When everyone clearly understands what “done work” looks like, all teams and project stakeholders can easily align their expectations. With standardized rules and practices to qualify the “work done”, you avoid delays and minimize errors. When is a transfer considered successful?
Where on site will received materials be delivered and when will they be considered correctly received? These are simple questions, but these seemingly simple actions can lead to delays and stoppages on the construction site. They can even cause commercial complaints that could compromise the project’s margins. Consequently, project managers need to have subcontractors and other project participants contribute to creating a single, central, live view of project planning in project management.
We repeatedly see people walking around construction sites with important information stored in their heads and in disconnected formats (hard/hard copies, PDFs, spreadsheets). They are constantly involved in work discussions without any knowledge of what they are doing, regardless of whether it has real value or not.
When you know when a job should be considered “done”; when you have the ability to communicate your conclusion to the correct parties; and when you can perform tasks in a collaborative environment, it makes a noticeable difference. Monitoring progress becomes easy, transparent and practical. However, disconnected timelines and stakeholders and non-standardized work practices lead to siled processes and systems that distort the entire picture of a project and its progress. This all boils down to constant delays, frequent disputes and a lack of peace of mind for you – this is not what you want for your project or for yourself.
Here are the main reasons and main benefits of having a shared understanding of the concept of “done”:
1. Everyone is on the same page
People often have conflicting ideas about what is completed and what is not. Deciding as a team on a standard of what is considered “done” is essential. This aligns everyone with the needs of the project and necessary next steps. Because everyone has the same precise vision of the project and is on the same page, people know when to communicate their tasks, show up at the right time and day, and update when they finish their work. Additionally, this helps everyone on the project make faster, more informed decisions.
2. Reduce downtime
Clearly communicating when a team or individual has completed a smaller task or a large job greatly reduces wait times between activities and jobs. As we have seen on thousands of construction projects, subcontractors or crews often arrive on site in vain because the work that needs to be done before they can perform yours is behind schedule or the necessary materials have not yet arrived. In this case, they wait unnecessarily or reschedule work for another day. This creates delays and additional costs that could have been avoided with a centralized and dynamic construction schedule.
3. Limit waste
There are many elements considered waste in a project: materials, time, unproductive labor, inadequate equipment. In essence, anything that does not add value to the project or decreases the value of the project is considered waste. By understanding and standardizing the system boundaries of a task, essentially when a task starts and when it ends, everyone can plan ahead more efficiently, implement actions for predictable scenarios, and avoid unnecessary practices.
4. Standardize tasks, practices and processes
When you clearly define each task and have shared criteria for when they start and end, you are standardizing task practices and processes that determine your fixed system boundaries. With this as a reference, you have implemented a system that can effectively measure the success or failure of a task. For projects that include repetitive processes, having a robust standard allows you to continually and consistently analyze the way you build and progress, and ultimately improve your work process and communication with and within your teams.
5. Better materials management
Once you break down your tasks and understand the hierarchical structure of the interconnected work required to carry out your project successfully, you will have a clear understanding of each activity that needs to be performed and the scope of work required. With this understanding, you will also have an accurate knowledge of what materials are needed and when. You no longer need to spend money on maintaining a huge inventory and the costs that come with excess inventory, such as damaged or stolen materials.
6. Better labor management
Knowing when tasks and activities are completed and being able to communicate your updates instantly helps develop a rational view of the work resources needed to accomplish the quantity, scope, and nature of work required. It provides a framework of what skills and experience and how many people you need to mobilize for various tasks. You no longer need to guess the project participants needed to achieve standardized project results.
Without a clear definition of “done,” your project teams and subcontractors won’t know the exact scope of work and what they’re working on. For your project to move forward successfully, you need to know exactly where things are in the construction process. A universal definition of done allows your team and subcontractors to finish what they're doing and move on to the next job. Without a clear idea of what is “done,” unfinished work piles up, disconnected tasks impede project progress, and you end up with delays and downtime.
Standardize your definition of “done”, avoid delays
Defining “done” for your project team and subcontractors starts with a project planning tool that allows you to break down project tasks and assign them to prioritized teams and subcontractors. Once you organize everyone on a central, active platform where they can communicate and update each task and deliverable, no one will need to wait between connected tasks. In the event of a delay, your teams and subcontractors can refocus on performing other functional tasks to avoid wasted time and complaints.
