SEEKING TRUE COLLABORATION AND TRANSPARENCY IN CONTRACTS
– Simbarashe Garaba, Lead: Strategic Projects – Mariswe
Would be you be open to different forms of contracting if they were more responsive to your operational challenges?
Picture reducing 20 to 30% of your project capital and time and channelling that value to other projects or areas of your business.
In an otherwise evolving construction ecosystem, the presumption that contract mechanisms are a holy grail that cannot be changed or improved entrenches adversarial relationships between the client, its engineer, and the contractor. Every aspect of the construction value chain is transforming except for our contracting methodologies.
Imagine if you could unlock cost savings, schedule reduction and flexibility throughout the construction process; increase the value of your assets; reduce your contract management time; increase your team’s output.
Collaborative contracts that support integrated project delivery (IPD) are the key to unlocking efficiencies for clients, engineers, contractors, and suppliers. Lack of collaboration and transparency are a barrier to IPD and result in time and cost inefficiencies. Weak balance sheets are forcing all parties to be ever more risk averse, translating into higher prices across the value chain and claim-riddled contractual processes where maximising returns is the primary objective.
There are three options when it comes to selecting a contract.
- Stay the same.
- Take the (considerable) time to work out a new collaborative mechanism.
- Use a proven home-grown South African contract methodology that has undertaken work valued at over US$1 billion without a single claim to date. This contract is called iCU (Integrated Construction Units). Using the NEC4 Option B platform, it offers all the above benefits. The iCU contract also allows for the development of emerging contractors through real time incubation, further reducing the project risk.
Contact Mariswe Management Services for a chat.
