The construction industry is worth $10 trillion globally, but growth has been an anemic 1 percent for decades. Inefficiency is to blame; many projects lose a third of their value to waste. One technology that’s emerging as a solution is collaboration software.
“A construction site is made up of different experts with one goal: Get the project done,” says Elizabeth Long, vice president of marketing and sales at Touchplan, a construction collaboration software provider. “Cloud-based collaboration software gives everybody on the job an easy way to communicate.”
“There is a ton of information passed back and forth on every project,” adds Jennifer Nussinow, Touchplan’s director of marketing. “The goal is to get everyone communicating together in one common place.”
Nussinow and Long emphasize three ways construction businesses can benefit from collaboration tools:
1. Get started easily
“The technology mimics simple processes the team is already using,” says Nussinow. “We’re able to get trades and project teams up and running in 15 minutes.”
2. Streamline day-to-day operations
“Collaboration software empowers leaders on the job to facilitate discussions,” Long says. “[This brings] experts in all the trades together as opposed to copying and pasting a schedule that nobody’s actually following.”
3. Improve the bottom line
“It’s not just time and money,” says Nussinow. “It’s manpower, it’s mental and physical exhaustion. It shows up in the bottom line in dollars and cents, but it also translates to a better project experience.”
This is about more than the bottom line, however. “We’re trying to change the way that all construction works,” Long says. “These tools offer the superpower of being proactive, rather than dealing with the complications after the fact.”
Jeff Somers, [email protected]