Elevate Construction

Cleanliness is always a key indicator of project success. When David walks One Care, he sees dirty porta-potties with graffiti, rushed and frustrated workers, and an uncoordinated frenzy. The water bottle demonstration proves the point. Pouring straight takes 10 seconds because air (roadblocks) keeps stopping the flow. Creating a vortex takes 5 seconds because the water flows in one direction and...

The traditional lean analogy about lowering the water level to see rocks is wrong, and it gives lean a bad name. Lowering the water level leads to slash and burn management. The real problem is not that you need fewer resources. The problem is that the water is moving too fast and the chaos prevents you from seeing the rocks even when they are right in front of you. What you need is stability and...

Jason opens the fable section of Elevating Construction Takt Planning with a personal story about a Southwest Airlines crew going out of their way for his kids, a reminder of what great culture looks like. Then he dives into the story of Olivia, a rising director at Evergreen Construction juggling eight projects, a struggling $150M hospital build, and a high-stakes interview for a $185M mega-proje...

Jason continues the audiobook series with the next section of Elevating Construction Takt Planning, closing out the introduction before heading into the fable. In this chapter, he examines where the industry currently stands with CPM and Last Planner, introduces Scrum as a complement to Takt, and draws from Miyamoto Musashi's Book of Five Rings to explain why builders need both a short sword and a...

Jason continues reading the second edition of Elevating Construction Takt Planning, picking up where the preface left off and diving into the introduction. He unpacks Takt as the visualization of time and space, sets out the six requirements that make a schedule an actual Takt plan, and uses Lord of the Rings and Hobbit allegories to explain why flow must be the one system that rules them all. Thi...

Jason kicks off a new audiobook series right here on the podcast, reading the second edition of Elevating Construction Takt Planning from cover to cover. In this opening episode, he introduces the Takt Production System, walks through the acknowledgements honoring the change-makers who shaped this work, and shares the book's dedication, vision, and preface. The goal is simple: scale Takt planning...

Jason sits down with site superintendent Nelson Atagi for a candid follow-up to yesterday's rant about supers and "security guard" behavior. They unpack why cleanliness is the easiest daily win for a jobsite, where the resistance to growth and training really comes from, and how a shift from taker to giver mentality changes everything about how leaders show up. It's a conversation about stability,...

Jason answers a listener question head-on: how should field superintendents actually spend their 9–10 hours per day, and why do they keep taking on the trade partners' work? In this unfiltered coaching episode, he exposes the real reason supers run to Home Depot, jump in forklifts, and pump water — it's escapism, rooted in the wrong human needs. Jason draws a hard line between "security guard" sup...

Are you ready to get schooled on production laws? In this special interview episode, Jason sits down with Hal Macomber (lean guru, chief operating officer at Nenan Company who did first Takt plan in 1999) and Felipe Engineer-Manriquez to unpack the production laws that govern construction. You'll learn why the order matters (overburdening, variation, then waste, not the reverse), Little's Law and...

Jason and Felipe Engineer discuss Brooks's law from software development. Brooks worked at IBM, found on thousands of projects that adding more people or spending overtime when behind schedule doesn't make projects finish earlier, data doesn't support it. Short-term overtime (less than 2 weeks) can make gains, but long sustained overtime or adding manpower up and down is detrimental. Why adding pe...

Jason shares Keith Cunningham meme from Tony Robbins Business Mastery: chalkboard shows math on left, "and then a miracle happens" in middle, results on right, professor says "I think we need some more detail around step two." Point: can't say "1 plus 2 plus miracle equals financial success", need optics, measurement, numbers to make good decisions. Same applies to construction scheduling: when va...

Jason talks about accountability and getting right people in right seats. Fundamental principle: blame process and behaviors, not people, but invite people who don't fit culturally to work somewhere else. Culture is microactions and beliefs (behaviors) of a group. Paul Acres' two second lean journey: half the people left, didn't want to improve. Large companies identify core values and get firm: d...

Jason records from Milwaukee doing organizational health consulting. Takt book update: finished writing, now called "Takt Planning and Integrated Control", editor said "got a lot more technical mathy sort of or maybe physics," exactly what everyone's been looking for. Project directors build people, not just projects, most don't show up the way teams need. Project director role: own strategy from...

Jason reads from the Elevating Construction Superintendence book, Principle Two: Steadiness and Flow, explains how superintendents should interact with Takt planning. Creative Trades game: seven participants represent contractors (concrete, steel, facade), 35 chips must move through to last contractor. Players roll dice, pass chips forward. Red team finished in 26 weeks with 380 people and materia...

Jason talks about mental discipline and superintendent standing orders. Research shows we have an exhaustible, not inexhaustible, supply of self-discipline, study where people remembering eight numbers were twice as likely to eat donuts at end because mental discipline was exhausted. Judges after lunch are three times as likely to convict criminals. You can white knuckle habits or change your circ...

Jason talks about boundaries and how they differ from emotional responses. Most people use anger to manipulate others and assert control, true maturity means having difficult conversations without getting angry. The key shift: expect nothing from people, but maintain certain standards and appreciate their best while still doing the right thing. When disappointed, instead of emotional responses, as...

Jason talks about the healing power of forgiveness for individuals, families, and teams, unusual topic for construction podcast, but shows up constantly in people's lives. Finished Takt and Last Planner training with Construction Accelerator. Personal story: leader ignored crucial issue to protect innocent people, wasn't transparent, and hid information, Jason standing in bedroom angry. Katie: "Yo...

CPM does not obey even one of the production laws, and Takt obeys and encourages all of them. This is probably the single most important information Jason has ever shared. The four production laws prove mathematically and scientifically why CPM will never work and why Takt planning is not magic but eternal truth. Little's Law says throughput time increases when you have too many flow units in proc...

You are going to make mistakes, and you need to be okay with that. Striving for perfection is beautiful, but thinking you need to be perfect now is damaging. It makes you hide who you really are, prevents you from asking for help, and makes you less human. Jason shares the major mistakes he made in his career. Installing a duct bank where a sewer line should go and costing $350,000. Flooding a bas...

Jason sits down with Joe Donnarummo to talk about generating curiosity in lean construction instead of intimidation and overwhelm. The skeptical superintendent who has been successful for 30 years will tell you there is nothing wrong with the way he runs work. But the industry is not the same as it was 30 years ago. The tools that made superintendents successful back then do not work today. Are yo...

Jason, Brandon Monteiro, and Adam Hoots dive into the four production laws that govern construction whether you know it or not. Fighting against these laws is like fighting gravity. You cannot win. When you want to cut a schedule, everyone throws manpower and materials at the problem, which is exactly what Satan would tell you to do if he wanted to extend your duration. The truth is you need to op...

If you want great superintendents, you have to grow them from the beginning through field engineering. Jason has never seen anyone go from college straight to assistant superintendent and successfully make it to field director. Ever. Being a superintendent is not a builder practicing position. You practice building when you are doing layout, drawings, quality control, and troubleshooting with work...

Many superintendents do not know what they are doing, and that is a reality you have to work around. If you are a foreman or trade partner waiting for an incompetent superintendent to map out your destiny on site, you cannot wait. Here is the secret nobody tells you. You are in trouble either way. Whether you blindly follow stupid requests or do it the right way, you are going to get in trouble. S...

You cannot improve on chaos. Everything thrives in stability and standards, and you cannot have continuous improvement unless you stabilize first. If today is a five, tomorrow is a two, and the day after is a seven, you are not improving. You are just bouncing around in chaos. Cleanliness, organization, safety, just-in-time deliveries, and Takt planning are not about being nice or fair. They are a...

If you keep giving up, it's because your why is not big enough. Jason and Brandon Monteiro dive deep into what it means to face your fears and live with purpose. Whether you believe in an afterlife or think this is all you get, the math is the same. You are wasting your time if you are not grinding toward something meaningful. People who retire early and do nothing wither away and become miserable...