1.3 · Imagine the possibilities

Desmium recovered $93,500 in one quarter

Five changes across the company

More work reached the invoice

Summit Ridge performed $550,000 in scope-change work during the quarter. Before Desmium, it collected $412,500 of it. As changes moved through documentation, pricing, approval, and billing with fewer gaps, $506,000 reached the company: $93,500 more from the same work.

New opportunities received an answer

Summit Ridge’s lead-response time moved from 42 hours to nine minutes. The team could speak with a prospective customer while the opportunity was still live.

Project questions stopped waiting for days

The information-request cycle moved from 9.7 days to one day. Answers reached the people doing the work sooner, instead of leaving a job waiting or moving ahead without the information it needed.

People got more of their week back

Time spent looking for information, resolving conflicts, and dealing with rework fell from 14.1 hours to four hours a week per office person. Across Summit Ridge’s nine office staff, that returned roughly 90 hours a week to other work.

Payment came sooner

The time between billing and payment fell from more than 65 days to 41 days. Summit Ridge could use money it had earned sooner, rather than carrying the wait.

Desmium · Operating dashboard · 26‑week projection

Summit Ridge

$22M Project-based company — committed-price work delivered over months · Mountain West · 4 project managers · 3 estimators · 9 office staff · 60 projects/yr · avg project $365K · $5.5M active (90d)

Projected exampleBenchmarks v5 · 2026-10-11
Illustrative company · Not a customer result
Scope-change revenue recovered
+$94K / quarter
Before$412K of $550K paid (75%)After$506K of $550K paid (92%)
~$375K / yrS3 S5 S10 S12 S13 S14
Staff hours recovered
~90 h / week across 9 office staff
Before14.1 h/wk wasted per office person (35%)After4 h/wk
~4,700 h / yrS16
Days to get paid
-24 days
Before65+ daysAfter41 days
cash float cut ~37%S17
Information-request cycle time
-8.7 days
Before9.7 days median, 22% never answeredAfter1 day, 0% unanswered
 S19
Lead response time
-99%
Before42 h, 23% never answeredAfter9 min, 0% unanswered
 S1 S2 S18

26-week trend · go-live at week 14

Scope-change $ captured / wk (bars, $K)Scope-change cycle days (field flag → signed change order)Lead response, minutes (log scale)
$0K$10K$20K$30K$40K$50Kscope-change $ captured / wk0d20d40d60d1m10m100m1k m10k mcycle days · lead response (log)DESMIUM GO-LIVE · WEEK 145 d9 min48 d2520 min (42 h)W1W3W5W7W9W11W13W14W15W17W19W21W23W25

Sources and assumptions

The published starting points, Summit Ridge assumptions, and source links are shown below.

AssumptionValueBasis
Scope changes as a share of contract value10%S3 · S5 · S9
Scope-change revenue paid, before75%S12 · S13 · S14
Scope-change revenue paid, after92%model
Staff time lost to non-optimal work, before35% (14.1 h/wk per person)S16
Hours lost per person per week, after4 hmodel
Days to get paid, before65 daysS17
Days to get paid, after41 daysmodel
Lead response, before → after42 h, 23% unanswered → 9 min, 0%S1 · S2 · S18
Information requests, before → after9.7 days median, 22% unanswered → 1 day, 0%S19

Deliberately conservative: Dodge reports ~30% of CO revenue lost; model uses 25%. HBR shows 7x qualification lift under 1 h; model uses 34%→55%.

Sources

PRIMARY = fetched from the originating study or organisation. SECONDARY = fetched from a page citing the study; the primary is still to be pulled. Figures are quoted as the source states them; sector labels are the source’s own.

#FigureSourceStatus
S1Qualification odds fall 21x when lead response goes from 5 min to 30 min; contact attempts after 20 h add nothingLead Response Management Study (InsideSales/MIT, Oldroyd) linkPRIMARY
S2Avg first response to a web lead 42 h; 23% of companies never respond; responding within 1 h = 7x more likely to qualify (2,241 US companies)Harvard Business Review, "The Short Life of Online Sales Leads" (Oldroyd, McElheran, Elkington, 2011) linkPRIMARYPRIMARY (page fetched; figures from article)
S3Change orders average 10% of total contract value; up to 25% on some projectsDodge Data & Analytics (cited by Rhumbix) linkSECONDARY
S4US construction loses ~$177B/yr to rework and delaysDodge Data & Analytics (cited by Rhumbix, BuildCheck) linkSECONDARY
S5Change orders = 8–14% of total project cost; CO process itself causes 10–20% of schedule delayNavigant Construction Forum (cited by Rhumbix, BuildCheck) linkSECONDARY
S6Rework = 5–9% of project costConstruction Industry Institute (cited by Helonic) linkSECONDARY
S7Change-order mismanagement = 35% of cost overruns on projects under $20MMcKinsey Global Institute (cited by BuildCheck) linkSECONDARY
S8Figure withheld until a primary source is confirmed.BuildCheck compilation linkSECONDARYSECONDARY, origin unclear — do not print until primary found
S9Typical commercial project 5–10% of contract value in COs; renovation 10–20%+Helonic benchmark linkSECONDARY
S10Avg 22 days from signed field T&M tag to priced COR submitted to the client; avg 26 more days to signed CO = ~48-day cycleDodge Construction Network x Clearstory, Specialty Contractor Change Order Report (2026 ed.) linkPRIMARYPRIMARY (publisher page)
S1197% of specialty contractors sometimes start work before the CO is approvedDodge Construction Network x Clearstory, Specialty Contractor Change Order Report (2026 ed.) linkPRIMARY
S12>50% of clients don't pay the full requested amount on >20% of COs; 66% cite disputed pricing; 91% of clients admit sometimes paying less than submittedDodge Construction Network x Clearstory, Specialty Contractor Change Order Report (2026 ed.) linkPRIMARY
S1377% of specialty contractors have written off CO work as bad debt (done, billed, unrecoverable); 83% say CO process hurts cash flowDodge Construction Network x Clearstory, Specialty Contractor Change Order Report (2026 ed.) linkPRIMARY
S14Specialty contractors lose avg ~30% of project revenue to unbilled/unpaid COsDodge Construction Network (2022 Top Business Issues for Specialty Contractors)SECONDARYSECONDARY (Gemini-cited; Procore IR page 404 on fetch) — pull primary PDF before printing
S15Laggard contractors formally approve <60% of COs before work startsDodge x ClearstorySECONDARYSECONDARY — confirm in report
S1635% of construction pro time (14.1 h/wk) on non-optimal activities: 5.5 h looking for data, 4.7 h conflict resolution, 3.9 h mistakes/rework; $177.5B/yr labor wasted; $31B rework from bad data/miscommunication; 48–52% of rework from poor data/communicationFMI x PlanGrid, "Construction Disconnected" (2018) linkSECONDARY → primary PDF: pg.plangrid.com/rs/572-JSV-775/images/Construction_Disconnected.pdfSECONDARY → primary PDF: pg.plangrid.com/rs/572-JSV-775/images/Construction_Disconnected.pdf
S17Slow payment costs US construction $299B/yr (2025), $280B (2024), $208B (2022); 82% of contractors see >30-day delays; ~30% of subs waited >90 days; clients lose ~65 h/mo on payment admin; 95% of clients float paymentsRabbet Construction Payments Report 2022/2024/2025 (2019 ed. with Procore) linkSECONDARY → primary: rabbet.com/reports/construction-payments-2025SECONDARY → primary: rabbet.com/reports/construction-payments-2025
S18Avg contractor web-lead response 42–47 h; 78% of homeowners hire the first responder; 90–95% of contractors miss the 5-min windowCompilations citing HBR/MIT, HomeAdvisor, ServiceTitan, Jobber linkSECONDARYSECONDARY — "78% first responder" needs its primary before print
S19RFIs: avg $1,080 and ~8 staff-hours each; median 9.7 days to answer; 21.9% never answered; 9.9 RFIs per $1M of contract; 13–14% unnecessaryNavigant Construction Forum, "Impact & Control of RFIs on Construction Projects"PRIMARY PDF available: cmaanet.org/.../Impact%20%26%20Control%20of%20RFIs%20on%20Construction%20Projects.pdfPRIMARY PDF available: cmaanet.org/.../Impact%20%26%20Control%20of%20RFIs%20on%20Construction%20Projects.pdf

Your numbers

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Enter your annual revenue. The dollar and hour outcomes scale from the $22M model in proportion to revenue; the cycle-time outcomes are the same at any size.

$
Scope-change revenue recovered—per quarter · — per year
Staff hours recovered—per week · — per year
Days to get paid-24 days65+ days → 41 days
Information-request cycle-8.7 days9.7 days median, 22% never answered → 1 day, 0% unanswered
Lead response-99%42 h, 23% never answered → 9 min, 0% unanswered
An industry-benchmark projection scaled to your revenue, not a forecast for your business — the demonstration is where we look at your actual jobs. Projected example from published industry benchmarks. Illustrative company. Not a customer result.
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How profit doubles

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A $20M company netting 8%$1.6M profit
Takes on 50% more work with the same office team+$10M revenue
Keeps about 25% of that added revenue, with overhead flat+$2.5M
Profit≈ $4M — about 2.5×

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