November 2010

COVER STORY companies to be doing this work, when business is slower,” said Luebke.

The company’s learning and development department – found at many established Fortune 1,000 companies – is an isolated investment in the construction industry. Faith Technologies’ L&D department began working on a variety of near- and long-term programs for corporate management and field employees, focusing on leadership, employee development, trade, business development, high potential employees, wellness, safety and computer training.

Luebke and her team – a director of instructional development, an instructional designer, two learning consultants, a technical training consultant and a learning coordinator – are also instrumental in the development and implementation of the company’s Faith Performance Advantage initiative. Rooted in lean philosophies, the program works to bring those same principles from the office to the jobsite.

Adapting a concept such as lean – which was created for the manufacturing environment where workers are stationary while the product moves from station to station – has been a challenge in the construction trade because every product is unique, noted Mike Schmaling, director of productivity at Faith.

“Additionally, our product is stationary, in which the workers must continuously move labor and material throughout the building to the point of installation. This is a reverse process to the manufacturing industry. The concept of lean can be applied to the construction industry by identifying areas in which we can minimize the amount of material handling and strategically stage the material at the point of installation just before it is needed. This is a fluid and dynamic process because there are many variables which are directly tied to many facets of the installation process like customer-initiated changes, conflict with other trades, material availability, variation in manpower and skill levels. Each variation in these facets can create a ripple effect throughout the entire installation process,” he said.

The company has improved other processes and procedures, including: v Pre-fabrication department, which mass produces like items or assemblies in a controlled off-site setting and then labels, packages and ships the “prefabbed” material to the site just in time for installation. This reduces the amount of onsite labor because one hour spent in PreFab saves three hours in the field. v Pre-construction services is a resource employed during the bid process to work directly with the customer in streamlining and refining their expectations and requirements by using design/build services, building information mapping, computer-aided drafting and detailing.

“By identifying many cost-saving techniques, this contributes to a more efficient process from bid award to project deployment. Most cost savings can be identified and acted upon earlier in the process as opposed to later stages, which increase costs dramatically,” Schmaling said.

“Everything we do, every decision we make, we are piloting,” said Luebke. “We haven’t found an existing model that could be successfully implemented to a construction site.”

The strategies Luebke and her team are developing take into account gender and generational diversity, as well as the diversity of temperament, thoughts and behaviors. Those differences can

22 l NEW NORTH B2B l NOVEMBER 2010

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