Miscellaneous Development Manager Best Practices During Construction
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Chalk Walk
Have the end user do a "chalk-walk" of the interior walls before they are framed up. A drywall subcontractor will always lay out the walls in chalk on the floor before he starts erecting the walls. By having the end user review these chalk lines, they can get a feel for the size and shapes of the rooms. It is one thing to look at a room's size and shape on a set of plans, but it is much better to stand in that room and see where all the walls will go. I've had several end users stand in a room with chalk lines and say, "Whoa, this room is way too small." If the end user wants to make a change, it is much easier and cheaper to make that change when only chalk lines are on the ground as opposed to an actual wall being erected.
When I have done this with my end user clients, I've found that they are really grateful and think I went above and beyond to service their needs and address their concerns. I don't tell them that this is just a standard practice that all good development/construction managers should be offering.
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Box Walk
After your GC installs all the junction boxes in the walls (and floors), check that all these boxes are in the correct location before your GC starts closing up the walls. Don't just check for electrical j-boxes, but also for data outlets, fire alarm strobes, fire alarm pull stations, thermostats, switches, etc.
You especially want to make sure that all of these boxes are coordinated with furniture, TVs, and art. If a floor box is needed to run power and data to a conference table, or a sitting area in the middle of a room, ensure the floor boxes are in the right location. As a development manager, you can do this check yourself, but I like to have my electrical engineers perform this box walk. Also, if you have a big piece of art going on a wall, make sure you don't have a fire strobe (or other device) in the middle of it.
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Related to the box walk, it is a good idea to have your plumbing engineer walk the project to review all of the plumbing rough-in to ensure the plumbing fixtures will go in the right place.
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Consistency in Repetitive Rooms
If your project has many identical and repetitive rooms (e.g., medical exam rooms, hotel rooms, apartment units) ensure those rooms have all of their MEP rough-in in the same location for each room. For example, if you have a bunch of medical exam rooms, and most of them have an electrical outlet to the left of a sink faucet, but a handful have the outlet to the right of the sink faucet, that will throw off the medical staff a little when they work in the different exam rooms. It could also change up the placement of medical equipment that needs to sit on the counter near the sink, causing even more inconsistencies between rooms. You want your medical provider focused on their patients, not in thinking about how to deal with different room inconsistencies.
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Structural Engineer Walk
Have your structural engineer walk the project after miscellaneous steel is installed, but before your GC covers up the walls with sheetrock. This is the last opportunity for your structural engineer to ensure the structure was assembled properly before it is covered up and no one will ever see it again. If your project is big, your engineer will probably have to make a few trips to the project for this walk since your GC will be covering up different walls at different phases of the project.
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Next Section: Project Communications
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