Newforma sponsors the ROG Growth & Ownership Strategies Conference

Newforma is excited to be a sponsor for the Rusk O'Brien Gido+Partners Growth & Ownership Strategies Conference, held in Naples, Florida on November 7 - 9, 2012. This annual conference gathers together leaders of successful engineering, environmental consulting and architecture firms throughout the country with the goal of showcasing the best practices and most effective strategies for achieving growth, improving profitability, and building real and sustainable value.

Those attending the conference will hear from industry leaders on a number of important topics including:

• Economic and industry trends and how they will impact your firm
• The executive's role in developing and executing a growth strategy
• Success secrets of the industry's fastest growing and most profitable firms
• How to motivate and inspire your next generation of leaders
• Tools and tactics for effective strategic business planning
• Learn how firms are changing their approach to ownership plans
• Advice from the experts for executing successful mergers and acquisitions…and much, much more.

For more information on the event, please visit the ROG Growth & Ownership Strategies Conference website.

The Power of Progress

Legend has it that when Zeus wanted to punish a man — to really punish a man — the god made it impossible for the man to ever again feel the satisfaction of accomplishment.

We’ve all had those days. Late afternoon rolls around and you realize you have not accomplished any of the tasks you came to work to do that day.

But this post talks about the other side of the situation, when you enjoy tangible forward motion on your projects. The joy of progress: That’s the real pleasure of work!

Don’t take my word for it. That’s the finding documented in this Harvard Business Review article. In “What Really Motivates Workers,” Teresa M. Amabile and Steven J. Kramer write:

On days when workers have the sense they’re making headway in their jobs, or when they receive support that helps them overcome obstacles, their emotions are most positive and their drive to succeed is at its peak.

I  believe Newforma’s success has resulted from delivering this feeling of overcoming obstacles and making progress in daily work:

• Architects measure progress by how well they serve clients and deliver successful designs.
• Engineers measure progress by how well they engineer solutions — and they like to engineer their businesses to operate more efficiently, too.
• Contractors measure progress by how far they advance the schedule and coordinate their legions of subcontractors.
• Owners measure progress by how well they understand and operate their facilities.

In each case above, Newforma software removes impediments to progress.

If you want to kill someone’s spirit, as Zeus did, Amabile and Kramer found that the Greek god-king knew what he was doing:

On days when [workers] feel they are spinning their wheels or encountering roadblocks to meaningful accomplishment, their moods and motivation are lowest.

But if you want to enjoy the satisfaction of achievement and help your colleagues do the same, we have some ideas of how you can make that happen. Write answers@newforma.com if you’d like to start a discussion!

Postscript video

Teresa Amabile, Harvard Business School professor and coauthor of The Progress Principle, explains the importance of wins at work:

New white paper examines project information management in the cloud

Newforma Chief Executive Officer Ian Howell has published a white paper, “PIM in the Cloud,” that discusses cloud-based project information management as practiced by Newforma and Newforma customers.

Newforma’s philosophy is to design software that manages project information wherever our customers wish to keep it. With more project information residing on cloud servers, we’re doing more implementations in the cloud.

That’s not to say all project information is moving to the cloud. Architecture, engineering and construction companies work with large volumes of dynamic and unstructured information that sometimes lives on cloud servers, but more often resides in-house.

To address these different needs, the Newforma solution includes a number of different software components that run on different platforms, depending on which best support our customers’ business needs.

Our “PIM in the Cloud” white paper examines these topics and more. To request a free copy, please complete and submit this form.

Treating the Redline Blues

This Architexts comic is funny because it’s true:

If you would prefer to get your laughs from sources other than frustrating rework, Newforma has a solution, and a Newforma customer has published the step-by-step instructions.

In “Managing Revit Drawing Revisions in Newforma Project Center” at AECbytes Issue #62, Matt Tosto describes how Affiliated Engineering, Inc., a multi-discipline technical consulting firm, is managing the steady stream of drawing revisions generated from Revit.

The process Matt shows in his “Tips and Tricks” article eliminates the possibility of people accessing dated drawings.

You’re not restricted to Revit alone to employ the Newforma Document Control activity center. It can be used to manage revisions of any file types, including AutoCAD DWG and Microstation DGN files.

For a short video overview, visit this page at newforma.com.

Top 7 Reasons to Upgrade to Newforma Project Center Professional 9th Edition

Reason #1: Newforma to Newforma
Come to think of it, there are 50,000 reasons to start using Newforma to Newforma - One for each of the 50,000+ Newforma Project Center users at design, construction and owner/operator companies worldwide. "N2N", which has been unveiled in 9^th edition, allows Project Center users to seamlessly share, exchange and synchronize project information like RFI’s, submittals, file transfers, shared folders and Autodesk Revit models as if you are all working on the same system – except you’re not! You continue to work locally with files and project information on your local network at LAN-access speeds, and your partners only get to see what you choose to share with them. As one of the early users of N2N from Cannon Design has said,  "N2N completely redefines what it means to be connected to your project team."

Reason #2: The Revamped Info Exchange web site
I really think you are going to like the new look of Info Exchange. I think your clients and project team partners will like it too. We’ve revamped Project Home with  "ATM Friendly" access to Transmittals, Submittals, Shared Folders and more. We’ve also added Project Home widgets so you can tailor each default Project Home to spruce it up with site renderings or construction photos; display primary project contacts and info; or add additional useful widgets for open items, local weather, look-ahead project calendars and more. The  "ATM-like friendliness" extends into the project logs as well with 1-click controls to open attachments or enter responses, as well as drag ‘n drop to update your shared folders. Finally, it ALL works just great on iPads and Android tablets with WIFI or 3G/4G enabled.

Reason #3: Project Publisher
One of the most mundane, oft-neglected phases of project delivery involves the closeout and handover of project information. And is it fair to say that the actual presentation of documentation and materials to the client at project closeout sometimes leaves something to be desired? Not so with the Newforma Project Publisher feature. First use the  "wizard" interface to select record documents, submittals, the project team roster, selected document sets such as warrantees and O&M documentation, and information from any other activity center in Project Center to be part of your closeout package. Then organize the content any way you want in a hierarchical table of contents and publish it to a DVD, USB or network drive. The contents are neatly packaged into tables with each record linked to its underlying data and files. And it’s all professionally branded with your project and company graphics and accessed from a hierarchical table of contents. A far cry from 12 boxes and a cloud of dust!

Reasons #4 and #5: Contact Directory and Custom Word Forms
The new Contact Directory is a standalone app to centrally access and manage your company’s contact database. It works hand-in-glove, or rather  "drag-and-drop ", with Microsoft Outlook and the Project Team activity center in Newforma Project Center. You can also lock down Contact Directory editing privileges with the new  "Content Administrator" role.

But what really makes Contact Directory is its integration with the new Word-based form templates in 9^th edition. You can now convert standard,  "boiler-plate " Word documents like contracts and letters into dynamically generated forms merged with company, contact or project fields from Newforma Project Center. Your forms can leverage formatting options from Word like page numbering, headers, footers, repeating column headers and more. And a Mail Merge "Helper" macro helps administrators add smart fields and tables from Newforma contacts and project items like submittals, contracts or change orders.

In fact, we liked the Word form templates so much that we extended its reach to support the built-in forms in Newforma Project Center, including transmittals, RFIs, submittals and contracts, all of which were previously only editable using Microsoft InfoPath. We knew this would be pretty cool – but I have to admit I was surprised to hear from several of our earliest 9^th Edition customers that this was their favorite of all the new features! 

Reason #6: The need for speed
In 9^th edition, our engineers made a concerted effort across many aspects of the product to optimize the code. From navigating between activity centers to viewing PDFs to working with projects pinned to remote servers, 9^th edition will feel noticeably "snappier". This has been confirmed by our earliest 9^th Edition customers.

Reason #7: It’s the Easiest Newforma Upgrade Yet
My final reason to upgrade to 9^th edition? Well, to quote one of our early 9^th edition customers,  "it felt more like an update than an upgrade."  The whole process is very well documented and can be completed in a couple hours. 9^th edition runs on the same hardware as 8^th edition and there are no changes to any underlying OS requirements. And for the first time, you can now skip a release when upgrading to the current release. So customers with 7^th edition can bypass 8^th edition completely and upgrade straight to 9^th edition. Once you get onto 9^th edition, life gets even better with regards to updating and upgrading the Newforma Windows clients as there is now an option to auto-update clients to the appropriate release when upgrading a Newforma server.

To see a complete list of new features and functionality you can download an overview in PDF format.  To learn more about Newforma Project Center Professional, visit our website.

Newforma - Uniquely serving the AECO Market

We recently launched Newforma Punch List, and I am reflecting on the road we traveled from the first Punch List discussions. Some themes keep popping into my mind:

1. Newforma is in a unique position. We are the only company I know of with customers across all aspects of project design and delivery.
2. Punching (or “snagging” in the UK) is a tedious process.
3. For construction companies, time really is money.
4. Project complexity is on the rise. At the same time owners expect their project faster without sacrificing quality.
5. Our customers want to do business with fewer technology companies.

Architects, engineers, contractors, design-builders, subcontractors, and owners across the globe use Newforma solutions to win, manage, and deliver projects. We have a unique insight on project delivery across all of these roles. While most solutions will claim they work for everyone, the reality is they either focus on Design, Construction, or Operating.

At the very beginning of our quest to capture information at the jobsite, we spoke with folks in every role to get their perspectives. We quickly realized that Punch List is the top issue folks wanted solved. Everyone agreed the process was tedious, error prone, and (although critical) not something they looked forward to doing.

I heard that we needed to make our solution incredibility simple. One of my goals was that tablet training should take less than 20 minutes—a goal I am proud that we achieved!

Any amount of time that construction companies can squeeze from the project schedule reduces the possibility of late delivery penalties. With IPD contracts on the rise, the goal is not just avoiding penalties, but tapping into bonus pools for additional profit. An integrated solution like Newforma Project Center that streamlines all project processes (including punch list) is a key tool towards optimizing the project schedule. Electronic submittals are another example where our products can save both time (cutting down review cycles) as well as money (eliminating shipping costs).

With projects increasing in complexity while also tightening timeframes, it’s clear that teams must rely on technology to stay in control. Punch List is just one of many processes that involve every company across the project. During the final intense phase of a project, it’s critical to have the punch list effectively coordinated since it’s the last hurdle crossed on the way to project closeout…and final payment.

Every time I participate in a customer or prospect meeting, I repeatedly hear about “technology overload.” There are too many solution providers offering bits and pieces of project information management.

Our customers demand that Newforma help reduce this complexity. Punch List, along with other field management tasks, is simply additional project information. So customers ask and expect Newforma to provide solutions to capture this information. After all—we are the Project Information Management solution for the AECO market.

Making Dollars and Sense – Newforma’s New VP of Finance

We’re excited to welcome Joe Santiago, our new VP of Finance, to the Newforma team. Joe brings topnotch expertise and a proven track record with venture-back high growth organizations. Joe is skilled in the areas of financing, reporting, revenue recognition, mergers and acquisitions, strategic planning and international operations having managed the finances at a variety of companies including Cedar Point Communications, Telcordia, and Granite Systems. Joe's experience traveling and living abroad in Singapore complements his understanding of doing business globally. Joe also worked at Ernst & Young and is an accounting graduate of Bentley University. Newforma is growing and with Joe at the finance helm the sky’s the limit.

Speaking of growing, you too can become a member of the Newforma team! We have several openings right now including a Customer Support Specialist in the UK, a Product Designer and Software Engineers. Check out “Careers at Newforma” for more information.

Newforma named Innovation Rocks! Award Winner for October

All of us at Newforma are excited to be recognized as the October “Innovation Rocks!” award winner! Innovation Rocks! is an initiative sponsored by the New Hampshire Division of Economic Development in coordination with Rock 101 (WGIR-FM) to celebrate the creativity and ingenuity of New Hampshire innovators.

I thought the comments were pretty much spot-on when it came to describe why Newforma was chosen:

“Newforma shows how a relatively young New Hampshire company can have significant market impact,” said New Hampshire Division of Economic Development Interim Director Chris Way. “It’s only been a little over six years since the First Edition of their Project Center software was put out in limited release, and now Newforma’s software is being used by 49,000 licensed users in 620 companies across 10 countries to manage 650,000 projects. That’s innovation that works.”

This award means a great deal to us. Even though Newforma products are being used by industry leading Architecture, Engineering, and Construction firms on projects all around the world, it is especially rewarding to be recognized in your home state as a leader in innovation.

I also personally like the connection with both the New Hampshire Division of Economic Development and Rock 101. I grew up in New Hampshire, and I’ve seen firsthand all the great things that NHDED have done for the state, and of course, Rock 101 was my go-to station for the best Rock and Roll!

We really appreciate the award and are very proud of the recognition. However, as is the Newforma way, we won’t rest on our laurels. To quote classic rockers Bachmann Turner Overdrive, “You Ain’t Seen Nothing Yet!”

Good news on the job front: architects & engineers are hiring and so is Newforma!

While the economists and politicians continue to debate on the overall status of the economy, the architectural and engineering employment has grown for the seventh consecutive month. This steady growth, albeit slower than we would all like to see, is definitely good news for the AEC industry. According to “Last Word” published by the American Council of Engineering Companies, and citing statistics from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the employment total for architects and engineers exceeded 1.299 million in May. This is well above the recessionary low of 1.273 million recorded back in October 2010.

This data correlates with the feedback we’re hearing from our conversations with our customers and potential customers in the architecture, engineering and construction industry. Slow but steady growth seems to be phrase everyone is using.

While we are on the topic of employment, Newforma is continuing to grow, and we have five immediate openings for employment. We are looking to hire a Director of Sales Engineering, a Product Designer, a Product Marketing Manager, a Senior Web Application Engineer and a Training and Implementation Consultant. If you are interested in a joining an amazing team here at Newforma, or know someone who might be a great fit here, please visit our website and apply!

Nugget 2011 – A Look Back

It is hard to believe that more than a month has already passed since we wrapped up the last session of Nugget 2011, our first annual user conference. It was an amazing event that brought together a wide range of our customers from all across the globe. While our newly released Newforma Project Center Eighth Edition was one of the focal points of the conference, the real stars were our customers and their interaction with the Newforma Team. You can’t have a great user conference without great customers, and our customers are the best in the business.

There was great dialogue between customers and with the team from Newforma on various topics. Thought-provoking questions were asked and answered. Tips and tricks were shared over delicious meals and best practices were discussed over cold beverages. We even gave our customers a sneak peak at a new product in development, Newforma Project Analzyer.

All in all, Nugget 2011 accomplished everything we wanted it to and it was a total success from our perspective. But you don’t have to take our word on it, here are some of the quotes we received from our customers:

“Very impressive. Very timely. Very much in keeping
with the spirit of Newforma and well presented.”

“One of the best "best practices" presentations”

“Looking forward to making mobile available
to my users and external team members”

“Exciting stuff, can't wait to use it!”

“Great information and excellent presentations!”

“All panel members were very insightful!”

“Awesome, knowledgeable presenter”

“Well prepared, energetic, great support for Q&A”

“Great "one on one feel" to presentations and discussions.
We appreciate you listening to our comments & suggestions.”

“Your Newforma staff are smarter than the average bear.”

We realize we’ve set the bar pretty high for the next event, especially since all the attendees said they plan on coming back next year. However, we love challenges here at Newforma and the planning is already underway for an even better Nugget 2012 conference. We hope to see you there!

P.S. For those Newforma Customers who missed the event, all is not lost. We did record the audio and Powerpoint presentations of the sessions and have made them available for purchase. Simply call me, Steve Bracy, at 603-625-6212 x304 and we’ll be more than happy to provide them to you. But next year, you’ll want to be there in person!

Nugget 2011 - T-1 day and counting

April 26, 2011 – Well, it was an exciting day, even before Nugget 2011 began. Today was a travel day with 23 Newformants converging on Chicago in preparation for Nugget 2011. Unfortunately, the continuing rough weather throughout the Midwest made for lots of travel delays and an accident at Midway caused a number of flights to be diverted from that airport. Fortunately, no one was injured in that accident and none of our Newformants were on that flight, although Tony Page was originally scheduled to be on it! Hopefully, none of our customers were on it either.

But the stories abound…. Aaron Kivett and Rick Saladino were diverted to Milwaukee. Dan Conery and Renee VanDyne were diverted to St. Louis and drove from there. Google maps says it’s a 5hr 13 min drive; Dan says it’s 4-1/2 hours – you decide! In true Newforma tradition, all of them made it to Chicago in time for deep dish pizza at Pizza Due! A few people are still unaccounted for at this writing, including Ian Howell and Chris Burns, but we have every confidence everyone will make it in before we kick off the product validation sessions at 9am and the opening lunch at noon! Right, Ian?

Reflecting on Newforma’s beginnings 6 years ago

Yesterday, Cinco de Mayo 2010, was Newforma’s 6th birthday. It was on May 5, 2004, that we closed our Series A funding.

The idea of starting a new business actually started a full year earlier, in May 2003, in the offices of Borealis Ventures in Concord, New Hampshire.

I wasn’t there, but as the story goes, several participants left that meeting saying “No thanks, and don’t call me again.” Others, including Bob “Batch” Batcheler (now Newforma’s VP Industry Marketing and Product Management) and Larry Nuttall (now a partner with the Ascentage Group) , were inspired enough to commit to doing some more research and to start talking to potential customers. Soon after, the instigator of the whole adventure, Jesse Devitte (our initial investor and current Board member), recruited Todd Kozikowski (NE Region Sales) to help. Next, they roped in Jim Forester (Senior Technical Advisor) and Allen Preger (Chief Product Officer) during what started as a casual conversation on a sun deck out in California. They then arm-wrestled Dave Plunkett (VP Engineering) to consider leaving his job at Autodesk.

So Newforma was started without any technology, not even a prototype – but with a founding team that was highly qualified to analyze the state of the AEC market to identify opportunities. Our founders sought to add value by creating a new class of software application to meet business needs that were not already being met by existing vendor solutions. Part of the process was to lock themselves in a conference room at an Embassy Suites in Las Vegas with only a small porthole window for a couple of days, after which AEC1 became a registered Delaware company with 7 founders: Batch + Larry + Todd + Jim + Allen + Dave + Jesse.

That is also about the time that I got a phone call asking if I would review the AEC1 business plan to provide input/feedback. This soon became a second full-time job, consuming nights and weekends. After exchanging lots of redlines I recall flying from California to New Hampshire on a very cold Dec 27th in 2003 to work for the next two days with the team on finalizing the business plan in the very same Borealis conference room where it had all started back in May. In January, I was asked by the founders if I would consider becoming interim CEO to lead the fundraising effort and start pitching the business plan to potential investors. Somewhere along the line I resigned from my VP role at Citadon, sold my house in San Francisco, packed my family into a Jeep and drove 3,000 miles across the country all the while pitching VCs in the hope that we would get funded.

I wanted to share this story with you to help you imagine just how excited (and relieved) all of the founders and I were on May 5, 2004, when our first round of funding closed and we actually had a bank account with a credit balance and we could all look forward to our fist pay check.

Wind the clock forward to today and we now have 50 employees, 460 customers, 40,000 users and a second-generation Seventh Edition product that has just been released. At this writing, we have over 1,100 servers deployed that index and share information on more than 350,000 projects. Along the way we have created: project information management (PIM) as a new software category in the AEC market, and we have established Newforma as the leading solution provider in that category.

In addition to thanking everyone on the Newforma team for their important contributions toward achieving these terrific milestones, my genuine appreciation goes to our partners and customers. To all the architects, engineers, construction professionals and IT executives who have shared their detailed requirements with us, provided feedback on product design ideas, validated our product functionality and volunteered to test our software; and to our partners, who have integrated their products with ours, we owe a birthday toast to you all!

What an amazing ride so far - - with still more fun, new challenges and lots of opportunity to provide even more value to our customers ahead !!

e-Discovery Resources

In our recent webinar on PIM and e-Discovery, entitled Capturing decisions as they're being made: facilitating e-discovery, I promised to provide links to several information resources that I have found useful on the topic of e-Discovery. Please note that some of these resources require you to register to access the materials, but registration is free at the time of this posting. Here they are:

The Sedona Conference is a nonprofit, “research and educational institute dedicated to the advancement of law and policy in the areas of antitrust law, complex litigation and intellectual property rights.” Their Working Group Series are some of the most readable, authoritative resources on the rapidly evolving area of e-Discovery and many other areas at the intersection of law and technology.

Their Jumpstart Outline is a great warm-up on the topic of e-Discovery; it will either reassure you that you have a handle on your record retention and discovery process, or, more likely, scare the hell out of you and motivate you to invest some time and effort. The outline is a sample of the type of questions your organization is likely to receive in the early stages of the discovery process. I suspect it would be intimidating, if you are not properly prepared in advance.

Other useful resources from The Sedona Conference include:

• e-Discovery glossary
• best practice guidelines and commentary

The Federal Judicial Center is where judges go to learn about this stuff, so it is also a very definitive source. The have many papers and other resources re: e-discovery. In particular, the pocket guide to e-Discovery is very readable and useful.

The Electronic Discovery Reference Model (EDRM) graphic shown in the webinar was developed by EDRM which “develops guidelines and standards for e-discovery consumers and providers.”

The websites of dedicated e-Discovery solution providers are also filled with case studies and whitepapers that you may find useful.

And, of course, there is always…

Coming in late October, 2009.

IPD Essentials: Model-based design

State-of-the-art use of building information modeling (BIM) today encompasses creating a design intent model (e.g. Revit Architecture), a structural analysis model (e.g. Tekla), an energy performance model (e.g. IES), a constructability and quantity take off model (e.g. Vico), a space program model (e.g. Trelligence), a facilities management model (e.g. Archibus), a coordination model (e.g. Navsiworks), and more.

IPD project teams need to embrace the reality and the associated challenges of managing multiple purpose-built building information models (BIMs).

(As a quick aside, the “the great debate” of April 2003, hosted and moderated by LaiserinLetter editor Jerry Laiserin, speculated on the future role of BIM. Wind the clock forward and the vision of a federated project model has prevailed over the alternate concept of a single building model. It is fascinating to observe that while Bentley was promoting the correct vision in 2003, it has been Autodesk that has promoted the most commercially successful product.)

So much has already been written about the now-proven advantages of using BIM that I do not want to regurgitate them here. Suffice to say that BIM and its close relative, virtual design and construction (VDC), are both essential ingredients to achieving integrated project delivery (IPD). In fact, certain IPD contracts actually dictate that the project team must use BIM.

Instead, I want to offer you a different perspective. Adopting BIM is not just about training your staff on how to use a particular BIM system. Rather it is about transforming your firm’s best practices from being drafting- and document-centric to implementing new and still-to-be-refined model-based design processes. What exactly does this entail ? I think as an industry we are all still working out the full meaning of that question, but there are some key lessons that have already been learned that offer great guidance:

• BIM is not synonymous with IPD – it is only one of 5 Essential Ingredients.
• Two different approaches – either ‘sharing the model’ or ‘exchanging model views’ – are currently being used each with a different set of pros and cons.
• The letter “I” is the most powerful part of BIM - should this information be locked into a proprietary file format ?
• In the world of a federated project model it is important to focus on the purpose-driven exchange of project information between different purpose-built BIMs.
• Virtual building models allow early prototyping and simulation as additional inputs to the design process.
• Integrated project delivery remains a function of people, process and tools.
• Model-based design is not just about geometry, but about arriving at a common understanding of the intersection of disciplines, the interaction of building fabric and systems and the involvement of everyone on the project team.

You are invited to join our conversation as we continue to explore these ideas in future posts on this Newforma Blog and on PIM in the UK, our sister blog authored by Tim Bates.

IPD Essentials: Multi-Partner Agreements

At the 2007 AIA Convention, Jim Bedrick of Webcor Builders, and Tony Rinella, then of Anshen+Allen, delivered what I still consider to be a breakthrough conference session on “Innovative Project Delivery Models.” Together they presented an overview and comparison of the different delivery models being used successfully in other countries such as P3 (public-private partnerships), PFI (private finance initiative), performance contracting and project alliances.

This session was an acknowledgement of the problems and waste in the US construction industry being reported by NIST and a response to the combined voice of building owners who were no longer willing to accept and pay for the litigation, cost over-runs and time delays that result from traditional project delivery practices. Read more on this in our blog entry about how traditional project delivery models have failed, below.

Our extremely fragmented industry has, to my amazement, rallied with a surprisingly unified response with 22 leading industry organizations, (including heavyweights such as AGC, CURT, ASC, ABC, LCI, etc) all endorsing ConsensusDOCS 300 as a new form of IPD contract. Separately, the AIA has published two new forms of IPD agreement – the “IPD Transitional Agreements” and the “Single Purpose Entity (SPE) Agreement.”

From our meetings with Newforma customers, we are also observing a new trend to establish Master Agreements between companies who desire to work together on multiple future projects. The Master Agreement captures all of the terms and conditions, agreed to in advance by both parties, that define a ‘trusted partner’ relationship. The idea being that a short, supplemental agreement can quickly and easily be prepared as necessary to document any other project-specific requirements on a case-by-case basis. Also, based on these Master Agreements, improved IPD work processes can be defined and implemented well in advance of the initiation of a particular project.

What do all these new forms of contractual relationship have in common? Principles include shared risk, shared profit, no disputes, collective obligations, greatly increased collaboration, fast (sometimes unanimous) decision making and everyone being incentivized to attain the design goals of the project. Experience to date (as was shared at the recent IPD Conference) strongly suggests that these principles motivate high performance by project teams, result in a higher quality end-product and generate increased profit for every stakeholder.

Please note, however, that there may also be some potential perils in accepting certain of the contractual liabilities that are contained in these new forms of contract. You should consult your own insurer and legal advisor about how these new agreements intersect with professional liability insurance (regarding negligence) and legal precedent (such as the limited liability of contractors established by the 1918 Spearin Doctrine). An analysis of this intersection by Schinnerer & Company is available here.

Having shared that necessary professional caveat with you, let me now also share my personal view – that Pablo Picasso probably got it right when he said “Every act of creation is first an act of destruction.” Shocking as it may at first seem, I strongly suspect that it will only be after we let go of legacy concepts like professional indemnity from negligence (in the case of architects and engineers) and limited liability (in the case of contractors) that IPD contracts will fully evolve. Look for future innovation both from Schinnerer (who reportedly is working on a new IPD multi-party policy) and from other insurers (who may offer project insurance to compete).

The bottom line on this topic: accepting greater exposure to risk, and stepping up to be fully accountable for project success as part of a trusted IPD team, can lead to increased reward.

Stand by for our next blog entry in this ongoing discussion, “The 5 essentials of IPD.”

The Cost of the Status Quo: Traditional project delivery models have failed

The status quo of adversarial contractual relationships, E&OE (errors and omissions exempt) plans and specifications, claims for extras and issue resolution via construction lawyers is captured perfectly by the now infamous ‘change order boat’ image.

But these outmoded practices are slowly being replaced and will (in time) disappear. Little wonder that the use of design-build contracts as grown to more than 40% of non-residential design and construction in the US (up from just as reported by the Design-Build Institute of America (DBIA). This reflects the willingness of a design-build firm to take full responsibility as prime contractor for a guaranteed maximum price (GMP) and a guaranteed delivery date along with the risk of significant penalties for late delivery.

Why ? Because owners are no longer willing to accept the finger pointing, risk avoidance, project delays, cost over-runs and litigation involved in traditional forms of project delivery. Witness the industry whitepapers published by CURT (The Construction Users Roundtable) as well as the results of the FMI/CMAA Annual Survey of Owners.

As a result our industry is finally seeking new and better ways to deliver high quality building and infrastructure projects, on time and within budget, more predictably and more profitably.

Leading firms are experimenting with integrated project delivery (IPD) methods defined by the AIA in their publication called “Integrated Project Delivery: A Guide” as: “A project delivery approach that integrates people, systems, business structures and practices into a process that collaboratively harnesses the talents and insights of all participants to optimize project results, increase value to the owner, reduce waste, and maximize efficiency through all phases of design, fabrication, and construction”.

For more about IPD as an emerging mainstream project delivery model, also read our blog entry below called IPD: 5 Essentials for Success.

IPD: 5 Essentials for Success

Newforma helped sponsor last week’s inaugural IPD (Integrated Project Delivery) Conference hosted by Stagnito Media in Boston, attended by about 80 AEC professionals from 24 states.

The aim of IPD is, of course, to change the status quo! An IPD project team strives to meet seven important goals:

• Deliver high quality projects on time and within budget.
• Reduce errors and omissions
• Invest in better team collaboration.
• Manage more complex projects requirements (e.g. LEED certification).
• Remove the “litigation phase” of a project.
• Redefine traditional (i.e. adversarial) behavior.
• Greatly improve the predictability and profitability of the project delivery process.

Leading up to this event I was privileged to be asked by Brad Horst, CIO of EYP, to join his panel of industry experts to share any observations distilled from the one-day agenda of presentations and informal discussion. Highlights for me were the project case studies by building owners such as Digby Christian of Sutter Health, John Moebes of Crate&Barrel, and Erin Rae Hoffer of Autodesk, who, together with members of their project execution teams, shared challenges and successes from their early implementation of IPD projects.

What I concluded from listening to the keynotes, attending various breakout sessions and engaging in conversation with numerous other participants is that there are (at least) five essential ingredients that must co-exist to ensure the success of an IPD project:

1. Enter into new forms of contractual relationships such as AIA Docs, AGC Consensus 300, IFOA (Integrated Form of Agreement as used by Sutter Health), etc.

2. Use model-based design that employs multiple special-purpose BIMs.

3. Manage documentation, capture decisions, agree on workflows and streamline processes based upon best practices.

4. Focus on more effective communication, team collaboration and information-sharing with full team visibility. (In short, provide transparency).

5. Build a different project team culture based upon a “trust but verify” relationship model motivated by shared risk with shared reward.

It is our intention of elaborate on each of these 5 essential ingredients for IPD success. Watch for future postings!

The Cost of the Status Quo: Architects and Engineers waste 20% or more of their time searching for information about their projects!

Shockingly, in meetings with hundreds of firms, the response to this assertion has typically been undisputed or “at least 20%”. That’s one day per week of unproductive time looking for information that is “somewhere on the network”, not finding it and more often than not having to recreate it. The cause is well understood given the sheer volume of information being generated on every project plus the demands of the day job denying even the most diligent project team member the time needed to save everything correctly. Some firms have tried to address this problem by implementing either a document management system (vault) or Sharepoint (library) but very often with failed results. Principles regularly tell me that getting project staff to fill out their time sheets is difficult enough so therefore it is not surprising that they refuse to apply the time and discipline needed to follow the rules of a highly structured filing system or make the extra effort required to add meta-data tags to facilitate easy retrieval at a later date. So what is the alternative?

Firstly, the design process is iterative and the project information it creates is dynamic rather than static. Secondly, every member of the project team (including all of the external consultants) is an originator of different parts of the project data set. Therefore the problem is one of how best to manage unstructured project information which is always being shared and often being communicated on an ad-hoc basis. By defining the problem more accurately, Newforma has intentionally taken a different approach in developing its project information management (PIM) solution. To quote Ken Herold, Chief Knowledge Officer of HOK Architects, “a more pragmatic and much more affordable solution involves simply using Newforma Project Center to index all your project information to enable users to search any project in their office or even across the company wide network just like searching the web. The time savings creates more billable hours on a project or can be spent on other initiatives like being trained on BIM.” HOK deployed Newforma Project Center enterprise wide in July 2007 and continue to use the solution in all 26 of their offices worldwide today.

To learn more about why Newforma is committed to an 'indexed based search' approach to managing project information as the right paradigm for architects, engineers and construction firms, view our recorded webinar “For knowledge mining, reuse or recall – the value of full-text search”.

The Cost of the Status Quo: Introduction Procrastination? Hesitation? Fear of Change?

We are all players in a design and construction industry in which more projects are completed late than on time, budget over-runs are the norm and excessive litigation prevails. Add to this the fact that a lot of firms are currently finding it difficult to retain the number of skilled professionals that they need on staff to perform their project responsibilities. Unless you enjoy paying ever higher liability insurance premiums, running jobs that end up costing you money or having even more sleepless nights, then the time has come to change the status quo!

As Newforma pursues its ambition to find new ways to help architects, engineers and construction firms streamline their work processes to increase efficiency and be more profitable, we enjoy the unique privilege of visiting with and talking to many leading firms, observing best practices and learning how these firms are innovating.

As a result, we have been able to identify seven areas where low impact project information management (PIM) technology can be applied to proactively change the status quo in your office; to significantly reduce your exposure to risk; to remove wasted effort; to protect your fee margin; and, to sleep better at night !

Look for seven more blog entries to follow on this topic as we explore the question: Can you really afford to delay being more diligent about managing your project delivery processes?

Alphabet Soup (or acronym hell ?)

Do you get confused or just plain frustrated when you are reading the industry press reporting that AIA, CURT and AGC have formed the 3XPT Strategy Group, GSA has published an IFC based MVD requirement for BIM concept models, NBIMS is adopting IDM, CSI is supporting the IFD Library and promoting PPD, AGC has published agcXML, ICC is developing Smartcodes, AIA TAP recommends using MPS, NIBS is sponsoring COBIE, or by all of the references to IPD, LEED and VDC. If you are an international reader, just substitute your local variations such as Avanti, be2camp,CIB, CRC, etc.

Regretfully, here at Newforma we too have been guilty of speaking in acronyms on occasion. For example, in December 2008 we sent you an email blast entitled “PIM and the DNA for IPD” inviting you to join us for a free webinar …. when what we really wanted to talk to you about was email management as an integral part of the project delivery process and to show you how firms like yours are tackling out-of-control inboxes to mitigate risk by capturing email decision trails and to improving team communication.

Through this blog we will be making every effort to demystify much of the industry jargon rather than just pile on and add to your confusion. We aim to be diligent about explaining exactly what the most important acronyms stand for, convey a fundamental understanding and provide an informed opinion regarding the importance of the specific project or initiative. As a start down that path, the links provided above (for anyone who wants to take the time to explore them) have been carefully selected to point you to an authoritative source that explains who or what is behind each of the acronyms used as examples above.

If we do err again, please call ‘foul play’ to get us back on track :-)