Applying Lean Thinking to Improve Safety Performance in Construction

The construction industry remains one of the most hazardous industries in the United States in terms of the number of occupational fatal and non-fatal injuries. In 2014, 874 fatal work-related injuries were reported in the U.S. construction industry1. Even though construction workers historically account for only about 5% of the overall U.S. workforce, the construction industry accounts for approximately 20% of the total occupational fatal and non-fatal injuries2.

Numerous studies have indicated that the high incident rate in construction can be influenced by the design of projects. For example, 42% of 224 fatalities in the U.S. construction industry between 1990 and 2003 were linked to decisions made during design, before the start of construction3.

To curb the high number of fatal and non-fatal injuries, safety management strategies are emphasized by construction stakeholders. Firstly, safety management involves preparing a plan to ensure that all safety hazards and risks are identified, assessed, analyzed, and then mitigated. This step is aligned with lean thinking where design and construction processes are streamlined to eliminate waste and maximize value.

Workplace accidents can have negative impacts on cost, schedule, and quality. Therefore, it can be argued that improving workplace safety is a form of waste reduction and value generation. According to the “hierarchy of controls” (HoC), eliminating construction hazards at the source is the most effective means of improving occupational safety4, as shown in Figure 1. HoC, in this regard, is defined as a means of determining how to implement the most practicable and effective safety controls on the jobsite to control safety hazards4.

By examining the graphical pyramid (Figure 1), consistency between lean thinking and safety management principles appears evident. However, eliminating safety hazards at the source, a.k.a., Prevention through Design (PtD), requires modifying the facility design prior to construction operations. It is worth noting that PtD encompasses the concept of protecting construction workers by addressing their safety during the design process5. In that aspect, lean design practices appear on the surface to touch on this critical subject because they promote the early involvement of specialty contractors and frequent team communications between project teams, particularly between design and building professionals.

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Comparison of Sources of Waste between Construction and Manufacturing Industries

Prior research has investigated the sources of waste in order to gain better understanding of waste in production systems and to promote the use of lean methods [1]. The study considered two types of waste, operational waste and organizational waste. In comparison with the manufacturing industry, the three peculiarities of construction, specific customer, site production, and temporary organization are acknowledged[2]. This article will give you a summary on the different sources of waste between construction and manufacturing.

Source of Operational Waste

A product of the construction industry, such as a building or a house, is produced on a construction worksite. Once materials are delivered to the site, they don’t leave the site and only wait to be consumed. After completing the project, a contractor needs to hand over the finished product to the client in the same location as where the construction worksite is. Therefore, it is necessary not only to ensure the product’s quality, but also at the same time to develop the living environment for users of the product during the construction process. These conditions lead to differences in supply chain management and managerial control, compared with operations within the factory environment, which provides finished products to the market that is accessed by end users.

The size of the managed resources, including materials and machines/equipment/facilities, on a construction site is usually much larger than in the case of the manufacturing industry. Depending on the nature of tasks, construction professionals may track the progress of a project by calculating the amount of materials/components constructed or installed. However, similar control is carried out using the number of finished products in the case of a factory. The same production lead time approach as in the manufacturing industry can be used in the construction industry by dividing larger tasks (i.e. building or floor) into smaller work chunks or even into smaller areas (location-based planning and control). Such a difference in the physical and temporal scales of management resources brings the result that in construction, a reliable picture of the whole of production, and progress against plan, cannot be confirmed at a glance.

In addition, there is the general principle that the more there is repetition, the easier it is to reduce variability. In factories, many repeated operations are included in the mass production system, catering to mass consumption. In the construction industry, this principle is confirmed in operations when constructing a building which consists of multiple rooms with exactly the same structure. Table 1 summarizes the mentioned differences in the attributes of a production system between the two industries.

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In its latest announcement, the Victorian Government says restrictions in the sector will ease from midnight on Monday.

Under the plan:

All workers will need to carry an authorised worker permit and have had at least one vaccination dose
All construction sites state-wide must have at least one fully trained COVID marshal whose job it will be to ensure compliance with Chief Health Officer directions
Prior to reopening, operators will be required to attest that they have implemented the CHO directions and every site will need to have an up-to-date vaccination register available for compliance checks at all times. In order to make this process as easy as possible, an online portal will soon be available on the Service Victoria website so these documents are accessible for both the operator and compliance teams.
Crib facilities may be used for the consumption of food and drink with strict density requirements and additional ventilation.
Small construction sites will be able to have up to five workers plus a supervisor
Large construction sites may have up to 25 percent of workers on site. This will be able to increase to 50 percent where crib rooms meet best practice and the entire workforce is vaccinated.
Projects on the State Critical Infrastructure list will operate at 100 per cent as long as crib rooms follow best practice guidelines.
Subject to continued high levels of compliance by the industry, workforce caps will progressively increase. At our 70 per cent double dose milestone, large scale construction can return to 100 per cent of its workforce.
Caps will be removed when Victoria reaches its 80 per cent target, and in addition, all onsite workers must be fully vaccinated by 13 November.
Fully vaccinated workers can travel between metropolitan Melbourne and regional Victoria in order to work onsite.
Workers on state critical projects or large-scale construction can also travel between metropolitan Melbourne and regional Victoria if they have had a single dose, take an initial test before their first travel, then test twice per week until fully vaccinated.
To allow all sites to remobilise, workers who have had at least one vaccination dose will be able to enter a site prior to 5 October in order to undertake crib facility improvements, participate in a reinduction or receive deliveries.

The government has provided further information on a frequently asked questions page.

In a statement, Victorian Treasurer Tim Pallas said the industry was expected to comply with the directions in full.

Teams of Authorised Workers will conduct checks to enforce directions whilst penalties will apply for builders and site operators that do not comply.

These penalties will include site shutdowns for significant or repeated breaches.

Building and property industry lobby groups welcomed the announcement.

Master Builders Victoria CEO Rebecca Casson said the past two-week shutdown had been extremely challenging for many of MBV’s members unable to work but most can now look forward to getting back on the tools next week.

Casson said the Master Builders had worked with other industry associations and unions over the long weekend on the plan’s development.

“It was a very positive meeting with excellent engagement from the Victorian Government and it appears that, despite yesterday’s high COVID-19 case numbers, our sector is on track to re-open on 5 October which is a win for our industry,” Casson said.

“Over the last week or so, we have had excellent engagement with the Victorian Government, including Treasurer Tim Pallas, Minister Jacinta Allan, and Minister Martin Pakula.

“They, like us, have had a sharp focus on re-opening our industry and getting our members back to work.”

Others agree.

“It’s a huge relief that the residential building industry will be back to work on 5 October as planned,” said HIA’s Victorian Executive Director, Fiona Nield.

“HIA has continued to work closely with the Victorian Government to prepare for the reopening of home building sites in metropolitan Melbourne and the other locked down regional areas such as Mitchell Shire and the City of Latrobe.

Property Council of Australia Victoria Executive Director Danni Hunter said the decision to reopen would enable 320,000 Victorians to return to work.

Hunter said it was now up to the entire industry to work to embed the best possible standards on site.

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