August 21 2012
Strategic Value Management
The construction/retrofitting industry is increasingly growing at a dynamic, demanding and challenging pace. This has also resulted in a lot of conflicts, discontent and unhappiness between clients and designers. The recent case in the US where the design teams were being thrown out for consistently busting the budget by a whopping margin.

Construction projects have in the past suffered from three major problems: (1) cost overrun; (2) time overrun; and (3) quality short fall. Predicting contract prices at the design phase is a necessary, albeit a difficult task in construction design and project management. Evidence shows that projects often suffer delays and costly disruptions because of the differences between design cost predictions and contractors' bids or not meeting value for money for user of the facility.

What are the crucial task to determine why design estimates are consistently significantly lower than construction bids and what study can show how strategic value management can help to address this problem.

Strategic value management is broadly divided into three main areas; namely value management, design value management and value engineering management.

Can we devise an implementation strategies for SVM; in developing a design costing system capable of producing prices and quality design; and lastly in enhancing value for money for the facility.

Are we able to do a research to investigate the theoretical basis of SVM in order to offer improvements to current practice :
(i) To evaluate the existing approaches, the benefits and pitfalls to implementing SVM
(ii) To evaluate the available literature on SVM
(iii) To determine the extent to which theory can contribute to working designs within budget and achieving value for money in building design.
 (iv) To develop a new methodology for value management which is both theoretically rigorous and practical in its implementation.
(v) To provide guidance on the types of situation within which the new methodology is applicable.
(vi) To evaluate the application of the new methodology in a real situation.

It is hope that the industry will act to inculcate the awareness and importance of SVM in delivering design within budget and value for money within the construction/refurbishment industry. It is also hope to update practitioner and provide essential information for all parties involved in the industry.