By Stephen Varone
Director of Operations, Rand Engineering

You’re about to undertake a capital improvement project. You’re excited about the outcome, but worried about everything going right. You have good reason. Many projects, even those undertaken with a fine set of specifications and drawings from a professional engineering or architectural firm, are plagued with problems or turn out unsuccessfully. The most prevalent reason? Insufficient coordination during construction.

Following are eight potential “job savers” that Rand Engineering strives to incorporate into every major construction project. They can make a vast difference in your ability to anticipate and, thereby, minimize construction woes.

1. Schedule a Project Initiation Conference. Gather all the responsible parties together at the onset of a project and you can avoid innumerable potential snags. The conference should be attended by your managing agent and building superintendent, engineer/architect, an officer of the contracting firm, and one or more members of the board. At the conference, discuss all items of concern, such as scheduling, security, access requirements, and 24-hour emergency telephone numbers, and obtain insurance certificates, current licenses and other submittals from the contractor.

2. Carefully Review the Project Timeline. Many projects have well-established start and stop dates, yet they run into trouble because not enough thought has been put into the scheduling sequence and crew size required. A properly constructed timeline should contain a start and completion date for every phase of the operation, allowing your engineer/architect to adjust components that may be overly optimistic or out of proper sequence.
3. Have a Full-time Project Superintendent. In most cases, the engineer/architect will visit the site once or twice a week to check on the status and quality of the work. If you do not request full-time supervision by your engineer/architect (which can be quite costly), the role of full-time supervision must be provided directly by the contractor, preferably in the form of a project superintendent. He may be a working foreman, as long as he is well versed in all of the project’s aspects and requirements, can speak on behalf of the contractor, and is in full charge of all workers at the site. It has been my experience that quality contractors will not quarrel on this point and have included the cost in their quote.
4. Require Daily Reports. Keep your engineer/architect current on site developments, without the extraordinary cost of full-time supervision, by requiring the project superintendent to phone the engineer/architect one or more times daily to report on that day’s activities and work planned for the following day. The daily report minimizes miscommunication and scheduling snafus and reduces potential for “wasted visits” by the engineer/architect.
5. Request Written Reports from the Engineer/Architect. Written reports keep all parties well informed of progress via the engineer/architect’s findings and recommendations. A good site-visit report focuses on the quality of the work observed, provides instructions for correcting any defective or improper work, lists other issues to be addressed (such as paint color selections and scaffold relocations) and notes the date of the next scheduled visit. Reports should be distributed to the board representative, managing agent, and contractor.
6. Hold Periodic Job Meetings. Hold meetings at the site at least once every two weeks. All interested parties should attend to review the status of the project, discuss any changes to the scope or timeline, point out work items or instructions that appear to have been neglected, and resolve any other problems. It is important to hold these meetings on site so that conditions and disputed work items can be viewed first hand.
7. Include a Liquidated Damages Clause in Your Contract. Contractors hate this one but no one can deny its effectiveness. Let’s assume your contractor is replacing both your roof and the roof of a neighboring building. Both contracts call for a 12-week completion, but only your contract calls for a liquidated damages assessment of $500 for each day the project extends beyond the deadline. Guess which schedule will be more closely monitored by the contractor? Construction projects mean disruptions. Residents and shareholders may grudgingly accept a 12-week construction imposition but they will not easily–or quietly–accept one that unnecessarily becomes 24.
8. Insist on 10 Percent (or More) Retainage. Your best defense against being saddled with unfinished punch-list items is to insist that a retainage of at least 10 percent of the contract amount be held back until at least 30 days after your engineer/architect has signed off the completed project. The 30-day period is important because it allows you time to investigate whether any new punch-list items develop. The 10 percent minimum figure is important because it is substantial enough to keep your contractor motivated and can comfortably cover the costs of having punch-list items completed by another firm should your contractor elect not to finish the work.

While these eight items are by no means the only essential elements of a well-run construction project, incorporating some or, preferably, all of them will substantially increase your prospects for successful results. 

This article was originally published in the November 2000 issue of Habitat magazine.