DEARBORN, MI A research paper co-authored by Samir Emdanat, Ghafari Associates' Director of Management Services, and Marcelo Azambuja of the Spire Consulting Group was published in the Lean Construction Journal. Titled "Aligning Near and Long Term Planning for LPS Implementations: A Review of Existing and New Metrics," the paper reviews existing Last Planner System (LPS) near-term planning metrics and assesses their ability to predict long-term performance using technology. The paper also introduces new and more comprehensive metrics to balance near-term and long-term planning performance.

Developed by the Lean Construction Institute, LPS is a collaborative, commitment-based planning system that improves workflow reliability by continuously aligning what will be done on a project with what should be done while ensuring that all of the known constraints are identified, planned, and resolved in advance.

"The alignment of near-term and long-term planning requires a systematic adherence to the processes of the LPS workflow from Phase Planning to Weekly Work Planning and Commitment Management, and, the continuous capture of the data in an integrated and uniform way," they write. "This cannot be achieved by makeshift tools commonly used in the industry to manage LPS workflows. Those makeshift tools and associated processes result in data fragmentation, redundant entry, long cycle times, and introduce errors into the process."

Ghafari specializes in guiding project teams through LPS, which allows them to produce predictable workflows, specify team member responsibilities and hand-offs, identify and plan around project milestones, and learn from past mistakes. After years of leading highly integrated projects, we created a software solution, vPlanner, to facilitate collaborative design and construction management. Built to complement LPS, vPlanner streamlines workflows and provides teams with an integrated set of tools to manage pull planning activities, phase schedules, and more.