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RT-334

Best Practices for Preventing Out-of-sequence Construction Activities and Minimizing their Impacts

Launched 2015

RT-334 defined out-of-sequence work (OOS) as an activity or series of activities that are not performed according to a planned logical productive sequence. Despite the seriousness of the challenges that OOS imposes on the construction industry, the existing body of literature lacks direct solutions for how to handle OOS. As such, the RT-334 research is the first of its kind, as it investigates the causes, warning signs, and impacts of OOS. It also provides proven concepts for preventing OOS and minimizing its negative impacts.

Through performing an expert-based study (surveying 88 experts) and a project-based study (tracking 42 projects), as well as integrating the collective academic and professional wisdom of the team, RT-334 was successfully able to accomplish the following tasks:

  1. Identify 88 causes of OOS, spanning 11 categories, and rank them with respect to likelihood of occurrence, relative impact, and risk rating.
  2. Identify 56 warning signs of OOS, spanning 11 categories, and rank them with respect to their correlation with the occurrence of OOS.
  3. Identify and quantify the significant impacts of OOS, spanning five performance areas.
  4. Detail 164 effective preemptive and responsive actions, spanning 21 concepts, to prevent OOS and mitigate its negative impacts.
  5. Evaluate the effectiveness of frequently used mitigation strategies for minimizing OOS.
  6. Develop a user-friendly computer-based tool “OOS Decision Support System” that aids practitioners in evaluating the OOS risk of their projects (using OOS gauge) as well as minimizing it through tailoring the research findings to best suit them.
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Figure 1. Key Takeaways of RT-334
 

 

Related Academic Publications (not published by CII)
CII does not review or endorse these publications, which were published independently, but added them here because they were directly or indirectly supported by the CII research project. Users may need to pay to access these pieces.

Abotaleb, Ibrahim S., and El-adaway, Islam H. (2018) “First Attempt Toward a Holistic Understanding of the Interdependent Rippled Impacts Associated with Out-of-Sequence Work in Construction Projects: System Dynamics Modeling Approach.” Journal of Construction Engineering and Management (144)9. This paper received the 2020 ASCE Thomas Fitch Rowland Award.

Abotaleb, Ibrahim S.; El-adaway, Islam H.; Ibrahim, Michael W.; Hanna, Awad S.; and Russell, Jeffrey S. (2019) “Causes, Early Warning Signs, and Impacts of Out-of-Sequence Construction: Expert-Based Survey Analysis.” Journal of Management in Engineering (35)6.

Abotaleb, Ibrahim S.; El-adaway, Islam H.; Ibrahim, Michael W.; Hanna, Awad S.; and Russell, Jeffrey S. (2020) “Developing a Rating Score for Out-of-Sequence Construction.” Journal of Management in Engineering (36)3.

Ibrahim, Michael W.; Hanna, Awad S.; Russell, Jeffrey S.; Abotaleb, Ibrahim S.; and El-adaway, Islam H. (2020) “Comprehensive Analysis of Factors Associated with Out-of-Sequence Construction.” Journal of Management in Engineering (36)4.

Ibrahim, Michael W.; Hanna, Awad S.; Russell, Jeffrey S.; Abotaleb, Ibrahim S.; and El-adaway, Islam H. (2020) “Quantitative Analysis of the Impacts of Out-of-Sequence Work on Project Performance.” Journal of Construction Engineering and Management (146)8.