Alternative Delivery: The Small Firm Challenge

Man! What a tough crowd. I had 50 minutes to impart "wisdom of the ages" (that's a lot of years) on the subject of business development best practices. While the feedback was largely positive, one person wrote in saying I didn’t spend enough time addressing business development and alternative project delivery. Ok!

Alternative Delivery, let me count the ways:

Group One

• Design-Build
• Design-Build-Operate
• Design-Build-Operate and Maintain
• Lease-Leaseback

Group Two

• LEAN Construction
• Integrated Project Delivery (IPD)

Each one of these methods requires a slightly different business development strategy. For simplicity, we're going to put them into two groups, as shown above. Now, let's talk strategy.

In traditional design-bid-build pursuits, architects pursue client and try to develop design teams to fulfill client facility needs. The game changes, to say the least, when the delivery method changes. Clients who seek to deliver projects through any of the methods in Group One shift the architects’ pursuit from the client to the contractor who is likely to lead the pursuit. As a result, architects need to develop strategic relationships with general contractors adept at delivering various building types from student services buildings to parking structures. Further, it becomes incumbent upon the architect to demonstrate (to the contractor) some previous design-build experience or some previous experience with the contractor in order to be able to have a seat at the table. No small order.

This is made even more complicated by end-user clients who seek to deliver buildings via LEAN or IPD. LEAN and IPD delivery require not only early involvement of the entire team, but collective versus individual responsibility for the design and construction of the project. Moreover, they use technology and tools such as BIM or Rivet to model the input and generate everything from schedules, to materials schedules, to costs (over-simplified, but you get the point). Talk about a BD game changer!

Under the latter scenario, architects must be able to accept the collective risk (and reward) and demonstrate their ability to utilize BIM or Rivet. For a mid-sized to large firm this is easy. For a small practice, it's an unacceptable risk.

So what do you do? Andy Warhol said, “They always say time changes things, but you actually have to change them yourself.”

• First, define the type(s) of clients that you want to work with and understand their preference in delivery methods.
• Second, adapt your business development strategy to who will be leading the effort. You may find that you now have to market to GCs as much as you do to your end user client.
• Third, know your value proposition. If you've never done a design-build project and don’t have a "story to tell" with a contractor, adjust your expectations and your messaging to focus on your strengths.

Finally, if IPD or LEAN are in your future, learn the technologies and manage your collective risk accordingly. This is no longer about just your firm, it is about the delivery team.

Got more questions? Send them along to me at kcompton@a3kconsulting.com. And for more information, see the AIA PMKC webinar Wisdom of the Ages: Best Practices in Business Development Part 2. This popular series and other resources are available on A3K Consulting's "Inform" webpage.

Karen Compton, CPSM. Karen Compton is principal of A3K Consulting (Glendale, CA), a business development and strategic planning firm specializing in the architecture, engineering and construction industries. Ms. Compton is also the founder of Industry Speaks™, a web-based business-to-business portal that connects AEC firms with experienced consultants, provides peer reviews of consultants, reports on key industry trends, and publishes expert reviews of professional courses and books. Contact her at kcompton@a3kconsulting.com.