CONSTRUCTION PM LABOR COST ACCOUNTABILITY: EARNED VS BURNED BY PHASE.
Most project managers know how to build. Most don't know whether their current active phases are on budget, over budget, or heading for a loss. The four figures that would tell them live in accounting and never reach the PM until the job closes. PM labor cost accountability starts with giving PMs the number: budget, actual to date, percent complete, and projected final cost. What happens to job margins after that conversation is consistently better than what happens without it. SPM builds PM accountability into the monthly job review meeting, a 30 minute session per project where the CFO-produced cost-to-complete is the agenda and every red phase produces an action item with an owner and a deadline.
The word accountability makes owners nervous because it sounds like a performance review. It's not one. Nobody is grading a PM on a financial metric they were never trained to read. The whole practice is one number per phase, delivered monthly, in language a PM who came out of the field already understands. Being 15% over on labor budget means the crew is producing at 87% of estimated efficiency, and that's a production conversation rather than an accounting one. Once the number is on the table, the PM usually knows what to do about it faster than anybody in the office does.
WHAT IT MEANS.
PM labor cost accountability is giving a project manager four figures on every active phase, budget, actual to date, percent complete, and projected final cost, so the phase can be managed to budget instead of explained at closeout.
The earned vs burned framework compares what the phase should have cost based on physical completion against what it did cost based on timecards. A PM who knows that rough-in labor is at 88% of budget at 70% completion understands they have a 12 day window before the phase goes over budget. A PM without that number makes scheduling and crew decisions with none of the financial context that would have changed them.
The accountability conversation is three sentences long: here is the number, here is what it means, and what do you want to do about it. That's the entire practice. Everything else is the reporting cadence that makes the number available on the same day every month.
NOT BLAME: INFORMATION AND OWNERSHIP.
The PM was never given the number
PM labor cost accountability isn't about evaluating a PM on a financial metric they were never trained to manage. It's about giving PMs the financial information they need to make better operational decisions. A PM who doesn't know where rough-in labor sits against budget is doing the job without one of its inputs. Most companies at this size have never produced that figure per phase at all.
Crew and schedule decisions get made with no cost picture
A PM who knows rough-in labor is at 88% of budget at 70% completion understands they have roughly a 12 day window before that phase goes over. That knowledge changes which crew goes where and whether overtime gets approved this week. A PM without the number makes the same decisions on schedule pressure alone, and the decisions are reasonable every time and expensive in aggregate.
The overrun gets found at closeout and not at 70% complete
Catching a phase running hot at 70% complete produces a different outcome than catching it at 100% complete, because at 70% there's still work left to manage and at 100% there's only a variance to explain. The same information delivered two months earlier is worth real money, and the only thing standing between the two is a monthly reporting cadence from closed books.
The owner is the only person watching job margin
When nobody else owns job level financial outcomes, the owner is the sole financial watchdog on every project at once. That works at three jobs and it doesn't work at ten. Moving the PM into the first line of job cost defense is what makes scaling past $5M sustainable without the owner working 80 hour weeks.
WHAT IT LOOKS LIKE IN DOLLARS.
If a phase is 70% complete and has consumed 80% of its labor budget, the phase has earned $56,000 in value and burned $64,000 in cost. That $8,000 difference is the over-budget position at this point in the phase. At the current burn rate the phase will close at approximately $81,000 against an $80,000 budget, a $1,000 overrun. Catching that at 70% complete produces a different outcome than catching it at 100%.
Green is actual cost below 105% of earned value. Yellow is actual cost at 105 to 115% of earned value. Red is actual cost above 115% of earned value. Simple, consistent, and applied to every phase on every project, which is what makes the colors mean the same thing in two different PMs' mouths.
When a PM understands that being 15% over on labor budget means the crew is producing at 87% of estimated efficiency, the financial conversation turns into an operational one they can act on. Labor hours per unit and crew days per phase are the units a field trained PM already thinks in. That translation is the whole training program.
BUILDING PM FINANCIAL ACCOUNTABILITY IN 60 DAYS.
Every project gets a labor budget by phase before mobilization. Actual against budget gets tracked weekly from timecards, and the PM sees the comparison monthly from closed books. The budget has to come off the estimate rather than off a percentage, because the estimate is what the crew is being asked to hit.
Green is actual cost under 105% of earned value, yellow is 105 to 115%, and red is above 115%. Write them down once and apply them to every phase on every project. Thresholds that move by project are thresholds nobody trusts, and the consistency is what lets a PM read the report without asking anybody what it means.
Thirty minutes per project. The CFO function presents the cost-to-complete, the PM walks each phase, and red phases produce action items. Meeting notes and action items go out within 24 hours. Green phases need no action, yellow phases need a conversation about production rate, and red phases need an operational response: tighter crew management, a schedule adjustment, or a change order review.
Over time, PMs who consistently manage phase level labor to budget get recognition and PMs who consistently produce red phases get coaching. This isn't punitive. It's the natural result of having information in the room that used to be invisible to everybody except the owner at year end.
When PMs own job level financial accountability, the owner stops being the only person who cares whether the job makes money. Moving from owner as sole financial watchdog to PM as first line of job cost defense is what makes scaling past $5M sustainable without the owner working 80 hour weeks. It's the single largest return in the whole job costing build.
FLAT MONTHLY FEE. NO SURPRISES.
Three tiers, priced by your trailing twelve month revenue. Which one you're in depends on how much of the work you want off your desk. No hourly billing, no payroll, and no add-ons.
Pricing
| Last 12 months revenue | Monthly fee |
|---|---|
| Up to $1M | $1,900 to $2,900 |
| $1M to $3.5M | $2,600 to $3,900 |
| $3.5M to $6.5M | $3,800 to $5,700 |
| $6.5M to $9.5M | $5,100 to $7,100 |
| $9.5M to $12.5M | $6,100 to $8,500 |
| $12.5M to $15.5M | $7,400 to $11,000 |
| $15.5M to $18.5M | $9,400 to $13,500 |
| $18.5M+ | Quoted individually |
Range reflects the three tiers below. Which one you're in depends on how much of the work you want off your desk. No payroll. No hidden line items.
You stop guessing.
You get the CFO work. Job costing built against the way you estimate, a 13 week cash forecast, monthly WIP, and a meeting every month that ends in decisions rather than a report.
Your bookkeeper keeps doing the books.
You stop touching the books.
Everything in Core, and we run the bookkeeping and the controllership as well. Nobody in your office is answering coding questions or chasing a reconciliation at month end.
We do the books. No payroll.
Every job shows its margin while it's still running.
Everything in Executive, plus the job costing and WIP platform set up, loaded with your cost codes, and managed for you every month. You never have to learn it.
We do the job costing.
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