Procurement
Procurement describes the merging of activities undertaken by the client to obtain a building. There are many different methods of construction procurement; however the three most common types of procurement are:
- Traditional (Design-bid-build)
- Design and Build
- Management Contracting
There is also a growing number of new forms of procurement that involve relationship contracting where the emphasis is on a co-operative relationship between the principal and contractor and other stakeholders within a construction project. New forms include partnering such as Public-Private Partnering (PPPs) aka Private Finance Initiatives (PFIs) and alliances such as "pure" or "project" alliances and "impure" or "strategic" alliances. The focus on co-operation is to ameliorate the many problems that arise from the often highly competitive and adversarial practices within the construction industry.