In the construction industry, do you know what takes up a massive amount of your time? You'd think it would be building related. Unfortunately, for all too many construction professionals, from project managers to project engineers, often, the biggest time lost is in your email! There are plenty of contacts that need to weigh in on every topic as it comes by: general contractors, subcontractors, engineers, architects, and more.
Quickly, you can get lost in the endless replies on an email thread, your email alert constantly letting you know that someone new has weighed in. Worse, searching through that email thread to find exactly the comment or reply you need can quickly eat up a lot more time than you originally thought.
LinkedField can help.
Stay on Top of Your Emails
LinkedField Collect is ideal for helping everyone in the construction industry, from general contractors to subcontractors and everyone in between, stay on top of their emails. With LinkedField Collect, you can separate yourself from your inbox and engage in more effective communication--because an email inbox is not the most efficient method for most types of construction project management communications. In your inbox, information quickly becomes cluttered. It helps:
Automatically collect documents & information
Are there specific replies related to a project that need to go in one location? Save time by having them collected for you in one location. LinkedField Collect is designed to work as an effective construction management system: it keeps all the data related to your projects in one place so that you don't have to spend unnecessary time digging through your emails just to find one specific piece of information.
Organize them for you
For many general contractors, one of the biggest challenges of construction project management is keeping everything organized. LinkedField Collect can help organize your emails by subcontractor, which can make it easier for you to look back on that information later--or keep up with your emails to begin with.
How Can You Decrease the Time Spent on Email & Messaging?
Across all industries, workers may spend an average of more than 352 minutes checking email each day--both while on the clock and during their personal time. That means a lot of time locked to your inbox--but how can you cut down on that time when you have subcontractors, architects, designers, and customers waiting to hear back from you, all of whom may have important questions they need answered at any given time?
Separate out the important
Your inbox is filled with emails that have nothing to do with your daily work responsibilities. You likely receive emails from suppliers, spam emails, and other content straight to your work inbox on a regular basis. Instead of wading through that content to find the emails related to your projects, use a program like LinkedField Collect to communicate with the members of your team.
It automatically separates those messages into specific areas, and allows you to keep track of what's going on with your projects easily, in one simple location. Email is far from the most efficient location for your project conversations. With LinkedField Collect, you get a much more streamlined communication experience that makes it easier for you to organize and manage your messages.
Designate specific times to check your messages
It's easy to get in the habit of checking your email or your apps every time you get a notification, particularly if you carry a smartphone with you every day. Each message creates a hit of dopamine in your brain, and checking that message becomes automatic or even a little addictive. Constantly checking email or messages, however, can drain the time out of your day and leave you struggling to keep up with everything on your To Do list. Instead, try setting aside a specific time to check email and deal with messages.
If you're waiting on an important email or message from a client, subcontractor, or inspector, you may need to check your messages more often. Make sure, however, that you're setting aside specific times when you're not busy with other tasks. Most of the time, you will not have to respond to or act on messages the moment they come in--and you do not want to be distracted when you're in the middle of a task that demands your full attention.
Answer quickly when possible
Often, emails and messages require only a short answer, but you may set them to the side and assume that you will get back to the thread later. Unfortunately, you may end up forgetting the message altogether--or ultimately spending more time on it than you would have if you had just answered the message in the first place. If you're already checking your messages, and you can handle the task or information required from a specific message in less than five minutes, always take care of it immediately.
When you can't answer your messages quickly--perhaps you need additional information before you can send a reply, for example--you should mark them clearly, then set them aside in a specific location. That way, they won't clutter up your inbox, and you'll be able to find them easily when you're ready to send off your answer. Make sure you set aside time to deal with those messages in the near future so that they don't fall through the cracks!
Organize your messages
In addition to other time-saving strategies, make sure you have an organization strategy in place that will make it simple for you to check the messages you need. LinkedField Collect offers both organization strategies and visual follow-up cues, so you can easily control the location of emails in your inbox and ensure that you have access to the content you need, when you need it.
Do you need a better system for dealing with the endless emails that come through your inbox? LinkedField Collect could offer the solution you need. Contact us today to learn more about our apps and communication solutions.
