Market Forces - Surviving vs. Thriving

Construction contracting is a highly competitive business in a rapidly changing market.

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Leadership Tools: Surviving or Thriving. Innovator or Fast Follower.

The “Invisible Hand” of the market is constantly demanding that construction projects are delivered:

  • Lower Cost
  • Faster
  • Higher Quality

Whether you are looking at your individual career, a contracting business or the whole value stream of delivering completed projects to a customer you must constantly be focused on being competitive.

Just to survive you must be adapting faster than the slowest of your competition.  Survival is not guaranteed and just surviving is not fun.  

To thrive you must be in the top 20% of your competition with a team that can rapidly adapt and scale innovations.  There are multiple ways to innovate:

When you are in a business with single-digit net profits every bit of discipline in operations matters.


Learn how we help contractors define the right strategies and improve their operations


Market Forces - Surviving vs. Thriving
Field labor is the often the biggest variable on a construction project - making it the biggest risk and opportunity....

Market Forces - Surviving vs. Thriving
Field labor is the often the biggest variable on a construction project - making it the biggest risk and opportunity....

Cash Flow Tip 12 - Rapid Close-Out = Good Cash Flow
If you effectively manage the startup and the close-out of the project, then the execution in-between mostly takes care of itself.
Benchmarks Only Tell a Partial Story
As the leader of a contracting business, you must be constantly focused on the basic scoreboard metrics of customer satisfaction, profitability, and cash flow. What’s a good number? What are others doing?
Required Leadership Focus Changes at Each Stage of Growth
At each stage of growth, the leadership focus at the top for majority Owners/CEO/President must change to continue navigating growth effectively. Concurrently, the leadership focus from the prior stage of growth must be transferred and expanded downward.