Structural engineers are among the most highly trained professionals in the construction industry. Their expertise in load analysis, foundation design, seismic detailing, and connection engineering is what keeps buildings from falling down. Yet in firm after firm, these licensed professionals spend significant portions of their workday on tasks that have nothing to do with engineering: answering routine client emails, tracking drawing revisions, chasing contractor RFI responses, and managing inspection schedules.
The opportunity cost is measurable. With licensed structural engineers billing at $150 to $250 per hour, every hour spent on administrative work represents $150 to $250 in foregone revenue or deferred project progress. Virtual assistants are increasingly being used to recapture that value.
The Structural Engineering Institute (SEI), a subsidiary of the American Society of Civil Engineers, has highlighted workforce efficiency as a growing priority for structural engineering practices as the industry faces a shortage of licensed engineers and increasing project complexity.
Project Correspondence and RFI Management
On active construction projects, structural engineers receive a constant flow of RFIs, clarification requests, and coordination questions from contractors, architects, and other engineers. Managing this correspondence — logging incoming items, routing them to the responsible engineer, tracking response deadlines, and distributing completed responses — is administrative work that can consume an hour or more per day per project.
Virtual assistants can own this correspondence management function. They can log all incoming RFIs into the firm's project management system, categorize by urgency and discipline, prepare acknowledgment responses that set realistic response timelines, and send reminders to engineers when response deadlines are approaching. After the engineer provides the technical content, the VA can format and distribute the formal response to all required parties.
This workflow keeps RFI logs current, ensures no items are dropped, and frees engineers from the inbox management that interrupts focused design work.
Drawing Issue Log and Document Control
Structural engineering projects involve multiple drawing issue cycles, from preliminary design through construction documents, addenda, and record drawings. Tracking which revision of which drawing has been issued to each party, and ensuring that contractors are working from current drawings, is a document control function that is both time-consuming and error-prone when managed informally.
Virtual assistants can maintain drawing issue logs, send transmittal notices when new drawing revisions are issued, and confirm receipt from contractors and other design team members. They can also maintain the project record file, organizing calculations, reports, and correspondence into a structured archive that supports project closeout and potential future liability review.
According to a 2022 survey by the Council of American Structural Engineers (CASE), document management errors — including contractors working from superseded drawings — are among the top five causes of construction claims against structural engineering firms. Systematic document control, even at the administrative level, is a risk management function.
Client Scheduling and Business Development Support
Structural engineering principals spend significant time on client relationship management: scheduling consultation calls with architects, responding to project inquiries, preparing fee proposals, and following up on proposals that have not yet been executed. These activities are essential to firm growth but do not themselves generate billable hours.
Virtual assistants can manage the scheduling layer and proposal logistics: maintaining the principal's calendar for client calls, sending meeting confirmations, preparing fee proposal documents from engineer-provided scope content, tracking proposal status, and following up on unsigned agreements. For firms pursuing new project types or geographic markets, a VA can also research target clients, compile contact lists, and draft initial outreach correspondence for principal review.
The American Council of Engineering Companies reports that business development and proposal preparation consume an average of 15% of principals' time at small engineering firms. VA support for these activities can recover a meaningful portion of that time for billable work.
Building VA-Supported Operations in a Structural Practice
Structural engineering firms typically integrate VA support in phases: beginning with project correspondence management, then adding document control, and eventually expanding into business development support. Each phase has clear deliverables and measurable time savings.
For firms ready to make that transition, Stealth Agents provides virtual assistants familiar with engineering firm workflows who can work within platforms like Deltek Vision, Procore, or Newforma from day one.
The structural engineering firms that build efficient administrative operations will be able to take on more projects with the same licensed staff — a competitive advantage that translates directly into revenue growth.
Sources
- Structural Engineering Institute / ASCE, "Structural Engineering Workforce Report," 2023. https://www.asce.org
- Council of American Structural Engineers, "Risk Management Survey," 2022. https://acec.org
- American Council of Engineering Companies, "Engineering Business Development Benchmarks," 2023. https://acec.org