Ep 46 - Much Love For The Techs

0:07 Welcome back to the Head, Heart, and Boots podcast. I'm Chris. And I'm Brennan. Join us as we wrestle with what it takes to transform ourselves and the businesses we lead. I don't know. What'd you think? I don't know. It's kind of serious. Should we laugh? Chris. Hey, man. There's another day and another dollar. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You don't even have your earmuffs on. You don't even know what I'm saying. Are you reading my lips? You are sitting next to me. Hey, so... The video world show. I've been... I had an experience this week that I wanted to share about, can I?

0:48 Before we dive into our... Yeah, is this when you got sick and were projectile vomiting? No, no, I don't want to... I was trying to put that behind me, actually, until you brought it up again. Yeah, it wasn't... That's funny you said behind me. It wasn't a very good experience. Okay, so... I had an interesting experience Monday, Monday night. So my wife and I got involved in a forest school for our two young boys. And actually our teenage daughter was involved for a little while, but it was just a, it was a forest school. We'd meet out at this place in the woods and they would like teach him survival skills and stuff. Really cool, like how to start a fire in the rain and all kinds of cool stuff like that, edible plants and whatnot. And so it was a really fun experience. And we would go, they'd have family events sometimes.

1:29 We'd show up, big bonfire and whatnot. Long story short, we got connected to this kind of coming of age wilderness event that our daughter is going to be going to. And they had a gathering. So they do this thing called monthly council. And it's kind of built off this old tradition of gathering as a community and open sharing, supporting one another like tribal council. So it's very woo-woo, naturalist, new agey slash whatever. And so my wife, Kara, thought, okay, this would be a great chance for us to meet this community. Our daughter's going on this experience in Central Oregon later on in July, and it'd be good for us just to meet everybody and whatever.

2:09 So we took the whole family. And this place is way out in the woods. And so we get on this compound and there's a yurt and there's this cool cabin and stuff. And everybody's gathered in the back. And there's, I don't know, eight or 10 of us. It's not a huge group. And there's a candle lit in the center. And I'm like, oh boy. And there's a fair amount of patchouli and Patagonia and Teva sandals. You're getting the picture, right? Like this is, you know, a little bit of a hippie vibe to it. And I'm not making fun of this, by the way, but I just like, this is not how I grew up. Like I grew up in a very... kind of just traditional Christian, you know, just conservative, whatever, in town, in the city.

2:52 So we arrive and I'm immediately, I'm like, this is weird. This is going to be weird. Okay, let's just ride this out. Try to keep an open mind. Which is just always my internal reaction because I grew up with that stuff being sort of viewed as woo-woo. Yeah. Right? And it's just hard to shake that. The introvert in me is freaking out. I know, right? Telling you that. So there's eight or 10 of us and our kids are the only kids there. And I'm just, I'm very, I don't know if skeptical is the right word, but I'm just uncomfortable. It feels a little awkward to me. And so they lay out this gal who's facilitating. She kind of lays out the rules. Hey, here's the design. We do this once a month. And this is just, this is kind of an ancient tradition. And she unpacked a little bit. And then she said, okay, now we're going to go around the circle.

3:33 And everybody is going to share what is alive in them today. And you've never met any of these people. I've never met any of these people. It's the first time we met. Oh, yeah. And so I'm thinking, okay, what does that mean? And she clarified and it made sense. Like, what's going on inside you? It's just kind of a fancy way of saying that. Like, what's happening inside you emotionally? Like, whatever. Like, okay, I'm trying to think about what to say. And she's like, and don't think about it. Don't plan it. Stay in the moment and let's give each other our full attention and focus. Okay. I'm like, okay, I like the idea of that. So they start at the other end of the circle and we go around and share. And again, in my mind, I'm just battling with, this is weird. I don't know what I'm going to say.

4:14 This is woo-woo. Why do we need a candle in the middle? Like what's going on here? Yeah. And finally, as I was listening to these people, and I mean, we're sharing all kinds of things were coming out. None of us knew each other before this circle. We only spent two hours together total. As I start to hear people share from their heart, I mean, we're talking about relationships, sex, our work, our disappointments, our relationships, good things, really negative struggles, all the things kind of runs the gamut. I got to me and I shared just something that's been going on for me and just kind of what's alive in me. And by the time we got around the circle, it was really interesting to watch the shift in my kids too. Because my kids were thinking it's really woo-woo.

4:57 They were just kind of hanging back. Their eyes were kind of wide and they don't know what they're going to say. But they each ended up saying something and offering something. Yeah. And it was just funny watching as I started to open my mind a little bit. Mm-hmm. And I just accepted the weirdness and I just kind of sat in it and I just participated. It really started to feel good. And I'm like, what is it about this that feels good? And I think it's that we just, most of us don't have that kind of honest community that we're plugged into. You know what I mean? Yeah. Where like you share what's really going on, things you're disappointed in, things are going well, ugly feelings and situations that you're stuck in or involved in or whatever. It's like we hide so much.

5:38 Yeah. Like we're prepped and conditioned so much to put out all the good stuff on Facebook and Instagram. And even just when we're at church and we're chatting with people or we're at our kid's soccer game or something like that, we share. There's so much pressure to share just the good stuff. Yeah. And sitting in this circle where people are sharing gratitude about things that are going well, but they're also sharing the dark things, it felt really good by the end of it. Interesting. And as we were driving home, it's about an hour and a half from where we live. As we were driving home, it was really interesting to hear what the kids had to say about it. We have a 10-year-old, a 14-year-old, and a 17-year-old. And they expressed the same thing. They're like, it's so rare that people gather and are really sharing honestly about their life.

6:21 Yeah. And so I guess the metaphor for me, because I've been thinking about that ever since Monday, as, okay, why did that feel so weird? And then why did it seem like it was such a good thing for us? We're going to go back next month and we're going to try to make a habit of it when we're in town. I think the metaphor is that there are so many things like that in life where it feels weird, awkward, even maybe not right, based on how we were, quote, brought up or whatever. Out of the ordinary. Yeah. out of the ordinary that we we avoid that you know it's like the moment it feels weird or awkward we take that as a sign that we shouldn't be doing it you know yeah And I think the more that I put myself in those situations, the more I realize, no, like that's a really natural reaction as we're exploring new things.

7:07 Yeah. That new and weird and awkward doesn't mean bad. Yeah. Or discounted. In fact, many times, like most of the time, it doesn't mean bad. It just means I had to hang in there long enough to kind of wait through the awkwardness and the weirdness to discover the value of it. There's probably a metaphor there for a lot of what we do in our businesses. And it just is throughout life, right? It's like most of us don't, and I, including me, like I don't press through the awkwardness to see what's on the other side. Like see, okay, why are these other seven or eight people, why many of them had come for the second, third, fourth, that they've always come to this. Like, why are they here? Yeah. Like a lot of times I don't hang around long enough to discover, well, why did my friend tell me to do this when this thing's so weird? So anyway, there's something about a lot of situations.

7:49 You know what I mean? Yeah, totally. I can think of a lot of situations where I think we introduced to some of our previous partnerships and teams where we introduced some concepts or some ideas. Oh yeah, it totally happens all the time with consulting. Yeah, it's just like, it's kind of weird at the beginning or it seems counterintuitive for what we're used to seeing. But they end up having some really neat positive impacts. I mean, I can think of a lot of situations where that happens. I am quick to discount that stuff, mainly because I feel so awkward that I can't get over myself. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I mean, I was like, I'm just not going to do it. A hundred percent. I left out some details by the way, because I didn't want people to shut down.

8:31 I'm like, there was a couple of things like ritual, just nothing weird. Nothing like, Oh my gosh. You know, like murdering babies. Yeah. There's not like a, there wasn't like a doll that we all like put a pin in or, you know, nothing weird, nothing like that. But there was some other stuff that whatever, it was weird. There's weird parts, but man, the net effect though was incredibly positive. Yeah. Okay. I have a weird And I think that there is potential and the topic, there's some potential for us to challenge people's perspectives in the way that they look at their staffing. And so I think kind of this is such a lame tie in. But going back to what you're saying is it's possible that as we talk about some of this, this onboarding idea, these training concepts is that they may sound counterintuitive.

9:19 They may go against it. What you've been taught, what we've learned or whatever. And I would just petition that folks just keep an open mind. And really, where there's a lack of clarity on execution, like what to do, I would just encourage people to be spontaneous and to really think about it in the face of their own business and some of the assets, resources, and people that they have on their team. And how could they flex that or maximize that to get the best results? So I think I'm leaving a little bit of today open of don't get too dialed in on the what and more of the why. And then use your own creativity and the things specific to your company to develop a what, a how.

10:00 You know what I mean? So anyways, we kind of did a 180, but it is loosely tied into where you... where we started. No, totally. And I think that's a really good question is the why question. Like, I think you can also apply that to that awkwardness of why do I feel awkward about this? Yeah. Because lately for me, I don't have a concrete answer. I don't have any good reason why it's so weird. Fear. Yeah, right. It's just, it's fear or, and of course, a lot of times it's, you know, there's scenarios where it's like, what will other people think of me? Yeah. Well, and I think there's some realities associated with not knowing the outcome. And that in and of itself creates anxiety, right? Like I think, especially if we tie that into people's businesses, I think when we start problem solving with something that feels a little out of the box, or maybe there's not a real specific direction that we can look that says, hey, this will work.

10:49 Yeah. that we get gun shy because we're like, man, I'm, I could be playing with fire with this idea. Right. Change has risk, right? It has a risk. I think that's a thing, you know, I think it's easy for us to chalk it up is that it's fear, it's emotion, it's all these things. And it is some version of fear, but I, it's okay for people to realize it's risk. I'm like taking a chance. I'm like, a lot of our businesses are built on you bet. And sometimes you bet right. And there's just a reality that sometimes you bet wrong, right? What's the whole fail and fail quick? Yeah. Is kind of the idea. As long as you don't bet the farm, you can always recover, right? Yeah. You can iterate through it. Okay, one other little fun thing I want to share. So those of you listening that have kind of followed Brandon and I from the jump, the old Mit Resto Mastery podcast, the beginnings, you probably heard me talk about mindfulness and us talk about mindfulness and meditation and just different forms of it.

11:37 Neither one of us is a guru or some yogi or anything like that. But it's something I've dabbled in. And every time I do, it's just had... value. And so my son, who's 14, he just finished his eighth grade year and he was having some final tests and he was nervous about it because he's really been trying to get straight A's, which is like that he doesn't get that. He doesn't get that from me. But he's like, dad, I struggle with test taking sometimes. I feel anxious and anxiety. I want to get an A so bad. It messes with my head when I get into it. I can't think straight. And yeah, I totally get it. I think most of us can understand some version of that. And I suggested he do a body inventory. Oh, yeah. And I've taught this to some clients. In fact, the very first time I taught it to a client was to a GM at a restoration company.

12:19 I was doing executive coaching and I taught him how to do it. He taught one of his techs. Maybe some of you've heard me tell that story. And so I told my son, Jack, I said, Hey, well, have you ever tried meditation to get ready for a test? He's like, no. And so we went out in our sunroom and we sat on our chairs and I led him through the body inventory. And I thought, oh, he just thinks this is weird. This will never go anywhere. Well, two days later, this was like last week or something. He said, Dad, I took my test and I aced it. Oh, wow. And I'm like, sweet, how'd you handle like the anxiety and stuff? He said, oh, I tried that body inventory thing just while I was sitting in my desk. Nobody knew. Yeah. He's like, it was kind of my own little secret. And he's like, I did it. And I just took a couple minutes and then I felt a little bit better. I said, really? So do you feel like it helped? He said, I think so. Because I don't know.

12:59 I did a lot better than I normally do. I felt better about it. So anyway, I thought that was fun. Because yeah, same kind of concept, right? I mean, it is weird. Yeah. Like mindfulness is to a lot of us. And I think especially business people, we seem to be so pragmatic and results oriented that anything that doesn't give us a very concrete and specific return on time investment, you know? Yeah, yeah. We just kind of put it in the useless category, you know? Or I don't have time for that stuff. Yeah. Oh, I think we've seen it be effective. Yeah, we've seen it. Yeah, exactly. I think the whole mental health thing is definitely coming on line for a lot more people. I think so. They realize the value. Yeah. I think so. All right, dude. You ready? You ready to get tactical? We're going to get a little tactical today. Yeah, let's do it, man.

13:40 Okay. So here's where I'd like to focus our time with our listeners. I want to talk about techs and onboarding. I think almost every few episodes, at least some nod to the fact that hiring right now is potentially the hardest it's ever been. I'm trying to stay away from the drama, but I think there's a reality that the blue collar environment, production environments... are struggling. We have a generation gap and it's been a challenge, I think, for all of us in hiring core staff. And I think you and I have worked with a lot of people. There's social channels where those higher area, those higher level roles tend to be easier to network with prospects, to connect with prospects, because we can use things like LinkedIn and some Facebook applications.

14:26 But probably LinkedIn is probably the more pro version of that. So there's some social networking that people can still use to headhunt and find those key roles. But I think all of us are just struggling with onboarding technicians, our field staff. And we had a conversation with a... Well, with Rachel from Accelerate. And one of the things that we were talking about was in her days when she was leading Titan and how they kind of settled on this idea. And I think both you and I kind of cringed at first because it kind of stands in the face of this employee engagement slash loyalty thing that I think all of us have kind of a mind for. She talked about how important it was to be able to come to terms with the fact that it's likely you're going to have technicians rotating off your roster.

15:11 Coming and going. Consistently, right? 18 months kind of time frame. And so the onboarding phase, that equipping phase, needs to get shrank down to as tight a timetable as possible. Get them productive as fast as you can, get the most ROI. Exactly. And I wanted to talk a little bit about that. And I think the place I want to start with is just unpacking the mindset. And again, it's very possible that a lot of you listening have already turned the corner in a lot of respects here and that you're already thinking outside of the box to overcome some of these roadblocks. But for a lot of us, we're still struggling with these old kind of mindsets in terms of employees and how long they stick around and how that affects our culture and those kinds of things.

15:53 And so the mindset here is, I want to encourage people to understand that when we're asking people to come on as a field technician... Whether it be on a mitigation side. I mean, I think it probably applies to our recon teams. If you've got some kind of in-house trade staff, that tends to look a little differently because I think a lot more trades people look at it as they're already getting into a career when they decide, hey, I want to focus on carpentry or I want to be a drywall or an electrician or something. I think because we've understood specialty trades for so long that people look at that more as a career, even when they start. Mitigation technicians, though, are contents cleaning technicians.

16:36 I think for most of them, and part of the challenge with this is as an industry, it's seen as general labor. Yeah. It's not a specialty trade yet, which is probably... Hopefully, somebody like RIA will continue to maybe invest energy and research into that. How do we become a specialty contractor doing what we do? But my point is, is that we're asking people to do some pretty nasty stuff. Let's be honest. Oh, sure. A lot of them see it as an entry-level job. A lot of them see it as general labor, non-skilled trade. And a lot of folks just realize it's nasty. Yeah. Right. It runs the gambit of gross. And so there's this reality of, yes, as much as we all want to have technicians that join our staff and stay for years that have some career path that we develop with them and they all turn into professional project managers.

17:26 There's a reality. We don't have that many open positions. Right. And there's a reality that we're asking a lot of times for technicians to be technicians for years. Right? That's what we want. We want somebody that's super skilled and confident. Totally. It'll hang in that wage range for 10 years. Right? Yeah. And the reality of it is what we're asking people is probably... It's just not going to happen in most cases. And so the challenge here is just for us to shift a little bit and say, okay, is it reasonable for me to look at my technical staff, invest in them, care about them, honor them, and realize that it's very likely these are 18-month to two-year positions tops?

18:06 And that means that unless I'm starting a new project manager position every few months, there's a reality that people are going to be on your team for 18 months and they're going to go away. It doesn't have to be bad. It doesn't need to be a negative. But there's a reality that you might even get great people and they're just going to rotate off your roster for plenty of great reasons. Sure. And it's not necessarily a negative. So I just want to start with that mindset. If we can buy into that, then how does that change the way that we look at what we do to onboard a technician? So some other factors that weigh in on this is I get people asking me often about certifications. Okay. I think a standard WRT cert is somewhere around $450, not including travel or loss of production.

18:53 Sure. Sure. And I think right now, based on COVID, a lot of that, your baseline certs can be done virtually now. Sure. And that may last forever. We don't know if that'll go back. Yeah. But my point is, is that for someone to begin getting some certifications, the expense is not enormous, right? It's not enormous. And so I think the challenge that I hear from a lot of people when they're asking me that question is they're asking for two reasons. One is, is there value in the certification? And the other thing is, is what if they don't stay? And I'd say the what if they don't stay thing is probably the heavier variable that people are concerned with. And so if we're challenging the mindset piece again, I would say that certifications have value, probably more perceived value to the individual you send versus the actual competency that they gain from the training.

19:44 Okay. Now, I understand there's advanced trainings that that's not necessarily true, that there really is some technical competency comes. But I would suggest in a lot of entry-level certs, a lot of it is you need to have some kind of experience to lay those building blocks on for them to have much value. Sure. But the perception for the individual who you are saying, Hey, I want to equip you. I want you to go to this training and walk away with an industry-recognized certificate. Yeah. Yeah. There's a lot of value in that. So then if we look at that cost thing, like what if they go away? Well, here's a reality check.

20:25 They're going to. They're either going to go away because they burn out and fail or they're going to go away because they determine there's no upward movement available on your current roster, which is totally realistic. And they want to go do something else. Yeah. Or they're just chasing the dollar. They're chasing the dollar. It's like right now, especially, it's like XYZ restoration companies paying 22 bucks an hour entry for their technicians. And I'm only getting $17.50 right now. And it's just whatever. It's going to happen. And I would say, though, that the reality of it is, what if I train people and then they leave? And I think the reverse question of that is, what if you don't and they stay? Right. Yeah. I think also we can bookend this conversation with... And I wondered how this might come up.

21:07 But a couple weeks ago, I read an article by Harvard Business Review and they were talking about... And it was kind of in the context of big companies. But of course, everybody is feeling the recruiting pitch. Everybody. It's not just the trades. It's not just small businesses. it's everybody is hunting for talent and production people and the whole gamut. And they talked about the importance of keeping an open door for employees to return to your company. Yeah. I thought that's a really important conversation that we don't really think about or talk about very often. Because Rachel is not so much of a pragmatist that it's just like people are units. That's not at all who Rachel is. No. And that's not the nature of her comment.

21:49 Her comment was pragmatic, though, and practical in the sense of, we all see that. We all see our technicians. They rotate off. I mean, on average, I mean, it's probably different in every business, right? But you're typically not going to keep a technician-level person for more than two or three years. Even a really great one. Yeah. That you've treated well. But it's possible you can get them back. Yeah. It's possible that two, three years later, they come back for a PM position. Yeah. or a field supervisor role, or they've all of a sudden got an interest in sales and they love the industry. And, you know, so I think that's something for us to frame this conversation with of, let's prepare our business. Let's set up our business for the long game. Mm-hmm. Right. So that, you know, the good ones that we bring in, we've created an environment where one, we can onboard them really quickly and get them productive for as long as they're going to stay around.

22:38 Right. And we've also created an environment where it isn't taboo. It's not like we aren't bad mouthing people that leave to go chase the dollar or chase an opportunity. But that there's this open door policy for winners, people that fit our culture, to come back. Yeah. To leave, go away, try something new, make some money, what have you. Yeah. And we've had some really great people. Oh, yeah. That have chased an opportunity and come back around. And it was really positive. Yeah. Inevitably, they kind of find out, okay, the grass wasn't any greener. Yeah. Right? And maybe that whatever it was in the moment that felt really important, it kind of faded with time. Yeah. And they recognize that it was a good team, that people cared about them, right?

23:20 Yeah. That people invested in them and they do circle back around. We have a client right now who he had an early employee 10 years ago. Yeah. Yeah. Those working in their business and young. Yep. You know, young, just... Go-getter. Yeah, go-getter. All the things, lots of positive. There's some attitude stuff, some maturity stuff. And they ended up parting ways. And this individual went on and worked for a different company in the industry and ultimately came back. Total rock star. Total game changer figure in the business. Absolutely. Absolutely. But it was only because they parted respectfully. And it was the parting of ways was done with an open hand. Yeah. And like, hey, this isn't, we're not done forever. Best of luck. Go make your way.

24:01 And so I just think that's an important thing for us to talk about as we talk about onboarding texts is that even if they do leave after two years, it doesn't necessarily need to be the end. Yeah. Right. Yeah. So let's think about this from a tactical perspective then. Okay. If we can buy into this idea that people are going to rotate off, sometimes it's going to be for bad reasons. Right. We all face those. But a lot of times we have great people rotate off for a lot of reasons for them personally and their families that made sense in the moment. So what do we do about it? And I love where you went with that. I think I would refer to that as mentoring as leaders. And so let's hang that in that pocket for a minute. So one of the things I'd say tactically, that in order for us to continue to be successful in the current hiring environment, and really this is probably just good business practice in general, is let's establish a mentality inside our company.

24:50 For instance, probably most of us are thinking right now as mitigation technicians. So our mitigation manager, your ops manager, your GM, you, whatever the size of business and the way your org chart looks, let's teach our team to adopt a mentoring mentality. And here's what I mean by that. You and I have talked a lot. We had a guest earlier in the year, Clint Pulver, and we talk a lot about his concept of this marrying of accountability and connection. Hmm. And this idea, again, is that we've got to have processes and procedures. We've got to have clear expectations that we hold our teams accountable to, period. End of story. But along with that, we need to create connection. We need to create this empathetic relationship where people understand their employees' real life.

25:34 I would offer... The word connection is hard for me. I get it. I think a lot of us have a version of what that means to us. I think another good word is love. Love and accountability. Right. You love using the word love. No, I do, right? I feel like it's shock factor a little bit, but I know where you're going. But you understand what I'm saying? I think sometimes connection, that can be a pretty ambiguous thing, but we all understand the different aspects of love. It's right. It's like it's seeing your employees as people, humans, treating them, they have equal, they have the same fears, hopes, desires as I do, right, as a leader. Yeah. And seeing people for who they are, right, and caring for our people genuinely. But marrying that up with the accountability of, hey, in order for a business to succeed, we have to establish certain standards and requirements.

26:18 We have to perform. We have to perform. It's not all kumbaya. Exactly. But I think what's important about this mentoring mentality is this idea that you're talking about is... If I can not allow my ego to take control of my interaction when an employee, it feels like they've just rejected me. Okay, right? Because dude, this is something I struggled with as a leader because I am a loyalist. Okay, that's no one else's fault. That's just an internal wiring mechanism. And it's like, you're either with me and loyal to the end of days or you hate me. So I would be challenged by employees that didn't agree with me or didn't think that my company was their end all.

26:59 And my ego could flare up in that. And I could demonize that person. I could make them, oh, you're not one of us anymore. Yeah. And there's a reality that at times when I... You're dead to me. You're dead to me. And there's times when I was being more mature where I would connect with my ex-employee. I would stay connected with them. Shoot them a text from time to time. Both of us have. Right? Many employees. Yeah. Like, how are things going? Oh, that's awesome. I mean, you and I just met not that long ago. go with an ex-employee of ours that we've maintained relationship with. But my point is, is that that always made more sense. And a lot of those relationships that I maintained some kind of mentoring connection to, I respected them. I liked them. They did a good job for me when they were on my team.

27:40 And then I just showed this care about the trajectory that they're on and the new adventures that they're seeking. How is that going? Just some check-ins from time to time. And a lot of those people did come back. Oh, yeah. Because I maintained some form of a relationship. And I think a lot of people now can do that via LinkedIn. You can do that via Facebook. There's a lot of amazing platforms, right? For you to keep this front of mind connection, knowing that people mature. You know what's funny? I know it's a wild idea and some people are like, who has time and money for that? But in this article, they were talking about holding alumni events. Oh, sure. And I'm like, Yeah, that's interesting.

28:21 God, that's great. Like, I think we tend, again, most of us have that default, that home team kind of feeling, like you're in or you're out. But it's like, what if, what if once a year, you had a company barbecue and alumni get to come and they get invited? Yeah. Like, what would that potentially do for your staffing and recruiting situation? And what's the real cost associated with that? Is that cheaper than a recruiting company charging you 20 or 30% of a base wage? Right. Right. And you think about, okay, who's going to show up to an alumni thing? It's the people that are most engaged with your culture. Right. That maybe even miss it. Right. Right. They valued it. Clearly. They valued it. I mean, I guess somebody might show up for some free beer and dogs. For some free beers and dogs, yeah.

29:02 But again, hey, let's not weed them out either. But no, I love that idea. All right, let's take a minute to recognize and thank our MitResto Mastery sponsor, Accelerate Restoration Software. And I'm fully aware by the way, that when I say those last two words, restoration software, that that instantly creates heartburn for some of you out there, right? Because we probably all fall into one of two camps when it comes to software. We've either cobbled together kind of a version of free website tools and spreadsheets just to make our business work, Or we're in the camp where we've adopted one of these existing restoration platforms, you know, one that has all the bells and whistles and supposedly does it all.

29:47 But we can't get our team to consistently adopt it and input information to it. Yeah, and that's really where Accelerate has honed their focus. They've created a system that's simple, right? It's intuitive, and it focuses on the most mission-critical information, i.e., guys, your team will actually use it. Let's talk about sales, right? After years of leading sales and marketing teams, the biggest trick is getting them to consistently update notes about their interactions with referral partners and clients. And the essential piece there is there's got to be a mobile app experience. And in our experience... the solutions that were previously out there were just too cumbersome and tricky to use.

30:32 Yeah. Imagine guys, how your business would change if your entire team was actually consistently using the system. Do yourself a favor, go check these guys out at xlrestorationsoftware.com forward slash MRM and check out the special offers they're providing to MRM listeners. All right, let's talk about actionable insights. Owners, GMs, you can't be your business's expert on all things estimating. You might've been three years ago when you were writing sheets in the field, but the industry's always changing and so are the tools. If you're the smartest person in the room when it comes to Xactimate Matterport, how does that scale? You're the bottleneck.

31:13 I know I'm preaching to the choir, but this is where Actual Insights comes in. They're a technical partner that can equip your team with the latest bleeding edge information and best practices, and then update them with webinars and training resources when the game inevitably changes again. For this reason, we recommend Actual Insights to all of our clients. Yeah, three of the kind of big things that stuck out to me when being introduced to AI and their team. First off is this consistently updated training. I mean, at the end of the day, these guys are the experts. They're out front all the time. They're constantly learning new trade secrets and ensuring that your team's got access to those things. A 3,700 plus page database of Xactimate templates.

31:55 I don't know what else to say here other than don't reinvent the wheel. It's already available. Download it, copy it, use it, bam. Yeah. database of commonly missed items. I think this is huge. So many of us can change the numbers by just moving the needle a couple points and those commonly missed items can make all the difference in the world. So go check them out at value.getinsights.org backslash FCG. So it's just this idea of remembering that we are connecting with people at different places in their personal development. Yeah. And there's a reality that an 18, 19, 20-something-year-old technician on our roster has got some more maturing that they're going to do.

32:42 Oh, yeah. And if we can just not get caught up in the current state of who they are today... And we can keep an open mind of the fact that they're going to mature just like we do. And in a couple years, they may be the super tech we've been waiting for because they've had an opportunity to grow up a little bit or just see the other side. Right. And so I think just maintaining that connectivity, that mentoring, we talk a lot with people about just getting into a basic rhythm of using LinkedIn to create a connection of folks that are prospect employees. Right? Technicians, project managers, estimators, and just keeping that relational circle built and knowing that it could be really effective for you later.

33:22 So that's one thing, one aspect, I think. Again, the what or the how, I think people can be creative there. Could be a monthly barbecue, a quarterly barbecue for alumni. Again, keeping connected with people on social platforms and just giving it 5 or 10 minutes a day. where you're intentionally reaching out to people and just saying, Hey, how's it going? Send them a DM, send them a text message or an email to check in. I think there's immense value in that. Going back to your topic of how we onboard and bring techs up to speed, just to put the wraps on that, This mindset, this way that we're looking at text, the way that we're cultivating our relationships. And ultimately, it comes down to recruiting. How do we keep fully staffed with great people that match our culture?

34:05 We've talked about this in past episodes, but I think it's worth mentioning again before we launch into some of the tactical stuff is the way that a person's first day... on the job really does set the tone for everything that comes after. Yeah. Right. And it's not easy because we're in a firefighting business of sorts, right? It's like every day we show up, we could have a different agenda, a different thing on our plate. And so holding to our battle rhythms and stuff, it's challenging. And we know that. But that first day, when that person shows up at 8am or 7.30am on day one, The little things of people reaching out to them and greeting them and them learning people's names and being introduced to all the key figures in the company so they feel welcome and they feel valued, all of those things.

34:50 And they also feel like they're just not a fish out of water. They just feel like, okay, I'm here for a reason. Everybody knows that I'm starting today. They feel like a part of the team from day one. Yeah. But even the little things like having their uniform kit ready for them. Yeah. Right? So they have a shirt and they're not wearing somebody else's shirt that day. Right? Or something. Their PPE bag. Yeah. They got it all. They got it all. Yeah. Right? Their name badge is ready. They have some swag to take home and whatever. Some notepads. All the things. Just we welcome them properly. Yeah. And give them a sure footing. I think that's so important. And yet so few of us do that well. rarely is that done. And to be fair, I mean, it was something that we struggle with. And I think over time, we got better and more intentional about it.

35:32 You know, you started doing the orientations with all new employees on a cycle. And that makes a huge difference as well. But I think just... That's, I think, an important opener to you. The tech onboarding is just how do we make them feel? How do we greet them? How do we get established on that very first day, week that they're on... And I think the why connection there for people, again, just kind of trying to stay focused on a mindset shift versus the tactical stuff is, I think we are challenged by the type of scenario where most of us are looking for a technician to prove that they should be on the team. And it's almost like we start right out of the gate telling them, you're really not part of the team yet. We're still trying to decide if you're going to hang on long enough for us to invest in you.

36:16 And I think that that is the wrong thing. message to send probably forever. But clearly in the current environment, guys, we are the ones selling the position. The days where we just have so many people lined up to fill our labor roles where it's like, no, man, it's your job to prove that we're going to keep you. Please make a shift. Make a subtle shift and realize that from the very first day you start working with somebody, you're selling why it is that they should stay on your team. Yeah. Why there's value in the position that you've offered. Why is there value in the relationships that they're going to create? One of the ways that you could do this, a little tactic here is assigning a battle buddy.

37:00 And we've talked about this before. But get somebody on the inside that's not a boss, that's just a peer, that can keep an eye on this new prospect. Yeah. Teach them the norms. Teach them the norms. Like the unspoken stuff, right? Yeah. Here's how to win. Yeah. The non-process procedure stuff. Yeah. Yeah. Right. Hey, here's these people. Here's kind of their personalities. Here's how they kind of, you know, you can be most successful working around them. Here's do's and don'ts in our culture. Exactly. And just checking on from time to time. Hey, dude, are you struggling at all with the time card piece? How's, you know, whatever, right? Hey, how's the training going? We're going to talk about that. Yeah. next. But I totally agree with you that onboarding sets the stage for absolutely everything.

37:42 And we just have to make this shift right out of the gate of, please do not start a relationship with a prospect where you're lording over them, waiting for them to prove their space on the team. Let's start investing and caring for them right out of the gate. Yeah. If you make a mistake, right? It's a wrong hire. Okay. Okay. But I think what we struggle with is we're going to not spend any money on somebody, but then we're going to allow them to be a very low productive team member for up to three, six months at a time. And even at the end of that, because we never really invested in them, they don't feel engaged at all. And so they leave anyways. Yeah. Like, I just don't really think we have a choice. Okay. Yeah. So it's that adage of consider people a hero until they prove otherwise.

38:25 Right. Right. Oh, you know what's interesting about that? Yeah. So I have... I've had some experiences overseas, predominantly with the military. And one of the... I had an Iraqi citizen. Actually, it was a village elder. And we were... I can't even remember the context of the conversation. But one of the things he said to me was, what's different about the US and here is that in the US, you have to prove that you're trustworthy before we're friends. And here, we're friends until you show me you're not trustworthy. Oh, that's interesting. Interesting. And it was like, I remember in the moment going, Oh my gosh, that is so true. And probably more so depending on how you're wired naturally. But there's this reality like, guys, we can't start our working relationship with a new prospect from this mentality of, I don't trust you.

39:11 I don't know if you're going to be a good fit. Prove it. To let's just start engaging them. The case is they're going to be a hero. And if red flags pop up and we have performance failures, then execute them. Of course, there's an integrity piece here. I mean, we could spend a lot of time talking about the philosophy of this, but you don't hire somebody that you think is maybe a dud. Right. Right. And so therefore, you're here because we want you. Right. You're wanted. Yeah. We're excited to see you perform, right? That should be the posture we have. Yeah. But so much of our hiring is guided by desperation brain, where it's like, we're playing. We're plugging holes. And if we're honest with ourselves, we are absolutely in the mindset sometimes of, well, they'll be able to do it. They'll be able to do the things. We hired a question mark.

39:53 So that certainly plays a huge role. And again, I know when we have these conversations, I always want to circle around with all of this sounds easier on paper. Like I get it. Like I understand. So, okay. Let's think about our training a little bit. So here's a suggestion I have. And many of you are great at this. You've got an onboarding system dialed in, you have training dialed in. But here's what I see commonly. And you and I have talked a lot about this. In fact, I think we've had a lengthy conversation with super tech guys. Oh, yeah. Eric and Larry about it. But I think what we do often is in service businesses, we lean very heavily into on the job training, OJT. Mm-hmm. Totally makes sense, right? Like a lot of service-oriented work, you need to do it.

40:35 You need to practice it. And it's in that on-the-job training that you develop the skill set to understand how to fill the role well. But I think what happens... And that's fine. But there's two things that I see very commonly happen. And I think that this stunts us. One is that the on-the-job training is literally just shadowing. It's like you throw somebody in a has experience and time and grade. Other than that, there's been no formal expectation established on what training even looks like. And then the other thing is, is we leave the content that we train on up to the current job flow. What kind of work are we getting? Is there a lot? Is there none? Am I having trouble getting these guys on a job site long enough?

41:18 Have I gotten a string of bold jobs and I really haven't had a chance to teach water? Whatever. And what I would petition people to reorient around is there's going to be some upfront training costs, i.e. payroll hours, that you should be willing to invest in to shrink the timeframe. So instead of it all being a whim, of what's the quality of the person I assign this new technician to? What's their competency level, skill set? How good at they are sharing ideas and concepts? And again, not being open to whatever workflow looks like. We need to realize that there's weeks of investment that happen in a person. And again, people cost sensitive people.

42:01 Good for you. I get it. But guys, a few hundred dollars in payroll over a couple weeks at a time to ensure that your new technician is focused on the specific things they should be getting trained on, regardless if we have a job to send them to, and regardless of the training quality of other team members. If we can go at that in a real proactive manner, we're going to greatly reduce how long they're on the team before they understand the basic concepts to be successful. And it's worth every single penny. I would rather spend money, payroll hours, for someone to train inside my shop versus letting them be on my team for six plus months at a time and really not have them have an ability to fill a core team member role.

42:45 Yeah, I wonder, it's important for us to maybe qualify what we... Oh, deem like core? Yeah, what deem a core technician. Yeah. Because I think that's another variable. I mean, you and I encounter this all the time. And I think it's just, again, it's a product partially of desperation brain, right? But it's this view of the technician role as purely a labor function. And that's not how you and I view the technician role. So why don't you describe that? Because I think it'd be helpful. Yeah. I think a lot of people have tiers. I think they look at their technician staff in terms of competency and there's some form of tiers with one, tech one, tech two, tech three, senior tech, whatever you name it. Sure. But the idea is that...

43:26 So a couple core thoughts. One is, we believe in having folks on your payroll that can fill what we would call a core technician role. And here's what we mean by that. It's a qualification of competency. skill set, adaptability, capabilities. And that is, can in time with training, does this individual model the behaviors, the attitude, the internal wiring that with exposure to training and time in the field, can they eventually do all the core tasks? tasks that we would expect from a technician. And what we mean by that is, could this individual go out to a job, determine cause of loss, create a moisture plan, and actually execute or lead a couple people on executing a job, taking great care of the client, and turning in documentation or submitting digital support that we can invoice that project?

44:21 Yeah. Okay. And now for some of you, that's different. Some of you have models where you have like a mitigation PM of sorts that goes out and they establish everything and then you have laborers that show up. Or your BD person, your sales rep is the one who goes and locks down the work authorization and then the technical staff takes over. And so this is a little bit different. And again, there are so many ways to skin a cat. But our point is, is that when we look at staffing, and we've had a variety of environments that we've worked in. When we look at staffing, if you have four technicians that are core technicians, meaning they can go out and do everything from sign a job to prepare the documentation to support an invoice, the whole thing.

45:03 You can give them very little labor support, very low skill support on a temporary basis and expand your workforce immediately. Oh, yeah. We can go from going to a couple jobs a day to now I can go to four plus jobs a day purely because I invested my time and energy into four people that can reach that core competency level. Yeah, the leverage is huge. It's huge. And now I support them with temporary labor. I support them with sub-staff, whatever the case may be. So anyways, that's yours and I's belief, is that we eventually want to have people filling up payroll positions that fill that core competency. Now, that being said, there's still some tiers of development. We might have a new team member that really is in that tier one, that tech one competency level.

45:46 But again, when I was hiring them and when I'm judging their performance, I see someone that can eventually You can do a core tech, tech two, tech three kind of scenario. So anyways, good call there. That's how we look at it. So onboarding, let's think about this. Don't leave training on the job training. It's still on the job training, but don't leave it to chance. And here's what I mean by that. If you haven't yet, I would highly suggest... And you know what? Honestly, reach out to us. I'd be more than happy to provide you a template to get you started. Okay. It is critical that every role on your team, but let's just focus in on technicians. That's where most of the pain is right now is they should have a training outline that they're following.

46:27 And when we have an opportunity to do it live on a job, great. But if we don't based on workload or work type, then you have to focus time in your shop, practicing the standard skill sets that a technician needs to learn. Yep. And so what that normally can look like, or this is just what we suggest, is that your training outline has a number of things on it. One is the core competency that you need to teach, obviously. But then there's a date and a signature block to where we can, in our engagement with the employee, get them and us to sign off on them reaching a competency level. It's not in question marks. It's not you six months down the road thinking that someone's got content or containment dialed in, but you don't really know.

47:09 Yeah. formalize that. Formalize the commitment to the training process and then formalize that graduation, if you will, or an acknowledgement of this person has reached a level of competency and they know how to do this task. And one of the ways that you can develop this pretty easily is look at your normal, let's say, mitigation process. From start to finish, from a first call to invoicing, What does that process look like? And then use that, identify the places that the technician holds in that process, and then start identifying what are the core competencies that I need to teach an employee to be ready to rock and roll.

47:49 And so things like that are going to be how we show up to a job and approach the front door and interact with the client. How do we go through documentation or digital documentation? How do we set containment? How do we bring equipment and stage? What does outlining a demolition plan look like? How do we mark out what needs to be removed and why? Those core competencies that helps a technician understand how to be a technician. Outline that. If it's two pages, if it's three pages, I don't care. But then you just very systematically, you go through that content and you build on itself. And then we literally at some point, whether it be a mitigation division manager, a GM, an owner, a senior technician, there's got to be this formal piece where we go through and eye to eye with our individual, we either watch them do it, we test them, we watch them execute that particular item.

48:43 And we're like, Hey, You're ready. Yeah. You're confident. I'm confident in you. Let's sign you off on this, man. So the point is, is you get done. If you do this, and we've tested this, and we've had clients practice this, we really believe that someone can become a fairly competent and highly productive individual in about 45 days. Yeah. 30, 45 days. Yeah. Meaning, are you going to send them to a complex loss on their own? No, of course not. Right? Right. But could they go out and do the majority of the functions, key functions of our role? Yeah. Absolutely. There's no reason not to. Yeah. It's totally doable. But it's not doable when we just keep throwing them in the cab of a vehicle, hoping that they're being exposed to what they need to get exposed to.

49:27 That does not shrink that timeframe. So again, assigning a battle buddy doesn't necessarily need to be the individual leading this training. But just formalize what you're going to teach a new technician. Because the vast majority of the training that they should get is actually in-house. It's not their IICRC baseline water certification. That's going to add some science layer on top of what should already be a fairly strong foundation of somebody that's been out in the field and been exposed to the tasks at hand. The operational understanding. They know what they're... There's something to strap that information to. If we just cold send somebody to a WRT training, that's tough for them to walk away with any extensive competency.

50:08 Again, so on that tactical side, guys, we just highly suggest that you formalize what a technician will learn and tighten that timeframe down. Get it shrunk down. Now, how do you do that? We can't always depend on whatever job that we have live. It means you're probably going to have to spend some payroll to have either a senior level person, or again, GM, mitigation department manager, whoever that leader is, and you're training that individual. It could be as simple as you've got a section in your shop and you do flood cuts. You set containment up. You practice the basics. You roleplay showing up to a customer's house in introducing yourself and what that looks like.

50:49 If you need to spend some dollars on payroll and have that individual because we don't have a job inside your shop for eight hours training, it's the best investment that you will make. It will shrink their onboarding timeframe and make them productive much, much, much faster. Yeah. And what does that mean? What kind of opportunity costs are associated with not being able to get to a job in time and we lose it, right? Or having people on payroll just burning hours on a job and the only thing they can really do is bring in some equipment and carry out some trash bags. I'd rather spend 8 hours intentionally than spend frivolously for 6 months having someone on my team that lends a marginal level of productivity versus an actual sincere level of competency.

51:35 Cool. Well, I think the other way that that contributes to the overall health of the company is that when there's just that basic level of discipline that we're applying to somebody's onboarding training, it also gives us a tighter, like a closer view of, is this person a culture fit? Totally. Totally. You know what I mean? You learn faster. You learn a lot faster before the drama rears its head. Before you have one of your veteran all-star employees coming and saying, hey, so-and-so, man, is really dragging the team down. And you're already three, four months into the drama building, right? Right. When we're intentional, even if it is just the 15-minute check-in, skill check-in, or that 30 minutes of inspecting some containment that they just built, just that disciplined interaction can help us get a clearer view of who this person is relative to our team culture much, much faster.

52:28 Well, I think too, you're exposed to coachability, attitude, behavior, core behaviors, communication styles, right? Like if I'm sitting and training somebody and I'm critiquing their first few performances, how do they handle it? Yeah. Is there 15 excuses why they didn't know and all that, right? Like those dumb comments that people make that clearly it's like, you are so uncoachable. Like you're so defensive. Yeah. That's all sorts of red flags. And if we can learn that in the first week to two weeks, if we've made a misfire on a hire, well, I'd much rather learn it that quickly than have somebody on the team marginally producing for three or four months at a time before we figure about it. You know, that drama piece, like how bad does it get before someone feels compelled to come tell us?

53:12 By the time somebody comes to you, it is usually a mess. It's normally bad, right? It wasn't one thing. It wasn't a red flag where somebody said, you know. Yeah. And so it's that whole concept of, right, C players turn A players into B players. Yeah. Right. Because the frustration, the irritation, the distraction, all that kind of stuff. And yeah, so it usually is because we just don't have our finger on the pulse of what's happening with our technicians, you know? So second phase here, because we alluded to it on the certifications. Let's get them signed off on our in-house training first. In some big franchises, they have everything that they're providing. They've got WRT certs and the whole mix.

53:53 But that's not necessarily who we're talking to here. There's a reality that get them signed off and competent in the core functions of the task. Meaning... Again, guys, this is containment, equipment setup, demo, cleanup. And probably the biggest one is the social skill of feeling confident and comfortable explaining the work authorization, asking that customer, greeting the customer appropriately. Hey, have you ever been through something like this before? Totally. Okay, let me... I'm going to walk you through the process. We're going to make sure you understand every step of the way. What is that social interaction like? Absolutely. No, I think you hit a nail on the head. It's part of the training that we need to outline that's required by our people is the soft skills side.

54:35 And here's a shameless plug. Okay. I know we're all struggling with... I think a lot of people hear this and they go, well, I'd love to. I've been thinking about that since the day I started my company and I just haven't gotten to the part where I can't. Listen, there is starting to emerge tons of resources. Everything from REITs, you know, REITs Academy to the Supertech universities. And Larry and Eric's team at Supertech, like it's all soft skills development. It's a few minutes every morning for a couple hundred bucks a month. Like there's no reason you shouldn't be teaching your technicians soft skills. Because again, if we're talking about core... behavior, core competency, how we carry ourselves as a technician is vital.

55:16 And I would say, this idea that we're just looking for someone with a ton of experience, well, good freaking luck. Yeah. Good luck. It's more about can you take raw clay and can you shape it into a certifiable technician? Yeah. And the way that we do that is we're going to have to invest in soft skill development. When we hire a 19, 20-year-old person onto our team, if you make the assumption that a good employee is going to be super mature and have their whole life figured out and have all these really great behaviors and attitudes, come on. When you were 19 and 20 years old, would that been the category that you fell in? For most of us, the answer is no. My head was straight in my ass at that age.

55:59 I'm not going to lie about it. So again, the soft skills part has to be a part of it. Okay. Certification. Here's again, this is all opinion. It's all opinion. I think certifications should follow after core competency has been established through our in-house training. And those certifications should be really played up. Yeah. Like, hey, I'm meeting with this individual to let them know they've got a cert date coming up. And we are so excited about the fact that, man, they've already completed all their core competency. They're 45 days in. They're already producing work out in the field. Hey, man, you're... He, she, here comes your cert. We're really excited to invest in you and get your certification.

56:43 And guys, I'd add this. And I have to be honest that we never made... This never became a consistent practice. I have a military background. Yeah. I'm really prone to making a big deal about how we wear our certifications on our uniform. In my mind, most companies that have any kind of weather besides sunny and 75 probably have some kind of jacket or even a formal uniform shirt, I would really suggest that as certifications are achieved by your personnel, make how they wear it, where they wear it, a really big deal. It really should be seen as a badge of honor.

57:25 It's some of the best money you can spend. It's credentialing. Yeah. It's like having the letters after your name in your LinkedIn profile. Totally. Totally. Yeah. I mean, for those of you that have a military background, I mean, if you went through... Dude, I had airborne wings. I got to tell you, man, between my combat badge and my airborne wings, those were the two proudest patches that I would wear on my uniform. They brought me a great deal of pride. And I wore them with honor. When you talk to somebody that had a Ranger Battalion patch or somebody who's been to some other type of school or training that people understood is hard... When you had that patch on, it brought pride. It said something about your skill set, your capacity, your mentality.

58:06 And I think we need to honor that in our industry. Because somebody that's gone through a WRT, ASD, they've been through some of the fire and smoke and odor control. Like... Guys, get them to put it on their uniform and have them wear that like a badge of honor. That's where the certification should come into play. Yes, it's adding competency, but more importantly, it's showing that you're investing in them. And it's normally on the back of them already showing they're willing to invest in their own training by completing the in-house requirements that you've established for them. Right? I think there's another thing we're saying too, is that it's very, very common in all different kinds of businesses, particularly large businesses, I think really understand this concept where a person doesn't go to their corporate advanced training, oftentimes for the first six or eight or 12 weeks while they're on the job.

58:57 So there's this whole kind of orientation period. They've got field training and stuff like that before they go off to the big corporate training at the mothership. And I've experienced that personally. And what I've found in my own experiences is you are so much more confident in that learning environment when you've had some time and grade in the field to get the context for it. Like I remember when I started at Cintas in my early to mid 20s, I was a contract sales rep. Well, I was already starting to... I was learning the process from my local GM and sales manager. And I was going out and I was actively selling. And there was a handful of people at the corporate training I went to two months later that, for whatever reason, had just gotten hired the week before.

59:37 And they were total fish out of water. Yeah. It was so... The information was so abstract. We were learning about the sales process and they'd never done it. But for me, I'd already gone through several reps. I'd spent windshield time with one of our other sales reps. I'd watched them sell. So I already had a context for all of it. I felt so much more confident and I was able to assimilate that information so much more effectively. Yeah. You know, but I think, but again, the tendency in our industry is, okay, let's hire them. Let's send them off, get them their certs like right out of the gate. And it just doesn't, they're not, they don't have a context for it to put that in for, they don't have a container to put that information in. Yeah. It's just math and it's just abstract info.

1:00:20 No, I totally agree. I totally agree. All right. So we've covered a lot of ground here. I mean, there is a lot. But again, I just... I want to dial us back to as we're wrapping this up. It's more the mentality and it's the why that I want you guys focused in on. And then let some... Again, some of the assets, some of the people on your team, some of the specifics about your market, your region, what kinds of tech schools, what kind of environment are you near... Let that derive what the what and the how that you execute on this. But just as a reminder, guys, we are fortunate when we find someone that we believe has the internal wiring to become a really quality team member.

1:01:04 It's your job to lead them through a process that helps them become a great team member. We can't assume that when we make the right hire, someone comes onto the team ready to rock and roll. That's just not realistic. And then again, don't be afraid to invest in people. Even though there's this fear that in six months, they're gone. A year, they're gone. It's going to happen. But if you maintain a professional mentoring relationship in the most... efficient way possible, guys. We're not talking about every person that crossed your path. You've got a one-on-one session with them. Use social media. Use a text message reminder from time to time. Use a calendar reminder to reach out, spend 15 minutes and connect with some folks from the past a week.

1:01:49 but just do something to remain connected and professionally represented to that individual. If you have someone cycle off your team that you like, that has value, that they were a good team fit, don't demonize them, which I made the mistake of doing far too many times. Support them, be excited about their new adventure. And you never know when that investment of time or energy or mental... It's going to come back. It will come back, man. It will come back. Okay, that's it, guys. Hang in there and we'll see you next time. All right, everybody. Hey, thanks for joining us for another episode of Head, Heart, and Boots. And if you're enjoying the show, but you love this episode, please hit follow. Formerly known as subscribe, write us a review, or share this episode with a friend.

1:02:31 Share it on LinkedIn, share it via text, whatever. It all helps. Thanks for listening.