Streaming Media Magazine July/August 2001
Author(s): Max Bloom
A Blue-Collar Construction Company Nails Enterprise Streaming and Achieves Concrete Results in Demonstrating ROI.
For companies that do not have a financial stake in the success of the streaming media industry, the internal use of streaming today is generally an option, not a necessity. The question is, is it an option like leather seats and walnut trim, or more like an automatic transmission and anti-lock brakes? The former are luxuries. The latter significantly affect performance, and may even help prevent a crash. For Structural Group, a 25-year-old company based in Baltimore, streaming media has become an integral part of its core business practices, and has markedly enhanced the performance of the enterprise.
Structural Group employs 800 workers in 17 locations throughout the United States, repairing and reinforcing large concrete structures, including buildings, parking garages, industrial plants, tunnels and bridges. It completes 800-1000 projects per year, with budgets ranging from $10,000 to $7 million. Led by a visionary founder and CEO, Peter Emmons, Structural recorded revenues of $125 million last year, and has enjoyed annual growth rates of 25% - 30% for the past 10 years.
One of Emmons most farsighted innovations is Comprehensus, Structural's groundbreaking system for using streaming media to capture, archive and distribute the company's knowledge base. "A big challenge in any business is capturing information and knowledge, and making it available to others in the company," says Emmons. Because so much of its work is procedure and process intensive, Structural enjoys particular benefits from its knowledge management system.
Structural began collecting detailed text reports from the field in 1996. The next year, to more efficiently gather and store this information, Structural shifted to a video model. "The experts doing the work didn't have the time or skill to properly document the knowledge that they had learned on a particular project," says Emmons. "We realized that video could capture this information very easily." Video also allowed viewers to experience the environment and working conditions associated with each project or process.
Comprehensus' charter is best summed up in its mission statement: Create and implement a video and document-based knowledge management system which will improve the cost and quality of processes, procedures & strategies while empowering human resources. Marc Yeager, a longtime company employee (see sidebar), was recruited to become the first company videographer/reporter. His mandate couldn't have been clearer. "The goal is to get the nuts-and-bolts detail of everything that we do," says Emmons. "We told [Marc] to come back with enough information on the videotape so that he could hand the tape to the receptionist, and the receptionist could do the repair."
Response within the company to Comprehensus was immediately positive. "People were just amazed that they could watch these videos at their desktops," says Emmons. But by early last year, having grown to include over 400 "mini-documentaries," the Comprehensus video archive was expanding faster than Structural's ability to manage it. "People complained that they couldn't find the specific information they were looking for," says Emmons. Structural then turned to Virage's VideoLogger video search engine to index the archive in manageable clips of one to three minutes. "Virage enhanced the value of our knowledge management system a thousand-fold," says Emmons.
Yeager and production specialist Joe Kibelbek - the only full-time Comprehensus staff - work under a tight annual budget of $150,000. Yeager helps to minimize costs by shooting in Hi-8, editing in the camera, and wearing lots of hats. "[Marc] is not just a videographer... he's really a reporter," says Emmons. "He has to plan and recruit stories. He has to direct out in the field. And he needs to edit it... The skill of the reporter really dictates the cost efficiency of our system."
When analog Hi-8 video from the field is returned to the Baltimore facility, it is simultaneously encoded in RealMedia Surestream (20k to 220k) and MPEG-1 (1.5M) formats. At the same time, the video is entered into the VideoLogger for indexing. The MPEG files are used as a digital archive, and for the occasional distribution of CD-ROMs. "MPEG-1 is a basic format that's going to be around awhile," says Emmons. "It's not labor intensive at all [to re-encode the RealMedia]... We can do it in a batch process automatically from the MPEG-1."
Assigning the right metadata - keywords associated with each video or video clip - is key to the efficiency of the VideoLogger. Keywords link specific information - e.g. the types of facilities, procedures, tools, materials, etc. - that might be entered by users to search the video. Assigning metadata keywords can be a labor-intensive operation, and Structural is working to widen the responsibility beyond Yeager and Kibelbek. "We've identified about six people within the company that have different expertise," says Emmons. "We're in the process of training them to add the metadata so that no one person is overwhelmed by it." One helpful feature of the VideoLogger is that it uses a Web interface, allowing experts in the field to assign metadata to video files from anywhere at anytime.
Comprehensus currently stores about half a terabyte of content - over 500 mini-docs, running from 15 minutes to two hours long, accessible in 10,000 searchable video clips. The videos cover virtually every aspect of Structural's business. Project management videos include topics ranging from job cost analysis to job closeout reports, each with multiple case studies. Business development topics range from sales and estimating techniques to job bid strategies, again with multiple case studies. Numerous safety orientation videos cover a wide range of frequently experienced jobsite situations.
But the bulk of Comprehensus' content consists of documentary-style videos detailing various concrete construction and repair techniques. In the Comprehensus Table of Contents, videos and clips are organized into categories including facility type (e.g. manufacturing, airport, shopping mall, etc.); structure type (e.g. bridge, chimney, dry-dock, etc.); basic principles (e.g. moisture and thermal effects), construction techniques (e.g. how to minimize cracking); and repair processes (e.g. strengthening and stabilization). Most of these procedural mini-docs are narrated by the project managers, superintendents, or engineers most familiar with the processes being demonstrated - an aspect appreciated by customers. Emmons notes, "When the person who's the most expert on a topic is talking... there's tremendous confidence and ease of communication."
While Comprehensus makes a wealth of information available at relatively low cost - which is clearly beneficial to the company - it still must justify itself with positive, demonstrable ROIs. Structural sees positive returns on investment in a number of areas, including recruiting, training, and decision support. But ROI is perhaps most clearly manifest through increased sales.
Emmons believes that Comprehensus drives sales in a number of ways. "When we have a video in front of a customer, the credibility is immense. We're not just talking it. We're showing them that we've been there and done it." He adds, "We minimize competition because we are differentiating ourselves from our competitors." Emmons also believes that videos help educate customers about their own structures' problems, and illustrate how Structural's repair techniques can help. "When we can show them different solutions to their problem on video, it portrays us as a solution builder, which is really what they are paying us for."
Emmons has learned through experience the impact that Structural's extensive knowledge base can have when it is streamed to customers' desktops. "The most impressive thing we can do [is let customers] go right into our Comprehensus website and call up this information," he says. "They are just blown away when they realize how committed we are to developing our company's quality and efficiency for them." And while it may be difficult to clearly establish which influences have caused a customer to choose Structural, the anecdotal evidence in support of Comprehensus is compelling. Emmons notes, "We've identified certain sales that have happened because of Comprehensus, based on salesmen coming back [unsolicited] and saying that this tool got us out in front of the customer and made the difference."
The most valuable asset held by most enterprises is people. Comprehensus realizes additional ROIs through its impact on recruiting. For example, engineering construction management classes at a number of major universities use Peter Emmons' "Concrete Repair Maintenance Illustrated" as a textbook. Professors and students in these classes receive password access to Comprehensus, and use its streaming videos to bring the textbook material to life. Structural also demonstrates the Comprehensus system at up to 30 job fairs put on by college engineering and construction management programs each year. These initiatives have helped to establish Structural's reputation as a forward-thinking company that cares about and invests in its people. "[Comprehensus] showcases us as a progressive company with all this knowledge that will help [our employees grow]," says Emmons. "We get better candidates and we get less turnover. What more could you ask for?"
Structural operates a physical training center in Baltimore, where classes are videotaped for subsequent streaming through the Comprehensus distance learning portal. Subjects include new employee orientation, as well as administrative, field operation, sales, management and safety procedures. Class lectures and case studies from the field are combined to create online courses. Successful completion of some courses - verified through testing - is required for advancement within the company. Test results become part of annual reviews and employee records. In addition to a reduction in the cost of travel to and from the Baltimore training center, distance learning ROI's are realized through shortened employee learning curves. "It creates an operational efficiency," notes Brian Gallagher, director of marketing at Structural. "People are better trained. They better understand what they need to do and how to do it."
Finally, Structural employs Comprehensus for decision support, and to more clearly define best practices. Rather than walking the halls asking more experienced co-workers for help with a particular problem, employees can enter relevant keywords and view videos detailing the knowledge gained from past experience with similar problems. Company-wide best practices are established by comparing videos showing different methods employed on similar projects - often by project managers in different parts of the country. "You combine all the answers into a better solution and you've become the expert," says Emmons.
As the number of projects to be videotaped continues to grow, Structural plans to bring another videographer/reporter on board. It is also seeking creative new ways to utilize its streaming media expertise. Last year, for example, Structural videotaped 80 sessions at the American Concrete Institute convention, and made them available for pay-per-view streaming from the ACI website. In the near future, Structural may defray some of Comprehensus' operating costs by allowing key vendors to run paid advertising on the Comprehensus website. With an eye to the longer term, Structural is testing wireless streaming applications using Metricom's Ricochet technology. And Structural has already received so many inquiries about Comprehensus that it has even considered making a business out of helping other companies develop similar systems.
In the days of the dot-com boom - only a year ago - confident new companies spent millions on hopes of big profits down the road. Today, many fearful enterprises are loath to invest in anything that doesn't promise immediate returns. Like any "old economy" company worthy of the name, Structural Group keeps a tight rein on its streaming expenditures. But Structural has achieved consistently high growth rates, in part by being willing to investigate new technologies, and to invest in those - like streaming media - that can be shown to add value in excess of their cost.
In a world where most adopters of large-scale streaming are themselves high-tech companies, Structural Group is still an anomaly. It is a company engaged in the traditional task of building out America's physical infrastructure, while simultaneously pioneering the application of cutting-edge streaming technology. If Structural's experience is any indication, the road to more ubiquitous streaming within America's mainstream enterprises may be paved with brick and mortar - and concrete - after all.
For companies that do not have a financial stake in the success of the streaming media industry, the internal use of streaming today is generally an option, not a necessity. The question is, is it an option like leather seats and walnut trim, or more like an automatic transmission and anti-lock brakes? The former are luxuries. The latter significantly affect performance, and may even help prevent a crash. For Structural Group, a 25-year-old company based in Baltimore, streaming media has become an integral part of its core business practices, and has markedly enhanced the performance of the enterprise.
Structural Group employs 800 workers in 17 locations throughout the United States, repairing and reinforcing large concrete structures, including buildings, parking garages, industrial plants, tunnels and bridges. It completes 800-1000 projects per year, with budgets ranging from $10,000 to $7 million. Led by a visionary founder and CEO, Peter Emmons, Structural recorded revenues of $125 million last year, and has enjoyed annual growth rates of 25% - 30% for the past 10 years.
One of Emmons most farsighted innovations is Comprehensus, Structural's groundbreaking system for using streaming media to capture, archive and distribute the company's knowledge base. "A big challenge in any business is capturing information and knowledge, and making it available to others in the company," says Emmons. Because so much of its work is procedure and process intensive, Structural enjoys particular benefits from its knowledge management system.
Structural began collecting detailed text reports from the field in 1996. The next year, to more efficiently gather and store this information, Structural shifted to a video model. "The experts doing the work didn't have the time or skill to properly document the knowledge that they had learned on a particular project," says Emmons. "We realized that video could capture this information very easily." Video also allowed viewers to experience the environment and working conditions associated with each project or process.
Comprehensus' charter is best summed up in its mission statement: Create and implement a video and document-based knowledge management system which will improve the cost and quality of processes, procedures & strategies while empowering human resources. Marc Yeager, a longtime company employee (see sidebar), was recruited to become the first company videographer/reporter. His mandate couldn't have been clearer. "The goal is to get the nuts-and-bolts detail of everything that we do," says Emmons. "We told [Marc] to come back with enough information on the videotape so that he could hand the tape to the receptionist, and the receptionist could do the repair."
Response within the company to Comprehensus was immediately positive. "People were just amazed that they could watch these videos at their desktops," says Emmons. But by early last year, having grown to include over 400 "mini-documentaries," the Comprehensus video archive was expanding faster than Structural's ability to manage it. "People complained that they couldn't find the specific information they were looking for," says Emmons. Structural then turned to Virage's VideoLogger video search engine to index the archive in manageable clips of one to three minutes. "Virage enhanced the value of our knowledge management system a thousand-fold," says Emmons.
Yeager and production specialist Joe Kibelbek - the only full-time Comprehensus staff - work under a tight annual budget of $150,000. Yeager helps to minimize costs by shooting in Hi-8, editing in the camera, and wearing lots of hats. "[Marc] is not just a videographer... he's really a reporter," says Emmons. "He has to plan and recruit stories. He has to direct out in the field. And he needs to edit it... The skill of the reporter really dictates the cost efficiency of our system."
When analog Hi-8 video from the field is returned to the Baltimore facility, it is simultaneously encoded in RealMedia Surestream (20k to 220k) and MPEG-1 (1.5M) formats. At the same time, the video is entered into the VideoLogger for indexing. The MPEG files are used as a digital archive, and for the occasional distribution of CD-ROMs. "MPEG-1 is a basic format that's going to be around awhile," says Emmons. "It's not labor intensive at all [to re-encode the RealMedia]... We can do it in a batch process automatically from the MPEG-1."
Assigning the right metadata - keywords associated with each video or video clip - is key to the efficiency of the VideoLogger. Keywords link specific information - e.g. the types of facilities, procedures, tools, materials, etc. - that might be entered by users to search the video. Assigning metadata keywords can be a labor-intensive operation, and Structural is working to widen the responsibility beyond Yeager and Kibelbek. "We've identified about six people within the company that have different expertise," says Emmons. "We're in the process of training them to add the metadata so that no one person is overwhelmed by it." One helpful feature of the VideoLogger is that it uses a Web interface, allowing experts in the field to assign metadata to video files from anywhere at anytime.
Comprehensus currently stores about half a terabyte of content - over 500 mini-docs, running from 15 minutes to two hours long, accessible in 10,000 searchable video clips. The videos cover virtually every aspect of Structural's business. Project management videos include topics ranging from job cost analysis to job closeout reports, each with multiple case studies. Business development topics range from sales and estimating techniques to job bid strategies, again with multiple case studies. Numerous safety orientation videos cover a wide range of frequently experienced jobsite situations.
But the bulk of Comprehensus' content consists of documentary-style videos detailing various concrete construction and repair techniques. In the Comprehensus Table of Contents, videos and clips are organized into categories including facility type (e.g. manufacturing, airport, shopping mall, etc.); structure type (e.g. bridge, chimney, dry-dock, etc.); basic principles (e.g. moisture and thermal effects), construction techniques (e.g. how to minimize cracking); and repair processes (e.g. strengthening and stabilization). Most of these procedural mini-docs are narrated by the project managers, superintendents, or engineers most familiar with the processes being demonstrated - an aspect appreciated by customers. Emmons notes, "When the person who's the most expert on a topic is talking... there's tremendous confidence and ease of communication."
While Comprehensus makes a wealth of information available at relatively low cost - which is clearly beneficial to the company - it still must justify itself with positive, demonstrable ROIs. Structural sees positive returns on investment in a number of areas, including recruiting, training, and decision support. But ROI is perhaps most clearly manifest through increased sales.
Emmons believes that Comprehensus drives sales in a number of ways. "When we have a video in front of a customer, the credibility is immense. We're not just talking it. We're showing them that we've been there and done it." He adds, "We minimize competition because we are differentiating ourselves from our competitors." Emmons also believes that videos help educate customers about their own structures' problems, and illustrate how Structural's repair techniques can help. "When we can show them different solutions to their problem on video, it portrays us as a solution builder, which is really what they are paying us for."
Emmons has learned through experience the impact that Structural's extensive knowledge base can have when it is streamed to customers' desktops. "The most impressive thing we can do [is let customers] go right into our Comprehensus website and call up this information," he says. "They are just blown away when they realize how committed we are to developing our company's quality and efficiency for them." And while it may be difficult to clearly establish which influences have caused a customer to choose Structural, the anecdotal evidence in support of Comprehensus is compelling. Emmons notes, "We've identified certain sales that have happened because of Comprehensus, based on salesmen coming back [unsolicited] and saying that this tool got us out in front of the customer and made the difference."
The most valuable asset held by most enterprises is people. Comprehensus realizes additional ROIs through its impact on recruiting. For example, engineering construction management classes at a number of major universities use Peter Emmons' "Concrete Repair Maintenance Illustrated" as a textbook. Professors and students in these classes receive password access to Comprehensus, and use its streaming videos to bring the textbook material to life. Structural also demonstrates the Comprehensus system at up to 30 job fairs put on by college engineering and construction management programs each year. These initiatives have helped to establish Structural's reputation as a forward-thinking company that cares about and invests in its people. "[Comprehensus] showcases us as a progressive company with all this knowledge that will help [our employees grow]," says Emmons. "We get better candidates and we get less turnover. What more could you ask for?"
Structural operates a physical training center in Baltimore, where classes are videotaped for subsequent streaming through the Comprehensus distance learning portal. Subjects include new employee orientation, as well as administrative, field operation, sales, management and safety procedures. Class lectures and case studies from the field are combined to create online courses. Successful completion of some courses - verified through testing - is required for advancement within the company. Test results become part of annual reviews and employee records. In addition to a reduction in the cost of travel to and from the Baltimore training center, distance learning ROI's are realized through shortened employee learning curves. "It creates an operational efficiency," notes Brian Gallagher, director of marketing at Structural. "People are better trained. They better understand what they need to do and how to do it."
Finally, Structural employs Comprehensus for decision support, and to more clearly define best practices. Rather than walking the halls asking more experienced co-workers for help with a particular problem, employees can enter relevant keywords and view videos detailing the knowledge gained from past experience with similar problems. Company-wide best practices are established by comparing videos showing different methods employed on similar projects - often by project managers in different parts of the country. "You combine all the answers into a better solution and you've become the expert," says Emmons.
As the number of projects to be videotaped continues to grow, Structural plans to bring another videographer/reporter on board. It is also seeking creative new ways to utilize its streaming media expertise. Last year, for example, Structural videotaped 80 sessions at the American Concrete Institute convention, and made them available for pay-per-view streaming from the ACI website. In the near future, Structural may defray some of Comprehensus' operating costs by allowing key vendors to run paid advertising on the Comprehensus website. With an eye to the longer term, Structural is testing wireless streaming applications using Metricom's Ricochet technology. And Structural has already received so many inquiries about Comprehensus that it has even considered making a business out of helping other companies develop similar systems.
In the days of the dot-com boom - only a year ago - confident new companies spent millions on hopes of big profits down the road. Today, many fearful enterprises are loath to invest in anything that doesn't promise immediate returns. Like any "old economy" company worthy of the name, Structural Group keeps a tight rein on its streaming expenditures. But Structural has achieved consistently high growth rates, in part by being willing to investigate new technologies, and to invest in those - like streaming media - that can be shown to add value in excess of their cost.
In a world where most adopters of large-scale streaming are themselves high-tech companies, Structural Group is still an anomaly. It is a company engaged in the traditional task of building out America's physical infrastructure, while simultaneously pioneering the application of cutting-edge streaming technology. If Structural's experience is any indication, the road to more ubiquitous streaming within America's mainstream enterprises may be paved with brick and mortar - and concrete - after all.
