Closing the Jobsite-Supplier Communication Gap: A Call to Action for Construction Leaders
By Jack Carrere, Co-Founder and CEO, Prokeep
Spend a morning on almost any site, and you’ll hear the same refrain: “Where’s the steel? Did those pumps ship? Who’s chasing the submittal?” Materials and information move through different hands, systems, and calendars, and the cracks between them are where schedules slip, and contingency disappears.
A global study by Autodesk and FMI estimates that “bad data” – as in inaccurate, incomplete, inaccessible, or untimely – cost the construction industry about $1.85 trillion in 2020, and drove a material share of avoidable rework. That’s the price of information failing to flow.
Volatile input costs have made those cracks wider. The Associated General Contractors (AGC) now publishes monthly rollups of Producer Price Index (PPI) shifts for construction inputs, an evergreen source leaders use to track real-time pressure on bids, buyout, and lead times, and their 2025 updates show continued month-over-month increases earlier this year, underscoring why “just-in-time by email” is risky. The lesson for owners, general contractors, and project leaders is plain: closing the jobsite-supplier communication gap is a schedule and risk imperative, not a courtesy.
Why Does the Gap Persist?
One reason is fractured data and inconsistent language. Submittals, purchase orders, mill certs, and delivery notices often live in different tools and naming schemes; without a governed system that distinguishes what’s work-in-progress, shared for review, or published for use, handoffs fail, and teams resort to manual re-entry of the same data.
The ISO 19650 family enshrines the notion of a Common Data Environment (CDE) with explicit “information container states,” so teams know which information to trust and when to act. For instance, UK BIM Framework guidance spells out the WIP → Shared → Published flow and the governance around it; adopting that structure reduces the ambiguity that breeds rework.
Another reason for this gap is that suppliers are often invited in too late to shape feasible plans. Integrated Project Delivery (IPD) addresses that by aligning incentives and bringing key participants in earlier under multiparty agreements and shared risk/reward. The American Institute of Architects’ current IPD guide lays out how early involvement, open information sharing, and collaborative decision-making reduce waste and improve outcomes. In practical terms, that means fewer late design changes, fewer heroic “expedites,” and plans that reflect what shops can actually fabricate and ship.
Planning horizons also tend to omit supply constraints. Look-ahead schedules become wish lists when they don’t distinguish whether tasks are truly made ready, design released, submittals approved, fabrication slots booked, logistics arranged, or site prepared. The Last Planner System (LPS) explicitly makes constraints visible and measures Percent Plan Complete (PPC) and Tasks Made Ready. Its 2020 benchmark remains the cleanest reference for the terminology and mechanics.
Recent research presented to the Internal Group for Lean Construction (IGLC) in 2025 shows LPS can be strengthened further, which is a timely datapoint that structured commitment planning improves reliability
Closing the Gaps.
There is a practical operating system for closing the gap, and it doesn’t require ripping out your tech stack. Start by establishing a common language for materials and scope, so what’s specified is what’s procured and installed. The CSI MasterFormat taxonomy in North America provides a maintained structure for aligning RFIs, submittals, POs, and installation records across the project lifecycle. When documents, registers, and status all reference the same divisions/sections, handoffs get cleaner, and searches become faster.
Next, create a digital handshake with suppliers for every delivery. Require an Advance Shipping Notice (ASN) before the truck moves, globally that’s the GS1 DESADV message, and in North America it’s the ANSI X12 856. An ASN communicates what’s coming, how it’s packaged, and when it will arrive. Coupled with Shipping Container Code (SSCC) “license plate” labels on pallets and logistics units, it lets the site plan labor and laydown, scan upon receipt, and auto-reconcile against the PO. Exceptions (damage or short counts) can be fed back to the supplier the same day, protecting both schedule and cash. The standards here are battle-tested and current; they’re not exotic.
Then, tie planning to packaging. Advanced Work Packaging (AWP) brings engineering, procurement, and construction into alignment through executable work packages rather than siloed lists. The Construction Industry Institute (CII) validated AWP as a best practice; their research and implementation guides document improvements in field productivity and predictability, with case studies reporting meaningful schedule and total-installed-cost gains when the method is applied consistently. The exact uplift varies by context, but the direction and the mechanism (better constraint removal and sequencing) are consistent.
Durability comes from contracts and schedules that reflect how materials actually flow. Procurement and submittal activities belong inside the CPM schedule, with review cycles, resubmittals, fabrication durations, transit, and receiving windows modeled as activities with owners and float, no different from pours or setting equipment.
AACE International’s Recommended Practice 88R-15 remains the reference for tracking procurement within CPM, so approvals and deliveries are visible and manageable rather than hidden in email. Pair that with service-level expectations in POs and you’ll have a process that can be audited and improved.
As teams push to “get ahead” of variability, a caution is in order: buying everything early is not a strategy. In construction terms, ever-larger laydown yards and material queues rarely make crews faster; they tend to make flow less predictable. The smarter move is to design buffers, limit work in progress, and raise throughput reliability via constraint removal and dependable deliveries.
Put together, these practices are vendor-neutral and immediately actionable. ISO-aligned information management clarifies what the “latest” actually is. MasterFormat gives everyone the same vocabulary for scope and materials. ASNs plus SSCCs make deliveries predictable and receipts verifiable. Last Planner turns the look-ahead into a commitment plan, not a wish list, and current field research shows how to strengthen it further. AWP keeps engineering, procurement, and construction synchronized so that when a crew shows up, everything needed for that work package is truly ready.
By integrating procurement into the schedule following AACE guidance, leaders stop managing materials in the shadows. When these pieces are in place, the refrain on site changes from “when is it coming?” to “we’re ready when you are.” Projects finish safer, faster, and closer to the business case they were funded to deliver.
Jack Carrere is a seasoned entrepreneur and business leader with extensive experience in various industries. As Co-Founder and CEO of Prokeep since 2016, Jack has spearheaded the development of a communication and commerce platform tailored for distributors. In addition, Jack has served as a Board Member at iSeatz since 2014, contributing to an advanced ancillary product booking engine. Jack also co-founded the NO/LA Angel Network, supporting early-stage companies in Louisiana from 2014 to 2018, and previously held roles as Principal at Carrere Consulting, Senior Consultant at Blue Tree Strategies, Business Development Analyst at GreenerU, and Associate Consultant at Norbridge. Jack earned a Bachelor of Science degree in Mechanical Engineering from Brown University in 2006.
Prokeep is an AI-powered Order Engine that helps distributors serve faster and win more business by turning every customer interaction into an opportunity. Prokeep gives teams the visibility and speed to strengthen relationships and unlock growth by uniting conversations, order history, and automation in one connected platform. Trusted by 8,500 distributor locations across North America, Prokeep has powered more than 20 million conversations and $11 billion in revenue since its founding in New Orleans in 2016.