While
site- and job-generated data is incredibly useful in construction from design
all the way to handoff, there is very quickly becoming too much of it, literally on the verge of becoming too much of a
good thing. If you’re not figuring out a way to take advantage of the appropriate data that comes packed
inside your project, you could end up looking like someone who just missed the
cruise ship by five minutes, standing on shore and waving good-bye.
There’s
an incredible number of ways to collect data compared to the ways to manage
it in useful ways for communication, decision-making, conflict prediction,
collaboration, and just plain making the job proceed in the most efficient manner.
In an August 2019 ConstructConnect article, How Do
Data-Driven Decisions Benefit Construction Businesses?,
the author lists four ways that companies can use job-related data to improve a
project’s timeline and profitability.
Predictive
Analytics
A
hundred years ago, no one would have envisioned seeing a model of a project
before it was built, unless someone spent a month building it by hand out of
balsa wood and toothpicks. But here we are in the new millennium, and we have collaborative
tools like Autodesk
Revit to “build” that model. All of the teams on a job can anticipate
issues and conflicts on a project before construction even starts and make
informed decisions based on the data collected. Modeling helps avoid the
redesign and rework that so many construction companies have simply come to anticipate
as a cost of doing business. But analytics need to start at the beginning of a
project and build as the project moves forward. By moving data beyond
individual silos to a centralized location, all teams on the job can gain
insights from it and better manage risk and project outcomes. Next-gen project
management tools like the family of Autodesk BIM
360 products help streamline this process.
Equipment
Investments
Data-based
decision making can help the project manager allocate funds effectively for big
ticket items like equipment. Purchase or lease? Every expense has a break-even
point on a job. Using the BIM process, you can make advance projections for how
often a piece of equipment will be used. Then you can determine whether it will
be more profitable to lay out the capital for long-term use of heavy equipment
or just rent it for a portion this job.
Connecting
Teams
All
of the teams on a job have a common goal: bring the project to completion on
time and within budget. But it’s a long way from initial sketches to the day
the building is handed off to the owner’s facilities manager. Architects,
engineers and construction crews all have different workflows to reach that
goal. Project models are loaded with data that is useful to every team on the
job and can keep everyone on the same page. When you link all of that data
together and make it accessible in a central location (like the cloud), there’s
a much better chance the architect’s concept can be accomplished by the
engineers, and the complex engineering can be installed by the workers in the
field.
Managing Disputes
A general
manager once told me, management would be a lot easier if we didn’t have all
these people. Human interactions make the world go ‘round, but on the job they
can sometimes bring a project to a grinding halt. Usually communication, or
lack of it, is the root of problems. That’s where project data helps grease the
wheels of job progress. Having as much information about a job available for
all the affected teams goes a long way to heading off problems before they
arise. Questions get answered faster; changes are approved and put into effect
quicker; teams aren’t at each other’s throat for holding up the job.
The
demands on the construction industry to do more with less money and labor
continue to intensify. Using project data wisely pre-, during and
post-construction enables a business manager to make better decisions, build
better projects and improve profitability. By planning ahead and taking advantage of the appropriate data at
the right times, you’ll be one of the people on the
cruise ship waving good-bye to the person standing on shore who just missed it
by five minutes.
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