Help your organization improve construction productivity and you’d be one step ahead of your competition.
Did you know 28% of employees’ time is often spent checking email, and 20% is spent tracking down information or internal resources?
This is a wildly inefficient use of company time and money. You can assume that your competitors are experiencing the same inefficiencies – so implementing tools and strategies to improve low hanging (productivity) fruit can give your team the advantage.
What can you do right now to improve construction productivity at your company?
Follow this recipe to improve construction productivity:
- Start with technology: McKinsey Global Institute (MGI) reports, inefficiencies are often a byproduct of the lack of shared knowledge. Thunderbolt Pipeline’s email integration feature allows your team to easily save important email correspondence to a specific bid or project. It’s worth exploring technology opportunities to see where you might be able to streamline communication and provide visibility.
- Use historical data to set realistic expectations: Use historical performance metrics to manage your timeline with efficiency. Let your team know the daily, weekly, and monthly goals ahead of time and make sure the goals are achievable based on similar jobs completed in the past.
- Set aside office hours: Chances are, if you’ve been doing this a long time you have your own process that you follow and your own contacts or industry knowledge that your team might not follow or have access to. If you want to improve construction productivity for your team, set aside time in your day specifically to be a knowledge base for questions, best practices, and email introductions for your team to outside resources.
- Hire a good management team: Hiring is often the most difficult part of running a business. Investing in a good management team who recognize the strengths and weaknesses of the team as a whole will increase construction productivity.
- Provide after-hours rewards: The construction industry can be tough and tiring. Many of your workers will want to head home and see their friends and family after a long day, but once in a while it might be nice to treat them to a fun treat to show you appreciate their hard work. Have a food truck arrive a little before closing to provide an impromptu happy hour.
- Give time off: Take a hard look at your Paid Time Off structure – is it as good or better than your competition? You don’t want your workers getting burnt out and you don’t want to lose a valuable resource to a competitor. If it doesn’t interfere with completing a project, provide a bonus afternoon off (and insist they take it). They will come back to work feeling refreshed and appreciated, ready to get the job done.
- Be a good listener: Everyone wants to feel heard and appreciated. With your troops being the boots on the ground, listen when they speak up and tell you that a goal is unrealistic, that a bid is priced too high, or that maybe a new approach is required. If your team feels their opinion matters, it will enhance their quality of work because they know you trust them.
When you follow this recipe to improve construction productivity you gain an advantage over your competition and simultaneously improve accuracy, safety, and job completion rates. A recipe for success!
