Next forum - how can we plan our time to avoid error?
14 Jul 21“We never have time to get it right” was a key finding from the GIRI research, and the modern construction industry is characterised by constant time pressure. This forum will unpackage the thorny issue of time management to expose the link between time and error.
Nick Francis from GIRI Training & Consultancy will run the workshop, guiding participants to explore: why we are under constant time pressure; how we actually spend our time; how we should spend our time; and what techniques we can use to make better use of our available time to prevent errors in construction.
How participants will benefit
This interactive session will start with participants considering an idealised construction industry, to identify how we should spend our time. We will then compare this with how we actually do spend our time, and identify if, and why, these are different.
Participants will be introduced to the ‘Eisenhower Matrix’, where tasks and activities are classified based on their relative importance and relative urgency. Group discussion will explore how this matrix relates to the GIRI root causes of error, to identify that:
- the industry is characterised by a constant barrage of ‘high importance and high urgency’ tasks;
- that ‘low importance and high urgency’ tasks can be a distraction from more important work;
- and that an increased ability to focus on ‘high Importance and low urgency’ tasks may be key to preventing error.
Breakout groups will explore practical measures that can create the capacity to plan, think, and pause.
The session will next consider delegation and automation, in particular asking why these are so difficult to achieve when everyone is busy. Structured group discussions will then explore how we can best use our time now to reduce error in the future.
Outcomes
The workshop will conclude with participants sharing their individual reflections on how organisational cultures can influence the way a project manages its time, drawing together the key priorities to effectively manage time pressures and thereby create the conditions to prevent error.
