Why are industry best practices underused, and how can associations collaborate to increase their implementation?

A web-based framework should be developed in which groups can share best practices as well as promote opportunities to improve, suggests the National Construction Forum, a group of 15 associations and eight universities, convened by the National Academy of Construction in Washington, D.C., on Nov. 16-17.

The forum's goal is to create a national voice on major industry issues by integrating and leveraging the efforts of key organizations.

"The idea is to start small but to grow to include every industry organization," said James G. Slaughter, president of S&B Engineers and Constructors and co-director of the forum.

Wayne Crew, Construction Industry Institute director, presented a study of CII members' use of the group's best practices. "Even among members, implementation of CII best practices is uneven," Crew said.

For the forum, Crew looked at 10 organizations and compiled about 50 best practices, including those from CII. He discovered that different groups define terms in different ways and may have recommendations referred to by other names, such as "guidelines."

Crew said, "There's an opportunity here to drive performance improvement."