Construction Contractor and Author Launches Consulting Practice

Nick Ganaway, author of Construction Business Management: What Every Construction Contractor, Builder & Subcontractor Needs to Know announces that he is now offering consultation services to contractors, subcontractors and builders experiencing the startup or growing pains and other hard times that he says are so common in construction.

Ganaway, a commercial general contractor for 25 years, says he learned about rough times in construction the hard way, nearly going broke at one point. “It’s nothing to be ashamed of,” he said. “Many of the high-profile names we see in the business world today had total failures before finding their niche and making their mark.” Similarly, Ganaway said his most successful years came after he fought back from the brink. “You're faced with the decisions you made that got you there when you’re in the ditch,” he said, “and you learn from them.”

Ganaway, who sold his construction firm several years ago, limits his consulting services to the business side of construction. He says one of the top problems he sees contractors struggle with is lack of management experience. “Construction firms are usually started by smart managers who have done well with another contractor, but they open up their own business, run through the jobs they brought with them from the old company, and soon find out there’s more to running the whole ball of wax than they ever knew about.” He added that seventy percent of startup construction firms are no longer in business at the end of their seventh year according to a 2006 report by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

The other top problem is cash flow, Ganaway said. Contractors tend to look at sales figures rather than profit numbers, he said. “If a contractor doesn’t make well-thought-out cash flow projections based on realistic expectations of income and outflow as his workload changes, he can get in trouble very quickly, and by then the damage may be out of control.”

For more information email Ganaway at NickGanaway@cbmworks.com or visit www.ConstructionBusinessManagement.com.