Concrete Finisher Job Description: Duties, Template & Pay (2026)
A concrete finisher has a few hours between the pour and the set to produce a surface that will be looked at for thirty years, and no way to start again. This page has a concrete finisher job description template you can copy, what the work pays, and the two things a posting has to say about a trade whose day is decided by the weather and the truck.
What a concrete finisher does
The trade is short bursts of unforgiving, time-critical work around long stretches of preparation. A posting that describes only the finishing misrepresents most of the week.
Before the pour. Setting and stripping forms, checking grade and elevation, placing screed rails, checking that the rebar or mesh is right, prepping the subgrade, and coordinating the truck schedule so concrete arrives at the rate the crew can place it.
The pour. Placing and spreading, screeding to grade, bull-floating, and consolidating — fast, because the clock started when the drum turned.
The finish. Waiting for the bleed water, then edging, jointing, floating and troweling by hand or power trowel to the specified finish: broom, hard trowel, exposed aggregate, stamped or polished. Reading when the slab is ready is the skill, and it cannot be taught from a book.
After. Curing, sealing, sawcutting control joints on time, stripping forms, patching and repairing, and cleaning tools before the concrete wins.
The finisher also owns the decisions nobody else can make: whether to place in this weather, whether the mix is right, whether to wait another twenty minutes before troweling. Those judgements are the job.
Concrete finisher job description template
Copy this into your ATS or job board, replace the bracketed fields, and delete what does not apply. It is written for a commercial and residential flatwork crew; the customization section covers decorative, structural, highway and precast work.
Job title
Concrete Finisher [/ Cement Mason / Flatwork Finisher] — [Company], [City, ST] — [$00.00–$00.00/hr]
Summary
[Company name] is hiring concrete finishers for [commercial / residential] [flatwork / foundations] out of [city]. You will work on a crew of [0] placing and finishing [0,000–00,000] sq ft a week — [slabs, footings, sidewalks, driveways and curb]. Start is [5:30–6:30am]; days run [8–12] hours and finish when the slab does. Pay is [$00.00–$00.00] an hour depending on experience, [with overtime after [40] hours]. [No experience? We hire finishers' helpers at [$00.00] and train you on a crew.]
Responsibilities
- Set, brace and strip forms; check grade, elevation and dimensions against the drawings
- Verify reinforcement placement, chairs and vapour barrier before the pour
- Place, spread, screed and consolidate concrete at the rate the trucks arrive
- Bull-float, edge, joint, float and trowel to the specified finish [broom / hard trowel / exposed aggregate]
- Judge set time and bleed water to start finishing at the right moment
- Sawcut control joints on schedule; apply curing compound and [sealer]
- Operate power trowels, screeds, saws, mixers and [ride-on equipment]
- Patch, grind and repair defects; protect fresh work from weather and traffic
- Clean tools, forms and equipment at the end of every pour
Requirements
- [0]+ years finishing [or willingness to start as a helper and learn]
- Able to lift [50–80] lbs, kneel, bend and work on your feet for long shifts
- Able to start at [6:00am] and stay until the pour is finished
- Able to work outdoors in heat, cold and wet — pours happen on schedule
- Valid driver's licence [and reliable transport to sites across [territory]]
Preferred
- [Decorative, stamped or polished concrete experience]
- [ACI Concrete Flatwork Finisher certification — or we will pay for it]
- [Power trowel and ride-on screed experience]
- [OSHA 10], [forklift or skid steer]
- [Spanish and English]
Pay and benefits
- [$00.00–$00.00] an hour based on experience, paid [weekly]
- Overtime after [40] hours; [00]+ hours a week available [March–November]
- [Health, dental and vision after [00] days], [401(k) with match], [PTO and paid holidays]
- [We supply trowels, floats, boots, knee pads and PPE]
- [We pay for ACI certification and add [$0.00] an hour when you pass]
- [Winter work — [interior slabs / repair / shop] keeps the crew going through [month]]
How to apply
[Apply here / text CONCRETE to 00000 / call [name] at [number]]. We reply within [24] hours and can put you on a crew this week.
Requirements: what is required, what is preferred, and what costs you applicants
Concrete finishing pays about $4.75 an hour above general construction labour and the work is harder on the body than almost anything else on a site. Postings that lead with the rate and say nothing about the knees, the hours or the winter are the ones that churn.
| Requirement | What to know |
|---|---|
| Experience | Real for finishing, because reading a slab cannot be trained quickly. But helper roles need none at all, and saying you hire and train helpers opens a pool many times larger than the finisher pool. |
| The hours | Say the start time and say that the day ends when the slab is finished. This trade cannot leave at five, and pretending otherwise produces a hire who quits in week two. |
| Weather | Pours run in heat and in cold and get cancelled in rain, sometimes at 5am. Be honest about both the conditions and the cancellations, because unpredictable lost days are a genuine income problem for the candidate. |
| Physical demands | Kneeling, bending, lifting 50 to 80 lbs, hands in wet concrete. This is one of the hardest-wearing trades in construction and understating it is not kindness. |
| Tools and PPE | Say what you supply. Trowels, floats, boots, knee pads and gloves are a real expense; a company that provides them should say so prominently. |
| Certification | ACI Concrete Flatwork Finisher certification is genuine and inexpensive relative to a vacancy. Offering to pay for it with a stated raise on passing converts helpers and general labourers. |
| Decorative work | Stamped, stained and polished work is a distinct and better-paid skill. If the role includes it, say so and pay for it; if it does not, do not imply it. |
| Winter | The single most valuable thing a concrete employer can say. If you have interior, repair or shop work that keeps the crew paid through winter, lead with it — it is worth more than a dollar an hour to somebody with a family. |
Concrete finisher duties, written for a posting
Give the volume and the type. Square footage a week, slabs or curb or foundations, commercial or residential, and the finish spec you work to. A finisher reads that and knows the pace.
Say the crew structure and the equipment. Crew size, who screeds, whether there is a ride-on trowel or a laser screed, and whether the crew also sets forms. Equipment decides how hard the day is.
Name the start time and the end condition explicitly. “6am start, we finish the slab before we leave” is honest and self-selecting, and it beats “must be flexible” every time.
Keep the responsibilities to eight or nine lines, and include the judgement calls — reading set time, calling the weather, checking grade before the pour. It signals that you are hiring a tradesman rather than a pair of hands.
How to customize it by type of work
Commercial flatwork
The template above. Large pours, flatness and levelness specs (F-numbers), laser screeds and ride-on trowels, schedule pressure. Say the spec and the equipment.
Residential
Driveways, patios, basements, garage slabs. Smaller crews, more variety, more customer contact and usually more hand finishing. Say whether the finisher deals with homeowners, because it changes the person you want.
Decorative and polished
Stamping, staining, overlays, exposed aggregate and polishing. A craft skill with a real pay premium and a much smaller pool. Describe the finishes you actually produce and pay accordingly.
Structural and form work
Walls, columns, footings and elevated decks; more forming, more rebar coordination, less finishing. Closer to the construction laborer and carpenter side of the trade. Say the form system you use.
Highway and DOT
Night work, lane closures, DOT specifications and inspection, paving trains and curb machines. State the shift pattern, the travel and the certifications — night work is either the attraction or the disqualifier.
Precast and shop
Indoors, year-round, predictable hours, no weather. For an experienced finisher whose knees are done, that is a genuine offer and it is almost never made explicitly.
What it costs to reach concrete finishers on social
Skilled trades are among the more expensive audiences we buy: in our 2026 Social Job Advertising Benchmark the skilled trades role family — 35 campaigns — ran a median cost per applicant of $14.14, a middle half of $7.58 to $21.49, a blended figure of $10.74 and a 15% apply rate. The wider Skilled Trades and Field Service sector, 335 campaigns, ran an $11.89 median at 18%.
The reason is structural: the people who can do the work are employed, and there are not many of them in any one area. Across all 891 campaigns the apply rate moves cost per applicant from $53.77 under 10% to $4.41 over 20%, a bigger swing than any bid change — and past three impressions a month the median cost roughly doubles in a small audience. Specificity in the offer beats budget. For a seasonal trade, start the campaign six to eight weeks before the season opens — everyone in the market hires in the same fortnight in spring and it is the most expensive fortnight of the year.
Building out the site crew? See the construction laborer, carpenter, equipment operator and ironworker job descriptions, plus the construction labor shortage.
Writing the ad version
The description is the document. The advertisement is read on a phone by somebody who has other options at a similar rate. It needs the rate, the start time and that the day ends with the slab, what you supply, and what winter looks like — in the first three lines. Our campaign data puts the best-converting length at 201–400 words, and for a role like this the shorter end works.
Three or four questions on the form, then call the same day. Every extra field costs completions, and the finisher you want has applied somewhere else this morning.
What concrete finishers earn
Cement masons and concrete finishers had a median of $27.41 an hour, $57,020 a year in 2025, across about 206,700 people with roughly 14,300 openings a year and 1–2% projected growth — slower than average.
| Comparison role | Median pay (2025) | Openings per year |
|---|---|---|
| Structural iron and steel workers | $30.18/hr · $62,780 | ~5,500 |
| Carpenters | $29.12/hr · $60,580 | ~74,100 |
| Drywall and ceiling tile installers | $28.33/hr · $58,930 | ~7,700 |
| Cement masons and concrete finishers | $27.41/hr · $57,020 | ~14,300 |
| Highway maintenance workers | $24.16/hr · $50,260 | ~12,300 |
| Construction laborers | $22.66/hr · $47,120 | ~205,700 |
Concrete sits mid-table among the trades and about $4.75 an hour above general construction labour. It is not the highest-paid trade on a site, and a posting that competes on rate alone against carpentry or ironwork will lose.
What it has instead is the shortest route in. A labourer who shows up, learns to screed and then learns to read a slab is a finisher inside two seasons, and the raise is real and immediate. Against 205,700 labourer openings a year, the employers who publish “we hire helpers and train finishers,” with the rate at each step, are recruiting from a pool fifteen times the size of the finisher pool and paying benchmark-cheap prices to reach it.
Frequently asked questions
What does a concrete finisher do?
A concrete finisher sets and strips forms and checks grade before the pour, then places, spreads, screeds and consolidates the concrete as it arrives, bull-floats it, waits for the bleed water and finishes the surface by edging, jointing, floating and troweling to the specified finish. Afterwards they sawcut control joints on time, apply curing compound, and patch and repair defects. Judging when the slab is ready to finish is the core skill.
How much do concrete finishers make?
Cement masons and concrete finishers had a median of $27.41 an hour, or $57,020 a year, in 2025 — about $4.75 an hour above construction labourers at $22.66, and somewhat below carpenters and ironworkers. Decorative and polished concrete work generally carries a premium above the median, and helper rates sit below it.
Do you need experience to be a concrete finisher?
To finish, yes — reading set time and bleed water is a judgement that takes seasons to build. To start, no. Finishers' helper roles need no experience at all, and stating that you hire and train helpers opens a pool many times larger than the finisher pool. The ACI Concrete Flatwork Finisher certification is inexpensive and works far better as something you pay for than as a requirement.
What should a concrete finisher job description include?
The type of work — flatwork, decorative, structural or highway — the volume and the finish spec, crew size and equipment including whether there is a laser screed or ride-on trowel, the exact start time and the fact that the day ends when the slab does, the hourly rate, the physical demands, the tools and PPE you supply, whether you pay for ACI certification, and what winter hours look like.
Is concrete finishing hard on the body?
It is among the hardest-wearing trades in construction: kneeling and bending for hours, repeated lifting of 50 to 80 lbs, hands in wet concrete, and long days that cannot end until the slab is finished. Postings that describe this honestly lose applications they were going to lose on day one anyway, and keep the people who can actually do the work.
What is the difference between a cement mason and a concrete finisher?
In federal data they are one occupation, and in practice the titles are used interchangeably. Where a distinction is drawn, cement mason tends to imply the wider trade including forming and structural work, while concrete finisher emphasises the surface work on flatwork. What matters far more in a posting is naming whether the job is flatwork, decorative, structural or highway.
Why is it hard to hire concrete finishers?
Because the occupation is growing slowly, the work is physically punishing, the days are long and unpredictable, and many employers go quiet through winter. Most postings address none of that. The ones that fill say the start time and the end condition plainly, state what tools they supply, offer to train helpers into the trade, and say what work keeps the crew paid in winter.
When should a concrete contractor start hiring for the season?
Six to eight weeks before the season opens. Concrete demand concentrates from spring through late autumn, which means every contractor in a market competes for the same crews in the same few weeks. Recruiting in March for April is meaningfully cheaper than recruiting in April, because the whole market bids at once once the pours start.
Other job description templates
Hiring concrete crews?
Everyone in your market hires in the same two weeks of spring. Running the campaign in March is the entire advantage.
Wage, employment, projection and task descriptions for cement masons and concrete finishers (SOC 47-2051) and the comparison occupations: O*NET OnLine and the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics Occupational Outlook Handbook, May 2025 wage data and BLS employment projections. Cost-per-applicant and apply-rate figures: Boostpoint 2026 Social Job Advertising Benchmark, 891 campaigns and 1,334 campaign-months.