S is for... Site Managers

Site managers manage the site, obvs.

This means you organise materials that are probably late, alongside trades that probably reluctant to fix them when and how you'd like, in order to meet the probably impossible demands of an unholy trinity of Clients, Designers and Trades, all of whom probably disagree with each other. Thankless job, no?

Not without its benefits, mind. First and foremost is the salary – not megabucks but according to payscale.co.uk the average project manager can expect £40k plus a year.

On top of that is the power they have. The head honcho! The one to ask! Where's the gaffer? over here! – some people lap that stuff up. They have a certain degree of power to hire and fire, they'll often get to know the client and designer well enough to have small influence over design decisions, and most crucially, their's is the key to the schedule and the quality control.

So, good pay, suit and tie, Larry Labourer and Colin Chippy following your every whim. Sound like a megalomaniac's dream? Well let's look at Pavel.

Pavel is running a small job, a luxury refurbishment of a three-bedroom flat. He's got a clear schedule, and they're actually ahead for once! But.... oh no. The floor layers are in this week.

From what Pavel's seen of their work so far, it's a bit dodge – and he should know, he used to be a joiner. The floor joints look big, massive even. Even worse, these rubbish floor layers are taking ages – not starting till 9, two hour lunch breaks, then leaving at 3 every day.

Pavel doesn't muck about. The electricians are in to fit the lights next week, and if he gets rid of these mugs immediately he can find someone he trusts from years of experience, and get the job back on track. Swing the axe Pav, Tiny Tim can starve this Christmas!

Wait, shiiit. The floor layers are also providing the materials. These floorboards are made from Andalucian Mahogany, veneered by a blind soothsayer the designer met on a wine tour of Italy last year, and half the boards haven't been delivered yet. Nobody else could find this blind soothsayer at such short notice, and even if they could it'd cost weeks and and a fortune to get them. Do you really want to piss off your only supplier Pav? Think, man!

Okay, let's say Pavel happens to have the supply sorted. He rings Useless Flooring Ltd, tells their gaffer that he'd sooner the floors be laid in lino by Edward Scissorhands, admires his shiny shoes, his Half Windsor knot, and remembers how stiff his knees used to feel when he was on the tools. Then the phone rings.

It seems the MD of Useless Flooring Ltd is good friends with the designer. Better than friends in fact, the MD saved the designer from a runaway horse at Cartier Polo five years ago, they're more like family. But Pavel holds firm; there is no chance these cowboys can keep fixing their terrible floor.

Next day, the other firm get started. Lovely joints, excellent veneer. Things are back on track. Until the client and designer comes to visit. The client wanders around, admires the work, tries to avoid eye-contact with the trades. But something's caught the designer's eye. Isn't this newer floor a bit less.... wood-y than the original? Wood-y? Pavel replies, not quite sure he didn't just imagine that.

Now the designer mentions it, the client does notice. It's definitely less wood-y. Is that down to the veneer, they ask? To be honest it's more in the fixing, the designer regretfully replies. It's a pity the original firm aren't free-- Pavel interjects with a gasp "But the joints!..."

...And Pavel stops there. 

You see, the schedule is in danger of running behind as it is, and as much of a stickler for quality as Pavel is, they simply can't afford to rip up the work Useless Flooring did before they were sacked. This client cannot notice these cavernous floor joints until long after the job is paid for, and their small children are paying homeless people to leap across them for sport.

The designer won't drop the wood-y thing, and so in thrall is the client that neither will they. And this floor layer... well while she's always been good, that's undeniable, it's also true that she's a bit of a psychopath. So when the client asks whether she's using enough "wood-y wood", and she replies that she'll find the woody-est wood and smash it on their skulls, Pavel knows that he'll be begging Useless Flooring to return before the day is out.

And, just to twist the knife, just for something the MD and designer can chuckle about over a pyramid of Ferrero Roche at the clubhouse, Useless Flooring are now busy butchering somebody else's floors. They can't make it back till next week. And both the client and the designer would like to know why the job seems to be running behind schedule. Because that is your job, isn't it Pavel?

Site managers come in two categories - good and not. Good site managers amaze me, they handle five problems like Pavel's every day, and still the site runs smoothly.

Not so good managers... well they're uncannily like David Brent. Okay, I know that's now a cliched description, but just imagine David Brent in an industry where people still get away with being openly sexist and mildly racist, and just picture the damage.

The David Brent Site Manager (he's always a he) never worked the tools – or if he did, it was long ago enough away for nobody to know how crap he was at it. Having an office job on a building site consisting mainly of men doing mainly physical work subconsciously affects David Brent, so he carries more false machismo than the lairiest scaff around.

But he is at heart a weak weak man. A good way to spot David Brent is to see what he says if you complain about another trade. If he's straight out with "I'll sort 'em out or they can fuck off", then he's a David, and you'll likely overhear him making the same promise to the trade you were moaning about. Another way is the language; if your site manager seems crippled by Cockney, all "I says to her, look petal", he's quite possibly a David Brent, and as soon as the designer arrives onsite the toe-rag will turn into Uriah Heep:

"'When I was quite a young boy,' said Uriah, 'I got to know what umbleness did, and I took to it. I ate umble pie with an appetite. I stopped at the umble point of my learning, and says I, "Hard hard!" When you offered to teach me Latin, I knew better. "People like to be above you," says father, "keep yourself down." I am very umble to the present moment, Master Copperfield, but I've got a little power!'"