"Communication failure" is a catch-all term that describes the cause of probably 90 percent of all business problems. Failures to communicate happen in many ways, for many reasons. Let's examine some of these and what can be done to correct them.
The year was 1977 and yours' truly was trying desperately to hold the end of a 12-foot sheet up while trying to finger a nail into the edge of the board and hit the nail instead of my fingers with a roofing hatchet. If memory serves, back then we were using blue ring shank nails. The heads were barely larger than the circumference of the rings, so it was virtually impossible to drive one without ripping the face paper under ideal conditions, and these were not ideal conditions.
Helping you learn the fine art of plastering is one of the main goals of this column. Included in that is the skill of how to estimate projects. It's the profits from plastering that pay the bills and keep things going. With this in mind, last month we started talking about what I consider eight important factors that are involved in estimating jobs. We used the acronym "ESTIMATE" to outline the eight points.
I received an odd email the other day from a company located in a town whose name I can't pronounce-somewhere in India. They had found me through Walls & Ceilings. The e-mail was an order for what looked like enough EIFS panels to cover the Pentagon.
My first day studying architecture at college started with the department head asking me to define the word "architecture." I came up with "architecture is structurally defining environments to accommodate human activities." But when we see "architecture" for the first time, we mostly see walls. Facades define architecture more than roofs, in most cases.
In part one, we began this series that takes a look at the recent developments concerning substituting/minimizing off-gassing from formaldehyde-based binders (adhesives) used for composite wood panel products. Known as non-added formaldehyde alternatives, research and development in this field is starting to pay off with a new generation of soy-based binders and substitution of phenol formaldehyde for urea formaldehyde binders for composite wood fiber panels used in architectural millwork as a means to lessen the effects of formaldehyde off-gassing into the interior environment.
The Hispanic workforce is unique to our contemporary business environment. As a group of people, this workforce is considered to be critical to the success of the construction industry. At the same time, members of the Hispanic workforce have special training needs that their Anglo counterparts do not have.
Last year, I wrote an article for this publication that drew attention to some of the greatest words of wisdom I've ever heard from a construction attorney. Those words are worth repeating: "It's better to sign a bad contract with a good person than a good contract with a bad person."
Hola y como estan (Hi and how are you). It's a new year and already it's been far too cold in the Midwest. It makes me yearn to use my stock Spanish phrase in Mexico City, Acapulco, Belize-anywhere south of the border, close to the equator.
In September 2003, an article appeared in this column titled "Formaldehyde: Free at Last." It concerned the voluntary switchover by Johns Manville from the standard formaldehyde binder for fiberglass insulation to an acrylic binder.
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