PROJECT SPOTLIGHT ON POWER CONSTRUCTION
How punch list technology improved inspections and reporting
Company Snapshot
- Client Types: healthcare, education, workplace, and government
- Project Types: apartment/condominium, hotel, senior living, retail, mixed-use and luxuryresidence
Power Construction Company, as their name describes, is a powerhouse in the industry. Operating in the northern Illinois region, Power is an 94-year-old management-owned firm, which provides pre-construction planning, general contracting, construction management, project delivery, and design-build services.
They have a wide range of client types that include healthcare, education, workplace, and government. Power delivers on a number of project types such as apartment/condominium, hotel, senior living, retail, mixed-use and luxury residence.
With spoke with Mark Roper (Director of IT), Matt Fahey (Project Superintendent), and Chris Newcomb (Project Superintendent) of Power Construction about their experiences with FinishLine Software.Finding a solution
Prior to using FinishLine Software, Power Construction mainly used paper and Excel spreadsheets for their inspection process. Project superintendents had to note issues on paper, upload information to Excel, and then distribute information to team members via email. The project engineers and assistants also had to spend ample time re-entering data. Using the paper/Excel spreadsheet punch list method was not only a time consuming, but also a labor-intensive process for Power. It became clear to Power that they needed a solution.
In 2013, Power decided to adopt technology based tools because they strategically decided it “would be very beneficial to us”, as Matt Fahey, a Project Superintendent at Power explained. They wanted something to make the inspection process faster, easier, and more consistent over the job. The Power team has used FinishLine Software many projects since the upgrade.
"FinishLine allows for collaboration between users. All users can login to one platform & make updates."
Chicago & Main Project
Powerful reports
Reporting capabilities in FinishLine has proven to be a helpful tool for Power. On larger projects, weekly reports were pulled for the senior executive team to communicate project status. This enabled Power to distribute accurate and updated project information with ease. Matt explained that the reports showed how many items were open, which floors were completed, the project percent completion rate, and who had items out.
Showing accurate progress reports meant the team knew what still needed to be done, what needed to be corrected, and who needed to do it. FinishLine’s notification capability proved to be very useful, as Power also used FinishLine to notify team members of outstanding items by distributing reports via email.Using the powerful reporting features in FinishLine meant that everyone was on the same page.
Notifying team members of pending issues was easy with FinishLine, as project superintendents could quickly send multiple emails with pending issues. Power mainly used the standard report features in FinishLine, but when report customization assistance was needed, the FinishLine tech support was there to help.
Northwestern University, School of Business Project
Time savings and ROI
Chris noted numerous advantages to using FinishLine and mentioned “I can confirm that there was definitely a time savings...”. First and foremost, FinishLine saves time. Matt said that the timesaving for Power was “substantial” as they had several thousand items entered in FinishLine on a previous large project. Matt shared that “I can’t even imagine what that would have taken if we had to manage that data in Excel.”
A dramatic timesaving for Power was experienced at multiple stages during the punch list process. Mark Roper, the Director of IT at Power and Matt emphasized that the notification and reporting capabilities were also major factor in the saving time.
They were able to see real world time savings on multiple levels among the team. Other areas of use include Quality Control inspections, pre-drywall, and above ceiling checks. The design team was able to complete punch lists on the job site with the FinishLine Pro App, which meant they didn’t have to return to their computers to type up reports. Power also didn’t have to input the design teams’ report/log information with their report to combine items into one final report. Subs no longer needed to type up responses to closing items. Power was also able to eliminate the need to input all of the written responses from subcontractors.
Offline Capabilities
As Mark and Matt pointed out, an Internet connection isn’t needed to make updates with FinishLine. This was important to Power since many projects in the field don’t typically have a strong Wi-Fi or cell connection. Chris mentioned “you can input punch list items and sync them once an Internet connection is available.” The team at Power mainly used iPads to access the FinishLine Pro app on the job site. Desktop PCs were used for reporting. Overall the team at Power found the FinishLine Pro App to be intuitive and easy to use.
"You’re sharing almost real-time information. It’s invaluable."
New City Project
Customer service
Chris noted positive remarks for the FinishLine staff as he mentioned that, “the FinishLine customer support team was excellent. They always took the call and were able to provide great on the go support. If they did not have immediate answers (they) always got back in a timely manner.”
Matt just recently set up a project with FinishLine and noted that Tom Orr, Implementation Manager at FinishLine: “turned it around very fast. (FinishLine) always calls us right back even with a time zone difference.”
After adopting the FinishLine Software technology, Power has streamlined their punch list process, which means Power has been able to save serious time and money with FinishLine Software on multiple projects.
(FinishLine) always calls us right back even with a time zone difference.