Evaluating labour productivity and profitability in precast concrete manufacturing

Purpose Off-site construction (OSC) methods are proposed as a viable improvement to traditional construction with the potential to deliver higher quality products, faster construction times, and reduced project costs. This study aims to provide an insight into the precast concrete manufacturing process (PMP) and the possibility to improve productivity and increase viability of its adoption through realizing its potential benefits. Design/methodology/approach We collected empirical data from a medium sized Australian precast concrete company and analysed using a system dynamics (SD) modelling approach. The labour productivity and profitability were simulated for different sensitivity scenarios across five (5) main PMP activities: reinforcement, formwork, concreting, finishing, and crane operation. Findings The results revealed the main bottleneck activity hindering the productivity of PMP as reinforcement. Overtime allocation was identified as the most economical solution compared to increasing the crew size, for a potential fast-tracking scenario. Higher profitability can be achieved by significantly increasing the production throughput by at least 40% as sunk costs are better distributed. Originality/value Limited research exists quantifying actual data from industry for labour productivity measurement, and cost investigations, especially for the PMP for concrete products. This paper fulfils this gap through the proposed flexible and robust SD models tested using empirical data.