Document Management in Construction: Practices and Opinions

Abstract

Previous surveys on document management (DM) have focused on certain aspects such as the adoption of electronic methods by construction firms and the important features of electronic document management systems. This study presents the results of a survey of practitioners on various aspects of DM, including document storage, classification, search, and transmittal. The survey aims to identify practices that are implemented in large firms in the industry and the opinions of practitioners regarding such practices. Statistical models were used to map the relations between DM practices, characteristics of firms, and opinions of practitioners. The results indicate elaborate interactions between the different components, in which traditional and advanced methods are used simultaneously. The metadata approach for organizing documents is dominant; however, the use of text content is also common, especially for document search and retrieval. The results are considered to be a snapshot to benchmark the development of practices and opinions over time. They serve researchers and developers by identifying deficiencies in current practices and highlighting important issues from the perspective of industry practitioners. They serve practitioners by offering a picture of how other top industry firms operate when managing construction project documents.