STrOp · Learn
Practical knowledge for specialty contractors
Compliance, change management, project controls, and the data discipline that compounds across bids. Written for California specialty subs — owners, PMs, estimators, and the field.
12 of 47 articles for Owner. Clear
All 78 topics
A new shop in STrOp — sign up and set up in one sitting
Create your organization in the two-step wizard, take the thirty-second tour, and let the getting-started checklist tick itself off as your real data lands.
California lien deadlines — preliminary notice, stop notice, mechanic's lien
The three deadlines that protect your right to get paid on a private California project. Miss one, lose the remedy.
CSLB license renewal — windows, fees, and the gotchas
When the 60-day renewal window opens, what an "active" vs "inactive" renewal means, and what STrOp warns you about.
DIR registration & renewal — California public works
Who needs to register, when annual renewal opens, and what STrOp checks before you bid a prevailing-wage job.
How estimate pricing is calculated
Every estimate line runs the same four-step recipe — pad the quantity, extend by unit cost (tax on material only), add overhead then profit margin, round. Profit is a margin; overhead is a markup or a margin, set per estimate.
Import a DIR wage determination (and keep it current)
Load a California prevailing-wage determination — including its scheduled July-1-style increase — so your projects validate pay against the right floor, and refresh it when DIR reissues.
T&M tag — why the owner signature is everything
What a T&M tag is, what makes it legally enforceable, and what STrOp does when the signature is missing.
The negotiated job — when the GC calls and there's no bid
How work enters the pipeline when a GC hands you the next job outright — log it, put it in Qualify, and run the same board with a different way in.
The STrOp glossary — what we call things, and why
Construction has never agreed on its words — the same term means three different things depending on who's talking. Here's the one name STrOp uses for each thing, and the words we deliberately split.
Where the job stands — read the budget and the business report
Read the job's Budget tab (baseline from the estimate, current adds executed change orders, committed from POs, actuals from approved hours and receipts, by cost code) and the daily, weekly, and monthly business report.
Who sees what — invite your team and set roles
Invite people by email with a role, read the capability matrix as the rule of your org, and see what a foreman's phone and a finance seat actually show.
Why the record is a database, not a folder of spreadsheets
Spreadsheets are where a sharp operator thinks. They're a bad place to keep the shop's record. What a relational database does that a folder of .xlsx files can't — one fact in one place, links that can't be mistyped, locks that hold for everyone, a history of who changed what — and why every list in STrOp still exports to CSV.
See STrOp in action
Single-pipeline operations for California specialty contractors — bid through warranty.
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