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How to Create More Construction Jobs Source: Blogs
...s?" Good question. Jobs have always moved to the most productive in society. If you look at a off-shoring of telemarketing jobs, they are moving because the actual amount of work per unit cost can ...

New Year, Let's Accomplish Something! Source: Blogs
No matter where you sit in your organization I would like for you to take a different look at your job duties. Over the years the titles for different positions have become pret...

What Makes A Good Estimate? Source: Blogs
Construction companies stand on three (3) pillars that define good business; Get Work, Do Work, and Monitor Work. If all three of them are done correctly and efficiently than th...

Keys to being a Great Estimator Source: Blogs
...rated. Review the Job (Don't just Start Counting) If as an estimator we need to find the lowest cost solution, we really need to understand the project. This is not a minor detail, as time is alw...

Life of An Estimator, Tougher than You Think Source: Blogs
For those of us in the construction industry we know the Estimators that are more cynical than the average Joe. They appear to be more prevalent than the fun loving young estima...

Subcontractor Projecting 2010: Part 2 Source: Blogs
In Part 1, we talked about how to start coming up with a realistic look at 2010 by looking at your continual or flow work. In this part, let's take a look at the next part of th...

Contract Sales: How to Understand Your Performance Source: Blogs
Last week we bid a few jobs. This week we bid a few jobs. Next week we will bid a few jobs. I am sure we all know which ones we won and which ones are lost, but do we really k...

MEP Coordination: why it’s expensive to be cheap Source: Blogs
MEP Coordination: why it’s expensive to be cheap. You’re a contractor and you have been awarded a contract to do what your good at, build a building. You assemble a team to ma...

The Art of Estimating Source: Blogs
Sun Tzu wrote the Art of War in the 6th Century BC. Since that time military experts have considered it a complete view on how to operate a military machine and business scholar...

News U Can Use: Feb.3.2010 Source: Blogs
...d Create 300,000 New Jobs NECA and their partners are trying to get political steam around a program modeled after the "cash for clunkers" program, except for buildings. The legislation that they ar...

What are we really selling? Source: Blogs
As subcontractors, especially during tough economic times, sales is a tougher and tougher battle. In the US there are approximately 800,000 specialty subcontractors, which means...

Need a Safety Program? Try a Culture First. Source: Blogs
As one of the most dangerous industries on the planet, construction focuses significantly on safety. Our industry is focused on the health and safety of our tradesmen and for go...

Tracking Productivity is the Key to Productivity Source: Blogs
Productivity is defined by economists as the amount of output per unit of labor. For example the number of light fixtures installed per labor hour worked. As a subcontractor I ...

MEP Coordination: It’s Expensive to be Cheap Source: Blogs
MEP Coordination: It’s Expensive to be Cheap. You’re a contractor and you have been awarded a contract to do what your good at, build a building. You assemble a team to manage...

Bid Work? Risk Taker, Price Taker! Source: Blogs
If you are bidding work out there, you are going to be a price taker and not a price setter. In fact throughout the construction industry whether it is bidding, negotiated, time...

national sales director Source: Blogs
we unveiled anew product for NYC agencies this week and had immediate sucess. we are ending walkthroughs in construction by having the jobs on line with full panoramic videos wi...

Risk Mangement, What is Your Role? Source: Blogs
In construction, talk to anyone about the single greatest challenge in surviving in the industry and it is risk. "Based on the risk, add more profit to it." "I am not goi...

Work of Prior Contractor is Defective Source: Library Letters
As you know, . Today we came to the jobsite to commence our work and our inspection disclosed to us that . We have pulled our forces off the job awaiting for the work to be acc...

Construction Customer Service Source: Blogs
In my last installment I talked about performance in relation to holding people accountable for what they accomplish and not what they do. Let's look at the bigger picture of wh...

Is the Economy Affecting Your Ethics? Source: Blogs
Contracting is a tough business. Our industry has a reputation among the community of having little or no ethics. That reputation is earned due to our poor communication, but d...

What Value Do You Add? Source: Blogs
In any economy and in any service industry, there is a very fair question: "What Value Do You Add?". This question goes for companies and employees and in this economy it become...

Can Contractors Change? Source: Blogs
The past two years have been the worst global economic times in more than a generation and it is anyone's guess if we are coming out of it or if there are more challenges ahead. ...

So What Does the Project Manager Do Anyway? Source: Blogs
At the expense of offending Project Managers as wells as the Monkey: A woman was looking at the animals on display in a pet store. A few minutes later, a man walked in and sai...

This Bonus Sucks! Source: Blogs
Bonus programs can really suck. Whether you want to call them bonus or incentive programs almost every company has them, but if they are not administered properly they can reall...

Three Most Important Things to Being A Contractor Source: Blogs
In retail and real estate there goes a saying that the three most important things are location, location, and location. In construction there is a similar truth that the three ...

Analytics, the Best Way to Improve Your Business Source: Blogs
Analytics is simply the science of analysis. In construction, and probably more specific in the subcontractor community analysis of data is few and far between, even though our ...

Order to Stop Work Source: Library Letters
We bid this project based on your having the work on the project in such condition that on , we could start our work in the and continue work uninterrupted until its conclusion ...

Order Not to Start Work Source: Library Letters
We bid this project based on your having the work on the project in such condition that on , we could start our work in the and continue work uninterrupted until its conclusion ...

We are selling Trust, That's It! Source: Blogs
In the previous part to this series, I made the claim that customers look towards the subcontractors to find the best "expert" in the field (or group of them) and then select fro...

Why BIM? Source: Blogs
So why would anyone BIM, or Building Information Modeling? Unless you are doing a power plant or some very specialized industrial job, our guys in the field can work things out,...

Cost Control is Construction's #2 Rule Source: Blogs
In Construction the #1 rule is safety. Without the principal of safety, the things we build and the people we employ will not be around once we finish. I hope that fact is not ...

Add New Pipeline Project Source: Help System
In order to add a new pipeline project click on the "Add New Project" submenu under the Pipeline menu option or click here and then follow these instructions. (Please note that ...

Extension of Time for Causes Beyond Control Source: Library Letters
This letter will serve to confirm that we have encountered a delay in transporting the material to the job site due to which is beyond our control. This will delay our completi...

Defective Specifications Source: Library Letters
Since the award of this contract we have worked diligently to perform the work under this contract. However, we have found that we cannot perform the work due to the following d...

Daily Inspection Form Source: Library Forms
... Job No.: Date: ...

Boating from an Owner's Perspective Source: Blogs
If you read the first part of this series, you have looked at the photo of two boats and hopefully gained a different perspective about the photo that has been circulating around...

Subcontractor Projecting 2010: Part 1 Source: Blogs
As 2009 closes, most of us are in the process of deciding what we think about 2010. If you have done your job right you already have this answer and if you have been lucky 2010 ...

Subcontractor: Projecting 2010 Part 3 Source: Blogs
In Part 1 and Part 2, we looked at projecting the flow work and the backlog, now to get a total picture of 2010, we need to look at work we don't have yet, our pipeline. The pip...

Subcontractor: Projecting 2010 Conclusion Source: Blogs
So we went through all of the steps of producing a good business plan for 2010, now what? First let's review what we have covered so far. Part 1: Building our Flow Work Pa...

Where is 2010 going? Source: Blogs
... Private Commercial Jobs Good luck. Outside of very large projects that take time from companies that need the facilities internally, I would expect 2010 to look like 2009. Not too many people wil...

Sustainable Yes! LEED be Careful Source: Blogs
When LEED was introduced it became a revolution in the construction industry changing the way Owners, Designers, and Builders approached jobs. The major objective was to create ...

Revit: An Asset or a Cool Cartoon? Source: Blogs
Revit: An Asset or a Cool Cartoon? According to Wikipedia, Autodesk Revit is architectural building information management (BIM) software for Microsoft Windows, developed by...

Do we have the money for Safety? Excuse Me? Source: Blogs
I have been reading and having discussions on whether it is worth it to save money on safety. Excuse me? Why are they mutually exclusive? If you execute a smart and well orche...

Construction News U Can Use 2.10.2010 Source: Blogs
Construction related news that you might of missed and can help you in your business. Mobile Data Traffic: 3.6 Billion Gigabytes a Month by 2014 All things Digital is reporti...

Construction: My Valentine Source: Blogs
As I sit here and package up chocolates for the wife and hope she got me that hoodie-footie I have been seeing so much on TV, I have been thinking about my 2nd love Construction....

Will Hiring A Safety Manager Matter? Source: Blogs
The vast majority of subcontractors in the country do not have a dedicated Safety Manager, so will hiring one make a difference? Short answer, yes. The real answer is much long...

What Can the Rig Disaster Teach a Subcontractor? Source: Blogs
Last month a terrible accident happened aboard the Deepwater Horizon oil rig, killing 11 workers on the platform and creating an oil leak that is still no fully contained. The i...

What Financial Reform Means for Construction Source: Blogs
The current Congress has passed the 2,300 page Financial Reform Bill which will have major impacts to the construction industry. After the 2008 elections there were three bills ...

Do You Know What You Are Building? Source: Blogs
In today's world of CADD, fast track projects, out sourcing, reduced design staffs, it is impossible to get through a project with at least a dozen new sets of drawings and hundr...

Best Way to Win that Next Project Source: Blogs
It appears as if the market is recovering (at least there are more projects out there to be bidding on), so how can you win that work to turn it from an opportunity to revenue? ...

Will Distributors Have A Place in Tomorrow's World Source: Blogs
As subcontractors we buy the vast majority of our material through Distributors. The system was established well before my time and benefited almost everyone along the supply ch...

Increase Profits, Minimize Risk Source: Blogs
What is the best way for a contractor to improve their profits? Minimize risk. Let's face it, contracting is another form of gambling. When we look at all of the stipulations ...

What Does Your 2010 Look Like? Source: Advertisements
What does your 2010 look like? This was a very typical question at the end of 2009 that sent most managers in a company scrambling to work on a spreadsheet to develop the busine...

Bid Calendar Source: Advertisements
View your Bids on a Calendar Most of us have utilized Excel, Word, Access, or even raw paper or whiteboard to track our bids. These manual methods provide for several...