GilbertLanham is opening applications for Rising Trade Partners, a year-long program for small and emerging trade firms that want to compete for larger work. Each firm is paired with GilbertLanham people who estimate, schedule, manage and keep sites safe every day, and who will share how a general contractor actually buys and runs a project.
Skill is rarely the problem
We meet excellent crews all the time. The firms behind them are often led by people who learned the trade first and the business second. They price a scope correctly and still lose the bid because the qualifications were unclear. They win a job and then struggle to get paid because the pay application did not match the schedule of values. Some never bid with us at all, because the process looks like a closed door.
That is a loss for everyone. Owners get fewer competitive numbers. Projects hire less locally. Good firms stay small for reasons that have nothing to do with the quality of their work. We would rather fix that than complain about trade capacity.
A year built around a real project lifecycle
The program follows a job from invitation to final payment, taught by the people who run each step at GilbertLanham.
- Bidding with confidence. Reading the bid package, building a takeoff, pricing risk and writing qualifications an estimator can actually compare.
- Schedules that protect your crew. How a look-ahead schedule works, how to flag a constraint early and how to read the critical path so you know when your work is driving the job.
- Getting paid. Schedules of values, pay applications, change order pricing and the documentation that keeps cash moving.
- Safety on a large site. Site-specific safety plans, pre-task planning and the habits that hold up when dozens of trades share one floor.
- Growing the business. Cash flow, insurance, bonding readiness and the steps to prequalify for bigger scopes.
Each firm also works one on one with a GilbertLanham mentor through the year, and where it fits, joins site walks and coordination meetings on active projects to see the process from the inside.
Your crew already knows how to build. We want to show you how the job is planned, measured and paid, so the firm can grow as fast as the people in it.
Trade partner development lead, GilbertLanham
Who should apply
The program is open to small, emerging and disadvantaged business enterprises in the trades we buy most, including sitework, concrete, steel, MEP, envelope and finishes. Completing the program does not guarantee a contract. It does prepare your firm to prequalify and bid GilbertLanham work on equal terms. To be considered for the next cohort, email partnership@gilbertlanham.com with a short note about your firm.
