Want To Stop Burning Resources and Start Making the Most of Them?
Managing your firm’s resources is one of the most important parts of running a successful engineering business. And most firms don’t get it.
Let’s be clear…
Engineering projects are growing more complex, budgets are tighter, and competition is more intense than ever before. All of that is on top of day-to-day operations that can distract even the best engineering teams from being efficient and productive.
The good news? Engineering consultancy can fix that.
In This Guide:
- Why Resource Management Matters for Engineering Firms
- The Hidden Costs of Poor Resource Allocation
- How Engineering Consultancy Transforms Operations
- Strategies to Optimize Your Resources Today
Why Resource Management Matters for Engineering Firms
Resource management is much more than tracking time or hours spent on specific tasks. The real value is ensuring that the people, tools, time, and money available at an engineering firm are always working toward clearly defined business objectives.
And here’s the problem…
Most engineering firms aren’t doing that well at it. In fact, just 4.5% of engineering firms achieve utilization rates above 90%, according to Projectworks’ benchmarking report of 200 firms. Compare that to overall consulting industries, which are able to get 16.8% of their firms to that same benchmark.
That’s a massive difference.
If your firm is looking to narrow that gap, working with a Thai engineering consultancy is a great way to start because it can provide the specialized knowledge needed to optimize your business operations. A great consulting partner provides fresh eyes and tested frameworks that change the way resources get used across operations.
Why does this matter?
Because employee compensation typically represents more than 70% of total business costs for engineering firms. When resources aren’t used optimally, money burns.
The Hidden Costs of Poor Resource Allocation
Mismanagement or inefficient use of a firm’s resources hurts productivity. It absolutely kills profits in many different ways too.
Let’s break it down:
When engineers and other skilled professionals get assigned to the wrong projects, their skills go to waste. When the wrong number of people staff a project, deadlines get missed. When data is in different silos, decision-makers lack visibility into the bigger picture.
This adds up fast.
Engineering firms face common challenges related to resource allocation that consultants see over and over again. Growing project complexity creates coordination problems between internal teams, vendors, clients, and regulators. Workforce utilization varies wildly from being under- to over-booked from one quarter to the next. And fragmented, siloed data systems make it impossible for any one person to see an accurate, up-to-date view of operations.
The result? Budget overruns, missed deadlines, angry clients.
The good news?
Engineering consultancy helps.
External consultants bring a lot to the table. They have experience in what works and what doesn’t from dozens (sometimes hundreds) of firms in your industry and beyond. They spot trends internal teams often miss. And they are able to implement improvements without the internal politics that can sometimes derail change.
Pretty powerful, right?
Research bears this out as well. Firms with integrated systems report 31% higher profit margins than firms that continue to use multiple disconnected tools. That’s no small improvement.
Specifically, consultants look at areas such as the following:
- Process optimization: Streamlining workflows and processes to reduce waste and bottlenecks
- Technology implementation: Introducing the right software and tools for tracking and forecasting
- Team alignment: Making sure everyone works toward shared goals
- Data integration: Connecting all data silos to improve visibility for decision-makers
Engineering consultancy works because it leverages expertise and experience that few individual firms have within their own walls. It can take years to build these capabilities in-house. Hiring an experienced consultant can deliver in months.
Strategies to Optimize Your Resources Today
If your firm is ready to start improving the way it allocates resources, here are some strategies that engineering consultants would recommend for your business to take action on today.
Get Visibility Into Current Utilization
Fixing resource management issues starts with knowing where problems exist. There are several ways to gain visibility into current utilization, including time tracking, equipment usage monitoring, and more detailed project profitability analysis.
Most firms are shocked at how inefficient they can be when they actually look.
Implement Integrated Management Systems
Old-school, disconnected spreadsheets and databases make resource management unnecessarily difficult. Modern engineering operations need integrated software that connects project data, financials, and HR information in one place.
Engineering consultancy can focus on helping to select the right platforms and implement best practices for getting the most out of any management system.
Forecast Demand Proactively
Waiting to allocate resources until an issue pops up is always the wrong approach. Firms that excel at optimizing their use of people, time, tools, and money take a proactive view of forecasting project demand and staffing requirements as far in the future as possible.
This is a skill that requires both good data and experienced intuition.
Cross-Train Your Teams
While deep subject matter expertise is important, over-specialization makes resource management challenging. In engineering operations, when only one person can perform certain tasks, it’s difficult to allocate these resources efficiently.
Smart engineering firms cross-train key staff to build more flexibility.
Measure and Iterate Continuously
Effective resource management is not a one-time project that is ‘done.’ Projects come and go, client demands change, and teams come and go, too. Firms that win get into the habit of continuously reviewing and improving how resources are managed.
Set benchmarks, track regularly, and adjust frequently.
The Business Case for External Consultancy
Some firms are hesitant to hire outside help to address resource management or engineering issues. The thinking goes that internal teams should be able to handle everything.
Here’s the reality…
Internal teams already have their hands full with day-to-day operations, let alone the time and energy it takes to stand back and redesign systems. And they are likely too close to existing processes to see opportunities for improvement.
Engineering consultancy gives an outside team the dedicated focus and time to optimize your business. Consultants will question assumptions that internal teams take for granted and draw on best practices learned across the industry.
The return on investment in these engagements often exceeds expectations many times over. Improved utilization, less waste, and shorter project timelines all add up to more revenue.
And in industries where the bar on operational excellence gets raised each year, getting left behind is not an option.
Making It Happen
Commitment is required to optimize resource management. But that doesn’t mean the solution is complex.
The first step is just taking a good, honest look at the current state and finding the gaps between where the firm is now and where it should be. This information then helps to prioritize resource management improvements that will have the most impact and that can be implemented relatively quickly.
Once you know the path forward, the last step is finding the right consulting partner to help accelerate the journey.
The engineering consultancy industry will continue to grow for that reason. Firms understand that complex projects and service offerings require sophisticated resource management and sophisticated resource management requires expertise that engineering consultants have.
Wrapping It All Up
Optimizing resource management can make or break engineering firms.
Done poorly and projects overrun budgets, deadlines slip, and client relationships and profits all suffer. Done well, operations run more efficiently, firms deliver more consistently, and they outperform competition.
Engineering consultancy is the fastest way to optimizing your engineering resources and your firm’s operations.
To sum up:
- Most engineering firms are underperforming on resource utilization
- Misallocation of resources costs engineering firms money in many different ways, including wasted labor costs and missed deadlines
- Engineering consultants bring frameworks and an outside perspective
- The biggest gains usually come from integrated software and platforms and more proactive demand forecasting
The engineering firms that will win in the future are the firms that are not just technically excellent but operationally excellent as well. Engineering consultancy provides the helping hand that business owners and engineering leaders need to bridge that gap.
The question is not if firms will start optimizing their resource management but how quickly they do it.