Conference Program
As the labor shortage for skilled trade workers continues to burden the industry, MEP contractors are looking towards pure retention and workforce optimization efforts as a way to increase their bottom line. Hear from a Procore partner and your peers on how they approach data collection and optimization to better understand their workforce productivity and maximize their labor resources
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After two decades in technology, Jeff Sample gives away his expertise in this engaging hands-on experience. You will dive into the 5 step process and collaboratively learn alongside your peers in this session. You will leave with a new process and tools to support your organization’s journey into digital transformation. Empower yourself and your company to thrive during the technology evolution ahead and create a sustainable approach for evaluating, selecting, and implementing transformative technology.
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You have created the list of process improvement topics and now it’s time to execute but where do we start. Let’s walk through the step-by-step process to achieving productivity improvement. Bring a project topic or walk through the exercise as you complete an A3 form. The exercise will help you see the thinking behind the problem solving. Leave the workshop will new tools and actionable items to meet your operational excellence goals.
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Although VDC software can help drive productivity gains downstream, it can be a time intensive solution. Many contractors have tried to reduce that time through coding solutions or software that has coding built in that can shortcut repeatable processes. In this session, Jeff Elwell will share how some of these solutions work and help attendees build their own solutions using their own devices. This session will demonstrate Dynamo, Trackvia and Revit platforms.
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Adding a 3D Scanner to your construction process can offer up significant advantages. In addition to capturing existing spaces and equipment, it can be used to verify field conditions, spaces and fabrication specifics. In this session, you will learn tips and tricks for improving your processes, productivity and workflows when implementing a 3D scanner.
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Explore how Milwaukee Tool’s MX battery platform is furthering the drive to eliminate cords & gas fumes to address user issues, frustrations, and hazards on the jobsite. These trade-specific solutions are delivering the future jobsite without cords and noisy gas powered engines, leveraging a breakthrough cordless battery platform. In this session you’ll have the opportunity to explore new products and understand the integrated safety features improving the jobsite.
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As the need for faster delivery times of fabrication increases, so does the need for increased speed of getting fabrication assemblies and work instructions to the shop. With MSUITE’s new Cloud Spooling feature, users of all skill levels can create advanced work packages and assemblies right from a web browser, in seconds.
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Construction robotics is beginning to infiltrate the industry by performing repetitive workflows, capturing jobsite data and performing work in conditions too dangerous for humans. In this session, attendees will see how Trimble is working with Boston Dynamics to implement construction hardware with robotics.
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A construction project is an interconnected web of data – from bid documents to BIM content, from Plans to POs and everything in between – not unlike a social network with connections of 1st degree, 2nd degree, and beyond. This presentation will introduce a new data network technology built on top of the DADO platform to help get instant insights from these relationships, and understand the impact of changes to the network of project data. Imagine being able to instantly see all documents and content impacted by a design change for example – this is now possible!
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As projects get bigger and more complex, there are more people and equipment moving between locations than ever before. Throughout this, do you know where your valuable assets are? In this hands-on session, you will understand how to leverage hardware & software tracking technology to control your logistics on the jobsite, reduce loss, and improve your bottom line.
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The MEP Innovation Conference kicks off with a roundtable with some of the industry’s most important behind-the-scenes leaders. Leaders from all three organizations – MCAA, NECA and SMACNA, will be on hand to discuss the importance of innovation within the MEP Trades. They will tackle how vital it is for contractors to continue to embrace technology and lead the building industry on practices and processes. Following their presentation, Lawrence Smith, VP & GM of Trimble will welcome everyone to the conference and introduce our final presentation of the evening.
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James Benham from JBKnowledge will demonstrate three companies that are using machine learning and artificial intelligence on construction sites today.
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We start day two with insights from NECA’s Vice President of Industry Development, Ron Bailey, discussing how to achieve your highest leadership potential. We will then dive into a presentation on ways that data is shaping the construction process. Chris Peppler of Trimble will share how the decisions made in design connect to estimating, fabrication, analytics, internal, and external teams.
Data and workflows are always a topic of discussion in construction today. But what does that really mean and where can a contractor get started? This session presents a vision for the construction industry that puts project, model, and managed item data at the core of what the industry must adopt to unlock downstream workflows for prefabrication, procurement, and the supply chain. In doing so, construction can become more predictable and profitable for contractors.
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Contractors that are starting down the path to digitize their operations need to consider a new set of tools and processes. This session, geared to project managers and VDC personnel will look at best practices for file structure, data security, data sharing, and the basic software used to manage it. Whether you are building from the ground up or optimizing already existing workflows, this session will explore some best practices to bring you further into the digital age.
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To ensure that next generation of manpower is ready to use modern tools and building practices, communication and coordination is essential between contractors and their local JATC’s. In this session, expert trainers will share best practices on how to develop educational programs, train for new technology, and re-train the workforce when necessary. They will share tips and techniques to approach holistic worker education and empower innovators to drive the future of construction.
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In addition to doing their primary job, VDC Managers must juggle many demands from internal and external customers. This session will cover how considerations like manpower loading, progressing coordination, and constructability review are all important while being flexible enough to handle emergency changes and schedule shifts. It will also consider how to manage the right work for the right level of detailer, using VDC helpers and specialists to manage repetitive aspects of BIM like hangers and spooling.
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Ever wish that another trade on your project would be more receptive to your team’s viewpoint? Ever wonder why another team on a job makes decisions in the way that they do? This roundtable discussion will focus on sharing and learning varying perspectives from multiple trades during project coordination. Better understanding of the concerns and workflows of the rest of the design team is essential to improve productivity and coordination to drive project success.
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Every problem has not found a solution in construction. Many people feel that to come up with an answer, it will take inventing the solution ourselves. The purpose of this roundtable is to help contractors adapt existing solutions through artful use instead of going through the pain of development, upkeep and modifications. This session will begin with a presentation of examples of adapting existing hardware and software before moving to a roundtable discussion set to identify problems with unknown solutions. After the problems have been identified, participants will reset their tables to work on some of the problems discussed in order to brainstorm possible adaptations.
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As contractors begin to digitize their operations, one of their first needs is to make sure the information that they are coordinating in house is shared with their team on the project site. This session will cover strategies and tools that can be used to manage RFI’s, design iterations, labor tracking, schedules and communications.
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For every piece of software that you include in your tech stack, a master service agreement (MSA) is typically clicked through without much thought put behind it. Every time you accept the terms of an MSA, you are accepting a certain level of risk that can have ramifications for your company. Data security, ownership and transference need to be considered. Service level agreements that guarantee uptime and inform users of updates or procedures when lapses in service are important to understand. Most notably, many of these terms are negotiable with the vendor to offset some risk of business interruptions and performance.
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Join us in this informative session as Jeff Miller from Harrell Fish Inc demonstrates their connected estimating, modeling and prefabrication workflow. This connected workflow significantly increases the accuracy of their estimates, reduces the effort it takes to track earned values, and eliminates the need for paper on the shop floor.
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This presentation is leadership focused. It is designed to help you understand the vitality of a comprehensive diversity program that engage and improve the interactions of a diverse set of stakeholders within an organization. We will talk about how the best leaders include everyone around them and make everyone smarter and productive.
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In a perfect world a successful tech implementation would end when the check is written. In this session we will go through the standard management pitfalls that prevent purchase and successful implementations. Not only will we talk about the pitfalls we discuss the multiple solutions. It’s about adapting process and technology to meet your company’s objectives.
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While construction is an agile process, contractors manage to waterfall schedules that force them to be reactive instead of proactive. This session will discuss how to apply an agile process to your projects where you adapt and plan for change, identify key milestones to make decisions and chart alternate paths based on the conditions of the project.
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While fabrication can drive increased productivity and safety to a project, how people track productivity is different for each contractor. This roundtable will ask attendees what are you tracking in your fab shop and what are you doing with the data? It will also look into best practices, shop layout, flexibility, retooling, and how productivity is impacted by workload.
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While most contractors have participated on projects that have used BIM software before, there is a steep learning curve to the software, process and gains that can be made from using it. This session will walk attendees through some initial considerations like hardware and software, training, basic workflow and how to use the data beyond contractual obligations in order to offset these costs with improved productivity.
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Keeping your tech stack operating smoothly can take a heavy amount of effort. Internally, getting all of the API’s to communicate the right information back and forth takes an investment in either a 3rd party software integrator or a full time coder. Externally, there is also the challenge of working with tools that the rest of the design team is using. This session will help contractors better understand integration best practices and tools that can be used to communicate properly.
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Service contractors face a specific set of needs when it comes to their core operations software. Beyond essential areas of accounting and payroll, service software needs to integrate dispatch, billing, sales, and support functions. This can get further complicated for companies that perform construction and service.
This session will help companies understand the complexities of service software integration. This includes software customization, upkeep, and training.
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BIM can drive large productivity savings, but only if everyone is on the same page. This session will show a case study of how contractors can leverage BIM for great productivity gains. Then it will focus on ways that PMs can impact that productivity both positively and negatively. It will look at how to manage a project efficiently, what we expect from the foremen about dates, and stress timely communication of concerns.
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Waste on the jobsite can involve physical materials, be tracked by effort, include time lost to re-work, or even refer to redundant actions required by your team. In this session, industry leaders will explore different methods to define project ‘waste’ and opportunities to assess and minimize waste in your processes. Whether you are building a new procedure from the ground-up or optimizing a workflow that already exists, join us to explore ways that you too can begin to eliminate waste across your business.
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While fabrication can drive productivity gains, it doesn’t take a tremendous amount of space, tools or manpower to get started. What is important is shifting the mentality of your company, identifying early areas to fabricate, and building on successes. This session will act as a primer for contractors that want to understand the basics of mechanical, plumbing, sheet metal, and electrical fabrication.
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Join us in this informative session as Tim Riedle from Icon Mechanical demonstrates their Revit based workflows and how Model-Based Estimating is an integral part of those workflows. iENG and Icon Mechanical work primarily on Design Build and Design Assist projects. Tim will demonstrate how Model-Based Estimating is keeping them better informed throughout their project lifecycle and enabling them to execute their projects with much more control, visibility and accuracy.
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For contractors that perform BIM, leveraging the use of jobsite construction hardware is a great way to offset the investment made in the model by taking advantage of huge productivity gains. This session will detail the basics of using robotic total stations to fast track layout and hanger placement. It will also cover methods of increasing model development through use of a 3D scanner.
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The stress that has been put on the global supply chain combined with a construction industry boom has caused tremendous problems in procurement and inventory management for contractors. Contractors using lean and just in time principles have had to rethink their strategy as simply getting enough materials has become a challenge for project managers.
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Building new capabilities within your business provides a huge opportunity to maintain competitive advantage and drive impact to the bottom line. Whether you serve two or more than ten specific sectors, this growth must be approached with a clear strategic vision to ensure success. Join us as this panel of industry experts shares best practices and multiple perspectives on how to grow your business through creating new streams of revenue.
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Your tech stack represents the technologies used to run your business. This suite of software and digital assets builds the framework for success within your organization. Join our multidisciplinary panel of construction experts as they explore best practices for procuring and scaling technologies. Learn how these pioneers navigate the construction tech market, identify, and deploy solutions, and adapt to the ever-changing digital world. Together we will explore how to assemble a technology collection that gives your business a competitive edge.
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Being a BIM Technician is a difficult job. You have to know software, how to build a job virtually like you would in the real world and even though you correctly draw something 99% of the time, you only hear about the 1% that was not drawn right. This roundtable will discuss how we recruit, manage and help mediate problems between the VDC department and the rest of the organization.
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Before heading out to Harpoon Harry’s for our evening reception, we celebrate the end of day two with a little bit of fun. The program begins with leaders from all each association speaking about program developments in innovation and impacts on contractors. Following their message, there will be an awards ceremony highlighting the MEP Innovators of the Year. This award showcases the industry’s talent to experiment, research and share ideas that move the industry forward.
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Implementing new solutions into your process requires contractors to take into consideration more that what that product can simply do. MEP contractors need to understand more of the fundamental operations that a new solution will not only rely upon, but also replace. In this general session, Trent Leinenbach of North Mechanical will instruct attendees in using process maps of their technology stack to help determine where the holes are that need to be addressed. A clear understanding of the who is using existing software and determining their core needs is essential for make sure operations are continued. Britton Langdon from MSUITE will also join the discussion to show how to perform a root analysis of your operations. Many potential problems arise not from processes or solutions but culture. You might need to solve people oriented problems separately.
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As companies try to adapt to new technology and innovation, having a technology committee is vital to its success. This session will talk about approaches that can be taken to consider background, experience, diverse perspectives, and building team members to be more knowledgeable than yourself in different areas.
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Modern sheet metal fabrication facilities take an investment of equipment, tools, software and facility space. Workflow between these elements is crucial to productivity and operations. This session will guide contractors through considerations and best practices.
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What are lean concepts and how have they changed the way that manufacturers have evolved their processes? What does this have to do with productivity in construction? Are we truly so unique that these methodologies don’t apply in construction projects or are there specific opportunities to assess and optimize our workflows through lean principles? This session will look at ways to modify and apply lean concepts, terminology, and processes to construction.
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For companies innovating and incorporating new tools, software, hardware, and processes can be met with a lot of resistance. How your company handles change management is going to impact the success of your implementation and training. This session will discuss how working as a team, collaborating, and problem solving can improve software and process adoption rate. These principles can be applied to fabrication, BIM, transportation, site coordination, and all areas of project success.
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The amount of time spent on BIM for projects is continually under-estimated. Many contractors take an approach where they assign a certain percentage of the project cost towards BIM, and then predictably go over those hours. With no realistic expectation of staying within estimates, this creates a situation of constant pressure to reduce BIM hours with no feasible expectation to meet an allotted budget goal.
This roundtable will open the discussion on ways to build an appropriate estimate for BIM hours on projects. It will look at how to measure and track BIM hours, the downstream productivity impacts gained from the process, and how to build more realistic estimates for projects.
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This recap session will provide attendees a chance to share the best takeaway ideas they heard from the many breakout, roundtables and hallway discussions. With so much content across multiple trades, this will be your chance to hear what happened in other sessions or best ideas coming from the program.
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