Development of a process documentation system for the house-building industry

The UK housing industry has often been criticized for the quality of its products. There is growing interest in the industrialization of house building methods. Much of the focus of attention has been on the use of manufactured structural components, which addresses the inherent problems of reliance on 'wet trades'. However, there is a need also to improve the quality of the assembly and 'fitting' processes on site. The house building process has tended to develop more through custom and practice rather than formal analysis of methods. There is a lack of standards, and of mechanisms for process review or sharing knowledge and good practice. The result is significant process variability on site. Process documentation is a rigorous description of a process, procedure or policy to facilitate training, development of consistency of operations, and analysis and improvement of current standards. The paper describes work on the development of a process engineering information system that has already been partially implemented by a major house builder. Process sheets have been designed for effective communication of quality-care points, and the system supports feedback from site staff on operation standards and maintains an audit trail of changes.