Engineering Deliverables: Get It Right the First Time

Publication No

RS320-1

Type

Research & Development Product

Publication Date

Dec 01, 2016

Pages

Research Team

RT-320

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DOCUMENT DETAILS

Abstract

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Abstract

High-quality design deliverables are essential to project success, yet quality is challenging to define and to predict. Project teams are diverse, so stakeholders often hold diverse opinions about and use diverse definitions of quality deliverables. Project stakeholders also often determine quality by utilizing lagging, rather than leading, indicators, and subsequent responses are inherently reactive. The industry lacks a shared understanding of quality defects and the tools to help detect design quality risks.

Identifying these challenges as significant opportunities for project advancement, the Construction Industry Institute (CII) chartered Research Team 320 (RT-320), Definition and Measurement of Engineering/Design Deliverable Quality, to develop a uniform definition and method of measurement for engineering/design deliverable quality, usable by project owners, project managers, project quality managers, and contractor design managers and discipline leads. RT-320 defined high-quality design deliverables as complete, correct, and timely.

Through a survey of experienced design professionals, the team identified 11 common detailed design deliverables that are often suffer from quality problems. By focusing on these 11 deliverables, the team gained a better understanding of common and significant deliverable defects, the impacts of these defects, and defect causal factors.

Armed with this information, RT-320 identified leading indicator metrics that can warn of defect-prone deliverables. Concurrently, the team used published literature, corporate tools, knowledge of deliverable defects, and team experience to formulate a completeness checklist for each of the 11 problematic deliverables. To enable proactive design quality actions by project teams, these findings were integrated into two tools that assess design deliverable quality and completeness throughout detailed design, beginning with Front End Engineering Design (FEED) validation and continuing through issued-for-construction:

The Design Deliverable Quality Assessment (DDQA) tool identifies threats to deliverable quality by focusing on leading indicators.
The Completeness of Design Deliverable Checklist (CDDC) tool provides a method for consistent measurement of deliverable completeness.

The application of these two tools can help project teams to achieve complete, correct, and timely results for the 11 commonly problematic design deliverables. By aligning project expectations and better predicting deliverable completeness, projects should benefit from reduced rework and improved cost and schedule performance.

Filters & Tags

Knowledge Area

Design Planning & Optimization, Quality Management

Best Practice

Quality Management

Project Phase

Detailed Design (Engineering)

Project Function

Project Management, Architects & Engineering, Construction, Commissioning & Startup, Operations & Maintenance, Quality Management, External Stakeholders

Industry Group

Light Industrial, Heavy Industrial, Buildings, Infrastructure

Research Topic

Definition and Measurement of Engineering/Design Deliverable Quality

Keywords

Problematic deliverables, Deliverable completeness, Defect analysis, Engineering deliverable quality, Deliverable correctness, Defect impacts, Design deliverable quality, Deliverable timeliness, Defect causal factor, Engineering quality, Deliverable defects, Leading indicators, Design quality, Engineering/Design defects, Lagging indicators, rt320

Related Resources

Engineering Deliverables: Get It Right the First Time

Related Resources

Study of Engineering/Design Deliverable Quality

Tools for Enhancing the Quality of Problematic Design Deliverables

Engineering Deliverables: Get It Right the First Time

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