Q & A Episode 3 - Optimizing Construction Project Management and Embracing the Future of the Industry
Episode #3 | Q&A with Mark D. Williams | Optimizing Construction Project Management and Embracing the Future of the Industry
Mark discusses strategies for managing project managers and construction supervisors, including setting realistic expectations, creating schedule buffers, and improving the punch list process. He also shares his optimism about the future of the residential construction industry, citing opportunities for mentorship, entrepreneurship, and the use of technology to address labor shortages.
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About The Curious Builder
The host of the Curious Builder Posdast is Mark D. Williams, the founder of Mark D. WIlliams Custom Homes Inc. They are an award-winning Twin Cities-based home builder, creating quality custom homes and remodels — one-of-a-kind dream homes of all styles and scopes. Whether you’re looking to reimagine your current space or start fresh with a new construction, we build homes that reflect how you live your everyday life.
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00:00:00 Now the client moves in the house is clean the house is done and there's no punch list at this point anything that they discover while they've moved in is now on your one-year [Music] warranty welcome to the Cur Builder podcast I'm Mark Williams your host and welcome to Thursday's Q&A so today's first question is all about project managers and construction supervisors how many projects can they handle at any in time so that there's still Peak Performance but also managing your overhead uh this is a pretty loaded
00:00:36 question I've seen it handled a number of different ways with the different Size companies and I'm not sure anyone can perfectly answer this question because as we all know construction is constantly ebbing and flowing and so I think this is going to be a very you know specific to um this is very going to be very specific to each company and how they like to operate uh I'll use my own company for instance and we are a small team of four or five people and in the past I have had a project manager a senior project manager I've had a site
00:01:09 supervisor and a project coordinator so a team of three so collectively those three people will handle the estimating the bids they'll handle the contracts they'll handle precon so there a lot of it is depends on what they're all handling and so you know the way we kind of handle it is they would probably be able to handle for sure they have to handle three as a group anything less than that and I think the overhead burn is probably just too high and I think they probably could handle more than
00:01:40 five because I think once you get Beyond five the amount of details the amount of ordering just becomes overwhelming so for that particular group uh of three the way we we used to run it in years past I'd say between three to five was about the right number the problem is as we all know if you're in building is you don't always get to pick when your jobs start and I think that's the the most difficult challenge because you know we're always trying to get more design work so that we can fill the funnel and
00:02:09 then we obviously want to get going and inevitably a client will delay something or there'll be a permit delay and it always seems to happen uh projects start at the same time and that I would say starting at the same time and ending at the same time is your most difficult challenge regarding how to manage your workflow and your people so that they don't burn out so what we really try to do to combat that is we really insist that all selections are made before we start and we actually use it as a
00:02:40 selling tool that your home or your remodel is going to go faster if you allow us to do the work on the front end and I I think a lot of this has to do with education uh both from me as in charge of sales and us as the builders to our clients that really this is a process and if you don't give them another choice if they want to work with you this is your process it's also just going to be smoother I don't know why you know for 20 years I've been building and I would say for about 18 of them you
00:03:08 know I always thought more is better and faster is better but that's not true you would you know inevitably you would meet a client you would try to sign them up into a design retainer and You' try to just go go go go as quickly as you could and a lot of times it was the clients they wanted to go and I think when they don't know any better um of course they're G you give them an inch they'll take a mile or if you even worse just being someone who's a very optimistic and sales forward individual is I would
00:03:35 sell them like yeah I'd build up the excitement let's go this is exciting let's go go go go so in some ways I was My Own Worst Enemy um it's like a cutting a hole in your ship and then driving it faster and wondering why your ship is sinking uh you've got too many holes in it and so I think really slowing the process down coming up with a pretty mapped out process on the front end especially pre-construction so that you can allow for proper time for the actual build I think is going to help regulate both your project managers and
00:04:05 your site supervisors as well as making sure you're not burning people out I also think checking in with your team what I often do now when I'm taking on a new job especially a remodel or if somebody says hey do you have the capacity to take on another job I always say yes I have capacity to take on design work in the way that I handle it from there is um you know it's first come first serve you know we try not to have two jobs start at the same time I explained my to my client this and so I can't tell you when your job is going to
00:04:36 start because we haven't even finished designing it or pricing it you know I'll give them a time frame hey we'll start probably within this three to six month window you know does that sound good to you and so you're really sort of already prepping the client for not a delay but just a realistic expectation of time and you're also giving yourself some buffer I think also when you build your uh your schedule it's really important to create some buffers in your schedule I think we as an industry are notorious
00:05:03 for over promising and undering and you can't get crazy about it I mean you can't add six months of extra fluff to a schedule and then just tell your client like oh surprise we're done four months early um you know you have to be more reasonable than that but one thing that's been a huge change for us is everyone at the end of the project is so stressed out because the last 30 days of a build is it's a lot of hands on deck and of course the client sees the end coming they're excited they're likely
00:05:29 moving out of a rent home you know they're arranging for movers and for Furnitures and once that date is sort of set like they are ready to go and that date is pretty much hard to change so one thing that we I got some advice from another Builder on this um and it was extremely valuable is we tell them that can move in their house about 30 to 45 days before we know the exact date we'll kind of give them an an estimated time and it's on the schedule we use Builder Trend so they can see the schedule but
00:05:58 we actually add a 30-day buffer at the end and it says right on there it's a 30-day movein period and where I'm going with this is that we all have run into problems with callbacks and with your punch list items and and what I used to do and I don't know why this was a good idea is you would build go as fast as you could to the very end and then you would do let's say a walkth through on a Monday and closing was going to be on a Friday so You' you'd walk through on Monday You' you'd identify all the
00:06:27 things that the client didn't like or maybe stuff was on back and you have four days to fix it before you move in and clean the house and move in the furniture and all these other things like that's just never going to happen especially with the caliber of homes that we build but honestly just in any any home that you build that's not a great idea and so what we do now is we have a 30-day window from that date so we will when once we do the walkth through which we have on our on our schedule that we will not do that um
00:06:54 meeting with the client until we have a substantial completion or a certificate of occup from the city so a final inspection and we have 30 days from that final inspection where the city deems it it's you know habitable uh to live in we have 30 days to complete that punch list and what this does is this now we can still meet on that Monday we put everything on a list and we we have them sign it and if if it's not on that list then it goes on the one-year warranty list it's not a punch list item and not
00:07:25 only on that list do we have we will itemize every single item so let's just say you have 30 items and we'll assign a value to it and the reason we do this is let's say you have $200,000 owed on your last draw well I don't want the client holding us hostage for $200,000 for 20 grand of work so I'll say like painting five grand you know wood floor Nicks and dings 1500 you know maybe a window's missing $500,000 or whatever it is you itemize all these things out and then that money if you end up closing or for
00:07:58 whatever reason it's he escro and it's released as it comes across that way a homeowner cannot hold a contractor hostage for the work that they've done and I've seen this happen time and time again so now you have these 30 days you also have it itemized and you're doing all the work in those 30 days well guess what you're gonna get it all done unless there's something on back order or something like that now the client moves in the house is clean the house is done and there's no punch list at this point
00:08:27 anything that they discover while they've moved in is now on your one-year warranty you're not trying to schedule a way back into a home that they've just moved into that their movers probably Nick some walls you know their kids have probably done something as well and now you're sort of in this grace period of like well you're here anyway can you just fix it you don't have to get into any of that plus you know it's probably been a year or two years during the build it just allows them to move into
00:08:50 their home kind of get settled it usually takes you know 30 to 60 days to for a couple to kind of feel acclimated into their new home and obviously you'll show up and maybe walk them through how to use things or you we often will have our hvat company our av company schedule individual appointments with the clients so they can come out and understand their own system because I always find like yes I can tell them how to do it uh but really the expert in that category should be the one leading them through
00:09:19 you know the walkthrough of their own home the other benefit of if the other benefit of this is if there if there's an issue and when there's an issue they will call those people Direct ly and so I know this is a pretty big answer to the question but I think it does sort of Encompass all of it I think the other part about managing project managers and site managers depending on the size of your company is how far are you looking down the road are you forecasting work and you know I mentioned this a little
00:09:46 bit earlier is we will ask our clients um I'm sorry I'll ask my trade partners and my project managers and site managers hey how are you feeling on a scale from one to 10 how maxed are maxed out are you um usually it's pretty much all hands- on deck for those last 30 days and so if they're really in the middle of a big push you know I'm going to make sure that I'm not starting another house while another house is ending to within my ability if it's the same project manager now if you have multiple teams obviously you have the
00:10:15 capability of doing that but if you're running a small set of of project manager and site managers you definitely want to make sure you're not starting a job while you're closing one that just is a recipe for disappointment and overwork hey everyone I wanted to talk to you today about CB USA the industry's leading group purchasing organization they make it possible for home builders like me and probably many of you to get better pricing and grow your bottom line I'll be joining the new local chapter
00:10:39 here in Minneapolis and I look forward to working with the other top builders in the area to drive down material costs cbusa has chapters all over the US and they're continuing to span every year you can learn more about the benefits and apply for membership by going to CB usa. uslearn that's CB usa. uslearn additionally if you want to hear my interview with Ryan lipek from cbusa that's episode number 26 so hopefully that was helpful the second question that was asked is where do I see the future of residential construction going
00:11:12 with the lack of people entering the trades I've heard a number of different stats about this something like for every seven HVAC individuals that are leaving uh that you know have their Master license and are leaving they there's only one to take their place or for every five plumbers that are leaving only one is taking their place um I don't doubt that's happening I mean as I look around at some of the crews you know you definitely see a lot of silver hair and um you know a lot of that knowledge is leaving the industry
00:11:41 however as I look around I feel like this has been going on for quite a while I think a couple things are happening one is I think podcasts like myself and other people we are we are pounding the drum and we are talking about it a lot and you see it in the media you see it in the newspaper you see on social media and I think the Young Generation sees a great opportunity here uh here in Minnesota uh alone I think we're 100,000 homes short of what our our demographic needs well man if you're looking at
00:12:10 starting a business you'd be pretty hardpressed to finding another career you know with um outside of the construction world that you could own your business as quick as you could within the construction world and so there's so much opportunity for entrepreneurship and there's so much opportunity for mentorship you know if I can imagine if you're a 65-year-old and this is your life's work and maybe your kids don't want to be involved maybe you have no one to sell it to like they they are yearning they love their
00:12:36 craft has been good to them like they would be happy to take somebody under their wing you know give them a career give them a job and sort of if they're the right fit they would do a transition of power so I think there's a great opportunity for those that are in their teens and in their early 20s honestly even in your 30s to find a a career that you like or a a passion that you have and see where it can go I think approach people that own their businesses and ask them what is your transition plan um I
00:13:06 think Builders it might be a little bit different most Builders will have a hard time selling their their business I'll use myself as an example you know Mark Williams Custom Homes I'm a small company you know I I think without me I don't think my company exists but you take a plumbing company that works for 20 or 30 Builders they have a uh a warranty division they have a bunch of maybe it's it's a mix between professional clients and residential clients you have a book of business that plumbing business is very sellable
00:13:36 electricians painters this list goes kind of on and on where it's more repeatable work there's huge opportunity there I think if I could go back in my career I think I would buy I probably personally would buy a plumbing company or maybe an electric company or an HVAC company probably HVAC frankly and I just think that there's so much opportunity there I think the margins are really good and there's so much opportunity I mean as a builder I look around you know there's three or four HVAC companies I
00:14:03 work with I've worked with one company for 40 years between my company and my dad's and they recently sold now that new company doesn't have a lot of interest in uh working with new construction they just want to do warranty work well now there's an opportunity now I'm looking at you know two or three other HVAC companies and exploring New Opportunities and those individuals are not the youngest people either one of them is and so that makes me encouraged I think also you know and this is only my own self-reflection to
00:14:29 this question not speaking to the industry at large but I'm also really encouraged uh we have a young framing crew I mean these guys have got to be 23 24 they're very young and they are so eager to learn and their customer service is phenomenal and I think that next generation is also really into building science I mean they're watching YouTube clips they're watching they're listening to podcasts I think that older generation you know they didn't grow up with it and so they're not either interested in it they don't have enough
00:14:57 time for it or they're like you know what I've got got a couple years left in my career you know I'm not going to teach an old dog new tricks not that you can't but I just think that there's a lot of energy with the younger people so I I would say if you're a builder out there if you're a remodeler and you're looking at hiring a company look at the age of their employees don't just meet the owner ask them about their staff ask them about their you know I don't even know if it's legal but ask them about
00:15:20 the ages of their of their people or maybe just ask to meet them I mean you can just visually look at somebody and understand if they're a little bit younger and I find it really encouraging when I see a lot of young guys my electrician super young team uh my cabinet shop same age as I am although I've got silver hair here so it's uh I may not be I'm more middle age now at this point and so I I think there's a lot of energy I think there's going to be a lot of advancements in technology too I mean I can't say that I'm an
00:15:45 expert at all in artificial intelligence or AI but it's definitely coming to help us a lot and so I know we use AI with adaptive they're one of our main sponsors for the podcast amazing company they handle all their draws and all of our bill pay our a payments they have taken hours and hours not only a day but I mean months of our time per year in savings so it if that helps my office staff that that frees them up to do more bids maybe it frees them up to help me out in the field things like that so I
00:16:18 don't think we're going to see AI obviously pounding Nails in or painting people's homes but if it can help you with your bill pay so let's say you're a painting company you know can you spend two hours less a week working on invoicing uh if you are a framer and you're spending all day in the field and you've got to go and and pay all your people but you can spend a couple hours less a week doing that because you've got some AI assistants amazing obviously when it comes to marketing AI is incredible for blog writing for just
00:16:47 writing in general most of AI tends to be either task orientated or seems to have some sort of language model so if you do a lot of writing a lot of emails I think we're going to see huge advancements there that ultimately are going to help spell the gap on some of the labor shortages I think we're going to see probably more sip panels and some more prefab home construction um you know we do pretty high-end Custom Homes and I know you can do it but some of the framing has to be maybe a little bit
00:17:14 simpler uh depends a lot on your roof Gables and some of the roof details but I'm sure a lot of the wall assemblies especially if you're thinking about it ahead of time with the architect and and assembling the team a lot of this is going to be able to bu be built in a factory and I think if you're building a factory you now are going to have straighter walls you're going to have a controlled environment there's a lot of pros and then guess what you can do all of this you know before you even come on
00:17:40 site so you could have let's say you had a 10,000 foot house or 5,000 foot house or whatever if all the walls are built you know rather than spending several weeks or a couple months of putting up all the walls and Floors you could do it in a couple days with a crane and I think we're going to see some advancements in speed which again this the people are just going to have to get more efficient and this is one of the ways that I think it's going to happen so I also think that with Rising tuitions I feel like every day when I
00:18:05 open the paper you know I see that you know our local universities are you know raising their tuitions by 5% eight% and you know at some PE Point people are going to stop paying 40 50 60 80 $100,000 a year in you know college education and what is it that they're really doing and I think you have Advocates of construction it's a great life um you get to build something that's really tangible so I think again not only just the podcast but I think with YouTube and Instagram people showing what they're doing uh the
00:18:36 construction world has has an amazing story to tell and I think as video is especially short form video is so powerful I think it's going to really capture the attention um of the younger generation because it's very visual I mean for years I've seen my framers where they'll take a video of the work that they've done that day and then they'll post it or text around well the world of sharing is so much bigger than it was 10 years ago that now those messages you know get liked by 10,000 20,000 you know however big It Go gets
00:19:07 it's just it's just broadcasting what you've actually done and there's no nothing wrong with being an engineer or you know being an accountant or working on a computer all day I mean frankly as a builder I do spend a lot of time on my computer but my point is is like it is very satisfying at the end of the day to walk off a job site and look at that home and be like we put all the windows in today uh we put a roof on a house today um it is really satisfying to see something that is physically a
00:19:34 manifestation of your work and when I ask um people what they find most validating about their job that is right up there with one of the tops I think also interacting with people you know being outside uh working with your hands um there's just so much opportunity you know and if you're and if you're into marketing there's tons of opportunity for marketing so honestly construction kind of has everything going for it so I feel like it just needs it's more about awareness and education and I think the
00:20:01 people will come I think we're going to see a great surge um of younger people coming into the trades I think we're obviously we're in a low right now I don't know how long that low will last is it five years is it 10 years but I think as you have a dir of talent and a lot of people exit prices are going to increase which is not great um but you're going to see people are going to move into that because it can make a lot of money if you have nobody it's going to be a supply and demand model and not
00:20:27 only will the homes go up but so will wages so will demand and so people that are really interested in starting a business or starting a career I don't know if I could pick another career where you would have better upside especially if you want to own your own business thanks for tuning in to the Curious Builder podcast we'll see you next week we're happy to announce that on August 1st Mark Williams Custom Homes and the joy collaborative are holding a charitable event at one of our past Builds on Medicine Lake if you're
00:20:55 interested in raising money to help out children with disabilities there's over over 66,000 Kids in Need in Minnesota alone we'd love for you to attend details can be found on our website the curus Builder podcast.com or any of our social channels we hope to see you there additionally if you want to hear more about the joy collaborative please listen to Episode 34 on the cous Builder podcast we're excited to announce that we've opened up another curious Collective for the last year we've had the Curious Builder Collective we now
00:21:23 have the curus Builder Collective for designers the first ones will be happening in September all the details are going to be on our website we have 30 spots available half of them have already filled We additionally have eight spots left in the Builder Collective if you're interested in getting together in small groups of nine with local Minneapolis based Builders and designers in separate groups and talking about your business talking about your Brands asking those questions that you wish you could ask another
00:21:48 business owner then this is the place for you details can be found at the cous builder podcast.com [Music] thanks for listening to the Cur Builder podcast if you like what you listen to please give us a five-star rating and write us a review it really means a lot it's a great way for us to just understand what you like about the podcast and what we can keep doing so like and review and please share with your friends and family find out more at curiousb Builder podcast.com [Music]
