Many AEC firms claim high quality, but without consistent action those promises quickly become hollow words.
If you look at most of the marketing materials from AEC firms of any kind, you will see the word “quality” used frequently. Pretty much everyone claims to be a high-quality service provider, or to do “high quality projects.” That’s great if it is true, but too often those are just hollow words with no real action to back them up.
Let’s take a look at a few things related to “quality,” or at least the perception of it in the AEC world:
- Office space. How is yours? Is it clean? How nice are your bathrooms? Are all the fixtures attached to the wall and functioning? Trash cans not overflowing? Is your lobby filled with 2-year-old magazines? How do your blinds look when you see the building at night? Is all of your signage clear and up to date? Lighting good? Work areas neat? Company lunchroom clean? Carpet clean and spot-free? Wall and trim paint in good shape? Parking lot clean? Planting beds weed-free? Dumpsters hidden away? Smokers out back where they can’t be seen? All of this is a reflection of your quality standards. It speaks to your visitors and employees alike.
- Vehicles. How are yours? Are they all painted to match? No visible scrapes, dents, or other damage? Name, logo, phone number, and web address on all work vehicles? Are they spotlessly clean inside and out? No trash in them? Your vehicles make an impression on people. It’s either good or bad. If bad, it calls into question the quality standards you maintain.
- People. Do they all dress appropriately? Decent shoes? Do they each have the educational backgrounds and registrations required to be experts in their fields? Are they good communicators? Do they have good manners? Does everyone have a business card? Do they do what they say they will and follow up when they are supposed to? Are they quick to respond to emails and calls? Everyone in the firm has to meet certain standards for you to truly be perceived as a quality service provider. You are only as good as your weakest team member.
- Phone systems. Does yours work like it should? Does the person who answers the phone sound like they are alive and glad to be there? If you use auto attendant, does the menu system make sense? Does it work? Is your employee directory up to date? Does your system dead end or cut people off? Is there some kind of music or talking on hold so callers know they haven’t been disconnected? Does the voicemail work like it’s supposed to? Does everyone have a current voicemail message? Phone systems are often the gateway to the customer experience. Your entire service quality can be judged by a bad phone system.
- Written communications. Does everything that goes out of your company meet a certain quality standard? Do your people use proper sentences and paragraphs? Do they all use the language properly? Do your people spell properly? (I recently saw a LinkedIn profile from a manager in a design firm that had his title listed as “principle.”) Have you done any training to improve the writing quality of your people? The quality of what you do is often judged by the writing quality of your people.
- Designs and construction plans. Have alternatives been studied? Do your people really care about giving the client what the client wants versus what they themselves want to do? Have you been honest with the client about what they are going to get? Have end users been polled to identify their wants and needs? Has unnecessary cost been cut out where it can be even if the budget is there to support it? What is the public reaction likely to be to the project? Is that a concern? Do the plans themselves reflect the physical quality that is expected? Spelling errors? Clarity? Have likely contractor questions been fully addressed? These things all impact the perceived quality of what you do.
- Documentation. Are your people quick to get out meeting minutes? Are the minutes accurate and spelled correctly? Do they go to everyone they are supposed to? Do they get site visit reports out quickly and accurately, and are they clear? This stuff is important to quality.
- Client satisfaction post-construction and recurring problems. Do you poll or interview your clients to find out how they feel about what you did for them after the project is complete and in use, or are you afraid to uncover problems that you don’t really want to hear about? Do you deal with common recurring problems with your work product and services, or just shrug them off as normal? These things have a huge impact on the perceived quality of your services.
It’s time to take quality seriously. While demand remains high for most everything firms in our industry do, it’s probably going to get a lot more competitive soon. Quality providers will always do well, but those with quality problems will suffer if demand slows.
Mark Zweig is Zweig Group’s chairman and founder. Contact him at mzweig@zweiggroup.com.