Project culture has direct impact on collaboration. A collaborative culture enables good design and is more important with the use of BIM enabled project delivery. Collaborative project delivery, when properly configured, has all parties benefiting from collective risk management, offsetting the trend to compartmentalize detailing inherent with BIM enabled project delivery.
This is a case study of how Sutter Health and SmithGroup architects, HerreroBoldt (a partnership of Herrero Builders and The Boldt Company) used an Integrated Lean Project Delivery® (ILPD) method to deliver a LEED-certified facility that encompasses California Pacific Medical Center's vision and guiding principles. The project incorporated the latest in lean project delivery including target value design, Building Information Modeling (BIM) and advanced approaches to ILPD.
Successfully leveraging the expertise of all these parties, focusing them in the same direction, and orchestrating them to move together seamlessly is no easy task. Under traditional contracts, architects and contractors aren't accustomed to working together like this. With integrated project delivery, all three parties-owner, architect, and contractor-are collaborating from the start, joining forces to problem-solve, pursue cost efficiencies, streamline the construction process, and share risks and rewards. That's the theory, at least. Does it work in practice?