Tricia Atallah is founder of SoundBuild, a part of Navigant Consulting as of December. She is also the author of Building a Successful Construction Company.

Building a Top Team in a Boom Market

Construction industry firms are reaching out for short-term and long-term solutions to the looming workforce crisis.

by Tricia Atallah

Times are good. We are in the midst of the biggest construction boom in the New York region in recent memory, and it’s not going to let up any time soon.

But times are also tough. We’re caught up in a frenzy of activity that, if we don’t deliver, can bring us crashing down.

Challenges posed by volatile conditions in labor, materials, supplies, and logistics, along with tightened financing and insurance markets, raise the level of risk. The building development and construction firms that thrive in this environment have broad strategic management capabilities, depth of technical expertise, and organizations that empower employees to perform efficiently and effectively.

That’s a tall order for any company seeking to meet those requirements today in an industry that historically has done little to attract, develop, and retain good management talent, and is now losing its senior people to retirement. Our “Achilles Heel” – a shortage of good people – has been fully exposed.

Stretched to the max, construction firms are assigning their “B” or even “C” teams to top projects, putting themselves at risk of loss or even failure. They are also disappointing demanding clients who expect excellent service and top-quality results.

We can’t make up for lost time in the management development department. And we can’t make supply catch up with demand overnight. For the time being, we have to use a band-aid of short-term solutions.

Industry participants are scrambling to recruit talent from other firms locally or outside the region. They are also chasing after a limited pool of graduates from architectural, engineering, and construction management programs. And even with higher salaries, firms still have to fight tooth and nail to retain people.

Even the largest players are making special efforts to bridge the gaps. Many are teaming up with competitors on the larger projects to assemble a viable project team.  Others are outsourcing work to independent consultants and luring retired professionals back to work.  

Another short-term fix that could even yield long-term benefits would be to look beyond the industry for talent, a routine practice in other fields. We could widen our search for experts in planning, systems, logistics, operations management, and procurement, as well as for generalists in executive management, organizational development, human resources, marketing, and finance.

Of course, this strategy will be expensive, but it's the price we have to pay to create a larger pool of viable candidates who can bring ideas, approaches, and methodologies that have proven successful in other fields. One banker I know who was recently hired as the CFO of a mid-size construction firm told me, “My immediate goal is to improve the company's financial controls. In the meantime, I'll begin to learn the ins and outs of the industry.”

Taking a longer view, we must heed the wake-up call. It is no cliché that people are our most important assets. We must focus on creating an environment conducive to recruiting, developing, and retaining good people. 

We have little choice but to go back to the basics – efforts that will lay a sound foundation for long-term staffing stability. I outlined many of these steps in my recently published book, Building a Successful Construction Company:

• Communicating a focused business strategy with clear-cut goals and objectives

• Managing prudently by calibrating company growth with capabilities and resources

• Implementing a strategic staffing plan

• Developing best practices, values, culture, and identity while also providing tools for planning, decision-making, and execution

• Improving the efficiency of company operations so that employees are able to work effectively as individuals and as a team

• Developing talent from within with clear-cut guidelines for career progression

• Motivating employees to take ownership of their jobs by making them accountable for results

• Providing clear-cut incentives and delivering rewards for performance

• Designing well-rounded training for technical staff with rotations in business functions

• Working with trade associations to develop training and professional development, and

• Partnering with universities to refine architectural, engineering, and construction management programs to make them more applicable in the real world.