Whether building a structure from the ground up or modernizing a structure that already exists, the design stage of a construction project presents countless opportunities for things to go wrong. Inaccessible valves, unwired controls and circuit breaker boxes in the ceiling are just a few of the more blatant design errors uncovered by maintenance or engineering managers once they have the run of the completed building. The fact is that if there were a greater level of communication between contractors and maintenance managers during the design phase, these mistakes could probably be easily avoided. Contractors, as knowledgeable as they are about a building's construction, are rarely as familiar as maintenance managers are with its post-construction operations. Keeping this in mind, design errors usually don't reveal themselves until a maintenance manager comes across them in the course of operations by which time redesign becomes difficult and costly. It stands to reason then that frustrating change orders, post-sign-off maintenance changes and operational inefficiencies would decrease if both parties worked a little more closely together during the design phase.

Involving maintenance in the design and construction process is not as radical as it may sound. Daniel Kelley, an HVAC superintendent at the University of Houston, says that quite often the school uses the same contractors for each of its renovation projects. Staying abreast of design changes is a matter of staying in touch with this team. "We work side by side with them on a daily basis," he says. "They have questions, and we have questions. At the end of the day, we walk through the project, and if we want something changed, we bring it up the next day. Usually, it's not a problem."

Of course, this sort of informal interaction is much easier when it's a smaller scale construction project. On larger projects, chance meetings between contractors and maintenance managers are less likely to occur. In these cases, it might be a good idea to arrange meetings between the maintenance managers and the architects, engineers and general contractors that are working on the project. Having maintenance managers involved in the project from the very beginning helps facilitate the design process and correct mistakes as soon as they occur.

Proactive maintenance managers and engineers are becoming involved in specification decisions and joining design meetings. Some are even performing their own internal reviews of design plans. Rod Leland, the director of facility services at Federal Way School District in Washington, makes a point of integrating his maintenance staff into the school's construction projects. "I don't sign off until my staff is satisfied with the project," he says. As a result of this greater interaction, the number of change orders and instances of post-construction redesign has decreased and the operating efficiency of the constructed buildings has increased.

Some managers, such as Reedley College building services manager Jack Burgess, go as far as to schedule onsite meetings with architects and contractors on a weekly basis. His objective is to let the design team know right from the beginning that his maintenance department is going to be involved. This "involvement" may even include bringing in a specialist of his own to inspect a particular aspect of the building if the need arises. "If you have resident experts – a boiler person for instance – bring them in at appropriate times," Burgess advises.

Traditionally, participation in a punch-list walk through has been the role that a maintenance manager takes in the design and construction process. While this plays a significant part in the process, many problems are often covered up before the punch-list is even introduced. To avoid this scenario, some maintenance managers perform continuous walk-through inspections. Of course, if they wanted a more official approach, the managers could always hire an outside inspector. As Burgess explains, "If the contractor says he has this and this done at 40 percent, we make sure he has done what he says is done, and our inspector of record will verify it." Agreeing with this philosophy, Rod Leland hires a commissioning agent to perform commissioning continually throughout the course of the design project. As a result, many design errors are corrected before the cost of redesign gets out of hand.

For this sort of cultural shift in the role a maintenance or engineering manager plays to be successful, construction engineers and maintenance engineers alike will have to rethink the linear progression of the design process. The traditional linear method has been for designers to hand off drawings to engineers, who then hand them off to general contractors, who then hand them off to subcontractors. When the project is finished, the keys to the building are handed off to the maintenance manager to do a walk-through. By leaving little room for maintenance input throughout the process, the linear method opens the door to all kinds of potential errors. "Most of the design and construction team members really understand this," Burgess says. "It is just that they're not typically exposed to anyone trying to change the process. Sometimes, it takes a little educating."

This "little educating" means changing the outdated linear process by bringing maintenance or engineering managers into the fold from the very beginning. While it's true that this method takes a little more effort on the front end and can cost a little more, those who use it say its long-term benefits far outweigh its initial costs. Ultimately, it's in the best interests of contractors and maintenance managers alike to construct a building that is efficient and cost-effective to operate and maintain.

Source: Hand in Hand with Contractors
Maintenance Solutions, Jan. 6, 2002
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