When it comes to construction, there are many factors involved in delivering a successful project. Getting the design/engineering right, streamlining the supply chain for the delivery of materials and equipment, managing on site quality and minimizing change orders to name a few.  However, one of the most costly and riskiest levers on any construction project is centered around effectively managing the workforce.  This has become even more difficult in a tightening labor market like we are experiencing now.  

In a recent news report from the Associated Builders and Contractors, ABC Chief Economist Anirban Basu said it best - “The workforce shortage is the most acute challenge facing the construction industry despite sluggish spending growth,” said ABC Chief Economist Anirban Basu.

The purpose of this post is to share some best practices of how Eyrus’ customers are leveraging construction IoT to reduce the administrative burden on project teams by automating the capture of the key workforce data required to make proactive project decisions as the construction labor pool continues to shrink.  This data is key to construction worker safety, retaining skilled construction talent and ensuring each project has the right mix of trade partners on site to meet schedule goals. We have boiled these best practices down into 5 key success factors to consider.

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5 Success Factors

1) Leverage Objective vs Subjective Data

Eyrus’ construction workforce management software leverages construction IoT devices (phones, badges and beacons) to provide project teams an “objective truth” of what is occurring on the worksite.

Eyrus automatically collects the workforce data in the background providing insights into the construction workforce representing owners reps all the way down to trade partners.  This is a huge improvement from the subjective data collected manually from a spreadsheet or an enter into construction app on a phone or tablet.  This objective data results in a comprehensive workforce visibility platform while not requiring your team to learn a new software or adopt a new process.  With this data, you can always know who’s on a worksite, more accurately generate construction timesheets & payroll, and create a centralized construction workforce database that’s available 24/7.  And the best part?  The data represents what is actually happening, not someone’s subjective opinion. 

2) Move Registration and Onboarding Offsite 

During the tightening labor market, teams are looking for ways to reduce the indirect labor burden by simplifying key processes such as worker registration and onboarding.  With Eyrus’ self-registration and onboarding functionality, workers receive a text message or scan a construction QR code to complete their project registrations.  Basically, they can enter their certification and demographic information and complete on-boarding activities before even arriving at the worksite.  This greatly reduces the time spent by project administrators of having to complete these processes in the job trailers or their corporate offices. 

3) Implement Proactive Safety Measures

With enhanced workforce visibility through the Eyrus construction workforce management software, project teams now have more granular data available to report on the entire workforce and proactively identify and react to potential safety issues.  For example, having the “actual” recorded hours each worker has been on site allows construction safety teams to receive automatic alerts if an individual worker surpasses a per day or per week threshold. For example, if an electrician has been on site for more than 10 hours, safety teams can receive an alert indicating that person may be at risk for a safety event.  As we all know, fatigue and safety incidents are highly correlated.

Eyrus’ centralized construction workforce database allows site safety managers to send out mass text alerts in the case of a live safety event or if an evacuation event is pending. In addition to mass text alerts, construction risk or safety professionals can also send customized text messages to a subset of the workforce for certain safety reminders. One simple example is a reminder to take water breaks during extreme heat.  

4) Connect Workforce Data to your Lean or CPM Schedule

The real-time workforce data collected via construction IoT platforms like Eyrus can be directly tied to either the project look-ahead or CPM schedule to better predict potential schedule delays.  This allows project teams to react to potential staffing issues within hours or days vs having to wait for a weekly or monthly forecast vs actual report to be available.  With less labor available, this will help ensure the entire worksite labor is working as efficiently as possible and our customers have seen an increase in “time on tools” or direct labor productivity. 

5) Construction Risk Management: Know Who is On Your Site

The tightening of the labor pool in construction is causing trade partners to have to sub out work to other firms or hire temporary labor agencies to get the work done.  From a construction risk management perspective, understanding who is coming to site is more important than ever.  Ensuring the workers are properly trained and certified and meet the necessary standards helps eliminate construction project risk and holds all parties accountable for safety. 

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It’s important to know that you don’t have to navigate the construction labor shortage alone. Contact the Eyrus team here to get a hands-on demonstration of how Eyrus’ construction workforce management software can help your project adapt to the construction labor shortage.