If you are planning to build a residential dream house or a commercial space for business anytime soon, then you may be at the point of choosing who to entrust your time, money, and effort with: (1) a Construction Manager/General Contractor (CMGC), or (2) a Team of Design-Build Project Delivery Method.
Let’s go ahead and check further the pros and cons of each one of them. It is about time to know who you would entrust the once in a lifetime building of your dream projects.
WHAT IS CMGC?
CMGC or Construction Manager/General Contractor is the process where the project leader or owner hires a reliable contractor in order to provide necessary feedback while in the design phase right before the construction stage begins.
The CMGC process includes two contract phases:
- The Design Phase – This is the first contract phase wherein the contractor works with the project owner or designer to identify the possible risks, provide estimate cost, and finalize the project schedule. In this process, both the project owner and the contractor negotiate with the total contract price for the construction. If both parties agreed then proceed to the second contract phase.
- The Construction Phase – This is the second phase wherein the construction of the project begins.
What are the benefits of choosing CMGC or Construction Manager/General Contractor according to the Department of Transportation State of Minnesota:
- Promote innovation. It is highly encouraged that both the contractor and the project owner collaborate with all the best possible options including the use of innovative approaches that can save time and possibly cut the cost.
- Risk reduction. The feedback of the contractor during the design phase can greatly affect the reduction of the project costs because the owner understands the process and starts to mitigate the identified risks.
- Refinement of the design. The contractor provides feedback through a careful review of the chosen designs, answer queries about the designs, and produce better changes that can reduce identified issues in the construction.
- Improvement on the cost control. Value Engineering is an integral part of the CMGC during the design phase. This is the part where the owner makes an in-depth decision upon consideration of the contractor’s proposal about the alternatives offering the most cost-effective approach.
- Optimization of the construction schedules. This enables the team to identify the right-of-way and other utility issues on the critical path of the design process and gives a better picture and focus on those details that can affect on the proposed schedule.
Now that you already have an idea of what is CMGC and how it works, let us now review the Design-Build Project Delivery.
What is a Design-Build Project Delivery?
Design-Build Project Delivery is a method that delivers a project in which the designer and the construction services are both being contracted by a single entity called the design-build contractor or design-builder. In contrast to the CMGC or Construction Manager/General Contractor method, the Design-Build relies solely on a single point of responsibility contract. It carries the clearest contract solutions for the clients because the Design-Build contractor will be the one responsible for all the work, regardless of the cause of the fault.
What are the Key Considerations for Design-Build Project Delivery?
- It is cost-effective since the designer and contractor are working as a team throughout the process. Therefore, less litigation, fewer changes, and fewer claims.
- With the Design-Build approach, the project can be delivered much faster than that of the conventional method CMGC or Construction Manager/General Contractor.
- It has the ability to improve project coordination.
- It has the ability to lessen project claims.
- The design-build team must possess qualifications that are essential for the success of the project. The owner must have a strong emphasis on the selection process on the qualification portion.
- The owner must be very cooperative with the Design-Built team in handling the details of the chosen design.
- The owner’s team must have the capacity to do the mental shifting on a different approach to deliver the project.
Does the Design-build Project Delivery method outperform the other conventional method?
The Revisiting Project Delivery Performance 1998-2018, authored by Keith Molenaar and Bryan Franz, shows that their study of comparing two samples – one from 351 projects in 1998 and the other one from 212 projects in 2018 – after 20 years, Design-Build projects remains to deliver faster result and with greater reliability in schedule and cost performance.
What are the benefits of choosing Design-Build Project Delivery according to the Design-Build Institute of America (DBIA):
- Risk reduction. About 79% of the project owners use design-build to minimize the risks involve in the process.
- Cost-effective. The design-build project saves about 6.1% of the total cost compared to the other conventional approach.
- Speeds up the process. Design-build projects are 12% faster than the traditional approach. The ability to fast-track projects without compromising quality is one of the reasons to consider using a design-build delivery system.
- High-quality projects. Design-build continues to outperform other traditional project delivery in various categories such as callbacks, startup, interior and exterior, O&M, equipment, and environment.
- Adapts to innovation. Many project owners continue to leave the traditional project delivery because of its lack in the collaboration and innovation process.
- Highly flexible. It provides flexibility, competitive bidding through different approaches to contracting and procurement including a selection of best value, selection of qualifications-based, and extensive growth of design-build, among others.
Since the rapid growth of the design-build project over the past decade, it continues to deliver nearly half of America’s building projects. New research shows that the design-build project is expected to grow at 18% until 2021.
Conclusion
There is a more in-depth discussion about their pros and cons. Although each method has offered its own way of saving the project owner’s time, money, and effort, it still pays to visit a trusted construction company for a personal consultation and business proposals.
It’s interesting that 79 percent of project owners use design-build processes. I’m looking to hire a commercial contractor to start building and digging for my new building. I’ll be sure to find one that has a good track record and that I can work with.