Lean construction is a strategy that aims to reduce waste and inefficiencies. The goal of lean construction is to improve the process, value, quality and safety while reducing cost. Lean Construction creates an environment where employees are empowered by their work culture and responsibility for continuous improvement.
In order for your subcontractor company to use lean construction, it must first understand what it entails. Lean Construction has five principles:
1 – Identify Value
2 – Map value stream
3 – Create flow
4 – Establish Pull
5 – Pursue / Seek Constant Improvement / Perfection
If you want to read more about Construction Business Made Simple then click this link
Once you have implemented these principles into your business practices, you will notice tremendous improvements in performance metrics such as total lead time (TLT) which includes planning/designing phase plus execution phase on average drops from 20-25%.
This blog post will discuss lean Construction, what it is and how construction subcontractors can implement it into their business. This style of work was developed in the 1970s by Toyota Motor Corporation to reduce waste and decrease production time.
It’s a very efficient way for contractors to produce high-quality products with fewer resources which increases profit margins while improving customer satisfaction. I’ll explain what lean construction is in plain English and give action steps for business owners to get the real benefits.
Lean Construction, simply put, is a style of work developed & designed specifically to reduce the cost per unit or product (aka efficiency). It’s not a style that’s for everyone, but it can produce high-quality results with fewer resources which will translate to increased profit margins and improved customer satisfaction.
This process is best used in industries where the products are mass-produced and have a high risk of defects. Lean Construction focuses on improving production processes to reduce waste.
Lean construction is commonly used in constructing projects such as schools, hospitals, warehouses, retail, office buildings, housing and care homes.
If you want to read more on improving your construction business here’s 10 Tips for Project Success.
What is lean construction and how can your company use it?
Lean construction is a collaborative, shared-value approach to commercial construction. The goal of lean manufacturing and project management principles at work in this method is the elimination or reduction of waste from every stage of development, production, processing and distribution.
Lean Construction harnesses the power of all trades involved on a job site (architects, engineers, main contractors, subcontractors and suppliers) to work together for a common goal: delivering quality construction on time and within budget.
Lean Construction is most successful when the team “walks through” the entire project before any tangible product or service is created in order to identify potential problems that could arise from specific steps of the process. This starts with potentially the architect, the main contractor, and any key subcontractors that should be on-site together.
Why should you care about Lean Construction?
Construction is a process-heavy industry, which means that it’s subject to many different types of waste. Lean Construction aims to reduce inefficiencies and maximize efficiency by focusing on value for the customer. It does this by decreasing building time, maximizing use of space during construction and increasing safety awareness at all levels. When used effectively, Lean Construction can help you to:
- Keep your project on budget and on time by reducing waste in the planning process.
- Reduce material costs by ordering only materials that are needed for certain parts of a building or site. This also helps eliminate excess materials on site.
- Increase safety
How does Lean Construction work for construction companies
Lean Construction is a method of construction that helps to plan and design for the future. It’s an essential approach in order to make sure all stakeholders are satisfied with the process, from investors, managers, designers and constructors. The basis behind Lean Construction is just as its name implies: making something “lean” or efficient so it can be used in the most productive and profitable way possible.
It’s an approach that is widely accepted in other industries, so it makes sense that construction companies are adopting it more frequently.
The benefits of using Lean Construction
It is a methodology that can be used by construction subcontractors to improve the efficiency and quality of their work. Lean Construction is based on the idea of waste elimination. By identifying and eliminating waste in the construction process, subcontractors can improve the speed and quality of their work.
Some of the additional benefits of using Lean Construction on your construction projects include:
- improved communication and coordination between team members
- reduced project costs
- It will increase the likelihood of getting projects that are more profitable.
- Less time spent on administrative work, so there is more time to focus on other aspects of your business and get a better quality product with increased efficiency (more production).
- The construction industry has been changing drastically over the past few decades, and lean Construction is just one of the many ways that it has been adapting.
- It can be implemented by business owners at any point in their career – from starting a new company to being established with years under your belt.
Join the list for The Subcontractor Hub Newsletter
The drawbacks of Lean construction
- Subcontractors may not be familiar with Lean Construction, and as such it will require additional training
- There is no well-developed system for practising Lean Construction for subcontractors which means that there is no way to measure the effectiveness of the methodology
- It can potentially take less profit margin.
- Some people might be resistant to change and find it hard to understand the process.
- Higher degree of risk with implementation – if not done correctly there is a higher chance that your business will fail.
- Hard to implement on projects with existing building structures or where there is already established culture of work practices in place.
How to implement lean construction in your company’s projects
Lean Construction, as defined by PMI (the Project Management Institute) is “a set of tools and techniques that can be applied to any process or project.” Regardless of what type of company you are working with- from manufacturing to design firms – there are benefits to implementing lean thinking to your workflow.
Lean Construction has five principles:
1 – Identify Value
The first principle of Lean Construction is Identifying Value. The process for identifying the value can vary depending on the company but typically starts with capturing customer needs and expectations. As you dig deeper into identifying value, it’s important to identify the root cause of a problem in order to solve it for a sustainable benefit
With lean construction, the importance of involving subcontractors, suppliers and other parties in the process of identifying value is paramount. You may be digging deep into solving a problem that will only affect your company but not another subcontractor or supplier. Therefore, these parties should be brought in at an early stage to avoid wasting time trying to figure out how to solve a problem which they could have helped identify from the beginning.
2 – Map value stream
The second principle of lean construction is mapping the value stream. The value stream begins with what you, as a company, offer and ends at the customer’s request for service or supply.
Value Stream
Beginning with what you have to offer, the value stream continues through to being completed. This is when it reaches the customer in one form or another. Some would say that it does not stop there, since your customer will also have a feedback loop for their interactions with your company. Thus, in lean construction terms, the true value stream is from when you pass your product on to your customer and when they pass it on to their next customer. i.e you completing your work, 1st fix then passing it onto the next trade for them to complete their 1st or 2nd fix.
3 – Create flow
The third principle of lean construction is creating flow. The goal of the process is to reduce the cost of not having enough materials on hand while also reducing costs in other areas. Material costs are traditionally more expensive at the time of completion, but adding them early in the process can decrease overall costs for a company. In lean construction, creating flow is more than just having the materials readily available.
It’s about making sure that those resources are moved as quickly as possible from one department to another without any interruptions or delays within a company. In order to achieve this goal of reducing waste and increasing value-added time for employees, it may be necessary to change some of your current processes.
4 – Establish Pull
The fourth principle of lean construction is establishing pull. In order to make sure that the correct materials and labour are being used in the correct order and at the correct time, it’s necessary to have a system in place that will allow for just-in-time delivery.
In order for this to happen, there needs to be a signal from the customer that they need more materials or labour on site. That signal is then sent back through the chain of suppliers and subcontractors until it reaches the company that is responsible for fulfilling that request. The key to making this work is creating a system where everyone involved understands their role and how they are interconnected with the rest of the process.
This comes from discussing at an early stage the individual elements for each trade and putting the following steps in a clear order. This enables the “signal” or completion of the previous step to be monitored and give notice to the following step of the process.
5 – Pursue Constant Perfection
In lean construction, the fifth principle of pursuing perfection is a more difficult goal. In order to approach this goal, it’s necessary to look at the root of a problem and see if it’s something that can be resolved. If so, then pursuing perfection will be attainable. If not, then ask yourself if there might be an external trigger that can be altered or removed from the process.
The goal is to constantly improve and perfect the process so that it becomes more efficient over time. This involves looking at what’s currently happening and making changes to see if they result in a positive outcome. If not, then the cycle of improvement begins anew until the desired outcome is achieved. Essentially 1% gains through every element can add up to a significant amount of improvement.
Tips for success when implementing a project with lean construction
Lean construction is the idea of building something only as it needs to be built, in contrast with traditional methods that use up-front planning or speculation. Lean construction can also include projects that are done on an incremental basis, meaning they don’t build everything at once but instead work in stages.
- Use a lean, incremental approach
- Get the right people on board
- Create a culture of entrepreneurship with no fear
- Aim for speed and quality at the same time
- Optimise your value stream to improve flow
- Focus on developing talents rather than individual competencies
- Keep things simple by keeping customer needs in mind when designing the end product and processes.
- Identify the process that needs to be improved
- Understand how quality is measured in your business and identify what those measurements are (i.e., time, cost, quality).
- Evaluate all the variables of a project – materials, labour hours required for each task, design; quantify these variables so you can measure them.
- Develop a plan for the project that sets goals and timelines, maps out milestones, and assigns responsibility to team members.
- Implement the process with minimal waste – eliminate things like unused materials or work hours that aren’t necessary.
- Learn from mistakes along the way so you can adjust your approach as needed throughout the project.
People who are involved with lean construction need to be able to work in a collaborative, team-based way and have the capacity for rapid change on demand. Lean construction is widely used by successful contractors because it is more profitable than traditional methods of building when done correctly.
Today, Lean Construction is one of the most popular construction management systems.
In order for your subcontractor company to use lean construction, it must first understand what it entails. Lean Construction has five principles: respect people; create flow; build quality in; manage from the customer’s perspective; see the whole system.
The goal of this strategy is not only to reduce waste and inefficiencies but also to improve processes among other necessary areas like safety and value while reducing cost. They can help any subcontractor company that strives to create a culture where employees are empowered by their work.
For more articles like this, please sign up to our newsletter.
