Clients' activities at the design front-end

Abstract

This paper describes a study analysing the front-end of the design process for primary healthcare facilities in the UK. A case study approach was used to gain a detailed understanding of the clients' activities at the front-end of the design process. The research identified the process undertaken to define new requirements, the difficulties faced by the various parties involved and the impact these had at the frontend. The findings have implications for managing requirements with novice construction clients. Keywords: built environment for healthcare, front-end design activity, requirements capture Corresponding author:Patricia Tzortzopoulos e-mail: p.tzortzopoulos@salford.ac.uk Tel: + 44 (0) 161 2954284 Fax: +44 (0) 161 2954587 2 The management of the design process has been a topic of study for over 40 years. There have been successive theories postulated with regards to effectively managing the process (see, for instance, Oakley, 1990; Cross, 1994; Gorb, 1994;Cooper and Press, 1995; Mozota, 2003). The relationships between the client and the designer and the effectiveness of briefing have been identified within such theories as one of the main contributing factors for good design (Cooper and Jones, 1995;Barrett and Stanley, 1999). Furthermore, it is recognised that at least 80% of the costs is determined at the front-end of the process, at the briefing and design stage (Bruce and Cooper, 2000). This is especially the case in construction (CRISP, 2001).There is currently a large programme of public building underway for the primary healthcare sector in the UK (DoH, 1998). The ethos of this programme is to deliver health and social care jointly so that people can have better, easier access to services through buildings which should also help regenerate deprived urban areas. It is recognised that the design of primary healthcare buildings is essential for the improvement of the services delivered to the community (Gesler et al., 2004). This has created an opportunity to take a fresh approach to the buildings that house healthcare provision, as well as an opportunity to consider the impact that the physical environment has on patients and on healthcare staff.Primary Care Trusts are now responsible for redesigning primary healthcare services and are 'the clients' of the new facilities being produced. As such, they are responsible for a number of activities, including identifying stakeholders, capturing requirements and briefing designers. However, Primary Care Trusts are newly formed organisations, and have no previous experience or skills in design and construction. They therefore provide an opportunity to examine the process of establishing requirements and briefing in a new context by inexperienced people working within new organisational structures. We use the terms 'novice/inexperienced client' to define this scenario.The main objective of this research is to better understand how novice construction clients actually develop design requirements at the front-end and how the circumstances in which t...

Multiple perceptions as framing device for identifying relational places

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Gestão de benefícios na etapa do projeto de empreendimentos para a saúde

“…Dentre essas mudanças, observase a descentralização do poder de tomada de decisão e a criação de órgãos regionais, para os quais sãorepassadas as principais decisões com relação à necessidade de investimentos nos diferentes segmentos da área de saúde (HOLMES; CAPPER; HUDSON, 2006). Tais mudanças acentuam a complexidade desses empreendimentos e a dificuldade de gerenciar os requisitos dos diferentes agentes envolvidos no processo (TZORTZOPOULOS et al, 2006 primários de saúde, responsabilizando-se pelo re-planejamento dos serviços e sendo, ao mesmo tempo, os clientes da nova edificação.…”

“…Tzortzopoulos et al (2006) apontam como resultado o aumento de re-trabalhos no processo de projeto e a consequente baixa qualidade dos mesmos. Não obstante, neste contexto, é comum a existência de requisitos conflitantes e de complexas estruturas para o processo de tomada de decisão (CAMPOBASSO e HOSKING, 2004).…”

A pilot study of client complexity, emergent requirements and stakeholder perceptions of project success

“…Client complexity is highlighted by Bana e Costa et al 's (2001) observation of convoluted stakeholder interactions with the emerging solution and each other. Public sector clients can be particularly pluralistic (Tzortzopoulos et al, 2006), comprising stakeholders who seek to use project outcome and those interested only in it as a capital asset (Hartmann et al, 2008). These goals often conflict.…”