*CHAPTER 1*
The Future of Productivity
*THE FUTURE OF PRODUCTIVITY IS DRIVEN BY AUTOMATION AND AUGMENTATION*
AI and automation
Data-driven tech
Robotics
IoT and sensors
Other
Automation on the jobsite will ensure that tasks that are dull or dangerous are handled by technology, while those that require human insights are handled by the crew. The results will be a higher quality product at a faster pace while creating a safer jobsite. Robotics will also support the shift to safer, more efficient jobsites, as work becomes augmented by machines. Robots will perform tasks alongside their human counterparts, saving workers from the hazards of repetitive, brute work, like carrying supplies, and preventing bodily injuries while providing more accurate results. This will not eliminate workers but will empower them to do more of the work that requires their specific talents.
Some companies are already seeing gains from this shift — according to the How We Build Now report, 27% of construction firms were actively using robotics, while 33% were planning to adopt robotics within the next 12 months.1 While the role of humans on the jobsite may evolve, there will always be a human instructing, controlling, and directing the machine. This shift means upskilling will be required to take advantage of new technologies. According to the state of construction survey, in some cases it’s training that drives digital transformation — 42% of construction leaders said upskilling has one of the biggest impacts on effective digital transformation,2 while 45% of workers cite technical skills as one of the capabilities they want to develop most.3
According to the How We Build Now Report, 18% of project time is spent searching for data.4 A further 28% of a project’s total time is spent on rework or rectifying issues. This has a massive impact on performance and contributes to nearly half of all projects going over time and budget.5
“Robotics lets your foreperson entrust layout to less experienced workers, freeing up the foreperson to focus on running teams, coordinating, and making sure the right work gets done.
On average, Dusty’s customers complete their layout process about 10 times faster than with traditional layouts. Then, when your project manager and superintendent walk the floor, they can literally look down and understand how all the components of the project come together. That reduces rework, RFIs, and change orders to drive down the total cost of the project. Plus, layout is a job that requires you being on your hands and knees, bending over, snapping chalk lines, and marking things with a Sharpie all day, for weeks on end, when a jobsite is at its most chaotic. It’s bad for you in the long term from a health and safety point of view. Robotics can literally and directly extend the careers of really talented people in this industry.”
Advanced preconstruction processes allow teams to plan for the tools and techniques needed for a specific job and make informed decisions before teams hit the jobsite. The driver behind this shift is access to multi- dimensional, real-time project data. Jobs with data-driven preconstruction will yield new productivity data points of their own, helping to improve processes for the next project. The accumulated data then becomes a data lake, from which insights and recommendations can be drawn to inform future productivity gains.
The AI revolution is already upon us. According to the How We Build Now report, 59% of construction leaders across the U.S. and Canada were already using AI or machine learning (ML), or planned to do so in the next 12 months.6 AI and automation makes the information transfer from unstructured data to actionable insights faster and more efficient. AI-driven solutions will use data accumulated through digitalization to create workflows, automatically update timelines, and provide real-time answers to critical questions.
mproved preconstruction processes driven by the insights of AI-enabled data will be a game changer for unleashing new productivity gains throughout the project lifecycle. The industry is optimistic about this potential as the state of construction survey indicates that 55% of construction leaders believe it is extremely likely or very likely that automation will disrupt the industry in the next 5 years.7 Companies that invest in these advancements now will be positioned to reap the benefits on the jobsites of tomorrow. In fact, 65% of construction professionals surveyed said the adoption of new technology has a high or a very high influence on their company’s culture and resilience to risk.8
Click on the graph to enlarge.
“I used to think of AI and robotics as two separate tracks, and now I think of them as one. What actually matters the most is making robots smarter and more capable. That’s what’s going to unlock the actual change in productivity. It’s humans orchestrating robots and scanning and imaging a site completely from top to bottom, creating this visual twin of what’s there, which isn’t something that we can do today with a human. None of our brains work quite that way. Then, you have these AI agents that are deployed within this visual twin. You’re unleashing these agents to work inside this visual copy of your jobsite and perform a lot of the quality, safety, and progress-checking tasks that normally would have required a human.
Data needs to be looked at through multiple different lenses to understand: Is there an OSHA safety risk here? What is the severity of that risk? Where is the risk on the site, and how many risks are there? A safety team often doesn’t have enough people to walk every single jobsite. Now, every person who has a camera becomes a safety agent who can then feed that data to the safety team.
It’s like having a million eyeballs everywhere looking for risks across the job site.”
It’s like having a million eyeballs everywhere looking for risks across the jobsite.”
When a worker at a solar farm construction site worried about a piece of plywood being used as a makeshift bridge, Moss Construction’s extensive AI expertise helped make a safer decision in less time.
First, the worker sent a picture of the plywood bridge over a trench to Moss’ AI system trained on OSHA expertise. The AI wasn’t quite sure where the standards fell in this situation, so it automatically consulted with Moss’ engineering AI. Then, the engineering AI analyzed and vectorized the image of the bridge to understand what it was looking at.
Working with dimensions from the site photo, the engineering AI calculated the material dynamics of the gap and its plywood bridge, showing its work at each step.
While its calculations indicated the bridge could hold an average worker, the consulting AIs also knew that OSHA requires a safety factor of four in these situations. The stopgap solution was not up to code.
Finally, the team of artificial specialists looped in Moss’ legal AI to draft a notice to the subcontractor about removing the plywood bridge. With a potentially hazardous situation resolved, work at the jobsite continued — safely.9
Click to watch the video.
Robotics are reshaping construction. For proof, look no further than Winvic’s Crown Place Birmingham project. With plans for Winvic’s highest-ever build in a very constrained urban space, the multidisciplinary contractor needed every possible advantage to keep work moving smoothly.
To prevent time- and resource-wasting rework and clashes, Winvic brought in a layout robot. This small, self-propelled device needs only the oversight of a single employee to set out the positions of partitions, sockets, ducts, and more, all printed directly onto the floor of each level with impeccable precision.
Winvic also used a remote-operated robotic tower crane driven by a worker seated safely several stories below. With a suite of screens presenting an immersive view, a heads-up display showing wind speed, radius data, and more information, it was as easy to operate from the ground as it would be from within its cabin.
The crane system also gathered and analyzed usage data to intelligently suggest how to optimize common tasks. These additions to the jobsite paid off almost immediately: after 12 stories of layout, there still had been no clashes between MEP, dry lining, and joinery. And, on top of being easier to use, the tower crane’s analysis helped Winvic improve lifting efficiency by about 10%.10
