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title: [GCPay Buzz] You Can't Recruit Your Way Out of a Retention Problem
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In the tightest labor market in years, payment reliability has become one of the strongest retention tools a GC has. \[GCPay\] ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­    ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏  ͏ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­ ­  

| View in browser We're excited to share valuable industry insights each month to help your business grow. After reading, share this article with a colleague for a chance to win a $100 Amazon gift card in the drawing below! Congratulations to Monica Young of Thomas Construction Group our September winner! You Can't Recruit Your Way Out of a Retention Problem The industry's workforce gap is well documented. What gets less attention is the role that payment practices play in making it worse. According to Associated Builders and Contractors, the construction industry needs to attract 349,000 net new workers in 2026 just to maintain equilibrium between labor supply and project demand. That figure climbs to 456,000 in 2027. The AGC and NCCER's 2025 Workforce Survey found that 92% of construction firms report difficulty finding qualified workers to hire, and industry surveys consistently show 70-80% of firms struggling to fill hourly craft positions, particularly in specialty trades.   Most of the response to these numbers has focused on recruiting: trade school partnerships, apprenticeship programs, workforce development initiatives. Those efforts matter. But they address a pipeline problem while leaving a retention problem largely untouched.   The workforce shortage has a payment dimension. Subcontractors and their crews make decisions about which GCs and projects to commit to based on more than just wage rates. Reliability matters. A sub that consistently waits 60 or 90 days to get paid, or that regularly navigates disputed pay applications and missing documentation, will deprioritize that GC when their calendar fills up. The best subcontractors have choices, and payment experience is part of how they make them.   Smaller subs and specialty trades are most exposed. The workforce gap is most acute in specialty trades: electrical, mechanical, plumbing, and finishing work that cannot be easily substituted or accelerated. These are also the subcontractors most likely to be operating on tight cash flow, most sensitive to payment delays, and most likely to walk away from a GC relationship that creates consistent administrative friction. Losing a reliable specialty sub mid-project is not a staffing inconvenience. It is a schedule event.   Administrative burden is a retention risk too. It is not only slow payment that drives subs away. It is the process around it. Unclear pay application requirements, inconsistent documentation requests, and back-and-forth over lien waivers and compliance paperwork all add non-billable hours to subcontractor operations. For a small business running lean, that friction has a real cost. Reducing it is a relationship investment that pays returns in bid responsiveness and crew availability.   The pipeline problem is real, but it is long-term. Apprenticeship programs typically require five to seven years to produce fully skilled workers. The shortage on active projects today will not be solved by workforce development initiatives launched this quarter. The teams managing best right now are the ones that have built reputations as good partners to work for, and those reputations are built one pay cycle at a time.   In a labor market this tight, how you pay is part of how you compete. The GCs with the strongest subcontractor relationships didn't build them by accident.   None of this minimizes the genuine difficulty of the workforce challenge. The structural gap in the trades is a serious, industry-wide problem that will require sustained investment to address. But workforce strategy and payment strategy are not separate conversations.   For project managers, accounting teams, and finance leaders, the practical takeaway is this: the speed and predictability of your payment process is a factor in whether your best subcontractors keep showing up. If the workforce shortage is already creating pressure on your projects, that is one lever worth pulling.   Enter Gift Card Drawing Visit Client Central for valuable resources & leave a G2 review to earn $25! GCPay, An Autodesk Company, One Market, Ste. 400, San Francisco, California, 94105   You received this email because you are subscribed to GCPay communications. If you no longer wish to receive these emails manage preferences or unsubscribe. If you would like to unsubscribe from all Autodesk communications, please visit your Autodesk account or update your Autodesk communication preferences here. |
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