Find out the top 10 core skills you need to master as a concrete foreman and what hard skills you need to know to succeed in this job.
A Concrete Foreman ensures that the assigned concrete projects are completed on time with the efficient use of resources. He/she is in charge of the daily operations of the concrete crew, organizes and supervises the employees to perform given tasks, monitors the progress of the tasks and coordinates subcontractors.
Other duties associated with the role include planning ahead to ensure timely supply of equipment and materials, running equipment, finishing concrete, ensuring safety at the job site, coordinating job site inspections, decision making in relation to project planning and production, reading the blueprint, maintain paperwork that include field reports and timecards, schedule and coordinate labor and materials, review the work daily to ensure it complies with the plans.
Core Skills Required to be a Concrete Foreman
Core skills describe a set of non-technical abilities, knowledge, and understanding that form the basis for successful participation in the workplace. Core skills enable employees to efficiently and professionally navigate the world of work and interact with others, as well as adapt and think critically to solve problems.
Core skills are often tagged onto job descriptions to find or attract employees with specific essential core values that enable the company to remain competitive, build relationships, and improve productivity.
A concrete foreman should master the following 10 core skills to fulfill her job properly.
Teamwork Skills:
Teamwork is the process of collaboratively working with a group of people with an aim to achieve a set goal within a business ensuring that the staff and management cooperate using their skills and provide constructive feedback.
A Concrete Foreman needs to exercise effectiveness and understanding in creating teamwork using the right techniques in an environment of trust and cooperation with the aim of increasing productivity, higher morale, and a fulfilled workforce.
Multi-Tasking:
Multi-Tasking allows one to juggle and perform more than one task at a time without losing track of what you are working on or dropping the ball.
A Concrete Foreman must learn the trick of multitasking and help the staff balance the competing demands of their time and energy that they are expected to handle multiple priorities every day without compromising on the effectiveness of the work done.
Physical Abilities:
Physical Abilities is the ability of one's strengths and limitations that are also known as the individual resources to perform well at the tasks given.
A Concrete Foreman must understand that his employees are very different types of people who vary in what they can or cannot do and treat each one with respect while supporting them to become the best in what they do.
Assertiveness:
Assertiveness is the inclination to stand up for your rights or other people's rights in a calm and concrete way without being aggressive or accepting a wrong.
A Concrete Foreman must be self-assured and confident to master the skills to put his points across without upsetting others or becoming angry and allowing the employees to do the same while complying with the company's policies and procedures.
Empathy:
Empathy is the understanding of another person's condition from their perspective by placing yourself in their shoes and feeling what they are feeling.
A Concrete Foreman ought to practice empathy with his staff by learning to be a good listener and understanding what his employees are going through and choosing to feel it with them through the use of imagination and accommodate them.
Attention to Detail:
Attention to Detail is the capacity to achieve a thoroughness and accuracy when accomplishing a task.
A Concrete Foreman needs to have this prime characteristic and utilize it in a high performing organization that allows both the customers and staff to understand the need to be keen to all the details required to avoid massive costs for overlooked details that are common in the workplace.
Consistency and Reliability:
Consistency and Reliability are the ability to be trusted to do what you do best all the time with or without supervision and without failure to produce results.
A Concrete Foreman is liable to maintain a high level of consistency and reliability by engaging with employees and treating them with respect deserved which produces excellent results in various kinds of reliability coefficients.
Personal Accountability:
Personal Accountability is the feeling that you are entirely responsible for your actions and consequences taking ownership without blaming others.
A Concrete Foreman should provide a list of duties and responsibilities that every employee is expected to perform and define timelines and supervisors who oversee the work to ensure each knows what she /he should do and remain accountable without passing blame.
Using Common Sense:
Using Common Sense is the ability to see what is missing in a situation or a project and supplying it without necessarily being assigned or asked to do it.
A Concrete Foreman needs to creatively train his employees always to see the missing element that is typically crucial in any workplace or project and take the opportunity to do business out of it.
Organizational Skills:
Organizational Skills is the ability to make use of time, energy and resources available in the most efficient manner to achieve their goal.
A Concrete Foreman should organize the work for the employees to ensure overall organization, planning, time management, scheduling, coordinating resources and meeting deadlines is handled most efficiently by each employee for both personal and professional growth.
Hard Skills Required to be a Concrete Foreman
Hard skills are job-specific skill sets, or expertise, that are teachable and whose presence can be tested through exams. While core skills are more difficult to quantify and less tangible, hard skills are quantifiable and more defined.
Hard skills are usually listed on an applicant's resume to help recruiters know the applicant's qualifications for the applied position. A recruiter, therefore, needs to review the applicant's resume and education to find out if he/she has the knowledge necessary to get the job done.
A concrete foreman should have a good command of the following hard skills to succeed in her job.