Navigating the Challenges of Construction Administration Travel

In this episode of 'What the RFI', Matt discusses the realities of travel in Construction Administration (CA). He explores the pros and cons of traveling for work, including the unique experiences and opportunities it provides, as well as the challenges such as time away from family and the physical demands of travel. The conversation emphasizes the importance of evaluating personal circumstances and preferences when considering travel in CA, ultimately concluding that while travel can be rewarding, it requires careful consideration of work-life balance.

Takeaways

• Travelling for work can lead to unique experiences.
• Building relationships with clients is crucial.
• Long trips can be exhausting and time-consuming.
• Staying fit while travelling is a challenge.
• Travel expenses should be carefully managed.
• Communication with family is essential when traveling.
• Travel can be a great marketing tool.
• Evaluate the pros and cons before accepting travel jobs.
• Consider the impact of travel on personal life.
• Enjoy the journey and the places you visit.

Sound Bites
"Is it worth it? Let's find out."
"You get to see some amazing places."
"It's a great marketing tool."

Chapters
00:00 - Introduction to Construction Administration and Travel
05:20 - The Perks of Traveling for Work
12:51 - Challenges and Cons of Travel in CA
16:32 - Conclusion: Is Travel Worth It in CA?

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Transcript

0:00

With CA, Construction Administration, traveling is part of the job. Is it worth it? Let's find out. Welcome to What the RFI, the podcast that focus on construction administration through the lens of an architect, project coordinator, engineering, you name it. Each week we talk about the techniques, the challenges and bring it to the show. So this week I'm traveling, I'm actually in Toronto and I thought, why not? Let's talk about CA and the travel that comes with it. I'm going to talk about the perks, know, the pros, cons. Is it worth it? So before we dive into the pros and the cons, let's talk about the standard general requirements that we have. So the first one is, the reality is jobs aren't always located in your backyard. As much as that would be great and that wonderful, it's not the case. You need to feed the firm with work. You may have to go outside of your comfort zone, out of your district, out of your state, out of your province to go get this work. Nothing wrong with that. It's just the reality of it. Some places are really remote and some, you know, they're only two, three cities away. Well, If anywhere we're going, some cities, in my case, I was out of Chilliwack for most of a good portion of my career. When I had to go into Vancouver or Richmond, BC, if I would travel that midnight, it would be about an hour. If I traveled during rush hour, it was two hours. It doubled. And then, let alone if there's an accident, good luck. That's going to be a two and a half hour trip, maybe three hours. It all depends. Or maybe you're going up north or to the Kootenays in that sense. It's about the same amount of time, but it's a very long drive and gas and all these things that we got to take into account. And we're to get into those details shortly here. Sometimes the reality, you can't drive to these locations. So you got to fly. So are you afraid of flying? Again, we'll come back to this. And regardless, the thing is when you're starting the projects, you got to review this. So when you're bidding it and you're preparing your contracts, do you want to work in this location? You know, is it worth the extra amount? It's got to take into account the amount of time, how busy you are. Is it possible to get there every month? Right? You've got to take that responsibility. So let's get into the pros, the perks. So first of all, you get to see some amazing places hands down. I, you know, I for myself been up up north to Haida Gwaii. Kelowna, Kamloops, you name it. I even traveled to Washington DC. So these are great places, great experiences, things I would actually never have seen in my career if it wasn't because of work. So a couple of those memorable ones, like I was kind of saying earlier, Kelowna and Cornell, great places. I love going in the summer. It really came on depending on the client too. If you've got a good client, that, you know, spends that extra time with you and he offers that, take advantage of it. Because I've had so many good memories of going out with clients afterwards, you know, from dinners and outings, adventures, even the casino too. And we had a ball, we had so much fun. And while we're going out for these nice dinners, not only let alone we're getting to know our client better, it's strengthening our relationship. And, you know, how many times have we been having dinner with a client and Work always comes into the conversation and we've walked away with a brand new job. That is the reality of it. And by having that extra time because you're spending the overnight, you know, it's a longer travel trip or even it's just during the day, you got to grab lunch. You know, taking that investment into the client is totally worth it. And again, not all clients are going to let you do this. know, some are very by the books and they won't let you accept by, you know, take you out for them for lunch. And then some are going to, you know, absolutely go out and have a great time. So major perk with that, it's great marketing tool, great way to build your relationship with your existing clients and just continue the work flowing through. And, you know, not only with the client, you're spending it with your colleagues as well. If you're on like a four or five road, four or five hour road trip, the thing is you're going to get to know these colleagues of yours, right? Maybe it's your boss or whatever the case is. And countless times I, you know, I've enjoyed this just like a retreat. If you go on a retreat, you're going to get to know those people. Going to the coffee shop every day with everybody, know, stand around the water cooler at break time. That's good, but you're going to get to know these individuals when you spend the time like this with them. again, another perk, another positive, maybe it's not a perk. I don't know. I always enjoyed my time with spending my colleagues. Okay. And like I said, you see some amazing places, you know, over this last year alone too, for travel for work, I've been going to Washington DC, know, Fargo, Las Vegas, you name it. And like I said, I'm in Toronto right now. In a few days, I'm going to be in Asheville and just, you know, I love taking advantage of these, these places when you do sometimes even book an extra day, go check out the city, go check out the town, you know, the attractions, you know, take advantage of it. Cause in all my time, I don't think I would have been able to see half the places if it wasn't for work. So Check this out. Check out your places. know, enjoy it, embrace it. You know, one of my favourite ones was Haida Gwaii. You know, I was walking around with my colleague at like 11 .30 at night and it was still bright because the way that it's positioned on our planet. So very cool in that sense. And like I said, there is lots of positives with the travel, but with all positives, cons, let's talk about them. So the reality is multi -day trips. You might be going for the whole day and it might be for literally a one hour meeting and that one hour meeting took you, you know, 12 hours or 24 hours, you know, based on the location. And that's what it is. That's the reality. It's part of the job. Sometimes, like I said earlier, you have to fly. Are you afraid of flying? Do you have your passport? Are you allowed to travel outside of the country? Can you stay only to buy domestic? whatever the case is, can you even get a flight out there? You know, maybe it's so remote where you got to fly into a place, take a ferry and then rent a car. Can you rent a car? All these things you got to take into consideration and the challenges that they bring and let alone the cost, which we'll talk about later. Okay. And with flying, like for example, going up north to Quesnel it's about a six, seven hour drive for me. It's a drive. Okay. It's a beautiful drive. Right? But it takes time. Now, if I was to fly from Vancouver to Quinnell, yes, the flight would be an hour. But the reality is I got to go drive to Vancouver, two hours. I got to check in, two hours. One hour for flight, you're almost in the exact same amount of time. And it's cheaper at the end of the day, right? Compared to buying flights and all that. And you have to have to change or again, it's just comfortable driving. But there's pros and cons on both. So those are things that you got to kind of take into account of. how you're doing this. And again, when you're reviewing the job to bid, these are things that you got to, you know, analyze. Okay. The other reality of is you are away from the family. End of story. Again, whether it's a day trip or not. And keep in mind, you're away at least once a month, maybe twice a month, and plus the lifetime of the project. So if the project is a school and it's going to be 24 months, two years, well, that's a lot of time away. And keep in account that that's just one job. Maybe you've got three, four, five, six, right? Maybe you're a dedicated CA guy. You are going to be away a lot. End of story. No ifs or buts. So those are things that you just got to take into account. You know, have the conversation with your loved one, with your partner, you know, maybe, you know, both work and it's not a big deal. Maybe you've got a family, maybe it's a stay at home mom or dad or whatever the case is. These are things that you have to take into account because it can be very straining and I speak from experience on that alone. So like I said, you're away and trying to schedule with all those, again, if you've got kids, all those school events, plays and theaters, lock those in your calendar right from the start. That's my tip is once I get those calendars, I use my calendar, my digital calendar, my iPad or Outlook, whatever, religiously to make sure everything's marked in there because when it's marked in there, I'm not going to miss it. And if a site meeting comes up, I'll try and push it back and forth. But the job is the job and sometimes you don't get that opportunity. So keep those things in mind. Okay. So not only with being away from the family, these are long days, you're not going to get paid overtime with it. Maybe you will, but you know, typically, you know, it's kind of just, you know, on your time sheet, traveled for the day. And that's what you did, whether it was a eight hours, you're getting up at four o 'clock to head to the airport and then you kind of wrapped it up at six o 'clock and then you went out for a client and entertaining them. Maybe you didn't want to entertain the client, but the reality is you've, you're going to be putting a full long day in and then you're going to wake up and then maybe you've got a second meeting or two, you're going to do it all again and get back to the airport and fly home. Right? So the reality is you have long days. And the other one thing that is very difficult and hey, if anyone's got a solution, I'm all years, you know, I'm again, me traveling this week right now. I want to stay fit. I've been working so hard on myself, you know, I draw I was, you know, I've dropped over 30 pounds since last January, and I don't want to gain it back. I do not I want to keep working on it. So, so how do we stay fit in the reality where we are? Well, bring your running gear and a story pack in your bag, right? You know, where your shoe your running shoes with you on the flight if you if you're really tight for luggage, space or storage or anything like that. But Bring your running gear, get running, get up early, go for a run or do it in the night. It's up to you, whatever works for your schedule, but keep fit. Absolutely. Maybe join a gym that has any location passes. I actually have a gym membership at Anytime Fitness and the nice thing about them is not only they're great gym and very reasonable, but I can go use my pass at any location and they've got a ton of locations. You know, even when I went to Hawaii, they had a location there. Here in Toronto, they've got a location. Yes, the locations aren't very desirable sometimes they're on the other side of town, but it's an option, right? Or staying in hotels with gym equipment, right? Or if you're staying somewhere where it's warm, then great. Then definitely, you know, go for a run outside. When I was at a conference in Hawaii, I was running outside every day. I loved it. What a beautiful place. Rain or shine. Rain was incredible. So You know, and take advantage of those running opportunities. Run to places. Use this as part of your exploring, right? Those moments there, bring your phone, take a couple shots, keep running. You're doing, know, killing two birds with one stone at the end of the day, which is great. So I think, you know, do as much as you can and lots of walks. Absolutely. And eating. my goodness. This is where discipline comes in. Don't be constantly eating and treating yourself, you know, having the burgers. Sure. Maybe it's a celebration. You won a big job. great, go out for a steak, go out for a burger, have some beer, have a little bit of fun, okay? But don't make it a habit. I encourage you to really watch that, you know, look at your calorie takes, get an Apple watch, check out your calories intake these days, what you're burning as well, because if you don't watch this, this can quickly change it. And again, for me, once I, you know, after I turned my, kind of about 35, that weight just came on so much quicker. And after when I hit 40, it was tough. So watch it. be disciplined and just keep active, keep moving, okay? And the last thing about the cons, the reality is it's not always the nicest weather. I love summer, going up to the interior is beautiful drives. I took my 22 Mustang up there, GTI, I flying through the roads, I was having a ball, it was a great experience. But the reality is some of those roads are, they're featured in the Highway to Hell documentary series, right? They're nasty roads, they're snow, they're dangerous and you gotta take into account. flying, good luck, maybe even getting out of the airport. Those are things that can take into account that as the delays and especially with these smaller airports and flights to them, the trickier they can be, fog, ice, you name it. So that's kind of the other reality is how are gonna deal with when your job sites, you know, in winter months and very severe winter months, okay? So let's talk about the billing side, the disbursements. Again, when you're bidding these contracts is up to you, but typically travel is included in the disbursements. So you want to take that into account. That was including your flights, right? You know, sometimes that's the only way. So you got to take into account, you know, hotels, right? Where you're to stay, your eating, car rental. Now, sometimes even locally, it's when you do the mileage. So say, for example, if You went 100 kilometres and you build out a 50 cents, you you're getting 50 bucks, right? So it, sometimes it makes sense to do that. But when you're driving up north or you are doing that six hour road trip, well, now you're to get like a $300 bill or an expense actually, right? Which is nice, but it puts a lot of wear and tear on your car. From the company standpoint, it makes sense to... rent a car, because a rental car is only like a hundred bucks plus the gas. So usually if you're kind of going over that kind of three, four hour, that three hour drive or that, or taking the count of how many kilometers you're going, sometimes it's better to rent a car, pay for the gas and save the wear and tear, right? Don't put the wear and tear on your vehicle. I've got one colleague that, my goodness, he bought a brand new Jetta and you know, a number of years back and the thing's got, you know, I think 150 ,000 kilometers and it's not driving work because work is less than 15 kilometers. In this case, it's all because of him driving to and from the site. Things to take into consider, right? Do you want that on your car or not? Some like it because they get the points, right, with their credit cards and sometimes it's easier. Like I said, would personally, I would rent a car if I could because again, it was cheaper and then I got bonus points on enterprise and I used that enterprise points when I went to Hawaii and got a free car for the time I was there. So all these things that you've got to take into account and like again, do you have a company credit card using your personal credit card? My goal to keep my life sane is I had two credit cards. One was my personal credit card and one was my Costco MasterCard, which I would use at Costco because they only take MasterCard, or I would use it my business expenses. So it was an easy way to help me track my bills back and forth. At end of the day, it's money, money, money in, money out. But the reality is it was just nice to see what was coming in and I always could pay it and versus getting muddied with that. You do what you got to do and go from there. And the last thing about disbursements is food, okay? Typically, I think you kind of budget about $100 a day and some companies are very strict. You got to do breakfast, you know, at this amount and lunch. Some just say, look, you got a hundred bucks, you do whatever you want with it. It's your way of, you know, going. And sometimes you can even pocket that money, right? It all depends each company and policies that have in place. But, you know, again, with the whole eating right stuff, sometimes I would have a breakfast, kind of skip lunch or skip breakfast and have a good lunch. And then of course have a good dinner, right? Those little things that you just got to do. Some clients refuse to pay for alcohol. So again, just check in with your clients and the policies and that. Sometimes you can include that. Again, that's an HR thing. You got to talk to your own team and find out those details. So the reality is you got to take those into account the time away, right? And put that in. is you may be charging a flat out fee for the whole job, including CA, or you may be charging up to CA and then it's all by hour. Well, that's going, the client's going to really review that and go, do I want to pay this guy 12 hours per site visit? Because the reality is it's not just a one time thing. It's going to be once or twice a month for the lifetime of the project being built. So all things to take into consideration. So in conclusion, is travel worth it with CA? Is it worth going for that job way out there in the middle of nowhere? Well, If you're single, you know, and you want to check out the world, go for it. It can be really worth it. You know, and again, maybe it's that it's a branch into a new client. Speaking of the Kelowna jobs, we never worked with that. And we took a risk and we did it and we, you know, not only just did one job, we did two, three, four, five, we did a lot of jobs. It was a great way for brand new territory to be involved in. So those are things to take into account. If you have a family, you really need to review that with your partner. Can you be away? Right? Or are you just, you know, is it going to be, you know, altering with someone or are you applying for a dedicated CA job where you're going from site to site to site to site? End of story. That's it. You're not in the office. You're not doing Revit. You're not drawing. You're just doing CA. You've got a lot of travel. Do you want to do that? Again, we talked about, you know, your life with your relationships, your friends and your health as a fitness side. So things to take into account. And at the end of the day, like I said, there's pros and cons with this. I personally enjoy the travel, you know, I do, you know, there's days where I don't want to do it as much, but it's fun. It's, you know, there's a lot of, like I said, a lot, I've seen a lot of places and I love it and I'm thrilled with it. So that's kind of your CA and travel and mix of this episode. I hope you guys enjoyed it, you know, and of course last but not least architects keep designing and contractors keep turning those blueprints into reality. We're going to see on the next one. See ya.