Article written by Stacey Holsinger and Mark Drury for Constructor Magazine

Across many industries in the U.S., there is a decline in educated, skilled and experienced personnel as the largest generation in history moves out of the workforce and into retirement. As a result, it’s become a war for talent, and construction companies are on the front line.

This comes at a critically important time for the construction industry as the current volume of work already exceeds the human capital resource capacity. Furthermore, between natural disasters, a growing economy and a crumbling infrastructure, the demand for increasing the industry’s production capacity is at an all-time high.

Article written by Joe DelRossi, Global Value Selling Program Director, Oracle, and appears the Oracle Construction and Engineering blog.

Organizations face increasing pressure to shrink technology budgets and get more out of smaller investments. Technology initiatives are now just another initiative to be evaluated like every other, whether a new building, product or service offering; employee development; or any other core investment.

To navigate through this new landscape for getting technology initiatives launched, it is important to associate your effort with your organization’s objectives. Ideally, you target objectives that will be more readily achieved by executing your initiative. And these objectives, when accomplished, will deliver some combination of increased revenue, optimized capital, reduced costs, and mitigated risks. These objectives transcend every organization size as well as industry, including not-for-profit and government organizations.

Article written by Garrett Harley on the Oracle Construction and Engineering blog

While construction historically has lagged other sectors in terms of IT investment, such spending is now accelerating as more and more organizations wake up to the need to move beyond the industry’s traditional practices. At the same time, the speed of technology development has increased the availability of robust, customizable cloud solutions, which is lowering the barrier to adoption.

But simply buying the latest tool is not enough. Positioning for long-term success and minimizing time to value requires a comprehensive approach to implementation that considers three key pillars: technology, people, and process. The way an organization approaches this triad can make or break a digitization venture.

Original article by Andy Holtmann on Dexter + Chaney

This is the final installment in a five-part series on how innovative technologies and software are helping project managers streamline processes to build faster, smarter projects

While many project managers today are still utilizing manual processes or working with significantly outdated software, it is becoming clear that this is less of a matter of choice. According to a 2015 Construction Technology Report¹ by JBKnowledge in conjunction with the Construction Financial Management Association and others, 77.4 percent of respondents considered mobile computing capabilities on the project jobsite to be either “important” or “very important.”

Original article by Andy Holtmann on Dexter + Chaney

This is the fourth installment of a five-part series on how innovative technologies and software are helping project managers streamline processes to build faster, smarter projects

While having the best people in place, working together well and using the latest tools is critical, the construction project can still suffer if the data being tracked and reviewed is days or even weeks old. That outdated project information can make it hard to accurately gauge current job costs or work in progress.

Original article by Andy Holtmann on Dexter + Chaney

This is the third installment of a five-part series on how innovative technologies and software are helping project managers streamline processes to build faster, smarter projects

All battle plans are perfect—until the battle begins. Construction project managers probably relate to that statement more that anyone. A construction project can be planned out down to the very last nail, but even in the best-planned project, something always goes awry.

Original article by Andy Holtmann on Dexter + Chaney

This is the second installment in a five-part series on how innovative technologies and software are helping project managers streamline processes to build faster, smarter projects.

While the lifeblood of the construction company is the construction project, the lifeblood of the project is the people working on it. Hire bad people to manage and build the project? The results will be poor. Hire smart, talented folks with expertise and the results will be good. Hire forward-thinking, open-minded folks ready to try new things and take calculated risks? The results are likely to be even better.

With construction booming again after the recent recession, there is plenty of work to be had. The talent pool for skilled construction professionals, however, is woefully shallow right now. A Bureau of Labor Statistics report in December of 2013 noted that the construction industry could face a shortage of 1.6 million skilled workers by 2022¹.

Article written by Moira Alexander and appears on CIO.com

With all the project management and collaboration tools available today, it's important for companies to carefully evaluate which ones will best meet their needs today and in the future.

The right tool for the right job goes the old adage, but knowing exactly what criteria you should consider and how to go about evaluating each of the project management (PM) tools at your disposal can be time-consuming and even frustrating. So we've taken some of the legwork out of it by offering some key considerations, broken down into three primary categories that should be included in your evaluation.

We'll start with the business model, strategy and needs.

Article written by John Chaney (CEO and co-founder of Seattle, Washington-based Dexter + Chaney) for Construction Business Owner.

How companies are turning to millennials & technology to bridge the skilled labor gap

The economy is performing well, construction projects are back in full swing and jobs are plentiful. But where are all the workers? That’s a question that has been asked frequently over the last couple of years, as skilled construction laborers, project managers and subcontractors have left the industry—either retiring or moving on to other roles in order to survive the recent recession. Fewer workers are returning to the industry, and training new generations of laborers could become a daunting challenge. It has become one of key issues for the industry to address for the present-day and long-term health of companies.

Higher Yearning

According to a June 2015 report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the number of available jobs jumped significantly from the previous year, adding more than 273,000 to companies’ payrolls. However, the talent pool is taking a hit as a whole generation of baby boomers—the largest segment of construction workers in the past 3 decades—has begun to retire.

It's easy to identify why construction ERP systems are advantageous for executives and accounting departments, but how can they benefit project managers? In this podcast, Dexter + Chaney’s Wayne Newitts and Mark Schwartz discuss why project managers should embrace ERP software and why it will make their jobs easier.

Key takeaways from this podcast:

• 1:35 - Wayne asks: "Why do you need ERP software in the field?"
• 2:35 - Mark explains that software is meant to make your job easier.
• 3:00 - Conversation moves to mobile software, accessible in the field.
• 4:34 - Mark talks about the disadvantages of just using spreadsheets and why an ERP system saves time.
• 5:49 - The main advantage for the project manager is the automatic sharing of information.