Decades of experience across all sectors and project types have given our industry a time-tested roadmap to success. Design-Build Done Right® Best Practices help you engineer higher quality outcomes by showing you what works – and what doesn’t.
By convening multiple disciplines, Design-Build Done Right® helps power singular success stories with collaboration and innovation that’s driving industry transformation.
Excellence. It’s built in.
DBIA’s Universal Best Practices is a good place to start your design-build journey. This document categorizes 10 best practices and nearly 50 supporting implementing techniques into three areas:
- Procuring Design-Build Services
- Contracting for Design-Build Services
- Executing Design-Build Projects
The evolution of this document is based on input from DBIA members and the A/E/C industry.
Additionally, DBIA created targeted resources to address specific issues impacting the Transportation/Aviation, Water/Wastewater and Federal sectors. Start with the Universal Best Practices document and then use these targeted resources to deepen your design-build knowledge.
DBIA’s Best Practice Primers are available to download in our online Bookstore for free, including
- Universal Best Practices
- Progressive Design-Build Done Right
- Project Delivery
- The Role of the Owner Advisor in Design-Build
- Federal Sector Best Practices
- Transportation and Aviation
- Water and Wastewater
- Public-Private Partnerships
- Virtual Design & Construction
More Resources
DBIA offers a number of additional resources to download in our online Bookstore to help deepen your design-build knowledge:
Contract Documents: DBIA provides the nation’s most comprehensive catalog of design-build standard form contract documents. Our documents are developed by industry experts across the spectrum of the entire design-build team to ensure all aspects of design, build and deliver are fully and fairly represented. Documents can be edited to suit specific projects and needs and purchases provide a one-year license for unlimited use. DBIA members receive a 50% discount.
Deeper Dives: These documents provide a more targeted look at specific topics important to each sector, including:
- Progressive Design-Build
- Qualifications-Based Selection Blueprint for Federal Design-Build Projects and Online Companion Tutorial
- Design-Build Teaming Agreements
- Federal Agency Use of Design-Build with Guaranteed Maximum Price
- Key Factors to Address When Considering Alternative Project Delivery in Transportation
- Unique Considerations for Social Infrastructure Public-Private Partnerships (P3)
Position Statements: These statements provide detail as to where DBIA stands on a topic or issue, including:
- The Flexibility of Design-Build
- Best Value Selection
- Qualification-Based Selection
- Procuring the Design-Build Team
- Organization of the Design-Build Entity
- Sustainability
- Design Excellence
- Prescriptive Design and the Use of Bridging Documents
- Use of Stipends
- Integrated Project Delivery
- Federal, State and Municipal LPTA Procurement
- Public-Private Partnerships (P3)
- Diversity, Equity and Inclusion
Additional Resources: DBIA offers a variety of design-build resources free to download, including research reports, market studies and surveys:
- 2024 FMI Design-Build Utilization Study
- 2026 State Statute Report
- Owner Readiness Assessment
- And more!