Executive Summary There exists an insurance product to mitigate the risk associated with catastrophic failure of a construction company. It’s called Project Loss Insurance. Tell me more about this insurance. Project Loss Insurance (PLI) is a product that covers financial loss to a contractor for losses associated with: Bad estimates […]
Don’t Be Afraid of a Little Manual Work: It’s Ok
Executive Summary In a world now so heavily reliant upon computers, many construction professionals try to automate the entire process, of whatever they may be working on. Some things will still have to be manual, and that’s ok. The Problem The problem here is that I watch many people in […]
Mistaken Taboo: Project Overhead
Executive summary. Field overhead carries different names with different contractors and owners. Discussed here is what field overhead is, and why it’s important for owners to understand. Project estimation. When a construction project is estimated, a good estimate will be one that captures all costs related to a project. These costs include, […]
Bond Premium and the Project Time Extension
Executive summary. Most traditional bond rates have two variables in their cost: the contract value and the time threshold. Do not forget to include both in time extension negotiations. What’s in a bond rate? The bond rate from your surety agent comes in two parts: (1) the cost as a […]
Project Parties – Who does what?
Executive summary. The management structure of sizable projects usually involves four major parties: the owner, the construction manager, the designer, and the contractor. Here’s how project management is structured and what the parties’ responsibilities are in two common project delivery methods. Project conception. Let’s take a sample project, say, a […]
Is One RFI One Too Many?
Executive Summary. How many RFIs (requests for information) are too many on a construction project? Is it time, is it possible, to tie the number of RFIs on a job to the cost impact suffered by a contractor? What is an RFI? “RFI” is an acronym standing for Request for […]
Microsoft Excel v. Microsoft Project v. Primavera P6
Executive Summary. In the construction industry, there are three main tools used for scheduling. Pros and cons of Microsoft Excel, Microsoft Project, and Primavera P6 are all briefly discussed. The Three Main Options. I still see schedules done on paper in the industry, and it works too, but here we […]
Embedding Cost Control Culture into the Project Cycle
By Scott Jennings, P.E. This article was originally published in CFMA’s Building Profits April 2019 Sometimes financial situations can cause a contractor to fail. But these mishaps can likely be avoided. Forecasting and managing the timely implementation and execution of cost controls can considerably impact effective bidding. In fact, cost […]
Forecasting with Confidence
Forecasting feeds the lifeline of the financial health of a company,” he says. “If owners and CEOs want to prevent profit fade during construction projects, they must equip project managers with sophisticated software tools that allow the managers to project costs accurately.
Bidding out a Civil Construction Project: Part I
Letting, or bidding out, a civil construction project can be a challenge for an Owner. Questions inexperienced owners may have involved choosing an engineer, what sort of contract to use, how to collect bids from contractors, and finally how to manage the construction of the contract. In this two-part series, in Part […]