20 4 Essentials to Consider When Choosing Construction Project Management Software
The negative effects can include tremendous inefficiencies, confusion, errors and delays. But most of
all, out-of-date drawings can lead to expensive, often avoidable rework that can add up to as much
as 20% of a project's total cost.
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Several factors make it challenging to keep construction drawings
up to date:
• Drawing updates can require multiple steps and applications. Engineers often must retrieve a
drawing from a file system, then process it through a PDF tool so it can be sent to field crews in
a standard, easy-to-use form.
• Requests for information (RFIs) can be stalled by lack of integration with the project control
system. Often, the engineer must export the RFI as a PDF and attach it to the drawing. This
method also makes it hard to see and document the complete RFI collaboration between
the engineering team and the contractor or crews.
• Multiple drawing systems are used by field and engineering teams, with no integration for
automatic version tracking and updates. A time gap can arise between when engineers release
new drawings and when field teams receive them. And the need to manually send changes and
RFIs back and forth from field staff to engineers creates further delays.
Although many construction teams have drawing management tools, those tools only partially
address these challenges.
What can happen when your field teams don't have
the current version of construction drawings?
