Posts by Duane Barney

Management in general and specifically in project management is a focus on anticipating problems and then solving them before they happen. This will not prevent the occurrence but will serve to manage the incident in a sane manner. Depending on your management role your anticipation view will vary, the higher in management, the longer your…

In practice the Design/Bid/Build model was never functional but evolved from commercial practices as the only model available. D/B/B at its core contains the three elements of any contract or project; value, cost and time. Design establishes the value the project objective Bid objectifies the cost of the work Build is the management process With…

The project schedule is an important and too often overlooked tool. A lot of time is put into preparing the schedule, sometimes for show, other times to meet contractual obligations. But, if contractual, why is it required? Too often the clients do not understand it, the superintendent ignores it and it rarely gets reviewed or…

If you are a Builder, Remodeler or General Contractor you are in the project management business, you just happen to manage construction. We live and die one project at a time, so how you manage your project is how you manage your business because that is your business. We work ourselves out of work, one…

Do you head up the building committee on the club board or Is your HOA planning a substantial project for the community, are you stumbling as how to get the project off the ground? Associations are the classic clients in need of a construction consultant or owner’s Rep. Let me guess. Your role on the…

A custom home, one built just for you in the perfect location, with every amenity just the way you want it. It is very exciting and should be fun but there will be a lot of work between your dream and enjoying the view pool side. One of the first tasks is understanding where to…

Let’s start with an understanding of what profit is and why it is necessary, as we all know profit is the money left over after all of the bills have been paid, but as a business owner it is NOT the money you have earned it is the money the business has earned, and the…

Labor cost, we are all aware it is a big expense, but do you take the time to really understand where productivity is costing you money or jobs? From a construction standpoint, far too often, we focus on the cost of materials, after all, it is an assembly of materials when we are done, a…

Let’s look at the cost of construction for a typical residential project, where is the money? The process begins with design, Architects, engineers, consultants all need to bring your idea to life. 100% of the cost associated with the design is labor. The business will have overhead expenses but what is being paid for is…