Tall Buildings need Strong Foundations

Each new year brings hope and excitement that is often not sustained for the 2080 hours of work scheduled each year. 2080 hours assumes a 40 hour work week.  

Contractors have plans, specs and schedules to keep them productive on a job site.  

Job sites are easy in the sense they have clearly defined execution parameters of a schedule working within plans, specs and generally accepted construction practices.  

Many contractors do not have plans, specs or generally accepted business practices needed to run the business of their trade with a sense of urgency.  

Achieving sustained consistent execution requires the following categories to be consistently nurtured and managed.  

• Team (Humans) | Subcontractors can be referenced as labor or trade contractors. Team members and team leaders are the primary asset of a subcontractor. A non-balance sheet asset.  

  • There is no labor without humans.  

  • There is no trade without the trade skills of humans. 

• Execution | Subcontractors are judged by how well they executed a contracted scope of work. The following concepts require consistent and efficient management.  

  • QA | Quality assurance the maintenance of a desired level of quality in a service or product, especially with attention to every stage of the process of delivery or production for principal level involvement.  

  • QC | Quality control is a set of procedures (written SOPs) that ensure a product or service meets certain quality standards. QC is important for business because it helps them keep customer satisfaction.  

  • Cross Functional Activities are activities where information or responsibilities move from the office to the field or the field to the office. Consistent execution of cross functional activities is critical to team unity and nurturing consistent growth and scaling.  

• Full Value Contractor | A contractor who wants to build a business that reaches its full potential. Potential is whatever the owner set out as the goals of starting the business – whether that is to maximize an economic outcome, achieve a certain lifestyle with work life balance or to create a legacy business that will endure past the owner running the business. Full Value Contractor is a long-term guiding strategy for growing and scaling a contractor.  

• Resources | Resources are hard to get for a labor-trade contractor. Damn hard!!! The following resources cannot be neglected at any stage of a contractor. 

  • Labor, as a job cost expense. 

  • Working Capital, the life blood of a contractor.  

• Tools and Material needed to execute a contracted scope of work. 

• Stakeholders | Do not get it twisted by pride and ego, contractors do not grow and scale by willpower and hard work alone. Third party approval and support are necessary. Always be developing and nurturing the following. 

  • Advocates are the best marketing and brand assets.  

  • Advisors provide support when specialized support is needed. Pay special attention when a trusted advisor is providing guidance on a topic that you do not know that you do not know. Hard to implement. Incredibly rewarding when carried out.  

  • Vendors, banks and leasing companies | Credit improves working capital and will be needed to grow and scale. Be credit worthy to vendors, banks and leasing companies 

  • Bonding companies are special stakeholders for contractors. Bonding companies share 100% of the business risk of a specific project with a limited, defined and guaranteed return.  

  • Clients are necessary to sustain operations. Client relationships must be supported and nurtured to achieve full value.  

New contractors may not be able to manage every item listed above in detail, but they need to beware of them and not mismanage any of them. Mismanagement of these categories may be a sin not forgiven in the business world.  

More developed contractors can take a deeper dive into managing the details of the items listed above as resources and bandwidth are developed.  

The taller the building, the stronger the foundation to support it. The same applies to building a construction companies. To sustain consistent growth and scaling a construction company must have the pillars list above correctly developed and in alignment with the resources and goals of the company just as a building is aligned with the resources and goals of the owner.  

Stay focused on continuous improvement and principal level involvement so management of these resources correctly evolves and stays aligned with your goals for your company.