0:01

Welcome to Contractor Cuts , where we cover

0:03

the good , the bad and the ugly of

0:05

growing a successful contracting company

0:08

.

0:13

Welcome back to Contractor Cuts . My name is Clark Turner

0:15

, I'm Jared Flo . Thank you for joining us again

0:17

this week . So today we

0:20

are talking about how can I get

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my employees , the people working for

0:24

me , to make decisions on the job site

0:26

the way that I would make the decisions . We

0:29

have so many guys that come in into

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ProStruct and say , listen , I

0:34

hired someone , they just aren't

0:37

me . I just need to get them to think like

0:39

me .

0:39

You just got a micromanaged to crap out of them

0:41

. That's what you need to do , yeah .

0:43

I mean , that's the problem . Is we

0:45

hire people and say , okay , just watch

0:47

what I do and I can train them on . This is how we

0:49

do estimates , this is how we communicate

0:52

, this is how our emails go . But

0:54

the hardest part is how do I get their brains

0:57

, when they're standing on a job site trying to make a

0:59

decision , to be able to make the

1:01

decision like I would make it , as opposed to

1:03

calling me seven times

1:05

a day ? Hey Clark , what should we do about this ? Hey Clark , what

1:07

do you think we should do about this ? Hey , I got an issue

1:09

here . What should we do about this ? How should we handle this ?

1:12

That eventually becomes super overwhelming

1:14

, super annoying , and

1:17

you end up looking at that person

1:19

like this person is an idiot . Why can't they just make their own

1:21

decisions ? Why are they always calling me ? And he's

1:23

never going to grow , I'm never going to be

1:25

able to back out , and so this guy's got to

1:27

go Right . And then you go

1:29

on the search again . Can I find somebody else

1:31

who's just like me ?

1:33

Yep , so what we teach

1:35

and what we preach , there's kind of two

1:37

phases of what we do . One

1:39

phase is what we call our core

1:41

values and the other phase is our

1:43

project management systems and processes

1:45

and all the office systems and all

1:48

of how the processes go . But

1:50

the first part that I mentioned , the

1:53

core values that we teach

1:55

. Most big companies have core

1:58

values right . And we

2:00

frame them as core values , which they

2:02

are . But we've built the core

2:04

values and we give our alliance partners

2:06

the whole spiel of

2:08

where they come from , how we

2:10

apply them . But we take those

2:13

and that is how we

2:15

teach people to think like us , and

2:17

so we use the core values as a training

2:20

model when a new

2:22

employee comes in . Here's our core values

2:24

, this is how we think and this is

2:26

the bar that is set that we're going

2:28

to judge you by , right . And

2:30

so we lay that out and we say this is , if

2:33

you make these decisions this way , if you can

2:35

check every box in these core values

2:37

, you are running perfectly

2:39

. Yep , right . And

2:41

so let's dive into that a little bit more Jared . How

2:43

do we teach people to think like us when

2:46

we I'm

2:48

sorry , how do we teach people to think like us

2:50

where we can hold them accountable , using

2:53

these ? So let's walk through these and

2:55

kind of the core value statement . So let's start with the statement

2:58

, kind of break them down and then we'll talk about how we

3:00

apply them . Sure , so our core value

3:02

statement is the concept is simple we treat people

3:04

right , the remarkable communication

3:07

advocating for others and leading

3:09

proactively in every aspect of our projects

3:11

. We create lifelong relationships

3:13

, the foundation of our company

3:15

Yep Right , and so that is our statement

3:17

. That is kind of the

3:19

general , broad statement . Now we go into high , high detail

3:21

about this when you , when you come

3:24

in and we kind of give you all of the core values

3:26

. But we break the core values down into

3:28

three categories we communicate

3:31

, we advocate and

3:33

we lead , and so everything that we

3:35

do . We're not going to go into each of those categories

3:37

, but when we're bringing on a new employee

3:39

, we walk through those three aspects

3:42

and underneath each one of those covers exactly

3:45

how I want you to make decisions . Yep , right

3:47

, so we've got the communicate right . So

3:49

what I expect your communications to look like , this

3:51

is how we , how we communicate

3:54

with , with transparency , we , and

3:56

we have a bunch of different things underneath each category

3:58

that we're not going to go into all those details today , but

4:01

I want you to communicate this

4:03

way with everybody with your

4:05

team , with your boss , with your

4:07

crews

4:09

, with your the homeowners that

4:11

you're dealing with . This is how we

4:13

communicate . This is the right way . This

4:15

is the wrong way . It is a general , broad

4:18

stroke of expectations of how those

4:20

communications should look . Yeah , they should be

4:22

put together and from there , anytime

4:24

that there was a communication issue with my

4:27

employee , I say hey , employee , it

4:30

looks like when you're sending those emails , you're

4:32

not being very transparent about what's going

4:34

on in this job . Let's talk about that .

4:35

Yeah .

4:37

I think that's one of our corrective actions . If it's a communication

4:40

issue is already preset

4:42

day one that they start working with us right . So if

4:45

you're not doing it this way , you know

4:47

that this is our expectations , yeah well , and I

4:49

mean going along with the you know , the

4:51

communication piece of it .

4:52

You know you mentioned earlier that we've also

4:55

got the 10 step project management process

4:57

right , and so when we bring an employee

4:59

in , we're training them on both of those , both of

5:01

those things the 10 step project

5:04

management process is saying . Here

5:06

is how I want your emails to look

5:09

. Here is how many communication

5:12

points I want to have . Here

5:14

is what I should be able to do with

5:16

your client . I should be able to call your client at any

5:18

given point and ask them what's

5:21

coming next and if they can answer that question . I know

5:23

that you , my employee , has been communicating

5:25

well , right . So that goes into , like

5:27

the specific application

5:30

of the core values . You

5:33

know , for me , when , when

5:35

I was bringing in new employees , new project

5:37

managers , this was

5:39

this was a place , one of the main places

5:42

that I would start and make sure

5:44

. You know we have a , we have a presentation

5:47

that we , you know , a slideshow presentation that will

5:49

go through . But I would also

5:51

, sitting in my office , go through and say

5:53

, hey , here , here are the core values and let

5:55

me help you understand what they are . One

5:57

this is going to be , this is the

5:59

standard of which our company

6:01

operates , right . That

6:04

being the case , you being an employee here

6:06

, this is what you're going to be held accountable

6:09

to , that you are treating

6:11

people right , you're communicating well , you're advocating

6:14

for people and you're leading in the way

6:16

that you're operating . And I'll set it

6:18

in front of them and say are you OK ? Do

6:20

you agree with these ? Yes , I agree with these

6:22

. Ok , are you OK if I hold you

6:25

accountable to that ? Yes

6:27

, and I said great , that's , that's fantastic

6:29

. Now , secondarily , these

6:33

are the things that when you need to make

6:35

a decision on a job site

6:37

and , let's say

6:39

, you can't get a hold of somebody to help

6:41

you make that decision , or there's not enough

6:43

time to call somebody and you just need to make a

6:45

call , these are the

6:47

things that you need to have in your head . Ok

6:50

, I'm going to make this call on site . Is this , is

6:52

this adhering to these things ? By making this

6:54

decision ? Am I advocating for my crew

6:56

? By doing this ? Am I advocating for

6:58

the client ? Am I ? Am I communicating

7:00

that well ? And you process through that

7:02

If you make a decision

7:05

, even if it's the wrong one , but

7:07

you can back it up by saying I made that decision

7:10

because I thought about these things . Here's

7:12

how I was communicating , here's how I

7:14

figured that this decision will be advocating

7:16

for the company and I was

7:18

leading in this fashion . Blah , blah , blah . There's

7:22

going to be a celebration of the fact that they you

7:24

know they may have made the wrong

7:26

decision , but they , they , they went to

7:28

try and make a decision on their own , based on

7:30

the standards , the core values of how

7:32

our company operates , right , and so

7:34

the value of that is core values

7:37

in my opinion , is

7:39

the basis of the beginning of being

7:41

able to duplicate .

7:42

Yeah .

7:43

Well , we started this thing off by saying , like

7:45

, how do I get people to think like me ? More importantly

7:48

, how do I hire somebody who

7:50

can operate like me ? That can I

7:53

don't have to micromanage , I don't have to babysit

7:55

that can can go out there and

7:57

make decisions , and make good quality decisions

8:00

and , more importantly

8:02

, make the decisions like I would make them . This

8:05

is the foundation , this is the , the

8:07

, the , the guide rails for your

8:09

employees . So now , you're not , you're

8:11

not , you're never going to find somebody out there in

8:13

, indeed , or you know , facebook

8:16

, you know whatever that that's going to be able to be

8:18

you .

8:18

Yeah .

8:19

That's impossible , right .

8:20

If he was out there exactly

8:22

making the decision you're making , they're going to be

8:24

running the wrong business . They don't need to

8:27

come to you and so this is that uptick

8:29

on how they , how to form them

8:31

in into the decision maker

8:33

that you are to get you to where you're at today . Yeah , I

8:35

think , with your example that you just said , my

8:38

, my PM , is standing on a job site and

8:40

he's thinking , ok , so the

8:42

if I did it this way , it would

8:45

be doing it transparently

8:47

, and I'm advocating for the client and also the

8:49

crew and I'm making sure that everyone's saying care

8:51

of , and I'm and they're going through

8:53

their , their list of how we make

8:55

decisions . It I

8:57

don't know when a wrong decision is made in that situation

9:00

. Right , like , like if they're making the decision

9:02

to treat people well , to

9:04

advocate for their clients , to advocate

9:06

for their crews , to lead with integrity

9:09

, to lead in a way that

9:11

we have really laid out what leadership looks

9:14

like . If you're doing that and then you're

9:16

following up with communication and communicating

9:19

it all really well , there's not space

9:21

for an error in that right . Like the wrong

9:23

decision might be . Well , I had to cover that

9:25

because that was my fault . That's

9:28

the right decision as much as I don't want to

9:30

cover it out of my pocket as a company

9:32

. That's the right decision .

9:33

That's what we should be doing right and so it Well

9:36

, the only way that a wrong decision

9:39

happens in that is just lack of knowledge , right

9:41

? I just don't know . I didn't know . I didn't

9:43

have somebody to ask . I had to make a decision now

9:45

. I ran it through this metrics and I made a decision

9:48

. Right , that's a good

9:50

decision because you followed

9:52

the process . But I might bring you in and

9:54

say , hey , you did a great job , that's a great way of thinking

9:56

about it , but next time , this

9:59

is that this affects this

10:01

thing . Did you know that ? No , I didn't know that . That

10:03

was a part of it . Okay , cool , no problem , I'm not

10:05

mad at you . You're not getting fired . You adhere

10:07

to the thing . And again , it gives them that guide

10:10

rail of a way to operate

10:12

. And the other way around is , when

10:14

there is some kind of corrective

10:16

action conversation , it

10:20

works the other direction . Hey , this is

10:22

the standard . At the very beginning of your job that we

10:24

said can I hold you accountable to this ? And you

10:26

said yes , your actions

10:29

. Was that advocating

10:31

remarkably right ? Was that

10:33

? Did you communicate that ? Well

10:36

? No , I didn't really . And so , like we've

10:38

said on previous podcasts , every

10:42

one of our management team has these

10:44

core values printed out on their wall

10:46

to be able to reference to in conversations

10:49

, because it's the guiding principles of how

10:51

we make decisions , how we treat people

10:53

and , honestly , the general ethics

10:56

of our business .

10:58

Yeah , I think one of the lines that I love

11:00

in the core value presentation

11:02

and the way we talk

11:05

about it internally is

11:07

I lead and

11:10

I advocate with respect , and

11:12

so in this industry , a lot of guys are

11:15

when you earn my respect , you'll get it , and

11:17

we started the basis of I respect everybody

11:19

. You don't have to earn it Now . You might lose

11:21

it , but it's not going to change how I treat you , and

11:25

so it's going to mean I'm going to keep myself guarded

11:27

. I'm not going to just trust you to do stuff if

11:29

you've shown that you can .

11:31

But it's . It goes down to I'm not going to act disrespectfully

11:34

because you didn't disrespect me . Yeah , I mean

11:36

it goes down to talking about .

11:38

When you're at home Depot and checking out and the person doesn't

11:40

know what they're doing , Are you sitting there wearing my

11:42

company's shirt saying this guy's an idiot , Get out

11:44

of it . No , we're going to treat everybody

11:47

with respect . Because we might know more

11:49

than them , that doesn't mean we're better than them

11:51

, yeah Right . And so that's kind of the core

11:53

value mentality of I'm

11:56

not better , I'm not we're

11:58

going to treat everybody the same . I don't

12:00

care how you Jared in your personal life , you treat

12:02

people To work here . This is how

12:04

we treat people . This is how we lead in our jobs . This

12:06

is how we have gumption and gumption . To me

12:09

, when you're advocating and leading

12:11

with gumption , I'm leading with

12:13

gumption , meaning I'm I've got

12:15

a curiosity when something might

12:17

not be going right and I'm going to step in and figure

12:20

that out before I'm asked .

12:21

Whether it's my job or not . Yeah , yeah and so

12:23

it's .

12:24

everything is built around how I want

12:26

you to view the job and , honestly

12:29

, this is how we mold people into being

12:31

better humans Right . I think we've

12:33

that's one of the side effects that

12:35

we've heard from past employees of like

12:37

you know what I've

12:39

, what I've learned in some of some of these core values

12:42

I've applied in my personal life , I've applied with

12:44

in my marriage in terms of leading

12:47

and advocacy and how I should be communicating

12:49

so people understand what I'm trying to say . Yeah

12:52

, and that's the long-term goal . I want to grow every

12:54

employee personally and professionally

12:56

.

12:56

Well , I mean , I've , I've got guys that

12:58

use the work here and they ended up with a

13:00

different opportunity and they went a different direction

13:02

and I'll , you know , touch base with them or

13:04

they'll call me occasionally and be like deck gummet

13:07

. I was driving down the road today and freaking core

13:09

values popped in my head . I don't even work

13:11

over there anymore , you know , but it's . It

13:13

applies to life and

13:16

business , you know . So one

13:18

of the one of the things that is

13:21

interesting about this , and kind of the the story

13:25

that I tell about the core values

13:27

, is it took us a long time to

13:29

to create them . Our

13:31

management team sat around for what six

13:33

months or so , and

13:36

you know we all had . You know this is

13:38

a good idea , this is something that I think that we

13:40

need to do , but I don't think any

13:43

of us had a real concept

13:46

of how valuable that they would

13:48

become and

13:50

really the the byproduct of that is

13:53

that

13:56

the jobs

13:59

that are being running , or running right now

14:02

, that you have no idea

14:04

what they are , no idea what the client

14:06

is . You don't have anything

14:08

to do with it , it's just running in the GC

14:10

company . Those are being operated

14:13

the same way that they were when

14:15

you were a one man show . Right

14:17

, people were being treated with

14:19

respect , they were being treated well , they were being

14:21

cared for . All of these things were kind

14:23

of the way that you

14:25

viewed clients and how you operated . The

14:28

process of creating these for those

14:31

creating the core values was

14:33

essentially taking your

14:36

forward progress and direction

14:38

of how you viewed your clients and

14:40

jobs and the management team

14:42

of like this is who we are and

14:44

putting that down on paper so that now there

14:47

are four , five , six , ten people out

14:49

operating jobs right now , or office

14:52

managers that are dealing with incoming

14:54

clients and whatever , that are being treated

14:56

the same way . You would treat them . You just don't

14:58

have anything to do with them , which is how

15:01

it is the

15:03

precipice of duplication

15:07

and growth .

15:08

Yeah and I think what you're saying is exactly right

15:10

of when we started putting this down for

15:12

you or for me , when we were writing

15:15

a lot of this out . It's like , yeah , that's common sense

15:17

, of course you're going to do it that way , of course , of course

15:19

that's common sense . But what

15:21

we realize is we

15:23

are now showing people what we believe is common

15:26

sense and this is the standard you're going to be held to . So

15:28

if you have hired someone before

15:30

who's worked for you and you're like why

15:32

are they making that type of this ? Like that

15:35

, just use your brain . This is

15:37

the just use your brain , this is the bar to

15:39

say , to not say you're an idiot , but say , hey

15:41

, look right here , this is how we're supposed to do things

15:43

. Right , that is what you did

15:45

. Line up with this . I don't understand

15:47

from what we talked about , from those

15:49

actions . Help me understand that . It allows me to

15:51

be curious . When you make a bonehead decision , as

15:54

opposed to being like hey , moron

15:56

, what are you ? Why are you and I'm not

15:58

the bad guy it's like hey , I'm so confused

16:00

because we talked about this and you did this . Help

16:02

me understand how those two things match up . And

16:05

so the importance

16:07

of these were very kind of low

16:10

in my head when we started it because it was like this

16:12

is just common sense . This is stuff that

16:14

if you don't know that , then you

16:16

probably should work here through in life . But

16:19

then it translates over to so

16:21

many different aspects of the job as

16:23

well as of the person , to where it's like

16:25

great , you can't be an idiot and work

16:28

here , because you have a guide

16:30

on how not to be an idiot if you

16:32

are right and that sounds mean

16:34

, but the truth is , if you can understand

16:37

this , learn this and kind of start

16:39

with the filter of these core values

16:41

, then you know exactly

16:44

how we want you to make decisions .

16:46

What's interesting and this just kind of popped into my

16:48

head is that we've

16:51

learned the value of

16:53

accountability in running a business . Right

16:55

, it just you have to have it . You

16:58

have to have accountability that's

17:00

coming from the top , that somebody's

17:02

going to check in on you and say , hey , what's going

17:04

on , why is this not happening ? But you can't

17:06

have accountability unless you have

17:08

a set of standards , right ? But

17:11

the interesting thing is that there's

17:13

really two sides of it . There is

17:15

the you're a project manager

17:17

and your job is to run crews

17:19

, deal with clients . You're supposed to show up to

17:21

job sites on time or early . X

17:24

amount of pictures , x amount of communication

17:26

points . Right , you've got those specific

17:29

details that they

17:31

know , that are clear and they're understood

17:34

, and if they are falling short on those

17:36

things , I can come in and apply accountability

17:39

. Hey , why are you not doing the things that you know you

17:41

were supposed to be doing ? But there's an aspect

17:43

of that that accountability

17:46

doesn't cover , which is decision making

17:48

, right , and so the core values

17:50

comes on the other side of it , that now we have

17:52

a set of standards that everybody knows

17:54

, everybody signs on the dotted line yes

17:57

, I'm good with this . And so now we have

17:59

accountability on specific

18:02

tangible actions , but also

18:04

on decision making where

18:06

I have something to point back to and say

18:08

hey , you made this decision , why

18:11

did you do that ? That doesn't flow

18:14

with how we function . Yeah , you're right . So

18:17

it's interesting . It just

18:19

kind of popped into my head the two different sides of it . Yeah , I think that's

18:21

a good point . Yeah , I think that's a good point . Yeah , I think that's a good point . We've

18:23

realized the value of accountability

18:25

and it can't be just on tangible

18:28

action items , because you

18:30

need unless you want I can't train

18:32

you for 10,000 different decisions

18:35

that might have to be made in any given day , unless

18:37

you want to be the one that everybody in your

18:39

company picks up the phone and calls you to make decisions

18:41

for them . Right , and

18:44

with one or two people , that's fine , but

18:46

if you're going to grow , it's impossible

18:48

. You talk about

18:50

getting fatigued . It's like you

18:52

can't get anything done because you're constantly getting

18:55

pecked to death by guys going , hey , should

18:57

I do this , what about this ? What about so

19:01

there's a real value to it , even

19:03

though , honestly , like we said

19:05

going into it , we were like this

19:07

sounds kind of corporate fancy

19:09

, is this for show ? And

19:14

I know , for us . We were very clear , and

19:16

you were definitely very clear , that you don't want the

19:18

like honesty , integrity and

19:20

leadership . Like that's

19:22

not what we wanted .

19:23

We didn't want the standard jar , we wanted

19:25

something Print it up and put it on the wall and everyone rolls their

19:27

eyes when they read it .

19:28

Yeah , we wanted something that

19:30

was robust but also very

19:32

specific and easy to understand .

19:34

Yeah , that's right . So if you were listening to

19:36

this and want to start heading that direction

19:39

on building out core values , so you can start

19:41

hiring your team or getting your team

19:43

that is currently in place in a better

19:45

direction , there's two ways to do it . You

19:47

can sit down and start writing out exactly

19:49

how you want decisions to be made

19:51

in your company . Yep , you

19:54

can build out your own core values . If you want ours , we

19:56

will train you on them , show them to you and

19:58

give them to you , and a lot of times when you come in to

20:01

Pro Shrugged with us , we say , hey , here

20:03

they are . Let me show you how we came up

20:05

with this . Let's talk about every line item on

20:07

here and how we pitch this . Let's give

20:10

it to you . Now you customize it for your company

20:12

. Do you want to take that out ? Do you want to add this in ? Is this important

20:14

to you ? Add that in and we help you custom

20:16

build it For the way you want decisions

20:18

to be made on your job sites .

20:20

Yeah , and as Pro Shrugged Alliance members , you actually

20:22

get the presentation

20:24

, the slideshow presentation that you

20:27

can go through . You can edit it with your company name

20:29

, specific details and whatever . You

20:31

can carbon copy and use it exactly as it

20:33

is right , or you can make it

20:35

your own , but it gives you a really hard

20:37

job . We spent there were four or

20:39

four of us in the management team at that time

20:42

it took six months of meetings

20:44

to get to where we're at right .

20:45

So anyway , yeah , when

20:48

you come into Alliance one of our trainings

20:50

we'll sit down and go through it like you are a new employee

20:52

for us , so you understand how we pitch it and

20:55

then during that , we train

20:57

you on okay . So this is how and why we did

20:59

it this way . This is how you might want to edit it , and

21:01

so it's kind of a fully customized

21:03

thing around you and your company . So

21:06

if you want that information , want to talk to us about

21:08

what becoming a Pro Shrugged Alliance partner

21:10

looks like , please reach out to us

21:12

. Go to our website prostrug360.com

21:14

. We've got there . You can

21:17

sign up for the software for free , which is the

21:19

really bones of

21:22

everything we teach . It's a skeleton

21:24

of how to run a company , and

21:26

then we build muscle on top of that , which is all

21:28

of the Alliance stuff that we give you . So

21:31

it's really our . Everything that we

21:33

do is built around growing contractors

21:36

to the next level , and so what we

21:38

want is start with the software . We got a

21:40

free version . We got a 199 version

21:42

, which is our absolutely most popular

21:44

level , because it's everything that

21:47

you get . But you can start

21:49

there . Come in , talk to us about Alliance

21:51

. If you want some of this stuff , we can custom build a package

21:53

for you , but we've got the coaching , the paperwork

21:56

, core values , processes all

21:58

that stuff waiting for you to implement

22:00

into your company immediately . So

22:02

we're not geniuses , we've just hurt

22:04

enough that we understand the right way to

22:07

do it . And so we pass

22:09

it on to you . You can figure it out in your own . We're

22:11

not smarter than you , but we're expediting

22:13

eight , nine , 10 years of doing a

22:15

trial and error and losing

22:18

cash very quickly into

22:20

our program to where you don't have to go through the trial

22:22

and error . We lay it out for you . If

22:24

you want to talk to us prostruct360.com

22:26

We'd love to hear from you . If

22:29

there's any other questions you have

22:31

or any suggestions for podcasts you want to

22:33

hear , we'd love to hear from you guys on that stuff . Thank

22:35

you so much for listening and we'll talk to you guys next week

22:38

. See ya , bye

22:42

.