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How to avoid dashboard disasters
Construction leaders looking to invest in technology often consider paying for an intelligent dashboard for their companies. Dashboard tools are seen as a major initiative for a company's long-term strategy. This view is outdated. The implementation process for dashboards can be messy and confusing in exchange for very little gain. At times, the project dashboard can present more problems than solutions. This scenario is so common that it has a name: Dashboard Disasters.
If the process required to implement software is too labor-intensive and results only in irrelevant information, it's not worth the effort. Team leaders can avoid this situation by analyzing what software offers their company the highest return on their efforts and investment.
Why compatibility is key
When investing in a tech solution, it’s important that this solution is a strong fit for the company. Many dashboards don’t measure construction-specific metrics or offer the insights construction companies want to see. Forcing software to bend to a shape it wasn’t built for it’s more effort than it’s worth.
Instead, businesses should invest in an infrastructure that already targets a particular business model in alignment with the company. This software should target construction-specific metrics such as fluctuating market costs for materials, sub-contractor bids, and performance reports. Additionally, any data reporting software should contain an interface that is intuitive, customizable, and built for reporting and integration within the team. If data cannot be added into the system smoothly, managers may spend more time performing data entry than they do reaping any real benefits.
Finally, the technology should produce real-time results for the analytics required. Information that comes at a slow pace will lose its relevance. For data to be useful, it must be both rapid and accessible. However, the work doesn’t stop there. Once a company has obtained the data, they need to make the most use of it. This is where knowledge mining comes in.
From data mining to knowledge mining
Executives need to focus less on data mining and more on knowledge mining. Here's the difference: Data mining is a computerized process of collecting and learning from information. Knowledge mining is when artificial intelligence uses your data and combines it with industry background knowledge to determine outcomes and analytics.
This background knowledge may include industry and market trends, such as real estate updates or new local or regional building regulations. By linking company data with industry knowledge, executives are able to create meaningful patterns and novel predictions for data-driven decision-making. This high-level application takes large amounts of data and places it in a context that makes sense for the business.
With knowledge mining, it is possible to extract meaning from big data sets. The proper technology can then present models and forward-thinking metric sets. This combined information flow helps leadership make informed decisions and keeps the company in a highly competitive position within the industry. A dashboard only looks within the business. However, knowledge mining technology analyzes the industry as a whole, and places the business in that context.
Automated tools and machine learning, when used in collaboration with knowledge mining, allow companies of all sizes to overcome dashboard difficulties and instead focus on project health, success, and future growth.
Briq’s financial automation platform contains all of these capabilities and more. The Briq platform was designed to bring cutting-edge technology into a format that’s easy and intuitive for construction businesses to use. If you’re interested in improving your business, contact us here and schedule a demo to see Briq in action.
