{"id":25609,"date":"2024-04-28T01:53:55","date_gmt":"2024-04-28T08:53:55","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/essential.construction\/news\/solving-aec-project-and-task-management-with-monday-com\/"},"modified":"2024-04-28T01:53:57","modified_gmt":"2024-04-28T08:53:57","slug":"solving-aec-project-and-task-management-with-monday-com","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/essential.construction\/news\/solving-aec-project-and-task-management-with-monday-com\/","title":{"rendered":"Solving AEC Project and Task Management with monday.com"},"content":{"rendered":"

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When construction production planning and scheduling is collaborative, and everyone working on a project is up-to-date, productivity increases. To achieve that, you need easy to use digital tools. Over a year ago, I discovered monday.com, a cloud-based tool for collaborative task planning and management. It has features that make it an excellent choice for AEC companies.<\/strong><\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Aalto University has researched<\/a> construction work, both internationally and locally, in Finland. It has discovered that construction companies all over the world face similar challenges when it comes to planning, organizing, and managing work on construction sites.<\/p>\n

According
\nto McKinsey, large projects across asset classes typically take 20
\npercent longer to finish than scheduled. Many factors contribute to this problem, but one of them is top-down,
\ntheoretical, rigid scheduling that does not account for the realities of a
\nconstruction site. There are several ways to tackle this problem, especially the
\nuse of lean construction methodologies and collaborative planning. New, digital
\ntools have emerged that support these methods.<\/p>\n

One such tool is monday.com<\/a>, which could change how we plan and manage projects. More than 100,000 companies around the world are already using this solution. The firm is also addressing the 10-trillion-dollar construction industry, and I think it has a solution worth checking out.<\/p>\n

How I\u2019ve used monday.com<\/h2>\n

I found out about monday.com over a year ago. I was looking for a solution for project collaboration with one of our clients, a construction software developer. We planned a six-month brand awareness and marketing project and used monday.com for weekly lookahead planning and progress monitoring.<\/p>\n

The company describes monday.com as a cloud-based project and task management platform, a Work Operating System. It\u2019s visual and easy to use, and you can easily modify it to your specific project needs. It does not force you to use a specific management model or workflow.<\/p>\n

Integrating monday.com into our routines, for us, took a matter of minutes. It\u2019s very intuitive, which I think is essential when you involve clients and other users who don\u2019t necessarily use the product daily.<\/p>\n

We created
\ntasks for different kinds of content marketing actions and organized them into
\nweekly groups. Each task had a description, date of publication, responsible
\nperson, and status. We could add notes and attach files for each task. We could
\nalso discuss each task within the project team. The client had access to the
\ntool, which made the process transparent. Email reminders were also sent to the
\nparticipants by monday.com.<\/p>\n

\"monday.com
My AEC Business board on monday.com<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Versatile functions<\/h2>\n

You
\norganize tasks (\u201cpulses\u201d) and group them onto boards in monday.com. A board can
\nconstitute, for example, a project or a business process. In the default view,
\ntasks are in rows that have several user-defined fields as columns. A typical
\nset of columns could include a task description\/name, team member, status,
\ntimeline, and date of completion. You can also assign one or more tags to each
\ntask. Fields can have user-defined colors and labels.<\/p>\n

Tasks are
\norganized into groups. For some projects, I\u2019ve grouped tasks as \u201cthis week,\u201d
\n\u201cnext week,\u201d and \u201cthe near future.\u201d I can then drag and drop tasks between the
\ngroups as the work proceeds. I can filter the board\u2019s contents using any
\ncombination of the field values.<\/p>\n

Templates
\nto make onboarding quicker are available in monday.com, but designing your own
\nboard is not difficult. There are many templates for project management, including
\none for construction scheduling. Other views besides the default table format,
\nat the moment, include timeline, Kanban, calendar, chart, map, workload, form,
\nand files. The selection of report templates is also extensive.<\/p>\n

One
\npowerful feature is rule-based automation. The system can alert team members
\nwhen a deadline is approaching and when the status of a task has changed. Rules
\ncan move items between groups if certain conditions are met. There are many
\npremade rules to choose from, each written in plain English.<\/p>\n

No
\nconstruction-related app is useful today unless it\u2019s able to integrate with
\nother systems. A variety of integrations are available from monday.com, including
\nMicrosoft Teams, HubSpot, Pipedrive, Jira, Trello, GitHub, Dropbox, Slack, and
\nGoogle and Outlook calendars.<\/p>\n

Possible uses for AEC
\nprojects and teams<\/h2>\n

Even though
\nI haven\u2019t used monday.com on design or construction projects, I think it would
\nsuit many of them well. It helps teams and individuals communicate efficiently
\nand see what they\u2019re supposed to do at any moment.<\/p>\n

An
\narchitecture or engineering firm could organize workflows with monday.com and
\ninvolve clients and partners in the process. Some engineering firms have
\nadopted Scrum as a project management framework: monday.com supports that
\nmethod perfectly.<\/p>\n

Similarly,
\nconstruction teams using traditional or lean project management methods can
\nplan and monitor the progress of a project better with monday.com than what
\nthey typically do today.<\/p>\n

Takt production with
\nmonday.com<\/h2>\n

To try out a construction scheduling scenario, I made a test board using the concepts of takt production. It breaks the work down into equally timed work batches. To be successful, takt production requires persistent planning and progress monitoring.<\/p>\n

On my takt board, I organized the tasks into different floors and\u00ad added a room ID field to specify the spaces on the floor. Another way to do it would have been to group the tasks into takts.<\/p>\n

In my
\nmodel, the tasks\u2013drywall, HVAC, and electricity installations\u2013were assigned to
\ntheir respective installation teams. As each team completes its task, it marks the
\ntask as \u201ccompleted,\u201d or as \u201cstuck,\u201d if something prevented the team from
\nfinishing the task. This way, any deviations from the original plan become
\nvisible at once and can trigger an alert in real time.<\/p>\n

\"monday.com\"monday.com
A sample construction takt schedule<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Using monday.com, project participants can plan their work ahead collaboratively. This type of distributed planning is a way to turn the theoretical overall schedule into a living plan that will eventually shorten project completions. Aalto University and several real-life projects have shown that takt production can shorten construction lead time by up to 50 percent. With digitalization of workflows, even more radical productivity increases are possible.<\/p>\n

In addition
\nto a web interface, monday.com has mobile apps for iPhone and Android phones.
\nThat makes it practical for field use, which is an important factor in
\ndigitalizing the construction site.<\/p>\n

Based on my experience, I believe that with consistent use of monday.com,<\/a> AEC firms can take their workflow management to the next level without making big investments in education and software.<\/p>\n

P.S. If you have used monday.com in your AEC business, please contact me.<\/em><\/p>\n

This blog post is in collaboration with monday.com<\/em><\/p>\n

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