The Four Steps To Make The Profitable Choice-Step 1

How accessible is the job data for your company?  Can you put your fingers on estimates, cost figures, RFI’s and lien releases, easily?  Is your job costing integrated with you estimating process? Do you worry that you are making decisions, without having all the information that you should have. Your life and your profits could be a lot better by using Construction Project management Software.

This article will spell out the four steps you need to take to choose the right software for your company.

Step 1:  Figure out what it is you need to be efficient.

The First thing to do is to talk to people.  A lot of what you need in software is probably a solution to the part of the construction management process that is frustrating you right now.  Depending on your role in the company, what it is that is bugging you, is going to be different?

If you are the project manager in the office, you’re going to have different frustrations than the superintendent at the site. Accounting will have different concerns than estimating. Estimating will definitely have some concerns. Recovering cost data from previous work is always a big plus for an estimator.

So go take a survey. Have some lunches with your key people. Brainstorm. What would make these people’s lives easier? What will improve their efficiency?  What will increase the potential capability of your company?  Don’t just talk to your managers; while your office manager may have the big picture, talk to your clerical staff, they are the ones entering data.

I once worked in an office where the business owner marched in with a new program. Everything was going on the computer. Some salesman had sold him! It doubled the work in the office. First you did what you always did, then you put it in the computer. He should have talked to us. After a month we dumped the program.

What will make it possible for your firm to do more work, or more complex projects, or work in a bigger geographic area? Maybe you don’t increase your work volume, but you increase your efficiency, decrease your cost and increase your profit. What will make your life more fun and less stressful? These questions are a good start to figure out what you need this software to be able to do.