4.3 The Owner’s Role
The broad responsibilities of the owner include two major factors:
a. Develop a complete and realistic requirements and objectives;
b. Provide a thorough understanding to other team members of the role and responsibilities of the owner.
A relationship where the design professional is working with the owner as an advisor on all aspects affecting design is beneficial to both the designer and owner, and is recommended. It allows the design professionals to suggest various alternatives, order of magnitude cost ranges, and tradeoffs in other related aspects.
An owner cannot expect poorly communicated objectives to be fulfilled. The owner and design professional should develop good lines of communication and agree on how the objectives will be achieved and what expectations are reasonable. Through discussion of all relevant facts, recordings, and delineation of such exchanges will greatly enhance the probability that expectations will be adjusted and objectives fulfilled.
The owner should understand important concepts and practices, such as life-cycle cost, peer review, alternatives studies, value engineering, construction contract documents and shop drawings. The owner should be cooperative, plan for proper communications, and insist that construction adheres to project requirements.
4.4 Communication and Coordination
Clearly communicating information such as requirement, expectations, scope, costs, schedules, and technical data is a vital element. A coordinated effort among various team members is required to achieve an integrated program. Insufficient coordination and communication have heavily contributed to failures and problems and to the dissatisfaction of team members. The frequency of lawsuits has been highest from clients in Nepal with whom communications are difficult and those with limited construction experience.
The owner, design professional and constructor are all equally responsible for proper communication during design and construction.
4.5 The Project Team
Hydropower projects are conceived, planned, designed and built by a team consisting of an owner, design professional, and constructor. Each team member has to fulfill competently and, in timely manner, his obligation in cooperation with the other members. Each team member has to have functionally selected experts assisting in construction activities. The organization arrangements integrating the roles of the owner, design professional, and contractor may be the traditional one where the owner contracts independently with the other two parties. In other arrangements, the owner may issue only one contract to design / construct firm [Engineering Procurements Contract (EPC), Built Own Operate and Transfer (BOOT), Built, Own and Operate (BOO), etc], or the owner may perform his own staff, employing an outside design professional or constructor. Discussions hereunder emphasize the traditional arrangement and outline the contractual requirements necessary to define this arrangement.
It is the responsibility of the owner to administer his contracts with the other team members and to monitor and coordinate the activities of all parties involved in the planning, design and construction.
The owner may discharge his responsibilities more effectively by retaining a project manager authorized to act for the owner.
In addition to the specific responsibilities listed, other responsibilities apply equally to all team members. These consist of accepting responsibility, striving for economy and efficiency, cooperating and coordinating with other team members adhering to the established budget, schedule and program and insisting on quality.
4.6 Procedures for Selecting the Design Professionals
Selecting the proper design professional is critical for the construction. No two professional design organizations have the same training, experience, capability, or culture. It is necessary for the owner to carefully structure and administer a selection procedure which secures a proper fit between the abilities of the design professional and the construction requirements.
This design professional is committed to competition on the basis of project-specific qualifications.
This commitment to selection on the basis of demonstrated professional competence is to be reinforced by legislation. Selection on the basis of price bidding is viewed as counter-productive. The recommended selection procedure requires to submit statements of interest and qualifications in response to the owner’s invitation and statement of requirements. These responses are evaluated by the owner according to previously announced selection criteria. After the design professional is selected on the basis of qualifications, contract negotiations between the owner and design professional are initiated. During these negotiations, definition of scope of work, schedule, compensation for design services, and other contractual matters are agreed upon and documented in a written contract.
It is important that both the owner and design professional begin the design phase with attitudes requiring excellence in performance, rather than lowest possible design costs. Project failures can be expected if minimum design cost is the primary basis for selecting the design professional. The best agreement results from establishing a fee after extensive scoping discussions occur, which utilize the experience and knowledge of the design professional, owner and advisors to the owner.
4.7 The Agreement for Design Services
For the best interests of both the owner and design professional and for the successful completion of a quality construction, it is imperative that the design professional and owner have a clear understanding, an agreement in writing, of the duties and responsibilities of each party. Without such an agreement, incorrect assumptions or misunderstanding may develop, jeopardizing the mutual trust and confidence. If standard contract forms with refined variations to meet owner’s specific concerns are used, and specific detailed agreements are prepared covering the extent of each party’s duties, responsibilities and authority.
4.8 Peer Review
Peer reviews are recommended as added safeguards for the public, the owner, and the design professional. A fresh, unbiased and diplomatic review by an independent, high-level professional can be a highly cost-effective measure. The overall time to complete a project can be reduced by a peer review.
4.9 Planning for Construction
Planning is necessary to meet the objectives, including quality in construction. In planning for construction, providing adequate resources to construct a quality work and verify conformance with requirements is essential. When planning in construction operations is effective, adequate lead time to mobilize certain critical resources is secured and the responsibility for quality performance is clearly assigned.
Planning for quality construction requires an accurate assessment of the owner’s capabilities and level of involvement or quality control assistance is required from outside sources. Proper planning includes implementing quality requirements in contracts and purchase orders. Construction planning includes recognizing the need and requiring the involvement of key representatives of other organization at the side. This full scope of planning for construction is necessary to fulfill requirements for projects.
The owner’s key roles are to form the project team as early as possible, assign responsibilities and establish levels of performance, include qualifications for quality performance as a part of bid evaluation, establish the contracting and purchasing program, and plan for necessary site representation from each project team member.