Top Mobile Apps for Jobsites
Kevin Halter Cofounder and VP of Business Development
at Getable
My Background
• Mechanical engineering at Tufts University
• Launched life-saving product to market for 8+ years
• Started Getable to focus on making tool and equipment rental easier
• Live on job-sites ranging from $350 million to $1.2 billion in Northern CA
• Heavy civil and commercial job-sites
• Saving skilled labor 1-2 hrs/week, PM’s 1-day/month, impact on productivity and schedule
Problem: Profit or Lack Thereof
• Razor thin margins of 1-3%
• Range of 0.5% - 2.5%
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
Skanska Obayashi Fluor Balfour Beatty URS Granite
Revenue ($ billions) Profit ($ billions)
Problem: Decreasing ProductivityThe only non-farm industry to decrease in productivity over the past 50 years
Problem: RecruitingTop firms are looking to recruit the leading construction managers, superintendents, and foremen
Craft
26%
74%
Trouble RecruitingNo Trouble
Professional
47%53%
Trouble RecruitingNo Trouble
OpportunityIncrease the productivity and efficiency of your labor
You have the most control over labor to affect your profit margins
% of Total Project Costs
10%
40%
10%
40%
Materials EquipmentLabor Project Management
How does your labor spend their time?“Laborers spend only 29% of their day on direct wrench time, while spending 19% procuring tools and equipment and 52% waiting, material handling, etc..” - 5 yr construction institute strategy
Labor - Time Spend
29%
19%
52%
Waiting, prep work, material handling, travelTools & EquipmentWrench Time
Solution:Mobile Technology
Smart Device Penetration in Construction
% of Construction Workers on Smart Devices
iPad
iPhone
All Smartphone
0% 20% 40% 60% 80% 100%
August 2012 August 2015
How can you reduce trips to the trailer?
• “Superintendents makes an average of 2+ trips back to the trailer/day.” -Engineering News Record
• “Walk less, save more.” -Top ENR contractor
• “If my superintendents needs some information on the 10th floor of a structure, we don’t want him walking back down to the trailer.”
Trips back to the trailer
Why should I look for mobile solutions?• Your workforce is mobile! Increased productivity.
• Improved communication and collaboration on-and-off the job-site
• Real-time data for better decision-making
• Acquiring new data from the field for enhanced reporting and analytics
• Young talent wants new tools to make their lives better
• Save time, save money, win more bids
• Owners will be asking soon…
How do I go about discovering new mobile apps?
• ENR magazine and FutureTech conference
• AGC conference, CLC, and quarterly board meetings
• Peers
• Job-site team—JV, subcontractors, etc.
• App Store
• Innovation leads
• Construction technology co’s (new ones)
What are key considerations when selecting a mobile app?
• End-User Driven. Buyer should be the end user
• Ease-of-use, adoption, and implementation
• Speed of feature development and deployment
• Cloud-based and SaaS billing = no large, IT investments
• Multi-platform (iPhone, Android, iPad, desktop)
• No Data silos, more APIs
• Offline Mode
• Data tracking and analytics
Build vs. Buy
• Are you a software firm?
• Focus
• Speed of technology innovation
• Consistent and ongoing improvement
• Larger data pool to make informed product decisions
• IT is there to help support and implement mobile solutions, which are working in the field, to the entire organization. They are not there to be a roadblock
How do I measure ROI?
• Industry averages (% of rework/project, etc.)
• Cost of doing business today (paper, manpower, etc.)
• Production time benchmarked against projects of similar size & scope
• Mid-stream projects, before and after
• Schedule savings ($1 million/day, etc.)
Hours Saved x Salary = Savings
How do I measure ROI?• Analytics and reports from software provider
• Would your employees recommend the product? (Net promoter score)
• Does it take off within your organization? (rate of growth)
Sample ROI: PlanGrid
Project: 770,000 sq. ft. hospital, 2.5 years, $175 million, 13 users
Savings
Time savings x Salary (11hrs/user/week x Salary) $478,872
Paper Savings $23,464
Rework Savings (0.12 - 0.72% of project) $294,000
Annual Total $786,196
Project Total $1,965,490
ROI 7753.41%
* Data from PlanGrid blog (Aug 1, 2013)
Sample ROI: Large Projects
• $1 million/day in biotech
• $40 million bonus for on-time and on-schedule for Bay Bridge
• $5 million bonus for completing 49ers stadium on-time
• Penalties of up to $20 million/day and $6 million/game missed for 49ers stadium
How do I deploy and scale?
• Select a job-site team and project, who is open to change and innovation
• Find success first, build champions and evangelists
• Share internally via field meetings, online communities, internal case studies
• Recognize field team with awards, bonuses, promotions
• Share externally to clients, owners, AGC, social media, website, construction community
• Select technology innovation lead to bring app to other job-sites
• Find your evangelists
Why should I get into mobile now vs. later?
• Make more money
• Win more bids
• Attract young talent
• Don’t lose innovative talent to innovative firms
• Product feedback
• Better pricing
• First-mover advantage
• Use new data & mobile tools to find new ways to improve productivity
• Free marketing, case studies, etc.
What are the top mobile apps for jobsites and why?
(it’s still the early days)