NEW DIRECTIONS FOR COMPUTERS IN CONSTRUCTION

In a remarkably short time, the computer industry has progressed a long way in terms of making useable productivity tools available for the construction industry. Not too long ago, all contractors had to turn to was some standard accounting program to handle the basics: keeping track of payroll, paying the bills, getting out the financial statements and maybe creating some rudimentary job cost reports. Everything else was done on those workhorse spreadsheets.

Though early programs did a competent job of helping contractors with the business side of their businesses, but they lacked one important thing: integration. Because you had to use several different software programs, to handle different aspects of a project. That meant entering data in more than one place: here for estimating, there for accounting, somewhere else for job costing, and yet again to produce reports specific to the demands of a particular customer or department.

Today, software integration is helping to alleviate some of the redundancy of those older programs. Software developers who participated in the early stages of integration congratulated themselves on begin able to send budgets from an estimating package directly to the job cost accounting software without having to re-enter those numbers. Now true integration is spreading farther and wider. Top quality software can include the tools for passing ideas from one aspect to another of the sales-design-estimating-constructing-follow-up sequence.

Here are some examples:

Estimating Software: Some estimating software is able to pull information in directly from CAD drawings and literally automate the take-off process. Frequent changes from a finicky owner or a design-build project? Import the changes from the drawing file and let the estimating software recalculate quantities, labor factors and materials lists. A good estimating package can make this a productivity tool and allow lots of flexibility to both the designer and the estimator rather than being a hindrance to both.

Some estimating packages can send information directly to scheduling software. Durations based on labor and equipment productivity are in the estimate. Resources from accumulated subcontractors are in the estimate. Why not send all that directly to the scheduling application and get a head start on setting up the charts?

Accounting Software: Time was when a good accounting application could handle most of your union reporting and also calculate Washington State's L&I premiums correctly. Good software publishers are doing better and better about addressing important issues that confront contractors beyond "how much is it costing me?" Things like:

• Entering invoices in a "pending" bin even before they become an accounting document. Two weeks later you can find out which project manager it went out to for approval, and see if it's still riding around on the dashboard of his pickup.

• Letting the system keep tabs in the background on whether your subcontractors' insurance policies are current. Computers can be really good at keeping track of dates, and providing you with ticklers to remind you of expiration dates. Much easier (and more foolproof) than doing that sort of thing with a paper system.

• Running "exception" reports: like: how many subcontracts do we have out there for which we still don't have the signed copies back?

• How many dollars have we spent completing work on contract changes that still haven't been approved?

• Where are most of our injuries coming from? What kinds of work, or whose projects, or what kinds of activities within a project, or which days of the week are producing the most injuries on our jobs?

• In some cases, you can even set up fields of your own devising to track things that may be important to you.

• How about attaching a note to a transaction ("Don't pay this invoice until Bill provides us the specs we need to produce the as-builts.") As that transaction flows through the system, such a note could be seen (or added to) by anyone on the system who may be impacted by that particular transaction: entering a PO, entering an invoice, approving an invoice (does the system include an invoice approval system?), or selecting invoices for payment. This is not a "sticky-note" or something scribbled in the margin of the invoice copy. It's attached to the transaction record in the accounting software and follows that record all the way through the process.

Good accounting software now can be just as much about project management as it is about budget-actual-variance.

Access to information: Inquiry systems now can help overcome that age-old conflict between field departments and accounting departments. As soon as invoices or timecards or purchase orders are entered into the system, that information (organized in a way that is sensible to job superintendents) can be available. Good software can make these inquiry functions easy to work with (so the PMs will actually use them). And more advanced software can make the screens flexible enough and interactive enough to accommodate different personal styles -and keep the information secure, so the accounting department need not be concerned about after-the-fact "interpretations."

Remote access: The information doesn't do the Project Manager much good if he's out in the field or on the road and the management/accounting system is in the office. With a substantial communications program or access server, you can connect the remote PM to the office's computers and allow him to do some of his on-line work with almost the same speed and flexibility as though he were sitting at a terminal upstairs. This provides information in a truly timely manner to the person who needs it most. The result can be tighter control and quicker response to problem situations.

Similarly, Wide Area Networks let us connect remote offices together for beefier exchanges of information. Remote Time Entry software can let a superintendent enter his timecards on a simple entry grid, then up-load that file to the home office to complete the payroll processing. Why write it down (or type it into a spreadsheet) only to have the clerical staff in the office enter it again?

Internet access: Yes, it really is here, and we're all coming to meet it by and by. It's not just pictures of questionable taste and slick advertising. One contractor downloaded some patent information from a supplier on the East Coast late one night across the Internet and saved himself from having to re-do a significant portion of his estimate to meet a bid day requirement on the following day.

Requests for bids, bid specifications and even drawings as attached files are soon to follow. Already, some public agencies are posting bid calls on there web pages. And the Seattle District Corps of Engineers has provided plan books on a few projects on their web site, downloadable in a matter of minutes.

Faster-faster-faster: Graphical software, more detailed management information and more "ideas" flowing through the system -all these make for more demanding software and larger data files. Connecting a remote PC now involves more than just a couple of modems and a phone line. If the performance is too slow, the system won't get used, and we're back to flying seat-of-the pants fashion. Bridges or routers and digital phone lines (ISDN), communications servers, remote processing servers are all components that can provide the additional horsepower required to handle the information load.

Two suggestions for making your software-network-computer system a tool to help keep you productive and competitive:

1) Your system requires planning and attention. Not constant, but at least occasional focused attention. If you don't have a plan for how your system will grow and expand to meet your increasing demands (and they will increase), you'll soon fall into a catch-up mode that makes you more vulnerable, and ultimately costs you more money.

2) You should have a budget for your computer system. It's hard to carve out the money for a new pickup, or an expensive piece of equipment if you haven't planned for it. The same is true for your computers. They're important tools. With no component in your budget for computers, for maintenance, and for growth, you'll always be scraping for the money when you need to expand.

So keep a focus to the future, keep some funds budgeted to help you get there, and be sure you have competent help available when you need it.

This article was provided by Business Software, Inc. of Bellevue, a Timberline dealer and network systems integrator for the past 11 years.