If TV execs ever want a charismatic consultant to style as an IT doctor, they might call on Microsoft's Mark Dodds. He's studied how major industries have adopted and adapted IT, and he spoke to Marcus Fairs about how construction is faring.
Mark Dodds is a senior manager at Microsoft UK. He recently spent 18 months getting to know the construction industry through his involvement in setting up construction portal Asite. Dodds, who has also worked with the retail, motor and textile industries, spent time with firms from across the supply chain to learn how technology could best be harnessed to make construction more efficient.

How does IT in construction compare with other industries you've worked in?
The use of technology in construction is very, very basic. I've seen the way supermarkets like Tesco and J Sainsbury have adopted technology to create efficiencies within their supply chains, to provide better links to their customers and so on. And the way the motor industry has used technology to design cars, to build cars, to manage stocks and inventory is appreciably further on than in the construction industry.

Why is that?
Three reasons. One, the industry is incredibly disjointed. There is a phenomenal number of large contractors, large construction buyers and manufacturers, and actually getting some kind of consensus across that group of people on how technology can help the industry develop has been nigh on impossible.

The second thing is that lack of margins has prevented people investing in technology. A construction company is much more likely to invest in capital equipment than technology, where it may not see an immediate benefit.

And the third thing is that I don't think the technology companies have done a great job in educating the wider construction industry in some of the benefits technology can deliver.

Can construction catch up?
Yes, but I think it will take some years. It takes investment and delivery of uniform processes across the supply chain. It is the change process that is very expensive, not the technology. Changing the behaviour of people – the way they plan, the way they order, the way they deliver – is a very big job and is one of the biggest challenges the construction industry faces.

What do other major industries do differently?
Retail and motor manufacturing EDI [electronic data interchange] standards long ago, which connected suppliers and manufacturers. They adopted standards that allow all the component parts of the supply chain to look at information. The adoption of EDI never happened in construction, so the number of disparate software systems that have been deployed over the years is huge. Getting any kind of integration is incredibly difficult.

Changing the behaviour of people – the way they plan, order and deliver – is the biggest challenge the industry faces

How does EDI work?
If you look at retail as an example, they will understand right down to raw material where the products are coming from to fill the shelf. And it's now so refined that when a customer goes into a supermarket and buys something, it's scanned, that scanning process then updates their ordering process which sends a message to the supplier who then sends another tin of beans or whatever.

What can construction learn from the car industry?
I think the ability to connect design and planning with the manufacturing process is fundamental. Most of the industry's real big wins will come in the linkages they can create between making the provision of raw materials more efficient, more timely, and in line with the project's timeline.

Nissan's plants now work to a 48-hour tolerance. They've got 48 hours' supply in stock and that's it. In construction, what I saw was that the provision of raw material was often an afterthought: oh, we need more glass; we need some more drywall.

Do construction bosses take IT seriously enough?
In other large industries, the biggest companies have chief information officers on the board. Their job is to provide information to the business. Technology is not interesting to them; it's just an enabler. What they are interested in is driving costs down – the business cases that make them buy technology. In construction, the business cases for technology seem to be an afterthought.

What emerging technologies should construction be getting excited about?
Wireless networks and logistics. Wireless networks on sites will change the way people order things. Contractors will be able to connect to suppliers via a handheld PC with a wireless card, look at suppliers' catalogues and place an order.

And technology will allow logistics companies to be much smarter about how they put orders together and deliver to multiple sites – thereby making huge savings. Right now they utilise trucks very badly – they come, they drop, they go back empty. They make two or three journeys when they could make one.