Dave Rhiner has, like most of us, worked for bosses that didn’t consider their employees’ free time a priority.
“I think the old-school way of thinking was more is better,” Rhiner says. “I’ve worked at companies where a 15-, 16-hour day was rewarded. Unfortunately, that usually leads to having a bad home life, a bad family life and early hair loss.”
Dwayne Honoré runs his shop with a different set of values, which is one of the reasons Rhiner now is a project manager at D. Honoré Construction. Honoré requires everyone to be out the door by 5:30 p.m.
“We’re going to reward you for getting to work on time and getting out of here on time,” Rhiner says. “We call it the ‘Road Home.’”
D. Honoré practices what Rhiner calls “slow, controlled growth,” unlike many contractors who take whatever work they can get. Rhiner says the company could grow to $50 million or $60 million in three to five years.
“I think Dwayne has worked very hard to hand-pick his clients and go with the winners,” Rhiner says.
The late Harvey Honoré opened his construction company in 1957. When Dwayne Honoré graduated from college at 21, he became a 25% owner along with his three older brothers. But the brothers eventually decided to move their eggs out of that family basket and form their own companies, and Dwayne founded D. Honoré Construction in 1998.
“One of our BHAGs [that’s Big, Hairy Audacious Goal for those not versed in corporate-speak] is to be the best place to work,” Honoré says. He tries to cultivate a corporate culture that values a work-life balance, hence the emphasis on leaving work at a decent hour.
But the other side of that coin is making sure the hours spent at work are as productive as possible. D. Honoré holds a daily huddle every day at 7:45 a.m., where everyone in the company states their top three goals for the day and reports whether they accomplished the previous day’s top three. The process usually takes less than three minutes.
“That helps us stay focused. It helps us communicate with each other, so everybody knows what’s going on in each other’s world,” Honoré says. “There’s a little peer pressure there. I don’t want to come tomorrow and say that I did not do what I intended to do, because that may affect not only what I’ve done, but also the performance of others.”
As an extra incentive, the company maintains the “Honoré Honors” rewards program. Every position in the company has an associated list of tasks, and each task is worth a certain number of points. Each employee fills out a report [the program is based on the honor system] on the number of tasks completed, and the points are converted to dollars employees can access with their assigned company debit cards.
“It promotes productivity, staying focused on important tasks, and it’s also a creative way of keeping things light and lively,” he says.
Obviously, D. Honoré is affected by the slowdown in commercial building. The public sector is Honoré’s “bread and butter,” and he says there are still public projects on which to bid. But the dearth of private projects means more competition for the public projects, which drives down prices.
“Like most people, 2009 will be a slow year for us,” he says. “We’re hopeful we’ll see a turn in 2010, hopefully the early part of 2010. Hopefully we won’t get caught in the bottom.”
In five years, Honoré figures he might be employing 35 to 40 people. The $6.7 million parking garage D. Honoré is building for North Oaks Medical Center in Hammond is a milestone for the company. They recently bid on a $15 million project, and Honoré expects to be doing $15 to $20 million projects within a few years.
“This company sets itself in a different position than the typical construction company, even the typical company,” says Kurt Miller, a project manager who started in January. “There’s a really outstanding balance of professionalism and the personal end of things, whereas a lot of companies have one, but they can’t achieve the other.”
The company has a very defined picture of where it’s going, which makes it easy to set personal targets, Miller says. He says he appreciates the company’s accountability system and the value placed on personal time.
“I’m the new guy in town, so every day I’m learning something else,” he says. “But in a nutshell, I’m loving life right now.”
Company of the Year [less than 100 employees]: D. Honoré Construction
Year founded: 1998
Employees: 27
Accomplishments: Completed projects totaling more than $150 million. Some projects involving the company include Bally’s Total Fitness in Perkins Rowe, Lamar-Dixon Expo Center and the administrative office and other projects for BREC. Ranked No. 1,642 on Inc. magazine’s list of the nation’s 5,000 fastest-growing companies.
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