For many people, the actual building of the project is what Production is all about. Looking at the bigger picture, Production has a great deal of responsibility to keep profit up. Production is a huge contributor to the financial health of the company.
It’s about the numbers — but what numbers are critical for the Production team to know and track?
In this episode, Judith Miller talks about the critical numbers for Production with Tim and Steve.
Judith is the resident financial expert at Remodelers Advantage, and says the numbers tell the story of your company. In college she studied architecture — but failed physics — and switched majors, graduating with a degree in economics. She has combined her love of architecture and building with economics to become a high-level strategist in the remodeling industry. Judith has been a facilitator for Remodelers Advantage Roundtables for more than 15 years, is a featured speaker at industry events, and frequently published in Remodeling Magazine.
If you can lay out a roof, which can be complicated, you can understand the numbers if you put your mind to it, she says. Looking at what numbers are trending, Judith says she’s seeing over-billing numbers decreasing, indicating a drop in sales from last year to this year. The economy may be slowing, Judith says, which makes understanding the numbers from the production side even more important. She talks about:
- How field labor efficiency affects the bottom line
- Indirect costs
- Controlling slippage to protect from slowing sales
- Job costs to look at in Production
- Acceptable gross margin levels
- Profit, loss, and overhead
- Why the little stuff matters in job costing
- The 80/20 rule
- Why to estimate hours over dollars for labor
- The most important things to hit in your budgets
- Solving problems together
The most important factor in your bottom line isn’t a number, Judith says, customer satisfaction is. And that’s driven by employee satisfaction. So as you dive into the numbers together, avoid finger-pointing, and work as a team to figure out how to make your company more profitable.
Here are the links to Judith’s webinar about the Labor Burden Calculator:
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