When it comes to managing construction, most general contractors or project managers focus on the scope, budget, and timelines. Yes, these triple constraints should always be at the top of your mind when you’re in charge of a job. On the other hand, project quality is the fourth constraint that is just as important to be considered even as early as the planning and pre-construction phases.
What Does Quality Mean in Project Management?
One essential part of project management is to plan the quality standards for a project’s output and ensure that those standards are met before, during, and after the construction phase. In project management, quality planning, assurance, and control are where the team puts plans in place to make sure that the project meets the needs of the end user. It is also part of the project management plan that saves money because it cuts down on the number of times that mistakes need to be fixed.
No matter the industry, it is critical to meet the wants of the customer or other important people who have a stake in the project. The tasks of quality planning, quality assurance, and quality control can all be put together to form project quality management. Having an efficient and effective quality management plan helps project managers figure out these things and ensure each project is delivered within budget, on time, and of the highest quality possible.
The standards for quality control are set by quality planning during quality control. During the construction, the team can use methods and tools to check if each deliverable meets standards and gives people a way to report issues or problems. Quality control tasks also give people a chance to learn from the changes that were made to the project and apply them to the next ones.
The Importance of Quality in Managing Projects
Before a construction project is turned over to the client, quality control finds and fixes any problems that are found. These can be in the form of punch lists or quality checks. During project planning, team members come up with ways to keep the quality high and ensure the best value possible. Quality control is an ongoing process that can save time, effort, and money while still producing top-notch results and services.
It is critical to be able to make sure that the project meets the standards and needs that were set in the beginning. It also means keeping an eye on and checking every part of the job on a regular basis so that any problems can be found and resolved quickly. In this case, the mechanical, electrical, or plumbing systems are often tested to make sure that they are working. Another example is the placement of the structural rebars, which are thoroughly checked to ensure that they are installed correctly before the concrete is poured. Quality control ensures that everything stays the same and is reliable throughout the project.
Here are some reasons why quality control is essential for managing projects.
Satisfied Clients
In order to secure happy and satisfied clients, you must ensure that the final results meet or exceed their expectations. People are more likely to be satisfied when they can receive what they want. This way, you will be able to get a lot of good testimonials about your quality, professionalism, and workmanship.
Saving Money in the Long Run
Reasonable quality control can help you keep mistakes and do-overs that cost a lot of money. It saves time and money for teams to find and fix problems early on. Ensuring good quality every step of the way also lowers the chance of getting complaints or legal issues, which can cost a lot to handle.
Lowering Chances of Mistakes
Having an efficient and effective quality control system can help lower the chances that a project will fail or disappoint. By finding and fixing quality problems early on, teams can avoid delays and budget problems. Also, consistently delivering good work can help you build trust with partners, which makes it easier to handle risks in the future.
Building a Good Reputation
When the company delivers good work, they get a good reputation. Clients will trust and respect a team or company that does a good job, bringing in more customers and business possibilities.
Getting Better Output
Teams are constantly striving for continuous learning and improvement because of quality control. They can get even better at what they do if they keep an eye on things and learn from their mistakes. In the long run, this helps them stay competitive and give customers more value.
How To Keep Quality in Check During Project Management
As mentioned in the earlier sections, controlling quality in project management means ensuring that the project’s results meet the standards and goals by using simple but effective methods. In this section, let’s examine the best ways to keep quality in check.
Set Clear Quality Goals
Before the project even starts, it is critical to be able to identify your quality goals. These goals should clearly indicate the quality needed. Having this early on ensures that everyone on the team knows what the goals are, how they are accountable for each one, and what they can do to help them reach them.
Make a Plan for Quality Management
Next, create a plan for managing quality during the job. This comprehensive plan should list the steps that need to be taken at each stage to check quality and who is in charge of each one. It should also include ways to check how well the quality is being maintained.
Utilize Methods For Quality Verification
This means utilizing steps to prevent problems and ensure that everything meets the quality standards from the start. Regular tests, checks, or reviews could be part of this to find issues early on.
Do Work Inspections Often
Make sure the work on the project is always up to par by checking it often. This could mean looking at things in person, trying them, or going over papers and plans on a periodic basis. If you do this usually, you can find and fix any problems right away. During the job, monitor progress. Use simple tools, such as checklists or reports, to track success and look for signs of quality decline. If you stay alert, you can address problems quickly before they get worse.
Use Construction Technology to Help
Construction technology, such as construction scheduling software or scheduling apps, can make quality control more accessible. They help keep things on track and ensure everything is noticed. It gives you a good overview of what is happening on your project and ensures that everything is going according to plan.
Teach Your Team
Whether you are a seasoned project manager or just new in the industry, everyone on the team must know what quality work is expected of them. Take the time to provide training and support to help them understand the standards and how to meet them. It will be much easier to keep quality high when everyone knows what to do.
How To Create A Good Quality Management Plan?
In a nutshell, a quality management plan is a series of steps that help project managers set up processes for quality planning, quality control, and quality assurance so that quality standards are met as the project is completed. In this section, let us go over the three steps of a good quality management plan.
Quality Planning
First, figure out what quality standards your project deliverables must meet and how the project must be handled. You, your team, and your stakeholders should all agree on how to record this process and how to send the information. For example, will you be meeting once a week, or will reports be sent out daily?
This way, there will be more information about these things and ways to measure quality while managing the project in the quality planning part. Try to create a quality checklist to help you keep track of the marks you need to get on the job.
Quality Control
The next step is to control the quality of the project. This involves setting quality standards for project outputs and inspecting, testing, and reporting to see if those standards are met. The main job of quality control is to ensure that rules are followed and that the project meets the set quality standards. One way to ensure that the deliverables are up to par is to review them with other people.
Quality Assurance
Quality assurance is the set of planned and standardized steps used in a quality system to ensure that a product or service meets its quality standards. In a nutshell, it is a way to ensure that your processes are helping to ensure that the project’s outputs meet quality standards. There are two ways to do this: a project audit and a process review.
Tips on How to Manage Quality in Construction
To manage quality, you need tried-and-true methods that help project teams find places where problems might happen. There are many ways that you can do this – audits, benchmarking, cause and effect diagrams, checklists, flowcharts, histograms, pie charts, and random sampling. Let’s dive in on some of the best ways to check quality.
Audits
An audit checks the project processes to see if they follow company rules or policies. It may be done internally, externally, or by a third party. Risks, procurement, quality control measurements, and other issues that could cause problems during the project or lower the quality of the products can all be examined during an audit.
Benchmarking
Benchmarking helps businesses figure out what they can do better to stay competitive. Benchmarking means looking at what the best companies in a particular field are doing, comparing the quality of your services and products to those standards, and figuring out how your company can use similar strategies to make your goods or services better.
Checklists
A project’s goals, partners, deliverables, milestones, and any other information needed to make sure the project is moving forward as planned can be written on a checklist.
Flowcharts
A flow chart is helpful for teams that need to see how a process works. Inputs, methods, and outputs are shown on flow charts with standard symbols and text. The flow chart shows the choices, steps, and sequences in the workflow so that users can see the whole process. Construction management software can help you map out the process and ensure that all critical steps are accounted for.
