Electrical Products Boost Construction Productivity

By Steve Killius


The careful selection of electrical infrastructure products has the potential to greatly improve productivity – not only for electrical trades, but for the entire project timeline – because an efficiently designed and implemented electrical infrastructure can affect other trades and the overall project.

Economic pressures, high labor costs, and compressed schedules have continued to mount on electrical contractors. In response to these pressures, contractors need improved means and methods to complete projects on-time and on-budget.

Products that contribute to higher productivity

Electrical infrastructure products and systems that have productivity "designed in" can help address issues like schedule acceleration, new project delivery methods, a shortage of skilled craftspeople, and a decline in productivity. Although these products have the greatest impact on electrical trades (and also data/com and A/V), they also have the potential to make other trades more productive. These designed-in features help the electrical contractor and benefit other trades by permitting them to proceed earlier. Examples include:
• Prewired raceway
• Modular wiring systems
• Welded wire cable tray and pre-assembled pathway supports
• Plug-and-play wiring devices
• Pre-fabricated wiring systems
• Integrated systems that can include lighting and plug-load control, power monitoring, load shedding and transient voltage surge protection.
Conclusions

The use of products and systems that have "designed in" productivity offer numerous benefits throughout the life of a building project.
• Reduce design time. Products and integrated systems offer time savings in the design, assembly and installation of the electrical infrastructure as a whole, which is the most labor-intensive portion of a commercial electrical installation.
• Address labor skill issues: simplify the installation, which means that less-skilled labor can install the job correctly. This results in fewer errors and less rework.
• Improve project timelines: products reduce the time required for installation, both individually and as an integrated solution. In commercial applications with repeating floors and rooms a contractor may eliminate up to 50% of the installation labor for feeder and branch circuits. Labor savings equal cost-savings, which improves contractor profitability.
• Overall costs are reduced and profitability is improved.

In and of themselves, labor saving products do not necessarily improve jobsite productivity, reduce risk and cost, improve timelines or increase profitability. It requires partnering and collaboration with suppliers who can integrate innovative products and newer best practices to impact the projects overall installed cost and timelines.

As other system and building product suppliers – and the contractors and subcontractors they serve begin to do the same, additional productivity can result from everyone working together more closely. For example, erectors, plumbing and mechanical contractors, and others are using pre-assembly and pre-fabrication of systems and sub-systems to speed installation, reduce coordination issues, eliminate errors and avoid risk.

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Steve Killius is Vice President, Contractor Resource Group for the Electrical Wiring Systems Division of Legrand North America. The EWS Division consists of Legrand/Cablofil, Legrand/Pass & Seymour, and Legrand/Wiremold.