We are more than willing to work with you in the manner that best fits your needs. If time and money are an issue, (and they usually are) we at Chappell & Assoc. use a methodology encased in proprietary software that will minimize the amount of time and money you spend on defining design scope, materials and products, as well as specifications.

In a Nut Shell:
“Ken-Specs” is not so much a spec editing software as it is a design management tool. Architects and Engineers do not think in terms of  “Specifications.” They think in terms of the design scope of the project and the materials and products they want and need to use in the design. To work at a higher level of detail impedes the creative design process. Our software compliments and organizes the design process. It does not bog it down.

As Engineers and Architects make decisions as to the scope of a project’s design, they point and click to capture the data in one centralized location where everyone involved in the project can see it. As is appropriate, products and materials relevant to the design scope may be chosen by the appropriate personnel given the access rights to do so. This design scope and product data is structured in the classic CSI Masterformat, both version ’95 (five-digit) and ‘04(six digit) format.

While these decisions are being made, one can easily see what they have chosen for a project and what is left in the master set of data. If there is nothing in the Master set of data, this raises a flag that some research and information needs to be rounded up for the project.

At any given point in time a Design Scope Document (usually a Schematic Design Deliverable) may be generated, or an Outline Specification (usually an Design Development Deliverable). Scope documents and Outline Specifications are merely a  bi-product of determining the design scope, not documents you have to generate from other data.  With these documents, Constrcution Specifications can be edited quickly in a fraction of the time and cost of current methods.

Additional Advantages:
The entire design scope is kept in one place, your network, your server, your computers. (You may use ours but that adds cost.) It is not spread out amongst several email accounts, or in notebooks on a shelf.

There is a historical time stamp user record of all changes.

Comments may be added by any of the Design team about any of the data.

Once the design scope and materials and products are “frozen” any changes are potentially added services or a change in the design scope that can be tracked.

Our clients may use our master data set or if they prefer, the information from their own specification office masters can be uploaded into our software. Even with the cost of this aded serivice, you will be saving time and money in the design and contract document process on the every first job you use Ken-Specs.

Where we are going from here:
In subsequent versions of our software the Construction Specifications themselves with LEED options, and Project Manuals will also be a bi-product of the design process. Only minor tweaking will be required to make specifications project specific.

The specifications portion of the project will be reduced to almost a bi-product of the design process.

Integration with BIM models will be entirely possible by building an interface between your modeling software and the database of design scope data.