| Better Next Year No. 4: Fine-Tune Project Management Reports |
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| Written by Fred Ode | |
| Tuesday, 14 August 2007 | |
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Construction-Specific Software Provides Much-Needed Details Flexible reporting, therefore, is something that contractors desperately need from their job cost accounting system. Fortunately, there are good construction-specific applications available that offer not only standard reports but also customizable report writers capable of creating an infinite combination of reports. Most importantly, a good job cost system's reporting features will be capable of showing cost breakdowns on many levels-from total job costs to labor costs per task, to costs per cost category, to costs per units of measure, labor productivity and so on. Using a sophisticated system with flexible reporting capabilities means contractors get to define exactly which type (or combination) of project-level management reports to produce on a regular basis. A mechanical contractor, for example, may elect to produce a project-level production report that tracks costs per unit worked (i.e., $5.34 per linear foot). Meanwhile, a heavy highway contractor may decide to create a report which tracks labor productivity by the ton or cubic yard per man hour worked (i.e., 10.4 cubic yards per man hour). A contractor's job costing system should not only have the capability of handling budgeted, committed and actual costs by job, phase, cost code and cost type, but it should also be capable of maintaining and reporting both the original budget and the revised budget (original budget plus change orders). For accurate job costing and reporting at the project level, a contractor's software should-at a minimum-allow for multiple levels of costs (jobs, tasks, phases and classifications, such as labor, materials and equipment.) Attention to detail, they say, is the hallmark of any great craftsman (or scientist, cook or software developer for that matter). Without the answers to the how, why, where and when details of every job, how can a contractor even hope to succeed in today's competitive construction market? And without access to accurate and timely project-level management reports, how can a contractor possibly become better next year? Fred Ode is the CEO/chairman of Foundation Software, developer of construction job cost accounting software called FOUNDATION for Windows. For further information on FOUNDATION for Windows, visit www.foundationsoft.com. Comments (0)
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