8.6 Documenting a Project for the Specified Delivery Method
Key Takeaways
- Design-bid-build requires a complete, self-sufficient set before pricing, while every other delivery method prices documents that are still in progress.
- A guaranteed maximum price set needs basis-of-design narratives, an assumptions log, defined allowances, and outline specifications to be priced accurately.
- Under multiple prime contracts, Division 01 must assign supply and install responsibility at every interface, because unassigned gaps become change orders in every contract at once.
- Fast-track freezes the parameters of each released package, and later design must work within them or pay for the change.
- Every issued set must carry an explicit issue purpose — not for construction, for permit, for pricing, or for construction — under a firm document-control procedure.
Objective 4.3 asks the architect to implement appropriate policies and procedures to document a project for a specified delivery method. The same building requires different documents, issued at different levels of completeness, at different moments, depending on how it will be delivered.
Why Delivery Method Changes Documentation
Under design-bid-build, the construction documents are complete before anyone prices the work, so the set must be self-sufficient: a bidder receives it, prices it, and builds from it with no further design input. Under every other method, pricing happens while design is still in progress, which means documents are issued for purposes other than construction.
| Delivery method | What documents are issued for | Documentation consequence |
|---|---|---|
| Design-Bid-Build | A single complete bid set | Documents must be complete and coordinated; no design development occurs after bidding |
| CM as Adviser | Multiple bid packages for multiple prime contracts | Scope must be divided cleanly among packages with no gaps or overlaps in Division 01 |
| CM at Risk | Progressive pricing sets, then a GMP set | A GMP set that is 60–70% complete must define quality and scope well enough to price, usually through performance narratives and assumptions logs |
| Design-Build | A bridging or performance-criteria document, then design-builder's documents | The architect may author criteria rather than construction documents, or may work for the design-builder |
| Integrated Project Delivery | Shared model with agreed model element authorship | The BIM execution plan, not the drawing set, becomes the primary coordination instrument |
| Fast-track | Sequential packages (site, foundation, structure, envelope, fit-out) | Earlier packages are released before later design is fixed, so assumptions must be recorded and verified |
Documenting for a GMP or Progressive Pricing Set
When a set is priced before it is finished, the architect's job is to eliminate ambiguity about what is not yet drawn:
- Basis-of-design narratives for each system, stating performance where the product is not yet selected.
- An assumptions and clarifications log issued with the set, recording what the estimator should assume.
- Allowances for scope that is genuinely undefined, with the allowance amount and its inclusions written into Division 01.
- Outline specifications in MasterFormat order so nothing is omitted, even where sections are not yet fully written.
- Quality level statements — a "fully finished" note is not a specification, and it becomes an argument at buyout.
Documenting for Multiple Prime Contracts
Where the owner holds several prime contracts, scope division is the documentation problem:
- Division 01 must state the scope of each contract, including who supplies and who installs at every interface.
- Drawings should carry contract-scope identification where scope changes within a single view.
- Coordination of schedules among primes is the owner's responsibility, exercised through the CM as Adviser; the documents must give that coordination something to work with.
- Every gap — the connection, the substrate, the blocking, the final connection to equipment furnished by another contract — must be assigned. Unassigned interfaces become change orders in every prime contract at once.
Documenting for Fast-Track
Fast-track releases construction before design is complete, which creates a class of risk that documentation must manage:
- Freeze the parameters that later packages depend on. Once the foundation package is released, the structural grid and the building footprint are fixed.
- Record the assumptions each package relies on, and verify them before the dependent package is released.
- Expect and budget for rework. Fast-track compresses the calendar but does not reduce effort; the coordination burden and the change-order exposure both rise.
- Track deferred submittals — delegated-design items such as trusses, curtain wall, and fire sprinkler design that will be submitted to the AHJ after permit issuance.
Firm Policies That Make This Work
- A document control procedure defining issue purpose ("Not for Construction," "Issued for Permit," "Issued for GMP Pricing," "Issued for Construction") on every set.
- Revision control so superseded sets are identifiable and cannot be built from.
- Consistent transmittals recording what was issued, to whom, when, and for what purpose.
- A model element table under AIA G202 on BIM-delivered projects, assigning authorship and level of development for each element at each milestone.
Exam Tip: The recurring error on this objective is issuing an incomplete set without labeling its purpose or recording its assumptions. An 65%-complete set issued for GMP pricing is appropriate; the same set issued with no assumptions log, no basis-of-design narrative, and no allowance structure is how an architect ends up owning the difference between the GMP and the real cost.
An architect is producing a 65% complete set that a construction manager at risk will use to establish a guaranteed maximum price. Which documentation practice most directly protects the architect and the owner?
On a fast-track project, the foundation package has been released for construction while the interior fit-out design continues. What documentation consequence follows?