Customer
Stockport-based contractor Multibuild's £50 million annual turnover includes everything from refurbishment to new build and fit-out. As its name implies, Multibuild works on a wide range of projects, although it used to specialise in the leisure sector.

"We've now also moved into different markets to grow the business," explains Managing Director Mike Peden. Among recent successes are the Big Blue Hotel in Blackpool and the fit- out of Megabowl at Star City, Birmingham. Current schemes include the construction of a new workshop for BMW Williams in Liverpool and new-build apartments for Wain Homes in Sale.

Requirement
Multibuild's prime need was to provide swift access to reliable information about projects, clients and enquiries. Staff had been "doing their own thing" by keeping ad hoc contact details, project files, notes and spreadsheets.
"We needed to centralise everybody's knowledge to make it useable by more people," explains Financial Director Karen Whittam. "As we grow and new people come in, it is more important than ever that we know exactly where to find things."

Staff might need anything from a client's mobile number to the costings for all the hotels that Multibuild has worked on. The solution would have to meet these needs from the start but have the flexibility for extra features later, such as the sharing of selected information with other companies. Above all, it needed to have a user friendly interface with access from the office, site or home.

Solution
Workspace Enterprise Portal, branded internally by Multibuild as MARVIN - Multibuild's All-Round Very Intelligent Network.

Supplier
Union Square Software

Results
Workspace provides Multibuild's staff with access to a wide range of essential information through a simple web browser interface that includes built-in searching. "We can respond faster to clients now that we have more at our fingertips," says Whittam. Work is more efficient and coordination is better.
Multibuild's Financial Controller Ginny Taylor was given the role of in-house project manager and the system went live in January for all 120 staff based in the head office. This first phase has concentrated on 10 core functions such as handling documents, project information and contacts. "Getting this right is essential before we implement the other good things that we have planned," says Peden.
All documents - including drawings, letters and photographs - are now managed through Workspace and can be easily found and opened through the browser. Comprehensive contact details are to hand, and steps have been taken to integrate project finances.    

Comment 
Peden particularly appreciates the fact that Workspace is geared to the construction industry. "We've had a very good response from staff," he says. "And it was critical from my perspective that clients would benefit too." 
He welcomes the fact that Multibuild can continue to develop its use of Workspace by adding extra features. There will also be great benefits in rolling the system out to sites. "People on site will become more involved in the business - we want our sites to be as connected as the office," he concludes. 

On construction projects of any scale, effective collaboration can present a very real challenge.  Increase the size of the project and introduce a joint venture (JV) agreement and the challenge becomes even greater. Steve Dunn, Planning Manager at Galliford Try, explains how project management software can produce a culture of collaboration and bring projects to completion on time and even under budget. 

Under a joint venture agreement, Galliford Try and Costain Limited are working on a three-year, £250 million contract awarded by United Utilities (UU) for the design and construction of water and wastewater treatment works in Cheshire and South Manchester.

The contract, one of three major framework agreements awarded, forms part of the UU £750 million national AMP3 framework programme and involves a total of 150 projects, spread over an estimated 250 sites, each of which schedules anything from 300-2,000 tasks per project. More than 140 project staff are based in the Galliford Try/Costain Joint Venture office in Warrington, Cheshire with a further 300-400 staff employed out on-site.

Planning managers are accountable to both the project owner and their employer for the delivery of projects to time and budget. To ensure this for Galliford Try and United Utilities, we chose project management software, P3e/c for Construction, from Primavera Systems Inc.  We knew from previous experience that the software would facilitate collaboration between the joint venture companies and strategic partners, while simplifying the often-daunting responsibility of managing a number of projects simultaneously.

With other software programs, project teams are often reliant on the distribution of printed hard copies. Conversely, as P3e/c resides on the local area network in the JV office, access to project data and reporting functions are available at all times to all people - which means that output is shared by the entire project team - including senior managers and board members. In fact, Galliford Try estimates a 30% cost saving in planning functions due to increased efficiencies in automated reporting.

With upwards of 30-40 task and schedule changes per month per project, effective change management is crucial, as all parties need to have access to accurate data in order to work proactively towards the achievement of project goals.  P3e/c enables the project team to capture changes as early as possible to minimize possible implications (time or financial) to the overall schedule and make the necessary adjustments. Early identification of potential issues, through the application of "what if" scenarios, enables the project team to take prompt remedial action to prevent them from occurring in the first place.

Assigning accountability is another important factor in establishing and maintaining collaboration, both on-site and with the owner. Using P3e/c, historical data can be tracked and current schedules analysed to determine tasks remaining, necessary rescheduling, financial values of activities, necessary cash re-profiling and of course, who may be responsible for an incomplete task.  By tagging each task with the responsible team member's name, Galliford Try has found that team members rarely fall behind schedule.

The level of data analysis available assists greatly with day-to-day financial management, and allows Galliford Try to accurately forecast the next accounting period for the project owner. Without P3e/c, effective management of a program this size would be nearly impossible. The software provides reliability, accuracy and ease of internal and client communications that are directly related to achieving project success.

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