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How can contractors modernize Lean construction practices without losing the simplicity and interaction of physical planning boards? Learn how PC Construction is using Nialli Visual Planner to bridge the gap between long-term contractual schedules and daily site execution. Now in use on more than half of its projects, shifting digital is providing PC Construction with real-time visibility on project progression, improving alignment with subcontractors and allowing for better adaptability when project plans require modification. |
PC Construction is an employee-owned construction company with 600 people and operations spanning the US East Coast. While traditionally focusing its expertise on high-end vertical building work in the Northeast (including healthcare, universities and hospitality) and waterworks and municipal projects in the Southeast, the company is increasingly blending its capabilities nationwide.
To support these large, multiphase projects, PC Construction relies heavily on Lean principles. However, when the company used traditional paper-based methods, with sticky notes and pull planning boards, many of its projects faced practical bottlenecks.
Looking for a way to digitize its collaborative planning without losing the simplicity of physical boards, PC Construction turned to Nialli™ Visual Planner. Today, the platform is active on over half of its projects, transforming how its field teams plan, track and execute work daily.
Before implementing Nialli Visual Planner, PC Construction used manual tracking methods on projects. For lookahead schedules, teams would enlarge a Microsoft® Project PDF, nail it to a physical whiteboard on their trailer wall and write out tasks.
“Our teams would tack a string on the wall, and they’d move it every week following the work week,” recalls Dylan Almeida, Project Superintendent at PC Construction. “They would cross out what had been completed, allowing for a visual representation of late activities as the string passed any remaining tasks.”
While these methods kept the project moving, they were time intensive and offered limited flexibility. It was impossible to share plan updates dynamically with off-site teams, trace long-term project history or easily adapt lanes when a new scope of work emerged. The team needed a digital tool that stayed true to the tactile nature of Lean planning methods while providing the sharing and collaboration benefits of modern software.
When PC Construction first trialed Nialli Visual Planner, it used a simple TV setup in a jobsite trailer. The team began replacing physical sticky notes with virtual ones to run their pull planning sessions.
The success of that initial trial sparked rapid, organic adoption on other jobsites, including Almeida’s current pump station project in Charlotte, North Carolina. This 14-million-gallon-a-day project is dug 65 feet (20 meters) into the ground and involves massive concrete work and complex piping.
To handle a project of this scale, PC Construction equipped its conference room with two 99-inch (2.5-meter) interactive touchscreen displays, which show the entire phase plan alongside the 3-week lookahead.
Today, PC Construction uses Nialli Visual Planner for a variety of planning workflows:
Phase pull planning: Setting up read-only master plans to lock in 3-month milestones.
Weekly/3-week work plans: Sharing interactive plans where all trades can edit, update and manage daily task cards.
Commissioning and startup plans: Managing critical, highly sequenced testing milestones alongside subcontractors.
Schedule integrations: Importing scheduling data from Oracle® Primavera P6 directly into Nialli Visual Planner to bridge the gap between administrative schedules and field execution.
For PC Construction, the three most significant benefits of Nialli Visual Planner are being able to move faster, improving the quality of collaboration and capturing more accurate data.
Instead of having to erase and redraw massive physical grids when a project scope expands, superintendents can adjust their plans in seconds.
“The adaptability is just endless,” says Almeida. “If we’re doing a new demo scope, I can add that new location without modifying my entire phase plan. Now my plan doesn’t have to be fully updated with expo markers or tape lines on walls. I can just update it in Nialli in seconds by adding the lane and updating the time frame.”
Physical sticky notes inevitably fall off the wall and get thrown away at the end of the week, but Nialli Visual Planner preserves every single project decision.
“We use Nialli as a history of the project. If we need to go back and reference a certain time in the project, we can scroll back and confirm what happened and how the work changed. It’s nice to have all those details easily accessible,” says Almeida.
Rather than having superintendents dictate schedules, teams at PC Construction can facilitate much stronger participation from subtrades. During weekly huddles, the trades actively participate in detailing and moving their own cards, ensuring a true commitment to the schedule.
“I don’t plan their work,” Almeida explains. “They put in every tag, all the inspections, work items and durations. We go through it together in our weekly planning meeting and we verify everything is forecasted appropriately for the next 3 weeks.”
To manage software adoption, Almeida and his colleagues pioneered an internal program: The Nialli Champions.
PC Construction hosts a quick bimonthly meeting that includes a dedicated “Champion” from every project site using Nialli Visual Planner. During these check-ins, team members share tips, address software updates and troubleshoot hurdles before they install field adoption.
“We try to make sure that everyone is operating within the same standards,” Almeida says. “If we can solve problems as they come up, it allows for a consistently positive experience, which keeps our teams using it. Nialli is a tool for us to be successful, but like every tool, it needs to be taken care of and maintained if it’s going to be useful.”
For construction firms hesitant to transition from paper sticky notes to digital tools, Almeida advises a “crawl, walk, run” approach:
“You can start small. You don’t need to buy $20,000 worth of touchscreen TVs right away. Most teams already have a TV in the trailer and you’re already using it for meetings. There’s a very low cost to trial the software. Just add some sticky notes in some lanes, see if you like tracking with it, and if you do, build from there.”
PC Construction’s experience shows that shifting to a digital solution doesn’t have to mean abandoning the collaborative habits that make Lean planning effective. By starting small, keeping the process simple and building internal champions across project teams, the company has turned Nialli Visual Planner into a practical everyday tool for stronger coordination, clearer accountability and better project history. PC Construction’s story offers a clear path forward: Modernize the method, keep the people at the center and scale what works.
Curious to learn more about the benefits of collaborative planning? Hear from other contractors using Nialli Visual Planner.