Building the Digital Frontier: Navigating AI and Technology in the Construction Industry

In this podcast, we explore the construction industry’s transformation through new technologies, data-driven decision-making, and AI. We discuss the importance of a single point of truth for owners, data management tools like Procore and Kahua, and human factors affecting technology adoption. As we delve into AI, we cover its applications in construction, strategic and ethical use, and the continued need for human intuition. Join us as we uncover the potential of AI and technology to revolutionize construction and reshape project management.

[00:00:00] Brad Ducey: Welcome to the Construction Insiders Podcast, where our host Jessica Busch talks with industry experts about new trends, best practices, and how to successfully deliver construction projects in today’s market. Whatever your role on a project, we think you’ll find these discussions interesting and worth your time.

[00:00:21] Jessica Busch: All right. Thank you, Brad. Today’s conversation is going to center around construction and how technology is making an impact.

It’s not a surprise to us in the construction world, but the industry is not typically the first to adopt and successfully implement new technologies. However, things are really starting to change and pretty darn fast, instead of diving into a specific build sector or a region today we brought in two of our experts on the West coast to really discuss how technology is changing the way we do business, especially as it relates to project management and how these technologies are expected to shape the future of building.

I’d like to welcome Chris Thompson and Fraser Davidson, who have not only been keeping their fingers on the pulse, but they are also currently implementing these new technologies on their job sites. Welcome gentlemen.

[00:01:06] Fraser Davidson: Thanks Jessica.

[00:01:06] Chris Thompson: Hi Jessica.

[00:01:08] Jessica Busch: So to kick it off today, when we’re talking about owners and starting to plan for a new project, what consideration should developers and clients be looking at? And where should they be focusing their research if it was up to you guys and guiding them in that experience?

[00:01:22] Chris Thompson: I think what we consider to be most important for any owner is to have a single point of truth and to make decisions around what’s going to comprise that point of truth in terms of tools, technologies, process, access, as early on in the development cycle as is possible. It’s really hard to migrate data, to migrate attitudes and training and what people are accustomed to once things are off the ground. Not to say it can’t be done. But it’s really one of the first things that we like to have a conversation about when we’re first engaged on a project or program at any scale, is what that framework for data capture is.

And taking the view that we want to measure twice and cut once. There’s no one size fits all approach. We really want to start early. Pick the closest suite of options that will best fit the project and start implementing it really as early in the game as we can.

[00:02:17] Fraser Davidson: And just to piggyback off what Chris said there implementing a single source of truth, like a project management information system or a PMIS it’s been shown that clients and owners who adopt these early on in their project are more likely to have projects completed on budget and on schedule.

I would say for developers and clients embarking upon a new project, spend the time up front on data management, set up those tools and templates. And also really tap into their historical data. There’s a lot of value in taking a look at past performance to really bolster the chance of a project success.

[00:02:53] Chris Thompson: That’s a good point. Fraser, there’s so many client types and project types where sometimes there really isn’t a lot of historical data and in other cases there’s just a whole trove of it and oftentimes it isn’t being leveraged.

[00:03:07] Jessica Busch: In talking about that system and putting in place, I think the framework in place early.

Are you seeing or have you seen recently some gaps in technology that maybe need some improvement?

[00:03:21] Fraser Davidson: Yeah, I think there’s a number of gaps, and I’ve put my thoughts into three different categories here, but one of the gaps that I’ve seen through my experience so far is the integration and adoption of new technologies into the construction industry.

And I think it’s no secret that construction lags behind other industries when it comes to picking up these new technologies like the Internet of things robotics even ai. And in construction, all of those applications are really in their infancy. They’re still being developed.

Oftentimes existing point solutions in construction are siloed. It might be only a small group of people who are able to see a project schedule in P6 or you see the instances of change or RFIs in Procore. So definitely think data management and adoption of these technologies is a gap that we’re seeing.

I also think there’s a skills gap. There’s a lack of data skilled people that want to work in construction. I think oftentimes they’re attracted to other industries. But one fortunate side that I’m seeing is that our interns and junior staff, they’re graduating from programs that integrate data literacy and technology into those construction programs.

[00:04:38] Chris Thompson: I’m encouraged too, when we’re oftentimes having a first discussion with a client, whether it’s somebody that we are already working with or perhaps a new relationship, it’s actually one of the first questions they ask now is, How are you going to put together a technology suite? They may not use those exact words that will best promote collaboration, serve our project and really reduce that lag between the realities of what’s going on at any stage of the development cycle and the reporting. It’s been the case for many years that reports were produced as a compilation of the prior months or prior quarters or prior weeks activities and budget and schedule data, and as Fraser is doing with his team, that’s really a real time thing.

Now, you should be able to take a real time view as a snapshot in time of the overall health of your project. KPIs. As well as some of the more subjective things, collaboration, outstanding tasks we’re seeing that gap close pretty rapidly, and we’re trying to stay at the forefront of it.

[00:05:39] Jessica Busch: Okay, so when we’re talking about the lag and reporting with projects, what are some common pitfalls that you’re seeing and how are we avoiding that with this type of robust system that you’ve mentioned about putting in place?

[00:05:52] Fraser Davidson: Yeah, I think just as Chris mentioned in his response there, People are more used to real time data in other parts of their lives, for better or for worse we can see all of our steps in real time tracked on our phones.

You get a fraud alert immediately from your bank whenever,

[00:06:09] Jessica Busch: which is an annoying problem.

Oh,

[00:06:11] Fraser Davidson: absolutely.

[00:06:11] Jessica Busch: Let’s be clear.

[00:06:12] Fraser Davidson: So there’s a natural frustration. Construction owners are often getting limited insight into their own data. It’s lagging behind reality by couple weeks a month at times. So it’s really easy to be frustrated by these problems.

I think there’s a few common pitfalls that you avoid by having a really robust, regular set of dashboards or a reporting suite that’s tied into your data. It really increases the likelihood of success when you’re able to visualize historic trends or insights. There’s a mountain of data that goes untapped in construction.

It’s possible that there’s a trend either in schedule or safety or cost that they’re missing by, keeping it in an Excel file instead of a regular report out. In my opinion. It also slows down decision making. Or owners might feel that they’re not making decisions with the confidence that they need.

As an example, one of the programs that my team has been working on for the past three or four years one of our data center clients, we’re working on a tool that’s supposed to be an integrated estimate analysis tool where we get the GC response. For the estimate, for the staffing plan, for the key quantities.

And instead of them scrambling around trying to compare five or six projects within a week and turn something around, they have employed us to help create a database. Create a dashboard automate the analysis so they don’t have to look over 90 cost codes. They only have to look after 10,

[00:07:49] Chris Thompson: But they can drill down into it if they want.

[00:07:50] Fraser Davidson: Absolutely. Yeah. But we are We’re doing all that legwork for them, like pointing them in the right direction. That way they can have those focused conversations without scraping around and trying to figure out all that data management and data analysis piece for themselves.

All in

[00:08:04] Jessica Busch: one dashboard.

[00:08:05] Fraser Davidson: All in one dashboard.

[00:08:06] Chris Thompson: I think the irony with all of this is that, as you both pointed out, we’re inundated by data, both in our personal and professional lives. Leave your phone alone for two minutes, walk away and come back, and how many notifications appear on your home screen depending on your settings.

And so all the more important to have health factors, KPIs, key pieces of information around a project or program available at a glance, because a glance may be all you get, depending upon how busy your stakeholders are. And so if you’re only going to get a few moments or a minute or 30 seconds, to show somebody the progress on the project and let them develop a true and accurate view of how things are going better to have it represented in a way that is quickly digestible.

[00:08:52] Jessica Busch: So you just mentioned, I think something that happens a lot across probably all industries and a lot of different companies and clients, if you only have those few minutes, for a stakeholder, how do you keep everyone on the same page throughout the project?

[00:09:08] Fraser Davidson: No, that’s a great question. It’s definitely an important task.

I think in a perfect world you might be using a PMIS tool like Procore or Kahua or E-Builder in conjunction with a project delivery method like IPD where you’re having the whole team engaged early on and you’re sharing the risk and the reward of the project, but, There’s also point solutions.

You can implement different parts of Procore or Kahua and maybe use that in conjunction with BIM or a digital twin. That way everyone has the same understanding of the project design. You’re working off the same files, you have the same list of RFIs and then pairing that with a really regular, concise reporting suite and maybe there’s a different report or dashboard that goes out to construction people, on site, construction managers and project executives. You’re honing or designing your dashboards

[00:10:05] Jessica Busch: so you can tailor it to the audience.

[00:10:07] Fraser Davidson: Yeah, absolutely. I think we wanna build insights and metrics that matter to your audience, and that differs depending on their level.

[00:10:15] Chris Thompson: I think we’ve done something as straightforward and yet still powerful as red light, yellow light, green light surrounding some of those key project metrics. Most developers, owners, stakeholders care about, are we trending on time?

How are we doing relative to budget, and what are our risk factors? And risks could be quantifiable. It could be unforeseen conditions, it could be something related to budget and schedule. And so if they can visually see, even sometimes on a map, you’ve done a lot with GIS that the project over here in this state is green.

Everything’s green. They can drill down and dig into it, but they’re able to immediately see just by virtue of color in that case.

[00:10:56] Fraser Davidson: Yeah.

[00:10:57] Chris Thompson: What’s the health of overall health of my program? And it’s, that’s a really powerful tool.

[00:11:01] Fraser Davidson: Yeah. Sometimes just seeing all on the same page is where you really see the trends.

[00:11:05] Jessica Busch: So with new technologies coming out on a daily, minute by minute basis almost, are there points of friction in the construction industry with these new technologies and what are you looking at with that and how are you handling it?

[00:11:18] Chris Thompson: I think it’s the human factors. We’re in the project program cost and development management business, but really if you roll all those things together, it’s a lot of human management as well.

[00:11:29] Jessica Busch: Yeah.

[00:11:29] Chris Thompson: There’s fatigue sometimes because there’s so many tools out there that people are having to use even before we show up on the scene. And so when we’re working with clients like I mentioned before, really early on, we want to make sure that we’re not crowding the space, that we’re not adding one more layer to something else that they already have to do. We don’t want to duplicate data, most importantly. We don’t want to duplicate effort. We want whatever we produce—nd that’s one of the things I think we’ve gotten pretty adept at is being able to compliment by being somewhat platform agnostic compliment the client’s existing technology suite.

How can we best plug into what you’re doing rather than showing up with something completely new that you have to learn, which we’re happy to do too sometimes. Sometimes it’s a first entree for a client into that space. But yeah, humans are definitely the most important consideration because that’s ultimately who we’re serving here.

[00:12:22] Fraser Davidson: Yeah, I think Chris made a really good point there. Unfortunately, I think there’s a whole bunch of problems with implementing technology and construction projects, and there’s a lot of headwinds, especially in the area of the human factor. When these systems don’t speak to each other the right way. They’re not integrating, people don’t want to do double data entry. They don’t want to do a duplication of effort.

[00:12:45] Jessica Busch: Report in two different areas for two different stakeholders.

[00:12:48] Chris Thompson: Which is surprisingly common.

[00:12:50] Fraser Davidson: Yeah. I think on top of the data integration, people aren’t able to represent their data in a meaningful way. I think ultimately the perfect tool doesn’t exist yet. I don’t think there’s a single platform out there at the moment that. Can really connect all the different components and trades. I think we still have a long way to go in terms of getting a lot of buy-in from senior management in terms of putting in this tool that can achieve.

Everything that they need to have a productive, successful project.

Chris Thompson: And I think you hit the nail on the head there, Fraser, that corporate and executive sponsorship, and that doesn’t mean a mandate, but

Jessica Busch: buy-in.

Chris Thompson: Real buy-in.

Fraser Davidson: Yeah.

Chris Thompson: Because adoption, the technology’s out there as we’ve underscored, it’s…

it’s imperfect and ever developing, but as long as something is implemented at a baseline level and broadly adopted, by broadly relative to the, to the stakeholders and partners on a project, that really is what gets us to the finish line, and I think showing. How at the end of the day, if you’re willing to tolerate that little bit of a learning curve at the beginning and that little bit of extra time investment in order to get to the steady state of being able to use whatever tools you have on a regular basis, you’ll ultimately start to realize some of those efficiencies and you’ll feel some of those, more mundane, burdensome tasks that can be taken over by technology. You’ll feel those lifted. I think it’s palpable, but we just have to get over that hump.

[00:14:20] Jessica Busch: You just touched on some challenges, but what about the rise of ai? That is something that is headline news. It’s talked about by the water cooler and the kitchens. It’s talked about with your best friends.

It’s just across all conversations now. What does that mean for our role in the day-to-day management of projects?

[00:14:39] Chris Thompson: As you said, AI is here. We’re all on the train whether we want to be or not. And it’s accelerating at a fast enough pace that every time you restart your favorite office productivity app or restart your computer, some new feature is activated.

I just noticed that the other day in one of the, one of the tools that we use. So it’s very fast. But I think something that’s important to remember is that, and I’m borrowing a quote from somebody, I can’t remember who credit where credit’s due. But that AI, at least at the moment, it is a tool and not a creature.

It’s not a replacement for the expertise, and in fact, really what it’s doing is mining existing expertise that was created by humans and by the aggregation and analysis of data. But we’re starting to see it used on a day-to-day basis, even in just normal office productivity. But it’s the generative aspects of it.

There’s the searching and data mining aspects of it. And the generative aspects of it tend to be what are the more headline grabbing. But we’re starting to see that in being able to create common addressable language for how we represent Narratives around certain things, how content is produced, but you do have to be very cautious.

Anybody that has attempted to use some of the tools that are out there, the ChatGPT, Google Bard,

[00:15:52] Jessica Busch: oh, it can be wrong.

[00:15:53] Chris Thompson: It can be very wrong, and you can easily steer it to being very wrong. So it’s not unlike anything else that you use out in cyberspace or on the internet.

You really do have to be mindful, and still need that expert. But I think if it’s, look, it’s going to continue to evolve. It’s going to, it’s going to explode exponentially, and we definitely need to embrace it, but it needs to be done in a strategic way and in a way that has some ethics and policies around it. And so, we’re very mindful of that too.

[00:16:18] Fraser Davidson: It’s likely that in the future people will use ai companies like OpenSpace and Onsite.ai that are walking through the site with sort of a Google Street view camera, and they’re able to use AI as a tool to compare the progress in site in real time versus the BIM model or the drawings.

And for pre-construction I think it’s been an area that’s been overlooked by technology for a long time. We’re seeing companies like Toggle AI and CostX looking into automating some of the more repetitive processes around takeoff and cost estimation. There’s a company out there called Alice that’s been rethinking the approach for scheduling.

I think they prefer the term iterative analytics instead of AI, but you can generate, hundreds of scenarios for your schedule and you can take a look at what if I add an extra crane in the corner of this site? What does that do for my schedule? And you can generate those, in a matter of minutes instead of weeks.

I think for us as a company we’ll just continue to keep looking for opportunities to bring more value for our clients by leveraging these new technologies. And I think in the future we’ll spend more time on critical analysis of construction data. And probably less on repetitive tasks. But I think even with the rise of AI and the increases in construction technology the human touch, the intuition and the problem solving will always be a cornerstone of everything that we do.

[00:17:52] Chris Thompson: No, it’s worth underscoring and just like humans that technology is not infallible, at least not yet.

[00:17:57] Fraser Davidson: Absolutely.

[00:17:59] Jessica Busch: Talking about AI. Let’s pivot just a little bit, but threshold for adoption with any sort of technology in general. People think these big mega projects, is there a threshold for adoption for these smaller one-off projects? We hear people say, scale tech accordingly and appropriately. Thoughts on that? What’s your opinion?

[00:18:22] Chris Thompson: Fraser’s brought up a couple of times the notion of a PMIS like. Kahua, Procore, Ingenious, Asite, all of those different tools that are out there, those types of programs or platforms I should say, that can be at the core as the single point of truth for a project if desired, apply to projects of any scale.

In fact, it makes more accessible some of the things that may be burdensome for a smaller project or program.

[00:18:49] Jessica Busch: Oh, interesting.

[00:18:50] Chris Thompson: Because you can automate it very quickly. The platform or the configuration is basically ready to go. You can start putting in data. And you can produce those real-time dashboards and reports that maybe you wouldn’t have had the time to do or had the allocation or effort levels to be able to do on something smaller. Obviously it needs to be scaled. You don’t want to use a sledgehammer to crack a walnut. I think also this is more Fraser’s world than mine. All that data that we can leverage will benefit projects of any scale because the physics still applies.

[00:19:19] Fraser Davidson: It doesn’t matter what size the project is if you’re able to look back, organize your data in a way and analyze it. You can look into those trends, those insights to bolster the likelihood of a good performance on a future project, regardless of what size it is. But yeah, I think there’s definitely a perception that larger projects or, larger programs benefit from large scale or from a adoption of construction technology. But one thing to note in my opinion, is that in terms of a threshold, I think rather than project size, it might be project complexity. Or, are you trying to implement a new construction technology system midstream? Is the project already 50% complete and now you’re trying to implement a PMIS while the building’s halfway in the ground. I would say that’s something that might discourage people from adopting at that point. But yeah, I don’t think project size is a threshold for adopting technology.

[00:20:18] Chris Thompson: Yeah. There’s another thing that’s always been on our minds is that when our job is done and a building or facility is turned over. There’s a whole operational life cycle of the building that is sometimes viewed as a completely separate era. And really we want the planning that we put in place during everything from concept and dealing with real estate and real property all the way through design and construction and closeout to be done with the eventual operation of that facility, whatever its uses to be in mind. And so leveraging these tools, regardless of the project scale, gives us a better ability to do that and provides that continuity with the team that’s going to be the steward of the property or the project once we’re wrapped up with our development.

[00:21:08] Jessica Busch: So we’ve talked a lot about what’s currently going on, some of the pitfalls, what we’ve seen in the past.

Let’s shoot forward. What are we thinking about the future? How are you visualizing that? What are you excited about? Maybe not so excited about, just your general thoughts. 5, 10, 20.

[00:21:23] Fraser Davidson: No, it’s a really exciting space and I reserve the right to be completely wrong on all of my estimates.

[00:21:28] Jessica Busch: You said it now.

[00:21:29] Chris Thompson: I’m writing this down, Fraser. We’ll check back.

[00:21:32] Fraser Davidson: I think in the short term, the next year or two I think we’ll continue to see those AI assisted tools continue to develop and mature a little bit. And maybe we’ll even get to the point where people are starting to put them to the test, like trying out these automated takeoffs and comparing it to past performances.

And that will really be sort for watershed moment if these companies are able to prove that their value proposition is the real deal and not just all hype in the midterm, like the mid future looking out five years. I think a digital twin will become much more commonplace. For example, the city of Las Vegas created a digital twin of their downtown area with the idea that it’d be a lot easier to model different scenarios around traffic patterns, emissions, and they use it a planning tool.

I would suspect that five years from now, most of our large clients looking to take on campus programming. We’ll have digital twins where is an integrated part of their decision making. And maybe also at this point people are moving away from those point solutions in favor of cloud-based PMIS systems like Procore and Autodesk Construction Cloud maybe in five years.

Those are just the standard. Looking out a little bit further into the long-term futures is where it gets a bit more interesting. But I think it’s easy to imagine that maybe simple trades on site are performed by robots. there’s a workforce that is running 24/7. I think at this point as well.

These aI assisted tools will become a trusted, proven part of everyone’s workflow. And I think the hope is, and in the future, the construction projects are predictable. They’re safe, and we’re seeing the majority of projects being. Complete on budget and on time wishful thinking, but who knows?

[00:23:28] Jessica Busch: But those technologies helping to mitigate the risks.

[00:23:29] Fraser Davidson: Absolutely. Yeah.

[00:23:31] Chris Thompson: I think there’s a bit of an iterative effect of that because if we can, I’ll use the term perfect, but by, approximate perfection in how in the process that’s used to develop something that will enable us to really push the envelope in terms of design, in terms of structures and architectural systems.

So I think we just as a species, we’re never satisfied. Once we’ve conquered something, we always have to move on to something bigger and better. And so this just gives us a better foundation to be able to do it. I think a year from now, just even outside of the construction world or inclusive of, many different markets, I think we’re going to be amazed at what’s out there even a year from now.

[00:24:13] Jessica Busch: We’re gonna look back.

[00:24:13] Chris Thompson: Yeah, absolutely. But at the same time, construction, real estate development, project development is really largely judged based on outcomes. And so if there are pockets of the industry that are still able to achieve good outcomes without adopting some of this, I wouldn’t be surprised if in five years you find people and teams that are doing things the same ways as they were 10 or 15 years ago, that will exist. They’ll also be the converse where we’ll have people that are really at the cutting or even the bleeding edge. And our goal is to be somewhere in the middle. We need to be able to and I think we’ve been able to do this successfully address all across the spectrum of ability and desire for technology. And we want to be able to serve irrespective of what people’s attitudes are on that, we’ll always want to show what’s best. But we have to adapt because the client is ultimately who we need to deliver those outcomes for.

[00:25:09] Fraser Davidson: Yep.

[00:25:11] Jessica Busch: So before I get let you guys go, Before that happens. I’m curious,

[00:25:14] Fraser Davidson: We get to go?

[00:25:14] Jessica Busch: not yet, but before I let you go when talking to a prospective client or a current client that has a project just about to kick off in terms of immediate next steps, if you could boil it down, what are that handful of next steps you would suggest to make sure they get off on the right foot?

[00:25:33] Chris Thompson: I’d say define the ecosystem. And the ecosystem could be just one thing, but decide what…decide what the necessary measuring tools are and then let us put together a recommendation for how to best accomplish that. And like I said, it could be something very simple. It could be a collection of things.

There are some very large organizations that we work for that are very sophisticated, perhaps in the software or AI space themselves even, and they already have all that. Then we are the ones that are adapting to what they’ve developed. So it really cuts both ways, depending on the circumstance.

[00:26:11] Fraser Davidson: Yeah. I would say give us a call. Get us involved. We can…

Chris Thompson: We always have to work, we always have to work that part in.

Fraser Davidson: I think if I was to boil it down to just a few key points, it would be invest in a single source of truth for your construction data.

[00:26:24] Chris Thompson: Yeah.

[00:26:24] Fraser Davidson: Get a handle on your historical data and squeeze it. So you get the maximum value, all those lessons learned, all those insights, and use that to guarantee success in your next project. And yet get your data skilled team members involved early on. I think tapping into those skill sets will really benefit people in terms of having better project outcomes.

[00:26:47] Chris Thompson: I think the biggest piece is not viewing this as an outlier or something extra, or a science project, if you will, but rather, this is how mainstream project development is going to get done and it’s only going to advance. Let’s dive in and make it work and make the whole process better for everybody.

[00:27:06] Fraser Davidson: Yeah. Couldn’t have said it better.

[00:27:08] Jessica Busch: On that note, wonderful closing. Thank you both. Have a wonderful day and we will chat soon.

[00:27:14] Fraser Davidson: Thank you.

[00:27:15] Chris Thompson: Thanks.

[00:27:17] Brad Ducey: If you enjoyed this episode of Construction Insiders, we encourage you to check out our website at wordpress-243686-4046764.cloudwaysapps.com, that’s wordpress-243686-4046764.cloudwaysapps.com where you can find our full knowledge library under the Insights tab. It’s all great stuff. We’re really passionate about it. We hope you’ll check it out. Thanks for listening.