Development of metrics and an external benchmarking program for healthcare facilities

This paper describes the development of a benchmarking program for healthcare projects. Healthcare construction projects tend to be unique due to varied healthcare facilities and offered services, thus requiring a platform to study distinct project management approaches for the healthcare industry. The idea of continuous improvement through competitive benchmarking is already well established. However, highly targeted comparisons are not possible without industry-specific metrics. The ability to measure project performance allows for credible industry norms and continuous improvement. As a first step, a comprehensive study focused on identifying specific metrics to measure healthcare capital project-performance in key areas such as cost, schedule, change, and best practice implementation was concluded with input from a team comprised of healthcare owners, contractors, and architects. In addition, space/dimensional and program-specific metrics were also identified for this external benchmarking program. This paper presents the development of a framework for different healthcare capital facility-types using absolute and relative metrics for the healthcare industry. The findings include resources for the healthcare community in the form of healthcare facility metrics and project database that enables the process of quantifying the effectiveness and efficiency of processes specific to the healthcare industry of completed and ongoing projects.