Short answer: it depends on your firm size, project complexity, and how much time you have to implement it. Here's the honest breakdown for 30-, 50-, and 100-person engineering consulting firms.
BigTime is one of the most widely deployed PSA platforms in the professional services space, and engineering consulting firms are a core part of its user base. But "works for engineering firms" covers a lot of ground — from a 20-person structural engineering boutique running three projects at a time to a 120-person civil engineering firm managing dozens of concurrent engagements across multiple offices.
This page cuts through the vendor marketing to give you a firm-size-specific answer. We cover the fit assessment, the engineering-specific features that matter, what it actually costs in year one, and what implementation looks like.
| 30-Person Firm | 50-Person Firm | 100-Person Firm | |
|---|---|---|---|
| BigTime Fit Assessment | Overscaled | Good Fit | Strong Fit |
| Project Complexity Match | Over-featured for simple project set | Well-matched for typical engagement mix | Handles complex multi-project pipeline |
| Resource Management Depth | ✗ Full RMS overkill | ~ Useful with ops support | ✓ Full value unlocked |
| Year-One Total Cost | $18,000–$30,000 | $20,000–$45,000 | $40,000–$80,000 |
| Implementation Timeline | 6–8 weeks | 8–12 weeks | 12–16 weeks |
| Requires Dedicated Ops Resource? | Recommended | Yes | Yes — essential |
| Milestone Billing Support | ✓ Strong | ✓ Strong | ✓ Strong |
| Engineering-Specific Modules | ✓ Basic project suite | ✓ Full PSA suite | ✓ Full PSA + multi-entity |
| ROI Justifiable? | ~ Only if scaling fast | ✓ Yes at 50+ staff | ✓ Yes — strong ROI |
| WorkPulse as Alternative | ✓ Strong alternative | ~ Viable if less complex | ✗ BigTime wins at this scale |
Engineering projects — structural, civil, MEP, environmental — have long-horizon timelines, multi-phase scopes, and approval gates that create documentation overhead most PSA tools aren't built for. BigTime's project management layer handles project phases, sub-tasks, and file attachments well enough for this use case. The limitation is that it doesn't natively integrate with CAD/BIM tools, so document versioning and drawing management still requires a separate system or manual process.
This is where BigTime earns its value for mid-to-large engineering firms. When you have 40 engineers across 15 active projects — each with different phase timelines, utilization targets, and skill requirements — spreadsheet-based scheduling breaks down. BigTime's resource management module gives you a capacity view by skill, department, and project allocation. The catch: it requires accurate skill matrix maintenance and at least one person who owns the resource planning workflow. Firms that let the resource layer slide see diminishing returns fast.
Engineering firms frequently bill on a milestone or percentage-of-completion basis — fixed fee at design phase complete, additional billing at permit submission, final payment on project close. BigTime handles this well: you can set up fee schedules tied to milestones, trigger invoices on completion, and track billing against contracted value. For civil and structural firms working with AIA contract formats, this is a meaningful advantage over spreadsheet-based billing workflows.
Larger engineering consulting firms often operate multiple entities — a parent holding company with separate subsidiaries for different service lines or geographic regions. BigTime's multi-entity support handles consolidated financial reporting across entities, which is essential for firms with this structure. This is a significant capability gap for most competing platforms at this price point.
| Cost Category | 30-Person Firm | 50-Person Firm | 100-Person Firm |
|---|---|---|---|
| Software Licensing | $12,000–$18,000/yr | $18,000–$30,000/yr | $36,000–$60,000/yr |
| Implementation Consulting | $5,000–$10,000 | $10,000–$20,000 | $20,000–$35,000 |
| Staff Training Time | $5,000–$10,000 (lost utilization) | $8,000–$16,000 (lost utilization) | $15,000–$30,000 (lost utilization) |
| Data Migration | $1,000–$3,000 | $2,000–$5,000 | $5,000–$10,000 |
| Dual-System Overhead | $5,000–$8,000 (3 months) | $8,000–$15,000 (3–4 months) | $15,000–$30,000 (3–4 months) |
| Total Year-One Cost | $28,000–$49,000 | $46,000–$86,000 | $71,000–$165,000 |
The hidden cost most firms don't account for: dual-system operation during implementation. Your team is running BigTime and the old system simultaneously — typically 3–4 months. Engineers who would have been billing 35 hours a week are now logging 25–30 while learning a new system. At $150/hour blended rate, a 50-person firm losing 10 hours/week for 16 weeks is roughly $120,000 in unrealized revenue. This doesn't show up in the software budget. Factor it in when evaluating ROI.
| Phase | Duration | Key Activities |
|---|---|---|
| Kickoff & Discovery | 1–2 weeks | Current workflow audit, user role definition, data inventory |
| Configuration | 2–4 weeks | Chart of accounts, project templates, billing rules, skill matrix, milestone structures |
| Data Migration | 1–3 weeks | Historical client/project/employee data import, validation, cleanup |
| Training | 2–4 weeks | Role-specific training for project managers, finance, principals, engineers |
| Parallel Operation | 4–8 weeks | Both systems running simultaneously, bugs resolved, team competency built |
| Go-Live & Stabilization | 2–4 weeks | Old system retired, BigTime becomes system of record, post-launch support |
Total timeline for a 50-person engineering firm: 10–16 weeks. For a 100-person firm with multiple entities and complex billing structures: 14–20 weeks. The parallel operation phase is the most commonly underestimated — it's where teams realize they're doing twice the work for a period of time.
The Margin Diagnostic ($149, one-time) uploads 13 weeks of timesheet and billing data and delivers a full AI analysis: project profitability ranking, utilization trend, concentration flags, and top recommendations — grounded in your actual numbers. Particularly useful for engineering firms evaluating BigTime or any PSA platform and wanting to understand the financial baseline first.
Upload your existing timesheet data. Get a clear view of your project profitability — before you commit to a 3-month implementation.
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Yes — with caveats. A 50-person engineering firm is in BigTime's sweet spot for project tracking, resource allocation, and milestone billing. The platform handles multi-project pipelines well and its financial reporting covers the metrics engineering firms actually need: utilization, realized revenue, and project gross margin by client. The catch: year-one costs run $20,000–$45,000 including implementation, and the team needs 6–10 weeks to fully adopt the workflow. If your firm needs profitability visibility faster and cheaper, WorkPulse delivers the same core reporting at a fraction of the cost and implementation time.
Potentially overscaled. A 30-person engineering firm is on the lower end of BigTime's target market. The platform's feature depth — full PSA suite, advanced resource scheduling, enterprise integrations — exceeds what most 30-person firms need day-to-day. You'll pay for capabilities you won't use and face a 6–8 week implementation for a team that may not have a dedicated ops resource to manage the rollout. For firms in this range, the risk is spending $18,000–$30,000 on a system with more complexity than your current operations require. A lighter-weight solution is often the better call.
Yes, and it's one of the strongest use cases. A 100-person engineering firm typically has enough project complexity — multiple concurrent engagements, cross-functional resource allocation, milestone-based billing, and multi-entity financials — to justify BigTime's full feature set. Year-one costs will be $40,000–$80,000 including implementation, which is a reasonable investment for a firm generating $10M+ in revenue. The implementation will take 3–4 months and requires at least one dedicated ops lead, but the long-term ROI is justified when you have that volume of projects and staff to manage.
Three issues come up repeatedly. First: time-entry compliance. Engineers resist logging time accurately — and BigTime's value depends on that data. Without a firm-wide commitment to consistent time entry, the resource planning and profitability reporting are unreliable. Second: resource allocation complexity. BigTime's resource scheduling tools are powerful but require an admin to maintain the skill matrix, project assignments, and capacity views. Firms without an ops coordinator often let the resource layer atrophy. Third: integration with existing tools. Most engineering firms have CAD, BIM, or project management tools that BigTime doesn't natively connect to — creating manual workarounds that undermine the automation promise.
BigTime's milestone billing is one of its stronger features for engineering firms. You can set up project milestones tied to fee schedules, trigger invoices on milestone completion, and track billing against contract value at the project and client level. This handles the standard fixed-fee and time-and-materials structures that most engineering consulting firms use. The limitation: if you have highly customized billing triggers — for example, percentage-of-completion tied to external approval cycles — expect customization work during implementation.
Realistic year-one cost for a 30–100 person engineering firm is $28,000–$165,000 total — not just software licensing. That includes implementation consulting, staff training time, and data migration. The hidden cost most firms underestimate: 3–4 months of dual-system operation where the team is learning BigTime while keeping the old system running. For a 50-person firm, that's roughly $120,000 in reduced billing capacity during the transition, which doesn't appear in the software budget. Budget for the full cost picture when evaluating ROI.
The exact 5 metrics that separate 40%+ margin firms from the rest — for professional services owners evaluating their ops stack.
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