and subcontracts are tracked and measured against the estimates. The fundamental goal is to maintain costs within or below budget parameters. The construction manager who can minimize cost while maximizing overall value to the owner will optimize the cost dial.
Time As the saying goes, time is money. For many projects, the speed with which the building can be brought on line is more important than almost any other factor. Time is monitored and controlled by a detailed schedule, breaking each item of work down into its component parts. Once all of the purchasing, fabrication, installation, and construction steps are identified, a time element is assigned to each step. The goal is to complete each of the work items within the time frame assigned.The construction management team that can guarantee the schedule and actually beat it is invaluable to the owner.
Quality Quality is the grab bag that covers all the aspects of the building not addressed by the other five values, such as aesthetic impact, user perceptions, appropriateness of building materials, and so on. Quality is monitored and controlled by a variety of means, including specifications, punch lists, inspections, tests, and user surveys. Special care must be taken to establish appropriate measures early in the project to focus attention and effort on the quality expectations of the team.
Safety No matter how valuable a facility or structure may be, it is never more valuable than the health and welfare of the people who build and use the building. Care must always be taken to ensure that the building process and the building itself do not create unacceptable hazards to workers or users. These hazards range from risks during the building process (for example, falls, accidents, injury, and death) to risks from the completed buildings (for example, toxic gases, biohazards, and structural failure). Safety is best monitored and controlled proactively by identifying potential risks and taking prudent steps to mitigate those risks.
Scope Scope is monitored and controlled by means of an architectural program, which identifies the space needs and tracks compliance of the building design with those needs. An optimal scope outcome would match the enduser's needs to the facility design over the life of the building with no gaps in between. The ultimate goal is high end-user satisfaction.
Function The best project teams try to meet all of the functional requirements of the end-user group. An optimal outcome would satisfy their short- and long-term needs, allowing for sufficient flexibility to adapt to changes in the market. Function is monitored and controlled by means of process flow diagrams and utilization analyses, which document the efficiency of the processes that will be performed in the completed facility.
Keep in mind that these dials are all interconnected and that adjusting one will ultimately cause a change in the others. For example, if an owner requests that we crank up the time dial and complete the project earlier than we had contracted to do initially, then it is likely that the cost dial will also be turned up. Likewise, if an owner increases the project scope, then both the time and the cost dials will be turned up. So, the job of the construction management team is to figure out how to best adjust, manage, and monitor these dials in order to optimize the performance of each value relative to the owner's requests. Throughout this book, I will focus on just how to do that for cost, time, quality, and safety.
The Owner Sets the Stage
Without project owners there are no projects. Every construction project starts with an owner who has a need for new, improved, or expanded facilities to serve their purpose. The purpose might be personal, such as a growing family that requires a bigger home with an additional bedroom or two. Or the purpose might be associated with a business endeavor that requires a manufacturing facility or an office complex. Then again, the purpose might be directed at serving the public such as the construction of a new railway station or a new high school. Whatever the purpose, the owner's needs must be articulated and defined in terms of the project values discussed in the previous section along with a description of the various architectural requirements and features necessary to meet those needs. Although this task, referred to as architectural programming, is the owner's responsibility, the owner often solicits the services of architects or other programming specialists to collect end-user information and conduct the research needed to develop it. The architectural program establishes the parameters for the design of the project and ultimately sets the stage for developing the scope of work that the contractor will be responsible for delivering.
architectural programming
The research and decision-making process, initiated by an owner, usually with the help of an architect or other programming specialist, that identifies the basic needs of the client and the parameters of the project to be designed and ultimately built by a construction professional.
scope of work
The parameters defining the overall extent of work to be included in a construction contract. The project scope is commonly communicated through construction plans and written specifications.
For building projects, at a minimum the architectural program typically includes information relating to the following:
The building site and any known constraints or challenges associated with it
The building's primary function and what is required in terms of square footage to meet the intended function
The types of spaces that will be required, their adjacency to each other, and how they will be used
Who will be using the spaces and what types of activities they will engage in
The mechanical and electrical needs of the facility
Aesthetics and architectural image
Any unique or special requirements associated with the project
NOTE
As used throughout this book, the term owner has broad meaning. It generally implies the party responsible for financing the project. Therefore, in most cases, the term client could be substituted. However, in many instances, the term owner can also be construed to mean the enduser who ultimately uses the space. The term owner can also apply to the various stakeholders who may not have financed the project or use it directly but who have an interest in it. For example, in terms of a public school project, the owner responsible for financing the project would be the school district. At the same time, a teacher or student would be an enduser, and parents would definitely be classified as stakeholders. So, as a construction manager responsible for satisfying the “owner's” needs, it is important to understand exactly how deep that responsibly goes.
The reason the programming stage is so critical is because the program establishes the basis for the project scope.
Scope Definition
The architectural program provides the basis of the design, and the design directs the construction. In other words, the building details described in the design define the limits or scope of work to be performed by the contractor.
The scope of work sets the parameters for the construction project and identifies the work to be done. Generally, the scope of work is presented in the plans or “blueprints” (so called because of the blueprint machines once used to reproduce them as white lines on blue paper) and in the written specifications, all of which are developed by the designer. The scope describes
