implementing school construction projects in a stability program.final.doc

7/29/2019 Implementing School Construction Projects in a Stability Program.Final.doc

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Final Project Proposal:Implementing School Construction Projects in a Stability Program

1. Project Management Application School Project Case Study1.1Competitive situation

As capital continues to upsurge in Afghanistan the building construction industry isprojected to sprout as construction businesses and other international organizationsbring in international designers, constructors and experts as well as other buildingconstruction companies from Australia, Asia, Europe and the Americas. All thesecompanies, INGOs and other private groups are employing local designers andbuilders, and providing training and capacity building in project managementapplications for construction.

Issues merit considerations are corruption within Afghanistans building constructionindustry and the overall security problems that continues to engulf this central Asiannation.

Corruption, which sometimes involves international partners, is on the rise requiring somuch control and hold points that not only extends project completion timeframe but hasalso demanded the presence of international experts putting high the cost of buildingconstruction project making the budget of two schools to fit into the cost of one school;denying several communities direct access to education facilities.

Afghanistan building construction industry has grown progressively for the past tenyears, and continues to grow because of the billion of dollars being pumped into thecountry to improve civil infrastructure and buildings. Construction works are ongoingbecause of international aid and it is projected the Afghan economy will still carry outconstruction. However, what is certain is the country's economy and security will remainentwined, with neither one being secured without the other (John Sullivan, 2011).

For this proposal school construction project, the competitive situation is even morepertinent as the location for the school is security and culturally pruned. In eastern

Afghanistan the culture of the people demand employing people from the region, bethey qualified or corrupt. Most contractors, designers and constructors alike, carrysimilar performance expertise and the only criteria mainly considered during vetting areanti-terrorist affiliation, anti-corruption records, the working strategy and performancerecord, and financial stability and capacity.

See the typical SWOT analysis of Afghanistan Construction Industry the process ofdesign and construction as well as project management and construction managementand contracting.


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Strength

The procurement method of design-bid-build has improve the complextrade-offs between the environment,physical design and the methods used

in construction The private and public sectors areboth boost of large cash investment

The level of education in the Afghanconstruction market is growing highwith local designers, engineers andconstructors

There is a need for regional andinternational comparison ofperformance

Weakness

Construction contractors are knownfor the reputation of trying to buycontracts by paying for tender/biddocuments and lowering prices

Local contractors have less in-house design and construction andcontract engineering capabilities thantheir international counterparts

The level of research anddevelopment expenditure in the Afghanconstruction industry is lower than othercountries in the region

Threat

The construction market isbecoming over capacitated with foreigncompanies making the competitionbetween players keen and marginallylow

Construction clients are becomingover powerful putting pressure oncontractors price and margin

Competition from overseas isincreasing rapidly

The continuous threat of insecurity

from insurgence group is makingcontractors to increase cost of risk andextend construction timeframe by 50%

Opportunities

The need for infrastructure is veryhigh therefore increasing the prospectof a sustained economic growth

Construction contractors arebecoming more customer oriented,which in turn reduces disputes andclaims and reworks

The use of several internationalbuilding codes and standard providesthe means to create a standardizedcode and industry policy and strategy

for Afghanistan There is the opportunity to improvethe business process of lean thinking,value stream and BIM integration intodesign and construction

.1.1 Business Need

The need for school buildings in Afghanistan cannot be overemphasized as the country,

under the Taliban rule underwent maintenance neglect and also the country had gone

through a devastating civil war that damaged nearly 90% of the civil engineering system

(The USAID, 2006)

For this proposed school construction there were readily available information of

existing terrain and conditions of the projects proposed location. The construction

project manager had to rely on verbal information concerning soil condition, earthquake

and ground movement intensities.


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However, the opportunity provided was the construction engineers used the community

leaders proposal as a design concept and collaborated with UNICEF, other education

infrastructure service providers to develop a more defined technical design. Another key

opportunity was the regulations to use community leaders design brought together the

leaders and members of the construction project managers design team and local

leaders in a forum that allow the design team to train the local leaders in the processes

of construction project inception, feasibility and strategy development. Through these

forums future proposals coming from community leaders became more defined and

entails most the information needed to establish a business case and plan, execute,

monitor and control and close the school building project successfully.

.1.2 Business Case

The projected cost for this project is $120,000.00 (One Hundred and twenty ThousandUS Dollars), with an anticipated duration of six months to complete. Quality standards

for this school construction are that is must meet the minimum standards provided bythe governments Ministry of Rural Rehabilitation and Developments school locationregulations and facility requirements, such as a mosque on campus. It is to be built tothe International Building Code and meet minimum American Concrete Institutesearthquake engineering structural specifications.

The project performance criteria includes:

Requirements the community must propose the school; the school must beendorsed by the governments ministry of Education. These terms are non-negotiable

Goals the design team worked with the community to develop the final design; thesite and design and construction meets the minimum environmental protectionconditions; the students and school administration appreciate and approve the endproduct.

Targets the acres of land provided for the school is the minimum enclosure; thecontractor works hand-in-hand with the community leaders in selecting workers andlocal materials; the test results indicate the parameters targeted during design; andthe funder, students, school administration, government and community leaders areinvolved in monitoring and controlling the achievement of requirements, goals andindicators

Key performance indicators the community leaders express appreciation for theschool and do continue taking their grievances to the government; and the sourcesof instability and insurgent activities decreased.

The success criteria for the school construction project was that is should be acceptedand appreciated and used for the intended purpose by the community; and people ofthe community on the increase turned away from seeking assistance from the Taliban.

1.2 Project Scope of Work


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The prosed project shall design and construct a Senior High School facility that shall

include six classrooms, a library, 3 offices, a drinking water, three separate restrooms,

garbage disposal unit, a mosque, playground and assembly point, a parking lot, a

boundary with vehicles and pedestrian gates, furniture and a made-simple operations

and maintenance training program and manual.

The project shall be titled: Proposed Asadabad High School Construction Project. The

lead agency is Development Alternatives Initiatives (DAI) and the name of the project

manager is John Constance.

1.3 Project Organisation,

The range of structures requires distinctive requirements (Sommer, 2009). This project

is organized under the following phases, and activities and roles and responsibilities:

PHASE 1 -SITUATIONAL AWARENESS (ON-GOING) The construction project

manager is not involved as this phase in conducted by the community leader and lead

agency program management team.

PHASE 2 -ACTIVITY SELECTION (24 HRS TO 2 WEEKS) - The construction project

manager is also not involved as the community leaders and lead agency program

management team do responsibilities

PHASE 3 -ACTIVITY DEVELOPMENT (1 TO 4 WEEKS) - The construction project

manager establishes the design team and collaborates with the community leaders and

conduct detailed field and site assessment and develop the detailed technical design

PHASE 4 -ACTIVITY APPROVAL (2 DAYS TO 1 WEEK) - clearing and emailing PDF,

CSV, and budget; updating DSF Book, confirming receipt, updating activity Tracker. The

project construction manages is not involved in the process.

PHASE 5 IMPLEMENTATION (DEPENDS ON ACTIVITY) - The construction project

manager conducts construction supervision and check quality and environmental

mitigation efforts and submits progress reports to grants management team.

PHASE 6 -EVALUATION AND CLOSEOUT (1 TO 2 WEEKS) - initiating close-outreport; reviewing program and financial documentation, evaluating project

implementation reports against impacts identified in DSF effects matrix, The

construction project manager is not involved.

Typical Work Breakdown Structure:


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As seen in the project organization construction project teams are not involved in all

phases and project organization activities. Within the context of the project organization,

construction projects are organized into three phases, the environmental management,

engineering documentation and construction implementation. See the typical WBS for

construction projects in Appendix 1.

.3.1 Stakeholder Analysis and Map

The key stakeholders for this project include the community leaders, the schooladministration, and the national government. Others include USAID, UNICEF, and DAI.

The community leaders, school administration, and the national government are allbeneficiaries. Others include USAID the project funder for design and construction,UNICEF the project operations and maintenance funder, and DAI the constructionproject management contractor.

Beneficiaries priorities include the community must propose the school; the schoolmust be endorsed by the governments ministry of Education; there must be mosque inthe school grounds, all materials and skills available in the community must be used bythe contractor and the school must be enclosed with a boundary wall. These terms arenon-negotiable.

The funder priorities include construction management team work with the communityto develop the final CFS design; the site and design and construction meets theminimum environmental protection conditions and American standards; the communityaccepts and use the facility as intended; and increase seeking assistance from thenational government, and increased stability and no insurgency in the community; theschool have a O&M training program and manual.

Construction project management contractor subcontractor selected in an open andcollaborative effort; all quality plans are achieved, the funder and beneficiaries acceptthe facilities and all audits are declared satisfactory.

1.4 Legal and Regulatory Environment

In the project area, it is not required that an engineer be licensed. However, all relevant

design codes, standards and permitting is required, and there exist several qualified

design and construction professionals in the country allowing for design and

construction services to be procured in-country.

It is a legal requirement that all projects undergo environmental screening and produce

mitigation measures for both environmental and social issues. There is also adequate

capacity and resources available in the project areas and its environs.


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The project stakeholders must be identified including the funder, construction

management services provider, contractors and infrastructure or building owner. All

works must be coordinated with all stakeholders.

There must be written agreement with the building owner obligating each party to

accept and approve the project technical design, attend inspections and create punchlistings, sign certificates and handover documents

1.5 Contracting processes, approaches, and documents

This project uses the two-stage tendering process using firm fixed-price contracting

approach and documents, and combines the labor laws of Afghanistan with legal and

contractual regulations and laws of the United States of America. The documents reflect

common assent, consideration, capability and aptitudes of the parties, and lawful object

(Lowe, 2007). The typical documentation includes the contract agreement, broad-

spectrum specification and scope of work, general conditions of the contract, specialconditions of the contract and various administrative and coordination procedures

required under the agreement.

However, due to the numerous insecurity in the project locations, and the continuous

recording of property theft which lead to lost by the sub-contractor, and the continuous

stop of works due to floods and heavy rain and winter snow and snow melts; and that

Afghanistan happens to be a muslin country, it is recommended the contracts be of the

commercial type of contracts used in muslin countries (McCormack, 2009), this will not

only reduce or eliminate disputes and claims but improve the contractual relationship

and help to increase stability amongst or from all Afghan parties involved in the project.

1.6 Project information technology

The project information technology requirements include the use of technical drawingsoftware and Microsoft office package. Some of these document must be converted toPDF formats to enable interpretations by other software.

In this project all information used is entered using computer program software tools.This includes AutoCAD for the production of technical drawings, Microsoft Word for

environmental screening checklist and environmental mitigation management plan,Microsoft Excel for bill of quantities and budget, and work plan or schedules.

The AutoCAD drawings must be converted to PDF format for the client review and theenvironmental management documents must also be converted to PDF afterpreparation and approval signatures have been inserted.

Other technology infrastructure that could have included Microsoft Project, Primavera,Building information Modeling and other civil design softwares. These were consideredtoo complex, as clients representatives with approving authorities have no knowledge


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of using these softwares. It is recommended that these softwares be part of the trainingbudget to enable the processing of design and structural analysis and calculations to bedone swiftly and with more accuracy.

1.7 Project site organization

The project construction site is organized by first and foremost defining the site

organization structure including roles, responsibilities, tasks, and accountabilities

specification, temporary services, site layout design and required equipment and

facilities, all the permits and paperwork, traffic management, public protection, materials

storage and waste managementand all the legal health and welfare requirements for

construction sites.

2. Proposed Approach

The project approach is the design-bid-build approach because there is an effectiveinternal engineering team to prepare design and conduct construction management.The inherent values in this approach

The inherent value of using the design-bid-build approach for this project is that itinvolved the clients internal engineering team and the end-user/owner design teamfrom the community and the construction services of a contracted constructor. Thiscreated a lot of communication between the end-users and the designer during thedesign stage and the three parties collaborating during the construction stage therebyeliminating design changes, and the risk and uncertainties of producing the school asplanned, delivering the project under budget.

However, the construction project manager collaboration with the community leaders indeveloping an extensive risk-management plan during feasibility and strategy prior toconstruction had its risks to the project's success. This risk inherent in this service andproduct characteristics included the project market, locally available technology, andsecurity risks. This is the main risk involved in completing the project anf would not onlycause delays but reckon the project incomplete.This risk event did occur during the project implementation and did make the projectcomplete beyond its planned end date, but this did not impact cost as payments to thecontractor as agreed in the contract was based on productivity achieved.

2.1 Quality management

Quality Policy focuses on compliance with requirements that ensures no subprojectactivities cause significant impacts to Afghanistans physical and social environment; allinfrastructure design and standards are compliant with Afghanistan National SolidarityProgram Technical Manual; and all quality systems applied is compliant with qualitypolicies based on the ISO 9000 quality managementprinciples and DAI/USAIDs otherpolicies.
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Quality Assurance sets the project quality objectives, specifies the project operationalprocesses and resources needed to achieve those objectives, which is achieving theprogrammed acceptable levels of functionality in building construction, the review andsign-off of all deliverables or work conducting all required testing of soil, water, and

concrete slump and compression and steel yield.

Quality control is be based on the quality standards of Afghanistan NSP TechnicalManual; British Standards Institute (BSI); the USACE Standards; Uniform BuildingCode; ISO 9000 quality management principles; and USAID environmental screeningreporting form procedures.

3. Procurement

The supply chain key objective is to satisfy the project specifications and standards ofquality, and the customers or community end-users. The flow of activities includes the

internal functions of the companys procurement department that was responsible toensure the contractor purchased all local materials (aggregates, bricks, etc.) directlyfrom the community. All logistics including the supply of local materials is the fullresponsibility of the contractor. This also included the distribution, sourcing, services,sales, manufacturing and accounting of all supplies. The structure of the supply chain isrepetitive and standalone, but standardized.

All supply chain management was the liabilities of the contractor as this was spelled outin the contract ensuring all risks involved was covered in the contract cost. The supplychain organization was planned and shared with the contract owner and the communityrepresentatives whom were all obligated to ensure the chain was never broken due theircondition of support and was to compensate the contractor if this was the case; and thecontractor was to cover additional risk costs if delays were from its ineffectiveness.4. Project Closeout

Commissioning was part and parcel of the project contract requirements. Testing wasconducted by a separate contractor clothed with the responsibility of confirming that thevarious building components did indeed meet required or contracted specifications.

The contract did not require the subtraction of a percentage retention fee, but rather thecontractor delivered a performance bond equivalent to ten percent of the contract valuethat was kept for expenditure in case the contractor that not correct identified defectsbefore the contract closeout. The defects were identified during the inspection of everymilestone deliverable required before each payment term, giving the contractor ampletime to make the corrections.

At the time of substantial completion the contractor turns the school over the authoritiesfor occupation while main defects rectifications. During occupation the school authoritieswas observed in its use of the facility and also allowed to develop a punchlist approvedby the contractor and contract owner; and demanded the contractor make saidrectifications until the end of the defects and liability period (60 days), after which time a
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final completion certificate is issued to the contractor whom performance bond stillremain as a guarantee until the end of the retention bond period after which time whenthe facility was declared non-defective by both the school authorities and contract ownerthe bond was returned to the contractor and the contract closed.

5. Project Conclusion

The effective practices on future school construction projects should include theconstructors in the design process as it was seen from this project that there were manyconstruction suggestions from the contractor that could have been included in thedesign but was not the case as the contract owner and community authorities, havingagreed to the suggestions rejected making design changes in order to not delay theproduction and use of the school due to the pressure of getting the community stable.

Other areas of improvement include the use of softwares such as Revit Architecture,Civil 3D, Primavera, and BIM. Other innovative considerations would be getting the

student directly involved in the design concept and brief development and consideringgreen design incorporated in the overall school design.

The most efficient approaches should include the use of the total design concept thatwill enable the designers to integrate not only the design and construction but also thenumerous culture factors that is appreciated by the community targeted for stability bymeans of construction project management.

Bibliography

A Guide to Project Management Book of Knowledge (PMBOK Guide) Fourth Edition 2008 Project Management Institute, 14 Campus Blvd., Newton Square, PA 19073-3299, USA

David Scott, Michael Kwan Wah Cheong and Heng Li, (2009) Web-based constructioninformation management systems [Online] Available from: http://www.icoste.org/ICMJ%20Papers/AJCEBVol3No1Scott.pdf

John Sullivan (2011) An Economic Handover in Afghanistan [Online] Available from:

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a_b_842196.html

Lester, A. (2007) Project management, planning and control: managing engineering,construction and manufacturing projects to PMI, APM and BSI standards. 5th ed.Oxford, UK: Butterworth-Heinemann, pp.17-19.
http://www.icoste.org/ICMJ%20Papers/AJCEBVol3No1Scott.pdfhttp://www.icoste.org/ICMJ%20Papers/AJCEBVol3No1Scott.pdfhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/john-sullivan/an-economic-handover-in-a_b_842196.htmlhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/john-sullivan/an-economic-handover-in-a_b_842196.htmlhttp://www.icoste.org/ICMJ%20Papers/AJCEBVol3No1Scott.pdfhttp://www.icoste.org/ICMJ%20Papers/AJCEBVol3No1Scott.pdfhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/john-sullivan/an-economic-handover-in-a_b_842196.htmlhttp://www.huffingtonpost.com/john-sullivan/an-economic-handover-in-a_b_842196.html


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