Document Review Workflow with the Capital Project Collaboration Platform (CP2) on AWS

As I wrote in ‘Reduce Collaboration Toil for Capital Projects Using AWS’ blogpost, customers in the energy industry spend millions of hours collaborating internally and across with external partners such as Engineering, Procurement, and Construction (EPC) contractors over the life of a capital project. The key pain points customers face include collating comments, inefficient routing of information, ineffective search, traceability, and auditability. AWS has developed a cloud-based collaboration solution for capital projects called Capital Project Collaboration Platform (CP2). Using CP2, teams can reduce collaboration challenges and streamline operations for capital projects on AWS.

The goal of CP2 is to reduce friction in collaboration internally and with external partners.

At this time, the CP2 platform supports three business workflows—Document Review, Technical Query, and Request for Information. These workflows drive efficiency in the collaborative aspects of capital projects. The goal of this article is to do a dive deep on the Document Review (DR) workflow.

Typically, in capital projects, an operator and its contractors exchange engineering design documents for review and approval. During the course of a major capital project, thousands of such design documents are reviewed and approved.

CP2’s DR workflow provides a seamless way for multiple organizations to connect, exchange, review, and approve documents. It provides automated algorithm-based routing of documents to correct individuals in the organization based on the stage of the workflow. This dramatically improves administrative efficiency (up to 40 percent) and allows engineers additional time (up to 20 percent) to review documents. DR workflow also supports a comprehensive feature set, including PDF markup and real-time user collaboration. Improved administrative efficiency and additional engineering review time potentially improve the outcomes of downstream construction activities and reduce rework.

How does the DR workflow reduce the cycle time of a Review-Approval loop?

The diagram below shows the DR approval workflow between an operator and a contractor. The key steps in the workflow are as follows:

1. Contractor initiates the workflow by creating and sending a document for review to the operator
2. CP2 reads the document meta-information and uses it to automatically deliver it to the correct lead reviewer and associated collaborators on the operator team
3. Lead reviewer may manually add or remove collaborators as needed. After getting collaborators comments, lead reviewer will finalize the review and send the document back to the contractor for corrections. The cycle may repeat as necessary.

Automated routing of documents

CP2 is set up with project organization information and document metadata for the operator. This meta-information includes individuals with their role and area of expertise, etc. When a contractor submits a document for review and approval, CP2 reads the meta-information related to the document and routes it to the correct set of individuals based on preset rules. Compared to the manual process, which can take up to 24 hours (or more) for delivery, CP2 reviewers receive the document within minutes.

Ad hoc collaboration

A lead reviewer can invite or remove collaborators as and when needed. This further reduces time and effort as compared to manual processes.

One-stop shop for reviews

The use of CP2 is intuitive and provides comprehensive features such as search, PDF annotation, and commenting capability. This allows reviewers to use CP2 as a one-stop shop for document reviews instead of switching between multiple tools.

How does a user collaborate with team members?

A user can invite any number of project team members within an organization to comment on the document. All project team members can be accessed through CP2.

How does a user add supporting content to a review?

For PDF documents, users can also annotate and add comments as necessary. In addition, users can attach any additional documents or other content, including video files.

How does CP2 support reporting and analytics?

CP2 moves all operational data into a data warehouse on a regular basis. It is assumed that customers can connect to this data warehouse with their preferred analytics solution.

Does CP2 integrate with existing document management review solutions?

Yes. CP2 has been integrated with a leading document management solution. AWS Professional Services and its partners can support the customer in the integration of CP2 to the desired document management solution.

How does CP2 compare to existing solutions in the marketplace?

The value of CP2 is that it will align with your organization’s business processes and capital project organization. For example, CP2 automatically routes documents to specific individuals because it is configured to understand project-level roles and responsibilities. In addition, organizations can further customize CP2 as their business needs evolve over time.

Can CP2 work in capital projects outside of the energy industry?

Yes. CP2 may be used in capital projects related to industries such as construction, mining, infrastructure, etc.

Are there any public customer references for CP2?

Yes. CP2 has been successfully deployed at ExxonMobil to drive savings in thousands of engineering hours. ExxonMobil presented DR capabilities at re:Invent 2020.

How do I get CP2 for my organization ?

CP2 is available to all AWS customers. It can be customized as needed for specific business requirements. Please contact AWS sales team for further information.