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Amid economic challenges and rising interest rates, the construction industry as a whole is facing its most notable downturn since May 2020. Demand has substantially decreased as a result, putting a heavy strain on the sector. Additionally, the RICS Construction Productivity Report highlights construction productivity rates are notoriously low in the UK and Ireland, with over 25% of construction respondents not regularly measuring productivity at all. One big reason for this is outdated business communications, hindering information sharing, team collaboration, exacerbating supply chain delays, and culminating in wasteful spend.
During turbulent economic times, the sector must re-evaluate embedded ways of working to not only survive and recover, but supercharge growth. To do so, a robust digital infrastructure that prioritise mobile is fundamental. Indeed, T-Mobile found that 60% of venture funding within construction is being directed towards mobile solutions. With a range of emerging mobile innovations now available, poor communication on-site should not be the thing that stifles industry progress.
Digging deeper into on-site issues
According to RICS, increased digital investment is a top priority for boosting productivity rates. While this is great news, firms must make sure they start with the basics by allocating budget spend for communication tools and, in particular, business mobile calling for on-the-go workers.
In the last five years, there has been a significant transformation in communication practices for workers in both traditional office setups and remotely. This shift has been powered by the adoption of Unified Communication (UC) tools, incorporating functionalities like call recording, instant messaging, CRM integration, and collaborative document editing. But this revolutionary wave has largely overlooked a crucial segment of the workforce – those engaged in on-the-go activities, such as builders, engineers, surveyors, contractors, and architects. Despite being in an era of technological advancement, mobile communication solutions for construction professionals have plateaued, precisely when they need it most.
The problem is mobile phone apps with UC features typically require the voice stream to travel over a public data internet connection shared with other bandwidth hungry applications. These data channels cannot provide guaranteed delivery in real time because there is competition for connectivity; this means there is latency and, therefore, voice communication quality suffers. This is not good enough for construction workers and professionals out-and-about. This is where PiPcall enters the conversation, able to provide quality calls over the dedicated voice network as well as offer UC-like calling features.
Concrete calling capabilities
Traditional calls will always remain vital in construction as the go-to communication for connecting contractors, suppliers, architects and more with ease. But PiPcall’s state of the art business mobile calling solution, Mobile+, will level up calls. Designed specifically for construction professionals, Mobile+ leverages the dedicated mobile voice network– to deliver reliable mobile HD voice quality calls combined with advanced calling features.
Mobile+ is a single solution designed to connect, secure, manage and supercharge mobile ecosystems easily. Armed with an intuitive admin portal bringing functionalities together in a centralised hub, it is an invaluable ally for keeping track of comms, team collaboration, and measuring workflow efficiency. Using PiPcall, businesses can integrate advanced features that connect to a wider network of colleagues working on the same project, without quality compromises. From call recording and transfer to ring groups, shared contact directories and interconnected staff networks, your team will never have to miss a call again.
This is imperative for the likes of Consultants, Project Managers and Quantity Surveyors whose; daily responsibilities involve making cost estimations, managing project timelines, co-ordinating suppliers and clients and frequent travel between the office and construction sites. These workers need a transformative shift in their embedded ways of working to heighten productivity.
Mobile+ is the ultimate solution for streamlined, centralised communications, facilitating enhanced project management from any location. With Mobile+, a Quantity Surveyor, for example, encountering a supply delay on-site can promptly contact suppliers and sub-contractors via call transfer without interruptions, bidding farewell to dropped calls.
Construct secure communications
Also, important to note is how construction firms enlist lots of project-specific professionals throughout the supply chain, and, therefore, deploy a range of mobile devices across SIMS, eSIMs and BYOD (bring your own device). While BYOD is an effective policy to enrol – known to improve employee productivity, and offers company cost savings – there is a risk of breaching GDPR. For instance, workers using the same device for work and personal matters might accidently share data.
To maximise the potential of BYOD, Mobile+ has been meticulously designed to meet GDPR compliance needs. PiPcall provides a dedicated mobile number that separates business communications from personal information. Moreover, Mobile+ empowers IT managers to erase sensitive data from mobile phones at the end of a project to enhance compliance, safeguarding your employees and customer data.
The business mobile blueprint
PiPcall's Mobile+ – available as a standalone app or as part of a SIM or eSIM deal – is the concrete answer to construction professionals’ communication needs. Our unified solution is more than about making calls. Mobile+ is a catalyst for transforming communications and boosting productivity for construction companies. Mobile+ will not only enhance your firm’s adaptability to meet dynamic industry demands, but future-proofs your working processes, enabling your teams to confront and collaborate on challenges as they arise.
This was paid for by PiPcall.
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