I had the great opportunity to meet with Professor Carl Haas after he presented at the 2024 Construction Industry Institute (CII) Annual Conference in San Diego at the end of July. A professor in Civil and Environmental Engineering at the University of Waterloo, current University Research Chair and a longtime leader in CII research, Carl presented on the power of partnership between industry and academia in CII.
In his presentation, Carl shared four key CII success stories:
- Project Definition – Using the Project Definition Rating Index (PDRI).
- Startup – Applying research to construction completion, pre-commissioning, commissioning, and startup.
- Safety – Prevention, Prediction, and Hazard Recognition.
- CII Best Practices – Advanced Work Packaging, Constructability, and Alignment.
I appreciated that the first two success stories directly contribute to our work at Valency, which helps organizations rapidly adopt CII project assurance best practices throughout the project lifecycle.
Carl shared that CII research found 47% of Oil & Gas megaprojects delivered between 1995 – 2010 had significant operability problems, and that between 1995 – 2001 , none of the 11 large steel manufacturing facilities reached capacity within the first year of startup. These facts confirm that there is still much progress to be made. Given the challenges highlighted by Carl, I’m proud that at Valency, we’re leveraging our Commissioning & Operational Readiness Assessment to empower our clients to successfully implement CII’s commissioning and startup best practices, helping them avoid similar pitfalls in their critical capital projects.
I am honoured to be a part of CII’s industry advancements to align academic research with industry tools that front-line construction projects can tactically employ. After 30 years of front-line experience in project management and commissioning, I am delighted to have the opportunity to share CII’s best practices with project teams. Carl’s presentation energized me to help drive continued CII research on commissioning and startup in the years ahead.
If you want to learn more about CII, its research, or have questions about what tools your organization can use to achieve predictability in your capital projects, email me at or connect with me on LinkedIn.