2025 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition

Automation has been playing an increasingly important role in the manufacturing sector for decades, to the point where it is now impossible to imagine that a robot-less manufacturing facility could even exist. As a matter of fact, automation has not been limited to manufacturing but has touched almost every sector of the global industry, including agriculture, pharmaceutical facilities, sorting facilities, and many others. In construction, automation is being heavily used in fabrication facilities such as structural steel fabrication shops and plants that produce prefabricated and precast building components. At the same time, there seems to be a serious effort being expended to adjust construction means and methods to make them more prone to automation. With an expected shortage in skilled labor that can be crippling, automation may become more and more of a necessity in many sectors of the construction industry. The objective of this paper is to examine the state-of-the-art in construction automation, investigate the need for incorporating automation in construction management and related programs, and develop a methodology by which automation can be gradually incorporated in these programs to prepare future professionals for better serving an increasingly automated industry. This study utilizes a design science research methodology to generate new insights about the applicability of automation in construction curricula. The findings of this study are expected to support the construction workforce development in preparation for an expected increase in the adoption of automation in the construction industry.