System Model for Analyzing Design Productivity

Andrew S. Chang, P.E.1; and William Ibbs, M.ASCE2

Abstract: Many engineering design companies collect data such as person hours to manage projects. But the relationships between
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operational variables and performance are usually not thoroughly analyzed and interpreted. This paper proposes a system model and
procedure to relate influence variables to project productivity. The model was tested by analyzing 190 projects of an engineering
consulting company. The relationships between design productivity and various input and process variables were identified and inter-
preted. For example, project size has a negative relationship with productivity, while the effect of quality assurance/quality control on
productivity is not clear. Based on documented data and derived information, this model can help companies gain operational insight and
thus improve productivity and profitability.
DOI: 10.1061/共ASCE兲0742-597X共2006兲22:1共27兲
CE Database subject headings: Information management; Productivity; Performance characteristics; Engineering firms; Project
management.

Introduction pany will improve the company’s performance and profitability.

Engineering companies usually collect data such as project dura-
tion and person hours to manage design work, but then do not
analyze these data rigorously. Therefore, information is not de-
rived to interpret cause-effect relationships, improve performance,
plan future work, and create knowledge. Such inadequate engi-
neering management is common and causes one-third of architec-
tural engineering 共A/E兲 projects to miss cost and schedule targets
共Barlow 1985; Anderson and Tucker 1994兲.
Many studies propose frameworks to create or acquire knowl-
edge, but they usually do not provide details of how this can be
accomplished 共Rubenstein-Montano et al. 2001兲. Knowledge
management demands better information in terms of data needs,
collection, analysis, and interpretation. When data needs and col-
lection are well planned, analysis and interpretation will generate
knowledge and better project management. For example, if
project duration is seen as related to performance, project dura-
tion and performance data are needed, collected, and analyzed to
interpret their relationship to verify tacit knowledge.
For engineering companies, explicit knowledge is more tech-
nical in nature and can be more easily expressed and transmitted
than tacit knowledge 共Nonaka and Takeuchi 1995兲. Tacit knowl-
edge is difficult to articulate and mostly embedded in less-
understood nontechnical issues such as project management
methods 共Kuprenas 2003兲. Bloodgood and Salisbury 共2001兲 argue
that making such tacit knowledge available throughout the com-
1 To identify the relationships between these variables and produc-
Associate Professor of Civil Engineering, National Cheng Kung
Univ., Tainan, Taiwan. E-mail: anschang@mail.ncku.edu.tw
2
Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering, 213 McLaughlin
Hall, Univ. of California, Berkeley, CA 94720; and The Ibbs Consulting
Group, Inc. 共corresponding author兲. E-mail: ibbs@ce.berkeley.edu
Note. Discussion open until June 1, 2006. Separate discussions must
be submitted for individual papers. To extend the closing date by one
month, a written request must be filed with the ASCE Managing Editor.
The manuscript for this paper was submitted for review and possible
publication on November 19, 2004; approved on August 15, 2005. This
paper is part of the Journal of Management in Engineering, Vol. 22, No.
1, January 1, 2006. ©ASCE, ISSN 0742-597X/2006/1-27–34/$25.00.
Knowledge can be generated by data mining tools 共Shaw et al.
2001兲. Data mining refers to the application of acquisition meth-
ods to the generation of potentially useful knowledge from the
organization and analysis of raw data 共Michalski et al. 1998兲.
The research described in this paper establishes a system
model and procedure to guide the performance analysis and inter-
pretation process. The model was tested on 190 projects of an
engineering consulting company to search for relationships and
knowledge among the input variables, process variables, and
productivity.
The Model
The system model of input-process-output 共I-P-O兲 has often been
used to manage organization operation and project performance
共Simons 2000; A guide 2000兲. Our research develops a similar
model, shown in Fig. 1, to analyze engineering project productiv-
ity. Because knowledge is potentially infinite, measuring organi-
zational knowledge has to rely on general categories to capture
the rich variety of knowledge 共Schulz and Jobe 2001兲. Therefore,
general categories and variables are established at the project
stages in Fig. 1. The work data 共I1兲 and work nature 共I2兲 and their
variables are listed at the input stage; work division 共P1兲 and
management 共P2兲 are listed at the process stage; and productivity
and other performance measures 共O兲 are listed at the output stage.
Productivity is influenced by the input and process variables.
tivity, a company has to establish categories and collect data con-
cerning the selected variables. Two explicit categories are estab-
lished at the input and process stages, respectively. The work data
category 共I1兲 includes variables that have been given at the begin-
ning of a project, such as project type, duration, contract amount,
etc. Work division 共P1兲 includes variables that can be deployed by
a company, such as budget and quality assurance/quality control
共QA/QC兲. These variables contain basic data for performance
analysis and can be collected by companies. But few variables are
tracked in engineering design projects except those mostly of a

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J. Manage. Eng., 2006, 22(1): 27-34

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Fig. 1. System model
quantitative nature, such as duration and actual hours 共Eldin
1991兲.
There are also implicit variables that influence productivity.
They are qualitative in nature and cannot be easily recorded in a
database, such as I2 and P2, expressed in the shaded portions of
Fig. 1. Work nature 共I2兲 includes variables such as task character-
istics, task interdependence, and possessed information. The five
variables listed in Fig. 1 are the sources of work uncertainty and
equivocality 共U&E兲 that describe work characteristics to a great
extent 共Chang 2001兲. They are used as proxies to measure work
nature.
The management category 共P2兲 includes coordination, stake-
holder needs, schedule effectiveness, etc. These process variables
have been proven to improve project performance 共Chang and
Ibbs 1998; Kuprenas 2003兲. They are adopted here to remind
management of their importance.
Implementation Procedure
A concept has to be implemented and tested in order to verify its
value; thus, a procedure was developed to test the proposed
model. It involves two steps to prepare the data and five steps to
analyze and interpret it, which is similar to a data mining process
共Feelders et al. 2000兲:
1. Define data needs at the O, I, and P stages. Define produc-
tivity or other pertinent performance measures 共O兲 such as
profit. The measurable I1 variables usually include project
type, contract amount, the client, etc. Other variables can be
included, such as the design impacting variables 共Chalabi et
al. 1986兲. Because the qualitative I2 variables are not usually
readily available, a project nature questionnaire was designed
to collect them 共Chang and Chiu 2005兲. Similarly, the pro-
cess variables P1 共and P2兲 are defined.
2. Establish database and collect data. A sufficient amount of
data must be collected and categorized according to the I, P,
and O stages.
3. Analyze I-O relationships. Extract data from the database
and start the first step of input-output analysis. The purpose
is to know whether productivity can be predicted upon re-
ceiving a project.
4. Analyze P-O relationships. Determine which process vari-
ables affect productivity. The relationships identified in steps
28 / JOURNAL OF MANAGEMENT IN ENGINEERING © ASCE / JANUARY 2006
J. Manage. Eng., 2006, 22(1): 27-34
3 and 4 will help management study and act appropriately.
5. Analyze I-P relationships. This analysis helps identify how a
company deploys the work team or adopts management
methods for a given work. The purpose is to examine a com-
pany’s decision-making relevance at the early stage of work.
6. Link I-P-O relationships. Synthesize the preceding relation-
ships and examine the combined effect of various variables
to identify dominant productivity-contributing variables.
7. Propose the company’s productivity knowledge. Disseminate
this knowledge so that all managers in the company can
utilize this information profitably.
Case Study and Exploring I-P-O Relationships
The preceding model and procedure was tested to prove its valid-
ity. This research mainly analyzed quantitative data of an engi-
neering consulting company’s projects and interviewed relevant
project managers to supplement the quantitative analysis. One
hundred ninety projects completed between 1996 and 2001 in the
company’s database contained data of eight I1 and 11 P1 vari-
ables, and parts of them are listed in Fig. 1. This company spe-
cializes in planning, design, and construction supervision of tra-
ditional construction projects such as transportation, hydraulics,
and area development.
Productivity is defined as hours per drawing in this research.
This is a commonly adopted measure and easy to obtain, although
some other measures may be needed if computer 3D models are
replacing drawings. The hours/drawing numbers were collected at
the project level and by different disciplines. For example, engi-
neers of architecture, structure, and mechanical disciplines may
charge hours if they work on a drawing. Hours and drawings of
individual disciplines were not analyzed separately, because the
data retrieval would have been too cumbersome. The projects had
cost codes for engineers to charge on drawings, specifications,
and other documents 共Chang and Tsai 2003兲.
If output performance is satisfactory, managers will not care
much about input or process variables. But when productivity is
not satisfactory, the managers need to explore I1 共and I2兲, as well
as P1 共and P2兲 to relate the causing variables. The I-P-O relation-
ship is linked through either I-O, or I-P and P-O. They are
described individually in the following sections.
 Table 1. Project Type-Productivity Relationship 共I1-O兲 Table 3. Project Phase-Productivity Relationship 共I1-O兲
Project type Number Hours/drawing Rank Project phase Number Hours/drawing Rank
Rail transportation 34 46 1 Design 115 42 1
Highway 64 55 2 Planning 66 93 2
Air transportation 18 59 3 Construction supervision 9 94 3
Soft systems 5 61 4 Total 190 63
Environmental facilities 10 65 5
Area development 39 80 6
Hydraulic 20 83 7 hypothesis of the same productivity will be rejected. That is, the
Total 190 63 productivity differences among project phases are not attributed
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I-O Relationships
I-O includes I1-O and I2-O. Fig. 1 shows that work data I1 and
work nature I2 are the two categories of input variables. Produc-
tivity in terms of hours/drawing stands for output performance O.
The I1 variables analyzed hereafter are project type, phase, and
duration. Project type and phase are qualitative information, while
duration is quantitative data.
Project Type 共I1兲-O
Project type is a variable that can be analyzed to see whether
certain project types are more productive than others. The project
type and productivity relationship is shown in Table 1. Productiv-
ity is ranked by average hours/drawing rates for individual project
types. It appears that transportation projects 共rail, highway, and
air兲 have better productivity, i.e., smaller hours/drawing values. In
contrast, area development and hydraulic projects are not as
productive.
To make sure these differences are not attributed to chance, an
analysis of variance 共ANOVA兲 using a = 0.05 was conducted. The
results are shown in Table 2. Because F = 0.98 is less than the
critical value of 2.15 for 6 and 183 degrees of freedom 共DOF兲, the
null hypothesis of the same productivity cannot be rejected. That
is, the productivity differences among different types of projects
are not significant.
Transportation knowledge is the company’s core competence.
The general trend in Table 1 indicates that the productivity of
transportation projects is ranked among the top, but this is not
concluded by ANOVA. This result deserves the company’s further
investigation: are transportation projects really more productive?
Or is it because transportation projects produce more drawings
and the other types of projects produce fewer? When the reason is
found, knowledge can be generated and transmitted to employees,
and the company can steer toward higher productivity for
transportation projects.
Project Phase 共I1兲-O
The project phase-hours/drawing relationship is shown in Table 3.
Design has the best productivity of 42 hours/drawing, almost half
the rates for planning and construction supervision. The ANOVA
results 共a = 0.05兲 are shown in Table 4. Because F = 12.0 is larger
than the critical value of 3.04 for 2 and 187 DOF, the null
to chance.
However, this does not necessarily mean design work is more
productive than the other two phases. Rather, it is because design
projects’ main products are drawings, while planning and con-
struction supervision projects focus on other deliverables such as
reports, which are less uniform and tangible. Further research can
be pursued to find other productivity or performance measures for
planning and construction supervision projects.
Project Duration 共I1兲-O
The project duration-hours/drawing relationship of the 190
projects is charted in Fig. 2. The solid line represents the statisti-
cal parabolic regression function. The coefficient of determination
R2 = 0.0937 looks low. Prior to this parabolic regression, a linear
regression resulted in a smaller value R2 = 0.0521, in which the P
value= 0.0015 in the ANOVA.
Another way of grouping duration is by year. Table 5 displays
a more obvious trend. It shows that project productivity has a
negative relationship with duration; that is, projects with shorter
durations are more productive, especially those shorter than
2 years. This relationship is confirmed by ANOVA results as
shown in Table 6, in which F = 2.9 is larger than the critical value
of 2.26.
One explanation is that, for long lasting projects, people who
are not released still charge their hours on the projects while the
number of drawings does not increase in proportion to the project
duration. This should garner the company’s attention when
managing longer duration contracts.
The preceding three analysis examples are based on the single
variable-productivity relationship. Since productivity is contrib-
uted by more than one variable, multiple regressions are more
appropriate to see how the combined effect would explain more
of the variance. A linear multiple regression was conducted by
including the three variables, but 11 variables were generated
in this equation: seven project types, three project phases, and
one duration. The R2 = 0.1967 increased and the P value was
8.07E-6.
However, it will become too complicated if all variables are
included in one regression, and the analysis would be formidable.
There are eight input variables 共I1兲, and some of them are quali-
tative data that need to be split into more variables to be included
in one multiple regression equation. Complication will further
increase if the other 11 process variables 共P1兲 are included, with-
out considering the implicit I2 and P2 variables yet. Furthermore,

Table 2. ANOVA of Project Type and Productivity

Sources SS DOF MS F P-value Critical value
Between groups 32,220.2276 6 5,370.037929 0.982505446 0.438471488 2.148409577
Within groups 1,000,215.26 183 5,465.657163
Total 1,032,435.49 189

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J. Manage. Eng., 2006, 22(1): 27-34

 Table 4. ANOVA of Project Phase and Productivity
Sources SS DOF MS F P-value Critical value
Between groups 117,484.6663 2 58,742.33313 12.00590899 1.2431E − 05 3.044240461
Within groups 914,950.8221 187 4,892.785145
Total 1,032,435.488 189

different companies will collect their own variable data. It is
very likely that the results from multiple regressions would be
irrelevant to other companies.
High R2 values are hard to get from single variable-
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Budget 共P1兲-O
The relationship between budget and hours/drawing is shown in
Fig. 4. R2 = 0.1375 indicates a higher degree of correlation.

Prior to this parabolic regression, a linear regression resulted

productivity relationships. For example, R2 = 0.0937 might be in a smaller value of R2 = 0.1323, in which the P value⫽2.50E-07
small. But a higher R2 value in a single variable relationship in the ANOVA. That is, using the budget to predict productivity is
normally will have a larger coefficient in a multiple regression. a meaningful method
Hence, relative productivity prediction by different variables can To further investigate, the budget is divided into seven ranges
still be obtained by comparing these R2 values from single vari- to evaluate the productivity in each range, as shown in Table 7.
able relationships, complemented by ANOVA significance. This More productive projects have smaller budgets, as is seen in the
alternative approach is also easier to understand and use. The first three project categories. One explanation is that smaller bud-
following analyses also adopt this approach. get projects have limited room for people to charge hours and
managers keep a closer eye on charges, while managers let engi-
Work Nature 共I2兲-O neers charge hours on larger projects with more room. This rela-
A questionnaire was developed from the five U&E sources to tionship is confirmed by the ANOVA results shown in Table 8.
quantify project work nature. For each U or E dimension, three Project duration, budget, or contract amount can be a surrogate
questions were designed, and each question had five possible an- for project size. The duration– and budget–productivity relation-
swers to represent the U&E degrees of 1–5. The mean score was ships have been identified previously. The contract amount is
27 关=3*共3 + 3 + 3 + 3 − 3兲兴 to distinguish high and low U&E for added to test its relationship with productivity. The linear regres-
each project. The fifth source is a minus item, because the task- sion shows an R2 = 0.1265 and a P value⫽4.76E-07; that is, the
possessed information reduces U&E 共Chang 2001兲. negative relationship between contract amount and productivity is
The correlation between work nature I2 variables and hours/ also significant. In addition to the human factor’s person-hour
drawing is low. Fig. 3 shows R2 = 0.0004 for the linear charge inadequacy, it can be inferred that, with increased project
uncertainty–productivity relationship. Similarly, R2 = 0.005 for size, the degree of difficulty and complexity increases, which in
equivocality but is not charted. These low R2 values mean that turn makes productivity worse. Some mechanisms are needed in
project nature does not affect project productivity. This implies the work process, especially from management, to prevent this
that work nature is not a key productivity factor for this company. danger. This is where project management 共PM兲 techniques can
A simple project may not be productive, while a complex one can play an important role 共Kerzner 2003兲.
be efficient. This means that some mechanisms in the work
process transform the work nature, and the variables in the QA/QC 共P1兲-O
mechanisms play a productivity change role. QA/QC are the management section and technical aspect, respec-
tively, of quality management 共A guide 2000兲. QA is the collec-
tive term for the formal activities and managerial processes that
P-O Relationships
attempt to ensure that products and services meet the required
Work division 共P1兲 and management 共P2兲 are the two categories quality level 共Kerzner 2003兲. For example, the project manager
in the process mechanism. Work division refers to how a com- needs to establish the administrative processes and procedures to
pany divides the work when it starts, including assigning project ensure customer satisfaction. QC is the activities and techniques
managers, allocating budgets, adopting QA/QC, etc. These vari- within the work process that are intended to create specific quality
ables are based on the company’s decisions and can influence characteristics. QC activities include continually monitoring pro-
productivity. The management category includes more implicit cesses, identifying problem causes, and use of statistical process
variables such as project 共process兲 management methods and control to reduce the variability and to increase the efficiency of
tools. These variables are formed by the ability and experience of processes.
a company and its managers. The relationships of budget and
QA/QC with productivity are analyzed subsequently.
Table 5. Project Duration-Productivity Relationship 共I1-O兲
Project duration
共years兲 Number Hours/drawing Rank
0⬃1 67 39 1
1⬃2 65 64 2
2⬃3 24 83 3
3⬃4 10 83 3
4⬃5 15 95 6
+5 9 92 5
Fig. 2. Project duration-productivity relationship 共I1-O兲 Total 190 63

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J. Manage. Eng., 2006, 22(1): 27-34

 Table 6. ANOVA of Project Duration and Productivity
Sources SS DOF MS
Between groups 75,419.1 5 15,083.81996
Within groups 957,016.4 184 5,201.176025
Total 1,032,435 189
The QA/QC implementation-productivity relationship is
shown in Table 9. The 190 projects are divided into two groups:
77 projects with QA/QC implemented and 113 projects without
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QA/QC. Table 9 shows that projects implementing QA/QC pro-
cedure are less productive. Because this difference is small 共64
and 62兲, it is further tested by a proportions inference. The num-
bers of projects, productive and nonproductive as well as imple-
menting QA/QC or not, are shown in Table 10. The average pro-
ductivity of 190 projects is 63, which is used to divide the
productive and nonproductive projects. To test the significance of
group difference, a confidence interval of 95% 共a = 0.05兲 is used
and Z共1−a兲 = 1.64. Because Z0 = 0.422, the hypothesis H0 that
QA/QC projects are more productive than non-QA/QC projects
cannot be rejected; that is, the presence of QA/QC requirements is
not significant on a project’s productivity.
Perhaps QA/QC implementation requires additional time from
quality engineers, which lowers planning and design productivity.
Although the construction phase of projects—and hence the over-
all project—can benefit from design QA/QC work, the company
should check whether QA/QC brings higher profits or higher cli-
ent satisfaction, which thus justifies the extra quality effort and
hours. The company’s quality process can also be validated to
ensure their quality knowledge.
Project Management 共P2兲-O
Many studies have pointed out that project management 共PM兲 is a
key factor to performance 共Anderson and Tucker 1994兲. Because
this category did not have recorded data, this research interviewed
four project managers on PM issues. Eight PM processes were
identified and proven to be associated with better performance
共Chang and Ibbs 1998兲. Six of them were adopted here to exam-
ine their relationships with productivity: coordination, stakeholder
needs, teamwork, knowledge and experience, progress reports,
and cost report.
The results shown in Table 11 indicate that projects C and D
performed better in terms of smaller hours/drawing numbers.
These projects implemented more PM practices such as frequent
coordination, good teamwork, and regular reporting. Emphasizing
PM practice is an important and direct way to improve perfor-
Fig. 3. Uncertainty–productivity relationship 共I2-O兲
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J. Manage. Eng., 2006, 22(1): 27-34
F P-value Critical value
2.90007873 0.015170297 2.263205799
mance. The simple comparisons in Table 11 did not intend to
prove the relationship between PM and productivity. Instead, they
are explained to remind managers of these influential but implicit
PM variables.
Projects of certain types or phases 共I兲 and adopting PM prac-
tices 共P兲 are associated with higher productivity 共O兲. Cross analy-
sis can lead to deeper knowledge. For example, the productive
project C in Table 11 was an environmental facility project in
Table 1 and a planning project in Table 3. Its productivity
共7 hours/drawing兲 is much better than the averages of the envi-
ronmental facility and planning projects 共65 and 93 hours/
drawing, respectively兲. Further investigation is needed to deter-
mine why this project is so special, or perhaps PM variables
influence productivity more than project type and project phase. A
company can collect PM data from productive projects to identify
the dominant variables that appear most frequently.
I-P Relationships
The I-O and P-O relationships may not be able to reliably indi-
cate whether certain I or P variables influence productivity. Per-
haps some transformation occurs between the input and process
that changes the influence. For example, the effect of QA/QC on
productivity is not apparent, as discussed previously. It may de-
serve further study of the work nature or quality process. Hence,
the I-P relationship is worth examining.
I-P relationships include I1-P1, I1-P2, I2-P1, and I2-P2. Be-
cause many relationships exist, a company can explore them ac-
cording to their importance and priority. In the following analysis,
P2 data could not be obtained, so only I1-P1 and I2-P1 are dis-
cussed, including project duration-hours 共I1-P1兲 and project
nature-QA/QC 共I2-P1兲.
Project Duration 共I1兲-Hours 共P1兲
For the project duration and person-hours relationship, the
R2 = 0.2329 in Fig. 5 indicates that this relationship is more sig-
nificant than prior ones. A smaller value of R2 = 0.1972 was shown
for a linear regression, in which the P value= 1.39E-10 in the
ANOVA. These results indicate that project duration in I1 would
increase person-hour consumption in P1. Individuals tend to
Fig. 4. Budget-productivity relationship 共P1-O兲
 Table 7. Budget-Productivity Relationship 共P1-O兲 Table 9. QA/QC-Productivity Relationship 共P1-O兲
Budget QA/QC Number Hours/drawing
共$兲 Number Hours/drawing Rank
Yes 77 64
⬃16,700 20 34 1 No 113 62
16,700⬃ 33,300 21 48 3 Total 190
33,300⬃ 167,000 71 44 2
167,000⬃ 333,000 34 77 5
333,000⬃ 1,000,000 29 91 6 enough and QA/QC consumes person-hours without tangible
1,000,000⬃ 1,670,000 6 76 4 output, so the influence on productivity may be mixed. The com-
+1,670,000 9 151 7 pany can further solicit opinions from quality engineers and
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Total 190 experienced managers to explain this I-P-O relationship.

charge as much of their time as possible to billable projects
共Goldratt 1997兲. This inference is consistent with the prior long
duration-low productivity relationship.
The higher R2 value implies that I and P-O are linked. This
linkage provides guidance in performance analysis and interpre-
tation. For example, a negative P1-O relationship, say, many
person-hours with low productivity, needs to be further analyzed
and interpreted from the project duration variable in I1.
Work Nature 共I2兲-QA/QC 共P1兲
To check the work nature-QA/QC 共I2-P1兲 relationship, the num-
bers of QA/QC and non-QA/QC projects and their work nature in
terms of U&E scores are shown in Table 12. 共Only 101 of the
original 190 projects had available data for this U&E survey.兲 As
shown in Table 12, the 40 projects implementing QA/QC have
lower U&E scores 共28 and 22, respectively兲 than the 61 non-
QA/QC projects 共30 and 23, respectively兲. This means that the
QA/QC projects were regarded as less uncertain and ambiguous
than the non-QA/QC projects. Further insights about the I-P-O
relationships are described hereafter.
I-P-O Relationships
When establishing the preceding I-O, P-O, and I-P relationships,
only one input or process variable with productivity is analyzed at
a time. To check the combined effect of various variables on
productivity, the I-P-O relationships can be searched. This
additional analysis provides more insights about work operation
from input to output. One I-P-O linkage example is explained
subsequently.
Project Nature 共I2兲-QA/QC 共P1兲-O
The I2-P1 relationship derived in the work nature-QA/QC section
helps explain the former P1-O relationship. Prior analysis from
Table 10 points out that projects with QA/QC requirements are
not necessarily associated with better productivity. A possible in-
terpretation is that project U&E 共I2兲 is reduced through imple-
menting QA/QC 共P1兲, in which the quality procedures clarify
work U&E and this, in turn, saves time. But the effect is not large
Conclusions
Engineering management needs to analyze cause-effect relation-
ships more rigorously in order to get insight about project perfor-
mance. This research proposes a model to systematically analyze
productivity causes in the project operation. Three categories:
work data 共I1兲 and work nature 共I2兲, work division 共P1兲 and man-
agement 共P2兲, and performance 共O兲 are established at a project’s
input, process, and output stages, respectively. An implementation
procedure is also provided to guide performance analysis and
interpretation. Before using this model, a company has to define
their own variables under these categories and collect sufficient
data.
The model was tested on a 190-project data set from an engi-
neering design company. The variables of work data, work divi-
sion, and management are found to influence design productivity.
For example:
• Design has better productivity 共hours/drawing兲 than planning
and construction supervision projects. The reason for this is
probably that drawings are design’s main products, so its
drawing number is larger and its productivity value appears
lower.
• Project size has a negative relationship with productivity.
More productive projects have a shorter duration, smaller con-
tract amount, and smaller budget. The implications are: 共1兲
people who are not released from long projects still charge
their hours while the drawing number does not increase; 共2兲
managers let engineers charge hours on larger projects; and 共3兲
mechanisms are needed in the work process, especially from
management, to prevent that negative relationship.
• Project nature in terms of U&E would not affect productivity.
This implies that work nature is not a key performance factor;
some mechanisms and variables in the process transform the
work nature and play a productivity change role.
• The effect of QA/QC on productivity is not clear. Perhaps
QA/QC implementation clarifies work uncertainty and ambi-
guity, which saves time, but it also consumes time without
tangible output, so its influence on productivity is mixed.
The identified I-O, P-O, I-P, and I-P-O relationships provide
insights about work operation for the studied company. Other

Table 8. ANOVA of Budget and Productivity

Sources SS DOF MS F P-value Critical value
Between groups 148,974.7 6 24,829.10967 5.14309963 6.57077E − 05 2.148409577
Within groups 883,460.8 183 4,827.654811
Total 1,032,435 189

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J. Manage. Eng., 2006, 22(1): 27-34

 Table 10. QA/QC-Productivity Relationship Test
QA/QC Productive Nonproductive Total H0 Result
Yes 55 22 77 More productive Z0 = 0.422
No 84 29 113 Less productive Accept H0
Total 139 51 190

Table 11. Process Management Variables-Productivity Relationship 共P2-O兲

Project A B C D
Downloaded from ascelibrary.org by The City College of New York - CUNY on 12/14/23. Copyright ASCE. For personal use only; all rights reserved.

Hours/drawing 33 32 7 25
Coordination No regular discussions No regular discussions Discussions with Discussions with
owner frequently owner frequently
Stakeholder needs Not much, no record Not much, no record No No
Teamwork Smaller project, Smaller project, Good chemistry Good chemistry
no teamwork no teamwork and common goals and common goals
among team members among team members
Knowledge and experience Fair Fair Good Good
Monthly progress report Only regular time sheets Only regular time sheets Yes Yes
Monthly cost report No No Yes Yes

when interpreting the cause-effect relationships. The result is that

companies will then be able to better and more profitably manage
their projects.

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Fig. 5. Project duration-hours relationship 共I1-P1兲
Table 12. Work Nature–QA/QC Relationship 共I2-P1兲
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QA/QC Number 共score兲
Yes 40 28
No 61 30
Total 101
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