In many construction firms, there is a “Wall of Silence” between the Pre-Construction department (Sales/Estimating) and the Operations department (Project Management).
The Estimator spends three months negotiating with the client, learning their quirks, and promising specific details. Then, they win the contract, toss a binder of plans on the Project Manager’s desk, and say, “Good luck, it starts Monday.”
This is the “Handoff Fumble.”
The Project Manager (PM) walks onto the job site blind. They don’t know that the client hates early morning noise. They don’t know that the “Tile Allowance” was based on a specific expensive stone the client picked out. They don’t know why the budget is what it is.
The result is immediate conflict: The PM buys standard materials, the client gets upset, the PM blames the Estimator, and the Estimator blames the PM for “not reading the file.”
To protect the PM during this transition, ensure they have a Change Order Form Template ready for any scope deviations discovered on site.
To stop this cycle, you must institutionalize the Pre-Construction Handoff Meeting.
This should be a mandatory 60-90 minute meeting for every project over a certain size (e.g., $50k). It is not a casual chat; it is a transfer of knowledge.
The Estimator likely cut some corners to win the bid. They need to confess this to the PM now.
The PM sees “$5,000 for Cabinets” on the budget. That number means nothing without context.
Construction is a service business. The PM needs to know who they are dealing with.
The “Binder Toss” is bad, but a structured packet is essential. The PM needs a “Field Bible” containing:
Perhaps the most common source of frustration for a Project Manager is the “Phantom Subcontractor.”
During the handoff, the PM looks at the budget and sees a line item for “$12,000 for Painting.” They assume the Estimator has a painter ready to go. Two weeks before the painting phase, the PM calls the office to get the painter’s number, only to be told: “Oh, we didn’t actually hire anyone; that was just a plug number based on a project from last year.”
A successful handoff must include a “Buy-Out Status” report. The PM needs to know exactly which line items are Fixed (contract signed) and which are Open (needs a sub). If 50% of the project is still unawarded, the PM isn’t just managing a build; they are also acting as a secondary estimator. Identifying these gaps during the handoff allows the team to prioritize procurement before the schedule is impacted.
The traditional “Binder” (or folder of PDFs) has a fatal flaw: It is dead data.
Once the Estimator hands off the Excel budget, the PM usually creates their own tracking sheet. Now you have two budgets:
Because these two files aren’t connected, the Estimator never learns from their mistakes. They keep bidding rock excavation too low because they never see the final “Field Budget” showing the loss.
Bid Bench eliminates the need for a Handoff Meeting to be a data dump. Because the Estimator and PM work in the same system, the data is already there.
Bridge the gap between sales and ops.
[Start your 30-day free trial of Bid Bench today. No credit card required.]