Construction organizations deal with a large number of documents, which can be challenging to process and manage. According to a recent poll, a third of construction professionals found it difficult to access papers while executing a project, and a fourth indicated that erroneous project paperwork contributed to a construction delay.
Sarah Buchner understands this well. Originally a carpenter, she launched Trunk Tools, a firm that offers automated tools for organizing unstructured construction documents.
"I grew up in a poor environment in a small village in Austria and started working as a carpenter at age 12," Buchner tells us. "After many years in carpentry, I moved on to the general contractor side and worked my way up from superintendent to project manager to group leader." My PhD research convinced me that building revolutionary construction technologies would allow me to make a greater effect on my field, which encouraged me to go to Silicon Valley to attend Stanford and earn my MBA.
The Trunk Tools platform can accept files such as PDFs, spreadsheets, drawings, blueprints, and tables and respond to questions about them via a chatbot-like interface. Trunk Tools can also "link" scheduled building activities to supporting paperwork, seeking to identify possible project challenges and reveal insights.
"Traditional construction software, like Procore, is centered around documenting workflows and storing data within a predefined system," Buchner told me. "In contrast, we're introducing a paradigm shift where Q&A and AI enable construction teams to interact with information using natural language."
According to Buchner, one customer's $500 million high-rise condo in New York City required 3.6 million pages of documentation. Given the amount of time it takes to look through such large file folders, it's not surprising that construction sector personnel dislike paperwork.
A survey conducted by Dodge Data and Viewpoint, a construction accounting software vendor, revealed that only 28% of contractors were comfortable utilizing paper methods, while only 47% were content with spreadsheets. Seventy-nine percent of poll respondents stated a readiness to use construction management tools.
“Construction technology so far has focused mainly on digitizing — taking what we used to do on paper and doing it on computers,” Buchner said. “Slipped timelines and rework can completely crush the razor-thin margins of construction projects, and Trunk Tools can alleviate both.”