Workforce management is an organizational approach that you use to optimize the effectiveness and efficiency of employees. This practice strategically improves productivity across various industries. For example, in the contracting business, WFM gets the right person at the right time in the right place, creating the right strategy.
Specialty contractors worldwide practice WFM, but most perform so unequipped and unknowingly. When done successfully, WFM helps specialty contractors schedule productive teams, track skills, and performance, and stay on budget to improve gains. Let us learn more.
On the top of scheduling, great workforce planning in the construction industry includes the following:
- Data Gathering and Analysis: Collecting workforce data and analyzing performance to make improvements moving forward.
- Performance Management: Tracking output of the team members against organizational goals.
- Training and Mentorships: Managing the team member’s training and career development.
- Human Resource Planning: Staying ahead of recruitment requirements to ensure there is enough time to choose qualified and skilled candidates to achieve organizational goals
- Forecasting: Predicting employee allocation with certain skills and qualifications to current and future projects.
- Human Resource Management: Managing the people within the organization.
Why is Workforce Management in Contracting Business Important?
Workforce management is essential due to following reasons:
Construction Workforce Planning Limits Employee Downtime
Nothing will hurt a contracting business more than workers or employees not working. However, it doesn’t mean working while actively on the job site. Infact, it involves the paid downtime a worker will have during projects if the tasks get properly allocated.
Worker downtime will impact the project profitability, but it is unavoidable in some cases when waiting for designs, materials, etc. However, worker downtime will directly affect the organization’s profitability, and every effort should be limited.
Keeps Workers Focused on Deadlines
Contractor workforce management tools increase transparency and align the team on project and company goals. The two most consistent goals for the project are staying on budget and time. In addition, contractor workforce management helps the project management teams to visualize the project and its deadlines. It also helps to understand the workforce plan impacting a project’s completion date.
Reduces Unnecessary Expenses
Human resources are the pulse of the contracting business. However, there is often a huge range of responsibilities, leading to administrative errors impacting an organization’s bottom line. Construction workforce management tools help the automation of administrative processes, helping to reduce errors and costs and providing more time for operations management.
Effective contractors help monitor staff reductions, forecasting, and schedules. As a result, it can help meet operational demands to enhance ROI in the short and long run.
Helps in the Ability Evaluating to Take New Projects
The key aspect of construction workforce management is forecasting. Accurate workforce prediction can help keep recruitment practices based on data, clarify the impact of future projects, and optimize capacity planning.
Conclusion
As more and more professionals select to make their working contractual, the contractor workforce is becoming a big part of the labor mix. Moreover, developing a best practice management plan and attracting and retaining them is critical to organizational growth.
