Innovation in the construction industry: Curiosity as a competitive edge

Planning & Construction News The greatest barrier to innovation in the construction industry today is not technology or cost, but mindset, argues Andrew Fettes-Brown of Rider Levett Bucknall The built environment has never operated in isolation but today that truth feels sharper than ever. As an industry, we are being asked to decarbonise, digitise, deliver affordability and create places that genuinely serve communities. None of those challenges can be solved by looking inward. Instead of narrowing the lens and relying on precedent, we need to widen it. While much focus has been put on technology and cost as barriers to solving construction’s challenges, what if the biggest problem standing in our way is mindset? We launched RLB’s Curious Conversations podcast to ask this exact question. Talking to voices from the built environment, as well as beyond construction, including those from communications, fashion and entrepreneurship backgrounds, we explored whether curiosity and creativity empower innovation in today’s working world. Linear learning leaves little time to explore, experiment and think differently We are encouraged to be curious from a young age, with parents marvelling at children’s inquisitiveness and their joy of getting it wrong, to be able to learn from their mistakes. However, from secondary school onwards, we are often caught in the learning cycle of having to get it right, to pass exams and progress in a linear route that often doesn’t allow us to explo...