ETABS ഉപയോഗിച്ചു ഒരു Truss Analysis എങ്ങനെ ചെയ്യാം Paty 5 by Suresh Lal...

Stilt house - Model 3D

Stilt house designed by CivilTalents.Com for a client in Kerala, after the floods in 2018

only one side road and other 4 sides with water and one side the sky! If anybody is interested in making stilt houses (ഊന്നു കാൽ വീടുകൾ), we are the best to do the deign and execution

Rear View  of the property

Related Article: https://civiltalents.blogspot.com/2019/08/stilt-houses-malayalam-article.html

What is SWOT analysis? Why it is important? How SWOT analysis shall be done?

SWOT Analysis

A SWOT Analysis is a structured brainstorming and evaluation tool used to identify your internal Strengths and Weaknesses and external Opportunities and Threats. You can use a SWOT analysis prior to starting a business, to evaluate and grow your current business, prior to launching a new product, or to improve a system or process. You can also use it on a personal level to advance or change your career and improve your financial health.

This SWOT analysis spreadsheet will help your analysis and discussion stay organized and efficient. There are a variety of layouts depending on your preference. They can be printed and filled out by hand, or you can display and edit the worksheet in real-time using a projector during your group discussion. The numbers for each area can be used to organize your team's responses from most important to least. The "action items and goals" section helps you put your results into action.

The information, steps and suggestions listed below will help you use the SWOT analysis template effectively. The references listed at the bottom of the page (especially [1]-[4]) were useful to us in preparing this material, and may also help you learn more about how to apply a SWOT analysis effectively in your business

S: Strengths (Internal)

Strengths are the key things you do well that give you an advantage over the competition. Continuing to remember, build upon and augment your strengths may help maintain a competitive advantage.

W: Weaknesses (Internal)

Weaknesses are the things you don't do well, or as well as the competition, that may hinder your success and growth. Identifying your weaknesses will allow you to make goals to minimize/mitigate them, turn them into future strengths, and determine if they expose you to external threats.

O: Opportunities (External)

Opportunities are changes occurring externally to your business that you could take advantage of, such as changes in regulations, social changes, or new products that don't currently exist. Opportunities help you identify areas where you can grow - where to focus your time and resources.

T: Threats (External)

Threats are any external factors that could have a negative impact, such as trends in the market and society or government regulations. These factors are likely out of your control, but your team should keep an eye on them and plan ways to mitigate their effects.

Keep in mind that Strengths and Weaknesses are internal, while Opportunities and Threats are external - confusing internal and external factors is a common confusion in a SWOT analysis. For example, an action you take to eliminate or improve a weakness is not an opportunity. It is simply an action that you will take related to your listed weakness.

How to prepare for an effective SWOT analysis?

Identify the Purpose

You can perform a SWOT analysis on your business as a whole or focus on specific aspects, products, or processes. The clearer the purpose, the more effective and actionable the SWOT analysis results are likely to be. The purpose will help determine what preparation is needed (such as who to involve, what questions to ask, etc.)

Some examples of what you would use a SWOT analysis for are:

• Assessing where your company stands today
• Launching a new product
• Deciding where to focus research and development
• Improving a specific process

Research and Prepare

Now that you have a purpose, collect important information prior to the group discussion. Get feedback from leaders, employees, and customers regarding your internal Strengths and Weaknesses. Research your industry, market, and competitors to gather information needed for external Opportunities and Threats.

The SWOT analysis does not need to happen in a single meeting. You may find that you need to do more research and get more feedback after a preliminary discussion.

Who should participate in a SWOT analysis?

The more perspectives you can include related to your analysis the better. At the minimum you should involve your core team - those who can take action on the results.

If any of your team members are not familiar with SWOT Analysis, you should brief them on the purpose and process prior to the meeting so that they can come prepared with information and incites. Having them review the definition of the four areas listed above can be especially helpful.

What questions should be asked during a SWOT analysis?

The moderator of the discussion should try to come up with a few questions for each of the four areas that can help guide and inspire the discussion. Below are some sample questions to get you started. A few of these are included in the SWOT analysis templates.

Strengths

• What do our customers love most?
• What are we more efficient at?
• What can we do for less money?
• What can we do in less time?
• What do we do better than our competitors?
• What makes us stand out?

Weaknesses

• Where do we lack efficiency?
• Where are we wasting money?
• Where are we wasting time and resources?
• What do our competitors do better?
• What are our top customer complaints?
• Where do we lack expertise?

Opportunities [keep in mind these are growth areas]

• What is missing in our market?
• What could we create/do better than a competitor?
• What new trends are occurring?
• What new technology could we use?
• What openings in the market are there?
• How/where could we grow?
• Do our strengths open up new opportunities?

Threats

• What changes are occurring in our market's environment?
• What technologies could replace what we do?
• What changes are occurring in the way we're being discovered?
• What social changes could threaten us?
• Are there any threatening government policies or regulations?
• What outside resources and companies do we depend on?
• Do any of our weaknesses expose us to additional threats?

How to run an effective SWOT analysis discussion?

Provide a Brief Overview: Some of the team may be less familiar with the process, so start the discussion with an explanation of the purpose, how the discussion will proceed, and what you hope to accomplish by the end of the meeting.

Discuss and Brainstorm: The first part of the analysis involves discussing each of the four areas and writing down your team's responses along the way. You may want to use brainstorming techniques during this part of the discussion. Keep the discussion fluid, not focusing for too long on one topic.

Analyze and Rank: After your team has come up with multiple points for each of the four areas, you can discuss the items in more detail. You may want to sort or rank them based on importance and priority.

What to do after SWOT analysis?

Make Goals and Take Action.

Completing a SWOT analysis is just the first step. It is important to then take the time to identify potential courses of action. This is why our template includes an Action Items & Goals section at the bottom which samples questions like these:

• Which opportunities should we pursue? How can we use our strengths to help us succeed?
• Which weaknesses can be worked on to help maximize success?
• What threats should we learn more about or monitor more closely? What strategies can we put into place to be prepared for threats?

fOR MORE DETAILS, WRITE TO US CIVILTALENTS@GMAIL.COM

Terminology and Acronyms used in construction Industry

Usually we hear a lot of abbreviations in construction industry such as PMC, BoQ etc. Do you know what it is?

See the following list

A&E: architectural and engineering
BOT: build operate transfer
BOO: build own operate
BoQ: bill of quantities
CA: contract administrator
CIP: capital improvement plan
CM: construction manager
CPI: cost performance index
CPM: critical path method
CREM: corporate real estate management
D/B: design/build
DD : Design Development
D/B/B: design/bid/build
DBOT: design build operate transfer
EA: environmental assessment
EIS: environmental impact statement
EPC: engineering, procurement, and construction
FBOT: finance build operate transfer
FEIS: final environmental impact statement
FONSI: finding of no significant impact
GC: general contract
GCC : General conditions of Contract
GEC: general engineering consultant
GM: general manager
GMP: guaranteed maximum price
JV: joint venture
LEED: Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design
MC: management contracting (mostly UK)
MPC: multiple prime contracts
MPO: metropolitan planning organization
OFE: owner furnished equipment
OSHA: Occupational Safety and Health Administration
O&M: operations and maintenance
OR: owner representative
PC: project control
PD: project director
PFI: private finance initiative
PL: project leader
PM: project manager
PMC: project management consultant
PMO: project management oversight
PMP: project management plan
PRD: project requirements definition
ProgM: program management
RE: resident engineer
REM: real estate management
RFC: request for change
RFI: request for information
RFP: request for proposal
SOW: scope of work
SPI: schedule performance index
VE: value engineering
WBS: work breakdown structure 

How to write a Progress Report for a Construction Project ?

Overview of progress report

Actually, the progress report can use as important tool for assess the project works, as well it will help to update all the concerned personnel. This current status can be used to review for identify key priorities, and identify potential actions for continuous improvement of entire project.

Probably, monitoring and accountability can be key objectives of the progress report. But if it uses as visual tool, it will be providing accurate estimation through brief timeline with anticipate completion time for the entire project significantly. Typically, the progress report template can describe details as below:

• It may provide brief summary of the entire project objectives / goal.
• During the reporting period, it will describe progress towards the goal.
• The report helps to understand how the project that management has funded is progressing. Even it may include significant costs and project plans related issues concern to financial.
• The reviews of entire progress report can be deliver the future objectives list.

The frequency of preparation of progress report may little vary for each business and industry. Typically, it is introducing for weekly, quarterly, monthly or annual. When you are creating a monthly or quarterly report, even for annual the contents and structure of report may change on time scale. Because each tasks may have its own priorities and time bounds.

How to write a progress report?

A Progress report should have the following parts.

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1. Start from heading of the progress report
2. State your progress report’s purpose
3. Introduce the summary for the progress report
4. Elements of the progress report
5. Review the budget
6. Make an outline of future tasks
7. Challenges & Lessons Learned
8. Conclusion & recommendations at bottom line

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When any business initiates a new project they always expecting the accurate results from the project outputs. Because the most of decisions can be made on report of the progress. Hence, it is very important to introduce the progress report once in a week, month or quarter to update related project team. Writing a progress report is not much easy if you don’t have proper updates from the projects. Hence, the collection of the information and analyze with sufficient method is equally important. In short, this report is an update on a project’s status. Here are some steps that may help you make a perfect progress report template:

Start from heading of the progress report

The header of the progress report may contain the identification information for the report. Typically, it can include:

• The project name and its related brief information.
• Project start and estimated end date. Normally there you can also include the time period of the project in the report.
• Describe about the subject of the report.
• You can highlight the project existing condition with specific color code to describe instant status.

Normally, each progress report may little vary from another progress reports from different businesses and industry. Hence, some of the contents may more or little with progress report. There is more thing you can add with your progress report at the heading. Such as overall metric, percentage of completion, project team details etc.

State your progress report’s purpose

At the introductory section, you have to describe the purpose of the progress report template. It may demonstrate entire project review. The purpose will outline for a report that will require to achieve the goals. The purpose may address the significant problems, and individual progress of task.

Introduce the summary for the progress report

Describe brief overview on the progress report for the background progress of entire project. If you want to make effective and enhance visibility of the summary, try to make objective-based summary. Even these summary will cover all the key aspects and goals cover.

There are so many methods to introduce the summary for the progress report. Normally, reports may contain highlight major steps and key objectives’ progress can be describing in line with plans.

Elements of the progress report

Actually, this is the main body of the report. In this section you can describe the details of progress in entire project components with its completed & in-process activities. Normally in this section you can include:

• Brief Introductions of the each completed & running tasks
• Review the on-going issues, challenges and solutions in line with requirements
• Describe the methods are used for the implement each work tasks.
• Desire outcomes – and achievements can be describing in this section.
• General Work plans & Schedules, Intervals & existing position of schedules
• Describe the estimated budget against the completion of works, progress and upcoming schedule details.

Normally, this section may include above details are common in any business progress report. At the end of this section you can include some more things such as what more resources require, management commitments, and additional assistance for complete the task smoothly.

Review the budget (not required for daily report)

Budgeting and allocation for tasks is important part of any project. It is obvious that each task may directly affect due to budget allocation. Even its monitoring and tracking for each task is essential part of the project. Normally, at this section you have to describe the summary report of the expenditure during the reporting period. These section may cover the comparison of the allocated budgets, with expenditure and to-date.

Make an outline of future tasks and critical issues for next week

Normally, the making an outline of the future tasks can be results from the discussion from the project team. The details of the future tasks or plan may be as per project requirements. Even in this section you can to describe the specific time require to accomplish work. You can use the specific tools for the forecast of the potential issues might encounter, and risks that associated with project. Schedule the proper plan with deadlines for each task.

Challenges & Lessons Learned

This is the optional requirement of the progress report. Normally, in this section you can explain what challenges were faced during the project progress, and how the solutions are deploying to reduce impacts of these challenges during the project. Even you can describe about what lessons learned from these challenges, which may help to prevent these for upcoming task schedules.

Conclusion & recommendations at bottom line

At this section, you can sum up what really achieved during this reporting period. Even make the list of completed tasks with dates with highlight the points. Normally, this is detailed summary and the timeline of the project’s components. Hence, make it more specific and accurate the details.

Normally, from the discussions of the project team, may be some suggestions can be raise up for the entire project improvement. Note down these suggestions in the recommendations section to show the potential improvement.

Malayalam article published in a periodical - regarding Vaastu

Stilt Houses - Malayalam Article published in Designer Builder Magazine last year. So many friends wanted its copy, So I am uploading it in my blog.