Leading construction industry to lean agile (le agile) project management

© 2015, Suhail Iqbal Page 1 Originally published as a part of the 2015 PMI Global Congress Proceedings – Orlando, Florida, USA

Leading Construction Industry to Lean-Agile (LeAgile) Project Management

Suhail Iqbal, PE, PfMP, PgMP, PMP, PMI-PBA, PMI-SP, PMI-RMP, PMI-ACP, CAPM SysComp International Private Limited

Abstract Construction industry is one of the most expensive and most expansive industry dealing with multi-million dollar projects world-wide from construction of building infrastructure and utilities. Being a highly structured discipline, construction is assumed to be mostly governed by Theory X since time immemorial. Though a lot of improvements and enhancements to the construction methodology and innovations have occurred dramatically evolving and turning around the concepts of construction in past few decades. Still we observe that the concept of Lean construction was accepted with a lot of disdain and is yet not globally implemented. While the Agile Methodologies are gathering momentum and are being tested to be adopted beyond software industry, construction industry still does not want to entertain the idea of agility in construction projects. This paper will not only highlight the positive need for adoption of agility in construction but will also attempt to marry it up with the lean construction, thus introducing a new concept of Lean-Agile (LeAgile) Project Management for Construction industry. This article would basically introduce concepts and new ideas on proposed LeAgile setting for construction projects and would discuss following main items:

1. Introduction to Lean and Agile 2. Lean and Lean Construction 3. Possibility of Agility in Construction 4. Can Lean and Agile be used in unison? 5. Proposed application of Lean-Agile (LeAgile) Project Management in Construction.

Introduction to Lean and Agile ‘Lean’ and ‘agile’ are two separate approaches to management, but some of the researchers have identified relationship between the two. As they both are historically being developed on a parallel path while some of their features are common and they intrude into the territory of other at various points, giving an impression sometimes that they are one and the same. Whereas both of these approaches are distinct and unique in purpose, but we definitely can find a way how to best utilize them together. We can find the similarities and differences and try to have the best of the both worlds. Specifically when it comes to the construction projects, we feel at a loss to draw a parallel or clear distinction between the two. The dilemma is that construction industry which is supposed to be most organized and prospers on the assumption that it manages the resources most effectively, still causes a lot of waste and they have already realised the need to be lean, thus the concept of lean construction is fast being circulated and implemented in construction projects. Naturally, we do have clearer objectives and static scope in construction projects, so it is automatically assumed by many that agile is not for construction, as they are still struggling with reducing the waste. It will not be wrong to say that this


difference in scope has almost eliminated the need for agile, while theoretically, it might be debated that if lean and agile can work together in software and other industries, then why not construction? If we take the numbers, the construction projects may be smaller in number as compared to software projects in any one place but the budgets of construction project are far more than the projects of all their industries put together. So it can be hypothesized that construction industry has greatest benefits to reap if agile and lean can work for them together. It will be debated in this paper why a construction project should be agile but at least we are going to debate it and not take the answer at its face value. It will be observed that the relationship of lean and agile has been taken up by many researchers and diverse views exist as to which one of them is more akin to a specific industry. Some treat agile, as a way to do things within the overall perspective of lean and some debate they cannot work together at all. We will try to establish, we can reinforce the commonalities of both and smoothen out the jagged edges, to present a fit for construction industry. This marriage of convenience between Lean and Agile is already called by some as LeAgile and that is the term we will be taking forward for construction industry. Definitions “Lean is an approach that identifies the value inherent in specific products, identifies the value stream for each product, supports the flow of value, lets the customer pull value from the producer, and pursues perfection.” (Karkukly, 2013) “Lean is doing more with less. Use the least amount of effort, energy, equipment, time, facility space, materials, and capital – while giving customers exactly what they want.” (Womack & Jones, 2008) Agility is the ability to both create and respond to change in order to profit in a turbulent business environment. Agility is the ability to balance flexibility and stability. (Highsmith, 2002) We see Lacher and Bodamer (2009) discussing Agility in Project Management, while they discuss agile in the perspective of lean. Lacher and Varisco (2008) tries to prove that Agile is the implementation of Lean Thinking. According to them Lean-Agile is a combination of Lean Thinking and Agile disciplines. Lean is the ‘What’ and Agile is the ‘How’. Discussion In layman language, to be lean an organization has to focus on most economical usage of resources where everything is available only when needed or required, which is called Just-In-Time (JIT). Moreover, a lean organization manages and maintains flow of all its materials and resources in such a calculated manner that only needful is done with surgical accuracy thus reducing, rather eliminating all chances of waste. To reach such a level of precision, the organization has to ensure that only the work required to meet the objectives of the project is taken up and anything which is not contributing directly to the organizational objectives is eliminated. Subsequently, this means all such effort which may lead to waste or a product with less than desired acceptability are not taken up at all. To be lean, we have to be highly proactive and experienced with processes, we should be able to forecast and plan very soundly each and every move we will have to make during the project. In agile, the focus is not on accuracy or precision but on speed and flexibility. Agile focuses how quickly team can react to the changing requirements of the stakeholders and still be able to complete the job in less than expected times. The team distributes the whole work in smaller chunks and concentrates on one piece at a time, remaining work is open to suggestion and change. Agile provides a cost effective response to customer demand and is based on flexibility of design, production and delivery. Projects with constantly changing scopes may be very good candidates


for agile project management, and therefore software development is where it was born. Agile empowers us to bring the product in the hands of customer faster reducing the development cycle considerably. As expressed earlier agile and lean have many commonalities while there still are differences. Where Lean focuses on reducing waste, Agile focuses on being alert to opportunities effecting changes in a fast manner. As we deduced Agile is for projects with constantly changing scope. Lean needs to be very well-planned right from the outset, so scope must be as clear and static as possible. Background The ‘lean revolution’ started with the introduction of Just-In-Time (JIT) technique given by Taiichi Ohno way back in 1960. Though the lean as a formal approach was not introduced earlier than 1982, when Toyota introduced it by publishing Toyota Production System. Lean was popular in quality circles and later was taken up by supply chain in 1990s, as they assumed themselves to be its beneficiaries. It was not as late as 1992, when construction industry started considering application of lean for construction projects. Since then a lot of work has gone into Lean Construction and physical results have been produced, which now necessitates lean as an integral part of construction project management.

Exhibit 1 – History of Lean and Agile (Copyright Ennova 2011, Friday, 23 September 2011)

There are similar techniques from Japan like Kanban, a scheduling system that helps determine what to produce, when to produce it, and how much to produce. Kanban was utilised mainly in the automotive industry but now it is talk of the town. Agile movement was also following lean on a parallel path, as in 1995 first paper on Scrum was published soon followed by book on extreme programming (XP). Formally, Agile Manifesto was released in 2001. Russell and Wong were first to represent effective scheduling for construction in 1993. In 1998, Harris and Ioannou coined the term ‘repetitive scheduling method’ (RSM) and in 2000, Last Planner System was first published. ‘Last Planner’ (LP) system and ‘Location Based Management System’ (LBMS) also have a parallel stream in history and in one way or other they show characteristics of either lean or agile. Line of Balance (LoB), a visual method of construction planning was introduced in 1950. Various names were used for these graphical scheduling tools like


Repetitive scheduling method, Linear scheduling method, Flow-line scheduling, Vertical production method, Time space scheduling method, Time Location scheduling, Time versus distance diagrams etc. (R. Kenley & Seppanen, 2009). LBMS is a construction planning and production control system most often visualized as a flow line. Differences and Similarities As we have been referring to the differences and similarities between lean and agile, we must understand that lean is a philosophy whereas Agile is a conceptual framework governed by Agile Manifesto, 2001. Lean works at reducing waste, giving value to the customer with an integrated and collaborative team. Agile’s primary focus is not on value but on customer satisfaction through simple interactions working with a self-organizing team. Where lean would maximize the profitability, agile would maximise the sales by keeping the customer satisfied. Lean needs elaborate planning upfront like in waterfall model and cannot leave things to chance, while agile plans continuously throughout the life of the project in smaller iterations.

Lean Agile Primarily a philosophy A conceptual framework Focus on customer value Focus on customer satisfaction Focus on eliminating waste Focus on simplicity Integrated and collaborative teams Self-Organizing teams Daily and weekly planning Close and daily cooperation between all parties Focus on improving task reliability and reduction of overall duration

Focus on speed and adaption to changing circumstances

Maximising profitability by reducing unit cost Profitable sales maximisation Exhibit 2 – Comparison of Lean and Agile (Copyright JACOBS)

Lean and Lean Construction? MacAdam (2009) applies the five Lean principles of Womack & Jones (2008) (specify value, identify the value stream, flow, pull, and perfection) into three types every task completed in an organization can be grouped, namely value-added, enabler and waste. Basically all the activities in a project must add value, if any activity is not adding value it must be eliminated, such activities produce waste and are not contributing to the organizational objectives. Still there are some activities which do not add value by themselves but are enablers for those activities which do, such activities are called enablers. So, in construction, if we want to be agile, we must ensure we only have value-adding activities and enablers in our schedule and all non-value adding activities must be eliminated, as they are waste. Moreci (2014) shows through a case study how application of the Lean A3 process leads to rapid and effective alignment of the sponsor, key stakeholders, and program team around a revised vision, strategy, objectives and resource requirements. Lean A3 process is a possibility of Agile in Lean. As in this case study it was successfully applied to fix a troubled program, there seems to be an opportunity for construction projects to use similar combination. Moujib (2007) also identified the five lean principles, highlighted issues and determined how these could be applied to project management, and discussed various types of wastes that exist in projects. The five lean principles as outlined earlier are listed below: specify value, identify the value stream, flow, pull, and perfection


Value is defined as a capability provided to a customer at the right time at an appropriate price, as defined in each case by the customer (Womack & Jones, 1996, p. 353). Once the value has been identified, we have to find the value stream, those activities which contribute positively to the outcome or the project’s product. Value stream is defined as all the actions, both value added and non-value added, currently required to bring a product from raw material to the arms of the customer or through the design flow from concept to launch. (Morgan, 2002). Once we make the value flow, we differentiate between the value-adding activities, enablers and non-value adding activities, and by eliminating non-value adding activities we eliminate waste. Once value is created, it is not delivered to customer until and unless customer needs it and pulls it on JIT principle. The whole process is then perfected by continuous improvement. How the seven types of lean wastes apply to lean construction is defined as under:

1. Over Production Waste: This waste occurs when we produce more than needed, faster than needed or before it is needed. Excess production is not required and costs money.

2. Waiting Waste: Any non-work time waiting for approval, supplies, parts, etc. In construction this waste is very common due to a preceding activity not delivering on time or finishing completely. It creates waiting time during which no value-added activity is performed.

3. Transportation or Conveyance Waste: Wasted effort to transport materials, parts, or finished goods into or out of storage or between processes with n specific purpose due to poor planning. Transportation should be minimized and if done it must be on JIT principle.

4. Over Processing Waste: Doing more work than is necessary is a kind of waste common in poorly planned construction projects where there is lack of coordination and communication. All unnecessary steps in operations, which adds no value to the product or service, must be eliminated.

5. Inventory Waste: Maintaining excess inventory of any supply (materials or goods) in excess of what is required to build the current homes under construction. Inventory includes raw materials, work-in-process and finished goods. Excess inventory can quickly build-up and tie-up dollars and resources.

6. Motion Waste: Any wasted motion to pick up parts or stack parts, also wasted walking. No extra steps should be taken to account for inefficient processes and other faults. If you have to move, it must add value.

7. Correction or Defects (Repair or Rework) Waste: These are products, materials or services that do not meet expectation or conform to specification. Corrections and defects are anything requiring repair or rework or even scrap.

Possibility of Agility in Construction Before we explore the possibility of application of Agile practices in Construction industry, we need to quickly review the agile values which were published in 2001 in the Agile Manifesto for Agile Software Development: Individuals and interactions over processes and tools

Working software over comprehensive documentation Customer collaboration over contract negotiation Responding to change over following a plan

It is understood that Agile Manifesto was created for software industry but what we are trying to find is the possibility of it being applied to Construction industry. I would re-phrase ‘working software’ to ‘working product’ in the second value to make it read as “Working product over comprehensive documentation”. Now we can debate each one of these values from applicability point of view for construction.

1. Individuals and interactions over processes and tools. Construction engineers value their processes and tools more than anyone else and would protect them in status quo at any cost. This is because they have a deep-rooted understanding that there is no other way this specific job can be done. Despite all this we have


seen construction industry evolving over time adopting new innovations all the time and adapting to new methods, tools and processes. What if we decide to consciously promote creativity in engineering and leave it to our team members and stakeholders to suggest how this specific construction work should be done? LBMS is a great example of that where construction engineers do agree a conventional schedule may not be workable for all locations and they will have to plan separately for each location. Though difficult to digest but there is a ray of hope that it is very much possible to somehow start prioritizing individuals and interactions over processes and tools.

2. Working product over comprehensive documentation. I suppose a construction engineer wants a workable product but they are so much in love with perfection that they start gold-plating their product and it exceeds the basic specification. If that is due not to the customer’s changing requirement, which we can discuss in next value then we must realize that we are causing waste and are not even meeting the target of being lean. As suggested in LP system, the schedule itself is divided into five layers, the first two layers being mandatory but are not detailed or restrictive for further planning. So we agree LP has already taught us to reduce documentation and take t to the last planner level. Again, there is a possibility this value can be met for construction projects.

3. Customer collaboration over contract negotiation. We do understand contract is the binding force in any construction project between the customer and the builder. Engineers will never agree to give priority to customer collaboration over the contract. Let us think over it from customer perspective. We go through a number of contract revisions, though after a lot of fuss, but changes do occur. Why can’t we remove this barrier and work as partners with our customer allowing her to flexibly and mutually make any changes. For that, we again have to learn some lesson from LP system where last planner improves his bottom-level plan due to feedback of the customer. There is definitely a possibility which must be explored further.

4. Responding to change over following a plan. If the discussion on previous point is understood and agreed then it helps us justify this value, we must be ready to respond to change as and when it is needed. The simple solution is to make our construction phases smaller in size and iterative in nature. We have a similar example in LP system where Weekly Plans are prepared and collaboration with customer is promoted. There is a possibility that we can apply this value in construction.

Can Lean and Agile be used in unison? Both, the Last Planner (LP) system and Location-Based Management System (LBMS) are lean by nature as they focus on decreasing waste and increasing productivity. LP system achieves this through an approach very similar to agile in which Last Planner is the person actually doing the work or the lowest level supervisor in construction. The planning is not centric and involvement of this last planner is essential. This makes the planning a collaborative effort and better commitments are achieved. LBMS is more of a technical system in which work flow lines are created for different locations while the overall plan may be governed by traditional CPM and PERT methods. LBMS makes the buffers of critical chain explicit and forecasts future performance based on statistical projections. Koskela, L., et al., (2008) compares Last Planner system (Ballard & Howell 1998, Ballard 2000) with Critical Chain Project management (CCPM) (Goldratt, 1997)., while Shankar, A., et al., (2013) compares Location based Management System with CPM and PERT. It is interesting to note that Last Planner and Agile has a lot of structural characteristics in common. Exhibit 3 show five levels of a LP schedule in construction. Last Planner interacts with the customer just similar to Agile and based on the feedback adjusts and improves the plan on the go. Master schedule is just to define the key milestones where the Phase Schedules are slightly more detailed explicitly defining the handoffs from one phase to the other. These two levels are mandatory but the third schedule, Look-Ahead Schedule is optional and if you have time to forecast or if anything has to be re-planned, we can use this level. Last two levels have similarity to Kanban as well as Agile. Weekly Work Plan may be considered somehow like an agile iteration and Progress Tracking may be the feedback loop with the customer, keeping the door open for scope changes at lowest level. The similarity to Kanban is that Weekly Work plan is something we intend TO DO, while Progress Tracking deals with DOING and DONE of


Kanban. Probably the missing link between Lean and Agile is Kanban which has the capacity to bind them together into LeAgile.

Exhibit 3 – Scheduling Levels in Last Planner (Copyright Ennova 2011, Friday, 23 September 2011)

Exhibit 4 reinforces the explanation given above, as to how this applies to a construction project. The project control here resembles the PMBOK Guide’s Planning and Monitoring & Controlling process groups, while in execution progressive elaboration is taking place in form of weekly work planning iterations. In whole of this process, we can see a glimpse of Agile while the overall control is lean.

Exhibit 4 – Last Planner in Construction Management (Copyright Ennova 2011, Friday, 23 September 2011)


Proposed application of Lean-Agile (LeAgile) Project Management in Construction.

The discussion in preceding paragraph is to stir up the minds to the possibility of applying a Lean-Agile or LeAgile method of project management, specifically for construction projects. So far there is no existence of such a formal method, though some research and white papers are available which indicate application of one or both of these approaches to various industries. Construction industry has finally started to embrace Lean Construction, which gives us hope that LeAgility in Construction is not a far-fetched idea, especially when the existing modern approaches to construction like LP and LBMS already hold the key to LeAgility. It is obvious that there would be a lot of opposition from construction industry on this suggestion, but what is the harm in opening the floodgates of new possibilities. If we can reduce waste in construction projects and can make them much more efficient and profitable, why can’t we be fast and flexile as well. This will take the future of construction industry a notch up as we will be saving enormously on time and cost, as well as will be able to satisfy our stakeholders and be able to sell more, thus making even more profits from our construction projects.


References Ballard, G. (2000). The Last Planner System of production control, PhD thesis, University of Birmingham,

Birmingham, UK. Ballard, G. and Howell, G. (2003). An update on Last Planner, Proceedings of 11th IGLC Conference, Blacksburg,

VA. Goldratt, E. (1997). Critical Chain, North River Press, MA. Highsmith, J. (2002). USA: Agile Software Development Ecosystem. Karkukly, W. (2013), The EPMO Achieve Leagility: An Organization Transformation Case Study, Proceedings of

PMI Global Congress EMEA 2013,,. Kenley, R. & Seppänen, O. (2006), Location-Based management of Construction projects:Principles and underlying

Logics, Proceedings of Joint CIB W065/W055/W086 Symposium 'Construction of the XXI century: Local and global challenges', Rome, Italy.

Kenley, R. & Seppänen, O. (2009), Location-Based management of Construction projects:Part of a New Topology for Project Scheduing Methodologies, Proceedings of the 2009 Winter Simulation Conference, Austin, Texas.

Koskela, L., Stratton, R. & Koskenvesa, A. (2008). Last Planner and Critical Chain in Construction Management: Comparative Analysis, Proceedings of IGLC-18, July 2010, Technion, Haifa, Israel.

Lacher, R. & Bodamer, R. (2009), The New Reality of Agile Project Management, Proceedings of PMI Global Congress NA 2009, Orlando, Florida.

Lacher, R. & Varisco, F. (2008), What's Lean-Agile and How Does it Allow Teams to Progressively Improve Customer Satisfaction and Service Delivery? Retrieved on July 07, 2015, from http://www.ccpace.com/news/What_is_Lean-Agile_color81.pdf.

MacAdam, T. (2009), Lean Project Management - Slashing Waste to Reduce Project Costs and Timelines, Proceedings of PMI Global Congress NA 2009, Orlando, Florida.

Moreci, J. A. (2014), Lean and Fast – Using A3 to Save your Program, Proceedings of PMI Global Congress NA 2014, Phoenix, Arizona.

Morgan, J. (2002), High Performance Product Development: A Systems Approach to a Lean Product Development Process, Doctoral thesis in Industrial and Operations Engineering, University of Michigan, 2002.

Moujib, A. (2007), Lean Project Management, Proceedings of PMI Global Congress EMEA 2007, Budapest, Hungary.

Shankar, A. & Varghese, K. (2013). Evaluation of Location Based Management System in the Construction of Power Transsmission and Distribution Projects, Research Paper submitted to Indian Institute of Technology Madras, Chennai, India.

Womack, J.P., Daniel T., & Jones, D.T. (2008). Lean thinking: Banish waste and create wealth in your corporation, Second edition. USA: Free Press.

Leadership & Management

Leading construction industry to lean agile (le agile) project management