The IKEA Effect for Contractors
D. Brown Management
October 12, 2025
The IKEA Effect goes far beyond kitting, prefab, and modularization in construction. The IKEA Effect is a cognitive bias that impacts how teams align and execute, from market strategy and business plans to processes, projects, and even succession.
leadership management productivity
Emotional Intelligence: Building Inner Strength and Impact
D. Brown Management
May 24, 2025
Emotional intelligence competencies are the impact multiplier for your technical competencies. Daniel Goleman has spent his career focused on defining, evaluating, and building these capabilities.
emotional intelligence leadership management
Balancing Exploration and Exploitation
D. Brown Management
January 3, 2025
Exploitation involves choosing the best option based on current knowledge of the system which may be incomplete or misleading. Exploration involves testing new options that could lead to better future outcomes but drawing resources away from exploitation.
execution leadership planning
Rubber Ducks for Planning and Troubleshooting Effectively
D. Brown Management
January 21, 2024
"If you can't explain it simply, you don't understand it well enough." - Albert Einstein Wisdom that is as applicable to physics as it is to being a Foreman, Project Manager, or Owner of a construction company.
communication leadership management
Strategic Foundations: What Is Unlikely to Change?
D. Brown Management
January 1, 2024
Like construction projects, construction businesses are only as strong as their foundations. Build your strategies around things that are unlikely to change in the long-term (10+ years).
business management business planning leadership strategy
Organizational Change and Sustainable Growth
D. Brown Management
September 10, 2023
Improving the rate that change is adopted across the whole company becomes increasingly more important and more challenging as a contractor grows. We will cover the basics of change, including how it is linked to strategic choices and management.
leadership management Organizational Development strategy
Management and Leadership (Similarities and Key Differences)
D. Brown Management
September 3, 2023
A growing contractor requires both great leadership (right direction) and great management (right actions). The creativity required to attract, motivate, develop, and retain people are where management and leadership intersect.
leadership management
The ABCs of Strategic Market Choices
D. Brown Management
August 20, 2023
Strategic Market Choices for where a contractor chooses to play must be balanced between diverse enough, large enough, and focused enough. These are the highest leveraged decisions that leaders of construction businesses make.
business development leadership strategy
Management Team Development Phases Within Each Stage of Growth
D. Brown Management
July 29, 2023
The management team leading a contractor through the different stages of growth will typically navigate three phases at each stage - Emerging, Hollow, and Ready. Understanding these phases guides growth planning, recruitment, development, and succession.
leadership management Organizational Development
Headcount, Stages of Contractor Growth, and Growth Inflection Points
D. Brown Management
July 29, 2023
Every contractor will navigate very predictable stages of growth. Each of these represents about a tripling of headcount and requires different leadership focus, strategies, structures, and systems. Stress and failure points are also very predictable.
leadership management strategy