The last few years have shaken up the status quo of every industry in the world, but perhaps no sector has had to find new ways to effectively operate than the construction industry. From the pandemic to supply chain fluctuations to labor shortages, events have combined to make construction margins tighter than ever.
But challenges create innovation. And when we look at the most prominent construction industry trends, we see successful firms finding ways to help their workforces operate smarter and more efficiently through technology.
A digital transformation in construction industry processes has facilitated progress towards goals like sustainable building practices, contributing to smart cities, and systematic overhauls that help increase consistency in content management and key jobsite workflows such as inspections.
With the final quarter of 2025 approaching, let’s look at the top trends that will be carrying the construction industry into the next year and beyond.
The first thing anyone learns when they start working with wood is that you should measure twice and cut once. One way technology has been able to extrapolate that philosophy onto a grander scale is by incorporating building information modeling (BIM) or digital twin technology.
By creating a digital twin of a project, you can anticipate and plan around potential pitfalls that would arise on the jobsite. You can see how the realities of a location can affect the design of a building, more accurately predict the amount of materials needed to complete a project, and reduce the wasted time that can come with an unanticipated problem.
To make digital twin modeling work most effectively, it’s important to pair it with a quality content management system. Utilizing a platform that facilitates easy collaboration and communication between everyone from the designers to the contractors allows a firm to plan out an effective strategy to take the information gleaned from predictive modeling and efficiently implement it in the real world.
Automated workflows in construction allow your team to quickly and accurately process key documents like invoices, purchase orders, and compliance forms so that the actual work of building and renovating at worksites can proceed.
A document management system that utilizes artificial intelligence and machine learning tools can leverage optical character recognition and natural language processing functions to identify, categorize, and sort documents and files of all types into their proper workflows automatically — even if those documents are unstructured or filled out by hand.
Using M-Files for construction document management is a great start for any organization looking to upgrade their construction document automation. TEAM IM developed tools within M-Files with the needs of the construction industry in mind. It facilitates the use of modules for Bid and Package Management as well as integrations with leading construction software — all while using M-Files’ metadata-driven approach to storing, tracking, and searching up information based on the content of your files and documents, not their file types.
Having this kind of content management system in place allows you to improve workflow efficiency through automation and AI, better maintain version control on designs and contracts that are frequently updated, and maintain compliance and security best practices no matter where you access your content — from the office, the jobsite, or anywhere else that you bring your mobile device.
An area of construction that some people don’t always associate with intelligent document management is inspections. Technology has greatly improved not only how your inspectors can do their jobs, but the speed with which your team can respond to any issues that come up through those inspections.
Mobile inspection apps like Inspection Management from TEAM IM allow your field agents to create custom checklists from templates, provide descriptions of issues as well as pictures and videos, and, if a jobsite does not have access to mobile data, ensure that all information from an inspection syncs to your system automatically as soon as a device’s connection is restored.
Additionally, one of the biggest construction industry trends recently has been the adoption of drones for inspection purposes. They can cover a lot of ground on large jobsites and bring your inspectors’ attention to potential safety hazards in difficult to reach areas.
Modular construction — building prefabricated sections of a home and then bringing them to a jobsite to be joined together — has become an increasingly popular construction option. Part of the appeal is that building conditions can be kept optimal right up until the home goes out for completion. That means no weather delays when you only have half a foundation laid.
Fully preconstructed homes follow national safety regulations while modular builds only fall under state and local laws. That means the home can be built with the specific needs of your locality in mind.
This also means that clear communication and compliance tracking are needed. Having construction project collaboration tools that prevent problems like data siloing makes the process of transferring key components from the factory to the jobsite much smoother and simpler for everyone involved.
Something all of the major construction industry trends have in common is making the most out of technology’s ability to let people collaborate and communicate across vast distances almost instantaneously. That comes down to the use of cloud-based construction platforms.
Giving your workforce access to a secure, cloud-based system means that they will always be working off of the same information, sites can be managed remotely or in person, and projects can be tracked easily with automated progress notifications going out to key stakeholders at every step of the way.
A platform like M-Files for Construction lets you integrate tools like the Microsoft 365 suite of applications and Dropbox Business with your construction industry specific tools. That gives your team access to everything they will need to ensure that their work is getting done exactly according to plan.
By incorporating transformative digital innovations, leaders in the construction industry can give their teams a leg-up on their competition via easier communication, smoother collaboration, and more thorough tracking of construction data analytics.
Smart construction solutions help your team focus on actually getting things built instead of waiting to hear whether or not a purchase order for supplies has been approved yet. The right software can make addressing potential problems or changes that spring up on the jobsite fast and as painless as possible.
TEAM IM has created tools specifically designed to facilitate efficiency and collaboration in the construction industry such as M-Files for Construction and Inspection Management. They allow you to leverage AI in construction workflows while making field data collection in construction that much simpler to carry out.
These tools can help your firm keep on the cutting edge of all the recent construction industry trends while putting you in a position to lead the way on the trends of the future. From digital twins to drones to integrations with other business applications like Dropbox Business, the right intelligent content management platform can help smooth out the wrinkles in your processes faster than you might expect.
Talk to an expert at TEAM IM today to see how much more successfully you can run your operations with a platform designed to manage the vast array of content required in a construction project. A smoothly operated and efficient jobsite awaits.
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