Project Delivery

We all talk a lot about Teamwork among Owner-Architect-Builder, but actually enabling it depends on the following...

 1.  Any chance of cooperative Teaming is determined at the very start of any project--NOT just at the bidding of construction--by the owner's choice of project delivery method.   The chosen method has to contractually align interests of the owner, designer and builder in order to allow them to function as true partners on the same team with the same contractual incentives and motivations.  Otherwise, 'partnering' is just an idealistic pretense that has to fly in the face of very real, too-often insurmountable, contractual obstacles and profit disincentives. 
 
2. There can be no expectation of "project teamwork" unless all the project's players are contractually on the SAME side of the SAME team.  Any delivery method where one party profits at the other's expense is NOT a team arrangement.  This may sound obvious, but in the typically contentious low-bid D-B-B and Design-Build delivery methods, an Owner is essentially paying the Contractor to be their opponent instead, resulting in contractual I-win-you-lose profit incentives to aggressively substitute, exploit loopholes, cut corners and make change order claims due to 'defective design documents', all of which slow down progress, defeat noble partnering ideals and increase costs for everyone. 
 
3. Successful projects do not just 'happen'-they require teamwork.  And successful teamwork requires far more than just lip service:  all team members have to contractually be on the same side, with the same transparent open-book, non-conflicting motivation to achieve the same goals for the same client, start to finish.  Traditional low-bid, no-peek Design-Bid-Build and Design-Build delivery methods impose on contractors self-interest incentives that are exactly opposite to the interests of the Owner and Architect.  The only method that can guarantee an Owner that their project will stay within a financially feasible budget and schedule-and do it in a true team effort with the Owner and their A/E-is a modified "Collaborative" version of CM at-Risk, a practical transitional step toward Integrated Project Delivery.
 
4. In the Collaborative version of CM at-Risk, CMR, the best-qualified (and fully-bonded, if desired) CM/GC builder is selected jointly by Owner and Architect via Qualifications Based Selection, QBS, to work open-book on a competitive fixed-fee basis to keep the project on a guaranteed early-GMP and schedule.  The CMR/builder is thus contractually incentivized to work as an actual team member with-not against, for a change-the Owner's staff and the A/E from early planning through completion of construction.  It works.

We all talk a lot about Teamwork among Owner-Architect-Builder, but actually enabling it depends on the following...

 1.  Any chance of cooperative Teaming is determined at the very start of any project--NOT just at the bidding of construction--by the owner's choice of project delivery method.   The chosen method has to contractually align interests of the owner, designer and builder in order to allow them to function as true partners on the same team with the same contractual incentives and motivations.  Otherwise, 'partnering' is just an idealistic pretense that has to fly in the face of very real, too-often insurmountable, contractual obstacles and profit disincentives. 
 
2. There can be no expectation of "project teamwork" unless all the project's players are contractually on the SAME side of the SAME team.  Any delivery method where one party profits at the other's expense is NOT a team arrangement.  This may sound obvious, but in the typically contentious low-bid D-B-B and Design-Build delivery methods, an Owner is essentially paying the Contractor to be their opponent instead, resulting in contractual I-win-you-lose profit incentives to aggressively substitute, exploit loopholes, cut corners and make change order claims due to 'defective design documents', all of which slow down progress, defeat noble partnering ideals and increase costs for everyone. 
 
3. Successful projects do not just 'happen'-they require teamwork.  And successful teamwork requires far more than just lip service:  all team members have to contractually be on the same side, with the same transparent open-book, non-conflicting motivation to achieve the same goals for the same client, start to finish.  Traditional low-bid, no-peek Design-Bid-Build and Design-Build delivery methods impose on contractors self-interest incentives that are exactly opposite to the interests of the Owner and Architect.  The only method that can guarantee an Owner that their project will stay within a financially feasible budget and schedule-and do it in a true team effort with the Owner and their A/E-is a modified "Collaborative" version of CM at-Risk, a practical transitional step toward Integrated Project Delivery.
 
4. In the Collaborative version of CM at-Risk, CMR, the best-qualified (and fully-bonded, if desired) CM/GC builder is selected jointly by Owner and Architect via Qualifications Based Selection, QBS, to work open-book on a competitive fixed-fee basis to keep the project on a guaranteed early-GMP and schedule.  The CMR/builder is thus contractually incentivized to work as an actual team member with-not against, for a change-the Owner's staff and the A/E from early planning through completion of construction.  It works.