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Weekly Construction Messages
Search Past Blogs by Headings Below
What Me Worry?
Jul 3, 2025 | Financial Management and Risk, Financial Management and Risk, Risk Management, Risk Management, Weekly Construction Message
Back in the 1960s "What Me Worry" was the masthead motto of a little counterculture publication known as Mad Magazine that is still around somewhere to this day. Some of you more senior readers out there may remember it. At that time, my brother and I were deeply...
The Enemy Within
Jun 26, 2025 | Built Environment, Cash Flow (Getting Paid), Financial Management and Risk, Financial Management and Risk, Financial Management and Risk, Leadership, Leadership, Risk Management, Risk Management, Weekly Construction Message
A major theme throughout the Godfather trilogy is betrayal by enemies hidden within the family. "You're nothing to me now, Fredo" Al Pacino says to his brother who has betrayed him in Godfather 2. "Nothing happens to Fredo while my mother is still alive," Pacino...
The CFO Consigliere
Jun 23, 2025 | Board of Directors, Built Environment, Business of Construction, Business, Strategic & Project Planning, Financial Management and Risk, Financial Management and Risk, Leadership, Risk Management, Weekly Construction Message
I have been waging a lifelong campaign to convince contractors that financial management is a professional skill and a critical component of their team. Our profits are limited by unique risk factors like multiple simultaneous projects, extended schedule, and risks of...
Your Chief Financial Officer
Jun 12, 2025 | Built Environment, Business of Construction, Financial Management and Risk, Financial Management and Risk, Leadership, Leadership, Risk Management, Risk Management, Weekly Construction Message
Contractors often wait too long to employ the business management expertise of a qualified Chief Financial Officer. Small and mid-size businesses across all industries have traditionally left accounting to a bookkeeper, hiring an outside accounting firm to close the...
Beliefs and Harmful Bias
Jun 5, 2025 | Built Environment, Business of Construction, Business, Strategic & Project Planning, Leadership
Unexamined beliefs play a role in the management decision making process and deeply held beliefs go largely unexamined. That is to say, we aren't even aware that we believe what we believe. The problem arises when these unexamined beliefs affect our decision making...
Profit, Profit, Profit
May 29, 2025 | Built Environment, Business of Construction, Financial Management and Risk, Financial Management and Risk, Project Selection, Project Selection, Weekly Construction Message
"A rose by any other name would smell as sweet." As most of my readers I am sure will testify, I don't often quote Shakespeare. But the confusion around the word profit in the construction industry has driven me to desperate measures. What do we mean when we speak of...
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