There appear to be two groups of people in our industry when it comes to technology. The first group, smaller in numbers, are putting in some risk to try something new. The second group, having graduated from the first, are waiting to see if it blows up in their face or not. Our industry is most definitely entering a new stage when it comes to ConTech. A brief look at the sheer number of new products on the market show that this is not business as usual, and these next few years are going to be determined by those in the first group. For anyone hanging back, you’ll be starting the race late.
We operate in a unique industry that has remained impervious to any silver-bullet disruptor, there has been — and will not be— any Uber for construction. That being said, the distance between what the latest tools can achieve and what is being deployed on projects is simply too great to be ignored. It’s not that change is coming — it is already here — but a race to see who can deploy these tools the fastest has already started.
Disruption in our industry is not going to be an outside actor; it’s going to occur from within, by the contractors who get their shop set up for success. If you want to trim down a twenty-times a day, ten-minute process into a few seconds, you’re going to have to take a real hard look at what software you have in your toolbox. Construction’s disruptors are going to be the builders who can most effectively transform their digital environment.
This isn’t a new premise for EllisDon. We want to manage our capabilities, and to that end, we’ve been climbing the learning curve at a fairly steady pace (developing, implementing, and servicing a considerable amount of own software), but everyone should be asking themselves: How much control do you want? Nobody is going to make their own operating system, or build a better Excel, so clearly there is a floor here to how much control you can have. But if your digital environment feels like a modular build, with a collection of single solution software that won’t fit together, then it may be time to find a contractor. Every player in our industry is going to have to find their own combination of pricing software, document control, reporting, BIM, and all these bricks that make up our space, but none of us can afford to hold off and wait to see who’s build works best. What would you do then, replace your whole house?
It’s our opinion that the industry has a need for a “digital contractor,” a ConTech partner who knows the construction side, the tech side, and can help build your digital environment with you (then leave). There is a learning curve here that cannot be overestimated, we know because EllisDon has 15 years of self-perform software development battle scars that have given us a rather unique skillset. We understand what’s under the hood, so to speak, when it comes to software and data, and we want to make that available to the industry. This group, which we are calling Building Digital, will have to earn trust — we know that — but right now we want to rise the tide and raise all ships.
This disruption that we’re feeling isn’t coming out of nowhere, there are very clear reasons why things are changing now and not 10 years ago when the tech industry said our days were numbered. There is a very real and warranted push for more sustainable practices, there are a lot of fresh faces in the industry looking for tech to solve their problems, and there have been massive strides in the practicality of the tech available. More than anything else, the industry is FLOODED with new tech solutions, some of which seem straight out of science fiction, and the success stories cannot be ignored.
Disruption is going to come from within our industry, from the builders who figure out how to fit all of this tech together in a way that works uniquely for them. Traditional technology companies couldn’t build it for us, so we’ll have to build it for ourselves. I, for one, look forward to building it with all of you.
