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By Quickbase

On any given day, a construction project manager may need to consult 10 or more different apps or software systems just to understand the full portrait of project status and plan for subsequent work. Workforce management, site safety and compliance, supplier tracking, resource management, contractor communications and more may all be housed in individual systems or your email inbox.

Ongoing tumultuous circumstances have created extreme uncertainty for the UK construction industry. While still reeling from the effects of Brexit and the COVID-19 pandemic, the war in Ukraine has drastically affected the cost of building materials and energy in the UK. Furthermore, the supply chain remains disrupted while resource and labour shortages abound. External challenges have left construction leaders searching for new solutions. The bigger picture shows that 85 per cent of business leaders across eight countries and a range of industries accelerated their digital transformation strategy in the immediate wake of COVID. Digital transformation isn’t merely about adopting new software (construction project managers already have too many software tools). Instead, construction managers should make their work simpler and smarter with digital transformation efforts. Here’s how to do it yourself.

What does digital transformation mean?

Digital transformation is the integration of digital tech into the business functions of an organisation. It leverages the accuracy, accountability and precision of digital technology to improve business systems and foster efficiency and operational agility throughout an organisation. Successful digital transformation is not about just buying software for the sake of finding a new solution. It’s about adopting a holistic strategy for making your existing processes and tech stack run more efficiently.

The key word for digital transformation in construction project management is integration. Project managers don’t need to reinvent their entire workflow. They need the ability to integrate the processes of others into a clear system. A digital transformation should result in major time savings for project professionals. So how do you achieve it?

Improving construction project management through digital transformation

Despite the abundance of process-management apps and the reliance on phones and tablets in the field, according to McKinsey & Company’s industry digitisation index, construction is among the least digitised industries.

Unified solutions are difficult to identify. Tracking requirements vary between projects. Communication and project data is siloed between multiple teams, subcontractors and vendors. Procurement schedules are often unreliable. Because of these factors, project managers tend to rely on a piecemeal system of point solutions and manual processes to function. A successful digital transformation requires that construction project managers adopt a flexible solution that integrates all team data and communication in a single source of truth and facilitates collaboration between stakeholders.

The most effective option for most construction companies is building their own project-management solution with a no-code development platform, like Quickbase. Platforms that enable project managers to craft a custom solution without professional coders have become increasingly appealing and cost-efficient alternatives to single-purpose applications. A built software offers numerous time-saving and efficiency benefits.

Developing your management solution on a no-code development platform empowers you to create solutions that simplify and automate tasks, processes and workflows that are already in place. Unlike point solutions, building a software allows you to solve a multitude of project-management challenges across teams and create a connected ecosystem that shares one database with a single source of truth. A custom solution promotes visibility for all relevant stakeholders and decreases time spent sifting through data needed for status reporting.

In closing

The solution to your project roadblocks shouldn’t create more roadblocks. Saving time on everyday project-management processes is simple, if you approach it correctly. A proper digital transformation is about more than putting a new application in your tech stack. Integrating your processes and making them work for you in a flexible platform is how you win in construction management.

To learn more about how easily you can simplify your project-management process and start your digital transformation, download our eBook.