The Plan of Work comprises eight stages, which are designed to act together to inform the briefing, design, construction, handover and use of a project.
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Net Zero go uses a plan of work to categorise project information. It is also used for topics to organise related knowledge.
The Plan of Work comprises eight stages, which are designed to act together to inform the briefing, design, construction, handover and use of a project. The Plan of Work can be used by a project team at the outset of a project, to help set up their project, or during the project, as a constant point of reference –to remind them of the core tasks that should be undertaken at any particular stage.
In addition to understanding the outcomes of each stage, it is crucial to recognise how the Plan of Work facilitates the progression of several priorities, defined here as Project Strategies, through the stages.
The stages can work on a standalone basis. However, achieving successful outcomes at one stage relies on achieving successful outcomes at the stage before.
Stages
The Plan of Work comprises eight stages, which are designed to act together to inform the briefing, design, construction, handover and use of a project. The Plan of Work can be used by a project team at the outset of a project, to help set up their project, or during the project, as a constant point of reference –to remind them of the core tasks that should be undertaken at any particular stage.
In addition to understanding the outcomes of each stage, it is crucial to recognise how the Plan of Work facilitates the progression of several priorities, defined here as Project Strategies, through the stages.
The majority of the stages work on a standalone basis. However, achieving successful outcomes at one stage relies on achieving successful outcomes at the stage before.
Where the outcomes from one stage are poor, it would be difficult to recover in the next stage. For example:
- A poor Project Brief is likely to lead to poor design outcomes
- A poor design will not achieve exemplary Project Outcomes
- Designs that are not Spatially and Locally Coordinated in Stage 3 will result in unnecessary iterations in Stage 4 technical design
- Poor information in Stage 4 will create an unnecessary volume of Site Queries during construction
- Lack of foresight on operation and maintenance in the early stages may create challenges and unnecessary costs during the in use stage.
In many instances, there will be cross-cutting issues that flow from one stage to another, or information produced by one party that is crucial to another at the next stage.
In this regard, while each stage acts independently, the Plan of Work works as a whole. Anyone using it should be cautious about changing the strategic tasks in any stage as this will potentially have an impact on the outcomes of the next.
Decisions
Each Stage identifies the major decisions that should be made before the stage can be completed. These will be informed by the activities and information available during the stage. Each project will have its own stakeholders to agree those decisions. Identification of the most efficient pathway through the local authorities decision processes is a vital part of delivering impactful projects.
Themes
Running throughout all the stages are a number of cross cutting features. The Energy projects plan of work calls these themes. These are areas that will need to be continuously revisited throughout the development lifecycle of the project to ensure successful delivery of a safe, robust and impactful project.
Plan of work Activities
Activities are the areas of focus that should be initiated or developed during a stage. These identify or support decisions and are delivered through actions. Each stage has a number of clearly identified activities. Each activity has a number of the decisions and actions associated with them.
Action and decision checklists
Clear outcomes should be achieved within an activity. This are presented as a set of actions that can be used to review progress during the stage and act as a structure to ensure a robust project. These are also referenced within the themes.
File information
During each stage a large quantity of information will be exchanged between project team members and with external stakeholders. A crucial goal at each project stage is to ensure that, at the end of the stage, all information required to sign off a stage is captured properly within a set of documentation.
This serves two purposes.
- Information delivered at the end of one stage becomes the basis for the next stage, so it needs to be clear at the end of the stage what information will be used by the relevant project team members at the next stage.
- Information produced at the end of a stage represents a wide range of decisions, made by the client, that will influence how the next stage progresses.
In early stages this may be captured in the business case but the supporting data, information and documents are important to capture and share as these may impact later stages, especially with respect to design.
Information exchanges may range from the agreement of the Procurement Strategy and determination of the Information Requirements, to decisions deriving from Design Reviews by the project team or external stakeholders, such as planners.
It is crucial that the information exchanged at the end of a stage not only includes the information required for the next stage, but also records the basis on which this information was determined.
Skills and Capability
The capability to deliver each stage is dependant on having the right skills available at the right time. The plan of work gives a high level overview of the required expertise for each stage and activity.
Resources and references
The plan of work identifies potentially useful resources that will support the project team in creating robust projects. These are split into those capturing or supporting good practice or emerging best practice.
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