Integrated Project Delivery
(With Open Book Review)
A project delivery method that attempts to spread the risk, responsibility and liability for project delivery equally among the primary parties – the owner, the designer and the builder, whether through partnership agreements or multi-party contracts. IPD (With Open Book Review) is shared risk among all parties, or an aligned relationship rather than an inverse relationship of risk between the owner and contractor.
Integrated Project Delivery (With Open Book Review) contracts are a relatively new entry into the U.S. marketplace; however, the concepts of IPD (With Open Book Review) have been around for many years. Pure IPD (With Open Book Review), in its contractual sense, requires a multiparty agreement among the prime players in the design and construction process – at least the owner, the designer and the builder – but this agreement can include many of the important sub-consultants and subcontractors as well. The intention of the multiparty contract – or the closely integrated family of contracts – is a team-based approach that integrates people, systems, business structures and practices into a process that collaboratively harnesses the talents and insights of all participants to reduce waste and optimize efficiency through all phases of design, fabrication and construction.
Achieving The Same Goals
IPD (With Open Book Review) is an attempt to properly reflect, in contract, the working relationships and efforts that are possible when a team is working in an integrated fashion to complete a design and construction project.
Compensation for parties in the IPD (With Open Book Review) delivery method, other than the owner, is typically comprised of three components:
- 1. Cost Reimbursement to cover costs,
- 2. Incentive for achieving or bettering agreed project cost targets and
- 3. Rewards for accomplishing set project goals.
Open-Book
Ideally all costs, bases of costs and cost inputs from all parties to the contract(s) are fully “Open-Book” in nature; and all incentive and goal achievement compensation will be agreed to by the team and incorporated in the contracts in advance.
As the entire project team is equally (or similarly) incentivized to achieve the same set of goals, which they have been party to setting or agreeing to, IPD (With Open Book Review) requires the owner to assemble the major players into a contracted team at the very earliest opportunity, ideally as early as project inception and feasibility.
This early creation and agreement of project goals results in earlier engagement of the project team than in other delivery methods. During the pre-design phase, the IPD (With Open Book Review) team designates all of the criteria it will be bound under contract to delivery.
