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October 7, 2013 - 12:40pm

Case Study from Hard Dollar

The Challenge

Hunter Contracting Co., an industry-leading, heavy-civil contractor serving the Southwest since 1961, was looking to reduce project risk and increase project accuracy and efficiency. Hunter needed a simple, effective way to leverage historical information to increase the accuracy of project bids. They wanted to remove multiple, manual data entry points between the field and the accounting office. Hunter also wanted to increase the transparency provided to owners looking for greater detail in their project estimates.

The Solution

Hunter selected HD PCM with HD Project Estimating and HD Project Performance to integrate with their Oracle Primavera P6 scheduling system and their Dexter + Chaney Spectrum ERP system. Integrating all their project cost and productivity information provides easy access to project status, giving Hunter staff the ability to proactively spot issues and immediately take corrective action.

HD PCM integration with Primavera P6 removes the need to manually enter schedule changes. HD PCM’s dynamic scheduling integration enables changes made in P6 to automatically update HD PCM. At the same time, resources, roles, assemblies, costs, productivity, and phases built in the HD PCM estimate can be passed back to the P6 schedule.

Likewise, HD PCM integration with Dexter + Chaney Spectrum streamlines data flow between estimates and project setup. Instead of manually entering data several times, data is entered once, in one place, increasing productivity and removing potential for errors.

Bob Carlson, Director of Estimating at Hunter, recalls, “2005 is when Hunter adopted widespread use of laptops in the field. The hardware adoption allowed our field team to enter all their information directly into HD Project Performance. From there, it flowed into our ERP system, ensuring fewer errors and reducing time spent manually entering data over and over again."

Return on Investment

HD PCM’s customizable features are a tremendous asset to Hunter, allowing them to incorporate standard operating procedures, while giving staff the flexibility to create individualized views of project data.

Hunter benefits from using HD PCM together with schedule and ERP integration. According to Carlson, “We’re able to get info out of our ERP system and review quantities and historical ranges to help us accurately create future estimates. Because of the historical data in HD PCM, we can closely predict the outcome of a project and create extremely accurate bids.” This accuracy is one of Carlson’s favorite benefits of HD PCM software: “The precision we get from HD PCM provides the confidence we need. In today’s competitive market, there’s no room for errors in our estimates.”

Hunter realized the benefits of adding HD Project Performance right away: “We are able to plan out the day beforehand, and then use HD Project Performance to budget work, to figure out the best way to approach the work. From management to contractors, we can plan work and keep a close eye on it to ensure we stay on budget. As a result, we’ve been able to increase accuracy on our estimate to actuals and reduce labor overruns by 15-20%.”

“When field personnel complete their time cards, we get instant feedback on how the day went,” Carlson said. “We eliminated the need to maintain manual reports. With staff entering time cards with production quantities on their laptops, we immediately know where we stand on any given project. Our goal is to have every project manager, engineer, and superintendent using HD PCM software.”

“As a result of using HD PCM, we have seen better alignment of our estimated cost-to-field production. During the boom we increased our workforce from 300 to 600 employees. Because we use HD PCM with ERP integration to handle time card reporting from the field, we have not needed to add accounting staff.”

The total transparency provided by HD PCM has helped Hunter win more business. Carlson explains, “Owners want to see everything. They want to see labor rates, productivity rates, and what’s getting subbed out. HD PCM allows us to quickly and easily provide that level of detail to owners.”

A word from Hunter Contracting Co."“The precision we get from HD PCM provides the confidence we need. In today’s competitive market, there’s no room for errors in our estimates.”" – Bob Carlson, Director of Estimating, Hunter Contracting Co.

 
 
 
 

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