Otto Construction Group
Platform case study
CLIENT NAME: Otto Construction Group
CONTACT: Trystan Martin, Managing Director
Overview
“We are a well-established mid-tier builder, specialising in projects ranging from $5 million to $30 million across the commercial and retail sectors.”
We have a 40-strong plus team and, given our steady year on year growth, offer attractive growth and career development opportunities to our team.
Challenges
Otto has consistently struggled to fill key roles with quality candidates in the current local market. In certain areas, the local construction management employment market is under-resourced and over-inflated for the calibre of employees available.
As an example, our high-performing estimating team pumps out quality work in volume. Despite this, we simply could not keep up with all the opportunities presented to us, nor find local team members of the same like to join us.
"We got to a point where we were turning away tenders and not responding to EOI’s. We weren’t even able to accept some guaranteed jobs because we just did not have the time or estimating resources to spare. We needed to scale up this department, and quickly"
Why overseas?
One of my carpentry subbies told me about his new estimator from the Philippines – how much money he saved by hiring offshore and how much value this employee was contributing to his business. He said this new hire had changed his life as he was now submitting quality estimates and winning a lot more jobs.
"I did some research, and Platform Outsourcing stood out as it was the only Australian outsourcing company that specialised in construction"
I had thought about outsourcing before as I know some of the bigger industry players, including our direct competitors, had already embraced it. But I was always slightly cautious about how the process worked. We were not sure how a person could work effectively without being based in the office. However, after COVID, we obviously became used to people working from home, so this was less of a concern.
Other concerns were around the quality and expertise of the hire, their potential cultural fit, and the level of control Otto would have over their performance. Mostly, I was reticent to outsource something that is one of our key competitive strengths. But after constantly falling short with candidates in the local market, I felt I had to explore this option.
Why
Platform?
The team at Platform provided great insight into how outsourcing construction management roles to the Philippines worked. Critically, they debunked my belief that outsourcing meant a loss of control. They clearly illustrated every area in which we’d be saving money and improving efficiency.
"From admin to office costs, we were looking at impressive numbers. And that was on top of the incredible cost savings on the hire itself – up to 70% less than what we’d be paying in the local market"
Platform took the time to understand our business needs and our company culture in order to guarantee the best fit.
The hiring process was straightforward and moved quickly. Through Platform, we had a much bigger pool of educated and qualified specialists to choose from, and this made the process a lot easier and quicker than hiring locally. Platform shortlisted our candidates and invited us to attend the interviews, which we chose to do.
After the interviews and competency tests, a decision was quickly made, though it was a tough one given the calibre of candidates. At the end of the day, we didn’t have to compromise on any of our hire needs OR wants.
"Platform took care of the entire onboarding process, looking after all of our new staff member’s administrative and employment needs. Again, they made the entire process hassle-free for us"
The Results
Philippines-based Estimator Elaine joined Otto early this year, and we have never looked back. She is easily accessible online or via the phone, works the same hours as the rest of the team, and communicates and participates in meetings in real time. Platform’s post-hire support has also been incredible with multiple follow ups conducted with Elaine, with me directly, and with our estimating team.
Elaine’s previous Australian experience meant she transitioned into the role seamlessly. She has a very western and commercially driven outlook, so managing and motivating her has been no different than our in-house crew. She has been the perfect cultural fit for us, and her sense of humour is refreshing!
"The most obvious benefit of hiring offshore with Platform is the incredible human resource cost saving. For this estimating role, we saved approximately $80,000 per annum!"
Just as importantly, Elaine is an exceptional employee who is highly skilled and motivated to succeed within her role. Elaine completes thorough BOQ on projects in a short time with very thorough detail and clarification. This has enabled us to submit more and superior tenders than we were previously able.
With Elaine working on the time-consuming and often tedious tasks of measuring, take-off, and BOQ preparation, our Australian team is now solely focused on the big issues. They spend their time preparing better tenders, vetting subcontractor quotations, and preparing detailed methodologies and construction programs.
"Elaine’s talent is not limited to estimating. She has also supported the programming team with her training in MS project. This has resulted in efficiencies company wide"
I’d say we saw the true value of Elaine shine when both our senior estimators were away, and we had an important tender closing. Elaine took on the role and showed she had capacity not only to prepare thorough BOQ’s but also to put together a tender, follow up, and communicate with our subcontractors. She vetted their quotations with the same vigour she applied to her measuring skills. It was a big turning point for us, and it helped us realise the exceptional value in the resource we had hired through Platform.
The Future
There’s no question we will be expanding our offshore team. Given the significant cost savings we can achieve and the level of quality output we now know we can expect, we are currently considering roles in other areas of the business.