WP109: A Work Instruction Template For Cast-In-Place Concrete Construction Laborers

The state-of-practice method to deliver work instructions to construction laborers (verbal communication plus construction drawing sets) often fails to effectively communicate the design and construction information that laborers need to perform their work. Poor quality of construction drawings (e.g., irrelevant, lengthy and unclear information) plus inadequate verbal communication skills of the actors in the field (field management and laborers) lead to many mistakes and inefficiencies. This problem is becoming critical today as these actorsí cultural and social backgrounds are increasingly different and varied and construction projects are getting more complex. This problem prompts for a formalization of the information in the instructions that allows field management to deliver instructions more consistently and reduce the negative impacts of traditional verbal instructions.

This paper presents a template that defines the format and content for work instructions for cast-in-place (CIP) concrete laborers in the construction industry. We developed this template starting from characteristics of good instructions found in the literature and then tested and revised it through active participation in several multifamily housing projects for CIP concrete work.

The field-based validation showed that both laborers and field management personnel felt that instructions based on our template reduce the rework and the number of questions during the work and increases productivity and safety. Based on this validation, we claim that this template is a better way to communicate work instructions to laborers than the traditional practice. This template contributes to the CIP concrete construction domain as it defines a foundation from where improvements can be made and enables leveraging of virtual design and construction methods that can interact with the formalized information in the instructions.