(Transcribed by TurboScribe.ai. Go Unlimited to remove this message.)

Welcome, everybody, out to podcast number 1280. In this podcast, I'm going to talk about a couple of different topics, but all of them really have to do with, I would say, preparation and being able to properly prepare work. But these are new concepts that I've been learning recently at boot camp and then in Canada, just really great topics.

So if you're into that, please stay with us. This is the Elevate Construction Podcast, delivering remarkable content for workers, leaders, and companies in construction wanting to take their next step. Get ready to step out of your comfort zone with Jason Schroeder as he encourages you to do better, live a remarkable life, and expect more.

Let's go. Welcome everyone. I hope you're doing well.

And I'm super happy to be with you. I'm still in Florida with my family and enjoying the boot camp out here with a company called CAST. We have 60 different people in a super PM boot camp, absolutely fantastic human beings.

One of the best events I've ever been to. And then our super PM boot camp in Phoenix is already at, I think, 35 people and climbing. We're going to be over capacity at 120, I'm just kidding.

So if you want seats, grab them. I do believe that the super PM boot camp in April in Phoenix will be the last one of its kind. The reason is because the construction company that we're doing in Phoenix is supposed to be a showcase so people can just fly out.

So if you're really interested in, I mean, I don't know for a fact that we won't have them in the future, but if you really want to hang out with this and have the experience of a lifetime, I would highly recommend that you hop into the one in April. Anyway, super love all of you. I'm glad to be here with you.

Let me start out by some feedback from our listeners. Hey, Jason, really enjoyed the webinar this morning. Unfortunately, I was only able to join for the second hour, but hope to watch the full recording.

Nonetheless, you did not disappoint in your heartfelt and important comments. I'm really fixated on respect for people at the moment. It is so foundational, seems so simple, easy even, but I witnessed it failing constantly.

Love to chat more about this one of these days. Lastly, thank you for saying we should not be willing to compromise any of the three pillars, quality, productivity, cost, as I find this is exactly where people tend to go. You can't have it all, you know.

Please do not stop doing the great work you are doing in the industry. I really appreciate this feedback as I do all of the feedback and I'm super excited to be with all of you tonight and I'll do a couple of podcasts and try and get caught up. I try just so everybody knows, I try to never be more than three behind.

I try to be on schedule, but if I'm going to get behind, I try to be more than three. Like my trigger by my set point is at minus three. It used to be that I tried to stay ahead, but I'm just getting too old to worry too much about it.

I know everybody's super patient and they have a good cadence with me. Anyway, let's go ahead and get started. I got some couple of things.

We're sorry, I got some couple of things. I've got a couple of things I want to talk to you about. First, let me tell you an insight the other day that I had in one of the simulations and the tact simulation that we do that is sold by Marco Benneger and Janice Louis from TACTING.

We typically break it up into six zones and excuse me, the TACT time is 30 seconds and we're attempting typically to hit under at least an eight minute duration and you know, unless they, unless we want to get down to six or, you know, even smaller numbers, but typically that's where we are. And when a team is doing well, they'll hit all the way at like five minutes or 40 seconds early by prefabricating the roof, really maintaining flow, keeping good communication, focusing on quality and like every now and then you'll have a team. Oh, and this is actually really interesting.

Every now and then that you'll have a team that just can't get out of the habit of pushing when I, uh, this happened to me the other day with the team and at the end, and so, oh my God, here's the story. Okay. So they weren't doing well, uh, and they blew their time, not because of the tax system didn't work, but because they kept fumbling the pieces and not focusing on quality.

And I got really annoyed, but I was like, I can't do this. I want them to have the reflection. So we're going to do it a fourth time.

And they had set a target of seven minutes, which was fine. And they were going to hit it, but they were right at time to where they had 20, 20 seconds left for the last zone. And they had a considerable amount of work to be done.

And one of the guys working with me, he, um, was wanting to get done. And I came over kind of as in the simulation as the general superintendent. And I said, practice this, do a mock-up as many times as you need to, until you consistently get it done in under 28 seconds.

And I said, do not start until you've done that practice. And they finished it in 14, finished under seven. All the teams nailed it.

Everybody really had a great time. But what I finished, sorry, what I realized is that we can't start until we know that we can win. And I started to use that with, uh, the simulations going forward.

I'm like, don't start with 30 second tax time. Don't start your trades on that day until you know you can win. That ties into the gate system where you have, uh, a full kit before you go through the gate, before you get the key to go through the gate.

And that's really a rule. Whatever you're doing on the project site, don't start until you know you can win. Most people just start with the hopes they can win.

Most people start with the hopes that it will be okay. Um, and actually most people start something knowing that it probably won't, but just turn to blind, turn a blind eye, blind eye, and just hope that from a statistical standpoint, there's a one-off, but it's never going to work. And so I love that saying, don't start until you know, you can win.

Let me pick out some of the other topics here real quick as I go. Uh, one thing that I noticed the other day when I was visiting in Canada was another reason why I love the afternoon form and huddle. Um, if you, and I never thought about this before, even though I've always loved having the form and huddle in the afternoon, instead of the morning, which I actually think is ridiculous, like to think that you can huddle the form in 15 minutes before or during when the workers are starting and then not create variation and not violate production laws is just that insane to me.

I don't even know how this ever started, but I'm not trying to be too critical. Um, so if you do the form and huddle in the morning, the person running the huddle, and this is going to cut deep in a good way. I think the person running the whole knows that they can't change too much or you'll do derail the cruel crew.

So all you really do is talk about where you are, how many people you have. The huddles are milk toast. You know, you're not going to do much plan, much change months or really prevent any problems because you know, you don't have that much time.

You know, you got to get out to the workers, to the work, and you know, you can't change much without changing production. So you're not solving real problems. If you do the afternoon form and huddle ahead of time, it forces you to actually plan, um, because you have to actually have a visual plan to communicate to workers as a customer, and you can actually plan real things, remove roadblocks, coordinate, coordinate handoffs, get the things that you need and actually make substantial changes if need be to make the work go well.

And so, uh, the best planners, uh, will not be reactionary the same day. They'll be the day before. And I just really feel like we've got to get into that habit where we're planning and not rushing and pushing and panicking.

When we do the simulations, the first round, everybody, everybody, I just want you to know, everybody has in this direction. Um, you, when you play the simulation, the first round, everybody just defaults to let's go, go, go and do work. So they try and do work fast.

And when they play the simulation the second or third time with attack production system and they win, they switch to the, Oh no, we're planning. And we're not rushing and pushing and panicking. And every now and then you have a team where they'll say ridiculous things like, let's get, let's have two crews for everything and run down both sides.

Let's, let's swarm this, uh, simulation. Let's just push through it. Let's skip the huddle, blah, blah, blah.

Sometimes I have to get after them and I, this is what I say. Hey team, you keep missing this and you're getting off rhythm and it's not helping you and you have to break the habit, stay on rhythm and stop going fast. Now that you're going out of rhythm and you're trying to go too fast.

Now you've caught up to the next trade. Now you don't have work for the next week. It hasn't helped you now, two or three people are now like not working.

You, they're probably going to demobilize from the site. The it's really difficult to track even where you are. It's not helping.

And the quality isn't even good and you're going to spiral out of control. You've got to stop it. You've got to slow down and you've got to start planning and preparing and stay within your zone, stay within your tag time and prepare for the next tag time.

That's the way to go. And that sometimes they'll even clap my hand and say, we've got to snap out of it. And as soon as they snap out of it, they start actually doing well.

Um, and so there's this mindset we've got to get away from. People think that pushing is somehow intelligent. It's not, it's so lazy.

It's so irresponsible. One last thought about this when it comes to preparation. Uh, I learned this the other day in Canada as well, a broker cannot make work ready.

If you don't know how to build and I'll go back to the field engineer thing, you don't know how to do lift trainings. You don't know how to do layout. Uh, you don't know how to prepare work.

You don't know how to QC it. You don't know how to run frontline safety. You don't know these builder topics.

Then you can't make work ready. A broker is just somebody who obviously goes and grabs a resource, but doesn't know much about it. A broker, the construction manager without a builder background can't make work ready cause they don't know how to do the work and they let alone make the work ready.

And so if you want to be a broker, that's fine, but you're just going to push people into an irresponsible situation. So if you're in that habit, ask yourself, do you enjoy being a broker and not a builder, uh, brokers do not know how to make work ready. So here were just a couple of different thoughts that I wanted to share with you that I've learned over the last little bit that talk about preparation.

I hope you've enjoyed this podcast. On we go. Join us next time in elevating the entire construction experience for workers, leaders and companies coast to coast.

If you're enjoying the show, please feel free to share with your construction colleagues and help us spread the word by rating subscribing and leaving a review on your preferred podcast listening platform. We really appreciate it. We'll catch you next time on the elevate construction podcast.

(Transcribed by TurboScribe.ai. Go Unlimited to remove this message.)