Construction Collaboration Today: Making File Sharing Work for You

As construction workflows become digitized, efficient file sharing stands out as a crucial success factor for collaboration. How do you succeed with it?

A bit of history

The question of collaborative construction file management is not new. My first CAD project was in the mid-1980s. File sharing was simple because the design disciplines worked on a shared server with remote graphical terminals.

Later, we moved to minicomputers, each with its own proprietary data storage. At that moment, challenges around sharing files with dispersed teams emerged.

When the Internet and the web became commercially available, the company I worked for set up file servers for project document sharing. We created folder structures for each discipline and used the FTP protocol for data transfer. It worked, but it was a manual process unless you were a programmer who could write code to automate your workflow.

Email was too limited for transferring large files then. When that changed, many companies started using email as their primary file-sharing technology. It was easy and required no setup.

From sending to sharing

It’s 2024, and many still consider email a viable way to share files and collaborate. The typical result, however, is chaos. Important information can go unnoticed or lost, there are doubts about security, and workflow effectiveness depends on people’s attentiveness.

Some AEC companies have given up on trying to replace email and have developed software that automates the management of incoming messages. Other peer-to-peer solutions are also available.

Most companies have concluded that a centralized, well-organized “single source of truth” is the way to go. The international ISO 19650 standard promotes Common Data Environments (CDE) for construction projects.

AEC firms have several options for file sharing, but not enough have implemented these solutions. According to a 2021 US survey by Dodge Data & Analytics, less than one quarter (24%) of AEC firms shared data digitally “frequently or very frequently” in multi-company workflows.

You can change behavior

Construction is a unique industry because it is project-oriented, and there is a great deal of variety in each aspect of a project: the location, the clients, the companies involved, the processes, and so on. A good file-sharing and collaboration technology must be flexible enough to serve various companies with varying levels of tech maturity, in multiple scenarios.

The biggest challenge is making the use of a shared platform an everyday habit. That happens when users find new ways of working that deliver clear personal benefits. Design professionals can attest to that, but construction field workers, too, are increasingly seeing the value of easy access to documents.

For example, construction workers spend a lot of time looking for information and asking for instructions. If they can get what they need, when they need it with a few clicks, they’ll leave behind their old, inefficient habits. This type of technology can help them improve productivity and make better use of their time on-site.

Don’t neglect the power of the user experience

In some projects, the client or the general contractor might require other companies to use their collaboration platform. That will support compliance, but if the platform is not designed for simple, multi-company collaboration, it can become a burden instead of a helpful tool.

When choosing a file-sharing platform, pay extra attention to the user experience. I’ve seen how even a brilliant piece of software can be abandoned during a project because users find it too hard to learn or cumbersome.

Data is like water; it finds the shortest distance to flow. Frustrated users will do the same and set up their own “unofficial” ways to share files or resort to email or messaging apps for data exchange.

When you have to rethink your choice

When hundreds of users from multiple companies participate in a construction project, every friction point can get in the way of productive work.

I recently learned about a large general contractor who changed their collaboration platform one year into a hospital construction project. They had to migrate around 12,000 files with metadata and set up access rights on the new platform.

Fortunately, the transformation was relatively smooth, and the company felt it was worth the trouble because the original solution did not sufficiently support their workflows.

The story highlights the importance digital tools have for the productivity and effectiveness of construction users. It also reminds us to plan and vet our tools well in advance.

Things to consider in choosing a file-sharing technology

There are plenty of file management and sharing options on the market. Some are dedicated solutions, and some are part of a project management application. Even though they serve the same function, they differ in ease of use, administration, and integration.

Technology today must be more than a place to share files. It must support workflows with approvals and audit trails and have automated features that eliminate errors and manual processing. Naturally, it must provide strong cyber security that does not make users jump through hoops just to get their job done.

Managing the matrix of changing users and their access to files can be daunting. A good tool makes it quick and easy to make updates so that users can save valuable time.

No application today should be an island. When choosing the right file-sharing technology, make sure it supports integration with the essential tools you use in projects.

Scale for the future

Don’t consider any platform a one-off, project-specific solution. It should scale with your needs and support your digital workflows over the long-term. As I stated earlier, an excellent user experience is the definitive element of success.

After using countless collaboration software and platforms, I’ve discovered ShareFile. It ticks all the boxes I have for an effective file-sharing technology. It has millions of users and has proved its worth in many industries, including finance, accounting, healthcare, insurance, and real estate.

To learn more about what ShareFile offers construction companies, visit https://www.sharefile.com/industry/construction.

I thank ShareFile for their continued support for AEC Business!