Creating a successful plan for the new year.
Start the new year right with a solid strategy.
The end of the year is always a busy time, regardless of the project workload. Between tracking down payments, bidding and scheduling work, and the holidays, the fourth quarter can be challenging, especially for small business. How can you plan effectively for 2023 while still attempting to manage the work of 2022?
Determine a project persona
Review your projects for 2022. Which were most profitable? Which were the least profitable?
Once you’ve determined what projects were the most and least profitable, you can analyze what similarities the projects with high profit have, and what commonalities the least profitable have. From here, you can develop a project persona that fits within your strengths and mitigates your weaknesses. For some, this will mean bidding a certain scope less often, or perhaps working with a certain client on fewer projects if profitability always suffers with that client.
Do you have a revenue goal? A number of projects you want to complete with a certain profit margin? What are the goals you want to reach in 2023? Once established, you can create a plan that helps you meet those goals that fits within the structure of your company. Make sure the goals are realistic based on your capabilities, liquidity, and staffing. Setting a realistic expectation for your goals is a great way to maintain morale and encourage growth. A goal that is out of reach or unreasonable can often cause additional stress and hamper morale with little purpose. Stress will not help you achieve goals any more effectively.
Set Realistic Goals
Analyze
Production
rate
What was your project production? Assessing the time it takes to complete each part of your project work is key to overall success and effective bidding. Once you’ve determined what your production is, and your overall costs, you can make adjustments to your estimating to ensure you’re capturing all costs. It also is a good time to assess your crew’s productivity and come up with ways to increase production on the jobsite. Include your crews in this discussion. They may have insight to bottlenecks and other limits to production that you aren’t considering.
Plan your work & work your plan
Do you have a process for planning upcoming work? If not, create one, being sure to include the important factors that need to be completed pre-construction, during construction, and after closeout. A plan is the best roadmap you can create for optimal outcomes in the new year. Once established, work your plan. While you may need to tweak here or there, working the plan you’ve established is key to consistency and good results. Find what works & what doesn’t, but don’t reinvent the wheel. Know your wheelhouse and seek work that fits within that parameter.
