Shadowing Practice: How To Deal With Construction Delays - Learn English Speaking with Video

In this video, we're gonna talk about how  to manage delays on a construction project.

The key here is to know how to do it without  compounding the problem. So that's one key thing you're going to learn in this video, but  you can't manage the delay unless you can see it. So we're going to show you how you can see  delays in the first place, and why most people typically can't see them and the one tool  that we must have to enable you to actually manage them when they happen. We're also going to  provide you a detailed list of the steps that you will take to manage the delays so that you can  do it on your project and the way that you can manage the delay to things specifically, so that  you can really take care of your customer. Okay, so let's get right into it right now. So  first and foremost, I want to say we've always had delays in construction, even back  before 2020, before the COVID19 pandemic, we have always had problems with exterior, curtain,  wall with tile with casework with elevators, it's just always been that way. In fact, there's  a really cool book that was written 100 years ago, it's called Calumet K and it talks about the  exact same things we're dealing with today and construction. And so it's not new, it's not a  new phenomenon and there are tried and true principles for how to recover and respond to  those delays and I do want to say that the common feedback from the industry is to say it's  a lack of labor and it's a lack of materials, meaning that we can't get the right train  people and we can't get the right materials on time. And my point in saying that is that's  always been the case, that's just construction, that's actually not the root cause. The root cause  is that those problems which have been consistent probably even back to Roman times, right, is that  we don't see those problems soon enough. So one of the key things that we do to manage delays is  to see them before they even happen. All right, so I'm gonna go over here to the flip chart, you  knew it was coming. And I'm going to talk to you about a key concept. First and foremost, so this is  principle number one for managing delays is that we must have buffers in the construction schedule.  So I'm going to briefly talk about that now, you can reference other videos in the future, if  you want to get more detailed with it. So when you have a construction schedule, and let me just draw  these activities, kind of in a Gantt chart format, this could be a CPM schedule, it could be a  Gantt chart, this could be a tact plan, whatever kind of schedule you have, I want to talk about  where buffers should be. So first and foremost, let's take this activity, we do not want to  pad the activity in and of the activity itself, meaning we don't want the buffers to be in the  activities. A lot of times, people or construction managers or trades will pad these activities  to be longer than they need to be. And that is a mistake. And let me tell you why we want the  buffers to be or the contingency in the schedule, we want that to be at the end of this schedule  for two specific reasons. Number one, if you put the buffers here, then the second activity  will not start on time, which means that you're automatically delaying your project unnecessarily.  Meaning it's not inevitable, meaning that you're doing it simply from bad practices, you want the  buffers out of the activities, and at the end, so they're starting on time, so that we can  prevent any delays within the project team or the internal team itself. The other thing that I  want to talk about is that when you have supplies or resources coming to that activity, to kick off  that activity, you'll want a buffer here inside of that actual supply chain activity. So let's say  maybe this is material or crew, something that you need to actually accomplish that activity, you  will want a buffer to be here in case this delays, it can still end up showing up here at the  right time. Then if this activity delays, it will push the other activities. And you'll eat  into this buffer over here. So there's no way and I want to repeat this so that everybody's really  clear, there is no way in construction to manage or absorb delays, unless we have buffers in the  supply chain. And unless we have buffers at the end of the schedule to eat into so that we can  still provide that item that building or that cycle of work on time for our end customer like  we promised. So you have to have buffers. Principle 2 is that we have to be looking for possible  delays, meaning non inevitable delays so that we can then react to inevitable delays, meaning  these are delays that don't have to happen we can see him and prevented before they happen so that  we can deal with delays that we couldn't see that are just going to happen you know things that are  like acts of God are like boats sinking on the way to the place of work and all of the materials  are gone and you have to reorder in some kind No force majeure activity like that. So what  we want to do is see ahead. Now, if you are at this current date on the project schedule, you  want to be seeing out at least six weeks ahead, you're going to do that in this six week, make  ready look ahead schedules, which I talked about in other videos, and really make sure that you  have the labor, the materials, the permissions, and the information for those activities, that  will prevent most of the delays on a project site because you're preparing for those activities.  And if you go through these activities and say, yep, that one's ready, not ready, nope, that one's  not ready, then you can see that and make it ready before it ever happens. So if you have buffers,  and you're ready to absorb and manage the delay, the next step is you have to prevent as many as  you can, so that you even have the capacity to absorb and manage delays that will happen that  you can't control. All right, so now I'm going to talk about principles. No, I'm not, I'm gonna  invite you to like and subscribe this channel. If you're jamming with us and loving these videos, we  want you to like and subscribe and get this free content consistently to help out your career, you  know, you want to, okay, now we're going to talk about principle three. Okay, so principle three  is we must have a visible schedule. So if you have the buffers, and you are looking ahead to prevent  any delays that don't actually need to happen, if we can see him and prevent him. The other thing  that you need to do is be able to see delays when they happen real time. And so that means instead  of having 76, 303 page schedule, that you can't see, you're going to want to see your schedule  on one single page. And there are videos that are coming up, which will talk about tact, tact  planning, and last planner, and scrum and how you use those visual scheduling systems in order to  see and manage delays real time. In order to get the team working on the same page, you have to  see the plan on one page. So if you're managing a visible schedule, so I'll just write visible and  you're doing it in a tacted system. And you're using last planner system. So that's LPs, right.  And you have a highly visible schedule on one page that the trades can see, when you have a delay,  immediately everyone will know it, they will know what it is they will know the root cause and we  will be able to deal with it as a team. So that's principle three, you have to have a schedule that  you can see in order to respond to and manage delays. All right, so I'm going to show you a  high level of how you would manage the delay when it happens and there will be a guide, a reference  at the end of this video in the notes down in the description below that you can reference in order  to do this yourself on a more detailed level. But let me go over here to the schedule and let me  assume that you have and I'll just do this on a tact schedule basis, with a tact schedule example.  Let's say that you have your tact times up here.

So this is tack time and you  have zone one, zone two and zone three, you'll have specific trades. So like we talked  about last time, you will have a trade here, that will cascade down to the right and in this  schedule, you have what's called trade flow. That means that trade is flowing at a diagonal, and it  is moving from area to area and what's called one process flow, which is the real way we flow in  construction. Now the first consideration for a delay is to delay the line of balance. And so this  is what I mean by that. If you have a delay, which is sin symbolized right here with this D, meaning  that in tack time number four, there was a delay, you can delay the line of balance. Meaning that  the production of these trades are at a certain line of balance, meaning at a certain production  rate when you consider the amount of area they're producing in a certain amount of time, right.  And so we want them to have that diagonal line of balance and to maintain it. We don't want to  stack the trade on top of themselves. So if you have a delay, and this trade was working and they  started out, you can stop them and ask them to go work on what's called workable backlog which  we've talked about before in the last planner video. And then you can experience that delay and  then start them again at the same line of balance.

With the same production with the same trade  flow. And the key to this is the only way that's possible is if you eat into this buffer,  meaning that if you shift this over to the right, that buffer is now gone, because this activity  has taken its place. So now you can see why having buffers in the schedule is so crucial,  and so critical. So the other thing that you can do is you can simply stop this trade during  this delay, and they can stop, wait and prepare, not even go do workable backlog and they  will make more money than if you shift them to another project and move around. Because they're  waiting. They're preparing. They're cleaning up their tools. They're training their workforce,  and they're absorbing and fixing that delay so that they can start out right again on schedule  with good production. The other thing that you can do is adjust this sequence. If there's a delay,  ask yourself, will this activity or for instance, this activity, could it be resequenced than the  overall sequence of work? And so if that happens, you still maintain your line of balance, you still  maintain trade flow and that's why that is our number one option for managing a delay. The second  approach to dealing with the delay is to pull the delayed work out of the train, or what most  people would understand is out of the sequence, or even out of the map from a zone standpoint. So  let me show you what I'm talking about. So if you experienced the delay here with this activity,  in the previous video, we said, hey, you can move this, maintain your line of balance, right? And  go work on backlog, or stop, wait and prepare or try and resequenced these and shift them around so  that you can absorb that delay. But if you can't, and the next option is to isolate that delay,  which is option number two, then what you can ask is hey, can this car be taken out of the train  or this tact wagon be taken out of the train and put on its own tack time. So instead of going in  this line of balance at that tack time, maybe we delay it to where this activity happens later, and  it's on a different tack time and it's isolated.

The other thing you can do with this work is to  say okay, the work that was supposed to happen in this zone, this tack time, maybe since this is  in zone number one is there a specific area where that delay happened that can be detached from the  overall production rhythm of the floor, within the zone so that it doesn't affect the schedule in its  entirety. And so if you ever have to do this and manage it on its own tack time, show that visibly  in the schedule, or on a pull plan or on a scrum board and if you ever have to pull out work from  the actual zoning itself, then make sure that you pull that out, show the trades that it  has been delayed work your normal flow of work around it. And again, pull that out, you can  show it visibly on the tech plan or in a pull plan or on a scrum board. And so you can isolate  the problem by pulling them out and managing them separately so you can keep the workforce going on  their normal contracted work. And then the third option, which is at the end on purpose because  it's the least preferable, the least ideal option is to talk to the trade partner and recover with  resources. Meaning swarm the delay, fix it right there, maybe add another crew really look at it  from a resource standpoint. But again, that's the last option, because we must have our resources  flowing, and have really good trade flow in order for that project to finish. So we can't do that  as our number one default. Remember, our number one option is to delay the line of balance. The  option number two that I prefer is to isolate and detach or decouple the work. Option number three  would be recovering it with resources. And so I'm almost done. Let me give you a couple more tips.  First and foremost, you're probably thinking to yourself, Jason, I would love buffers, and I would  love to absorb my delays with buffers. How do we determine how many buffers we need? Well, just  like we've shown you in other videos, you will do a risk analysis for that phase of work. Identify  the risks, identify how many days represent each risk, and make sure that your largest number is  represented in that phase with buffers. So that's how you know. And so that's the number one thing  that you'll need to have is a good risk analysis with buffers in order to manage delays for your  client. The second thing is a baseline schedule, especially with tact like I showed you before,  that shows what we were planning on from a production standpoint, and what we're planning on  from a material procurement standpoint so that if there is a delay and there will be and you're  having a conversation with your owner, it's not just a trust me conversation. It's a here's my  schedule and my material procurement log that we had day one. Here's my schedule and my material  procurement log that we have now. This is what how happened. This is the delay, let's have an  intelligent conversation about it. So that's number two is to make sure that you always  have a baseline schedule and always have a baseline for your material procurement log,  so that when delays happen, you have the right information to talk to your customer and in that  situation, you can always then form a really good analysis or time impact analysis, if there just  is no way to absorb that delay. Meaning that it actually extends the construction schedule and  we need to show that and partner with the owner to come up with a plan and to basically accept  a new end date or a new milestone date for that work because you have the information, you have  the buffers, and you have a schedule that you can see. And so one last bit of advice that I want  to give you is make sure when you absorb a delay, if you haven't heard anything else, I want you  to hear this, here's your construction schedule.

Again, you have to have buffers, you have to see  it, and you have to delay it properly. But you will not target a proper end date or overall total  project duration unless throughout the schedule, you have that trade flow, meaning every trade  is flowing from area to area to area, and it's never stacked. And so whatever conversation you  have with your owner, make sure that your overall duration and your critical path is correct  by having that trade flow. And I have a free gift for you in the description below. You'll  want to check that out. Here's what we did. We went through and analyzed all types of delays  and every single option that you can take for that delay. We've outlined it, we've made it  easy, we've made it visual. We've given you guidelines so that you can really go have those  conversations with your owners, you have to have this that's why we're here so that you have  these tools. So if you go download that content, and you get it, you'll be able to respond and  manage these delays in an effective way that doesn't compound the problem and allows you to  go home at night happy with your family. You've got to check it out. It's free. You're going to  love it. Call me if you have problems. On we go.