SMACNA recently held its annual Business Management University (BMU) program on March 5-9, 2023, in Tempe, Arizona. The program BMU was once again at full capacity with 24 participants, and the program began Monday morning with Tony Kocurek, SMACNA President, addressing the group. He was followed by Mounir El Asmar, Ph.D., who led a presentation on Contractor Survival & New Market Entry that covered the following topics:
- Important management decisions.
- The five primary causes of construction business failure
- The various types of market entry
Richard Reese, Senior Consultant with FMI Corporation, led discussions on factors influencing productivity, habits of highly effective managers, and how to work smarter, not harder, through communication, cooperation, and collaboration.
Stephane McShane, Director with Maxim Consulting Group, discussed change order management, including recognizing, preparing, quantifying, and managing change orders. This session led to a discussion on successful business negotiations and de-escalating conflict.
Former SMACNA President and current New Horizons Foundation Co-chair, Angie Simon, SMACNA's past president,presented Strategic Planning for Business and led discussions on the importance of planning, developing a plan, and creating a SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats) analysis.
The program concluded with Kevin Dougherty presenting sessions on Time Management and Leadership.
The next Business Management University will be held in March 2024. For program information, contact Shelly Dixon at education@smacna.org.
