All construction projects face challenges that can lead to costly delays if not managed properly. It's rare for a major project to proceed exactly according to plan. Unanticipated issues inevitably arise during the engineering, procurement, and construction phases.

Even small problems can quickly spiral into significant setbacks if they are not identified and mitigated early on. Some common sources of issues include engineering rework, construction defects, resource constraints, scope creep, and lack of alignment between stakeholders. The impacts of these issues range from minor inconveniences to major blows to the project budget and schedule. Effective issue management is crucial for keeping projects on time and on budget.

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Importance of Tracking Issues

Keeping track of issues that arise during a project is critical for several reasons:

• Preventing Cost Overruns: Even small issues can snowball into major expenses if not addressed early. Careful tracking helps identify problems while they are still minor. Catching issues early prevents wasteful spending on extra labor, materials, or rework down the line.
• Maintaining Project Schedule: Issues often cause delays as teams scramble to solve problems. Tracking issues helps maintain timelines by allowing managers to anticipate and plan for delays.  
• Ensuring Quality: Detailed tracking provides visibility into recurring problems. Identifying frequent issues enables root cause analysis so corrective actions can be taken. This improves processes and prevents repeated mistakes, enhancing quality.  

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Typical Issue Tracking Workflows

Most organizations rely on informal and inconsistent processes for tracking project issues. This leads to several problems:

• Emails get lost and forgotten - Email threads discussing an issue can easily get buried over time. Without a centralized system, there is no easy way of reliably finding past conversations and decisions about an issue.
• No historic track record - With email and verbal discussions, it is tedious to document a history of conversations about a certain issue
• Multi-step process – With many stakeholders involved, and multiple data points needed for investigation, teams gradually lose visibility into the full lifecycle of an issue.

Relying solely on disconnected and ad-hoc methods for issue tracking leads to critical information getting lost. It also makes it difficult to properly analyze issues and learn from them. A more structured workflow is needed.

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Documenting Issues through KYRO’s Forms

KYRO’s forms and reports provide a centralized platform to track issues that arise during a project. Rather than relying on scattered emails or manual logs, project teams can leverage KYRO's forms to properly document each issue.

When an issue occurs, team members can quickly create a new issue from the corresponding form in KYRO. The form allows them to capture all the key details:

• Issue Type - Categorize the issue appropriately, whether it is an engineering problem, outdated document, etc. Having the issue type makes it easier to track trends over time.
• Location - Pinpoint exactly where the issue occurred. Spatial data is powerful for identifying problem areas.
• Images - Pictures can be taken and instantly uploaded into forms. Attaching these images to issues makes highlighting the exact issue easier.
• Time Lost - Quantify how much time was lost due to the issue. This could be hours of labor wasted, days of delay, etc. Time lost directly correlates to dollars lost.
• Revenue Lost - Estimate the direct revenue lost. For example, an issue that halts production for a week could result in thousands in lost revenue.

Properly documenting issues goes beyond just describing what happened. It's about capturing structured data that can be analyzed over time. KYRO streamlines issue documentation unlike informal emails or conversations.

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Analyzing Data in KYRO- Dashboards & Copilot

KYRO provides powerful analytics and data visualization tools to help teams analyze issue data to identify trends and recurring problems. Dashboards make it easy to visualize issue metrics like frequency, type, location, time lost, and revenue impact.

KYRO's AI assistant, Copilot, can analyze issue data to automatically detect patterns. The AI Copilot reads issue descriptions to identify correlations. This allows teams to see which issue types occur most frequently, where problem areas are concentrated within a project, and which issues have the biggest impact on timelines and budgets. Copilot surfaces these key insights, allowing project managers to focus on addressing systemic problems.

Through KYRO's analytics capabilities, teams gain visibility into issue trends and can prioritize corrective actions. The data also feeds into the  ‘lessons learned’ processes, creating possibilities for continuous improvement. Teams can use issue analytics in KYRO to turn project problems into learning opportunities.

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Identifying Recurring Issues

The data captured from KYRO’s dashboards and the AI Copilot can be used to identify  common and recurring issues on projects. By analyzing the issue types, locations, and other metadata, you can spot trends and patterns.

For example, you may notice a high number of quality issues being reported at a specific construction site. In such cases, digging into the root causes of common issues is key. You want to understand why these problems keep happening, so you can prevent them in the future.

This helps companies move from being reactive to proactive. This continuous improvement mindset leads to higher quality outcomes and fewer headaches down the road. The data in KYRO gives you the insights to make this possible.

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Converting Data into Learning

KYRO allows teams to easily convert the issue tracking data into valuable learning experiences. By analyzing the recurring issues and understanding why they happen, project teams can establish regular retrospective meetings about the lessons learned.

In these meetings, the team can review the top issues from the past month or quarter. They can analyze the root causes and brainstorm ways to prevent these issues from happening again. For example, if a particular project is causing excessive rework, maybe the field crews are not being updated with the latest plans or drawings.

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Benefits of Learning from Issues

Some key benefits of learning from project issues include:

• Avoiding repeat issues: Reviewing past issues helps project teams identify patterns and common pitfalls that tend to recur. By understanding what went wrong previously, teams can proactively prevent the same problems from happening on future projects.
• Early identification of risks: Analyzing past issues that emerged during projects enables earlier identification of risks for future projects. Teams can anticipate what might go wrong and plan mitigation strategies.
• Continuous improvement: Systematically learning from issues creates a feedback loop for continuous improvement. Teams can implement new processes, training, or tools to address root causes.
• Informed decision making: Having data on past issues provides fact-based input for making better decisions on subsequent projects. Trend analysis gives decision makers vital insights.
• Increased project performance: Learning and improving from issues leads to higher quality project outcomes, fewer delays, and reduced costs over time as recurring issues are minimized.
• Improved team morale: When teams treat issues as learning opportunities instead of placing blame, they foster openness and morale improves.

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Resolve your construction project issues with KYRO

Tracking issues that arise during projects provides tremendous opportunities for learning and improvement. By properly documenting each issue in a centralized system like KYRO, teams can build a knowledge base of insights.

With detailed information on the issue type, location, impacts, and root causes, project managers gain visibility into patterns and trends. Over time, they can identify the most common and impactful issues.

Issue tracking through KYRO transforms challenges into lessons that propel an organization forward. The end result is better performance and outcomes.

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