2020Case11SuirEngineering

Contents Lean Construction Ireland Annual Book of Cases 2020 44 Ca e 11 Suir Engineering rolled out this Lean project on a large-scale pharmaceutical project in the north east of Ireland. Once complete, the project will be the largest pharmaceutical facility of its kind in the world. Suir Engineering is responsible for the Electrical & Instrumentation package, design-assist, testing, and commissioning, along with the temporary electrical package for the project. The project started in April 2019 and is expected to be complete in December 2020. At the time of writing, Suir Engineering has 10 supervisors who manage 180 direct personnel on the site. With that many direct staff to manage, a Lean approach was required towards the assignment of tasks and how materials and resources would be managed on-site. In doing so, it would help to ensure that key milestone dates would be achieved and that issues and constraints could be raised and rapidly resolved at the correct level of the business. Tier 4 Meetings Each Suir Supervisor installed a Tier 4 (T4) meeting board in the work area they were responsible for (Figure. 1). The supervisors ran daily meetings at the workface at the start of each shift, at which everyone is made aware of what is expected of them for the day, issues and constraints are identified, safety watchpoints are highlighted, along with quality or coordination. On-Site Material Management Material that is required to be brought to the area is also arranged. Planning is a key part of the T4 board and 2-week look-aheads are issued and monitored with the supervision to gauge plan adherence and to highlight any issues/ delays. In order to reduce the time spent getting material in stores, small material workbenches were brought to the work area. This was implemented along with the reduction in time spent by employees travelling to and from stores, the materials benches also incorporated a Kanban system allowing material shortages to be managed effectively and to highlight when materials were low. Suir Engineering also ensured that BIM stations were available at each level of the facility. This was to allow trades and supervision have the most up-to-date information, empowering them to make decisions in the field and correctly sequence work. When the BIM stations are not in use, they automatically switch to play SOP and safety videos to enforce the safety culture on site (Figure. 2). Tier 3 Meetings The Tier 3 (T3) meeting is a focal point of the day and has been run successfully throughout the project. The Suir team has been fully engaged in the T3 meetings where conversations are open, honest, and to the point. The Project’s Construction Manager chairs the meeting and ensures the conversation remains on topic and the meeting keeps pace. The meeting is attended by site supervision, store manager, safety lead, QA lead, lead planner, site admin, QS lead, and project director. Tracking of Downtime Reworks and Covid-19 Issues Obtained directly from the workface T4 boards, information flows freely on the site and is passed on and discussed with the site management team at the T3 boards. This allows for a lot of valuable information to be tracked in real-time. This has allowed the team react to issues that have arisen on site more quickly than they would have previously. This also allowed them to try different approaches and get feedback as to how it is working within 24 hours. This feedback has been invaluable as the team try and navigate through Covid-19, allowing the team to experiment with different approaches and help maintain productivity whilst also ensuring that employees are kept safe. Lean Initiative Undertaken – Lean Thinking, Tools, Techniques Figure 1. Tier Board & Meeting On-Site Figure 2. BIM Systems Used to Promote Safety When Not in Use