Assembling A Collaborative Team - Other - Page 49
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Chapter overview
The briefing process is a core interface between the client and the project team
and a successful briefing process is essential if the assembled collaborative
team is to be effective at Stage 2 and, more importantly, if the Project Outcomes
are to be achieved at project handover. This chapter considers strategic briefing
issues and how the briefing process relates to the assembly of the project team.
The Concept Design will be prepared in response to the contents of the Initial
Project Brief. In addition to the information necessary to facilitate the design stages,
some clients, particularly those who are more experienced, might include other
aspects in the brief. For example, the information to be exchanged at each stage
(see page 72) or the Communication Strategy or other protocols that they may
require the design team and the contractor to follow. The brief might also stipulate
specific information that the client requires at project handover for the running of
the building. On this basis, the brief might comprise:
• the strategic requirements of the project
• the functional requirements of the project
• the desired Project Outcomes
• the Project Objectives including Quality Objectives
• the project’s Sustainability Aspirations, and
• the Project Budget (see page 45).
This chapter is not intended to provide comprehensive advice on briefing;
however, the project brief is an essential client document and its purpose needs
to be clearly understood if the right professional services contracts are to be
prepared. It develops incrementally: strategically at Stage 0, in detail at Stage 1
and fine-tuned in response to the Concept Design proposals (see below) at Stage
2. It also relates to the assembling of the project team as Schedules of Services
may be required to ensure that the requirements of the brief are met. As the brief
develops, some aspects of it may be superseded by the WHO, WHAT, WHEN
and HOW outputs.
In some instances the brief will be contractual. This is more likely to be the case
for contractor-led forms of procurement where the brief may act as the Employer’s
Requirements forming part of a tender process. In these situations, the order of
precedence between the brief and the developing design and the Contractor’s
Proposals needs careful consideration. For example, a comprehensive brief might
include subjective design aspects (such as ‘design a secure environment’ or ‘public
spaces to be bright and airy’) as well as prescriptive items (such as ‘staff common
rooms to have a minimum of eight sockets’). In this example, when the Building
Contract is signed, some aspects of the brief will be superseded by the Contractor’s
Proposals and the subjective items may need to be deleted from the brief with the
prescriptive items retained in the version included in the Building Contract.
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