15

Real-World Project Management Results

In this chapter, you learn why a thorough, initial research phase can pay off handsomely for your project, the difference between squeaking by and excelling, and why open and easy communication is critical to your project’s success.

Helping Site Managers to Be More Effective

Marcus works for a large metropolitan construction firm that handles 20 to 40 projects annually, ranging from new-home construction, office buildings, and parking lots to assorted public works projects. Each project is headed by a project foreperson who has various assistants and from 5 to 25 crew members who handle the labor.

Like any business in the construction field, the company has had its ups and downs over the past several years. Regional weather patterns, shrinking municipal budgets, new competition in the marketplace, and a host of other factors keep upper management on their toes.

A good plan, executed by a knowledgeable foreperson with sufficient labor, ideally adds up to overall corporate profitability. It was the owner’s belief that as a cadre of highly experienced, well-trained forepersons were established, the profit potential on jobs should improve, if only slightly. Yet, things didn’t seem to be working out. One of the biggest challenges, however, was declining profitability per job even as the company matured.

On construction jobs that represented fourth or fifth jobs for a regular client, where the parties involved were relatively seasoned at various processes, profits were down. A thorough audit of the company’s practices revealed that the critical issue was high turnover among labor crews.

All other factors—increases in cost of materials, increases in wages, licenses, permits, bonding, insurance, and the dozens of other issues that go hand-in-hand with initiating new constructions—were handled relatively well. In fact, compared to other comparably sized businesses in the field, this particular company was above average in many categories.

Let’s Assign It to a Project Manager

Marcus was put in charge of an internal project, authorized directly by the owner. The project mission was to determine why the company was experiencing higher than normal turnover rates among its construction crews, and then to develop a strategy that lowered turnover rates to those of industry and regional standards.

Using the same software that the company employed to manage construction projects, Marcus initiated a project of his own, called “Overturning Turnover”—“OT” for short. Marcus was the solo person on the project; he had no staff. All responsibilities were up to him. What’s more, the owner was often lobbying at the state capitol on certain issues, was the chief marketer for the company, and served as the purchasing officer. He had precious little time to spend with Marcus.

Marcus laid out a plan on his own, based on his industry experience. He knew that he would need to speak to each of the forepersons to learn their views, plus several of their assistants as well as the onsite crew chief. Marcus chose to inspect each of the construction sites and then talk face-toface to the players involved, as opposed to calling, though many of them would have opened up to him over the phone.

Marcus felt certain that the key to successfully completing this project and devising a winning strategy would be found largely at the sites themselves. In the days that followed, he made the rounds, spent time with the key participants he had targeted, and carefully updated his notes.

Armchair Analysis Versus Onsite Observation

After his third visit to a construction site, Marcus felt he had made a breakthrough, but he wanted to confirm his findings and continued to maintain his visitation schedule. Marcus’s major observation was that the project forepersons were largely Caucasian, English-speaking males (no surprise to Marcus), whereas over the years, the construction crews comprised an increasing number of immigrants.

The company’s far-flung empire extended to several counties and included projects in major urban and suburban areas from which the company recruited its labor. In past years, many Spanish-speaking laborers, a number of whom knew sufficient English to survive, filled the ranks. In fact, among crews with five or more Spanish-speaking laborers, at least one of them spoke fluent English. So, the language barrier did not seem to be a problem, even between the foreperson and a non-English-speaking worker, because a liaison person was always on hand.

As the region began to be inhabited by a more diverse population, construction crews themselves became more diverse. It was not uncommon for a single crew to have several Spanish-speaking workers, as well as natives from Malaysia, Korea, Vietnam, India, Afghanistan, several countries from the Middle East, and various Eastern Europeans, including Albanians, Bulgarians, Greeks, Poles, Czechs, and Romanians.

Many workers also came from Guiana, the Ivory Coast, and Sierra Leone, as well as Somalia, Ethiopia, Uganda, and Kenya. From the western hemisphere, it was not uncommon to have Brazilians, who speak Portuguese; workers from several of the Latin or South American countries; and from French-speaking portions of Canada.

In essence, the company’s construction crews on many sites represented a virtual United Nations! When several crew members speaking the same tongue included at least one worker who had decent fluency in English, foreperson-to-crew relations went reasonably well. Often, however, this was not the case. The composition of crew members varied widely from site to site, project to project, and even season to season.

Tower of Babel

Even kind or caring project forepersons could be less effective at their jobs when language barriers diminish effective communication. After delving into the project at length, Marcus realized that slightly increasing turnover rates were due, in part, to the inability of project forepersons to communicate directly with individual crew members.

He reasoned that if countries sometimes ended up going to war with one another over misunderstandings, then it made sense to believe that workers might be departing at higher rates because of their inability to express themselves adequately, be heard and understood, appropriately express frustration or grievances, and, conversely, receive appropriate feedback or even praise.

When he presented his findings to the owner, at first Marcus received a rather cool reception. “It couldn’t be that,” he was told. “We’ve had foreign-speaking crew members for years.” Marcus persevered and explained that with sophisticated project management software and advancing construction methods, available down time and slack time on many projects were at all-time lows. In other words, construction projects were literally being completed at a quicker pace each year, and the timing, coordination, and precision compared to past operations was a marvel to behold.

Operating at a more efficient pace with little or no slack also meant that there was less overall time for bonding among the workers and conversation in general. Perhaps modern management efficiencies contributed to a “tipping point” in regard to maintaining the human touch.

Slowly but Surely

By and by, the owner acknowledged that Marcus’s analysis likely was correct. He then became interested in the strategy that Marcus had devised to “overturn turnover.”

As a result of making his rounds and collecting the input of many others, as well as collecting articles from construction industry magazines on this same topic, Marcus had developed a multipart strategy. It was innovative, even if simple and inexpensive. And the owner liked it!

Marcus’s plan involved having each foreperson attend a short training program that he himself would personally design. The program would last 90 minutes and only require one handout with printing on both sides of the page. Here is the handout that Marcus devised:

After the Handout

Marcus covered the entire program during this session and then requested each foreperson to employ at least one of the measures, with each crew member, at least once per week. With, say, 15 crew members on a project, the foreperson was responsible for one of the following measures per crew member, per week, for a total averaging three such instances a day:

◾  Offering an encouraging word in the crew member’s native tongue

◾  Giving workers unannounced, on-the-spot breaks

◾  Rotating leadership among some groups, and so on

Each project manager would then report back to Marcus at the close of each work week so that they could assess progress.

Happily, progress was visible from the first day on! Foreign-born crew members perked up immediately when people said a few words or phrases to them in their native language.

After the first week, forepersons reported an increased level of vibrancy, higher morale, and even a higher energy level. At the end of several weeks, the forepersons were convinced that the program was sound.

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Marcus Scores Big—After several months, as they looked at the data on a project-by-project basis, Marcus and the owner determined that turnover rates were dropping. Workers were staying onboard longer and didn’t need to be replaced as often. Project profitability was rising. Both Marcus and the owner certainly felt great about that.