From the jobsite to the ledger.
How construction money and data really move, why it breaks between systems, and what we're building to fix it. Written for supers, PMs, controllers and CFOs.
All articles
Building in public: the founding contractor program
Construction has been sold a lot of software that demoed well and fell apart at the first month-end close. We'd rather build with contractors in the open. Here's what the founding program is, what we'll ask, and what we don't know yet.
Retainage, lien waivers and pay apps on one record
A pay app, the retainage it withholds and the lien waivers that release it are one transaction. Most contractors track them in three places. Here's how each piece works and why they belong together.
Agents with approvals: how we think about AI in the back office
AI in construction accounting goes wrong in two ways: chatbots that know nothing about your jobs, and autopilots that post entries nobody checked. Our model is an apprentice with a supervisor. Here are the rules.
WIP shouldn't be a month-end project
The work-in-progress schedule is the most important report a contractor produces, and most build it from four sources a week after the month closes. Here's the math, what over and under billing really tell you, and why WIP should be live.
The real cost of re-keying a change order
We followed one change order from a ceiling cavity to the pay app and counted every time someone retyped the same facts. The typing is the cheap part.
Why construction needs an operating system, not another app
Most contractors don't have a software problem. They have a seams problem: the same number lives in five systems and none of them agree. The fix is a shared record, not another tool.