Last month, the Boulter team gathered for the second annual “State of Boulter” discussion. The term discussion here is important, because unlike the “State of the Union,” this isn’t an address from me to the company. This important event is a forum to facilitate discussion about how we as a company are doing, ensuring the whole team feels engaged and active in our future. Before the event, we conducted a survey to ask what everyone wanted to address and then we talked about what worked this past year, what we are doing differently in 2017, areas for improvement, and our company goals for 2017 and beyond. Here are some highlights of what we discussed:
What worked in 2016
This was our fifth consecutive year of increased profitability. The team logged a total of 101,114 hours in 2016 and sent 2,065 invoices. We also spent about $1 million on new equipment to ensure we continue to provide the best service and save you money on your projects. We were certainly a busy group, and we’re thankful to our customers for being such great partners. Our projects ranged from steel fabrication to custom rigging, to production line installations and more. We’re looking forward to taking our learnings from 2016 and fine-tuning our operations to make 2017 our best year yet.
Goals for 2017 and beyond
While the last few years have been tremendous for profitability and growth, there are a 
few different areas that we’d like to improve upon. We’d like to prioritize better communication between our employees, and invest more in ourselves to become the best industrial contracting partners for current and future customers. Communication is a challenge in our business, because many of our employees are out in the field and not reporting directly to our office every day. We’re developing a great system that will improve lines of communication for all employees, and help our leadership team manage more effectively.
In addition to improving communication, we’re also investing in our team by implementing a company-wide bonus program and focusing more on professional development. We recognize that our employees are out there doing a great deal of the heavy lifting for our customers, and we want to reward all of their hard work. Coupled with the bonus program will also be a more robust professional development initiative with more training opportunities and an organizational chart that better reflects our management structure.
It was important to us to get the team together to discuss progress, challenges and goals so that we could better serve you, our customers. We’ve been in this business for 125 years, and it’s our customers that inspire us to adapt, grow and evolve; and our employees who help make it happen. Interested in learning more about our recent work? Check out our project gallery. We’re looking forward to continuing to serve you in 2017.
—William Boulter, CEO & President