Iris D. Tommelein

Iris’ pioneering research in Lean Construction includes teaming up with owners, design specialists, general- and specialty contractors, suppliers, and other stakeholders in order to increase process- and product development performance. 

Iris is an expert on site layout and logistics, operations and methods design, materials management, and supply-chain management. She is involved in developing digital twins and related decision-support systems, enabled by information technology systems that leverage sensor data, heuristic- and mathematical optimization as well as artificial intelligence (AI), and graphical and interactive user interfaces. 

Her current research focuses on takt planning, applications of Industry 4.0 technologies, and modular offsite construction. Some of the research topics she is currently working on are:

• Industrialized Construction Initiative - The scarcity of traditionally skilled construction labor, increasing project complexity, development of innovative materials and greater ambitions for more sustainable construction, and advances in construction digitalization and automation (in technical capabilities and affordability) are driving the industry towards increased industrialized and off-site construction. A change is needed in how projects are conceived, from design to manufacturing to assembly (Design for Manufacturing and Assembly aka. DfMA) to final delivery, operations, and maintenance (generally speaking, Design for X aka. DfX, with X to be filled in by you). Tommelein’s  P2SL research group is investigating what industrialized construction (IC) entails, a company’s process for deciding to use IC, and assessment tools to evaluate the feasibility of using IC components and systems in construction projects.

• Takt Planning Initiative - Takt serves as a work structuring method: using takt means introducing regularity in time-space to work planning. This regularity alleviates the need for crews to spend resources planning when they will work where, so that they have more time to focus on doing work. Tommelein’s research group is exploring how to determine what a takt time and associated work areas (zones) should be given a project’s scope of work, workload imbalances, and management considerations of alternative options.

• Mistakeproofing Architecture-Engineering-Construction - “Mistakeproofing” is the use of any device or method that either makes it impossible for a mistake (error) to occur or makes the mistake immediately obvious once it has occurred. To eliminate the need for quality control, the practice of mistakeproofing sets out to prevent mistakes from occurring in the first place. Mistake proofing is particularly well suited for the AEC industry with its low-volume and mixed production systems where statistical quality control methods cannot be implemented due to a lack of data and the untimeliness of findings that result from after-the-fact data processing. Tommelein’s  P2SL research group studied the principles of mistakeproofing, and their study findings suggest that the principles of mistakeproofing offer practical and useful applications in the construction industry, with a positive improvement in quality performance, including safety- and health performance.

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