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So What Does the Project Manager Do Anyway? 44    ...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 said to the shopkeeper 'I'll tak... Life of An Estimator, Tougher than You Think 21    ...nds with Executives, Project Managers, and Superintendents that may be on a different schedule and do not understand the urgency of the matter at hand.  This is not to mention the affect that vendors ... Risk Mangement, What is Your Role? 18    ...mitigate that risk. Project Managers - The folks that I have always said are the most important risk managers.  They own the safety, production, quality, client management, and financial risk for the... Subcontractor Projecting 2010: Part 2 16    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... New Year, Let's Accomplish Something! 16    ...pretty standardized, Project Manager, Superintendent, Estimator, Salesman, Manager, etc.  The actual duties of these positions vary drastically from company to company and as you are aware may vary fr... Will Hiring A Safety Manager Matter? 15    ...  If you take a good Project Manager and put them in charge of Safety, they will be thinking about client satisfaction, costs, risks, etc before safety.  Safety Managers think about safety first and f... Subcontractor: Projecting 2010 Conclusion 10    ...Flow Work Part 2: Projecting our Current Backlog Part 3: Dealing with Our Pipeline Part 4: Projecting Overhead and Calculating ProfitIf we have taken time to calculate each of the numbers and... Contract Sales: How to Understand Your Performance 10    ...p your game plan. Project Category/Sub-Category (i.e. Health Care/Hospital) Construction Type (i.e. Out of Ground) Squarefootage Customers bidding the job Bid Price and Margin (duh!) Competiti... Subcontractor: Projecting 2010 Part 3 9    ...healthcare work. Projecting your pipeline into a financial system is a lot more difficult than looking at flow or even backlog, because you have three critical moving parts: (1) are you going to w... Cap and Trade, What to Expect 9    ...from service vans to Project Manager trucks. With more regulation, we will definitely see increased vehicle fuel economy that will help out the bottom line, but may adversely impact our ability to hau... Revit: No Place for Amateurs 9    Revit: No Place for Amateurs Let us look at the typical building information modeling services firm and how things are done. Typically, a CAD manager is hired to create all of... Best Way to Win that Next Project 8    ... sells like desire.  Projects that make you feel a little giddy and excite the soul become the best ones sometimes to chase.  For each estimator or sales person this is a different type of project, bu... Subcontractor Projecting 2010: Part 1 7    ...other parts: current Project Backlog, current Project Pipeline, and future Project Pipeline.  If done properly at every stage, you should be able to accurately project not only the Revenue and manpowe... Where is 2010 going? 7    ...iling. Government Projects If you can print your own money and have the ability to orchestrate your own re-election, well then there will be more government projects.  A quick look at the stimulus... Quality Control, Be in Control 7    When you ask Owners what their top priorities for their next construction project, quality control is always near the top if not at the top.  With the slow down in the economy th... Construction News U Can Use: 2.24.2010 7    ...se Led by Commercial Projects Reed Construction Data is reporting that January's starts have improved from December and impressively from last January.  This is good news for the pipeline of constru... The Art of Estimating 7    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... Do You Know What You Are Building? 7    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... Want to Win Better Projects? 7    ... people, Estimators, Project Managers, and Superintendents.  Look at rebuilding a chunk of the organization.  Think about it this way, Motel 6 is a budget hotel.  If one day their CEO states that they... Best and Final Offer, Are They Ethical? 7    If you have been involved in bidding work you have probably at one point in time been apart of the Best and Final Offer (BAFO) routine.  In private work it is typically called "s... Keys to being a Great Estimator 6    So what does it take to be a good estimator?  Being great with numbers?  Having a desire to color on drawings all day?  There are a few key traits I have found in my career that ... Tracking Productivity is the Key to Productivity 6    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 ... How to Improve Construction Productivity 6    pro·duc·tiv·i·ty  (prō'dŭk-tĭv'ĭ-tē, prŏd'ək-) n. The rate at which goods or services are produced especially output per unit cost of labor.  Or if you prefer how much does it c... What Makes A Good Estimate? 6    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... Construction Customer Service 5    ...or all of the roles, Project Manager, Estimator, Preconstruction Team Leader, Superintendent, Journeyman, Apprentice, etc. we have one boss that makes our job possible, the client.  Without the client... Bid Work? Risk Taker, Price Taker! 5    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... Can Contractors Change? 5    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. ... Construction News U Can Use 4.20.2010 5    ...onstruction market. Project Labor Agreements will raise federal construction costs Reed Construction Data explains the use of PLAs on Federal Projects and the cost implications to projects and the g... What Does Earth Day Mean for Construction? 5    ...tors.  If your Project Managers and Estimators are not LEED accredited, you should get them accredited as soon as possible.  Visit the US Green Building Council for additional details on how.  A... Cost Control is Construction's #2 Rule 5    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 ... Increase Profits, Minimize Risk 5    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 ... Subcontractor: Projecting 2010 Part 4 4    Well, we are almost done.  We have now compiled all of our revenue and gross margin amounts for our 2010 year.  You should have a spreadsheet that has totals that mirrors the fol... Need a Safety Program? Try a Culture First. 4    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... Revit: An Asset or a Cool Cartoon? 4    Revit: An Asset or a Cool Cartoon?  According to Wikipedia, Autodesk Revit is architectural building information management (BIM) software for Microsoft Windows, developed by... Construction News U Can Use 3.24.2010 4    ...all of us. Regional Project Cost Inflation Now Varies Widely and Widens Further in 2010 Reed Construction Data is reporting that regional differences in costs are varying widely and that overall ... Is PM software a Waste of Money? 4    ...o manage a project.  Project management does not require a vast amount of mathematical calculations, so some people do not even see a need to use a computer at all.  Well, in my opinion that is misgui... Be A Master in Construction 4    Where are the true Masters in Construction?  I am not talking about those that have ventured out to get a Masters License in their prospective trade, I mean real masters.  Americ... What Financial Reform Means for Construction 4    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 ... Construction Production, What to Track 4    In my last blog, I discussed the need to track productivity to increase the performance of the company which now comes up with the natural question: What do we track?  It is actu... We are selling Trust, That's It! 3    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? 3    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,... MEP Coordination: why it’s expensive to be cheap 3    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... News U Can Use: Feb.3.2010 3    In a new weekly installment, we will be scanning the news sources to find the most interesting news items for contractors and summarize what it means to them.  For our Februrary ... What are we really selling? 2    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... So What is BIM? 2    Building Information Modeling (or BIM) is all the rage in today's commercial and industrial construction markets.  I am unaware of many large General Contractors that haven't inv... Is the Economy Affecting Your Ethics? 2    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... Sustainable Yes! LEED be Careful 2    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 ... MEP Coordination: It’s Expensive to be Cheap 2    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... Do we have the money for Safety? Excuse Me? 2    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: My Valentine 2    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 Anti-Immigration Law Affect You? 2    Arizona recently took an unprecedented step in passing a law that required the state to action on a federal issue.  I am not going to get into the middle of the political ideals ... Construction: The Lost Decade 2    Yesterday the Department of Commerce came out with the July 2010 construction numbers and the current state of affairs is not very attractive.  The numbers represent the seasonal... This Bonus Sucks! 2    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... Analytics, the Best Way to Improve Your Business 2    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 ... Where Have the Good Craftsmen Gone? 2    One of the largest complaints I hear is "the quality of the workforce is not what it used to be".  Whether I am talking to union or non-union, family owned or large business, the...