Glossary
Construction Manager Terms & Vocabulary
15 essential construction manager terms with plain-English definitions: the vocabulary you’ll hear in training and on day one.
Key construction manager vocabulary
These 15 terms come up constantly in construction manager training, on the job and in interviews. Knowing them helps you follow instructions, document accurately and sound prepared.
- Change order
- A formal change to the contract scope, price or schedule.
- Closeout
- Final documents, warranties and as-builts delivered at project end.
- CPM schedule
- Critical path method schedule showing the sequence of tasks.
- Critical path
- The sequence of tasks that determines the project’s finish date.
- Daily report
- A record of work, weather, crews and issues each day.
- GMP
- Guaranteed maximum price contract.
- Look-ahead schedule
- A short-term schedule, often three weeks.
- Means and methods
- How the contractor performs the work.
- OAC meeting
- Owner-architect-contractor meeting.
- Punch list
- A list of items to finish or fix before closeout.
- Retainage
- A portion of payment held until work is complete.
- RFI
- Request for information: a formal question about plans or specifications.
- Submittal
- Product data, samples or drawings sent for approval before installation.
- Substantial completion
- When a project can be used for its intended purpose.
- Value engineering
- Finding lower-cost alternatives without losing function.
Practice these terms
Test yourself with the free Construction Manager practice test: it includes vocabulary questions built from this list. For a complete course, see Construction Manager training.
Browse terms from every career in our career glossary.