Whether you are the prime contractor or a subcontractor working with a building owner and design team, first impressions are always a valuable tool to set the example of project management and time management. It’s been my experience that standardizing the construction phase meeting process can expedite the participants time and achieving a cost-effective approach to managing one’s involvement at each meeting. To do this, the individual facilitating the meeting, as well as a subcontractor documenting their own responsibilities should have a time-tested process.
As a rule, construction meetings, involving the trade contractors, are facilitated by the general contractor, construction manager, design-builder, or IPD (integrated project delivery) builder and more specifically by the project manager and/or mechanical-electrical (ME) coordinator. The building owner’s representative, e.g., the facility manager and the design engineer are often invited guests to these meetings. In preparing for the meeting, and for this discussion we will assume the meeting is occurring during the shop drawing submittal phase of the project.
From a time management point of view, and as the meeting facilitator, preparation time should be spent planning for the upcoming meeting so that he/she efficiently performs the required contract administration tasks at this meeting. To do this efficiently, it is recommended the following be completed prior to the meeting:
- Create a checklist of “things-to-do”, a.k.a. meeting agenda and then begin compiling the necessary documents. Ideally all of the documentation should be on a tablet or some other electronic device that allows the meeting facilitator to pull up the specific document needed for the job site visit.
- A completed meeting sign-in sheet with the required attendees names, company, and contact info on the sheet so each attendee can simply initial their presence. This prepared sign-in sheet will have additional space for others who may attend a meeting but are not always required to be at each meeting.
- Often overlooked are the Division 1 General Conditions and any Supplementary Conditions and these specific sections should be part of these uploaded documents for quick reference if questions arise at the construction meeting.
- Important contract documents to also be uploaded at the shop drawing phase of the work are:
- Division 1 specifications that address shop drawing submittal, O&M manual, training, field coordination, and project close out. It is important to get the message out that Division 1 applies to each subcontractor, as well as the individual trade specifications.
- In regard to the HVAC specification, frequently the design engineer will have overlooked the General Conditions and replicated his/her own shop drawing submittal, O&M manual, training, field coordination, and project close out criteria resulting in potential conflicts between the Division 1 specification and the specific trade specification.
- A helpful hint is to “begin to close out the project at the start” by mandating these five prime contractor and subcontractor build their close out binder as the documents are approved rather than wait until the job comes to a closes.
The building owner and the design engineer should always remember, when in the company of the trade contractors, that the prime contractor is responsible for the contract document compliances no matter what the subcontractor has interpreted.
What I consider to be an effective way of full participation in the meeting is to have the meeting facilitator call upon each trade contractor’s representative to participate in facilitating the meeting so that there is ownership versus sitting in the meeting and not contributing to the discussion.
The meeting facilitator is responsible for maintaining meeting minutes but quite often these meeting minutes don’t get sent out for several days and/or they don’t get distributed until the next meeting. This has always been a pet-peeve of mine and, as a result, I always required implementation of the “24-hour rule”! This mandate encourages the meeting facilitator to complete the meeting minutes before leaving the job site so that nothing interrupts and/or interferes completing these minutes later versus documenting each and every actions items, task assignments, and due dates without interruption that day,
With the meeting minutes completed, the facilitator can electronically distribute them along with any other pertinent documents discussed at the meeting. Prior to the next schedule job site meeting, this project manager or ME coordinator can notify and remind those attendees of their specific action item task requirement(s) and to come prepared with results for tasks each attendee was assigned with responsibility so that the next meeting doesn’t go astray with time wasted discussing unfinished tasks, as well as completion due dates not met.
Remember the phrase, “Time is Money” and lost time is lost money that can impact on the project completion schedule.