1. My Journey with Lean Construction and Last-planner
Dr Steven Ward MCIOB
Lean Construct Ltd
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2. In This Presentation History & Development of Lean
What is Lean Construction?
My Experiences with Last Planner
Some Lean Myths
The latest Process Benchmark for Last Planner

3. Some Lean History F.W.Taylor – Scientific Management - 1893
Gilbreth – “Therbligs”
Ford – Flow Production
Shewhart – SPC
TWI
Deming – System of Profound Knowledge -1948
Juran- Practical TQM – Pareto in Industry – Quality Trilogy -1949
Ohno
The term “Lean” – Machine that changed the world

4. Assembly plant performance (mid 80’s)
Japan USA Europe
Output:
-Productivity (hrs per vehicle)
-Quality (defects per 100 vehicles)
Work Force:
-% of Work Force in teams
-Number of Job Classes
-Suggestions/Employees
Layout:
-Space (sq.ft./vehicle/year)
-Repair Area -% of assembly
-Inventories (days)
Source; Womack,Jones, and Roos 1990,92
This is the data that kicked off a “lean revolution” in manufacturing. The way to present this is to say. “Imagine that you are Vice president of General Motors, Chrysler or Ford in the 1980’s and this lands on your desk, this is revolutionary improvement and such figures could not have happened by chance” Productivity= double. Quality= 33% better. 25% less Space. Design Performance figures are similar so the way of thinking applies to information flows as well. (next slide)

5. Design Performance ( mid 80’s)
Japan USA Europe
Avg. Engineering Hours m m m
Avg. Development Time (months)
No. of Employees in Project Team
No. of Body Types per New Car
Supplier Share of Engineering % % %
Prototype Lead Time (months)
Prod. Start to First Sale (months)
Return to Normal Quality (months)
Source: Womack, Jones and Roos 1990

6. PRODUCTION THEORY TRANSFORMATION, VALUE, FLOW
Construction is Typically regarded as a transformation process, i.e. transforming inputs to outputs. Consider a Gant chart programme with “foundations, superstructure, finishes” etc. These are the “Value adding steps.” in reality a “flow process exists” which includes every single activity, whether value adding or not in the process. Value in construction is depicted above as the flow in the stream. The rocks (waste) impede the flow.
L.Koskela

7. Womack & Jones 5 Lean Principles
What is Lean Thinking?
Womack & Jones 5 Lean Principles
Understand VALUE from the customers perspective
Understand the VALUE STREAM – All the steps in the process
Create FLOW by reducing waste
Use the principle of PULL
Endlessly pursue PERFECTION

8. What do you see? ACTIVITY = WORK + WASTE
When you look at sites, offices, fabrication yards…
What do you see?
Lots of busy people?
Busy at what?
ACTIVITY = WORK + WASTE

9. 3 Elements of a Day
Something changes to get closer to what the customer wants
Value Adding
Something we currently have to do but does not in itself add value for the customer
Support Activity
Transport
Inventory
M otion
Waiting
Over Process
Over Production
Defects
Waste

10. Why eliminate Waste?
To raise the ratio of Value Added activities to Support Activity and Waste
Working Day
WASTE SA VA
More resources available for other activities
Eliminate
Minimise SA VA VA SA
Working Day

11. This is an example of a one day intervention to help solve a particular problem on site. (see full summary book attached to )
The installation production rate of pre-cast panels was supposed to be 8 per day but the team were achieving 4. A day was spent facilitating and carrying out direct observation of the process. The fitters were “our most experienced men and cannot be improved” By closing out the actions formed by the end of the day, the team were able to easily reach the required outputs. Note the proportions of value and waste on the summary above. These are REAL. By tackling the waste part productivity easily doubles.

12. Construction Opportunity
“The actual amount of time needed to progress from contract to completion for the typical home, if all of the relevant skills and materials were marshalled in the proper sequence, could be reduced from six months to fifteen days using current construction techniques”.
Womack & Jones 1996
Have any of you read this book?
I can strongly recommend it.
Lean Thinking is a new production management and control theory. The focus is on overall system flow management, control and feedback.
The benefits of lean are increased throughput resulting in a more reliable delivery process including
shorter timescale,
reduced cost and
improved quality.
Lean thinking is starting to gain momentum but still in infancy stages. Suppliers and subcontractors are becoming more critical parts of the delivery process. 12

13. Early Years
2001 – Pearce Construction (now ISG) - Last Planner (by Glen Ballard)
2002 – Whitbread = little boxes- batch reduction
2003 – Asda & Waitrose = big spaces!- still batch reduction + SMMT Industry Forum (TPS)
2004 – CLIP/BRE – the Common Approach - understanding TPS & Collaborative Planning
2007 – Lean Practitioners – change the world
2009 – 6ix Consulting – keep changing the world
2017 – Lean Construct Ltd – Live in it!

14. Traditional Planning Project Objective Planning the Work Information
Should
Executing the Plan
Normally we produce a plan and say what should be done.
Resources
Did

15. Last Planner Project Objective Planning the Work Information Should
Trade Foremen
Can
Did
Difference is that the weekly plan is based on what work can be done, rather than what should be done.
Key point is that trades commit to each other to carry out the tasks.
Construction
Resources
Did

16. Weekly Work Plan Task Timescale Quality & Delivery Review
Electrical first fix ground floor
Glass Delivery
Glaze ground floor
Timescale
Quality & Delivery Review
Task
Note that Plan B is the available constraint free work that can be worked on if all else fails. It may not be work on the critical path, but we know there is work there to protect the resource and that can be done if all other work is finished early.

17. Example Weekly Plan

18. Weekly Planning

19. 3 week rolling programmes
Review Last Week
Discuss this week
Plan next week

20. Example from Student Accommodation

21. Make Ready / Ready to build/Lookahead

22. Ready to build template

23. Ready to build example

24. 2003 – Whitbread, Asda & Waitrose
Batch Size Reduction
SMMT Industry Forum – the Next Customer
Continuous Improvement TPS

25. Master Programme Planning
The Steps
Introduction to the Project
Background, target dates, milestones, critical paths
Create current programme, with target dates and milestones sign posted - Map the programme in detail by the week
Challenge the programme produced and re-juggle activities as necessary
Consider NEXT customer needs and wants
Consider work sequence and inter trade impact
Can the programme be realistically pulled back?
Capture key issues raised during the process for discussion and action

26. Master Programme Planning
Weeks
Designer
Trades
Sub-contractor
Architect

27. Batch Reduction Theory
Batch of 6 Rooms 1
Complete 6 Rooms before next trade can start
Each trade takes 1 second
Total time 24 seconds 2 3 4 5 6

28. Batch Reduction Theory
Batch of 6 Rooms
Batch of 3 Rooms 1
15 Seconds
24 Seconds 2 3 4 5 6

29. Customer Satisfaction
FOCUS IS ON CASH BUT SHOULD BE NEXT STEP
SUPPLIER OR PREVIOUS STEP
PERSON DOING WORK
NEXT STEP IN PROCESS OR NEXT SUB/C
PARTY WHO PAYS PERSON DOING WORK
END USER
E.G. STUDWORK WALLBOARD DRYLINE M/CONTRACTOR CLIENT

30. The Plan, Do, Check & Act (PDCA) Process Cycle
Incorporate successful improvements
PLAN DO
Manage HERE!
Control
the Method
Measure HERE!
OUTPUTS
INPUTS
Quality
Manpower
Process
Cost
Materials
Machines
Delivery
Health & Safety
Messages
ACT
CHECK
Trial Improvements on a small scale
Identify Opportunities
Compare Plan to Actual Identify Problem/Opportunity for Improvement

31. Some Lean Myths The Japanese invented Lean
Offsite Manufacturing is Lean
Lean means cutting everything to the bone
Lean makes you more money
It’s a silver Bullet
You need to Use all the lean tools like Value Stream mapping, 5s, Single Minute Exchange of Dies (SMED) and Just in Time to be Lean

32. Interesting chart
= £1.5mil pa saving on prelims alone + an overall cost reduction of 7% By End 2013 Progressed 400m2/week – nearly 4 times faster.

33. Small Scale Actions… Over the last 3 years… Street Lighting +20%
Patching %
Slurry sealing +30%
Blairgowrie +10%
Forfar +10%

34. Produce large scale benefits

35. The Last Planner Benchmark
Some others have had similar journeys
This means there are now several “Flavours” of Last Planner
We should always try to follow a standard, an unstable process is difficult to improve.
The Current Process benchmark can be found here:-

36. The Last Planner Benchmark
Reviewed by approximately 40 experienced practitioners worldwide.
12 of these contributed
Now Includes – Milestone Pull Planning and Phase Scheduling
Now Includes 3 KPI’s
PPC
TMR TA
Noted that TMR & TA are rarely used
Includes 5 Why & root Cause analysis
Includes PDCA

37. My Journey with Lean Construction and Last-planner
Thankyou
My Journey with Lean Construction and Last-planner
Dr Steven Ward MCIOB
Lean Construct Ltd
+44 (0)