Works direction and execution direction

The LOE entrusts the director de obra (works director) with directing the development of the works in their technical, aesthetic, planning and environmental aspects, in accordance with the design, the licence and the contract, with the aim of ensuring their fitness for the intended purpose. From that formula derive the core tasks: verifying the setting out and the fitness of the designed foundations and structure to the ground conditions; resolving the works' contingencies, recording in the libro de órdenes y asistencias (site order book) the instructions for the correct interpretation of the design; drafting the design modifications the progress of the works may require; and signing the setting-out minutes and the final works certificate.

The position is that of the design's guarantor: when the site asks, the works director answers for the design, and when reality forces a change, it is the works director who modifies with the author's authority. That is why the design's indefinitions end up on their desk, and why the quality of the detailed design determines how much of their time the site consumes resolving what should have been resolved on paper.

To the director de la ejecución (execution director) the law entrusts directing the material execution of the works and controlling it qualitatively and quantitatively. The core tasks: verifying the on-site reception of construction products, ordering tests and trials; directing material execution by checking setting-out, materials and the correct execution and arrangement of the construction elements and services; recording in the order book the instructions proper to this function; and signing, together with the works director, the setting-out minutes and the final certificate, besides preparing and signing the interim certifications and the final settlement of the executed units.

The position is that of the independent verifier: nothing enters the site without their reception, nothing is covered without their check and nothing is paid without their valuation. The two systems operating under their baton, quality control with its programme and testing and cost tracking with its certifications, have their own articles developing their mechanics.

Document	Works director	Execution director
Setting-out minutes	Signs	Signs
Site order book	Design instructions	Execution instructions
Design modifications	Drafts and signs	Applies in control
Product reception and testing	Is informed	Orders and verifies
Interim certifications	Is informed	Prepares and signs
Final works certificate	Signs	Signs

The map teaches the system's grammar: the design's documents carry the signature of the one who governs it, the control's documents that of the one who verifies, and the acts closing phases, setting out and completion, carry both because they attest both things at once. That distribution of signatures is what sustains the cross-control.

Three overlaps concentrate the system's real friction. Modifications: the execution director detects on site what does not fit, but the design solution belongs to the works director; without a fast circuit between the two, the gap is filled by the contractor with accomplished facts. The rejection of units: the execution director's authority not to accept what is badly executed needs the backing of the whole site direction against schedule pressure. And informal instructions: works directed by calls and messages manufacture diffuse liabilities; the discipline of the order book, written instructions, dated and signed by their author, is the cheap vaccine.

For the developer, the practical reading is organisational: agree each direction's commitment and visits, demand the documentary circuit from day one and never bypass the execution director in the negotiation of certifications. All three decisions are taken when contracting rather than during the works.

The first is treating the two directions as redundancy and cutting one: the system loses exactly the cross-control that justifies it. Both functions are legally distinct and do not combine in one person.

The second is letting modifications accumulate unformalised, with the works advancing on verbal decisions nobody signed. Each decision is recorded in the order book on the day it is taken.

The third is the certification negotiated apart from the execution director, turning independent economic control into scenery. Certification is based on the real measurement of what was executed.

The fourth is the empty order book: months of works without written instructions describe a direction that did not direct or will not be able to prove it did. The book is kept current like any other site document.