Investing for Sustainability - Growth Hurts

“I can’t afford to invest more in talent development or process streamlining because we have a bunch of bad projects.”

D. Brown Management Profile Picture
Share

This may come from the different levels - for instance a crafts person who is too focused on individual productivity to train their apprentice.  It may come from the Project Manager who is too overloaded with work to train their Project Engineer.

Leadership Tools: Growth Hurts. How effectively are you investing your dollars?

The only way a contractor can truly grow sustainably is to build a culture that is focused on continuous personal-development and teaching others.  Truly great development hurts - it stretches our brains to grow the same way physical exercise stretches our muscles. Most of your team will resist this level of exertion and insist there is an easier way.  Most of your team will rationalize away performance problems and downplay the need for training.  

The management teams of growing contractors systematically lead their teams through extremely rigorous training building them to dominate tomorrow’s construction environment.


Look at your business and the stage of growth it is in.  

Is your team prepared (or preparing) for the next stage of growth?

What pain are you avoiding today that will be 10X worse in the near future?  




Talent Growth Triangle - Balance is Required
Building capabilities in a person takes a balanced approach, starting with clear standards, training, and consistent management.
Higher Scores Aren’t Always Better: Percent Planned Complete (PPC) Example
Construction is full of competitive personalities - more is always better. This is not always the case, and you must be careful when setting targets that your goals don't have unintended consequences. Percent Planned Complete (PPC) is a perfect example.
Lean Principle - 8 Categories of Waste
The first step in improving labor productivity in construction is improving everyone’s ability to see the waste. Waste can then be broken down into 8 major categories. Like colors these are often interrelated.