SPEC.

The same four questions, whatever you do.

Every business wants to make money, do it safely, have people who are good at their jobs and love them, and stay clear to work. What changes between industries is not the questions — it is what each one is measured by.

Contracting and tradesManufacturingProfessional servicesHealth and careRetail and hospitality

Contracting and trades

Crews across several sites, work won by quote, and the margin decided before anybody picks up a tool.

What differsLabour is the largest controllable cost and the quote is where the money is made or lost, so Earnings is measured against the quote rather than against a budget.

Safety

Are we going well in Safety?

  • · Incidents and near misses
  • · Corrective actions closed on time
  • · Toolbox talks held and signed
People

Does everyone love coming to work?

  • · One-to-ones held
  • · Turnover inside ninety days
  • · Supervisors signed off as capable
Earnings

Are we making money?

  • · Margin against quote
  • · Billable utilisation
  • · Work in progress against plan
Compliance

Are we clear to work?

  • · Tickets and licences current
  • · Contract obligations met
  • · Records producible on request

Roles that usually carry a scorecard

Roles, never people. A role is defined by what the business needs and can exist with nobody in it — that is what lets you draw the business you need rather than the one you have.

  • · Managing Director
  • · Operations Manager
  • · Business Development Manager
  • · Safety and Compliance Lead
  • · Site Supervisor
  • · Scheduler
  • · Estimator

Where the numbers usually come from

By category, never by product. SPEC reasons about the kind of number a system produces, so there is no vendor list for your stack to be absent from — and anything with no system is confirmed by a named person, which is a complete way to run it.

  • · Jobs and scheduling
  • · Financials
  • · Safety and compliance
  • · Clients and sales

Where the labour leaks in this sector

Same principle, different shape. Ten per cent is the floor, thirty is what a well run rollout reaches.

Waiting — for materials, access, a decision or another trade34%
Rework, and the travel back to site to do it26%
Chasing paperwork that should have been captured once22%
Jobs scheduled around the crew rather than the crew around the jobs18%

A starting shape, not your figures. SPEC measures your own within the first two months and the shape usually turns out different — which is the point of measuring it.

What does not vary at all

The measures above are a starting point and you will change them. Underneath them sit four commitments that are identical in every business on SPEC, whatever it does — carried by pass-or-fail gates reported beside the score and never averaged into it.

SafetyZero harm, physical or mental.The figure is nought, and it is not negotiated.
PeopleNever lose great talent.The figure is nought, and it is not negotiated.
EarningsGross profit at the percentage this business needs to be profitable.The one figure SPEC cannot supply — it is read from your own record.
ComplianceNo breach of the commitments the business has already made.The figure is nought, and it is not negotiated.
Why three of them are absolute and one is earned →
Start with your own roles

SPEC proposes the roles and the measures; you edit them. Nobody is handed a blank form to invent an answer for.