Why do business support organisations find it so difficult to engage small firms in the construction industry? Our large scale survey suggested that there are two intractable reasons which result in a very difficult choice.

First, it is very hard to make direct contact at a distance with the owner/managers of small firms regardless of which mechanism – phone, letter, e-mail or website – you use to address them. In part, this difficulty arises from the nature of small firms and how they operate.

And second, even when contact is made with them, they often don’t listen to the messages business support organisations are trying to deliver. They aren't open to such messages because many of them are pre-disposed to ignore what outside advisers have on offer. CAR and Eclipse’s work looked at both why it is difficult to contact small firms and why they are pre-disposed to disregard outside advice.

Engaging with small-medium firms in the construction industry is clearly fraught with difficulties. Relatively few firms seek outside advice. When they do, it is often from those closest at hand, from colleagues, friends and family. The type of advice they typically value most is general advice about how to manage the finances of a business successfully – for instance, managing cash flow, chasing invoices, dealing with VAT. Such advice is sourced locally and non-construction specific. In order to engage with these more open firms, it is often necessary to operate locally and through general business advice mechanisms, rather than construction-specific ones.

Any strategy that business support agencies develop to engage with small-medium firms in the construction industry needs to confront these difficulties head on. We recommended maturing a partnership-based approach, working with and through local sources of general business advice. Our survey suggested accountants are seen by small-medium firms as the most valuable local source of advice. Other local service providers and agencies could also be brought into the partnership.