The Indiana Hoosiers, led by Curt Cignetti, were transformed from being the most unsuccessful college football program in history to becoming undefeated national champions - in just two years. It was amazing to witness the excellence in execution—a true work of art—as powerhouses like Oregon and Alabama were routed.
Imagine, however, if Fernado Mendoza and the rest of the Indiana football team had never met before being assembled at random, and then given only a week to draw up and practice some plays before the big game. The same great players playing the same great game, with vastly different outcomes. Yet, this is an apt analogy of the planning, design, and construction process.
The Hoosier's story gives me renewed hope that construction’s long, steady decline can be as rapidly transformed. All it takes is for leaders among owners, advisers, designers, and builders to capture the vision, and care about our industry’s and nations’ future.
Today's hospital construction cost crisis sets the stage for identifying and eradicating tens to hundreds of millions of dollars in non-value-added waste.
Today, there are dozens of hospital expansions or new builds in the planning and early design stages that are ideal candidates for turn around. We just need a team of motivated leaders willing to give it a try.
This is the fourth in a series of articles presenting the problem and a proposed road map for the Construction as a System alternative to our industry's broken, stagnated state.The first three articles provide essential background:
Construction as a System envisions a high-production, high-performance, noble American construction industry that seriously attacks the waste and stagnation problem.
We have a tried-and-true road to take—W. Edwards Deming's System of Profound Knowledge, which he used to lead the transformation of manufacturing.
This Deming-based road, combined with today’s data processing and complexity science capabilities, sets the stage to end our fragmented and severely stagnated state.
Based on my 32-year journey of studying and advocating for Deming's System of Profound Knowledge, I discovered that every philosophical and practical principle that Deming espoused for manufacturing also applies to building planning, design, and construction.
That journey led me to co-found Building CATALYST as construction’s first knowledge system or what we refer to as an Intelligent Automation System (IAS). Based on Dr. Deming's work IAS essentially provided the complexity science and multivariate analysis (MVA) capabilities needed for construction to embrace profound knowledge and excellence in execution.
As a result, the leaders and innovators now can methodically embrace integration, automation, and excellence in execution. Since it can then it should reform.This reform begins with the inception of a building need and continues through owner occupancy. The owner, and every team member is lifted into a new realm of knowledge, effectiveness and efficiency.
A Case for Trying out Construction as a System
Granted, the thought of reforming construction is overwhelming . Overhaul everything? Who has time to take this on?
But as you shall see, the opportunity to reap the immediate benefit of profound knowledge and actionable corrective measures is available.
The following list of bullet points makes the case for implementing the Construction as a System alternative on a project that is still in the planning or early design stages:
Furthermore, Deming's promise of a win-win business outcome for all parties involved should be convincing enough to give Construction as a System a try.
How to Get Started
Again, any hospital expansion or new build currently in planning or early design presents the ideal setting to pilot and implement Construction as a System. The full-orbed Intelligent Automation System (IAS) is in place to analyze the current program, design, and budget and then prepare a strategic plan to remove layers of non-value-added waste in time and cost.
All that's needed is an owner and team willing to adopt a Value-based Contracting System (VCS), as seen in Figure 1.
Deming promises a win-win, return-on-effort outcome, as well as the privilege to pursue excellence in execution across the team.
Evaluating the Construction as a System risk and reward alternative couldn’t be easier. There is no risk, and the reward potential is substantial. That’s because Building CATALYST will provide a free project analysis and evaluation based on the key information available against market baselines and benchmarks, as applicable. This will include:
CATALYST will then present a comprehensive CaaS strategy, investment proposal, and ROI plan for piloting and implementation.
To learn more or sign up for the free project analysis, visit www.buildingcatalyst.com
The Bigger Picture
Construction as a System vision is implemented in five stages, integrating intelligent automation and execution excellence throughout the trades and across the total project development, ultimately optimizing the total building life cycle and total cost of ownership (TCO). Our next article, Construction as a System – The Five Stages describes what a full-orbed construction reform future looks like.
Deming’s admonishment to American management philosophy is that, “A change in philosophy requires unlearning industrial thinking evident in departmentalization, scarcity of knowledge and information competitiveness."
With that mindset and a desire to see construction transformed, Building CATALYST welcomes other competing businesses to collaborate on the development of data standards and structures, as well as process improvement.
We have no secrets (apart from our customers' data, of course) and are eager to share what we've learned and built. Just visit www.buildingcatalyst.com to learn more.