How to Streamline Design Reviews Across Multiple Disciplines
On complex infrastructure projects, design issues rarely arise from a lack of technical capability. They arise when multiple disciplines progress in parallel without a clear, controlled design review process to manage decisions and risk.
In modern infrastructure, where regulatory demands and project scales continue to increase, streamlining these reviews is essential. In this guide, KPMC explores how the design review process operates in multidisciplinary environments and how a structured design workflow can improve coordination and commercial outcomes as projects move toward construction.
Understanding the Design Review Process in Construction
The design review process is a structured evaluation of a design’s functionality, feasibility, and compliance before it advances to the next stage of development. In construction, this control is not limited to checking drawings for accuracy or aesthetic preference. It exists to confirm that design development remains aligned with project objectives, delivery constraints, and approval requirements.
On multidisciplinary projects, design reviews must operate as strict decision gates. Rather than simple quality checks, they are sophisticated coordination exercises that examine architectural, structural, and MEP designs simultaneously. Each review stage should confirm that specific risks have been addressed and that unresolved issues are visible and managed before further design effort proceeds.
What the Design Review Process Should Control
To be effective, reviews must fulfill several critical objectives that directly impact project outcomes.
1. Design Intent Alignment Across Disciplines
Reviews must confirm that architectural, structural, civil, and services designs meet the same functional and performance requirements. Misalignment at this level often results in late coordination issues that are difficult to resolve without significant redesign.
2. Technical Compliance and Standards
With Australia’s increasingly stringent regulatory environment, design verification is crucial. This involves confirming that assumptions used by one discipline do not create compliance exposure for another, ensuring adherence to all local building codes and safety standards.
3. Interface Risk: Permanent vs. Temporary Works
Interfaces between permanent works and construction staging require early review. Where these interfaces are not tested during design, temporary works risks are often transferred to site teams with limited mitigation options. We discuss bridging the gap between design and delivery in further detail in our blog: Bridging the Gap Between Design and Delivery in Construction Projects
4. Constructability and Sequencing
The review must assess whether the proposed design can be built using realistic methods. This includes checking tolerances, material handling, and installation constraints that may not be apparent from 2D drawings alone.
5. Commercial Exposure
Unresolved design decisions carry cost and schedule consequences. Effective reviews make these visible by linking technical issues to procurement timing and potential variation risk. For more on how strategy impacts costs, read our article: How Commercial Strategy Shapes Project Outcomes in Australia.
Common Coordination Failures in Multidisciplinary Design Reviews
Despite their importance, the design review process faces significant challenges. Many issues stem from poorly structured, loosely governed, or disconnected reviews.
- Communication Gaps: Design teams often work remotely from construction sites or in disciplinary silos. This isolation leads to misunderstandings about scope and design intent, resulting in costly on-site errors.
- Misaligned Review Timing: When design packages progress at different speeds, reviews often occur before all inputs are available. This leads to partial assessments and repeated cycles that add time without resolving risk.
- Unclear Ownership: Where responsibility for resolving comments is not assigned, review findings remain open. Over time, this creates a backlog of unresolved issues that surface during construction when changes are costly.
- Document Inefficiencies: Teams frequently rely on static PDFs or Excel sheets, resulting in version-control issues. Multidisciplinary coordination fails when teams review outdated information, which undermines confidence in the entire process.
- Lack of Psychological Safety: If the review environment focuses solely on critique rather than improvement, team members may hesitate to raise valid concerns. We explore the importance of team culture in our blog: The Power of Risk Culture: Why People Matter as Much as Processes in Project Management.
Structuring a Workflow That Supports Cross-Discipline Review
To overcome these challenges, organizations must implement a disciplined design workflow. This ensures reviews are not ad hoc but are integrated into the project’s delivery framework.
Define Review Stages by Maturity
Break the process into multiple-stage reviews rather than a single comprehensive event. Early-stage reviews should focus on feasibility and alignment, while later stages confirm construction design management details and procurement readiness.
Assign Clear Roles and Acceptance Criteria
Every participant must understand their authority. Assigning accountable parties ensures comments are resolved promptly. Furthermore, defining clear acceptance criteria prevents ambiguity: designs should not advance until specific, measurable thresholds are met.
Integrate Independent Design Verification
Design verification should be separated from design authorship. This provides an independent assessment of compliance and safety. Concurrently, constructability checks, informed by site experience, should be integrated to ensure designs are practical to build.
Leverage Collaborative Technology
Modern design management in Australia relies heavily on technology to bridge gaps.
- BIM Integration: Create accurate discipline-specific BIM models integrated into a Common Data Environment (CDE). This allows for automated clash detection, identifying conflicts between structural and MEP elements before they reach the site.
- Real-Time Collaboration: Use platforms that allow for asynchronous reviews, ensuring remote teams can access and comment on the latest design iterations without version control errors.
How KPMC Supports Multidisciplinary Design Review Execution
At Kubri Project Management & Consulting, we bring commitment, international best practice, and innovative solutions to every project. We bridge the gap on your project with a team well-versed in local and international standards.
Our team comprises more than 70 combined years of experience, having successfully delivered major infrastructure works including the Western Roads Upgrade, Monash Freeway Upgrade 2, and the Westgate Tunnel Project. We utilize this deep expertise to streamline the design review process for our clients.
Independent Design Analysis and Management
Kubri provides an impartial assessment of designs, ensuring that each discipline meets project requirements. Whether it is engineering review, risk review, or program management, our extensive experience helps you achieve your project’s objectives.
Constructability-Led Reviews (Value Engineering)
We evaluate designs not only for technical accuracy but for practical efficiency. Our team leverages experience from major projects to identify savings and improvements.
During a recent Melbourne tender, our team utilized our experience to redirect a bridge design, reducing costs by 40%. This innovative solution replaced steel beams with mono-piles, cast-in-situ piers, and Super T beams, proving that rigorous constructability analysis delivers tangible commercial value.
Commercial and Contract Integration
We offer professional support for every stage of your project, including tendering, estimating, and commercial management. By integrating review outcomes with project schedules, we highlight potential cost impacts before they affect procurement. This holistic approach ensures multidisciplinary coordination extends beyond engineering into the commercial reality of the project.
Stakeholder and Team Coordination
We harness the great international pool of talent that now calls Australia home to deliver world-class solutions. This expertise enables us to facilitate structured review meetings, manage documentation centrally, and ensure alignment among all stakeholders, from clients to subcontractors.
KPMC: Turning Design Reviews Into Delivery Controls
Effective design reviews protect cost and quality outcomes. By establishing clear responsibilities, defined acceptance criteria, and structured workflows, the design review process becomes a tool for managing risk rather than generating commentary.
On complex projects, unresolved design issues can quickly escalate into cost and schedule exposure. Kubri ensures that each review identifies and addresses these risks early, linking technical decisions directly to construction sequencing, procurement planning, and commercial management.
When integrated consistently across a project, design reviews transform from routine checkpoints into delivery-focused controls that maintain technical alignment, manage risk, and safeguard project certainty.
Contact Kubri Project Management & Consulting today to learn how structured design reviews can support your next multidisciplinary project.