Lydon Solutions

Construction Project Management Software Solutions

Construction Software

How to Plan for a Construction Software Deployment – Part 2

How-To |

This is part two of three in a series of blogs called How to Plan for a Construction Software Deployment.

Here are several tips to help your organization successfully deploy a construction project management information systems (PMIS) or other similarly large-scale IT solution.

We shared five foundational steps for planning a construction project management software implementation in our last blog post – so if you haven’t read Part 1 yet, you should start there.  For Part 2, we'll offer a handful of best practices to keep in mind whenever you plan any major system deployment for your organization. In our upcoming Part 3, we will cover managing a construction software deployment.

Step 1 – Get IT onboard early

We recommend getting your IT team involved early in the project even if you are working with an outside vendor. Any major system deployment will involve multiple IT infrastructure considerations. The software, hardware, firewalls and virus protection in use at your organization can all impact your new system and it is best to discover and resolve any compatibility issues as soon as possible.

Chances are your IT group will also have a compliance checklist. Any new software platform or externally hosted solution will need to meet relevant information governance or other requirements. Obtaining early input and approval from IT will prevent issues downstream for your project.

Step 2 – Start small

It will be tempting to go big with the construction project management software implementation and deploy it across your organization or on multiple projects. Caution!!!! Don’t do it.

Our recommendation is to select a single project or two to pilot on first. This keeps your investment small. If things don’t work, you can easily write it off and move on to something else. If your trials succeed, you then have a better justification to move on to a wider deployment with more budget and resources.

Starting small also lets you build grassroots acceptance for your system among project team members as well as test and refine your assumptions. Top-down, mandated software deployments are much more challenging and have a low success rate. Do yourself a favor and score some wins early to pave the path forward.

Step 3 – Have a communications plan

Make sure you have a communications plan in place from the start of your project that includes a regular cadence of updates to other teams in your organization. Start educating potential stakeholders and project teams early so that they understand the project’s goals as well as its value to them and the organization. Building interest in this way not only helps find potential sponsors and champions, it also improves user adoption down the road.

Related to the above, communications shouldn’t just be one way –  you need to collect feedback. Set up open forums or focus groups to get input from stakeholders and users. Doing this early and consistently will help you pre-emptively resolve concerns before they become roadblocks to your project.

Step 4 – Don't forget about legacy data

Consider how your organization handles existing data in other systems or locations. If you followed the steps in our previous blog post, you should have documented your business practices and know where your new system will intersect with legacy data. You will need a migration strategy for any information that needs to be imported or converted to your new construction project management software system.

Step 5 – Develop an ongoing support strategy

Don’t forget to figure out who will support the solution and for how long. An effective support strategy will need to involve both your solution vendor, the business owners (Sponsor, Champions, SMEs), and your IT group – with clear handoff points and escalation paths.

Your support strategy should also include a roadmap of future project priorities for any upgrades or enhancement as well as potential integrations with other systems.

Step 6 – Invest in a solution, not software

Do not buy software, buy a solution. Software is only one piece of the pie. It is easy to be wowed by a long list of features and promises from prospective construction project management software vendors. But don’t lose track of what is most important.

You want a solution that is flexible and user-friendly to ensure that your users will actually want to use the system. Most importantly, the system you deploy should fit your business, not the other way around.

Finally, any vendor or service provider you select should know the construction industry, have proven successes, demonstrate content expertise and be flexible with their offering to meet your business needs.

We hope you found these tips helpful. Part 3 in this blog series will share advice on managing a construction software deployment. In the meantime, let us know if you have questions in the comments below. And if you recently deployed a new construction project management software system, what tips did you pick up along the way?

Your organization is unique, your PMIS should be too

We designed Construction Viz based on the idea that ever organization, project and PM is unique. Construction Viz is our flexible, subscription-based construction project management solution powered by Microsoft SharePoint 2016, SQL 2016 and Azure. The platform includes everything you need to manage your construction projects— document management, dashboards, reports, forms, workflows and more—in one place.

Contact us to get a free consultation to learn more about what Construction Viz can do for your organization.

Check out more blogs from How to Plan for a Construction Software Deployment

Mobile Dashboards for Construction Project Management

Company News |

We have good news for construction project managers. You can now easily provide real-time dashboards and KPIs to your team – no matter what OS or device they use.

We are big believers in the power of dashboards for construction project management. Our award-winning Construction Program Management Portal is built around robust custom dashboards. Construction projects are complex, with lots of moving parts and dependencies. Dashboards offer stakeholders a visual summary of a project’s status at a glance. And of course, more detailed information is always only a click away in our portal.

But wouldn’t it be great if your team could access these dashboards from anywhere on any device? We agree. Which is why we are very excited to offer construction project managers an even more powerful way to deploy dashboards.

Enterprise Mobile Construction Project Management Dashboards with Microsoft Data Zen

Lydon-Solutions-Construction-Project-Management-Dashboard-Example
Easily provide real-time dashboards and KPIs to your team with the Lydon Solutions Project Management Information System

Lydon Solutions now provides enterprise level dashboard and KPI reporting using Microsoft Data Zen. Now you can easily provide your team with interactive dashboards that show real-time KPIs in a visual and easy-to-understand format.

Your users can interact with these reports regardless of the device or operating system they use. That means mobile users see the same information as team members back in the office.

Best of all, no special coding is required. You can build and deploy these dashboards yourself. Data Zen makes it simple to combine information from virtually any system you use (including SharePoint).

With the Lydon Solutions Project Management Information System (PMIS) and Data Zen, you now have several powerful new capabilities, including:

  • Interactive charts – Display data in robust graphs, charts, tables, maps, and KPIs. Quickly drill down to more detailed information.
  • Real-Time Reporting – Build robust dashboards using real-time information from all your data sources. No custom coding required.
  • Support for multiple platforms and devices – Use your preferred device. Data Zen supports iOS, Android, and Windows phones, tablets, and laptops.
  • Better team Collaboration – Share KPIs and dashboards in real-time. Collaborate with team members using integrated instant messaging.
  • Dashboards on an enterprise scale – Deploy your dashboards across your entire organization and leverages SQL server and Active Directory for permissions.

Lydon Solutions continues to push the envelope of what is possible in managing your construction projects. Thought you knew SharePoint? Guess again. Contact us for a free consultation.

Join Us For The 2015 CMAA National Conference & Trade Show

Miscellaneous |

Lydon Solutions is a Bronze Sponsor at this year’s CMAA National Conference & Trade Show, taking place October 11-13th at the Hilton Bonnet Creek in Orlando. The conference is an excellent forum for industry professionals to learn about new trends, share best practices and network with their peers. We are excited to take this opportunity to showcase the benefits of our award-winning Construction Program Management Portal powered by Microsoft SharePoint as well as our full range of professional services, IT development and hosting solutions.

Look for us at booth #111 and make sure to join us for our ‘Microsoft Excel PowerPivot and SharePoint – The Perfect Solution’ presentation at the Demo Theater, Monday October 12th at 2:30pm.

This event will be special for us, since we will be unveiling our new cutting-edge enterprise mobile technology for Dashboards and KPIs that runs across IOS, Windows and Android devices.  These dashboards are served up through apps that can be downloaded across devices and then connected to your enterprise data sources such as Microsoft SharePoint.  At our booth, we’ll be demoing our power BI solutions using Microsoft Power Pivot and SharePoint – it’s sure to knock your socks off.

Not able to make it the CMAA National Conference? Contact us for more information about our services and schedule a free consultation.

PMIS the Right Way

How-To |

Considering a new Project Management Information Systems (PMIS) for your construction company?

We covered the reasons PMIS implementations typically fail in our previous blog post. Below we share the best practices we’ve learned implementing successful PMIS solutions for our clients over the years. Follow these tips and you will save yourself and your company headaches.

In a future blog post, we’ll explain why we believe Microsoft SharePoint, a tool already in place at most organizations, is the best PMIS option for many companies.

10 Tips for a Successful Project Management Information System Implementation

Do not go into an Enterprise PMIS rollout with your eyes shut.  A PMIS needs a scope, schedule and a budget just like any other construction project.  Buying software is the last step in the process not the first.  Do your homework and follow these best practices:

  1. Take stock of what you already have.  Analyze what you have before going out and buying an expensive new PMIS. You may find you already have tools that will meet your needs. For example, most companies already have Microsoft SharePoint. We have been able to provide 95% of our clients’ requirements by supplementing SharePoint with P6 and Arc GIS integration. Be sure to read our next blog article to learn why SharePoint may be the best PMIS solution for your company.
  2. Take time to do requirements.  We cannot say this emphatically enough. Taking time to do a proper requirements gathering phase is the difference between project success and failure. Requirements are independent of a PMIS, so spend the time defining your process before you even look at platforms. Understanding what your organization needs will make it easier to pick the right tool, prioritize features, avoid bloatware and ultimately save you time and money.
  3. Shoot High, Aim Low.  Plan the deployments so that functionality is released in phases.  The shotgun approach does not work.  Everybody on the project team is busy and their ability to change is very limited.  Small wins build support and foster empowerment of project teams.
  4. Assign Subject Matter Experts. A PMIS doesn’t build itself and magically know how you do things. You have to commit internal resources to collecting requirements, testing, training, encouraging adoption and managing feature requests. Establish a team of internal subject matter experts (SMEs) to support the PMIS throughout the entire Software Development Lifecycle (SDLC). These should be experienced SMEs from each discipline that will use the PMIS, not “newbies.”
  5. Get the right team.  Ensure your PMIS deployment is successful by entrusting the project to a team that is expert on the platform. Many construction companies hire one-off contractors or consultants from staffing agencies to develop functionality and deploy solutions. Companies do this because they believe they will save money. But hiring IT generalists often leads to wasted time, incomplete solutions and ballooning project costs. A PMIS solution should be deployed by a team that knows the product – both hardware and software – inside and out. Hire a team that specializes in PMIS deployments that can efficiently deliver a complete solution.
  6. Build grassroots support for your project.  PMIS systems are successful when users embrace them, not when they are forced to use them by upper management. You can increase adoption by ensuring the PMIS makes things easier and more efficient for all stakeholders. Otherwise you are just creating more work for other teams. Find internal champions in each department who know the business and can influence the rest of the organization. Work closely with them to gather their group’s requirements.
  7. Focus on core competencies.  A successful PMIS implementation requires the help of technology experts with experience deploying project management systems. You are probably thinking that this is convenient advice coming from a consulting company. That doesn’t make it any less true. You know your business backwards and forwards, but you are probably not an IT expert. Your internal IT department specializes in software and hardware refreshes. But they are not experienced with the intricacies of PMIS deployments. Bottom line: you will end up spending double the cost and tenfold the time trying to develop and roll out a PMIS without expert help.
  8. Embrace the cloud.  Companies spend millions maintaining data centers that will never keep up with the latest technology and security requirements.  We realize moving to the cloud seems daunting, But if you want to save cost, improve efficiency and foster innovation, your best bet is to get out from behind your firewall.
  9. Make your IT partner part of the construction team.  Your ideal IT partner should become part of your construction team to understand your business and your requirements. This will allow them to respond quickly to project needs and build solutions as they are needed.
  10. Expect to spend money.  Software is only part of the cost you need to consider. A bigger cost is the labor to develop and support your implementation.  A PMIS should be treated just like rolling out an enterprise financial system or CRM.  You don’t buy a system and then walk away. A successful long-term implementation requires careful initial planning followed by expert installation, maintenance, and support. Make sure your budget takes into account the full lifecycle of the PMIS.

Why Microsoft SharePoint is an ideal PMIS platform

In a future post, we’ll pull everything together to discuss why we recommend Microsoft SharePoint to our clients as the ideal foundation for a robust PMIS solution.

Mobile SharePoint Forms for construction with offline capability

How-To |

“No Internet Connection? No Problem.”

Being able to conveniently complete and electronically submit forms like Daily Inspection Reports or Safety Incident Reports is an important requirement for most construction projects. But connecting to a server in the field is sometimes impossible. Wouldn’t it be great to be able to work on your forms with or without internet access and not worry about losing data or having to re-enter information?

Lydon Solutions understands that construction professionals can’t always count on an internet connection in the field. That’s why we created Mobile SharePoint Forms for Construction featuring robust offline mobile support. With Lydon Solutions’ mobile forms, you and your team can complete all your necessary project forms in the field offline with a tablet or a mobile phone (IOS, Android, and Windows 8 devices). Forms can be filled out on your device without a connection and then uploaded to SharePoint when you are back online with a simple push of a button.

Best of all, Lydon Solutions’ Mobile SharePoint Forms for Construction can be configured for your business requirements without coding. Need to include photos in your forms? No problem, simply take photos with your mobile device and they are automatically embedded directly into your forms and ready to be marked up with comments. You can also include your GPS location, so the forms can be Geo Located into an Arc GIS map once they are submitted to SharePoint. Users can even sign the forms with their finger or stylus.

If you need to access the same forms on multiple devices, we have you covered too. Multiple views of the same form can be tailored to different screen sizes so you don’t have to build new forms for each device. And no matter which view you use or where you work, every field in the form is seamlessly integrated into a single SharePoint library with workflows, queries, reports and dashboards always available.

Want to find out how Mobile SharePoint Forms for Construction from Lydon Solutions can enhance the mobile productivity of your construction team in the field? Offline mobile forms are one of the many tools that are offered with Lydon Solutions’ award winning Program Management Portal. Learn more about our construction solutions and contact us for a demo.

Oracle Primavera P6 hosting & SharePoint integration

Company News |

We are pleased to announce that Lydon Solutions, a leading provider of Microsoft SharePoint solutions for the construction industry, now provides Oracle Primavera P6 enterprise hosting, integration and reporting in our Microsoft Azure data center.

This this new offering has several key benefits for our clients:

1. Affordable Primavera P6 enterprise hosting in our Microsoft Azure data center along with seamless integration of Primavera P6 and our Microsoft SharePoint solutions
2. Custom Primavera P6 web service reports as well as Oracle BI reports. These custom reports provide the entire project team with the ability to run reports and queries within Microsoft SharePoint.
3. Activity, WBS, budget, resource and dashboard reporting combined with the capability to export to Excel. These features are available to the project teams based on user permissions.
4. The ability to compare multiple projects side by side for “what if” analysis, changes from the baseline and reports on critical path and longest path

Oracle Primavera P6 enterprise hosting, integration and reporting is yet another way in which Lydon Solutions is helping you aggregate all of your mission critical construction project information into Microsoft SharePoint.

Contact us today and ask for a demo.