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Journal of Construction Engineering and Management. Submitted February 24, 2010; accepted February 8, 2011;
posted ahead of print February 10, 2011. doi:10.1061/(ASCE)CO.1943-7862.0000369

Evaluating the Knowledge Management Practices of Construction
Firms Using Importance-Comparative Performance Analysis Maps
By Serdar Kale1 and Erkan A. Karaman2

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ABSTRACT: The emergence of theeffective management of knowledge resources as a

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key factor in gaining and sustaining competitive advantage presents new challenges to

construction firms. Evaluating knowledge management practices is considered one of the

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most important challenges facing firms in today’s business environment. This paper

proposes a model forevaluating the knowledge management practices of construction
firms. The proposed model incorporates knowledge management concepts and multilayer perceptron (MLP) neural networks to construct an importance - comparative
performance analysis (ICPA) map, a simple visual tool that can provide powerful
diagnostic information to executives of construction firms. The model evaluates a firm’s
knowledgemanagement practices, identifies its competitive advantages and

disadvantages in each knowledge management practice, and sets priorities for managerial
actions to improve knowledge management practices. A real-world case study was
conducted by administering a survey to 105 construction firm operating in Turkey and is
presented to illustrate the implementation and utility of the proposed model.The case
study findings provided preliminary support for the validity of the proposed model.
CE Database Subject Headings: Organizations, knowledge management, construction
industry, artificial neural networks, performance, construction firm.

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Assoc. Prof., Izmir Institute of Technology, Dept. of Arch., 35430, Izmir, Turkey, e-mail :serdarkale@iyte.edu.tr
Res., Asst. Balikesir Univ.,Dept. of Civ. Engrg., 10145, Balıkesir, Turkey,e-mail:eakaraman@balikesir.edu.tr

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Copyright 2011 by the American Society of Civil Engineers

Journal of Construction Engineering and Management. Submitted February 24, 2010; accepted February 8, 2011;
posted ahead of print February 10, 2011. doi:10.1061/(ASCE)CO.1943-7862.0000369

INTRODUCTION
The knowledge-based view of the firm(Spender 1996; Grant 1996) constitutes the latest
milestone in the evolution of the concept of competitive advantage. It proposes that
gaining and sustaining competitive advantage in today’s business environment depends

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significantly on knowledge resources. Managing knowledge resources presents new
challenges to the firms regardless of their size, type, or industry. One of these newAc
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challenges is evaluating firms’ knowledge management practices, which is considered an
essential and inseparable part of managing knowledge resources (Marr and Spender
2004). Several research studies (e.g., Hsieh et al. 2009; Wen 2009) have proposed a
number of performance measurement models to evaluate firms’ knowledge managementpractices.

The research presented in this paper proposes a simple but powerful performance

measurement model to evaluate knowledge management practices in construction firms
(Figure 1). The proposed framework differs from previously proposed models on three
counts. First, it includes the competitive perspective in performance evaluation. A
succinct review of performance measurement models (e.g.,Kululanga and McCaffer
2001; Arif et al. 2009) developed to evaluate the knowledge management practices of
construction firms reveals that the competitive environment in which construction firms
operate was almost always ignored in formulating these models. This exclusion is one of
the major limitations of performance evaluation models of knowledge management
practices in construction...