According to a recent Smart Market Report, “Managing Uncertainty and Expectations in Building Design and Construction,” the greatest risk to project success is the ability for the designer and contractor to resolve issues together along with the owner organization and that the ability for the team to collaborate is even more important than the selection of the project’s delivery method. For these reasons and more, the International Partnering Institute (IPI), whose mission is to

As a partnering facilitator on challenging building projects, I can share that effective communication among team members is the best offense in managing risk on any type of project. On a design-build hospital renovation project that I recently facilitated, project challenges related to unknown conditions and owner additions triggered each stakeholder’s conventional risk management strategies—such as case building and communicating entirely through emails and letters—all of which led to distrust

The Anaheim Regional Transportation Intermodal Center has been selected as one of the American Public Works Association’s Public Works Projects of the Year for 2015. This project was facilitated by Neal Flesner of Ventura Consulting Group.  This honor will be commemorated during an awards ceremony to be held in conjunction with the 2015 International Public Works Congress and Exposition in Phoenix, Arizona and is scheduled for Monday, August 31, at 5:00

 On March 13 2015, the AGC celebrated its 33rd Annual Alliant Build America Awards Ceremony.  The Alliant sponsored event is conducted to recognize the highest achievements in construction for state-of-the-art advancement, outstanding project management and innovative construction techniques. Recipients of the Build America Awards have demonstrated construction excellence and are building a better world and improving our quality of life. Each project reflects the crucial combination of contractor excellence with talented

 Solving problems for employees is like playing a game of fetch and that’s not a good thing. What do you say when a person gets into the habit of coming directly to you with a problem and asks, “What do you think I should do?” Your subconscious urge will be to provide you recommendation, or even make the decision for them. Your ego gets stroked because you get to play

At Least 10 Unnatural Acts of Misguided Management: 1. He only lied when his lips were moving. The CEO announcing to all of a firm’s employees, “there will be no layoffs,” over a pizza lunch in the warehouse. Ten days later, there were layoffs. 2. Coordination is over-rated. An executive team who despised each other so much, they never met. What do you think happened to this business? You’re right.

 Setting goals are crucial to success, but there are 4 practices you should avoid. As you can imagine, we are big fans of setting goals. Hundreds of studies conducted in numerous countries and contexts have demonstrated that setting goals can be a powerful driver of behavior and performance. However, a Harvard study suggests that whilst goal setting has many beneficial effects, there is a potential for significant side-effects if goals

The Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority (Metro) Phase 2 of the Exposition (Expo) Light Rail Line, at $1.5 billion, has been hailed as the light rail project that will finally connect downtown city of Los Angeles residents with the beaches of Santa Monica. A milestone design-build project in Los Angeles’s massive more than $40 billion transit program. As with any large complex transit project, there are major challenges and

On May 14th, 2015, IPI celebrated its 6th Annual IPI Partnering Awards Ceremony. Owners, Contractors, Facilitators, CMs, Designers, and other associated Construction professionals dedicated to construction culture change, gathered at the SFO International Airport Museum to Celebrate the Nation’s most collaborative organizations and Project Teams. Total contracted work: $2,079,873,557 Total budget savings: $135,878,595.74 (7% average savings) 19/23: ration of jobs without a Time Loss Incident 15/23: ratio of projects that