March 22, 2010

Construction Sector Council’s firm-capacity survey to identify challenges

VINCE VERSACE

staff writer

The Construction Sector Council’s current contractor capacity survey aims to help fully capture Canada’s construction industry landscape as it faces new trends and pressures.

“This survey rounds out our labour market information effort. We want to put as much emphasis on tracking and monitoring the contractor side of the industry as we do the labour side,” explains George Gritziotis, executive director of the CSC.

“We have to look at the two key players who provide the services.”

Understanding the contractor community in the current demographic and economic environment as it faces issues such as an aging workforce and a potential loss of small contractors to buyouts is important, adds CSC.

Approximately 80 to 85 per cent of companies in the contractor community have less than 15 employees, CSC reports.

Preliminary survey results reveal that contractor age demographics are no different than those of skilled tradespeople. Construction businesses tend to be small and managers and owners are concentrated in the age group between 50 and 65.

“When publicly let projects are being put out that require a certain capacity, will Canadian contractors be able to respond?” wonders Gritziotis.

“With globalization and many other firms looking to do work in other parts of the world, we are starting to see a trend of foreign companies coming here. Also, with bigger Canadian contractors buying up smaller firms, what will the contractor community look like as we move forward?”

Gritziotis notes that the CSC has heard of owners putting out projects for tender and not attracting enough bidders to ensure competition.

“How common is this?” Gritziotis asks. “And, if it’s happening now, during a recessionary period, what will this mean when the economy recovers?”

Concerns expressed by contractors in the past about sharing potentially proprietary information through the survey need not be a stumbling block, says Gritziotis.

“We are providing this information in an aggregate. This survey is no different than any other kind of survey we do,” says Gritziotis. “We do a lot of work with the owner community as well, and obviously we have an understanding and agreements in place concerning providing proprietary information.”

The effect of industry trends such as Building Information Modeling (BIM), Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) and issues like bonding, insurance capacity and union versus non-union restrictions, affect contractors is among the information Gritziotis hopes the survey can capture.

“Most people expect certain competencies from a skilled trades worker when they come on a job to do the work,” says Gritziotis.

“There is a flipside to that — there is an expectation that contractors have a certain capacity to respond to things like BIM and LEED requirements. That all clearly has an impact on the ability of the industry to respond to future demand.”

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