Why Grade A Construction Chose the Unlimited User Plan and is Never Going Back

Being a construction startup is far from easy. After setting up shop, many companies try to navigate the industry’s exorbitant amount of aspects and deny the use of technology. After several years of banging their heads against the wall, the companies with a strong desire to succeed will finally relent.

For HCSS customers on the Unlimited User Plan (UUP), the results are pure magic.

Does Grade A Construction’s story sound familiar?

Today, Grade A Construction is a massively successful construction firm. They started as a grading contractor and have now grown into a one-stop shop for sitework and general contractors in that arena. After first being founded back in 2013 in Mt. Juliet, Tennessee just outside of Nashville, there were definitely some growing pains, especially those first few years.

“We didn’t really use a lot of technology, anything but what we thought was working and hoping it was cash-positive,” says Kris Neely, VP of Construction. “Over the course of my 7 years being here, we’ve tried different programs, time card modules, tracking mechanisms – nothing really stuck until we went down to HCSS in Texas.”

On that same note, John Alan, Senior VP of Business Development, has been with the company since the beginning, back when they consisted of only 4 employees – whereas today, Grade A has over 300 full-time workers.

“When we first started, it was like caveman times, honestly,” admits Alan. “Reality is, it was all paper-driven. Less processes, no collaboration from department to department, no ability to react in real-time.”

First recognizing the significance of streamlined equipment management, Grade A turned to the dynamic duo of Equipment360 and Telematics, setting the stage for a complete transformation.

“We seemed out of the ordinary at first to want to prioritize technology and want to spend money on that, but it was just a few years into it when it seemed like the world started catching up with us,” recalls President and Founder Rachelle Reigard. “This is the way of the future and it makes sense to do all this. We brought with us from other industries the need for technology and how important it was. Now we know that everyone in the field would not want to do without any piece of technology that we’ve introduced to them so far.”

Their journey began with equipment software.

Prior to implementing equipment software, the biggest issue Grade A experienced with the equipment division was the people in the field not knowing what was going on with the equipment, including what was down, what was available, how long pieces would be down, and everything else of that nature. At the same time, the team didn’t know when it was time for preventive maintenance.

“When we implemented E360, right off the bat, it took away one of our big issues,” says Jessica Cox, VP of Corporate Services. “We were able to figure out what was happening to every single piece of equipment and what the status was. We were able to see, real time, where all our pieces of equipment were instead of wasting time calling the field. It made us more efficient and not having to bother people in the field to lose production.”

Grade A is like most construction companies in the sense that their equipment, a significant investment, is at the heart of their operations. With Equipment360 and Telematics, the team was able to orchestrate a dramatic turnaround in the entire equipment division.

“Mere years ago, chaos reigned supreme,” Reigard adds. “We grappled with equipment location, maintenance scheduling, and even fueling. In a pivotal shift, we adopted E360, ushering in a new era of strategic efficiency. This shift is profound; it has empowered us to be in control, aware of each piece’s status, health, and utilization.”

Here’s what the unlimited user plan can do.

After opting for an in-house implementation at the HCSS office to get rolling with Equipment360 as quickly as possible, they soon learned the benefits of the unlimited user plan – more commonly referred to as UUP – which allows maximum access across every program on the HCSS platform.

“That’s probably the best decision we’ve made,” Cox says. “We felt welcomed and learned a lot about other products – FuelerPlus, HeavyBid, HeavyJob – and decided to jump all in. That week we implemented 4 different systems with HCSS. Today, it has helped our organization grow tremendously. We went from everything being on pen and paper to now everything is digital – in no time.”

Fellow VP Neely remembers the shift fondly, as if it was yesterday. “We fell in love with your products. They’re not out there just to have. They’re out there to solve a problem to where you can actually grow in the future,” he says.

Grade A has witnessed their processes go from paper to real-time data, where at the click of a few buttons, they are able to pull up information that directly came from the field just minutes ago. This varies greatly from back when they started, where they were lucky if paper made it back to the office.

“They could bring a folder in, it might have stuff, it might have a McDonald’s wrapper stuck in there too,” John Alan laughs. “That’s just the way it works in construction, we all know it. As we’ve changed over the years, we’ve systemized that to where every single person can have an iPad or phone in their hands, or a PC if you’re a project manager. Put that information in there, we have it within seconds. We’ve seen it’s out of the dark ages to the new frontier.”

Project managers never have to leave the office.

Connecting the field to the office is a challenge every construction firm wrestles with, and prior to HCSS, the project managers at Grade A didn’t always know what was going on at their jobsites. “Are we on schedule? Off schedule?” These are the questions that persisted.

“There was no way to know, without actually taking a PM out of the office and out of the day-to-day activities,” comments Kris Neely.

Grade A implemented both HeavyJob and HCSS Plans to help eliminate unplanned costs and rework. Through the use of HCSS Plans, their operational side set up processes to use the Sheets Overlay feature to track progress and identify all plan changes. Establishing best practices in the software enables the company to stop rework and capture all costs in change orders before they occur, among numerous other benefits such as client communication.

“This allows for project scheduling and quality information to be sent to our clients weekly,” Neely also says. “In this day and age in our industry, your company has to be different to become more attractive to large clients. We use HCSS and all of its services to do just that in all aspects of job performance.”

Similarly, the use of HeavyJob helps them stand out as an industry leader, especially when connecting HeavyJob and HCSS Plans. “The Daily Digest allows our project managers to keep key stakeholders informed in real time with accurate information,” Neely adds.

According to Rachelle Reigard, the company is still seeing the positive effects trickle in as the software helps them manage all of the data in the most effective way possible.

“The day-to-day impact has been huge as we’ve expanded,” Reigard says of their operations. I can sit in my office and feel like I know what’s going on with the company, but when I have 20 different jobs going on, guys all over the surrounding counties in all different areas, trucks everywhere, equipment everywhere, I really don’t know what’s going on. To have some technology I can depend on to tell me what I need to know is priceless. It’s what the office needs to have in order to have that comfort level that we’re doing the right thing and our company is on the right track.”

Protecting over 300 employees with better safety software.

Safety is incredibly important to Grade A, and making upgrades to protect workers was a mandatory initiative for their leadership team. Before HCSS Safety implementation, they were doing everything backdoor and weren’t very productive with anything safety-related.

“Once we implemented HCSS Safety, we were able to train our foremen on doing electronic toolbox talks each day,” says Jessica Cox. “It’s not on paper anymore. HCSS Safety has hundreds of different toolbox talks we can choose from. They were able to capture it [in] real time, have all of their employees sign off, and it’s sent to the office so we know who had a safety meeting that day and who did not. It holds the guys accountable for completing their safety every single day, but also giving them a shorter amount of time to do the meeting.”

Additionally, by tracking certifications and trainings through the Skills feature, Grade A can always ensure that the employees on jobsites are qualified for each specific position they get assigned. Another notable improvement in their safety protocol has been in connecting HCSS Safety to Equipment360.

“It’s benefited us in a major way with equipment inspections,” Cox continues. “We could not keep track of all of our equipment inspections prior to HCSS Safety. Once we implemented Safety, all of our operators can do an inspection every day. If anything is wrong, it does send an automatic message to Equipment360 to alert them and create a work order to get this repaired. It helps keep our machines up and running, it helps hold our operators accountable to make sure they are taking care of these machines, and overall, keeping Grade A very safe.”

Connecting other software is also made easy.

It cannot be understated that financial decisions need to be accurate, and that directly ties into the importance of accounting integration. Their partnership with HCSS has given Grade A access to products with API capabilities that connect to their accounting software. With this integrated web of information, they have been able to compare cost history data to similar works and prevent overruns.

For example, one specific project could have gone off the rails pretty quickly, which was a large paving project. As a site contractor, stone can be incredibly expensive. What helped them was the collaboration of two programs, one being HeavyJob and the other being Viewpoint, their accounting software.

Easily being able to communicate back and forth between the two programs, the team at Grade A quickly identified where they were experiencing overruns. Correcting bad data by tracking volumes and quantities, accounting was able to see costs that were coming in, which PMs could pinpoint, stop the process, and figure out what was going on.

“In the old days, our overruns would have been ridiculous,” says John Alan, Senior VP of Business Development. “We would have got to the end of the job and realized we did this, not only for free, but we paid them to build the project. And that’s the last thing you want to do in this business.”

Empower Employees in the Field & Office

For Grade A construction, utilizing UUP with HCSS has proved transformative. From their perspective, it wasn’t just software – it was a game-changer. The platform of HCSS products became their arsenal, enabling employees in both the office and the field to transcend the status of mere tools and provide a significant strategic advantage.

“All of the technology gives us a better sense of who we are and where we stand,” summarizes Reigard, Grade A’s Founder and President. “From the very beginning, Grade A has just wanted to soak up everything HCSS-related. We love all the products and want desperately to integrate every piece of HCSS technology and find ways to make it all work together the best we can. It’s about using all the data, finding a way to put all that together and use it for the betterment of your company that starts to set you apart.”

John Alan echoes that same sentiment. The company just keeps on building, all the while seeing cost savings and a reduction in labor costs.

“The impact in our business with technology is essential,” he declares. “It’s something we need to continue to invest in. What makes companies like ours different is that they invest in technology, and they keep investing and recognize the importance of it.”

To explore Equipment360 and learn more about the benefits of investing in the Unlimited User Plan, contact a software expert at HCSS today.