The other day I was visiting over breakfast with a contractor friend of mine, and we were discussing various issues pertaining to running an effective construction business. He mentioned a statement to me that many times we fail to think about, and I thought as adults we should be reminded of from time to time. This statement was: “Everything you do says something about you”
It is really a simple statement that says a lot! Think about how we operate day to day as construction business owners and managers. Do we make mistakes because we rush through our daily business activities? Are we well dressed and clean? Are our trucks and company cars clean inside and out? Is our work turned in timely? Do we show up to jobsites, meetings or other events in a timely fashion? Are we always rushing to bid work? Do we give ourselves time to put together a solid well thought out bid? Are our quantity takeoffs accurate? Are we using good estimating figures to send out a profitable bid? Is our home, office or other work space clean or unorganized? I can go on and on. The real truth is that no matter what you look at, all these items are a direct reflection of who you really are.
So after thinking about this statement for a while I started to think about my life and how I operate both personally and in business. I found that I fall into the same trap as many others. I am not as organized or as neat as I can be. I am not as timely or as accurate on bid documents or other business activities, and so on. Yes, I can improve. I just have to take the time to slow down and plan a little better, prioritize better, and to learn and leverage the experts around me better.
The cause of many of these issues comes from some simple facts that we need to focus on improving: time, organizational skills, self-discipline, self-pride, and continued learning and education. Some questions we can ask of ourselves are: How do I manage my time? How do I organize myself, my crews, and my employees in the office? Do I delegate work effectively? Do I manage people well? Do I train people in my office to do their respective jobs? Are my people held accountable and do they report to me as a manager well. Do I do my employees work? Do I put things off that I do not want to do or do I make those items first on my list every day. Do I eliminate items I do not want to do completely? Do the items I do complete make me the expert? Do I have much self-pride? Do I dress well? Am I well groomed for the position I want to portray. Am I organized at my desk, my workplace, at home, etc? Is my work on-time, complete, and accurate? Are my company trucks clean and visually appealing? Do I carry a smile with me day to day? Does my company have developed systems and processes that allow employees to communicate, transfer information and to learn in in an effective manner? Do I use experienced mentors well? Do I ask enough questions to draw out information from other successful business people? These are just a few items to consider.
We all are going to make mistakes in just about everything we do. What we don’t want to do is to make such large mistakes that really extinguish ourselves and our business or repeat mistakes over and over. We want to be open to learning and to knowing that success is a journey not an event. That it takes time to build a sustainable business; one that will can be run successfully whether or not you are there every day.
If we really and truly want to be the best at what we do, we have to become an expert. To become an expert takes time, nearly 10,000 hours of refining what it is that we are. We do this through educating ourselves through extended learning mediums, by real life business experience, and a lot of time by speaking with other successful businessmen or women who become mentors to us. Can we become the best at everything in business? The answer is no. We must develop a plan to surround ourselves with people who can do the things we are not good at doing. We have to leverage others who have experience to help us, since we do not have the time (10,000 hours) to become an expert in a particular area of business.
If you are interesting in improving in any area of your business come to our Constructus International website at www.constructus.com to be educated, inspired, mentored and trained by experts who are willing to share their experiences with you. For a small monthly fee you can leverage the knowledge of others and help yourself develop the person and the company you truly want everyone else to see. Remember..”Everything you do says something about you!”
Thanks for reading!
-Tom Dedin
CEO- Constructus International