It’s funny that a Maine-based construction company would need a “policy” about this, but you would be surprised how many companies tolerate horrible practices for relating. We outline our approach, and why we don’t waste time with jerks…
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As a contractor, one of the most important relationships we negotiate is with our subcontractors. They are the hands of the entire building operation; without them, nothing gets built. But how do you build better relationships with subcontractors?
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We think that excellent relationships are what undergird excellent building; it’s the key ingredient that makes a difference in our efficiency and in the quality of work we do.
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The Optimum Construction of today didn't pop out of thin air, the fully formed top-notch construction management firm it is today. It was a long road that involved a lot of hard work and hard-won successes.
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There’s an assumption that, under normal circumstances, a child will shed the stages of infancy, grow up and become a fully formed human adult. Applying the metaphor to a work environment it’s no different: employees may start out like uncertain infants, falling down every three steps, but with time, effort, and the right support they will come to own their roles and grow into new ones.
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How do you find the right people to work with you? Optimum Construction doesn’t have a magical formula to answer that question, but if you look at our employee track record, it’s obvious we’re doing something right. Our employees love working for us, and we love working with them.
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If you've spent any time around a construction job site, you've probably seen some version of this scene: Two guys, looking at a piece of work, scratching their heads. They look at each other shrug and say…"looks good from my house". With a chuckle and a nod and they turn to the next task of the day.
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One of the most important factors in every project, at any stage of its development or completion, is the question of dollars and cents. Of course it is! This is business after all, right? But, Optimum's central focus is building better relationships and if that is the case, the way we work with money must be more closely tied to our heartbeat than you'd think
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Experience is really only valuable if it is put to work, shared, known about, allowed to come onto the playing field. So, the question that matters more than the sheer number of years is what kind of team dynamic does that experience get to play in. How are the past experiences, mistakes, and achievements of each team member brought to bear on the daily work.
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If you've gotten a feel for how Optimum works and what we care about most, you might have asked yourself "Why make such a big deal of the whole "relationships" thing? Aren't you a commercial construction business?" And you'd be right to ask, we really are aiming for something quite different in the way we do the work we do.
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Jacob wanted something hands-on, something more collaborative, more relational. But how would he get his foot in the door? The answer to that question is a truly "Optimum" answer: through a relationship.
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Getting a job to that “done and done well” place takes a lot more than nuts, bolts, nails, wood, and steel. It takes people…..lots of people: clients, architects, trade apprentices, master carpenters, even the guy that cleans out the port-a-potty every week (yes, that’s part of the General Contractor’s job too).
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It’s early morning on a Friday. A couple of the Optimum guys are unfurling a nearly unending, thick vinyl banner, and they start to chuckle. Who’s going to be on this one? It’s become an office joke and a teamwide prank, to put each other’s faces on the long fence scrims that stretch around the Optimum job sites.
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Relationships are built at their own pace. There’s an inevitability that both frustrates us, and also becomes something we can rely on. “When the time is right” seems to be Newton’s unspoken law of relationship development.
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What you may not remember often enough, is that everybody comes from somewhere. Every great company had to “start” and it’s usually not that pretty of a picture at first.
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In our last blog with Marcus Golding (which obviously you’ve read, annotated and committed to memory) he mentioned off-hand that Optimum is expanding their work within the custom homes market along the coast of Maine.
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It’s Monday morning and Marcus Golding is getting, to use his word, “roasted”. It’s Optimum’s weekly team meeting and as a Project Manager, he’s well used to it. “Listen, most of us do something stupid most days and getting roasted keeps our feet on the ground, keeps us humble and keeps us driven. It’s how you know you’re part of the family at Optimum, when you get roasted on a Monday.”
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Today we are looking at the Optimum Construction Sales Call. How to close new business, Optimum-style. For some companies, this would be a venture inside the SPAM factory, a place you’d rather not visit, because ignorance is bliss.
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As a Superintendent for Optimum, Jesse Eastman is charged with turning renderings into reality. His job daily requires him to play interpreter between the digitized, CAD, perfect-plumb-and-square plans of the architect and the concrete and wood of the subcontractors.
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It’s easy to get the momentum going and just start grinding through the days, the weeks, the months and eventually the years. Momentum can help us get a lot done! But, a wide-receiver can’t catch the ball unless he’s running with his head up.
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