Our Values

Quality, Integrity and Sustainability

FIDIC’s key role and that of its Member Associations around the world is to improve people’s quality of life through the promotion of quality, integrity and sustainability in the infrastructure industry and the projects and services it delivers on a global scale.

Quality

To improve quality, the responsibility lies with all the stakeholders on a project, including the investor, government, clients, contractors, suppliers, consultants and operators. It requires a team effort, with all parties committed to achieving quality and excellence in all that they do. FIDIC has long advocated for quality in the consulting engineering industry. FIDIC has invested great resources in producing quality management and best practice guidelines to help inform and assist the industry.

FIDIC defines quality as all the key attributes of professional services including skill, experience, innovation, integrity, sustainability and best business practice. FIDIC’s Best Practice Committee (BPC) develops best practices guides and recommends to the board the best delivery mechanisms for the guidelines. They also monitor developments in key areas of the industry and provide relevant information to Member Associations in areas such as risk identification and management, insurance trends, practice management, quality-based selection, quality management selection, etc.

FIDIC is committed to further spreading Best Practice within the industry by: 

  • Continually developing programs for capacity building, procurement, sustainable management, which are tightly related to improving quality.
  • Promoting quality-based selection for the selection of consulting services within the multilateral development banks.
  • Work in partnership with the MDBs and UN organisations to develop special in-house training programs on best practices.

The key part of ensuring quality and best value from an infrastructure project is the procurement of the consultant, who is best able to provide the solution to meet the client’s requirements over the whole lifespan of the project. FIDIC has been promoting quality-based selection for many years, as it emphasises the importance of selecting consultancy firms on the basis of qualification, experience, professionalism and integrity, rather than price. The advice of the consulting engineer should be regarded as an asset investment, not a project cost.

Click here to find out more about the FIDIC quality-based selection guide.

FIDIC has also developed a policy statement to assist all Member Associations and their member firms in the pursuit of their commitment to quality. It states: “Member firms must have a commitment to the excellence through the implementation of a Quality Management System involving all levels of management and every employee, focusing on continuous improvement.”

Integrity

FIDIC has been energetically promoting integrity within the industry for years. There is evidence to support the idea that a formal and systematic approach towards the management of integrity works better than sporadic efforts developed by individual companies, yet the idea has been slow to achieve success in the consulting industry. Combating corruption requires a concerted effort by all parties involved in projects - clients, contractors, government procurement groups, and funding agencies alike - in helping to prevent and not just to punish. The industry cannot solve the problem without its partners.

FIDIC uses the term “integrity management” purposely. FIDIC advocates ethical integrity to fight corruption and an integrated management system as an approach to control and verify its performance in this regard. It begins with a firm’s commitment to a code of conduct on behalf of all of its members and leadership which demonstrates this commitment in a clear and visible way. The CEO must lead in the formulation of the code of conduct and in the allocation of resources to the integrity management initiative. There should be no misunderstanding that top management demands compliance to integrity values and is prepared to take the necessary actions for achieving integrity.

FIDIC also has a dedicated Integrity Management Committee (IMC) tasked with the development of policies, guidelines and processes aimed at better understanding and ‘managing’ risks of corruption. The IMC works with other international organisations to achieve this objective to ensure that there is only one standard used by the industry. The organisations that FIDIC works with include the World Federation of Engineering Organisations, Transparency International, Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, World Economic Forum, International Organization for Standardisation, Confederation of International Contractors’ Associations and the United Nations. The IMC liaises with the international financing institutions for complementing and supporting their anticorruption initiatives.

Sustainability

Sustainable infrastructure is vital to Quality of Life and the key advisors to help determine the correct investment choice are consulting engineers. FIDIC, with its partners, has proposed a new approach for sustainable urban development based upon improved cooperation, new synergies and integrated systems. As confirmed by several FIDIC and EFCA reports, to avoid irreversible damage to living conditions, there is a very limited timeframe to change the trends arising from the way people live today, resulting principally from the conditions under which society operates. The FIDIC Sustainable Development Committee (SDC) drives the work of FIDIC on sustainability. The SDC is tasked with building a knowledge base of project accomplishments and technology advances relative to sustainable development, from which to share best practices and lessons learned. Also, to encourage the incorporation of project sustainability management principles and practices into industry policies procedures, procurement documents and quality assurance programmes. FIDIC produces a range of best practice guides and information documents on sustainability. For further information, see the FIDIC Publications.