Shaun McCarthy OBE, Chair of the Supply Chain School explains how building for the future is being delivered…
The launch of the Offsite Management School in March this year issued a clarion call to the construction sector at large to engage with offsite methodologies as a matter of urgency. In the bid to meet national targets for 2025, the Government Chief Construction Adviser, Peter Hansford threw down the gauntlet to sector suppliers:
“The industry has moved a long way in collaboration over the last few years, but it’s got a long way to go. The thing with offsite thinking is that it requires the input of all levels of the supply chain, right from the earliest stage.
“The Offsite Management School is aimed at the supply chain. For suppliers, this is the future. If you don’t get involved, you are going to be left behind. You’ve really got to get on board!”
The Offsite Management School aims to help industry meet the challenges set out by the UK Construction Strategy for 2025: to construct infrastructure, buildings and homes that create 50% less CO2 emissions; are delivered in half the time; and will cost 33% less to build and operate over their lifetime.
The Offsite Management School
The School consortium of Partners brings together Skanska, Laing O’Rourke, Costain, Carillion, Siemens and United Utilities, working in collaboration with knowledge organisations such as Buildoffsite, BRE, CITB, Total Flow and Exelin. Together, they have developed an online learning environment for suppliers. The School’s online resources, e-learning modules, workshops and events are all completely free of charge to users and offer supplier Members the chance to benchmark their knowledge of advanced construction and manufacturing techniques, plus assess their organisation’s management skills.
To help boost offsite capability across Construction, the School has also successfully secured £180k of industry co-investment from the UK Commission for Employment and Skills (UKCES).
The Offsite Management School builds on the experience and expertise of the learning-resource model developed by the award-winning Supply Chain Sustainability School, founded in 2012 which proved successful on an unprecedented scale, with 34 Partners and over 10,000 Members now participating.
Transforming How We Think About Construction
Operating collectively through the Offsite Management School, Partners are sending a consistent message to the supply chain about the need to transform the way we think about construction. Their shared belief is that the industry must go through a process called Construction Industrialisation.
The School focuses first on five main stages of industrialisation:
• Digital design;
• Offsite manufacturing;
• Logistics;
• Onsite assembly; and
• Best-in-class maintenance.
It then develops a further eight supporting ‘soft’ management competencies, enabling businesses to build skills. As such, the School simultaneously taps into a cultural shift happening at present and anticipates future demand, says Mike Putnam, President and CEO of Skanska UK:
“The Offsite Management School will facilitate a truly collaborative way of working – at project, programme and industry level. It will lead to creation of a network of like-minded businesses with access to expert groups and people. The School will enable us to work better together, driving use of industrialised processes and delivery on a just-in-time basis.” Partners recognise supply-chain development to be a key market driver, as Managing Director Siemens Process Industries and Drives, Mike Houghton, explains:
“We are backing the Offsite Management School because we value industrial sustainability. We also understand that taking a strategic approach in line with the Government’s Strategy has the potential to strengthen supply chains and create the foundations for solid economic growth.”
Offsite, Digital Design and BIM
The key to modernising construction for future growth will be the systemic digitalisation of the sector, observes Alex Lubbock, BIM Development Manager at Carillion:
“As we move from analogue to digital delivery, it is essential to foster greater collaboration between Partners, as well as our supply chain, to bring a common understanding and shared view, so we can make the step change in a consistent fashion.”
Accordingly, rather than a dedicated, but isolated module on Building Information Modelling (BIM), the School has embedded it into all primary e-learning resources. BIM is seen as an integral tool to be used along with digital design to grow understanding of Design for Manufacture and Assembly (DFMA).
Applications for BIM exist all the way along the offsite value chain, right from original drawings through to onsite FM, maintenance and post-occupancy. This embedded approach to digital underpins a fully integrated view of construction going forward, concludes Ian Heptonstall, Director of School Delivery Partner Action Sustainability:
“It is obviously really important to get the design of the product, component or building right, but also to understand how you are actually going to construct it. It is a matter of design for the process of building and BIM is essential for that – supply chains need to be able to share specification data to deliver successfully on the original design intention.
“In the decade between now and the target dates of the Government Construction Strategy, the built environment sector faces a stiff challenge upskilling at speed. In a digital world, offsite technologies and solutions will have an increasingly critical role to play and the Offsite Management School will help the industry meet its strategic objectives.”
How does the School work?
- Organisations register for free and answer a series of questions based on their trade/service.
- The answers determine the level of knowledge of their organisation in 13 particular areas.
- The end result of this self-assessment is a 10-point action plan for the organisation to follow.
- On completing the plan, the organisation is asked to re-assess, with scores recorded to show progress within the industrialisation process.
Shaun McCarthy OBE
Supply Chain School
Tel: +44 (0)207 697 1977
rosie@actionsustainability.com
www.twitter.com/SupplyCSSchool
