As a veteran commercial roofing company, Register Roofing has continued to scale and the requirements of the tools needed to run our business have grown exponentially. The basic construction management process of finding a job, performing the job, paying everyone for the job, then finding the next one does not promote or allow for business expansion or great client service. Moving beyond this basic approach is necessary to achieve excellence. Acute awareness of the company’s capacity and capabilities now and into the future is necessary to build a business that scales to meet the needs of clients and the market. Enter Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) software.
Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) software groups all the different business processes, projects, and people together in one manageable space. In 2020 Register Roofing adopted Foundation Software, an ERP solution specialized to help construction businesses scale. Scaling a construction business provides many customer benefits including reduced costs and greater efficiencies both on-site and in the bidding process. Doing this effectively requires a high-level focus shift from day-to-day operations to long-term forecasting. Such a shift requires a tool that sheds light on the complex interconnectivity and overall picture of the business; not just typical one-size-fits-all accounting systems.
Think of a business like the human body, both having parts that rely on each other in a system of interconnected complexity. The body contains several individual parts that all have a specific function but must work in concert to promote growth and good health. Just so, the people and processes that support a business must also work in concert for success and excellent client service.
On a regular visit to the doctor’s office, a physician will evaluate basic wellness using external tools like a scale, blood pressure cuff, and stethoscope. If something seems off, the doctor will want to dig deeper with more specialized diagnostic tools. An individual may appear healthy, but what if the heart doesn’t sound right? An echocardiogram will be ordered to obtain more data on how the heart is functioning.
Similarly, basic business tools like spreadsheets, budgets, and other KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) can provide a basic picture of a business’s wellness, but they have their limitations. Without more insight and visibility to the inner workings of its various parts and systems, it is impossible to comprehensively judge a business’s overall health.
As Register Roofing has scaled and evolved, more robust tools have become necessary to ensure long-term viability and sustainability. Foundation Software’s ERP solution enables us to make planning decisions utilizing key information from every aspect of our business. This means we can know we have the capacity for a project a year or more down the road versus thinking we should have the capacity to perform it by then. It enables us to bid with confidence and then make all the necessary preparations to ensure the job will be completed on schedule and within budget.
We evaluated multiple ERP solutions before deciding Foundation Software was the right choice for Register Roofing. It is designed for construction companies which ensures more accurate job performance analysis. We found that we could eliminate paper vendor invoices and add digital approvals for more efficient payment and record keeping. Concerning burden and overhead loading to jobs–a vital part of assessing the performance of a job–the powerful payroll module can allocate benefits, taxes, and any other cost associated with an employee directly to the jobs the employee worked on during the week. We were also impressed by the way the software consolidates project and financial performance into various dashboards that give a high-level, user-friendly view.
Foundation offers a fully cloud-based Software as a Service (SaaS) product that enables remote access from anywhere and is in compliance with Register Roofing’s disaster preparedness and business continuity planning. Arguably the greatest feature from the CFO perspective is the ability to tap into the data on the back-end, through SQL integration. The software can automatically integrate with third-party applications, such as Excel, PowerBi, which gives us the ability to create real-time, on-demand custom reporting dashboards to further analyze the data.
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We have been using Foundation’s ERP solution for two years and we are only scratching the surface in utilizing the powerful features the tool provides. As we grow, we will continue to tap into other modules within the software such as the inventory module, equipment tracking, costing, fixed asset, service Dispatch, time and material, and unit billing.
All of these features comprise an effective enterprise resource planning that ensures the well-being of the entire business is taken into account when forecasting, bidding, and making any other business decision. This approach gives confidence that we are fully prepared for viability, growth, and excellent client service for years to come. Our partnership with Foundation’s ERP capabilities demonstrates our commitment to better health from head to toe and enables Register Roofing to move forward with confidence.