To roll out the new technology, the company invested in rugged new phones for each crew member who would be using the software and tried it on just a couple of phones to get started. Once the initial users were comfortable, training sessions were held for the rest of the crews. “We emphasized the ease of the program and the time it would save,” Landis says. “We’re looking forward to seeing the long-term results.”
Serve It Up
Landis also touts the benefits of another office tech advantage: networked computers with a shared server. “Having the computers networked together lets us keep the design side and the construction side linked in,” he says. This is something remodeler David Merrick is familiar with. His company, Merrick Design and Build, in Kensington, Md., uses Microsoft’s SharePoint Server to keep everyone connected.
“When the phone rings and new lead comes in, the first thing we do is open SharePoint,” Merrick says. “Our entire sales process is handled and tracked there because we could customize it with our own lists.”
For example, Merrick has SharePoint set up to show him, at a glance, the status of any project on the company’s calendar, the dollar volume of each project, and where leads are coming from. Beyond creating customized workflows, Merrick says server-based SharePoint is closely connected with Outlook e-mail, letting users save e-mail messages to a central repository and keep documents in a common location.
“Many people will use spreadsheets for the same purposes as what we’re doing here,” Merrick says. “But having everything server-based has a lot of benefits — most importantly: there’s only ever one version of the data. We can all access the server at the same time, and if I add or change something, it’s reflected on everyone’s screen as soon as they refresh.”
Also, because it’s so closely connected with Outlook, the firm can keep a master calendar of everyone’s meetings and events and not worry about scheduling meetings over one another.
Moreover, with files backed up off-site, Merrick identifies an implied insurance policy that accompanies server-based work processes. “The files don’t actually reside on the computer, so if any of our workstations crashed, we’d still retain the information on the off-site server,” Merrick says. “That’s how businesses should be set up — workstations shouldn’t host data.”
Merrick remembers an industry friend who lost all of his company’s computer equipment to a fire. With project information stored on a server, the company had to replace the machines but didn’t have to worry about recreating all of the project documentation.
Keyboards vs. Clients
Besides servers, cell phones, and flat screens, other opportunities to incorporate technologyinto the remodeling workflow include software, digital cameras, interactive Web sites, and more. Some such tools help remodelers work more efficiently, and some make it possible to run a whole job over e-mail. After all, in-person client meetings only slow things down, right?
Not so, says Linda Gridley, owner of Gridley Co., in Campbell, Calif. Like Polifka, Gridley presents clients with virtual walk-throughs of their plans. She’s also beginning to use a new software that will let the company estimate a bathroom in all of five minutes. These approaches let designers make presentations quickly, but she recognizes that this could come at the expense of client interaction.
“Everything depends on the client — you have to go their speed,” Gridley says. “That was a mistake we made early on. We could finish the design, make the presentation in 90 minutes, and have a contract and a pen ready for them. That really put them off.”
Now, even with speed and technological advances, Gridley says that the company’s focus is to let people know what they’re buying and how the company is going to solve their problems.
Polifka agrees. “We want people to leave our offices feeling confident in the direction we’re going and in the company they’ve chosen,” he says. “So beyond the technology, we try to make them feel comfortable during our presentations. There’s a hospitality aspect, like offering clients a bottle of water when they walk in the door, that lets them know what this relationship is going to be like down the road.”
Vision Remodeling also uses video testimonials on the company Web site — another aspect of technology that helps the firm distinguish itself from competitors while helping clients understand what they’re getting for their remodeling dollar.
Inside the office, Landis identifies some extra expenses involved in maintaining a technology, but says that the investment is worth the benefits. “Even with your basic computers and servers, there’s server maintenance to consider, upgrades, adding memory, backing up files, and security issues,” he says. “But even with all that, it’s not more trouble than it’s worth. The ability to pass documents around so easily and send them out quickly really makes our workflow more efficient.”
