The UK Leads the Adoption of Lean Construction
November 12th, 2006 by HalLean construction is alive and well in the UK…it's even flourishing. Alan Mossman shared what has been going on in UK. He started this way:
- Badge engineering — renaming those things people are already doing so they don't have to change
- Lean and Mean — the iconic view of cost-cutting typified by Chainsaw Al
- Bidding is waste — the process of bringing together low-priced bids to build a team
- Collaborative procurement to produce a steady pipeline of work — this is the shining star of the UK conventional wisdom
- Procurement on quality and price criteria…sometimes on quality criteria alone — leading thinking on delivering client value
The UK government buys about 40% of all construction services and has been behind the drive for changes in the industry leading to the establishment of Constructing Excellence in the Built Environment.
The costs of doing business are 200 times the cost of construction.
The "lean consultants" in construction don't agree on what lean is. Critical Chain is called lean construction; lean manufacturing gets applied as lean construction; lean thinking and in some places LPS is used to describe lean construction.
A Lean Construction Delivery System is a corporate-oriented approach that starts at the top and leads to lean at the project level. It's an approach Alan says will work. Still, lean construction in the UK tends to be isolated interventions.
The industry formerly known as construction
Design costs typically run 10% of the cost of construction. Operating and maintenace costs 5 times construction while the costs of doing business are 200 times the cost of construction. Alan claims the design process isn't attending to producing business outcomes. The process needs to be turned around to pull design based on the outcomes that are desired from habitating the built environment.
Question
How is the current programming-oriented start of design like or not like pull?
Alan, "The current emphasis is on controlling the costs of design rather than attending to the outcomes."
Alan looked to the ceiling of the meeting room. He called attention to the incandescent lights. He said in the UK if we looked up all the lights would be CFLs. He asked, "Do we need more power plants or do we need light?" This question is at the heart of lean construction. Is there a way of developing the built environment that minimizes waste? That is what we call lean.
Related Posts
- Succeeding with a Lean Implementation Implementing lean in construction (or anywhere) has nothing to do with lean. It is about changing the business. Imp...
- Succeeding with Projects Requires a New Set of Skills Currently, people seem to not be ready to participate in lean construction environments. Catolica University, Santiag...
- How Do You Gauge Your Readiness for Lean Construction? Indonesian Contractors' Readiness towards Lean Construction Muhamad Abdu and Hengki a Roza (Muhamad made this pr...
- Business PLUS Design Design for design sake? Not according to BW Best Product Designs of 2005 nor bplusd. Jess McMullin writes, "Value-c...
- Lean Construction Congress 2006 Construction project management is changing. The Lean Construction Institute (LCI) is behind it. Each year LCI has a...
