[DPC] Clarity: Turning ConTech Bottlenecks into Breakthroughs

Our TrailMap for Today

1. The Power of Clarity

2. Three Pillars of Clarity

3. Worthy Problems: The Path to Business Improvement

4. Embracing ConTech Bottlenecks - A Practical Approach

5. Learning to Love Our ConTech Problems

6. Clarity to Action

1. The Power of Clarity

“The confused mind says 'no.'”

We've all been there: firefighting the daily crises, putting out one blaze after another. Often, it feels like we're playing a relentless game of ConTech “whack-a-mole,” trying to keep up with each new challenge that pops up.

It’s no wonder, then, that true innovation feels out of reach.

But clarity changes everything.

Clarity is more than a nice-to-have—it can be a galvanizing superpower. It's the antidote to feeling overwhelmed. See the outcome you want, and the reason you want it.

Clarity can move you and your team from a "confused no" to a "hell yes!".

Where should we be training and flexing our "clarity muscles"? Let's point it at the construction technology roadblocks and bottlenecks that have been holding us back.

2. Three Pillars of Clarity

Hopefully, you're on the path to believing clarity is power. As it relates to data-powered business improvement, we think about three pillars of clarity:

1. Select the Problem: Identify the key bottleneck or challenge worth addressing.

2. Assess the Impact: Evaluate the impact and benefit of the potential business improvement ("Impact Horizon" - next week!).

3. Create the Plan: Develop the plan to go from "here" to "where you want to be" — a TrailMap.

With these Three Pillars of Clarity, your team can align and purposefully decide where and how to improve the operations and business.

We're covering all three aspects of clarity over this next three week. This week, it's about selecting (and learning to love) "worthy problems".

3. Worthy Problems: The Path to Business Improvement

Here is a thought to chew on: what if technology problems weren't the roadblock holding us back?

But rather the path to business improvement and growth.

Eliminating information bottlenecks and chokepoints can create meaningful progress. When viewed this way, it becomes an obvious path to improvement.

To move your business forward, focus on solving high-impact bottlenecks— 'worthy problems.' Not all problems are created equal —some are nuances, while others present significant opportunities.

A worthy problem isn’t just a nuisance—it’s an opportunity to create impact and business value. Addressing worthy problems unlocks immediate and long-term improvements for your business.

Take, for example, manual payroll data entry. On the surface, this is a mundane task with obvious opportunities for efficiency improvement. Looking deeper, we can see where this manual data entry can have broader business implications:

• Payroll errors resulting in costly administrative rework and disgruntled workers.

• Lack of timely project information for risk management and decision making.

• Challenges and delays in downstream business processes: billing and project management.

One client, in addressing a manual Excel-based payroll process, uncovered a business rules error that was resulting in a $20,000 payroll overpayment - every week!

Technology is simply the means to make this data-to-result transformation happen: to capture, organize, transport, communicate, and analyze data.

The role of technology is to turn data into information that powers our business objectives.

See more data-powered construction case-studies.

4. Embracing ConTech Bottlenecks - A Practical Approach

Theory of Constraints (TOC) tells us that every system has a bottleneck—a constraint that limits overall performance. By identifying and addressing this bottleneck, we can make significant leaps forward.

The good news? In construction, we see the same constraints and bottlenecks over and over again.

Here are the results to date for our "favourite construction technology challenge" poll:

Not surprisingly, the related problems of Siloed Data and Manual Work are the top two challenges in the poll. Which results in Poor Visibility (#3).

Finding worthy problems is not generally a challenge. There are ample construction technology challenges for ongoing business improvements (momentum, baby!).

5. Learning to Love Our ConTech Problems

To gain clarity, we must first develop a deep and curiosity-driven understanding of the problem. Instead of rushing to find a solution, we take a step back and fully explore our bottlenecks. This kind of exploration leads to effective and lasting solutions.

To truly 'love the problem', we need to approach it with a spirit of curiosity and exploration. Here are some questions to guide this process:

1. What is the problem?

2. Why is it a problem?

3. How big an issue is this problem? How long has it existed?

4. Who does it affect directly? Indirectly?

5. What are you doing to deal with this problem today?

6. What negative outcomes does (or can) this problem cause?

7. What does the world look like when this problem is gone?

Understanding the problem deeply leads to effective solutions by focusing on its context, impact, and opportunities.

This understanding sets the foundation for assessing business impact, charting the investment path for improvement, aligning stakeholders and getting them on-board, and assessing the result at the end of the initiative.

It's definitely worth Einstein's 55 minutes!

6. Clarity to Action

1. Identify a Bottleneck: Look at your business processes and identify a key constraint—whether it’s manual work, siloed data, poor visibility, or IT limitations.

2. Love the Problem: Dig deeper into this bottleneck. Why does it exist? Who does it affect? What would solving it mean for your business?

3. Prepare for the Impact Horizon: Get ready to assess the potential value of solving this problem—this is what we’ll dive into in Week 4.

Clarity is just the beginning. It’s the foundation for focused action. Having gained clarity on the problems, bottlenecks, and opportunities, the next step is to plan how we’ll tackle them.

In the coming weeks, we'll explore the next two pillars of clarity: the Impact Horizon, where we'll assess the tangible business value of harnessing data to address key problems, and the TrailMap, where we'll craft the plan to move from where you are to where you want to be.

Forward, Trailblazer. Clarity is the compass that will guide us.

Aedo

Your Data Team, On-Demand

P.S. We’d love to hear your thoughts on this lesson! What bottlenecks are you seeing in your organization? Hit ‘reply’ and let us know. Or set up a time to connect. We’d love to talk!