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Nexus Marketplace Update: Construction Management Software
NexusCon 2026 will be the first NexusCon with a dedicated construction track. Thus, the Nexus Marketplace needs to grow to contain the technologies that support that phase in the building lifecycle.
We've started by adding the most general form of Construction Tech: Construction Management Software. We're defining Construction Management software as "Software platforms that serve as the operational system of record once a project is awarded — managing schedules, budgets, RFIs, submittals, change orders, daily reports, and field-to-office communication through closeout. These tools replace the patchwork of email, spreadsheets, and paper that used to run a job site, giving general contractors, owners, and trades a single source of truth for what's happening, who's responsible, and what's changed."
While choosing the right construction management software may be meaningless to a building owner or operator, it is clear that the construction-to-operations handover is an entirely broken process, and it's worth considering what these technologies can do to help us fix it.
To prepare for the NexusCon Construction Track, I have been interviewing capital project managers, controls contractors, and GCs that sit in the middle of this broken turnover to better understand it. It takes a village of trades to make a building come to life, and within that fragmented process, nothing ever seems to go as planned. Here are some examples of the most common recurring problems I am hearing about the turnover process:
Operators expect day-one-perfect operation, which never happens.
When you buy a new car, it never works as well as the moment you drive it off the lot. That's the expectation that's set for buildings, but is never achieved. Gabe Sandoval, Senior Controls and Commissioning Engineer for UCSF Health, says it sometimes takes them years after turnover to get a building dialed in for optimal operations, which is why the entire UCSF campus has adopted new-build contracts that keep the commissioning agent and controls contractors onsite for months after turnover.
Use cases get translated into specs and lose their meaning.
It's the classic game of telephone. An owner sits down with a designer to describe how a space will be used years before it's built. Those use cases are then translated into written specifications of what the trades need to provide, in a language they understand. Years later, the outcome doesn't match the intent.
Jacob Jackson, senior design engineer, gave a concrete example of this flaw: A hospital construction project team had specified digital signage for the nurses. It was designed and installed outside the patient rooms, as called out in the spec. When the nurses who actually work the floor walked into the space to weigh in, they immediately rejected the digital signage. The screens were going to be used to display patient information that HIPAA prohibits from being shared outside the room. The game of telephone had failed.
Documentation exists, but it doesn't translate.
This is probably where I see the most tension between the two sides of construction turnover. Ask an operator, and they'll describe how the construction team dumps useless data in a format that doesn't support operations, with room, equipment, and point naming that don't match reality. Ask a general contractor, and they'll describe how they spend countless hours meticulously documenting everything they can about the building. Still, the operations team is nowhere to be found, providing no input on what they need or the format they want the data in.
Owners' in-house controls capability creates an accountability vacuum.
"It's always the controls contractor's fault," is a common joke on construction sites. Controls are basically the last trade to get access to the building to complete their work, because they need all the power and infrastructure in place before they can start. Months and months of delays by other trades before controls were ever on site, and suddenly, the control contractor's time to complete is cut in half. The pressure is on to get the building turned over.
If you're a building owner with your own controls team, it's tempting to have your team support the work. Getting the building turned over on time is as important to you as it is to anyone, and you have the resources and expertise to support it. But fall for the trap, and now you're on the hook for any control work that doesn't look right post-turnover. You lose the ability to hold your contractor accountable.
At NexusCon 2026, we're going to dig into all these juicy conflicts and debate how both sides of the turnover process can improve. The tech that is best positioned to solve these problems and get us to Connected Buildings Outcomes faster is Construction Management Software Platforms.
If you know how Construction Management Software is solving the problems described above, or have another example of how turnover is broken, reach out and let us know. We'll make sure to address it at NexusCon when all the right people are in the same room.
Browse the Construction Management Software category in the Nexus Marketplace.
Register for the next Nexus Labs event.
Sign up for the newsletter to get 5 stories like this per week:
NexusCon 2026 will be the first NexusCon with a dedicated construction track. Thus, the Nexus Marketplace needs to grow to contain the technologies that support that phase in the building lifecycle.
We've started by adding the most general form of Construction Tech: Construction Management Software. We're defining Construction Management software as "Software platforms that serve as the operational system of record once a project is awarded — managing schedules, budgets, RFIs, submittals, change orders, daily reports, and field-to-office communication through closeout. These tools replace the patchwork of email, spreadsheets, and paper that used to run a job site, giving general contractors, owners, and trades a single source of truth for what's happening, who's responsible, and what's changed."
While choosing the right construction management software may be meaningless to a building owner or operator, it is clear that the construction-to-operations handover is an entirely broken process, and it's worth considering what these technologies can do to help us fix it.
To prepare for the NexusCon Construction Track, I have been interviewing capital project managers, controls contractors, and GCs that sit in the middle of this broken turnover to better understand it. It takes a village of trades to make a building come to life, and within that fragmented process, nothing ever seems to go as planned. Here are some examples of the most common recurring problems I am hearing about the turnover process:
Operators expect day-one-perfect operation, which never happens.
When you buy a new car, it never works as well as the moment you drive it off the lot. That's the expectation that's set for buildings, but is never achieved. Gabe Sandoval, Senior Controls and Commissioning Engineer for UCSF Health, says it sometimes takes them years after turnover to get a building dialed in for optimal operations, which is why the entire UCSF campus has adopted new-build contracts that keep the commissioning agent and controls contractors onsite for months after turnover.
Use cases get translated into specs and lose their meaning.
It's the classic game of telephone. An owner sits down with a designer to describe how a space will be used years before it's built. Those use cases are then translated into written specifications of what the trades need to provide, in a language they understand. Years later, the outcome doesn't match the intent.
Jacob Jackson, senior design engineer, gave a concrete example of this flaw: A hospital construction project team had specified digital signage for the nurses. It was designed and installed outside the patient rooms, as called out in the spec. When the nurses who actually work the floor walked into the space to weigh in, they immediately rejected the digital signage. The screens were going to be used to display patient information that HIPAA prohibits from being shared outside the room. The game of telephone had failed.
Documentation exists, but it doesn't translate.
This is probably where I see the most tension between the two sides of construction turnover. Ask an operator, and they'll describe how the construction team dumps useless data in a format that doesn't support operations, with room, equipment, and point naming that don't match reality. Ask a general contractor, and they'll describe how they spend countless hours meticulously documenting everything they can about the building. Still, the operations team is nowhere to be found, providing no input on what they need or the format they want the data in.
Owners' in-house controls capability creates an accountability vacuum.
"It's always the controls contractor's fault," is a common joke on construction sites. Controls are basically the last trade to get access to the building to complete their work, because they need all the power and infrastructure in place before they can start. Months and months of delays by other trades before controls were ever on site, and suddenly, the control contractor's time to complete is cut in half. The pressure is on to get the building turned over.
If you're a building owner with your own controls team, it's tempting to have your team support the work. Getting the building turned over on time is as important to you as it is to anyone, and you have the resources and expertise to support it. But fall for the trap, and now you're on the hook for any control work that doesn't look right post-turnover. You lose the ability to hold your contractor accountable.
At NexusCon 2026, we're going to dig into all these juicy conflicts and debate how both sides of the turnover process can improve. The tech that is best positioned to solve these problems and get us to Connected Buildings Outcomes faster is Construction Management Software Platforms.
If you know how Construction Management Software is solving the problems described above, or have another example of how turnover is broken, reach out and let us know. We'll make sure to address it at NexusCon when all the right people are in the same room.
Browse the Construction Management Software category in the Nexus Marketplace.
Register for the next Nexus Labs event.
Sign up for the newsletter to get 5 stories like this per week:
This is a great piece!
I agree.