John Rapaport, with John Lord, David Scognamiglio, and Jeremy Moskowitz

Component Assembly Systems, Inc./Component West

25th October 2017

Rapaport: First, what you're doing is important. What's going on doesn't get out there – the reality of it. The sub's perspective. The fact that you care and are writing about it matters.

“To us ‘design’ means: how are we going to accomplish that with the systems we're installing?”

Can we start with a little company background?

Rapaport: We are specialty contractors: walls, ceilings, carpenters, tapers, and related subtrades. David was a carpenter in the field and now runs the West Coast. So, he's seen it and can describe what we do better than anybody. Component Assembly Systems is a 54-year-old company. We started doing carpentry then changed the name in the late 1960s to reflect a broader scope. Now it's come full circle. Dad is still the CEO. He loves technology and we have seven offices in the U.S. We're working nationally. John Lord came in the early 1990s and started to digitize our processes. We took estimating onscreen, did our own software and acquired a company called C/F Data Systems for accounting. We got into it, and it helped us drive revenues and clarity. David can expand.

Scognamiglio: We're a carpentry trade contractor. Not strictly interiors. We do exterior framing as well. In different areas of the country we do different scopes of work. In New York we do millwork and acoustic ceilings in addition to framing, drywall and finishing. On the West Coast, we're doing primarily interior carpentry and exterior skin. As a 54-year-old company, the trick is: How do you teach an old dog new tricks? That's what we face as a carpentry-trade subcontractor. A lot of our workforce is mature, so they're used to traditional building methods. Not just for our company, but for many we deal with. You have the traditional folks and this technology wave. That's the biggest challenge we face, internally and externally, with other trade and general contractors.

I want to get a perspective of life from your point of view: a subcontractor trying to manage design. As an architect, I learned to rely on people like you because I didn't know what I was doing. I needed your expertise.

Scognamiglio: Right. But we have to ask: what do we mean when we say “design”? As an architect, you're going to come up with an aesthetic, a shape, or an effect you're looking for. But to us, “design” means: how are we going to accomplish that with the systems we're installing? How can we meet your objectives? So, for us, “design” is the fire rating, the acoustical systems, the details, implementation – all the things we're installing to meet your objectives.

A recurring theme. Design has many meanings to different audiences.

Lord: Design professionals aren't exploring all the available opportunities. We get the job. We come up with our means and methods to put in place what the architect has envisioned. Why doesn't the architect come to us sooner? We have tremendous experience. No architect on the planet has what we have. We've seen it all, over five decades on major projects. Yet, we're brought on board after design is done; we can offer curved treatments they really want, where they've squared things off.

“Design professionals aren't exploring all the available opportunities … we're the Rodney Dangerfield of the industry.”

We see opportunities for architects to leverage our experience in ways that aren't being done in today's delivery methods. We're using machines to prefab drywall into unique shapes, multifaceted surfaces. The average architectural draftsman doesn't know where to go. They look at canned books from manufacturers. Yet, if they'd lean on us to say, “I'm trying to achieve this,” we have the expertise. We can push boundaries with them, but it takes coming in earlier, rather than saying, “Hey, we need the bid on Friday.” We're not considered as a partner. Anything but. We're the Rodney Dangerfield of the industry, at the bottom of the food chain. We get beat up even by our own suppliers: “You're gonna use Revit, Tekla, etc.” Creating our own ERP software was a matter of desperation. It helps us with trend analysis. Architects don't lean on us.

“Why architects don't ask for that?” is a good question. What's your answer?

Lord: You may be in a better position to answer. Delivery methods dictate it at times. We're working on prefab opportunities, panelization and standardizing wall types. Walls are being drawn from scratch, when they could be pulled from a standard library. Then we can focus estimating on means and methods rather than relearning new types and recounting walls embedded into a BIM.

It also starts with the AIA Documents, which are one-sided. Ten percent is held as retention and a bond is held. Our profits don't come close to that. So, you're double insured. Our reputation doesn't even come into play, that we've completed every project in 53 years. There should be a bond rating applied so we're not commoditized.

Rapaport: Mike, what do you think is reason architects aren't using our expertise?

I agree with what John said, contracts and delivery methods dictate some of it, no contractual privity or direct access. But more than that, it's cultural. In the architect's education and practice, we're taught by implication, that contractors are second-class citizens. Extrapolating, that must mean subcontractors are third-class citizens. This is never stated as an intention; it's implicit in the education. The architect, we're taught in our self-contained culture, is the only one qualified to perform the “high act” of building design. We're supposed to be the experts. We weren't taught to rely on others, except for our consultants, which is another group considered a tier below. Contractually, they are, but God knows we need them.

“We're not considered as a partner. Anything but.”

This is changing, but the past is precedent. When we get cutting-edge projects we need help. If we're lucky enough to have expert partners like you, more of us are taking advantage of it. Architects who don't get that you are professionals too are missing the boat. My sense is you'd welcome a direct call for advice from an architect whether you had the job or not: “Can I pick your brain?” It might help you get it later. At the worst, you'd develop a relationship, or do a favor.

Scognamiglio: Yes. What we're seeing on the West Coast is the beginning of partnerships between architects and subcontractors. But as carpentry trade contractors, we're not part of it yet. We're relegated to the group that comes in later. Now, it's the ones deemed “most valuable” to the job: the mechanicals, the electricians.

On a job we're working on right now, they were brought in 2 years in advance of our contract being issued. This was a fully modeled BIM job – every stud, not just king studs and conflicts – including full shop drawings. So, you have a situation where all the MEP work was fully coordinated in BIM. Then we were brought on and began our modeling process, and we realize we can't put the stud there. The duct has to move. There's no other way to resolve the conflict. You have a fully coordinated mechanical model that now has to move and change because we were brought in so late in the design process. Frankly, it's wreaked havoc with field changes and things that could have been avoided bringing us in as a partner at the same time.

“Mostly, scheduling is a myth. There's no data from subs that drives the work dynamically. It's just done top down, and often abandoned. So, schedules don't matter. They're just people, targets, or hopeful things that don't pan out.”

We've seen an expertise food chain: people at the perceived bottom of the list are masonry and drywall – they don't have any moving parts. But why solve the puzzle with parts missing?

Scognamiglio: Any money you could have saved by hard bidding or possible buyout, you could have saved two-fold by coordinating with the other trades and using us earlier for our expertise, BIM coordination, value engineering, and tweaking the design. You didn't have to spend that money in the first place. Some owners get it, but the contractual and lingering, historical misconceptions persist, like hard bid being a good delivery method.

Let's talk about leverage and impact. Where are you seeing the best leverage? Is it people? Or is technology your big survival strategy?

Lord: A long time ago, when we were blaming everyone for everything as “whiners,” we found we couldn't rely on anything. Not even “trust but verify.” We had to do things ourselves. We took it upon ourselves to get into BIM, doing our own models to highlight clashes and areas we need to go in for an early pass, so we don't get closed out by the GC. A little historical perspective: HVAC contractors brought BIM to the construction world. They were vertical in BIM long before we knew what the term was, because they had a manufacturing component they wanted to tie to the field.

Because they're doing heat calcs, the GC leans on them for design. They're in the best position to get on the job first. We had a meeting with a mechanical contractor and a GC in Boston a few years ago to talk about how delivery is working. By default, the HVAC contractor ends up running the clash detection meetings. Maybe they throw in a schedule. They want to pump out product and aren't doing it floor by floor. That's not efficient. They want to stamp out 1,000 pieces of the same thing. Anyone who understands manufacturing understands that, because you have to change your tooling for the next thing. That lends itself to vertical HVAC construction, and we wonder why we're going back so many times.

That's a generalization, but we have to be nimble with the schedule and do our own. We know the real sequences are nothing like what the schedule shows. Schedules are mostly static. At the tail end of a job, these Excel spreadsheets don't tie to any schedule, they're just expedient: get this floor done, so it looks good.

We lean on technology a lot for the back-office stuff you don't see and to solve the GC's problems, so they don't come back on us. If we don't, we're talking about money, the scraps we're all chasing. So, technology is a big part of our business to manage design, in the field – the Total Stations – and in manufacturing.

If the design firm doesn't have a technology, prefabrication or manufacturing mindset when they come to the table as customer design objectives, or do their part in making costs, schedules and construction more efficient, they miss the chance. They won't benefit from our expertise or improve the process. If they start design hanging on to the mindset that “it's just drywall and studs, we can rip it out or change it,” then that's what we'll do. I only know a few architectural firms in the country that even remotely think about those things.

I agree, if you're not there early, the ship has sailed. It's got to be their philosophy. At conferences, people are talking about sharing models and right of reliance, but the majority aren't sharing. I understand why you're having to rework your own stuff.

Rapaport: At the Georgia Tech Digital Building Lab we're the only subcontractor present. They've had success with Tekla, steel and precast, but we're a late award trade. When we come in, duct is already in the air – forget the model – we have to get top track around the duct. It repeats because they buy us late. Many subs are late awarded, price-driven, unknown entities, with no consideration of performance.

One of your questions reminded me: there's little feedback to subs. Not just every day, “We hate you/we love you,” that's nonsense. But: “You're doing this well.” Are we meeting schedules? Mostly, scheduling is a myth. No sub data drives work dynamically. It's done top down, and often abandoned. So, schedules don't matter. They're just targets or hopeful things that don't pan out. At the end of the job there's not enough feedback on specifics, such as: “You didn't do well giving us proposals on time, you did great BIM work, great job meeting the schedule.” There's little feedback to make us better, or vice versa. Most everything's a one-off throwaway, like: “See you on the next job.” We need more feedback. We're willing to learn. Not many people approach it as creating a relationship. It's largely a commodity environment, especially with walls and ceilings. I just sent you a magazine cover from our industry that illustrates what we're talking about. It's a voodoo doll with stickpins in it. It will give you a laugh. That's how we feel about our ability to be part of managing design. Unless that changes, I don't see how you can reach out to us ahead of time if you haven't talked to us at the end.

“At the end of the job there's not enough feedback on specifics … to make us better, or vice versa. Everything's a one-off throwaway.”

Lord: Project financing is predicated on viability. You have rental rates, costs substantiated by low bids, but if people turned in the honest numbers it might not be a “go.” That's how it's initiated. You're in for a penny, in for a pound. You've got to finish it. That could explain why it's still a low bid world. The original funding group has offloaded it and moved on, so there's no accountability. We see BIM's potential to cost and schedule load as offering more meaningful data and feedback than static, disconnected Primavera schedules and PDF printouts.

The original price is seldom the final price. Owners get seduced but pay later when the difficulties come in. One solution is less low bid, price-driven work. The other thing you're talking about is feedback and data. Renee Cheng's interview talked about knowledge management and research to get that feedback and share it. But Josh Kanner found, in contrast to other business sectors, that design and construction leaders see investments in technology as additional problems rather than solutions. We have work to do.

Designer and contractor mindsets are still to figure things out for ourselves for the first time and adapt and overcome. Science, technology, and rigor are not defaults. We generally don't look to see who's done it before and move that forward. Those are things we could stop and start doing. Any other new things you're having success with?

Scognamiglio: We're trying to bridge the gap. Technology's available to a handful of people in the office doing BIM. But how is that leveraged in the field where the rubber meets the road? We've put BIM computers, PlanGrid, Bluebeam technology in the hands of the field guys. We're doing shop drawings from BIM, putting data vaults in the field with Wi-Fi to get it literally in the hands of the people doing construction. We can integrate RFIs on the fly. For each building geography, we have an RFI folder. The minute the contractor uploads an RFI, it's available in the field. When we go to an area to build a room or a pod, we look at the model first, then the plans and shop drawings for RFIs that would affect us. Jeremy and my push has been to get technology out of the office and into the hands of the guys building. We're also using it for layout.

I've had a theory for those using BIM in the field, that the only ones really touching it are at a management level. If I'm a guy hanging wallboard, a supervisor is telling me what to do there. Am I correct in that assumption?

Scognamiglio: Not necessarily. For us it stops or slows down at the framing level. Every stud is modeled. It stops at the board. I need my framing guys to be able to go to a community data center. I have a gang box, a computer, a printer and the model set up at every leading edge of the project. They don't have to depend on the framing foreman, who may be in one of ten different locations. It's like a library: they go to a community desk, pop open the model, and are trained and empowered to use that information, so they don't have to wait. They don't have to bottleneck at the foreman. Each lead person gets that information the minute they need it.

It's not hard to teach someone how to access design information on an iPad. The distinction that it stops at the framing helps – you're not modeling the board.

Scognamiglio: No, but for the drywaller, taper or bead installer, a lot of jobs for the high-end design firms are intricate designs. What you knew on a standard office building no longer applies. Even late tasks need model access: how does this bead work or meet the exposed steel column detail? That design information has to be available to everyone – even if you think they might not need it.

That's managing design implementation in the field by giving open access to current design data.

Rapaport: Yes. And more data is getting created. Productivity data. 5D BIM, the most basic data. How much does it cost to put this in? How many man-hours? Managing design, in our terms, is not during its creation, but in implementing it and performance. Owners don't have historical data because they haven't required it. They should have a right to it. It's an industry debate. We're starting to see owners require that subs provide labor coding and task durations. The estimate is ours to keep. It's proprietary. The GC tracks how many carpenters are on the job, where they are and what they're doing, but not in a format useful on future projects. It's all one off. Yes, there are a lot of one-off designs, but there are also repeat projects it would be useful for, like schools, and simple office buildings, stock designs where that history would help.

“I like to call it moving from ‘design-assist’ to ‘project-assist.’ That's how we subs should be thought of.”

We don't know of anyone except the subs who are holding this historical information. The GCs get that. They do conceptual estimating, but they don't know what it's going to cost broken down in meaningful ways. It's one of the most remarkable things I've seen in 30 years: they're not collecting historical data.

“It's one of the most remarkable things I've seen in 30 years: they're not collecting historical data.”

Where do you, as a GC, get your historical cost information to begin with? The R.S. Means databases aren't based on actual data. Teams have a right to know it. It would help us get budgets in line with designs. Some are trying to collect it, but they're not organizing it in useful ways. An ENR article¹ talks about how we can't get better if we don't know what we did. Until that changes, how do you manage design? It'll be over budget and late. We had a major highly visible project – it was over budget – and yet every stick was modeled in BIM. It should be in the AIA contract: you must provide us the codes we tell you. Then we could roll it up, and figure out how much time it took to build that stairwell, how much framing, hours? Then, designs can reflect it, and we can work together to control costs. I like to call it going from design-assist to project-assist. That's how we subs should be thought of.

You mean adding value project wide, not just on your trade?

Rapaport: Yes. Getting in early, starting with design-assist and advice, doing the things we've talked about, then providing expertise and data that benefits the whole project. You don't have to hold all our money because you know we're building on the 5th floor. Held money in this industry shows no one trusts each other. Subs have to bill aggressively because you're holding 10 percent, but we have to pay for labor, materials, and our subs. We don't get paid for sixty-five days, plus you still hold 10 percent. That's gotta change. We'll let you come into our systems and see our data, how we're performing, then you can free up money. Change the values. Hold two percent, maybe, not ten.

An IPD flaw is the idea of full, open-book accounting. We want our profits and risk to be ours. We own it. We're not fee based, but we'll share process data, hours, and history. How we use that for future bids is ours. That will be a future game changer. You'll know what it takes to do things, you can have better conceptual estimating and start learning from each other. Now, everything's hidden. That's why you don't see reaching out: Hey, why don't we work together? Aside from “Gimme this answer now, go faster, we need more people …” Well, you didn't pay for more people. It was low bid, done our way.

That's what it will take to make a collaborative team – not just somebody plugging Primavera schedules with no input.

“Think about the extended services architects could provide. They start the ball rolling, but then get into the ‘defensive legal fetal position’ once things develop.”

Lord: Think how GC superintendents are graded. In my mind, a perfect one conducts the symphony to perfection with high quality. Everyone works together. How do you get feedback on that? Were the subs productive? No. In fact, superintendents are graded on how hard they beat the subs into submission. Another GC told me they're trained to do that. How is that mentality helping our industry? Let's say there's an issue on the job. We work with GCs long term. Many owners are one-shotters. If there's an issue, who do you think the fall guy is? It's the designer. I understand the architect's point of view. They feel targets on their back. If you understand delivery you know why. When there's a job issue, there may be an attempt to make it look like a design issue, when it's really a GC or project issue. Subs want to get paid for GC-directed inefficiencies, so, there's designer blowback.

I'm trying to get designers to see that. Contractors are better at business and getting paid for inefficiencies caused by others. Architects aren't. They need to shake up their process and defend themselves.

Lord: Think about the extended services architects could provide. They start the ball rolling, but then get into the “defensive legal fetal position” once things develop. When that happens, it's a lost project asset. They should be camped out on that job. I'd love to see them turn around an RFI in one day, not 45. They should be tied to overall job performance, and mediating payments fairly to get us closer to zero retainage. When we miss the chance to learn from projects it's a shame.

What may drive that retracting attitude is our collective commoditized position. I lobby to owners to pay architects more and fund onsite people. They need our help in the field.

Moskowitz: Our architect is onsite every Wednesday. On most projects, we're not using BIM as it was intended. The fail on these projects is late buyout. The intent is to model every stud, dimension everything. But when you buy BIM so late, it defeats the reasons BIM was designed: to make construction efficient, improve quality, and create efficiencies. Coming in after the fact and turning BIM into an as-built, wastes value, defeats the purpose and misses the intent. If that message could get through to owners and architects, quality and cost would be so improved.

We've got to share that blame for late starts. Owners, GCs, architects. We know better but don't change. If we all got on board earlier, it would be better. But owner problems prevent that.

“Coming in after the fact turning BIM into an as-built, wastes value, defeats the purpose and misses the intent. If that message could get through to owners and architects, quality and cost would be so improved.”

Scognamiglio: They're missing the opportunity on multiple levels. From a GC standpoint, you're working for leaner fees. So, the more coordinated things are, the less supervision, management or rework you need. We're looking at another phase on a recently completed project. We asked: when are you going to buy out the drywall? They said: probably the same as last phase, which equated to 3 months before work starts. We threw up our arms and said: didn't we learn anything from the 1,000 conversations we had on late BIM starts, missed expertise and full coordination? The importance of getting someone involved earlier? But it was just the same mindset.

We've always said we'd have to build the same project twice to get that learning and those efficiencies. So, when you finally do get that chance and still miss it, you want to pull your hair out, if you have any left.

Scognamiglio: We had a situation with a 4" pipe in a 6" wall. Our structural rule said, “No penetration could exceed 5/4 of the track width.” It was never flagged as an issue. But nobody realized the floor core was 6", which violated the rule. Because the job was so compressed, nobody saw it until we got in the field. A lot of the benefit of timely BIM was shot. We've done a lot of BIM on the West Coast. What usually happens is that the BIM effort is behind construction – the issue Jeremy mentioned about how BIM serves as a source for not much more than a nice set of as-builts. It could have done so much more to help the project be efficient.

Moskowitz: The other thing we notice in a lot of architect's drawing sets, is that details seem to be pulled from standard, outdated details. After we're awarded, we end up being having to explain more current technology, products, assemblies, that work more efficiently and improve schedules such as top-of-wall products that turn 3-pass operations into 1-pass. Coming in late, it's difficult to get those into the job. In early design, we can share that expertise, the STC (sound transmission class), the fire rating, and end up with solution that streamlines the schedule for everyone. GCs love that.

Scognamiglio: It's got to become part of the process. Some walls have stringent requirements. There's a common misconception among those not intimately involved in drywall, that “a wall is a wall” –just studs and drywall with a bottom track and a top track. That could NOT be farther from the truth. A wall is a dynamic assembly that moves in many different directions under different conditions to meet different criteria. In some cases, a fire rating, a sound rating, a smoke rating. There's a matrix of products and assemblies for every wall we build. An architect needs a wall with a certain STC rating. That's created in a lab with strict standards. In a lab environment, it meets them. But in designs and the field, things change, and we have to react. So, a wall is not just a wall. It's a dynamic assembly that has to meet a set of dynamic criteria. We have to educate the architect and owner: one of the biggest parts of our Preconstruction efforts and “our” design is how to design walls to meet specified criteria.

I've been on the other side of the table, valuing your help, and it's absolutely a design exercise, focused on technical implementation, but design nonetheless. Without it, and you, the likelihood of achieving a design vision that meets specified criteria is low. What do you see for the future?

Lord: You touched on IPD. We've done some. Insurance companies aren't wild about it. Here's an anecdote about architects sharing BIM models: We met an architect at a conference who said, “Sure, we'll share.” We called him Monday and he said, “I'm sorry, I can't.” There's innovation in the West, with pods, prefab, not your grandfather's prefab, but higher quality. We also see material handling differently – like exoskeletal material handling that alleviates worker injuries. Technology can help that.

Rapaport: We are leading a NIBS BuildingSmart BIM initiative for Partition Exchange types called PARTie. It was originally called WALLie. We're standardizing wall types and developing digital materials ordering. Now, it's still paper based. Type 1 and Type 2 walls will be the same through all architect's designs. Now, on every job you have to rethink and reunderstand design intent. If they're standardized, you can work at a higher level. Spec writers are hidden. People don't understand their connection. A flawed issue can repeat and cause problems. We should get the quantities. Why are we having to recreate those? No one wants to recount them. In Europe they get them digitally. A better future would be to give quantities to subs. Why have subs spend the time? So many uncompensated hours. We get 2D drawings, have to count them and make mistakes. Specs aren't linked, or intelligent. They're PDF-ed and dumbed down for us. That's what you get when you dumb down information and buy at low price. That's got to change. With less held money, there's money for technology investment. Subs don't have money for servers because things are so tight. Maybe it comes back to self-respect. In the future, the IPD concept is: we're equal partners. If we do well, come with me to the next job. Then, good owners will say, “Let's get that team together again.” The future should be clarity, less held money, and more service: working together. Then, others will have to up their game, so it's not just about low price.

“Details seem to be pulled from standard, outdated details. We end up … in the position of trying to explain more current technology, products, assemblies, that work way more efficiently and help improve schedules.”

Your work towards standards presents a positive view of the future. We've got work to do though, fueling change through technology, but plenty of hurdles left.

INTERVIEW

Don Davidson and Jeff Giglio

CEO and Chairman, Inglett & Stubbs

7th February 2018

Let's talk about “Design.” Although you're an electrical contracting firm, you do significant amounts of “design” – finishing, or adapting engineer's designs to reality or market conditions, detailing design, or doing design-build work. What does “design” mean in your terms?

Davidson: To be true design it's from scratch. On a lot of jobs, we partner in design development. We coordinate with end users to create what they are looking for to avoid rework. We don't do a lot of true design, we do a lot of refinement. Clients count on us to have their backs. One of the advantages of a solid MEP team is we get to know that owner's best interest, needs, and wants. They rely on us for that. That's not always the design engineer of record. In many cases we deal with the same engineers over and over. We've earned a good reputation, so they're open to discussion and that we may know more about the owner's need or operation than they do. New people may be reluctant to modify their designs, but when we deal with repeat teams it's easier.

“Manage the project. As opposed to the project managing you.”

I'm curious how you approach that, not being the lead. Some call it “leading from behind.” You provide design assist services to some degree on almost all projects, right?

Davidson: Design assist is a good term. Leading from behind is too. It's an art. So many are interested in their agenda – not all designers, but many want to put their stamp on something the owner may not want. Give clients what they want without upsetting your design teammates.

Conversely, what about the projects where the owner wants to raise the bar, and builds a process with a stellar team and brings everybody on board early to establish synergy?

Davidson: We like those jobs. You can't do the best design without a good construction team to keep it in budget and on schedule. You have to be cognizant that all these vendors want to push new technology, but the owner is wary. Balance. Solving those puzzles are fun.

How do you get keep on course when technology is pulling you one way and design interests another? With maybe unknowing owners in a third direction?

“All I wanted was two switches.”

Davidson: Communication is a big part of what we do. The end user is the key. At one extreme are the lighting designers and interior designers. We try to respect what they're trying to do but have to communicate and go to the end user – the maintenance guys – and they say, “That's not what I want at all.” Not long ago we had a job with fancy lighting controls, zones, massive, very complex, very expensive. When we turned it over to the owner's facilities engineer, he said, “All I wanted was two switches.”

“When CM clients tell us, ‘We can't tell you if you got the job until Friday,' and ‘If you get it, we need you onsite Monday,’ it just doesn't work.”

But what they want may be too simple and not meet code. Some energy codes no longer allow “simple.” You have to walk the line between energy codes, fire codes, the janitor and lighting designer.

How do you find the mix of people skills, persuasion, psychologist and tech savvy to keep up? That's not something the average electrician has.

Davidson: We're training for it! We've brought in people who know about these things, but technology changes so fast. Even if you're the factory rep, it changes faster than you can keep up with. We expend effort to stay current as we bid and install. We're doing it, so it works. But lighting control is nearly impossible to keep up with no matter where you fall in the chain.

How do you dispel the lingering mistrust and old cultural biases among teams?

Davidson: That's where history and trust comes in. You can't lead someone down a bad path and keep their trust.

We just finished the new Mercedes-Benz Stadium in Atlanta together. With the end date set, it was a tough process. From your perspective, what could we have done better?

Davidson: That was a design management and design completion challenge. Most would agree if we'd spent another year in design, it would have allowed construction to go smoother. For reasons beyond our control the date was set, and the cart was before the horse. We were brought in to help with Preconstruction and design assist. That level of innovation needed it.

How would you change the design management process in an ideal setting?

Davidson: Planning! Not just about scope, but manpower, management, and cash flow. We don't allow enough time to plan and manage all phases. Calling and saying, “We're starting next week; we need your preconstruction people here” doesn't give us enough time to develop a team. We constantly see owners not allowing enough time at the front end, so we can avoid redesign. It affects all phases. When clients tell us, “We can't tell you if you got the job until Friday,” and “If you get it, we need you onsite Monday,” it just doesn't work.

That's perhaps the biggest issue everyone has raised. Industry data and personal experience shows that when we do plan, it pays off. Why can't we get owners, and sometimes ourselves to do it?

Davidson: It's owner driven. It pushes the same people under the bus every time. Even the GCs. We've grown accustomed to waiting until last minute. Because we can. That doesn't mean it's the best way, it's just become expected – a default bad behavior. If people feel they have until the last minute to decide, they do. If they'd commit earlier things would be better

Giglio: The State Farm Office complex we did with you is a good example: we were brought on way early. We had a big hole to dig first. We had almost 100 percent drawings before we started, so we had time to estimate, schedule, and determine labor needs. We planned the heck out of it, and it went amazingly well because we had time to do installation layouts and BIM coordination. Instead of just keeping our head above water, we had 95 percent of most of it weeks in advance. All we had to do then was execute the plan and react to daily crises. It showed. It had challenges but wasn't an everyday fight. Our catchphrase is “Manage the project.” As opposed to “The project manages you.”

What new tools and processes are you using to get better results? What can traditional practitioners apply to our industry?

Davidson: A lot of new tools have come into play to make it easier. BIM, LEAN, and so many others. If we do them, our work is supposed to be better, faster and save money. I haven't seen that yet, but it helps manage conflicts. If you don't do BIM, prefab, and other things today, you can't keep up. It's part of today's means and methods.

Giglio: BIM is a good example. A great tool, great return, but we have to be careful how far we take it. It has diminishing returns. It doesn't all have to be done down to the last locknut. Having the last 10 percent in BIM costs a fortune and doesn't serve anyone. The Trimble units we use now to layout work are great. We can't function without them. They're a standard. Speed-wise, prefabbing is big. It helps with safety, quality control, waste, and logistics. The problem with prefabbing is it requires pre-job planning. You can't make changes the day of, or it's costly and what's on the skiff must be tossed. So, prefab brings risk too.

Logistics is key. How we think about materials and people. Where they park, working conditions. Our ability to manage design projects flows to operations. When people think we don't respect them, they stop caring. They go from being professionals to just laborers. We need to start moving the pendulum, because logistics is a motivator, and it's driven by our ability to manage design process.

How can you work with designers better?

Davidson: When people drafted by hand we could do redlines. Now, they're designing and documenting final product simultaneously. Looking over their shoulder is harder, but necessary. If they let us have access to their systems, we can have input. Some resist because they don't want us looking over shoulders. Their fees are low … they don't have time. The way contracts are set up, all they have to sell is time. Some still don't think they need us.

Maybe they also resist because they're in the middle of the creative process? Giving access and transparency can be an issue.

Giglio: We need to look at design as they're doing it, versus their doing it, issuing it, sending it, and weeks passing, and then us coming back with feedback. That doesn't keep up or add value. Our work needs to be done in real time.

Davidson: It gets back to being brought on early. When we are, we're there to help ensure a smarter creative process. When we come in late, we can't. Right now, the entire industry is facing an issue of not having enough skilled people – office and field people. For us, it hurts doubly. It's not just getting the right people, but our supply chain is impacted too. We're on the job day one and the last day too, the longest of any subcontractors, because of the nature of our work. We are so dictated by our predecessor's work: if they're not on schedule, it doesn't matter. If not, it's impossible to stay on schedule. We have to plan and resource-level it, so design rework and mismanaged design kill us too.

Giglio: Going back to prefabbing, the more we can preplan and prefab the better. We might only have an hour in a prefab wall onsite versus eight hours for site-built.

Prefabbing is a solution, but it needs two things: motivation and time. First, you need an interested owner and design team. Then, you need upfront planning time to pull it off. Teams who want to do it have a different mentality and goals. We're not seeing that much. We have to drive it more.

Giglio: A downside is prefab removes the owner's flexibility to make changes, because we've spent half the cost in the prefab process. So, there are risks.

INTERVIEW

Wayne Wadsworth, DBIA, LEED AP

Executive Vice President, Holder Construction Company

21st March 2018

You won the company's first ever Chairman's Leadership Award for your role on the stadium. And the project has just won the AGC's national Grand Award for Best Project of the Year, in 2017. To a person, everyone involved admits it was the toughest project they faced in their careers. You were a leader, confidant, strategist, spiritual guru, and counselor to all of it to owners, contractors, designers, trades – you name it. How did you do it?

Wadsworth: I'm honored by the awards, but as I said when I received them, I did so on behalf of every individual who contributed. Thousands. I had a role in orchestrating the talent. We had an extraordinary team and did a good job bringing the right people to the right situation at the right times. We tried to create a platform where they could do what they do. It's a simple formula.

As I think back, one of the things I tried to stay focused on was not getting into the noise – the level of stress present in every meeting. You simply cannot get caught up in the exposure of the dollars, the schedule, your own firm's and the personal challenges and emotions. I stayed focused on accepting the reality of what is, and then, consistent with Holder's culture, how do we treat people and solve problems for everybody? Because you have to understand their individual problem sets and business needs. I just read something you wrote – that we were “building while we were designing.” Doing that brings issues. With such an unbelievable design, we had to keep reconciling the reality of where we needed to be to finish, while we were caring for that design. That was an ever-changing battle. You can't get frustrated. I don't know how many times plans changed. New issues came up and walloped us. There's just no choice. For the sake of Arthur Blank [owner of the Falcons], the city, the state, our own company – you're in this and you're committed. You've got to move forward. You can't get down. You can't fret.

That was the greatest lesson I'll take away: you better be careful what you ask for – especially when you ask for things that have never been done. What it took to get it done is remarkable.

The lesson for a “design-driven,” “first ever” activity, by God, is: “Fear it, respect it.” Face it together. It will take the best – and even they may have never done it before. It becomes an exercise in managing risk, and the unknown.

“Not getting into the noise.”

Wadsworth: Yes. My preconstruction background was critical, because so many of the problems were “forced reality checks” of going back to square zero and assessing: how do you find a path that still leads you to success? All the fundamental project controls – how do you balance budget, schedule issues? How do you get documents to support it, scope coordinated among trades with commitment and understanding? Then figure out the processes and people to execute it – and it changed a million times.

“So many of these problems were ‘forced reality checks.’ How do you find a path that still leads you to success?”

Most readers, having never done it, don't know what “preconstruction” entails. It's not simply getting plans, doing a quantity takeoff and an estimate, and awarding the trade contract. We define it as something very different, much broader.

Wadsworth: It's more holistic. Taking ownership for the entire process, owner, developer, designers, everybody coming together to plan, set goals. Then, how do we achieve them?

Practiced at its highest level, preconstruction is really an exercise in design management, beginning with setting expectations – often based on an already started design.

Wadsworth: For us as builders, it's about translating it all into construction. We've got to build something. Ultimately, subcontractors have to do shop drawings and fabricate it. It's about understanding design, expressing the goals, and translating it all – in a balanced way – with cost, schedule and quality.

How do we share those lessons? I'm a curator of such things. Being so engaged on a project like the stadium, did you keep a diary or lessons learned log?

Wadsworth: I have become more thoughtful. Interestingly – architects and designers will appreciate this – my notes are becoming much more graphic in nature with more diagrams than words, as I make connections. Words are less efficient. My thoughts about cause-and-effect relationships are becoming clear. I've found diagrams more effective. I have thousands of lessons I intend to share. It'll just take time. I have a difficult time doing them when I'm in the moment on a project like the stadium, when I'm processing as quickly as I need to. But I have so many thoughts I'm dying to pour out, not unlike you are. Beliefs, thoughts, principles that got me through it.

I know in the moment, it's all you can do to sleep and try to clear your head. Diagrams have always been a part of my toolset. The McKinsey 7-S Organization model is a great one. It shows a networked web of 7 organizational systems that must connect and align:² Strategy, Structure, Systems, Style, Staff, Skills, and Shared Values. But I add an 8th “S” for the Supply Network. (See Figure 12.1 below.)

Wadsworth: Yes. It's very good.

You are very “together”: confident, capable, positive, a great leader, an uncanny teammate. We've shared in stressful times, I go home late at night and have a beer to unwind, but as an ex–track star and Iron Man athlete, you go home and work out. Did this project threaten your resolve? It did mine. It was one of the more complex buildings in recent years. Did it change your behavior – how you managed yourself?

Wadsworth: Certainly, my time was modified. Virtually every waking moment was claimed. I had to dedicate myself fully, to be all in. I love to work out and train on that side of my life. The goals dropped off, but the activity didn't. I still worked out, generally twice a day. Before work and after. And I even took to doing it during other activities. While brushing my teeth or shaving, grab a chair, stand on one foot, or do squats. You can do it if you're committed. A concentrated effort like that does provide a mental, physical and psychological relief. It's part of who I am. I try to share it with others. There's no excuse. I try not to accept excuses – in any part of my life. There's always a way. You just have a find a way to adapt.

“You always have to be watching and asking: What about an issue is ‘one off,’ not your familiar, bread-and-butter path?”

“How well equipped are all aspects of the industry to deliver it?”

“Eyes-wide-open collaboration, and links in the chain become more critical.”

I love your no-excuses mentality and how you rose to the challenge with an equal reaction to keep your equilibrium. I'll share – at the other end of the spectrum – after I left the jobsite for the last year, I was usually on the elliptical trainer during our weekly 7 a.m. Friday leadership calls, doing two things at once – with a different level of intensity, I'm sure.

What else did you learn about design management, and how has it shaped your outlook?

Wadsworth: You always have to be watching and asking: What about an issue is “one-off,” not your familiar, bread-and-butter path? Where your normal blocking and tackling aren't going to deliver the normal result. The stadium had so many systems in that category.

You've said this a million times, Mike, the importance of planning. Lessons learned are to stress-test and understand: what are you asking for, and how well equipped is the industry to deliver it? It's one thing to have wonderful ideas, and another to recognize how they translate to the people who fabricate, ship, and coordinate with trades, and understand the risks inherent in all of it. Some design issues offer a challenge, even a disconnect, between design intent and what the industry is capable of constructing. No matter what the process is called: planning, preconstruction, or design management – it's figuring out and having a grounded execution approach. For new things, it's also how you change reality and improve the market. Because you can do that. You can set lofty goals and stretch the industry to places it hasn't been, but “eyes-wide-open” collaboration and knowing each link in the chain become critical. If just one of those links is missing or broken, you don't have a chain that works.

On the stadium, when we saw and experienced each of those breaks, we made shifts and changes not normal in the industry, but that the industry is capable of, given the need and motivation, to the extent your owner and developer are on board. The transparency, collaboration, and having the right people are exponentially more important as you stretch boundaries. Not just people who want to, but who can, and are in the right position to. There's a big difference.

The 7-S diagram applies. Not only does every link in the chain have to be aligned and working, but there's an eighth component – outside your internal organization – it's your network. In this case, the industry supply chain. You can't operate without it. It takes design management to a new scale. Not only do teams have to manage designers, owners and builders – they have to do it in the context of the industry – in some cases changing that industry.

Wadsworth: Design management isn't just about lines on the paper, or making sure geometry, aesthetics and functions work. It's how that design relates to our ability to deliver it. Constructability, not just means and methods, but how the entire industry comes together to deliver all of it, is key. If you don't understand all that you're fooling yourself.

Let's shift to look internally. Twenty years ago, I left architectural practice to join Holder to create a new role in managing design. You were a big part of the leadership team that brought me on. Did you have a vision for what my role could be? How has it played out?

Wadsworth: It was the right decision then, and I'm a thousand percent all in that it still is. We are in the design business – whether we're the CM, the GC, the Design-Builder, or doing delegated design. I say this universally: you can't be a contractor in the way we are and not realize we are in the design business.

To clarify, we are not the designer-of-record, nor we do design in house. We bring on expert partners to do that. You're talking about owning and being affected by design process.

Wadsworth: Yes, I'm speaking philosophically. Relationally, not contractually. But that planning and design success dictates our ability to succeed and execute as a contractor. Putting energy in setting projects up for success and collaborating with AEs and trade partners is essential. My vision for doing that is to make life better, easier. Not for the sake of getting credit, or any other purpose. The more we understand design, the better we'll be. In the traditional education of a contractor, there's just not enough time to learn that. In the risk we take every day as a contractor – to guarantee costs, schedule, quality, and other things – we're 100 percent dependent on design. So, the better job we do managing design … you get the point. I still believe today having individuals within the company with those skills makes things so much more efficient. So, I'm drinking the Kool-Aid and I'm going to keep espousing it.

From starting with one architect – me – and a germ of an idea twenty years ago, we've grown to five registered architects – dedicated to transferring design skills and spreading that gospel across the company. Who does design management involve? Clients? AEs? What's your philosophy?

Wadsworth: It's not just managing architects. It starts with an initial conversation and an owner having a need. At that point you're beginning to manage design. It might not be lines on paper yet, but there are concepts, options, ideas, forces that shape the project's birth. What are they? Is there a site, a budget, a program, a need date? You're starting to balance the equation of expectations and drive it down into every aspect. You balance them in a nuanced way. That equation is always running in the background of my head – in conjunction with our own needs as Holder, our core goals and business.

Let's look at each of the OAC perspectives. Since owners drive things, what do our clients need to know about managing design?

Wadsworth: A healthy appreciation for the chain we talked about earlier. Anything they want, has a chain and its links. The best owners don't commoditize any link in that chain.

“I say this universally: you can't be a contractor in the way we are and not realize we are in the design business.”

That theme has come up often! As professional service providers, nobody wants to be commoditized. Maybe there's a market for a commodity approach, but we're not in it.

Wadsworth: If you respect each link of that specific product and think about what's unique, you'll get it. Maybe it's not even the design. Maybe it's the market. Right now, labor shortages limit manufacturing capacity, or steel tariffs may impact or change the design. How might they potentially dictate a different material or approach? Rather than saying “that's the contractor's or designer's problem,” good owners embrace that risk and pull it forward. This is a detail-oriented business. Anytime you take something for granted has the chance to come back and bite you in the butt.

When owners say, “That's what we hired you for,” they distance themselves. It sends the wrong message. Not one of enlightenment, trust, togetherness, and risk sharing. In many cases, the design team works for the owner, and the market is a collective team risk.

Wadsworth: Our saying has always been: “We only have team problems and we only have team solutions.” Focus on staying together as a team and bring your different skillsets and experience together to solve problems. We share the role to prevent and solve problems.

You touched earlier on my pet peeve: failure to plan and align objectives. We find out mid-project we're trying to do different things. Owners first, but us too. We have a voice.

Wadsworth: We all – owners, architects, and contractors – tend to underestimate what it takes. Particularly on pioneering projects. It's a puzzling issue. We should advise owners to have the fortitude to speak up. Some of our brethren overpromise trying to win work.

Speaking of brethren, what would you like to tell our design partners? Plenty of design firms, good ones, well respected ones, seem to be distancing themselves from what you're talking about.

Wadsworth: That we are in the design business. And they are in the construction business. Even though we're not designing it, and they're not building it, we share the outcome. Good architects take complete responsibility for helping their contractor execute and vice versa. In the same way we're trying – spiritually – for design. That goes back to education. How much did you learn in architecture school about how to be a contractor? Not much. And motivation. You can't underestimate the extraordinary design talent out there. We want and need it, but somebody has to translate it.

In 20 years we've made a difference, helped teams, and trained many apostles, but there's still much to do. What should contractors know about managing design?

Wadsworth: The opportunity to evolve and take ownership of everything we've talked about doing is still out there. That's not a criticism, it's a celebration. How can we aspire as teams to return to being master builders? There's so much expertise. On some projects you can feel the flow, the beautiful music. You have teammates who get it. Somehow the team is aligned. Everybody knows what they're supposed to do and it's fun to be a part of that dynamic. It makes life better. That's what we all have to aspire to.

INTERVIEW

Jon Lewis

General Superintendent, Holder Construction Company

31st July 2018

We're talking about managing design as it affects construction. As a boots-on-the-ground guy, you get limited exposure to early design stages but then have to make it all real. What are your issues? I'm giving you the soapbox.

“For 100 percent collaboration, everybody should be willing to take part of that risk.”

Lewis: The big issue is the industry wants 100 percent collaboration and input but isn't set up with contracts that allow us to behave like that. We're restricted on how free-flowing and open information can be because of contract risks. An example would be, if everybody wants a share of the schedule risk and utmost collaboration, then everybody should be willing to take part of that risk. But in every project in my career the schedule risk is completely ours. Unfortunately, that causes every conversation to be led with the premise of “This is going to affect the schedule.” I get it that owners need a commitment to move in and run their businesses. But if we want to get to 100 percent collaboration and share in profit, accolades, and rewards, the industry is going to have to figure that out.

Great observation. I don't lead with that because I'm not a lawyer, but it's true. Even when we don't get those contracts, our culture still has us trying to collaborate. Those who know understand contracts are where the leverage is. Not to be defensive, just to be just good risk managers, we have to be aware and honest about how the actions of others – like designers who may not be under contract to us – affect us.

Lewis: As you know, we teach and train our people to go the extra step, never write a cold RFI, never have a conversation that hasn't been vetted. No surprises. And when we don't get what we need we're going to shoulder the load and carry the rest of the team to the finish line. That's who we are. But it gets difficult when you have a developer or owner's rep that doesn't' live in that cooperative world and thrives on conflict – that puts the team in a defensive position. That puts us in turmoil.

People who haven't worked with us or any collaborative group … if they only knew how much risk we assume – that we don't need to.

Lewis: Right. I don't know if we'll ever get there. The other issue is time. Owners don't give design teams enough time to complete contract documents before we start. We're always chasing a completed design. It shows in submittals. We'll do them based on the CDs and they'll be sent back with red ink saying “see forthcoming bulletin” or “submit RFI to get that detail” for things that aren't on the drawings. Design is always still happening. That's why the first issue will be hard to achieve: drawings aren't done enough to get construction started. We're holding the candle for the schedule, and we might seem combative, when the opposite is true. We have to constantly force completed design to meet the schedule. 100 percent CD's are issued and when you open them, you can't chase details through. They're missing, incomplete, uncoordinated.

“We're always chasing a completed design.”

Some are working on contracts and shared incentives, but until the industry gets there, this book is to educate people on these impacts and cope in the meantime. Even experienced owners don't understand the trouble they cause by failing to allow enough time for planning and design. That's why they need us: we solve their problem. But it demands working until 2 a.m., burning people out, and costing more money. They could get better, smoother projects if they knew this: allow more time, pay architects more, set up collaborative cultures and get better service and buildings. What other issues come to mind?

Lewis: The modeling process. When we don't have complete designs it's hard to coordinate models when we should to build on time. If the documents were complete, we could do shop drawings and trade contractor models. They can't be completed when they need to be because design isn't done. Modeling's in the wrong sequence. Today, it's after we award contracts, and that's where it needs to be. The problem is, we award trade contracts and go to work the same week. The schedule dictates that. We're forced to by the way contracts are set up. Once we're forced into that scenario, we're behind the eight ball in modeling and trade coordination.

We learned that in the early days of BIM, but we haven't made it happen enough – getting coordinated BIMs 45 or 90 days before work gets fabricated.

Lewis: Trade contractors need to model and coordinate as soon as the GC/CM gets awarded. We need to bring them onboard earlier – while protecting costs, competition, and risk – or extend the schedules.

Very clear articulation of three major issues.

Lewis: In my role I have to look at details and also step back to reflect on big issues. When you do that it's always these three issues. I appreciate your comment, but it's what I live with every day.

I'm trying to build empathy and bilateral understanding. First in your direction. How many times have you moved your family for the company to build projects?

Lewis: Nine times. From Bloomington, Illinois, to Atlanta, then Winston Salem, Richmond, Charleston, Phoenix, Oklahoma City, Ashburn, Virginia, and Atlanta again.

What design-driven issues do you face in the field? What keeps you up at night?

Lewis: In my role, I fear the unknown. I don't know what the owner and design team are thinking as it relates to change. We pride ourselves on being flexible and always having a Plan B. But you have your eye on the ball and then suddenly: curveball. You're still asked to hold the schedule. I just call it the unknown. Sometimes those unknowns can derail a project.

Design management is about making the unknown known, and helping our partners achieve interim steps in a more predictable controllable way. Do you understand the architect's process? Do you get enough time and engagement to affect it or are you too busy or committed elsewhere?

Lewis: If design partners would involve us early enough, we could help them march down a less disruptive path. I understand what they have to do, but not how long it takes to do it all and issue it. I don't know the manhours to do a significant bulletin. I'd be willing to spend more personal time and effort with them if I knew they'd design to means and methods, available products and standard industry practices. It is difficult to find that time. You've got your own ship on the water you're trying to keep from sinking. So, you have to justify the time you'd spend with them versus the reward or benefit. If I was sitting next to the architect while he worked, and he'd ask, “Jon, can you build this?” I could answer questions on the spot. We'd save so much time and eliminate so much back and forth. He'd know what he puts on the drawings is affordable and buildable.

It goes back to contracts. Can we require or incentivize that time and expertise? Every time we collaborate it proves that it works. We do it to afterward to get out of problems, but not to prevent them. What can we change to get better drawings to build by?

Lewis: More input on the front end from the guys going to build it to help design go down a track that's affordable and meets the team's objectives.

How can architects take advantage of your knowhow? What would you change about the process?

“In my role, I fear the unknown.”

Lewis: More time together. A more appropriate question might be: what would I have time to do that would improve the process? It's balancing my own project risk and responsibilities versus helping others. We schedule repeat meetings. We have a standing structure coordination meeting every other Wednesday at 9 a.m. People bring design, coordination, or constructability issues. We resolve them, then issue drawings and RFIs prior to issues showing up in the field. It can be that easy, done early enough, when we talk first. But more needs to take place on the front end.

Talk about some of the technology you're using in the field to cope.

Lewis: Federated models are the biggest thing. Our coping device with incomplete uncoordinated design is the model put together by subcontractors. We might default to that model more than CDs. That's a risk. But we can hang our hat on the model being right because we've already worked the issues out. Those six other uncoordinated drawings, not as much.

How do you do a constructability review?

Lewis: Every time a significant bulletin or new CD is released, we immediately look through them individually. After 3 days everyone brings their reviews together and we talk about issues. We use BlueBeam overlays to point out changes. Then we ask the AE, developers and owners reps to resolve the comments. In almost every case that's done within a few weeks. If we're building the structure, we focus on those issues first. There isn't time to do it all at once at detailed levels. We do it incrementally to support the sequence.

I think people don't know how much we need to prioritize those reviews due to limited time. What are the most screwed-up processes and how can we fix them?

Lewis: One more issue has to be dealt with moving forward. Every time the owner hires a third-party consultant they issue field reports and make suggestions. We don't work from suggestions. Somebody has to read that report and make decisions. Today, the only person who does that is the CM. What about the 14 optional issues? The design team or owner need to fix and own that. That exists to the nth degree with waterproofing consultants. Design details in the CDs are usually generic. But once you hire a CM and a roofer you have to abide by the rules of a specific manufacturer. Changes need to be issued as a Bulletin or solicited by us via an RFI. We're held responsible for fulfilling items in the field report. But we didn't because they're not in the construction documents. When we raise this open-endedness to the owner they look to their designers and ask: Didn't we issue a drawing? Didn't we tell the contractor what to build? Why not? Owners should tell the design team to digest the reports and recommend what to do. This detail no. This detail yes. This one you rejected. That's what we need.

Can you share any good stories of AE/CM collaboration or adversity overcome?

Lewis: I could go on all night on that. So many good things have come from collaboration. One that stands out is the top of the structure – the crown details – at the Devon Energy Tower. The building had a varying radius. There, the structural engineer, erectors, and glass designers and installers spent a year discussing the details and challenges before we ever started construction. In my career, that stands out. It was remarkable, at the end we could all say we fabricated and installed the complex roof crown structure with very few issues.