— Sustainable Design —-
I have had many requests for a sustainable design discussion, so I start my first blog post with this theme.
Sustainable design is a cross between new inventions in the design realm relating to hot topics such as LEED but with a twist of continuous improvement and six sigma. Designs are always being improved with new technologies (CI or Six Sigma concepts) and LEED brings many Environmental aspects to the forefront for thought starters.
These philosophies blend a unique amount of “what’s new” in engineering and environmentally friendly design that will stand the life cycle of a construction project while offering a maintenance neutral cost benefit to the life of the facility.
Designs need to work with the social, economic and ecological viability of the structure being considered. If the project can utilize environmentally feasible products to construct and offer a long-term benefit to life-long occupants to enjoy — it’s a win-win for all.
From a feasibility cost perspective, a potential higher initial cost for a sustainable design my pay off over the 30-year life cycle of a facility in the first 5-10 years.
Whole Building Design, Green principles, LEED and a host of other philosophies can take our designs to a new reality if the masses are willing, so more economical solutions can be fostered and delivered cheaply. (a work in progress from the Environmental movement)
Please send emails to discuss your sustainable projects that require feasibility analysis.
I had a Firm looking for Cost Estimating services ask two (2) questions: I will post my discussion on both topics – Continuation from below question —
I added more to the answers on some other areas in an estimate to consider —Additional note(s):Cost estimates also took labor productivity into account ranging from 60% to 75% inefficiency, depending on the work. Labor rates – Rate can be found on AGC websites and if you call local unions. Government wage rates can be found on Davis Bacon websites. Lately labor rates require per-diem for travels due to lack of skilled trades, wage premiums to attract workers and pay skill increases for Apprentices to get help. Apprentices were getting the same pay rate as journeyman. Lots of Government estimators missed a lot of this in the MII estimating tool. If performing Life Cycle cost analysis, you need the OMB circulars.Material Costs – Discussed above. One other thing to mention was lead times and upfront payments to vendor to hold your order.Construction Equipment – The demand for construction equipment was also a factor to consider. Inflation was 6% per increase for rentals. Plus, fuel prices were going above $4/gallon for diesel for operation costs. I always revery back to reviewing Equipment Watch an online service that gives a lot of Dozer, excavator, etc. pricing for Rental and Owned equipment going back 20-years. So, if a 1985 John Deer tractor is showing up on site Equipment watch will tell us the amortized value of the equipment is ZORO, but you should only pay for Fuel, oil, lube costs for operational cost. Mark-up’s – (This an example of a $10M Project) Projects require many more services on a construction site, so I’ll discuss: (Depending on size of project these percentages vary) (Note these percentages are ranges and are different for all projects, Estimator judgement and experience in the location of the project should be considered for budgeting purposes.)General conditions (GC’s) – 20-40% depending on size of project.Prime Contractor HOOH – 7-12%Prime Contractor JOOH – 15-20%Prime Contractor Profit – 7-10%Prime Contractor Bonds – 1-1.5%Prime Contractor Allowances – Varies % (more contingency)Subcontractors HOOH – 8-15%Subcontractors JOOH – 8-15%Subcontractors Profit – 5-15%Owner Costs – SIOH – 1-10%Other Owner Costs – ~ Varies (more contingency or management reserve)Contingency costs – $ Use difference from Baseline Estimate to the P50 value.Management Reserve – Dollars from P50 to P80.Escalation to the Midpoint of Construction from the date of the Estimate.Having said all of that, I just want to say, this process has been vetted out and works.It just needs to get out to more Owners, Government agencies and the Estimating community that crashed and burned over the last two years.Note 1: If you plan to reward estimating work on this type of scale, your estimator will fail, sometimes, depending on the work. Estimating should not be looked at as one size fits all. I tell my customers this is only a gauge, until you show me the work. If you hire CPCII, we can develop a better metric. The hours shown would be for Estimating only. We would have to discuss the software you want, as well.Note 2: All of the other services and costs recommended below would have to be built-into our billing rate and assess hour for each service on tracking commodities inflation or deflation, escalation, RS Means data, P6 PRA tool, Monte Carlo Simulation, Equipment watch – Blue Book, Global insight, IPA,...
read moreI had a Firm looking for Cost Estimating services ask two (2) questions: I will post my discussion on both topics – Continuation from below question —
Answers to your questions:2. Explain how you plan to account for erratic material price increases and shortages when estimating a project.During the last 1-2 years, Escalation, contingency allocation of commodity inflation into the future has caused havoc on cost estimating, for many owners across the world. I determined that the escalation and inflation was approaching 40% in the Food Manufacturing industry due heavy use of Stainless Steel coming from Ukraine and deliveries were 3-4 times long as what we used to call normal. At a certain point we told management to hold off on Construction Contracts until the economy came back to earth. The BOD took our recommendation.These are the methods I’ve been successful using:I’ve had the luxury of utilizing some expensive ($10,000/year +) on-line services like Global Insight. Their escalation and commodity Indexes all have leading 3–6-month indicators on where the anticipated prices would go. These were spot-on, looking back. I’ve also utilized AGC Economists for Union work. (Membership required)Used ABC Economists for Open Shop work. (Membership required)For Government projects I tried using some of their Escalation and inflation models, but they were lagging indicators.I looked at ENR for Commodity pricing and the ENR Index for comparison. Every one of the sources of indexes I used were misleading or lagging indicators.If project escalation runs “from estimate date to the mid-point of construction” during that timeframe estimates were only good in the 3–6-month window. Now that escalation and inflation are somewhat stabilizing, I would still recommend following indexes like Global Insight, until we get back to a “New Normal” again. I would also recommend that in the Estimator Basis of Estimate (BOE) they caveat their assumptions on commodities, escalation and the source from where they used the information.In times like the last 1-2 years, I’ve recommended a re-estimate of the projects to capture the relentless increases of the future 3-6 months.When the customer requires accuracy ranges on the Conceptual, Budget and Definitive estimates they should pay for resources and back into your overhead and billing rate for estimators. The same with other software: Scheduling, QTO, estimating software and the RS Means data and risk Monte Carlo software.Scheduling duration recommendations for long-lead commodities can be found in the Economist info for AGC and in Global insight information that may cost more. We also called the vendors who provided quotations to add the lead times to their quotations or we called them directly.Risk Modeling – Estimating: Once the estimate is created, we would take the Risk Register that had high, medium, and low risks and model the estimate and the high-risk items only. We also modeled the material commodities in the Monte Carlo (@Risk) and that provided a P50 value of where the predicted value would be if owner tolerance was at a P50 (50% of the projects are winners and 50% of the projects were losers).Many of my clients and project stakeholders wanted a P80 during this timeframe.At P50 this needs to be subtracted from the cost estimate baseline which equals a delta $ value which is considered Contingency value for Project.Any dollars from P50 to P80 are considered Management Reserve.Risk Modeling – Scheduling: We used Primavera Project Risk Analyzer (PRA) to model the Baseline schedule or the latest Schedule update. Some say the new versions of P6 don’t let...
read moreI had a Firm looking for Cost Estimating services ask two (2) questions: I will post my discussion on both topics.
Answers to your questions:1. Provide a technical narrative detailing how you would develop a cost estimate for a 90% set of multi-trade construction documents with a construction budget of $2.5 million. In your narrative, identify manpower hours to produce your cost estimate.Utilizing 90% design drawings with multi-trade estimates would be handled in this manner:With 90% drawings, assuming all trade estimates have all the details to estimate with and there should be minimal contingency. I used to use the 1-3 hour per page (Estimator Judgement) methodology (based on how detailed each drawing is) to give estimate hours for proposals. It worked well until BIM models furnish quantities now, which saves hours. Utilizing a software tool that has RS Means data as a starting point to pull into cost estimates.If the estimators are in a production setting, then I would use all trade estimators and have each only focus on their trade and have a merge of estimates into the final delivery.If these estimates have no deadlines, one estimator could perform with all the hours suggested below. This isn’t an exact science but with years of experience you get the hang of it.A sliding scale would have to be determined if the project size is small enough for one (1) estimator or multi-trade estimators. Depends on the size of the project. For example: All of these scenarios assume durations and disciplines of work are equal.• Projects < $1M to 5M 1-3 Estimator Duration: 2 weeks• Projects < $5M to 10M 1-3 Estimator Duration: 2 weeks• Projects $10M – $25M 3 Estimators Duration: 2-3 weeks• Projects $25M – $100M 3 Estimators Duration: 3-4 weeks• Projects $100M – $500M 6 Estimators (PMO) Duration: 4-6 weeks• Projects $500M – $1B 6 Estimators (PMO) Duration: 4-8 weeks Note: Project that are this large may estimate in Phases or 2 teams of multi-discipline estimators. $500M to >1B would require a PMO office and teams of estimators, PM’s Engineers, Schedulers, Project Controls,...
read moreCPCII name change in 2024
CPCII will still be the “doing business as” but,The CPCII detailed description will be as follows:Certified Professional Cost Innovation, Inc.
read more— CPCII rules for working with clients —-
Professionalism Professionalism is the conduct, behavior and attitude of someone in a work or business environment. A person doesn’t have to work in a specific profession to demonstrate the important qualities and characteristics of a professional. Professionalism leads to workplace success, a strong professional reputation and a high level of work ethic and excellence. In a recent study on Career Readiness conducted by NACE (National Association of Colleges and Employers), employers who hire college graduates were asked which professional competencies were essential to workplace success. Professionalism/work ethic topped the list with 97.5% of respondents identifying it as either “absolutely essential” or “essential” for a new college hire’s success. Here are 12 ways you can develop and practice professionalism: Be productive Use your time productively at work. Focus on your job responsibilities and avoid getting pulled into social media, web browsing and phone activity while on the clock. Develop a professional image Project a professional presence and dress appropriately for your industry and organization. A good rule of thumb is to dress in the position you aspire to have. Take the initiative Ask for more projects to be given to you or think of assignments that will meet your organization’s goals. You don’t want to be under-utilized. Maintain effective work habits Prioritize, plan and manage your assignments and projects. Follow up and follow through with your supervisor and team members. Manage your time efficiently Establish priorities, set goals and create action plans to meet deadlines. Demonstrate integrity Be accountable for your work and actions while behaving ethically at all times. Provide excellence Produce work and results that reflect a sense of pride and professionalism, often exceeding expectations. Be a problem-solver When you run into problems and obstacles take the time to brainstorm a few solutions and alternatives before you meet with your supervisor. Be resilient Develop coping skills to manage setbacks and challenges with a positive and constructive attitude. Communicate effectively Practice professional on-line, in person and interpersonal communication skills. Develop self-awareness Learn to manage your emotions and gain awareness of your emotional triggers so you can manage your reactions positively and productively. Accept and reflect on feedback to assist as you learn and grow. Build relationships Network with colleagues, customers and clients to build professional cordial relationships, work on teams and collaborate effectively. Ethics Ethics are considered guideposts for entire larger groups or communities. Ethics are also more culturally based. Ethics refer to rules provided by an external source, e.g., codes of conduct in workplaces or principles in religions. Morals Morals are considered guidelines that affect individuals. Morality is a person or society’s idea of what is right or wrong, especially in regard to a person’s behavior. Maintaining this type of behavior allows people to live successfully in groups and society. That said, they require a personal adherence to the commitment of the greater...
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