An Assessment of Lean Design Management Practices in Construction Projects

Rodrigo F. Herrera, Claudio Mourgues, Luis Fernando Alarcón and Eugenio Pellicer
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Rodrigo F. Herrera: School of Civil Engineering, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Valparaíso, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile & Universitat Politècnica de València, Av. Brasil 2147, Valparaíso 2340000, Chile
Claudio Mourgues: School of Engineering, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Vicuña Mackenna 4860, Casilla 306 Correo 22 Santiago, Chile
Luis Fernando Alarcón: School of Engineering, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Vicuña Mackenna 4860, Casilla 306 Correo 22 Santiago, Chile
Eugenio Pellicer: School of Civil Engineering, Universitat Politècnica de València, Camino de Vera s/n, 46022 Valencia, Spain

Sustainability, 2019, vol. 12, issue 1, 1-19

Abstract: Evidence exists for the application of lean management practices in the design process. However, there is no systematic review of this type of practice that links the design management practices to the lean construction principles. There is no tool to assess the level of use of lean design management practices in construction projects either. Therefore, this paper aims to assess the lean management practices that are performed at the design phase of construction projects. The research was divided into a literature review of design management practices; a validation of lean design management practices with a practice–principle relationship, based on an expert survey; the devolvement of a tool (questionnaire) to evaluate the lean design management practices; and an assessment in 64 construction projects (coherence, reliability, correlation, and descriptive analysis). It is concluded that evidence exists for the implementation of 19 lean design management practices. These practices are grouped into three categories: stakeholder management, planning and control, and problem solving and decision making. Additionally, in the assessment of the 64 projects, it can be observed that the lean design management practices are at initial levels of implementations, so there is a significant development gap. This research proposes a tool to assess management practices in the design phase of construction projects; then, the study identifies implementations gaps, it provides benchmarks with other projects, and it improves the design process through a taxonomy of lean design management practices.

Keywords: design phase; management practices; construction projects; lean construction (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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