Bird Construction Soars on the Digital Updraft

The Challenge

At 100 years old, Bird Construction was founded a scant 53 years after Canada itself was federated. Today Bird Construction’s projects are spread across some 4,424 kilometers (2,729 miles), making management of the portfolio—and individual builds—a problem of reach.

The Solution

After test-driving a number of cloud-based solutions, Bird Construction signed on with a platform whose real-time presentation of consolidated project data provides actionable, detailed insights—at both the portfolio level and on the individual jobsite.

The Results

• Gained full workflow transparency, ensuring everyone from specialty contractors to clients stays on the same page
• Standardized processes across Bird’s extensive portfolio by running everything through a unified platform

Bird Construction’s Disconnected Success

When Hubert Bird set up shop in 1920 Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan, he likely didn’t foresee that his modest building business would one day become a nation-spanning giant of Canadian construction. "We’re fairly diversified in the type of work we do," says Executive Vice President Paul Bergman. "From institutional and commercial, to residential, industrial, heavy mining, and civil. Recently we’re doing some work with a nuclear division of the company. So we’re covering a very broad project landscape."

Bird’s decision to seek out construction management technology arose in part from a particularly dynamic project, one whose fluid design readjustments were not well-served by paper and e-mail. "It was a fairly complex fast-track design-build construction project with multiple project sites strewn throughout the country, each of them constantly changing as we interacted with our clients through the design cycle. And it was done the old-fashioned way. We were literally printing revised drawings and sending them to the jobsites and emailing them out to the trades."

Connectivity. Transparency. Accountability.

When Bird realized they wanted a technology solution to connect, standardize, and digitize their expansive construction portfolio, they auditioned many solutions, ultimately going with Procore—for its adoption rate and ease of use. Suddenly they had a single platform archiving, organizing, and actually analyzing a massive amount of project information flowing in from every project site and office across Canada. "With the entire team using the program and all of our documents and communications going through the program, we’re all up to date as to what the others are sending out." Paul pauses, then sums up. "Having the project’s entire set of drawings and specs contained on my phone or my tablet, it’s just...fantastic! I mean, I could never carry that amount of paper physically around the site. There’s just no comparison."

Drawings in Pocket. Ball in Court. All-in-One.

Bird Construction at 100 is completely owning the latest construction technology, consolidating its reputation and bringing 21st-century tech to bear on founder Hubert Bird’s early 20th-century grit and momentum. It’s a matter of consolidating strengths and getting one’s arms around the future. Bird’s Executive VP Paul Bergman explains. "With this platform, all documents, all communications, all messages and notifications—everything is archived and organized and can be referred back to. No one is left in the dark when there’s a change. Everything is instant. I can’t imagine the challenges they would have faced 100 years ago compared to the advantages we have now. It’s just...amazing." Assistant Site Supervisor Trevor Talbot concurs with a bit of shorthand. "This system can easily save you two hours a day. Look; you’re up on the 43rd floor, you need information. It’s on your device. You look at it."