How we help you
By aligning AI strategy with your operations and financial priorities, Wipfli helps you reduce manual processes, improve efficiency and position your firm to compete as construction continues to change.
Select the right solutions for long and near-term impact.
Prepare your data and infrastructure for AI initiatives.
Empower your staff to use AI effectively and securely.
Mitigate your cybersecurity, fraud and regulatory compliance risks.
AI adoption that delivers measurable value
Wipfli’s construction AI consulting provides the strategic guidance you need to cut through the AI noise and find a straightforward path to value.
Explore our services
We can help you ensure that you’re leveraging accurate and reliable data, so your AI outputs are valuable and trustworthy.
We can marry your organization’s objectives with the right AI solutions for construction for your team to consider.
We help you truly transform with an AI strategy that goes beyond traditional data management. Our strategists can help you build clear objectives, measurable goals and tangible KPIs to maximize decision-making and revenue opportunities.
Enhance client experience and staff engagement with AI for construction. Our team helps you adopt the right solutions for more accessible, easy-to-use technology for both employees and customers.
Ethical AI practices can help maintain trust and mitigate potential biases and harm. We help you comply with regulatory requirements and implement ethical use of AI in construction.
Our training support helps your team understand how they can best leverage AI for success. We also help you minimize implementation disruption with support for change management.
Our data analysts and technologists explore your organization’s existing infrastructure and technology systems to help ensure they are capable of supporting generative AI initiatives.
We work with your team to set up the appropriate guardrails and controls to help mitigate privacy concerns, reduce bias and maintain compliance with regulations, including CMMC.
AI can be a powerful cybersecurity tool — and threat. Our team can help you use AI to build controls that can analyze data patterns to spot potential fraud and strengthen defenses against AI-enabled cyberthreats.
Insights and resources
ARTICLE
Data lakehouses: The key to scalable AI in construction
Artificial intelligence has the potential to transform the construction industry. From accelerating estimates to improving jobsite safety, AI can enable construction firms to work smarter and faster while reducing risk. But to move beyond isolated AI tools and toward enterprise-wide use cases, construction leaders must realize that AI is only as good as the data it can access. Connecting data through modern data lakehouses needs to be a strategic priority. Keep reading to learn how data lakehouses bolster AI initiatives and how you can start using them. How do data silos hinder AI use in the construction industry? Construction firms often maintain separate systems for: ERP and accounting Estimating Scheduling Project management Bidding RFIs and change orders Time tracking Sales and Marketing Internal document management AI tools can’t reach their full potential and deliver measurable ROI if they can only access a partial amount of your business’s data. For example, a tool might have access to SharePoint documents, email conversations and meeting notes but be locked out of ERP data, project schedules, procurement systems or job costing information. AI typically does not recognize when it’s working with only partial data. It will still produce answers that appear polished and authoritative. But with incomplete data, how valuable are those answers? What is a data lakehouse? A data lakehouse is a centralized platform that integrates data from systems used across the business. By bringing together structured data, such as financial records, schedules and project costs, together with unstructured data, such as emails, RFIs, contracts and project documentation, a data lakehouse allows data to be accessed and analyzed from a single source. This removes the need for people and AI systems to search across multiple systems or manually connect information. If correctly implemented, a data lakehouse makes your company’s data available in one place, in one language at one time. How does a data lakehouse benefit construction companies? The value of a data lakehouse isn’t just centralized data. It’s what becomes possible when data are centralized and organized into logical and informational models. When information from all your systems and documents can be analyzed together, AI gains the context it needs to deliver more meaningful insights. Examples of how a data lakehouse can benefit your construction company include: Budget versus actual performance When estimates and reality capture are combined with actual project financials, change orders and other project data, leadership teams gain a better understanding of project health and future projections. Schedule and procurement risk Project delays rarely occur in isolation. A delayed subcontractor, late material shipments and a compressed schedule can create cascading risks across a project. In a connected environment, AI can identify these downstream impacts early, helping teams intervene before minor issues become major disruptions. RFI cost and schedule impact RFIs frequently affect budgets, schedules and project outcomes. The challenge is that the impacts often surface weeks after the initial issue appears. When RFIs, schedules, budgets and change orders are connected, AI can highlight the true ripple effects of open issues and help project teams prioritize responses based on business impact. Enterprise-wide visibility Many contractors operate projects as independent units with limited visibility across the organization. A connected data foundation allows firms to identify trends across their entire portfolio, including: Subcontractor performance patterns Procurement opportunities Resource allocation conflicts Margin erosion risks Emerging project issues The ability to see across projects creates opportunities for better decisions at both the project and executive levels. How can AI that uses data lakehouses be used in construction? When AI leverages a data lakehouse, it delivers value both in the office and onsite for construction companies. AI systems with robust data can improve: Estimates AI can analyze previous bids, identify comparable projects, highlight pricing anomalies and help teams evaluate potential risks before a proposal is submitted. Estimating capacity can be a growth constraint. AI can help reduce bottlenecks by making institutional knowledge more accessible and speeding up routine analysis, allowing experienced estimators to focus on higher-value decision-making. Engineering Engineering and project teams are increasingly using AI to review specifications, compare design documents, identify inconsistencies and accelerate review processes. Generative AI tools can also help draft responses, summarize technical information and provide quick access to historical project knowledge. Safety Safety was one of the earliest areas where AI gained traction in construction. AI tools can analyze photos, videos and safety documentation and inform field crews of the protocols required for specific job sites. PDF and project document organization Construction firms are swimming in PDF documents. RFIs, specifications, contracts, submittals, drawings and other documents exist almost entirely as PDFs. AI can help extract information from unstructured documents, summarize content and answer questions about project records. It can also connect these documents to project schedules, financial data, procurement records and other operational systems. How to get started with a data lakehouse The successful use of a data lakehouse isn’t just about technology. It’s also about having clear business objectives. When getting started, your business needs to: Know what is to be accomplished Before investing in a data lakehouse, define the business problems you are trying to solve. Do you want more accurate estimates? Better project forecasting? Improved visibility into project profitability? Faster executive reporting? Many firms find success by starting with a focused pilot project, demonstrating value and then expanding capabilities incrementally. A clearly defined use case helps prevent costly investments in technology that isn’t needed. Find the right partner Your expertise is building, not designing AI architectures or data platforms. Find a partner with experience in the construction industry that can help your business evaluate technology options, prioritize use cases and avoid costly missteps. The best partners do more than implement technology. They take the time to understand your business, processes and goals. Communicate goals and processes Technology alone cannot fix inconsistent business processes. Organizations should clearly define how work is performed, what data is required and how success will be measured. Strong processes and governance help ensure AI systems are using reliable and consistent information. The responsibility of understanding how information is used throughout your company’s business process should fall on your CIO or IT Director. Understand this isn’t just an IT project Construction firms should treat this effort as an organizational initiative rather than an IT project. Success depends on aligning business and information leadership, operations and technology around shared objectives and ensuring everyone understands how connected data will support better business decisions. Learn more Level up your build: AI strategies for growth 5 strategies to help contractors overcome interest rate uncertainty For construction companies, better cash flow management starts with clear visibility R&D tax credits for the construction, architecture and engineering industries
RESEARCH REPORT
The state of technology in the construction industry
Technology is the investment. Technology maturity is the advantage. Construction executives are seeing an increasing value in technology for lowering costs, streamlining operations and leveraging data and analytics, according to data collected in Wipfli’s second state of technology in the construction industry report. And the organizations creating the greatest value aren’t necessarily buying more software — they’re building more mature technology environments. Wipfli surveyed 308 construction and real estate executives to understand their technology progress, pain points and strategic priorities. In this year’s survey, we learned: Investment intent is high. Virtually all leaders (94%) said they plan to add or replace at least one software tool in the next 12-24 months — and most are planning several. Twenty-eight percent of executives said four or more technology changes were under consideration. Construction project management, preconstruction and contract management, and CRM and marketing tools were the leading candidates for addition or replacement. Technology volume often obscures technology maturity. While 59% of executives reported full or extensive integration in their organizations, less than a third (30%) met the broader criteria for high technology maturity. “Executives often mistake adding systems for technology maturity,” said Brad Werner , who leads Wipfli’s construction and real estate industry practice. ROI is not guaranteed. Construction leaders cited employee adoption, implementation costs and integration as their biggest infrastructure challenges. Those practical barriers often determine whether technology investments deliver meaningful business value. Technology maturity is becoming the next competitive advantage. Organizations with the strongest technology maturity consistently outperform those with disconnected systems and fragmented technology decisions, according to Werner. “We see a growing performance gap between firms that build mature, integrated technology environments and those that accumulate tools,” he said. Learn where construction and real estate leaders are investing in technology — and how to turn those investments into measurable business value. Download the full report for additional findings, plus insights from Wipfli advisors.
ARTICLE
Executive summary: The state of technology in the construction industry
Technology is the investment. Technology maturity is the advantage. For the second consecutive year, Wipfli surveyed construction and real estate executives to understand their technology progress, pain points and strategic priorities. This year’s research shows that the organizations creating the greatest value aren’t necessarily buying more technology — they’re building more mature technology environments. DOWNLOAD THE FULL REPORT
Reach out to our team
Our construction AI specialists are ready to help you navigate the opportunities, data requirements and strategies you need to maximize AI.
LET'S CONNECT
Wipfli’s construction advisory services combine decades of industry experience with a team that can provide clarity on the decisions that shape your future.
