Importance Of Lean Construction

2.5 Lean Construction

According to Diekmann et al. (2004), Lean construction is “the continuous process of eliminating waste, meeting or exceeding all customer requirements, focusing on the entire value stream, and pursuing perfection in the execution of a constructed project” [50]. Koskela and Howell (2002) stated that the general idea behind Lean construction is waste reduction, which is manifested in time, materials and effort to get the maximum value [51].

For the first time the term Lean was introduced to construction industry in 1992 by Koskela in his work “Application of the new production philosophy to construction” [21]. The author pointed out the importance of Lean principles, which can be applied to construction operation and cut

Koskela (2000) stated that the combination of these two leads to “Taking care that customer requirements are met in the best possible manner” [55]. Implementation of all three views will result in construction performance improvement [55]. Table 2.3 below presents information on comparison between Lean construction and traditional approach.

Table 2.3: Comparison of Lean construction and traditional construction [1, 56]

Lean construction

Traditional construction

Control

Causing events to conform to plan

Monitorng against schedule and budget projects

Optimization

The entire project

A specific activity

Scheduling viewpoint

“PULL” schedule

Based on when its completion is required by a successor activity

“PUSH” schedule

Based on emphasizing required start dates for activities

Production system

Flow production system

Conversion production system

Production process

Efficiency

Effectiveness

Performance measurement

Percent Plan Complete (PPC)

Work Breakdown Structure (WBS), Critical Path Method (CPM), Earned Value

Customer

Moreover, it also contributes to understanding of tools such as 5S, Last Planner System (LPS), Value Stream Mapping (VSM) and visual management towards waste reduction and process improvement. Special attention is given to the topic of Lean waste and its classification into 7 types.

The literature study shows that even though there is a plenty of sources regarding the topics of Lean and Lean construction, there is still a gap between theoretical and practical knowledge for the construction industry. Most of the studies are explaining the concept of Lean construction, however, only few of them are focusing on a real case examples of how the process of identification of non-value adding activities occurs, how they can be classified and with what tools they can be eliminated.

In order to fill the practical part of the knowledge of Lean construction, the following research is going to focus on identification and quantification of non-value adding activities by visiting construction sites, observing real construction processes and conducting questionnaire. Furthermore, relying on information from existing researches and results from practical study will lead to identification of Lean tools useful for the reduction of particular wasteful activities and process