- Lean Construction is a well-acknowledged path for continuous improvement.
- Real-time location technologies allow identifying last planner improvements quickly and effortlessly.
- Trusstor's C² (Command & Control Suite) helps general contractors accelerate Lean Construction.
Leaner Lean Construction
Lean Construction is among the most significant improvements in modern construction management. Alongside BIM, which organizes building information, Lean Construction principles guide builders on how to increase value and reduce waste.
Adopting Lean Construction improvements isn't always smooth. General contractors' Lean initiatives are often hampered by an invisible threshold for identifying improvements and overseeing last planner issues. Yogi Berra said, “You could observe a lot just by looking”. But when you constantly need to dig through hints, suggestions and testimonials, it's easier to develop a blind eye than a bold vision.
Trusstor's C² is a Lean Construction catalyst. It helps site managers and industry stakeholders see what's going on in their sites in unprecedented detail. Re-evaluating performance and safety benchmarks, identifying critical path issues, focusing on possible last planner improvements and enjoying the benefits of data-driven construction management make Lean Construction leaner.
Three easy and quick steps to enhance Lean Construction capabilities
- Make your site digital and smart by installing sensors in your work areas. With Trusstor’s plug-and-play sensors, you would be able to deploy sensors across a high-rise building in less than a day and gather operational data immediately.
- Take the data collected to the next step by using artificial intelligence and identify gaps between the general project schedule, weekly tasks and hourly efforts. Analyze possible causes, and share awareness.
- Make informed and educated decisions. Choose improvements from a menu of possible adjustments, or define your operational enhancements. Data-driven management makes communicating issues with partners and subcontractors easier and motivates them to build better. Automated follow-ups will let you know if your last planner issues are resolved.
Bridging the gap between actual and assumed work patterns
New real-time location technologies and platforms, such as Trusstor’s C², automate and enhance site managers' ability to attend to the variety of minuscule day-to-day inefficiencies that aggregate into significant delays and cost spills.
Following a quick installation of Trusstor’s C² sensors, site managers begin to receive real-time status of the workforce, equipment and material whereabouts, accompanied by improvement insights.
“Understanding the reasons behind the discrepancies between the project Gantt, weekly work plans, and actual wrench time is no longer a demanding task.“
Re-evaluating industry benchmarks and focusing on improvements
For meaningful improvements, we must re-measure and re-evaluate our operational benchmarks.
Operational benchmarks are the ultimate source of truth in the construction industry. However, they need context. Planning projects based on inaccurate rules of thumb figures unintentionally leads to discrepancies between actuals and plans.
We "know", for example, how many square feet of tiles a good floorer places on a good day, or we assume how many days it takes a good team of HVAC specialists to install ventilation ducts on each floor. But do these figures apply to all our sites? And if not, why is it different?
In one project, we expedited schedules by 12% after revealing that the time allocated to some of the subcontractors was unnecessarily longer than it took them to finish the jobs. On other occasions, we’ve shown that a consistent and unnoticed delay of one to two days when starting tasks led to a five weeks gap between general and actual schedules in a manner of months. Using data gathered in projects, we could predict when busy and time-sensitive days will occur and suggest how to alleviate bottlenecks by organizing work shifts differently.
"Insights like those provided by Trusstor’s C² are rarely created during the busy days on site. And now, Trusstor’s C² suite does the science for us. It's like having a data analyst in my team, just waiting to make all these inquiries that help me improve construction works and safety."
Lean Construction can be improved at scale and speed with sensor-based measurements and data-driven acknowledgment of operational truths.
Get it all
There is a common belief in the construction business that when it comes to cost, speed and quality, contractors must choose two out of three. However, we've seen that with new technologies, contractors can get all three and then some.
To lead in competitive markets and prepare for the next generation of construction sites, Trusstor helps contractors develop the next generation of construction intelligence.
Contact Trusstor.com to expedite your lean construction achievements.
