Every factory in every industry believes they have the best people. Their passion for a job well-done drives both quality and quantity and the modular off-site construction industry is no different. Most factory owners and management believe they have great communication skills and tell everyone they have an “open door” policy.
And for the most part, this is very true. However, there are some truths that can’t be ignored, not only in the modular housing industry but by every single industry in the world.
Mariotti Building Products
Viking Carrier
PFS Corporation
Here are the 5 truths shared by every Modular and Off-Site factory:
1. People are Lazy
You may not want to hear this but, really, we are. Every person in the factory will seek to accomplish whatever needs to be done with as little effort as possible. Many times this is referred to as being efficient. Has there ever been an innovation in modular housing that requires more effort to accomplish a current process? Has anyone ever sat down and said that we need to make the production line more complicated?
Think back on ideas your company has had to improve production. Have any ideas that meant more work and extensive retraining ever been implemented?
Laziness is also found in how we think. We tend to do the bare minimum and end up making serious errors of judgment as a result. In a nutshell, thinking is hard work and we don’t do any more work than absolutely necessary (and often not even that much). Given a choice between exerting a bit more effort (mental or otherwise) or a bit less, how many of us choose to work harder? That’s right – we’re all a bit lazy.
2. Patience is Not a Virtue in any Factory
Just as we want things easier, we also want them to happen faster. The fast food restaurants started this. Today if we have an idea for improving the factory we first turn to Google and see if someone else has done it. If you can’t find the answer, how many of you have the patience to sit down and completely start from scratch putting your idea into a Word document, then an Excel spreadsheet followed by a PowerPoint presentation, then defend it and finally seeing it implemented? Yeah, I thought so.
Sales managers want orders now! Owners want profits now! Builders want their homes yesterday! Patience is not really tolerated in our industry.
Every single part of an industry centered around a production line and rapid construction screams for speed, not patience. The success of the fast food industry should tell us all we need to know about the value of instant gratification.
3. Everything Takes Longer Than Expected
It doesn’t seem to matter how much time I allow for any given task – whether it’s picking up dry cleaning or writing an article. Time seems to evaporate, leaving me scrambling to catch up.
In a perfect world, everyone does their job right, the first time and on time. But that never happens in the modular housing industry or any other. Owners sit down with their Sales Managers and want more orders to fill the future production schedule. The SM doesn’t have a face-to-face meeting scheduled with the sales staff for another week. The Sales reps look at the current schedule and don’t see a real problem so they don’t feel the urgency. Besides, they can’t pull contracts out of their builder’s butts.
The engineering department has builder’s drawings overflowing from one week to the next. They are holding their own until one of them leaves on vacation. Now either that CAD person’s drawings are put on hold for a week or others, who are already swamped, have to pick up extra work. Builders call wanting to know where their drawings are. Threats to call the owner only succeed in getting the drawings pushed back further.
On the production line, the house moves down the line but those special order windows haven’t arrived and the house is built without them, put aside in the yard until they arrive and installed in the elements. Yuck. That never happens!
4. Builders Are Not Treated Equally
Squeaky wheels, price shopping builders, service abusers and royal pains in the neck are never given the best price, the best service or full attention.
I remember sitting in on sales meetings with Sales Managers at different factories where certain builders were singled out as problem children. Salespeople were told to cut their discounts, take their time getting back to them, make it tough on getting service and other things hoping the builder would simply go to another factory and slow down their production process.
The more houses a builder ordered, the better they were tolerated. The modular home factory is not a retail store where they want all their customers to come back and shop often. No, they are manufacturers that want to build modular homes, send them out the door and get paid. They have little tolerance for builders that only buy a couple homes a year but expect beyond first-class treatment.
They are looking for those cherished few builders that place orders, understand the problems of manufacturing a modular home, take care of small service issues without complaining or threatening to sue the factory, work well with their sales reps and cause few problems for management. Every factory has a couple.
5. Factories Don’t Always Hire the Right People
Just like marriage, sometimes a factory employee will not work out. Salespeople are often kept longer than they should be, doing more harm each week. Even though it usually takes a new salesperson 6 months to a year to effectively begin selling homes, the signs of a mediocre sales rep are usually evident quickly.
Builders begin having a tough time getting them on the phone or answer emails. Details are often overlooked and nothing they do seems organized. When a sales rep is kept on the job instead of being let go, builders, the engineering department and the factory suffer.
Sales Managers are a special breed of person. Most have come up through the sales department where they were a star. Offered a salary and management authority, some of them fold under the pressure. Senior management knows they made a mistake but they are forced to choose to put this person back into sales or letting them go.
Hiding in plain sight among their peers, these lackluster employees tend to bring down whole departments with their attitude and work ethics.
I find it interesting that when one of these people is let go, everyone says “what took the boss so long to see how bad he was” or “We couldn’t believe that the boss didn’t fire him months ago.”
Factory owners and management don’t want these people working for them but there are people in every plant that shouldn’t have been hired in the first place.
The Modcoach writes the Modcoach News, Modular Home Coach and Off-Site Construction News blogs. Modcoach Connects matches Consultants with Clients.
Contact me at modcoach@gmail.com
