Construction company revolutionizes processes with document management software

Companies without comprehensive, all-inclusive document management software solutions in place frequently fall prey to the disarray for which infrastructures built on different – and sometimes conflicting – systems are known.

Take Construction Coordinators Inc. (CCI), a Needham, Mass.-based contractor of commercial and institutional facilities, for instance. A Constructech profile of the company indicated that CCI, which has flourished since its inception in 1991 and serves a big-name client list that includes Harvard, Westin and Mont Blanc, was getting tripped up by the hurdle of organization. Eventually, the problem reached a point where convoluted and contradictory processes were impeding CCI's ability to do business by having a negative impact on the time it took the firm's project team to turn around shop drawings submitted for review, the news source explained.

The issues plaguing the company were endemic. For one, members of the project team were not following a specific archiving system, which resulted in shop drawings being frequently misplaced. On top of that, there was a much bigger problem at work, i.e. the fact that the entire company's record storage protocols left a lot to be desired. Specifically, according to the media outlet, "CCI was collecting items in different formats and locations. Some items were submitted electronically; others in hard copy. Sometimes information was delivered to the office, and other times it was handed over in the field."

Needless to say, this resulted in paper-based and electronic records being siloed from each other, while also cultivating confusion about data generated in the field and at the office. Something had to change – and it did.

Emerging from the forest of disorganization
Since taking advantage of Web-based content management services that facilitated the tracking, organization and storage of project submittals, job reports, meeting minutes, requests for information, drawings and more, that company has significantly streamlined the turnaround time of submittals, reducing it by a full week (from the previous average of 17 days to a new figure of just 10 days). Moreover, the firm also did away with the need to resend lost submittals, which ate up approximately four hours of staff members' time per week, and has realized a host of other organizational advantages in the process.

Some firms that go paperless do so for the environmental benefits, while others are more concerned with saving physical space in the office. For those eager to optimize organization, digitizing operations by leveraging business process automation tools can yield dramatically positive results.

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