 Managers of highway construction programs face complex problems administering a wide range of activities. Construction management covers activities such as surveying, inspecting, quality control, documenting payments, and related field activities. As a result of the complexity of the work, there is a need for a comprehensive construction management system, which can be adopted for use by highway agencies. In this course, we will provide an overview of the construction management system, or CMS. We will identify the basic functions of construction management and present information on how to develop a construction management system. The major elements of the CMS are planning and staffing, budgeting, scheduling, monitoring, and system updating. This program will provide an overview of the entire CMS. The following four tapes in this series provide details on each of the major system elements. Implementation of a construction management system can result in a number of benefits, such as lower cost and increased efficiency of the overall construction program, streamlining of management processes, improved timeliness of contractor payments and project finalization, and automation of and increased access to critical construction information through reporting functions. The CMS elements are modular in design. Each element may be used by itself or as a part of a complete system. The elements are flexible. They can be modified. Guidelines provide for adapting the system to local needs. The planning and staffing element defines manpower requirements, how many employees are needed, and when they will be needed. Staffing needs may be tabulated by contract, by engineer, by sub-district, or by district to determine the number of employees required. Total level requirements may be defined to determine the numbers of technicians needed in each grade. In the planning element, the number of manhours and man months are determined. Standard planning values are determined for each contract type and multiplied by the number of units involved, resulting in total manhours required. The total man months required are determined by dividing total manhours required by available manhours per month. The monthly needs are determined by distributing the man months over the contract period. In the budgeting element, the manpower needs determined in the planning and staffing element are priced out, using standard costs to develop a program budget. This provides realistic cost estimates for performing the construction management work for the anticipated construction program. The man months from the planning element are multiplied by standard costs. The scheduling element provides for short-term, typically weekly, assessment of staffing needs to react to the contractor's plans, weather conditions, and employee availability for effective use of personnel. The process involves listing the work to be done, assigning personnel, comparing needs with available personnel, and advising districts or other areas of excesses or deficiencies in personnel levels. In the monitoring element, the actual manhours used are compared with those planned and with the contractor's progress to allow engineers to assess their effectiveness in utilizing their employees. The monitoring procedure compares actual manhours used with contractor's progress. This is done by dividing manhours used by planned manhours to determine percent of manhours used. Next is system updating. Guidelines detail reviewing and updating the system annually. You also need to consider several other factors. First, select an implementation organization. You will also need to develop a plan for system design and implementation. Investigate work methods improvements and consider numerous data processing decisions. Adapting and implementing the system is a one-time effort and requires a full-time staff as well as a firm commitment from top management. The person who will operate the system should be on the implementation team to ensure complete familiarity with system design. It is recommended that the implementation organization include a steering committee, a technical panel, and a project staff. The project staff should be assigned to the construction engineer. Committee and authority for construction quality assurance and for staffing construction projects should not be separated. Throughout the system development process, a conscious effort should be made to involve all levels of personnel in the organization. A steering committee should be selected to guide the project. The committee's duties include establishing the framework within which the project will be carried out, reviewing and evaluating project progress with special attention to matters that cause delays or difficulties, reviewing and evaluating major findings, analyses, conclusions and recommendations for completeness, logic, consistency and practicality. Ensuring that the project is fully supported at the central office to expedite implementation. Evaluating final system design characteristics and recommending actions needed for implementation and ensuring that the system is implemented and supported by the field construction supervisors. The steering committee should consist of four to six top management officials. Suggested members are the chief engineer, the chief of operations, the construction engineer, the personnel director and the head of computer services. The technical panel should consist of four to six agency personnel who are very knowledgeable about current construction operations. The panel will work with the project staff on a part-time basis in adapting the various components of the system. Panel members should be selected to represent various geographical areas, urban, rural, flatland and mountainous areas. Panel memberships should include a mix of engineers in charge, area construction engineers, district construction engineers and assistant district construction engineers. The project staff will be responsible for successfully implementing the system. The staff should include a full-time engineer to provide direction to the work and a full-time assistant engineer to assist in adapting the system and training field crews. Once the system is fully implemented, the project staff can typically be reduced to one full-time construction staff engineer and a full-time clerk typist. The technical panel is used annually to assist with reviewing and updating the system. Construction at the chief engineer level should select the implementation organization. Recommendations for the project staff and the technical panel can be made by the chief of operations, construction engineer or other appropriate officials. Next, you will need to develop a plan for system design and implementation. The plan should allow for collecting available data on the current workforce, construction programs and personnel classification plans. Computer time available, current turnaround time and priorities should also be checked. The plan should provide for modifying the elements selected from the model system. The system should be implemented in one district first to fine-tune the system. Implementation should proceed as quickly as possible after the first area has been implemented satisfactorily. You will also need to investigate work methods improvements. There is a need for continual evaluation of methods, equipment and materials. Paperwork is often started to correct specific problems, but is continued long after the problems are solved. Departments must eliminate wasteful, outmoded practices. It is important to expand most of the effort in work methods improvements on those activities which require significant amounts of manpower. A 5% statewide reduction in office work for earthwork quantities would result in a significant savings in most departments. While a 50% reduction in office work for asphalt paving would yield very little savings in manpower. Efforts should be concentrated where the potential for improvements is the greatest. There are many data processing considerations to resolve. Each agency must assess its own computer capabilities. There are many variables to consider in distributing the man months over the calendar year. Engineering judgment is the best method for considering all of these variables. If the planning computations are computerized, budgeting would logically also be calculated on the computer. It may be possible to save programming time by using or adapting existing software. There are two sources of program information. The American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials, AASHTO, and the Highway Engineering Exchange Program, or HEEP. The American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials prepares a computer systems index. The index is updated annually. It is available from AASHTO at the address on the screen. The Highway Engineering Exchange Program, HEEP, encourages members to share systems and programs. The information about HEEP may be obtained by contacting the president of HEEP at the agency shown on the screen. In this program, we have provided a basic overview of a typical construction management system. As you will recall, the major system elements are planning and staffing, budgeting, scheduling, monitoring, and updating. For more information on this or other IRF videotapes, write to the International Road Federation or call the numbers on your screen.