5TER dgeting Projects .TER CTIVES I sold escalatus and elevators tor my first job out of business school As part of my training, belare I was sent to tha field, I would look over the estimates made by the sales staff ThlS served to double-check their math so the company had confidence in their estimates. it also served 10 teach ma many of the little nuances that more experienced estimators used, I had my training manuals, iis!s of standards, man methods ot calculation. and so torqh. but earning from others' experience nstead of making au mv own mistakes holped. One of the last parts mv training was to spend eight weeks at the Denver branch to get seasoned a lit-tie bit. Construction was booming in Denver during the 'ate 1970s. 'n fact. some days I needed to bd more Sekctlg C"ing Pbnnlng Encuung Realm ng Kick-ON *Olecl Result p MBOK G u 10 E -roelcs: tnan one job. Thu Iirst part of putting a bd was to go Iha atflce where the requests tor proposas. plans. speciilcations, and the uke were stored. Then, armed with that information, I would put together an estirnale, Fina'S', the actual bidding took placeusually over the phone. The problem was that creating a detailed estimate would generally take at Gast half a day If that was my only duty (it was not). I would still have had a hard ume when multiple jobs were let Ior bid on the same day Something had to give Every morning around 10 , met the construction superintendent for coffee. We would dlscuss each bid that was due. What other job was it like? How was it bigger or smaller than a recently completed job? What features did it include more or less than a previous job? Did we make money on that job? We use-d questions to compare an upcoming job to other recently completed jobs. We would also ask, "What do wa think our compet'tion will bid?" By the and of the conversation. we had determined our strategy for bidding the job. It w; won the bidi we would comple\e a detailed cost estimate to see if we were close.' After my training, I was transferred to Kansas City. Kansas City had less construction than Denver. I had enough time to parform datailed cost estimates before I submitted bids. Therefore, we were more certain that 't we got the bid, we would have a good chance of making money. worked the same company in both cities. However. we usa-d two very different rrFthods of estimating cost, Both mada sense where they we used In Denver, if we Vnted to bid every iob (and you cannot win the job if you do not bid an it), need-ed a fast method 'n Kansas City, we had the time to develop detailed cost estimates, and so we took the ume. There are many of esttnating proiecl costs and each has its place