Recently I participated in a forum for contractors where I led a discussion on how to retain clients. One of the participants made an interesting observation that described a general feeling among many contractors to the necessity of retaining workers.
Making this observation suddenly drew the ire and interest from those in our group. After admitting that retaining workers IS a huge issue today with the great shortage of workers that appears to be infecting most contractors, one contractor raised an interesting question:
Is it more important to focus on retaining work or workers?
In the perfect world the answer would be…”Both.” As this group of contractors and construction leaders discussed, as critical as it is to keep your workers we can’t sacrifice the need to win and retain customers. Let me share a few thoughts toward this line of thinking.
The strategies to retain workers are many. Briefly, a short list of strategies that many construction employees have embraced to retain workers.
- Offer/provide flex-time
- Increase pay/bonus amount or frequency
- Build greater relationships with workers
- Provide more opportunities for professional/personal growth
- Allow workers more choice about what project they might work
- Provide workers more opportunities to work closer to home and suffer less travel to complete work
Look, all of the above strategies are critical to retain workers. Certainly we are seeing an uptick in wages paid to workers, for example, and contractors are rethinking their pay rates for all levels of the workforce. However, if a contractor were to staff a project that requires a “stay out” (working at distant locations requiring staying in a hotel, not returning home each evening) for those workers who will voluntarily travel, completing projects might become more difficult to do.
So this begs the question again, “Is it more important to focus on retaining work or workers?” In the final analysis, and contrary to many sincere and needed employee retention strategies, it is very important to win and retain work. (Oh boy, I even admit that this just doesn’t sound right.)
But that doesn’t mean it’s not.
Next week I’ll offer a few strategies for retaining work, but in the meantime remember that if you aren’t retaining work you might not have the need to retain workers!
Brad Humphrey
© 2014 Brad Humphrey, Pinnacle Development Group/The Contractor’s Best Friend™
