Janet LemanskiOfffice Engineer/Document Control Specialist, PMP| Bryant Associates IncSpringdale, MD, United States
At one of our job sites, we had a long lead time for a sole source company to deliver a very specific piece of equipment. When it arrived months later it was the wrong model. The item had to be shipped back and we had to wait 6 more months for the correct item. This led to affecting a milestone in the schedule. How often does this happen in the construction field. Saving Changes...
While I can't provide insights on the construction industry occurrences, I have run into this in the past on systems projects where a particularly unique component was required from one or a limited number of suppliers.
Was this proactively identified as a risk and what responses had been developed to address that? In extremely critical situations, the client might include a couple of checkpoints during the build period to confirm that what the supplier was designing and building was meeting requirements rather than waiting till the end.
I have received the wrong equipment in manufacturing environments, but with long lead schedule critical items we do have steps to avoid that as Kiron suggested.
For one we review the supporting documentation well before the product is shipped to ensure it's what we ordered. Another mitigation step sometimes used is inspecting the equipment at the supplier's facilities prior to shipping. Even if a small team has to fly overseas for a couple days, that is a lot less expensive than a very long production delay. Saving Changes...
Senior Projects Manager | Field & Marten AssociatesNew Westminster, British Columbia, Canada
Janet, this happened on one of the projects I was involved in back in 2006. It was and Oil and Gas project and although we took all mitigation measures, the specialized piece of equipment received was the right model but was faulty which the supplier said it was caused by a damage during shipping so we had to wait 3 more months to receive a replacement for this long lead item.
For long lead items, we do always take mitigation measures like my fellow colleagues mentioned but you can't always avoid the risks so to answer your question, yes, it does happen even though we assess the risks and put mitigation plans. Saving Changes...
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