Rethinking Data Collection: Done By You vs Done For You

Team PMG
Apr 17
5 min read

It’s Tuesday morning, around 9:00 a.m., and you haven’t even had a chance to finish your coffee when the phone rings. A resident is calling about a road that hasn’t been fixed. They’re frustrated. It’s been an issue for years, and they want to know why nothing has been done.

You pull up your spreadsheet and start searching for answers. You find the road, review the condition data, and realize it’s three years old. You don’t have a clear explanation. All you can say is that it hasn’t made it into the budget yet and that you’ll look into it.

The call ends, but the problem doesn’t. Because that wasn’t the only complaint, and it won’t be the last. At some point, the realization sets in. If the data isn’t current, you can’t rely on it. And without reliable data, it becomes harder to explain decisions, plan, and stay in control of your network.

From Realization to Decision

Once that realization sets in, the next step is clear. You need updated data. But getting that data isn't as simple as deciding to collect it.

It requires:

A plan for how the collection work will get done — who's responsible, what roads are being assessed, and in what order
Time from your team to execute it — data collection can't happen alongside everything else without something giving way
A clear approach to managing the process — coordination, scheduling, and making sure the right people and resources are in place

And that leads every municipality to the same decision:

Do we collect this data ourselves, or do we have it collected for us.

Done By You vs. Done For You

Most municipalities fall into one of these two approaches.

Done By You — Your team handles the data collection, whether entirely in-house or with a provider supplying the technology while your staff drives the network. The process stays close to home and your team is in direct control of how the data gets captured.

Done For You — A pavement management provider's team captures the network and delivers the data back to you, ready to use. Your team skips the collection process entirely and goes straight to using the data to plan, prioritize, and make decisions with confidence.

With both approaches, you end up with the data you need. The difference is how much of your team's time and resources it takes to get there.

A Story From PMG

At an event last year, a city manager stopped by our booth. He liked what we do and told us he'd reach out when their next data collection cycle came around.

We asked when that was.

"Every eight years."

They were five years in, with three more to go.

When we told him we recommend at least every two-three years, he paused. Eight years had always felt reasonable when his team was handling everything in house. It was just how the program ran.

We talked through why more frequent data matters: tighter maintenance windows, more defensible budgets, conditions you can actually rely on. He understood it, and agreed.

But he still had three years on the clock.

When your team owns the entire collection process, eight years starts to feel like the only realistic option. Not because it's right, but because it's what's manageable.

As James Golden, Founder and CEO of Pavement Management Group puts it, “The way you collect data often determines how often you’re able to update it.”

3 Red Flags That Your Data Collection Approach Is Under Strain

For many municipalities, this doesn’t show up all at once. It shows up in smaller ways that are easy to overlook.

Here are a few signs your current approach may be putting more on your team than it should.

🚩 Red Flag #1: “We’ll get to it when we have time.”

Data collection is planned, but it has to compete with everything else on your team’s plate. As priorities shift, it gets delayed, paused, or pushed out entirely.

🚩 Red Flag #2: The process is bigger than the collection

Scheduling, coordinating, making sure the right people are in the right place. By the time data collection actually starts, your team has already been managing the process for weeks. The collection is just one part of what they're carrying.

🚩 Red Flag #3: Your collection cycle stretches longer than expected

What should be completed in a defined window gets spread out over time. When the responsibility stays internal, the process often expands just to make it manageable.

If your team is responsible for carrying the full data collection process, it’s only a matter of time before it starts to compete with everything else they need to get done.

Here's what changes when that responsibility is lifted.

What It Looks Like When the Approach Changes

When data collection no longer relies on your team to manage the process, everything downstream becomes easier.

The full network is captured within a defined window, giving you a true snapshot of current conditions. The data is consistent, reliable, and easy to stand behind.

Your team isn’t trying to find time to collect it. They’re focused on using it.

Planning becomes clearer
Budgets are easier to justify
Conversations with council become more straightforward
Resident concerns are easier to address

Because instead of piecing together answers, you can point directly to the data and explain exactly what’s happening and what comes next.

That’s the difference.

The Bottom Line

Both approaches get you to the same place: the data you need to plan, prioritize, and make decisions.

But they require very different things from your team. A done-by-you approach means planning, coordinating, and completing the entire collection process alongside everything else. A done-for-you approach removes that responsibility entirely.

The difference isn’t whether you get the data.

It’s whether your team has to carry the weight of getting it.

That’s April’s Better Roadways Newsletter

If this felt familiar, consider sharing it with colleagues or neighboring municipalities working through the same challenges. Every city deserves pavement data they can rely on without it becoming another responsibility their team has to manage.

Across the country, municipalities take different approaches to data collection. The key is choosing an approach that keeps your data current without overloading your team.

— Team PMG

P.S. Not every pavement management program requires your team to take on data collection themselves.

Book a Quick Demo → See how PMG helps municipalities save time, reduce internal workload, and focus on making better decisions.

Want to go deeper? James Golden breaks down the most common pavement management mistakes (and how to avoid them) on our YouTube channel.