Achieving Industrial Facility Quality: Integration Is Key

This paper demonstrates methods for measuring integration (information flow) in the facility development process and for measuring the quality of completed facilities. Facility quality measurements serve as benchmarks of the performance of the facility development process. Integration parameters are the basis for adjusting the facility development process so that it produces increasingly higher quality facilities each time the process is repeated. We measured the flow of information in the facility development process: vertically (between functions such as operations and engineering), horizontally (between disciplines such as process piping and electrical design), and longitudinally (across time). We also measured the plant manager's satisfaction with the operational facility. A study of 17 industrial facilities shows that the three dimensions of information flow are good predictors of facility quality. The results suggest an increased emphasis on vertical and longitudinal information flow in the facility development process to achieve higher quality facilities.