Committee: Handoffs to Construction

The Impact of Late Deliveries and Changes on Increased Project Costs... What Can Owners and Contractors Do To improve Results

Construction is dependent on engineering and suppliers for timely delivery of engineering drawings, specifications, process equipment and materials to meet the project targets objectives.  Unfortunately, on many projects, the actual experience is much worse than planned. It is common to experience:

• Engineering issue dates that are revised frequently and usually missed
• Engineering packages are frequently incomplete/lack adequate coordination or quality assurance
• Frequent engineering revisions and significant scope changes
• Key materials and process equipment are frequently received later than planned

Since construction completion dates are fixed, these delays and changes during construction result in significantly higher project costs for expedited delivery costs, lower productivity, overtime and rework.  In this committee, we will investigate the current state of project execution in the area of “Handoffs to Construction” including the actual experiences of CURT member companies on their recent projects for the following:

Actual vs. planned:

• Engineering issue dates
• Late changes in schedule commitments
• Material and process equipment deliveries
• Engineering revisions during contraction

Major causes of changes and delays:

• What is driving late issues and deliveries?
• Are there outside factors that are causing frequent issues?

Metrics:

• What are owners and contractors using to measure performance vs. schedule?
• What are the results of these measures on recent projects?
• How can owners and contractors use measures to drive improvement?

System Improvement opportunities:

• Will proposed process transformations (BIM, Lean, IPD, etc) impact future handoffs?
• Are there specific tools that could be used to improve the “Handoffs”?
• How should/will CURT incorporate handoffs into current or new initiatives?

CURT members are experts in executing capital projects and we are at our best when we are sharing our experiences and learning from each other. In this committee, CURT owners and contractors will share their experiences and opinions and will discuss alternate approaches for both individual project improvement and the potential for industry wide system improvements.

For committee participants, there will be significant opportunities to:

• Discuss and evaluate alternate approaches, share pluses and minuses
• Ask questions, get answers from others based on their experience
• Share experiences
• Collaborate on solutions
• Discuss needs and opportunities for future improvements