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When you first start hiring staff, you may find that it’s quite hard to keep them on board. Start ups tend to have a high staff turnover for a number of reasons. More often than not, a lot of the issues that employees find with working for a start up boil down to the business owner’s lack of awareness or knowledge on how to maintain a happy staff base. Start ups can often feel disorganized, mismanaged, high pressure and ungrateful for staff’s efforts, as owners are trying to focus on too many areas at once, may be reluctant to let go of certain tasks or areas of operation and so much more. As a business owner, it’s important to be open to criticism, to research others’ failings and to really reflect on your actions to ensure that you’re providing your new team with the best experience possible. Here are some suggestions that could help you on this journey.

Hiring Right

First and foremost, you need to make sure that you hire the right staff in the first place. Start out by really focusing on job descriptions. Know what you’re looking for and make sure that interviewees are fully aware of the job demands, working hours, working environment, salary and other important elements of the role. This will allow them to weigh up whether it works for them or not, rather than you selling a dream and your team growing disappointed when they find themselves in a position that is different to what they were sold.

Paying Well

Sure, you may be a start up and you may not have a lot of funds yet. But paying just above market rate will do your business a lot of favors. At the end of the day, staff are unlikely to leave a role that’s paying more than other options that are available on the market. Paying well really can maximize staff retention, as few people will leave for anything but a pay rise. If other companies won’t match your rates, you’re onto a winning formula for happy staff and staff loyalty.

Being Inclusive

Making sure that your business is inclusive will make your team more proud to work for you. You will draw in the finest talent regardless of the individuals’ backgrounds. Take a look at the DE&I survey by Goodhire to learn more about diversity and inclusion in the workplace and the benefits that its proper implementation can bring to your business.

Offering Progression

Your staff don’t want to feel stagnant or like they are in a dead end job. Opportunities of progression can encourage hard work and will keep your team on board. Offer training opportunities. Staff are unlikely to leave your business if they are in the middle of a training program that maximizes their qualifications. Offer opportunities for promotions and pay raises. Staff will strive to reach these goals in order to be rewarded.

Implementing just a few of the tips outlined above can really make all the difference to your staff retention rates, even if you are operating on a smaller scale.

When working in the construction industry, there are various steps you must take to keep your business building environment safe. For example, this could include investing in both employee training and PPE, which will help you to better care for the health and safety of your team.

Of course, it’s important to note that construction businesses are also at threat from other incidents, such as theft and crime. In fact, these sites are often described as easy targets for criminals as: 

• They are often left unattended at night.
• Expensive equipment is stored on-site/at warehouses.
• Vehicles and equipment used on site are hired, making them difficult to track. 
• Construction sites are easy to access.

With that in mind, here are some simple ways in which you can improve security at your construction business or construction site. 

Install fences. Installing a fence on your construction site is an easy way to restrict access, ensuring that no authorised personnel can get onto your premises. This will also help you to abide by government health and safety standards, protecting you from further legal troubles. 

Use intercoms to allow access. If you’re working on a long-term project and have some kind of office set-up on site, you may also want to install business intercoms at all access points. This once again will reduce the chance of unauthorized personnel entering the site, and gaining access to your expensive tools and equipment. This is because you will be able to remotely control who enters the site and keep stricter logs of who is present and when. This can also be useful in hectic workplaces, as you can control access remotely. 

Install lights throughout the site. Workplace health and safety regulations often dictate that construction work cannot be carried out at night, due to poor visibility. This means that you may mistakenly believe that lights are not a necessary purchase. However, they can act as a deterrent for crime as if the area is well-lit, they are more likely to be caught on security cameras. As a result, they are facing a greater risk of prosecution than they would be should they enter the building/construction site under the cover of darkness.  

Rely on security cameras. Much like bright lights, security cameras work by acting as a deterrent against all forms of crime, such as vandalism and theft. This is because they will capture vital evidence of whatever transpires. As a result, their presence alone often deters criminals. Ideally, you should place them internally and externally, so that you can capture as much evidence as possible should an incident occur. 

Include security in employee training. When it comes to employee training, it’s easy to focus on helping them develop career-related skills. For example, you should spend some time instructing employees on how to properly (and safely) use any on-site equipment. However, you should also use this as an opportunity to make clear the importance of good on-site security too. For example, you should ensure that employees know how to lock up equipment and tools at the end of the shift and that any keys are stored in a secure location. 

Hire security personnel. As mentioned previously, one of the key reasons why construction sites are vulnerable to crimes is because they are often left unattended at the end of the day. This gives potential offenders plenty of time to access the site, damage property or steal equipment. However, the chances of such an event occurring are much lower should you have security personnel, such as security guards on-site. While this may be an additional expense, it’s definitely worthwhile due to the extra level of protection (and peace of mind) they provide. You can also order ID cards online and have your security team monitor visitors and ensure that people are wearing them when on the premises. Security really does matter and identification is one of the first steps toward better security.

Don’t forget cybersecurity. When working on a construction project, you might not spend much time online. However, this does not mean that cybersecurity is unimportant. After all, your computers likely house a range of private information from your customers, such as their contact or banking details. If this information is leaked, not only will you face significant legal and financial consequences, but your reputation will also take a considerable hit. This means you’ll find it harder and harder to keep your business appealing to customers, or bring in enough custom to keep your business afloat. Thankfully, there are various ways in which you can reduce the chances of cybersecurity breaches occurring. For example, you could install cybersecurity software on all devices, and ensure that you use strong passwords throughout your business. Passwords should also be changed every few months.  

If you are keen to make sure that your industry business is working as it should, and that it is likely to continue growing in the future, then one major area that you should always focus on is providing your clients with what they really need. This is something that is both important and yet surprisingly tricky to get right, but if you do manage to succeed here you will find that it makes a huge difference to the success of your company. In this post, we’ll look at some of the major things you can consider to ensure that you are doing right by your clients at all times.

Listen To Them

At all times, it is a really good idea to make sure that you are listening to your clients fully, as they will always know better than you what it is that they are after and what they need. So listening to them is really important from the start. You might be surprised at how many businesses in the industry fail to do this, and this might account for some of the mistakes that those businesses tend to make in other ways too. Make sure you don’t fall into that same trap: always listen to your customers as fully as possible to ensure that you are able to then give them what they really need.

Look At A Range Of Options

In any problem, there are always a range of options available that you might be able to consider, and it’s vital that you are considering as many of them as you possibly can. When you look at all the options you have, you are going to ultimately be able to provide your clients with what they really need, whether it’s a Detroit Diesel Engine Rebuild Kit for themselves to use, or for you to provide them with a fitting service so they don’t have to do it themselves. It often depends on the customers themselves, as well as a range of other factors, so it’s important that you are thinking about this from the start each and every time.

Be Honest & Upfront

In terms of how you should handle your clients, one of the most important things of all is that you are upfront and honest about your dealings with them. This is a basic thing that everyone expects and demands, and that everyone deserves too. That means that you are honest about where you can help and where you can’t, and that you are doing all you can to keep them up to date about the problem and the likely solutions that you are pursuing. Being communicative is important here too, so that’s something that you are going to want to think about if you are keen on keeping them truly happy.

If you have done all that, your clients will be much happier, and your business will benefit greatly from this, so it’s something that you are definitely going to want to think about.

The world of contractors and the building industry has endured a rocky start to 2022. There’s a lot going on around the world that’s impacted things in a relatively negative way. If you’re currently running a business, don’t be surprised if you experience slower progress than usual. You’ve got lots of struggles to fight against, but it can be useful to know what to do to combat them. 

As a starting point, you need to know what these big struggles are. From here, you can find the solutions to deal with them as best as you can!

A lack of materials/parts

The whole premise of being a building contractor means you need materials and parts to actually build things for clients. So, it’s difficult to do your job if you don’t have access to a lot of the materials you require. Things like steel and lumbar are in low supply due to various circumstances – like the war in Ukraine and coronavirus. 

A possible way to get around this is by switching up your suppliers. As loyal as you have been to suppliers over the years, it is impossible to conduct your business if they no longer have the materials for you. Instead, opting for more local companies like Butler Building could be beneficial. Getting your supplies from a North American supplier means you don’t have to worry about things like international transportation, border controls, and so on. 

High prices for materials

In turn, the high prices for materials will mean you have to start charging more money to your clients. As a result, this can price some people out of your services, making it harder for you to find regular clients. 

In all honesty, this is one of the hardest things to deal with as you have no control over the industry prices. Again, the only thing you can try is finding a new supplier with better prices, letting you keep your rates at a reasonable price for clients. Alternatively, look at other aspects of your business to save money, allowing you to keep your costs down low. 

A lack of workers

Yes, the construction industry is struggling with people not wanting to work these jobs anymore. Or, you have workers or contractors, but they are taking lots of time off because they get sick with the coronavirus. Without many people on your team, it is harder for you to complete projects. 

The only way around this is by improving your hiring process and searching far and wide for viable workers. You should also boost the employee benefits that you give out – make people want to work for your company because they are paid well and given lots of additional incentives. 

It’s no secret that being a building contractor is harder now than ever before. However, there is hope on the horizon. If you can find ways of dealing with these struggles and pushing through 2022 and the next few months, you should come out the other side in a good place. Things will not be like this forever – you just need to cope while you can.