The Challenge

The Draper Approach

Results Realized

The Challenge

The decision by the Georgia Public Telecommunications Commission to locate the new GPTV Production Center on the same site as the Georgia Center for Advanced Telecommunications Technology (GCATT), while mutually advantageous to both organizations, posed some potentially significant management challenges since two different general contractors would be working on adjacent sites. To facilitate orderly operations, the state hired Draper & Associates to manage the interaction between the two general contractors.

The Draper Approach

As with the GCATT program, Draper & Associates immediately organized a management system to quickly capture and resolve issues between the two contractors. As is often the case involving two fierce competitors, Draper & Associates' objectivity kept the focus on activities essential to timely project completion and ensured that neither party perceived preferential treatment to one or the other. Challenges with the site were even more difficult since the two projects shared common real estate and some structural elements.

Results Realized

Through its proactive management techniques, Draper & Associates succeeded in creating a process which enabled problems to be identified and resolved at the lowest level possible, thus allowing the GCATT and GPTV Center projects to stay on schedule, and preventing disputes from escalating to claims. As a result, both projects were completed ahead of schedule and without major conflicts.

Of significant note was Draper & Associates' analysis of contractor change orders that established a strong position for the owner in its negotiations with the general contractor. The cost savings result of this process was approximately 10% of the contract work.

Providing cradle-to-grave services for a new construction project, and as a result of demonstrated successes thus far, Draper & Associates was hired to manage and coordinate the various owner contractors' move-in activities. Once the building's shell was complete, communication and security cabling, furniture, and broadcast and satellite equipment had to be installed. This particular project was made more complex by the fact that each of these activities was accomplished by separate contract. Displaying versatility and broad-based capabilities, Draper & Associates also coordinated the relocation of food service, network plant, and furnishings from existing Georgia Public Broadcast facilities into the new building.