Powerhouse Consulting Group Founder Jenny Benbrook has seen a recent trend across construction firms: Growth is creating operational blind spots. Growth spurts are great for construction business, because more business means more projects, but more business also means more people, technology, equipment and billable hours. Any change in scope will require changes in tactics when it comes to communications and operations—what used to work for the smaller version of your business no longer fits. As a consultant and business founder, Benbrook works with contractors on identifying the operational gaps that emerge during growth and helping teams improve alignment between the field, office and leadership.
She sat down with Construction Executive to discuss the common signs a construction company has outgrown its operational processes; why growth often creates communication and accountability challenges; the hidden costs of disconnected teams and workflows; practical ways leaders can improve visibility and efficiency as their organizations scale; and more.
What are the earliest signs that a construction company has outgrown the processes that helped it become successful?
Usually, the first sign is that everything feels harder than it should. The company is growing, but the team is constantly putting out fires. Information lives in spreadsheets, text messages or with one person who knows how everything works. Leaders are being pulled into decisions they should not have to make, and employees are creating their own processes just to get the work done.
A lot of these companies were built by genuinely smart people who knew the business and could manage it through experience and instinct. That works for a long time. But eventually, the business becomes too large and too complex to run that way.
Many firms assume growth challenges can be solved by hiring more people or investing in new technology. Why is that often only part of the solution?
Hiring more people does not fix a broken process. It usually just puts more people inside of it. The same is true for technology. A new platform does not solve an operational problem if the company has not first decided how it wants the business to operate.
I see companies invest a significant amount of money in technology and then use a fraction of what they purchased. The system often gets the blame, but the real issue is usually that processes were never clearly defined, the team wasn’t properly trained or no one was accountable for ensuring the new way of working was fully adopted. The technology matters, but how the business uses it matters more.
As construction companies grow, where do communication and accountability tend to break down between leadership, the office and the field?
Communication and accountability usually break down in the handoffs. Leadership has one expectation, the office creates a process around it and the field develops a workaround because the process does not match what is actually happening on the job. Then everyone thinks someone else owns the outcome.
The office may think the field is not following the process. The field may feel that the office does not understand the realities of the work. Leadership is often looking at reporting that does not tell the full story. Without clear ownership and a consistent feedback loop, those gaps continue to grow.
What operational blind spots become more difficult for executives to see as they add projects, crews and locations, and what are the consequences if those issues go unaddressed?
Revenue can cover up a lot of operational problems. A company can be growing quickly while losing visibility into labor efficiency, project profitability, material costs, scheduling, change orders, rework and performance differences between crews or locations.
Executives often do not realize how many workarounds exist because the work is still getting done. Someone is stepping in, fixing the issue and keeping the project moving. That can make the operation look healthier than it actually is.
The consequence is that the company begins scaling the problems along with the revenue. Inefficient processes become more expensive, reporting becomes less reliable and leadership starts making decisions without a clear picture of what is happening in the business.
How can construction leaders improve operational visibility and create more scalable processes without disrupting ongoing projects or overburdening their teams?
I always recommend starting with an honest assessment of how the business operates today. Not how the process is supposed to work, but how the work is actually getting done. Look at where information is being lost, where teams are duplicating work, where people are relying on manual workarounds and where leadership does not trust the data. Then prioritize the changes based on impact. You do not have to fix everything at once.
The best approach is phased. Fix the foundation, test the process with the people who use it, document it, train the team and then build from there. Operational improvement should make the work easier for employees. If every change feels like additional work, adoption will always be a struggle.
What distinguishes the construction companies that are able to scale efficiently from those that find themselves constantly reacting to operational challenges?
The companies that scale well are intentional about how they operate. They do not just add people, technology and locations and hope everything stays connected. They define what should be standardized, establish clear ownership and make sure their systems are giving leadership information they can actually use.
They also understand that a process is only valuable if the team can follow it consistently. The strongest companies are the ones that can see the problems early, understand what is causing them and address them before they affect the entire business.
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