Thursday, December 02, 2004
Chasing Dollars
I own a small metal manufacturing business in Greensboro. In addition to me, there are four full-time employees in our plant and one half-time employee in our office. We are a tight group, and I work hard to make our plant a good place to work. The atmosphere is fun, and everyone except me works a four-day week.
I handle the sales, estimating, and project management, more than enough work even in a small business. Preparing a proposal is often a complicated process. Since all our products are custom, my job is a little like being a waiter who gives prices for meals at a restaurant with no menu. I have to figure out the recipe before I can figure out the price.
Yesterday morning, I got a call from another metal fabricator who is a long-time customer. He wanted to subcontract a pressing job with a very tight delivery schedule. I dropped what I was doing and met with him. I worked until 9pm last night and the first half of today to prepare his proposal. Many of my coworkers had other plans for Friday, but I asked them to be prepared to work overtime that day.
When I called our customer with our prices, his immediate response was that we were way over his budget. He left little hope we would get the work and said there would be no decision before the end of Friday. When we hung up, I told my coworkers to keep their original plans for Friday - no work required. I was bummed, because I put several other customers on hold to pursue this work.
The customer called back at 3pm and placed the order with me. I refused to recall my coworkers to work on Friday and moved our completion date later to reflect the lost day of work due to his indecision. That ruffled his feathers a bit, but I think he understood I was stubborn on that point.
So, now I will get some sleep before going to the plant on Friday to do Wednesday's work. I wonder who will call me with an emergency tomorrow morning?
I handle the sales, estimating, and project management, more than enough work even in a small business. Preparing a proposal is often a complicated process. Since all our products are custom, my job is a little like being a waiter who gives prices for meals at a restaurant with no menu. I have to figure out the recipe before I can figure out the price.
Yesterday morning, I got a call from another metal fabricator who is a long-time customer. He wanted to subcontract a pressing job with a very tight delivery schedule. I dropped what I was doing and met with him. I worked until 9pm last night and the first half of today to prepare his proposal. Many of my coworkers had other plans for Friday, but I asked them to be prepared to work overtime that day.
When I called our customer with our prices, his immediate response was that we were way over his budget. He left little hope we would get the work and said there would be no decision before the end of Friday. When we hung up, I told my coworkers to keep their original plans for Friday - no work required. I was bummed, because I put several other customers on hold to pursue this work.
The customer called back at 3pm and placed the order with me. I refused to recall my coworkers to work on Friday and moved our completion date later to reflect the lost day of work due to his indecision. That ruffled his feathers a bit, but I think he understood I was stubborn on that point.
So, now I will get some sleep before going to the plant on Friday to do Wednesday's work. I wonder who will call me with an emergency tomorrow morning?
