Last month, we teamed up with Construction Dive for a free webinar. In the webinar, Raken’s industry experts discuss why productivity tracking is essential and how construction companies can collect productivity data with the help of modern technology.
How to Boost Productivity in the Construction Industry is available now for streaming. Or, if you prefer to read instead of listening to the webinar, take a look at some of their tips below.
Why should I track productivity today?
With today’s rising material expenses, supply chain delays, and talent shortages, many construction executives wonder if they even have the time to worry about tracking construction productivity. However, understanding the way you work is integral to profitability, especially in our current work environment.
Tracking productivity sets your company up for success, because having an accurate assessment of your capabilities helps you plan effective budgets and schedules. It’s more important than ever to use your resources efficiently and accurately gauge how many workers you need on each and every jobsite.
Adopting a better productivity tracking process now may take some initial extra effort, but it will pay off substantially in the long run, saving both time and money.
How do I know I need to make changes to my productivity tracking?
If your projects are consistently finishing over or under budget, it’s time to take a look at your productivity tracking practices.
It’s easy to understand why a contractor would want to avoid going over budget, but when jobs frequently spend less money than anticipated, that’s also a red flag. Underspending means you’re constantly leaving money on the table when it comes to estimating—You’re losing potential work, overplanning how much time or labor is needed and allocating more resources than necessary to complete your work.
Another sign to watch out for is a breakdown of communication between field and office. Most project and operations managers don’t have the luxury of working onsite every day. If they feel too far removed from the day-to-day tasks that are being completed on each project and spend a significant amount of time checking in with their field teams, they may need a better overall productivity tracking solution.
What mistakes should I avoid when tracking productivity?
Start small
Some companies try to improve productivity tracking and end up failing because they do too much too quickly. It’s important to accurately and thoroughly assess the type of information you need to better plan budgets and schedules and implement tools that will help you collect the right data, no more and no less. Trying to get overly granular at first will only frustrate your field team and cloud your insights. Start small, and work your way up instead.
Get stakeholder buy-in
Make sure all stakeholders buy into any technology you adopt to track productivity. You’ll need a solution that’s easy to use for both the field and office. Changing processes without consulting the people who will be implementing the changes will cause roadblocks.
Scale wisely
If you’re trying to increase the level of productivity tracking you do for your business, make sure you scale your processes wisely. For example, you may currently track work using pen and paper reporting. It may make more sense to transition to a digital reporting application as your company grows, rather than continuing to scale manual data entry.
What’s the best productivity tracking technology for construction?
Luckily modern tools make collecting productivity data much easier than in the past. Using digital productivity tracking software with mobile data capture capabilities allows the field to quickly and accurately report what’s happening on the jobsite then instantly share that information with the office via cloud storage. You’ll gain better visibility and save your field workers valuable time over pen and paper reporting.
Using a single solution for time, labor, and material tracking helps streamline your productivity tracking process and can deliver insights more efficiently than ever before.
How can Raken help track productivity?
There is almost always a difference between what you think you can do and what you can actually do. Good data helps narrow that gap.
Raken’s digital reporting solution helps your field team collect high quality productivity data without distracting from their daily tasks. Try it for yourself to see how quick and easy Raken can make tracking productivity—for both the field and the office.