Time Is Money: 5 Keys to Maximize Scheduling for MEP Contractors

When it comes to scheduling, collaboration among GCs and MEP contractors remains the standard for achieving jobsite efficiencies — but MEP contractors can also take initiative and use strategic time management that maximizes their profits.

Through coordination, collaboration, schedule tracking, forecasting and thoughtful look-aheads, MEP contractors can maintain timelines while anticipating schedule-busting and costly surprises.

These five tips highlight the keys to scheduling success and prove that time really is money.

1. Collaborate early.

The GC’s master schedule typically drives the bus, but subcontractors aren’t merely passengers with contractual obligations. Specialty contractors who collaborate on refining tasks and durations before they are carved into the schedule are equipping themselves with realistic expectations.

Schedules are certain to evolve, but key milestones handed down by the GC include substantial completion date and equipment startup, which keeps equipment on track for testing and commissioning.

With those milestones known, specialty contractors can create their own, internal schedules. These plans break down each activity ID into the granular steps needed to manage the workforce and complete the task. 

Bringing field supervision into initial conversations adds boots-on-the-ground insights into efficient timing. While data harvested from previous jobs informs many aspects of scheduling, superintendents can confirm — or contradict — the logic and profit impact of scheduling a task at a certain time.

This is also the time to scrutinize the schedule for necessary weekend, night, and holiday labor — maybe a test conducted while a building is vacant — to avoid being hit with uncompensated overtime pay.

2. Coordinate the trades.

Coordinating MEP installations without accounting for the whereabouts of every worker and piece of equipment creates inefficiencies and heightens the risk of trade stacking, when multiple trades are clustered into a single area.

In their first scheduling conversations with GCs, MEP contractors can minimize trade stacking and its costly repercussions by asking where other trades will be working during assigned tasks.

While the GC coordinates sequencing of trades to maintain productivity, the specialty contractors also have a responsibility to communicate and collaborate among themselves. In an atmosphere where competing priorities can generate conflict, compromise that puts the project first helps assure the profitability and productivity of everyone involved.

Installations themselves become a time factor if they obstruct the progress of other trades – perhaps a wall built before delivery of the boiler meant to go behind it. While GCs try to avoid time- and resource-consuming obstructions, MEP contractors can collaborate further to clarify timelines and contribute to logical sequences of delivery and installation.

At this point, BIM models support trade coordination by transforming 2D drawings into 3D visualizations. Shared understanding allows for these virtual plans to be altered before they become expensive real-life obstacles.

3. Document everything.

The first question about change orders is how they impact profitability, but their effect on scheduling also harbors a cost.

When a job lags the contracted completion date, MEP contractors who have diligently documented the scheduling impact of change orders can dodge the pain of liquidated damages by proving that the delay wasn’t their fault.

Subcontractors can also use scheduling software to track the changing schedule against the initial plan, allowing them to compare the implementation against a baseline. Even as milestones are reached, they should continue tracking and, in a sense, creating multiple baselines from one point in time to another.

Although time-consuming, the practice gives subcontractors their own story to tell of the project’s progression and their efforts to stay on schedule.

4. Balance equipment procurement and labor forecasting.

Post-COVID, many of the long lead times for MEP equipment remain stubbornly intact.

Subcontractors can create a cushion against late equipment deliveries by being proactive with submittals and promptly obtaining product data approvals from the engineer.

However, considerations to weigh include storage costs and potential wear on early orders exposed to the elements. The decision hinges on which is more important — rapid retrieval of the equipment to stay on schedule, or saving money on storage costs but risking damages if the equipment doesn’t arrive on time.

In the case of labor, use of scheduling software can generate a cumulative view across simultaneous projects, right-sizing each crew assignment and saving money on excess hiring and overtime. Forecasting the total number of hires needed for the month generates efficiencies by allowing workers to be assigned and shifted as needed.

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5. Utilize look-aheads.

In the changeable day-to-day of construction, the schedule is a living document. The collaboration that launched the process remains a powerful tool for achieving cost efficiencies through time management.

Three- to six-week look-aheads support gradual adaptations that ease the schedule into place and prevent sudden and costly lurches. Look-aheads convene GCs and subcontractors to share their upcoming tasks and preparations for the coming weeks, making gradual adjustments that keep the full job on track toward scheduled milestones farther into the future.

For MEP contractors, time-conscious scheduling looks at projects in the short and long terms. As they streamline daily tasks, avoid obstacles, and anticipate contingencies, they build capacity to maximize profitability through strategic time management.  

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