Excellence, a writing experiment.
Going to try something here. A bit of creative writing exercise...
I'm thinking of excellence and what that means to me.
I think back to my early project days when I spent so much time learning to lead and manage a construction job effectively. I was lucky because I just happened to pop in at a time that computerized estimating, planning, accounting, scheduling and design were getting off the ground and being seen by the industry as an improvement... but not necessarily by the workforce. Especially with construction, which has so many differing ideologies, skill sets and backgrounds... union workers see things much differently than say... Mexicans. Putting together a job site and project where both had to do work as well as work with each other... and for each other. It is a real challenge to alter the average job site expectations. But I did, and it worked... with a great deal of extra effort at first. But excellence happened soon after and everyone benefited and it was a wonderful thing.
When people get the opportunity to really do their work with integrity and not have too many hurdles put in front of them. Are able to find a passion or motivation for it that allows them to love what they do or at least be proud of it. Then to add to that to be surrounded with a helpful environment. They improve in amazing ways... and it rubs off. It is an amazing thing to see in person and especially play a part in. Excellence has a sweet spot in my heart.
The first chance I got to implement my version of excellence was working as a residential production builder, building single family homes in Indianapolis. I will preface this by informing you that I had worked a school summer prior with the company while still going to college and was instrumental in them being able to teach their workforce how to run a computerized construction management program. In fact, I wrote the instruction manual and all the activity and quality checklists. Unfortunately, for them and fortunate for me, they spent little time on teaching it, so I really became the only expert. When I graduated and became a full time employee, I got stationed out in the field as a assistant builder, and within a month, my superior, who was the "Builder" for the project, a subdivision of about 350 homes, had a family emergency that became an extended leave of absence. I had to step in temporarily. When I did, I started using the system I had learned to it's full capabilities... and within a few months had improved productivity by 3x. When we're talking $350k homes, and the average was 10 per year for a Builder then. That's about $3.5 million in cash flow. Three times that is $10.5 million with the same workforce! The workforce was happy too! They all got bonuses. Everybody saw, excellence was a good idea!
For myself, a Builder's bonus was between 1-1.5% of that gross on top of a regular base salary. Going from a 50k to a 150k annual bonus turns some heads. Especially for someone who just stepped out of college. For me I saw clearly the effects of excellence and also how working together well made a big difference.
I wasn't satisfied though, I had ideas, I felt there was much room for improvement. I went into multifamily developments. Bigger projects, more of a all encompassing job, I got to start with raw land and from there build a "community". Eleven buildings, a clubhouse with a pool, and another activity building, laundry and day care. It was a 24 month project. We did it in 11! The quality was superior to any of company's other projects (with superintendents twice my age). And it came in millions under budget! I was really starting to get the idea and be confident, excellence delivers! We would have an initial job meeting, outline the individual activities, string them into a schedule with predecessors and successors, put together a game plan with a checklist for everyone and every activity. Then we went to town compressing the schedule while improving quality and cutting waste. Every "swinging dick" was involved and even a couple ladies every once in awhile too. It worked again! The second project I took on squeezed the time down to 6 months. Everything else improved similarly as well. Even with the government sticking it's nose in (We had a job site injury occur and OSHA showed up to collect) didn't stop the massive improvements. My subcontractors gave their unending devotion to any job I had.
As I employed the same methods and computer aided processes. Success after success added up. All the way up the ladder. I went into various roles, from supplier to subcontractor, to general contractor to owner's rep. I'd start with a planning session where we'd discuss a schedule, break the job into activities, develop checklists and processes, fit it all together into a plan and a budget, get approval and go to town. My paycheck improved until it was irrelevant. My time became the problem, I didn't have enough of it. But excellence applies there too!
I used to be out the door by 5:30 am and be lucky to be home by 10pm. A 17-18 hour day... 5 days a week. With most weekends involved too. I lived that way for a few years because for me, it was full on learning... I also squeezed in school at night pursuing several Master's degrees. As I applied constant improvement to a process and started streamlining it, my necessary time shrank to the point I can say, I was doing a four hour work week before the book ever came out!
However, as successful as I was, I was falling into a bit of a rut ethically. The government and it's rules and regulations, in comparison to what was able to be done working together voluntarily, was archaic and stupid. They made things incredibly more difficult and also invited corruption. Dealing with those shadowy types too much rubs off... and I didn't like that at all. By this time in my career I was doing projects in the big cities. NYC, Boston, Miami, San Francisco, Chicago, the places the real crooks and politicians are... and often switch places!
Plus, I had developed a reputation of being able to work magic on impossible projects. The impossible projects started to line up in front of my door. Site problems, labor problems, government, bad and crooked accounting by executives, crooks... after a while they all just burned up my last bit of passion for the business. At 38 years old, I had the opportunity to grab a nice severance package, so I jumped out with a golden parachute of sorts. Retiring early! Not bad, but I also lost my venue for excellence. It wasn't three months later that I didn't know what else to do, I was so bored... so I took another impossible job. I can't even begin to explain the complexities of the job, no one wanted it, everyone thought it was a sure fail. Even the executives knew it was a loser but they accepted it in order to get a bigger contract with the client corporation. It was endless red tape, negotiating and road blocks. Needless to say, I had never stepped out on a job I committed to and after a year, although I had made tremendous progress, I ran out of gas and patience. I said the words that got me fired for the first time in my professional life and I walked out smiling. I even got fired with excellence!
Before I make this too much about myself though, let's step back to seeing excellence in action on a job site. Let me describe one of my favorite workers to watch... because it was such an art form back in the day. Heavy equipment operator. My uncle Dale was one. And it wasn't even his day job! As a small child I would watch and sometimes ride with him while he did his thing. He had a passion for it. When you've got a good operator, magic happens! He or she can contour the earth, most efficiently move it, and do it with a signature that, with a careful eye, one can tell they did it. The efficiency of motion, the ability to do more than one thing at once, the creative approach to tackling a problem is one in which I can still be fascinated by a good operator's skill and ability. With the older equipment it was truly an art form. To move a machine like a dancer with 16 levers, 2 pedals and some switches... This is how expertise is really developed, through love and joy of doing something valuable with integrity. Moreover, this is just one example of thousands that go on each day when a construction project is run well. When workers are allowed and given enough freedom to actually do their job well.
This for me is the proof of what books like Rose Wilder Lane's "The Discovery of Freedom" point to. People can be dynamos, that energize those around them, that then lead to further innovations and improvements, that propel new things to be developed and efficiency to be realized and transformed. But it does require an environment. One that rewards trust instead of hindering it. One that allows people to be free of fear. To have the authority to make decisions on their own and with each other. This is probably something few even consider but is so important to the end results.
Sorry if it appears trite but I'll point to my pursuit of excellence with my current endeavors. This is what these are all about. Ethical Emergence and the Local Dynamo project are all about creating an awareness of excellence, an environment of collaboration and support, a culture of excellence and... I've been able to diversify my narrow venue for excellence from construction into being almost all inclusive. I think I've got something very valuable for almost everyone.
I have a vision of everyone I work with having that light bulb moment when they finally conceive what their real potential is. Most have no freaking clue of what they are truly capable of! And I'd certainly like to spread that awareness!
Please help me do so.