Relationship-building, education activities strengthen customer partnerships as well as the paving industry
Establishing partnerships with customers has served as a cornerstone of Kirby-Smith Machinery’s operating philosophy for many years. These important relationships are built upon a covenant that is made and kept daily, providing results that benefit the well-being of both enterprises. While mutually nourishing in a business sense, establishing these relationships also makes our careers more meaningful and our lives more enjoyable.
My thoughts turned to the subject of these partnerships recently while attending an area AGC luncheon, where a district engineer explained a new prime contractor evaluation program that TxDOT is rolling out at the behest of the Texas legislature. The program will periodically evaluate a contractor’s performance on each job where the contractor is given a specific time frame for completion. While TxDOT has attached a scoring methodology to the areas of proficiency, the tenants of the evaluation are the basic foundations of building roadways: quality, safety and timeliness.
Putting values into practice
With these simple, well-defined standards, TxDOT has distilled the key ideals of our industry, working in concert for the greater good and common goal of project delivery. While vendors do not fall within the evaluation scope, I believe that we are measured by the same yardstick each day.
In order to be an integral part of the highway construction industry, those values have become ingrained in the Kirby-Smith culture. If we add value to the road building process, it must be discernible by all three of the standards outlined above, and training is a key component in meeting those standards.
For instance, Kirby-Smith recently hosted a slipform paving seminar for area contractors. We are also planning a similar asphalt paving event in the future. In addition, we have offered foamed bitumen training for contractors and TxDOT as a part of a pre-construction conference to ensure a successful job outcome. These are a few examples of how we add value to become a better partner.
In this competitive construction bidding market, contractors must be able to recognize how the value of their partnerships can affect the bottom line. With Kirby-Smith, our partners know that they will find expertise and experience, receive training in new technologies as well as a keen understanding of the meaning of productivity and time. The complexities and risks of highway construction are considerable. It helps to have a reliable partner.
