Field Team Resistance To Emerging Construction Software
With all the benefits linked to construction-focused technology and construction software, tech-experienced leadership might assume rapid adoption and adjustment from project field teams.
Doesn’t happen.
Fact is, even upper management often recoils from the introduction of new computer technology. Face it: For most folks, any form of change evokes an underlying fear of failure. For example:
The Colorado Department of Transportation (CDOT), categorizes the impact of change in management and/or operations into seven theories and principles. For the sake of this article, consider DOT change principle number two:
Resistance and Comfort: In every work environment, resistance is the first and primary reaction to cultural change. Furthermore, if left unattended, resistance to change spreads in a barrier sufficiently significant to become a threat to business success (CDOT (Colorado Department of Transportation, “Summary of Change Management: The People Side of Change“).
The following tips will help you lead your field teams into the benefits of construction management and operational software.
1) Satisfy the “What’s In It For Me” Rebuttal
Although construction software touches every aspect of management, workforce and asset allocation, planning and task-specific details, most employees set first focus on the personal level of return. For workers, this means:
- Automated time cards
- Ready access to necessary documentation
- A reduction in office visits
- A safer construction work environment
- AND Much more.
Isolate the group benefits and the personal benefits to the specifics of each field team.
2) Keep It Simple – Initiate Change In Baby Steps
Construction workforce and asset allocation and planning software helps construction firms:
- Reduce rework
- Track operational performance
- Pass safety audits
- Ensure the performance of equipment maintenance
- Promote better quality control
- AND Process estimating and accounting.
But rather than pushing your workforce to adopt all aspects of the technology in a single stage, consider a multi-stage implementation. Let them see the personal gains from automated time keeping, and then slowly expand into real-time document exchange and communications. Even baby steps produce organizational benefits.
3) Responsive Training – Use Patient People As Trainers Of Others
The best construction field team software includes an integrated online training system. And your teams should know how to use it. Yet the best teaching comes through the patient leanings of a fellow worker who is already competent in associated areas of the software.
4) Group Testing
Following behind the individual rapid-tech adaptable people, pull together a team of such individuals and let them smooth out the learning curb. As new construction software functions are proven out and come into full play, individuals within the primary group can begin to delegate roles and responsibilities into the hands of those most often tasked to perform the given duties.
Conclusion
Perhaps you lack sufficient personnel for group testing. Maybe you don’t yet have an individual who readily adapts to new construction software. Consider hiring a temporary software professional. Activating effective and efficient construction management and operations software offers a worthwhile payback. Qualified teachers have a knack for patiently motivating field teams into a mindset that not only accepts the software but also responds favorably to the benefits of this cost-effecting construction software advantage.
Learn more about the Assignar benefits of “Construction Site Management Gone Digital.”
