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8 Tips to Grow Your Construction Company

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Once you have started your own construction company you may be looking for ideas to help you grow and develop your business. 

Here are some recommendations on how to grow your construction company: 


1.  Hire Good People

At some point, you will want to hire employees to help you grow your construction business. Ensure you know how to write a good job description, develop good hiring practices, and understand exactly what you want for your small business. Also, you want to ensure your employees present a clean, professional image for your business, especially if they will have customer contact. Once you start hiring staff, ensure they are an extension of the professionalism you want to maintain. Develop and discuss policies such as smoking on the job, where to park, and dress code. Implement other policies and processes that help your business shine and distinguish you against the competition.  Conduct background checks on your employees. You want staff that you can trust. Your business may be bonded, but you don’t want your business reputation to suffer.


2.  Be a Great Leader

If you want to run a good construction company, you should ensure you are a great leader and you hire great managers. Also, if you are unsure of how to manage others and would like to be better than other managers you’ve had, consider researching and possibly taking classes that focus on leadership skills

Furthermore, if you or your managers don’t use good leadership skills, your business may suffer. You may start having more turnover or absenteeism. Make your small business a great place to work. Also, make sure to use good communication techniques and that you don’t micromanage. Think about making the job site better as well. Keep workers happy and listen to their problems to make the job better. Schedule the job well so they won’t have to work overtime. Celebrate the completion of each project, such as buying them lunch at the end. 

Think about ways you can make your employees happy. If they are happy, they are engaged and won’t leave your company. 


3.  Implement Good Systems 

Research and purchase construction project management software that will help you streamline your business practices. For example, are your employees clocking in or out on a time clock machine or are they writing down their times? Consider using a construction time clock app. This will allow you to create work schedules for your employees and assign employees to a specific worksite. In addition, your employees can clock in and out from anywhere. 

The best construction time tracking apps offer GPS verification so you can ensure they are at the job site when they clock in and out. Also, employees can view their schedules on their phones or computer whenever you make changes. One of the biggest problems for industries is workers forget to clock in and out or turn in their timesheets late. By using a precise construction time tracking app and having the location verification at your fingertips, it’s easy to see which employees consistently are late to work, leave early, or don’t show up at all.



Need an Affordable Time Clock App for Your Employees?



4.  Become an Industry Expert and Network

Once you have a system down for bidding on jobs or running a good schedule for clients, think about becoming an industry expert. Write content or be a guest speaker at construction trade shows. There are a host of people wanting to know about a variety of topics that you once wanted to know. Share the knowledge you’ve learned with others. Host webinars to help other small businesses who may not be competing against you but could partner up with you. 

Networking is no longer just about joining your local Chamber of Commerce and attending meetings. There are so many ways you can now network that may be better suited for your skills. For example, think about starting or joining a Facebook group. There are probably remodeling or building groups people have started. You can offer tips or answer questions to people on their building challenges. You’re not giving away free advice, you are establishing yourself as an expert. People like to hire experts when they need work done. 

Consider going to local meetups in your area. You can either be the giver or receiver of knowledge. Also, enjoy learning from others and meeting interesting people. You may even find another small business owner where you can cross-promote your products. 


5.  Produce Great Quality

By offering great quality of work, your clients will recommend you to others. Additionally, they will tell everyone they know if they were happy with your work and about their experience. If you and your workers show up on time, do great work, clean up when work is completed, and maintain the promised schedule, your clients will be happy. 

Ensure your team knows and understands your expectations. Your team will make mistakes but implement processes to ensure those mistakes don’t happen again. Are you known as the construction team for high quality? If not, determine ways to be better at it. Because if you are great at producing high quality of work, you will be recommended by others.   


6.  Ask for Customer Feedback

If you want your customers to recommend you, ask for their feedback. They may tell you things you don’t want to hear. However, this necessary feedback only helps you to improve. For example, let’s say a client says that one worker kept acting inappropriately at the job site in some way. You won’t know that you need to fix something if you don’t know it is broken. 

Once you receive feedback from your customers, implement strategies to improve. Customer feedback helps you develop best practices and processes.


7.  Bid on the Right Jobs

Are you at the point in your business where you are bidding on all jobs or can you be more selective? Nina Patel of Remodeling gives great ideas for better bidding. The first step suggests you shouldn’t bid on every project. Select the project you would like to bid on by the client, the type of project, or reference. For example, if you get referrals from someone you trust, then you want to bid on those jobs. 

Understand the right ways to bid on jobs and understand that process perfectly. Also, that ensures you are pricing competitively and can stay on budget. Furthermore, get quotes from your subcontractors too. Present your clients with an adequate timeline of decisions they will need to make before you take the next step. The more you put in your bid that shows your organizational skills and professionalism, the more likely you will get that job. 


8.  Train Your Employees

Train your employees on everything. Many times, you may be hiring people straight out of high school. They may not have people in their lives who have taught them how to act professionally. You may be their mentor. They should be taught about good customer service skills, how to act at a job site, and other topics. Ask your staff for feedback too. What do they need to learn to help them become better? 


Final Thoughts on How to Grow Your Construction Company

Treat your business like a corporation and be professional at all times when meeting with clients. You may be a small business but if you are researching and implementing continuous improvement ideas, you will be getting more and more projects. 

Hire great employees too. Great employees want to exceed customer expectations and they want your business to succeed. Ask your employees for feedback. Brainstorm with them about common project issues. Listen to what they say as you may discover something you didn’t know. 

In order to grow your construction company find ways to be the best construction company out there even if you are small. If you are small and you keep improving, you will be recommended heavily by others. People look for great businesses that are professional and offer great quality of work. You can be that business. 


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Author: Kimberley Kay Travis

Kim Travis has over 20 years of experience in business, human resource management, and leadership roles. She has specialized knowledge in employment law, employee relations, recruiting, management consulting, small business growth, leadership development, workplace safety and health programs, and writing business content.