Visually Improving Construction Contract Administration

The construction industry runs into many claim and dispute issues. Often these can be associated with the contractual conditions. What if the conditions themselves or the people writing them are not causing the problems? The blame may fall on the actual reading of the complex conditions and the inability of the human brain to comprehend all the information read. The field of psychology can be used to support this claim as well as to support the potential solution of use of flowcharts to illustrate contract conditions. The flowcharts provide a visual framework to complement and organize the text of the conditions. A project was designed with the Virginia Department of Transportation and the Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University to collaborate and investigate flowchart usage. Flowcharts depicting general conditions were produced, and the outcomes of the project support the claim that a greater understanding can be achieved with the creation and use of flowchart-based conditions complementing the text format.