School of Civil and Construction Engineering Photo courtesy of NBBJ Exploring the Opportunities for Applying Lean Principles to Electrical Prefabrication Exploring the Opportunities for Applying Lean Principles to Electrical Prefabrication H. W. Chris Lee, Ph.D. Oregon State University July 22, 2013

Working Hypotheses 1.Electrical construction has its own unique barriers to prefabrication 2.A project that applies more lean principles provides more opportunities for electrical prefabrication Photo courtesy of Oregon Electric Group

Project Objectives Identify barriersInvestigate a list of lean principlesDevelop a leanness scoring matrix Increased Prefabrication in Electrical Construction Organizational Contractual Technological 1 2 3

Project Tasks 1 Interviews to identify barriers 2 Case studies to identify lean principles 3 Cross-case analysis to develop the leanness scoring matrix 4 Documentation

(Tentative) List of Lean Principles Design alignment –Design for Prefabrication –BIM implementation Variability management –Lead time/Labor/Quality/Design Inter-organizational collaboration –Multi-trade cost and design management Alignment of commercial interests –Integrated contracting methods Photo courtesy of OEG

Project Outcomes – Research Report What to overcome? Why to overcome? How to overcome? Barriers Lean Principles Leanness Scoring Matrix

Research Outcomes: Leanness Scoring Matrix Cross-case analysis to identify improvement opportunities Photos courtesy of OEG and Skanska WHY Simple? WHY Advanced?

Hyun Woo “Chris” Lee, Ph.D. CEM faculty at Oregon State University –School matching support of $20,000 for the project Head, IPDS (Innovative Project Delivery for Sustainability) Lab –Applying lean construction concepts and methods to sustainable investments 7 years of construction experience –3 years as estimator for electrical construction of light rail and trolleybus in California

Strategic Partnership for Research NECA Oregon-Columbia Chapter NECA San Francisco Chapter And more!

School of Civil and Construction Engineering Thank you! Questions? H. W. Chris Lee, Ph.D. School of Civil and Construction Eng. Oregon State University Photo courtesy of NBBJ

(Tentative) List of Barriers Organizational –Late decision making –Lack of pre-planning –Inflexibility of construction workflow –Lack of (field personnel) buy-in Contractual –Lack of contractors’ involvement –Lack of multi-trade communication Technological –Interoperability issues of design software