31 Jul, 2007
EMCOR's Quarter
However, the news is amazing.
EMCOR boosted its expectations of full-year 2007 sales to as high as $5.7 billion.
The company's backlog of work is at $4.26 billion, a record high. It's up 32% over 6/30/06. It's up 10.9% over 3/31/07. More impressive is the claim of Frank T. MacInnis, the boss here, that the composition of the backlog now includes "larger and more complex projects, which tend to have longer durations and increasing profit opportunities." A few years ago, EMCOR's backlog had more public-sector projects in it. Those had lower profit opportunities, and the company's results reflected that.
Operating income came in at 3.1% of revenues in Q2 '07, vs. 2.1% for Q2 '06.
Organic revenue growth in the quarter was 11.5%.
The company's backlog of work is at $4.26 billion, a record high. It's up 32% over 6/30/06. It's up 10.9% over 3/31/07. More impressive is the claim of Frank T. MacInnis, the boss here, that the composition of the backlog now includes "larger and more complex projects, which tend to have longer durations and increasing profit opportunities." A few years ago, EMCOR's backlog had more public-sector projects in it. Those had lower profit opportunities, and the company's results reflected that.
Operating income came in at 3.1% of revenues in Q2 '07, vs. 2.1% for Q2 '06.
Organic revenue growth in the quarter was 11.5%.
EMCOR's operations include electrical contracting, mechanical contracting, and facilities services.
EleBlog take: I am a BIG fan of EMCOR and of Mr. MacInnis. However, I do not own EME stock (or have any other investment in the company). Reason: I don't think I could ethically rave about the company's performance if I had stock in the thing. Is EME stock a buy right now? Generally speaking, I'd be giving the stock market a wide berth at this very moment, so my answer (were I to remove the self-applied shackles) would be NO.
But if you take the time to check out EMCOR's situation, you can see that it has no debt, that it's been very prudent in terms of shopping for acquisitions (even during the go-go contractor roll-up days of 1997-2001), and that the company is now generating cash flow -- and if the backlog numbers and characterization are honest, it will do more of that in the future.
A big change for EMCOR, as I've written here recently, comes from that 2-for-1 split. Before the split, the company had too few shares outstanding to earn the notice of Wall Street types. This has now changed. There could well be more recommendations from more analysts coming the company's way in the near future which -- should the stock market calm down (???) -- might make this a worthwhile investment.
31 Jul, 2007
HGTV Sked
International Consumer Electronics Show 2007 -- "hottest gadgets unveiled" at this January show.
Aug. 5, 5pm eastern and pacific
Aug. 9, 11am eastern and pacific
International Builders Show, 2007 -- this is the annual NAHB show, held every winter. It's amazing (I've visited once in the past).
Aug. 19, 5pm eastern and pacific
Aug. 21, 11am eastern and pacific
31 Jul, 2007
IT + Energy Efficiency
David Douglas, Sun -- Practical power and cooling issues, and cost and availability of power
are the more common rationales. I’ve only talked to a dozen or so large
companies who are truly making decisions based on environmental
concerns—though the list is growing. The good news is that no matter
which of the reasons drive you to reduce power and get more efficient,
the environment wins.
David Kepler, Dow Chemical -- Our IT-related energy savings are small relative to the overall company, but we have an established mind-set about reducing them. A few years ago we went to automatic configurations of monitors. We had more than 40,000 workstations in use globally. At the time, according to the announcement we posted on our intranet, we were conserving more than 45 million kilowatt-hours annually. This translated into enough energy to power 4,365 homes for a year and it saved $2.5 million in electricity costs. For those that want to do their own calculations; see the Energy Star site.
Mary Adams, Citigroup -- Another example is our Flexible Work Program. We launched it two years ago, to boost employee morale. Employees could request compressed work weeks and telecommuting arrangements. Now, we’re taking it to the next level and looking at it much more from a business perspective, in terms of office space reduction. This isn’t about Friday telecommuting, it’s about analyzing roles within organizations and making decisions about the type of employee who can be set up in a home office, supported by IT.
Our real estate group is on the forefront of this initiative, and they are targeting to have a significant number of their employees in the program by the end of this year. We envision savings in office space, reduced energy consumption and increases in productivity and service delivery.
David Kepler, Dow Chemical -- Our IT-related energy savings are small relative to the overall company, but we have an established mind-set about reducing them. A few years ago we went to automatic configurations of monitors. We had more than 40,000 workstations in use globally. At the time, according to the announcement we posted on our intranet, we were conserving more than 45 million kilowatt-hours annually. This translated into enough energy to power 4,365 homes for a year and it saved $2.5 million in electricity costs. For those that want to do their own calculations; see the Energy Star site.
Mary Adams, Citigroup -- Another example is our Flexible Work Program. We launched it two years ago, to boost employee morale. Employees could request compressed work weeks and telecommuting arrangements. Now, we’re taking it to the next level and looking at it much more from a business perspective, in terms of office space reduction. This isn’t about Friday telecommuting, it’s about analyzing roles within organizations and making decisions about the type of employee who can be set up in a home office, supported by IT.
Our real estate group is on the forefront of this initiative, and they are targeting to have a significant number of their employees in the program by the end of this year. We envision savings in office space, reduced energy consumption and increases in productivity and service delivery.
30 Jul, 2007
Dots To Fight Copper Theft
NSP working to halt copper thefts:
Nova Scotia Power has come up with a plan to discourage the theft of
copper from its 300 substations. Spokesperson Margaret Murphy said with
the price of copper increasing by four times in recent years, thieves
are placing themselves and others in life-threatening situations. It’s
a huge problem, she said, noting “we had six break-ins into substations
in Cape Breton in 2006 that caused outages for over an hour and a half,
affecting more than 1,000 customers. When they do this they take out
the whole substation, all the customer served by the substation lose
power.”
The utility will be using microdot technology to mark and identify equipment at substations and other electrical facilities in the province. “The microdot that we will use comes in a spray can and there are much larger applications including large volume dispensed under pressure used to reach large infrastructure wire high off the ground,” she said. It’s largely invisible and once applied it won’t come off and is easily detectable by police, NSP staff or anyone doing surveillance. The technology, called DataDot, makes it easier to trace copper wire back to its owner.
“Even if it is mixed in with other wire, it will be able to be identified,” she said.
Crime Stoppers will also be part of the new anti-theft campaign. NSP officials say copper thieves are putting their lives in danger, along with those of the technicians who have to repair the damage. “We are worried our technicians will walk into a substation and find a body, a very real possibility that has already happened in New Brunswick. Someone who was trying to steal copper wire was electrocuted,” Murphy said.
– Wes Stewart, Cape Breton Post
The utility will be using microdot technology to mark and identify equipment at substations and other electrical facilities in the province. “The microdot that we will use comes in a spray can and there are much larger applications including large volume dispensed under pressure used to reach large infrastructure wire high off the ground,” she said. It’s largely invisible and once applied it won’t come off and is easily detectable by police, NSP staff or anyone doing surveillance. The technology, called DataDot, makes it easier to trace copper wire back to its owner.
“Even if it is mixed in with other wire, it will be able to be identified,” she said.
Crime Stoppers will also be part of the new anti-theft campaign. NSP officials say copper thieves are putting their lives in danger, along with those of the technicians who have to repair the damage. “We are worried our technicians will walk into a substation and find a body, a very real possibility that has already happened in New Brunswick. Someone who was trying to steal copper wire was electrocuted,” Murphy said.
– Wes Stewart, Cape Breton Post
I looked around and found an explanation of this technology.
30 Jul, 2007
Power Plants: Sticker Shock
- Cost for a new nuclear power plant: $2,000 to $3,000 per kilowatt of capacity. Yes, a 1,000-MW nuke is gonna cost as much as $3 billion!
- From a GE Energy executive: "There's massive inflation in copper and nickel and stainless steel and concrete." He's right. And if you think there's inflation now, wait until the U.S. starts building a bunch of power plants, and a bunch of purchasing folks (buying for construction of those plants) starts to bid up the prices!!!
- From a Siemens Power Generation exec: "There's real sticker shock out there." His estimate: The price of a COAL-fired power plant has risen 25% - 30% in the past 18 months.
- "The high-pressure piping for steam, used on a 293-mW plant, is up about 60% in the last two years."
- "The equipment that uses exhaust heat to make steam, used at a 590-mW plant, is up about 40% in the last two years."
- "Simply moving a 435,000-pound turbine for a 198-mW plant from factory to the plant site now runs about $100,000 . . . up from $50,000 two years ago."
. . . of course, that's not quite right. Consumers don't pay for new generating stations. Consumers pay monthly electricity bills. What the writer meant was: The average electricity bill, already high and slated to go higher thanks to the costs of fuel (coal, natural gas, and even uranium oxide are all up in price), will GO HIGHER STILL in areas supplied by new power plants.
30 Jul, 2007
Where The Jobs Went
- - - - -
For IBM, the world's largest supplier of technology services, moving up to more sophisticated work is not the only step in its strategy to address the rising global competition. Labor represents 70 percent to 80 percent of the cost in traditional technology service contracts, and the traditional work of maintaining and updating software and data centers for corporate customers is still a large part of IBM's services business.
So IBM has moved aggressively to tap the global labor pool, and is increasingly using software to automate as much traditional services work as possible.
Today, IBM employs 53,000 people in India, up from 3,000 in 2002; in India, the salaries for computer programmers are still about a third of those in the United States. Over the same span, the company's work force in the United States declined slightly, to 127,000 at the end of last year.
30 Jul, 2007
Home Energy Monitor
According to the lead on the article (in Triangle Business Journal), the test is "part of the utility's effort to curb electricity use in the face of opposition to new plant construction."
A very small, limited, unambitious part -- wouldn't you say?
27 Jul, 2007
People Aren't Really Green
Now, let's agree on something first: If people WERE "green" and environmentally aware, they would act that way 100% of the time. They wouldn't have to "try" to be green. They just BE that way, without effort.
Here's an excerpt from a report on the survey:
The majority of people surveyed (60%) are more likely to leave a
bathroom light on overnight in an unfamiliar hotel room than at home,
and nearly 70% of frequent travelers open a new mini bottle of shampoo
and conditioner each time they shower on the road. Sixty-three percent
of frequent hotel guests are more likely to leave a light on when they
leave a hotel room than home. And although only about a third (34%) of
respondents believe it is important to change sheets and towels daily
at home, three-quarters think it is important to have fresh sheets and
towels daily in a hotel.
When it comes to evaluating eco-options, for most consumers the bottom line is the bottom line, the survey found. In fact, 62% of respondents agreed that "When I stay in a hotel, one reason I use water and energy less efficiently is because I don't have to pay for it." And their reported behaviors for water use reflect this attitude. Seventy percent of frequent travelers agree that they try to conserve water "as much as possible" at home, while only 18% do the same in a hotel.
When it comes to evaluating eco-options, for most consumers the bottom line is the bottom line, the survey found. In fact, 62% of respondents agreed that "When I stay in a hotel, one reason I use water and energy less efficiently is because I don't have to pay for it." And their reported behaviors for water use reflect this attitude. Seventy percent of frequent travelers agree that they try to conserve water "as much as possible" at home, while only 18% do the same in a hotel.
Found in a blog on Todaysfacilitymanager.com, in an item headlined "Hotel Guest Leave Green Habits At Home?"
27 Jul, 2007
Free Math Stuff
It is always our pleasure to give
back to the industry as much as we can, whenever we can. For this reason we’ve
extracted Unit 1 – Electrician’s Math and Basic Electrical Formulas from Mike’s
Electrical NEC Exam Preparation textbook and are offering it to you for
free.
27 Jul, 2007
Eaton's Home Heartbeat Product
27 Jul, 2007
Life Is Still Cheap - Someplaces
Life is still cheap -- at least in Myanmar (which people my age might think of as "Burma"). According to a new item, there are 20-hour-long daily blackouts there. During these blackouts, thieves set to work stealing copper power cables.
Here's the problem with that: The power can come back on at any time -- without warning. As a result, it can cut in at exactly the moment when one of these capitalistic types has hit hands in the cookie jar. At that moment, our Burmese thief gets very unlucky.
News items I've seen on this reference "dice with death" and "electrical Russian roulette." It pains me to think how little money these people are probably getting via their crimes . . . the price at which they are willing to sell their lives.
Further, all of the dead are not guilty. "In one case, the broken cable end left by the thief dangled into a puddle and a woman jogger was killed when she stepped into it," a police officer told a reporter.
27 Jul, 2007
40 Pounds . . .
A typical dismounted troop going out for a
four-day mission carries as much as 40 pounds of batteries and
rechargers in his pack. The Defense Department wants to reduce that
load significantly, and it’s dangling a $1 million carrot to entice
people to help them do it.
27 Jul, 2007
Mobile Phone Explodes
27 Jul, 2007
Wesco Boss on CNBC-TV
Note that Haley is also a director of the Cleveland Fed (the Federal Reserve Board has 12 district member banks, Cleveland is one of them). I don't think CNBC mentioned that.
26 Jul, 2007
How They Find Contractors
26 Jul, 2007
Lighting's Moment???
The Association of Energy Engineers makes available on its website a 14-page PDF -- Market Survey of the Energy Industry 2007. Download it and turn to the bottom of page 5 -- question 14 -- which asked, "Which technology listed below is the highest priority for application at your facility in the near future?"
As provided by 410 respondents, the answer came back - LIGHTING, BIG. See the chart. Lighting is the top prority for 42% of respondents. #2 priority (finishing up the track) was metering equipment -- with 20%.
(More)
26 Jul, 2007
Aging ECs + Tool Ergonomics
You might read it, even if you're not in the marketing biz. It's damn interesting. It includes some details on how Greenlee works down the food chain in its product development, including talking with its electrical distributors (in this case, Codale Electric of Salt Lake City is included).
But here's a main point for EleBlog browsers. It's out of context here, but you can "see" the context if you read it:
After feedback from last October's preview, Greenlee made a few subtle but potentially significant changes in its hand tools, he explains. One modification involved the aforementioned grip on the handle of the pliers, improving them ergonomically—something the company tries to be attuned to, Ellis explains.
“We know through our own research that our demographic—the electrical contractor—is an aging demographic,” Ellis says. “So it's in our best interest to make them better ergonomically so it won't cause any repetitive type of injuries.”
Job sites also have safety directors paying closer attention than ever to such things, Ellis adds.
“They're willing to pay a percentage more for safety and ergonomics,” Ellis says.
26 Jul, 2007
New Electrical Industry Blogs
Electrical Trends -- from David Gordon and another guy. Commentary from an industry consultant.
NEMA Currents -- the National Electrical Manufacturers Association started a blog. They really pissed me off in their press release, which says the new thing is "the only blog focusing on the electrical industry." Screw you, NEMA.
Powerline Blog -- I found this by accident on the site of EGSA, the Electrical Generating Systems Association.
(More)
26 Jul, 2007
Electrical Construction Data
It's a 6-page PDF -- Electrical Construction: What The Figures Tell Us.
26 Jul, 2007
Nonresidential Outlook From AIA
Market Segment Consensus Growth Forecasts
Commercial / industrial 2007 2008
• Hotels 26.4% 1.3%
• Office buildings 11.2% 3.5%
• Industrial facilities 6.5% 5.2%
• Retail 3.7% -0.9%
Institutional
• Health care facilities 8.5% 5.0%
• Public safety 8.6% 3.3%
• Education 5.9% 4.1%
• Amusement / recreation 4.2% 2.7%
• Religious 1.3% 4.3%
AIA's release is headlined "Strong Nonresidential Construction . . . Stabilizing in 2008." Want more depth/detail? Look for the link to the full report in that release (it's free).
EleBlog take: No one is stupid enough to forecast construction inflation -- although we can be pretty sure that inflation in the construction industry (especially in electrical construction!) has been running MUCH higher than the "core rate" reported in the newspapers, and somewhat higher than the 5% REAL inflation rate.
So: If construction inflation approximates 5% in 2008, and if the AIA consensus forecast figures for 2008 are all on the mark . . . we are looking at a year of flat to slightly down construction revenue in the 9 nonresidential niches for which figure are provided above.
26 Jul, 2007
Housing Outlook
In the July 18 "Eye" column, Seiders provided this outlook:
- - - - -
Although we expect most housing aggregates to bottom-out by the end of this year, the projected recoveries in 2008 produce only modest year-over-year gains. In this regard, NAHB’s forecasts for 2007-2008 show the following broad patterns for the key components of housing production:
- 23% decline in single-family starts in 2007, followed by a 2% recovery in 2008.
- 16% decline in multifamily starts in 2007, followed by another 2% decline in 2008 as the condo market weakens further.
- 19% decline in manufactured home shipments in 2007, followed by a 10% recovery in 2008 from a historically low level.
- 2% declines in the real value of residential remodeling in both 2007 and 2008, driven by 5% declines in improvements – particularly on owner-occupied housing.
- 14% decline in real Residential Fixed Investment in 2007, followed by a 1% recovery in 2008.
I've followed Seiders closely for years. In the 1990s and into the 2000s, his forecasts, if anything, were conservative. Additionally, NAHB's annual housing forecasts have been so CLOSE (closer than most others) over the years that -- I have noticed -- other economists, in recent years, have "fallen in line" with NAHB. It's rare to find a forecast from someone else differing from NAHB's outlook by more than a few thousand or 10,000 starts.
That doesn't mean Seiders is right in what's above. He might be better at chipping up short in good times than he is in bad times. After all, we've not had a lot of bad times for housing during his 20 years at the NAHB!
EleBlog take: Re-read those 5 bullets. There's not a lot of optimism there. The last bullet shows a 14% decline in '07 in residential fixed investment; if you adjust that for REAL inflation, it comes out closer to a 20% drop. Ditto the 2008 Fixed Investment projection; a 1% recovery, adjusted for REAL inflation, comes out to be a decline.
23 Jul, 2007
Turn It Off!
Out of 104 million office PCs in the US, at least 31.2 million are left on all night.
Turning off every work computer in the United States every night would save as much CO2 emissions as taking every car in the state of Maryland off the road.
The simple step of shutting computers down each night can save a 10,000 PC enterprise more than $165,000 a year in energy costs. Across the US, this adds up to more than $1.72 billion dollars and almost 15 million tons of CO2 emissions.
EleBlog take on this: Geesh, are we stupid!
(More)
23 Jul, 2007
HOT: India
No -- it's about heat. According to a Voice of America print clip from 6/12, the temperature was running around 50 degrees (Celsius) in northern India in early June. More than 100 deaths were attributed to the heat.
"In urban areas, power-hungry air conditioners running around the clock have put a strain on local transformers and the regional electrical grid. As a result, many neighborhoods in New Delhi, due to rolling blackouts and equipment failures, are enduring power cuts lasting up to 15 hours a day."
...of course, this is the Bush Administration. You can read that short clip (which is reproduced without alteration) and wonder how the heck AC units are "running around the clock" in an area in which the power supply is OUT 15 hours a day. 'Splain it to me.
Leaving that idiocy aside, I wanted to note that 50 degrees C = 122 degrees F.
23 Jul, 2007
Doors & Ethernet - Linked
According to the release: "The RCM III with PoE enables new and retrofit sites the cost-cutting alternative of supplying power to near door readers, door controllers, and door strikes via the building's Ethernet."
Convergence, anyone? See the Ethernet-powered door controller release here.
23 Jul, 2007
Algae
[Just so's you know that I'm not talking up the stock, COMS (the stock symbol) is the only one of my investments that I re-evaluate every week. I think the investment was a terrible mistake. Sure, I'm ahead a few bux right now -- but that's right now. I never count "gains" in investments until I sell them. And right now I'm afraid to sell COMS (there are rumors about a takeover) . . . and I'm afraid to keep it. Thank the goddess Fortuna that I didn't buy a lot!]
Here's the reason this is here:
a. GreenFuel, of Cambridge, Mass., is a start-up "that seeks to replace imported oil with home-grown algae." I find that a bit weird, don't you?
b. The founder of 3Com is Robert Metcalfe. He's now with a venture capture firm, but he will go down in history as the guy who dreamt up Ethernet (if you click through, you'll see a reproduction of his original drawing, from 1976).
b. The founder of 3Com is Robert Metcalfe. He's now with a venture capture firm, but he will go down in history as the guy who dreamt up Ethernet (if you click through, you'll see a reproduction of his original drawing, from 1976).
23 Jul, 2007
NECA Boss's Blog
According to John, the Electri 21 decision-makers allocated $677K to fund research into: "The winning research projects will produce studies on effective project management, the role of electrical contractors on LEED projects, local apprenticeship program best practices, effectively recruiting and training the supervisory workforce, and implementing lessons learned from the market recovery initiative in Florida."
Find Electric International here.
- - - - -
Disclaimers:
a. John Grau once hired me. I worked for him for 8.5 years. I enjoyed it.
b. I still work, as an independent contractor, for NECA and NECA-IBEW.
Based on these disclaimers, you shouldn't really anticipate me writing any bad stuff about John or his organization.
23 Jul, 2007
IP Networks + BAS
What we're talking about here its running HVAC control, access control, and other building control systems over the network. What happens typically, without an integrated IP network running all of these things? You've got "multiple systems for multiple applications . . . [leading to] increased overheads." And none of the stuff generally is able to talk to the other stuff!
23 Jul, 2007
New Thing: HSL
This has got NOTHING to do with solar photovoltaics or solar thermal. We are talking here about routing illumination. According to the RenewableEnergyAccess.com story, it can be cheaper than incandescent lamps (what about CFLs, you ask?). The link takes you to the story, which prints out in brief; there are 16 reader comments that follow the piece.
23 Jul, 2007
Networking Survey
• Category 6A cabling currently represents 5% of the installed
base of structured cabling systems. Respondents now expect 25% of new installations
to utilize Category 6A cabling, up from just 17% a year ago. The largest
adopters are expected to be in the finance and technology sectors.
• Category 5e cabling was used in 53% of historical installations,. Participants now expect to use Category 5e in less than 9% of new installations.
• While OM1 and OM2 multimode fiber is currently the most popular, that popularity is expected to be cut in half, dropping to only 34 percent of new installations.
• OM3 laser optimized multimode fiber is expected to become the dominant fiber for future installations. While OM3 currently represents 11% of the installed base, it is expected to be utilized in 43% of new fiber installations. The increase in usage matches the faster networking speeds in the backbone. In 2002, only 28% of the respondents intended to install OM3 fiber; today 43% of the survey participants believe they will need OM3 to support their networks.
• Category 5e cabling was used in 53% of historical installations,. Participants now expect to use Category 5e in less than 9% of new installations.
• While OM1 and OM2 multimode fiber is currently the most popular, that popularity is expected to be cut in half, dropping to only 34 percent of new installations.
• OM3 laser optimized multimode fiber is expected to become the dominant fiber for future installations. While OM3 currently represents 11% of the installed base, it is expected to be utilized in 43% of new fiber installations. The increase in usage matches the faster networking speeds in the backbone. In 2002, only 28% of the respondents intended to install OM3 fiber; today 43% of the survey participants believe they will need OM3 to support their networks.
Find the CommScope/SYSTIMAX survey results here.
23 Jul, 2007
MacInnis Q+A
I've listened to MacInnis in conference calls with analysts, I've read transcripts, I've even seen TV commercials and CNBC-TV interviews with him. What I like about the guy is that he is A Straight Shooter. He doesn't tailor his answers.
More of this is on display in a USA Today Q-and-A with MacInnis. Among the flat declarative statements in here:
"I'm paid to think for myself."
"A CEO has to read as much as possible, not just about his own business, but about broad trends."
"The construction industry is made up of optimistic people, somet o a fault."
"That's what every CEO does in a nutshell, decides how to allocate capital between risk and reward. Every company needs to be willing to take a measured chance and take advantage of trends. But it's a terrible mistake to put all your assets into a perceived trend."
"A CEO has to read as much as possible, not just about his own business, but about broad trends."
"The construction industry is made up of optimistic people, somet o a fault."
"That's what every CEO does in a nutshell, decides how to allocate capital between risk and reward. Every company needs to be willing to take a measured chance and take advantage of trends. But it's a terrible mistake to put all your assets into a perceived trend."
It breaks my heart that I've not been able to invest in EME stock. Why not? I write about electrical construction; I think it would be at least unethical for me to write glowing stuff about EMCOR and MacInnis (as I have several times in the past) and be a stockholder. So I don't own any, and won't. But the company is almost debt-free, is huge (more than $5 billion in annual sales), and just underwent a 2-for-1 stock split. You might look into it.
[About the split: I don't believe you should buy a stock because of a stock split. In this case, EMCOR had a problem BEFORE the split -- it didn't have very many shares outstanding. It still doesn't. However, I have noticed that, since the split, there are more stock brokers "initiating coverage" on EMCOR. That's probably because there are more shares outstanding. Weird, eh?]
21 Jul, 2007
Worker Shortage/Mechanical
Here's a key piece of the article (read the whole thing here):
The Giants say the lack of human resources may be the one obstacle holding back the nonresidential construction market, outside a few specific industries and geographic areas. The CEO of the No. 2 Giant on our list echoes the Indian HR executive when he says his problem is finding enough people with specific skills, including project managers and supervisors. Another-CEO says his company is accepting-only work where it can put qualified-people on the job so that quality doesn't suffer.
Complicating the situation, another CEO tells us, is that construction management firms are trying to lure away mid-level project managers and supervisors to run their mechanical, electrical and plumbing projects. About 20% of contractors in a recent survey by consultant FMI say they poach employees from other contracting firms to address their manpower shortages.
21 Jul, 2007
Screw 'The Trades'
If you're an electrical contractor involved in residential -- or maybe even if you're NOT doing houses -- you probably need to read this step-by-step guide to giving the subcontractors on a housing project a royal screwing. One of the subhed: "Fire Your 'Punch List Guy' and Put Your Trades On Notice." Read the thing here.
21 Jul, 2007
Hedge Fund Pay
"To get some perspective on potential income gains, let's assume a $2.0 trillion (or so) industry -- [he's talking here about the hedge fund industry] -- enjoys returns of 10%.
"With the industry standard 20% incentive payouts, hedge fund manages would enjoy a $40 billion windfall -- $2.0 trillion x 10% = $200 billion x 20% = $40 billion."
Wowser!
21 Jul, 2007
'Data Does Not Compute'
21 Jul, 2007
Energy Star Products - Mandated
21 Jul, 2007
Good Headline
"You do the math. About 250,000 illegal immigrants. About two dozen federal agents."
That's the sitch in the Hampton Roads, Va., area, according to the newspaper -- there are 24 agents of the U.S. Immigrations and Customs Enforcement agency working in an area believed to be home to 250K illegals. Wow.
