Design Review Checking System with Corporate Lessons Learned

Abstract

Design reviews are critical to the success of a construction project. They eliminate costly rework and conflicts, and promote creative and innovative design and construction. This paper discusses a unique way to improve design reviews by gathering and including direct corporate experience that can be used company- and industry-wide. The Design Review Checking System (DrChecks) and the system called Corporate Lessons Learned (CLL) were developed by the U.S. Army Construction Engineering Research Laboratory to collect personal experiences and lessons learned on projects and incorporate these data into corporate knowledge, expressly for the design review process. DrChecks provides a framework for a standardized review process. Typically, exchanges of personal experience and knowledge have occurred informally by word of mouth. With DrChecks and CLL, direct personal experience can be collected into a database while the design review process is on-going. Lessons learned, success stories, and good work practices, which can be identified easily by experienced staff members, can then be shared throughout the organization. DrChecks and CLL both take advantage of the Internet and facilitate the management of design review process and the collection and reuse of corporate lessons learned asynchronously and remotely.