Home Builders: Taking on the Search for Skilled Labor

We've been reading interesting articles regarding a labor shortage in the homebuilding trades and seeing suggestions as to how to find qualified vendors.  We'll highlight a few -- as well as ask have you considered how to best manage the resources available to you?

First, the suggestions:

-- Network
-- Encourage current employees/vendors to join in the process
-- Build a pipeline
-- Make sure you're competitive
-- Develop talent within
-- Consider apprentice programs (your own and those in the community).

All great ideas; some will take a fair amount of time to produce results.

FieldCollaborate: anywhere/anytime scheduling & more!

We have one additional suggestion that can generate results almost immediately: make sure you're maximizing your current resources. 

Automated construction scheduling will not only create schedules and allow you to track/report progress against the schedules.  It will highlight problem areas, allow you to focus attention on trouble spots and help you develop solutions.

Do you know which trades show up on time, have all their equipment available and are ready to work, leave the job site clean and ready for the next trade? Scheduling systems that include quality ratings, punch lists and safety assessments will take you a long way in answering those questions.

How about taking your knowledge and expanding it throughout the supply chain? Make drawings available on line through a Vendor Portal; provide illustrated guides to specialty installations; put your schedules on line to streamline the trade partner notification process and keep everyone up-to-date.

Growing your labor pool is essential; maximizing its effectiveness is critical, too. Talk to us and see how CPS' FieldCollaborate can add efficiency and effectiveness to your construction process.

Touchscreens: Illustrating Livability

We suggested in an earlier blog that a successful interactive touchscreen system helps your home shoppers become more engaged as they find out about your product and more informed when they begin a model tour. 

They're not just looking, in other words, once they're taking the model tour; they're already making decisions.

Help your buyer visualize living in the community

That concept is actually one of the major differences between touching a screen and a mouse click: the brain is making decisions with each touch.

Well-designed touchscreen systems incorporate this powerful concept into their design. No doubt you've heard us say SalesTouch is more than "just a pretty face." Design, when you're thinking about touchscreens definitely includes great-looking photos, virtual tours and video.  It expands to include considering the target market, neighborhood features, selling opportunities.

Energy savings interest every demographic!

Encourage touching by showing information your buyer wants more of: livability items (neighborhood shopping, dining, schools and recreation), home specialty items (lazy Susans, open wire shelving in the closets), green features (tankless water heaters, Smart vents). 

Keep in mind: effective design directed towards encouraging decision-making  has to be oriented towards your buyer demographic and their livability objectives. There's absolutely no sense, in other words, in showing 55+ images to first-time buyers (or the reverse). Both generations are interested in energy savings, however.

 Use the touchscreen to visually describe how your community meets your buyer's livability objectives.