Harold - Case Study

Fragment 1 - How to Run a Job in the Field

My first question to Harold was based on my own personal experience of meeting superintendents who worked for other companies and my ability to tell that they had once worked for Davis Mechanical. I remember on a hospital project in North Carolina how amazed I was that the rhythm of the crews was so seamless, and how productive they were. What I observed was:

The Superintendent had done his own material take off for each work area.

He had organized the material and flow of material so that each morning the crew in each work area had the equipment and tools that it needed.

He met with the lead craftsman each morning and discussed the work to be done by reviewing the prints, the specification requirements for quality and tests, what the goals were for the end of the day. He would highlight on the drawings the work to be accomplished and at the end of the day, would highlight in a different color what was accomplished. So the drawings became the plan of work and the earned value measurement.

Each night, the Superintendent would meet with the other trade foremen or superintendents to discuss the work ahead and how they could best work together to avoid collisions between them. These meetings may last only a few minutes but they were very important to the success of the project.

During the day, the Superintendent would walk the job to make sure it was going according to plan, discuss issues with the lead man or the foreman. If there were conflicts, he would meet quickly with the general contractor's superintendent to resolve, or with other trade contractors' supervisors to work out the problem. It seemed that everything was done in "real time" so that there were occasionally speed bumps in the road but no "stop signs". I would soon use a two-bit word that has become almost trite among the recent self-proclaimed project management gurus and that is "collaboration." I saw on this job that the superintendent could not even spell that word, but this is what he did. This was the mark of a "Davis Superintendent."

And at the end of the week, the Superintendent added another week's planning to his three week look ahead schedule, which was then discussed with other trade contractors' supervisors and the General Contractor's Superintendent. On Thursday he would contact his project manager to give me an update on progress and support that would be needed on Monday morning for the upcoming week.

I had seen these practices among other former Davis Supervisors and so I assumed that Harold had developed a written policy for how to run a job and that there were extensive training sessions. However, I was surprised by his answer, for he seemed puzzled that such a process would be done. According to Harold:

The success of the field operation came from the fact that he had a mechanical engineering firm prior to purchasing Davis Mechanical.

That meant that his key employees (project managers) were extremely competent in the technical side of the business, but they also had extensive "boots on the ground" field experience. They had created the drawings and had been in the field to see the implementation of those drawings in the actual construction process.

The field supervisors were brought in during the estimate phase to give their input on labor units and to provide input on constructability which could give the estimators an edge in getting the job. Thus, when Davis acquired the work, the supervisor already had an ownership interest in it.

Because of the supervisors' input in the estimate phase, they had at least a toe in the water in pre-planning. They already knew the job and could more quickly figure out the initial steps to create momentum.

And Harold provided a bonus to superintendents for meeting and exceeding labor manhours, which again gave them an incentive to figure out how to succeed in spite of obstacles that may come their way.

The hand in glove of the experienced project manager and the superintendent was a major component of the field success of these early projects. But there was more.

In part, because Harold had seen Davis Mechanical prior to his purchase and was aghast at its lack of organization and practices which were often not ethical, he developed something of a professional paranoia and was not willing to simply rely on cost reports and progress reports to tell him how his projects were going. Instead, he went to as many jobs as possible, walked them, chatted with the crews, had parties with the staff in the evening. In the post World War II days when the U.S. was in the cold war with Russia and the possibility of a nuclear war was more than just science fiction, it was necessary for all of the B-52 and missile bases to be "on ready" at any given second. And the head of Strategic Command, Curtis LeMay, made frequent unannounced visits to this bases and inspected to assure there were no foul-ups and if there were, heads rolled. As a result, SAC was at the top of its game every minute, twenty-four seven. Harold seemed to have the same philosophy and felt that the possibility of his visitation alone was a motivation to the field to "get it right the first time".

Harold believed the best management technique was "coaching". More can be gained by the one on one instruction, challenge, and often intimidation than all the seminars or project manuals you can devise. The whole concept of apprenticeship and internship programs is built around coaching, the master providing face to face input while the apprentice learns his trade. And coaching is required at all levels of a company, from the field up. And thus, while modern gurus believe in "kaizen" or continued improvement, Harold seemed to believe that improvement came from these components:

  • First, learn the right way to do things.
  • Second, do the right things.
  • Third, have checks and balances to make sure the first two are being done.
  • Fourth, through "coaching", that is the involvement on a personal basis of the leaders of the company in challenging the supervisors to continually strive to meet and exceed their goals, to become "solution providers", to figure out how to overcome the bumps in the road, was making "total quality management" an integral part of one's job, every day, every hour. TQM programs often fail because they become separate parts of a company, laden with administrative requirements. But though Harold never read anything by Demming or others in TQM, the concept of customer satisfaction through continual improvement in work performance as a part of the structure of the company was an inherent part of the culture of Davis Mechanical.

And my observation is that there was definitely a "culture" in Davis Mechanical. In Japan, the foremen become leaders of their crews on and off the job. They work together, and they play together. They are a true family unit. In Davis Mechanical, in the early days at least, this same culture at the field level existed. Supervisors would take their crews (family units) with them to off site locations and thus the quality performance of Davis was easily transportable throughout his geographic market area.

Yet, it is obvious that Harold sought outside input. He stayed on top of the technical innovations in his industry and doubtlessly his engineering background was an important consideration in this regard. Further, there was once a giant in the construction management consulting profession by the name of Emol Fails. Harold turned to Dr. Fails on more than one occasion and did use him to conduct programs for his staff. Having known Dr. Fails, I am sure that even infrequent programs by him in Davis had a significant influence on all who heard him speak, but Harold was wise enough to know that the genius is in implementation of one's knowledge more than the knowledge itself. And that occurred through the personal involvement that Harold himself had with all the major projects and his staff.

In the days of my father's construction (the 30s through the 60s), it seemed that the field supervisors did their cost accounting in their heads. My father actually had a white dress shirt for each of his jobs. On the left sleeve, he had important bid data (manhours per various tasks, e.g.) and on the right sleeve he would maintain actual data that he observed when he walked a job. For example, on the left sleeve, he might have 18cents per square foot for rubbing and finishing a concrete wall and on the right sleeve, he would have the cost per square foot for rubbing for each day he walked the job. And his superintendent also knew morning, noon and night, what the job was costing him. This concept of knowing where you were in real time, using your head and not the computer, was also an essential element of the culture of Davis Mechanical. This was the supervisor's job. So if the early trend of a work activity was demonstrating an overrun, measures could be taken early on to improve or to mitigate the cost. This was the "engineering mentality" the supervisors were to have. How often have I seen on my father's jobs a supervisor doing sketch drawings on a brown paper bag that had contained his lunch earlier in the day, as he continued to plan, to figure out, to improve. Again, this was the culture that was endemic in the industry and in Davis Mechanical at the time.

If I were to visit modern jobs, I would find that many of the more advanced contractors have used technology to aid the supervisor or sometimes to replace the creativity of the supervisor of days gone by. For example, I would find:

  • The use of Building Information Models
  • The use of computerized cost reports and earned value reporting
  • The implementation of Lean Construction Practices, including the concept of the Last Planner and Pull Management.
  • Commissioning to assure that things were done right.
  • Built-in-Quality concepts, instead of inspect and correct.
  • Computerized schedules ( that often are not being used effectively or at all)

And still I will find project after project which is sick with overruns, conflicts, workmanship problems and claims.

And so, from all of this and studies of what other companies are doing, I would consider doing the following where field supervision is concerned if I were to be the head of a construction company today:

  1. Understand that my greatest risk is labor.
  1. Hire and train field supervisors who can be excellent at managing labor.
  • They will have the technical skills
  • They will have the relationship skills
  • They will have supervisory skills
  • They will be able to communicate and not brag about not liking to write
  • They will have computer skills
  • They will be educated in the techniques of planning (they would be steeped in the 25/10 concept attached.)
  • They will be educated in the techniques of scheduling
  • They will educated in how to improve productivity
  • They will receive adequate training in construction contract, claims prevention
  • They will be trained in documentation management
  • They will be able to monitor earned value
  • They will be trained in how to coordinate their work with others
  • They will be trained in the meaning of customer obsession
  • They will be trained in supply chain management
  • They will be trained in the techniques of built in quality (the three step approach) among others
  1. And there will be a Best Practices Committee comprised of field supervisors who continue to develop and communicate to other field personnel practices that work, improved techniques, and who will be an interface with company management to assure the field continues to receive adequate support from the home office. I would listen to my field supervisors. I have attended management meetings where top management asks for input only to have the supervisors say: "Sir, you have been having these meetings for years and have never implemented a single suggestion we have given you." And how often do we chastise field supervisors for not making daily reports or providing adequate information only to find out that the project managers are not reading them anyway. I would not ask the supervisor to write down one word if the project managers were not going to use those reports.
  1. I would definitely use BIM or some form thereof as a planning tool. People respond better to pictures than to words or lines on a drawing.
  1. I would have my supervisors develop look ahead schedules (six week or more, weekly, and daily). And then monitor to make sure that the performance goals in those schedules were being met, daily, not just at the end of a month or so. My supervisors would be trained to work with the supervisors of other trades to discuss the best way of doing things (priority conversations they are called, such as how to handle priority walls so that coordination becomes a way of life and not a deliverable document)
  1. I would provide adequate recognition to my supervisors, both in the form of pats on the back and financial as well. I would take care of them and their families, but remember, I would not have C players. I would have at least B players and climbing. I would not have a B player who is standing still.
  1. My project managers would realize their duty to support the field, in providing information, decisions, material, equipment and leadership. The project manager and the superintendent would be a Siamese Twin, joined at the hip and joined at the brain thinking and working toward a common goal. And they would remember, as true Siamese Twins know, that if one fails, the other fails, if one dies so does the other. Thus there would be a real unity, a 1+1 that would equal one (unity) and then 1+1 could equal three (sum plus arithmetic).
  1. Top management would periodically walk jobs but so would people from accounting, purchasing, the shop, CAD. I would get them out of the comfort of the office and into the real world with the troops with the boots on the ground. In the old days at Cessna, some one from the manufacturing plant would be in the cockpit of the test flight of each new plane that went out the factory door. It gave the factory worker a new perspective, that the quality of his work might affect his own safety one day. And the accountant, payroll clerk and other home office people need to feel that they will ride that airplane one day, that they are also a part of the success of the projects and the company.
  1. Each job would be kicked off by reading the attached story of the construction of the Empire State Building, to get across the idea of creative planning which can be assisted by the computer but can never be replaced by it.
  1. And I would demand one thing among all others: HONESTY. Honesty in reporting information to the home office, honesty in not concealing problems, honesty in preparing daily reports. And like in the old days of Martin K. Eby, one of the giants of the industry in the sixties and seventies, I would fire those who were not honest. I can correct incompetence, but like the man says: You can correct ugly, but you can't correct stupidity. Well, you can correct an honest mistake, but it is very difficult to change one's character and dishonesty is one of those character flaws that seems to be like the battery . . .it just keeps going and going. Most companies which get into serious trouble will discover that key personnel have been improperly and knowingly misreporting job costs. And when top management discovers reality, it is often too late. If a project gets into trouble and if the problem is discovered and reported in real time, something can be done to mitigate damages but history cannot be changed. As soon as you realize that the light at the end of the tunnel is a Mack Truck, you can do something to avoid the collision or lessen its impact. Once the Truck hits you at sixty miles per hour, once the wreck has occurred, you are not into damage assessment, not prevention. Dishonest reporting leads to a collision every time.
  1. I would train my supervisors to stop bitching about others. Covey in the Seven Habits recommends that before we begin placing blame on others that we should clean up our own house. He recommends against "confessing the sins of others!. On my projects, I would forbid the use of pronouns such as "He", "They" and replace them with "I". Instead of saying: "That stupid architect still hasn't given us a decision" I would have my supervisor say: "I have not provided the information or the persuasion necessary to get a timely decision" (That is not always the case, but begin with YOU, not HIM). In other words, I would develop responsibility and accountability in my supervisors to the extent it poured out their ears and not abide a syndrome of being a victim and blaming others. And when my supervisor made a promise to perform a task with certain manpower and within a certain time frame, he would live up to that promise. Reliability would be a characteristic of all my supervisors.

Fragment 2- What Went Wrong