Chairman’s Message: VALUE IN REVIEWING OUR YEAR

Words: Dick Dentinger

My father used to have a way of teaching me lessons by purposefully not intervening when I struggled. He thought if I felt at least a little of the pain of a potentially bigger mistake, I’d come out of it wiser and more prepared for the next time. He would watch and be aware of what was developing, and then would more or less call a time-out and have me walk through what to avoid. Whether related to school when I was young, or early in my career while we worked together, he helped me learn by going over my work. In my school days, when I was struggling in a class I actually cared about, he would have me meet him at the office after school, and I’d write my papers, and then he’d stop working and review my paper with me. Rather than simply editing my work, he would walk me through why one way was better than another way. He’d explain why this phrasing or that phrasing would be more effective in selling whatever message the paper was supposed to communicate to the reader. It was fun. It allowed me to absorb the critique constructively, and as the semesters went by, I needed his help less and less.

Later, in our time working together, there were times when I would be working to prepare bids and proposals. We used spreadsheets at the time. They were still a fairly new tool in the industry, and he would often point out that the dangers of spreadsheets were that they looked so organized, neat, and simple. As a result, it was easy to trust them as being perfect. I quickly learned how shocking it could be to your bid if you didn’t notice your perfectly looking spreadsheet had an entry error or decimal error. Thankfully, he caught a few of my bids with such an error before we sent out our price. I remember how he used a serious tone and pointed at the error and said, “That number doesn’t make sense. When you look at it, it ought to jump off the page and hit you smack in the middle of the forehead,” as he slapped his own forehead with his palm. It was effective. I learned from the near misses and now look for such things subconsciously every day in our business. I learned from reviewing the past.

It's those lessons that give us wisdom and make us more valuable, and more equipped to meet whatever we face on our next day or on our next project. So, we should look to learn from the most recent year’s effort and see how we can improve going forward.

In our business, we need to review the year while looking for the truths that present themselves. Winning stories that were earned because of what we, as a company, did correctly. Or, truths that are hard to look at and should hit us smack in the forehead, revealing something we need to reevaluate going forward. Review our crews and teams over the past year. Who worked well together, and which personalities would do better if they were working on different teams or types of work?

We should also take the time to evaluate our relationships with our clients and our vendors. Having a year-end meeting or lunch with a customer to say thanks is easy. We all already do something like this to some degree, I’m sure. We, of course, don’t want to get work from our customers only based on our price. We have to evaluate key customer relationships over the past year and see where we need to re-establish trust or note any customers we’re taking for granted. The same applies to our key vendors. We should thank our best vendors for their role in our success. They are an extension of the service we provide. We needed them last year and will need them again in the new year.

As we finish up this busy December, we should also consider our local masonry associations. Have our companies been supporting the local associations this past year effectively and fulfilling our obligation to provide influence? Have each of us who is reading this column done our part locally? Do we show up at local meetings and events held by our local or regional masonry contractors’ associations? Most of us likely would have to answer that question by at least admitting we could have done more. If that is the case, we should challenge ourselves to commit to showing up when called for our local association efforts in 2026. If you are one of those who already are doing your part locally, perhaps it’s time to reach out to a competitor who isn’t active in your group. Reach out and ask them why they aren’t participating and tell them why you find it important, while also telling them why their voice, leadership, and talent are needed. The fight to grow success for our businesses is on all fronts. It’s in our own offices and jobsites, in our local markets and regional areas, and at a national level. We need to review how we have done recently and see how we can improve going into the next year, so we hit the ground running. December is a month of joy for many reasons. Let’s all declare victory on the year’s performance, celebrate the holidays, and then recap how we can tweak our operations wherever needed to ensure 2026 is a success.

Chairman’s Message: VALUE IN REVIEWING OUR YEAR

About: Chairman’s Message

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