Building a building, of any type, is one of those things that desperately needs collaboration to be completed. And depending on the quality and intentionality of that collaboration, you can get very different results.
Too Little: Not enough collaboration more often leads to rework, and extra cost. Construction is one of those things that forces coordination. If the HVAC contractor isn’t talking to the plumbing contractor, you end up with pipes running through the middle of ducts. I also believe construction is one of those things where if you don’t manage it, it will manage you.
Like with everything, there is a spectrum. And different projects have different needs and can sit at different points in the spectrum. A construction team that has worked on a bunch of projects together in the past can develop a shorthand with their expectations. Collaboration can build on past experience. Compared to a new team, that is more than capable, will need additional and very intentional collaboration to set expectations.
Engineering in the construction world can also fall onto this spectrum of collaboration. Some projects don’t need much, while others demand significantly more. And some engineering firms operate very well with looser demands on collaboration, these same firms may not be very successful when a project comes along demanding a level of collaboration much higher up the scale.
There are tons of tools out there to help consultants maximize their collaboration effectiveness. And this is where you start hearing terms like Virtual Design, BIM, and 3D Modeling. And one of the cool things about virtual design at this higher level is that it begins to pull construction level coordination & collaboration into the design phase. Every project has a fixed amount of coordination activities required to complete it. So, if some of those bigger buckets of coordination can be pulled forward, the construction team can become drastically more efficient with construction timelines and cost effective with our building owners dollars.
Sometimes this additional collaboration is needed, sometimes it’s requested. And sometimes, as mentioned, it isn’t required. In any case Intune Engineering, and its partner organizations are capable and excited to partner with you and deliver a successful project.