ABSTRACT
Construction projects are usually characterized by many and varying risks. Being able to manage risks across all phases in the construction process is an important and central element preventing unwanted consequences, not least exposure of the client to financial or other losses and quality failures. Many different actors are involved in a construction project and often they have no or limited experience of earlier collaboration with each other. It is not unusual for actors to avoid risks as far as possible and let somebody else in the value chain deal with them. The generally accepted principle is that, in each phase of a construction project, the management of a specific risk should be allocated to the party that has the best ability to handle it. In the context of small projects, where risk management might not be formalized as in larger projects, understanding of the risk management process in general and mitigation steps in particular might be wanting. Many actors are involved in just some of a project’s phases and this lack of continuity has been identified as one source of problems relating to quality and cost (Yngvesson et al., 2000; Ericsson et al., 2002). These actors tend to focus on short-term financial results and protect their own interests rather than worry about the project. Such behavior leads to less effective management of risks overall. From our preliminary investigations, little attention has been paid to identifying the roles of individual actors in risk management across the project’s phases. No research seems to have been directed at small projects, i.e. those running for a matter of months with contract sums in the region of SEK1 million to SEK15 million,1 typically ground works, minor building works and refurbishment. They are believed to represent in the region of 80 percent of all projects by number and whose aggregated value is significant at roughly 20 percent of total construction output (Hultén, 2004). The objective of the chapter is to analyze the risk management process on construction projects from the perspective of the client, contractor and consultant in general and in the context of small projects in particular. We examine the ways and extent to which the main actors are involved in risk
management across the different phases of projects and compare practices with the generally received view of risk management (Osipova and Apleberger, 2007). The particular case of small projects is given closer examination to understand the extent to which systematic risk management takes place and the methods and tools used in this work. Our research is based on literature reviews and the results of two surveys carried out in parallel.
