0:01

Welcome to Contractor Cuts , where we cover

0:03

the good , the bad and the ugly of

0:06

growing a successful contracting company

0:08

.

0:12

Welcome back to Contractor Cuts . My name is Clark Turner

0:14

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

0:16

week . So today we are talking

0:18

about hiring your friends , hiring

0:21

family members , hiring your spouse

0:23

, which is the hardest . We're diving into

0:25

how to do it . Well , we see a lot

0:27

of people that we're coaching , probably close

0:30

to 50% of the people that come in

0:32

either have a partnership with a friend

0:35

, or have their brother that works for them

0:37

, or their aunt is doing the books

0:39

for them , or their wife is doing the

0:41

books , or the husband's helping out doing

0:43

some stuff .

0:43

So a lot of relational

0:46

stuff that happens and I feel like a lot of our

0:48

coaching turns into being

0:50

therapists right , yeah , well

0:52

, and I mean honestly I would say probably

0:55

everyone that has come to us in the

0:57

coaching program who has some family member

0:59

, spouse or whatever . One's

1:02

pulling the weight and the other one is

1:04

not . Or one feels like

1:06

they're pulling the weight and the other one is not , or one

1:08

feels like they're pulling the weight and the other one is

1:10

just kind of you know on

1:14

the coattails or you know like there's . I don't think that I've ever seen a partnership

1:17

between friends or family that everybody was like oh yeah , man , we're both killing

1:19

it .

1:19

We're both at 100% . Yeah , and if you're listening

1:21

to this and think we're talking about you , we've

1:24

got a lot yeah .

1:24

And if you're listening to this and think we're talking about you , we've

1:27

got a lot . It's not just you , there's a lot .

1:28

So today we're going to break that down . We're going to

1:30

set up what you should be looking

1:32

for and how to do this . Well , we

1:35

say don't , but

1:38

that's not a reality , right ? If I don't have enough

1:40

money to hire a bookkeeper and my wife's at home

1:42

hanging out and wants to help out and

1:44

keep my QuickBooks up , great , I'll

1:46

take all the help I can get .

1:47

Yeah , it's not a horrible

1:50

idea right

1:54

.

1:54

It's just it can make things really really difficult , yeah , so today we're going to talk about how

1:56

to do it systematically in a really really

1:58

easy way that allows

2:00

accountability without frustration , relationally

2:03

or as much as possible .

2:04

Yeah , one of the things that I think the

2:07

reason why we see so

2:09

many people with family members , friends

2:11

or whatever is anytime

2:14

you're hiring somebody , you're

2:17

hiring for quality , is what they bring to the table

2:19

and all the stuff , but there's no real way to know

2:21

. Am I going to be able to trust this

2:23

person , right ? If you're hiring off , indeed off the street

2:25

somewhere , like you hope they're trustworthy , but

2:28

you don't really know it . You've got that built in

2:30

as friend , family or whatever , right

2:32

? So it's natural

2:35

to think , oh , it's a no-brainer

2:37

to hire my brother , my brother-in-law , I'm

2:39

going to bring my wife in because we have

2:42

the trust already , which is something , as

2:44

an employer , you want to gain

2:46

it's hard to find somebody that you

2:48

know can kind of hold the banner

2:50

of of

2:57

the company and run with it . Um , you know . So you've got that built in

2:59

already , and so it's a natural instinct to say you know what I'm going

3:01

to , I'm going to hire , you know , my brother . Um

3:03

, but we see it go wrong a lot

3:05

because you lean into that

3:07

trust of like oh well , I don't have

3:09

to do , we don't have to have rules , we don't

3:11

have to talk about stuff , it's my brother , We'll

3:13

be fine . Yeah , Right , and that's

3:16

fine . And while things are

3:18

going great , while things are going great , you guys

3:20

are celebrating , you're knocking back a couple

3:22

beers in the evenings , Like you're enjoying

3:24

it . Things are going great . When things

3:27

get any kind of difficult

3:29

, sticky or whatever , that's where it becomes a real

3:31

big problem .

3:31

Yeah , Well , and a lot of times employees

3:33

don't work out for

3:36

there's , I mean , we've covered all

3:38

a lot of different reasons , but one of them is

3:40

bad leadership , bad

3:42

accountability , bad setting goals

3:44

. A lot of it is on me as the

3:46

employer , and

3:48

it's easy to blame the employee for those

3:50

issues and then employee sitting there pointing

3:52

his finger back at you saying , no , that's your fault . And

3:55

so it becomes this finger pointing as to whose

3:57

fault it is , and the truth is it's probably a little both

3:59

, and so that's one

4:01

of the hardest issues with this . Also going into

4:03

it , when you

4:07

can have an employee , you can have

4:09

a friend that's working for you or a spouse that

4:11

has high integrity , hard

4:13

worker , loyal , has every

4:15

quality that you want , and they don't

4:17

fit with you and your company

4:19

or the job position that you want them in . So

4:22

you see your brother-in-law and he's amazing

4:25

and he's great and , like dude , he's

4:27

killing it at his job . He's really good at sales

4:29

and he's a car salesman or whatever it is

4:31

. He'll fit in great here . Well , being

4:34

a really good salesman doesn't always

4:36

say you're a really good project manager too . It

4:39

doesn't always convert over that way

4:41

. So some of the issues is

4:43

okay , you quit your job . You can work for me . You're

4:46

great at what you do . I love you . You're , you

4:48

know , your family . To me , this is we have fun

4:50

together we have so much fun together and you're loyal

4:52

and you're honest and you do the right thing and you

4:55

hit all our core values , but

4:57

you're not organized or good at project management

4:59

. Or you're running the office

5:01

but you're not good at math . You

5:03

don't work technically well

5:06

in QuickBooks , or you're not good at

5:08

getting back to people . I'm not good at remembering

5:11

to do things on

5:13

the agenda for my job description . So

5:16

that's where a lot of the trouble comes in . Is the

5:19

right person for the wrong position

5:21

, and I needed

5:23

a hire . You're looking for a job . I

5:25

trust you . I know you'll work well here . I'm

5:28

not really doing a lot of hey , why don't you go do

5:31

an estimate for me on a job site ? Let me see how you build that

5:33

. Let me see and do all the tests that we do up front

5:35

for new hires . We don't do a lot of the

5:37

. You know how well do you type , how

5:39

well do you do that , all the stuff that you should

5:41

be checking ? You just assume listen

5:44

, I'm not going to test it's my brother-in-law , I'm not going to

5:46

send him through my testing , and

5:48

so there is this . I really

5:50

want it to work out . So I'm just going to fit that

5:52

person into this job role and I hope it works

5:54

, and you're really setting yourself

5:56

up for disaster , relationally

5:59

as well as professionally . So let's

6:01

dive into some of that . So the biggest pain

6:03

point that we

6:05

have seen when you're working with a family member

6:07

, spouse or friend is that your

6:10

professional relationship is

6:12

usually seen through

6:15

personal glasses , right , right ? So

6:17

I know Jared . Let's say we're

6:19

brothers , right , and I know Jared , he's this guy

6:21

and he's this way . He's always

6:23

attentive , he's on top of things . What

6:25

I've never had , that interaction with Jared

6:28

, is me telling him what to do and him saying , yes , sir

6:30

, we haven't had that interaction as brothers

6:32

. That's not a normal thing for us to do , and as soon

6:35

as that happens , jared's

6:37

looking through his personal glasses . Who's this guy

6:39

think he is ? You can't tell me that . You're not my

6:42

big brother anymore . You're not my little brother anymore

6:44

. You can't tell me what to do , and that

6:46

stuff starts creeping in when it's like , well , I

6:48

can , as the person that hired

6:50

you as the boss , as the person running these jobs

6:53

, instructing

6:59

you , hiring you to come in and work for me , I should be able to ask things of you that are

7:01

in your job description to do . And so a lot of times it's those

7:04

personal glasses that people put on that

7:06

they look at our relationship through

7:08

that thinking . Well , you know , I can separate

7:11

it out , I can compartmentalize business and professional

7:13

. You can't Not . When it comes

7:15

into your heart and your feelings and how

7:17

you feel about this person or what you

7:20

expected or assumed they'd be like as a

7:22

boss , all that goes out the window , right

7:24

, yeah , I think one

7:26

big thing about the relationships and trying to separate

7:28

them out . And you know , jer and I have been friends , I've

7:30

known him since high school . We

7:35

weren't good friends or close friends when we started working together , which was a great In passing acquaintances basically

7:38

, and it's so much easier to start professionally

7:40

and then form personal

7:42

and then be able to say well

7:44

, we got to have the professional conversation and be

7:46

able to bounce back and forth , because professional is

7:48

first . Now , when it's relational first

7:51

, it's way harder . Because

7:53

here's the difference A

7:56

personal relationship is about being

7:58

. I'm there for you , I want to be with you , I want

8:00

to hang out , I want to talk with you , I want to get a beer

8:02

with you . It's being Right . A

8:08

professional relationship is doing . You're doing these things and I'm paying you to get

8:10

them done . I need you to do this for us in exchange for this

8:12

money , I'm buying this from you , and

8:15

so the difference of being together

8:17

gets crossed up with . I need you to

8:19

do for me and those

8:21

two things , if you start with I need you to do

8:23

for me , then I can

8:26

go into being around you also . Yeah , so I mean

8:28

, it's kind of vague , but comparing

8:30

those two is understanding . This

8:33

relationship is being together . We're friends , we're

8:35

buddies , we're spouses , we're married . Whatever it is

8:37

, I'm here for you , I'm being

8:39

and as a leader . You need that as well

8:41

, mm-hmm .

8:43

But professionally I'm hiring you

8:45

to do .

8:46

And in a personal relationship I

8:48

don't necessarily in a healthy marriage

8:50

telling my wife I need you to do this for me

8:52

, I need you to do this for me and you need to do this , and

8:54

you failed at doing this Right . That

8:56

doesn't work very well with the spouse .

8:58

Yeah , and I learned a lot of that the

9:00

hard way . I had

9:03

one of the first employees that I hired

9:05

was somebody that I knew I had done

9:07

life with him , hung out with him . We were

9:09

good friends not like we hung out all the time

9:12

, but we were good friends Hired

9:21

him in to be a project manager for me and we blurred the lines a lot and I didn't realize

9:23

it because I just was trying to care for him . They were trying to help him

9:25

be better at his job . Trying to care for him . They were , you know , trying to help

9:28

him be better at his job , trying to help him solve situations and

9:30

also like personal life . You know

9:32

, as as a boss , there are a lot

9:34

of times that you're having conversations with your employees

9:36

of , hey

9:41

, what's going on , how's how's life , how's you know , how's the home life , and there's sometimes that

9:43

you get the opportunity to have conversations and maybe

9:45

talk to them about your experience

9:47

in marriage or whatever , and so there's there is

9:50

some of that where you're kind of up against the

9:52

line of personal and business . But when

9:54

it is somebody that you started with a friendship

9:56

with , that line is blurred

9:58

and then we would finish that conversation

10:00

and then I would have to have like accountability

10:03

conversations about hey , you're , you're not doing

10:05

this stuff , right , why

10:08

are you not getting these things done ? And

10:10

it while

10:12

I was coming at him from

10:14

a boss level , like a professional boss

10:17

, you know business side , he was

10:19

hearing it through the lens of personal yeah

10:21

, right , and so we , because two minutes ago

10:23

we were talking personal . That's right ? Yeah , that's right . And

10:25

so there was a lot of disconnect and I had to learn

10:27

how to do

10:29

that , the timing of it , and there were

10:31

plenty of times that I needed

10:33

to . You know , I would say , hey , I need you

10:36

to meet me out at . You know , such and such , we're going to

10:38

sit down . We're going to , you know , break bread . We're going to talk

10:40

, you know , have a dinner together . But we

10:42

need work and figure out this relationship

10:44

and have some clarity

10:47

conversations or this

10:49

thing is not going to go well , you know , and

10:51

there was a long runway

10:53

that was given to him , you know , and

10:56

eventually , you know , he went

10:58

his different way because it just wasn't working out

11:00

here . You know it just became more and more difficult

11:02

.

11:02

Yeah , it is very difficult to

11:04

as

11:07

a boss and we talked about this in a couple of other

11:09

leadership podcasts that we've done earlier but

11:12

there is a line as a

11:14

boss where I'm supposed to carry your burdens

11:16

as my employee but you're not responsible

11:18

for my burdens , Right , Right , and

11:30

we've talked there for each other and helping each other

11:32

out and sacrificing for the other person's

11:34

betterment , Right , and so

11:36

that's a healthy friendship in

11:39

a relationship with a boss

11:41

employee . It can't be

11:43

that , as a boss I am I'm not a

11:46

bad boss is making his employees carry

11:48

his burdens . Right now , there's

11:51

a space for when an employee grows

11:53

into a management team and we're all kind

11:55

of growing this together .

11:57

Yeah , there's tons of that .

11:59

But at the same time , when I

12:01

had a project manager , that was the

12:03

first two years that they were with us . I'm

12:05

not telling them my personal stuff . I'm not making them

12:07

carry that burden . I'm not making them carry that burden . I'm

12:09

not talking asking of them

12:11

anything outside of what they're supposed

12:13

to be doing here , Right . And so there's all

12:16

sorts of lines like that where it's hard to be a good

12:18

leader for a friend , that when we

12:20

were equals and now I'm supposed to be your

12:22

leader and you're supposed to follow me

12:24

into battle here . That's a difficult

12:27

hill to climb .

12:28

Well , and mainly because I

12:31

am the boss . I'm in charge of your paycheck

12:33

, I'm in charge of putting

12:35

money on the table , I'm in charge of how

12:37

well the business is doing . If

12:40

I'm letting them know

12:42

some of the things I'm struggling with , or personal

12:45

life that I'm struggling with , it

12:48

actually hits them on both sides . Yeah Right , it

12:50

hits them from the personal side that they care about

12:52

what I'm going through , what I'm dealing with and whatever . But

12:54

it also puts them on a little bit of shaky ground

12:56

. Business wise of like oh crap

12:58

, I didn't realize like he was struggling like

13:01

that . What about my job ?

13:02

Yeah , I'm going through

13:04

this divorce and I'm thinking about leaving my wife

13:06

. Shoot , I thought about renting an RV and just driving

13:09

for the next three months across the US

13:11

. Yeah , and you're sitting there as my friend saying

13:13

, okay , so should I put a resume ?

13:15

together . Uh-huh , should I start looking ?

14:01

I'm so sorry bud .

14:02

I hate to hear that about your relationship . What

14:05

should I do about me ? Right ?

14:11

And so , yeah , there with any employee , anybody

14:13

that is I'm going to say it this

14:15

way but is under you , right , you're

14:17

over them as far as the boss . You

14:20

shouldn't be sharing your personal life information

14:23

with them , things you're struggling with . When

14:25

you have a friend or family that's

14:27

working with you , it's natural .

14:29

It's going to happen . It's going to happen .

14:31

Either you share it with them or they're going to know about it . Yeah , they'll

14:33

hear about a Thanksgiving dinner , they're involved in your

14:35

life Right , so it breaches

14:38

that thing without you doing it Right

14:40

and so it causes it can cause

14:42

a lot of issues and upheaval

14:45

in the company , some mistrust

14:47

. I mean all sorts of different things .

14:49

So , all of that said

14:51

, that's our warning of why we don't

14:53

like it and the difficulties of it . If

14:56

you are doing it , if you're currently in

14:58

a , have an employee

15:00

or work with someone that is a spouse

15:02

, relative or friend , we are

15:04

going to talk through how to set it up to

15:06

where your relationship is

15:08

not on the line just because

15:10

there's some tension at work , right

15:13

? And so the key thing that we want

15:15

to do is we want to create a system that

15:17

highlights failure . So

15:19

you aren't the bad guy , right ? We want the systematic

15:22

way to say hey , jared , man , listen

15:24

, this is what we talked about , this is what's

15:26

not happening . Man , I feel like you

15:29

don't want to work here , like you're not doing

15:31

this , where I'm not saying hey , you're not doing

15:33

what I want you to do , so get out of here , you're fired

15:35

. So how do we do that ? How do we set up a

15:38

system that highlights the

15:40

failures so you can see

15:42

when you're failing , and it's not me constantly

15:44

berating you about how bad you're doing at your job

15:46

. First

15:53

thing that we have down is an open conversation about fit and what happens if this isn't

15:55

working . Right , right , leaning on caring more about our relationship

15:58

than our business . So let's say you're

16:00

, you're married to my sister , right ? You're my brother

16:02

in law and you're looking for a job . I need

16:04

a project manager . You've you've been in construction

16:06

before . Might be a really good fit . Yeah

16:08

, first thing I'm doing is sitting down with you

16:10

saying , hey

16:19

, jerry , listen , before we talk about this job , I want to have a conversation

16:21

about what I'm looking for and , if this doesn't work , what that's going to look like . I want to

16:23

have that open conversation about if you do or don't fit

16:25

as Jared the individual

16:27

, not Jared , my brother-in-law I want to make sure that that

16:29

fits and I also want to circle the spots

16:31

where you don't fit . So we're both aware of those . Right

16:34

, you've never done project management , so organization

16:36

is going to be a struggle for you . If

16:39

you're not organized , I'm not going to be able to keep you here long-term

16:41

. Right , let's talk about that . Where

16:43

you wouldn't fit , hey , where else do you think ? Here's

16:45

the job description , jared . Where else do you think you're not

16:47

going to fit with this ? Look through this and let's have that conversation

16:50

about fit right now , because we have

16:52

that with every employee . Every employee isn't going to be 100%

16:54

perfect in any category . I

16:56

want to know where you think you're not 100% and

16:58

where I might be able to help you circle some of these

17:00

, and then we're going to look at that and say , hey

17:03

, so if this starts going downhill

17:05

, maybe this isn't a good fit for you here . Right

17:07

, and we both agree . Yep , if I can't

17:09

get that stuff , I don't

17:11

learn and I don't grow there . This wouldn't

17:14

be a good fit for me . Cool , we've had that conversation

17:16

. Next , if this isn't

17:18

working , if that's the case , if you don't like

17:20

this , I don't want you to feel like you're trapped here

17:23

because you're working for your brother-in-law . I

17:25

want you to be able to have the open conversation with

17:27

me that you're not enjoying your job and

17:29

I'm not going to take it personal . The same

17:31

time , if I don't think that we're a good fit

17:33

working together , I'm going to have that open conversation

17:35

with you . Are you okay with that

17:38

? It's going to feel like me saying , jared

17:40

, I don't think you should work here anymore

17:42

because it's not a good fit

17:44

together . That doesn't mean you're bad

17:46

at your job or you shouldn't be doing this . It's just

17:48

there's different personalities that fit when

17:50

it comes to business and I don't want to ruin

17:52

our personal relationship at

17:55

all . Right , so that having that sort

17:57

of conversation upfront before

17:59

even starting starting the job and

18:01

once you start the job , doubling down on that conversation

18:04

but fit as well

18:06

as what happens if that fit doesn't work out .

18:08

Yeah Well , one of the things like the , the a

18:10

big reason for that is you

18:12

know , you're the . The goal is to

18:14

spend some time being proactive in

18:16

looking at the future and planning for if

18:20

the worst case scenario happens . I want to protect

18:22

our relationship and protect the company

18:24

. Yeah , right , so let's , let's

18:26

look at that . What you don't want to

18:28

do is we're

18:31

going to rely on the trust in

18:33

our relationship and when something like

18:35

this happens , we'll just figure it out . Yes , right

18:37

, don't , don't do that

18:39

, right , if you're like , no , it's me

18:41

and him . We talk well , we communicate well together

18:44

. So if something like that happens , we'll just figure it out at the

18:46

time of . I promise you that doesn't work , that will

18:48

not work . You

18:55

have to set these things up . You have to spend some time , look into the future and forecast . Hey

18:57

, if this doesn't go well , if you don't perform at the job , if I feel like our relationship

19:00

isn't working and it doesn't jive

19:03

, it doesn't groove with the way the business is running

19:05

just all the stuff you just spelled out yeah , like

19:07

you've got to think through that and have that conversation

19:10

wrapped

19:12

around in the effort of . I want to

19:14

. I think that

19:16

you and I together in this business

19:18

can make it successful .

19:20

Yep .

19:20

But I don't want that at the risk

19:23

of our relationship , right , and

19:25

so let's have a conversation about

19:27

how do we maintain the relationship

19:29

moving forward when and if hard

19:31

decisions have to be made . Yep , right , that's

19:34

right .

19:35

I would say advice

19:37

on that conversation too . When that hard

19:39

, when it gets hard is , I'm

19:41

going to make it about what doesn't work for me

19:44

not what your issues are , but

19:46

what doesn't work for me , and I'm

19:48

always going to make it about our relationship

19:50

first which it is it is about the

19:52

family relationship . If you were my brother-in-law

19:54

, let's say so , my conversation with you would

19:57

be something like Jerry , listen , man , we've said

19:59

from the beginning we don't want anything

20:01

to harm our personal relationship , and

20:04

I've started to get a little bit of inkling

20:06

in my brain that's starting to hurt

20:08

that because of just

20:10

us working together and at this point we both feel

20:12

the tension . Right , you'd have to be an idiot

20:14

not to know , not to feel something . And

20:17

so I would say , jared , I'm

20:19

starting to get like there's some frustrations

20:21

and some other stuff , and I guarantee I

20:23

know that you've got frustrations with me too . I

20:26

know I'm learning and I'm new with this as a

20:28

leader and trying to grow my team , but

20:35

I want to take care of our relationship more than I want this company to just boom

20:37

right now , and so because of that , I feel like you should be looking for

20:40

another job , because I want to make sure that

20:42

we're guarded here . I want to make sure that you

20:44

are safe and have a good

20:46

income for the family that you have

20:48

, and

20:56

I don't want , I feel like if we keep going the way we're going , it's going to harm our relationship and I don't want that at all Right

20:58

, that's the conversation . I'm trying to protect our relationship . I'm not saying Jared , you didn't show

21:00

up for the third day in a row on time , jared , you didn't do this , jared

21:02

, you didn't do this . Instead , I'm saying

21:04

listen , big picture , I care about

21:06

our relationship and I feel like we're starting to get to a spot

21:08

where it might be a couple

21:11

months away from harming if it continues how

21:13

we're doing it . We're just not a good fit business-wise

21:15

, but we're a great fit personally . So

21:18

, that's kind of that conversation , but along

21:20

with that , the next thing we

21:22

have on our list to really set up these

21:24

protections is you have to have

21:26

a bigger financial runway than with

21:28

a normal employee . So if

21:31

you're , especially if you're a spouse , but

21:34

really more if we're talking friends

21:37

or family , my brother-in-law , if

21:39

I'm Jared , my brother-in-law , that I'm

21:41

ready to lay off because this isn't working . It

21:44

is very difficult to say , hey , jared

21:47

, you suck at what you're doing . Because

21:49

of that , I'm going to be blamed for your kids

21:51

and wife not having food potentially on the

21:53

table . I'm going to be blamed for you getting

21:56

kicked out of your house because you can't find any more work

21:58

. I'm going to be blamed for all of that

22:00

and I'm going to feel that blame and I'm going to blame

22:02

myself and my sister is going to probably blame

22:04

me and my nephews and nieces are going to blame

22:06

Right , and so you have that

22:08

whole level to where , if you're a straight employee

22:10

, that's , it is what

22:12

it is . I'm sorry , like you , can't work here anymore

22:14

.

22:15

Well , and on the employee level , when you've

22:17

got a non-friend-to-family employee

22:19

and it comes to the place

22:21

where you need to let them go , you need to fire them

22:23

. You are

22:26

aware of their like

22:28

the personal impact that that's going to have

22:30

and sometimes you factor

22:32

that in to the decision that you're going to make . I

22:34

mean , we've had , we've had guys that got

22:38

to the place where we knew we had to let them go and

22:40

they literally just had a baby . Yep , you're

22:42

like oh my gosh , right

22:45

, Yep , and that's

22:48

a really , really hard decision to make

22:50

. Yeah , now compound

22:52

that with it's my brother-in-law . Yeah

22:54

, it's my brother , it's my . You

22:56

know , whatever , right it

22:58

, it makes it really really difficult

23:01

to make that decision and I promise you're going to be

23:03

a month , two months , three months , six months past

23:05

, when you probably should have made the decision

23:07

before . You have to go . Okay , I have

23:09

to , I can't go any further . And

23:12

so that's where this comes in of like you

23:15

need a bigger financial runway when you hire

23:17

friends and family . To

23:19

knowing yourself , everyone

23:22

wants to be like oh no , there's business

23:24

and personal and if it comes to it , I'll cut them at the time

23:26

up Shenanigans . That's

23:29

just not the truth . That's not how it works .

23:31

And when we say bigger financial runway

23:33

, we always say we want you to have three

23:35

months of salary that you could just burn on

23:37

any new hire for the next three months . I don't

23:39

need you to make us money . If by then it's

23:42

not working out , I'm gonna let you go , and I just lost three

23:44

months of your pay , right ? Bigger

23:46

financial runway means I want you to have five months

23:48

, because at the end of three months , if it's not working

23:50

out Jared , listen , this isn't working

23:52

out . I love you . I love

23:54

you being a father to my nieces and nephews

23:57

and a husband to my sister . But

23:59

for both of our sake , I think you should

24:01

look for another job . But I'm

24:03

going to pay you for two more months to job hunt

24:05

because I want to make sure you're taken care of on

24:07

my dime , because you quit your job to take

24:09

this and I want to make sure you're taken care of . So

24:11

you've got two more months of paychecks

24:14

that I'm going to pay to make sure that you can find another

24:16

job . If you get a job before , then I'd

24:18

love to not pay you all that , but if not , I want to make

24:20

sure that you're covered in

24:22

this little gap time between leaving

24:25

here and going there . That's right . That's the financial

24:27

runway we're talking about to where I can throw

24:29

money at . Relational to where I can't

24:31

be blamed , where , if an employee

24:34

is not self-aware that they're messing up , they're

24:36

going to blame me .

24:37

That's what happens .

24:38

The self-awareness of oh you know what , maybe

24:40

I did mess up and maybe I'm not the best at

24:42

what I was doing at this company . That

24:45

allows an employee to say you know what I get

24:47

, why I'm being fired . A lot of times people

24:49

don't have that self-awareness and so we

24:53

are trying to eliminate the need for

24:55

that to where I can say listen , I'm going to

24:57

not make you in a bad position , I'm going to pay for

24:59

the next two months to keep working here . Next

25:03

, we've got all that thought through . We've got the money

25:05

, we've had the conversations

25:07

. We think they're a perfect fit . We've

25:09

talked through . If they're not a fit , next

25:11

thing we're going to do is take our

25:13

job description that we push you guys

25:15

into writing all the time , and I'm

25:17

going to define that job description to

25:20

a three page , three

25:22

pages of what they are

25:24

I'm going to be more clear than

25:26

ever in terms of where the accountability

25:28

is , of what you need to be doing for this job . I'm

25:31

going to write it all out . I'm going to edit it as

25:33

you're working here , I'm going to change things , I'm going to

25:35

put things into it to make sure that you

25:37

know in writing what you are

25:39

responsible for , that job

25:41

description . I mean , it's

25:43

crazy how many times people don't do this because

25:45

it's like hey , they've kind of been helping me

25:48

. My brother-in-law has been a crew for a while . He

25:50

of me , my brother-in-law , has been a crew for a while . He knows how things run . All right , you're hired

25:52

. Now I need you to start doing it this way Nothing in

25:54

writing , no way to say

25:56

hey , jared , look right here . Remember how

25:58

we said we needed this done on every Friday . You

26:04

haven't done it yet since you've been working here . It's written right here man , you're

26:06

the one . Don't make me fire you . You're firing yourself by doing this , man . So that written

26:08

job description is more

26:10

important in this hire than any other hire to

26:13

really spell out how they're

26:15

going to be held accountable and how they're going to

26:17

fire themselves if they don't do this stuff right ?

26:19

Well , and what that specifically does

26:21

is that , if it

26:23

gets to the place where you have to make a really hard decision

26:25

, you're not the bad guy . Yep , there

26:28

is a . We agreed . Was

26:30

this clear ? Yes , did you

26:32

understand it ? What Was this clear ? Yes , did you did you ? Did you understand it

26:34

what your job was ? Yes , do

26:36

you agree that you didn't do it ? Yes

26:39

, I agree that I didn't do it . Okay , so here

26:41

we are .

26:42

But I tried Right . Yeah , I understand

26:44

, but it's not done , man , I can't you

26:47

know , it doesn't . I don't . Money doesn't grow

26:49

on trees .

26:49

I don't , I'll tell you what it

26:52

will be a difficult conversation , either way you look at it

26:54

.

26:54

It doesn't matter .

26:55

Right , but if you don't have a

26:57

job description to go off of , it

26:59

is your opinion that

27:01

they're not working out here . Yeah , yeah , that's

27:04

it . And now it's the opinion of

27:06

my brother , of my brother-in-law Like

27:09

. He thinks I'm a jerk , he thinks I'm

27:11

a slack ass . He thinks I can't do my job . I've

27:13

been working . Why does he not know he doesn't

27:15

do anything every day . I know what he does . I saw him playing

27:17

video games . It becomes

27:19

that thing where it's an

27:21

opinion that you're

27:23

not doing that person's not doing the job . You're

27:27

not doing that , that person's not doing the job . You , if you have this document , at least you have

27:29

something concrete to set in front of them that if they want to get upset about it and

27:32

point fingers , I don't know what to

27:34

tell you . Man , we , we , we agreed upon this

27:36

. You were .

27:37

You've got facts in front of me that you didn't

27:39

do this stuff . That's right , yeah . After

27:42

you've got your job description written , you've got it all

27:44

laid out . The next thing once you start

27:46

working with that person is we're going to

27:48

do weekly accountability meetings . Now you need to be doing

27:50

that with every employee you have . You need to have weekly

27:53

check-ins . This is what you're supposed to be

27:55

doing . Let me help you do better at your

27:57

job . Let me look over your jobs . Let me go

27:59

through this . We

28:01

teach with our coaching what we call

28:03

PAL meetings , project manager action lists

28:05

that we do with our project managers

28:07

, where we sit down

28:09

and we go through every single job 30,000

28:12

foot view . What's going on here ? How can we

28:14

get this better ? How do we ? You know anywhere

28:16

that balls are dropping . We kind of help them see that

28:19

and we coach them through what they should be doing ?

28:20

How have you been taking care of the jobs ? How have you been taking

28:22

care of the clients , exactly ?

28:24

And so we want to be doing that , but

28:26

also relationally . I

28:29

wanted a two-way accountability

28:32

conversation once a week about the jobs

28:34

, about the projects , and the same

28:36

thing that we do in our PAL meetings . But at the end of

28:38

it I'm saying all can't be . I can't be this sensitive

28:41

person that can't hear critiques

28:43

of them . But I say hey , jerry , listen

28:45

what

28:57

isn't working for you in the way I'm

28:59

a leader here . I need I need to know that because

29:02

I want , I want that feedback and I'm

29:04

going to give you feedback too . Like there's some stuff that you've been doing

29:06

that's been bothering me , but I want to have an open conversation to

29:08

make sure our relationship's protected , right , right

29:10

. And so let's have that conversation at the end of this

29:12

meeting . Now , you're not going to do it every week forever

29:14

, but let's let's , for the next month

29:16

, two months , three months , have that part of the conversation

29:19

that we're doing . That kind of leads into

29:22

my last one , I think .

29:24

I think that specific one , I think that's one

29:26

that you and I have done over the years I mean

29:28

over a decade or so of working together

29:30

. We've done that tons and I

29:34

don't know if it was regulated as

29:36

much of like we do it every week or every other week

29:38

or once a month or you know that type of stuff that

29:40

we were specifically talking about that , but

29:42

we did it on a regular basis early

29:45

on and

29:49

it's gotten to the point now where you and I both have kind of a thermometer of like it's getting

29:51

a little hot . I think we need to have a conversation .

29:53

There was this one time that I can very

29:55

specifically remember I won't go to the specifics

29:57

, but it was when there was

30:00

some changeover in companies , when we're moving from

30:02

the construction here and there's some moving parts

30:04

, and we had a disagreement where we

30:06

didn't see eye to eye on how things should be done

30:08

. And I remember saying

30:10

both of us sitting

30:12

in your office I remember saying listen

30:14

, I don't need you to agree

30:16

with how this is being built , but I need

30:18

you to understand why I'm

30:21

doing it this certain way and if you're

30:23

not okay with that , we shouldn't be working together

30:25

. I understand you don't agree . I

30:27

totally understand you don't agree with this . I

30:29

don't need agreeance and I don't need a

30:32

sign off from you , but I do need you

30:34

to say I understand where you're coming from

30:36

, clark , and I trust you on that , and I can still

30:39

be on this team . And those are the conversations

30:41

that are very hard to have . But if you

30:43

don't have that , the

30:45

other person doesn't have the opportunity to either

30:47

say you know what ? I

30:54

can agree to disagree on this and continue on with this person . Because if you don't have that buy-in

30:56

from the other person , two years later they're still thinking about it . Oh yeah , it's still

30:59

festering in there , right . And so those

31:01

type of conversations relationally

31:03

with friends , even more important

31:05

with family members are

31:07

the hey , listen , I don't

31:09

need you to understand or I don't need you

31:11

to agree . I just need you to see

31:13

how I'm what , how and why I'm making this

31:16

decision , how I'm not trying to hurt you in it and

31:18

if , if you can't be here

31:20

because of that , I understand . I totally

31:22

understand .

31:23

Right , well , and I think the big point about that

31:25

is , you know , going along with the

31:28

three topics that we've just gone over , you

31:32

, as the leader , you

31:34

need to understand that once you set the foundation

31:36

, you have the conversation , you have the job description

31:38

, you've got all that put into place . It's

31:41

not a one and done . Yeah , right , you

31:43

, as the leader , need to continue

31:47

to check in on that . Hey , just want to check in . Where are

31:49

we at with this ? How are you feeling ? Right , you need

31:51

to stay engaged with the pulse

31:53

of that person Because

31:56

a lot of times

31:58

they're you know , they're

32:01

going to be hesitant to come to you . They might not

32:03

want to say something that you know because

32:05

they agreed to this bottom line thing early

32:07

on . They're like I'm just not going to say anything , but

32:10

again , that stuff is the stuff that's going to fester

32:12

. Yeah , and you want

32:14

to have the confidence in your people

32:16

, especially when it comes to friends and family , that

32:18

they would raise their hand like , hey , we've got this relationship

32:21

. Yeah , of course they would raise their hand . That's

32:24

you relying on the personal

32:26

relationship for a business response

32:28

? Yep , right . And you

32:31

, you as the leader , need to

32:33

just within the same with any employee

32:35

, but especially friends and family . You

32:37

need to be checking in with them on

32:39

these things . Where are you at with this ? How

32:42

are you feeling about your job ? This

32:44

, you know , I , I with us relationship . I

32:46

want to protect the relationship side . I want to

32:48

make sure that there's nothing that's going on that's

32:50

causing a discord in that .

32:52

Let's have that conversation well , and and so

32:54

, with what you're

32:56

saying and continuing that , let's talk about

32:59

spouses as well , because that's where it gets super sticky

33:01

, because my brother-in-law I can

33:03

let go and we can be upset and we can wait

33:05

three weeks and get a beer and be like listen , I get it

33:07

, yeah , I can't wait three

33:09

weeks to sleep in my own bed

33:11

. No , usually , yeah , right , like , I

33:13

need to have that conversation differently for

33:15

a spouse . And I think one

33:18

of the hardest parts of all of this and

33:20

the stickiest parts is not black and white Like we're making

33:22

it sound is that you think you're doing

33:24

it the right way , right , and I think you're doing it the

33:26

wrong way . Who's right , right , and

33:28

so you're getting fired for doing it the exact

33:31

way that I asked you to do it , and

33:36

that's not fair because all of that stuff that happens

33:38

in any of these relationships . And so I think with a spouse , the

33:41

hardest part is when I'm at home , right , I'm

33:43

thinking about my wife , right , if

33:49

I'm at home and I my job as a husband . And now we're getting into a different area of of

33:51

of relationships and spouses . But

33:53

I believe , as a husband , my job is always

33:56

put my wife first , put her first

33:58

in anything that happens

34:00

and make sure that she is always taken

34:02

care of . I want her to be the princess that that

34:05

she is Right , and so that

34:07

I can't have that same attitude towards an employee . I can't want my employee to be the princess that she is right , and so I can't have that

34:09

same attitude towards an employee . I can't want my employee to

34:11

be the princess that they are right , I

34:13

don't want to put them first in every scenario , because

34:15

, as a business owner , the

34:18

business comes first over me , over you

34:20

, over us . If the business is healthy

34:22

, then we all have jobs here , right ? And so that's

34:24

where some of this , the crossover

34:26

, starts happening . So my advice on that

34:28

like , let's say my wife was going to be driving

34:31

to our job sites to take pictures and keep our social media

34:33

posted let's say that's her

34:35

job , one of the jobs on

34:38

her description , and we're 17

34:40

houses behind on getting those done and we

34:42

haven't posted in three and a half weeks and

34:44

it's fallen off and we've had conversations

34:47

. Yeah , I'm going to , but I've got to the kids up and

34:49

I'm going to . I'm going to . What

34:51

I'm going to say is there's

34:53

really two options here . Either I'm going to take it over and

34:55

just start doing the work , or I'm going to say

34:57

hey , babe , I know that

35:00

you are so busy that

35:02

there are higher priorities in our life that you're handling

35:05

outside of taking pictures . I know

35:07

you're busy and I know that you're

35:09

taking care of our kids . You went

35:11

to the Costco yesterday , and

35:13

I get it , because I wasn't going . Someone had

35:15

to go buy food , right , I'm justifying

35:17

how they're acting first and I'm saying I

35:20

understand that that is more

35:22

important than driving to a house to take pictures

35:24

. So why don't you let me handle that ? Why don't

35:26

you let me hire someone to do that ? Because your time

35:28

is more valuable to do what you're

35:30

doing than to go do that stuff . Now

35:38

she might be watching a lot of TV at home and not hanging , maybe not be doing as much as I want her

35:40

to be doing . That's a marital conversation , not a business conversation . Either

35:43

way , what I'm going to say business-wise is

35:45

hey , why don't I take that

35:47

off your shoulders ? It seems like it's been

35:49

three weeks and it's just really eaten

35:51

your lunch . It's taken a lot out of you . Why

35:54

don't we put that on the shelf ? I'm going to handle it for a little

35:56

bit . I'm going to hire I got someone , an intern

35:58

that's coming in that can definitely handle that , whatever

36:00

it is , but I'm going to figure out

36:02

how to have someone else or myself take

36:05

over that task without saying

36:07

, hey , if you don't do this , I got to let you go . Right

36:09

, it's more of a slow moving towards . What

36:11

do you want to do here , because a

36:13

lot of times people say what they want to do , but

36:16

that's not really what they do or want to do

36:18

?

36:18

In my head .

36:19

It'd be great to do this , but really

36:21

, in all reality , I don't have more than 10

36:23

hours a week to put into this .

36:25

Yeah Well

36:29

, and what I mean with with any of these friends , family or spouse , I think the biggest

36:31

complication is that you

36:34

, as the business owner , your job

36:36

and what you need to be doing is

36:38

making the best decisions that you can

36:40

make to put the business in the best place

36:43

possible to be successful . Yeah Right

36:45

. When you have friends , family and especially

36:48

spouse , your

36:50

decisions end up being well

36:52

relationally . I'm not

36:54

going to make this business decision because

36:56

of how it's going to impact relationally yeah

36:59

, that's . If I've got a friend right

37:01

. I don't want to make that decision because I don't want to hurt

37:03

my friend's feelings yeah Right , and that

37:05

that could harm your business . When

37:07

it's your wife and you know that if

37:09

you make this decision , it means

37:12

that you're going to have to take on more work

37:14

, business wise , which means that

37:16

she's not going to have to . She's

37:18

going to have to take on more work at home or

37:20

I have to stay late because of this

37:23

thing , so now she's got to go pick them up and

37:25

take them to the baseball game all by

37:27

herself . All of those things that

37:29

are happening . The

37:31

majority of your decisions are now

37:33

being made associated with . How

37:35

is this going to affect my personal life , and

37:38

that's why the husband-wife-spouse

37:41

relationship in a business

37:43

becomes so difficult .

37:45

Yeah Well , and there's not a money exchange , right , right

37:47

, usually . Usually business becomes so difficult ? Yeah , well , and there's

37:49

not a money exchange right , usually usually like if . If my wife was helping out doing our QuickBooks

37:51

or doing the photos . Like I said , there's not like

37:53

a paycheck . She's making , right , she's helping

37:56

me out in her head , she's doing

37:58

it for me , to help help my day get more efficient

38:00

, but if she didn't do that for two weeks , we don't

38:02

lose any more money . We're not paying

38:04

someone to do it . Who's not doing the work ?

38:06

Yeah , so it still needs to be done .

38:08

Yeah , and so that's where it kind of gets complicated

38:10

, because it's like I can't threaten money Like

38:12

hey , I'm paying you to do this and you're not , so I got to pay

38:14

someone else to do this .

38:16

Right .

38:16

That's kind of a little more black and white . With

38:18

a family member , yeah , where if it's a spouse

38:20

together , you know , and it's hard to hard to tie the draw those

38:23

lines .

38:35

Well , I don't know if you've experienced this , but for me , my wife and I have times that we're

38:37

in a really healthy spot and we have times that we're not in a healthy spot . And

38:39

if we're in not a healthy spot and

38:41

I went to my wife and called accountability

38:44

, be like hey , I see that you're not really doing

38:46

the job that you need to be doing . Like

38:53

this is a conversation that's not going to go well because the separation of business personal

38:55

is impossible .

38:56

Oh really , oh really , You've never been ?

38:58

how about those socks have been laying next to your bed for the last

39:00

three weeks . What are you going to do about those ? You know

39:02

all of that stuff , right , and it becomes it

39:05

really , on both sides . It becomes petty

39:07

, it becomes , you know , and it's like it's not worth it

39:09

, it's not , it's not . It becomes very , very

39:11

, very difficult . That's right .

39:13

So all of that being said , you

39:15

know what the

39:17

best move on doing

39:19

this if there is issues

39:22

in that relationship or if there's not issues

39:24

, having a third party person

39:26

to help negotiate some of these and navigate

39:29

some of these roads that you're going down

39:31

. That is one of the things that we do really

39:33

well with ProStruct Alliance , and this isn't a

39:35

sales pitch , but what we love

39:37

doing is getting into

39:40

your company and working for your company , not

39:42

for you , for your company . And so we set

39:44

up every single conversation . I mean

39:46

, I remember a family that we've

39:48

done some coaching for , where it's a father-son

39:51

type thing , but it's like hey

39:53

, just so you know , your dad didn't

39:55

hire us as his representative

39:58

. I'm here to make sure this company

40:00

does well , so I don't care about your feelings .

40:02

You're motivated for the success of your business .

40:03

Yes , I don't care about your feelings , I don't care about his feelings

40:05

, I care about the company being successful . And

40:07

I'll tell you exactly what that means and

40:10

how each of you are harming and each of you are helping and

40:17

that allows it to not have this other relationship of hey , that's not right . It's a different

40:19

angle of like . When I tell my brother-in-law that he's

40:21

not doing a good job , he might be thinking

40:23

well , that's because I didn't show up to your birthday

40:25

and I didn't come to this and I didn't do this . And

40:27

there's these other glasses that he's seen

40:29

it through . Where if it's coming from a

40:32

coach that's involved in the company that's saying

40:34

hey , man , you're not good at project management

40:36

, bud . Then I look at the

40:38

owner of the company as a coach and say , if

40:40

you don't do these things , you got to let him go . Man , I'm sorry

40:42

I'll be the bad guy here , but , like

40:45

bro , you're taking advantage of your brother-in-law

40:47

, who owns this company , right ? And so those

40:49

type of conversations we can have very easily

40:51

with people .

40:51

Which is funny because I've actually done that . I've

40:54

had that conversation

40:56

with a family friend's

40:59

situation

41:01

that they had the week before , had the same

41:03

conversation , yeah , and it went really bad

41:05

. It did not go well Because

41:07

, like you said , all the baggage that

41:09

comes with that conversation is is

41:11

being factored in . I had the exact

41:13

same conversation and the people that

41:15

were like that's not fair , you can't say that . They

41:18

heard me say it and they were like , yeah , you're probably

41:20

right , I did . You know , like they

41:22

could see it . Right , it was

41:24

an immediate reaction when it was friends and family

41:27

having the conversation of like defensive , I'm

41:29

not going to listen blah , blah , blah and pointing out

41:31

the other people's flaws when it was me

41:33

. I don't care

41:35

about any of the relational

41:38

stuff here . What my motivation is is the growth

41:40

of this business and we need to get the relationships

41:42

in order for that to happen right

41:44

. And they were able

41:47

to hear it because it came from

41:49

that , that third party person . That's right , and

41:51

whether , whether you go with us , you

41:53

know , as a ProStruct Alliance coaching

41:56

member , or you find

41:58

a therapist , a therapist or

42:00

you know . I mean , in the past we've had a friend

42:02

of ours that is , he

42:05

knows the both of us and doesn't

42:08

have anything to do with the company . He

42:11

signed on like hey , if there's a problem that

42:13

you need somebody to sit in and just hear

42:16

and talk and mediate , I'm willing to

42:18

do that Right . So

42:21

it has proven to be a valuable

42:23

thing for us as well as the

42:25

clients that we're coaching .

42:27

Listen , if you have currently hired

42:29

, or are thinking about hiring , a friend , family member

42:31

, spouse into your company , we

42:34

would love to give you a free one

42:36

session of a conversation of how

42:38

to navigate that .

42:40

We'll hear your personal situation , what

42:42

you got going on , and we'll process through

42:44

it with you .

42:44

If you want to hop on a call with me or Jared

42:46

, go to .

42:47

ProStruxure . It'd be better with me .

42:49

Write in the comment of who you want to talk to

42:51

and that person will call you . But go to ProStruck360.com

42:55

and go to contact us and

42:57

submit there and request

42:59

Clark , if you know what's good for you

43:01

. But we would love to have that conversation

43:03

. I mean for us it's a long-term relationship

43:05

that we're trying to make with contractors and help them grow to the

43:07

next level . Whether you want our software

43:09

, whether you want our coaching , no matter

43:12

where you're at , we love to help out

43:14

and give you a free session to have that conversation

43:16

about it . If you don't want

43:18

the software , no problem , we're not trying to sell you

43:20

stuff . We

43:25

know that as you grow in your company we've got plenty of ways that we can help

43:27

support . So please don't don't feel bad giving us a call and having that

43:29

conversation even though you're not ready to do coaching

43:31

or anything else . We just love to meet you

43:33

and help you out in those situations

43:35

. That's right . That's right , all right , that's it

43:37

. Thank you so much . Talk to you guys next week

43:39

. See you then .