The title of this blog is our theme for 2024. It is too hard to make good money in our industry these days. Contractors risk their own capital taking on enormous and highly complex projects that require expert knowledge and execution and often last for years. But,...
Every bet has a winner and a loser. The bookie always wins a little, but the bettor often loses a lot. What’s the difference? The Recognition and Management of Risk. Risk Recognition Both the bookie and the bettor recognize that every bet has a winner and a loser....
Over my career as a contractor, educator, and consultant to the construction industry I have worked with hundreds of different contractors that were as dissimilar as chalk and cheese. They were short or tall, large or trim, but they were all self-confident. No one...
Our ongoing discussion on the importance of managing the flow of cash into and out of a construction contractor’s balance sheet identified the two major financial risk factors that contractors face: (1) a chronic shortage of working capital; and (2) a highly...
The first rule in both baseball and golf is keep your eye on the ball. The best hitters in baseball say they can sometimes actually see the ball hit the bat. Ben Hogan, one of golf’s greatest, claimed that the visual image that stayed with him after he hit a …...
Capital capacity is just a fancy way of saying having enough cash around to finance projects ongoing plus projects under consideration. The construction industry is grossly undercapitalized. This, I believe, is the primary risk factor that contractors deal with daily...
