Are We Solving the Right Problems?

Coming back to my background in product, I often ask myself "Are we solving the right problems?" I have personally gotten to get more of a first hand experience when it comes to the SMB (Small Medium Business) world within the construction industry and every day brings new eye opening thought provoking scenarios.

Besides labor, what are the other major pain points which are still unsolved in the industry and how can we disrupt the industry to solve them. Think outside of the box, not simply try to digitize the way in which we did things previously without technology? Also, being a women in the industry I would love to see how we can elevate more of the DEI (Diversity Equity & Inclusion ) in the industry. Make it a level playing field for all to be able to bid on projects, provide simple tools to support the true pains which these companies are facing on a daily basis.

Reflecting on my own experience, or rather my evening conversations with my husband about the daily struggles he is facing with our company, getting paid is a major daily issue along with the simple aggregation of project information or simply all the information which is going back and forth amongst all the stakeholders we are involved with. Changes from clients were documented in an email chain, or a specific quote was sent out or even worse verbally provided to a prospect and now we are trying to reconcile. A lot of time is spent in looking for information. There is definitely daily pain which is felt in doing simple daily jobs to be done, but the irony is there is very little time to reflect, stop and correct to improve. It is the reality of the game.

We also aren't the only ones feeling these daily challenges. This is where starting to think of ways to organize and drive automation to support better out of the box solutions for companies such as ours along with the vast amount of SMB's which exist out there could be a game changer in reducing the barrier to adoption and introduce incremental change. This is one area where we could start with many more opportunities on the horizon.

Take the time to stop and reflect, are we truly solving the right problems? Are we solving real problems or the problems that are causing the most pain? How can we reduce the barrier for the DEI community within the industry and lift those around us up?