Why You Should Have a Construction Schedule Template

Happy Tuesday, Reader

Last week, I wrote about how Home Builders often take schedules one-at-a-time (like I did). And the problem with that was that you just keep doing things the same way - and - you never learn or get any better.

So - how do you start getting control of schedules in a homebuilding business?

You create a Schedule Template.

What's a Schedule Template?

Quite simply, a Schedule Template is just a pre-determined set of construction activities that are arranged in an order to build a new home.

And you use that Schedule Template as a baseline for all homes that you build.

Think of it as the "ideal" homebuilding schedule. You know...a perfect world where all your Trade Partners are just waiting to work exactly when needed. And they get done exactly when they tell you they will.

And it doesn't rain or snow. And materials always show up and are never on backorder.

Yeah, I know. That's a really dreamy state that rarely (if ever) happens in real life.

Why, you may wonder, should you even care about having an "ideal" schedule if reality will muck it up anyway?

I hear this argument often from homebuilding executives who just don't get it yet. They argue that it's pointless to have a "pie-in-the-sky" schedule template, because "that's not how it works in the real world."

And that's why I bolded and underlined the word "baseline" above. It's ok, you can admit that you were wondering why the heck that was underlined and bolded when you read it earlier (or.....you can admit you didn't notice I did that - no judgement from me).

Why is "Baseline" Important?

The importance of having a Baseline in a "real world" situation is that you need something to measure against.

Yeah. You're measuring against an "ideal" that may rarely happen - but - you need to measure off of something. And that's exactly what a Schedule Template is used for.

Otherwise, how do you ever know that you are consistently losing time at, say, Rough-Ins (Link will take you to my Incredible Growing Homebuilding Glossary).

Or - how can you prove that your Supplier misses their scheduled deliveries by XX amount of days?

Or - how can you see that the new Drywall Installer may be less expensive BUT takes twice as long as others?

Short answer: You can't (as a trend). You can know for this ONE job. And the next one. And maybe another one three houses later.

But you're still not learning. And when you're not learning, you're not improving.

That's ok if you want to keep making life hard on yourself - but - I've found that when you start to plan out and have a baseline to measure against, you'll soon see that the data you can get from that makes you smarter, happier, and puts more money in your pocket.

Where do I still see Home Builders stumble?

It's when they think their Superintendents (and/or Trades) just can't come together on a Schedule Template.