RALEIGH, N.C.— FMI, management consultants and investment bankers to the construction industry, and the Construction Management Association of America (CMAA) presented the FMI/CMAA Tenth Annual Survey of Owners at the CMAA National Conference on Monday, October 26, 2009 in Orlando, Fla.

According to Mark Bridgers, the FMI consultant who managed the study, “With drastic drop off in construction activity over the past year, we felt it was appropriate to explore how construction management and the outsourcing of construction activities are changing. In the Tenth Annual Survey of Owners, we learn the outsourcing of design and construction activities will be a trend that cannot be ignored going forward.”

This year’s study portrays a construction owner community that is responding to changing economic conditions by looking to service providers for more comprehensive support across the entire building lifecycle. During 2008 and 2009, the economic turmoil has resulted in a dramatic shift in the business environment for the A/E/C industry and this shift or “inflection point” represents a significant moment of change.

In the A/E/C industry, typically it is five to ten years before we can look back and recognize a curvature shift. The Tenth Annual Survey of Owners examines the long-term trends affecting capital-construction program management and focuses on how the construction delivery process, owner perspectives and necessary skill sets will transform the A/E/C industry over the next 10-20 years.

Survey highlights include:

• Owners are outsourcing more work, and more kinds of work, and they expect this trend to continue.
• Owners are seeking outside support for program activation and ongoing operations and maintenance activities, but the increase in outsourcing will embrace all phases, beginning in pre-design.
• Program activation/commissioning and operations and maintenance demonstrate a 60 percent and 30 percent acceleration in outsource use respectively.
• Between 2009 and 2014, owners expect to attach significantly more importance to the following areas:
  • Selecting the most effective project delivery system
  • Maintenance management support in both process and technologies
  • Proactive strategies to avoid claims and disputes
  • Development and use of a construction management plan
  • Effective documentation and processes designed to support facility commissioning or turnover
• Owners identified “team coordination” as the area in which all types of service providers need the most improvement, with the lone exception of labor/unions, for which knowledge transfer and safe workplace were the most frequently mentioned as needing improvement

The Survey of Owners, sponsored by CMAA and published every year, surveys, analyzes and summarizes trends and concerns of business owners in the construction industry. The survey has become a definitive resource on construction owners’ perspectives since capital asset owners serve as the bellwether of construction industry trends and movements.

The FMI/CMAA Tenth Annual Survey of Owners is available at www.fminet.com.