IMPACT OF CONSTRUCTION PLANNING ON PROJECT DELIVERY TIME IN NIGERIA

The paper has already assessed the impact of construction planning on the project delivery time, and it also examined the causes of the delay factors and also proposed the possible viable solution, which could be employed to rectify the situation. The method of data collection was survey research design where the construction professionals in the construction firms of Ilorin, Kwara state were sampled to fill the structured questionnaires amounting to 80 construction professionals who responded out of 10 sampled construction firms in Ilorin, Kwara state. The findings summary indicate that there was a high consensus regarding the need to have construction planning because 53.75 per cent of the respondents identified it as very important, and 47.5 per cent of respondents indicated that this has very high influence on delay reduction. It was identified that the hierarchy of delay factors should be in the order that the delay problems that were found to be client oriented (late payments, mean score, =4.45) and design changes ( =4.40) were above inefficiencies of the internal contractor (poor scheduling, =4.34). Risk management (=4.33), resource leveling (=4.28), and proactive management strategies were the strategies that were regarded as the most effective ones, whereas the digital tools, including cloud-based platforms (=4.45) and BIM (=4.40) were referred to as highly helpful. The findings revealed that they agreed significantly on the need of construction planning to have the project delivered on time and proactive tools to be used including risk management and resource leveling were seen to be the most effective. The identified factors of delay identified during the analysis are client-related issues like late-payments and design alterations, material shortages and external economic pressures that are as significant as the contributors of the delay due to inefficiencies in contractors, but the poor internal scheduling and communication ones remain important contributors. Consequently, the study proposed institutionalization of active and responsive planning processes, implementation of cutting edge digital technology with the view to possessing greater incorporation and transparency like BIM and cloud-based applications, an effective communication and contract management processes with an aim of minimizing risks related to clients and specialized education on human resource with the view of developing capacity in new project management techniques thereby providing comprehensive guiding principle towards project construction project completion in Nigeria.