By Marvin Kemp, AIA, CSI, CDT
The next several postings to The Felt
Tips blog will deal with the umbrella topic of The Golden Rule: Do Unto Others
As You Would Have Them Do Unto You. This post deals with the messages that you
send in how you handle your business and more importantly the messages sent to
employees of companies. In a couple of weeks, please look for a posting on
handling construction administration through email and the respect issues
associated with that medium. Finally, I'll present some thoughts on how
attention to detail, or lack thereof, can affect your business dealings and the
folks you hope to do business with.
Most of us are highly plugged in these
days. Smart phones, laptops, tablets and other devices make our business and
personal email and social media accessible 24 hours a day, 7 days per week. I
personally have an iPhone, an iPad and a company-issued lap top computer, in
addition to several other computing devices in my home. I have w-fi access in
my home and office and I groan when I'm in a long meeting without wi-fi to the
point where I commandeered our company's mobile hot spot so I can be wirelessly
connected most of the time. It's crazy, I know, but I enjoy the connectivity.
My volunteer work not only with CSI but with scouting and our church frequently
puts me conducting those types of business after business hours but wi-fi
access helps me take care of some things during the spare minutes between
meetings.
I try to draw a clear distinction
between my business and my volunteer activities and the time I spend on each. I
typically work on volunteer activities at night and on the weekends, but I try
to avoid sending business related emails late at night and on the weekends. I
do that primarily to avoid having people I conduct business with thinking they
can have access to me 24-7. I have some clients and contractors who already
feel that entitlement, but I don’t want to encourage it. From time to time, I
wind up working evenings and weekends: writing proposals, reviewing RFP's,
marking up drawings, reviewing submittals, etc. When I do send emails at night
and on the weekends, they are normally related to management tasks and are
internal to our company. That seems to be part of our firm’s corporate culture:
our leadership manages our teams and the firm after hours.
In the last year, I've noticed a
dramatic increase in folks sending emails late Friday night through late Sunday
night. In one case, a young architect I'm working with at another firm likes to
send emails after 10:00P on Friday and Saturday night! That action begs the
question: is that a part of the corporate culture at that firm? Or is her
personal situation such that she leaves the office early to care for children and
needs to make the time up late at night? I have children and I know that
sometimes you have to leave your office to pick them up from day care before
the job is done. I also know some younger people feel the only way to get ahead
is by making it appear that you put in extra hours and work late at night.
As a leader in our firm, these
activities both leave me curious and cause me to wonder. What is the message
our firm leadership is sending to our young staff? Do we give off the
impression that it is necessary to get ahead at our firm by appearing to work
24-7? I don't think we do and I personally make sure that the young architects I
work with understand they need to take their accrued vacation and they need to
put down the mouse and go home at night and on the weekends. I very bluntly
tell the youngest staff to not sync their work email to their smart phones. I
recognize that we don't pay them enough for that type of access after hours.
A different kind of message that was
sent can be gleaned from this story. A number of years ago, I was involved in a
large project and sat in some scope review meetings. One particular contractor
was a bit down on his luck at the time and took some significant discounts off
his costs in order to try to win the job and keep his people employed across
the winter. As the scope review continued and his discounts came to light,
there still seemed to be about a $1.5M gap between his bid and the construction
manager’s estimate. Finally, his chief estimator found her mistake and the
contractor hung his head and wrote a personal check for the bid bond: $500,000.
Just this week, I was in another scope review meeting with this same
contractor. The chief estimator, despite a mistake that cost her boss $500,000,
is not only still with the company but is now vice-president in charge of
estimating. What message does that send to the other members of the company?
What messages do you or does your firm
send to its employees? Do you forgive their mistakes? Do you expect them to be
in contact 24-7? For your firm, does PTO stand for "Paid Time Off" or
"Pretend Time Off?" If you can't answer these questions or don't like
the answers, go into the office tomorrow and change it. If you need help
answering these questions, invite a younger staff member to lunch and pick
their brain. If you want to know what others in your position are doing, go to
a CSI Meeting and meet your peers. Visit www.csinet.org and click on the “Chapter Locator”
button to find the chapter nearest you. The networking opportunities alone will
make it worth your while!
