Importance of Effective Communication in Construction

Importance of Effective Communication in lookIntroductionCivil engineering whole kit and caboodle atomic number 18 non just the building of structures, simply they provide a livable and safe environment for society. To make it tout ensemble work, the disciplines involved must(prenominal) be in constant conversation. They bumnot work in isolation and must communicate with another(prenominal) well-mannered engineers and professions and also be able to communicate with society. When conference fails it leave have a negative effect on the works.Defining communicationIn the Oxford Dictionary the word communication is defined as to share or exchange instruction, and the word in force(p) is defined as producing an intended result. For a civil project, effective communication can be defined as communication between inter-disciplines, which produces a structure that is shapeed to be safe, serviceable and economic, and constructed to be on budget, time and to the customers sat isfaction.In order for communication to be effective a common language must be used which is still well by the various disciplines. In communication between twain parties, there are four get a line components involvedTransmitter person with informationReceiver person to whom information is directedMedium (nature of information) words (written and spoken), drawings, figures, symbols, codes, graphs, diagrams, charts, etcChannel (method of communicating information) meetings, documents, email, telephone, characterization link, projector slides, etcFor communication to be effective, information should flow in both directions because the receiver may not be listening to or reading what is world communicated. there must be a response from them to know that the person has both received the message and understood it2.The nature of Civil Engineering worksCompared with products fabricate in factories, where most if not all the design and production stages are carried out by a single p honer and the end products are the uniform, civil engineering works are manufactured on site with a number of different disciplines involved in the process at different stages of design and construction. These works are al slipway make to the customers specifications, making them unique for each project.With so many different disciplines3 involved, there is an important need for effective communication between them for any project to be successful. For example, the customer must communicate their needs to the consultant engineers. The consultant engineers must understand the customers needs and interpret them into a design. Then, once the plans have been developed and a bid has been taken, the contractor must understand the plans and communicate the plans to the sub-contractors.The importance of effective communication during civil worksAs said by Peter Rogers How many projects go wrong because somebody has a vision at the top and the people beneath destroy it because they all do not believe in what is universe created or the ambition has not been communicated to them?4Effective communication is a means to an end, which is fundamentally a project delivered on time, on budget and to an agreed quality. So, where there is a breakdown in communication the opposite is likely to occur. In the UK this has left a bad reputation of the construction sedulousness with the client and as has lead to an increase in disputes with many of cases ending up in court.In 1992 this increase trend prompted the Conservative g everywherenment to assign Sir Michael Latham, a former MP with experience of the construction industry to investigate. In 1994 he published his account statement called Constructing the Team5. ane of the recommendations he made was the need for improved team-working, which highlights a need for improved communication between team members.A few years later when the drive g everywherenment came into office in 1997 they set up The Construction labour Force. It was made up of a team of ten industry clients6 who were to advise on ways of improving the quality and efficiency of housebuilding. They mentioned seeing the industry typically dealing with the project process as a series of sequential and for the most part separate operations undertaken by individual designers7.In 1998 the Construction Task Force presented their report (commonly known as The Egan Report). Based on their findings they recommended five key changes that were needed for improvement in the construction industryCommitted leadershipA focus on the customerIntegrated processes and teamsA quality dictated agendaCommitment to peopleIt can be seen from their recommendations that a crucial element for any of them to be successful is the ability to communicate and listen effectively and although the Task Force looked specifically at housebuilding, their findings can be applied to civil works as well.It has been over ten years ( before long 2009) since the Construction Tas k Forces recommendations. Looking at the performance of the construction industry in last 5 years, it can be seen that there has been improvement but a fold is still needed. A summary of the performance of the construction industry from 2004 to 2008 is shown in Table 1.1. Client product satisfaction has been at 80% or higher up for the last five years, but this also means that 1 in 5 clients have not been mostly satisfied with the final outcome of their project. in like manner the figures for defects last year show that approximately one third of defects had a negative impact on the client.Case Study 1 Wembley StadiumThe Wembley trough project is an example of how clients, contractors and sub-contractors can fall out due to poor communication or the lack thereof, which can cause the project to go over budget and time. The client who is Wembley National Stadium Ltd originally selected Bovis Lend Lease and multiplex to both design and construct the stadium, but negotiations broke down over costs. Multiplex then independently offered a cheaper tender to the client for a fixed price of 326 million, which in September 2000 was accepted by the client10. However, the price piecemeal increased to 445 million after detailed specifications were made.Bovis believed the client had broken the public sector procurement guidelines and that the project should have been retendered.The government commissioned a report to investigate the issue and concluded that retendering would have harmed the project even further in respect to time and money and believed it was not practical to have retendered. save the report also stated that the clientFailed to follow a formal procurement process, including creating proper documentationCarried out two procurement processes at the same time, making it difficult to have competitive procurementHad meetings and conversations with Multiplex before a formal procurement processThere were also other problems. Multiplex complained that the cl ient had made 600 design changes to the contract and there were disputes such as the definition of practical completion. There were delays with the raising into position of the arch. Multiplex said that the delays and other troubles were the result of the subcontractor Cleveland Bridges late and defective design of fabrication work. Cleveland Bridge said that the delays and other troubles were because of too many variations or the late supply of information by Multiplex or by the morphologic engineer, Mott MacDonald Limited.Case study 2 Heathrow Airport Terminal 5On 27 March 2008 baa opened Terminal 5 after six years of work, costing 4.3 billion. The project was a success in scathe of being built on time and within budget. However, on the first day of opening there were problems with the luggage system. The baggage system failed and so over 23,000 pieces of luggage needed to be sorted manually. At a press conference just two weeks earlier, BAAs strategy director said We have a wo rld-class baggage system that is going to work perfectly on day one.An investigation into why these problems occurred was undertaken by the House of Commons Transport committee. They found that most of these problems were caused two main factorsInsufficient communication between owner and operator, andPoor staff training and system testingDuring their inquiry the national secretary for aviation, told the committee members and scab stewards locally had been raising concerns both within BAA and BA for a considerable period in relation to the opening of Terminal 5, but that no consideration was given to the response from the trade union side. 11A shop steward working for BAA said that union representatives said to the company that the way it was going would not work. Based on our own experience having worked there for years no technology can take that away. we said that they must listen to what we said and do it this way, but we were told that, no, it was a state-of-the-art building and everything would work and be all right.12 The party boss executive of Heathrow BAA said that if he could rewind time, he would focus resolutely and determinedly on keeping British Airways and BAA in the same room tightly together. 13Methods to achieve effective communicationAccording to research carried out by Court, Culley and McMahon14, the method of communication has an effect on the richness of the information received and processed. Table 1.2 shows the various methods of communication and the levels of richness of each.Table 1.2 shows that the best method of communication is verbal, such as in meetings. With verbal communication immediate feedback is received. Information flows in both directions and unexampled issues may be introduced by either party. Meetings are an essential part of effective teamwork and are probably the most important time where designers and constructors work together. They can be said to have two main functionsA social purpose where team members b ecome familiar with one another and one anothers ways of working,A business purpose for communicating information and agreeing actions.For meetings to be successful each must take time to listen to the other, and remove prejudices. We are all individuals and have our own ways of working and communicating with others. What is needed is the desire to communicate and the passion to build something that is good. By sharing information between members, a team is able to make best use of its combined knowledge.Good communication in meetings also depends on individuals being able to understand what is being said. The use of terminology which is not understood by others outside the profession risks poor communication and misunderstanding. A language must be found which is understood well by all parties.Integrated teamsAn integrated team which was one of the recommendations of the Construction Task Force is another effective method of having team members talking to each other. Multidiscipli nary companies like Arup or Amec have the advantage of the different disciplines working for the same company and in the same building. Typically the members of the project work on the same floor in an open plan office making it easy for communication and ideas to be exchanged between the different team members. computing machine programmesAs the old saying goes A picture is worth a thousand words, in the same way computer programmes such as click can be used to produce 2D and 3D drawings, which can then be communicated to other project members. There is industry standards in terms of symbols and legends used on drawings so that everyone is able to understand what is being communicated. CAD drawings can also be sent electronically to the other team members so that they are able to view the same information and develop their information onto the design. They are also able to analyse the structure and its connection with other structural elements and make any adjustments if necessary .Case Study 3 MidCity Place, LondonMidCity Place, an office development in London took 57 weeks to construct, which according to the developers Stanhope Plc is half the industry second-rate build time and at a cost 20% lower than the market average for a building of its quality15. The project was completed in declination 2001, eleven weeks ahead of schedule and within budget.The contractors Bovis Lend Lease and Stanhope developed a logistics process based on experience in the car industry. The logistics programmes schedule all the components in their sequence in the construction and put this information into 3D modelling software. The programme modelled the building and its assembly and also allowed them to find glitches in the delivery and construction sequence.The techniques used on MidCity Place are now being used on other Stanhope/Bovis Lend Lease projects, where they are being developed further.EducationEducating students at an early stage is important in order to allow them to enact the roles they will need to fill when entering the industry. From experience, this is currently being achieved by methods such as group projects, presentations and subjects such as Civil Engineering Management.Although these methods do improve the personal skills of an individual there does not seem to be any formal subject in developing communication skills. It seems that communicating ideas is left more as an art that needs to be developed individually by students, than something that can be learnt academically.There are postgraduate courses such as Interdisciplinary Design for the Built Environment (IDBE) digest at Cambridge University or the Project Team Leadership Programme run by Design Build Foundations and Henley Management College, which broaden the education of graduates to getting the industry communicating and working together.ConclusionsCommunicating information is just as important as the information that is being communicated, without which no progress can b e made and ideas will remain just that.A lot of time is spent communicating during civil projects. It is in the interest of all those participating in a project to develop effective forms of communication, as a breakdown in communication can have not only time delays and cost overruns, but also harm a companys reputation and/or even bring financial ruin.References1. Payne, A.C, Chelsom J.V and Reavill L.R.P (1996), Management for Engineers, John Wiley Sons, England, Pg 192.2. Ibid, Pg 193.3. These professions are typically the Client, Civil Engineer, Contractor, Sub-contractor, Manufacturer, and also the command public.4. Spence R, Macmillan S Kirby P. (2001), Interdisciplinary design in practice, Thomas Telford, London, Pg 28.5. Latham, M. (1994), Constructing the Team, HMSO, London.6. The members of the Construction Task Force (circa 1998)Sir John Egan (Chairman), Chief Executive, BAA plc,Mike Raycraft, Property Services Director, Tesco Stores Ltd,Ian Gibson, Managing Director, Nissan UK Ltd,Sir Brian Moffatt, Chief Executive, British Steel plc,Alan Parker, Managing Director, Whitbread Hotels,Anthony Mayer, Chief Executive, Housing Corporation,Sir Nigel Mobbs, Chairman, Slough Estates and Chief Executive, Bovis Homes,Professor Daniel Jones, Director of the Lean Enterprise Centre, Cardiff Business School,David Gye, Director, Morgan Stanley Co Ltd,David Warburton, GMB Union.7. DETR (1998) Rethinking Construction the report of the Construction Task Force July 1998, Pg 13.8. Ibid, Pg 12.9. Ibid, Pg 4.10. Morton R, revised by Ross A (2008), Construction UK, Introduction to the Industry, Blackwell, Pg 145.11. House of Commons Transport Committee (2008), The opening of Heathrow Terminal 5, The Stationery subroutine Limited, Pg 74.12. Ibid.13. Ibid.14. Court AW, Culley SJ and McMahon CA. (1997), The Influence of information technology in new product development. International Journal of information Management, Vol. 17 N0.5, Elsevier, Pg 359-379.15. www.stanhope plc.com, MidCity Place (2009).16. map for National statistics (2008), Construction Statistics Annual No.9, Palgrave.