Understanding the Construction Field Day

For a contractor to truly improve their field productivity, they must start with understanding how the time is spent.

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Depending on the trade, project, and the labor, study the time spent on actual installation ranges from 50-64%.  

Field Productivity: Understanding the Construction Day from the Field Perspective. Increase actual installation to 70% means almost 10% increase in production.

Remaining time is spent on non-installation activities including material logistics, movement around the jobsite, breaks, layout, mobilization to the work area, etc.  

These labor studies include craft labor and direct supervision at the foreman level.  

An average amount of rework and typical jobsite conditions are all factored into these studies.  

These form the basis for the labor units all contractors use to estimate projects.   

Assuming our quantity take-offs are accurate, this is why multiple contractors can be so incredibly close in a competitive bidding situation.

Projects are then budgeted with these labor units and we manage projects to meet these budgets.  

BOTTOM LINE

There is a significant amount of non-installation time built into the labor units the whole industry uses. Just increasing the actual installation time by a few minutes will make a contractor significantly more competitive and profitable.

Create the Perfect Field Day

 

 


Labor Productivity
Field labor is the often the biggest variable on a construction project - making it the biggest risk and opportunity....

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Labor productivity IS NOT the biggest problem with field productivity. Under similar conditions the variation in how fast two crafts people actually “turn wrenches” is about 2X but there are far bigger problems to tackle. Focus on these three areas.
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A contractor’s value stream is every step required to take raw materials and information then deliver a completed project to the waiting hands of a customer. Deep understanding of this value stream is the foundation for major productivity improvements.
Understanding the Construction Field Day
For a contractor to truly improve their field productivity, they must start with understanding how the time is spent. Depending on the trade, project, and the labor, study the time spent on actual installation ranges from 50-64%.