With over 20 years of experience in civil construction, Sydney Civil are leaders in their industry. They specialise in work for local government as well as the private sector, including contractors such as Richard Crooks and Meriton Apartments but government work remains their crowned jewel. Their CEO and founder, Adrian Murad used his background as a civil engineer and his local government experience to provide insights into the market. With this knowledge, he was able to empower his team to provide the quality of work necessary for government contracts.
Systems are the foundation of success
Working on mostly government-funded projects our processes need to meet very strict and specific requirements which is quite an intense process in terms of delivery. We have to manage a tight schedule, quality assurance, work health and safety, environmental concerns and stakeholder expectations all whilst ensuring customer satisfaction.
At Sydney Civil, we pride ourselves on being an innovative company and are in constant search for systems that can support our growth and create operational efficiencies.
“I believe that when you have the right system, everything else just falls into place.” – Adrian Murad, CEO
In our search for the right system, I wanted one that I could talk to and that could talk back to me. As a business, I wanted data and information that helped us assess our productivity and manage our bottom line. Specifically in terms of resource utilisation. How we measure it, how we control it and how we deliver.
We looked at a lot of systems in our search for the best software to support our operations and Assignar was the best fit.
“Assignar is brilliant! It is the best software we have come across. We tested every system that is out there and nothing else compares.”
Scheduling with ease
Prior to using Assignar, we were using paper timesheets, word documents and various spreadsheets to manage our workers. We would try and link all these silos of data and create a holistic system out of a lot of different programs. This was a complex process in which we ran the risk of losing these important processes with the employee who managed it. Imagine if the employee who championed these systems and how they were connected left our business. We would need to start again, conduct retraining whilst having a gap in our operations.
Now everything is connected in Assignar. We are very big on the allocations module as we can see where all our employees are and where they are going. Additionally, our employees now have an element of ownership with their work as there are no more surprises when they receive their job. In terms of timesheets, our workers simply clock in and clock out via the mobile app and their digital timesheets are received by the office in real-time. With Assignar as our system working in the background, we have removed a lot of the manual effort and admin tasks we used to conduct.
Previously, our workers needed to come to the depot to receive their daily job cards to find out what jobs they needed to complete and where they need to go. With Assignar, they know who is on their crew, what assets are required, what materials they need to bring to the site and job location before they arrive at our depot or josbite. Our workers can have multiple jobs they need to conduct during a day and with different systems not talking to each other, they could only plan out 2 jobs at a time. Now, with the communication and data sharing Assignar provides, our workers can focus on planning 5-6 jobs a day.
Maximising resource utilisation
In terms of our fleet, all related safety documentation is digitally created, stored and submitted. From there we can create maintenance reports, hazard reports, and incident reports. Will these crucial reports stored on the cloud and accessible via desktop, mobile and tablets, we are always ready for any audit.
At Sydney Civil, we have a workforce of over 130 people and a fleet that can have up to 100 machines out on site any given day. The reporting in Assignar also allows us to manage our outputs. As an output-driven business, we have to measure our costs against our revenue. As our work is activity-based, Assignar’s forms module allows us to set those targets, measure if the team are meeting those targets and how we can further improve the process. With Assignar, we have saved on the time we spent chasing up, finding and filing of the physical documents. Everything now is digital and instantaneous.
“Since implementing Assignar we have seen a 30% improvement in our operational efficiencies across the organisation.”
At present, we use Assignar as cloud-based technology to our advantage. Our team love arriving on the jobsite and seeing our clients as they are always impressed by our processes. Specifically, how all our hazard material documents, safety data sheets and maintenance reports are digitally stored on the platform. Also, having a paperless solution for safety, maintenance and timesheets is an environmentally sustainable option for our operations. In addition to impressing our clients, our compliance matters can be dealt with quickly as all safety data is received from the field to the office in real-time.
Implementing Assignar
We implemented Assignar from the top level down, then to our office staff and eventually to our workers. The biggest challenge was employees concerns the technology being used for the wrong reasons but once I explained that it was all about improving our bottom line, our output and our revenue, everyone slowly came on board. As a better bottom line means you can do more for your staff. We started implementing timesheets for our workers, teaching them how to clock in and out. Then our WHS managers, compliance officers and engineers started introducing forms into their workflows. We started with one form, for our workers to get familiar with and then once they were exposed and had the experience it was all pretty straight forward and the fear factor has gone.
Our Customer Success Manager has been excellent in helping us learn the system and since starting with Assignar less than a year ago, we are now 95% paperless. Having a physical office is slowly becoming redundant as all crucial business information and project information is located in Assignar. Currently, we live by Assignar in our office as it drives efficiency and increases productivity as you no longer need to be in the office to access and submit paperwork.
