Construction blockers: why projects stall and how to clear them faster
Most construction delays start as a small blocker raised on site: a question nobody has answered, a material that has not been ordered, a decision still waiting on someone in another company. Give every blocker an owner, a due date and a follow-up, and track the time it takes to clear.
What is a construction blocker?
A blocker is anything that stops planned work from starting or finishing: an unanswered question about a drawing, a material that has run short, an inspection not yet booked, or a decision the client, designer or a subcontractor has not made. Blockers are usually raised informally, on a call, in a group chat or in passing on site, and that is exactly why they get lost. The work is ready; the answer is not.
Why waiting costs more than the work
Public research points the same way. In a survey of 600 construction professionals by FMI and PlanGrid, respondents said 35% of their working time, more than 14 hours a week, went on non-productive activity such as looking for project information, resolving conflicts and dealing with mistakes and rework, and 48% of rework was put down to poor communication and poor project information. A Navigant Construction Forum study of more than 1,300 projects found the median response to a request for information took 9.7 days, and 21.9% were never answered. McKinsey reports that large projects typically take 20% longer than scheduled.
FMI and PlanGrid study (Construction Dive) ↗
The four kinds of blocker to track
| Kind | Typical example | Usually owned by |
|---|---|---|
| Information | A dimension or detail missing from a drawing | Designer or engineer, often through an RFI |
| Material | Tiles, fixings or adhesive have run short | Procurement or the supplier |
| Decision | Close the ceiling now or wait for services? | Client, project manager or architect |
| Access or sequence | Another trade has not finished the area | Subcontractor or site manager |
Give every blocker an owner, a date and a follow-up
- Write it down the day it is raised, in the words the site used, with the location.
- Name one owner outside the site team who must act, not a whole company.
- Agree a due date that matches when the work actually needs the answer.
- Follow up before the date, not after it, and record each follow-up.
- Close it only when the answer has reached site and work can continue.
- Track the days from raised to cleared: the time to unblock.
A worked example
Illustrative example: on Monday a supervisor says the tiles for level three have run short and four more boxes are needed by Thursday. Logged as a material blocker, it goes to the tile supplier with a Thursday due date, and the project manager approves it the same morning. On Tuesday the supplier confirms delivery for Wednesday, the answer goes back to site, and the blocker is closed with a time to unblock of one day. Without an owner and a date, the same remark could sit in a chat until the tilers stop work.
Review blockers, not just progress
In the weekly meeting, review open blockers before percentage complete: oldest first, then those due before the next meeting. For each one ask who owns it, what they need and what happens to the programme if it is late. A short list of named, dated blockers says more about next week than a progress chart does.
Where Bullet fits
Bullet is in early access: capture and review are live, routing is rolling out. A supervisor speaks a site problem in any language; Bullet turns it into an owned item, sends it to whoever must act and follows up until it is cleared. Bring a blocker from your last project to a guided demo.
Common questions
- What is a construction blocker?
- A blocker is anything that stops planned work from starting or finishing, such as an unanswered drawing question, a material that has run short, an inspection not booked or a decision another party has not made.
- How do you clear construction blockers faster?
- Write each blocker down the day it is raised, give it one named owner and a due date that matches when the work needs the answer, follow up before the date, and close it only when the answer reaches site.
- What is time to unblock?
- Time to unblock is the number of days from when a blocker is raised to when it is cleared and work can continue. Tracking it shows which kinds of blocker and which parties hold work up longest.
Construction blocker log
A blank CSV you can open in Excel or Google Sheets. Adapt the fields to your project. No signup required.
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