Samenvatting

Synopsis
 
Purpose: The purpose of this study is to explore which factors contribute to accelerating the matching process in demand and supply of suitable housing for the elderly in the Netherlands.
 
Design/Methodology/Approach: This research provides knowledge on the aspects related to cooperation and required skills for cooperation between stakeholders in the building process to meet the demand for suitable housing for the elderly. This study is explorative and is classified as a single embedded case study. For this research purposive sampling and a qualitative approach have been used. In total, 10 interviews were conducted with representatives from multiple stakeholder groups.
 
Findings: Both aspects related to cooperation and skills required for cooperation in building projects are closely intertwined and can have both a positive and a negative effect on the duration of the building process. The best result, i.e. the shortest duration of the building process, can be achieved by thoughtful considering both aspects and skills in all phases of the building process. Also, some cooperation aspects and skills are more relevant to certain stages of the project.
 
Research limitations: This research is limited to the housing sector for the elderly in a few Dutch regions. Semi-structured interviews were held based on the aspects related to cooperation found in the literature. Additional information on skills, based on the literature, was gathered separately from the same group of interviewees. Some groups of stakeholders were represented by only one interviewee. A small selection of the literature available on cooperation was studied.
 
Originality/Value: Literature shows that both cooperation aspects and skills related to cooperation can enhance or delay a project’s progress, which was also found in practice. In addition, the aspects and skills can mutually influence each other leading to progress or stagnation in processes, which is congruent with the literature studied. Some combinations of skills and aspects seem to be more relevant in certain contexts and stages of the building process than others. As the demand for adapted houses for the elderly is rapidly increasing in the Netherlands, knowledge of influencing factors and skills related to cooperation and especially the linkage between these factors and skills in the housing business is useful.
 
Keywords: aspects of cooperation, skills related to cooperation, Dutch social housing for the elderly, acceleration factors, delay factors.
 
Type of paper: Master thesis.