Current AEC digital landscape
It's not about resisting digitalization anymore. Since the pandemic, key players in the AEC industry know that embracing digital transformation is the only way to survive, and even thrive, in this current competitive landscape.
In fact, Deloitte reported in its 2023 E&C Industry Outlook that 44% of developers and contractors are invested with advanced technologies to address issues such as global chain supply disruptions, labor shortages, and skyrocketing material prices.
The real problem lies with how fragmented the industry is. If you look closely at the building lifecycle from cradle-to-grave, all value chains are interconnected but point solutions are not designed for interoperability. That leaves many AEC firms with a staggering data governance problem as their data storage quadrupled from 0.9 TB in 2017 to 3.5 TB in 2021.
Collecting data is an essential starting point, and this only leads to a series of questions that can help you set up a robust digital strategy:
- What exactly do you do with the data you collected?
- What are the goals you need to accomplish organization-wide?
- How do you identify and filter low-impact from high-impact tasks across the project lifecycle?
- How do you transform complex and messy data into actionable insights?
Enter OKRs and KPIs
Setting KPIs without OKRs is similar to steering the ship without a rudder. Objectives and key results (OKRs) serve as strategic high-level organizational goals, and firms can use this yardstick to quantify, measure, adjust and pivot key performance indicators (KPIs) as needed.
De-risking starts with covering all bases from financial, operational to management levels. Without a "strategy first before tool" approach, change management is an uphill battle. Winning buy-ins up and down the chain for digital transformation can be challenging if you can't link business value with proven and quantifiable results.
Asking the right questions as you move from macro to micro can make or break your data strategy:
- What are your data sources and connectors?
- What are your lagging and leading indicators?
- What processes are set up in place to identify OKRs and KPIs?
- How do you build your data stack for ingestion, storage, analysis and visualization?
- How do you compare apples to oranges?
- How can you win buy-ins from owners, C-suite executives, mid-management and down to field crews?
Know how, why, who and what are you measuring the KPIs for. Solve efficiency leaks, and win more business.
Data silos from point solutions
At this stage, AEC firms already shifted away from pen-and-paper and invested on point solutions to digitize their processes, but also ended up dealing with error-prone problems such as data silos, manual data transfer and cybersecurity breaches. All because they can't make their point solutions talk to each other.
We found out from this 2021 JBKnowledge Construction Technology Report that 40% of companies use 3 to 6 apps for construction jobs alone, and 24% report that none of those apps are plug-and-play solutions.
Because workers have to sign in and navigate non-intuitive apps altogether, this leads to zero productivity and maximum friction where tools aren't used at all. Even with increased app usage, workers still waste time manually updating and cross-checking data for consistency having no single source of truth.
Enterprise-wide data strategy
Companies aiming for enterprise-wide data accessibility capitalize and scale up their modern data stack with KPIs for higher ROI in the long run. They've already built their workflows around their data sources, have the resources to hit data strategy at scale, and are now leading the industry change towards interoperability for improved scheduling (75%), productivity (78%) and safety (79%).
Big data is here to stay. With a strategic direction in place, AEC firms can automate lifecycle data capture from point solutions like mobile apps, BIM models & digital twins. They can store unstructured data in a data lake, or pre-structure them for analysis in a data warehouse, then view dashboards & run reports with business intelligence tools for a trusted single source of truth.
Data journey on the horizon
AEC firms that can integrate their financial, project management, and all other data sources are already reaping the benefits. Easier said than done, but our no-code platform shrinks the time it takes to deploy data strategy. Over time as firms transform and visualize data into actionable insights, they can only get more creative with KPIs and use cases all throughout the lifecycle.
There's no one way to set up OKRs and KPIs for success. At Toric, we've put together a strategy guide to help you drive momentum for your data strategy roadmap. By the end of this whitepaper, you can:
- Identify high-impact use cases throughout the building lifecycle
- Connect relevant data categories and data sources
- Set OKRs and KPIs next to established use cases
- Deal with data blindspots using Toric templates and connectors
- Follow best practices and set new customer insights
See full whitepaper here.
