How to Start Construction Projects off on the Right Foot

What happens when you start your construction projects off on the wrong foot? You lose time, money, and credibility! I’m sure you’ve been in a situation where the initial estimate was way off base or all of your legal bases weren’t covered, or maybe you and the client had way different expectations of the results of the project from the beginning; the results were probably not what you wanted.

On the other hand, when you start every project on the right foot, your business will see the benefits in no time, because when you can provide everyone involved with clear expectations upfront, there is less confusion, less chaos, more money, and happier clients.

Keep reading to learn our best tips for how you can start every project off on the right foot.

1. Create a Detailed Project Scope

A good project starts with a detailed project scope. This includes making sure your team and all stakeholders understand the project expectations upfront so that there is little to no confusion about what’s to come.

A project scope describes everything a project will and will not include. It gives everyone an overview of the goals, objectives, and necessary resources of a project and how those goals will be accomplished, which ensures there are realistic and accurate expectations between the client and the contractor.

Your project scope should include all information that would accurately define project expectations for you, the client, other stakeholders, and your team. If you want to know more details the importance of project scope and what to include in one, check out our article Construction Project Scope: What It Is, Why Use It, & How to Define It, but here are a few reasons having detailed project scopes are so important for starting off projects:

Sets your project up for success before you even break ground
Prevents litigation that can happen when clients and contractors disagree on the terms of a project
Defines clear expectations and goals for clients, stakeholders, and your team
Sets boundaries to prevent scope creep which happens when more and more tasks that were not initially agreed upon get added to a project
Establishes responsibilities for your construction team members so that everyone has a general idea of what is expected of them

If you need a simple way to create detailed, complete project scopes for your next projects, you can click the button below to download our Free Construction Scope of Work Template:

2. Clearly Communicate Project Expectations Upfront

It’s one thing to create a detailed project scope, but if you don’t communicate those project expectations to everyone involved, it doesn’t matter how great the scope of work is; it’s not going to serve its intended purpose.

Think about it this way: You’ve created the most detailed project scope complete with expectations, an estimate, a general timeline, roles and responsibilities, and everything else a good scope should have, but somewhere there is a breakdown in communication and the client ends up having different expectations about what the project will entail.

As a contractor, the responsibility to communicate important project details to the client before the project even starts is mostly yours, whether you do it verbally, with written documents, electronically, or all three ways. If you need an easy way to communicate project details to your team and clients, including the timeline, milestones, an initial estimate, and more, schedule your free demo with us to learn how our construction project management software, ConstructionOnline™, can help you.

3. Start With an Accurate Estimate

An accurate project estimate is the foundation of a profitable project that starts off on the right track.

As I’m sure you’ve experienced, when the estimate is way off, it snowballs into much larger issues down the line, such as going over budget, making clients unhappy, more stress that falls on you, lost credibility, and an overall unsuccessful project.

When you start projects off with an accurate estimate, you, your team, and stakeholders have more trust in you and you’ll end up with less stressful and more profitable projects that result in happier clients and improved credibility.

Need an easy way to create reusable estimates for your upcoming projects? Check out our free construction estimate templates by clicking the button below:

4. Ensure Required Permits Have Been Approved

Permits are one of those essential aspects of construction that are required for all new construction, alterations, and remodels. If you don’t have the necessary permits before you start building, you risk legal consequences like fines, being forced to demolish the unpermitted work, and a host of other problems.

Permit tracking is essential for legal compliance, financial protection, reputation, and trust within the industry.

To learn more about the importance of permit tracking for your construction business, read our article Protecting Your Construction Business: Insurance and Permit Tracking Best Practices.

5. Assign Roles & Responsibilities

Assigning and managing roles and responsibilities of your team at the beginning establishes confidence in you and your team. When everyone knows what is expected of them from the start, there is little room for confusion about who is supposed to do what throughout the project.

The last thing you want to happen is for your team to be left wondering what their role is during project execution when the actual work is supposed to be happening.

6. Plan and Manage Projects With Software

We’ve covered the main tips for starting projects off strong, but wouldn’t it be great if you could manage all of those aspects without the hassle of keeping up with several different documents, contracts, and spreadsheets that are a million different places?

With project management tools like ConstructionOnline, you can do everything from project start to finish for multiple projects, including: