Software Selection

Burger Consulting Group has considerable experience in helping contracting companies with software selection. The firm has a number of state-of-the-art tools that support the decision-making process from requirements gathering, to developing RFPs and analyzing results, to facilitating structured demonstrations, and finally negotiating favorable license agreements.

Our independence from the vendor community is important as it ensures that our consultants provide objective unbiased guidance throughout the process. The firm has a good working relationship with all of the primary software vendors which ensures that your selection process will get the attention it deserves.

Objectivity

With no interest in any one technology, BCG can quickly help you find the best solution for your organization.

Industry Knowledge

BCG knows construction and the role various technologies play in process improvement.

Experience with the Vendors and Products

Having worked with the vendor community for years, we can quick separate hype from reality.

Software selections are often fraught with challenges.

Sometimes organizations don’t agree on what the objective for the new system should be or what functions are most important in the decision. This coupled with the variety of claims made by the vendor community can make for a confusing and frustrating selection process. BCG normally moves a construction process through evaluation and selection in under ten to 12 weeks (depending) which includes assistance on the license agreement negotiations and implementation planning.

We also assess the organization’s ability to implement a solution while the selection takes place. This helps reduce deployment risk downstream.

Software Selection FAQ

What types of software selections can you help me with?

Burger Consulting can help with most any software serving the construction industry. Our consultants have knowledge and expertise on a wide variety of applications, working with our client to identify business requirements and translate them into system needs. Burger Consulting works independently from the vendor market, providing trusted, unbiased consulting advice to each and every one of our clients. A non-exhaustive list of broad functions we cover are:

How long does a software selection engagement take?

An individual software selection engagement can take an average of two to three months in duration depending on the complexity of the software being replaced and the availability of the client team.

Who needs to be involved from my team?

It is our recommended that client teams consist of an executive sponsor, an internal coordinator (to work with our project manager), IT leadership, and a core selection team, including subject matter experts (SME) for each functional area being evaluated.

What does a software selection process look like?

After an initial kickoff meeting, during which time the goals and objectives of the engagement are reviewed and the Burger Consulting team hears from senior leadership about long- and short-term goals for the business, the requirements gathering phase begins. Though a series of interviews and/or workshops facilitated by individual Burger Consulting experts, this phase focuses on two main areas; existing and desired feature functionality and process workflows, and the underlying IT infrastructure available (personnel and equipment), or is needed, to support new software. Once the requirements gathering phase is complete, the Burger Consulting team develops an RFP and solicits bids from the vendor community. The RFP’s responses are reviewed by the Burger Consulting team, an executive summary is developed that compares functional fit, technical fit, organizational impact of the implementations and the initial and five year costs for each system. After a workshop with the client to review and shortlist vendors, demonstration scripts are developed based on client requirements followed by vendor demonstrations. Working with the client team, Burger Consulting will facilitate a workshop to identify the winning vendor based no the information provided in the RFP and the demonstrations. Burger Consulting will facilitate reference checks and software agreement reviews, finishing up the engagement with a pre-implementation planning session providing the client with steps necessary to manage the implementation of the new software on their own, or with addition help from the Burger Consulting team.

Can you help with build vs. buy decisions?

Occasionally Burger Consulting has been requested to assist in evaluating the impact of building an internal software solution versus buying a commercially available product. In these instances, Burger Consulting will conduct a thorough assessment to determine software requirements, underlying IT infrastructure available or is needed and technical skill sets support required. A detailed assessment report will be delivered with our assessment findings and recommendations.

Schedule a consultation

Please provide us your contact information and some initial background information in the following form. One of our project coordinators will schedule an introductory call with you (and other members of your leadership team as necessary) to discuss your current challenges and a potential consulting approach.