Construction Biz Wiz

“The ability to maintain your business’s standards is one of the best indicators of long-term success. Business owners can be under pressure to lower their standards for two main reasons: when conditions are abnormally bad or when they’re abnormally good.”

That’s the take on maintaining quality as presented in an article published by American Express OPEN Forum, an online community of business owners.

Business owners often lower the quality of their offerings if company’s revenues and profits are low, thinking that it’s a survival method and things will turn around. The opposite scenario draws the same owner reaction. If experiencing a flood of work and interest, owners don’t want to turn down business and opportunities for increased revenue, and so cut corners and lower quality standards to meet the demand.

Have you compromised quality? For example:

• Purchased subpar materials?
• Took shortcuts with methods, processes, plans?
• Lowered customer service by reducing personnel?
• Employed less experienced workers to cut costs on labor?

Maybe you saw a short-term boost to cash flow by lowering standards, but the long-term effect could damage or sink your business. Your customers will feel the impact of poor products and service. Plus you’re sending a message to your competitors, customers, and employees that you care less, choose not to compete, and can’t produce quality the way you used to. Compromising quality is a sure way to lose. Do not concede to the pressures to lower your standards, whether times are good or bad. Maintaining (or enhancing quality) is the way to succeed and stay competitive.  

To read the source article for this blog post, read this OPEN Form item, authored by Mike Periu.

Even during the tough construction market of recent years, Maxwell Systems continued to take its quality offering very seriously. The company has invested in developing an innovative solution from the ground up on Microsoft’s .NET and SQL technology; invested in resources to service and support customers with convenient and reliable tools and information; and made an investment in its development capacity to continue delivering product offerings and updates at an accelerated pace. All of these efforts are to solidify Maxwell Systems’ ability to best meet the needs of contractors and be the ideal technology partner to construction businesses across the industry’s sectors. To learn more about Maxwell Systems and how you can evaluate vendors to be your technology partner, you’re invited to download this free eBook: 7 Reasons for Partner Fit.

How have you demonstrated your company’s quality standards? Invested in software for business management? Demanded your material producers, subcontractors, and employees maintain certain standards on projects?

In follow up to the August 31^st post, today’s topic also address the value of leveraging investments and making the most of what you already have.

According to a CIO Insight survey, 76% of respondents agreed that “Enterprise systems provide a competitive advantage and strategic value to their organizations.”  However, they also reported that (on average) their companies use only 64% of their enterprise systems’ core functions.

In the construction industry, many businesses may not be fully taking advantage of their software due to high turnover of office and project management personnel and limited commitment of time and resources to provide ongoing education for their staff. After all, there are only so many hours in the day – so save time and do more with what you have.

If you have a good software partner, the software you purchased in 2007 and are still using in 2010 has changed. New features have been added, new government regulations have caused requirement changes, and functions you did not need in 2007 are now there waiting for you, but are not being used. Plus, your software provider should have a process for receiving and processing customer requests for enhancements, which will help you stay on the system you like but keep it at pace with the changes and needs in your organization.

Leslye Love is Product Manager at Maxwell Systems, “In my role as Product Manager, I’m responsible for receiving enhancement requests from customers. Most, about 80%, of the enhancement requests I receive are for functionality that is already included within the product they own, or it can be easily added with an available module.”

So how does the business owner or the office staff know what they are missing? Just like you take your car in for regular service, you need to make sure your staff is in tune with the training and understanding of software capabilities to keep your business running at its best. By investing in as little as two hours, a business review could be performed by your software provider. Or, if that software holds a conference for product users, you may find that as a great environment to see what’s new with your product as well as to pick the brains of your peers in your industry.

Gerry Thiel, president, G.W. Thiel, Inc. (carpenter contractors), explained how they partner with their software vendor to stay informed and up-to-date about features to help his business: “There are some things we’re not utilizing to their capabilities and working with Maxwell [Systems] and going back [to the conference] to see if we can eliminate double processes – it’ll be a great opportunity for us.”

John McDonough, project manager at Rossi Electric Company, also appreciates attending an annual user’s conference to learn about the software and suggest future enhancements: “I see new designs that have been put into the system, see how they work and how I can put them to work to improve my productivity on a job. And I love the wish list – I give a dozen items I’d like to see and when I see one of mine in the software it makes me feel good that I was a part of that!”

You have made the investment in your software solutions, so be sure that you are fully leveraging all aspects of the solution to maximize your technology investments. Talk to your software provider to learn about the breadth of offerings available – there may be plenty just waiting for you to take advantage of, starting today.

What new things have you taken advantage of in 2010? Attended a user conference for the first time? Upgraded your system to use new features? Added modules? Participated in training?