Thinking ahead – Construction Today

If you asked the common individual which industries they would affiliate with tech prowess, it’s not likely they would immediately offer you up design. But the reality is that the construction market has the potential to direct the way in technological improvement as companies come across new means to prioritize productivity, effectiveness and protection.

This is some thing J. Pettiecord, Inc. has figured out firsthand. As a single of the Midwest’s top rated contractors in a aggressive marketplace, the firm has developed at a rapid clip considering that its founding in 1981, setting up with a one truck and backhoe. Now, more than 40 many years later on, J. Pettiecord discovered alone losing momentum to speed bumps in its management processes as it scaled, specially when it arrived to its fleet of extra than 260 assets.

Adam Bliss, the IT and safety manager for J. Pettiecord, Inc, noticed an prospect to utilize better technologies to solve some of the problems the company was struggling with, from pricey breakdowns and servicing delays to decentralized info and technology gaps amongst the employees. By building the switch to a additional advanced fleet management computer software, Bliss and J. Pettiecord have been able to automate handbook data entry procedures, centralize their fleet info in a one procedure, and streamline the full upkeep procedure for the fleet.

Bliss broke down the 5 largest rewards of switching to a much more superior fleet administration application:

1. Staying in advance of the curve
In buy to pull in advance of its competition, J. Pettiecord, Inc. desired a application option that would empower it to work more rapidly and far better in get to secure more work opportunities than its rivals. But with over 65 employees handing in paper inspections and other guide reporting, a large amount of managers’ time was used hunting down info and repeating data entry processes that took much too extended to finish in the initial put.

Bliss realized the firm essential an overhaul of its recent units so that staff members could focus a lot more on their work roles, and that releasing them up of some time-consuming manual duties would permit them to use the competencies they were hired for extra properly. That is why Bliss selected to onboard Fleetio, a fleet administration system that experienced the potential to automate and digitize far more fleet processes than their more mature, out-of-date computer software could manage.

“Shop supervisors can emphasis on their occupation, which is running the shop – not getting into paperwork or chasing down the fellas when they wrote something that we cannot browse,” Bliss mentioned.

2. Keeping away from highly-priced breakdowns
As a distinguished building business in the Des Moines space, J. Pettiecord, Inc. has worked on quite a few jobs that develop a favourable affect in their group, with a heavy aim on environmental and general public infrastructure. But currently being a aspect of a group means becoming well prepared when pressing emergencies appear along, no matter whether it’s clearing debris from storm injury or disposing of contaminated soils.

“We will need to be capable to reply speedily to unexpected emergency incidents,” Bliss said. “If we have equipment down, we just cannot company those prospects.”

In purchase to remain completely ready for what ever operate will come together, J. Pettiecord, Inc. uses fleet management application to continue to keep a well-taken care of fleet with automated preventive routine maintenance schedules to prevent any possible breakdowns. And when breakdowns do take place, it uses digitized get the job done orders and interaction techniques. In-home technicians can take care of their day with established PM schedules and notifications, when also getting able to quickly react in-app to any challenges noted by operators.

3. Taking care of 3rd-party vendors
Though J. Pettiecord, Inc. does have its very own crew of technicians, its workload can often outweigh its staffing. Obtaining reliable partnerships with outsourced maintenance retailers and staying able to converse with them without any games of phone tag is vital to ensuring its external servicing endeavours operate just as smoothly as its in-dwelling procedure.

Simply because J. Pettiecord, Inc. utilizes Fleetio for its fleet management, the enterprise is capable to make use of servicing shop integrations to connect with a spouse of its selection and quickly see company updates, take care of payment and billing processes and even look at savings from various outlets.

“Having a fleet answer that allows us discover troubles immediately, receiving that information to our mechanics and our store manager is absolutely essential,” Bliss mentioned.

4. Acquiring everybody on just one system
As an IT supervisor, Bliss understands the significance of picking the appropriate technological innovation options to suit an business and every person in it. He worked diligently to obtain a software that had a person-pleasant mobile platform that would be accessible to all people that would have to have to use it, no matter of their expertise or consolation degree with technology.

“Some are better with technological innovation than other individuals,” Bliss mentioned. “When you have men employed to doing matters for a lengthy time, you have to instruct them a minor bit how to use these new tools. Luckily for us, Fleetio can make it quite obvious what they need to have to do.”

Fleetio permits motorists and specialists at J. Pettiecord, Inc. to accessibility and finish inspections, function orders and other vital fleet information from their phones or tablets, guaranteeing simplicity of use and dependable adoption.

5. Centralizing fleet knowledge with automation
As fleets test to develop into additional tech-ahead, it can immediately grow to be challenging to stability all the distinct tech methods that are meant to make existence less complicated. In get to stay clear of having missing in a jumble of data and dashboards, Bliss built absolutely sure to appear for a fleet management alternative that could simply combine with other platforms to unite fleet facts in a one spot, as effectively as offer you a level of customization to assure the proper data was out there in their platform.

Bliss primarily usually takes benefit of Fleetio’s open API from an IT point of view, an open API provides him extra overall flexibility to quickly import the info which is most major to his fleet. This permits him to make guaranteed that their Fleetio dashboard normally displays what they will need now, somewhat than staying stuck with an outdated software that can not scale with the organization.

“It’s awesome when [software] have their have integrations, but the advantage of an open API is that I can establish my possess as vital,” Bliss stated. “That’s what can conclusion up saving us a whole lot of time – the capability to automate tons of issues.”

Peyton Panik is a content marketing professional for Fleetio, a fleet management software company that can help organizations track, assess and boost their fleet operations. For more information, take a look at www.fleetio.com