DesignFlow Build
Construction ERP Evaluation Scorecard
A working template for contractors comparing ERP and construction management platforms. Score each vendor 1–5 on six criteria, weight them for your business, and make vendors answer the questions in writing — demo answers evaporate; emailed answers don't.
Scoring is deliberately strict: a 3 is "acceptable," not "good." Most vendors land at 2–3 on most rows — that's normal, and it shows you where the real differences are. Treat any single score of 1 as a red flag worth a direct conversation.
1. Implementation time
Why it matters. Implementation is where ERP projects die. Every month between contract signature and daily use is a month you pay for software your team isn't using, and long rollouts drain the internal champion's credibility until the office quietly reverts to spreadsheets. The realistic timeline — not the sales timeline — is the single best predictor of whether you'll get value at all.
Ask the vendor:
"What is the median time from signature to daily use for a company our size, and can you show me three recent examples?"
"What does the implementation cost beyond the license — consultants, our own staff hours, data migration fees?"
"If we're not live in 90 days, what happens to our contract?"
| Score | Looks like |
|---|---|
| 1 | 6+ months typical; mandatory paid implementation partner; vague on examples |
| 2 | 3–6 months; consultant strongly recommended; migration billed separately |
| 3 | 2–3 months; vendor-led onboarding included; clear milestone plan |
| 4 | 4–8 weeks; mostly self-serve with vendor support; migration tooling included |
| 5 | 2–4 weeks; self-onboarding with guided data migration; vendor commits to a timeline in writing |
2. AI-native vs bolted-on AI
Why it matters. AI that was designed into the product works on your live data automatically; AI added later usually means a separate module, a separate price, and a copy of your data that's stale by the time the model sees it. The difference shows up in the boring places: does the takeoff feed the estimate directly, or do you export a CSV?
Ask the vendor:
"Which AI features are included in the base price, and which are add-ons?"
"Walk me through what happens after the AI produces output — does it flow into the estimate/schedule/ledger, or does someone re-enter it?"
"Can my team review and correct AI output before it's committed, and does the system learn from those corrections?"
| Score | Looks like |
|---|---|
| 1 | "AI" is a chatbot over help docs; everything real is on the roadmap |
| 2 | AI features exist but are separately licensed add-ons with their own UI |
| 3 | Useful AI in one or two workflows (e.g., document search); output needs manual transfer |
| 4 | AI embedded in core workflows (takeoff, estimating, scheduling); output flows downstream with review steps |
| 5 | AI in the base product across workflows, output feeds the shared data model directly, human review built in, included in published pricing |
3. Unified data model
Why it matters. If estimating, scheduling, and accounting each keep their own copy of the project, your team becomes the integration — re-keying data and reconciling versions, which is where margin quietly leaks. "Suite" on the brochure often means several acquired products with sync jobs between them, and the sync is where things break.
Ask the vendor:
"Is this one database or several products connected by integrations? Which modules were acquisitions?"
"If a PM changes the schedule, what updates automatically in billing, payroll allocation, and job cost — and what needs manual re-entry?"
"Show me one project's data in estimating, project management, and accounting. Same record, or three records?"
| Score | Looks like |
|---|---|
| 1 | Separate products, separate logins; you export/import between them |
| 2 | Common brand, but modules sync on schedules; reconciliation reports exist because they're needed |
| 3 | Core modules share data; accounting or estimating still lives in a connected-but-separate system |
| 4 | One data model across ops and financials; a handful of edge modules still sync |
| 5 | One system of record, field to finance; enter a number once, it's the same number everywhere |
4. Self-onboarding
Why it matters. A system your team can learn without a training program is a system your team will actually use — including the next hire, six months from now, with no consultant in sight. Dependence on vendor-led training is also a cost signal: it usually means the product is hard, and hard products lose to Excel.
Ask the vendor:
"Can I start a trial or sandbox today, myself, without a sales call?"
"How does a new PM or foreman learn the system — in-product guidance, or a scheduled training class?"
"What percentage of your customers went live without paid professional services?"
| Score | Looks like |
|---|---|
| 1 | No trial; demo only; training is a paid, scheduled engagement |
| 2 | Sandbox after sales call; onboarding requires vendor sessions |
| 3 | Trial available; decent docs; most customers still need vendor-led setup |
| 4 | Real self-serve trial; in-product guides; vendor help optional |
| 5 | Sign up and start same day; guided in-product onboarding; typical customer goes live without paid services |
5. Pricing transparency
Why it matters. If you can't find the price, the price is negotiable — and negotiable pricing means the next contractor is subsidizing your discount or vice versa, with a surprise at renewal either way. Hidden pricing also makes total cost of ownership impossible to model: the license is often half the real number once implementation, add-ons, and per-module fees land.
Ask the vendor:
"Is your pricing published? If not, why not?"
"What will my all-in cost be in year one and year three — license, implementation, add-ons, support tiers, price escalators?"
"What triggers a price increase — users, projects, revenue under management?"
| Score | Looks like |
|---|---|
| 1 | No published pricing; quote requires multiple calls; renewal increases are standard practice |
| 2 | Ballpark given verbally; add-ons and implementation quoted separately, late in the process |
| 3 | Pricing shared readily on request; some modules and AI features cost extra |
| 4 | Published pricing; clear tiers; add-on costs listed |
| 5 | Published pricing, everything material included per tier, written year-one and year-three totals on request |
6. Field usability
Why it matters. The office doesn't generate your project data — the field does. If foremen and supers won't use the system, everything upstream runs on stale, re-typed information no matter how good the dashboards are. Field adoption is won or lost on speed, offline behavior, and whether data entry fits how field people actually work.
Ask the vendor:
"Hand me a phone and let a foreman-level user log time, a daily report, and a photo — how many taps, and does it work with no signal?"
"What does the field see of the schedule and drawings — live data or a published snapshot?"
"What is your actual field adoption rate at customers like us, and how do you measure it?"
| Score | Looks like |
|---|---|
| 1 | Field access is the desktop site on a phone; offline not supported |
| 2 | Mobile app exists but is a limited viewer; entry still happens in the office |
| 3 | Field can enter time, dailies, photos; clunky but functional; partial offline |
| 4 | Fast, purpose-built field app; offline sync; field entries flow straight to job cost |
| 5 | Field crews prefer it to paper; minimal-tap or voice entry; reliable offline; field data updates the same records the office uses, in real time |
Score sheet
| Criterion | Weight (1–3) | Vendor A | Vendor B | Vendor C |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Implementation time | ||||
| AI-native vs bolted-on AI | ||||
| Unified data model | ||||
| Self-onboarding | ||||
| Pricing transparency | ||||
| Field usability | ||||
| Weighted total |
Two final checks before you sign, regardless of totals:
Reference the misses. Ask each vendor for a reference from a customer the same size as you who went live in the last 12 months — then ask that customer what took longer and cost more than promised.
Get the timeline in the contract. Whatever implementation window the vendor quoted in the demo, ask them to commit to it in writing. The ones who will are telling you something. So are the ones who won't.
DesignFlow Build publishes its pricing, implements in 2–4 weeks with self-onboarding, and runs estimating, AI takeoff, scheduling, accounting, and field ops on one data model. Score us with this card.