New Wave Design & Contracting | Project Management Workflow Analysis
Feb 2025
✏️
Click any text to edit directly. Use the Save HTML button to download your edited version.
Executive Priority
"My biggest area that I think we need to improve ... getting the pre-con signed up."
— Antoine
Manual entry / rework
Handoff between roles
System-captured
Neutral step
01
Core Workflows
Pre-Construction Sales Flow
Deal Conversion Risk
1
Inbound lead / walkthrough request
James Gold (BD) fields initial inquiry. Moving from PM role to dedicated business development.
Handoff
2
Paid 30-minute discovery call
Scoping call with client to understand project requirements, preferences, and timeline.
3
Generate Pre-con cost template
Currently using a generic base template — not tailored to the actual call content. Sent after manual review.
Generic TemplateHours Delay
⚠ Generic output may be costing deals
Antoine: "If it's not specific to the call, I think I'd rather have something that's a little bit more focused on what they just talked about." Precon template doesn't reflect actual conversation topics, scope, or pricing discussed.
4
Client reviews precon proposal
Includes incentive: 50% precon cost back if client signs full project.
5
Follow-up and close
James Gold and new PM collaborate to close. No structured follow-up cadence or CRM automation in place.
2-Person Handoff
Estimating & Bid Assembly
Time Sink + Succession Risk
1
Receive drawings + spec book
Client provides drawings and a separate spec book naming preferred vendors and materials for various trades.
2
Estimator produces broad estimate
Retiring estimator creates estimate based on self-perform costs. No full-time estimator on staff. Method and format undocumented.
Retiring — Key Person RiskManual
⚠ Succession Risk — Knowledge Holder Exiting
20 years of estimating knowledge sitting with one person who is "half out the door." Estimates are based on self-perform costs, but the business is transitioning to a sub-everything model — making the current method increasingly misaligned.
3
Contact spec'd vendors for pricing
Manually identify vendor contacts from spec book, call each trade for quotes. Vendors are frequently slow to respond.
Manual OutreachSlow Vendor Response
4
Assemble composite bid
Combine estimator's numbers with vendor/sub quotes. Transition from self-perform to sub-based pricing adds complexity.
5
Value engineering (up to 5 rounds)
Client requests scope reductions. Team must recalculate profitability at each round. "Is this worth it?" — currently hard to answer quickly.
~2 Week CycleManual Recalc
⚠ ~2 weeks to produce estimate
Antoine: "Used to be two weeks. I'm telling you, people are going to get it quicker. I don't want to be too fast on it, but I want to get a little more efficient." Competitors adopting AI-assisted estimating will compress this timeline.
Estimate → Schedule Handoff
Disconnected Pipeline
1
Estimate approved / contract signed
Estimate becomes the approved scope of work. Should immediately feed scheduling.
2
Scope handed off to scheduling
Estimate data is manually transferred. Scheduling is partly outsourced and built in Microsoft Project — disconnected from Procore.
OutsourcedManual Transfer
⚠ Data re-entry between estimate and schedule
Timeline data exists in the estimate (e.g., "21 months") but must be manually rebuilt in Microsoft Project. Antoine wants this to auto-generate: "That should then just go in and then do its own schedule, and then we can review it."
3
Build detailed schedule in MS Project
Outsourced partner builds schedule, sends back.
ManualExternal Partner
4
PM receives schedule and begins execution
PM reviews schedule and starts project. Critical path items must be surfaced — currently buried inside MS Project file.
Material Procurement & Pricing
No Visibility
1
PM identifies material needs
Based on project scope, PM determines what materials to order and when.
2
Order from single vendor
Currently locked into Prince Lumber / Trade Supply. No competitive bidding — "we're not getting any competitor pricing right now."
Single Source RiskNo Price Shopping
⚠ Price increases going undetected
Vendor raises prices without notification. Team discovers increases "a few orders too late." Contract includes a 5% cost escalation clause, but there's no data infrastructure to enforce it proactively.
3
Receive & log materials
No structured inspection or logging workflow at receipt. Inventory goes to the garage and tracking degrades immediately.
No Inspection Log
4
Pay vendor invoice
Runs through QuickBooks → Procore integration (recently improved). This step is functioning.
Integrated
Inventory & Tool Tracking
Fragmented Systems
1
Tools tracked in Asset Tiger
Driver logs tool movements between sites. System exists but "just hasn't been working — too much."
Underperforming
2
General inventory tracked in Sortly
Non-tool inventory managed separately. Recently migrated but adoption is low.
Underperforming
⚠ Two systems, neither working
Inventory split across Asset Tiger (tools) and Sortly (materials/equipment). Both underperforming. Can't justify a full-time inventory person. Result: no reliable picture of what's in stock, where it is, or what it cost.
3
Physical garage storage
One garage serves as the central depot. No real-time inspection, logging, or location tracking workflow in place.
No Real-Time Tracking
PM Execution & Data Entry
Capacity Bottleneck
1
Procore financials — fully adopted
PMs using financial tools in Procore. Accounting staff assists with data entry. QuickBooks integration recently improved via new third-party connector.
Working Well
2
Superintendent daily logs
"A lot of manual labor on that." Daily reporting from the field is time-consuming for supers and PMs alike.
ManualHours Per Day
3
Data hygiene & system upkeep
PM spending "too many hours" on data entry. Hiring Amanda to assist, but still insufficient.
ManualBurnout Risk
⚠ PMs are data entry clerks, not project managers
Kerry: "She's spending too much time on it." Current PM capacity is consumed by data hygiene rather than managing additional projects. The business can't scale project volume without either adding headcount or eliminating manual entry.
4
Task alerts & reminders (Procore)
Automated task reminders and email alerts are configured. Kerry: "We would have to check in with them and see how well they're working."
Configured
5
Bonus KPI tracking
5-point bonus program: safety, Procore compliance, schedule adherence, no violations, +1 more. PMs incentivized at milestones and on profit share.
Structured
02
Key Friction Areas
Strategic Context
New Wave is at an inflection point
After 20 years in business, Antoine and Kerry are building toward an exit or passive ownership model — "get this so situated that we could either sell or just let it run." They've made real progress: Procore financials are fully adopted, QuickBooks integration is working, and the team is open to learning. But the front end of the business (precon → estimating → scheduling) is still largely manual, dependent on a retiring estimator, and disconnected from the back-end systems that are working. The next phase of growth — and the ability to step back — depends on closing the gap between a modernized back office and a still-manual front office.
🎯
Generic Precon Risks Losing Deals
Every client gets the same base template after their paid discovery call, regardless of what was discussed. This commoditizes the first impression and likely contributes to the "amount of times we don't get to the end part." Tailored follow-up is a competitive differentiator that's currently being left on the table.
⏳
Retiring Estimator = Single Point of Failure
The only person who produces estimates has been doing it for 20 years and is "half out the door." His method is based on self-perform costs, but the company is transitioning to a management-only model (subbing everything). When he leaves, both the knowledge and the misaligned methodology go with him.
💰
No Competitive Procurement
Locked into a single vendor with no price benchmarking. Price increases go unnoticed until several orders have already been placed at inflated rates. Past attempts to hire someone for price shopping failed — "the day is over and they don't get their material the next day."
📋
PM Data Entry Consuming Capacity
Project managers spend "too many hours" on data hygiene instead of managing projects. The company can't afford assistant PM layers, but the current PM is already over capacity. Hiring Amanda to help, but adding headcount for data entry isn't scalable.
🔗
Estimate → Schedule Disconnected
The estimate contains timeline data (e.g., 21-month project duration), but this must be manually rebuilt in Microsoft Project by an outsourced partner. Every handoff introduces delay, data loss, and the risk of misaligned milestones between the plan and execution.
📦
Inventory Across Two Failing Systems
Tools in Asset Tiger, materials in Sortly — neither is working. The driver-based logging approach is "too much." There's no justified headcount for a dedicated inventory role, so tracking degrades to best-guess. No real-time visibility into what's on hand.
03
Opportunity Areas
Priority 1
AI-Assisted Precon Estimate from Discovery Calls
Record the paid 30-minute discovery call, extract scope signals, and auto-generate a tailored precon cost proposal for review — replacing the generic template within hours of the call, not days.
Impact: Deal conversion rate · Speed to first impression · Revenue capture
Priority 1
Estimating Workflow Acceleration
Digitize the estimator's methodology before he exits. Automate vendor outreach from spec books (parse → identify trades → send drawing packages). Enable faster value engineering with live profitability modeling at each scope reduction round.
Track invoice line items over time. Flag any material price increase above a configurable threshold (e.g., 5%) via email alert. Provide leverage for vendor negotiations and contract clause enforcement.
When an estimate is approved, automatically generate a draft schedule with critical path milestones based on the scope, trade sequencing, and timeline data already embedded in the estimate — eliminating the manual MS Project handoff.
Impact: Handoff speed · Data consistency · PM readiness at project kick-off
Priority 2
PM Data Entry Automation
Identify the top 2-3 manual entry tasks consuming PM hours (daily logs, invoice matching, submittal tracking) and build automated capture workflows — freeing PMs to manage more projects without additional headcount.
Replace Asset Tiger + Sortly with a single, lightweight system. Build a receive-and-log workflow that captures inventory at point of delivery — including inspection, price, and location — without requiring a dedicated inventory person.
Impact: Inventory visibility · Reduced loss/waste · System simplification