Ever considered the number of actual hours a field supervisor spends managing a change from inception to completion? What does a field supervisor actually do to complete a change? Does a $1,000 change cost less to supervise than a $4,000 change? On average, how often is your supervision budget met or exceeded?
Subcontractors commonly complain that their field supervision costs regularly exceed budget with or without changes. Consider there was a time of higher margins and lower production rates when subcontractors didn’t care if their supervision budget was exceeded because the overall job made money. Today, subcontractors bid jobs at lower margins and higher production rates, and a percentage of labor to determine field supervision hours. Hence, most jobs are bid with less than enough field supervision hours.