If you work in construction, you’ve probably noticed smartphones, tablets, and other new technology solutions appearing on job sites over the last few years. If you’ve been in the industry for a long time, you might even find them annoying: Why create complicated new processes when the old ones work just fine?
The fact is: The new tech we’re seeing in the workplace is meant to make our jobs (and lives) easier, not harder! And construction firms that embrace mobile technology give themselves a competitive advantage over those that don’t. Full stop.
Using construction management apps — such as mobile forms that can be filled out on a smartphone or tablet — saves time, streamlines workflows, creates more reliable data, and improves communication between job sites and the office.
Here’s how:
Save time and money
Imagine taking all those paper forms you fill out on a construction site (equipment inspection forms, safety audits, daily contractor reports) and turning them into digital forms that live in your team’s mobile devices. No more copies to be made, no more papers to be driven back to the office and filed, no more torn, wrinkled, illegible (or even missing) forms slowing everything down.
Site workers can fill out pre-populated forms, take photos, scan barcodes, and collect signatures all with the phone they are already carrying — even without an internet connection. All that information is then stored on their device until they sync it to the cloud, where it’s immediately available to folks in the office. This expedites the approval process so projects get completed faster.
Streamline your workflows
How much time do your employees spend scanning in forms, reentering data, uploading photos and matching them up with the appropriate records?
Mobile forms eliminate all of those cumbersome, annoying processes.
When you adopt mobile construction management apps, not only do you lose all the hassles that come with paperwork, but you gain quicker access to field data. As soon as a record is synced to the cloud, anyone in your organization with permission can see it.
Improve communication and accountability
When employees out in the field use GPS-enabled mobile forms, you can track their progress, seeing where and when forms are completed — and even receive alerts when forms are submitted or other actions are taken. You can also monitor things like the number of devices being used and how frequently each one collects and syncs data.
With real-time information sharing, you can catch errors as they occur and make adjustments while workers are still on site. With construction management apps, supervisors never have to wonder if what they’re seeing is the latest report, and they can be confident that work on site is being done right the first time.
Increase data reliability and accessibility
Paper forms introduce opportunities for error at every step. Illegible handwriting that needs to be deciphered, incomplete forms that get sent back to the field, and data-entry mistakes cause frustration and costly delays.
Using construction apps, information is collected one time and shared immediately, which not only speeds up processes, but improves the reliability of your data.
And when an inspector arrives, there’s no digging through a stack of paper for forms that were filled out last week. They’re right on your phone or tablet!
As you can see, upgrading to mobile forms not only saves companies time and money, but it improves productivity, compliance, and data accuracy — and makes life easier for everyone, whether they’re on the construction site or in the office!
Want to give mobile forms a try? Check out the Fulcrum gallery of construction apps and sign up for a FREE trial!
Fulcrum is a data collection platform that enables organizations to reduce costs, access critical data in real time, and improve decision making at every level. With Fulcrum, you can create custom apps using our simple drag-and-drop builder to turn your paper documents into digital forms that your field teams can quickly complete on mobile devices.