Web site results in accountability and self-esteem

Concrete Construction, July, 2003 by Lee Clark

Garber Brothers Precision Concrete has always had a culture and value system based on hard work and accountability. But once we exceeded 50 employees, we started losing the personal connection. That's why we developed a system that we call PC Time.

PC Time touches virtually everyone in the company. Each employee has access to the system on a different level, but all have to enter the system every day. It's an issue of trust to let them fill out their own time sheets every day, and it's the best time to exchange information. The superintendents create a start time sheet that automatically creates all the time tickets and job sheets. The foreman tells workers where to record time, which phase, which job. It forces training and helps focus on what is important, what we are trying to measure. From day one, the culture of the company is being impressed on the employee.

Each employee has a home page on the system and can log in anytime from any place. The individual's home page includes up-to-date information on everything about his or her relationship to the company. For example, workers can log onto the Web site of the company that handles our 401k plan and see how much money they have in their accounts. They can also link to our health insurance provider and check for participating doctors, or they can check our travel policies, or look at a complete company manual.

But the most important thing for the employee is the time sheet. When the employee comes back from a job at the end of the day, he logs in and gets a time ticket, which pulls information directly from our job-costing setup. From there, the employee puts in his time. Time can be entered only into the phases available for that job. Drive time is kept separate so that it doesn't affect production rates.

The hours they record go straight to the job costing system. We can check to see not only where any worker spent his time that day but relate it back to training and see how many hours were spent on a specific type of work.

The check boxes on this time ticket, available only to foremen and higher management, make up what we call "the ding system." If an employee is late or doesn't show up for work, he gets a ding, which costs against his incentive bonus program. If he forgets to bring his tools and has to borrow some, he gets dinged. If he doesn't fill out his time ticket at the end of the day, he gets a ding. Each has a value assigned, which is taken out of his incentive. We pay an incentive bonus for every hour worked, and on December 1, we write a check to the employee for that incentive minus dings. Each day when they fill out their time sheets on their home page, they know how many dings they have and if they've gotten a new ding. There's also a dispute system if they feel they shouldn't have gotten a ding. These dings can be assigned or revised only by management.

We distribute the collected ding money among those with fewer than five dings. The ding money can amount to almost as much as the baseline bonus. It's only fair because the other guys on the job had to make up for the guy that didn't show or forgot his tools.

Hourly employees also can access their benefit pages. They can review vacation time-totals, days left and used, and when they took it. They can put in vacation requests and find out how much time they have left after the request. The program lists all their dings, how many, what day, the job they were on, and the reason. There's no question--they know exactly what's going on.

The system shows all pertinent employee performance evaluation information. Workers can compare their previous evaluations with where they are now. In the two-step process, the employee and the superintendent both fill in a form. Then in a formal meeting they go over the review together.

Training is important in performance appraisal. Workers can see how many more hours they need for each skill level. We can add comments to the evaluation. The employee knows where he is at all times.

The next level, for foremen, is an administration screen, which shows the daily job sheet. When a foreman closes out a job, the sheet disappears from this list, meaning that all the required information is complete.

The superintendent can check and correct all time tickets. The sheet shows total hours for each phase so far and tracks production rates. This is important because our incentive program is based on these production rates.

At our company picnic in October, employees get "PC bucks," accumulated whenever they beat the production estimate. We buy about $5000 worth of prizes--grills, bicycles, computers--and then we auction off that stuff for PC bucks at the picnic. Last year there were about $4 million dollars in PC bucks out there. It's fun because you may be bidding $100,000 for a gas grill. The best prizes go to the guys who have the most PC bucks because they'll spend them all for that prize.

Except for specific hourly rates, we share all financial reports with all management level employees. The daily job sheet has a diary of work performed so we know what happened each day. If a sub bills for something different, a red flag comes up. Special concerns, like potential delays, are noted. This eliminates all re-entry of data.