Keynote

The Human Blueprint: Restoring Craftsmanship and Flow to Lean Construction

Summary

Lean Construction is widely recognized as a philosophy derived from the Toyota Production System, yet many of its underlying principles — efficient resource use, coordinated workflows, craftsmanship, continuous learning, and respect for people — have shaped successful human endeavors for thousands of years. This keynote traces the evolution of these ideas from nature's resource-efficient systems and the survival strategies of early nomadic societies to the remarkable organization of ancient construction, the fragmentation of work during the Industrial Revolution, and the human-centered philosophy of the Toyota Production System.

Drawing on findings from a systematic literature review, the presentation argues that while Lean Construction has made significant advances in process optimization and technical innovation, its human and organizational dimensions remain comparatively underexplored in both research and practice. By reframing familiar Lean tools such as 5S as mechanisms for enhancing human capability rather than merely improving workplace organization, the keynote proposes that the next stage of Lean maturity will depend not on new technologies alone, but on restoring craftsmanship, trust, collaboration, and flow. Ultimately, it argues that the future of Lean Construction lies in reconnecting the mind, the hand, and the human spirit.

Biography

Dr Rateb J. Sweis is a Full Professor of Project Management at the University of Jordan with over 180 peer-reviewed journal publications in project performance and construction management. His research specializes in Lean Construction, sustainable operations, and the integration of emerging technologies like IoT, BIM, and machine learning into modern project workflows. A dedicated mentor and international collaborator, his recent work explores how Lean principles enhance productivity, decision-making, and organizational health. He remains committed to translating academic research into practical solutions for the global AEC industry.

Presentation

Lean Construction Ireland Maturity Assessment Tool

Summary

Lean Construction Ireland, in collaboration with Atlantic Technological University (ATU), has developed a new Lean Maturity Assessment Tool to help organisations across Ireland's built environment sector understand their current level of lean maturity. The assessment provides valuable insights into organisational strengths and improvement opportunities, enabling companies to establish strategic priorities and accelerate their lean transformation journey.

This presentation will outline the background and development of the tool, explain its purpose and benefits, and provide a live demonstration of the assessment process, including data entry requirements and the insights generated through the reporting outputs.

Biography

Dr Trevor McSharry is Head of the School of the Built Environment at Atlantic Technological University (ATU), with over 30 years of experience across both the multinational and higher education sectors. Trevor is deeply committed to bridging the gap between education and industry through meaningful collaboration. Together with his departments across ATU, Trevor has led the creation of Ireland's largest suite of online programmes and consortium-led apprenticeships for the Irish construction sector.

Trevor holds a Doctor of Education, specialising in change and leadership in higher education. He is a Chartered Engineer and Fellow of Engineers Ireland, as well as a certified Project Management Professional. His academic and professional qualifications also include an MBA from Dublin City University and a Postgraduate Certificate in BIM and the Digital Environment.

His research and consultancy interests span leadership, project and change management, lean construction, and process optimisation. Since 2018, Trevor has served as a founding director of Lean Construction Ireland (LCi) and currently holds the role of Treasurer.

Presentation

Lean i Praksis (Lean in Practice) — Turning well-known Lean Construction theory into tools that actually work on site

Summary

Danish construction still loses significant value to waste, weak coordination and low on-site productivity — the very problems Lean Construction was designed to solve. Lean i Praksis is a national initiative from Lean Construction-DK (LCDK) that closes the gap between theory and site: rather than developing new theory, it systematically reviews, updates and re-packages the Lean tools the industry already knows — Last Planner System, TAKT planning, 5S, PDCA, Kaizen, A3 and VSM — and tests them against how they are actually used on Danish building sites today.

Several hundred practitioners — site managers, foremen, consultants, contractors and clients — have contributed through workshops and seminars, sharing real project examples and hard-won experience to sharpen each tool before publication. The talk shares the project's model for turning established theory into field-tested practice at scale, presents preliminary findings from an awareness-and-effect analysis showing which tools practitioners know, use and trust, and walks through concrete examples of how practitioner input has reshaped classic Lean tools for today's building sites.

Biography

Morten Skaarup Jensen is a Senior Project Manager at Værdibyg and works within the Lean Construction-DK network (LCDK / LCI Denmark), where he leads the Lean i Praksis initiative bringing established Lean Construction tools into everyday practice on Danish building sites.

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Presentation

Lean Construction in a Complex Industry

Experiences, reflections, and recommendations — 16 years and one successful mega project.

Summary

After 8 years on a Norwegian mega project — The Life Science building in Oslo — and 16 years working with Lean Construction, Hans Thomas Holm shares the experiences of those years and gives insights into why projects tend to fail.

It is not one reason, or two: there are several, and they must be handled together.

Biography

Hans Thomas Holm started on the road of Lean Construction in 2009 and Lean Projects in 2010, taking part in Porsche Consulting's seminars. He has applied takt planning methodology on the Domus Medica, Academy of Art and Design in Bergen, and Life Science in Oslo projects, and has since added Lean Process Planning, Lean Design, Systematic Completion and more. He has written about the experiences and methodologies from the Academy of Art and Design in Bergen and is writing about the same from the Life Science project. He is a well-known speaker who has presented all over Europe.

His strengths span coordination, operations, organisation and communication, and he has led Transport Management within two Winter Olympic Organizing Committees. He works in five languages and is motivated by visible results, a process mindset, cross-functional relations and clear visual communication.

His work has been recognised twice: in December 2014 he was awarded Statsbygg's Innovasjonspris 2014 for implementing Lean principles in Statsbygg projects, and in October 2017 he received Bygg21's Best Practice award for his work with processes and the use of Lean on a Norwegian construction project (the Academy of Art and Design in Bergen).

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Presentation

How to Save the World with Takt

Summary

Green, Lean, Digital. — "Okay, but how do we achieve it now without overstretching our financial, logistical, and human capacities?" Building on today's insights into carbon-reducing sustainability initiatives and AI-driven digitalization with TAKT, this keynote converges these themes into a call to action on how we tackle our global climate targets together.

Leveraging Evolutionary AI, Jacqueline Zurke introduces a Takt-enabling resource allocation model to calculate the Pareto-optimum of CO₂ reduction and cost-efficiency for modernizing building stocks and realizing innovative construction projects of the future. By scaling the "heartbeat" of Takt planning to the macro-level of entire building portfolios, we will discuss how to synchronize system-wide construction operations with actual capacities — eliminating misallocation-induced waste and creating feasible pathways to climate neutrality from theory into our everyday reality.

Biography

Jacqueline Zurke is responsible for the DACH region at VisiLean, where she leads and manages the implementation and establishment of Lean Construction projects in Central Europe. Her focus lies on the digitization of operational processes and the transformation of traditional Lean approaches into scalable, data-driven solutions. Her goal: reducing manual effort and standardizing innovation — to make Lean truly "lean." She has been working intensively on Lean and Takt for the construction industry since 2012.

During her studies in Civil Engineering and Business Management at RWTH Aachen, she conducted research at renowned institutes on lean methods, focusing on energy-efficient construction process management and data-based resource optimization (published in Nature). Today, she continues her academic pursuits with Lean 5.0 concepts. Jacqueline has gained significant international project experience and research insights through Lean Construction initiatives in 10+ countries, including the Caribbean.

Presentation

Aware Worksite turns one of Lean's core principles into measurable daily practice

Co-presented with Marika Nyyssönen (HOAS).

Summary

The Aware Worksite concept developed by HOAS combines Lean principles and social responsibility into a measurable framework for improving construction-site performance. Its foundation is seven core rules that guide daily operations and support effective collaboration, placing every worker at the centre — regardless of their employer — so that everyone is valued as part of the project team.

Regular surveys assess both site performance and employee well-being, giving workers a voice to share experiences, opinions and improvement ideas. Results are reviewed openly with all site personnel and displayed on-site to promote transparency, and improvement actions are then jointly planned and implemented with contractors based on the feedback received.

Biography

Laura Pääkkönen is Construction Manager at HOAS, working to improve project performance through collaboration, continuous improvement and people-centred leadership. She is actively advancing Lean Construction, Integrated Project Delivery (IPD/IPT) and industrialised construction across the Finnish industry, and serves as a board member of LCI Finland.

Her particular interests include production flow, takt production, construction logistics and prefabrication to improve quality and predictability. Laura also co-hosts the Rakentamisen muutos (Construction Transformation) podcast.

Presentation

Aware Worksite turns one of Lean's core principles into measurable daily practice

Co-presented with Laura Pääkkönen (HOAS).

Summary

The Aware Worksite concept developed by HOAS combines Lean principles and social responsibility into a measurable framework for improving construction-site performance. Its foundation is seven core rules that guide daily operations and support effective collaboration, placing every worker at the centre — regardless of their employer — so that everyone is valued as part of the project team.

Regular surveys assess both site performance and employee well-being, giving workers a voice to share experiences, opinions and improvement ideas. Results are reviewed openly with all site personnel and displayed on-site to promote transparency, and improvement actions are then jointly planned and implemented with contractors based on the feedback received.

Biography

Marika Nyyssönen is Sustainability Manager at HOAS, driving sustainability initiatives focused on measurable impact and evidence-based decision-making. A strong advocate of the principle that Lean is the most responsible way to build — reducing waste, improving resource efficiency and creating better outcomes for people and projects — she played a key role in developing the Aware Worksite (Tiedostava työmaa) concept.

She is also active in the sustainability workstream of the Lyra project, helping integrate Lean principles and ESG objectives into industry development, with an emphasis on transparency, collaboration and respect for people.

Presentation

Digital Twin for cultural heritage conservation: An integrated framework for monitoring, maintenance and decision support

Summary

Historic monuments and cultural landmarks are living assets that require continuous care, informed decision-making, and sustainable management strategies. This conference explores how Digital Twin technologies are transforming cultural heritage conservation from reactive restoration to predictive, data-driven maintenance. By integrating HBIM, 3D reality capture, IoT-based monitoring, and advanced analytics, Digital Twins create dynamic virtual replicas that support real-time condition assessment and long-term asset management.

Biography

Hassane Jarar Oulidi is a full professor at the Hassania School of Public Works Engineering (EHTP) in Casablanca, Morocco. From 2015 to 2018, he headed the Department of Mathematics, Computer Science, and Geomatics. Previously, he was a researcher at the German Research Centre for Geosciences (GFZ) in Germany. His current research focuses on geospatial data infrastructure, with a particular interest in Earth Science Data and Climate Change in Africa. He has also developed strong expertise in Building Information Modeling (BIM) and Digital Twin technologies, especially in the context of urban infrastructure and territorial management. He has led numerous research initiatives, authored several academic works, and collaborated with various companies to oversee and execute GIS, BIM, and Digital Twin projects.

Presentation

Takt planning for a new car assembly

Summary

The presentation shows how BMW used takt planning to deliver a new assembly area with integrated seat-production and logistic facilities at its inner-city Munich plant. Despite ongoing production, limited space and a compressed schedule, the expected construction duration was significantly reduced.

Dynamic takt zones, digital planning tools and close cross-functional collaboration enabled reliable coordination across trades. The case demonstrates that successful takt planning requires continuous operational control, integrated logistics and strong collaboration.

Biography

Livia Lippl holds a master's degree in Civil Engineering from the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), with academic research on barriers to alternative project delivery models in Germany. She gained international project experience as Lean Manager on an alliancing project in Melbourne, followed by construction supervision work on the subway project in Karlsruhe.

Since 2021 she has been a Real Estate Development Manager at BMW Group, working on the “New assembly, logistics and seat production” project at the Munich plant, and since 2023 she has been responsible for leading the client-side construction execution of the project.

Presentation

Data-Driven TAKT at the Signe Project in Helsinki

Summary

This presentation explores how Jatke integrated takt production and data-driven management in the Signe office and retail project. It presents the TAKT supporting system architecture and the flow of production data between planning and site management systems.

The session demonstrates how BIM-based quantity management, takt planning and daily production control are connected through a unified workflow, and highlights the practical tools and routines used to maintain production flow and transparency on site.

Biography

Niklas Huitti is the project manager of the award-winning Signe project, Finland's Construction Site of the Year 2025. He has solid experience in commercial building construction and a strong focus on developing site leadership with data-driven methods.

Niklas believes in creating real value through takt production supported by digital tools, while keeping people and collaboration at the core.

Presentation

Takt & Digital Change Management

Summary

Construction projects rarely fail on technology — they fail on coordination. Takt brings rhythm to execution: every crew knows where they work, and when. Cordeel has been building this in practice since 2023, with projects finishing on time or ahead of schedule.

One shared library of work packages lets every partner speak the same language. The C-flow platform brings planning, contracts, documents, quality and cost together in a single view.

Biography

Cordeel Group is an independent family business and multidisciplinary construction partner in Belgium. Bart Audenaert is, for his biggest client, Head of C-flow. After 15 years as a project manager, he led the group's Takt planning implementation for the last 2 years.

He now designs and builds the Cordeel Production System (C-flow). This system integrates planning and data to make construction predictable, optimize workflow, and reduce failure costs based on practical experience.

Presentation

From Reactive to Predictive Site Management: applications of A* algorithm for Construction planning Optimization

Summary

This research presents an AI-augmented A* pathfinding framework within a BIM environment to optimize construction supply chain routing and procurement scheduling. Unlike Dijkstra, which exhaustively explores the graph, A* uses heuristics refined by machine learning on real-time site data to compute efficient, goal-directed paths.

Simulation results show faster computation, higher on-time deliveries, and reduced vehicle idle time.

Biography

Francesco Livio Rossini is a Tenure-Track Researcher at Sapienza University of Rome. His research seeks lean, safe construction environments at three levels: process optimization via Location-Based Management and BIM, proactive risk management through AI and multi-agent simulations, and digital integration for complex heritage sites.

Earning his Ph.D. from Sapienza in 2018, he was visiting researcher at ENSAG in Grenoble. With over 60 scientific publications and awards like the ISTeA 2024 Best Paper, he actively bridges academia and practice. As a Project Construction Manager and BIM Consultant, Dr. Rossini directly applied innovative digital frameworks like the Construction Productivity Graph to solve real-world AECO industry challenges.