Audience Focus: Advanced
Application Type: Experience-Based
Time/Location: MON 11:15-12:15/Salon D
Abstract: Sustainability has been heightened to a new level of importance, due to the current global race for commodities and conservation of our environment. Buildings are of particular interest since they are significant contributors to consumption of resources. Since the inception of the LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) rating system, there has been a constant increase in the number of LEED certified buildings “green” buildings. Do green buildings truly provide financial benefits? What framework needs to be in place and followed to gauge these benefits?
This paper focuses on the creation of a framework for the life cycle cost assessment of sustainability features in the areas of mechanical, electrical, and plumbing components; further subdivided into “green” and “non-green” base construction, consumption, operations and maintenance costs to generate percent savings or percent added cost. The findings of the research were also compared to leading researchers in the field of costs of building green. A case‐study was researched based on a recently designed and constructed dormitory, awarded LEED‐Gold Certification, of a major higher education institution.
Audience Focus: Basic
Application Type: Experience-Based
Time/Location: MON 2:00-3:00/Salon D
Abstract: As the world marketplace in the process industry heats up, owners will rely more and more on contractors to provide accurate, timely, and value-added project control information so owners can manage the overall project function. This cannot and will not occur unless owners define and mandate what is required by the owner to effectively execute the project control function. This includes defining (in the request for proposal (RFP)) the reporting requirements down to specific deliverables, the reporting sequence, forecasting requirements, etc. The owner needs to evaluate the contractor’s capability to deliver these requirements during the bidding process and include them in the final contract. Although not the main or only evaluation criteria, owners need to determine if the contractor has the capability to deliver on these requirements. The owner also needs to mandate that these requirements are delivered during execution without exception or excuses. This paper will provide guidance for the above and convey realistic ‘rules of the road’ to assure effective contractor/owner collaboration.
Audience Focus: Intermediate
Application Type: Experience-Based
Time/Location: TUE 5:00-6:00/Salon D
Abstract: In 2011, my company decided to implement the Oracle Primavera suite of Project and Portfolio Management (PPM) tools. Included in the scope was the upgrade of our existing Primavera P6 Client and Web to Release 8.1, and the implementation and integration of Primavera Analytics, Primavera Inspire interface with SAP, Oracle Business Process Management (BPM), and Oracle BI Publisher for reporting. It has been a long journey from no standard PPM tool to what may be one of the largest implementations of this scale of all the major Oracle tools. There is much consternation and apprehension in the scheduling profession about the “Oracle-ization” of the Primavera we all know and love, and what that means to the future of the P6 Client and even P3. This paper will discuss the business case for upgrading to the most current versions, leading change from the grass-roots in a large owner organization, innovative uses for some of the modules in the tools, and realizing the results of the change on overall project and program performance.
Audience Focus: Intermediate
Application Type: Experience-Based
Time/Location: WED 8:00-9:00/Salon D
Abstract: The purpose of this paper is to shed some light on the role of project controls in different types of engineering, procurement & construction (EPC) contracts from an owner’s perspective. The varied functions of project controls should all work together and supplement each other to act as a decision support to project management and manage the contracts no matter what type of contract is. This paper will focus on the three main types of contracts and the roles of the different areas of project controls to handle it. In addition, this paper will shed light on the different disciplines within project controls and the integration among them to reach the ideal goal of controlled execution of a project with repeatable best practices.
Audience Focus: Intermediate
Application Type: Experience-Based
Time/Location: WED 9:45-10:45/Salon D
Abstract: From owner’s point of view, project controls management on CAPEX projects requires collaboration from these functions such as project planning, cost estimation, cost controls, project scheduling, change management, progress and performance measurement, project reporting, and risk assessment. However, in some organizations, project controls functions are isolated. For examples, project controls team does very less contribution during project planning phase (FEED phase); cost estimator works solely, without involvement from cost engineer so that the latter has no in-depth understanding of estimation development. Risk assessment workshop normally closes the door to other project controls personnel except risk analyst. Actual project data (cost, schedule, performance and risks) are not updated through corporate capital projects database. So on and so forth. In return, this results in biased project status information, unsatisfactory team moral and low project execution performance. In a more cost-effectiveness or consciousness project environment nowadays, a lot of scattered project controls functions should be combined into a collaborative fashion led by the project control manager assigned on the CAPEX projects in order to improve owner’s project execution performance, which is the lean project controls management that this paper aims to describe its concept and process from an owner’s perspective. Therefore, this paper will focus on:
Major functions of lean project controls management, and
Lean project controls management practice.
This paper only covers CAPEX projects from an owner’s perspective and the author has no inclusion of OPEX projects and R & D related projects.
Audience Focus: Basic
Application Type: Experience-Based
Time/Location: MON 3:45-4:45/Salon D
Abstract: In today’s world of mega capital projects the process and cycle times are under the constant pressure of costs and schedule to get the projects completed and operational. One of the major milestones in the project life cycle is the development and management approval of a final funding estimate which will help define the scope of the project and provide a control basis going forward. This paper will address issues related to confirmation of the validity of a third party estimate to allow the owner to have confidence the project will meet the companys financial and operational objectives.
Audience Focus: Basic
Application Type: Experience-Based
Time/Location: MON 10:00-11:00/Salon D
Abstract: In today's "project" world, it can no longer be assumed that one single approach or methodology can be used for the development and execution of a project. Therefore, there is a need for practitioners to be proactive in understanding and implementing all applicable delivery philosophies that support the needs of the organization and the project. This paper is a compilation of the contributions of existing recommended practices, philosophies and methodologies, that when blended together, provide a unique and comprehensive approach to the development and implementation of a project delivery model.
Audience Focus: Intermediate
Application Type: Experience-Based
Time/Location: MON 5:00-6:00/Salon D
Abstract: This research provides a deeper insight into the performance of alliances for the construction of road, rail and water projects. The principle objective of alliances is to align team member expectations so that they work together for the benefit of the project. To date, this has been a challenge, and as such this makes alliances an innovative approach to procurement of infrastructure. The paper reports on a survey of 18 public infrastructure projects across Australia that utilized the alliance form of procurement. The results were based on alliance team interviews, which addressed the most critical management issues impacting on the performance of process. The research identified a sample of stakeholders form alliance leadership teams (ALT) and the alliance management teams (AMT) that had recently completed a major infrastructure projects. Results revealed that communication and trust between the ALT and AMT teams was a major issue that impacted on the effectiveness of the alliance. Furthermore, the research identifies several key factors that were necessary preconditions for successful alliances.
Primary Author: Ms Nakisa Alborzfard Worcester Polytechnic Institute
