International Journal of Sustainable Building Technology and Urban Development ISSN:2093-761X(Print) 2093-7628(Online)

This study proposes a data-driven competency framework and maturity model design for modular construction designers in the digital transformation era. Modular construction is increasingly positioned as a strategic response to low productivity, skilled labor shortages, housing supply pressure, and carbon-neutral construction demands. However, the competencies required of designers who must integrate architectural design, factory production, transportation, installation, BIM-based coordination, and digital construction technologies remain insufficiently structured. To address this gap, the study analyzed online job postings for modular, prefabricated, and off-site construction design roles. Data were collected from eight countries and 15 job platforms, resulting in 21,935 raw records. After text cleaning, duplicate removal, blacklist filtering, length filtering, and Hybrid Whitelist screening, 3,769 English postings were retained for BERTopic analysis. The model produced 37 topics and met the predefined validation criteria for topic coherence, diversity, topic count, and outlier ratio. Through pre-Ward noise removal, Ward hierarchical clustering, post-Ward refinement, merging, and semantic splitting, the study identified 17 competency domains, 43 competency categories, and 98 observable performance statements. A Korean job posting cross-validation further showed that 89.1% of 1,283 domestic postings could be mapped to the proposed domains, indicating broad contextual applicability while revealing Korea’s stronger emphasis on manufacturing and production competencies. Finally, the study proposes an exploratory five-tier priority structure and a five-level maturity model design that can support recruitment, training, self-assessment, and organizational competency development for modular construction designers, while acknowledging that expert-weighted validation remains a subsequent step.