BEST VALUE Construction METRICS
Peter Cholakis
Improve facilities repair, renovation, maintenance, and new build outcomes and reduce costs
Best value construction metrics involve continuous assessment of team performance and improvement. Key areas monitored include the level of collaboration, timeline, costs and cost comparisons, specifications, satisfaction, and quality.
Best value construction requires the integration of planning, procurement, and project delivery people, processes, information, and technology. As such its important to monitor and continuous improve across all of these previously disparate domains. Integrated project delivery, IPD, for major new construction, and LEAN job order contracting, OpenJOC(TM), for repair, renovation, maintenance, and minor new construction are robust environments that support best value construction. Both of these enable organizations to transition from lack of productivity and positive outcomes due to issues with multidisciplinary teams and multi-functional task requirements to highly collaborative and coordinated outcome-focused systems. IPD and JOC promote the ability for people with diverse capabilities and backgrounds to collaborate and enhance overall performance and maximize goals attainment.
Best Value Construction delivery is dependent on collaboration and teamwork among all project participants. Poor collaboration is the most primary cause of construction project failure.
While all the requisite tools and services are readily available to support IPD, LEAN JOC, and best value construction delivery, the participants' ability to collaborate, and a real property owner's ability to lead and implement collaborative environments varies significantly. Currently less than five percent (5%) of owner's implement these proven tools, and fewer maximize their capabilities.
A collaborative team requires performance assessment and continuous improvement to remain effective. This includes regular independent third-party audits and well as initial and ongoing training, as well as real-time monitoring of key performance indicators (KPIs). A common data environment (CDE), inclusive of a locally researched detailed unit price book and supporting technology to assure full document management, inclusive of version control and change monitoring are also key components.
Tracking communication activities as well as workflows and associated phases is a central focus of best value construction performance monitoring. Collaborative construction planning, procurement, and project delivery environments include a multi-party contract and an Operations Manual/Execution Guide. All of the roles, responsibilities, documents, workflows, information architectures, and deliverables are clearly written. Performance metrics, therefore, are derived from these documents.
References:
El Asmar, Hanna, and Loh, 2013
Baiden and Price, 2011
Thomsen, 2009
AIA California Council, 2007
Gerschman and Schauder, 2006