3 Tips to Achieve Balance Between Jobsite Productivity, Worker Autonomy + Connected Crew

By Robert Salaj

Despite the availability of digital tools for the jobsite, more than 91% of construction sites still use paper-based processes to some degree, according to a 2025 State of Construction survey by Quickbase of more than 400 construction professionals. The impact on communication and productivity is profound.

For example, think about how many times a call is received from the office in search of a missing timesheet, clarification of an illegible name on a sign-in sheet or seeking additional details about an accident. From a productivity perspective, chasing down information and rekeying it can take upward of 11 hours a week. The time spent chasing down that information is why, according to the same survey, it may not be surprising to learn that 95% of construction professionals reported unexpected or increased costs over the past 12 months, resulting in exceeding project budgets.

Of course, the reasons for a project going over budget are not wholly attributable to productivity gaps. However, closing these gaps makes a difference. One of the fastest ways to do this is by reducing, if not eliminating, paper-based processes.

1. Facilitating efficient jobsite communications with digital tools
Introducing or expanding the use of digital tools on a jobsite to eliminate paper-based processes and facilitate jobsite interactions is not always simple as highlighted by the following considerations.

• Learning curves: Workers don’t want to spend time mastering a new digital tool, especially if they believe they won’t be using it in six months. On the plus side, with many workers being digitally native, learning curves are nonexistent if the technology is intuitive and draws from their knowledge based on using apps in their lives outside of work.
• Disconnects with back office: Digital tools built for activities on a jobsite are easy to download, but become counter-productive if the information they store stays on the user’s phone or a project tablet and doesn’t easily flow to the back office. Valuable data stays disconnected, and insights aren’t available, making it hard to stay ahead of projects and budgets.
• Too many tools: In an aggressive effort to streamline admin and overhaul manual processes on a jobsite, it’s not uncommon to see a glut of digital tools, resulting in a collection of different, disconnected slices of information about the project.

For example, if wanting to know the status of a subcontractor, you’ll have data about their attendance in one app. Another app will track their certifications while another keeps record of project history. Alone, that information is helpful when deciding who to bring on the jobsite. But it takes time to review those apps to get a snapshot of a subcontractor, not to mention the added costs of subscribing to those different apps.

2. Finding balance without compromising productivity
The most effective way to replace paper processes with digital tools and maintain efficient jobsite communications is to tackle the simplest activities; e.g., passing around a tablet to replace the paper sign-in form or tweaking a mobile app template to create a customized form for the daily log. The key is to ensure the information from those forms can be easily uploaded to the office contact so they receive updates as they happen.

As workers get more comfortable with the new digital way of working, two scenarios are likely to emerge. First, the boost of productivity, and second, workers will provide suggestions on how to further improve processes.

Encourage those suggestions by utilizing a mobile app with templates that users can customize in minutes; e.g., tweaking a mobile form for reporting a jobsite incident specific to a particular project. The template can be reused and customized for future jobsites, and the process for creating it will get faster each time. However, it’s important to avoid the creation of multiple digital forms containing similar information. This creates confusion and undermines productivity for workers on the jobsite, and those in the office who rely on jobsite data to make timely decisions to avoid potential issues. This is a primary reason construction superintendents and crews rely on work management platforms to centralize information.

3. Trading carbon copies for reusable digital forms
One company that shifted to digital processes to improve jobsite productivity by connecting workers onsite with the office is Caledonia Group, which specializes in providing scaffolding, insulation and sheet metal work services, but the paper processes used on jobsites were carbon-copy forms. Along with the frustration of workers bearing down on the form to ensure the writing was legible on each copy, there was also the risk of losing the form; one lost form led to a $50,000 discrepancy with a customer.

Once the supervisors implemented digital forms on the jobsite for job tracking, safety and incident reports and invoices, they trained crews on how to use them. Along with zero downtime on the jobsite and eliminating the time-consuming carbon-copy forms, the digital format created a more polished look for customers and a better way to track invoices. With a way to centralize all their jobsite forms back in the office, the company now has a solid library of project documentation that can be used on any jobsite, allowing them to more easily scale their business.

It may be surprising to learn how much paper is still used on a jobsite, but that’s changing. Based on continued dialogue with superintendents who lead and support the transition to digital tools, they confirm that each project only becomes more profitable.

Robert Salaj is industry solutions lead, Quickbase.