Why Digital Tools Matter in Construction

Most industries have been turning away from old fashioned pen and paper processes to digital ones for decades in order to save time. But there are a lot of other reasons for going digital that may not be immediately obvious.

Organization is another important perk of going paperless that can’t be understated. In fact, 48% of employees have difficulty finding documents quickly, according to a 2023 Adobe Acrobat survey. That’s almost half of the workforce! It really doesn’t have to be that hard, though.

What goes in your digital toolbox?

Every construction company needs the right tools to succeed. When you employ the right digital tools, the likelihood of success skyrockets. 

Digital daily reports

You save a lot of time by moving from pen and paper dailies to digital ones. But that’s not the only benefit. Digital daily reports make it easy for everyone in your company to see what’s happening on the jobsite.

Project visibility is particularly difficult to achieve with old-fashioned paper reports, because they can only be in one place at a time unless they’re scanned and copied. However you can often share digital daily reports with collaborators or notify stakeholders via email.

It’s easier to edit and correct digital dailies as well. With paper reports, reports have to either be marked up with a red pen or completely redone. Digital daily reports can easily be edited, though, eeither in-app, on a desktop, or both.

Production tracking

When you’re operating with just pen and paper, tracking progress on the jobsite becomes especially challenging. You have to pull data from multiple different sources to develop a clear view of what’s actually happening at the jobsite, and that can take a long time.

With digital production tracking, that’s a lot easier. Rather than tracking down the right information every single time, you can monitor productivity by automatically pulling up-to-date data from time cards, equipment and material logs, and more.

Safety dashboards

Jobsite safety is one of the most important aspects of every construction project, but it’s often overlooked. When you rely on pen and paper tools for safety, it not only takes longer, but can lead to unsafe conditions because of how hard the necessary information is to find.

However, digital safety dashboards make it easy to consolidate information related to safety compliance and identify issues early on. You can monitor toolbox talk attendance, checklist completion, report incidents, and track safety and quality observations all in one place. 

Equipment and labor management

For a project to run smoothly, you need to make sure you’re using the right resources in the right places. That’s harder than people think, though. For example, your only forklift certified employee might have been told to report to one jobsite, but another jobsite needs him to move a shipment that was just dropped off. And speaking of forklifts, where is yours?

That’s what makes digital equipment and labor management tools essential. Digital equipment management enables you to track usage for owned and rented equipment, both big and small. Plus, you can run reports to get an overview of all your equipment by type, condition, and more with just a click. You can even stay on top of budgets and maintenance to get the most out of your investments for as long as possible.

Similarly, digital labor management makes it easy to track worker certifications and schedule accordingly. More advanced labor management tools will even have a labor map that helps you see where skilled workers are being deployed.

Trying to do any of this with just pen and paper takes up a lot of extra time and leaves too much room for human error. By going digital, you save time and get a clearer picture of how (and where) your resources are being allocated.

Go digital with Raken

You can think of us as your digital toolbox. We take a multi-faceted approach to helping companies like yours succeed. Here’s what our customer Dickinson Cameron has to say about how we help them stay organized:

Improve daily operations with our easy-to-read digital daily reports, safety and productivity dashboards, and resource management tools. Not only will you save time, but you’ll avoid confusion and achieve better budgets down the road by consolidating data and maintaining accurate records. We’re your all-in-one tool for the field.