Why Your PM Shouldn't Be Doing Estimates (The Field vs Office Problem)
Task-switching costs 40% of productive time. For a $5M contractor, that's $200K+ per year in lost productivity.
Your project manager walks into the office at 7am to work on a bid that's due tomorrow.
7:15 — phone rings. Supplier has a question about an order.
7:30 — text from a tech. Customer wants to change the scope.
7:45 — you pop in to ask about yesterday's job.
8:00 — she finally opens the estimating software. But now she's thinking about three other things. The estimate that should take 2 hours takes 4. And it's not as tight as it should be.
This is the field vs office problem. And it's quietly costing you a fortune.
Two Types of Work, Two Types of Schedules
In any contracting business, there are two fundamentally different types of work:
REACTIVE WORK (Manager Mode)
- Dispatch and scheduling
- Customer calls and complaints
- Vendor coordination
- Quick decisions and approvals
- Email, Slack, texts
Works in 15-30 minute chunks. Calendar filled with interruptions. Availability is the job.
FOCUSED WORK (Maker Mode)
- Estimating and takeoffs
- Job costing and financial analysis
- System building and documentation
- Strategic planning
- Training development
Needs 2-4 hour blocks. A single interruption kills the whole session. Unavailability is required.
The problem? Most contractors don't separate these. They expect the same person to do both, at the same time, from the same desk.
The 40% Tax
Research on task-switching shows that jumping between different types of work can cost up to 40% of someone's productive time. Even brief mental blocks from shifting between tasks destroy output.
Let's do the math for a $5M contractor:
- Office payroll (PM, office manager, estimator): ~$250,000/year
- 40% lost to task-switching: $100,000/year
- Add the owner's time lost the same way: another $50,000+
Total: $150,000+ per year in lost productivity
That's not counting the downstream costs: estimates that get rushed, mistakes that get made, balls that get dropped.
The Classic Contractor Mistake
Here's what typically happens as contractors grow:
You hire a PM. They're good, so you give them more responsibilities. Estimates. Dispatch. Collections. Customer issues. "They can handle it."
Now they're doing five jobs poorly instead of one job well.
Their estimates get sloppy because they're interrupted every 20 minutes. Their dispatch is reactive because they never have time to plan ahead. Their collections slip because it's always the thing that can wait until tomorrow.
The irony: By giving them more, you made them less effective at everything.
How to Fix It
Step 1: Identify who's doing what type of work
List every office role and categorize their tasks as "Maker" (needs focus) or "Manager" (reactive).
Most people will be a mix. That's the problem.
Step 2: Separate or time-block
Option A: Separate the roles entirely. One person does estimating. Another handles dispatch and customer calls. This works if you have enough volume.
Option B: Theme the days. Estimates Monday and Wednesday mornings. Dispatch and reactive work afternoons and other days. Make it predictable.
Example schedule for a hybrid role:
- 7:00-11:00am: Maker time. Phone off. Door closed. Estimating or job costing only.
- 11:00am-5:00pm: Manager time. Dispatch, calls, emails, coordination.
This gives you a protected 4-hour block every day for focused work. That's 20 hours a week of actual productivity instead of 8 hours spread across 40.
Step 3: Communicate the schedule
This only works if everyone knows when someone is available vs focused. Update Slack status. Put it on shared calendars. Tell your team: "Sarah doesn't answer calls before 11am. That's when she estimates."
At first, people will push back. "But what if there's an emergency?" Fine—define what an actual emergency is. A customer complaint can wait 2 hours. A tech locked out of a job site can't.
For You, the Owner
You're probably the worst offender here.
You bounce between strategic thinking, putting out fires, sales calls, job site visits, and "just checking in" on your team. Your day is chaos with occasional pockets of actual work.
The same rules apply:
- Block one full morning per week with no meetings, no calls, no "quick questions." Use it for the thinking work only you can do.
- Batch your reactive work. Check email at 8am, noon, and 4pm—not constantly.
- Stop interrupting your team. Every time you "pop in" to ask a question, you cost them 20 minutes of refocusing.
The Bottom Line
Every meeting with a "maker" costs them 10x what it costs you. Every interruption destroys an hour of focused work.
Stop treating all work the same. Separate reactive work from focused work. Protect the time that creates actual value.
That 40% productivity tax you're paying? It's optional. You just have to stop paying it.
Where Else Is Your Business Leaking?
The Contractor Cash Flow Assessment looks at more than just your financials. We examine how work flows through your business and where productivity is being lost. One week of analysis. Clear recommendations.