Purpose – Improving construction supply chain collaboration and performance is central for achieving short-term business objectives as well as long-term competitive advantage. Lean thinking is an approach that has been adopted in many different industrial settings as a means for improving supply chain performance. In the project-based construction industry, lean thinking has, however, not yet been widely adopted. The purpose of this paper is to increase the understanding of how various aspects of lean thinking can be implemented in a construction project and how they affect supply chain actors and their performance. Design/methodology/approach – Action research was performed in a case study of a lean construction pilot project. Empirical data were collected through three surveys and follow-up workshops, document studies, and interviews of 12 project participants. Findings – The findings show that many of the lean-related aspects identified in the literature review were utilized in the pilot project. These aspects have mostly focused on increasing the cooperation among supply chain actors, for which reason the pilot project is very similar to a partnering project. Hence, much work remains in order to obtain full-fledged lean construction, but the pilot project may serve as a starting point for continuous improvements and development of lean construction in future projects. Research limitations/implications – The research results are based on one empirical case study for which reasonable generalisations could be made, albeit cautiously. Practical implications – The frame of reference can serve as an illustration of important aspects and core elements of lean construction and the case study findings show how various lean related aspects can be implemented and how they affect supply chain actors and their performance in a construction project context. Originality/value – The action research approach based on both qualitative and quantitative data collection in a lean construction pilot project provides a valuable opportunity to study both the process of implementing lean construction and its outcomes.

Although the interest of partnering and supply chain integration (SCI) has increased in various industries, there is still a lack of comprehensive conceptual and practical frameworks that enable both a detailed and systemic understanding of integration in project-based supply chains. In this paper a theoretical framework is developed, based on general SCI literature, but adapted to a project-based context. Integration in project-based supply chains is a multi-dimensional construct, including the four dimensions strength, scope, duration, and depth of integration. Empirical findings from a multiple case study of four engineering projects indicate that these four dimensions are critical when conceptualizing and implementing partnering in engineering projects. The results show that there are strong interdependencies among the four dimensions, suggesting that it is crucial to manage them simultaneously and systemically rather than in isolation. Consequently, it is not enough to decide on the extent to which suitable integrative activities and technologies should be implemented to strengthen integration in project-based supply chains. The integrative activities and technologies must also be implemented together with the right companies (scope), at the right time (duration), and with the right people in the companies (depth)

Client-contractor relationships are often criticized for being competitive and adversarial, rather than cooperative. The main purpose of this paper is to examine how construction clients’ procurement procedures affect the balance between cooperation and competition (i.e., coopetition) in client-contractor relationships. The empirical results, based on a survey to 87 Swedish construction clients, show that clients’ procurement procedures facilitate a focus on competition. It was also found that clients’ earlier experience of a certain procedure heavily affects their procurement choices, thereby preserving old behaviors. Although two-thirds of the clients wish to increase cooperation with contractors, this does not affect their procurement decisions. This study therefore concludes that the theoretical framework, based on transaction cost economics, is correct in prescribing more cooperation than is empirically observed in the construction sector. The theoretical framework can increase clients’ awareness of how procurement affects cooperation and competition, thereby serving as a basis for more unbiased and systematic procurement decisions, facilitating cooperation-based coopetition.