{"id":263824,"date":"2026-02-02T12:05:20","date_gmt":"2026-02-02T12:05:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/263824\/"},"modified":"2026-02-02T12:05:20","modified_gmt":"2026-02-02T12:05:20","slug":"how-to-fix-the-build-now-fix-later-culture","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/263824\/","title":{"rendered":"How to fix the ‘build now, fix later’ culture"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Mark Kirby* of \"The<\/a><\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n

\"No<\/p>\n

\nIf a builder spends 10 hours rectifying avoidable mistakes their productivity for the day is effectively zero.
\nPhoto: 123RF\n<\/p>\n

Analysis – New Zealand’s residential construction industry contributes roughly NZ$26b<\/a> annually to the economy and employs around 70,000 workers<\/a>. Yet despite its significance and scale, the sector’s productivity levels have flatlined since the mid-1980s<\/a>.<\/p>\n

In housing construction, “productivity” isn’t a simple measure of output per worker; it refers to the industry’s ability to deliver the right quantity of high-quality homes without significant delays or flaws.<\/p>\n

If a builder spends 10 hours rectifying avoidable mistakes<\/a>, for instance, their productivity for the day is effectively zero. And this has become all too common within the sector.<\/p>\n

A 2014 study<\/a> by the Building Research Association of New Zealand (BRANZ) confirms 92 percent of new houses surveyed had compliance defects.<\/p>\n

Subsequent analysis carried out for BRANZ by the New Zealand Institute for Economic Research estimated the annual cost<\/a> of defective building to the overall economy: “The results show that economy-wide effects of an increase in productivity would see New Zealand’s GDP rise by $2.5b, as the industry’s overall costs of production decrease.”<\/p>\n

That means nearly 10 percent of the sector’s total value is lost to systemic quality failure. Based on the average construction cost of an Auckland house<\/a>, that loss represents around 5000 missing homes every year.<\/p>\n

Recognising the productivity problem, the government last year introduced major reforms<\/a> aimed at speeding up consent processes and allocating financial liability for defective buildings to those responsible.<\/p>\n

But while poor productivity is often blamed on procurement methods, technology or labour, our research suggests better quality management is key<\/a> to remedying the industry’s “build now, fix later” culture.<\/p>\n

Commercial viability before quality control<\/p>\n

We surveyed the views of 106 residential construction professionals, including general managers, construction managers, site managers, project managers and subcontractors.<\/p>\n

They were asked about the influence of quality management on improving residential construction productivity, and about the effects of government policy. The views expressed suggested a culture prioritising time and cost over quality is a systemic norm at the industry level.<\/p>\n

We then traced the industry’s problems back to the major policy shifts that began in the mid-1980s. Before then, building quality was anchored in the percent7E:text=In %201936 %20the %20Standards %20Institution,construction %20and %20means %20of %20egress prescriptive standards<\/a> set by the percent7E:text=The %20organisation %20took %20seriously %20its,sites %20at %20many %20different %20scales Ministry of Works<\/a>.<\/p>\n

By specifying how to build, the ministry acted as a national governor of technical standards. But by 1988, those standards were viewed as a barrier to efficient market operation, effectively ending the era of the state as master builder.<\/p>\n

The New Zealand Building Code<\/a> subsequently replaced the previous prescriptive system with a performance-based model focused solely on outcomes.<\/p>\n

Without strict procedural guidance, the industry moved towards a culture that prioritised speed and commercial viability over rigorous quality management.<\/p>\n

\"no<\/p>\n

\nFile photo.
\nPhoto: 123RF\n<\/p>\n

A ‘tick-box’ culture<\/p>\n

To understand why industry performance stalled, we refer to what’s called the “theory of constraints<\/a>“, which argues a system is only as strong as its weakest link.<\/p>\n

In New Zealand’s residential construction sector, we argue, the weakest link<\/a> is not just poor quality control but the absence of a quality-focused culture in general.<\/p>\n

The 1980s shift to a hands-off, self-regulated model helped foster a “tick-box” culture rather than genuine organisational reform. This has meant that with every step forward, the industry is pulled back by the need to fix previous errors, stalling productivity.<\/p>\n

On the building site, this manifested as a disconnect<\/a> between the “work as imagined” (the manuals and checklists from head office) and the “work as done” by builders and subcontractors.<\/p>\n

The worst outcomes are well known. New Zealand is still paying for the nearly $47b legacy of the leaky homes crisis<\/a>, which peaked in the early 2000s. Poor quality, damp and mouldy housing<\/a> contributes to respiratory illnesses<\/a> costing $145 million<\/a> annually in hospitalisations.<\/p>\n

While policies such as the healthy homes standards<\/a> for rental properties now exist, such measures mainly treat the symptoms of a deeper problem.<\/p>\n

In Auckland alone, one-third of all projects fail<\/a> their final inspection. The high volume of remedial work<\/a> required chokes the entire system’s throughput.<\/p>\n

The government must lead<\/p>\n

Fixing an annual $2.5b problem requires a structural shift. Our research proposes a framework<\/a> where the state, as the primary funder and driver of major construction, sets the standard the rest of the industry must adopt.<\/p>\n

\"Building<\/p>\n

\nConstruction Minister Chris Penk.
\nPhoto: Marika Khabazi \/ RNZ\n<\/p>\n

The proposed framework is underpinned by “lean principles<\/a>” designed to minimise waste and encourage continuous improvement through a “plan-do-check-act<\/a>” cycle. It uses the ISO 9000 standards<\/a> New Zealand already has in place for exports.<\/p>\n

To help achieve this, we argue the government would need to do two things.<\/p>\n

Establish a national construction, productivity and quality commission. This would be a nonpartisan body staffed by industry and academic experts to ensure reform survives beyond three-year election cycles.<\/p>\n

Mandate quality management systems that align with existing ISO 9000 standards for all government-funded residential projects.<\/p>\n

The aim is to create a trickle-down effect, driving culture change throughout the industry. To win stable government contracts, subcontractors would be forced to up-skill and formalise standards-based oversight of their work.<\/p>\n

Improved quality and productivity should not be aspirational. New Zealand has 2.5 billion reasons to create the genuine structural reform required.<\/p>\n

The author acknowledges the contributions of Senior Lecturer Funmilayo Ebun Rotimi<\/a> and Associate Professor Nicola Naismith<\/a> of AUT to the research described in this article.<\/p>\n

* Mark Kirby is a Construction Industry Consultant, Auckland University of Technology.<\/p>\n

– This story<\/a> originally appeared on The Conversation.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"By Mark Kirby* of If a builder spends 10 hours rectifying avoidable mistakes their productivity for the day…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":263825,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[48,47,111,43,139,69,49,46,44,45],"class_list":{"0":"post-263824","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-new-zealand","8":"tag-audio","9":"tag-current-affairs","10":"tag-new-zealand","11":"tag-news","12":"tag-newzealand","13":"tag-nz","14":"tag-podcasts","15":"tag-public-radio","16":"tag-radio-new-zealand","17":"tag-rnz"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/263824","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=263824"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/263824\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/263825"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=263824"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=263824"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=263824"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}