B2W Flipbooks

5 The whiteboard or magnet board, an old standby for decades, can only be seen and updated in one central location. Translating and transferring that offline information to anyone outside of the office creates extra work, the data is inherently outdated, and collaboration is difficult. E-mails and text messages provide a virtual paper trail, giving them a slight edge over phone calls. Still, these electronic communications are visible only to the selected recipients and must be repeated to others or re-keyed into systems. Extended e-mail and text chains are a recipe for confusion. Errors are common, and there is no structure to or validation of the content against actual jobs, employees or equipment. Spreadsheets lack specialized functionality. Filtering the schedule to view it according to the specific needs of individual users is difficult or impossible. Logging resource requests or creating and changing assignments cannot be done with drag-and-drop simplicity. Circulating and keeping track of continuously updated versions are also a challenge, and it is hard to manage security permissions governing who can view and edit the schedule. Phone calls are easy and immediate, but they usually involve two people. Decisions must then be relayed to others. That introduces lag time and invariably opens the door for miscommunication and mistakes. Structured Communication Communicating is a core function of construction scheduling and dispatching. People across the organization need to know about the schedule as it changes so they can get the right resources to the right place at the right time. The tried-and-true tools many contractors rely on can be highly ineffective, and using a combination of these tools can compound the chaos, errors and inefficiency. With specialized software, the way employees enter information into the schedule and the ways they view and communicate that information are structured. Resource status, requests and assignments are documented and visible in real time, eliminating the miscommunication and mistakes that prevent contractors from optimizing their resources. The tools that many contractors rely on for scheduling and dispatching make it difficult to maintain accurate information and to communicate and collaborate in real time. DRAWBACKS WITH "THE WAY WE'VE ALWAYS DONE IT"

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