Author: Adroit

Optimizing VE Team Composition for Interdisciplinary Synergy

Posted on by Adroit

Amin Terouhid, Ph.D., CVS

 

Executive Takeaway: A Value Engineering (VE) study’s success depends primarily on team composition. A weak, unqualified, or biased team produces generic, short-sighted cost-cutting ideas rather than effective, practical VE alternatives or design suggestions that enhance value. Therefore, project owners are advised to assemble an independent, qualified, multidisciplinary team that balances technical expertise, operational insight, and objective facilitation.

 

Overview

Value Engineering (VE) emphasizes function analysis, a process that requires viewing a project through multiple technical lenses simultaneously. When qualified specialists from diverse disciplines collaborate, they challenge design assumptions, assess cross-disciplinary interface conflicts, and uncover high-value alternatives that a weak, unqualified, or biased team may overlook. Interdisciplinary expertise combines specialized knowledge across design, construction, operations, and cost management to evaluate systems. The team’s objective independence brings an unbiased perspective that can help challenge underlying assumptions without unnecessarily defending previous design elements.

SAVE International emphasizes that the Value Methodology requires a multidisciplinary team led by a Certified Value Specialist (CVS) to ensure the study remains focused on function rather than arbitrary budget reduction.

Aligning Team Roles with Study Objectives

The table below defines the essential roles required for a typical VE study, and generally describes each member’s core purpose and their expected contribution toward optimizing value:

Role

Core Purpose

Value Contribution

 

Independent VE Facilitator

Guides the VE Job Plan and maintains methodological discipline.

Prevents bias, enforces neutral language, encourages effective collaboration and idea sharing, and keeps focus on function analysis.

Subject Matter Experts or Specialists

Evaluate the core technical, engineering, and operational baselines to ensure all project requirements are thoroughly vetted and bring discipline-specific knowledge to challenge assumptions and identify underlying constraints or functional gaps.

Specialists uncover high-value design alternatives, design suggestions, and cross-disciplinary interface issues that generalists often overlook. By validating technical feasibility and constructability, they prevent costly design flaws while maximizing long-term project performance.  

Cost & Scheduling Experts

Provides real-time market pricing, feedback on the reasonableness of estimates and schedules provide and constructability feedback.

Validates cost and duration estimates and models the life-cycle cost impact of ideas.

Operations & Maintenance Representatives

Represents long-term user, facility, and life-cycle interests.

Prevents short-term capital savings that increase long-term operating expense.

Owner / User Stakeholders

Defines project requirements and non-negotiable constraints.

Clarifies essential performance criteria and makes real-time scope decisions.

 

To maximize synergy, the following key team criteria are typically recommended:

  • Subject-Matter Authority: Specialists must possess peer-level technical expertise to ensure their recommendations are technically reasonable, practical, and carry weight.
  • Constructive Mindset: Members must focus on creative problem-solving rather than defending legacy designs or criticizing the original team.
  • Operational Familiarity: Including end-users ensures that alternatives account for realistic daily maintenance and service life needs.

Overcoming Common Composition Pitfalls

According to the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA), independent team members who are not involved in the day-to-day design bring fresh perspectives that are critical during the Investigation and Creative phases. The following summary highlights key pitfalls to avoid when structuring a VE team which outlines common mistakes that undermine study objectivity:

  • Excluding facility managers and operational staff may result in upfront design decisions that lower initial construction costs but significantly inflate long-term maintenance, energy, and renewal expenses.
  • Staffing the study primarily with the original project designers creates an inherent conflict of interest, as members reflexively defend baseline choices rather than objectively evaluating alternative solutions.
  • Employing an untrained or ineffective leader allows the VE study to lose methodological focus, devolving from a structured, function-oriented analysis into an unguided, unproductive brainstorming session.
  • Purposefully excluding dedicated cost estimators leaves the team unable to accurately model financial trade-offs, which may result in unrealistic savings estimates and impractical budget recommendations.

Recommended Approach

To ensure VE teams deliver high-value outcomes, project owners are advised to:

  1. Involve qualified, Interdisciplinary expertise: Involve interdisciplinary expertise to combine specialized knowledge across design, construction, operations, and cost management and enable the VE team to evaluate VE alternatives and design suggestions that enhance the value.
  2. Mandate Team Independence: Source core technical reviewers from outside the active project design firm.
  3. Require Certified Leadership: Engage a qualified, certified VE facilitator to lead the Job Plan execution.
  4. Include Operations Early: Mandate the participation of facility management and operational staff.
  5. Size the Team Appropriately: Maintain a core team of 5 to 8 focused specialists to ensure productive dialogue.
  6. Pair Design with Costing: Ensure every technical discipline on the team is backed by real-time cost-estimating capability.

 

A balanced, multidisciplinary team transforms Value Engineering from a crude cost-cutting exercise into a strategic value-creation process. That interdisciplinary synergy protects required functions, validates project constraints, and secures superior long-term life-cycle performance.

Common Misconceptions about Value Engineering (VE)

Posted on by Adroit

Amin Terouhid, Ph.D., CVS

 

Executive Takeaway: Industry practitioners sometimes mischaracterize Value Engineering (VE) as an aggressive, late-stage cost-cutting tool deployed only when a project faces budget overruns. In practice, treating VE as an exercise in price-slashing degrades the actual value that VE exercises provide and the main purposes it serves. VE is a function-oriented methodology used by a multidisciplinary team aimed at improving the value of a project, product, process, service or organization [1]. Correcting these misconceptions is essential for those who seek to maximize returns on their investments and enhance the value of their projects, products, processes, services, or organization.

Key Misconceptions

  1. Misconception: “Value Engineering Is Just a Fancy Term for Cost-Cutting”

When a capital project exceeds its baseline estimate, project managers often announce a “Value Engineering phase.” In practice, this phase usually degenerates into a reactive exercise where designers, contractors, and owners meet to slash line items, eliminate scope, or downgrade finish standards to meet an immediate budget cap. Because these budget-clearing drills are labeled as “VE,” industry professionals have come to assume that value engineering is simply a euphemism for cheapening a design.

Value Engineering, however, as established by international standards bodies such as SAVE International, does not begin with a dollar target; it begins with an analysis of Function [1]. Function analysis forces project teams to strip away specific physical solutions and ask fundamental questions: What must this asset or system actually do?

Traditional cost-cutting focuses strictly on reducing upfront capital expenditures (CapEx) by removing components. VE, by contrast, identifies alternative, often innovative ways to fulfill the required function at equal or superior performance levels.

When a team simply removes scope or specifies inferior materials without re-evaluating the underlying function, they are not performing VE. Instead, they are executing an unvetted scope concession that often compromises the project’s core intent.

  1. Misconception: “VE Inherently Compromises Project Quality”

Designers, architects, and end-users sometimes resist VE proposals because they operate under the assumption that “value” is a code word for compromise. Such a narrative suggests that any modification proposed during a VE workshop will inevitably result in a second-tier facility: thinner walls, less reliable equipment, degraded architectural aesthetics, or shortened asset service life. This misconception stems from a fundamental misunderstanding of the mathematical definition of Value, which is performance achieved based on the resources used. In a formal value study, value is defined as the quotient of functional performance divided by resource expenditure. This formulation underscores how effectively a design transforms invested assets into results. As such, value can be enhanced in several ways that have nothing to do with sacrificing quality. Examples include:

  • Increasing Performance while holding Resources constant: Introducing higher-efficiency equipment or a more flexible layout for the same capital investment.
  • Maintaining Performance while reducing Resources: Fulfilling the exact technical and operational requirements through an alternative layout or modular construction technique that requires less material and labor.
  • Significantly increasing Performance with a minor increase in Resources: Investing slightly more capital upfront to eliminate a chronic operational bottleneck, which yields significant long-term reliability gains.

VE actively protects baseline performance standards. For example, if an alternative proposal reduces safety margins, degrades required capacity, or accelerates material failure rates, it fails the fundamental test of functional equivalence.

  1. Misconception: “Value Engineering Is a Late-Stage Emergency Intervention”

On some capital programs, VE is treated as an emergency brake, a process invoked only at 90% design completion or after construction bids come in significantly over budget. The team rushes through a high-pressure workshop to identify immediate design rollbacks so the project can move forward to award or groundbreaking.

Treating VE as a late-stage rescue mechanism severely diminishes its effectiveness. The ability to influence total project value follows an exponential decay curve across the project lifecycle, while the cost of implementing changes increases dramatically over time. Therefore, when VE is delayed until the end of design:

  • Redesign Costs Multiply: Architectural and engineering revisions require extensive rework of calculated drawings, calculations, and specification packages, which erodes the net financial gains of proposed changes.
  • Schedule Delays Cascade: Re-evaluating major systems late in the design phase may cause disruptions.

To capture maximum strategic value, owners must deploy Value Engineering during the conceptual and schematic phases—when fundamental decisions regarding footprint, structural framing, system selection, and spatial relationships are still fluid.

  1. Misconception: “VE Focuses Purely on Initial Construction Costs (CapEx)”

Financial management on capital projects is often structured in silos: the project management team is evaluated solely on delivering the asset within the initial construction budget (CapEx), while the facility operations team inherits the ongoing operational costs (OpEx). Because of this split, VE workshops frequently fall into the trap of evaluating alternatives based exclusively on upfront installation prices.

Evaluating capital decisions solely on initial contract pricing creates a distorted picture of asset economics. A lower upfront purchase price frequently conceals costs such as higher energy consumption, complex maintenance requirements, or expensive replacement parts. It is important to note, however, that VE evaluates proposals through the lens of Total Cost of Ownership (TCO) by assessing complete asset lifecycles and factoring in the time value of money.

  1. Misconception: “The Design Team Can Facilitate Its Own VE Process”

Project owners looking to streamline administrative overhead often ask their primary design firm to lead the internal VE review. The rationale seems straightforward: the original engineers and architects understand the facility requirements better than anyone else, so they should be best positioned to optimize it. This approach overlooks two critical human and organizational factors: confirmation bias and disciplinary isolation.

  • Confirmation Bias: Design teams often invest hundreds of hours developing specific technical solutions. Expecting them to objectively critique their own assumptions, challenge their own design choices, or propose alternatives that render their previous work obsolete is unreasonable.
  • Siloed Perspectives: Designers often lack real-world insights into daily facility maintenance, constructability bottlenecks, current supply chain realities, and specialized trade labor availability.

A VE workshop requires independent process leadership provided by a certified facilitator (such as a Certified Value Specialist) [1]. An independent facilitator brings no emotional attachment to the baseline design, enforces strict adherence to the formal VE Job Plan, encourages cross-disciplinary debate, and ensures that facility operators, cost estimators, and contractors have an equal voice in shaping project outcomes.

Conclusion

In conclusion, VE is not a late-stage emergency exercise, a superficial cost-slashing exercise, or a compromise on project quality, nor is it a self-assessment best left to original design teams or limited to upfront CapEx line items. Far more effective than these reactive, price-focused missteps, VE is a function-oriented methodology used by a multidisciplinary team aimed at improving the value of a project, product, process, service, or organization. By deploying a multidisciplinary team early in the design phase, VE aims to optimize the true performance-to-resource ratio, to preserve or enhance functions and enhance the overall value provided by the project, product, process, service, or organization.

References

  • [1] SAVE International. Value Methodology Standard and Body of Knowledge.
  • [2] Federal Highway Administration (FHWA). Value Engineering Policy and Job Plan Guidelines.

 

Value Methodology for Capital Asset Owners: An Effective Approach for Enhancing the Value

Posted on by Adroit

Amin Terouhid, Ph.D., CVS

 

Executive Takeaway: Value Engineering (VE), when deployed as an owner-driven, function-oriented discipline, serves as a primary engine for enhancing value. Rather than functioning as a late-stage cost-cutting exercise, systematic Value Methodology aligns early design parameters with long-term operational objectives, regulatory demands, and user expectations.

Function Analysis and Overall Project Value

For owners of capital infrastructure, project success extends far beyond budget adherence; value is defined by factors such as the alignment of functional performance, operational reliability, asset adaptability, and stakeholder satisfaction. Traditional project reviews often make the mistake of narrowing their focus strictly to capital expenditure (CapEx) line items, which may adversely affect function, compound operational complexity, or compromise the service life of the project in the process.

VE shifts this dynamic by elevating the conversation from what a project costs to what a project achieves.

Two of the core considerations that establish the foundation for value-driven capital asset ownership include:

  • Function: Analyze the project to understand and clarify the required function of the project.  In accordance with SAVE International standards, functional analysis empowers owners to eliminate unnecessary design friction, improve user experience, and reallocate project resources toward high-impact performance drivers [1].
  • Performance: Criteria governing functional execution, including operational capacity, system redundancy, safety margins, environmental sustainability, and target service life.

Maximizing Project Value

The capacity to enhance project value changes dramatically throughout the delivery lifecycle. During early concept phases, owners possess maximum flexibility to optimize facility configuration, streamline operational workflows, and integrate innovative design solutions. As design matures and solidifies, opportunity shifts toward constructability enhancements, installation quality, and risk reduction.

To maximize long-term project outcomes, owners must integrate structured VE milestones across key project stages:

  1. Conceptual & Planning Phase

During initial project formulation, value studies refine project vision, align multi-stakeholder priorities, right-size facility footprints, and optimize system architecture. Intervening at this stage establishes an adaptable project framework, which can reduce design rework and establish clear performance criteria before design is solidified.

  1. Schematic & Detailed Design Phase

During design development, the VE framework evaluates discipline-specific assemblies (e.g., structural framing systems, MEP redundancy, building envelope performance, and spatial flow). In this phase, the focus shifts to enhancing operational functionality, improving maintainability, standardizing systems, and optimizing construction sequencing.

  1. Construction & Execution Phase

During construction, value methodology transitions to formal Value Engineering Change Proposals (VECPs). At this stage, contractors propose field-level innovations, advanced material technologies, or constructability improvements. Owners maintain rigorous technical oversight to ensure that construction innovations improve field execution without compromising specified quality or long-term durability.

Methodological Framework

To yield results, capital owners are recommended to adhere to a standardized, multi-phase value methodology. As recognized by SAVE International and the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA), the VE Job Plan provides a disciplined structure for objective project enhancement [1, 2]. Each stage of the Job Plan fulfills a distinct function:

  1. Information Phase: Gathers baseline requirements, stakeholder goals, operational constraints, design models, and risk registers to establish a complete project picture.
  2. Function Analysis Phase: Maps required performance outputs using active verb/measurable noun pairs, uncovering areas where design complexity does not contribute to core project goals.
  3. Creativity Phase: Conducts multidisciplinary brainstorming to generate innovative design concepts, technological substitutions, and operational improvements.
  4. Evaluation Phase: Screens potential ideas against owner-defined value criteria, such as operational reliability, safety, and maintainability.
  5. Development Phase: Models viable VE alternatives into engineering proposals, supported by performance calculations, constructability reviews, and lifecycle impact assessments.
  6. Presentation & Action Phase: Submits formal recommendations to executive leadership and key stakeholders for final review and implementation.

Conclusion

Ultimately, embedding Value Engineering (VE) as a governance discipline transforms capital asset ownership from a reactive management exercise into a proactive value-creation strategy. By leveraging decisions in function analysis and conducting the workshop process through the structured VE Job Plan, owners ensure that resources spent serve a defined objective. Rather than compromising quality through superficial cost-cutting, the VE methodology aims to balance upfront execution with long-term performance, durability, and operational adaptability. Integrating VE milestones from early planning through construction by strategies such as enforcing multidisciplinary collaboration and conducting VE workshops can help capital projects better fulfill their strategic intent, minimize lifecycle costs, and increase the overall value the provides.

References

  • [1] SAVE International. Value Methodology Standard and Body of Knowledge.
  • [2] Federal Highway Administration (FHWA). Value Engineering Policy and Job Plan Guidelines.
  • [3] U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO). GAO Schedule Assessment Guide & Cost Assessment Guide: Best Practices for Project Management (GAO-16-89G / GAO-20-195G).

 

Value Engineering for Schedule Improvement: Evaluating Whether an Alternative Saves Time

Posted on by Adroit

Amin Terouhid, Ph.D., CVS

 

Executive takeaway. A value engineering (VE) alternative may save time without compromising functional scope or performance metrics. Localized activity time savings, or what is referred to as schedule compression, do not necessarily shorten project duration. Instead, assessing the critical path can determine if such schedule compression results in shortening the duration of a project. As such, project owners are recommended to evaluate proposed time savings within the schedule network prior to acceptance.

Start with the required function

Value engineering (VE) is a structured process for improving value by analyzing required functions and developing VE alternatives or design suggestions. SAVE International’s Value Methodology uses function analysis as the basis for conducting a VE study. According to SAVE International, the “Value Methodology (VM) is a systematic process used by a multidisciplinary team, led by a qualified VM facilitator, to improve the value of a project, product, process, service or organization through the analysis of functions. VM helps achieve an optimum balance between function, performance, quality, safety and cost. The proper balance results in the maximum value for the project” [1].

If schedule improvements are being considered as part of a VE study, it needs to be determined if such efforts undermine or adversely affect the value of the project or not. Compressing durations by compromising quality, safety margins, or operational durability erodes total value.

Time savings are assessed against the schedule network

Evaluating VE alternatives for schedule improvement requires assessing the critical path of the project network. The critical path represents a project’s longest continuous sequence of activities in the project schedule. This path determines the earliest time that the project can be completed. To complete a project earlier than its originally-planned completion date, the project longest path is typically shortened. Shortening a project schedule may be costly and result in unintended consequences. For example, schedule compression may cause stacking of trades and ultimately result in loss of labor and equipment productivity. Nevertheless, project teams may choose to shorten a project schedule due to a variety of reasons, such as catching up to achieve the planned dates that are affected by delays or due to a need to achieve some milestone dates earlier than expected.

Due to the potential impacts of schedule compression on the project, the project teams should use proper strategies to shorten the project longest path. In accelerating project activities, priority needs to be given to the critical activities because these activities drive the expected project completion date in the schedule. If a number of options exist, priority is typically given to those critical activities whose crashing is less costly. Improper implementation of acceleration plans may result in less than expected time savings, unexpectedly high costs of crashing, quality or safety issues, and loss of labor or equipment productivity. It is important to note, however, that acceleration is not the only option for shortening the longest path.

Depending on the type of the project and its scope of work, project teams may have a number of options to compress project schedules. The following table outlines some of the example methods in during the engineering, contracting and procurement phases:

Phase

Method

Method Description

Engineering

Constructability review and analysis

The review of designs to ensure designs can practically be implemented with cost-effective means and methods.
 

Incorporate modular components in design

The incorporation of modular components in design to ensure less time is needed to be spent on the jobsite to implement these components.
 

Reuse designs and plans

The reuse of previously-used design elements may result in saving design time and efforts.
 

Incorporate standard or typical components in the design

The use of standard or typical designs may help the design team save time and efforts in implementing designs.
 

Incorporate pre-engineered or on-the-shelf components in the design

The incorporation of pre-engineered or on-the-shelf components may reduce the need for designing new elements.

Contracting and procurement

Fast-tracking

The creation of an overlap between design and procurement or an overlap between procurement and implementation activities may result in time savings.
 

Outsourcing

The assignment of work to outside entities instead of implementing all activities in-house may help to use in-house resources in more effective ways.
 

Find alternative or equivalent modular products or systems

The use of alternative or equivalent products or systems may help to save time that would have otherwise been used to fabricate or supply items.

Conclusion

Because of the potential impacts of schedule compression on the project, the teams should use proper strategies to shorten the project’s longest path. Acceleration is not the only option to shorten the longest path. If a project team intends to shorten the project’s longest path, it is recommended that the team choose the most appropriate strategies in each of the main phases to ensure the schedule can be properly compressed in a cost-effective manner that fits the project needs, and by verifying that the value of the project is not adversely affected by factors such as compromising the quality or improperly sequencing the work.

Reference

[1] SAVE International. About the Value Methodology.

The Importance of Facilitation in a VE Workshop: Keeping the Team Focused and Productive

Posted on by Adroit

Amin Terouhid, Ph.D, CVS

 

Executive takeaway. Effective facilitation transforms value engineering (VE) team members into a cohesive, high-performing VE team. While the facilitator governs procedural rigor, stakeholder engagement, evidentiary standards, and workshop momentum, the project owner/sponsor and authorized decision-makers retain authority over functional requirements and recommendation acceptance.

Facilitation makes the method work

Value engineering (VE) is a structured, multidisciplinary method for improving value by studying what a project must do before deciding how it should do it. On the other hand, facilitation is the neutral management of that group process. The facilitator helps participants understand the task, follow the agreed method, contribute their knowledge, test assumptions, and document conclusions. SAVE International describes the Value Methodology as a systematic, function-oriented approach, making disciplined facilitation central to a credible study. [1]

Four core concepts establish the foundation of these methods:

  • Function: The essential objective of a project or system.
  • Performance: Quantitative standards specifying how a function must be fulfilled, evaluated against criteria such as capacity, reliability, safety, quality, and operational lifecycle.
  • Resources: The key process inputs including capital, schedule duration, labor, raw materials, equipment, and energy.
  • Life-Cycle Value: The economic and operational relationship between performance and resource expenditure across all project phases.

The facilitator operates as a process leader rather than a technical delegate, supplementing, but not replacing, technical specialists, designers, estimators, schedulers, operators, regulators, or owners. Technical specialists validate discipline-specific data; the facilitator enforces process execution; the VE team formulates VE alternatives or design suggestions.

 

Navigating the VE Job Plan Phases

The VE Job Plan defines the systematic sequence required to execute and follow through on a value study. As outlined by SAVE International and the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA), the plan integrates investigation (i.e., information phase), function analysis, idea generation, evaluation, development (i.e., implementation), presentation, and implementation monitoring [2]. Each phase demands a specific facilitation approach to maintain focus and momentum.

Job Plan work

Facilitator’s practical contribution

Information

Confirm the study boundary, establish common facts, expose missing information, and separate requirements from preferences.

Function analysis

Help the team state functions clearly, test relationships, and focus on project needs rather than familiar components.

Creativity

Defer criticism, invite broad participation, and generate alternatives before narrowing the list of alternatives.

Evaluation

Apply agreed criteria consistently, identify unsupported assumptions, and record why ideas advance or stop.

Implementation

Assign technical, cost, schedule, risk, and life-cycle checks so recommendations are adequately supported.

Presentation 

Present the reasoning clearly, capture decisions and conditions, and assign actions, owners, and due dates.

Neutral does not mean passive

Process neutrality requires the facilitator to remain unbiased regarding technical outcomes. It does not, however, permit passive tolerance of procedural deviations. A skilled facilitator actively intervenes to challenge poorly defined requirements, halt premature evaluation during creative synthesis, demand empirical substantiation for cost or schedule assertions, and neutralize dominant personalities or hierarchical influence.

Constructive disagreement serves as a tool to surface hidden constraints, risk profiles, or operational parameters. The facilitator converts conflict into actionable insight by framing core issues, identifying required empirical data, and refocusing discussion on agreed evaluation criteria.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) emphasizes that proficient VE study leadership requires capabilities beyond theoretical methodology, explicitly citing team alignment, integrative problem-solving, conflict resolution, and strategic communication [3]. These qualifications underscore the necessity of selecting facilitators who demonstrate both methodological mastery and advanced group management capabilities

Recommendations for Project Owners

Project owners can optimize value study outcomes by executing key governance actions across the study lifecycle:

  • Pre-Workshop: Retain a qualified facilitator during early project planning; align facilitator qualifications with project complexity and regulatory frameworks; formalize the study scope, deliverables, and decision-making protocol; assemble a balanced multidisciplinary team across engineering, construction, cost, schedule, operations, and stakeholder domains; ensure timely provision of current design data; and allocate sufficient time for each Job Plan phase.
  • Workshop: Cultivate a culture of transparent technical critique, refrain from signaling pre-determined preferences, and ensure unresolved engineering questions are assigned to specific owners with explicit resolution targets.
  • Post-Workshop: Establish and maintain a formal decision tracking log to record recommendation details, supporting assumptions, required technical verifications, final disposition, assigned action owners, and implementation schedules. This repository preserves accountability among design professionals and owners while ensuring viable value-add recommendations are realized during final implementation.

References

[1] SAVE International. About the Value Methodology.

[2] Federal Highway Administration. The Value Engineering Process and Job Plan.

[3] U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Value Engineering Frequently Asked Questions.

Preparing VE Workshop Participants with a Welcome Package

Posted on by Adroit

Amin Terouhid, Ph.D., CVS

 

Executive takeaway. A concise pre-workshop information package gives value engineering (VE) workshop participants a common starting point, clarifies preparation expectations, and preserves valuable workshop time for analysis. The package should prepare participants without overwhelming them, defending the current design, or predetermining solutions.

Create a common starting point

A value engineering (VE) workshop is a facilitated, multidisciplinary study that uses function analysis to improve value of a project, product, or process. SAVE International describes the Value Methodology as a systematic, function-oriented approach. [1]

A pre-workshop information package, sometimes called a participant information package or welcome package, is a focused set of materials issued in advance. It introduces the study purpose, project context, schedule, roles, working methods, and preparation assignments. Unlike the complete project record, it provides essential information and directs readers to supporting documents.

FHWA explains that the VE Job Plan begins with the Investigation Phase, when the team identifies known facts, missing information, and opportunities for value improvement. Advance review supports this phase and allows informed discussion to begin promptly. [2]

Connect each of the key elements of the welcome package to a preparation need

The following table connects each of the key elements of the welcome package to a preparation need and identify the purposes they aim to serve:

Package item

Purpose

Participant action

Welcome and study purpose

Explains why the study is being conducted and what decisions it will support

Confirm the purpose and identify questions

Agenda and VE Job Plan

Defines the workshop sequence, timing, and expected outputs

Understand when each type of contribution is needed

Project summary and study boundary

Describes the project and the systems or decisions included in the study

Review interfaces, exclusions, and constraints

Requirements and performance criteria

Identifies required functions and measurable expectations

Distinguish mandatory requirements from preferences

Baseline cost and schedule summary

Identifies the current design basis, estimate, milestones, and major assumptions

Flag missing, outdated, or inconsistent information

Team roster and roles

Identifies the sponsor, facilitator, specialists, decision makers, and key stakeholders

Know whom to contact and what expertise to bring

Logistics and preparation assignments

Provides location, technology, security, deadlines, and requested pre-reading

Complete assignments and arrive ready to participate

 

To align the team, key terms must be clearly established in advance:

 

  • Study Boundary: Identifies the specific systems, areas, interfaces, and decisions included or excluded.
  • Constraint: A non-negotiable condition every acceptable VE alternative or design suggestion must satisfy (e.g., codes, permits, funding limits, or owner requirements).
  • Baseline: The approved design, cost estimate, and schedule against which all VE alternatives and design suggestions are evaluated.

Improve participation without directing the answer

A well-prepared package minimizes time spent reviewing basic facts, which allows VE specialists to verify key inputs, and helps the facilitator spot information gaps early. It clarifies expected contributions across disciplines, including design or design disciplines, estimating, scheduling, construction, and operations.

 

When participants thoroughly understand required functions and performance criteria and the purposes of the study, they will be in a better position to explore creative alternatives or design suggestions. However, the practitioners are warned against some common mistakes. Common pitfalls include:

  • Unguided pre-reading assignments
  • Conflicting document revisions or undefined acronyms
  • Missing instructions or late distribution
  • A large document transfer

Recommended owner actions

Facilitators are recommended to prepare and distribute the welcome package, and owners are recommended to authorize one controlled package. They need to keep it concise; link to detailed records; identify required reading; state the purpose, boundary, constraints, and decisions; define roles and decision authority.

A useful welcome package does not guarantee agreement, but it allows informed disagreement to occur earlier and on a common factual basis. That readiness helps the workshop protect required functions, test performance, use resources responsibly, and pursue better life-cycle value.

References

[1] SAVE International. About the Value Methodology.

[2] Federal Highway Administration. The Value Engineering Process and Job Plan.

Value Engineering and Constructability Reviews: How to Coordinate Two Complementary Services

Posted on by Adroit

Amin Terouhid, Ph.D., CVS

 

Executive takeaway. Value engineering (VE) and constructability reviews address somewhat different questions, but their findings often intersect. VE evaluates whether project, process, or system functions can be delivered with better overall value. Constructability review, on the other hand, evaluates whether the design can be built safely, efficiently, and as intended. Coordinating these services gives owners broader insight while preserving separate objectives, methods, and records.

Different questions, complementary results

Value engineering (VE) is a structured, multidisciplinary process that analyzes project functions and develops VE alternatives or design suggestions to improve value. A function states what the project must accomplish, and performance describes how well that function must be delivered to be able to demonstrate performance in areas such as capacity, safety, reliability, maintainability, and code requirements. Resources typically include money, time, labor, equipment, materials, and energy. SAVE International’s Value Methodology uses function analysis to examine the relationship between function, performance, and resources. [1]

Although VE and constructability reviews address somewhat different questions, their findings often intersect. A constructability review is a systematic examination of design documents by people with relevant construction knowledge. It considers whether the work can be safely built with available access, equipment, labor, materials, sequencing, temporary works, and site controls. The review may also identify incomplete details, conflicts between drawings and specifications, difficult interfaces, unclear bid requirements, and obstacles to inspection or maintenance. USACE describes constructability reviews as evaluating project and contract features for ease of successful and safe execution.

The distinction is practical. For example, VE may ask whether another structural system can transfer the required loads with better life-cycle value. Constructability review, on the other hand, may ask whether the selected system can be fabricated, delivered, erected, connected, inspected, and protected under actual project conditions. Either review may identify cost or schedule benefits, but neither should be reduced to informal cost cutting or routine drawing coordination. The following table compares the primary questions, the main lens through which these types of studies assess the project, and their typical output:

 

Comparison

VE Study

Constructability Review

Primary question

What must the project do, and how can value improve?

Can the design be built safely and efficiently?

Main lens

Function, performance, resources, and life-cycle value

Access, sequencing, means and methods, interfaces, and field conditions

Typical output

Developed design suggestions and VE alternatives with evaluation and recommendations

Comments, risk items, design clarifications, and practical corrections

Overlap occurs when a constructability observation reveals a value opportunity. Limited crane access, for example, may prompt a different assembly strategy. Conversely, a VE alternative may introduce new construction risks that require a closer review. The two services should exchange information, but each finding should retain its origin and evaluation criteria. They have different focus areas.

Coordinate the reviews through one decision process

The owner typically begins with a common information package, consisting of the owner’s project requirements, drawings, specifications, cost estimate, schedule, site and utility information, permit conditions, risk register, and/or major procurement assumptions. The owner’s project requirements define the outcomes and performance the completed facility must achieve.

A qualified VE facilitator leads the structured VE Job Plan, including information, function analysis, idea generation, evaluation, development, and presentation. SAVE International and FHWA describe these phases as an organized process for developing and presenting alternatives. The constructability lead coordinates discipline reviews and consolidates comments on execution, safety, access, sequencing, interfaces, and document completeness. Designers explain the design basis and evaluate changes, and the owner accepts, rejects, or defers recommendations. [1, 2]

A shared issue log can prevent duplication. Each item should record its source, affected requirement, discipline, cost and schedule implications, responsible evaluator, decision, and required follow-up. Similar comments may be combined, but a constructability correction should not be reported as a VE saving unless it has undergone functional and value evaluation. Likewise, a VE alternative should not be recommended for implementation until its constructability has been verified.

Recommendations for owners

Owners are recommended to define separate scopes and deliverables; schedule coordination early enough to influence design; include design, construction, operations, estimating, scheduling, safety, and procurement knowledge; use one controlled issue log; verify VE alternatives for constructability before approval; evaluate constructability ideas through VE when they change function, performance, or life-cycle economics; and document final decisions and assigned actions.

Coordinating the reviews supports that balance by avoiding solutions that appear economical but are difficult to build, operate, or maintain. The objective is not to maximize the number of comments or VE alternatives. Instead, the objective is to produce practical and reasonable VE alternatives or constructability recommendations that are practical, buildable, preserve required functions, meet performance criteria, use resources responsibly, and reduce avoidable project risk.

References

[1] SAVE International. About the Value Methodology.

[2] Federal Highway Administration. The Value Engineering Process and Job Plan.

Orientation Meetings Before Value Engineering Workshops: Why Early Alignment Improves Workshop Results

Posted on by Adroit

Amin Terouhid, Ph.D., CVS

Maryam Mirhadi, Ph.D., VMA

 

Executive takeaway. An orientation meeting prepares the value engineering (VE) team for the workshop. It confirms the objective, scope, information, participants, and decision process. It does not perform the VE study; it creates the shared understanding needed to conduct the workshop effectively.

Define the meeting before defining the agenda

An orientation meeting, often referred to as a pre-workshop or VE kickoff, is a structured, targeted session held prior to the formal value engineering (VE) workshop. To understand its purpose, it is helpful to define key VE terms:

  • VE: A systematic, multidisciplinary process led by a qualified facilitator using function analysis to optimize the balance between performance and resources.[1]
  • Function: What an element must accomplish.
  • Performance: How well the function must be fulfilled, including parameters like safety, capacity, reliability, quality, and maintainability.
  • Resources: The total commitments required, encompassing capital cost, construction schedule, labor, materials, equipment, and operating energy.

As such, the orientation meeting is not a shortened or preliminary workshop. The actual workshop adheres strictly to the six-phase VE Job Plan; therefore, the workshop follows the VE Job Plan: information, function analysis, creativity, evaluation, development, and presentation. The orientation meeting, however, confirms scope, information, participants, logistics, and decision process. This separation is important and prevents unintended outcomes (e.g., solutions from being selected before functions and alternatives are analyzed) for the orientation meeting.

Align the study with the decisions the owner must make

VE teams are recommended to begin by defining the core decision the study must support (e.g., closing a budget gap, mitigating schedule risks, or confirming major systems). Evaluating life-cycle value, which requires balancing performance against resources across all stages, and deciding on the approach to use the life-cycle approach throughout the VE study are also important. A well-defined objective guides preparation while keeping the team open to creative alternatives. Some of the key agenda items for orientation meetings can include:

  • Study Boundaries: Define the specific systems, physical areas, project interfaces, and decision points included in the review.
  • Constraints: Identify non-negotiable requirements that every viable alternative must satisfy, including legal mandates, permits, environmental commitments, owner standards, funding limits, and stakeholder approvals.
  • Preferences: Document desirable features that can be re-evaluated if a competing approach delivers superior value.

Therefore, some of the key items discussed in orientation meetings are as follows:

 

Orientation topic

Description

Purpose and scope

Study objectives, boundaries, decisions to be supported

Project requirements

Required functions, performance criteria, commitments, constraints

Information readiness

Current drawings, estimate, schedule, risks, operations data

People and roles

Sponsor, decision makers, facilitator, team members, presenters

Workshop plan

Dates, location, Job Plan, deliverables, decision and follow-up process

USACE identifies pre-workshop tasks that include defining scope and schedule, selecting the team, and collecting cost, schedule, scope, and risk information. Its guidance also recognizes implementation meetings and resolution of technical issues after the workshop. A credible VE study therefore begins with preparation and continues through implementation. [2]

Put the right people and information in the room

The VE sponsoring agency or sponsor should explain the need, approve the objective, and identify the decision authority, the person or group authorized to accept or reject recommendations. The project manager coordinates records and follow-up. The facilitator confirms the Job Plan, schedule, team, and deliverables. Collectively, the VE team should provide relevant design, construction, cost, schedule, procurement, operations, maintenance, safety, and user knowledge.

The meeting should also identify missing or inconsistent information and assign a responsible person and due date. Inputs typically include owner requirements, design criteria, drawings, specifications, estimate, schedule, risk register, site data, permits, procurement assumptions, operating costs, and lessons learned. A risk register records identified risks, potential impacts, and planned risk responses, also referred to as risk response strategies. The facilitator can also distribute a focused welcome package for participants.

Use the meeting to protect workshop independence

Preparation should support creative analysis. Designers should explain the design basis, the documented criteria and assumptions behind the current design, without defending solutions or rejecting alternatives in advance. The facilitator should record required functions, measurable performance criteria, constraints, unresolved questions, and assumptions so the team can question solutions while respecting requirements.

FHWA’s VE process and also SAVE International value mythology begin with an Information Phase that gathers facts, constraints, costs, schedule data, and stakeholder objectives before function analysis. The orientation meeting supports this phase by identifying presenters and controlling documents. The meeting is not intended to replace independent review or the Job Plan. [1,3]

Concluding

By establishing clear boundaries, securing the right multidisciplinary expertise, and gathering complete baseline data prior to the VE study kickoff, the orientation meeting sets the stage for a disciplined VE study. Rather than rushing into premature problem-solving, this crucial preparation phase aligns the VE team around the owner’s core decisions, protects the independence of the formal VE Job Plan, and ensures that the upcoming workshop can focus entirely on maximizing project value.

References

[1] SAVE International. About the Value Methodology.

[2] U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Value Engineering Frequently Asked Questions.

[3] Federal Highway Administration. The Value Engineering Process and Job Plan.

From Value Engineering Workshop to Implemented Value: Closing the Value Engineering Follow-Through Gap

Posted on by Adroit

Amin Terouhid, Ph.D., CVS

Maryam Mirhadi, Ph.D., VMA

 

Executive takeaway. A value engineering (VE) workshop produces VE alternatives or design suggestions, but value remains unrealized until the project team acts. Owners should make timely decisions, assign responsibility, incorporate accepted VE alternatives or design suggestions into the design, and verify the work. Structured follow-through connects VE workshop to project delivery.

The workshop is a decision point, not the finish line

Value engineering (VE) is a structured, multidisciplinary process that uses function analysis to improve the relationship between required performance and the resources needed to achieve the intended functions and enhance the value of a project, process, or organization. SAVE International describes value as the relationship between function performance and resources. [1]

A VE recommendation is a developed proposal supported by assumptions, advantages, disadvantages, cost and schedule effects, risks, and implementation steps. Acceptance is the owner’s documented decision to proceed. However, implementation occurs when the VE alternative or design suggestion is, in fact, incorporated into design, approvals, procurement, construction, and operating requirements. Because these are separate stages, a VE workshop is not considered an achieved saving or enhanced value.

Create an accountable path from recommendation to completion

Before the VE workshop closes, the facilitator and project manager typically establish a VE action register, which is a register that tracks each VE alternative or design suggestion through closeout. Each entry should identify the affected function, required performance, cost and schedule basis, reviews, documents, decision authority, action owner, due date, dependencies, and final disposition. The decision authority may accept or reject the proposal; the action owner completes the assigned follow-up. A deferred item should state what remains necessary and when it will be reconsidered.

The VE report should provide enough technical, cost, and schedule information for a decision. FHWA’s VE process includes developing VE alternatives or design suggestions, presenting recommendations, and preparing an implementation plan. Its Job Plan supports both the study and implementation. FHWA also cautions against overstating or double-counting estimated savings. [2]

 

 

Convert an accepted VE alternative or design suggestion into controlled changes

Change control is the formal process for reviewing, approving, recording, and communicating a change to the project baseline. The baseline is the approved scope, cost, and schedule used to measure change. After accepting a recommendation, the project manager should identify affected drawings, specifications, calculations, estimates, schedules, risk records, permits, procurement packages, contracts, commissioning plans, and operating information. Commissioning verifies that systems are installed, tested, and operating as required. The designer must confirm continued compliance with owner requirements, codes, permits, and professional responsibilities.

If the established change management requirements are properly followed, an accepted VE alternative or design suggestion should be formally incorporated into the change management process. The proposed change should be appropriately reviewed, approved, documented, and incorporated into the design in accordance with the applicable change control procedures. This is what is meant by converting an accepted VE alternative or design suggestion into a “controlled change”: the recommendation does not simply become part of the design informally but is implemented through the established change management process to ensure proper authorization, documentation, coordination, and traceability.

 

Verify value and retain the lesson

Verification determines whether the completed VE alternative or design suggestion preserved the required functions, met the performance criteria, used the expected resources, and improved life-cycle value. Supporting evidence may include approved design revisions, procurement records, inspection and test results, commissioning data, schedule updates, cost records, maintenance requirements, and user feedback. For applicable Federal-aid highway projects, current federal rules require State transportation agencies to incorporate approved VE recommendations into the plans, specifications, and estimates before construction authorization and to monitor and report implementation. [3]

Although those requirements apply only within the regulation’s scope, the management practice is useful: distinguish among proposed, accepted, incorporated, completed, and verified recommendations. Close an item only when evidence is available. Record rejected VE alternatives or design suggestions, and reasons so later teams can understand the decision and avoid repeating the analysis.

Recommended owner actions

 

It is recommended that owners identify decision authority and action owners before the VE workshop; align response dates with design and procurement milestones; maintain one action register linked to change control; perform technical, cost, schedule, risk, permit, and operational reviews in proportion to the change; update affected baselines and contract documents; verify function and performance; and report achieved results separately from the VE workshop. The facilitator may support tracking, but project leadership remains responsible for decisions and implementation. Owners should make timely decisions, assign responsibility, incorporate accepted VE alternatives or design suggestions into the design, and verify the work. Structured follow-through connects VE workshop to project delivery.

References

[1] SAVE International. About the Value Methodology.

[2] Federal Highway Administration. The Value Engineering Process and Job Plan.

[3] Electronic Code of Federal Regulations. 23 CFR 627.7, VE Programs.

Initial Costs Versus Life-Cycle Costs

Posted on by Adroit

Maryam Mirhadi, Ph.D., VMA

Amin Terouhid, Ph.D., CVS

 

Executive takeaway. The alternative with the lowest initial costs does not necessarily provide the lowest total cost or the best value. A sound value engineering (VE) comparison first confirms that each alternative performs the required functions at an acceptable level. It then evaluates the resources each alternative will consume over an appropriate period. Life-cycle cost analysis places costs occurring at different times on a common economic basis so owners can reasonably compare alternatives.

Begin with function and performance

VE is a structured process for improving value by analyzing required functions and developing alternatives. SAVE International’s Value Methodology places function, or the main purposes that a system aims to serve, at the center of the analysis. [1]

Initial costs are the cost required to design, purchase, install, test, or place an alternative into service, whereas life-cycle cost (LCC) is the total cost of acquiring, operating, maintaining, replacing, and disposing of an asset over a defined period. A future dollar is not economically equivalent to a dollar spent today. Therefore, life-cycle cost analysis (LCCA) can be used as an economic method to calculate and compare those costs. Before performing LCCA, the team should confirm functional equivalence, that the alternatives provide the same required functions or at an enhanced level, and satisfy the owner’s minimum performance criteria.

Test the assumptions, not only the arithmetic

An LCC result is only as reliable as its inputs. Owners should document the source, timing, and uncertainty of each cost. Energy prices, operating hours, maintenance labor, component life, replacement scope, loss of service, and price escalation may change the ranking. As such, sensitivity analysis can be used to perform the systematic testing of how results change when uncertain inputs vary. By varying service life, energy cost, or the discount rate, the team can identify the conditions under which the preferred alternative changes.

It is important to note, however, that not every important factor can be priced reliably. Nonmonetized effects can still be evaluated without assigning a dollar value. Examples may include factors such as reliability, occupant comfort, operational continuity, safety, adaptability, environmental performance, and stakeholder impacts. These effects should be documented and evaluated alongside LCC. A lower LCC is not a sound recommendation if the alternative impairs a required function or creates unacceptable performance risk.

Recommendations for owners

As a professional recommendation, owners should confirm functional equivalence and minimum performance; define a common analysis period, base date, and cost basis; and include all relevant costs including acquisition, operation, maintenance, replacement, loss-of-service, and disposal costs. They also need to use current owner-approved economic assumptions; document data sources and uncertainty; test influential variables; and report initial costs, LCC, and nonmonetized effects separately to ensure a reasonable LCCA can be performed for reasonably assessing and comparing alternatives. This approach makes the reasoning transparent and keeps VE focused on the life cycle costs, not initial costs of alternatives.

References

[1] SAVE International. About the Value Methodology.

[2] Federal Highway Administration. Life-Cycle Cost Analysis.