Abstract
Construction industry in India is growing at a rapid pace. Along with this growth, the industry is facing numerous challenges that are making delivery of projects inefficient. Experts believe that capacity constraints in the industry need to be addressed immediately. Government has recommended ‘introduction of efficient technologies and modern management techniques’ to increase the productivity of the industry. In this context, lean principles can act as a lever to make project delivery more efficient and provide the much needed impetus to the Indian construction sector. Around the globe lean principles are showing positive results on the projects. Project teams are reporting improvements in construction time, cost and quality along with softer benefits of enhanced collaboration, coordination and trust in project teams. Can adoption of lean principles provide similar benefits in the Indian construction sector? This research was conducted to answer this question. Using an action research approach a key lean construction tool called Last Planner System (LPS) was tested on a large Indian construction project. The work described in this work investigates the improvements achieved in project delivery by adopting LPS in Indian construction sector. Comparison in pre- and post-implementation data demonstrates increase in the certainty of work-flow and improves schedule compliance. This is measured through a simple LPS metric called percent plan complete. Explicit improvements in schedule performance are seen during 8 week LPS implementation along with implicit improvements in coordination, collaboration and trust in the project team. This work reports the findings of LPS implementation on the case study project outlining the barriers and drivers to adoption, strategies needed to ensure successful implementation and roadmap for implementation. Based on the findings the authors envision that lean construction can make project delivery more efficient in India.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Accenture and CIDC, High Performance in Infrastructure and Construction: India Perspective 2012. (2012) [Online]. http://www.accenture.com/in-en/Pages/insight-infrastructure-construction-industry-india.aspx. Accessed 13 Nov 2014
A. Sawhney, R. Agnihotri, Grand Challenges for the Indian construction industry. Built Environ. Proj. Asset Manag. 4(4), 317–334 (2014)
Planning Commission of India, Investment in Infrastructure during the Eleventh Five Year Plan (2011)
R. Singh, Delays and cost overruns in infrastructure projects : extent, causes and remedies. Econ. Polit. Wkly. 45, 43–54 (2010)
K.N. Satyanarayana, K.C. Iyer, Evaluation of delays in indian construction contracts. J. Inst. Eng. 77, 14–22 (1996)
K.C. Iyer, K.N. Jha, Critical factors affecting schedule performance: evidence from indian construction projects. J. Constr. Eng. Manag. 132, 871–881 (2006)
S. Tabish, K.N. Jha, Analyses and evaluation of irregularities in public procurement in India. Constr. Manag. Econ. 29, 261–274 (2011)
K. Ahsan, I. Gunawan, Analysis of cost and schedule performance of international development projects. Int. J. Proj. Manag. 28(1), 68–78 (2010)
J. Pettersen, Defining lean production: some conceptual and practical issues. TQM J. 21, 127–142 (2009)
J.P. Womack, D.T. Jones, D. Roos, The Machine That Changed the World: The Story of Lean Production, Reprint. HarperCollins (1991), p. 323
G.A. Howell, What is lean construction? in Proceedings of 7th IGLC (1999)
A. Sawhney, Modelling value in construction processes using value stream mapping. Masterbuilder (2014)
H.G. Ballard, The Last Planner System of Production Control (The University of Birmingham, Birmingham, 2000)
T. Ōno, Toyota Production System: Beyond Large-Scale Production (Productivity Press, London, 1988)
G. Howell, What is lean construction. Concurrent Engineering 7(July), 1–10 (1999)
L. Koskela, Application of the New Philosophy to Construction (Center for Integrated Facility Engineering, Stanford University, Stanford, 1992)
O. Salem, J. Solomon, A. Genaidy, I. Minkarah, Lean construction: from theory to implementation. J. Manag. Eng. 22(4), 168–175 (2006)
A. Mossman, Why isn’t the UK construction industry going lean with gusto? Lean Constr. J. 5, 24–36 (2009)
E. Johansen, L. Walter, Lean construction: prospects for the German construction industry. Lean Constr. J. 3, 19–32 (2007)
A. Koskenvesa, L. Koskela, T. Tolonen, S. Sahlsted, Waste and labor productivity in production planning case Finnish construction industry, in 18th Annual Conference of the International Group for Lean Construction (2010)
L. Koskela, J. Leikasb, Implementation of lean production in construction component manufacturing, in Automation and Robotics in Construction XII (1995), pp. 211–220
G. Barbosa, C. Biotto, B. Mota, Implementing lean construction effectively in a year in a construction project, in 21st Annual Conference of the International Group for Lean Construction (2013), pp. 1017–1026
L.F. Alarcón, S. Diethelm, O. Rojo, Collaborative implementation of lean planning systems in Chilean construction companies, in Tenth Annual Conference of the International Group for Lean Construction (IGLC-10), August, Brazil (2002), pp. 1–11
M. Fiallo, G. Howell, Using production system design and takt time to improve project performance, in Proceedings for the 20th Annual Conference of the International Group for Lean Construction (2012)
R. Al-Aomar, Analysis of lean construction practices at Abu Dhabi construction industry. Lean Constr. J. 2012, 105–121 (2012)
W. Peng, L.S. Pheng, Lean and green: emerging issues in the construction industry—a case study, in 20–21 Sep 2011, EPPM, Singapore (2011), pp. 20–21
G. Shang, The Toyota Way Model: An Implementation Framework for Large Chinese Construction Firms (National University of Singapore, Singapore, 2013)
M. Horman, R. Kenley, V. Jennings, A lean approach to construction: an historical case study, in 5th Annual Conference of the International Group for Lean Construction, ed. by S.N. Tucker (1997), pp. 63–76
I. McKinsey & Company, Building India—Accelerating Infrastructure Projects (2009)
O. Salem, J. Solomon, A. Genaidy, M. Luegring, Site implementation and assessment of lean construction techniques. Lean Constr. J. 2(2), 1–21 (2005)
Engineers Australia WA Division, Recommended practices for the application of LEAN construction methods to building new Australian LNG Capacity. Engineers Australia, 2012. [Online]. https://www.engineersaustralia.org.au/sites/default/files/shado/Divisions/WesternAustraliaDivision/TechnicalPresentations/lean_construction_august_2012.pdf. Accessed 2 Sept 2014
J. Darrington, Using a design-build contract for Lean Integrated Project Delivery. Lean Constr. J. 85–91 (2011)
G. Ballard, I. Tommelein, Lean management methods for complex projects. Eng. Proj. Organ. J. 2, 85–96 (2012)
S. Bertelsen, J. Nielsen, Just-in-time logistics in the supply of building material, in 1st International Conference on Construction Industry Development: Building the future Together (1997), pp. 9–11
M. Rother, J. Shook, J. Womack, D. Jones, Learning to See: Value Stream Mapping to Add Value and Eliminate MUDA (Lean Enterprise Institute, Cambridge, 1999)
G. Ballard, Lean construction and EPC performance improvement, in Proceedings of the 1st Annual Meeting of the International Group for Lean Construction (1993), pp. 79–92
J.L. Fernandez Solis, Z.K. Rybkowski, S. Lavy, V. Porwal, N. Lagoo, K. Son, A. Shafaat, Survey of motivations, benefits and implementation challenges of Last Planner® System users. J. Constr. Eng. Manag. 139(4), 354–360 (2013). doi:10.1061/(ASCE)CO.1943-7862.0000606
A. Mossman, Last Planner—5 + 1 crucial & collaborative conversations for predictable design & construction delivery 2013. [Online]. http://www.leanconstruction.org/media/docs/Mossman-Last-Planner. Accessed 10 Oct 2014
G. Ballard, G. Howell, An update on last planner, in 11th Annual Conference of the International Group for Lean Construction (2003), pp. 1–10
S. Gao, S.P. Low, The Last Planner System in China’s construction industry—a SWOT analysis on implementation. Int. J. Proj. Manag. 32, 1260–1272 (2014)
J. Garza, M. Leong, Last Planner technique: a case study, in Construction Congress VI (2000), pp. 680–689
E. Johansen, G. Porter, An experience of introducing last planner into a UK construction project, in The 11th Annual Conference of the International Group for Lean Construction (2003)
M. Fiallo, V.H. Revelo, Applying the last planner control system to a construction project—a case study in Quito, Ecuador, in 10th Annual Conference of the International Group for Lean Construction, ed by C.T. Formoso, G. Ballard. (2002), pp. 1–12
A. Alsehaimi, Last planner system: experiences from pilot implementation in the Middle East, in 17th Annual Conference of the International Group for Lean Construction (2009)
Y.W. Kim, J.W. Jang, Case study: an application of last planner to heavy civil construction in Korea, in Proceedings of the 13th Annual Conference of the International Group for Lean Construction (2005), pp. 405–411
M. Liu, G. Ballard, W. Ibbs, Work flow variation and labor productivity: case study. J. Manag. Eng. 27, 236–242 (2011)
G. Ballard, Lookahead planning: the missing link in production control, in Proceedings of 5 th Annual Conference International Group of Lean Construction (1997), pp. 1–14
G. Ballard, G. Howell, Implementing lean construction: improving downstream performance, in Presented at the 2nd Annual Conference on Lean Construction at Catolica Universidad de Chile (1994)
G. Howell, G. Ballard, Lean production theory: moving beyond ‘Can-Do, in 2nd Annual Conference on Lean Construction (1994), pp. 17–24
P. Järvinen, Action research is similar to design science. Qual. Quant. 41(1), 37–54 (2007)
B. Dick, Action research: action and research, 2002. [Online]. http://www.scu.edu.au/schools/gcm/ar/arp/aandr.html. http://www.aral.com.au/. Accessed 10 Nov 2014
E. Gummesson, Qualitative methods in management research, in Long Range Planning, vol. 25 (Sage, London, 1992), p. 131
F. Hamzeh, G. Ballard, I.D. Tommelein, Rethinking lookahead planning to optimize construction workflow. Lean Constr. J. 15–34 (2012)
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Kovvuri, P., Sawhney, A., Ahuja, R. et al. Efficient Project Delivery Using Lean Principles - An Indian Case Study. J. Inst. Eng. India Ser. A 97, 19–26 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s40030-016-0142-6
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s40030-016-0142-6