Building Winning Teams in Construction with Paul Sanneman
0:00
Utilizing AI for Staffing Success
10:59
Assessing Candidates for Staffing Success
16:17
Effective Recruitment and Staffing Strategies
22:26
Leveraging Technology for Business Growth
31:33
Taking Action for Business Success
Unlock the secrets to transforming your hiring process with Paul Sanneman, a seasoned expert in construction industry coaching and recruitment. Together, we explore the revolutionary impact of AI and automation in tackling staffing shortages, and why viewing employees as valuable investments can lead to unparalleled success. Paul's incredible 95% success rate in hiring is a testament to the power of continuous recruitment and strategic staffing, shattering the myth that the trade talent pool is drying up.
Join us as we uncover the art of matching candidates' personalities and skills with job requirements using assessment tools like DISC profiles and integrity assessments. Paul passionately discusses how thoughtful recruitment strategies, inspired by Jim Rohn’s philosophy of personal growth, can lead to zero turnover in construction businesses. By embracing self-improvement and maintaining integrity, business owners can transform their experience from stress-filled to truly rewarding, creating thriving company cultures that stand the test of time.
Discover how residential contractors can step up their recruitment game by employing effective marketing techniques and writing compelling job ads. Paul emphasizes the importance of rapid responses to applicants, akin to client leads, and the need for thorough onboarding processes. With anecdotes and practical insights, we stress that true success lies in personal accountability and strategic planning. Whether you're looking to attract top talent or reshape your business strategy, this episode is packed with actionable insights to propel you toward growth and prosperity.
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Speaker 1: 0:00
What's up, Lemonheads? Welcome to another episode of From the Yellow Chair. Guys, I am in our virtual podcast studio, if you will, literally feening on what could possibly be a Hawaiian backdrop but is actually left in Texas, and so my guest today is going to give all of the information about being inspired, about hiring and staffing using AI, building culture. Guys, there's so much that we're going to cover today. Let's sip some lemonade. Welcome, guys. Today in the virtual lemonade stand, all the way from Hawaii, is Mr Paul Sandeman. Now listen, I don't know if I say Hawaii correctly.
Speaker 2: 0:51
My Texan will show Texas sounds always sexy. Anyway, hawaii is fine, we're good.
Speaker 1: 0:58
Good, good, good. Well, paul and I actually met because I was on his podcast and then we were like, hey, you should get on our podcast Guys. So much industry knowledge that Paul shares. It is so good to listen to him as such a valued resource when all of us are really trying to kick our way through the staffing shortage. If you will coming up with a source, so, paul, tell us a little bit about yourself. Why should anyone care what you have to say?
Speaker 2: 1:25
That's a really good question. Well, first place, I have done I hate to say I've been coaching for 50 years. That makes me like a really old guy. I hate to say that I personally work with two to 3,000 contractors over that time.
Speaker 2: 1:39
Long time, right. And what happened was I've been doing this for ages and then I could usually get contractors from like a million to 20 million. I was really good at marketing and stuff, but the problem was about four or five years ago. I could build companies but they couldn't find the employees, and so building a company without finding employees doesn't really help you much, right, right? Well, I said OK.
Speaker 2: 2:02
So my first idea, crystal, was I'll find all the best practice. I found the best software, the best assessments. I did some research, found all the really cool software they should use. I gave it to my clients and they totally screwed it up because they didn't have the time to do it Right. It was like you know, like no time for time management. So I said fine. So I put a guy in my garage and I said look, I just want you to use all the cool stuff I found and just do recruiting for my coaching clients. That was my original intent. Fast forward four or five years. We now have 35 people on the team. We've hired two to three thousand people in the last four years. The cool news is we got a 95% success rate. Normal construction is 50. So the reason you should listen to me is how come I've hired 2,000 or 3,000 people in construction only, whether from laborers, project managers, electricians, whatever and 99.5% of them stick. So that's why you should listen to me.
Speaker 1: 3:01
I figured out the secret of making this really work right.
Speaker 2: 3:05
I know how to do this. We're now in every market in the US and Canada and any day we post four to five hundred jobs. We go to three thousand resumes plus a week, and you know we're really good at it. So I'm going to tell people if you want to do it yourself in this podcast, you're going to learn exactly what you need to know that I found out on how to get your employees you're looking for. I think the big thing, crystal, is we don't have people think there's a big trade shortage. It's sort of like if you can't find any customers, do you have a customer problem or a marketing problem, right?
Speaker 1: 3:45
Oh, Very true.
Speaker 2: 3:47
Right. So people go, there's no, I go. No, it's a marketing problem. Same thing with recruiting. I mean, how could I find 2,000 or 3,000 people if there's nobody out there? Right, that's true, that's very true, I mean, there's not a shortage.
Speaker 1: 4:00
There's just an issue somewhere right.
Speaker 2: 4:02
You don't know how to do it. That's the problem, and I'll show you how to do it. But there is no shortage. You always find people. It's just getting the right way to do it.
Speaker 1: 4:10
Okay, so what do you think, paul, then, are like, what are some unique challenges that you know construction, home service style companies face when it comes to really building up a reliable team Like we might can go out there and get all these people, but how do we get good people Right, like, how do we filter through those Like who has time to do all of that? You?
Speaker 2: 4:30
know. Well, that's, you know, that's. That's a good question, crystal. I mean I would say you know, the reason contractors have problems is it's their mindset. All right, it's you know.
Speaker 2: 4:42
As you probably know, everything starts with a thought Right, and the problem is they've got what I call some limiting beliefs and this really gets in their way. I mean, the first one is that most contractors believe that you know you only recruit when you need somebody, right, and so they say, oh, I need a project manager. That is not true. You recruit all the time. There isn't any company who's any good who doesn't recruit all the time. It's like when do you market All the time? It is a process. It is not something you just start and stop. The next one that gets in the way is employees are expensive. I can't hire that guy. He's 125,000 a year. If an employee isn't making you money, you shouldn't hire them. Right, right. So they think employees are expensive and it's not true. They're the best investment you're ever going to make.
Speaker 2: 5:31
The other one, this one gets in the way. The biggest, probably, crystal. Oh, we can do it ourselves. How hard is it, you know? I put in at it, indeed, and I'm done. And 50% of the people in construction. They, I mean they last like the recidivism rate like 50%, only about 50% actually make it. You hire that's because you sort of second recruiting. I'm going to hate to use the word, but it's true. They, they, they think they can do it themselves and the truth is most of them can't. I mean, crystal, do you fix your own car?
Speaker 1: 6:00
No, that would be a disaster. Right, do you do your own accounting?
Speaker 2: 6:02
no, that would be a disaster, right Do you do your own accounting Also a disaster.
Speaker 2: 6:07
Right, that's true. And you know it's sort of like contractors saying things to do their own marketing or their own recruiting. Hire somebody who knows what the heck they're doing. I mean, it's silly to try to do stuff you don't know how to do. So the third one is don't try to do it yourself. Find somebody who's good at it. This is the mindset that gets in the way. This is why they fail. Recruit them in the construction industry. Only, that's not true. I mean, I'll give you an example, crystal.
Speaker 2: 6:33
We've hired some wedding planners that have just killed it as selection coordinators. Think about it. What does a wedding planner have to do? Get a bunch of sort of no offense, flaky groups together, like the band, you know, the flower person, the venue, all these semi-reliable kind of professions. They all have to show up at the right time. It's got to look good and everybody has to be happy. Sounds like a remodel to me. Yeah Right, same seal set. So we've hired some wedding planners, just killed the construction industry. So limiting yourself to construction industry is a problem that against gets in the way of doing a good job. Here's a big one Higher, fast, far slow. Since they're not recruiting Right, crystal, they take they need a project manager yesterday, so they hire fast the first guy that shows up right, so they hire fast.
Speaker 2: 7:28
To be done.
Speaker 1: 7:29
Just to be done.
Speaker 2: 7:29
Just to be done, right. And then the guy's the world's worst employee, not bad enough to fire, good enough to keep, and they kill the organization. I mean you spent years building up this culture of trust and honesty and all this kind of stuff. You bring in a guy or a woman who only lies some of the time, only trashes your company occasionally, just kills your culture.
Speaker 1: 7:51
Yeah.
Speaker 2: 7:52
It only takes one person I've done it in other companies to destroy a culture in a company. So the truth is you need to hire slow because you're recruiting all the time right and fire fast. I always ask Crystal Peaveley's question If there's anybody you wouldn't rehire today. You should fire them. Think about that and and it's so. That is the thing is the way. Another thing is you know, recruiting is a project. Most most, unfortunately, most um people that go into construction have no patience as a group and they don't do delayed gratification very well, so they look at it as a project. I need a project manager. I find when I'm done and it's like marketing, marketing and recruiting are something you do all the time you never stop. So in my opinion, that's why contractors fail at this. It's their mindset, because if you get through those and you have the right mindset, I can show you processes. It's not that hard to do.
Speaker 1: 8:51
Yeah, so you know. Again, when you lean into this, you know you start realizing that the leader is everything. So a lot of times I can come into a company and interview a company to be utilizing, you know, to consider partnering with them for marketing with Lemon Seed, and the first thing I do is just like an overall, like tell me about your business and within five minutes I'm able to tell if this is a strong leader, a weak leader. Does he get ran over by his team? Does he lead with integrity? And all of this is all about mindset, like you said.
Speaker 1: 9:25
So you know you also like trusting the professionals. It's something that we speak on all the time. So you've got to trust that people are. Trust yourself enough to align with vendor partners, whatever that looks like, whether it's through recruitment or marketing or websites or whatever that they are doing best. You know you trust, but you verify right, I hear that a lot. Trust the process, but verify that things are getting done. And same thing here, like it's just to really be on top of recruitment. You have to be all, always be recruiting, as I say.
Speaker 2: 9:58
I would say, always be branding.
Speaker 1: 9:59
But you know, just keeping keeping that up there.
Speaker 2: 10:02
You know, I think, Warren Buffer, somebody said that you know you look for three things in employee versus integrity. Second is maybe like persistence, and third is intelligence. Without the first one, the second two will kill you.
Speaker 1: 10:18
Oh yes, oh 100. I mean you're right, Like, and then you know, one bad apple spoils the bunch.
Speaker 2: 10:24
Yeah.
Speaker 1: 10:24
You know you get, you get one, and I've made that mistake myself with my own company. I allow problems to linger too long and it just radiates and permeates everything around it, and so you just need someone on your team that's successful at this. But I know that contractors often struggle with finding people who are just not only skilled right Like skilled sometimes is even easier but also like really fits the culture, like talking about that integrity and things like that. What qualities and I wanted you to just expound on that a little bit what qualities do you look for when you're hiring these roles?
Speaker 2: 10:59
Well, we have sort of a secret tool which I'll share with you later again. Now we use assessments, all right, and there's now tools out there, instruments I can, you can tell you. You know, we use like a DIS profile. We use integrity assessments, assessments, very psychological profiles. By the time they're done, taking my assessment, I know whether they have the right personality for the job, because we have a bunch of profiles We've done hundreds of thousands of these. So we should do their profile against somebody who succeeded at that specific job. So I know what personality traits they need and what they are.
Speaker 2: 11:33
Secondly, I can measure for integrity. I can give you an assessment that tells the way you tell the truth, whether you're honest, whether you're deceptive, whether you're a victim or not. I can give you an assessment that lets me know who you are as a person. And I can also give me an assessment that tells you how smart you are, your mechanical abilities. So I guess the good or the bad news is to hire the two or three thousand people we've hired. We've gone through five hundred thousand applicants. On the average you have to go through three, two to three hundred applicants to find the right person. It's just the way it is yeah, if you use the assessment, you can. You can assess those things. There is a video interview which tells us everything we can find on the assessments background checks and reference checks. So if you follow the right protocol, you can really good people.
Speaker 1: 12:21
But you can't skip that part. No, no, and you, you know you can't. There's so much like we love disc profile here at live and seed so we make all of our team take the disc profile and then we start understanding like this person's definitely a high d, so we need to. You know they't really they're not here for all that. I personally am a very high I. I tend to have lots of energy, lots of conversation and not everybody wants to be here for that. But more than anything, when you start learning through whatever you know assessment you're taking, it just opens your eyes before you buy all the way into this person. A lot of times you're able to identify where they would be a good fit on your team. It's not necessarily to always get, not choose people. It's more about are they in the right role?
Speaker 2: 13:02
Right, and not using the tools is just not smart and they're not expensive. I mean, you know, a wrong hire. I think the average cost of a wrong hire is like $50,000. It's huge.
Speaker 1: 13:12
Oh yeah, that's painful, painful, painful. Well, how do you assess the candidates, like their soft skills right there, the skills that they're going to use, their interpersonal skills as well as their technical ability?
Speaker 2: 13:24
Well, the assessment gives us everything from you know, as you know, disk profiles and we have predictive disk profiles, right. So we've done a hundred thousand of these or more. So we know the personality is. We give them the integrity things. You know if they're honest and you know victim or not, that kind of thing. We give them an iq test, mechanical test, so all this can be tested. We can't test you know, how old are you, what do you look like? How's your english? Um sure, we use video for the rest of those and then use background check.
Speaker 2: 13:51
So if you follow the right procedure, you can make sure by the time the person gets to the end of the funnel, so to speak. Like like sales, the same, like a sales funnel. It's the same thing as a client funnel for recruiting. When they get out the bottom, you know you got the right person. As I said, our company has 35 people in it. We have zero turnover, nobody ever works and we always have the right person. But we have to go through 300, 500, 400 people to find the person. But when we find them, they're the right person.
Speaker 1: 14:19
Yeah, yeah. Well, I know that one of your also like it kind of goes into this. You know, once you get the right people on your team, you actually allow yourself to work more on your business than in your business, and one of your core messages is that business owners should be able to make more money in less time but more than anything like have a little bit more fun and ease and comfort doing it. You know, what is your little secret there to helping contractors like find that place in business? And I mean I have so many contractors right now that just live in this state of constant panic and turmoil, like it causes them anxiety and all these things Like what's that mind shift?
Speaker 2: 14:57
well, I know you know jim rohn, who's one of my mentors in the old days, is, you know you work hard on yourself and you do on your business. I mean, I think that's where sort of personal growth comes in. If, if you're a victim, you're going to attract victims, right, so you got. You know, if you, if you spend time working on yourself and you've got integrity, then that spreads throughout your company. So I would say most you know. A question for you, krista what's the number one reason people don't take time management?
Speaker 1: 15:24
Yes, Just because maybe the accountability side or it's just too hard.
Speaker 2: 15:30
No time? Yeah Right. So I mean, it's the same kind of thing. It's like you know, there's all these systems out there and I can go through how to do it specifically, but there's if you work on yourself and you've got integrity, you can do your job in 40 hours a week. If you're working over 40, 50 hours a week and you haven't got balance in your life, that's your fault, it's not the industry's fault. I mean, this is a great industry but you have to have good, good clients, which your marketing will fix, and you've got to have good employees, that your recruiting will fix. So if you've got good clients and you've got good employees, this is an awesome industry. But the people that you're struggling with, my guess is either don't have good employees don't have good clients and that's why they're suffering.
Speaker 1: 16:14
Well, I'm telling you that it's. There is a mindset that comes along with being an entrepreneur in general, regardless of construction or home service businesses. Right? Just so much time we just get overwhelmed with the day-to-day demands of business, you know. But you know the common obstacles that I think residential contractors face that tends to heighten that level is is recruiting and retaining and marketing. I mean, I think we live the same life as far as too much stress.
Speaker 2: 16:48
You don't find good clients. You don't find good employees If they've got good clients, good employees. This is a great industry and if you look at people that are suffering in this industry, it's because they don't have good clients or good employees, and that's that's the problem. And it's like the no time for time management. They don't have the time to work on their business because they're in survival.
Speaker 1: 17:10
You know what is some advice? Some like an action item. You think that our owners that maybe feel overwhelmed with the day-to-day demands of business, like what is one or two things they can like literally go do.
Speaker 2: 17:21
Well, obviously you know, if you build a business right, anything you don't want to do, you have somebody else do for you, Literally.
Speaker 1: 17:28
Well, that's the perk. That is one perk of being the boss.
Speaker 2: 17:31
You know, and that you just delegate this kind of stuff and you know, I mean I'm going to, I'm going to sort of diverse, I'm going to run through a real quick process and if you follow it you can get all the employees you want. It's pretty simple, like you know. How do you get healthy? You eat less and exercise. What's the problem? Right, but getting people to do it, that's the hard part. So in the next four or five minutes I'm going to outline exactly what you need to do to find good employees. Getting people to do it's going to be the challenge. I'm sure you have the same thing happen in marketing, right, like you know, just answer the damn phone. It's like, yeah, right, so it's like OK. So the first thing and I can help you do some of this stuff, but as you've got to write a great job, the thing is, you've got to write a great job ad Thing is, you've got to get somebody to quit their job and come to work for you.
Speaker 2: 18:19
Right, right, and it's an ad. You're an ad person, you know, when you're advertising your company, you don't say we do kitchens, call us, right, right, you've got to get somebody to want to call you. So it's an ad, it is not a job description. And then the next thing, you've got to place it everywhere on the planet. When we place an ad, it goes on 100 job boards, linkedin. We put it everywhere on the planet you can put, and if you go through chat GPT, it'll tell you the place to put it. But don't just put an ad and didn't think you're done it. Literally you've got to put it on 100 job boards, all the local ones. You've got to put the ad everywhere. Now, crystal, this is the deal breaker for most contractors.
Speaker 1: 19:03
You've got to respond in real time Now the speed to lead right, not when you remember it or are forced to do it, not a week later.
Speaker 2: 19:08
I mean, like you're a marketing person, when a lead comes in and the phone rings, when should you answer the phone and get back to the person?
Speaker 1: 19:20
As soon as you can.
Speaker 2: 19:21
Right. I mean, and if it takes a minute, you're good, and after a minute and 10 minutes, 20 minutes an hour, the probability of closing that client drops off like a rock, right when you talk speed to lead. So it's the same thing in recruiting You've got to get back to people in real time the minute they go in, indeed, and put apply, apply, apply, apply. The minute they hit your apply, you've got to go. Thank you for applying, we appreciate you. You look like you've got a great resume, let's talk. So if you're looking for a job, the person that replies first has a lot better chance of getting your attention right Right Now. The question is how does the average contractor respond?
Speaker 2: 20:01
well you better start using a tool, it's, it's not going to happen. That's the problem. I can show them how to do everything else, but that's that's where I think you need to hire an outside person, because we respond in real time to everybody. We get 3 000 applicants a week and respond in real time to all of them. The next one we talked about it was a detailed skills assessment. Once you respond in real time, you do a really good detailed skills assessment, behavioral assessments. You know who they are. Then you do a video good detailed sales assessment, behavioral assessment so you know who they are. Then you do a video interview. There's all kinds of tools out there. You look at a video interview, ask them specific questions. We change the questions with every client and every applicant and every job to make you got good questions. Then do a Zoom interview, conduct background checks. I had a guy who hired a person who embezzled him, went to the DA and she'd embezzled the last three employers. We didn't check it out.
Speaker 1: 20:48
Oh my gosh.
Speaker 2: 20:49
Right, so do background checks, you call the references and you make competitive job offering onboarding. If you do all that stuff, you'll find good people, but they don't Right. It's like if you do right marketing, the phone will ring with the right kind of client. If you do right marketing, the phone will ring with the right kind of client. If you do right recruiting, the right people will show up and you can hire them. So it is not a lack of people or a lack of talent, it's a lack of knowing how to get it.
Speaker 1: 21:16
Oh yeah, a thousand percent, because let me tell you I said this the other day on a podcast like my contractors that I work with, they're one of two things they're either really good at being a technician and fixing things and building things and doing things. They normally are not just super great marketers or finance people right. They have to learn those skills and so you know, we have to be careful that we are always identifying what where we fit into the equation.
Speaker 2: 21:45
Right.
Speaker 1: 21:46
You know, I just think that's so important.
Speaker 2: 21:49
I've been doing this forever and the hardest part for me as a coach for me it's been years is getting somebody to make the transition from a craftsperson to an entrepreneur. It's difficult because a craftsperson there's certain skill set. You're really good with details, you like to get done as quickly. You have no patience. You're good at building. Difficult because a craftsperson there's certain skill set. You're really good with details, you like to get done as quickly. You have no patience. You're good at building stuff right, which is really cool. But knowing how to build a house and knowing how to build a company are two entirely different skills oh yeah, absolutely.
Speaker 1: 22:19
My saying is just because you're the best shortstop on the team doesn't mean you always need to be the coach.
Speaker 2: 22:25
Right, it's the same kind of thing. So what happens is, as I said earlier, they think they can recruit, they think they can market. The good news now is you can hire that stuff very inexpensively. We use a lot of AI, a lot of offshore people and I can literally recruit everybody you need for $1,500 a month for five positions. You can't even come close to do that yourself. So, and with marketing? I mean, if I was a marketing company, marketing guy is going to cost me $120,000 a year and you're good, right. So the thing is, use those resources. You know, and something is happening. I'm going to diverge a little bit here.
Speaker 2: 22:58
In this industry, I saw how AI is affecting this industry. Isn't maybe the way you think, crystal, what AI is affecting this industry isn't maybe the way you think, crystal. What's happening is sure I can go to AI and say I'm hiring a lead carpenter. I have a $3 million remodeling company in Kansas City. I want the KPIs, the job ad, where to put it? I can list them, everything I want takes about 45 seconds and ChatGPT will do the whole thing for me. Boom done. What ChatGPT won't do is call them back in real time, so that that's much easier to do than it used to be. But what's happening is ai is disrupting a lot of our industries. I mean, I believe in the future. On your phone, your doctor, your attorney, your you know anybody you're asking for information, for money. It's going to be virtually nothing. It's like music used to cost money, right, I have this collection now. For 10 bucks on Spotify, you can get pretty much all the music you want, right? Yeah, so it's AI.
Speaker 2: 23:52
Automation change industry. What's happening in construction is it's all those other industries are getting disrupted. There's hundreds and hundreds of billions of dollars are now coming into construction and what they're doing is they're buying companies like roofing companies, those kind of companies. They're doing roll ups because they're doing what I call the Walmartization of construction. Remember the old days when, like, they had a downtown drug store or the department store, your little downtown had all these services, right, right.
Speaker 2: 24:24
And what happened is they said I can't find any good people, I can't find any customers. They kept complaining about how it wouldn't work. Somebody builds a Walmart which is one mile out of town. Somehow they find 500 people to work there. Where do they come from? I don't know, but they find them. And then they set up a system and they suck all the business out of downtown because they're cheaper, better and faster. And so what's happening in construction is all this money is coming into construction and, like where there used to be 50 moving companies, there's going to be four, because the guys are going to come in, they're better at marketing, they're better at recruiting, they're better at running a business and they're going to take over the market. Now, that didn't used to bother us, because that money was going someplace else, right.
Speaker 2: 25:05
Yeah, yeah yeah, but now it's coming into construction because AI cannot do a roof for a long time. Yeah, it's going to be a while, so that money's coming in. So unless contractors that are small guys that depend on you know their friends for marketing and their friends for recruiting, they're going to be gone.
Speaker 1: 25:25
Yep.
Speaker 2: 25:26
So the good news is you can hire marketing, you can hire recruiting. Because of all this technology, you can hire it done very inexpensively and done well.
Speaker 1: 25:37
Yeah. So here's what I say about AI, because, from a marketer, I'm like it's a little cringy, right, but AI is a tool. It's not a replacement, right, it's a resource. So you need to learn how to deploy where it doesn't impact your brand or your you know, your recruitment strategy, where everything becomes so robotic that we take the humanization out of those things. Well, do you have six? I was reading something the other day. Let's dive into the six hiring realities that you have.
Speaker 2: 26:07
Well, what I had was, you know, the one I had was earlier, which is the belief system I talked about, which is only recruit when you need people. You should recruit all the time. The second one is employees are expensive. They're not. The third one is we can do it ourselves. You can hire somebody to do it. The fourth one is recruiting within the construction industry. We talked about that. You can go outside the industry, hire fast, fire slow. It's just the opposite. You should hire slow and fire fast, and it's not a project that lasts all the time. So this is what gets in the way. I mean, you know, I'm sure you've been working with contractors a long time. Knowing telling them what to do is easy. Getting them to do it is some bit of a challenge.
Speaker 1: 26:47
Oh, I have clients that have been with me for three years still don't do what I tell them to do.
Speaker 2: 26:51
I know. I mean, my wife has said you told that guy for the last four years you're saying the same conversation. He's paying you a hundred dollars an hour. Why does he just listen? Right? So you know, and that's the hardest part, is changing that behavior, because people are going to listen to this podcast. I've already told them how to do it and that's nice, and they'll go back to their old, same way of doing stuff and say there's no good people out there, which is not true.
Speaker 2: 27:20
There's plenty of good people? Yes, absolutely and so. But like you know why did Walmart find those 500 people that you couldn't find earlier? Because they've got better systems Right. So the good news now is, with marketing and recruiting and those kind of things and accounting project management software, there's really good systems that are really inexpensive to implement. But you've got to take advantage of those. You've got to find outside resources to do those things you're not good at.
Speaker 1: 27:49
Yeah, yes.
Speaker 2: 27:50
And Crystal, you know I I'm old enough for when I started working contractors using pagers. I'm that old right. And so I remember I talked to contractors let's use cell phones. And the contractor later told me it's going to disturb my peace of mind in the truck. I'm not using a damn cell phone. Okay, and then we went through email. I don't need email, it's a fad. I've got mail, I don't email. And then the next one was you know, websites. I don't need a website. My reputation will carry me. Everybody in town knows me. I go no.
Speaker 1: 28:24
Lord, yes, yes.
Speaker 2: 28:26
And then, after websites came project management software. Right, I can do it on an Excel spreadsheet, I don't need this project management software. And now the latest one is AI. I mean, guys, you've got to get on board with technology, you can't ignore it. I mean, as an example, we're going to go dig a ditch, you're going to use a shovel, I'm going to use a backhoe. Who's going to win, right? And you're going to? Well, it's taking backhoes expensive. I don't want to take the time to learn it. Oh well, good luck, right.
Speaker 1: 28:58
All in the sense of efficiency and having another resource, like you just have to embrace change. Change is extremely hard to embrace, you know, but it does kind of lead me into the role of, like, personal growth. You know, when you're trying to build a vibrant and thriving team, you know, I think it's important that we understand, like all, how, all the areas that are impacted in our business when we are slow to either have personal growth or the good things that come from when we invest in personal growth. So how do you think business owners might could integrate, like self-development into their company?
Speaker 2: 29:36
Well, I think it's a time manager problem, right? I don't have like no time for time management, right? So, as Jim Rhodes said, work harder on yourself than you do on your job. And when you look at most of these people a lot of contractors, they don't, they were a contractor. Then they get fired or whatever, and they decide to start their own business. Then they hire some people. Now they got to keep working for them. They don't learn what they need to learn, which is interesting. Right now, information is free, literally. You can go to your you, you know your phone and all the information on the planet is here, virtually free. Now you can spend your time zooming through tiktok or you can listen to a podcast like that. That's up to you.
Speaker 2: 30:15
That's personal choice, right, and so you know, yeah, I would say personal growth has never been easier, but it has never been less taken advantage of if it makes any sense.
Speaker 2: 30:28
Yes, yes, we're the first generation that's going to die, younger than the generation before, because people eat crappy food and don't exercise, and you know so. It's personal choice. So if you there's no reason why you can't meditate, why you can't exercise, why you can't listen to good podcast, it's all there, it's all on your darn phone, man. But if you just do to scroll through TikTok or other things, they're sort of useless or spend your time. So you know I use YouTube is earning a living to make any money. I mean, that's your shot, it's your fault.
Speaker 2: 31:05
Yeah, it's your choice, and the good and so right now, it's never been easier to get information and to learn and to do personal growth, because it's all there for free.
Speaker 1: 31:17
You can literally at your fingertips right you can.
Speaker 2: 31:20
You know you can list to the best people on the planet on your phone. I listen to side girl. I listen a lot of. You know different kinds of things for me, for my spirituality, and you can listen to the best people on the planet on your phone. I listen to this side girl. I listen to a lot of. You know different kinds of things for me, for my spirituality and whatever you can listen to. How to organize? It's all here and it's all free. But if you choose, if you're too busy earning a living to make any money, that's your fault, that's on you. So I would say you know, work hard on yourself than you do on your job and you should be easily be able to make. I mean most contractors I know they're doing well and make at least a million bucks a year. It's a great profession. But if you're not, it's not the industry's fault.
Speaker 1: 31:58
No, no, and a lot of times it's just a self-reflection. When you're, when you're in these positions, you know you just have to step back and take a look at like, where are you not choosing to utilize resources to grow prep and to grow your leadership and to grow your financial situation?
Speaker 1: 32:23
And a lot of times they're so busy running the actuals and the day-to-day of their businesses that it's extremely hard to work on those things. And so for maybe people that are sitting like right at that spot like, hey, financially I've got to run my business every day, you know, you have to just start carving out little pieces of the day that are more intentional.
Speaker 2: 32:41
You know it's interesting. I've had clients, literally. I have one guy that crashed his plane, ended up in a hospital for six months and he had to learn to have run his business from his hospital bed. It made more money than it ever made before. He worked less but it was.
Speaker 2: 32:58
It was imposed on him by the plane crash right because he had to run from a hospital to some people get sick, so that was a bad way to learn, right like sudden death is naturally telling you to slow down, so it's like you know you have to take stock and recurring yourself in your business and you just got to make you have the discipline to do it, because if you don't it, there's no other way out of it.
Speaker 1: 33:22
Yeah, I mean, you're totally, you're totally hit the nail on the head with this of you know we're in our own way, all of us you know of of reaching some point of, of you know success, whatever that looks like for us. But well, I know that today's conversation has been full of tons of just kind of a little few gut punches to us, right, paul? Like, hey, you know, a lot of this is just you not being intentional, or you not being open minded, or you not finding the time to do what you need to do, or even trust in the experts to help you get things done.
Speaker 2: 33:57
So you know, in this example, when you're pointing at somebody right, there's one finger pointing at the person and the other three fingers are pointing back at you, right.
Speaker 2: 34:04
So you got to take notice, so you know, if you have a problem, it's you, it's not the industry, it is not the economy, it is not anything else, because, when you think about it, our contractors are so small, their market segment is so small that the economy isn't going to kill them. And there's good people out there because they only need to hire 15 or 20 people, not 500. They only need to do two or three, 5 million or 20, they have to do 100 million, and so it's all about them.
Speaker 1: 34:37
The importance of intentional hiring, team building and focusing on those things is really what has to happen for them to grow, and then also pinpointing those essential qualities and team members that you want, that creating the culture that you want, creating the life that you want to work smarter, not harder. So, paul, I think your insights were really game changer here today. I love the no nonsense we're not trying to sugarcoat this, but, listeners, I challenge you today to implement something that Paul said today, something that a little golden nugget, if you will that stood out to you today make a move right. Don't just receive this information and not make a move right. So, paul, if anybody in that is listening to my podcast would like to get more information about you, how do they reach out to you?
Speaker 2: 35:27
well, they just go to contractor staffing sourcecom and they're going to get it. They'll get an appointment with me if they want to click on get an appointment with paul and I'll be happy to talk. I'll tell them how to do it themselves. If they want to, that's fine. I mean you know, but not to take some action is just not smart.
Speaker 1: 35:45
Absolutely. Listeners, thank you so much. I want you to take action. Don't go another day without making moves towards creating a strategy and an implementation plan for a great hiring plan. Get your culture right, Get your mind right, Get your personal self together so that you can really grow and earn money from the business that you've worked so hard to do so well. Paul, thank you so much for joining me today.
Speaker 2: 36:09
Thank you very much for having me. I appreciate being here.
Speaker 1: 36:10
Absolutely Well listeners. Thank you so much for listening to another episode of From the Yellow Chair. Again, if you loved it, I want to hear about it. Give us a follow, Make sure you're following us on social media, Leave us a review. If you love us the most, you'll leave us a review. Thanks, guys, for sipping some lemonade with us. We will all see you next time.
Speaker 2: 36:29
Thanks
