Builds in Outstanding Quality by Increasing Leverage of Construction Industry Standards
One of the UK’s largest construction companies is building stellar quality into its projects by increasing its leverage of construction industry standards information — positive results range from reassuring a customer about a pipe-fitting solution to resolving a subcontractor dispute and saving £35,000.
The Challenge
- Assure delivery of well-engineered products and services to achieve customer satisfaction
- Mitigate or eliminate the risk of noncompliance to prevent waste, defects and liability issues
- Improve employee awareness of industry standards and access to documentation
The Solution
Accuris Product Design with Accuris Standards Expert™
Results
Ensured compliance with relevant industry regulations as well as best-practice standards to meet higher customer expectations
Trained over 45% of staff in 6 months – increasing usage from ~200 to 650+ employees a month – 3x prior level of engagement for better ROI
Boosted team productivity by simplifying access – reduced log-in time to 10 seconds instead of 5 minutes for lost password
Settled dispute with sub-contractor regarding manufacturer information – saved £35K
Supported “quality alerts” to head off problems – e.g. overheated schools, leaky pipe fittings
Contributed to improvement in overall quality of products and customer satisfaction
Willmott Dixon Builds Quality Based on Industry Standards
Quality is a key differentiator in the construction industry. Founded in 1852, Willmott Dixon long ago established a reputation for superior quality across all of its businesses. As one of the United Kingdom’s largest privately owned construction, regeneration and support service companies, Willmott Dixon’s annual revenues surpass £1 billion. The company’s Capital Works division includes a Construction group that specializes in non-residential work including award-winning projects for education, leisure and culture, hotels, offices, custodial, health, retail, and infrastructure for national and local government agencies.
Today, Willmott Dixon is building upon its competitive advantage by sharpening its focus on quality. Internal audits are identifying defects and mitigating their potential impact on projects. Project managers are proactively researching new materials and best practices. In each of these steps and more, Willmott Dixon employees must reference industry standards information to ensure compliance, eliminate delays and hidden costs, and deliver maximum value to their customers.
“Our company’s vision is to provide well-engineered quality products and services to our clients,”
explained Rumana Shaukat, Quality Delivery Manager at Willmott Dixon. “My job is to look at how we
can meet each customer’s expectations while reducing waste and risks. Raising awareness of industry
standards and showing our employees how to apply them in our daily operations is an essential part
of the process. That’s why we use online standards documentation from Accuris. I’m already seeing an
improvement in the quality of our products and customer satisfaction.”
Leveraging the Right Resource
Willmott Dixon invests millions of pounds each year in the development of its employees’ skills and expertise. In this case, however, the company has been able to achieve tremendous gains by simply showing employees how to make use of a powerful resource that is already at their fingertips.
In 2010, Willmott Dixon had been subscribing to Accuris Standards Expert for a decade but usage had dropped off due to organizational changes at the construction company. Shaukat found that the great majority of her colleagues were unaware of the Accuris service and were conducting their own searches on the Internet.
“Unfortunately, when you search the Internet, you have to visit many sites and you may still not get current construction standards. With Accuris, we get the specific information we need in the one place and it’s been checked by experts. We know it’s focused on construction and we can access or download it easily,” said Shaukat.
Raising Awareness, Simplifying Access
To show employees at Willmott Dixon how the Accuris solution could help them in their jobs, Shaukat began a series of face-to-face briefings and demonstrations.
“Since the campaign kick-off six months ago, we have run about 80 training courses and reached more than 45 percent of our staff. As a result, we have increased usage from about 200 users a month to more than 650. That’s three times the previous level of engagement so we know we’re getting a much better return on investment now.”
Willmott Dixon also made it easier for staff to access the Accuris solution by simplifying the login process.
“We’ve developed a page on our Intranet, called a Quality Dashboard,” said Shaukat. “From your desktop, you’re literally two clicks away from the Accuris database. It makes everybody’s life easier. Now it only takes about 10 seconds to get started instead of 5 minutes when someone forgets their password.”
Quality Information, Quality Results
The Willmott Dixon team is ensuring higher quality for the company and its clients by researching standards throughout the project lifecycle.
“That’s where Accuris assists quite nicely,” said Shaukat. “Our people can check products before they’re ordered whether it’s a manufacturer catalogue, CAD drawings or finding local supply chain. The level of detail of construction data that’s readily available – the Construction Information Service, Specify IT, SCI Bluebook and Environmental Management – makes this tool very valuable.”
“Our people can check products before they’re ordered wherther it’s a manufacturer catalogue, CAD drawings or finding a local supply chain. The level of detail of construction data that’s readily available… makes this tool very
– Rumana Shakat, Quality Delivery Manager, Willmott Dixon
Jo Rock, a senior environmental manager uses the Accuris solution to check environmental impact rules. She says it is “A great tool – acts like Google, but specific to construction products. Great for looking up standards, research and widening your knowledge.”
Here are other examples of staff experiences that were highlighted in the company’s Quality Delivery publication, where Shaukat serves as editor.
Accuris partners with 400+ Standards Development Organizations to support their non-profit mission, streamlining your access to 2.3 million engineering standards for innovation and progress across the globe. Accuris brings you technology with the knowledge built in – so you can build a better world.
- Owen Craister, a company quantity surveyor had a dispute with a sub-contractor. Craister was not familiar with the Accuris system until Shaukat took five minutes to show him how it worked. He used the system to check the specifications for joints connecting paneling from a certain manufacturer. The data proved that Willmott Dixon had scoped the job correctly and saved the company £35,000.
- Neil Ballard, a services manager for mechanical-electrical installations, was having trouble with overheated school buildings. He researched the issue and teamed with Shaukat on a ’quality alert’ to let their Willmott Dixon coworkers know the problem, the relevant standard and a potential solution. Recently, Ballard described the Accuris solution as, ”A very useful tool. Easy reference to British Standards, etc. plus relevant guidance notes and publications.”
- A senior bid manager saw a quality alert that Shaukat had sent out after researching crimped pipe fittings and the effects of leaks if incorrectly installed. He was in the process of convincing a client to consider press fit in place of traditional soldered and welded fittings to avoid potential problems. After sharing the standards information, the client took the senior bid manager’s advice and went with the better pipe fittings.
Building for the Future
“The best scenario for us is to make sure we design out potential issues in pre-construction… before we build,” concludes Shaukat. “We want everything right the first time, every time.”
Willmott Dixon has demonstrated its commitment to quality for years, in each of its projects. Now, by leveraging best-in-class standards information and insights from Accuris, this industry leader is ready to continue raising the bar as it builds toward the future.
