Data-driven decision making (or DDDM) is the process of making organizational decisions based on actual data rather than intuition or observation alone. Many mid-market companies usually don’t have the resources to accomplish decent data-driven results.

StratusVue enables your teams to consume all project data;

whether you use PowerBI®, DOMO®, Tableau® or homegrown reports. Data-driven decisions are the natural extension of the “Big Data” concept. Big Data’s roots are in the ability to connect data sources that were previously a silo and relating the information.

Improve the Way You Price a Job

Your ERP has a cost that associates to actual pricing. Connect that to your estimating and now you can compare ‘estimated’ versus ‘actual’ when you are pricing out a job for accuracy. Take that newly blended view and tie in a schedule that allows you to see if pricing is affected by staging and logistics. Those silos of structured data can now blend into a unified view for better decision making throughout your project.

Elevate Your Cost-To-Complete and Forecasting

During your monthly review of projected costs, you can spend hours going through each estimate item and PCI/PCO to identify what you expect to happen. When using a data-driven decision process, a PX can quickly bring up items automatically. This eliminates the amount of time needed to manually search.

This is a relatively new option for mid-market construction companies. StratusVue can enable your team and their abilities to leverage better data.

Follow us on LinkedIn to stay up to date with the latest company news!

The evolution of drawings for construction has reached the digital age. We are moving into the next era and it is an exciting time for those in the construction industry. For example, the current technology allows real-time sharing and maintenance of construction drawings resulting in greater efficiency on projects.

A Brief History of Construction Drawings

The concept of construction drawings dates back to the ancient Egyptian and Mesopotamian cultures. To many people’s surprise, these drawings often included descriptive specifications. However, the birth of the blueprint changed the course of drawing production forever. In 1842, John Herschel invented a way to reproduce drawings.  Cyanotype is a photographic printing process done by a chemical reaction that produces white lines on a cyan-blue background, thus dubbing the name Blueprint. This process was much more cost and time-efficient. It also increased accuracy when producing an unlimited number of copies.

Eventually, the whiteprint replaced the blueprint. This new style of drawing was typically on a white background with blue lines. Currently, technical drawings are produced using Computer-Aided Design (CAD) files. Because of this, the files can now be saved digitally and sent directly from a computer to a plotter.

Drawing Tables: A Thing of the Past

Drawings originally needed large plotters to print full-size and scale-size drawings. Typically, this required a third party print house and large drawing tables. Often this called for a dedicated project coordinator or assistant to maintain these drawings; both on the site and in the office. Furthermore, when revisions were made, the old version of the drawings had to be physically replaced and redistributed.

Drawings on Tablets: The Era of Digital Construction Plans

Due to the evolution of technology, there is now the ability to digitally share construction drawings in various file types. Additionally, the project team can access the drawings from anywhere, at any time, and can distribute them to the project team in a matter of minutes.

As if real-time distribution is not enough, the team can revise or interst drawings into the project set without ever needing to leave their desk. Because of this, reproduction houses no longer need to reprint the technical drawing. Similarly, a project assistant or coordinator does not need to spend hours maintaining a set of drawings.

Today, field superintendents can open drawings immediately. They can see changes in real-time as the drawings for the project evolve. Likewise, the right digital tools provide the project team with the ability to annotate drawings just like they would on a drawing table with a red pen.

Today’s Tools

Many different platforms offer various solutions for digital construction document management. Having the right tools for the job can completely change the project’s profit. Some solutions address stand-alone documents, construction project management, cost management, and document management processes.

With StratusLink, built-in artificial intelligence can automatically “link” your plans. This results in your project drawings being interactive.

The benefits of using technology in the construction industry are countless. Are you ready to go digital?

Happy International Podcast Day! Podcasts are a great way to stay informed while respecting your time. Throw one on while you’re getting ready for work in the morning or during your morning commute.

To make things easy for you, we have compiled the top four construction podcasts to help you keep up with the latest industry news.

The Construction Leading Edge Podcast

Hosted by Todd Dawalt, this podcast is a “one-stop-shop” for construction professionals looking to improve their leadership and entrepreneurial skills. Each episode ranges from 30 minutes to an hour and covers topics such as effective hiring, punch list problems, and job site productivity.

ConTech Crew

Hosted by a variety of people including James Benham and Rob McKinney, this podcast hones in on all things Construction Tech. Listen to the latest trends, breakdown different software, and learn how to effectively integrate construction technology into your business.

The Art of Construction

Learn the best ways to grow your business with entrepreneur, Devon Tilly. This podcast hosts some of the best names in the industry and breaks down everything that is going on in the world of construction.

The Lien Zone Podcast

For those that are interested in construction law, dive into this podcast hosted by Alex Barthet; a construction lawyer out of Miami. Barthet covers a wide variety of construction law topics in each episode. 

Did we miss one of your favorites? Let us know what you’re listening to!

Also, be sure to follow us on LinkedIn to keep up to date with the latest StratusVue news.

One of our goals here at StratusVue is to make our clients feel like part of the family. While you can’t choose your family, you can choose which business partnership works best for you. The goal here is to give you a better understanding of our company and the relationship you’ll have with us. To make it easy, here are three words that best describe StratusVue.

Dedicated
We know that you are dedicated to your craft and you can expect nothing less from us.  Our team sees everything through to resolve.  That is within our development, support, and operations. Therefore, we do whatever it takes to keep you successful.

Caring
When you have a question or concern, we see to addressing it quickly and thoughtfully.  We understand that using new software can be a shift from your norm. Tasks that were second nature might now require more thought.  We empathize with what you are experiencing and will support you until it becomes second nature.

Personal
It’s not unusual that someone will call support just to talk. We know it’s important to feel heard and we appreciate you taking the time to call us.  We pride ourselves on knowing our customers and making sure that you know we are available.  We’ve woven customer service into our fabric.  We are here for you and because of you; that’s not lost on us.  

When you combine our culture, company values, and the program, we are one strong ally.  You have our word, that when you trust us with your project, you will get the best in return.

Be sure to follow us on LinkedIn to stay up to date with the latest company news.

We are working during a time where things are different.  Your kids walk into your meetings and your desk is steps away from your bed.  I know how you feel because I’m writing this from home in the same situation.

Today, I want to focus on things that I have found to be effective in working with and managing your team from home.

We’re In This Together

Don’t stress about the dog barking in the background or your child’s movie playing behind you while you are on the phone.  There’s no need to explain it; just move forward. You and your coworkers are all navigating this time together. If anything, this will humanize your team and foster stronger connections.

Get Personal

Make a point to touch base with your team on a personal level. We don’t see each other as often right now and a lot of office culture and team fluidity has been built on face-to-face interactions.  Since that doesn’t exist, we email, message, call, or video conference. While that helps keep the work on track, it’s not the same as reaching out by phone to check in on a personal level.

Trust Your Team

The temptation to schedule more meetings or check-ups is normal. But remember this: Nothing has changed in what your requirements, expectations or structure is other than the fact that now it’s remote. There’s no need to manage any differently than how you did before March 2020.  Your team might indeed need to adjust because work-life balance looks different now. But in the end, your expectations of them are the same. If the output is the same the management should be too.

Find Ways to Bring the Team Together Virtually

Set up virtual happy hours, internal contests, or simply take some time in your meetings to check in with your team to see if their needs have changed.  There are a lot of ways to keep your employees pointed in the right direction and make sure that they feel that they are an integral part of the machine.

Set Your Company Apart

This is a great opportunity to think about what makes your company, culture, and team different from the rest. It’s important to highlight those things to remind your employees of the company’s ultimate goal. This will refresh everyone’s focus and sense of pride to be working with an effective and goal-oriented team.

I hope these tips have eased some of your worries.  Even though you might hear about how bad things are and how difficult it is to be remote; you can take this opportunity to strengthen your team.  When the day comes that we get to shake hands again, your team will be smiling, excited, and more motivated than ever.

-Brian Anson, COO

Make sure to follow us on LinkedIn for company news and updates!

As contractors are met with new challenges during the COVID-19 pandemic, it’s crucial to find ways to minimize risk. Here are a few tips to help navigate these complex times.

Document EVERYTHING
Let’s talk about the biggest buzz phrase in construction – finishing projects “on time and under budget.”The reality is you’re going to face delays and unexpected costs. It’s imperative that you are documenting at every stage of projects. It is the single most important thing any general contractor or subcontractor can do to ensure full payment and, in worst cases, avoid litigation.

Communication
As deadlines loom and the work piles up, it’s natural for team members to put their heads down in an effort to get everything done. Working remotely can create an opportunity for communication to slip through the cracks. If you’re not following these two seemingly minor steps – communication and documentation – the owner of the project can turn around and say, “we don’t owe you anything because you didn’t follow contractual obligations,” and the finger-pointing begins.

Leverage Technology
One major step that’s going to help you with the previous points is having a single source of truth. Picture this: You receive a spreadsheet, make an edit, share it via email and suddenly there are numerous versions being emailed back and forth. By using software like StratusVue, you ensure version control and take a step towards the future of paperless job sites. It may seem daunting implementing technology, but doing so will have a massive effect on time savings. It’s not a matter of if, but when we will no longer see papers scattered around job sites.

Owners, now more than ever, are nervous about their projects. They not only want but need up-to-date documentation to feel at ease. Companies that provide accurate and timely data prove their reliability. This will appease owners on current projects and ensure future jobs. With all of your documents and communication in one location, you can focus on providing quality service.

Be sure to follow us on LinkedIn for all of the latest StratusVue updates!

Deciding to utilize Construction Management software is a big step. But taking the leap will increase your company’s efficiency as well as save you time and money. A painless implementation process and a user-first experience are vital to successful adoption and usage of your new software. At StratusVue, we want to make it as easy as possible to make the transition.

You’ll hear the word ‘process’ a lot in this blog. That’s the best thing about new software, it will create and maintain a process. The following five items will ultimately make the use of StratusVue seamless and successful.

Know Your Goals
A trouble-free and straightforward process is one of the main goals of every software. Therefore, it’s important to map out what processes to maintain, improve, and eliminate. That way, you’ll be able to use StratusVue to your full advantage.

Evaluate Your Strategy
With StratusVue, it is easy to delegate tasks to create additional savings. For example, assign an employee to focus specifically on document control. This creates consistency in the way projects are set up, run, and organized. All of your information becomes centralized and simplified.

Operating Procedures
Even though you may already have a successful process in place, it’s worth one more review. You might find areas to improve cost management. Look at how certain cost events are written as well as how far they go until additional approval is required. Also, consider how and when information is stored and if it’s beneficial. Cost Management is important; so providing our team with a good outline will ensure success.

Workflows and Approvals
To make the setup process simple, map out your current workflows and approvals of RFIs and submittals. Also, review cost events both internally and externally. Your internal checks and balances process will improve by utilizing a formal workflow.

Assign Tasks
The last thing is pretty simple but just as valuable. Make sure to decide who does what. It sounds obvious but when you break down who is performing what data entry on a project it will prove fruitful. Take a day and evaluate your projects to make sure that the team knows who is doing what.

Change is never easy.  Different things work for different people so having an unorganized system leads to inconsistency and frustration. So remember: StratusVue will help take your team to the next level in achieving one common goal. We are here to enable you to achieve great things!

Be sure to follow us on LinkedIn for all of the latest StratusVue updates!

Here at StratusVue, we offer the best software on the market for construction management. Our product covers the full spectrum of functionality with Cost Management, Project Management, and Invitation to Bid.

Today we are talking about how StratusVue improves Document Control.

Document control is essential for collaboration but it can be time-consuming. For instance, you’ll usually need to edit, revise, link, and distribute drawings or file documents. That’ll take up more time than you think.

But imagine an automated way to streamline each of those tasks all in one central hub. Well, we did the dreaming for you and now you get to reap the benefits.

StratusDrive and StratusLink guarantee improvement to your management system and here’s how:

Everything is in One Place

Having a central location that holds everything involved in the project eliminates the task of searching through different locations to find what you need.

Ability to Markup, Measure and Distribute

Being able to mark-up your documents and keep your construction set clean is important. We provide mark-up, measuring, and distributing without needing an outside license to read or edit PDFs, 2d/3d models, and images.

Provides Flexibility

If you change your sets, our software makes it easy to create the next iteration. If you want to distribute single sheets or bound sets we handle the transition. A task that typically takes hours can now be done in minutes due to automated linking.

Automated Linking

It’s important to make sure collaboration is as seamless as possible. Our ‘check out’ and ‘lock out’ feature allow changes to be made in a document while others are still using the file. Once you close your updates, each team member immediately has access to the most recent version.

Complete Automation

With StratusDrive and StratusLink you don’t need to find connections, create zones for linking or do your work offline because it’s all done automatically. But don’t worry, we give you the opportunity to proof it and make necessary edits before pushing it to your team.

Interested in seeing how it works? Register for our live learning event on August 21 for a demonstration on how our software operates.

We all know that the construction industry is slow to adopt construction technology. Although the rumor is that we are ‘slow to adopt’, we see the growth with new technologies that are using AI, VR, and the cloud for the construction industry every day. But, even though more and more construction job sites are using construction technology in many different ways, some companies still don’t know how to use construction technology the right way.

The breadth and depth of the different construction technologies is tremendous already. For instance, you can find many different solutions to help manage every aspect of a construction project. From preconstruction to scheduling, from project management and field reporting to managing your back office, there’s a software solution out there to help streamline your processes and improve productivity. But not every solution one will be the right solution for each and every jobsite.

How do you figure out this dilemma? It isn’t practical to change to a new software each time you start a new job. That would be costly and time consuming. This is why it’s smart to understand the different areas construction technology can enhance your jobsite before you invest money into a platform.

Areas to Use Construction Technology the Right Way

Labor. Finding skilled labor in the construction industry hasn’t been an easy task since the Great Depression and the Bureau of Labor Statistics projects construction employment growth to be 11% from 2016 through 2026. So, what’s the answer? Hiring younger workers who might not have the experience of working on a jobsite but will have technology experience and expertise. There will be less training involved and your company will save money by negating technology training with only onsite training. Also, with the use of drones, robots, and autonomous heavy equipment you will need to hire less laborers on your sites, and the younger workers you have hired will already have an understanding and be able to run these technologies as if they have been doing it all along.

Collaboration. The construction industry is highly fragmented. In other words, a jobsite will have workers, engineers, and equipment, plus offsite stakeholders, including project managers and the customer. This means it can be hard to get everyone on the same page when a decision needs to be made. The use of mobile apps has made communication and collaboration on projects easier. Mobile technology can help facilitate a meeting of the minds that will lead to definitive conclusions without interrupting the day’s work, which saves time and money. Also, being able to communicate in real time ensures that issues on the jobsite are resolved quickly with every stakeholder having a say. With the use of integrated solutions that sync in real-time, different stakeholders can make changes, add notes or respond to RFIs instantly and that information can be shared with every person involved with the project at the same time.

Safety. According to OSHA, approximately 1 in 10 construction workers will experience a jobsite injury. This is a problem that general contractors worry about from the first time they step onto a new jobsite until that job has wrapped up. Construction technology can alleviate some of that worry and keep workers safe on jobsites with the use of wearables that track and respond to slip, trip and fall incidents, virtual reality that reduces the need for boots on the ground, augmented reality that tags hazards before they become accidents, and the use of predictive analytics to identify likely hazards before they even occur.

Owner Expectations and Tight Margins. Owners usually understand they need a foundation under their building, but they still expect tight margins. Typical margins for construction companies range between 2 and 8 percent and continue to shrink as owner expectations increase. By implementing cloud-based document management systems that improve workforce efficiency, better coordinate materials and prefabrication deliveries, tag issues before they become problems, enable faster and better collaboration, reduce administrative burden, and improve outcomes all saves time and money. Cloud-based construction document management also gives owners visibility that can make it easy for them to understand the project and justify the budget.

Construction firms are starting to come around on construction technology and more and more companies are researching and implementing technology that are bringing about increased productivity and better collaboration while completing projects on time and under budget, which results in higher profit margins. Construction companies that aren’t investing in new construction technology and solutions can’t stay as competitive as those that are strategically adopting and implementing tech solutions.

What construction technology solutions has your company invested in and how have you seen a difference on the jobsite?