Specialty Contractors Highlight Their Vital Role in a Vast Industry
By Kate Gawlik
Mark Kershteyn, SIS Partner
In this article, ENR talks with Mark Kershteyn, SIS, LLC Partner. For 25 years, SIS has been providing project and service-based software solutions for the construction industry including the Microsoft Dynamics 365 Construction Software Solution suite, SIS Construct 365.
Today, ENR helps tell the SIS story about what makes them special when it comes to the companies affiliated with the construction industry. It may seem like the general contractors and architectural teams get all the glory, but no project is complete without the layers of engineers, subcontractors, management firms, and technology support systems that contribute to each built structure.
ENR: How do you contribute to helping firms grow their businesses?
Kershteyn: SIS helps engineering/contracting firms grow and protect their margins by providing a technology platform and business solution to these project- and service-driven businesses to better manage complex financial project accounting and project management. We help contractors manage cost and risk and deliver their value to their customers with complete visibility, intuitive interfacing, mobility, and accurate reporting across all platforms of operational data required to traverse today’s ever-shifting marketplace. We do this with one end-to-end solution. From the back office to the field, Microsoft Dynamics 365 with SIS Construct 365 gives users a complete set of tools familiar to them with interfaces across the entire enterprise that help them reach their digital transformation goals.
ENR: What hurdles do you address in the construction industry?
Kershteyn: At SIS, we assist our contractors who face business challenges related to complex project requirements, integration challenges, data management, mobile access, a declining labor force, training and support issues, and customization needs. This includes data that is siloed, legacy systems, inefficient business processes and legacy payroll processes for union workers. We help specialty contractors become agile with modern project management tools verifying project cost within budgets and viewing margin fade or gain based on productivity and change orders. We make it easy for project managers to face their hurdles around taking corrective performance action to salvage project margins when necessary.
ENR: What global trends are you seeing?
Kershteyn: SIS has operations in North America and Europe. The trends we see globally are common to both, which are a dramatic increase in technology playing an important role in the construction industry, and specialty contractors are no exception. We see more contractors implementing software to streamline project management to become more efficient and effective. Ultimately, businesses on all continents are working diligently to digitally transform to survive and be more competitive. We see skilled labor being a challenge as the shortage affects their revenue. With digital technology, we are equipping specialty contractors with the modern workforce necessary to meet the requirements of younger generations who have grown up with automated applications and require those ease-of-use systems and improved training for the jobs they choose.
Be sure to join SIS at Table 3 at the ENR FutureTech Conference in San Francisco June 5-7, 2023
