Integrated lifecycle requirements information management in construction

Effective management of information about client requirements in construction projects lifecycle can contribute to high construction productivity; within budget and schedule, and improve the quality of built facilities and service delivery. Traditionally, requirements management has been focused at the early stages of the construction lifecycle process where elicited client requirements information is used as the basis for design. Management of client requirements does not extend to the later phases. Client requirements often evolve and change dramatically over a facility’s life. Changing client requirements is one of the principal factors that contribute to delays and budget overruns of construction projects. This results in claims, disputes and client dissatisfaction. The problems of current requirements management process also include: lack of integrated and collaborative working with requirements; lack of integrated requirements information flow between the various heterogeneous systems used in the lifecycle processes, and between the multiple stakeholders; inefficient and ineffective coordination of changes within the lifecycle processes; manual checking of dependencies between changing requirements to facilitate assessment of cost and time impact of changes. The aim of the research is to specify a better approach to requirements information management to help construction organisations reduce operational cost and time in product development and service delivery; whilst increasing performance and productivity, and realising high quality of built facilities. In order to achieve the aim and the formulated objectives, firstly, a detailed review of literature on related work was conducted. Secondly, the research designed, developed and conducted three case studies to investigate the state-of-the-art of managing client requirements information. A combination of multiple data collection methods was applied which included observations, interviews, focus group and questionnaires. Following this, the data was analysed and problems were identified; the necessity for a lifecycle approach to managing the requirements information emerged. (Continues...)

BPM-driven construction client requirements change management

Changing client requirements is one of the principal factors that contribute to delays and budget overruns of construction projects which as a result causes claims, disputes and client dissatisfaction. Change management ensures that such changes are handled through a properly coordinated and controlled process and retained throughout the project life cycle. This paper presents an empirical study that investigated the potential for an automated process of managing changes to clients’ requirements in construction projects. An initial focus group meeting was set up as a preliminary study which was followed by two case studies. Participant observation was used to conduct the case studies during which technical documents were also reviewed. The results show that current requirements change management process lacks efficiency. The paper concludes that business process management (BPM) approach could be a solution to better manage the requirements change process

Lifecycle approach to requirements information management in construction projects: state-of-the-art and future trends

Changes in client requirements are most frequent in construction and are known to contribute to budget over-runs and late delivery of projects. Such changes need to be managed adequately to enhance visibility, traceability and linked to the original requirements and communication with all stakeholders throughout the lifecycle of a facility. Traditionally, requirements management has principally been focused at the early stages of the construction process where elicited client requirements information is used as the basis for design and does not extend to the later phases. A life cycle approach is important because client requirements often change dramatically over a facility’s life. This evolution needs to be understood, for example, particularly if the facility is to be refurbished or adapted for uses other than those for which it was originally designed. This paper presents an empirical study to highlight the current state of managing clients’ requirements and to propose the need for a lifecycle approach to requirements information management in construction projects. An ethnographic study was conducted to examine the requirements management process based on participatory observations of construction project meetings and interviews with project managers. The study also details the state-of-the-art of requirements management by presenting a qualitative review of literature on this topic. This review includes industries other than construction. The paper concludes that currently, with no lifecycle insight, very few informal schemes detail the management of requirements beyond the design process into the later stages of the project. It proposes that the management of requirements should extend beyond elicitation and documentation and requires an approach that will enable changeability and impact analysis, accessibility, traceability and communication to all stakeholders

Development of an innovative framework for clients' requirements information management in construction projects

Properly managing client requirements information can contribute to high construction productivity and improve the quality of built facilities. This paper presents an innovative framework which defines a life-cycle approach to managing client requirements information. The Enterprise Requirements Information Management Framework (eRIM) introduces an approach to managing client requirements throughout a project lifecycle. It defines an information-centric and process-oriented approach to requirements management and describes how Information Technology (IT) / Information Systems (IS) can serve as support tool. It supports life-cycle requirements information availability, facilitates coordination, enables visibility, traceability and dependency checking which is crucial for analysing the impact of proposed changes in requirements. The paper includes findings from three case studies of construction projects through observations of meetings and interviews with selected construction practitioners. The results indicate that implementation and incorporation of the framework in construction projects could contribute towards improved performance and more efficient and effective client requirements management

Integrated change and knowledge management system - development and evaluation

Knowledge is often generated as part of the change and dependency management (CDM) process. Given that knowledge has become a fundamental resource for organizations, it is imperative that any new knowledge generated from CDM is captured and disseminated. In energy retrofits, inadequate management of changes and dependencies could have negative impacts on building energy performance. This paper presents the development and evaluation of an Integrated Change and Knowledge Management System (ICKMS) in this scope. It discusses the use case, requirements, information exchanges, and the system architecture. ICKMS can be used in projects to manage changes and dependencies, track change histories, and capture lessons learned from changes. The proposed ICKMS eliminates the gap between CDM and knowledge management (KM) activities, and prevents loss of potential knowledge in CDM processes. The use of the integrated system in construction projects is expected to improve the efficiency and effectiveness of simultaneously managing changes, dependencies and knowledge

An integrated requirements management system for construction projects

Within the AEC/FM Industry, the current paper-based system used to manage client requirements information and the change request process lacks efficiency and effectiveness. Traditionally, requirements management has principally been focused at the early stages of a construction project where elicited client requirements information is used as the basis for design and does not extend to later phases. Links between corresponding requirements at different phases do not exist which makes traceability difficult. There are no methods to keep track of client requirements and the changes in a satisfactory way that take a whole lifecycle approach. Construction organisations, like other engineering related businesses, are turning to computer systems (to replace current manual and paper intensive processes) in their quest for practical ways to facilitate requirements information management. This paper presents a prototype system for client requirements information management taking a whole lifecycle approach. It comprises of integrated components made up of a repository and change management system (CMS). The prototype was developed following case studies of construction projects and interviews with construction experts in order to fully understand the need for such a system. The applicability and effectiveness of the prototype will be validated using a focus group made up of various construction stakeholders and academic practitioners

An empirical study of the complexity of requirements management in construction projects

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to investigate in-depth the current approach of managing client requirements in construction and to highlight the significant factors, which contribute to the complexity of managing the requirements in order to define a better approach. Design/methodology/approach – A case study of a leading international global built asset and engineering consultancy organization was conducted over two years. The case study was conducted principally using semi-participant observations supplemented with other qualitative data collection methods (i.e. interviews, questionnaires and document analysis). Thematic analysis was used to analyze the data. Findings – The results highlight major factors associated with the complexity of managing client requirements information, which include: mechanisms for documentation, storage and access, distribution of requirements information between stakeholders and across lifecycle phases of a project, traceability management and the provision of effective change management incorporating dependency checking and impact analysis. Research limitations/implications – The main limitation of the research is the use of an in-depth study of a single organization, which applied the same project management method across all the projects they managed. Further work is planned to develop the proposed framework fully, and develop a software platform to operationalize and evaluate its industrial applicability with construction projects. Practical implications – The implications of this research is that a better approach to managing requirements information is needed, which will facilitate the design, construction and operations of buildings within budget and time. An integrated framework and an associated tool are suggested to implement the approach. Originality/value – This study identifies major research gaps and problems in the architecture, engineering, construction and facilities management industry; proposes and presents Electronic Requirements Information Management framework to facilitate lifecycle management of the requirements

An enterprise architecture framework for electronic requirements information management

© 2017 Elsevier LtdManaging information about client requirements effectively can contribute to improve the quality of built facilities, and their related services. However, the process has been challenging to construction project management often resulting in failed projects. This necessitates an overwhelming need for a better approach. This paper presents a novel enterprise architecture framework for managing information about client requirements across all phases of a construction project and through-life of a built facility. The Integrated electronic Requirements Information Management Framework (eRIM) defines an information-centric, and process and service-oriented enterprise architecture approach to requirements management. It also describes how Information and Communication Technology (ICT)/Information Systems (IS) can support this information management. In developing the framework, findings from three case study projects were collated through observations, a questionnaire and interviews of construction practitioners. It is concluded that when implemented and incorporated in the management of construction projects, the eRIM architecture framework can potentially contribute towards improved and more efficient and effective management of client requirements across all stages of a project. Further work is outlined to operationalize the framework

Lost in transition: transition from design to construction: losses in knowledge and tools for their minimisation

This report presents the findings of a six month research project – ‘Lost in Transition’. The research was carried out by a multidisciplinary team at Loughborough University and was aimed at identifying knowledge management issues that can lead to loss of knowledge. Construction projects go through series of phases during which several activities are performed by multiple stakeholders. This requires information and knowledge supplementary to the competences of project teams. This involves knowledge management (KM) processes to adequately capture, document, store, share, use, refine and reuse the knowledge from one phase to another and from project to project. However, due to certain KM issues, knowledge is lost as the project progresses from phase to phase. Several factors contribute to this phenomenon thus the investigation of this research

Integrated change and knowledge management approach for energy retrofits

The importance and benefits of change and dependency management (CDM) and knowledge management (KM) and have been increasingly recognized in the Architecture, Engineering and Construction (AEC) industry. In energy efficiency retrofits, traditional manual methods of managing changes are inefficient and do not fully engage all team members or adequately capture the rationale for changes. In addition, given that knowledge has become a fundamental resource for organizations, it is imperative that any new knowledge generated from change management is captured and disseminated. This paper presents the development of the Integrated Change and Knowledge Management (ICKM) approach based on literature and case studies. The integrated approach established a systematic way to facilitate change and dependency management, capture lessons learned during CDM processes, and support information exchange between different disciplines in change and knowledge management activities. It has been evaluated and refined through two case studies