Capital Construction Program Managers and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day
Your eyes start to lose focus and you find yourself staring past rows of numbers on a jumbled capital funding spreadsheet.
You’ve been trying to make sense of a projected budget for what seems like the entire day and it’s still just not adding up. Where is this new funding coming from? Did someone else mess with these numbers? What did I do with that email?
The clock hits 5 and you’re still right where you started.
Scenarios like this play out all too often for construction program managers who are stuck trying to execute a capital improvement plan using outdated systems, manual tools, and complex spreadsheets.
It doesn’t have to be this way.
Not when you have a comprehensive suite of capital project planning tools to mitigate risk, enhance project visibility, and ensure reporting accuracy.
The Job’s Not Easy but Projectmates Makes It Easier
Look, capital improvement planning is a tough gig. And when the cost of a multi-year, multi-million-dollar project changes by the day, the job can be downright miserable.
Before a single slab of concrete is laid at the construction site, program managers have been hard at work creating a firm funding foundation. In order to make the biggest impact, they need real-time information to make the most informed budgetary decisions.
That’s why capital construction project managers use Projectmates. It’s a trackable, single source of truth to house all construction and financial documents. All cost or funding changes can be tracked right in the software and configurable organizational tools like interactive dashboards give you complete control over how your budgets display and act.
Keeping your budgets up-to-date, organized, and tracked saves time, money, and frustration.
Project managers at Tarrant County College know firsthand how critical it is to have all construction project data under one roof.
The college is in the middle of a seven-year $825 bond program covering construction, redevelopment, and facility improvements.
Before switching to Projectmates, the facilities administration team was tracking down construction documents in multiple locations and their legacy software lacked any in-depth reporting functionality.
Now, they’re seamlessly managing their bond program and construction projects with the help of Projectmates.
Diving Deeper into the Data
Better project data can take your construction program to the next level.
An incredibly useful capital planning tool in the Projectmates application is the ability to rank project requests based on an organization’s specific criteria. Environmental, economic, regulatory, and other factors can all be used to judge a project’s viability.
There’s no second guessing on whether a project should be funded immediately, sent to the back burner, or dropped altogether. Projectmates also provides unparalleled visibility into planned, current, and past construction projects.
You can track every allocation, commitment, and actual in real-time for the clearest picture of how your construction program’s budget is performing. Even narrow down fund sources by phase, project, fiscal year, and more for increased clarity.
The city of Newport News, Virginia, struggled for years using a patchwork of disjointed software platforms to run its capital improvement program. City employees were wasting time and taxpayer dollars tracking down financial reports and rifling through paper documents to determine their next move.
The ability to rank projects, view project status in real-time, and learn from past projects was a game changer for the construction project management team in Newport News.
“The team was thrilled that we upgraded to, what we saw, as a state-of-the-art system,” said Newport News’ Director of Engineering, “We had their buy-in and I’d say it even improved morale.”
Foresight by Design
Projectmates can’t tell the future. But it CAN help you prepare for it.
Running “what if” escalation scenarios on your budget gives your construction program valuable data on how projects could potentially look down the line. These scenarios, coupled with valuable insights from past projects, can help you forecast planned versus actual costs.
The Gannt chart functionality in Projectmates is also incredibly easy-to-use. Schedules for active and planned projects are mapped out so you know exactly which projects are moving according to plan and which ones may need more attention.
The fund summary tool further enhances visibility by providing a snapshot of all of your projects in one place. Projects can be sorted by fund group, project name, fiscal year, and even construction phase.
Project managers at UT Southwestern Medical Center switched their entire construction program over to Projectmates on the cusp of a 6-year, $1.1 billion construction plan after determining their construction project management solution simply wasn’t getting the job done.
“We wanted something that would streamline the entire process and speak with our current software suite,” said UT Southwestern project control manager Sandra Gant. “We also wanted something that was more user-friendly. That was the main reason we decided to go with Projectmates.”
With multiple facilities in the pipeline, all needing to pass through rigorous regulatory processes, they use Projectmates’ capital planning tools to keep tabs on construction and are able to pivot when necessary.
You can read more about how UT Southwestern is managing its impressive construction plans here.
Break Records, Not Budgets
In the end, a bent budget can break a construction project and if you’re not careful, bust your entire construction program.
Sadly, many program managers are still focusing on cost reconciliation at the end of a project instead of planning and analysis at the beginning.
Being proactive and using Projectmates’ capital planning tools from the very start can save your organization money, time, and frustration.
