The Wooten Company, an engineering consulting firm celebrating its 80th anniversary this year, announced on Monday that it has opened a new Regional Office in the Old Salem Historic District of downtown Winston-Salem, NC. Overseen by Regional Manager John Grey, PE, the office was previously located in Asheboro, NC, from where it served the towns,…
Integrated Delivery – Why Is It?
Integrated delivery is a delivery method that embraced 360 degree collaboration between all the stakeholders on a project; including designers, consultants, general contractor, subcontractor, vendors, and yes the owner. Design-build (DB) and Integrated Project Delivery (IPD) are two examples of integrated delivery. There are numerous differences between the various contract forms of both DB and…
Should You Get Out of the Contracting Business?
That may seem like a strange resolution for a contractor. However, it might be the best advice you ever receive. How many people do you think wake up in the morning and say to themselves, “I can’t wait to hire a contractor today?” If you do service work, it’s even worse. No one wakes up…
Improving Leadership Effectiveness
In a previous issue of The Garrison Report, I discussed effective leadership. Using the following techniques will improve your leadership effectiveness and allow you to deliver a lot more value to your organization. 1. Have a list of people to whom you can delegate certain issues. We all have challenges, opportunities, problems or important tasks that need to be…
Sell Value and Increase Profitability
Daniel Pink, author of A Whole New Mind, identified the primary cause of the construction industry’s low-profit margins. He wrote, “For business, it’s no longer enough to create a product that’s reasonably priced and adequately functional.” Unfortunately, that’s what the construction industry attempts to do when it bids work based on price. The problem with…
Does Your Construction Company Need to Change to Increase Profitability?
The current recession has placed tremendous pressure on the profitability of the construction industry, causing some contractors to even take work at below cost. This situation is easy to blame on the recession, but the underlying problems existed in the construction industry long before the recession. The hypercompetitive nature of the construction industry has existed…
