Special purpose simulation template for workflow analysis in construction

Workflow analysis is an important component in the simulation of construction operations. It involves creating a specific number of work requests for a crew every time period, computing outputs such as work arrival rate for a downstream crew and plotting work in process (WIP). These outputs are not directly provided in many construction simulation software tools. Determining these outputs is generally considered a time consuming and tedious undertaking. Developing modeling constructs that automate the computation of these workflow outputs will be useful for construction modelers. This paper presents a special purpose simulation (SPS) template developed for workflow analysis. The SPS template consists of four modeling constructs that implement the workflow analysis functionalities mentioned above. The SPS template logic was verified using two simulation experiments. Use of this SPS template for analyzing different workflow based issues as well as to test the production management principles in construction is also highlighted.