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The Last Word
It's tough to build something on time and exactly as specified. It is even tougher to make money doing it. It seems like the deck is stacked against us. A project in progress is like a leaky vessel that oozes money out of every crack. Cracks can appear in a...
What Contractors Say About Risk
If risk recognition and assessment is so fundamental to the construction transaction, why do so few contractors engage in formal risk management? This is a question I have been asking myself for 30 years. To begin with contractors are Type A risk takers or they...
Risk Assessment
Financial risk is embedded in the nature of construction transactions. Project risk management begins during project selection. Signing a legally enforceable performance contract, for a complexity of services, to be delivered over an extended period, is a high-risk...
A Risk Management Case Study
Recognizing and assessing financial risks before you sign a construction contract is not an exercise you can ignore. Let's take a quick look at how a regional contractor uses last week’s Probability and Impact Matrix in everyday business. Risk Factors Recognized XYZ...
Setting the Line
Continuing last week’s risk discussion: Recognizing, identifying, and measuring risk is a critical pre-bid task. A Las Vegas sports book doesn’t wait to set the line until after the game. A handicapper who failed to take a key player’s injured wrist into account or...
Prior and Proper Preparation Prevents Poor Performance
Designers avoid risk, owners prefer to pass it along, and contractors absorb it. Today's construction risk environment is dramatically different than it was in the last several decades, and risk factors are mutating just enough to be almost unrecognizable. It is not...
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