Every ten years, the American Institute of Architects (AIA) updates its contract documents and 2019 marks the ten-year anniversary since the last revision of the Construction Management Contracts. This group includes both the Construction Manager as Constructor (CMc), more commonly known as Construction Management at Risk (CMr), and the Construction Manager as Advisor (CMa) agreements.
Just like all industries, the construction world has seen significant advancements in the last decade, so the purpose of revisiting these contracts is to keep them relevant to the way business is being conducted. For example, two main topics that are at least evaluated if not utilized in all major projects are sustainability and the use of building information modeling (BIM).
The new Sustainable Projects Exhibit revisions were created to clarify the owner’s sustainable objectives and how that ties into the roles and responsibilities of the involved parties.
Building information modeling improves the collaboration between the design and construction teams through the entire project to create an even better set of plans. These models are not only a great resource to the teams building the project, but also the owner, as they create an extremely accurate and thorough set of as-built plans that can be used for the life of the building. Advancements in this technology warrant addressing, therefore provisions requiring establishment of digital data and BIM protocols have been added.
There were several modifications in addition to those listed above and I recommend checking out the free webinars conducted by the AIA to learn more about these contract modifications. Also, if you want the cliff notes version, there is a press release with a high-level summary of all the updates.
Click here to check out the press release
Click here to watch the webinar on CMA updates
Click here to watch the webinar on CMC updates
And if you happen to be a first-time buyer of construction services or would just like a refresher on what options for construction delivery methods are out there, the AIA has a great document that has easy to follow diagrams and explanations.
Click here to check out the contract relationship diagrams
