Braconier VP Touts ‘Transparency and Accountability Across the Board’
Braconier adopted eSUB’s comprehensive software platform to standardize project management and operations, cutting processes such as timecard inputting and payroll processing from a full day down to minutes. The platform also helps Braconier document every aspect of their projects, which helps keep things running smoothly.
Braconier prides itself on providing systems that the community and public rely on, such as hospitals, aerospace facilities, and government buildings. They attribute much of their success to a culture of treating each other as family and supporting one another in their continuing efforts to be the best in the industry.
A critical piece of supporting employees is empowering them to do their jobs effectively with the latest technology. “We get the best out of our people because we give them the best information,” said Scott Calahan, vice president of Operations for Braconier. “That’s what eSUB does. It gives our people information.”
‘People Were Doing Their Own Thing’
Braconier has successful, experienced leaders in the field, but many used manual processes without standardization. “Several project managers and field leaders were doing things their own way—spreadsheets, Word documents, PDF documents,” said Calahan. “With timecards, some would take a picture of paper timecards and email them to the office, while some would call in their time. A lot of people were doing their own thing, not a real standard process.”
The Braconier team selected eSUB to help standardize their core processes. Developed exclusively for trade contractors, eSUB mobile and cloud-based project management and document control software seamlessly link the field and office. eSUB standardizes project management procedures so users can easily enter data, site events, labor activities, material costs, workforce information, documentation, and more into a fully searchable database updated in real time.
“The ability to go back in time and gather information on a project is valuable. … We have everything documented.”
—Steve Van Wormer, Project Manager, Braconier
Calahan continued, “We used to track RFIs [requests for information], change order requests, and project documents in our spreadsheet or accounting software. The accounting software was too complex for those purposes, and everyone had to take the time to modify the spreadsheet. With eSUB, the project cost tracking is in real time, and we receive notifications if we’ve passed the time limit to get a receivable back.”
eSUB’s comprehensive platform delivers the ability to create and track project documentation for complete visibility on project information. Project managers and field leaders can create RFIs, change requests, purchase orders, and more using eSUB’s customizable templates. The two-way email integration delivers a detailed project correspondence with date and time stamps to serve as the contractor’s historical timeline of the project. The timeline can help resolve conflicts before they arise and improve collaboration and communication with general contractors and customers.
Steve Van Wormer, project manager at Braconier, explained, “The ability to go back in time and gather information on a project is valuable. We can search previous field notes and daily reports or delayed responses to see where we got held up. We have everything documented.”
Because eSUB is integrated with Braconier’s accounting software, “There’s no double entry—everything is sent to eSUB and streamlines the entire process.”
—Liz Vigil, Project Coordinator and Estimator, Braconier
Standardizing Operations to Save Time
As an operations platform, eSUB captures critical labor and cost information on projects. Because eSUB integrates with the Sage 300 construction and real estate accounting system, Braconier’s project coordinators, project managers, and field supervisors minimize double entry while getting real-time cost information.
“eSUB … serves as a central location to get an overview of the job and know if your job is going in the right direction.”
—Scott Calahan, Vice President of Operations, Braconier
“I set up all the jobs and phasing with cost codes in Sage 300, and that information is sent to eSUB,” said Liz Vigil, project coordinator and estimator at Braconier. “There’s no double entry—everything is sent to eSUB and streamlines the entire process.”
The Braconier leadership team adopted a phased implementation process that started with timecard management. The previous timecard process included either handwriting timecards on paper or taking pictures of the timecard itself. Some field supervisors had collected time on spreadsheets. The payroll administrator received all this information via email and fax and manually entered it into the payroll system.
“We used to spend a full day of inputting timecards and processing payroll, and now with eSUB, it takes minutes,” noted Calahan. “The way that eSUB combined timecard management with daily reports is brilliant. It takes only an extra couple of minutes to take a picture and note what happened onsite that day. It was successful starting out with timekeeping, then daily reports, and additional modules such as RFIs and other pieces of eSUB. It helped us get more adoption across the board.”
Easier Onboarding
With the standardized processes now in place at Braconier, the onboarding process for new project managers has become much easier. Once they learn eSUB, any project manager or foreman can jump into the middle of a project and know exactly where it stands. When customers are not responding to them, anyone from the team can view the status of the documents.
Mr. Calahan elaborated, “eSUB gives us a good platform for our core project management processes. It serves as a central location to get an overview of the job and know if your job is going in the right direction. A foreman, project manager, or even the president can log into eSUB and get the same project information in real time.
“We have very skilled and self-sufficient field supervisors,” Mr. Calahan went on to say. “eSUB is an empowering tool for them to see where they stand financially and with working hours on a project—and it’s something they can easily do themselves. It allows for transparency and accountability across the board.”
For more information, visit www.esub.com.
