Construction Software Review .com

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CENTRIC SOFTWARE, CENTRIC PROJECT, CENTRIC CONNECT REVIEW

Before Kiewit Corp. purchased Centric Project and Centric Connect, its employees were inundated with paper -- millions of pages of paper from photocopiers, the United States Post Office and overnight shippers. Workers waited for paperwork to arrive before they could move onto the next phase of a project -- all as more paperwork was being created for the complex projects engineered and built by the Omaha, Nebraska-based firm.

"Centric Project allows the instant delivery of documents for all to see, without photocopies; it allows custom workflows of customer forms, without overnight delays, and it is all done at the click of a mouse," explains Adam DeMuth, information management engineer at Kiewit. "I know we had a study performed that found we spend millions of dollars annually shipping documents. Using Centric, we have been able to significantly decrease that amount and we no longer have overnight delays or people spending a lot of time making photocopies."

The construction project management software has become so central to Kiewit that each employee is issued an account, along with a company email address and telephone number, he said. "We have individuals who are beginner-level computer users who access our system daily, just to view published documents and approve tracked forms and workflows," DeMuth added.

According to company policy, DeMuth was unable to provide a ranking for the software. However, he did mention that Centric's products were worth the money.

What kinds of construction projects do you mostly work on?
 
How long have you been using this tool?
 
Where did you obtain it?
 
How much did you pay?
 
How are you using this product?
 
Why did you pick this product?
 
Did you look at other tools on the market before picking this one? What was it you didn't like about them (or made    this product better)?
 
Comparing the way you work now with the way you worked before you bought this tool, what has changed?
 
Can you give us an example of a job where this tool really made a difference?
 
Can you estimate how much time or money you saved or other measurable benefits your firm realized using this    tool?
 
What are the best features (for your business) in this tool?
 
Do you think it's a fair value for the price you paid?
 
What would you change about the product if you could?
 
Are there features that you don't use? Why not?
 
Who would you recommend use this tool?
 
How much computer experience do you think someone needs to use this tool effectively?
 
Did it take much training (or studying) to learn to use this tool?
 
Have you ever called the company's support lines and asked for help? What was your experience like?
 
How would you rate the user documentation? Is it helpful?
 
When the next version of this software comes out, will you upgrade to it?
 
Overall, on a scale of 1 to 10, how would you rate this tool?

What kinds of construction projects do you mostly work on?
Kiewit Corp. is one of North America's largest and most respected construction, mining and engineering organizations, and is the successor to a construction business founded in 1884. With headquarters in Omaha, the employee-owned company operates through a network of subsidiaries in the United States and Canada.

How long have you been using this tool?
We have been using Centric Project for more than six years on some of our larger projects, those that cost $500 million and more.

Where did you obtain it?
We first acquired the construction project management software from Framework around 2000. In 2006 Framework Technologies sold the software to Centric Software.

How much did you pay?
I am not aware how much the first license cost. We now have purchased an unlimited user license -- we are at more than 20,000 users now -- and pay Centric Software annually for support.

How are you using this product?
We use it as our project information center.

Why did you pick this product?
We chose Centric Project because of its flexibility with custom workflows and tracked communications. We can build custom forms -- for RFIs, submittals, JWRs, etc. -- and select the approval process along with the individuals or groups of individuals who need to approve the form at each step. The form can also require users and/or groups to enter information at a certain step.

Did you look at other tools on the market before picking this one? What was it you didn't like about them (or made this product better)?
We looked at other tools but they only provided limited functionality.

Comparing the way you work now with the way you worked before you bought this tool, what has changed?
Before we had Centric Project, we did our construction project management mostly by paper. This included millions of photocopies, millions of dollars spent on shipping via Federal Express or the United States Post Office, and mass amounts of time lost waiting for items to be shipped or arrive. Centric Project allows the instant delivery of documents for all to see, without photocopies. It also allows custom workflows of customer forms, without overnight delays, and it is all done at the click of a mouse.

Can you give us an example of a job where this tool really made a difference?
The I-40 Coors Interchange project in Albuquerque, NM, and the T-REX project in Denver were both fine examples of projects that benefited from having Centric. These were huge roadway projects with traffic engineering, bridge construction and so forth, and the difference that Centric made was with the Department of Transportation in each state. The Departments of Transportation in each state were our joint venture partners in each project, and I imagine Kiewit had subcontractors and joint ventures for some parts of the projects. Having so many key players dispersed, Kiewett needed something to maintain its communication. The Centric Project's role was the main hub for all the communications, contract negotiations, all of the engineering work, all the environmental work, all the quality control and safety work. All Kiewit employees have a Centric account automatically.

The document control power users can have external users added to the system -- like joint partners or subcontractors -- who can have a different set of permissions in the system. They have all kinds of different logs and reports that are kept. Centric Project has the tracked activities or logs that can be completely customized. You can outline a workflow process or approval process. What we've done very well making sure those steps are set up groups instead of individuals, who are responsible for each task. As people move, the group stays the same and you can add and delete individuals. You can manage the permissions of the group as a whole.

Another example of where Centric made a difference is with one of my co-workers, who travels every week to the 24 Kiewit district offices and helps them make templates for their projects. They can hit the ground running because with Centric the template's built for their district. Each of our districts works differently because they do different kinds of work. It saves two to three weeks at least when they can get started on a job immediately.

We have one applications server, a database cluster server and a 1.56 terabytes of storage over fiber channel on the back end of that. There was some money spent to build this system, but it's been done right and it saves the company.

Can you estimate how much time or money you have saved or other measurable benefits your firm has realized using this tool?
That's tough to say. I know we had a study performed that found we spend millions of dollars annually shipping documents. Using Centric's construction project management software, we have been able to significantly decrease that amount and we no longer have overnight delays or people spending a lot of time making photocopies.

What are the best features (for your business) in this tool?
I find the custom workflows and custom-build forms very useful. They allow our project teams to perform all of their construction project management activities electronically.

Do you think it's a fair value for the price you paid?
Yes.

What would you change about the product if you could?
There are a few things I would change, from both the technical aspect and the user-interface aspect. The software requires too many round trips between the client PC and the server when its performing actions through the system's web interface. Thus, any network delays over a wide-area network (WAN) are multiplied because of the increase in round-trips.

The user-interface is currently undergoing a significant facelift, and thus Centric is in the middle of moving functionality from the old interface to the new one. We decided, collectively with Centric, to have the two interfaces working side-by-side while porting over functionality to allow a piece-by-piece move. We agreed that this would be smoother and allow for quicker problem-resolution, without having downtime or loss of functionality.

Are there features that you don't use? Why not?
No, we use the construction project management software to its fullest capabilities.

Who would you recommend use this tool?
I cannot provide this information, due to corporate policy.

How much computer experience do you think someone needs to use this tool effectively?
The system is easy to use. We have individuals who are beginner-level computer users who access our system daily, just to view published documents and approve tracked forms and workflows.

Did it take much training (or studying) to learn to use this tool?
It took approximately one week of being trained on the system and end-user experience of Centric Project to get up to speed. Individuals can learn to use the system effectively in only a few hours. We have spent ample time developing training materials and also providing hands-on training to our 24 districts and home-office employees.

Have you ever called the company's support lines and asked for help? What was your experience like?
I am in contact with the Centric Support Team daily. We work collectively to resolve any issues discovered in the system. They are usually responsive.

How would you rate the user documentation? Is it helpful?
The user documentation provided by Centric is not helpful. We have however, developed our own user documentation and training materials to be dispersed to anyone who uses our system.

When the next version of this software comes out, will you upgrade to it?
Yes. We are constantly pushing Centric to provide us with upgrades and hot fixes. The hot fixes usually resolve any bugs or issues we've discovered in the system, and the upgrades provide enhancements we have specifically requested.

Overall, on a scale of 1 to 10, how would you rate this tool?
I cannot provide this rating, due to corporate policy.