Innovation Leading to Improved Safety, Health, and Productivity Is Enabled by Close Collaboration Between Construction Companies and Technology Start-Ups

Abstract

The transfer of innovation to practice is one of the fundamental challenges of efficient social advancement. Because of its structure, with mostly small employers with limited working capital and short-term thinking arising from working on time-limited projects, historically the construction industry has been a slow adopter of technological advances. Now it is faced with a barrage of new technologies that not only can help solve some of the most pressing occupational safety and health needs but at the same time also contribute to productivity improvements. To address this, we—and others—have been finding ways to bring together tech start-ups and their innovations with construction companies who are willing to put them to use. We present four examples to illustrate how this can be accomplished and discuss the lessons we have learned in doing so.