Before we can schedule the work and assign resources or measure production, we need a consistent unit to plan and track. In steel erection, the natural unit is often the erection sequence.
When the sequence becomes the work package, it gives us one place to connect everything required to complete that piece of the job: drawings, model views, crane plans, schedule activities, constraints, quantities and eventually production results.
Easy access is only the first step.
Bluebeam describes a digital dashboard as an interactive PDF that links to project documents. Giving the team one place to access the drawings, model, schedule, crane plans, RFIs and other project information can save a lot of time.
But a dashboard can put every file one click away and still leave the team bouncing between five different places to understand one sequence. The information is easier to find, but it is still organized by document type instead of by the work those documents support.
The field does not build the project one file type at a time. The job gets built by area, phase, sequence and installable scope.
I first learned the value of this as a field engineer at Long Harbour in Newfoundland. I started with catwalk closeout, working through railings, grating, supports, inspections and signoffs. Over time, the work expanded into steel erection packages and multi-trade support alongside the millwrights. We eventually moved into setting massive tanks and coordinating the delivery of multi-story modules on self-propelled modular transporters (SPMTs). The team had organized the work packages in a way that made it easier to move between very different scopes.
It was a lot to take in. I kept coming back to that old question: how do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time. Once I started treating each package as a list of things we could finish, it became manageable. I eventually made a game of working through them. That experience shaped a lot of how I think about planning work now.
Make the sequence the work package.
A work package brings the information for one defined piece of the project together. Instead of starting with the drawing folder, model, schedule or RFI log, the team can start with the sequence and see what supports it.
In the eight-sequence example used throughout these notes, the eight erection sequences become eight work packages. A larger project may have 15 or more, but the idea stays the same. The work required to erect, detail and close out each sequence remains tied to that package.
The sequence is the work package. Its drawings, model views, constraints, quantities, resources and production results stay connected from erection through closeout. That gives us one clean unit to track across the job.
A work package might include:
- Drawing links and model views
- Crane positions and erection sequence
- Schedule activities
- RFIs and open decisions
- Readiness and coordination constraints
The source files do not need to move from wherever they are controlled. The dashboard gives the team a shared path into them based on how the work is expected to happen.
That changes the dashboard from a collection of shortcuts into a working view of the erection plan. It also gives the office and field a common structure for discussing scope, ownership, readiness and sequence.
Connect it to production.
Once the work package becomes the organizing unit, it can also carry the quantities, planned resources, duration, status and actual performance for that scope.
An RFI is no longer just another line on a log. It can be connected to the package it affects, the work it may delay and the part of the production plan that may need to change.
- File access helps the team find information.
- Work packaging connects that information to a specific piece of the job.
- Production data makes the package measurable.
When the information is organized around the work, each package becomes something we can plan, measure and improve.
The next question is how to size the work inside each package. Tonnage is useful, but it does not tell us everything the crew has to do.