The Construction Leading Edge Podcast

The year is half over. Are you halfway to your goals, or halfway to another year of almosts? In this episode, Todd DeWalt breaks down why so many construction business owners stay stuck overthinking the decision they already know they need to make, still camped on the wrong side of their own Rubicon, waiting on a little more research and a little more certainty before they move. ⚡Schedule a Busin...

EPISODE 450: Why are you still stuck in the middle of everything, even with the best tools, a solid team, and steady projects coming in? In this episode, Todd DeWalt sits down with Eric Fortenberry, founder and CEO of JobTread, to dig into the real reasons contractors stay under-profitable and overworked, and what it takes to finally get off the hamster wheel. ⚡Schedule a Business Evaluation Call...

EPISODE 449: Can you grow your construction business, pay yourself real profit, and still work a normal 40 to 50 hour week? Most construction business owners are working harder than ever and going backwards. ⚡Schedule a Business Evaluation Call with The Construction Leading Edge Team: HERE  👉 If you're grinding 60-hour weeks and every decision still runs through you, the problem isn't what you t...

EPISODE 448: Got construction clients who miss selection deadlines, go around your communication process, then blame you when the schedule slips? In this episode of the Construction Leading Edge Podcast, Todd Dawalt shares the one question that gets your team to hold clients accountable to your process without sounding rigid. ⚡Schedule a Business Evaluation Call with The Construction Leading Edge...

EPISODE 447: Before you hire your next superintendent, project manager, or estimator, you need to know whether you have a capacity problem or a process problem. Todd Dawalt walks construction business owners through a five-step hiring framework to make smarter, more strategic staffing decisions. ⚡Schedule a Business Evaluation Call with The Construction Leading Edge Team:  HERE   👉 If your PMs a...

EPISODE 446: Something feels off in your construction business but you can't pinpoint it. Sales are slipping, the team's out of sync, or projects feel chaotic, and your instinct is to add more meetings, more software, more hours. In this episode, Todd Dawalt breaks down why throwing action at the problem usually makes it worse, and walks through four diagnostic questions that help you find the rea...

Episode 445 If your prospects are ghosting you, dragging their feet, or making the final decision based on whoever has the lowest number, the problem probably isn't your price. It's that you're selling the plunger. In this episode, Todd Dawalt breaks down why most contractors spend too much time talking about their company and not enough time talking about what the client actually wants. He shares...

EPISODE 444: Most construction business owners think their job site fires are operations problems. They're not. They're pre-construction problems that nobody caught in time. In this episode, Todd Dawalt breaks down the Toyota manufacturing concept of Jidoka and what it means for your construction business. He walks through why bad information keeps moving downstream undetected, how the "just enoug...

EPISODE 443: Jake spent three years running a construction business that felt like waist-deep mud. He blamed the labor market. He blamed the economy. He blamed himself. Then he found a signature at the bottom of a stack of invoices — and everything clicked. His chaos had a name. And it had been there the whole time. In this solo episode of The Construction Leading Edge Podcast, Todd Dawalt tells t...

EPISODE 442: Most construction business owners are managing 20 things at once and wondering why the job still falls apart. They've got good people, solid clients, decent projects — and somehow it still ends in chaos, rework, and fires they didn't see coming. The problem usually isn't the building. It's the handoff. In this solo episode of The Construction Leading Edge Podcast, Todd Dawalt breaks d...

EPISODE 441: Most builders assume cost plus is the safe play. No locked-in price. No exposure if materials spike or scope grows. But according to the author of Markup and Profits, cost plus contracts end up in lawsuits two to three times more often — and in arbitration nine times more often — than fixed-price contracts. That's not a pricing problem. It's a process problem. In this solo episode of...

EPISODE 440: Andy Kolp had clients, projects, and a reputation worth protecting. He also had gaps in his process — vague scope, trade bids coming in by text with no context, and jobs where the client ended up running the show. The projects finished. The clients were happy. But Epic Building Company had bent more than it should have. So Andy set a goal for 2025: operate from a position of strength....

☎️ Schedule a Business Evaluation Call with The Construction Leading Edge Team HERE   EPISODE 439: Daaron Yester has been framing custom homes in Southern California's Coachella Valley for nearly 30 years. He had loyal crews, a strong reputation, and clients who kept coming back. He was also borrowing money to keep the business alive, undercharging on jobs, and trying to run every part of the comp...

☎️ Schedule a Business Evaluation Call with The Construction Leading Edge Team HERE   EPISODE 438: Why do construction business owners with real integrity still end up with frustrated clients? In this episode, Todd Dawalt breaks down the systems gap between what you promise and what your customers actually experience — and why pre-construction is the fix.  ☎️ Schedule a free Business Evaluation Ca...

☎️ Schedule a Business Evaluation Call with The Construction Leading Edge Team HERE   EPISODE 437: In 1937, the U.S. Army Air Corps sent out a design proposal with a set of detailed performance specifications for a new pursuit aircraft — one that didn't yet exist and that no plane at the time could match. That proposal eventually produced the Lockheed P-38 Lightning, a fighter that flew over 130,0...

☎️ Schedule a Business Evaluation Call with The Construction Leading Edge Team HERE EPISODE 436: John Springs has been in construction since 1991. For most of those years, everything lived in his head — no written systems, no pre-construction process, no clear handoffs. He was the first call for every problem, working 60-hour weeks, and couldn't step away without something falling apart. Three yea...

☎️ Schedule a Business Evaluation Call with The Construction Leading Edge Team HERE EPISODE 435:  There's a belief running in your construction business right now that sounds completely responsible. Maybe it's "now's not a good time." Maybe it's "when things calm down, I'll fix it." Maybe it's "we just need to hire more people." It sounds like you're being smart and protecting your business. And i...

☎️ Schedule a Business Evaluation Call with The Construction Leading Edge Team HERE EPISODE 434: There's a problem in your construction business right now that you've already identified — but haven't engaged with yet. A tough conversation with a client or employee, a financial trend you keep meaning to address, a hire you've been putting off. And every day you wait, it takes up more mental real es...

☎️ Schedule a Business Evaluation Call with The Construction Leading Edge Team HERE – EPISODE 433: Construction business owner buried in reactive mode, watching your business grow while your stress grows with it? Working 60+ hour weeks, stressed about profit, team management, and scaling your construction company… and still feeling behind? If that hits a little too close to home, this episode is f...

☎️Schedule a Business Evaluation Call with The Construction Leading Edge Team HERE – EPISODE 432: What if the reason your team is stressed, your projects feel harder than they should, and your profits aren't where they should be has nothing to do with labor shortages, material pricing, the market, your subcontractors, or even your clients?  What if the real issue is that you've been letting your c...

☎️Schedule a Business Evaluation Call with The Construction Leading Edge Team HERE – If you've been listening to podcasts, reading books, going to conferences, and consuming business content for months, but your business still looks the same… this one's going to sting. In this episode of The Construction Leading Edge Podcast, I break down how construction business owners use podcasts, webinars and...

EPISODE 430: If your construction projects feel chaotic before they even start, the problem isn't execution, it's the handoff. In this episode of The Construction Leading Edge Podcast, I explain how a weak preconstruction handoff creates scope gaps, delays, missed details, and profit bleeds long before work begins. He breaks down why many builders rely on "figuring it out later," how urgency addic...

☎️Schedule a Business Evaluation Call with The Construction Leading Edge Team  HERE – EPISODE 429: If you're hiring more people but your profit still isn't moving, this episode is for you. Many construction business owners assume the only way to grow profit is to add headcount. More project managers. More superintendents. More office staff. But in reality, hiring too early often creates higher ove...

☎️Schedule a Business Evaluation Call with The Construction Leading Edge Team HERE 🚀Is Your Construction Business Ready to Scale? Take the free online assessment  HERE – EPISODE 428: Trying to scale your construction business in 2026 but feeling stretched thinner than ever? Many builders, remodelers, and general contractors try to grow by hiring more people or chasing more work, only to see const...

☎️Schedule a Business Evaluation Call with The Construction Leading Edge Team HERE 🚀Is Your Construction Business Ready to Scale? Take the free online assessment  HERE – EPISODE 427: If it feels like something's off in your construction business, like you're working your butt off, but profit isn't where it should be, jobs are dragging on, and you are always being pulled into every little decision...