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MMC supply
Projecting at the project level: chain
MMC supply chain integration
roadmap for small housebuilders
Ruth Dowsett, Martin Green, Martin Sexton and Chris Harty 193
School of the Built Environment, University of Reading, Reading, UK
Received 10 July 2017
Revised 28 November 2017
17 January 2019
Accepted 10 February 2019
Abstract
Purpose – This paper aims to provide insights into how supply chain integration may occur for small
housebuilders adopting modern methods of construction (MMCs). The process of creating an empirically
informed road map is described, whereby the practical day-to-day challenges of adopting a timber-frame
solution on a small housing development in Southeast England were fed into a road map of future supply
chain integration scenarios. The intention is to better position small housebuilders to contribute in addressing
the shortfall in housing that continues to face the UK.
Design/methodology/approach – Interviews with supply chain members along with on-site
observations captured key aspects of integration. Findings were used within two collaborative forums to
guide discussion in a dual approach; discussing the challenges of timber-frame on the project and what would
be needed on future projects for the firms analysed.
Findings – Empirically informed malleable roadmaps, of the kind developed within this study, provide
feasible options for small housebuilders and suppliers of MMCs to collectively collaborate when transitioning
towards fully integrated supply chains. Practically, the roadmapping approach, and the roadmap itself, would
help small housebuilders and suppliers of MMCs transition towards full integration. Opening up avenues of
integration that are spread across yet connected through numerous phases, firms and technologies helps
construction professionals use more sophisticated modular and volumetric off-site solutions.
Research limitations/implications – Data collection took place over the course of a year. Future
research could expand this relatively short duration to analyse the potential for construction professionals
within the supply chain to integrate further over a longer period of time.
Originality/value – The novelty and contribution of this paper lie in the development and application of
an alternative approach to roadmapping that departs from the normative linear examples of roadmaps found
within the technology-roadmapping literature. The authors present a structured yet flexible approach to
roadmapping that is both representative of the strategic planning and innovation activities that occur within
small housebuilding firms and open to adaption to account for firm-level characteristics and contingencies.
Positioned alongside firm-level dynamics (e.g. business cases and approaches to design), the roadmapping
approach also reinforces the potential of incremental rather than whole-scale transitions.
Keyword Innovation
Paper type Research paper

Introduction
The residential construction sector at present is largely dominated by volume housebuilders
whose economies of scale favour large green-field sites where standardised and repeatable
homes can be constructed quickly and cheaply. Yet there is still a significant undersupply of
housing, and it is estimated that 225,000 to 275,000 or more homes per year are required to
keep up with demand in England (DCLG, 2017). It is also estimated that an additional 25,000
Construction Innovation
Vol. 19 No. 2, 2019
pp. 193-211
This work was supported by the Economic and Social Research Council [ES/M000249/1] and © Emerald Publishing Limited
1471-4175
Innovate UK [20160427]. DOI 10.1108/CI-07-2017-0059
CI homes can be built each year by SME housebuilders if the number operating in the market
19,2 can return to 2007 levels of around 6,000 (HBF, 2017). Until now the role of small- and
medium-sized enterprise (SME) housebuilders in the construction of new housing in
England has gradually declined from over 10,000 in 1980, building 57 per cent of all housing,
to 2,800 in 2014, building only 27 per cent of all output (Archer and Cole, 2016). A number of
reasons for this decline exist predominantly relating to planning and financing that
194 significantly influenced the shape of the market in favour of larger housebuilders
(HBF, 2017). Consequently, there is now a drive to diversify the market and re-establish
SME housebuilders, whose business models favour small brownfield sites, as significant
contributors to closing the demand-supply gap.
The 2017 Government White Paper, “Fixing our broken housing market”, acknowledges
this problem, clearly stating that the undersupply of housing is not a problem of “not
enough space” but more so an issue with planning, a slow construction process and a
market reliant on a small number of large volumetric housebuilders. Consequently, we are
now seeing a shift in policy direction favouring brownfield development that supports the
business practices of SME housebuilders through the provision of government lending
schemes and relaxation of planning charges.
These state-led policy initiatives seek to improve market entry conditions for SME
housebuilders and re-establish their position at the forefront of the residential construction
sector. They also draw attention to the operational aspects of housebuilding and prioritise
the use of modern methods of construction (MMCs), implicitly proposing a new future
scenario for UK residential construction where the number of SMEs delivering housing
using MMCs is greatly increased. This paper argues that although the antecedent conditions
for market entry have been rebalanced in favour of SMEs – based on past and present
understanding of the planning system, and “the market” as a whole – a more granular
understanding of the implications of adopting MMCs across supply chains is required. It is
our contention that this has the potential to open up further avenues of supply chain
integration for SMEs and therefore implement MMCs more effectively.
MMCs and the technologies they comprise require changes to the existing business
processes and practices of SME housebuilders and their supply chain that are under
acknowledged in industry and governmental publications (Pan et al., 2007). Here, the future
of housebuilding for SMEs has been decontextualised from the processes of small-scale
housebuilding and the number of supply chain interfaces that need to be reconfigured to
adopt MMCs.
More attention should be paid to the specificities of MMC adoption by small
housebuilders to better represent the context of implementation and inform the facilitating
conditions for increasing uptake. This paper aims to tackle this problem by presenting an
empirical case of a small housebuilder utilising timber-frame; the day-to-day challenges and
instances of supply chain integration as they happened on this project are discussed
concurrently to the process of developing a roadmap for future supply chain integration.
Roadmapping is presented as an approach to consider and capture opportunities to innovate
specific to SMEs (Savioz and Blum, 2002) and framed as structured yet flexible to
accomodate contextual contingencies. The intention is to establish a stronger association
between the roadmap and evolve and adapt configurations of integration that occur to
inform its content. The strategic lens through which the normative and dominant
approaches to roadmapping are framed is challenged but more pertinently the applicability
of these approaches to small housebuilders as a strategic planning method. By drawing on
the construction innovation literature, in particular that which pertains to SMEs, we develop
fresh insights into how roadmaps can be operationalised. Thereby making a contribution to
the broader roadmapping literature whilst concurrently capturing how supply chain MMC supply
integration (and the discrete innovations that can constitute it) occurs across the supply chain
chain of a small housebuilding project.
This paper is structured as follows: first, an overview of the challenges and constraints
faced by small housebuilders in their attempt to adopt and implement MMCs is discussed,
which elaborates on the wider contextual issues relating to supply chain integration. Second,
the utility of roadmaps and the process of roadmapping as an approach to exploring supply
chain integration potentialities are discussed, situating the research approach in relation to 195
the context of housebuilding for SMEs. Subsequently, the case and research methodology
are described, followed by the findings, and discussion and conclusion.

Modern methods of construction housebuilding for small- and medium-sized

enterprises
Current research into technology implementation and innovation diffusion within
construction firms demonstrates that the process of implementing innovation is distinctly
different within SMEs than it is in larger organisations (Sexton and Barrett, 2003; Barrett
and Sexton, 2006). In postulating potential constraints for SME’s to innovate, Sexton and
Barrett (2003) show that approaches to innovation taken by small firms relates to specific
organisational characteristics and capacities. Attention is consequently needed when
designing strategies of innovation that are appropriate to firm-level characteristics.
Innovation strategies – such as those presented in roadmaps – need to be appropriate to the
specific challenges and opportunities that smaller organisations face.
In contrast to larger construction firms, SMEs have less absorptive capacity (Upstill-
Goddard et al., 2016), whereby the extent that firms can incorporate external knowledge to
innovate is restrained by the skills, training and experience of their smaller human capital
(Muscio, 2007). Housebuilding adds a further distinction between the innovative practices of
SMEs and large organisations whereby the greater amount of capital available enables them
to build on larger sites and have more resources to standardise homes that are more suited to
prefabrication. The initial adoption of innovations within SMEs is generally motivated by an
economic necessity to stay in business, but as Abbott et al. (2006) show, if absorptive capacity
can be increased, developmental innovation as a proactive activity becomes embedded within
an organization, thereby increasing their capability to implement more ambitious innovations.
At a practical level, however, there is little guidance for SME housebuilders as to how
they might go about adopting MMCs in their business practices based on their current
processes. Such processes include the size of developments that are feasible for SME
housebuilders, whereby the economies of scale required for standardisation and
modularisation of building components are less viable – than volume housebuilders – due to
business models centring on bespoke housing designs. Procuring sites with planning
permission approved can also dictate the design requirements of the homes built. Access for
heavy lifting equipment required for building with MMCs is also more difficult on smaller
sites. Furthermore, the use of subcontractors makes it difficult to innovate in a proprietary
way as compared to large volume housebuilders (Asibong and Barlow, 1997), but as Green
et al. (2017) argue, it is this distinctiveness of supply chain relationships that needs to be
examined to innovate within the context of small-scale housing developments.

Road mapping for small- and medium-sized enterprises

SME housebuilders are now presented with a relatively well-defined future market
opportunity/scenario that requires a very different mode of operation to those currently in
place but limited insight into how they might move towards it. Further, strategic planning
CI within SMEs across all industries is consistently shown to be lacking (Wang et al., 2007) for
19,2 reasons of market instability and resourcing and therefore lack what could be considered the
appropriate skills and knowledge to plan a strategy of supply chain integration to
successfully compete in a newly redefined market (Stonehouse and Pemberton, 2002).
Despite road mapping having the potential to aid the systemic level of reconfiguration
that is needed for SMEs, research relating to road mapping either neglects or is not
196 appropriate for them. Research often focusses on issues pertinent to large firms such as
aligning research and development structures with product development structures
(Caetano and Amaral, 2011). Furthermore, technology roadmaps often foreground strategy
creation – and neglect operational uses of roadmaps – which suits larger enterprises
developing particular products (Savioz and Blum, 2002). The emphasis given to strategies
rather than operational aspects is also less useful for SMEs whose work often includes short-
term projects (Probert and Shehabuddeen, 1999). Current approaches to roadmaps are rarely
suitable for SMEs as they fail to take into consideration the distinct processes that
characterise SMEs and thus also ignore their strengths (Savioz and Blum, 2002).

Road mapping for small- and medium-sized housebuilders

The lack of fit between approaches to roadmaps and the organisational structures of SMEs
is of particular significance to SMEs in construction. There is a relative lack of road
mapping in the public domain for construction as a whole than many other industries (Amer
and Daim (2010) for an overview of roadmaps in the public domain). Road maps designed
for housebuilders often get lost in translation when applied in the context of small to
medium housebuilders due to fact that they were created for and by volume housebuilders.
The following section attends to the problem of trying to project a future without fully
understanding the characteristics of the work that is undertaken, and builds on the
acknowledgment that road maps need to be tailored specifically for SMEs for courses of
action to be feasible. To do so we take a “step back” and think through the implicit
trajectories that are embedded into roadmaps.

Approaching road mapping

As detailed above, strategic planning requires attention to align strategies to firm-level
strategies, and in the case of housebuilding in the UK, strategic planning needs to take into
considerations the constraints and opportunities for small housebuilders to transition
towards using MMCs. Road mapping as an approach to strategic planning has become
increasingly popular over recent decades (Phaal et al., 2004; Phaal et al., 2010; Phaal et al.,
2013). In the following, we reveal some of the potential ways that roadmaps have been
framed at firm, industry and market levels before detailing how they may aid transitions to
MMCs for small housebuilders in the UK.
The term roadmap is widely – and often vaguely – used (Loureiro et al., 2010). Broadly
speaking, road mapping is an approach to strategic planning, whereby long term objectives
are envisioned and routes of transitioning towards such objectives suggested (Albright and
Kappel, 2003). In the words of Phaal et al. (2010; 2):
In essence, roadmaps are simple, adaptable ‘strategic lenses’ through which the evolution of
complex systems can be viewed, supporting dialogue, alignment and consensus.
Phaal continues to explain how Motorola, as an early exemplar of roadmaps in 1970s,
famously aligned technological advances – such as display technologies and possibilities of
tuning – with particular products for the coming decade. Since Motorola initiated and
illustrated the potential benefits of roadmaps to align trajectories of technologies and
products, the use of roadmaps has continued to aid strategic planning at a variety of levels MMC supply
including firms, industries, and policies. For the purpose of this paper it is important to build chain
on Phaal’s (2010) assertion that roadmaps feed into complex systems, and as such it is
important to unpack how roadmaps incorporate wider contexts and thus require adaptability.
What constitutes the system that roadmaps attend to varies dramatically. Roadmaps can
relate to industrial trends and the planning of new products or services (Oliveira and
Rozenfeld, 2010) and managing technological processes in relation to economic and social
contexts to make the most of opportunities that markets may provide (Rocha and Mello, 197
2016). In this context, projections of markets and of technologies as a whole are used to
redesign products to align market and technological trends. Others have focussed more
specifically on facilitating the support for particular technologies through adaptions such as
the implementation of IT platforms to ease the development of technologies (Lee and Park,
2005). Yet for project-based companies such as housebuilders who focus just as much on the
process of construction as the product itself, the saliency of roadmaps relates less to how
markets may be characterised in the future or which technologies are going to be available,
but more so on how they can improve their products and processes through implementing
different technologies and tailoring these to fit particular projects.

Flexible integration: road mapping with multiple construction professionals

Despite an acknowledgement that partnerships need to be taken into account when creating
roadmaps, research on technology road mapping has only scratched the surface of the
implications of these arrangements (Wells et al., 2004; Gerdsri et al., 2009) where emphasis
has been given to selecting partners (Lichtenthaler, 2010; Lee et al., 2009; Daim and Oliver,
2008). Little effort has thus been given to the variety of work that different partners
specialise in (Caetano and Amaral, 2011). When taking into consideration the unique
problematics for small housebuilders managing multiple subcontracted trades on short-
term projects, together with skill bases shifting partially to manufacturing phases when
building with MMC, more work is needed to consider the variety of intersecting activities
that require adaptation (Caetano and Amaral, 2011).
Considering these intersections means recognising the current forms of integration
between supply chain members and the types of adaptations to individual firm processes
that are necessary to achieve a desired form of integration. Within this paper, emphasis is
placed on achieving a “desired form of integration” as opposed to a prescribed level to
acknowledge discussions made within the literature around the varying absorptive capacity
of firms within SME project teams (Abbott et al., 2006; Barrett and Sexton, 2006).
In light of the preceding literature, the approach to road mapping adopted within this
research project departs from normative approaches that position technology innovation as
linear and prescriptive and builds upon Phaal’s (2010) recommendation that roadmaps
should be adaptable. We argue that the destination or form of integration that a supply
chain targets towards should be defined by the categories of adaptation needed to reach
them and the current capability of the firms to do so. In other words, roadmaps for SMEs
using MMCs should not propose linear progression through stages of integration nor
prescribe them. The key to unlocking the utility of roadmaps for SMEs, we argue, is
adaptability and flexibility in structure so that the route taken to achieve the desired form of
integration can be modified according to an interplay between project level objectives and
firm capabilities to innovate. In the process of developing the roadmap practitioners are
acquiring, amalgamating, and storing collective information, to produce “a product
depicting space peculiar to a moment in time” (Paulston and Liebman, 2016) from which to
make projections of future supply chain integration scenarios.
CI Method
19,2 This research was primarily concerned with understanding how actors and firms within the
supply chain interacted throughout the construction of the four timber-frame houses, and
the implications of these interactions on the completion of supply chain partner tasks, as
well as the delivery of the development as a whole. Necessarily this involves the
examination of context-dependent knowledge and as such, an interpretivist case study
198 approach – as advocated by Flyvberg (2006) – in which particular issues are studied in
detail and from the perspective of the actors involved to draw lessons, was adopted. Case
study research has been criticised on the basis that it is not possible to generalise from an
individual case and that they contain biases towards verification. Conversely, Flyvberg
strongly defends the value of single-case study research, arguing that formal generalisation
is overvalued compared to the “force of example” and that it is possible to generalise from a
single-case study by providing, for example, a counter-example to normative beliefs and
assumptions. Further, rather than a bias towards verification, case studies tend towards
falsification as the complexity of cases and the depth and intensity to which they are
examined are likely to challenge researcher preconceptions.
The research described in this paper reflects this approach: the researchers spent a
significant amount of effort building up relationships with both the onsite and offsite team
to collect a large amount of data using a variety of techniques to examine the process and
context of implementing timber-frame as an innovation on small housing developments.

The case: Percy’s yard

An Innovate UK-funded research project led by the housebuilder in collaboration with the
timber-frame supplier and the academic research team provided the circumstances of
empirical data collection As detailed in the literature review, there is a longstanding
shortfall in the supply of housing in UK of which building on brown field land, utilising off-
site methods of construction and facilitating SME construction firms is often cited as a
solution. “Percy”s Yard’ was chosen as a representative case that includes all three of these
characteristics.
The case centres on a small housing development of five units in South East England,
four of which built using open panel timber-frames. “Percy”s Yard’ is the first site on which
the housebuilder has used this method of construction. The strategic aim to adopt timber-
frame was to capitalise on more stringent performance requirements of new homes and
minimise risk to the project’s programme by reducing their reliance on bricklayers. Percy’s
Yard was also in close vicinity to other existing dwellings buildings resulting in restricted
access to the site. Utilising off-site methods overcame some of the access challenges by
reducing the amount of deliveries to site and time on-site in general. The challenges
pertinent to Percy”s Yard were typical that many others can learn from, the case study
helped to develop potential recommendations of how SME’s can integrate with off-site
suppliers across a number of different phases/activities.

Data collection techniques

Empirical work took place over the course of a year, involving extended periods of
observation, analysis of project documents such as programmes of work and interviews
with supply-chain members. Participants included managing directors, designers of the
timber-frame, the installation team, the site manager and assistant site manager, carpenters
and subcontracted trades such as plasterers, bricklayers and carpenters (Table I). Strict
adherence to the principles expressed in the University of Reading research ethics
framework, particularly those regarding participant and firm anonymity, was kept
Firm Role
MMC supply
chain
Developer Director
TF Contractor Sales and Marketing Manager
TF Contractor Senior Estimator
TF Contractor Design team
TF Contractor Purchasing and logistics Manager
TF Contractor Regional Sales Manager 199
TF Contractor Designer
Developer Site Manager
Developer Assistant site Manager
Subcontractor Brick Layer
Subcontractor Carpenter Table I.
Subcontractor Electrician Project participants

throughout the data collection process. Each of the data collection techniques are discussed
below.

Observations
Field notes were used to capture important aspects observed by the researcher in both on-
and off-site project activities, including informal discussions with site personnel and visits
to the timber-frame factory. These were neither standardised nor used explicitly for data
analysis but used as points of discussion within interviews to stimulate more in-depth
responses from participants and further understanding of the problems the team faced.

Interviews
Purposive and sequential sampling was used to locate “information-rich” informants to
ensure an information-rich case (Patton, 2002) whereby participants were selected, where
possible, based on their experience of integrating SME housebuilders with MMCs. When
initially selecting participants, the research team worked alongside project partners to
identify roles pertinent to the challenge of integrating SMEs with timber-frame suppliers
and to select participants who had experience of this challenge. For example, as noted
earlier, the role of subcontractors such as electricians and bricklayers is crucial to the overall
build out of MMC, and as such, subcontractors were included in the sampling criteria.
Interviews were semi-structured and designed to explore participants’ previous
experience of working with different construction professionals, experience of working on
Percy’s Yard and reflections on how and why forms of integration were or were not possible.
Interviews were conducted prior to the installation of the timber-frames, throughout the
build-out and once the development was complete. Follow-up interviews encouraged
reflection on initial findings from Percy’s Yard and how integration could occur differently
on future developments and through firm-level adaptations.

Collaborative forums
Throughout the duration of the project findings were shared with the project partners as
were drafts of the road map created. Collaboration occurred through quarterly meetings,
regular contact via email and telephone and two sandpits/forums. The sandpits/forums
enhanced the suitability and relevance of the findings (Broadley et al., 2016) by both
presenting findings to the research partners and encouraging the co-creation of potential
avenues of integration in the future.
CI Attended by the site manager, managing directors, installation managers, and architect,
19,2 the first sand pit/forum focussed on concerns and queries surrounding Percy’s Yard. The
second sand pit/forum focussed on the design considerations for suppliers and small
housebuilders and was attended by members of the design team based at the timber-frame
suppliers.

200 Analysis and interpretation

To enable understanding and interpretation of what was happening within these forums,
prior knowledge of the context of study was developed through a concurrent review of the
literature, consistent with the idea that observation is “theory-laden” (Hanson, 1958) and
always shaped by the concepts in the mind of the observer (Winch, 1958). Following Ritchie
and Lewis (2013), our analysis was continuous and iterative as we frequently moved
between stages of managing and making sense of the data. In terms of the former, potential
themes were identified, while the latter focussed on analysing the themes in relation to the
data as a whole and on the saliency of the themes for all research partners.

Collaborative trajectories: an evolving roadmap

From the outset of the research project, all actors were aware that one of the outputs of the
research would be a roadmap. The structure of the roadmap was however open for
discussion. Despite consensus that it would have the aim of strategically planning how
small housebuilders and timber-frame suppliers could adapt processes to ease and improve
the construction of timber-frame houses, the following findings illustrate how the categories
and the axis – fragmented, partial and full integration – came to structure the roadmap
(Figure 1). Following this, the “indicative manual” created by the team shows how the
empirical data was used to populate the roadmap. Here projections of future supply
integration scenarios and retrospective assertions of a fragmented supply chain in areas
where they had integrated on the project are provided. We then discuss the implications of
putting projects into projections through the creation and adaption of empirically informed
roadmaps.

Axis of integration: supply chain status

Drawing on both the roadmap literature (Phaal et al., 2013; Kappel, 2001) and the empirics of
the case, three indicative stages of supply chain status were elected to form the axis of
integration: fragmented (where they are now), partially integrated (steps taken to move
towards a future state), and fully integrated (where they want to be). This was to account
for the distinct characteristics of each firm – in terms of business processes – and emphasise
that the effectiveness of the roadmap relies on an appropriate balance between
the capabilities of each firm and the activities necessary for integration. In other words, for
the project partners to gain any real value from the roadmap, flexibility and customisation
were important features to include, allowing them to negotiate collective strategic
milestones relative to their own commercial and technological perspectives. Therefore an
important feature of the roadmap is to present different forms of integration that present
that overall route of integration taken throughout the project and to highlight areas for
focussing on improvement relative to firm capability.

Sandpit Stage-Gates
Prior to the delivery and installation of the timber-frames onsite, the team participated in a
collaborative forum – loosely based on a sandpit methodology – to review and discuss
 MMC supply
chain

201

Figure 1.
MMC supply chain
integration roadmap
CI project progress. Within the “sandpit”, project members reviewed aspects of the design,
19,2 installation, and build-out stages of the timber-frame houses that could potentially be
problematic, discussing them in relation to the efficacy of planned onsite activities. This
proved invaluable to the onsite team in that it gave them the opportunity to qualify their
understanding of the process of erecting a timber-frame structure, query their planned
approach to tackle onsite tasks and decide upon a more pragmatic course of action informed
202 by the collective expertise of the project team. The positive experience of the installation
prompted the team to include a further three sandpit stage-gates within the roadmap.

Threading and rethreading integration

In the context of the roadmap, these sandpit stage-gates serve as a designated collaborative
space, facilitating dialogue that is productive and requisite to collective decision-making
around the route taken to move towards an integrated supply chain. Timed prior to major
project phases so that meaningful interventions can occur, these stage-gates are identified as
design, installation, build-out and post-project. The reasoning behind this is that these are
the stages at which new stakeholders are introduced, bringing new experience and
knowledge that must be thread into projections of future integration activities or at later
stages – based on their experience throughout the project – rethread to make new
projections of integration activities. This incorporates reflexivity into the roadmapping
process centred on the experiential knowledge within the project team as a collective,
balancing technical considerations and market potential against the project context and the
capabilities of the firms involved. The intended benefits of doing so are to make clear, and
therefore better manage, expectations and perceptions around the process of integration. In
doing so, flexibility and adaptability is given precedence over the perceived linearity,
discipline and thoroughness of more prescriptive examples of roadmapping processes to
respond to potential risks and therefore determine appropriate mechanisms and
management approaches for the deployment of integration activities.

Project phases
The roadmap is divided into the five distinct yet interdependent phases of the timber-frame
housing project. Each project phase constitutes a distinct configuration of the project team
where one member’s expertise will dominate and in some way dictate the activities of the
others to deliver the tasks necessary to complete that phase. By making the distinction
between these project phases the team were able to populate the “boxes” with the empirical
findings gathered from on-site activities, observations, and interviews providing a graphical
overview of how a small-scale timber-frame housing development progresses (Figure 1).
Project partners were then able to situate themselves visually within a wider context of the
project, using this as a frame of reference to consider the impact of upstream activities on
their own process and the impact of their own processes on downstream activities. This
prompted more meaningful and realistic discussion, based on their current ways of working,
around future projections of integration. The project phases are described in the following
section using examples from the empirical data and elaborates within five vignettes how the
team discussed onsite implications in relation to their current capabilities to come to
pragmatic potentialities for future supply chain integration scenarios.

Benchmark zero: putting projects into projections

The key objective of the roadmap was to provide an overview of potential options for the
project partners to integrate further and to allow them to identity adaptions within and
across project phases at the same time as making considerations for the overall supply chain
when doing so; linking the commercial and technological perspectives of each firm. Used in MMC supply
conjunction with the project phases, this allowed project team members to reflect on the chain
status of their supply chain as it currently was – agreeing an assumed starting point as
fragmented with some areas of partial integration (see Figure 2). As the case study findings
show, adaptions to supply chain integration occurred at different points throughout the
project phases and varied in extent depending on the firms and their capacities.

Business case
203
The significance of providing a separate phase to describe the business case for each
integration phase draws on the literature regarding how the distinct organisational
capabilities of small firms defines their ability to innovate (Barrett and Sexton, 2006; Sexton
and Barrett, 2003). It was also informed by the specific circumstances of the case and how
the type of procurement method used on the case project defined the extent to which the
supply chain was able to integrate.

Vignette 1: The implications of contradictory procurement strategies

To allow an appropriate time for project programme planning, the housebuilder needed to
secure the relevant trades in advance. Conversely, the timber-frame contractor operates on
just-in-time principles, where they finalise the design of the timber-frame two weeks prior to
delivery onsite. Their rationale for operating in this way is to avoid interrupting factory
processes when clients make late design changes. This approach, based on experience of
working on one-off builds, was standardised across the firm but created problems for actors
used by the housebuilder.
To ensure project progress, trade tenders had to be made from the architectural drawings
rather than the finalised timber-frame drawings. Onsite problems occurred when it was
revealed that the timber-frame designers had specified a steel beam to run through one of
the first floors of one of the plots to accommodate the large span designed by the architect.
The implications of which were that the services had to be rerouted around the steel beam
creating additional unanticipated work for each trade with the risk of cumulatively adding
cost to the project.
The delivery of off-site timber-frame housing lends itself to more integrated procurement
methods such as partnering. However, the characteristics of these methods – such as long-
term relationships – conflict with the existing business models and operational actions of
small housebuilders and their supply chain, and so the team began to discuss ways in which
to transition towards a fully integrated supply chain. When discussing the business case
and potential future projections solutions the team tended to refer to procurement
mechanisms most suited for large-scale firms. However, it was quickly realised that whilst
these were useful discussion points that drew out the key value-adding principles of supply-
chain partnering, these mechanisms in their normative definition were not suitable for
smaller housebuilders, and whilst included into the roadmap they were further defined in
more widely applicable terms (Figure 1). This centred on the consensus that communicating
the business benefits of supply chain integration to deliver timber-frame housing is
particularly important for small housebuilders and fed into discussions around resolving
tensions between the procurement method used by the housebuilder and the design and
supply method of the timber-frame contractor.

Design
Experience of designing with off-site timber-frame amongst the design team is important for
the successful delivery of a project. Design for manufacture (DfMA) requires an
CI
19,2

204

Figure 2.
MMC supply chain
integration roadmap
project level example
understanding of the prefabrication process, more specifically the early receipt of complete MMC supply
information. This is predicated on a collaborative design process where design intent and chain
information requirements are clearly communicated. The following vignette shows how the
team used the onsite implications of the procurement method to discuss the design process
and proffer potential future solutions at the level of SMEs when full-scale partnering cannot
be achieved.
205
Vignette 2: Design process conflict
Whilst the tension between business processes provided the situation for the steel beam
issue to arise, it was not, in and of itself, the cause of onsite changes. The conflict between
the design method of the timber-frame contractors and the traditional project procurement
method exposed areas elsewhere in the project phases to consider for integration. This
vignette focusses on the information flow and design process conflict that leads to the
inclusion of the steel beam.
The timber-frame contractors design the timber-frame from the architects drawing,
redrawing the design according to the structural requirements of timber-frame. This
included a steel beam in one of the plots. In a traditional brick and block design, process
changes such as this tend to be made by the architect and are signed off based on final sum
rather than interpretation of the drawings. This process was overlaid onto this project and
the existence of the steel beam was only realised during installation. As the timber-frame
designer described:
Normally there’s, with my experience, they don’t really take a lot of time to look at details on the
drawing, they just see the big letters at the bottom and just sign them.
Not only did this create issues for first fix services, in that they had to be rerouted, but also
became an issue for the tackers who were then required to use additional material and
labour to level the ceiling height which resulted from the additional depth required for the
steel beam. This prompted discussion within the roadmap sandpit around how to
incorporate buildability into the design by improving communication and feedback
throughout the supply chain, the difficulties of doing so, and how to implement it. Within
the roadmap sandpit, the timber-frame team drew on this example and gave an overview of
their information flow throughout a contract, identifying areas where information gets “lost
in translation”, thereby reviewing their own processes.

Manufacture
The success of the processes and practices within the manufacturing phase determine the
quality of the timber-frame components. However, these processes and practices are
dependent on wider supply chain experience of working to a prefabricated project process.
As proposed in the business case phase, in a fragmented supply chain the prefabrication
process is overlaid onto a traditional construction programme. In many cases, the logic of
prefabrication and the just-in-time principles that ensure its success conflict with the
existing processes and practices of the supply chain.
To capitalise on the benefits of prefabricated timber-frame the alignment of processes
and practices is essential in moving from a fragmented to a fully integrated supply chain.
Adaptation by both the developer and the timber-frame contractor should be considered to
make full integration a viable option. This section expands on a key issue that affected trade
progress onsite and how the timber-frame contractor capitalised on this feedback to improve
the design of their proprietary timber-frame panel. Further considerations are illustrated
CI within Figure 1 to show how the project team might move towards a fully integrated supply
19,2 chain.

Vignette 3: The benefits of supply chain feedback

Through a process of documenting and discussing trade experience with the timber-frame,
in relation to their package requirements, it was found that the service battens installed
206 within the timber-frame panels were too shallow, making it difficult for follow-on trades to
route and install first fix services. Consequently, the site manager had to retrofit additional
10mm strips of timber on the panels where these issues occurred. This onsite problem – the
implications of which are further elaborated on within the build-out section – was used by
the TF contractor to redesign the standard panelling system produced within the factory to
increase depth and ensure consistent quality:
Instead of using a different sized top plate to studs now we’re going to use the same [. . .] with the
service battens only on the studs that’s a different size but now everything is going to one solid
timber made panel with service battens round so there’s going to be no discrepancies at all.
Material suppliers were reviewed to provide service battens at the correct thickness and
factory operatives were consulted with to determine the most appropriate configuration of
the improved wall based on this supply chain feedback.
Based on the issues raised from onsite data collection, supply chain feedback became a
central point of discussion within the roadmap forum to project forward and make
retrospective assertions as to a fragmented supply chain status. Focussing on the difficulty
of maintaining consistent engagement with trades highlighted that the scale of problems
experienced onsite seem small to trades because they can implement workarounds, but at
the factory level this feedback is vital to improving the quality of their product and
ultimately the progress of the project. As the following comment illustrates:
It’s actually when it gets to site and issues that are raised that may be not fed back to us maybe
causes a delay, which puts us in a bad light, if you like, for future contracts. It’s that end thing,
and it, we’re trying to get this across to people. It might seem minute or small for you guys, but to
us on the wider spectrum of mass producing, if you like, it can mean a hell of a lot, yeah.
This also prompted discussion around how to engage follow-on trades highlighting that
their willingness to feedback and contribute may be dependent on their understanding of the
“logic” of the timber-frame; if they do not fully understand how it should perform, then it is
difficult for them to provide constructive feedback.

Installation
Site activities will determine the success of the installation phase, and so communication
between the manufacturing team and the site manager is essential. Site-specific constraints
should be considered in the previous stages to optimise the design of panels but the progress
of manufacture and groundworks are interdependent. For example, if the frame is finished
before the site is ready the developer can incur a fee and vice versa in terms of temporary
works, etc. To avoid these penalties, liaison between the site team and the timber-frame
team is vital to ensure accurate intersections between the timber-frame, substructure and
foundations. As the timber-frame consultant describes, the extent of dialogue varies from
client to client: “The guy on the site knows exactly where he is with his site schedule. On other
occasions we’re having to fight tooth and nail”.
In the case study project, this proved to be successful; the process of which is described in
the following vignette that was fed forward and backward into the roadmap scenarios.
Vignette 4: Substructure and foundation solution – success of soleplate MMC supply
Along with the developer, this project was the first that the site manager had been involved chain
in. Having read the industry literature regarding timber-frame, they realised that site
logistics and the substructure are an integral part of a successful installation phase. The
tolerances that they normally work with in traditional brick and block are considerably
higher, and any discrepancies at substructure level can be “made good” by an expert
bricklayer as they complete each course of brickwork.
An installation sandpit aided this process by discussing soleplate tolerances, along with 207
strategies of ensuring that all construction professionals involved are aware of the specific
requirements of the timber-frames being installed.
The sand pit led to extremely accurate intersections, in the words of an experienced
bricklayer: “they are the best I’ve ever worked with”. The timber-frame installers were also
complimentary about how level the substructure was which led to the rapid installation of
the soleplates. The installation sandpit and continuous communication between Site
Manager and TF Contractors ensured that the soleplate was ready for the timber-frame.

Build-out
Prefabricated timber-frame construction is intended to reduce the number of interfaces and
extent of scope of works between trades onsite. However, attention should be paid to the
programming of onsite activities to fully capitalise on this benefit. To do so, build-out tasks
and activities need to be well defined to avoid trade overlap and unanticipated tasks that
create “pinch-points” in the project programme. Ongoing review of the project programme
should be supported by trade feedback and information technology to improve the
management of materials and resources.

Vignette 5: Unanticipated tasks and additional work

As mentioned in the previous vignettes, the short lead time for the timber-frame meant that
the developer had to issue the architects drawings for trades to tender from. At this point the
full scope of work packages was not fully defined having the most impact on the carpenters
whose workload on the site increased as unanticipated or unaccounted for tasks were
identified. These generally revolved around the specification of work packages and making
clear the distinction between what would be completed by the timber-frame team and what
would need to be completed onsite. In one example, the carpenter described the process they
had to go through to allow the plasterers to fire-line party walls:
[. . .] the timber-frame people hadn’t fire lined the gable wall in the loft. So we had to come in and
take a lot of the straps out and a lot of the timber out so that the tacker could get up, plasterboard
it, fire line it. And then we’ve had to go back and then put all the battens back and the bracing
back that was already done by the timber-frame, but I could see that as soon it was going up. I
wondered why they didn’t put and spandrel panels in that were lined at the time.
In a similar example the carpenter described how the stairs needed to be removed and
refitted to, again, allow for the plasterers to fire-line the walls. The reason this had to be done
was that the sequencing of trades followed that of a traditional brick and block build – first
fix services needed to be able to get up to the first and second floors before the plasterers
were scheduled to begin their work package. What this case study example illustrates is the
importance of recognising and understanding the effect of activities and decisions made
within previous phases. However, for a housebuilder using timber-frame for the first time
the cumulative impact of such issues can have an impact on the overall benefits that
supported the business case to build with timber-frame in the first instance.
CI Discussion and conclusion
19,2 The focus of this paper has been to present the process of creating an empirically informed
roadmap of supply chain integration suited to the context of small housebuilders, arguing
that scenario building should be contextualised and empirically informed. Within this paper,
we focussed on SMEs integrating through the construction of timber-frame houses as a
basis of contextualising the roadmap. In doing so, we connected current supply chain
208 dynamics across various aspects of construction with projections of what integration could
be in the future to open up tangible ways of increasing integration with suppliers of MMC.
In building on work concerning the capacity of small house-building firms to innovate
whereby challenges and opportunities are spread across project teams (Abbott et al., 2006;
Barrett and Sexton, 2006), and developments in approaches to road mapping that emphasise
the importance of context driven flexible scenario planning (Savioz and Blum, 2002), this
paper has demonstrated some of the potential benefits of creating roadmaps for small-
builders implementing MMC. This paper contributes to technology-roadmapping literature
and construction innovation literature by countering normative conceptions of
roadmapping with a “force of example” case and by putting forward possible ways – such
as axis of integration and stage-gate sandpits – that structured yet flexible approaches may
be operationalised. The sum of which provides a nuanced and theory-laden approach to
roadmapping supply chain integration for SME housebuilders adopting MMCs. This has
revealed forms of integration that a supply chain may target to modify technologies and
processes to suit particular contexts. In doing so, we have developed an approach based on
adaptability and flexibility to facilitate the creation of desired forms of integration based on
between project level objectives and firm capabilities to innovate.
The stage-gate sandpits gave the firms an opportunity to overcome obstacles relating to
the development – see substructure and foundation solution – and also a sounding board for
options to integrate further. Placing phases – such as the contradictory procurement
strategies in the business case – alongside other phases – such as the design process
conflict – helped to inform the team how adapting forms of integration in one phase has
consequences for others.
Having an axis on integration rather than fixed durations helped to reflect the innovation
characteristics of small firms, for example, in our case there was no prospect of the
housebuilder committing to build all subsequent developments with timber-frame; some
projects may be more appropriate than others to utilise timber-frame. Doing so takes into
serious consideration how integration happens and positions onsite implications alongside,
rather than separate to, capabilities. Illustrating what tasks are required, but also helping to
inform how particular processes of construction occur and are adapted across multiple
actors and firms; if small housebuilders are to take up MMCs, their dispersed supply chain
needs to be on board to contribute to the overall direction in which the firm is directed.
Furthermore, situating supply chain actors within the overall project context helped
them to understand some of the complexities of supply chain activities and, in some ways,
the extent of their jurisdiction and the implications of upstream and downstream activities.
This reflexivity was intrinsic to the roadmapping approach presented within this paper and
began to open up realistic avenues of integration. Adopting an open table approach to
roadmapping meant that scenarios were eradicated just as much as they were created, for
example, the discussions surrounding full-scale partnership as a procurement method. In
addition, foregrounding the dynamics involved when small-housebuilders take up MMC for
the first time focussed more attention on improvements to buildability rather than focussing
on the cost of integration. Explicitly engaging with the empirical findings gave the
housesbuilder a realistic expectation of how the implementation of MMCs occurs and that
directions of innovation are possible rather than whole-scale transitions. Therefore, it is MMC supply
hoped that these findings will inform consequent studies into both innovation and chain
approaches to integration within SMEs. Future research trajectories could involve
longitudinal studies over the course of a number of housing projects to analyse the impact of
this approach on both the uptake of MMCs and the impact of the routes to integration on
project success.
The flexible and adaptable approach taken to the roadmap allows the roadmap to be
customised to particular contexts. As such readers applying the approach to a different
209
geographical location – or context in general – will inevitably require activities in the
roadmap to be customised. The approach to roadmapping taken suggests a starting point
for further adaptation. Hence, the major limitation of the study – only focussing on one year
of integration between the firms – can be overcome through longer stretches of research that
follows how the firms continue to integrate. Further research could also compare results
with other case studies.

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Corresponding author
Ruth Dowsett can be contacted at: [email protected]

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