Ep 7 - Part 3 Why Would Anyone Want To Work For You

0:02 Welcome back to another episode of the MRM Podcast. I'm Chris. And I'm Brandon. Join us as we discuss business, life, and legacy. It's business time. Hey, hey, brother. Yo. How you doing? I have one less child right now for the next two weeks. Oh, wow. I'm glad you added for the next two weeks. That would have started a little awkward. Actually, not quite. So yeah, about 10 days. My daughter, my 16-year-old is out of state. Wow. So we love our daughter, but it's really nice to have a break. She's probably thinking the exact same thing. Probably.

0:43 I'm certain of that. Yep. No doubt. Oh, man. All right. So today we're wrapping up. This is episode three, if you will, of a three-part series about a focus on attracting and retaining these A-plus players. Our first episode, we dove into this idea centered around recruitment, onboarding. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Episode two, we jumped into the idea of kind of really exploring our benefits and benefits, I think in quotation marks, doing a better job of... Yeah. Why would anybody want to work for us? Exactly. I mean, I think you literally asked that question. Yeah. Yeah.

1:23 Yeah. And so this final piece here, again, this is not a massive deep dive into this topic because ultimately what we're talking about here is culture, right? Company culture. What's our team dynamic? How are we leading our group? But where we're going to focus today is this idea of, all right, we've got them. We landed some killer team members. They started strong with us. We've identified ways to make our company more attractive and How do we keep them? How do we keep them there? What are the things that we're doing to give these folks more than just a job? That's where we're going to hang today. Right on. You want to take off with us? Lead us off here? Yeah. Yeah. You know, the first thing that comes to mind, I want to say we were in that 5, 6, 7 million mark.

2:06 But we had a marketing team, which really are salespeople, you know, that are out building referral partner relationships and stuff. One of our marketers came to me and said, actually, it didn't even come to me. What it is, they just started making videos. Oh, sure. Like for the company. Yeah. Like little... Fun social media videos, highlighting team members, job site, little interviews with technicians and started putting together these cool little videos. And I thought that is really fun. But we weren't at the place where... we could afford to just have that person do that. But it was clear they really liked making these videos.

2:47 And there's value. I think all of us realized, most of us haven't quite figured out exactly how to leverage it, but we know we've got to be active in social media. It's a great recruiting platform. It's also a great way for people to follow our brand, follow what we're doing and whatnot. And so that started some wheels turning for me of, okay, this is clearly something this employee enjoys doing. Is there a way? And I think I came to you and I said, I wonder, is there a way for us to allow this person to spend some of their time? Or is there a way for us to equip them to maybe grow this thing a little bit for us? Yeah. On the clock. Can we allow them to do that? And so I approached this employee and I said, hey, what if we did that on a little bit more of a routine schedule?

3:31 How much time would that take? Yeah. Like that video you did the other day of so-and-so at the job site, like that was really awesome. What would it take for you to do one of those a week or a few of those a month? Like how long did that take? And we got in this dialogue. And long story short, we ended up figuring out a way to... Give them the latitude to do this social media, this video production thing on a more regular basis. And I mean, it absolutely was a huge win for that employee. I mean, they were so blown away that we would want to help them do that thing that they were just doing for fun. They would have just kept doing it for fun, even if they weren't getting paid for it.

4:11 Mm-hmm. And the fact that we were going to let them do that on the clock to a degree, right, was just hugely motivational. And that person is still there, still growing at that company. Yeah. Their role is expanded. They're continuing to do all the media and video production stuff for the company. And it's just turned out to be this thing. And that was years ago that we made, we identified that skill. Like, wow, this person's really good at making videos and stuff like that. And eventually, we ended up investing in equipment for them. We got them a nice camera to record with. We got them lapel mics, so the cool audio. And it was something that really was a shot in the arm for this employee. And I think even today, if we were to interview them right now, they'd be like, man, that in some ways changed their life.

4:53 Because now he's actually producing several videos a month. So I think part of career pathing or continually revisiting where our employees are at and what they have to offer, and then finding ways to invest into those areas, I think you and I have seen just routinely that pays off. Whether it's somebody on the operations side of investing in their certifications and other types of training has been a real key to our success in keeping the really good people on board. Yeah. giving them new opportunities periodically. Yeah. You know, not allowing them to get to a place where they're burned out on doing the same thing for too long.

5:36 Yeah. And I think, honestly, when I hear you replay that story, there's a couple of things that stand out to me that I think really are critical or are critical elements of this idea. And that is, one is you heard and noticed this individual. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Right? Like you were monitoring something that was happening naturally based on their wiring, based on kind of their caricature, who they were, their things that get them excited. And then we had an opportunity to say, hey, we noticed that. And we believe that there's value into the team and this thing and this skill set that you have. And so I think a big part of this, like, especially because the idea with this entire series is we're really just touching on some small elements.

6:22 Yeah. That all make up this bigger picture idea of creating a culture, a sticky culture, something that someone wants to participate in and be a part of. An environment that people enjoy being in. Right. And what a better way on a really monumental level to do that when we identify in someone a skill set or... And in this case, they knew they liked it. They knew that there was an opportunity in this. And I think there's also versions of this that we see where we can see from 30,000 foot, like our experience, right? Often as leaders, we're a little bit older than our teams. Maybe our technicians are younger individuals. Whatever the case may be, we have this opportunity sometimes to see the things that they don't about themselves, right?

7:06 And this idea that we can speak into that and let them know, hey, we see this in you, that this could really go somewhere. Yeah, you've got a talent for this. You've got a talent here. You're naturally gifted in this. I think the things where we most often gravitate towards are the things we see ROI in as leaders. Yeah. The obvious ROI. Yeah, the obvious ROI. Like, wow, this person is really good at this. We need to put them into this role. Yeah. And they're going to kill it doing this. And I think sometimes, like my example of this marketer that wanted to make videos, there wasn't an immediate ROI that we perceived. Yeah. it was all about trying to invest into that person, into something that they clearly had a talent for.

7:49 We didn't necessarily see how it was going to make us money right out of the gates. We kind of knew we need to be doing something on social media and wow, they've got a knack for this. But I think that is critical that sometimes... it makes sense to invest in that person's skill set and what they enjoy. Yeah. Yeah, I think... You know what I mean? Yeah, I think in this case, there really was a cost-effective way to retain. Yeah, we didn't wait. If we really boiled it down. Yeah, because what it came down to at the time when we first got that going was they needed five hours a week. Yeah. And we did the calculus and we're like, okay, five hours a week. That's five hours that they're not going to be, you know, visiting with insurance agents, giving job updates. It's five hours they can't be doing these other direct sales activities.

8:32 But that five hours is going to mean everything to this employee. Yep. That was kind of the, wait, this is something we want on our team for a long time. Yeah. So if we can give them this and it makes them happy and it reinvigorates them, they're probably going to bring a better version of themselves to all the other activities they're doing. You just nailed it. That was the piece. Did we really lose five hours? Or if we go back right to our whole 80 hour episode, or are we just getting the maximum? Yeah. Yeah. out of those hot hours that we are getting from that individual. And ultimately, it wasn't a waste of money. It was a differentiator.

9:13 Those things stood out. It made us look different. I mean, we won awards for it. I mean, later on, we became a preferred vendor for a big association group. It was this person that did the big introduction video in front of 500 people. It definitely paid us dividends over the long haul. Right. But I think the biggest thing was just seeing the light come back in this person's eyes. You know, it's like, yeah, a lot of the grinding work we do in sales to open up doors is, It gets old when that's your only focus. Yep. And so that made a huge difference. Yeah. No, I love that story. And I think in general, this is lending itself to kind of like this bigger picture idea of where we're going with this conversation.

9:53 This concept is we have to put the dots together. Like we need to help create the vision and the plan that, For what opportunities lay ahead for someone on our team? I remember when we were first developing some of our all-company meeting conversation topics. And one of the things that we discussed quite a bit was this idea of the people that fit our team, the people that fit within our culture. And we were very aggressive about creating diversity in terms of the types of individuals that participated on the team. However, there was some likeness when it came to some of these principles or the things that mattered the most to us as a group.

10:35 And I remember us spending a lot of time and attention defining this idea of personal vision. And I know we used to use the example at that time was the idea that when I first came onto the team, I was only a small number of employees. And we were really operating at a very small, really a storage building. for lack of a better term. And I remember like I personally, because this is kind of how I'm wired naturally is I can always see what could be. I'm always going, well, where could we go? And I remember that piece of vision really helped me stick that out and participate in one hell of a journey, a really neat adventure of growing a company and creating a brand.

11:16 And I remember we used to highlight that story all the time for our newer players is that there is some element that you have to come to a team with a sense of vision for yourself. You've got to be able to look at the land and say, what could I do here? How could I influence this? How could I participate in such a way that it makes it better than what it currently is? And I do believe in that. I believe in it strongly. And I believe that that's a message teams probably need to get really good at reminding their team members about. Yeah. It really is our job as leaders to establish the map, to mirror that for them, to help create this bigger picture of where could you be going?

11:57 Yeah, I feel like one of the tools that you deployed with that was your new employee orientation that you did. Mm-hmm. And I sat in on a handful of those. And I feel like one of the things you did is you explained the cultural standards. You walked them through. This is who we are. This is how we act. And I feel like you also communicated, this is how you can win. in this environment. Right. Absolutely. Like this is how people win within our company, right? You bring this character, this work ethic, this client focus, this awareness, you know, to your work. Like those are the people that win here, you know? And if you're willing to be that and do that, become that, there's an opportunity for you here that I mean, and there were so many at that point when we started doing those, we had a lot of stories.

12:48 Oh, sure. Already. Yeah. I remember part of your shtick would be to highlight those people on the team that's like, look, this person here who's now our mitigation manager overseeing millions of dollars of production, they started as a trade technician. Right. How rad is that? Right. Right? Yeah. They started as a $15, $16 an hour employee and now they're running a big organization that's... Yeah. With massive responsibility. They're effectively a different person now. Right. Than when they showed up two and a half years ago. And I think it was. It was that kind of timeframe. We had people that were going from technician to leader in a period of just 24, 36 months. Yeah, absolutely. And so then you start pointing at those stories.

13:30 And I think we even had people in those orientations that we watched do that over the two years that you were doing those. Yeah. Yeah, that is key. That's a critical element to that was because we have to look at this pathing, this career mapping, whatever you want to call it, as a series of touch points, right? And I think with anything, we make this joke all the time, like anything worth saying is worth repeating. Yeah. And sometimes as GMs, as team leads, as business owners, we get frustrated because we feel like we are saying the same things over and over. And we got to be really careful that we understand the category. Because when we're repeating ourselves in terms of process, we're probably not doing a good job of actually getting the processes adopted.

14:11 Because we're probably not repeating. We're not staying in the trench long enough. Exactly. And repeating the... Right. Yeah. The behaviors aren't being repeated. However, when we're repeating cultural, leadership, visionary, mission perspectives on a consistent basis, that's a good thing. That's your job. Right? That's part of our job as leaders is to continue to point our teams in the direction. This is where we're going, guys. Remember why we're doing this. Okay? Those are the conversations you should be repeating. Right? And when it comes to career mapping or giving people a sense of vision on your team and helping them understand that where I am today is only the beginning. I can invest time and energy and commitment and loyalty to this team.

14:52 And I'm going to be rewarded in the shape of advancements, education, more training, more coaching, more closely mentoring, right? All these different things. And it starts with that orientation. It really does start at the beginning of their time on your team to say, hey, guys, this is how we do what we do. here's what success can look like. Here's the behaviors and the attitudes that lend itself to someone really excelling in our particular environment. So not only are you kind of weeding out those that will see and hear that and go, I'm not in. Right. But more importantly, what you're doing is you're helping. That's like stage one, phase one of telling someone success can be yours. Here's what it looks like.

15:33 I think post that, there's other tools that we can be using to create some clarity on where someone can go, right? And really giving them a sense of, okay, here are the options that I have. And here are the things that I would need to do, participate in or commit to in order to execute on those. And you and I kind of talked about this during our onboarding piece of this conversation was, we want to make sure that we put the cards on the table and give our employees the full deck. It sucks to be an employee and have someone tell you in one conversation that all these things are available, but to never really do a great job of putting those tools in your hand. Yeah, to never have a roadmap. You don't know.

16:14 Like, okay, they're available, but what am I doing to achieve it? And it's always, well, work hard, have a great attitude. Okay, that's cool. But physically, can't we do a better job of laying out what a career path looks like for someone in our teams? I think so. You know, one of the things that you did that I had not seen before or certainly had any leaders, you know, in my career, share with me is when you pulled out the org chart, and you did this, I think, at one of our leadership meetings, and you were talking through kind of the way we're set up and where we were headed and so forth. But that even as a leader, it was powerful to look at the org chart and say, okay, this is how we're organized now. And this is where we're going.

16:55 And we've since done that with clients, helping them build their org chart for today. But then also identifying, okay, here's the next person that we're going to add to the team. This is the next role that's going to be necessary here, likely in three months, six months. And then after that's in place... then that's going to create a need for these other roles. And now all of a sudden, somebody on a 10-person team or a five-person team can start to grab hold of, okay, in a matter of months or one or two years, there's going to be so much opportunity opening up. If we can get from here to there, there's going to be all kinds of directions that I could go as an employee.

17:35 Absolutely. Whether I want to go into ops or I want to go into some kind of sales role or a sales support role eventually, or all these different admin functions that open up. But I remember that was one of the things that you were really good at was casting vision of, hey, we're here right now and here's what now requires of us. But here's where we're headed. And you, man, I mean, I think that was one of the things that you were gifted in was in that repetition of here's where we're at now. Here's what we need. But here's where we're going. Because there was just like, that was always part of the all company meetings. And I think that regular reference for people of, okay, what we're doing now is just, we might only be doing this for another few months.

18:24 And then everything's going to change again for us. Yeah. You know? One of the things that I latched on to early, and it's not like I came up with this stuff. I was a product of watching. Yeah. I was definitely a product for watching great leaders for me and having the honor to work and serve under some really great people. And there's something powerful about knowing that you have influence and control over these things out in front of you. And that's a big thing that we always focused on. In fact, we just did a training for one of our clients where we literally conducted for their team what you deem as every job sales activities, right? This operational selling system.

19:04 And a big part of what we're doing in that meeting is really mirroring for owners. When we introduce ideas and concepts to our team, how are we communicating the value for them? What's in it for them? What's in it for them? And I think that that's what you're referring to is that we really did buy into this idea that we need to constantly be telling and communicating to our team members. What is in it for them? Not just giving them information about where we want to go and what we want to be and make more money, blah, blah, blah. But there's always this tie-in. And this is what we alluded to at the very beginning of the show is leaders that get really good at helping identifying the dots that connect together for their team members.

19:46 Not thinking for them. But just being really competent and consistent. And go ahead and connect the lines. Go ahead and do that. You're not doing your team member a disservice. Give an example of that. Can you kind of think through a conversation that you had along those lines? Yeah, absolutely. I remember that we, like every team, we also went through phases where profitability was just a battle, right? We were doing jobs. Especially when we were growing like crazy. Oh, sure. We were spending so much money bringing people on and whatnot. Yeah. And so you're just spending money at every level. And then your callbacks and the little things where our teams were doing really good at managing the client's expectation and falling on the sword and doing what they needed to do when mistakes were made.

20:30 And in general, we slid into a But our execution, it started to slide. Yeah. Right? And so we were just so good at the relational part that people gave us grace. Yeah. And so there was this element of having to remind the team, it's not one or the other. Mm-hmm. It's both. Yeah. Right? And so we went through this phase where we were really diving into profitability at the job level and what some of that looked like and how, as individual team members, they contributed to that bigger picture. And part of that was just a reminder to the team of, okay, let's be really honest in this conversation.

21:10 Why is it that I would stand at the front of the room and talk about profitability? One of the things that we created as leaders in our organization was the four Ps, right? And as part of the four Ps, this was, I don't want to get too out on a line here, but the idea behind the four Ps was, our team was growing quickly. We were expanding service lines. We were expanding the kind of clients that we were working with. we needed to be sure that we could tell someone that, okay, yes, all these things are happening, but what we do and who we are is still the same. Okay, and so what we said is, is there a way for us to identify kind of four sentences, ideas, or concepts that remain the same no matter what is happening?

21:50 And so we called it the four Ps. And it was the four Ps because it was started with protect. Mm-hmm. Right. And so initiative one was protect the referral relationship. Initiative two, protect the client relationship. Initiative three was protect us as a team and our reputation. Yeah. And we always were very clear in that, that that did not mean cover crap up. Yeah. It meant communicate, look out for one another, make sure we're preparing the team for each phase. Right. Yeah. And then last... When necessary, take one for the team. When necessary, fall on the sword and do what's right, right? And then that last one, and this was very intentional, was protect the profit. And we talked about the fact, and we actually had a visual, that it was a circle.

22:32 Yeah. Right? And that each one of these peas really fed into the other. Yeah. Because in order for us to protect the client, we have to conduct ourselves in a way that makes our reputation strong, right? If we want to take care of the referral relationship, we've got to take care of the client. They really are symbiotic. They are. And the other thing, because I think this is what, in hindsight, we were trying to create common language and we were teaching. But I think what we were really teaching our team is how to think properly about the business. There you go. I remember when we rolled out the four Ps, one of the questions was, well, why isn't the client at the top? Why not client instead of referral partner? And there was rationale behind that, right? Yep. It was because we knew we get bad clients sometimes.

23:14 Yeah. Right. Let's be honest. Yeah. We get people that, and a lot of, they're not bad people typically, but they're just, you know, irrational or emotional or they're just high maintenance. They're demanding. It's a bad mix. Demanding, all the things, right? We all know what a bad client looks like, sounds like. But what we discovered over time, right, was that even if we've got a difficult client, right, if we do a great job of communicating and buffering communication between the agent office and the agent, we do our part essentially. Yep. And we protect the referral partner relationship by being disciplined in our communication and everything else. Chances are that referral partner, that insurance agent or property manager or plumber or whatever, they already know that customer is a tough one.

23:56 It's tough. Yep. And so if we do everything we can to communicate well and to get in front of things and reduce the calls that they're getting from their policyholder, at the end of it all, even if we get a three-star review from that customer, we're still likely to have a five-star review with that referral partner. Right. Because they know we did our very best. Right. To help that difficult customer that's ornery for them too. Right. Right. Yeah, and what you're alluding to is that in certain scenarios, we understood there was times that that symbiotic relationship, one of them had to be prioritized. Yeah. And so what we wanted to be very diligent is, at the end of the day, we would gladly give up profit on a single job to protect those other three things.

24:36 Totally. Right? Only when we were in those rare occasions where we had to choose one over the other. But as part of that conversation, there was this push at that time to really clean up the profitability at the job level. And so what we did in order to kind of tie the, you know, connect the dots was we were just very honest. Like, why does this matter to you? You get paid the same per hour if you do it efficiently or not efficiently, right? And so why is it important to you? And we started to lay out. And fortunately for us, and this is a great example, is that we had feedback actually from all employee surveys. And so we had themes of wants and needs that were communicated to us by the staff themselves. Yeah, they wanted tool allowance.

25:17 They wanted tool allowance. They wanted more benefits, right? Fully paid health insurance. Exactly. And so there was this great opportunity to say, look, there's no one on this leadership team that doesn't want to say yes to the things that you yourselves as our team members said you would want. How do we get those things, guys? We go out and we do jobs in an efficient, effective way that earns us another job and helps us retain profit every time we go and do one. And those profits then are used in turn to protect our team, to give you the things that you want, that you wish for, that you're asking for, right? So your direct involvement is what says yes or no to the things that you've listed in this survey.

25:59 And that was... A lot of us would look at a situation like that and go, well, they're smart people. They can connect the dots. And what I'm saying is, is not that people are stupid. Right? It's just we all just get caught up in the now, in the thing right in front of our face, in the fact that we are lacking discipline that day or that week or we're tired or our home life is a bit spun out or whatever. And part of our job as leaders is to constantly be pointing, guys, follow me. We're headed this way. Yeah. And reminding them. And so that was a perfect example of, again, committed to a bigger picture thing. We have to maintain profitability.

26:41 But why do they participate in it? What's in it for them and connecting those dots? And I think that that's what we're talking about when it comes to this idea of career pathing and giving people a vision for what they could do possibly on your team is it's our job as key leaders and business owners to connect those dots, to give them a vision. Another way that we can do this pretty consistently, and I got to be completely transparent, this was not something that we executed on well. So I'm going to call myself out. Since we've been working on the consulting side and working with people is we really teach them how to create a formal path. Like we're talking about in writing, where you get to say, for example, hey, a tech one needs to meet these minimum standards.

27:24 Yeah, we started building this out. We did. We did. And now we get the honor of watching teams use it super effectively, right? But it's this idea of what does a tech one look like? What's a tech two look like? A tech three, senior commercial, project manager, and really allowing your team member to see that I can go in and ask for training on these things, secure training for these, get signatures and times showing that I've accomplished it or that I own it, that I'm competent in these different categories. And that gives me the ability to move and get a pay raise or move into the second rank. And the beauty of that is, is that there's no secrets. No, it's just, if you want to make more money, you want to have more responsibility, you need to increase the value that you're bringing to the team.

28:13 That's true for every single person on this team. Every one of us. Every single one of us, we need to bring more value. How do you bring more value? Well, you put yourself out there. You learn, you train, you put more effort in. You know, it's like, you learn how to work smarter instead of harder, you know, all of those things. And I think as we started to map this out for folks, I think one of the things that started to become really apparent to you and I and everybody else on the leadership team is that we had team members that, you know, I'll just say it. Like, we didn't see a ton of potential in. Mm-hmm. They were position players. They did what they did. But as we started, and I think there's a lot of people listening to this who are like, okay, I got demo guys.

28:53 You have certain people in your company that are there filling a role. You don't see a ton of potential in them. And I think what you and I discovered, as well as the rest of our team, is that as you start giving people the playbook, is that you end up being surprised at who has what potential. Man. Right? Yeah. Like how many times as we started explaining these things and casting vision and creating those visual pathways for people like, hey, you move up to tech two, here's the pay range for tech two and tech three. And what are the opportunities beyond being a tech three, right? Yeah. As we started to lay this out for folks, we started to see, gosh, there were individuals on the team that actually had more ambition than we thought.

29:35 And I think the thing is in our industry and in just the trades and the service sectors as a whole is that we've just become very pessimistic. Mm-hmm. about our labor. We think of them as labor units. We don't say it out loud. We know they're people. But at the end of the day, it's like, I need so many people to be able to respond to jobs, tear stuff out. And so we almost think of our frontline staff as interchangeable because in most of the industry, they are. And we were just talking to another very successful leader the other day, and we'll probably have him on the podcast here at some point. And they were just saying, hey, the reality is this is a high turnover industry. And we need to figure out ways.

30:17 And their point was, we need to figure out ways to get people up to speed. Train them faster. Train them faster. Get them productive. And we totally agree with all that. And I think we discovered that as you start to cast a vision for these frontline staff, really everybody in the business, but particularly frontline staff, many of them turn on. Yeah. They get it and they start to make moves and then they start to make a little more money. And, you know, we've talked about examples and these examples, these people were ambitious, but like we think of this technician who became the mitigation manager. Yeah. Yeah. I think we often surprise ourselves with the industry hasn't provided that to many of them before. Yeah. So you provide them that vision and all of a sudden you're helping them think in a way that they've never thought.

31:02 And let's face it too, a lot of our people are coming to us from different kinds of broken backgrounds. Sure. They haven't necessarily been exposed to the same opportunities, mentorship, modeling that some of us have, right? That own business. And that's not to say that all of us who are leaders like had some advantage, like many of us had to work our way up from the bottom as well. Yeah. But I consider myself lucky to have had those kinds of models. A lot of our people are coming into our businesses. They haven't had that. They don't have a model of what it looks like to move up in an industry. You know what I mean? Oh, I totally do. And you know my opinion on this. And I'm careful to say opinion. But I think we underestimate the responsibility that we have at a higher level once we take on certain roles and titles.

31:47 And as business owners, the moment you decide you're going to start a business, own a company, do what you're going to do, and you're going to hire staff and employees, whether you wanted to or not, you've elected... to place yourself in a position of leadership. And leadership is not owed. Leadership is not followed on demand. Leadership and loyalty to that leadership is earned, honestly. And so part of what we're talking about here is that it's our job as developing leaders to provide this vision casting for our team. It's not... appropriate for us to sit in a corner and wish that people were in quotation marks, smarter, more visionary, more proactive?

32:33 Do we need to have realistic expectations about those things? Yes. But you're the one that has the keys to the Corvette. Like if you're the business owner, if you're the leader that's been in the game for a while, if you're the one that's taken on these responsibilities, you're likely the one that has access to the information and can see what people have in front of them. We used to make the joke all the time. I don't know if it was a joke, but it was almost like a sad recognition is, often as leaders, I can see two corners down the path from you. And I can easily see the opportunity that's in front of you. And I would get frustrated with folks because I'd be like, man, you just come towards me. You just, one more corner, you're going to see what I'm seeing.

33:16 Right? And I think that that's what we're talking about here is that this is the way that we attempt to eliminate those choke points where people stop making forward progress because they can't see a couple corners down the path. And so by us creating career pathing and giving people very sequential steps of what they can do and initiatives that they can take to be successful, right? is powerful. The other thing that you see happen is that maybe it's a poke and prod for the first few steps. Because again, like what you mentioned, they just don't have this. They're not confident in this kind of role or this kind of process. And so by helping them get the first couple wins, then the next thing you know it, that initiative starts to climb.

34:01 So this same person that you thought, wow, they really don't have much for drive or personal initiative. No, they're fearful. Yeah. They're a fish out of water. They don't understand the process, the systems. They don't fully have the ability to articulate how I get from step A to step B. However, as we outline those things out and give them these little wins and teach them what's in front of them, next thing you know, you've got a freaking force driver on your team. You've got someone that's breaking down doors and kicking walls over to get to the next initiative that they can take when they started very passive and meek. Well, it's because they didn't know. And so part of the power, right, in creating this stickiness with our people is just give them the roadmap.

34:45 Just put the playbook on the table and teach them how to read it. And the next thing you know it, you're going to encourage them and give them competency at a different level of how to take initiative and how to take those steps themselves. Can we talk a second about how I think we get it wrong sometimes? Oh, yeah, sure. Here's something that I know that we were guilty of at times. I think we grew through it eventually, but I see this a fair amount with clients we've worked with and just in the industry in general. Especially as I've spent some time doing executive coaching of downline leaders. And so I'll hear kind of the nitty gritty of what it's like, quote unquote, for them to work for their owner. Oh, yeah. Like, you know, I get some of that feedback.

35:26 Yeah, sure. And I think one of the things we do as leaders a lot of times is we tell people, hey, there's so much opportunity here for you. Like you could be this, you could be that. Here's your income potential. We throw these things out there. But then we fail to chart a course. It's like we're dangling a carrot out there, but it's just always three feet out in front of them. And we don't follow through. We don't chart a path of, hey, once you get here, this is going to happen. And then once you achieve this and you accomplish this, this is going to happen. Instead, it's just this ambiguous, hey, we're going somewhere. Because I think culture is on people's mind, but I think that's one of the mistakes we make is we're so vague and ambiguous.

36:07 And we think that as the owner or the general manager just saying like, hey, there's a ton of potential here for you. And someday I'm going to need a director of operations and I could see you. And we throw those big carrots out there, but then we aren't diligent in letting people know where they stand. Where are they on that path? Yeah. Yeah. Like I can think of right now, I can think of two branch managers that I've worked with where, well, actually one of them was a senior estimator for a large company. And one was a branch manager for a smaller company. And both of them had a very similar story. They were so frustrated because there was all kinds of money opportunity that was just ambiguous money opportunity that was put out there.

36:52 And then never really revisit it. And just how frustrating and also demoralizing that is for the employee. Because there's part of them, it's like, I know there's opportunity here, but I'm not seeing it. It's been six months, a year. That pay raise or that job change isn't materializing. And every time I bring it up, it's like, yeah, well, we're not quite there yet. Well, when are we going to be there? How do I get there? I want that. Yeah. That's a really common problem I see. And we were guilty of it at times too. It's like, hang in there. Hang in there. We're in a tough spot, but this is going to open up. This is going to happen. We were guilty of doing that too at times because we didn't know what we could commit to.

37:33 But I think over time, we've started to figure out, okay, We've got to give people a roadmap. Yeah. We have to tell them how they can win. Yeah. Specifically. And then we have to follow through. And that is hard sometimes. Oh, yeah. Because at times, there's things that we promise or we put out there as, hey, once you do these things, we're going to provide you X. Yeah. And sometimes the timing was not great, but following through on that vision casting and the quote promises, because employees always hear it as promises. Oh, sure. When we put programs and plans out there, it's, we're totally flexible, adaptable, right? As leaders, because you have to be. But our people, you give them a maybe, right? They're hearing a for sure.

38:15 Yeah. It's kind of like when you give a client a price range. Yeah. The lowest one is the one that cements itself in their mind. Yeah. That's the one you told them. Yeah. And that's a real deal, right? Yeah. On a whole bunch of different levels, right? So if we talk about... If we give specifics about pay ranges or raises or salary changes based on performance, we sure as hell better deliver on that. Yeah. I think you bring up a really great point. Maybe here's an additional layer to slap on top of that. Being realistic about this mapping is a big part of what we're talking about here. So what we're not saying is that when a technician comes on, entry-level technician, we're not from day one talking about them being a commercial project manager.

39:01 Yeah, or the general manager. No. No. That's not what we're talking about. What we're talking about is consistently placing in front of them the next handful of steps that they can proactively engage in to move the ball forward for them personally. Yeah. Right? And we've seen this before where, for instance, we go out and we recruit someone And the idea is that this person, based on their caliber, their skill set, their background, man, maybe this person could become our repair division manager, right? Our construction division manager. Well, what do we need them to do really well right now? We need them to be an outstanding estimator. Yeah. Okay, great. So let's talk about the phases of estimator.

39:42 Right. So let's break that down a little bit. So we, we don't start by talking about day one, Hey, hang in there, really kick some ass for us. And you're going to run our construction division. Maybe that's our plan internally as a leadership team, but let's look at that individual and say, okay, Hey, day one on the ground, We're anticipating you're going to write a million, maybe a million and a half in work this year. Or maybe let's be more realistic. Your first year on the ground, maybe you're going to write $750,000. Here's what we're looking for. Here's what the margins that we're anticipating. Here's what kind of relational navigation we're looking for. Here's the referral relationship type activity we want you to successfully build. Once you do that, you'll move into a senior estimator position and a senior estimator position gets these kinds of losses.

40:27 So here's what I mean by that. If our entry level estimator, as an example, is doing more of our TPA work, more of our smaller residential work, right? We clearly articulate for them, what does it take to go to a senior level estimator? And what's the perks of that? Well, now instead of managing 30 files at $5,000 a piece, maybe you're managing 15. And more of those are in that $30,000, $40,000, $50,000 range. Maybe at a senior estimating position, you start to take on some of the commercial projects. And we outline the benefits for that second tier or that second phase in terms of workload, in terms of pay scale, in terms of commission structure.

41:10 That's the win that they're focused on right now. Because you don't know when your team's going to be big enough to actually initiate the division leadership role or whatever. But then here's the other caveat to that. We always tie into it what role they're playing to help create the future vision of the team. You and I talk about this all the time that sales is a team sport. It's not the sales team's job. They have a role in it. Yeah. Right? Their role looks differently than mine, but I have a role in it. Right? Everyone does. And so again, those are the pieces that we're focused on. We don't go from day one to GM. Which is... You know what?

41:51 It sounds funny when we're talking about it in a vacuum, right? But we've seen this. That's why we're talking about it. Yeah. How often... I've made the mistake myself. Oh, geez. You get an awesome person across the interview table from you. Yes. Oh, this person could run the company. Yeah. Right? And we've had those. I think all of us have encountered those individuals who are like, whoa, there's a lot here. We want them. We want them. Yeah. But we can't pay them a hundred grand right now. We don't have that role available. But how often in the moment... we get romantic or we get the desperation brain. Yeah. We need this person. We want to cast a big vision for them. And we say, Hey, listen, here's where we need you to start.

42:31 But really what we've identified for you is you're our next division manager or, Hey, our GM is going to be transitioning. So we see you as being a general manager at some point. When you start people that way, yeah. All they heard is, I'm getting hired to be the construction division manager. And the estimator thing, that's just for a while until we... Right. And so their headspace is not in being excellent and maximizing the role that they're placed in. It's they're just biding their time. Right. They're just checking this box. We've had that bite us. Oh, man. You know, an internal optimist. Okay. I love vision casting.

43:12 Yeah. Yeah. earlier in my career, and I still fail big time on this from time to time is, I love sharing the ideas and the concepts. I love talking to my team about where we're going and what we're doing. And we do need to practice some levels of restraint. Yeah, we do. Because our team members honestly cannot work 10 years into the future. They're never going to make it. Right. They're going to struggle to get six months down the road. So as we're planning, vision casting, talking about next steps, doing career pathing and road mapping for our teams. Yeah, let's close the gap a little bit. Let's take a little shorter perspectives.

43:52 Let's make sure the steps are mapped out in shorter... timetables and don't get too carried away and telling people what the future will look like in terms of years down the road. I really suffered from that personally because I can hang in there to create those things. That's still building phases for me. And so I'm wired naturally for that. But for a lot of people, to do the same thing or grind towards a goal for more than six months, that's the end. That's the maximum that they can stay focused. So no, I think that's a great idea because ultimately what we saw in scenarios like that where we kind of set the tone of, hey, we're taking you in to do this, but really this is the carrot out there is that ultimately we got a subpar performance at the thing that we needed right now.

44:38 And that was what was critical in order for us to ever get to this distant opportunity. And so they burn out. we don't get what we want. And we inevitably just spend a year to 18 months failing. Really, what that looked like is failing. We lose what was potentially a great person. Inevitably, that conversation turns into they weren't quite what we thought, blah, blah, blah. But I think you get on the other side of it and you're like, is it that they weren't what we thought? Or did we sabotage them? Exactly. Which I think in hindsight, they say there's no bad employees. There's only bad leaders. I don't 100% agree with that, but I see the truth in it. Yeah. Right? That we can set our people up for failure.

45:19 Their egos get involved. Yeah. I'm going to be whatever the next role is. Yeah. And the ego screws that up. Yep. We're still trying to grind it out. Yeah. Two years later. Hey, so I want to do something a little bit differently with this one. So I'm going to do our summary a little bit different because technically this is a third part in a three-part series. So I'm going to do a little recap of the whole thing. So let's summarize this show first. So here's the idea, guys, is that as we do the hard work to get folks onto our team, as leaders, it's absolutely critical... that we begin laying out the path for our folks, for our team members.

46:01 Let's give them very black and white, measurable steps, skill sets, training, things that they can learn, adopt, and become competent in, in order for them to continue their forward progression within our company. So the idea is that we want to lay out that expansion, that growth, an actual career within our organization is important to us. It's a principle that we lead by. And then let's give our team members the tools. Let's lay out the different positions within our team. An example was a tech, right? A mitigation technician. outlining what are the two, three tiers, the different levels of competency and skill set and responsibility that a technician can have as they develop on our team.

46:49 And let's give them the ability to learn those things, have signatures and dates from leadership, showing that they're making progress and then follow through on our promises and award them for those skill set gains and those advancements ultimately that they're making. And then while we're doing this, being very clear to ensure that the career pathing that we're developing from our team doesn't go directly from entry level to GM. Let's stay focused on realistic one-year type focuses where they can get real traction that you can execute and follow through on what it is that you say you're going to provide and then constantly just nudging them one step closer to what they ultimately can be within your organization.

47:34 Some of the areas that we can play this out is general orientations, setting the tone, the foundation when they first come on the team. Here's how you win in our business. Here's how you win. Providing updates during employee reviews, going back to the worksheet, the career path worksheet and saying, Hey, man, you've done an excellent job working your way into tech too. Here's the things you have remaining to hit that tech three phase, blah, blah, blah. That's how we continue to review and talk to them about what we're doing. And then I think the last piece here is to just constantly be connecting the dots for your team. Don't make the assumption they're figuring it out on their own. And if they're not, they're not good. Let's do our job. You're the leader. You're the one that can see the mission from 30,000 feet.

48:18 Do your job and cast vision for your team. Connect the dots. It's okay. What's in it for them? Okay, so here's the big picture that we wrestled with. The work environment right now, our ability to attract people, it's hard. There's some variables that might make it a little easier for a period of time. But the reality of it is, I don't think this version of trying to attract good players to our team is really ever going to get easy. Okay. So what are you doing as a company to start well? Once we've done the work and we've gotten someone interested to join our team, how are you getting them started out of the gate? What's the foundation you're laying for them?

48:58 Are you onboarding them in a way that's proactive, well thought through, that sets the tone that they have value and that they have a place on your team and that you appreciate they chose you, right? Yeah. What are you doing now once they get on the team to keep them engaged? Right? We talked about really analyzing our benefit package in quotation marks. And as you like to say, like, why would someone work for my company? And more importantly, when we ask that question, get out of your own head. Stop acting on principle of, well, we provide a good job, we pay well, and start asking yourself this question, why would someone want to work for me?

49:39 But put yourself in someone else's shoes, not the owner, not the one that's got all the keys, all the doors, all the secrets. What are you doing to make it attractive? Yeah. And then this last piece is once they get on your team, where are they going? Are you doing a good job of putting the tools and the decision factors in their hands so that they can see they play a proactive role in guiding their success in your organization? Are you showing them there's a future? Are you casting for them that there's an idea that they're going to participate in something that's growing and that's alive and that their influence will have a direct impact on their ability to succeed on your team?

50:22 Guys, this is not easy things to do. But I believe the reality of it is we don't have a choice. Like either your team's going to die on the vine or you're going to understand that the rules are changing and you're going to adapt your leadership skill and your company priorities to ensure that you can win at the most current version of the game, right? All right, guys, that's a wrap. Later. All right, everybody. Hey, thanks for joining us for another episode of the MRM podcast. And if you got something out of it, share it with a friend, hit subscribe, hit follow, leave us a five-star review. Thanks a lot.