ABSTRACT
Value management (VM) is a methodological management style for managing value in projects. With it origins in US manufacturing, it has developed and become more widely adopted in construction. North American thinking dominated development in VM for the first four decades, whilst recent developments in principally Europe, Australasia and China (notably Hong Kong) have also seen divergence of thinking emerge, reflected in different published national standards. What is clear is that value management studies are conducted at discrete intervention points, with associated characteristic study styles using tailored methods and a number of tools and techniques built around workshop formats at these intervention points. The use of technology within the workshop process tends to be limited, revolving normally around presentations and to a lesser extent group decision support tools. Experience of conducting over 150 VM studies has identified one critical issue – the need to use 3D visualisation techniques in a range of buildings-related studies where team members during a workshop process need to understand the interactions between the use of space by an organisation and the associated briefing and design options. This requirement is particularly acute at the early stages where VM is being used either proactively to develop a design brief or potential design options or reactively when an existing design brief or design solution is being reviewed. The chapter presents case study vignettes where this requirement has arisen and discusses why it has arisen, and identifies the potential use of 3D computer visualisation methods in such situations, together with the implications that stem from this for the VM and value engineering (VE) method, the design process and supply chain members under different procurement routes. The chapter also presents a series of generic VM study styles where ICT visualisation technology could be of benefit and
the consequences for different supply chain strategies. The chapter concludes with the argument that there is potential for the use of ICT visualisation technologies in VM and that this would enable rapid prototyping in such situations.
