Tailoring PDCA to improve construction’s productivity

Construction needs a unified productivity method. This paper asserts one. Standardisation increases a country’s GDP and a company’s profit. Shewhart’s Plan-Do-Check-Act (PDCA) was created for the manufacturing industry. It has been helpful for construction contractors as a starting point. Still, it contains misalignments and blind spots, making it suboptimal —i.e., not readily adaptable to the custom installation and rehabilitation industry. This paper examines the limitations of the model and proposes a potential solution that builds upon Shewhart’s model. First, we describe the realities that for-profit construction organisations face, and then we expand and tailor the PDCA approach to address those issues. In summary, completed tasks comprise a finished project. Each project requires dozens of physical installation activities. As an improvement, a repetitive set of management activities that support trade professionals' on-site tasks, done on time, will ultimately deliver quality, cost, and schedule. This paper examines potential variations in project inputs and projected results. This approach applies to both new construction and rehabilitation projects and can be utilised as a diagnostic tool in post-project reviews to facilitate continuous improvement.