My Three Little 'Ice Breakers'

I spend a fair amount of time traveling around the country teaching, presenting, and lecturing on integrated project delivery, collaboration, and acquisition management. I teach the "Owner's Series" course work for DBIA, I just presented a lecture at Drury University (my Alma Mater), I, along with the owner and design-builder, presented a performance-based design-build project at the AIA National Convention. I could go on (lucky for you, I won't)...I just finished a comment in my Linkedin discussion group, and thought I'd share it.

During nearly all of these presentations and lectures I ask three (tongue-in-cheek) questions as an 'ice breaker' to get the audience thinking...

How do you stump an designer? Answer: Give them a budget.
How do you stump a builder? Answer: Give them a blank sheet of paper.
How do you stump an owner? Answer: Ask them what they want.

The point I want to make is that all three primary players involved in project delivery truly need each other to define, plan, and create a successful project. This interdependence is what I believe has led to the move toward integrated project delivery: the realization that no one player is the end-all in creating success.

The best that Integrated Project Delivery offers is success for each of the three players...the least it offers is a project executed without any major surprises. Either way, IPD adds value to any owner, any designer, and any builder on any and every project. So why not Integrated Delivery for all projects? Stay tuned....
1980-Builder 1990-Architect 2000-DesignBuilder Today-Experienced and well-worn

Popular posts from this blog

"Proposed Solution" does not equal "Problem Solved" (Problem-Based Contracting)

Image
Prediction: The Key to Planning Let's say 10 people are invited to propose how they would execute the task of taking a trip from New York to LA. The goal is to leave NY and be in LA in 7 days (to deliver a letter for some kooky eccentric who makes-up odd challenges). Each competitor would propose details of their planned trip and would sign a contract to deliver the letter. What would influence the path and pace of their individual routes? Let's say each person had only $1,000 to spend toward the trip. Does the mode of transportation change? Let's say each must visit at least one National Park along the way (more than one park visited earns a 'tip'). Do the routes change? Let's say that each had to spend at least one day photographing a "national landmark" along the way (more than one photographed earns another 'tip'). Does the 'itinerary' change? Of course each 'proposal' would likely be different, there is a thousands
Read more

DBIA's 10 BP's in 10 Post (#2)

Image
NREL's First DB Project If you missed my discussion on DBIA Best Practice #1 and the introduction of this series, now is the time to review . Moving on to BP#2 An owner should implement a procurement plan that enhances collaboration and other benefits of design-build and is in harmony with the reasons that the owner chose the design-build delivery system. Right off the bat, this practice charges the owner with fostering a procurement plan that enhances “collaboration”: a prominent opportunity and result of Design-Build Done Right. However, the beneficial affects of collaboration do not move from opportunity to result without a determined effort on the part of the owner. To pause here, and go deeper into collaboration, consider that this requires the owner, designer and builder to make commitments, and keep them. The owner is, and must be, the guardian of the collaborative effort: because the project owner is uniquely positioned as the default “governor” of th
Read more

Long Long Ago…

Image
C. 2008 Well maybe not “long long ago”. To be real…September 17, 2014 was my last post to this blog. Almost a decade. Back then, bloggin’ was somewhat new, at least to me, having started in 2011. Writing thoughts to anonymous readers was a way to crystallize the research and application of what I’ve developed over my many years in the design and construction industry. Much of this thinkery was applied to projects that achieved great success, beyond my expectations. Many fell flat on their face, providing insult to my ego, a loss of credibility to some, humility, doubt in my mind. What the hell…let’s tweak it and try again! And the outcomes always got better in direct proportion to my learning from both success and failure. On that note, the note of courage to try again, I have a future post coming. The story of a major government project, millions of dollars, a third-party critique of the project approach, an empty office occupied by only me and a government PM (who had about 20 bosses
Read more