related barriers in descending order of pervasiveness.
The study also proposes solutions to overcome these principal barriers.
Originality/value – This study provides a global overview of the barriers to implementing lean
construction. It contributes to the body of knowledge, as it uncovers for the first time the barriers to
implementing lean construction in the KSA construction industry with reference to the socio-cultural,
economic and operational context of the KSA. Thus, it is relevant to other countries in the Middle East
because of their shared similarities to the KSA. Furthermore, the solutions proposed to overcome these
barriers in the KSA construction industry can be applied in other countries where similar barriers are
identified.

Keywords Barriers, Implementation, Principal component analysis, Lean construction,

Construction Innovation
Barrier factors, Saudi construction industry © Emerald Publishing Limited
1471-4175
Paper type Research paper DOI 10.1108/CI-04-2017-0033
 CI 1. Introduction
Over the years, the Toyota Way principles (Liker, 2004) and equivalent terms such as lean
thinking (Womack and Jones, 1996) have gained popularity and have become recognised as
strategic means that can lead to substantial improvements in productivity, quality and other
performance indicators (Karim, 2009). Consequently, efforts have been initiated to seek their
implementation both in and outside of manufacturing organisations. Success in
implementing lean practices can be attributed to several factors, including a shift in
organisational behaviour (Sim and Rogers, 2009), a shift in thinking (Atkinson, 2010; Shook,
1997) and a culture that focuses equally on the development of human resources and waste
elimination (Liker, 2004).
The construction industry appears to be one of the first industries to embrace lean
concepts and techniques, following the manufacturing/automotive industry (Shang and Sui
Pheng, 2014). The lean construction method was developed (Ballard and Howell, 1998) and
built heavily on lean principles (Womack and Jones, 1996) and the Toyota Production
System (TPS) (Ohno, 1988). Effective methods of lean implementation in manufacturing
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industries have also been suggested (Karim and Arif-Uz-Zaman, 2013). Despite some
criticisms of lean construction (Green, 2002), such as it being complex and requiring a
lengthy period of implementation, the construction industry has recognised the opportunity
to embrace improvements through lean implementation (de Souza and Pidd, 2011; Egan,
1998; Salem et al., 2006). During the growth of lean practices in the construction industry, the
same types of challenges have been commonly witnessed in the execution phase as those
encountered in other industries (Alinaitwe, 2009, Forbes et al., 2002).
The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia (KSA) has experienced an unprecedented rise in
construction projects during the past 20 years (Ikediashi et al., 2014). It has the largest
construction industry in the Middle East and is booming with current expenditure rising to
more than US$120bn a year (Alrashed et al., 2014). Currently, the Kingdom’s construction
industry encompasses 15 per cent of its workforce and consumes more than 14 per cent of
the country’s energy (Dhahran International Exhibition Company, 2015). However, the KSA
construction industry is facing problems in measuring and improving its performance
(Bannah et al., 2012). Common problems include, but are not limited to, time delays (Assaf
and Al-Hejji, 2006), cost overruns (Harris, 2014) and poor safety and quality issues
(AMEInfor, 2014).
To address these problems, the lean construction concept was introduced into the KSA
construction industry (AlSehaimi et al., 2009). Al-Sudairi (2007) reported that lean practices
have significantly improved project performance, especially at the trade level by reducing
the waste involved. Despite this, lean construction in Saudi Arabia is still in its infancy. The
implementation of lean construction concepts in large and complex projects has not yet
taken place (Sarhan et al., 2017; Sarhan et al., 2016). Organisational problems, social change,
local culture, deficiency of skills and the challenge of selecting the right lean tools could all
contribute to problems when attempting to engage lean concepts. Nevertheless, no research
has been carried out to date to systematically investigate the barriers to the implementation
of lean construction in the KSA construction industry. It has been shown that cultural and
geographical differences may contribute to fundamentally different manufacturing
strategies (Samson and Ford, 2000; Voss and Blackmon, 1998). Owing to a lack of research
on the subject, operators such as respective construction organisations and professionals are
unaware of the barriers to implementing lean construction which are specific to the socio-
cultural, economic and operational context in the KSA construction industry. Consequently,
it is difficult to appropriate potential solutions to these barriers.
 Therefore, the objective of this study is to identify the barriers to implementing lean Implementing
construction in the KSA construction industry and to prioritise the principal factors that lean
constitute these barriers. This study is significant because it contributes to the existing body
of knowledge of lean construction, first by prioritising the barriers to lean construction in
construction
terms of their level of pervasiveness and, second, by revealing how the socio-cultural, practices
economic and operational contexts of a country can contribute to the barriers to
implementing lean construction. This will enable operators in the KSA construction
industry and others likewise in the Middle East to develop appropriate solutions for
overcoming the barriers to implementing lean construction. Meanwhile, this study proposes
some universally applicable solutions to address the principal barriers to lean construction
with recommendations that they should be holistically implemented to encompass the
participation of the many operators such as the management and employees of construction
organisations and professional bodies in the KSA construction industry.
In terms of structure, the paper starts with a description of the lean construction concept,
how it compares to lean manufacturing and its benefits to construction projects and the
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construction industry. This is followed by a literature review of the global barriers to

implementing lean construction in both developed and developing countries. After
presenting the research methodology, the results are discussed before conclusions are made
and recommendations proposed.

2. Concept of lean construction

The success of the lean production philosophy of the TPS to ensure improved organisational
performance in the manufacturing industry has encouraged the uptake of the concept in the
construction industry in the form of lean construction (Moghadam, 2014; Kanafani, 2015).
Thus, lean construction extends the lean production philosophy to the construction industry
in the form of maximising value and minimising wastes in the construction project delivery
process (Ogunbiyi et al., 2014). Therefore, according to Ogunbiyi (2014), lean construction is
a philosophy as well as a production management system that uses unique tools and
techniques to cause changes to the culture within an organisation while also maximising
value to clients by identifying and eliminating waste and aiming for perfection in the
delivery of construction projects, as well as contributing towards a sustainable and greener
environment (Marhani et al., 2012).
According to Abdullah et al. (2009), the uptake of lean construction in the construction
industry has been very beneficial. Corroboratively, many studies have been able to
demonstrate the benefits of lean construction (Alarc!on et al., 2011; Nahmens and Ikuma,
2009; Nahmens and Ikuma, 2012, Locatelli et al., 2013; Ogunbiyi et al., 2014). For example,
Nahmens and Ikuma (2012) analysed the effects of lean construction on the sustainability of
modular homebuilding. By applying the lean tool Kaizen on the project, the study revealed
that lean construction positively affected the environmental, social and economic
performance of the project by reducing material wastes, safety hazards and production
hours (Nahmens and Ikuma, 2012). Bashir et al. (2011) focused on a theoretical analysis of
lean construction tools such as the Last Planner System and the 5S (housekeeping)
methodology. The study demonstrates that the features of lean construction tools are
significantly relevant to promoting safety on construction sites. For instance, the 5S
methodology emphasises workplace organisation and cleanliness which, if implemented,
helps to address poorly organised and unkempt sites (Bashir et al., 2011). In fact,
industrialised home builders in the USA confirm that applying the continuous improvement
(CI) principle of lean construction significantly lowers the injury incidence rates during
construction project delivery (Nahmens and Ikuma, 2009). The Last Planner System is a
 CI particularly important lean construction tool, and by implementing lean construction on an
industrial project in Egypt, Issa (2013) showed that this tool helped to reduce the project
completion time by 15.57 per cent. On most construction projects where lean construction is
implemented, the constant benefits are shorter delivery time, and increased project
performance arising from lean construction principles enhanced productivity of workforce,
better coordination and communication, minimisation of reworks and zero value-adding
activities (Locatelli et al., 2013). These principles guide the implementation of lean
construction in the construction industry (Marhani et al., 2012).
While the implementation of lean construction contributes directly to the successful
delivery of construction projects (Ogunbiyi, 2014), the greater benefit is ensuring best
practices in the construction industry. According to Abdullah et al. (2009), the uptake of lean
construction has increased the level of innovation in the construction industry over time.
Furthermore, by directly tapping into relevant production theories (Omran and Abdulrahim,
2015), lean construction changes the manner in which construction projects are delivered in
construction organisations to be more systematic and effective (Abdullah et al., 2009). This
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encourages best practices in the construction industry whereby the ineffective traditional
processes of project delivery in many construction organisations are altered, while the lean
construction approach is embraced for enhanced project performance (Abdullah et al., 2009).
Furthermore, based on the perspectives of construction professionals in the UK construction
industry, Ogunbiyi et al. (2014) found that lean construction, especially when integrated
with sustainable construction, helps construction organisations to improve their corporate
image, competitive advantage, productivity and effective compliance to customers’
expectations.
The above accounts indicate that although lean construction is a concept that originated
in the manufacturing industry, it is very beneficial at the project, industry and
organisational levels in the construction industry. Despite the benefits, there is very low
implementation of lean construction in the construction industry in many developing
countries owing to various barriers. For instance, Marhani et al. (2012) revealed an infancy
level implementation of lean construction in the Malaysian construction industry. Abdullah
et al. (2009) corroborates the limited implementation of lean construction in the Malaysian
construction industry, which is the same situation in other developing countries like Ghana
(Ayarkkwa et al., 2012) and Libya (Omran and Abdulrahim, 2015). Notably, certain barriers
are responsible for the low implementation of lean construction in these countries.
Therefore, global barriers to the implementation of lean construction are reviewed in the
following section. The intention is to verify these barriers in the KSA construction industry,
where there is equally low implementation of lean construction (Al-Nafil, 2013).

3. Global barriers to implementation of lean construction

Previous studies on the barriers to the implementation of lean construction in the
construction industry can be categorised into those carried out in developed countries (four)
and in developing countries (six). The developed countries were the UK, where two studies
were carried out, Germany and Singapore. The developing countries were Malaysia, India,
China, Libya, Ghana and Uganda. In addition, the majority of the developing countries
(three) are African countries. This may suggest that, globally, the barriers to the
implementation of lean construction are more pervasive in developing countries, especially
those in Africa. The first study was carried out in the construction industry in Singapore
among medium to large contracting firms (Dulaimi and Tanamas, 2001), and a significant
barrier identified was the unwillingness of the management in contracting firms to train
their workers about lean construction techniques, which is also linked to legislative
 bottlenecks against the training of workers, especially foreign workers in the country. Implementing
Furthermore, there was high averseness to change or to embrace new ideas or innovations lean
such as lean construction among the contracting organisations, while there was an
unfavourable procurement system which pushed the risks involved in implementing new
construction
ideas to only the contractors. Although this study identifies averseness to change as the practices
most critical barrier, there is no statistical analysis to support this. Thus, this conclusion
may be unreliable and more so given that the country is currently an economically and
technologically advanced country, which is different from when this study was carried out.
According to Johansen and Walter (2007), the level of economic and technological
development in a country influences the implementation of lean construction. In this regard,
Johansen and Walter (2007) found that the barrier of averseness towards implementing lean
construction among the construction companies in Germany is attributed to the high
technological advancement of the country. However, the study advocates further
verification of this finding because lean construction has been successfully implemented in
other technologically advanced countries such as the USA and Australia (Ballard and
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Howell, 2003).
The two other studies in developed countries focused on the UK. This is important
because these studies will help determine whether, in developed countries, the barriers to the
implementation of lean construction in the construction industry change with time. After
surveying the opinions of 140 construction professionals, Sarhan and Fox (2013) found that
the barriers to the implementation of lean construction in the UK construction industry are
cultural in nature. The significant cultural barriers are lack of adequate lean awareness and
understanding, lack of top management commitment and cultural and human attitudinal
issues, in descending order of severity. In addition, owing to its lowest severity, lack of
financial capital is not considered to be a threatening barrier to the implementation of lean
construction (Sarhan and Fox, 2013). Bashir et al. (2015) appear to corroborate these findings
of Sarhan and Fox (2013). It was found that human-related issues, particularly the
unwillingness of construction industry operators to change their behaviour and practices,
are the most critical barriers to the implementation of lean construction in the UK
construction industry. Consequently, to successfully implement lean construction in the UK
construction industry, the greatest emphasis should be on establishing a lean culture that
supports lean transformations in construction organisations (Sarhan and Fox, 2013).
According to Bashir et al. (2015), the responsibility lies with the management of construction
organisations to implement strategies such as providing training avenues for employees/
workers to develop their skills, as well as providing the required facilities and incentives
which can serve as motivation. The workers/employees in these organisations also have a
role to play, specifically to be open to emerging changes, and persist in adopting changes
such as lean construction that may be beneficial to improve project, organisational and
industry performance in the construction industry (Bashir et al., 2015).
Other barriers to the implementation of lean construction in the UK construction
industry are management-related issues such as lack of management commitment and high
expectations, technical issues such as the complexities of lean construction implementation,
educational issues such as lack of knowledge of lean construction concepts amongst
construction industry operators and financial issues such as the high cost of implementing
lean construction (Bashir et al., 2015). It is also interesting to note that no government-related
issues such as inconsistency in policies are found to be barriers to the implementation of
lean construction despite the expanded government role in the UK construction industry
since the Egan report (1998). Against expectations, the prevalence of human and cultural
barriers over a 15-year period (2001-2015) signifies that barriers to the implementation of
 CI lean construction in the construction industry do not appear to change over time in
developed countries.
Despite the indication of greater prevalence, as pointed out earlier, the focus on the
barriers to the implementation of lean construction in developing countries began much
later than in the developed countries, with the first studies in Malaysia (Abdullah et al., 2009)
and Uganda (Alinaitwe, 2009) both published in 2009. In Malaysian construction companies,
the barriers to the implementation of lean construction were found to be similar to those in
the developed countries, namely, lack of management commitment, limited understanding
of the concept of lean construction and averseness to adopting new ideas (Abdullah et al.,
2009). For medium to top managers in large contracting organisations in Uganda, the critical
barriers to the implementation of lean construction are both financial and management-
related such as management’s inability to provide lean construction inputs and technical
features when required (Alinaitwe, 2009). In addition, the barriers that are most difficult to
overcome are related to the inability of management in these organisations to provide an
enabling environment whereby employees/staffers can develop relevant skills and work
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together to implement lean construction (Alinaitwe, 2009). The emphasis on these particular
barriers could be a result of the number of respondents being in higher management roles. In
other words, it is possible that barriers to the implementation of lean construction may be
different from the point of view of non-managerial-level respondents or employees/workers
in construction organisations in the Ugandan construction industry. Further, similar to the
UK construction industry, the greater onus lies on the management of the construction
organisations to commit more financial resources and managerial responsibility towards the
implementation of lean construction in the Ugandan construction industry.
The barriers to implementing lean construction in the Ghanaian (Ayarkkwa et al., 2012)
and Libyan (Omran and Abdulrahim, 2015) construction industries are no different from
those of other developed and developing countries. Likewise, the barriers to implementing
lean construction in smaller construction organisations in India (Devaki and Jayanthi, 2014)
are similar to those in larger construction organisations in other countries such as Uganda.
In contrast to the UK, in China, Shang and Sui Pheng (2014) found government-related
issues such as stringent requirements and approvals to be barriers to the implementation of
lean construction. Similarly, Olamilokun (2015) revealed that corruption and/or corruptive
tendencies from government agencies is a barrier to the implementation of lean construction
in Nigeria. And similar to the Singaporean construction industry (Dulaimi and Tanamas,
2001), Shang and Sui Pheng (2014) found adversarial relationships and/or lack of
cooperativeness among construction professionals to be a barrier to the implementation of
lean construction in the Chinese construction industry.
From the above, it could be deduced that the barriers to the implementation of lean
construction in the construction industry in both developed and developing countries
around the world are similar (Table I). Nevertheless, as there are no studies from the Middle
East countries, these barriers may not be applicable to the construction industry in the
countries in this region. Even though the KSA has the largest construction market in the
Middle East and the construction industry is a major economic driver (AlSehaimi, 2011),
there have been no studies focusing on the barriers to implementing lean construction in the
construction industry in this country. In comparison to other countries where barriers to
implementing lean construction have been determined, the culture in KSA is different. For
instance, in contrast to western countries like the UK, it is a cultural norm in the KSA to not
adhere to time commitments, and this has effects on the performance of the construction
industry (AlSehaimi, 2011). Furthermore, being an oil-rich country, lack of financial
resources may not be a problem in the KSA construction industry as much as it might be, for
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Bashir Shang and Dulaimi and Johansen Devaki and Omran and Sarhan Abdullah
et al. Ayarkkwa Sui Pheng Alinaitwe Olamilokun Tanamas and Walter Jayanthi Abdulrahim and Fox et al.
Barriers (2015) et al. (2012) (2014) (2009) (2015) (2001) (2007) (2014) (2015) (2013) (2009)

Influence of traditional
management practices ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓
Unfavourable organisational
culture ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓
Lack of technical skills, training
and understanding of lean
techniques ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓
Lack of knowledge of lean
construction approaches ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓
Lack of committed leadership of
top management ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓
Ineffective communication
channels between construction
teams ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓
Lack of robust performance
measurement system ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓
Lack of technological adaptations ✓ ✓
Difficulties in understanding
concepts of lean construction ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓
Traditional design approach ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓
Long implementation period of
lean concepts in construction
processes ✓ ✓ ✓
Lack of client and supplier
involvement ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓
End user preference ✓
(continued)
practices

found by researchers
Implementing

construction as
Barriers to lean
Table I.
construction
lean
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CI

Table I.
Bashir Shang and Dulaimi and Johansen Devaki and Omran and Sarhan Abdullah
et al. Ayarkkwa Sui Pheng Alinaitwe Olamilokun Tanamas and Walter Jayanthi Abdulrahim and Fox et al.
Barriers (2015) et al. (2012) (2014) (2009) (2015) (2001) (2007) (2014) (2015) (2013) (2009)

Additional cost and high inflation

rates ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓
Slow decision making processes
owing to complex organisational
hierarchy ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓
Improper resource management ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓
Lack of clear job specification
from client ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓
Lack of provision of benchmark
performance ✓ ✓
Lack of support from government
for technological advancements ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓
Uncertainty in production process ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓
Use of non-standard components ✓ ✓
Uncertainty in supply chain ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓ ✓
 example, in many African countries. In addition, the KSA is an Islamic country with strict Implementing
conservative values that are not expressly open to adopting Western ideas without scrutiny. lean
It is thus important to identify and prioritise the barriers to implementing lean construction
in the KSA construction industry. It is expected that the barriers will be more reflective of
construction
the socio-cultural and operational contexts of the KSA construction industry, as well as practices
those of the Middle East.

4. Research objectives
The main objectives of this study are as follows:
! to identify the barriers to the implementation of lean construction in the KSA
construction industry; and
! to establish and prioritise the principal factors that constitute these barriers.

The achievement of these objectives in this study will help relevant stakeholders in the KSA
construction industry to develop appropriate solutions to overcome these barriers. The
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quantitative methodology that comprises a survey method of data collection and the
application of statistical techniques to analyse the data was used to achieve the objectives.

5. Research methodology
The objective of this study is to identify and prioritise the barriers to the implementation of
lean construction in the KSA construction industry. Similar to Durdyev and Mbachu (2017),
the objective focuses on assessing the association among the variables identified as having
an impact on the implementation of lean construction. The aim is to evaluate whether there
are inter-correlations among these variables and, should this be so, to extract the principal
factors that could explain the variances among the variables.
To gather data for analysis, the survey questionnaire method of data collection was used.
This research method is commonly used for obtaining data about the barriers to the
implementation of lean construction because it helps to gather a wide range of views from
individuals across the construction industry (Omran and Abdulrahim, 2015; Ayarkkwa
et al., 2012; Shang and Sui Pheng, 2014). Moreover, this method aligns with the quantitative
research methodology which enables the statistical testing of data to derive varied but
meaningful explanations that increase the understanding of the subject of investigation
(Abawi, 2008).
The survey questionnaire was structured into two sections. The first section contained
questions requesting general information from the participants, including their primary
designation, academic qualifications and the type of organisations they were engaged in.
The second section, which was the main section, was based on the 22 global barriers to the
implementation of lean construction that were identified from the literature and are
summarised in Table I. The participants were asked to indicate their level of agreement with
the 22 barriers in the KSA construction industry context. The barriers were displayed in a
tabular format with a five-point Likert scale ranking that ranged from 1 as ‘strongly
disagree’ to 5 as ‘strongly agree’. In addition, a ‘don’t know’ option was also provided as a
standard procedure for participants who were unable to answer the question.
Industry-wide data collection is very important to identify the barriers to lean
construction and to encompass the views of a broad range of construction professionals
and organisations in the KSA construction industry. The Saudi Council of Engineers
(SCE) is the largest professional group in the KSA construction industry, and members
include specialty contractors, general contractors, subcontractors, architects, project
 CI managers, clients and suppliers. In the KSA construction industry are other
construction professionals who are not members of the SCE but are engaged in different
contracting, consulting and client organisations, as well as government agencies. Thus,
there is no definitive population of construction professionals and organisations in the
KSA construction industry. Given this position, a convenience sampling of construction
professionals that were willing and accessible was carried out in the KSA construction
industry (Teddlie and Yu, 2007).
The administration of the questionnaire commenced in March 2015, and the targeted
construction professionals were approached in two different ways. In the first
approach, an online questionnaire survey using Survey Monkey was conducted to
survey members of the SCE, including suppliers, specialty contractors, general
contractors, subcontractors, architects, project managers and clients. An invitation
letter and a questionnaire template were initially sent to the management of SCE to seek
their assistance in the survey. Realising the importance and urgency of this study, the
SCE agreed to help by administering the questionnaire among their members, and as a
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result, 155 responses were obtained. In the second approach, hardcopy questionnaires
were sent out to 300 construction professionals ranging from employees of contracting
and consulting companies, academics, government representatives and clients. This
strategy resulted in 127 responses. In total, 282 responses were obtained and used for
analysis.
Data analysis was carried out using the statistical package for social sciences (SPSS)
software (version 22). Frequency distribution and percentage were used to summarise the
background information of respondents (Olanipekun, 2012), while the mean item score (MIS)
was used to analyse the main responses. The MIS, based on equation (1), is the sum of item
scores for each identified barrier to lean construction divided by the number of items
contributing to it (Taffe et al., 2008). Therefore, MIS represents the average of the agreement
among respondents about the barriers to lean construction in the KSA construction industry
(Olanipekun et al., 2014; Watt and Van den Berg, 1995). Given that a five-point Likert scale
was used, the current barriers to lean construction are those with an MIS higher than the
midpoint ("2.5) of the Likert scale used (Johns, 2010). In addition, the MIS is used to rank
the level to which the respondents agree with (or are concerned about) the pervasiveness of
the barriers (Olanipekun, 2012).

5V5 þ 4V4 þ 3V3 þ 2V2 þ V 1

MIS ¼ (1)
V5 þ V4 þ V3 þ V2 þ V 1

V5. . .. . ..1 = variables operationalised as barriers to lean construction

Furthermore, Mann–Whitney U test was used to evaluate whether the barriers to
implementing lean construction were significantly different in terms of the individual
and organisational characteristics common to the respondents (Olanipekun et al., 2017).
Examples are the level of education of respondents (individual characteristics) and the
size of organisation in which the respondents were engaged (organisational
characteristics). Finally, exploratory factor analysis (EFA) with the principal
component analysis (PCA) extraction method was used to explore the underlying
dimensions of the barriers to implementing lean construction in the KSA construction
industry (Norusis, 1992), while the Cronbach’s alpha (a) test was used to examine the
internal consistency of the variables that were loaded on each component (Ngacho and
Das, 2014).
 6. Results Implementing
6.1 Background information of respondents lean
Table II presents the background information of the respondents. Regarding the
organisational characteristics of respondents, 39 per cent work in project management
construction
organisations, 23 per cent in general contracting organisations, 10 per cent in architectural practices
firms, 9 per cent in speciality contracting firms and 5 per cent in client, academic and
government organisations. Other respondents work in subcontracting (3 per cent) and
supplier (1 per cent) organisations. In the KSA construction industry, these organisations
represent the consulting, contracting, client and government divisions. Thus, the majority of
respondents work in the consulting division (49 per cent), which comprises the project
management and the architectural organisations, followed by those in the contracting
division, comprising general contracting, subcontracting, speciality contracting and
supplier organisations (36 per cent).
In the KSA construction industry, construction organisations with more than 1,000
employees are categorised as ‘large’, those with 201-1,000 employees are categorised as
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“medium”, while those with less than 200 employees are categorised as “small” (Sarhan
et al., 2017). Table II shows that the majority of the respondents work in large organisations
(46 per cent), followed by those in small organisations (24 per cent), while the least number
work in medium-sized organisations (20 per cent). A descriptive analysis of the annual
revenue size of the construction organisations where the respondents work showed that 36

Profile Categories Frequency (%)

Organisation Project management 111 39

General contractor 66 23
Architect 28 10
Specialty contractor 25 9
Client 13 5
Academia 14 5
Government 13 5
Subcontractor 9 3
Supplier 3 1
Experience 1 < 5 years 71 25
5 < 10 years 69 24
10 < 20 years 84 30
20 years and over 58 21
Education Diploma 18 6
Bachelor’s degree 208 74
Master’s degree 49 17
Doctor’s degree 7 3
Size of organisation (based on number of employees) Small (1-200) 68 24
Medium (201-1,000) 57 20
Large (More than 1,000) 131 46
Don’t know 26 10
Annual revenue of company (year 2014) Less than US$2m 26 9
US$4m to US$20m 49 17
More than US$20m 102 36
Don’t know 105 38
ISO certification Yes 137 49 Table II.
No 49 17 Profiles of survey
Don’t know 96 34 respondents
 CI per cent of the organisations generate an annual revenue of more than US$20m, followed by
those with revenue between US$4m and US$20m (17 per cent) and those with revenue of less
than US$2m (9 per cent). While this result indicates that there are more large construction
organisations in the KSA construction industry, 38 per cent of the respondents did not
indicate the annual revenue of their organisations.
In terms of the individual characteristics of the respondents, a slight majority of them
had more than 10 years’ experience in the KSA construction industry (51 per cent), while the
rest had experience ranging from 1 to 10 years (49 per cent). In terms of academic
qualifications, the majority of the respondents had either a bachelor’s degree or diploma (80
per cent), while the rest had postgraduate qualifications in the form of master’s degree or
PhD (20 per cent). Overall, the background information of the respondents added to the
feedback quality and reliability of the findings in this study (Durdyev and Mbachu, 2017).

6.2 Mean item score analysis

Table III shows the MIS analysis results for the barriers to implementing lean construction
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in the KSA construction industry. Overall, all the 22 identified barriers to lean construction
have MIS > 2.50. The highest-ranking barriers are influence of traditional management
practice (MIS = 3.84; 1st), followed by unfavourable organisational culture (MIS = 3.74; 2nd),
lack of technical skills about lean techniques (MIS = 3.73; 3rd) and lack of understanding of
lean construction approaches (3.68; 4th). The lowest ranking barriers are lack of provision of
benchmark performance (MIS = 3.32; 18th), lack of support from the government for
technological advancements (MIS = 3.28; 19th), uncertainty in construction production
process (MIS = 3.28; 20th), use of non-standard components (MIS = 3.08; 21st) and
uncertainty in the supply chain (MIS = 3.01; 22nd).
Furthermore, as shown in Table III, the highest, middle and the lowest rankings of the
barriers to lean construction by respondents with different organisational and individual
characteristics are similar. For instance, in terms of type of organisation, “influence of
traditional management practice” is ranked in 1st position by respondents working in
consulting organisations and in 3rd position by those working in contracting organisations,
while “uncertainty in the supply chain” is ranked in 22nd position by the respondents from
both types of organisations. In terms of size of organisation, “lack of knowledge of lean
construction approaches” is ranked in 3rd position by respondents from both large and
small-to-medium construction organisations, while “lack of provision of benchmark
performance” is ranked in 18th position by the former and in 17th position by the latter.
With respect to individual characteristics, “unfavourable organisational culture” is ranked
in 2nd position by respondents that have up to 10 years of experience and in 3rd position by
those with more than 10 years of experience, while both categories ranked “use of non-
standard components” in the 21st position. In addition, the respondents that have a
bachelor’s degree or a lower level of education ranked “lack of technical skills about lean
techniques” in 3rd position and those with a postgraduate qualification ranked the same
barrier in the 1st position, while both categories ranked “uncertainty in the supply chain” in
the 22nd position.
The Mann–Whitney test results in Table IV confirm that the barriers to implementing
lean construction are not significantly different among the respondents working in either
consulting or contracting organisations (U = 8388.500, p = 0.723 > 0.05) and in either large
or small-to-medium organisations (U = 7490.500, p = 0.283 > 0.05). In addition, the barriers
are not significantly different among respondents who have a bachelor’s degree or less and
those who have postgraduate qualifications (U = 9200.500, p = 0.665 > 0.05), as well as
among respondents who have up to 10 years’ experience and those with more than 10 years’
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Barriers Consult Rank Contract Rank Small/M Rank Large Rank 1-10y Rank >10y Rank Bache Rank PostG Rank Overall Rank

B1 Influence of traditional 3.94 1 3.72 3 3.71 1 3.92 1 3.78 1 3.94 1 3.85 1 3.82 3 3.84 1
management practice
B2 Unfavourable 3.77 2 3.75 1 3.70 2 3.74 3 3.71 2 3.80 3 3.72 2 3.82 2 3.74 2
organisational culture
B3 Lack of technical skills, 3.75 4 3.66 4 3.67 3 3.86 2 3.66 3 3.85 2 3.69 3 3.89 1 3.73 3
training and
understanding of lean
techniques
B4 Lack of knowledge of lean 3.76 3 3.52 7 3.62 4 3.72 4 3.65 4 3.72 4 3.65 4 3.79 4 3.68 4
construction approaches
B5 Lack of committed 3.52 11 3.74 2 3.51 7 3.64 6 3.55 7 3.66 7 3.63 5 3.47 14 3.59 5
leadership of top
management
B6 Ineffective 3.59 5 3.55 5 3.56 5 3.61 7 3.56 6 3.65 8 3.57 6 3.68 5 3.59 6
communication channels
between construction
teams
B7 Lack of robust 3.57 6 3.49 11 3.5 8 3.61 8 3.42 14 3.72 5 3.55 7 3.52 10 3.53 7
performance
measurement system
B8 Lack of technological 3.54 9 3.46 12 3.39 13 3.68 5 3.63 5 3.33 15 3.53 8 3.45 15 3.51 8
adaptations
B9 Difficulties in 3.54 10 3.45 13 3.49 9 3.61 10 3.41 15 3.67 6 3.48 11 3.63 7 3.51 9
understanding concepts of
lean construction
B10 Traditional design 3.54 8 3.50 10 3.48 10 3.48 14 3.45 13 3.57 9 3.48 10 3.55 9 3.49 10
approach
B11 Long implementation 3.55 7 3.41 14 3.48 11 3.56 12 3.50 11 3.48 11 3.47 13 3.58 8 3.49 11
period of lean concept in
construction processes
B12 Lack of client and supplier 3.42 13 3.54 6 3.45 12 3.59 11 3.54 8 3.40 12 3.51 9 3.39 17 3.48 12
involvement
B13 End user preference 3.39 15 3.51 8 3.38 14 3.61 9 3.52 10 3.38 13 3.40 14 3.68 6 3.46 13
(continued)

Table III.

barriers to
MIS analysis of
practices

construction industry
Implementing

construction in KSA
implementing lean
construction
lean
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CI

Table III.
Barriers Consult Rank Contract Rank Small/M Rank Large Rank 1-10y Rank >10y Rank Bache Rank PostG Rank Overall Rank

B14 Additional cost and high 3.38 16 3.50 9 3.53 6 3.43 15 3.52 9 3.37 14 3.47 12 3.42 16 3.46 14
inflation rates
B15 Slow decision-making 3.29 19 3.37 16 3.34 16 3.41 16 3.38 16 3.31 17 3.31 17 3.48 13 3.35 15
processes due to a
complex organisational
hierarchy
B16 Improper resource 3.31 17 3.32 17 3.28 20 3.49 13 3.25 20 3.50 10 3.35 15 3.34 19 3.34 16
management
B17 Lack of clear job 3.45 12 3.16 20 3.35 15 3.29 24 3.35 18 3.32 16 3.29 18 3.48 12 3.33 17
specification from the
client
B18 Lack of provision of 3.24 20 3.39 15 3.34 17 3.35 18 3.37 17 3.25 19 3.32 16 3.34 20 3.32 18
benchmark performance
B19 Lack of support from 3.41 14 3.14 21 3.30 19 3.38 17 3.49 12 2.98 22 3.22 20 3.52 11 3.28 19
government for
technological
advancements
B20 Uncertainty in production 3.31 18 3.17 18 3.33 18 3.35 19 3.29 19 3.29 18 3.26 19 3.37 18 3.28 20
process
B21 Use of non-standard 3.01 21 3.17 19 2.93 22 3.34 20 3.14 21 3.00 21 3.03 21 3.29 21 3.08 21
components
B22 Uncertainty in supply 2.98 22 3.01 22 3.08 21 3.06 21 3.02 22 3.01 20 2.99 22 3.11 22 3.01 22
chain
 experience (U = 6475.000, p = 0.543 > 0.05). Therefore, the barriers to the implementation of Implementing
lean construction are not significantly different in terms of both organisational (type and lean
size of organisation) and individual (experience and academic qualifications of respondents)
characteristics of construction professionals in the KSA construction industry.
construction
practices
6.3 Principal component analysis
PCA with varimax rotation was used to explore the underlying dimensions of barriers to
implementing lean construction given that the objective was to establish the principal
factors and prioritise them in the KSA construction industry. A Kaiser–Meyer–Olkin (KMO)
value of 0.909 indicated sufficient sampling adequacy or the appropriateness of the data for
PCA (Fields, 2000). This result indicates that multicollinearity structures among the
variables were sufficient to justify aggregating the barriers into related sets for the purpose
of extraction of principal components (Durdyev and Mbachu, 2017). The Bartlett’s test of
sphericity ( x 2 5 3670.939; df = 378) was significant at r < 0.01, indicating that the
correlations were sufficiently large for PCA (Hooper, 2012). Furthermore, the ratio between
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the 282 data points and the 22 variables was 13:1, indicating a stable factor structure
(Ferguson and Cox, 1993).
In conformity with the scree plot test, PCA revealed the presence of six principal
components with eigenvalues greater than 1. These principal components accounted for
61.273 per cent of the data set. Principal component 1 with an eigenvalue of 3.632 explains
13.493 per cent of the variance in the identified barriers to lean construction. Component 2
with an eigenvalue of 3.524 explains 12.164 per cent, while Components 3, 4, 5 and 6 have
eigenvalues 3.137, 2.761, 2.626 and 1.275, respectively, that explain 11.075, 10.007, 8.877 and
5.657 per cent of the variance, respectively. The extracted components listed in Table IV
show that no item correlation was less than 0.5, suggesting a strong inter-item correlation
(Hon et al., 2012). In addition, there was no incidence of cross-loading, indicating a uni-
dimensionality of items as reliable measures of extracted components (Durdyev and
Mbachu, 2017). Furthermore, according to Ngacho and Das (2014), the Cronbach’s alpha (a)
test showed that all the extracted components achieved high internal consistency, i.e. >0.70
(with the exception of Component 6 which had only one variable and was not tested for
internal consistency). Still, the internal consistency of all the variables was very high with a
Cronbach’s alpha value of 0.915.
As shown in Table V, the majority (five) of the variables (22.73 per cent) loaded strongly
on Component 1, and they are labelled ‘traditional practice barriers’. Four variables each (or
18.18 per cent of total variables) loaded on Components 2, 3, 4 and 5, and they are labelled

Categories Mean rank U statistic Significance Remarks

Organisational and individual characteristics of respondents

Consulting organisations 134.45 8388.500 0.723 Not significant
Contracting organisations 131.08
Large organisations 132.82 7490.500 0.283 Not significant
Small/medium organisations 122.91
>10 years’ experience 144.11 9200.500 0.665 Not significant
1-10 years’ experience 139.80
Postgraduate qualification 147.06 6475.000 0.543 Not significant
Bachelor’s degree qualification or lesser 139.93 Table IV.
Mann–Whitney test
Note: Statistical significance at 5% results
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CI

industry
Table V.

successful

KSA construction
implementation of
lean construction in
Principal barriers to
Components
1 2 3 4 5 6
Traditional practice Client-related Standardisation Technological Performance and Financial-related
barriers barriers barriers barriers knowledge barriers barrier

Cronbach’s alpha (a) 0.934 0.912 0.891 0.887 0.812

1 B2 Unfavourable organisational culture 0.827
2 B1 Influence of traditional management 0.736
practices
3 B6 Ineffective communication channels 0.694
between construction teams
4 B5 Lack of committed leadership of top 0.673
management
5 B10 Traditional design approach 0.522
6 B18 Lack of provision of benchmark 0.783
performance
7 B17 Lack of clear job specification from 0.756
the client
8 B12 Lack of client and supplier 0.731
involvement
9 B13 End user preference 0.501
10 B20 Uncertainty in production process 0.685
11 B21 Use of non-standard components 0.683
12 B15 Slow decision making processes due 0.673
to complex organisational hierarchy
13 B22 Uncertainty in supply chain 0.638
14 B19 Lack of support from government for 0.778
technological advancements
15 B11 Long implementation period of lean 0.58
concept in construction processes
16 B8 Lack of technological adaptations 0.571
(continued)
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Components
1 2 3 4 5 6
Traditional practice Client-related Standardisation Technological Performance and Financial-related
barriers barriers barriers barriers knowledge barriers barrier

17 B9 Difficulties in understanding 0.549

concepts of lean construction
18 B7 Lack of robust performance 0.769
measurement system
19 B4 Lack of knowledge of lean 0.559
construction approaches
20 B3 Lack of technical skills, training and 0.553
understanding of lean techniques
21 B16 Improper resource management 0.520
22 B14 Additional cost and high inflation 0.68
rates
Eigenvalues 3.632 3.524 3.137 2.761 2.626 1.275
Percentage of variance explained 13.493 12.164 11.075 10.007 8.877 5.657
Cumulative percentage 13.493 25.657 36.732 46.739 55.616 61.273
Extraction method: principal
component analysis
Rotation method: varimax rotation
KMO = 0.909
Bartlett’s test of sphericity = 3670.939
Significance = 0.000

Table V.
practices
Implementing

construction
lean
 CI “client-related barriers”, “standardisation barriers”, “technological barriers” and
“performance and knowledge barriers”, respectively. Lastly, one variable (4.55 per cent of
total variables) loaded on Component 6, labelled as cost-related barrier. These six
components constitute the principal factors that are barriers to the implementation of lean
construction in the KSA construction industry.

7. Discussion of findings
The objective of this study was to identify the barriers to the implementation of lean
construction and to establish and prioritise the principal factors that constitute these
barriers in the KSA construction industry. This section discusses the findings and compares
them to the body of knowledge in the following sub-sections.

7.1 Identified barriers to implementing lean construction

Table III shows the 22 barriers to the implementation of lean construction in the KSA
construction industry, as identified by the respondents in this study, having different
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organisational and individual characteristics. The overall MIS for each of the barriers was
>2.50 which suggests, in accordance to Johns (2010), that they are all current barriers to
implementing lean construction in the KSA construction industry. However, the higher the
MIS of the barriers, the greater (the level to which the respondent construction professionals
are worried/concerned/agreed about) is their pervasiveness (Shang and Sui Pheng, 2014).
Therefore, similar to previous studies such as Omran and Abdulrahim (2015) and
Ayarkkwa et al. (2012), this study used MIS to rank the barriers to implementing lean
construction in the KSA construction industry. The highest-ranking barriers to
implementing lean construction in this country are influence of traditional practices (B1),
unfavourable organisational culture (B2), lack of technical skills about lean techniques (B3)
and lack of understanding of lean approaches (B4). Their rankings suggest that they are of
the greatest concern to the construction professionals in the KSA construction industry.
Similar to the findings of Shang and Sui Pheng (2014), these barriers signify the importance
of top management of construction organisations to the implementation of lean construction.
For instance, establishing a lean culture and providing resources for training employees to
increase their lean construction skills are responsibilities of the top management.
The rankings of the middle barriers (B5-B17), those ranked 5th to 17th, suggest that the
construction professionals are only moderately concerned about their pervasiveness in the
KSA construction industry. Most of rankings (B5, B7, B10, B11, B12, B13, B14 and B17)
signify that actions taken during project delivery by the project participants are important
to the implementation of lean construction. The barriers which construction professionals in
the KSA construction industry are least concerned about are lack of benchmark
performance, lack of support from the government for technological advancements,
uncertainty in construction production process, use of non-standard components and
uncertainty in the supply chain. These barriers signify the importance of both the activities
of construction participants during project delivery (e.g. B20) and industry-level support and
coordination (e.g. B22 and B18) on the implementation of lean construction.
In contrast to previous studies (Johansen and Walter, 2007; Alinaitwe, 2009), the barriers
were compared on the basis of the organisational and individual characteristics of
construction professionals in the KSA construction industry. Therefore, based on the Mann–
Whitney test result, the barriers to implementing lean construction are not significantly
different for both the organisational (type and size of organisation) and individual
(experience and academic qualifications of respondents) characteristics of construction
professionals in the KSA construction industry. This suggests that the effects of the barriers
 to lean construction are experienced in the same way irrespective of the differences in the Implementing
organisational and individual characteristics of construction professionals in the KSA lean
construction industry. Therefore, a holistic solution which encompasses the organisational
and individual differences of construction professionals is more appropriate to overcoming
construction
the barriers to lean construction in the KSA construction industry. practices

7.2 Principal barriers to implementing lean construction

This study established and prioritised the principal factors which constitute the barriers to
implementing lean construction. It is expected that the potential solutions to overcoming the
barriers to implementing lean construction will focus on these principal factors in the KSA
construction industry. From the PCA, six principal factors were established: traditional
practice, client-related, standardisation, technological, performance and knowledge-related
and financial barriers. With the exception of client-related barriers, these principal factors
are similar to those identified in other developing countries, especially in the construction
industry contexts in Ghana and China (Ayarkkwa et al., 2012; Shang and Sui Pheng, 2014).
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The client-related barrier indicates the limited client involvement in lean construction
implementation (B12) and their inability to clearly specify their lean construction
requirements (B17), preference (B13) and expected performance level (B18). It has often
been the case that client involvement in lean construction (or otherwise) has never been
considered a barrier to lean construction in the construction industry (Alinaitwe, 2009;
Hussain et al., 2014). Therefore, the identification of “client-related barrier” in this study
suggests that it is a new kind of barrier to implementing lean construction in the
construction industry. However, as this study focused on the KSA construction industry,
more research is required to determine the pervasiveness of the client-related barrier to lean
construction in the construction industry in other countries, especially the developed ones.
Regarding the prioritisation of the principal factors which constitute the barriers to
implementing lean construction, the traditional practice barrier with an eigenvalue of 3.632
that explains 13.493 per cent of the variance in the data set is the most pervasive barrier to
lean construction in the KSA construction industry. This is the first attempt at empirically
supporting Dulaimi and Tanamas (2001) that traditional practices, mainly in the form of
averseness of operators to change from the traditional approach in managing construction
activities, are the major barrier to implementing lean construction (Abdullah et al., 2009;
Devaki and Jayanthi, 2014). With this barrier, the top and middle management in
construction organisations are often unyielding to adopting lean construction ideas (B5)
(Abdullah et al., 2009; Sarhan and Fox, 2013), as well as not promoting lean culture among
their employees (B2) (Shang and Sui Pheng, 2014). In addition, many construction
organisations are rooted to the traditional design approach of dichotomous design and
construction of projects (B10) (Sarhan and Fox, 2013) which prevents effective
communication among the construction team members (B6), thereby becoming a hindrance
to the implementation of lean construction (Ayarkkwa et al., 2012). In the KSA construction
industry, the plausible reason for the pervasiveness of this barrier is the conservative nature
of the KSA as an Islamic society, whereby the reluctance to change from traditional ways of
doing things to the detriment of lean construction in the KSA construction industry is highly
likely.
The client-related barrier, with an eigenvalue of 3.524 that explains 12.164 per cent of the
variance in the data set, is the second most pervasive barrier to implementing lean
construction in the KSA construction industry. Despite the important role of the client in
making decisions and providing oversight to ensure successful implementation of lean
construction (Ballard, 2008), this barrier reveals the failure of clients to contribute
 CI adequately towards implementing lean construction in the KSA construction industry.
Thus, a greater client contribution is necessary to ensure successful implementation of lean
construction in this country.
According to Ballard et al. (2002), standardisation in components, inputs and processes is
very crucial to the successful implementation of lean construction. Interestingly, it is the
third most pervasive barrier to lean construction in the KSA construction industry, with an
eigenvalue of 3.137 that explains 11.075 per cent of the variance in the data set. The lack of
standardisation has been previously revealed as a barrier to implementing lean construction
(Abdullah et al., 2009; Alinaitwe, 2009). For instance, this barrier prevents the successful
deployment of lean construction principles and tools in the Ghanaian and Nigerian
construction industries (Olamilokun, 2015; Ayarkkwa et al., 2012). In the Indian construction
industry, this barrier is the second most pervasive, mainly in the form of uncertainty in the
production process (B20) and supply chain (B22) (Devaki and Jayanthi, 2014). Therefore,
given the lack of evidence in developed countries, the standardisation barrier may be limited
to developing countries only, including the KSA construction industry. This contradicts
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literature evidence that barriers to implementing lean construction in developed and

developing countries are similar.
The technological barrier, with an eigenvalue of 2.761 that explains 10.007 per cent of the
variance in the data set, is the fourth most pervasive barrier to implementing lean
construction in the KSA construction industry. This level of pervasiveness is very moderate,
which is similar to the Malaysian context. Abdullah et al. (2009) identified the technological
barrier to implementing lean construction as one of the least pervasive in the Malaysian
construction industry, in the form of long implementation periods due to the extensive time
taken for operators to understand the associated technological sophistications (B11). In a
developed country context, Bashir et al. (2015) identified the technological barrier to
implementing lean construction in contracting organisations in the UK in the form of
operators experiencing difficulties in understanding the technological sophistication
associated with many lean construction tools and techniques (B9). Furthermore, similar to
the Chinese construction industry (Shang and Sui Pheng, 2014), in the KSA construction
industry, the lack of government support is a barrier to implementing lean construction, in
the form of lack of government support for technological advancements (B19).
With an eigenvalue of 2.626 that explains 8.877 per cent of the variance in the data set,
the “performance and knowledge barrier” to implementing lean construction in the KSA
construction industry is minimally pervasive, in the fifth position. Mostly, this barrier
suggests limited knowledge of lean construction among operators in the construction
industry (B4), which is aggravated by lack of training and training avenues to increase the
level of lean construction skills in the industry (B3) (Ayarkkwa et al., 2012; Abdullah et al.,
2009). As a result, there remains a greater emphasis on the outcome-based traditional
performance system of cost, time and quality, as compared to the process-based
performance system in lean construction which evaluates the flow of project delivery to
eliminate non-value-adding activities (B7) (B13). The minimal level of pervasiveness of this
barrier contradicts many studies (Abdullah et al., 2009; Sarhan and Fox, 2013; Shang and
Sui Pheng, 2014; Omran and Abdulrahim, 2015). For instance, Shang and Sui Pheng (2014)
revealed that lack of proper knowledge of lean philosophy is the major barrier to lean
construction in the Chinese construction industry, while in Ghana, it is one of the top
barriers to lean construction (Ayarkkwa et al., 2012). Shang and Sui Pheng (2014) linked this
barrier to lack of education. This suggests that construction professionals in the KSA
construction industry are well educated about lean construction, and as a result, they
perceive the performance and knowledge barrier to be minimal.
 The least pervasive barrier to implementing lean construction in the KSA construction Implementing
industry is the cost barrier. It has an eigenvalue of 1.275 that explains the variance of 5.657 lean
per cent in the data set. This finding is similar to those in many studies which reveal the
influence of the high cost of providing lean construction tools and equipment and that
construction
incentivising and empowering employees for increased lean culture is a very low barrier to practices
implementing lean construction (Ayarkkwa et al., 2012; Abdullah et al., 2009; Sarhan and
Fox, 2013; Alinaitwe, 2009). Equally, the low pervasiveness of this barrier in the KSA
construction industry could be attributed to the rich economic status of the KSA as an oil-
producing country. As one of the sectors which contributes hugely to the economy and one
which is strategic focus of the KSA Government to deemphasise reliance on oil, the KSA
construction industry is well funded for increased development (AlSehaimi, 2011; Husein,
2013). Hence, the respondent construction professionals perceive the cost barrier as very low
hindrance in the KSA construction industry.

7.3 Proposed solutions to barriers to lean construction

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To overcome the principal barriers to lean construction, universally applicable solutions are
proposed. As the most pervasive barrier to implementing lean construction, the greatest
effort should be concentrated on traditional practices in the KSA construction industry.
Within construction organisations, the management should be open and committed to
making changes in the construction field (Ayarkkwa et al., 2012). According to Devaki and
Jayanthi (2014), this could be achieved by making changes to the culture in construction
organisations to accommodate lean construction principles as part of organisational policy.
If this were to occur, employees and organisational partners would be compelled to embrace
a lean construction culture. As part of cultural changes, Bashir et al. (2015) suggested that
construction organisations should use very simplified terms to convey ideas about lean
construction in the organisation policy. Similarly, as part of a commitment to lean
construction practices, the management should acquire the necessary managerial skills to
oversee the successful implementation of lean construction during project delivery (Shang
and Sui Pheng, 2014). For instance, using a participatory style of management which allows
employee participation in decisions leading to lean construction is likely to build their trust
and support for the implementation of lean construction (Bashir et al., 2015; Shang and Sui
Pheng, 2014; Devaki and Jayanthi, 2014). Furthermore, both Sarhan and Fox (2013) and
Shang and Sui Pheng (2014) suggested that the traditional design approach to project
delivery should be replaced with an integrated design approach to reduce dichotomy
between the design and construction stages of project delivery for the easy implementation
of lean construction.
As the client-related barrier is a new kind of barrier, solutions to overcoming it rest
largely on construction clients. First, they need to insist on the adoption of lean construction
in the delivery of their projects. By inserting lean construction clauses in their contracts,
contractors will automatically be obliged to implement the concept (Dulaimi and Tanamas,
2001; Bashir et al., 2015). However, this may increase the project cost for the clients.
Therefore, second, construction clients need to desist from evaluating the success of their
projects primarily on the basis of cost and time, as both of these are inconsistent with lean
construction principles (Sarhan and Fox, 2013). Instead, construction clients should
emphasise on achieving value in their projects through waste minimisation.
Most potential solutions to overcoming the standardisation barrier to lean construction
relate to reducing the uncertainties in the construction supply chain. Devaki and Jayanthi
(2014) advocated that construction organisations should engage in long-term relationships
among themselves to strengthen their working relationships in the construction supply
 CI chain to be aware of each other’s style of managing projects with minimal uncertainties. The
use of standards to define construction project requirements and relationships in the supply
chain is also projected to reduce the standardisation barrier to lean construction. For
instance, Dulaimi and Tanamas (2001) recommended the use of standards such as the
International Standards Organisation (ISO) frameworks to benchmark performance
requirements in a standardised format in the construction supply chain. Common metrics
which can be followed by operators to implement lean construction should also be developed
in the construction supply chain (Devaki and Jayanthi, 2014).
According to Bashir et al. (2015), rather than an aggressive and one-off implementation
approach, a step by step or simplified implementation of lean construction is necessary to
enable operators to adapt to the technological sophistications involved. These
sophistications can also be reduced by supporting the implementation of lean construction
with visualisation mechanisms such as building information modelling (BIM) to enable
operators to easily monitor the process (Devaki and Jayanthi, 2014; Sacks et al., 2009).
Furthermore, the government has a role to play to overcome the technological barrier to lean
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construction, especially in terms of enacting policies that will make lean methods more
feasible (Ayarkkwa et al., 2012). For instance, such policy would set an agenda and provide a
direction for construction organisations to identify and implement feasible lean construction
methods (Bashir et al., 2015; Shang and Sui Pheng, 2014; Devaki and Jayanthi, 2014).
Although the performance and knowledge barrier is minimally pervasive in the KSA
construction industry, it can be overcome by training construction professionals to increase
their knowledge and skills about lean construction (Omran and Abdulrahim, 2015). Such
training should emphasise not only lean construction tools such as the last planner system
but also lean construction principles, especially the principles of waste minimisation and
JIT, to ensure a balanced understanding required to undertake the concept (Abdullah et al.,
2009; Shang and Sui Pheng, 2014). According to Bashir et al. (2015), the management of
construction organisations should take greater responsibility in providing and sponsoring
avenues such as seminars, conferences and workshops to train their employees about lean
construction. It is important because the employees are responsible for the daily operation
and implementation of lean construction activities. Nevertheless, lean construction training
should be implemented across the board in construction organisations, especially to include
middle-level managers and sub-contractors and suppliers, to ensure that the concept
percolates to all levels (Devaki and Jayanthi, 2014). The management of construction
organisations should also seek to retain skilled and newly trained employees by
incentivising them with competitive wages to achieve ongoing lean construction (Shang and
Sui Pheng, 2014).

8. Conclusions and recommendations

This study has identified the barriers to the implementation of lean construction and, at the
same time, prioritised the principal factors that constitute these barriers in the order of their
pervasiveness in the KSA construction industry.
Overall, there are 22 barriers currently hindering the implementation of lean construction
in the KSA construction industry. Based on the MIS, the top-ranking barriers that are of the
greatest concern to construction professionals in the KSA construction industry are the
influence of traditional management practices, unfavourable organisational culture, lack of
technical skills, training and understanding of lean techniques and lack of knowledge of the
lean construction approaches, and together, they signify the importance of the involvement
of the top management in construction organisations in implementing lean construction.
The middle-ranking barriers that make up the majority of the barriers such as lack of a
 robust performance measurement system, traditional design approach, long implementation Implementing
period of the lean concept in construction processes, lack of client and supplier involvement lean
and end user preference are of moderate concern to construction professionals in the KSA
construction industry (organisational level). Nonetheless, they signify that the actions (and
construction
inactions) of project participants during project delivery are important to the practices
implementation of lean construction (project level). The barriers which construction
professionals in the KSA construction industry are least worried about are lack of provision
of benchmark performance, lack of support from government for technological
advancements, uncertainty in the production process, use of non-standard components and
uncertainty in the supply chain, and they mainly signify the importance of construction-
industry-level support and coordination in the implementation of lean construction (industry
level). Furthermore, despite having different individual and organisational characteristics,
the respondent construction professionals were undivided in their agreement with the above
rankings. Therefore, in conclusion, construction professionals perceive that the
implementation of lean construction can be influenced at the organisational, project and
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industry levels in the KSA construction industry.

The six principal factors that constitute the barriers in the KSA construction industry are
traditional practice, client-related, standardisation, technological, performance and
knowledge and cost-related barriers, in descending order of pervasiveness. Thus, the
traditional practice barrier is the most pervasive, while the cost-related barrier is the least
pervasive. In addition, literature evidence suggests that these principal barriers exist in
other countries, with the exception of the client-related barrier, which appears to be a new
kind of barrier to the implementation of lean construction in the construction industry. In the
KSA construction industry, the client-related barrier indicates the failure of clients to
contribute adequately towards implementing lean construction. Elsewhere, more research is
required to determine the pervasiveness of the client-related barrier in lean construction.
The socio-cultural, economic and operational context in the KSA is reflected in the level
of pervasiveness of some of the barriers to implementing lean construction. For instance, the
high pervasiveness of traditional practices as a barrier to implementing lean construction is
linked to the conservative nature of the KSA as an Islamic society, while the least pervasive,
the cost-related barrier, is related to the economic prosperity of the country. Therefore, the
socio-cultural and economic contexts in different countries potentially influence the barriers
to implementing lean construction. Given the similarities in socio-cultural processes, as well
as economic prosperity and mode of operation, the principal barriers to implementing lean
construction in the KSA construction industry may be relevant to other countries in the
Middle East. However, a qualitative research is necessary to explore this causal relationship
empirically and identify the specific socio-cultural, operational and economic factors that
induce the barriers to lean construction in the construction industry in other countries
outside the Middle East.
Finally, as identified in Section 7, solutions to overcoming the barriers to lean
construction in the KSA construction industry are proposed. This study recommends that
these solutions should focus on the traditional practice, client-related, standardisation,
technological and performance and knowledge barriers while excluding the cost-related
barrier owing to its minimal pervasiveness in the KSA construction industry.

8.1 Areas of further research

With findings that the conservative nature of the KSA as an Islamic society contributes to
the high pervasiveness of the traditional practice barrier in implementing lean construction
in the KSA construction industry, this study provides an insight to the role of socio-cultural
 CI issues such as national culture to the pervasiveness of barriers to lean construction.
Although the national culture is very influential on the operations in the construction
industry in different countries, studies exploring the role of national culture in the
implementation of lean construction are very limited. More research is therefore necessary to
understand the role of national culture in the implementation of lean construction, as well as
how the national cultures in different countries constitute barriers to the implementation of
lean construction. Furthermore, this study found that the client-related barrier to lean
construction is new to the current body of knowledge. As this study is limited to the KSA,
future studies should be conducted to verify the existence of the client-related barrier in
implementing lean construction in other countries.

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