Odds are at some point you’ve been afflicted by the symptoms of processing problem blues: missed deadlines, schedule delays, cost overruns, and lost documents could be leaving your project fighting for life. Luckily workflow automation for construction could be the simple cure for you.
In today’s construction industry creating a cohesive team that can collaborate effortlessly within your own organisation is a challenge. Coordinating workflows across multiple project stakeholders, across multiple companies, states and countries is considerably more complicated and full of added risks and costs, not to mention the stress.
Fortunately for project partners’ workflow automation can eradicate processing problems by connecting your people, procedures and information.
Gone are the days where multi-company project activities were retained behind a firewall on the network of a single company. Along with the everyman for himself attitude that saw companies managing their own workflows and sharing information when necessary through email, fax, courier or snail mail.
Automating your workflows from a single, centralised, platform reduces the risk for rework, schedule delays, cost overruns and potential disputes. Instead the automated processes can be built on the skills and expertise of the entire workforce, giving everyone involved the information they need to do their job successfully.
This is the brilliance of workflow automation software. It turns workflows into the underground electronic transmission pipes that keep a project functioning and allows you to take advantage of your greatest resource, your team.
Project management software like IPM has taken workflow management to a whole new level by recognising the complexity of construction projects as different from any other sector. They have not only included many workflow processes that are unique to the construction industry but have made the program customizable to suit your specific area of need. Workflows can even be organised to reflect the contractual obligations of a project.
But the real hero of workflow automation is that it works in real-time. This means no more waiting around for information when crucial decisions are being made. With workflow automation a permanent audit trail is being captured, which can be accessed at any stage. So your team, with access to the relevant documents and communications, has the ability to stay on top of the big questions – the who, what, why, when and where, of a project. After all it can only take one individual, one miscommunication, one hitch in the road to bring the whole system to a grinding holt. The real time environment allows project managers to communicate with the entire team to track outstanding tasks, identify opportunities and pre-empt and resolve possible roadblocks.
So, if your project is suffering from missed connections, task delays, and unexpected obstacles then it’s time to get automated. Workflow management software, specifically designed for the construction industry, will transform your project. While allowing you the freedom to design, perform and manage your workflows, automation is bring your people closer together and applying a structure that will stop information from slipping through the cracks.