Tag Archives: work model for wireless

Is the Work Model for Wireless Changing? Part 3 of 3.

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This is part 3 of  3-part series.

How does this change our model here in the US? Well, for tower climbing most contractors are trying to get crews to work on the same model that the carriers have built. This is because they can no longer carry the burden of absorbing problem costs. Trust me, in tower work, you learn to improvise, adapt, and overcome. You learn to carry a ton of spare hardware in your truck. You know to be prepared. However, you can’t always account for everything. It’s just too much. Which is OK except that no one wants to absorb these costs, especially the end customer.Tower Safety for all your safety training!

With all that said, the business model is changing. Correction, the model has changed. Like it or not, the carriers have changed the model. The role of PM, (project management) has changed. The PM must manage so many groups and entities and hardware. So many moving parts. They are looking for a flat fee for every site for hardware and services. Any field worker knows that all sites are different, but any accounting person doing budgets doesn’t care. They want a cookie cutter approach. A way to build a budget and move on. Welcome to all national builds for 3G, 4G, 5G, and beyond.

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The thing that is happening, so slowly, is the trickle down effect. What I mean by that is that the contractors want to pay their workers the same way they get paid. That’s right, by the job. It’s already starting to happen as more and more people become contractors. Terms of pay are changing. Net 30 is more common than ever. Be prepared for the change. I am having a hard time with it. I know several people who are worried about this model. I just want everyone to be paid fairly and promptly. It’s only right. Good pay for good work. Good work is a gray area though, isn’t it? It’s a matter of perspective. Hard work isn’t enough, quality work that passes the sign off is what matters.

Will this model continue to take over? It seems that way.,W4W Cover 4sw

Do I have an answer, sure, pay the people for their work! Unfortunately, the way the layers of contractors are laid out, payments can be a problem. Most of the field workers today are contract employees. Most contractors do not want to pay people through the slow times, they would prefer to hire contractors for the work when they need them. While many of you want to criticize this, it is how business is done. No one seems to care until there is a climber injured or killed.

There are GCs which hire crews and track all the problems in the industry, but they won’t share, even with OSHA, because they have the fear of getting a bad reputation or getting in trouble, so they keep the valuable information to themselves. They know that if they share it could look bad, they don’t see it as helping the industry. I would love to see this change as well, but I have no recourse. Mistakes, lessons learned, and safety concerns are kept hidden from the industry because GCs often feel others need to learn for themselves.

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The model for work is changing in the US. The workers will need to find a way to do the work in a timely manner and still deliver quality. The investors of the companies are controlling the industry.

The model is changing and the flat fee model is happening. I have some illustrations that may help you understand but let’s look at it this way. The contractors are getting a flat fee. Prices are driven down because they look at much of the work as a commodity. It is no longer considered a specialized construction job. I guess anyone can work at 100 feet above the ground attached to a tower by a rope. To be honest, I don’t see a lot of carrier CTOs up there.Get the Wireless Deployment Handbook today!

The Wireless Deployment Handbook eBook that covers professional carrier end to end deployment of LTE small cells, CRAN, and DAS showing you the proper way to plan for deployment then execute.

The pay structure is going to change. The smaller tower companies may get even smaller and there may be more independent crews that get paid by the job, not by the hour. This is the trend that I see.

Wireless construction is expensive. Towers are loaded. Townships and municipalities are making it harder and harder to build new towers. Much talent has left the industry because of the slow and erratic work as well as the work conditions. I am curious how this new change will affect the industry. I would think that tower work would start to demand a premium again, but it certainly doesn’t look like it’s headed in that direction. The flat fee model seems to be where it is headed. DAS 101 Distributed Antenna System: A Basic Guide to In-Building Wireless Infrastructure by [Baasan, Soyola]

That’s OK, but eventually it is going to hit other jobs. It already hit RF engineering. It already hit construction. Soon it will roll into other jobs. I see it all over the industry. When bidding a job, you need to predict what it will cost you, then live with the price. That’s the way it is.

See part 1 and 2!

Be smart, be safe, and pay attention!

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Do you know what to put in your SOW, the details needed to get paid for milestones or job completion? 

 

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Is the Work Model for Wireless Changing? Part 2 of 3.

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This is part 2 of a 3-part series.

For the contractor, flat pricing causes change order issues. If there are problems at the site, then the contractor must ask for a change order. If the GC who hired them does not want to pay, then the contractor risks not getting paid if the job is not complete. The common excuse is that there is no money for change orders. Usually, the GC does not want to go back and ask for more money because it would look like they don’t know what they are doing or it could mean that the margins are so small they don’t have any reserve dollars. Perhaps they know that the customer won’t approve any up charges. Maybe approvals would not happen in a timely manner or cause delays. It all adds up to problems down the road.Tower Safety for all your safety training!

The model for most of these services are “flat fee”. Whether it’s done through RFP or reverse auction, the GC will hire contractors and expect a safe job with trained workers to go to the lowest bidder. While on paper this looks good, to be the lowest bidder must be efficient and assume no problems to creep up on the job. If they are losing money they start to make other cuts, usually in training and safety. If the work ramps up, then they start to hire inexperienced people or they turn down the work.Get the Wireless Deployment Handbook today!

The Wireless Deployment Handbook eBook that covers professional carrier end to end deployment of LTE small cells, CRAN, and DAS showing you the proper way to plan for deployment then execute.

With this change, the way they hire workers may change. Workers may have a new model. Many contractors may want to pay them by the job. With tower work it is a problem because of safety training, safety gear, insurance, taxes, liability, and travel. So many variables in an industry that the carriers have already beat to death. GOD bless the contractors who are still doing it and doing a good job at it.

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Getting paid even when you finish the work can be a problem. Payment terms have gotten ridiculous because companies want to get paid before they pay anyone and some carriers want stupid payment terms like Net 120, net 90 is bad enough. It should be net 30. Remember to be clear that the timer starts when the work is finished. If you wait for the inspection them many carriers delay the inspection for weeks, maybe months. Yes, I have seen this in the industry, be clear in your scope of work or contract so you know when the timer starts. The most important thing you can do is define the terms ahead of time and agree on them with signatures. Your signature and the customers signature. It’s your best bet to get paid or at least show up in court to get paid. Again, I digress, back to the point.W4W Cover 4sw

In the old days, contractors would get a bonus for getting done early and mistake free. Now they don’t get paid because they take too long or if they have a problem, even if it’s not their fault, at least not full price. Sometimes GCs have no intention of paying no matter what happens. They leave companies high and dry. This is very common in our industry. Know your customer. Know your terms. Know your milestones. It pays to ask around about the customer and the person you’re working with. While you may be doing an install that is for Verizon or AT&T, the turf vendor you’re working with may pocket all the money and leave the crew with nothing. I hear this story all the time. It pays to talk to other contractors. Most are honest about getting screwed. That’s why they generally like to work for larger OEMs and GCs.

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While I talk mostly about tower work here, the problem exists for drive teams, site surveys, inspections, and so on. RF engineering work is leaving the US and going mostly to India where the talent pool is deep and the pay scale is much lower. To be honest they do a fine job. Outsourcing is affecting the entire industry. The carriers want to be efficient, the KPIs, (key performance Indicators), are all about the budget. They want the biggest band for this buck. They still want quality, but like Sprint advertises, if you’re within 1%, we’re good, right?

See Part 1 and Part 3!

Be smart, be safe, and pay attention!

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Do you know what to put in your SOW, the details needed to get paid for milestones or job completion? 

 

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Is the Work Model for Wireless Changing? Part 1 of 3.

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This is part 1 of a 3-part series.

I got news for you, it already has. Think about how the wireless work has changed over the last decade. Most workers expect to have an hourly job or they expect to capture a salary. From what I see, those days are coming to an end. I see it with many offers out there. I see the changes happening and the contractors see it too. The carriers are looking at how to save money and the latest target is the GC. However, they have had a flat fee per site model for years. Is the work model for wireless going to change all the way down to the worker? Maybe. Let’s look at why this is changing.Tower Safety for all your safety training!

There are many changes in the wireless services industry, but the wireless work model is certainly one of the biggest. It affects almost everyone in this industry. If you are a worker in this industry then you could be a 1099 or W2 employee. Most workers are still paid hourly or salary, this is changing. You will soon be paid for the job you do, not for the hours on site, (although it is bid it that way).

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If you are a contractor or own a services company, then you are likely to get paid by the job, site, or specific service. Generally, a flat fee per site. I don’t see too many T&M, (Time and Materials), jobs unless they are for emergency repair work. If you can get this work, good for you!Get the Wireless Deployment Handbook today!

The Wireless Deployment Handbook eBook that covers professional carrier end to end deployment of LTE small cells, CRAN, and DAS showing you the proper way to plan for deployment then execute.

The type of work has changed. It used to be you had a tower crew and the tech at the site after the engineering was complete. Now you have the ground crew, the tower crew, the IT tech, the BTS tech, the lighting crew, the alarming people may be out there, the grounds keepers of you are in a place that needs to look nice, so many people to maintain a shelter or cabinet or site. The remote group is just as critical as you have a team of engineers, RF, BTS, low-level design, IT, and so on. Let’s not forget the NOC or managed services that will monitor alarms and look for issues as well as manage the access to the site. It takes a huge team. This all costs money.W4W Cover 4sw

When a contractor responds to RFPs, it is usually a flat price per site or job. They get paid by the job/site and usually commit to one price per site across dozens of sites. They fight for every change order. They often they hear, “there is no money for change orders” which we all know is just a line to make sure GCs, (general contractors), don’t pay more or they don’t want to go back to the end customer and admit they missed something. If you don’t do the extra work, what happens? You could lose future work, you could get a bad name in the industry, or you could do it and eat the costs. Maybe let them hire another contractor down the road to do the change order. Today’s contractor should be smart and willing to walk if they know the jobs can’t be done for that cost. That takes balls because it will risk future work and reputation. However, they want to get paid, they don’t want to piss off the customer, and they don’t want a bad reputation. It all plays into this formula. Flat fee per site is the way things are being done today.

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Times are changing. Now we expect to have a flat rate to complete a job. Most companies don’t want to pay change orders. Work is a flat fee and most people hiring contractors have a good idea how long it takes to do a job. For instance, a cell tower, 120 feet mounting location, 3 sector array with antennas, radio heads, and hybrid cable, most companies expect to pay for 2 days labor. They estimate what it will cost for 2 days labor. This is how they drive the price down. Then they put it out to reverse auction. This is because they see the work as a commodity. A commodity is a common product that can be bought and sold anywhere, like coffee or copper. The only difference is that most companies don’t see value in better work. This is because when you look at supply chains, procurement, and accounting departments, their main KPI, (Key Performance Indicators) that they are judged on are cutting costs, not quality of work. This is where the problems begin in the wireless world. I am not blaming accountants, but these decisions have affected quality and safety. When a climber dies due to poor safety equipment or poor training, no one remembers that those costs were cut as a money-saving effort, but I digress, sorry.DAS 101 Distributed Antenna System: A Basic Guide to In-Building Wireless Infrastructure by [Baasan, Soyola]

Flat pricing is not all bad. It makes it easy for carriers to roll out. They can have can plan a solid budget. They know what is needed at each site. The contractor knows what to expect to get paid on each site. It makes sense from a business perspective. It should motivate the contractor to get done quickly and efficiently, in theory.

The downside? It will encourage the contractor to take shortcuts. To get paid as soon as possible. The end customer should audit each site for safety, workmanship, quality, and completeness adding costs to the job. The PM must manage not only the rollout but the other contractors that are doing the safety and quality audits. Now that its flat fee most companies only do 1 service, tower work, ground work, RF work, sweeps, optimizations, commissioning, integration, and so on. By the way, none of this is free. The flat fee will add costs.

Will the flat fee model trickle down to the worker? That is where it seems to be headed.

See Part 2 and 3!

Be smart, be safe, and pay attention!

Do you know what to put in your SOW, the details needed to get paid for milestones or job completion? 

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