Selvig Development: Lessening the load of administrative duties with construction tech

Their goal

Spending less time on job production and more time on jobs

Scheduling, Timecards, Change orders, Client management, and more. Lots, lots more. Rolf’s head was spinning, Running a tight construction team that’s just him and one to three other people, there was too much to get done and not enough time.

“Basically, I was without a hub,” Rolf said. “I was having to be the guy between everyone in the field, subs, billing, supplies. It was a lot to manage.”

Their solution

Rolf also needed a system that was accessible to more than just himself. He wanted a cure-all that everyone could access – team members, subs and clients. A party in a platform. If he was really going to save time, he needed something that kept everyone in the loop – instantly.

That’s why one of the first features he implemented was the Schedule. Prior, he was wasting too much time on this administrative duty. Now he can easily set one up – even using templates from prior jobs – link To-Do’s, attach Daily Logs and share with all stakeholders in the project.

“I can tell you I sleep a lot better,” Rolf said. “I can’t get a human being to do all this work for what I pay for Buildertrend a month.”

The other big advantage to Buildertrend for Rolf and his team? Every detail is tracked. This is a remodeler who thinks details define a design, but they’re just as important to keeping a project on track. By using Buildertrend as their all-in-one-solution, a background of all activities is established. That even goes for when team members are on the job site.

To not worry about the detail of when his team or trades are (or aren’t) working, Rolf began implementing the Time Clock feature. Here, employees can clock in and clock out right from the mobile app on the job site. This helped hold his crew responsible and saved hours from his workload.

“The fact is I don’t have to chase guys down for timecards anymore,” Rolf said. “Overall, there is a fundamental change from flying by the seat of my pants with cobbled systems. Buildertrend brings everything together in a far more managed and orderly way.”

Tracking everything in one construction management app proved beneficial for not only team communication but client management as well. Rolf learned through experience that using construction tech with smart features can mean the difference between spending thousands on a legal claim or not.

Recently, and the first time in his company’s history, he got a call from an angry lawyer. A client who owed money was actually demanding a refund. With the Change Order feature and other financial tools in the system, Rolf could go back and prove that the work that was done was actually requested by the client, signed off and approved.

Following two quick phone calls with the attorney and a quick show of the job price summary, the dispute was ended. Within any Buildertrend job price summary, a history of invoices, change orders, payments and approvals exist.

“Since the calls, I haven’t heard another word.” Rolf said.