Heavy Civil Construction Operations Management Consulting

Our work in the heavy civil construction world began in 2011 with our engagement with Borger Group (Alberta’s largest underground civil engineering contractor). Since then, for over 15 years, Feasibility First owner David Howse, has completed over 30 major consulting projects for Borger.

The most significant project we not only worked on but, developed the concept for, is Vizzn. Follow the below links to have a better understanding of David Howse’s initial vision for changing the way heavy civil construction company owners operate.

Based on a review of the Vizzn website and its solution menu, here are the top 15 software-based solutions offered. Each is analyzed below with its core Feature, operational Advantage, and competitive Benefit for a heavy civil construction company.

1. Vizzn Comms

• Feature: A real-time, built-in heavy civil communication tool that powers the entire software suite, replacing disjointed phone calls and texts.

• Advantage: Eliminates communication silos by connecting field and office teams instantly within the context of the job or asset.

• Benefit: Operational Unity. Drastically reduces miscommunication and “phone tag,” ensuring faster decision-making and a unified response to site challenges.

2. Truck Management

• Feature: Digital tracking and management of all trucking events, covering both internal fleets and subcontractor/broker trucks.

• Advantage: Automates the dispatching, tracking, and ticket collection for every load of material (gravel, asphalt, etc.).

• Benefit: Cost Control. Prevents overpayment for materials not received and optimizes trucking cycles, directly improving the bottom line on material-heavy projects.

3. Dispatch & Scheduling Software

• Feature: A centralized dashboard for organizing daily activities across all divisions (heavy equipment, paving, underground, etc.).

• Advantage: Provides total transparency into heavy civil equipment and crew moves for the next day, replacing whiteboards and verbal orders.

• Benefit: Maximizing Utilization. Ensures equipment and crews are exactly where they need to be, minimizing expensive downtime and rental costs due to scheduling errors.

4. Workforce Scheduler

• Feature: An app to assign and manage heavy civil crews, mechanics, and drivers to specific projects and equipment.

• Advantage: Streamlines the complex logistics of moving specialized labor to the right site at the right time.

• Benefit: Labor Efficiency. Reduces administrative overhead in managing payroll and schedules while ensuring the most qualified talent is utilized effectively on critical tasks.

5. Estimating (Interactive Drawings)

• Feature: Heavy civil estimating software that allows estimators to open digital drawings on a mobile device, walk the site, and geo-stamp photos and notes directly onto the plan.

• Advantage: Captures pre-bid site conditions with exact location context, superior to generic notes or memory.

• Benefit: Bidding Accuracy. Reduces risk in the bidding process by documenting existing hazards or conditions, leading to more competitive and profitable operational plans.

6. Construction Management (Day-to-Day Interactive Drawings)

• Feature: Visual site overlay on to civil engineering drawing. Enables project managers to overlay construction methodology (e.g., “single line trench here,” “rock truck route there”) directly on digital drawings for field teams.

• Advantage: Visually communicates the “how-to” of the project to the foreman, ensuring the field executes the office’s optimized plan.

• Benefit: Execution Certainty. Bridges the gap between the bid strategy and field reality, ensuring projects are built as profitably as they were estimated.

7. Safety

• Feature: An all-in-one heavy civil safety software that identifies missing paperwork (like equipment checklists) and shows worker location relative to hazards on a map.

• Advantage: proactive “sleuthing” that alerts management to non-compliance in real-time rather than after an incident.

• Benefit: Risk Mitigation. Lowers liability and insurance costs while fostering a culture of accountability that keeps projects open and safe.

8. Project Scheduler (with Embedded Equipment)

• Feature: Long-term heavy civil scheduling app that forecasts equipment needs months in advance based on project timelines.

• Advantage: Identifies equipment shortages or surpluses long before they become critical issues.

• Benefit: Strategic Asset Planning. Allows the company to rent or buy equipment strategically rather than reactively, avoiding premium rates and last-minute scrambling.

9. Vizzn Fueler

• Feature: Optimization software for fueling heavy civil equipment, directing fuel trucks to the most efficient routes and assets.

• Advantage: Tracks fuel usage and dispensing logistics in real-time, reducing idle time for equipment waiting on fuel.

• Benefit: Reduced Operational Waste. Lowers fuel burn and labor costs associated with fueling, ensuring heavy iron keeps moving without interruption.

10. Fleet Management

• Feature: Heavy civil fleet management. A hardware-free GPS and fleet status board that tracks location, repair status, and “return to service” times for equipment.

• Advantage: Provides a “magnet board” view of the entire fleet’s status (active vs. parked, broken vs. fixed) without expensive GPS hardware installation.

• Benefit: Asset Visibility. Increases fleet uptime by giving dispatchers and mechanics a shared view of machine availability, preventing “lost” or underutilized equipment.

11. Quality Control (Interactive Drawings)

• Feature: Heavy civil quality control. Enables field teams to snap photos and videos of completed work, which are auto-geostamped onto the project drawings.

• Advantage: Creates an irrefutable, location-specific digital record of work quality as it happens.

• Benefit: Rework Reduction. drastically reduces the cost of rework and warranty claims by proving work was done correctly the first time, protecting profit margins.

12. Extra Billings (Interactive Drawings)

• Feature: Heavy civil extra billings software. Allows site leaders to document out-of-scope work or unexpected site conditions immediately on the drawings.

• Advantage: Captures the evidence needed to justify change orders (extras) at the exact moment and location they occur.

• Benefit: Revenue Capture. Stops revenue leakage by ensuring every extra hour and material cost is documented and billed, directly increasing project profitability.

13. Job Site Layout

• Feature: Heavy civil job site layout software. Tools to electronically design the optimal physical layout of a job site (haul roads, laydown areas) before mobilization.

• Advantage: Converts a theoretical site plan into an exact digital duplicate that can be followed by field teams.

• Benefit: Site Logistics Optimization. Prevents costly bottlenecks and site congestion, ensuring smooth traffic flow and material handling from day one.

14. Ticketing

• Feature: Heavy civil ticketing software. A digital collection system for all field tickets (gravel, bills of lading, work orders), organizing them by job and vendor.

• Advantage: Eliminates lost paper tickets and automates the reconciliation of tickets against invoices.

• Benefit: Financial Accuracy. Reduces administrative burden in accounts payable and prevents payment for unverified goods, tightening cash flow management.

15. Document Management Solution (DMS)

• Feature: Heavy civil construction document management software. A centralized file system with version control, remote access, and folder templates standardized for construction projects.

• Advantage: Ensures every team member, from the office to the field, is looking at the latest version of drawings and contracts.

• Benefit: Litigation Proofing. Protects the company by ensuring document integrity and availability, preventing costly disputes arising from teams building off outdated plans.