ENR survey shows no "happy news"

Don Mclean said it well in his 1972 anthem "American Pie" with the following lyrics:

I met a girl who sang the blues
And I asked her for some happy news,
But she just smiled and turned away.

While I didn't meet a girl who sang the blues, I was in fact looking for some happy news today when I opened up the ENR (Engineering News Record) website. The computer screen simply smiled and looked away.

ENR posted an article showing results of a market outlook survey conducted of 752 designers and contractors. A stout 86% of these firms see the current market as declining while only 11 firms out of 752 respondents thought the market was improving. I think these 11 folks were smoking the same stuff Don Mclean was back in '72 because if things are improving then my job application response ratio certainly isn't showing it.

In the chart:

brown=declining
green=stable
yellow=improving


The only good news that came out of this survey in my mind is that 76% of respondents are predicting an improving market three years from now. That's right, three years from now.

While I can't remember if I cried when I read this article, I can remember that the survey was distributed to 2000 companies with only 752 respondents. I can only hope that the 37% or so that responded were stunned with a nasty dose of pessimism while those who didn't respond were too busy with the phone ringing off the hook. The only evidence that may lead me to believe this to be true is that the ENR index is comparatively lower than the Princeton, N.J.-based Construction Financial Management Association’s CONFINDEX survey of commercial construction companies’ financial health; however, this index was most recently released in December of last year when many may have thought we were at the bottom, plus it wasn't that much better.

So why are leaders of the AEC industry so gloomy about the future? ENR suggests the very familiar continued reluctance of financial institutions to lend on projects.

“Everything we do is predicated on the availability of money, either through banks or bonds,” say Hugh McCoy, vice president and managing partner of White-Spunner Construction Inc., Mobile, Ala. He says there are a lot of projects on the boards that make sense and a lot of money is available, but financial institutions are afraid to pull the trigger on loans.

What can we do about this? I've got it! Let's drive our Chevy to the Levee.

We can fire up the Chevy all we want but if the banks don't start lending, the levee will remain dry as a bone and in need of desperate maintenance. Can the banks really take taxpayer money to keep them alive as a result of their own negligence and then stuff it in their big fat wallets while Americans are a generation lost in space?

Evidently they can.

So bye-bye Miss American Pie, if we can't somehow persuade the banks to shell out some cash we may not be seeing you for quite a while, and we might as well break out the whiskey and rye.

ENR survey shows no "happy news"

LEED exam prep ain't easy

I've been studying for the LEED accredited professional exam for the past several weeks partly because I have a personal interest in green building and I would like to have a professional certification reflecting this, and partly because I have nothing else to do since I got canned from my job (besides blogging of course). Let me tell you what, this is a lot of material to digest and spit back at a testing center computer screen in 2.5 hours with nothing but a photo ID as a reference. Trust me, this isn't enough.

I've never been great at memorization and I don't really know why. Perhaps it is because I don't feel the need to remember things that I can just look up later, or perhaps my brain is only capable of holding a very finite amount of information. Regardless, I've always been better when I had a cheat sheet of formulas or methods and then applied them to a problem. So memorizing gobs of information associated with 69 LEED credits is not my forte. I think I'd rather take a class in contract law, and that's pretty bad.

Since I've been exposed to LEED much more over the past six weeks, I've been noticing it more in the news and blogs that I have come across. Nicolette Toussaint who posted a blog today on the greening of school projects, noted that not only does green building present significant energy savings to schools but also increases student and teacher health (less absenteeism) and is consistent with higher test scores.

This phenomenon also holds true for businesses, where green office buildings decrease worker absenteeism and increases productivity on average of 1-7% according to the US Green Building Council. Yes business owners, that means mo' money in yo' pocket. I can already hear the boardroom high fiving. Or perhaps they'll celebrate with a stiff bloody mary on the corporate jet.

However, all this new found knowledge for green building will be much less useful if I don't pass this test of facts, figures, and processes. I need to figure out in the next two weeks what I need to do to get all of this info in my head without losing other very important facts like my Facebook password, my street address, or my mother's maiden name (I would then be unable to retrieve my Facebook password).

I resorted first to the tried and true method of flashcards. I have not made up flashcards since fourth grade and now at the ripe age of th-th-th-thirty one years I'm without a job, making up flash cards, and hoping like hell that I pass a LEED certification, ahem, accreditation exam. This valiant attempt at conventional memorization proved to be much less effective when I dropped my neatly organized flashcards. Many of the credits had two or three cards each and I was left trying to peice back..., oh well, you get the idea. Flashcards are a pain in the a**.

This is the last year you can take the LEED AP exam on the current rating system because they will soon be changing the system to weight credits on a scale of importance (sorry, it's too late to sign up). Presently, a project will earn the same number of LEED points for redeveloping and remediating a former site of a thermo-nuclear reactor as it would for putting a bike rack out front. So this is a much needed change, but the exam will undoubtedly be much more difficult and I'm scared s**tless about passing it this time around.

Perhaps I'm overreacting, and I hope I am, but if this cramming doesn't pay off I'm going to be a perennial LEED AP test taker. I'll have to build a personal green study facility to increase my learning potential and brain capability. This may not be a bad idea, but I really hope it doesn't come to this.

LEED exam prep ain't easy

Time Lapse Tuesday - What can this do for construction?

Starting last week, I made the brilliant choice of making Tuesday (already a great day) Time Lapse Tuesday featuring a time lapse construction video found on the web. There is plenty out there to choice from so I'm doing the laborious task of sifting through the internet dust and picking out a very good time lapse video of a construction project every week. Aren't you lucky?

This is a video of a five day construction project of a wind turbine in Lubbock, Texas. In my opinion we should be building these turbines as fast as this video shows except in real time.




I'm curious as to what people think of the benefits of time lapse photography and video in construction so please feel free to comment. It's a nifty and eye catching technological gadget, but does it add any real value to a project or organization? My own list of benefits is as follows:

1. TL photo allows builders to see the construction of a similar project to theirs for logistic purposes as well as visualization purposes. In golf, you have to visualize the shot before you can actually make it. Piecing a construction project together in your mind may not be as easy as seeing before your eyes.

2. You can look at the construction process of past projects and critique it for possible losses of efficiency. Much like a football coach will analyze film of previous games, construction companies can look at their past projects going up and determine if the best construction methods were used.

3. Construction can be a slow painful process at times, kind of like a baseball game. TL takes a slow moving marathon and turns it into a fast moving spring. This can make excellent marketing material to present to owner's who may want to see your work in action but don't happen to drive by one of your sites on their way to work every day.


If only construction moved as fast on the jobsite as it does on computer screen, we'd really be doing well.

Time Lapse Tuesday - What can this do for construction?

Don T. and Miss USA

I happened to peak at the television this morning and what did I see, but the smiling face, and peculiar hair-do of Donald J. Trump. There's nothing like a little Don Trump rhetoric to brighten up your morning.

I had a construction management college professor who always referred to Donald Trump as Don, as if to infer that they are on a first name basis. I'm nearly certain they were not on a first name basis or even met each other, but it sounds pretty cool to call the guy Don, so I think I will.

Anyway, Don was mainly talking about Miss California who gave a very controversial answer to a gay marriage question in the recent Trump owned Miss USA competition. Miss Cali and others blamed her response to this question as the reason for losing the competition.

She said, "We live in a land where you can choose same-sex marriage or opposite. And you know what, I think in my country, in my family, I think that I believe that a marriage should be between a man and a woman. No offense to anybody out there, but that's how I was raised."

Ouch. Tough question. That's like having your only major league at bat against a prime of his career Nolan Ryan - and whiffing on three straight 95 mph fastballs.

Regardless, this is Constructonomics, not Pageanomics so we're going to move on to the content of the interview that may in some way pertain to the construction industry. And since Don is a real estate tycoon, you know he's going to make some remarks about why no one is building anything. Of course, he blamed it on the banks.

Trump went on to say that the banks need to start loaning money again and should be mandated to do so by the government. Frankly, I agree with him.

The banks were given some hefty taxpayer bailout money and the intention of this bailout (I assume) was to put them in a position to lend this money instead of stuffing it under their mahogany bed in hopes of the economy recovering before they have to loan anything. Last time I checked, the cart doesn't come before the horse.

An NPR blog a couple of days ago gave some opinions as to why the banks are so reluctant to loosen the vice on their wallets. Some potential reasons are as follows:

1. They're scared that borrowers won't be able to pay them back
2. They're already too strapped to hand out any more cash.
3. Fear of being short of funds if investment opportunities get even better

The third scenario was proposed by Douglas Diamond and Raghuram Rajan from The University of Chicago School of Finance. They write:

"If financial institutions expect that those with liquidity could make a killing in the future (by buying financial assets or banks at fire sale prices), they will restrict their lending or investment today to very short maturities or liquid securities and not lock up liquidity in term loans."

Whatever that means. All I know is that lenders are about as conservative today with their lending as Miss California is with her question responses, and if we don't collectively liberate a little bit we're going to remain highly unemployed and quite ignorant to the personal preferences of others.

Don T. and Miss USA

Promoting a culture of safety

I ran across an article today of a settlement reached with the family of Matthew Ammon, a Microsoft attorney, who was killed in 2006 when a tower crane from an adjacent construction site crashed through his apartment. Having not heard of this incident previously, I started reading a bit more into it.

The reports show that the crane sat on a very unconventional foundation that was really not a foundation at all. The crane sat on a steel frame when cranes typically are supported by a foundation of concrete. This very unusual set up was designed by a local structural engineering firm and deemed to be safe by the engineering firm as well as the general contractor on the project.

A settlement was reached yesterday after an interesting admission of some responsibility by the designer of the crane support system one day before the trial was slated to begin. The engineering firm was fined $10,000. This seems a little light to me.

The most interesting part about this story however, was the fact that there were numerous reports of noticeable fatigue of the crane system. There were reports of the tower of the crane leaning upwards of three feet when the allowable lean was less than six inches.

So the question, of course, is if there were noticeable signs of stress on this system, why was a correction not performed? Ron Slater, a former construction foreman for the general contractor presented a possible reason for a construction company not being quick to deliver information about a potential hazard to a Seattle publication shortly after the incident.

"They preach a lot about safety but when you open your mouth too much, all of a sudden you become the problem," said Slater.

Slater also said that he has been blackballed from all construction supervisor jobs in the area due to whistle-blowing on un-safe practices earlier in his career and has since been able to find work only as an equipment operator.

While Slater's accusation of what could have happened may or may not have any true validity, I'll be one to attest that it is certainly possible. To bring a potentially poor crane foundation to the attention of the owner or engineer would at least cause minor delays, and at most cause severe financial impact to the project by requiring a new foundation to be designed and installed putting the crane temporarily out of operation.

I hope that this situation could not have been as easily prevented as Ron Slater is suggesting, but since this accident there have been several similar crane accidents in the US and some with more catastrophic outcomes.

We can add regulation and checklists all we want (and we are), but we also have to think about changing the culture on construction job sites to one that will not sacrifice safety or potential hazards just to save a buck. While laws and penalties are being enacted and more thoroughly enforced, I believe progress needs to be substantially supplemented by the leadership within construction organizations.

Promoting a culture of safety

Time Lapse Tuesday

Time Lapse Tuesday

What is the best way to job hunt?

While I sit here and write about my trials and tribulations of searching for a construction industry job during the worst market since the Great Depression, I will have you know that I in no way feel that my need for employment is any more important or news worthy than that of anybody else. However, I happen to have some experience with writing, some unexpected time on my hands, and a bi-weekly unemployment check that turns the hemmoraging into a slow bleed.

Anyway, I've done some serious thinking lately about the best way to get a job in these "uncertain economic times". While standing at a stoplight with a squeegee and a rag is probably the best way to earn a buck in the short term, I think I'm turning my attention more toward networking and away from rapid fire resume launch. I think that a few months from now will be when most companies begin hiring, and now is the time to lay groundwork, make contacts, and get in front of people's faces. There is no substitute for face to face contact when looking for a job.

Of course some will argue that the rapid-fire resume launch method into cyber-space is the way to go, but I don't see this being any more successful than launching them into actual space and having a potential employer run across it in their travels through the universe (looking for work perhaps). There are hundreds of applicants per position, and to get your docs in front of the right person at the right time who is in the right mood is highly unlikely. In my opinion, networking for jobs not advertised is a more realistic and sensible method of job hunting.

I took to the streets on Friday with resumes in hand with the intention of shoving it in the face of some potential employers and possibly getting some business cards. I did a little research of the Philadelphia construction companies and made a list of who I'd like to work for and then found out where their projects are located.

I'd rather not mess around in their corporate office right now because typically, the jobsites get the final word on who they do and don't hire. So I went straight to the office trailer of a $500 million casino that just broke ground along the Delaware River in Philadelphia and being a casualty of an expired casino project, I thought I could maybe grab a little attention.

I walked around and couldn't find the site at first but after asking some other street wanderers (I guess they got laid off as well), they pointed me in the direction of a construction site that was barely getting underway and a little single wide trailer. I popped my head in and got a look from a man in the back office of the trailer that could have easily said, "Who the hell are you?" or perhaps, "Get out of here before I throw you in that concrete pour."

I introduced myself and asked if I could drop off a resume. I also threw in how I just got laid off from a steel contractor working on the Revel Casino. He seemed immediately more interested. Construction companies will often start a project with a few "pioneers" and then add to it with people from other jobs or new hires and the workload ramps up. I got the feeling that this guy knew he had to hire people eventually.

He took my resume, but when I asked him for a business card he said he didn't have any - must have been fresh out. However, he did say I should stop back next week. I suppose that's better than getting thrown in that day's concrete pour.

What is the best way to job hunt?