Engineering solid partnerships

In 1998 Sir John Egan published Rethinking Construction, which advocated the encouragement of longterm partnerships between clients and suppliers to foster trust and expertise and reduce inefficiencies. However, today’s economic climate is bringing about a sea change in this approach and the large-scale construction sector is adopting a far more combative line.

One sector for which this approach is not ideal is that of housebuilding. Neil Lewis, sales manager of Masonite Beams AB, reveals why.

With more onerous demands being placed on developers than ever before, they need to be able to trust and rely on suppliers more than ever to help them to meet their targets. The Code for Sustainable Homes, increasing housing volumes, labour shortages, environmental pressures and pared down management structures, are all driving housebuilders and building products manufacturers, towards a strengthened partnership approach, that does not make price the epicentre of decisionmaking.

And this is particularly the case in the area of the structural building fabric.

It would be easy to opt for something only just fit-for-purpose, in order to keep costs and prices down. However, we are finding that what developers are increasingly looking for are safe and reliable solutions, which can be easily repeated for different site requirements. Partnering with builders is vital in the development of structural systems because builders are able to help identify during the design phase which elements are critical for a more robust solution. It is only through a partnership approach that early solutions to developers’ more urgent challenges can be brought about.

A perfect example of how such co-operation has benefited housebuilders in the past, has been the transition from solid wood floor components to engineered timber floor systems. Housebuilders were encouraged to design with the whole floor system in mind, rather than individual components, and this system-led approach, has gradually become integrated into the design and build process.

In today’s economic climate, and particularly with the drop-off in housebuilding activity,
suppliers are working harder than ever to build and maintain good working relationships with
clients.

There is another reason why a partnering approach between developers and suppliers will become increasingly vital over the next few years. Housebuilders starting to look at the requirements of Code for Sustainable Homes Levels 4 to 6 will have to look at which materials to combine, in order to meet them. With this extra research to do and fewer in-house resources to do it, developers will turn to companies that can help. Those manufacturers that can work with them to come up with a total solution, ie that can simplify the specification process, will be the most successful competitively. Thus a floor solution is going to be far more attractive to a buyer than having to consult on various combinations of component products. Those companies that can offer a system solution for the building structural fabric, will work increasingly in partnership with developers, quite simply because they give buyers a simplified and cost-effective answer to their procurement headaches.

In the engineered timber products sector there are very few companies that can tick all the requisite environmental boxes, and offer whole structural solutions that not only fulfil developers’ current requirements, but which have been developed specifically to fulfil their future ones also.

The Masonite Flexible Building System is an engineered timber-based system allowing up to eight storeys with internal clear floor spans of up to 10 metres, allowing superior internal space design flexibility. It is ideal for apartments or any buildings where, in addition to high thermal performance, superior sound reduction is also required.

The company’s Dry Apartment Floor System was developed out of the Flexible Building System in response to the need for increased housing density. Most current timber-based solutions require the installation of multiple layers of individual components or large amounts of very wet screed to be poured into a dry building. The Masonite Dry Apartment Floor System allows nearly all the floor system fabrication to be done off-site with a simple ‘crane in and forget it’ approach to site installation. It is the whole process of continuous product improvement and development borne out of co-operation and good communications that makes me confident that partnering still has a big role to play in the housebuilding sector. Perhaps the word ‘partnership’ is trotted out too readily sometimes seeing as it has over the last few years become the buzz word in the building industry. If those involved are becoming weary of it, let’s simply replace it with another one: ‘co-operation’.

For further information visit: www.masonitebeams.co.uk.