Name: Russell Hardman
Employer: Wates Retail
Project: John Lewis Partnership, Liverpool
Contract: JCT 98
For Russ Hardman, there was a lot riding on this job. Having narrowly missed out on another project with the client because of higher prelims, Wates was keen to show off its skills and deliver real value for money on this one, which the client intended as its ‘10 for 10’ benchmark.
Realising that for the client it wasn’t just about the snag-free handover of a final structure on time and on budget, but the journey that brought that about, Russ took no chances. Three months before project start, he met up with key players from the client’s previous projects to identify and remedy potential problems, in particular with sequencing. He then met all the main subcontractors to ensure that they had a full understanding of the project targets and constraints.
He addressed common goals and how to build a strong team by holding an offsite team workshop with the designers and key stakeholders. A session of African drumming and another with a simulated golf machine later, and team dynamics were progressing famously.
Russ’s thorough preparation paid off handsomely. He allocated value-engineering tasks to the site package managers on the basis that the best ideas would come from the people who built the store day in day out. The resulting changes to procurement, design and installation exceeded the 5% value-engineering target, and Russ collated a series of possible VE opportunities for future consideration. By streamlining the sequencing, he was able to cut three weeks off the predicted construction programme.
The store has been received with rapture by the client: fantastic, excellent and delighted are the terms it uses. It is not just the finished building the client praises, but the degree of collaboration that brought it about. And Russ’s own commitment to John Lewis’s community engagement, with the construction team transforming a derelict schoolhouse into a fully functioning clubhouse for a local children’s football team, has helped deepen the sense of mutual corporate alignment that was so important on this project.