Purpose In recent years, China is exerting effort to improve the performance effectiveness of its construction industry. This paper aims to report a preliminary study on organisational culture of five selected construction enterprises from different geographical locations in China and to discuss a framework for developing effectiveness measurement criteria for Chinese construction enterprises. Design/methodology/approach The research approach focuses on the culture profiles of the selected enterprises which have similar size, number of employees, general reputation (in terms of quality of construction), business type (building works) and tax bracket. The measuring instrument of organisational culture is adopted from previous tested research. Findings It is found that the hierarchy culture is dominant in four cases; Shantou in the Special Economic Zone is the exception. The Shantou enterprise has a market culture and Shantou was one of the first regions to embark on economic reform. Further analysis is required of the spread of the culture profiles in terms of geopraphcial regions and developmental stages of the construction enterprises in China. Originality/value The result of the five case studies is indicative of the presence of the dichotomy in hierarchy – market culture dominance. Evaluation of operational effectiveness of such organisations must depend on their developmental stages in line with their stated objectives, and a framework for effectiveness measurement is proposed.
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