No, this needs to be done properly

(1993) Having just finished a project with a team of seventeen staff, my boss Jim said to me “Dave we haven’t got that much on so I want you to run this small job”. He went on to say there wasn’t much in the budget for staff so you need to do it ‘one man and his dog’ style. Meaning me doing everything.

My immediate response was “no, this needs to be done properly [and] I am not running myself ragged here”. This didn’t go down well at all and there was a heated row followed by a stand-off that lasted a few days and an atmosphere that lasted a few years until we both left and went our separate ways.

Over the course of the stand-off I found out about the ‘small job’ and its history. It was the last part of a three phase project. Phase one was construction of retail units. Phase two was relocation of an existing owner and demolition of buildings making space for phase three, building more retail units. Phase one and phase three, my bit, were almost identical.

Phase one was done ‘one man and his dog’ style, was chaotic according to the client, there were significant and unresolved quality issues, it lost money, was late and the site manager was still unwell. Finding all this out stiffened my resolve in my stand-off with Jim, even though it was made clear to me my stance was career threatening.

I dug my heels in and built the job with the help of a site engineer, a general foreman and a site secretary. As a team we identified a few clever methodologies which significantly reduced our costs and shaved a few weeks off programme. The job was handed over early and it made a decent profit. We also sorted phase one quality issues and overall the client was delighted.

For me this was more about setting out my stall and doing the job right and less about saying no and digging in. I do think saying no is really important at times, though not all the time.

A few years later with another company and at a more senior level I would encourage site managers to set out their stall and get the right amount of staff so they could delegate and allow themselves thinking time to get things done properly and create clever methodologies. Though it seemed that was (and still is) a cultural challenge – the ‘one man and his dog’ style runs deep.

Here’s an example, I found out it was policy that “jobs less than £7m don’t need a site secretary”. Each time I would try to ring one particular £6m project the phone was always busy and whenever I visited found it hard to have a conversation with the site manager or the site QS as one of them was always answering it. And on the same project was shocked to see tea and coffee served up for a meeting with the client and design team in filthy mugs and no one was having any of the sugar! After the meeting when challenged, the site QS told me “we get one of the labourers to make the tea as we can’t afford a site secretary”

I suggested they get a site secretary and they did though only for three mornings a week and life carried on as before for the rest of the time.

So, what do I take from all of this? There are pressures, yes definitely, though this thing we are doing needs to be done properly. I am not going to be run ragged here, I cannot and don’t want to do all of this myself. I can create more value doing other things and our reputation is at stake here. So let’s get set up properly and no more talk of ‘one man and his dog’, we’re not leading that sort of organisation, are we?