Developers, both private and government, always want their construction projects: finished on time; completed within the approved budget; done in accordance with the specifications; conducted with utmost safety measures so that no accidents arise out of the project during construction and even long after it has been completed.

Unfortunately, these expectations and aspirations are seldom, if at all, met concurrently. Either the project is finished way beyond schedule, over-budget, substandard, unsafe, or all, or some of the above.

Developers must work only with industry players who have a reputation for integrity and who will never stand for corruption.

I’ve been a construction manager for more than 16 years and personally witnessed more than 100 projects from start to completion. Despite that attention, mistakes do occasionally pop up. Admittedly, I have had my share of mistakes. Construction is a never-ending learning process. Not a day goes by that no mistake needs to be solved, whether big or small. Mistakes are inevitable; but the learnings that can be derived from these mistakes are invaluable. We take it as an opportunity to make our processes and even ourselves better, so we mitigate, or totally avoid the chances of it being unnecessarily repeated.

There are however two apparent causes why mistakes happen in a construction project. One is where a mistake is caused by deficiency in the process or standard procedure, or failure to follow the said procedure due to unavoidable or unexpected reasons. For these types of mistake, focusing on improving your processes and standard procedures, and making this desire to continue to improve a constant habit, helps eliminate the glitches and avoid these kinds of mistakes, although this may be easier said than done.

The other reason is that a mistake happens because someone intentionally lets it happen due to selfish interests. Sadly, a recurring cause of many of the mistakes in a construction project is caused by corruption — or the selfish desire to protect one’s own interests. Corruption is as much a cancer to the construction industry as it is to society.

Corruption in construction occurs when substandard materials are allowed to be used and short cuts in construction methodology are tolerated in exchange for something or to simply favor a select few. The interests of the developer, the end user, and ultimately the public are compromised. Checks and balances disappear and consequently, the quality of the finished product suffers. A chain reaction then happens. If noticed, the flaws have to be redone or rebuilt and they become a cause for delay. The reputation of the developer suffers as the promised date of turnover to the end user is pushed back. In fact, in some cases, the effect of having a project with poor or substandard quality is not only delays, but it could also result into fatal consequences.

Corruption in construction occurs when substandard materials are allowed to be used and short cuts in construction methodology are tolerated in exchange for something or to simply favor a select few.

Several investigations on allegedly overpriced and substandard construction projects have been made before. We get to read about it in newspaper reports and we see it on TV. Many of these inquiries tend to get nowhere because they never get to find the root cause. Sadly, the investigations are conducted by people who lack the expertise in engineering and construction.

Developers must work only with industry players who have a reputation for integrity and who will never stand for corruption. It’s the only way to come up with an excellent product because consenting to corruption is equivalent to sanctioning a project that is inferior in quality.