I come from a commercial construction background where I worked in the field. After completing a few projects and having the same issues come up over and over again, I started performing my own construction coordination review of the construction documents. It is surprising how often things like access control for door hardware are not coordinated when the documents are handed over to the contractor often resulting in change orders.
Does anyone use a third-party to review construction documents in an effort to catch as many coordination issues as possible? If so, what criteria do you use to pick a third-party reviewer? I feel like this is an undervalued part of the process that is often overlooked.
That would be ideal. Unfortunately, these issues have been consistent across the majority of design teams and projects I've worked on across the southern/southeast US. Good to hear that it isn't an industry norm.
I've worked in numerous southern US offices where coordination and detailing at the drawing stage were shut down by management in favor of "working it out with submittals" or "working it out in the field".
Yeah, and it's spawned a cohort of people in the architectural workforce who got trained to work that way. A lot of the MEP engineers in the region are the same way.
I feel like a lot of the time it is a quick budget item to get struck. The cost for me performing these reviews are 100% paid for by issues caught before construction started. All egos aside, I haven't ever seen a set of perfect construction documents. There are so many things that need to be coordinated that it is inevitable for something to slip through the cracks. I don't claim to catch every single thing but do find a lot.
There's no such thing as a perfect set of CDs - architectural fees are just not enough to cover the hours it would take. That said, the quality of CDs does vary greatly among firms (or even within the larger firms). There's an old saying, "fast, cheap, good - choose two." The market pushes architects to prioritize fast and cheap, and many (possibly most) firms go along with it. Those of us who try to prioritize quality are often "swimming against the current," sometimes even within our own firms. Another pithy saying of more recent vintage goes, "a project manager is someone who thinks 9 pregnant women should be able to produce a baby in 1 month." This is where we find ourselves when trying to do quality work.
Obviously agree that offices should do their own coordination.
However, the contractor should also be doing construction coordination. It's their only job. There's only so much the design team can predict, and the shop drawing/submittal process is there to dial in all the finer details that only come with actually putting the pieces together.
The above feels obvious to write, and I assume OP would agree. It's just very challenging when the contractor only pushes paper between subs and architects, as opposed to someone who actually reviews and manages the whole process. This is coming from a place of bitterness, haha, apologies.
To further clarify, I was surprised to read that you'd only just now begun doing this. I would have assumed that it's a regular part of your job. If not, I wonder if it's because no one else does it and did not train you to do it. Which would produce the scenario I outlined above. Perhaps I've misread the situation.
so much this...
how many times has the design side due diligence run up against product/process info that is incomplete because the mfr hides the secret sauce from public consumption & we only find out a given detail when a shop drawing shows up?
Or GC's who push the responsibility of coordinating trades onto the subs? That is the GC's responsibility primarily. The sub also needs to see beyond his own trade, but his responsibility is primarily communicating the inclusions/exclusions of his trade to his GC so the GC can resolve any work that is doubled or missed in the overlap of sub scopes.
I've known outside document review to be primarily done by older, experienced architects. They are either hired by the architect on a consulting basis or they work for the owner, either independently or as an employee of a business providing owner representation services.
I think it depends on the project type as well. In my experience, high-end single family residential tends to be the most highly coordinated, multi-family the least. Commercial and hospitality fall somewhere in between.
QC / Coordination During Design
Hi Everyone,
I come from a commercial construction background where I worked in the field. After completing a few projects and having the same issues come up over and over again, I started performing my own construction coordination review of the construction documents. It is surprising how often things like access control for door hardware are not coordinated when the documents are handed over to the contractor often resulting in change orders.
Does anyone use a third-party to review construction documents in an effort to catch as many coordination issues as possible? If so, what criteria do you use to pick a third-party reviewer? I feel like this is an undervalued part of the process that is often overlooked.
Thanks!
T
No, we do our own quality control and doc reviews in house. Perhaps you just need to work with more diligent offices.
That would be ideal. Unfortunately, these issues have been consistent across the majority of design teams and projects I've worked on across the southern/southeast US. Good to hear that it isn't an industry norm.
I've worked in numerous southern US offices where coordination and detailing at the drawing stage were shut down by management in favor of "working it out with submittals" or "working it out in the field".
I've seen it too, terrible practice .
Yeah, and it's spawned a cohort of people in the architectural workforce who got trained to work that way. A lot of the MEP engineers in the region are the same way.
I feel like a lot of the time it is a quick budget item to get struck. The cost for me performing these reviews are 100% paid for by issues caught before construction started. All egos aside, I haven't ever seen a set of perfect construction documents. There are so many things that need to be coordinated that it is inevitable for something to slip through the cracks. I don't claim to catch every single thing but do find a lot.
There's no such thing as a perfect set of CDs - architectural fees are just not enough to cover the hours it would take. That said, the quality of CDs does vary greatly among firms (or even within the larger firms). There's an old saying, "fast, cheap, good - choose two." The market pushes architects to prioritize fast and cheap, and many (possibly most) firms go along with it. Those of us who try to prioritize quality are often "swimming against the current," sometimes even within our own firms. Another pithy saying of more recent vintage goes, "a project manager is someone who thinks 9 pregnant women should be able to produce a baby in 1 month." This is where we find ourselves when trying to do quality work.
Obviously agree that offices should do their own coordination.
However, the contractor should also be doing construction coordination. It's their only job. There's only so much the design team can predict, and the shop drawing/submittal process is there to dial in all the finer details that only come with actually putting the pieces together.
The above feels obvious to write, and I assume OP would agree. It's just very challenging when the contractor only pushes paper between subs and architects, as opposed to someone who actually reviews and manages the whole process. This is coming from a place of bitterness, haha, apologies.
To further clarify, I was surprised to read that you'd only just now begun doing this. I would have assumed that it's a regular part of your job. If not, I wonder if it's because no one else does it and did not train you to do it. Which would produce the scenario I outlined above. Perhaps I've misread the situation.
so much this... how many times has the design side due diligence run up against product/process info that is incomplete because the mfr hides the secret sauce from public consumption & we only find out a given detail when a shop drawing shows up?
Or GC's who push the responsibility of coordinating trades onto the subs? That is the GC's responsibility primarily. The sub also needs to see beyond his own trade, but his responsibility is primarily communicating the inclusions/exclusions of his trade to his GC so the GC can resolve any work that is doubled or missed in the overlap of sub scopes.
Truly, even when I want to go wild coordinating something it's absolutely impossible to get reliable product/system information.
I've known outside document review to be primarily done by older, experienced architects. They are either hired by the architect on a consulting basis or they work for the owner, either independently or as an employee of a business providing owner representation services.
I think it depends on the project type as well. In my experience, high-end single family residential tends to be the most highly coordinated, multi-family the least. Commercial and hospitality fall somewhere in between.
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