Escaping the Messy Middle in the Trades

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Unknown
Oh, hey. Oh!

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Unknown
Oh!

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Speaker 2
Welcome everybody to Blue Collar start up, the podcast where hard work meets big ideas. This is your home for real talk, real stories and real strategies from the front lines of life and the business of the trades. I’m one of your host, David Foster of Dago Cleaning Systems here in Albany, New York.

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Speaker 2
Today. Are you doing the other host?

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Speaker 1
You got energy. You know, we always do this in the other way. That’s all right. And normally, I’m the other host, Mike Nelson from $5 media. Thanks for kicking us off the.

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Speaker 2
You got it, man.

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Speaker 1
What’s going on over there at Albany, New York?

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Speaker 3
Well, we were.

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Speaker 2
Chatting a little bit before, you know, we got rolling here about some of the things that, you know, we’re, we’re doing here and, and some of the, I guess, challenges of, you know, helping some of our individuals and leadership, within our company get outside of their comfort zone and grow and, and not be afraid to try something new and, and make decisions.

00;01;13;20 – 00;01;26;04
Speaker 2
So, you know, we’ve had a couple instances of that with, with things being so busy this summer and, you know, it’s it’s been it’s been a lot of fun. Yeah. People grow. Yeah.

00;01;26;06 – 00;01;38;23
Speaker 1
Yeah, it’s I’m looking forward to our guests. Brent Garrett I’m looking forward to maybe getting some insight from him on on how we can work to solve that problem is one of the many things I’m sure we’re going to get from him. Brent Garrett, welcome to the show, man.

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Speaker 3
Hey, thanks for having me, guys. Looking forward to, yeah.

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Speaker 1
Brent, you’ve got a great story that I. We can’t wait to tell. If you don’t mind, so that we don’t do a poor job of doing it, would you mind, just introducing yourself to the audience? We are. And kind of a little bit about your background and what you’re doing these days.

00;01;57;11 – 00;02;36;19
Speaker 3
Yeah. Brent Garrett, I’m in Dallas, Texas. We service about a ten mile radius of, kind of the North Dallas area. If you heard of Plano. Some haven’t, but I’ve been in the business for about well over 30 years. I started, I like to say, on the end of a show at 12, my dad was a plumbing contractor, and, you know, he put he was, high school educated Korean War vet that came back from the war and, you know, started working in a hammer factory and then helped a guy in some plumbing and never got out of it.

00;02;36;19 – 00;03;01;24
Speaker 3
And, but for kids to college doing that, and, he wasn’t real thrilled that I wanted to get into skilled trades business. We talk more about that if you want to, but I’m licensed, both as a master plumber in the state of Texas. They call it a responsible master plumber here. And then in, residential HVAC, we’re about 95% residential.

00;03;01;24 – 00;03;42;05
Speaker 3
We do some light commercial, we’ve got about 30 employees. We run 17 trucks, and, we do about 5 million. I am now a, owner that owns a business, doesn’t own a job, and, usually end up talking more about how to scale your business and where the pitfalls are and where the stages are. And going from a solopreneur where you do truly on a job, not a business, but it’s it’s still a great, exciting time, in your business all the way to where you can own a business, you coach the coaches and you’re building a legacy.

00;03;42;06 – 00;03;43;25
Speaker 3
I love it.

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Speaker 1
I, I can’t wait to dig into this brand. But we I, we need to kind of bring it in. And you mentioned and New York offered. So I’d love to talk a little bit more about it, the fact that when you were young and wanted to go into the trades, your dad was trying to coach you against it, it sounds like, and, you know, fast forward to today’s day and age where, you know, people is trying to figure out the trades is the place to be.

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Speaker 1
Can you maybe give a little insight as to why your dad was trying to keep you from going into the trades?

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Speaker 3
Yeah, I, I, I saw my dad cry twice. And one of those was when I told him my last semester in college, I told you I got an accounting degree, that I wanted to start my own plumbing air cashing business, and that brought him to tears. He dried up pretty quick. He was drill sergeant, and, it quickly turned to anger, but, I don’t think he saw he was looking through a set of lenses.

00;04;43;11 – 00;05;11;22
Speaker 3
My dad was always somebody who, was in that category, and we talk more about it. Of 80% of the business owners that really own a job. And they never do get out of what I call the messy middle. And they’re just always kind of stuck in their growth. And, and I think he just saw a lifetime of that for me, because his view was, this is what the business is.

00;05;11;22 – 00;05;35;26
Speaker 3
Why would you want to do that? And, you know, he passed away, pretty young, 62, but he never got to see that. I sold my first business after five years. I had a different vision about what I wanted to start, and I guess maybe I was one of the first young guys that said, man, this is a great business.

00;05;35;29 – 00;06;07;18
Speaker 3
And I already knew this, the technical side of it. And so, and it’s just been a great ride for 30 years. I, we have a, we have a large amount of youth coming into young adults coming into this business, and it’s so exciting to see their energy. And we are leaning into it. And really what, what we really need from people who are in their 40s, 50s is we need to teach them to be really good coaches in our business.

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Speaker 3
And I’m finding that that is the new struggle for me is how do I take somebody who’s been in the field and help them become somebody who encourages teachers because they can’t they can’t do the work their whole life? I mean, it it the work itself, it is built for stronger backs. I’m just going to say that I’m 61 and, and so, you know, I think that’s something else is that we’ve got these young adults coming and they’re excited.

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Speaker 3
They have great visions for their careers. And we got to retool these, these, I’m reaching for the work. I don’t want to say older these these experienced technicians in the field to to change their mindset and shift and become mentors and teachers and coaches and, and there’s more money in that for them. And, so that’s you didn’t ask about that, but that’s, that’s kind of where the conversations leading in my mind about what’s new in our industry.

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Speaker 1
Yeah. Well, that’s it’s exactly what Derek and I were talking about before you jumped on the show, was that very problem of how do we, as leaders, help our team members elevate who they are and what they’re doing in the business, especially when it’s uncomfortable for them and they’re resistant to that change. And so, yeah, very, very on the on the chin here, as far as, what we were just problems that we are currently facing in our businesses.

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Speaker 1
So.

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Speaker 3
Sure, sure. I think I think one of the mindsets would be if I coach this one up, then I lose my job. And that’s, you know, Stephen Covey, you said it’s a scarcity mentality, right? It’s like there’s only so much here. And, man, this this market and this business is just the industry’s huge. Now I’m in the plumbing and air conditioning.

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Speaker 3
Lame. We, I certainly work with and coach electricians. It sounds like you guys come from a different background, but we talk about skilled trades. It’s not just plumbing, electrical and, and HVAC. I mean, it includes a lot of things out there. And there’s still trades gap right now. It’s just it’s documented.

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Speaker 1
It’s huge. I well, we I, I continually quote the, the stats that I pulled last year where we have roughly we’re losing roughly 2.2 million skilled trades workers every year. And for every five that leave, we’re only getting about to back into the, into the workforce. So it’s, it’s a huge problem for our country, but it also means there’s a great opportunity for these young, young people coming into the trades and considered because the demand is there, the money because of the demand is there, you know, like it in my mind.

00;09;05;18 – 00;09;12;14
Speaker 1
And I’m, I’m, I’m in marketing, you know, but in my mind, there’s no better place to be right now than in the trades, you know.

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Speaker 3
So yeah. Absolutely. And and by the way, Michael, our industry need, really good honest, committed, teaching marketing specialists to help business owners understand, you know, things of just a simple block and attack landing, branding, making sure internally you’re communicating your message and it’s consistent. What’s the client experience and how do you build your marketing around that?

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Speaker 3
You know, it’s it’s not just pay per click or SEO. It’s it’s a hundred different things working together. I know I’m preaching to the choir, but we need people like you that are lean in and understand our business.

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Speaker 1
Well, I do have the the fortunate,

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Speaker 1
Experience of having been in the trades previously and having a small business that I sold that was that was trade related. And, and now I’m, I’m a, I’m a grubby farmer. So, you know, that’s, you know, I’m back in, I’m back in. And somehow I always keep my hands dirty somehow. So, and and and thank you for sharing that, too, by the way, about with your dad.

00;10;23;23 – 00;10;43;17
Speaker 1
You know, I think and we’ve talked about it on the show quite a bit, Brent, where we discussed the fact that the the trades, the stigma of the trades, which I definitely think is turning. But, you know, previously, it’s certainly when I grew up, you know, the trades were kind of the what you did when you, when you failed in life.

00;10;43;18 – 00;11;00;04
Speaker 1
Right. Like it was like, oh, well, you got to go to college, you get a good job. And you know, if that doesn’t work out for you, you can always, you know, go, go swing a hammer. And where now you know it. I think one of our objectives is always to help young people understand that that’s really not the case.

00;11;00;04 – 00;11;19;03
Speaker 1
Like there there’s plenty of people that are going to college and, are still swinging hammers and being very successful. There’s also people that skip college entirely. They go to trade school or they do an apprenticeship, or they just go to work and get to learn while they earn. And, it’s not the trades is not a failure mode.

00;11;19;03 – 00;11;22;13
Speaker 1
Now. It’s a recipe for success for people.

00;11;22;16 – 00;11;56;23
Speaker 3
What I love about the yeah, what I love about these podcasts is, is that and I, you know, I do a fair amount of, maybe, you know, 4 or 5, six, a month and, it’s a format or you can kind of go wherever we want to. And so it’s not just the the trade side either, though, that the introduction of I has, created a challenge for those getting out of school, you know, graduate or undergraduate degree and entering the workforce.

00;11;56;25 – 00;12;21;07
Speaker 3
I have needs inside the office that that require those that skill set that they learn in school and they, they can spend two or 3 or 4 years with us, and they learn a lot about how to run a small business and, and how they can apply that. What I do see happening right now is I wouldn’t say it’s sexy.

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Speaker 3
I, I would just say it’s attractive. And people are looking around and going, yeah, I think I’d, I’d like to know more about that. But also with these young adults coming into the business, I think business owners have to make the shift to streamline their processes, and their goal needs to be, how can we onboard somebody in a safe but expedient way to where they’re adding value to the business as quickly as possible?

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Speaker 3
Because what I’m finding is they bring different ideas. They and I always say is 61. They keep me young. They really do. So I enjoy working with them. And, and and they’re, they bring a lot of energy and different perspective. They help me understand who our new customers are. And, you know, it’s it’s an exciting time to be in the business.

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Speaker 1
Yeah. So time to be alive in general, right?

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Speaker 3
Yeah. Exactly, exactly.

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Speaker 2
I got a I got to ask you, Brent. I took a look at your website. Brent Brent Barrett or Brent Garrett, Aecom. What did those early days look like for you at 24? Starting your your first business? What did what did the early days look like. And then into the messy middle. And then how did you get out of the messy middle to eventually sell that business?

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Speaker 3
Yeah. So, there are five stages of small business ownership. Let’s talk about the first three, and then you could follow up with me on the last two. There’s that day and I lived every bit of it. I mean, at 26, I had 5000 box and 50 page business plan. I had an astro van, guys, that you can go back that was around.

00;14;12;15 – 00;14;36;12
Speaker 3
That was around 1995. And it’s an exciting time to start your company. And there are things you need to do that we could talk about to stay in business through that cycle, but, man, it’s it’s, you know, you start, you start, put money in the bank and you start running calls, and you, you get a lot of, pride and interaction with your customers.

00;14;36;12 – 00;15;08;25
Speaker 3
And it’s it’s it’s young and it’s new that next phase, I call the taming phase. And that’s when you add your usually your first 1 or 2 technicians or people who. And when I say technician, it doesn’t have to be just plumbing, air conditioning. I’m talking about people who do the work or perform the service. And if you’re in retail and you’ve got a cake baking company, then it’s the people in the restaurant or back in the kitchen that are actually making the cakes.

00;15;09;02 – 00;15;31;26
Speaker 3
So but in this case, so you stay with the technician, then you have a steaming phase where you start getting introduced to some, things that might be out of your comfort zone, like payroll and gosh, I’ve got taxes and I have to make I have trusted funds. I have to make tax deposits and gas. I got to find an accountant.

00;15;31;28 – 00;15;36;01
Speaker 3
And it just goes on and on and on.

00;15;36;03 – 00;16;06;08
Speaker 3
The teaming phase in my business is somewhere between seven, 50, 700, 50,000 and 1,000,005. And while there’s a number that typically identifies the messy middle, there’s also a set of things I want to share with your listeners of, you know, you’re getting close to the messy middle at 750 in your teaming. You’re making, probably close to six figures, if not more.

00;16;06;10 – 00;16;26;15
Speaker 3
Okay, that 752 million and half. We’re starting to approach the messy middle and what happens is, oh my gosh, I gotta have a I need a bigger office. I need a phone system. My cell phone is not the only thing I. What’s a what’s a voice over IP systems. So what’s that mean? What’s what’s QuickBooks and what kind of computer.

00;16;26;15 – 00;16;47;25
Speaker 3
So I have and what’s my platform and, and all this stuff starts coming at you and the phone keeps ringing and, and you get to this million dollar level. And this messy middle to me looks like a whirlpool where you’re in a small little raft and you’re going around, and there is certainly something in the middle that could take you down and drown you.

00;16;47;28 – 00;17;13;02
Speaker 3
And so here’s what it looks like and feels like in the messy middle. You’re working twice as hard as you were when you were at 750, and you’re making maybe half the money and you don’t know where it’s going. You are stuck in your business. You have more things to do that have less to do with taking care of customers.

00;17;13;05 – 00;17;45;10
Speaker 3
And it’s coming at you really fast. Some might be in a situation where their family life or their relationships are beginning to be compromised. And if you’re not careful, you could go bankrupt. And it’s usually in the first five years. Here’s what is the strength of a small business owner, especially skilled trades. All I have to do is work a little harder.

00;17;45;10 – 00;18;08;10
Speaker 3
That’s my paradigm. If I can work through this, I’ll push through it and I’ll get to something better. I just got to double down. I just got to work a little harder. And that’s what the messy middle looks like. And that kind of mindset is not the answer to get to stage four and five. And there’s some really cool things that you can work through.

00;18;08;12 – 00;18;41;28
Speaker 3
But the mess messy middle can be bankrupt rep see, it can be, really, really stressed relationships. At home. And there’s a lot of despair. Because the one thing about being a small business owner is it’s it’s a small circle. It’s 3 to 5% of the population that are successful. Past five years. And, and so that’s what the messy middle looks like.

00;18;42;01 – 00;19;21;18
Speaker 3
One last thing before we move in most other two step, two stages in my industry, I’ll just give you some facts and figures. It’s $125 billion a year. Industry in plumbing, air conditioning, residential service. 80% of those contractors that are driving that revenue are between a dollar and a million, five, 80%, 20% of that group control 60 to 65% of that 125.

00;19;21;21 – 00;19;41;24
Speaker 3
And there are things that that 20% are doing that the 80% just don’t get through the messy metal and start doing. And I, I prepared to share them with you. But but that’s I’m glad you asked about it because it’s very real and it’s very scary and, and and many end up in bankruptcy.

00;19;41;26 – 00;19;51;27
Speaker 1
Well, we we got to hear what the how do we get stage four? That’s like that’s like a cliffhanger. That was well done. Now I’m, I’m sitting here on the edge of my seat. I’m like, well, what are we gotta do?

00;19;51;29 – 00;20;25;05
Speaker 3
So and this these are these are my clients. These are the folks I coach. And and so the first thing we do is say, I need you to breathe in and breathe out, and it’s going to be okay. Let’s go look at what the top five things are that those 20% are doing. Okay. And so before we talk about that next phase I’ll go ahead and I’ll keep the teaser going.

00;20;25;05 – 00;21;03;16
Speaker 3
But the next phase is moving toward being a coach okay. And so one of the five things that those that 20% does is a coach, you have to realize cannot play the game. They can’t play the game on the field. You’ve got to get off the field. And guys, I’ll share a personal story. There was a time when I knew I had to move to that coaching phase, and every time I had a problem, I’d run out the door and go fix the problem because it made me feel good and it gave me a lot of satisfaction.

00;21;03;16 – 00;21;22;24
Speaker 3
I was actually doing something. But what? That will take me down. The first thing you have to do is you have to think who is going to do the work, and it’s not you doing the work. You got to think, who not do you have to move toward being a coach? They go, well, how do I do that?

00;21;22;24 – 00;21;36;00
Speaker 3
Well, you know what you already shared with me. You’re doing about 10 or 15 things and you don’t have time. Let’s find the thing that you hate the most.

00;21;36;02 – 00;22;02;27
Speaker 3
That takes the most of your time. And here’s the key. What we’re going to do is we’re going to work on a client experience that’s consistent, that others can repeat. And we’re going to make sure that our sales process, a defined, repeatable sales process, is in in your client experience. And we talk more about that. But the first step to get out of that is think who not do it.

00;22;02;27 – 00;22;26;27
Speaker 3
Man. It’s so exciting when you start working with business owners and a light comes off me, go, man, I don’t have to do payroll anymore. You know, I don’t have to do marketing. I don’t I don’t have to do this or require, you know, I, I’m not on board and I have to deal with the computers, I mean, whatever that is it for you, but you got to delegate the leadership, okay?

00;22;26;29 – 00;22;49;12
Speaker 3
And you don’t delegate everything. You just start with the thing that you do. You don’t do very well and you don’t like. And that seems to bring the most satisfaction. Second thing you have to do is you have to get the flat rate. You have to understand your numbers, and you have to make a consistent gross margin. So that got to understand.

00;22;49;14 – 00;23;13;06
Speaker 3
Typically in service business got to be somewhere around 55, 60%. And you know, I’m not going to turn this into an accounting lesson. But that’s the second thing you have to do. You have to control your pricing to control your margins. And and really, you have to win at the gross margin level. You can control overheads. You can you can predict overheads.

00;23;13;08 – 00;23;33;02
Speaker 3
But if you aren’t at the right gross margin, you are dead before you start. Okay. Typically that 80% I’m talking about, they’re charging by our time material. Can’t believe they are. But you got to think flat rate and create the value for the job. Third thing is you got to have you got to have the stock and able to do it.

00;23;33;02 – 00;24;01;03
Speaker 3
Make a one stop service if you know what you need. It’s got to be on your truck. You have to be able to deliver at the point of sale, because you’re not making any money. It’s at parts house. You you’re busy, but you’re not productive. Time box. I want to talk about something called Parkinson’s law. Michael, can you be a pig for me for a minute?

00;24;01;03 – 00;24;26;20
Speaker 3
You’re my technician. Yeah. And, you got you got two kids, and, man, you’re a great technician. You do great work. But you’re working to provide for your family. If I have two calls and the average call takes two hours and two hours to run, and I only have two calls for you. And. And you are allotted eight hours in the day.

00;24;26;26 – 00;24;32;26
Speaker 3
How long did it take you to do this? Two calls, four hours.

00;24;32;29 – 00;24;41;00
Speaker 3
I found. Parkinson’s law says that time gets filled by the space allotted.

00;24;41;02 – 00;24;45;03
Speaker 1
So it’s going to take me eight hours to do those. Exactly. Yeah. Right.

00;24;45;05 – 00;25;07;08
Speaker 3
Okay. And that in the messy metal starts as well. And so we call that time boxing. Let me give a example what that looks like. Man I just on the other side of that wall are 30 really hard working pit folks. Okay. And I had a problem and I was coaching and we had we had installations drifting off into six, seven, 8:00 at night.

00;25;07;10 – 00;25;22;25
Speaker 3
Well, it goes against our culture. We’re not going to be camping out at your house. So we had a little training classes and guys, by 10:00, this is what we need to do. This is where we need to be in this in this project by 12 you need to be going to lunch, taking a break because it’s hot here.

00;25;22;27 – 00;25;31;24
Speaker 3
This is where we need to be in that stage at 2:00 we’re here and by five we’re picking up and we’re done.

00;25;31;26 – 00;25;54;09
Speaker 3
We just time box the job. So I want an update at ten, 12, two and at two. If you think you’re going to go past five, I want to call. And I want to understand why and what we need to fix for tomorrow’s job. Make sure that never happens again okay. And so that’s real obvious things. So time boxing is really important.

00;25;54;12 – 00;26;21;02
Speaker 3
Understanding Parkinson’s law I’m not going to go deep into it. You Google it. It’s it’s a fascinating thing. It’s you would say if you worked in a corporation, you see it personified. Unbelievable. Right. Because yeah. How does this company make any money? I mean, all there does sitting around kind of have meetings, right? Well, that happens in a skilled trades business too.

00;26;21;06 – 00;26;47;29
Speaker 3
Number four, performance driven compensation. Now I didn’t say offering something to the customer that they don’t need, but real simply if you read my book 30 days to a Better Business, I talk a lot about that client experience in the sales process. People hate to be sold. They love to buy. So our process and client experience is is an option sheet I didn’t come up with.

00;26;47;29 – 00;27;11;03
Speaker 3
It’s Harvard business study called good better best we call it must should could we know that 60% of the time customers going to pick the better option, 20% of the customer is going to pick the must or the or the the the good option. Right. Your job is to remain the expert, the skilled trades expert. Ask good questions.

00;27;11;05 – 00;27;42;03
Speaker 3
Help the customer decide on what keeps their home healthy, safe and clean. So got to provide options because it eliminates competition. We can come back to that if you want to. Third thing marketing. You love this Michael. You need to be spending. If you own your own business, you’re in the messy middle. You have to commit understanding. You budget for at least 8 to 12% of your total revenue, not for what you had in revenue last year, but what you budget for.

00;27;42;03 – 00;28;00;28
Speaker 3
And sometimes they go, what’s the budget? We talk about that. But what you budget for next year and you put a budget together and you go to somebody like you and say, look, this is what I want to spend. I want to get this much, this percentage in this, this percentage in that help me understand what my strategy needs to be.

00;28;01;00 – 00;28;33;17
Speaker 3
I need a certain amount spent for top of mind awareness I have. I need some things that are transactional. I need SEO that drives the high profit big sale leads that I need. And those are the five things that that 20% is doing. That 80% isn’t. When you do that, you create space. You start coaching your team, then you coach the coaches, and after you coach the coaches, you own a business, not a job.

00;28;33;19 – 00;29;00;12
Speaker 3
You sustain that for a period of time. Now what do we do with a successful business? It’s like investing. We diversify our income and we spread out our risk and we start building a legacy. And so going back to your question about what would I say to somebody who’s starting out as a solopreneur? Ask me, I’m sorry, and answer my question and tell me where you want to be.

00;29;00;14 – 00;29;23;01
Speaker 3
Well, I want to make a shirt. That’s not what I’m asking. You. Don’t start this business. If you don’t have an end goal of building equity in your business and having something you can sell and something that doesn’t require you every day, because then you’ll change your life. You’ll change your kids lives and your change your kids kids lives.

00;29;23;01 – 00;29;28;01
Speaker 3
And that’s a legacy. That’s the fifth phase.

00;29;28;03 – 00;29;29;23
Speaker 1
Legacy is the fifth. The fifth thing.

00;29;29;23 – 00;29;55;14
Speaker 3
Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. I work with a community of skilled trade business owners that have a burning desire to scale and grow their business without compromising their values. I mean, it’s a serious thing that entrepreneurs, they have a mistress and it’s called their business. And if they’re not careful, they’ll lose everything trying to get to their goal. You don’t have to sacrifice everything.

00;29;55;17 – 00;30;17;18
Speaker 3
I will just tell you people in the messy middle, what I end up usually saying to them is the problem’s not the problem. The problem is the way we are looking at the problem. I don’t say the problem. It’s you. You’re looking at the problem because I’m coaching. We have to look at this differently, because if we always do what we always do, we’re always going to be what we always been.

00;30;17;20 – 00;30;35;23
Speaker 3
I call it the do don’t be Ben rule, okay? And if you want to stay stuck here, that doesn’t look like a burning desire. To me. The pain has to be. The pain has to be greater. To not change, to go make a change. Does that make sense?

00;30;35;26 – 00;30;39;09
Speaker 1
It makes perfect sense. Yeah. You ever hear David Sandler?

00;30;39;12 – 00;30;45;24
Speaker 3
Oh, yeah. Selling systems. Yeah. Oh yeah yeah yeah yeah I went through and through. I went through Sandler selling systems.

00;30;45;26 – 00;30;52;25
Speaker 1
Oh yeah. It. Well, it’s funny because you’re saying the problem is not the problem. Then I was like, man, I was like, I think I read that in one of Sandler’s books, talking. What was his.

00;30;52;25 – 00;30;58;02
Speaker 3
Book? You can’t teach a kid the right to ride a bicycle in, in a workshop or something like that.

00;30;58;03 – 00;31;04;10
Speaker 1
Something like, Yeah. You can’t teach kid to ride a bike. Oh, my God, I should know that at a seminar.

00;31;04;10 – 00;31;04;17
Speaker 3
At a.

00;31;04;17 – 00;31;12;23
Speaker 1
Seminar? At a seminar. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. But you said that it’s very similar. What the problem is not. The problem is how you view the problem.

00;31;12;23 – 00;31;26;22
Speaker 3
And you always. Oh, yeah. Hey, my problems are my problems. And the problem is I’m not looking at the problem. Right. Yeah, but it’s the way I’m looking at it. I’m not. I’m not asking the right questions to get to a different idea.

00;31;26;27 – 00;31;28;20
Speaker 1
Yeah. Love it.

00;31;28;22 – 00;31;54;17
Speaker 3
I also like to say, you know, different isn’t always better, but better is always different. You gotta take the risk to make the change. You know, we try to limit our downside on change, but but but different isn’t always better. So let’s not just go rush out there and do it right, but better, I guarantee you, is always different where you are.

00;31;54;20 – 00;32;17;04
Speaker 1
What what do you say to And by the way, I love the coaching analogy of you saying that coaches aren’t on the field. Right. And they’re not in the game. Coaches are on the sidelines and they’re coaching their players and they’re seeing a broader view of things. And you know, speaking from from a place of where sometimes I’m like, I could just do it.

00;32;17;04 – 00;32;33;26
Speaker 1
I could just jump in and just like you said, right? I I’ll just I’ll just do this real quick. It’ll be fine. Right. How do you or what do you say to business owners that are doing that? And they, they continually find themselves jumping in the game even though they shouldn’t be on the field.

00;32;33;29 – 00;32;38;20
Speaker 3
They have to do what I did. You got to burn the boat. Yeah. Burn out. You know what I mean? If I burn the.

00;32;38;20 – 00;32;40;03
Speaker 1
Boat, I do. Yeah.

00;32;40;04 – 00;32;59;25
Speaker 3
I mean, I mean, I, I don’t think any one warrior or general or whatever came up with that. I mean, there are plenty of examples and I, I, we could get on I could find out the origin or the whole history. Right. But the concept is, is you got to eliminate the option to quit or go back or do something different or retreat.

00;32;59;25 – 00;33;21;26
Speaker 3
Right. Here’s what I had to do, Michael, I had this I had I had a new employee in my in my, on my team. And, and I was so frustrated that I realized that was the problem. And I had to I gave him my tools. I just got rid of my tools. I got out of the truck and now it’s no longer an option, right?

00;33;21;28 – 00;33;26;20
Speaker 3
Sometimes you have to burn the boats.

00;33;26;22 – 00;33;50;01
Speaker 1
First of all, I love it. I also love the burn Your boat story. Would you mind if I told it to the audience real quickly? Oh, okay. I’ll give my version of it. And but before I do, I gotta issue the caveat of this is not historically correct. Number one. Okay. So like so the story when I first heard the burn the boats analogy was Cortez coming across the ocean, right?

00;33;50;01 – 00;34;10;09
Speaker 1
Come into the New World, coming into Verde land, Mexico coming to the shores. They parked their boats off the shores and they’re going to go invade. Right. And they get to the shores and he’s got his, you know, his whole his teams of people with them. And he’s like, all right, now I want you guys go and burn the boats.

00;34;10;11 – 00;34;27;08
Speaker 1
And his crew looked at him was like, if you burn the boats, like, how are we going to go home? What if we fail? And Cortez’s response was, if we’re going home, we’re going home. In their ships, there is no other option. So it’s either we’re going to die or we’re going to, or we’re going to win, but we’re not going home in our boats.

00;34;27;08 – 00;34;54;09
Speaker 1
We’re going. And it was just a great story about committing to what you’re doing and at any cost, right? Persevering and pushing through. I love that story. I love that idea of what it takes to, commit to what you’re doing and don’t leave yourself any route of escape and, or any route of retreat. But like I said it, it’s I don’t I, like you said, there are plenty of stories that are in line with that.

00;34;54;09 – 00;35;03;11
Speaker 1
That one is not historically correct. I believe it was another explorer that said burn the boats. And like you said, we can we can look it up on I. But, I love it.

00;35;03;11 – 00;35;21;02
Speaker 3
Well, and yeah, I know a great job because it was Cortez. I did know that. Okay. Yeah, I think I think I think you hit it pretty well. But I think there’s also to that story. I think they won the battle like in three days. I mean, yeah, it was, it was, it was I think there was another example where, food wasn’t available.

00;35;21;02 – 00;35;32;26
Speaker 3
If they didn’t when the, when, when the battle. So yeah. But of course we’re not talking about actually burning things. It’s a metaphor in skilled trades business. Why you.

00;35;32;26 – 00;35;33;16
Speaker 1
That.

00;35;33;18 – 00;35;57;08
Speaker 3
What’s it’s real easy to burn the boats or use the metaphor on something that you don’t like doing. Right. That’s why we, we we go book a win that way. Hey, I hate payroll. Well, sometimes they just don’t know what the option is to. To make that better is never easier to get answers to things. You know, I use Gemini every day to answer.

00;35;57;09 – 00;36;19;16
Speaker 3
We could have we could have put burned boats in there and we would have been historically accurate. Right on everything. So it’s never easier than today. And and back to these young folks coming into the business. They already come with that skill set. I can come with that mindset. But but that’s for me personally I had to give my tools away.

00;36;19;16 – 00;36;30;08
Speaker 3
That was my first time to, to, to just eliminate the option to be responsible for that task.

00;36;30;11 – 00;36;32;18
Speaker 3
Yeah. Good stuff.

00;36;32;21 – 00;37;03;01
Speaker 1
It’s great stuff I love it I love the commitment piece to it. Years ago when I was in, sales training and management training, I, I used to play the movie. There was one of the Madagascar movies with the penguins, and they’ve got this great scene where they, like, steal this van and they’re tearing down the highway, and, the the lead penguin turns the other one of the other penguins, and he’s like, hit the brakes or something like that.

00;37;03;01 – 00;37;22;08
Speaker 1
And and the penguins, like, I tore out the brakes and the and the line that the commanding penguin issues is like, no brakes. He’s like, wait a commit, you know, and I think about that all the time, right? Is like, just no brakes and commitment and and moving forward, once you’ve decided what that path has got to be.

00;37;22;08 – 00;37;29;01
Speaker 1
And in this scenario of deciding that, like, I’m not doing these things anymore, someone else has got to do them. So what does that look like?

00;37;29;03 – 00;37;30;06
Speaker 3
Yeah.

00;37;30;08 – 00;37;52;01
Speaker 2
Yeah. From a from a bucket standpoint, Brent, how do you typically analyze? Because a lot of small business owners, myself included, that was always a scary thing, you know, taking and giving something back, to be done by somebody else in a business. Maybe you need to hire somebody new in the office. It’s another expense. And obviously controlling, gross profit is, a key factor.

00;37;52;01 – 00;37;56;16
Speaker 2
So is there a certain metric that people can use to.

00;37;56;23 – 00;38;20;03
Speaker 3
Yeah. I’m glad your your question was spot on because about rate it makes couple points about that messy middle because you’re right. Yeah. You know you can’t. Delegating is not hey you go do it now. Here’s here’s QuickBooks and you’ll lose your business doing that right. It’s a process. You can’t manage and lead what you don’t know.

00;38;20;03 – 00;38;52;13
Speaker 3
I didn’t I never I never proposed that that somebody just delegate something without the knowledge what to do. Okay, so, number one, we pick something that is the biggest time waster for you and that you don’t like. What are we going to do with that free space? If you want to get out of the messy middle the quickest, every space you fill up, you you fill as the rainmaker of the company.

00;38;52;13 – 00;39;16;21
Speaker 3
Nobody will sell your business better than you, okay? Sales will cover a multitude of sense. My first week in my book is all about sales. Okay? And and I think I’ve already told you it’s a it’s a need based selling process. It’s when I talk to technicians, they don’t want to be seen as salespeople. It’s great. Never again.

00;39;16;23 – 00;39;37;20
Speaker 3
It’s not it’s not in that be an expert. But the way to get through that is to continue to be the rainmaker until you get to that next phase. The second piece or make is, is that you can’t lead and manage what you don’t know how to do. You don’t have to be the best at it. You have to be functional at it so you can manage and coach it.

00;39;37;22 – 00;39;57;07
Speaker 3
And here are the four keys to managing and coaching. Set the expectation. Gotta set the rules. Gotta set the expectation. This is what winning looks like in your role. You know payroll can’t be two days late. I won’t have anybody here anymore. It’s got to be on time, right? I’m going to train you. That’s the second thing for the coach.

00;39;57;07 – 00;40;22;21
Speaker 3
I’m going to train you. I’m at teach you. We’re going to work. We’ll show you how to do it. I got a real easy training model, I do it, you watch, we do it together, you do it, I watch and I go away. The third thing they have to do is they have to evaluate their performance. Talking about the coach and what they have to do in each one of these roles that they off board have to evaluate performance.

00;40;22;21 – 00;40;42;20
Speaker 3
How does it match up against the expectation? Is it exceeding, is it matching? Is it is it below below average. And then we got to hold them accountable. And we don’t move on until we’ve got a written process for that. We know what it is so that if somebody else comes in guys we’re going to leave. We’re going to have people come in and out of our company.

00;40;42;23 – 00;41;14;03
Speaker 3
The speed in which you can onboard that new person develops, how fast your company moves and what you do after it moves at. So you hold them accountable. And that’s the coach’s job. Not no place in that is the coach playing the game. I want to make another point to as you leave the messy middle and you start coaching, your office starts to grow, your administrative starts to grow and make this point to your listeners.

00;41;14;05 – 00;41;36;20
Speaker 3
And I darn sure make it, clear to the people I coach, I, I was a quarterback in college, and the game is played on the field and in the skilled trades business, it’s not played in the locker room. The office is the locker room. The magic moment is when the technician is in front of the customer. Don’t lose.

00;41;36;20 – 00;42;01;04
Speaker 3
Your quarterbacks don’t lose. Don’t let the office create the drama and the narrative for how we’re going to play the game. And and it happens in businesses and somebody who owns a business. It’s like Stephen Covey said, you know, if there’s going to be a garden, there’s got to be a gardener. Gardeners got to weed and trim and prune the trees.

00;42;01;06 – 00;42;26;20
Speaker 3
When you own the business, that doesn’t mean you’re not involved. You are protecting the culture of your business, which is the pruning. You have to make sure that your coaches buy into your culture and they are constantly training Ryan their process. You are looking for fractures and trying to predict their failure before they happen. But see, that’s not a right now today thing.

00;42;26;26 – 00;42;47;08
Speaker 3
That’s an over time thing. And if it’s an over time thing, guess what? You get to go on a cruise, you get to go on a vacation, you get to watch your kids go through school and you get to make the events instead of making apologies. I didn’t say owning a business isn’t a job. It’s a different kind of work.

00;42;47;11 – 00;43;08;24
Speaker 3
And you get to choose when you work. When you own a business, you get to choose when you work. I believe that all of us, all of us never want to retire, especially if we’re doing what we love. What we want is the choice of when we work. And you can only have that if you own a business.

00;43;08;26 – 00;43;15;28
Speaker 3
But once again, don’t let the office.

00;43;16;00 – 00;43;33;10
Speaker 3
Interfere with the game on the field. If they’re not adding value to what’s going on with the players, that’s the magic moment. So this is good stuff, guys. I know if you’re getting what you want, but, you sure give me a little Add. And I love sharing this stuff with you because it’s just common sense.

00;43;33;12 – 00;43;35;11
Speaker 1
100%, what you’re.

00;43;35;11 – 00;43;56;22
Speaker 2
Talking about, Brent, I just had to deal with, And it’s it’s so funny you bring that up, and I. I had the conversation with the office, and I said, well, do you fully understand the problem and what’s going on in the field? It turns out, you know, the answer is no. And the solution they were proposing didn’t incorporate anything.

00;43;56;25 – 00;44;08;12
Speaker 2
That would make the life of our operations team any easier. So I said, we’ll go back in and redraw it and bring it back and let’s see what you come up with. But, this is so funny. Bring that up.

00;44;08;15 – 00;44;38;03
Speaker 3
You know, HR has a function, but in, in some organizations HR and I’m using HR as that total administrative back office stuff that’s so necessary when you get to a certain level of complexity or growth, it has a very important role. But in many organizations, what happens is it’s what killed the dinosaur. The head got bigger than the body.

00;44;38;05 – 00;45;00;08
Speaker 3
Don’t don’t forget the the cash registers out in the homes. It’s it’s taking care of customers. But if you spend all day in the office and owners do that own businesses, I mean, they’re they need to get out. I encourage them to get out. But you start thinking, and you’re so engaged in what’s going on on the office, you start thinking, that’s the business.

00;45;00;08 – 00;45;24;06
Speaker 3
It’s not, it’s not. And the best way to get your team reset in the office to say, guess what? We don’t have a job. If they don’t do there’s out there. We play a support role to them, not the other way around. They don’t work for us. We work for them. We serve them. They don’t serve us. Guess what happens when you have a skilled trades guy that’s a great technician.

00;45;24;06 – 00;45;32;11
Speaker 3
And they really, truly feel that and we’re busting our tail to make them successful. They don’t go anywhere.

00;45;32;13 – 00;45;37;22
Speaker 3
It’s called make them feel somebody feel special.

00;45;37;24 – 00;45;45;14
Speaker 2
Love it. Oh God. They know that’s that. That’s a that’s awesome advice.

00;45;45;16 – 00;46;14;15
Speaker 1
Brenna. I know we’re getting short on time, and, you know, we want to keep you any longer than, Then we said we would, but, I got at least one more question here at, you know, when it comes to people growing a business in the trades or even maybe thinking about getting into a business in the trades, if you were going to give them one piece of advice on what to, you know, the number one thing they should focus on, what would it be?

00;46;14;18 – 00;46;18;01
Speaker 3
As a business owner or a skilled trades technician?

00;46;18;03 – 00;46;22;06
Speaker 1
Let’s go business owner side.

00;46;22;09 – 00;46;29;29
Speaker 3
Never delegate your culture and always own your financials.

00;46;30;02 – 00;46;55;27
Speaker 3
If you have the sales aptitude in the company, don’t don’t lose sight of being connected to that pretty, pretty. Well, yeah. I want to I want to make a point for you real quick. I can get to where I’m talking about business, and it sounds like everything’s just cherries and ice cream. Okay, I want to connect on a real visceral level with your owners and your listeners.

00;46;55;29 – 00;47;29;08
Speaker 3
Just in the last 30 to 60 days, we’re growing to a new level. I had coaches that were committed to where we were headed, and and it’s been a tough two months, half of more here anymore. Now, I didn’t fire them. They quit. A good man, good managers, good managers help people realize that this is the team for them, rather than having to terminate people.

00;47;29;10 – 00;47;48;14
Speaker 3
So in a lot of it has to do with that setting standards. But I want you guys to understand and your listeners understand I have problems to solve every day. And it’s and it’s not something where it just all goes perfect. But I do know what what?

00;47;48;17 – 00;48;11;28
Speaker 3
What it should look like and what you have to do to keep it there. And it’s it’s problems are going to be worse every day. And I just want to say it’s never perfect, okay? It’s, perfection is unattainable, okay. Because we’re dealing with people and customers alike and stuff. But there is certainly a way, to make it successful and make it work.

00;48;12;00 – 00;48;33;04
Speaker 3
And I can hear that in Derek. I mean, he’s dealing with a problem in his office that he knows he has. I don’t want to give you the impression that, oh, man, this guy’s got it nailed. I be the minute I start getting a little bit cocky or arrogant about where I think we are, I promise you, the world will smack me down really quick, and I just.

00;48;33;11 – 00;48;57;27
Speaker 3
I wanted to connect on that level too, and say it’s not. It certainly is it. They’re that 20%. They’re doing really well. Those, but that 20% they’re making north of 4 or 500,000 a year and, and 80% are working harder than those guys. So try to do that. I hope I answer your question. Financials and culture.

00;48;57;29 – 00;49;10;23
Speaker 1
Yes. No, no, I love that answer. Actually hit okay. Yeah. Brent, if if our listeners are they’re here and yeah, they want to connect with you. They want to learn more about how you work with businesses. How do they find you?

00;49;10;25 – 00;49;30;00
Speaker 3
Yeah, it’s real simple. And before I before I answer your question, look, I am a coach that I believe and spending time with my clients. But if you need me for the rest of your business life, I’m not a very good coach. My plans, like, if you’re in the messy middle, I can get you out of that 3 or 5 years.

00;49;30;07 – 00;49;58;28
Speaker 3
Okay? Some faster, some take a little more time. But the way I work is not in quantity. It’s in quality. I said I look for skilled trades, business owners who have a burning desire to grow and scale their business without compromising their values. And that last part’s really, really important to me. So what I do, and I believe that I didn’t say this first, but I believe leaders are readers.

00;49;59;00 – 00;50;20;28
Speaker 3
And it’s been said that you’re changed every five years by the books you read and the people you meet. So if you go to Brent garrett.com, it’s real simple to book 30 or 40 minutes with me. If you just want to talk to me, here’s the promise I make to you. You will leave in 30 40 minutes with three pretty good ideas on where to go work in your business.

00;50;21;01 – 00;50;43;28
Speaker 3
Some of them we talked about okay, but so you get to meet me, have a conversation doesn’t cost you a dime. And on the leaders are readers thing I’ll give you my book in an E version, much like I think I did share with you guys. Or traded. It’s 30 days to a better business. It’s a book written about what would older Brent say to younger Brent?

00;50;44;00 – 00;51;11;05
Speaker 3
And the first three weeks is 30 days, 1200 words of chapter. You can read it in a month and you’ll have 30 to 40 good ideas. So what I’m trying to do is add value to that conversation. So go to break Caricom, book a conversation with me. And I think we both will be changed by the book I share and the conversation we have and the chance to meet then cost you dime.

00;51;11;07 – 00;51;24;11
Speaker 1
Love it. I listen, we just spent 40 minutes with you and I’ll tell you, I got 3 or 4 things for sure that I’m taking away from our conversations. Good, good. Yeah. No, I appreciate it, man. I agree for it. Definitely resonated a lot with what you’re saying, so.

00;51;24;18 – 00;51;33;17
Speaker 3
Oh, yeah, it’s. Thanks for having me on yet. You run a great podcast and, it’s been a joy. And, man, I don’t know about you, but time flew by really quick.

00;51;33;22 – 00;51;37;14
Speaker 1
It goes by quick. That’s. I looked at the clock. I was like, Holy moly.

00;51;37;16 – 00;51;40;22
Speaker 2
And feel free. Reach out any time you want to come back on. We would love to have you.

00;51;40;23 – 00;51;42;29
Speaker 3
Well, thanks for the invite. Yeah. It’s great.

00;51;43;02 – 00;52;01;17
Speaker 1
Yeah. Anytime. Thanks a lot, Brent you can find this episode and the rest of our episodes at Blue collar startup.io. Of course, all of our podcasts end up on Spotify. Apple Rumble, YouTube. Check us out on social media if you want to see some, you know, short clips and all that fun stuff.

00;52;01;19 – 00;52;18;14
Speaker 1
And of course, huge shout out to our sponsors that, make it possible for us to be able to donate money for tools and tuition for young people in the trades. We’re going to keep working on that and keep trying to increase the amount of money we’re able to give to that community. And, thanks, everybody for listening.

00;52;18;14 – 00;52;20;04
Speaker 1
And you’ll hear from us next week.

00;52;20;06 – 00;52;48;04
Speaker 1
And that wraps up another episode of Blue Collar Startup. A big thank you to our sponsors, Five Towers Media, Daigle Cleaning Systems, Daigle Fire Solutions, The Michaels Group, Martin Electric, MLB construction, Pinocchio Construction People, and Catamount Consulting for making this podcast possible. And thank you for tuning in. If you learned something or felt inspired. Connect with us on our website at Blue Collar Startup Bio or email us at hardhat Dot CSU at gmail.com.

00;52;48;04 – 00;53;01;02
Speaker 1
We’d love to hear your questions and topic ideas. Help us spread the word by sharing the show and following us on social media for updates. Until next time, keep on building. Keep on dreaming and keep hustling like your future depends on it.

00;53;01;05 – 00;53;10;08
Unknown
Oh, hey. Oh!

00;53;10;10 – 00;53;11;16
Unknown
Oh!