COAA WorkFace Planning Best Practice: Supporting Alberta’s Heavy Construction Industry

Written by Bill Luxton Friday, 28 May 2010 05:30

The recent COAA Best Practices Conference XVIII (May 18&19, 2010) in Edmonton was the fourth such event I have had the opportunity to attend on behalf of SAIT. This involvement started with the successful award of the exclusive right for SAIT to provide the COAA (Construction Owners Association of Alberta) WorkFace Planning training to the Alberta heavy construction industry.

What a journey it has been to pioneer WorkFace Planning with COAA members through committee meetings, corporate and site visits and attending, participating and sponsoring at Workface Planning events. Working with industry subject matter experts—particularly Lloyd Rankin, Ascension Systems and Geoff Ryan, Insight WFP—has greatly assisted me and several of my colleagues understand the role of the WorkFace Planner and the complexities and benefits of this technique on large construction sites.

Each Best Practices Conference gives me a chance to reconnect with a great many people that I have met and worked with through COAA. SAIT has completed three years as the official COAA WorkFace Planning trainer and is pleased to renew for another two years through to June 30, 2012. We look forward to working with Al Wahlstrom, Chair Workface Planning Committee and Larry Staples, COAA and the other members of the WFP Committee in continuing to promote the benefits of COAA WorkFace Planning training.

While there have been challenges over the past three years, WorkFace Planning training has been delivered regularly in Calgary and Edmonton and on demand in Fort McMurray. Certainly the economic downturn over the last 12–18 months has hurt the growth of this training; it also points to the advantages of adopting WFP as a competitive advantage. At the Conference panel discussion on the Tuesday evening,  I heard several references by Chris Allard, Senior Project Manager, Kearl Oil Sand Project, Imperial Oil Ltd and Kevin Nabholz, Executive Vice President, Major Projects, Suncor Energy refer to the importance of WorkFace Planning on large projects such as those that their companies are building.

Dr. Larry Rosia, SAIT’s Dean of the School of Construction and Faisal Arain, Academic Chair for the Construction Project Management Degree joined Faisal Ali, Business Development Manager and me at this year’s Conference. Each of us has committed to be a volunteer member of a COAA Best Practices Committee. This builds upon the efforts of Faisal Ali and me with WorkFace Planning and increases SAIT’s commitment to COAA.

I attended and participated in the Wednesday afternoon workshops, WorkFace Planning Performance Metrics and WorkFace Planning–The Owner’s Role. Both workshops were very well attended and generated a lot of discussion. The results of the workshops as well as all Best Practice Conference proceedings will be available shortly on the COAA website. If you have any comments or observations on the Conference or Workface Planning training, we would welcome hearing from you.

Bill Luxton
Director, Business Development, Corporate Training