• Sector : Building - multi-project business
  • Challenges : Planning reliability & team work
  • Results : 20% increase in planning reliability
  • Location : Belgium

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Managing efficiently several construction projects in parallel
Building - Multi-project business

Managing efficiently several construction projects in parallel

In building industry a Wood Carpentry typically works for multiple construction projects in parallel.  Addressing the efficient servicing of each of these clients tends to be a challenge.  So how to manage efficiently several construction projects in parallel?

When poorly managed, all projects impact one another. It creates a huge mess, day-to-day firefighting, lower reliability & performance, teams' & clients' frustration.

To address these challenges, we decided to focus on team work and visual management. Together with the team, we set up a weekly team meeting structure based on Agile and Lean principles. During the meeting, the team focuses on:

  1. Reviewing last week's activities and performance (based on KPIs)
  2. Planning new projects in the long-term
  3. Planning and anticipating running projects

Each team member plans his/her own activities knowing his/her own constraints.

To support teamwork, a room was defined as the projects' cockpit room. This cockpit room ("Obeya room") is where all visual management supports are located and where weekly meetings take place.

These solutions led to following results:

  • Quickly improving planning performance (From 65% to 90% planned activities realized)
  • Transparency on planning and activities
  • Aligning the whole team on customers expectations from day 1 and giving them ownership (external customers)
  • Aligning workshop work with construction site needs using pull planning (internal customers)
  • Work balancing by anticipating on peaks and taking measures early on low activity days
  • Allowing project managers to better align on teams planning on several projects in parallel (how many people needed on site, who and when)
  • Go from silo work towards team work in a complex multi-projects environment