ABSTRACT
Construction supply chain management (CSCM) is an emerging area of practice. It is inspired by but diff ers substantially from manufacturing supply chain management, where the emphasis is on modeling volume production. CSCM is more concerned with the coordination of discrete quantities of materials (and associated specialty engineering services) delivered to specifi c construction projects. Th e organization and sourcing of materials is becoming increasingly complex across the global construction industry. Mounting emphasis on CSCM is due to both global sourcing of materials and assemblies provided by advances in transportation technologies as well as a shortage of craft labor (reaching crisis proportions in many parts of the world) that force increasing amounts of value-added work to be conducted off -site deep in the supply chain. At the same time, construction clients are demanding faster, more responsive construction processes and higher-quality facilities. Th ese demands generally involve both more responsive production chains and closer coordination between the owner and the construction team. For all these reasons, eff ective construction project execution will mean eff ective CSCM.
