Construction technology has become easier to buy, but harder to evaluate. Contractors can compare prices, specifications and feature lists in a matter of minutes. What is much harder to determine is how a system will perform once it becomes part of an active project, and crews, equipment and schedules begin to depend on it. The purchase price represents only one part of the investment. A system that performs well in a controlled demonstration may look very different when used every day on a congested jobsite, under a tight schedule or by people with varying levels of experience. Training that takes longer than expected can slow adoption, downtime can leave workers and equipment idle, and limited support can extend an interruption. Difficult data transfers and integrations can add manual steps to work that was supposed to become more efficient. Those costs rarely appear on a proposal or specification sheet, but they…
Construction technology has become easier to buy, but harder to evaluate. Contractors can compare prices, specifications and feature lists in a matter of minutes. What is much harder to determine is how a system will perform once it becomes part of an active project, and crews, equipment and schedules begin to depend on it. The purchase price represents only one part of the investment. A system that performs well in a controlled demonstration may look very different when used every day on a congested jobsite, under a tight schedule or by people with varying levels of experience. Training that takes longer than expected can slow adoption, downtime can leave workers and equipment idle, and limited support can extend an interruption. Difficult data transfers and integrations can add manual steps to work that was supposed to become more efficient. Those costs rarely appear on a proposal or specification sheet, but they…
Add comment