Uncertainty and Information in Construction: From the Socio-Technical Perspective 1962-1966 to Knowledge Management - What Have We Learned?

Abstract

This chapter questions the possibility of knowledge management in construction, other than among leading organisations handling a restricted population of projects. Socio-technical research in UK coal mining from the 1950s and construction from the 1960s and other relevant studies are compared. The extent to which the tacit order, instability, and diffuseness of construction may, practically, undermine knowledge management is explored. Knowledge management is compared to other methods in terms of the stability required for it to be effective. It is demonstrated that this stability is not usually available in construction, whose projects and processes are subject to an unusually wide range of disturbances.