Abstract
Aim: Work safety and health protection at construction sites (WSHP) depends on many factors. They are varied and difficult to identify, as they vary between the applied technologies, and the organisation and methods of work.. This paper aims to familiarise the readers with the rules of applying multi-criteria analysis in construction as exemplified by the DEMATEL method, which is designed to diagnose the state of work safety and health protection.
Project and methods: This paper is based on research literature and the author’s own knowledge and research findings. In order to determine the direct relationships between the factors affecting work safety and health protection in terms of cause and effect, the paper uses the results of National Science Centre research project, N N115 347038 (2010-2013), involving a survey conducted among construction managers, on “The identification of the state of work safety and health protection within Poland’s construction industry following entry into the EU and the design of an WSHP management model meeting the European qualitative, environmental, ergonomics and labour protection criteria”. They served as the basis for the use of the DEMATEL method.
Results: There are many ways to identify factors that affect the level of work safety and health protection. The paper proposes the use of the DEMATEL method, employed extensively for solving complex problems, including in the construction industry. The use of the DEMATEL method to identify factors affecting the level of work safety and health protection at construction sites and to determine the causal relationship has made it possible to create a map of significance (relations) that can be used to determine which factors were dominant and required special focus when performing further action.
Conclusions: Many factors occur during the construction process which may pose a threat to the health and even life of the construction workers. These can be identified, for instance, by questionnaire surveys or expert knowledge. This should be followed by operational research methods, which, via set criteria and applied mathematical models, enable the evaluation of decisions so as to ascertain the optimum decision
Keywords: construction site, work safety and health protection, multi-criteria analysis
Type of article: original scientific article