Building relationships

Even though he’d already had more than
35 years with the company, nothing had
prepared Vince Corrado for what happened at Shook National Corp. in 2004.
Corrado was named Shook’s CEO in 2003
just as things turned ugly in the industry.
With a perfect storm of events mixing
together — including subcontractor failures, underperforming jobs and unforeseen litigation — the company and its
new leader suddenly found themselves in
a scary patch.

But Shook, who believes in strong relationships with his people and his community, had the tools to dig the regional professional construction solutions company
out from under the muck.

He took a step backward. Refocusing on
jobs with trusted owners, the company had
the experience to better gauge expected
cost and financial stability. Being more
careful with the type of customer the company would work with led to smaller, more
productive jobs.

At the same time, he turned up the internal pressure on accountability, opening up
communication lines to get more feedback
from front-line employees to figure out
what things could be improved upon to get
things running the Shook way. As he developed those relationships with more and
more employees, he created a program
dubbed “Beyond the Bottom Line” that
focused employees on their duties, not just
to the company but also to the community
it serves. This new focus both internally
and externally led to the kind of relationships that eventually meant more jobs,
more accountability and a better balance
sheet.

HOW TO REACH: Shook National Corp., (937) 276-6666 or
www.shookconstruction.com