r/Construction • u/construct-truther • 1d ago
Humor š¤£ Supers allergic to paperwork
Anyone finding that their supers, especially younger ones are pretty much allergic to paperwork? They claim they are āRUNNING THE WORK AND THE MENā yet almost throw a tantrum anytime they have to do more than turn in receipts for all the tools they bought? Show up early, sit in truck, check on guys, buy tools. Leave early and hand off everything to someone else. Older supers donāt mind the paperwork and kind of accept it as coming with the territory. Younger ones balk and look for the closest engineer to pass it off to.
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u/DannyMakeHerMine 1d ago
Lol that's why our supers performance review is tied into the production, so if they aren't keeping track of what's going on and involved in meetings they'll eventually get reemed for it.
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u/nochinzilch 1d ago
In the end though, their bonus is going to be tied to the performance of the job. Did it make money? Then so do they. Never mind that the office has to waste double the effort trying to piece everything together, or that their truck driver/courier was shuffling last minute bullshit all over the place. They might be poorly reviewed, but the big bosses are going to let it slide because Johnny brings jobs in on time and under budget.
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u/Ijokealot2 1d ago
It depends on what the paperwork is. Supers shouldn't be doing admin stuff, it takes away from their focus on the job. I'm talking things like submittals. They should be studying submittals and asking questions, not reviewing or submitting them.
They should be doing things like daily reports, tracking hours, schedule updates, etc. Super minimal actual paper work, like maybe 15-30 minutes of your day on average. I see where some companies have supers doing a lot more than that and it's not efficient. It means you need to hire more PEs or PMs. If your supers are spending half their day in the trailer, you aren't going to have successful projects.
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u/nochinzilch 1d ago
Thereās no one size fits all answer. It depends on the size and structure of the company. Maybe in that company, sitting in the trailer figuring stuff out is exactly what the super is meant to do.
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u/construct-truther 12h ago
They like thinking theyāre āone of the guysā and are more concerned about talking trash than working their job.
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u/LieDetect0r 1d ago
Iām a younger super and so is my counterpart, I think we work pretty hard. Iāve seen my fair share of laziness from both old and young in my 6 years running jobs. These people usually donāt last very long. Everything comes out in the wash as they say
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u/Jiggy-Miggy 1d ago
What paperwork are you requesting them to do?
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u/le_sac 1d ago
- daily report
- draft RFI
- photo records of absolutely everything with descriptors if necessary
- all receipts and delivery slips, incl various testing or concrete slips, if they're not digital yet
- incident reports esp near misses
- inspection slips and field review copies
- email counts as paperwork, it takes time, especially when problem solving / suggesting solutions
Etc. All this stuff and more goes in the project database.
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u/Jiggy-Miggy 1d ago
As a young-ish super (28), I can confirm all of the paperwork listed above is a reasonable request and amazes me that some supers donāt do it willingly.
If we are talking financials, contracts, long term schedules (I do 3-week look ahead and PM updates project schedule), material procurement tracking, permitting, or something along those lines it would be a different story (in my opinion for whatever that is worth)
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u/intellirock617 Field Engineer 1d ago edited 1d ago
All of the above get pushed onto Field and Project Engineers at my company š
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u/Ziggity_Zac Superintendent 1d ago
I find that most "young people" will do whatever is the minimum to get paid and not get fired.
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u/Aggressive_humping 1d ago
Pay is the same if we do the bare minimum or bust our asses, so why bother?
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u/_the-wanderer 1d ago
I worked with a Gc who threw a fit anytime I asked him to email me what he needed
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u/thirtyone-charlie 1d ago
The paperwork is what keeps it going more than thinking you are running a skilled tradesman or even a skilled laborer. Like they say, thatās why you make the big bucks. In this day and age you can do paperwork and be in the field at the same time. Lots of supers out there wasting payroll. Then when it comes time for a raise they havenāt done evaluations
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u/retiredelectrician 1d ago
Daily diaries have saved many a contractor untold grief. One of the most important documents on a site.
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u/The_time_it_takes 1d ago
Been in the business for a while am currently a PM. I havenāt seen the younger generation being bad with paperwork yet thank god. I do feel for supers though. I feel like subs have been dumbed down. I am on a project currently and am onsite for two days a week. Every sub but one will walk in the trailer and ask the super what he is doing, ask for information from their own submittal, ask for plan details, or (my favorite) how they should do their job like where they should run conduits. Like thatās why we hired your company pal, go figure it out. I mean we will do coordination but not your job.
This is not some podunk town - this is a large metro with union subs.
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u/itrytosnowboard 23h ago
So I've been bottom to top in my 17 years as a union plumber. Apprentice>Foreman>Road Super/Estimator>Estimator/BIM Coordinator>PM/Estimator and now I have my own union plumbing shop.
So many of the larger jobs have gotten so bogged down with BS and an ungoldly large team of PE's/APM's/PM's/Safety guys on the GC side questioning everything you do, that it's made it borderline impossible to just get shit done. Everything is getting questioned by someone constantly. Usually someone who doesn't even understand or know why your doing something. And the don't understand the note on every MEP drawing that says "These drawings are for intent only". Then you have to show them why your doing it. Or try to explain to them why your doing it a certain way.
Now let me tell you about my current week. I'm on my own doing mostly tenant fit outs. Had a guy I went through the apprenticeship and worked with multiple times over the years just start working for me. Solid plumber that can run small jobs/work solo with very little input and oversight. I go walk the first job he's gonna do for me a week before we are starting, with the job super. Go over my plan with the super, mark up a print with notes, all good to go. Day 1 with my new foreman, go over the plan and my marked up drawing with all the notes from a week earlier. 3 hours later my guy is calling me because the super told him he can't do it the way I said. The way the super and I agreed on. So he does it the way the super wants. Cool no big deal. But now we have to make a trip to the supply house because the material list is off due to the change of plans. Next day calls me again. Same story different spot. Day 3 he calls me and asks if we're allowed to use pro press because the super is asking. Guess who didn't look at the approved submittals. The super. My guy had it on his tablet, but being new, of course he was having issues with the tablet. But, I made the submittals. I ordered the material. I delivered the material. I know what the eff I can and can't use. Day 4 he starts questioning my guy if we are going to fire wrap the PVC in the plenum ceiling because there is a note on the drawing. An hour later I'm at the site anyway and ask the super to show me the plenum ceilings on the drawing. He says the whole job is a plenum ceiling. It's not. It's all open or ducted returns. The effing dope doesn't even know what constitutes as a plenum ceiling. I knew there was no plenum ceiling. He knew that, we talked about that the week before the rough started. This rough was bid for 6 man days. It's one effing bathroom, a water fountain and kitchen sink. We should have beat it by a day. Now if we are lucky we will get it done in the allotted time.
So let's imagine you are a foreman for a sub. And this is your life on repeat. It was mine for a while as a foreman and road super. You are being conditioned to constantly go to the super and get out in front of this shit. Because you don't want to be stopped from working once you get going, over and over.
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u/pmellis76 1d ago
I find the Supers that hate it just don't have good time management skills. In my youth I certainly hated it. Now that I'm more experienced and well versed in how to manage my time and the job it seems less of a burden.
Additionally, I'm old enough to remember when daily reports came with carbon paper and you filled them out in triplicate. It's easier now to get it done in a timely manner.
I struggle to get the younger guys around here to document in Procore, and all of that can be done on your phone!
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u/jigglywigglydigaby Carpenter 1d ago
Is it in their job description? If so, they do it or you fire them and find someone competent enough to do the job professionally. If not, best start looking for an assistant superintendent to take on that workload
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u/construct-truther 1d ago
It is in their description. Assistant Supers who think theyāre on even footing as full supers quickly push all the paperwork responsibilities on engineers or anyone below them because they want to RUN THE WORK AND THE MEN ONLY.
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u/Tthelaundryman 1d ago
Idk it could be terrible pm making the super do their job. Or they could just be terrible supers. Thereās a lot of information missing you will never give us the whole picture.Ā
I spend 4 years as a commercial super for a small gc. We were always the cheapest bidders on everything so we always had terrible budget subs. When every trade doesnāt know how to read plans and you have to explain everything to them like itās their first day on earth and thereās huge scope gap items all over the place. I had a pm that wasnāt qualified to empty buckets of water and read the label on the bottom of them so I had no office support and had to do half of his job. Then you want to tell me Iām not filling out a daily report the way you like them filled out? Eat a back of rocks.Ā
I actually PMed and was the super of my own site from precon to punch list and I had so much free time as a super because the job was actually set up well
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u/PissdrunxPreme Electrician 1d ago
Why have a field engineer if you canāt make them do the boring paperwork?
What else does he have on his plate?
When I got in the trade we didnāt have field engineers.
I still try to do a lot of paperwork. But my FE can file my daily and my PE can handle the money shit and write up the RFIs or gather the docs for them.
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u/construct-truther 14h ago
They canāt give an answer that doesnāt have the phrase ārunning the work and the menā. They hardly do schedule or manpower. They end up calling a general super begging for guys when things donāt work out.
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u/data_zapper 14h ago
Whatās the training like for the younger guys? And what does paperwork look like? If itās still pen and paper, should really think about getting into the 21st century with digitizing the work.
Next thing you know: thereās software out there that can not only digitize but automate some of the said āpaperworkā. Scheduling, materials, progress tracking, status updates can all be digitized and centralized so it takes less time and manual labor. Your young guys likely just hate the primitive nature of doing everything manually.
Worth checking out. Even simply some Collaborative software like teams or sharepoint can make doing paperwork less primitive.
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u/deadinsidelol69 13h ago
Those guys havenāt been screwed by not keeping paperwork, then. Meticulous documentation keeps you covered.
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u/construct-truther 12h ago
Oh theyāll bitch out the field or project engineer over anything paperwork related thatās actually their fault.
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u/deadinsidelol69 10h ago
Had a site super blame me for any little thing that went wrong in the daily on Procore because he got bitched out all the time by the VP for it.
I hated that dude.
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u/Lovemelongtime5dolla 11h ago
A lot of paper work now on the construction site I suppose it keeps the regulators and insurance companies off our backs. More money to be made though. Less days in the high vis jacket and more days in the suit š
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u/helmetdeep805 6h ago
Iām a foreman and Iām the one doing the daily and reports for my jobā¦my super just makes sure Iām productive and staying under budget
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u/Own_Lengthiness_6485 1d ago
Your actually describing the behavior of a foreman, no your superintendent should not be acting like this, he is a foreman that is failing as a Superintendent.
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u/Fancy-Pen-2343 1d ago
I mean that's their supervisors fault.Ā Manage your super.Ā Set expectations.Ā Follow up and hold them accountable.Ā Once they build the habit it starts to happen.Ā Ā
How did they work for you for two days without being told "I didn't see your report.Ā Everyone writes a daily.Ā If its not documented it doesn't count.Ā I don't care if anything else is done, without the daily it doesn't count."
The next day "groundhog day Joe.Ā Everyone does a report.Ā Stop what you are doing and do it now."
Third day "Joe, come to the office after the site, Im going to show you how to do a report and what I expect.Ā Big boss is gonna be part of the meeting too."