Waste Reduction by Lean Construction - Office Building Case Study

Abstract

The proper organization and planning of building processes plays an increasingly important role in building projects, and appropriate management is becoming a more frequent problem. Tools of quality management are very often used in other areas of business, such as automotive, aerospace and production, unfortunately, rarely in the field of construction. The main goal of this article is to show that individual quality management tools and Lean Construction tools can be used in construction, and their use brings significant and visible benefits. Authors present their work as an example of implementing these tools in building processes at the construction of Pixel office buildings in Poznań. Authors present the basic concepts related to quality management and the tools used in the field of Lean Construction as well as assumptions of Lean Management. This aims to introduce the reader to the main concept, assumptions and allows to learn the principles of lean management. The reader needs to be aware, that all company employees and suppliers must be involved in introducing Lean Management to the enterprise, starting with the owner and ending with the employee. It is not possible to implement a lean philosophy into a company, without understanding the basics and purpose for which they were introduced. Practical part of the article is devoted to a detailed analysis construction process using the well-known Six Sigma cycle DMAIC - an abbreviation of the words: Define - Measure - Analyze - Improve - Control. The analysis was carried out on the basis of own knowledge and interviews with the construction management and employees of subcontracting companies present at the construction site. Results are presented in the form of conclusions. It can be said that using quality management tools (mainly Lean Management principles) it is possible to visibly improve building processes and it is likely to achieve better financial and time results during execution of works.