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Host Scott Lollar is a 35-year veteran of the painting industry and founder of Consulting4Contractors. The 'Success Beyond The Brush' Podcast serves as a touchpoint to painting contractors who have hustled, sacrificed, and worked hard to get their business to where it is today. Now, you need the guidance, expertise, experience, and team to make it into the multi-million-dollar company of your dreams. You'll hear stories and interviews from "Brothers of the Brush" and "Sisters of the Sprayer" who have been where you are and are charting a new course for their company's success. Listen in and go beyond $1,000,000!
SBTB Ep. 27 | Contractor Time Management: Stop Solving Every Problem Yourself
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[00:00:00]
Coaches Don't Fix
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Scott: He is not interjecting because that means he took the opportunity away from the employee, project manager, whoever, to learn. And what he's doing is he's empowering them and actually then forcing them to come up with some solutions.
Scott: He did not say, "I would not help them make a decision if they give me some options or they ask me for coaching." He said, "I'm not going to solve their problem. I'm going to coach them and encourage them and nurture them or whatever to solve the problem, because that's why they were hired. That's why I believe in them. That's why they're in position." When someone calls you and tries to get you to do, th- you do their job or solve their problem, just ask a question.
Scott: I don't know. What would you do? Give me some options. I'm not sure. I'm not there." Not in a hostile or arrogant or demeaning way, but force them to process, and they just don't want to deal with it.
Scott: They just want you to tell them what to do. "I don't want to deal with this. I'd like [00:01:00] someone else to please help me." And so they're trying to pull you into it, and what you're saying is, "No, you're going to do this, but I- I'll help you.
Scott: I'll coach you. You're not alone, but this is your job." So if you're a person that's going to solve every problem, then just know you're going to solve every problem forever, they're always going to call you. True,
Rick: I loved to solve problems for people, and I loved to be the one that got everything straight. And I never... It took me a while to realize that I was taking away opportunities from the people that was, that were working with me. And then I would get frustrated that the people that were working with me weren't of a certain level or didn't behave in a certain way, and I blamed it on them until one day I realized it's really me.
Rick: I mean, if you think about it, if a project manager has an issue with a client and we interject ourselves in that situation and not, don't give them the opportunity or the tools to take care of it themselves, it's like button in line in front of somebody at Starbucks, right? You're just saying, [00:02:00] "I have no value for you.
Rick: I'm just going to take care of this myself because I don't believe in you."
Welcome to SBTB Episode 27: Contractor Time Management
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Welcome back to an all-new episode of Success Beyond the Brush. You know, every trip to the paint store, unclear scope of work, unnecessary phone call, and last-minute job site emergency costs your company time and money. The biggest time management problem may not be your schedule. It may be your need to personally solve every problem.
In this episode, Scott Lollar and Rick Holtz sit down and explain how better pre-job planning, clearly defined roles, stronger delegation, and intentional leadership can help contractors reclaim their time while developing a more capable team. Let's dive in.
Scott: All right, welcome back to another episode of Success Beyond the Brush. We have, once again, Rick Holtz with HJ Holtz & Son, and a C4C coach. Rick, welcome to the podcast.
Rick: Thanks Scott, it's been a while, good to see you.
Scott: Yeah, excited about this conversation.
Common Time Leaks
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Scott: We're going to talk today about time management at several levels. First of all, at [00:03:00] the high level, ownership, and Rick's going to bring wonderful perspective to that.
Scott: And then we're going to bring it down a little more granularly to your management team or to whoever is on your staff at a high level. We have in our industry tons of time leaks, and I think it's a timely conversation to talk about how do you protect your time, so we're going to talk a little bit about how to manage those time leaks, some tools that we have both developed over the years to protect our time, and some things that you could take back and implement in your company and get your time back.
Scott: So Rick, What are some of the time wasters you see in our industry from a high-level owner's perspective or even management?
Rick: Getting materials. Getting materials. Having to be the one that talks to the client all the time. The one that has to deal with employee issues all the time. Getting involved in employees' issues. Getting involved in employees' personal issues. All those things.
Rick: Get- getting involved in the personalities so much
Scott: Yeah. Wow. There's a lot of the-- lot-- You said a lot right there.
Material Chaos
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Scott: [00:04:00] Let's unpack the materials. Why do we spend so much time in the field or in management chasing materials?
Rick: I think because we become so reactionary, we start projects before we have all our information. And then if we start a project before we have all our information, then we're constantly playing catch-up. You know, you're always playing catch-up. And I think the problem is, goes back to scheduling, right?
Rick: You you don't know when your crew's going to finish, and then they finish before you think they are, and then you got to get them on something else because you're worried about revenue, and they need to get hours, whether they're subs or whether they're hourly employees. And you start a job before you have everything you need, right?
Rick: You don't have the color information. You don't have the quantities of what you need. You h- nobody's been out there to see it since it was sold. A crew shows up, the scope's changed nobody has any paint, nobody has enough paint, and it just snowballs from there. And you see it all the time. The busier we get in our industry, the more that happens, in my opinion
Scott: So isn't that a product of [00:05:00] planning? Like we have not spent the time to get ready to start the project, so therefore we start the project and all we can do is react to the fact that we don't have this, we don't have that, manpower's not communicated with, scope's not clear, et cetera, et cetera. Isn't it just the fact that we haven't spent the time before the moment to make sure that ha- doesn't happen?
Rick: Yes and no. I mean, I feel like it's a symptom of growth, don't you think, Scott? I think when we start, we have a, a company that we can get ahead of. We can do that. We have a couple crews. We have a couple job sites. But then in your busy season, you go from a couple job sites to five or six job sites.
Rick: And then I'm not so sure it's a matter of planning. There's just not enough hours in the day.
When To Hire Help
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Rick: I think that's a good opportunity to say, " Hey, do I need another overhead employee?" Whether that be an office manager that can call people ahead of time and get some of that information or what. But I think a lot of it is owners are growing, and they don't see that they're growing, and they don't see the need yet to hire another person to help them do [00:06:00] that.
Rick: So I think what you said is valid, but I also think it's this as well
Scott: So do you have a ratio or do you have something in your mind project to project manager or when an owner might say, "Okay, I can no longer be the project manager and the estimator and the HR"? Do you have ratio or when do you know it's time for a project manager or a second or a third project manager?
Rick: I think a lot has to do with your types of jobs you're doing, but I feel like four jobs, you know? More than four jobs, it's hard to get ahead of it. I think a project manager can run more than four jobs if they have somebody else supporting them, making phone calls for these jobs that are t- one and two weeks out.
Rick: But I think it's hard to manage the here and now with much more than four if you're also having to think about and gather all the information for your upcoming projects
Scott: Now, at your company you're really a proponent of frequent visits from your [00:07:00] PMs, correct?
Rick: Yes, absolutely
Scott: Yeah. So you're t- you're saying about four jobs per PM, and how many do you have in your company currently?
Rick: Well, well, I mean, if you aren't like us, if you're not structured like us, like, our PMs can run six to seven jobs, but they also have a person in the office that's doing the scheduling, that's calling clients, that's gathering the information so that when they get the job, all that stuff is already ready, so if you're a smaller company than us, and I remember the time very well when we did not have somebody in the office to do that, and that's when we were wasting all that time, you know? So I think if you're doing all of it from handoff and getting all this information to execution I just think four is max.
Rick: When you get up to five and six you're not going to be prepared. There's just not enough hours in the day.
Scott: Yeah. And I agree with you. I love the idea of a operational assistant. We've called them customer concierges before. every [00:08:00] company has its own little title, but I feel like the way I think about it is an internal project manager or ops person and an external. So there's pre-job work that is really more in line with someone that's sitting at a desk and has l- time to answer a phone or send an email.
Scott: They're sitting there versus someone who's driving around a lot doing this, doing that. You can do a lot of things before the job starts from a stationary office position, getting colors, as you say, communicating with customers as to schedule or delays all that type of thing.
Scott: Ordering toilet, you know, porta johns or lifts or whatever you need. Those are excellent internal administrative tasks that can happen. And then I like the project manager to pick it up maybe a week or two in advance, and then they're the primary contact. But they're, like you said, there's so much we can do to support the field with a person that for 40 hours a week has control of their time.
Rick: Yes, I agree. And I just think it's just such a hard thing to do when you're, [00:09:00] you know, you're an owner and you're doing estimating and you're doing the daily schedule and you're looking at the weekly schedule and the s- the, the order of the projects that you're doing. It's hard to find even more hours to pre-plan these jobs, but the pre-planning is critical.
Rick: It's crucial to not wasting time.
Scope Creep Calls
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Scott: Let's talk a little bit about scope creep or scope of work accuracy. We hear that a lot where people get out into the field and knock on the door or show up at a job site, whether it's commercial, residential, and they're not super clear what they're doing, and then the phone calls start? Wasting time of the estimator or the owner, whatever.
Scott: and I say this a lot to people. I said, every time you say the word phone, you know, like, "I'm going to call," my-- I have this, you know, little I get a little twitchy because I'm like, now you're wasting time. And when you're talking about a business, you're wor- you're wasting at least two people's time, if not three, because [00:10:00] you've got a crew leader, you've got a project manager that's calling the estimator.
Scott: You've got three people doing nothing but clarifying something that should've been clarified before now. And so tell me how you would recommend to people to minimize that, if not eliminate that.
Rick: Well, I think for certain projects you want to see if that project manager, once he gets, he or she gets handed that project, can go and meet with the client, even if it's for 20 minutes. This is more residential speaking. I'm you know, I'm sure commercial's the same way. But one, is the job site ready?
Rick: And then two, just go over the scope of work to make sure everybody's still on the same page. Because the problem is these proposals are created when an estimator meets a, a client, and then it could be a week to two weeks to a month before the job's before the job starts. So there's a lot can change in that time, and people forget things.
Rick: "Oh, your estimator told me that, you know, y'all were going to do this as well," but it's not in the scope of work. You know, and you're [00:11:00] right, if you wait to have that conversation when there's a crew at the curb or a crew on the front porch steps, you're wasting a lot of time
Scott: sure are.
Better Handoffs
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Scott: So I like the idea of a handoff. I prefer it in that weekly management meeting, depending on the rhythm of your company. But from the meeting that you're having today back to the last meeting, any, any job that was accepted, I'd like it to come into the production department.
Scott: One of the things that I really advocate is that estimators continue moving on and selling new work. And if they have to come back and be a- asked a lot of questions for something that was accepted months ago I think sometimes that can be a challenge because we forget. But the idea is I'd li- love to be able to put something on your, you know, conference room TV or whatever and show pictures, have notes, and have a scope of work that comes out of our contract in our estimating program.
Scott: And from there, I would love for the project manager to quick review and be able to own that [00:12:00] job from there. I want it to be that clear. So pictures are a fantastic way to clarify something that's in writing. So if it's in writing, but I could show you a picture. And there's great tools.
Scott: You know, Company Cam is one that I, I really like. But, you know, you can annotate it. You can make a, you know, circle, box it, you know, replace this piece of wood or careful of this, you know, bush or whatever you want to say. But, you know, the more notes the more a estimator can provide notes, good pictures, and then a great scope of work enhances the ability of the field to not call the estimator.
Rick: With the estimator making all these notes and all these details is clients are impressed by that. You know, clients are impressed. They feel like they've been heard, and they're more willing to pay a more premium price. You know, the vague, the more vague we are, the more people, it leads clients to wonder, "Do they really know what I want? Did they really hear me?"
Scott: Right. this is stuff that we've talked about in the past, but, you know, when I see [00:13:00] proposals, and I especially talk about this on the con- commercial side is when you have a proposal that says, "We're going to paint your house," I'm like, "Well, that's a crazy statement." I mean, everything? Like there's a, you know, a there's a lot of stuff that could be painted in the eye of the homeowner that you're just saying, "No, I meant the siding."
Scott: Like, well, there's a lot more in my house that could be painted.
Rick: Exactly. I think the other thing, you know, as far as residential, residentially speaking, clients we change our minds a lot. You know, everything today is immediate. We see things, transformations right away. People can see what their house wants, is going to look like after it's painted with AI, like right away.
Rick: And if you give people more time to think, that job's going to change, right? So your estimator can do all these details, and I think they need to, and make it as detailed as possible. But I still think to save time, you need to reconcile what you have with the client, because they could have changed their mind.
Rick: And it's a great [00:14:00] opportunity for change orders. It's a great opportunity to increase your revenue on a job. But we've also found that it's an opportunity where a job that we thought was going to take us a month is now only going to take us two weeks because they've cut half the scope.
Scott: So you were talking about in your market sometimes making a pre-job visit. So that's one way to do that. If not then, when else do you clarify the scope with the homeowner?
Rick: I think you could do it with your person in the office on the telephone. "Hey, M- Mr. Smith, you know, while I got you on the phone, we've gotten all the colors straight. I just want to go over the scope one more time. We're painting these three bedrooms. We're painting this Jack and Jill bathroom, and closets are excluded."
Rick: Yeah, that's right." "Oh, no, wait a minute, that's not what I said." " Oh, you're also painting my living room ceiling because we had a leak." "Oh, we are?" You know, that sort of thing. You know, just like you said, you're driving around town, you can only stop so many places. Driving is a waste of time a lot of times, too.
Rick: So if you can do some of these things with a telephone [00:15:00] call with someone in your office, and you have the ability to do that, you're saving time there, too
Scott: Yeah. We also, and I think you guys do this at H.J. Holtz & Son, but what we see often are the, the problems of projects are for sure the bookends, the beginning and the end. What happens in between kind of depends on how high-functioning your painters are, right? And how good your project management. I don't know that you have to start, stop everywhere every day necessarily,
Rick: Yeah, no
Scott: yeah.
Scott: So but the, the, what you just said I think is really helpful and critical is to walk through the project with the customer and the crew leader because we know that for some reason painters just don't enjoy reading the scope of work. Like, they just kind of make a lot of assumptions. They glance at it and then, you know, we hear crazy things like you didn't paint something.
Document The Details
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Scott: You're like, "Oh, I didn't know that was included." I'm like, "You obviously never read the scope of work." So just walking through, because like you said, depe- a lot of [00:16:00] estimators, especially if the owner's the estimator, say, say crazy things in the sales process and they say things to the homeowner that they didn't write down, and
Rick: That doesn't get documented. You're exactly right. Doesn't get documented. That's the... Oh my gosh,
Scott: Yeah.
Rick: I could tell stories about that, you know? And did I say that really? Oh my God, I must have really wanted to, you know, get this project. And when you do that, you do, you say things to try to get the job.
Scott: Yeah. And I don't think that what you're saying is, are lies. I think what's happening then is, especially if you're selling to pain, you might be having a conversation about something, about the last painter you know, used my sink that I didn't like that. I want I want them to, "Oh, no problem.
Scott: We'll w- we'll wash outside," or whatever, right? And so that's kind of a little agreement you made. It was something that made you different, but I forgot to communicate that with you, so the first thing the painter does is go downstairs, use their slop sink or whatever, and that was the thing that sold the job.
Scott: And she's like, "I thought you guys were going to be different. You're not [00:17:00] different."
Rick: you're not
Scott: just a simple thing that needs to be in the notes. I, when I was estimating residential years and years ago, I would put that stuff right in the contract. We won't use that sink or we, you know, washing off-site or, you know, whatever.
Scott: Storage has to be in the gara- you know, whatever it is we talked about, I would put it right in the contract because then th- the people that did the work could see that I had this conversation, and there was no ambiguity.
Rick: Yeah.
Rick: Yeah, you're right, especially these details that are non-work related, but it's just these details that involve working and being on someone's property. They are critical, because people care so much about their property, their belongings, their pets, and you can't work at a person's home or property, and probably even in, in the commercial world, I think it's probably very similar, too, in its own way.
Rick: You've... it's that art of knowing all those things, and that's, that can be a huge time waster, right? ' Cause now you got to pay somebody to scrub a slop sink that should have never been used, and who's going to... who's paying for that?
Scott: Yeah. And probably all of [00:18:00] us could tell stories of damaged property because, you know, we put something on a table or we scratch something or we just, you know, we just did something stupid that we should never have done and we damaged it.
Rick: Yeah, and that's a perfect example of a time waster too, Scott. It's like when you're smaller and smaller, you're thinking small. You scratch a table, "Hey, I bet we can fix this person's table." Well, then you're going to start spending a lot of time doing something that you're not good at, and it's probably better off if you found a furniture restoration guy and just paid the money.
Rick: You're going to make... y- it, it's going to be better for you from a time standpoint and probably from a money standpoint.
Get Your Free Job Profitability Workbook Now!
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Well, we are about halfway through our episode here, and if every question, customer complaint, and job site problem still has to reach you, your problem may have outgrown its current systems. The coaches at Consulting4Contractors can help you define responsibilities, strengthen your management team, and build an operation that does not [00:19:00] require you to solve every problem personally.
Use the link in the show notes to schedule a free, no-pressure discovery call with Scott or Rick. They'd be glad to sit down with you, talk about your current business status, and how your systems can be optimized, so you don't have to be the bottleneck. Right now, we are also offering a free job profitability spreadsheet that can help you in determining if jobs are profitable for you or not from the get-go.
Let's jump back in to this episode with Rick and Scott.
Protect Owner Time
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Scott: Let's move up a little bit because obviously not everyone is small. They're growing. So let's talk a little bit about how you get out of the day-to-day and how you stop doing some of the things that you used to do but now can't do. Let's talk a little bit about how you manage your day and week, and what are the things that you do to actually protect your time, and what things will you get involved with, [00:20:00] what things won't you get involved with?
Rick: I think the first thing we need to do before we even get into that is why do people waste time? Wh- where does this concept of wasting time come from? And I think one of the biggest things that has been beneficial for us is to say, "People don't know what's important." Right?
Rick: There we have a misconception of what's important, so we run off and do this or run off and do that, and then we realize that we've done nothing all day th- of the important things that we need to do. So I think the first thing to do is explain and train and educate your team on the importance of time, first of all, because that's all the, you know, in our industry, that's the majority of what we're selling is time.
Rick: And then looking at it from a standpoint of, I want people to think, "Does this make sense for me to do?" You know, because they know the value of time. They know that, do we have people in our company that get paid less than me that can do these [00:21:00] things? And then if these time wasters are continually happening, is it a process or procedure that we're missing? You know, just pre-job planning and that sort of thing. So I think it's super important to educate your team from the bottom to the top on the importance of time. Because if they don't understand that, then they don't think they're wasting time when they run to the paint store. They don't think they're wasting time when they're talking to a client.
Rick: They don't think they're wasting time when they're over there, you know, having a, a powwow with a foreman for an hour, you know? So I think that's a critical first step, especially as you grow. Because if we could have gotten ahold of that concept earlier on, we'd be further down the road as a company in our company.
Scott: Yeah And Le- you just said something that triggered an old concept.
Roles And Processes
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Scott: This comes from The E-Myth. It's an old book at this point. It's been written, rewritten a couple times. And if you haven't never read that book, you should read it. But key frustration. So when we have an issue that comes to our attention over and over it should be solved [00:22:00] with, like you said, a process or a procedure so that we stop having that problem.
Scott: Because the stupid is just solving the problem over and over again for the rest of our life. So, you know, let, I think oftentimes we don't stop and say, "Okay, I'm going to do this one last time, but I'm never going to do this again because I'm going to create a process or procedure that eliminates my need to be involved with this."
Scott: And I think you know, some of those urgent calls and materials calls are one of those things that why are we always unaware that whatever, right? And just getting ahead of that.
Rick: So it's two, yeah, it's the processes and then the other thing I think that's really important is it's the role. Like, what is your role in the company? Is your role as the owner of the company to go get paint for a crew? No. You know? Because you can look at your, you know, your company and there's two or three other people that are beneath you that could probably do it a lot better. It just, you know, [00:23:00] these it's kind of using this filter of process and role. Does this make sense for me to do? Is this a worthwhile action for me to do? Does it bring value to the company? Because at the end of the day, that's what our purpose is every day, is bringing value to our companies in different ways
Scott: Yeah, and also we would be able to tell very easily the time value, of a painter or a, even a project manager. Like, we know how much we pay them, and you could do the math and go, "Oh, they're worth $50 an hour. They're worth $80 an hour." Well, you could do the same for yourself.
Scott: It's why I don't mow my own lawn. Now I'm not disparaging people that enjoy mowing their own lawn, like Rick maybe, but...
Rick: I don't know my own lawn anymore either, and I love it
Scott: there you go. And I just... And it's like people think, "Well, you know, are you disabled?" Like, no. Because I could hire someone to mow my lawn so inexpensively compared to what my hourly cost is.
Scott: I would rather go work and do my job than mow my lawn. Now, if you love mowing your lawns, that's fine. But I also, you know, I- they do it better. They have the [00:24:00] equipment. I don't have to buy stuff. I don't have to, you know, put the clippings on my curb every Monday. I, you know, and my time, I know what my time's worth, and I've, I look at all the things that are asked of me, and I measure it based on is that worth giving my time to?
Scott: And if it's no, it's got to be no, and it's got to be ruthlessly no
Rick: Yeah. Yeah, it does. And, you know, like from an owner standpoint for me, I'm thinking about is this a day-to-day issue? Am I getting... Is this something that somebody's drawing me into that's just a day thing? Because if it's something that's just going to affect the here and now, a lot of times, unless it's a major thing I don't need to be involved.
Rick: I really don't. If it's something that's brought to my attention that's going to have ripple effects down the road for a long period of time or could affect the company in a different way, then I want to be aware of it, and maybe I want to ma- I want to be involved in that. But otherwise, you know, as the owner of the company I'm looking at bigger things.
Stay Out Of Fires
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Scott: When do you decide [00:25:00] that you need to move in and be involved with something, whether it's a customer complaint or a HR issue? You know, what I, I find a lot is there's a lot of owners that are very controlling, right? So
Rick: Yeah,
Scott: they're like, "Okay Rick, this is your job. I'm going to get, I'm going to stay out of your way."
Scott: And then tomorrow they come in and start telling you how to handle every little detail and they don't let go. They actually are holding on pretty tight. How... And I know that was a process for you. I think it was a process for you of learning how to do that. But where, when do you coach people and support them as far as having them do it even when they don't want to or are nervous about it, and when do you know that you should get involved?
Scott: Do you have kind of a benchmark?
Rick: We we have such clearly defined roles now, Scott, that I don't get involved unless I ask permission. I mean, that's just the way it is. If it's a client issue, there's a project manager on that job. If that client asks for me specifically, then I'm going to talk to that project manager and say, [00:26:00] "Your client has asked to speak to me.
Rick: Do you feel like you've done everything you need to do, and do you want to be involved in this conversation?" But otherwise, I'm not going to interject myself in these client issues, whether I hear them, you know, or whatever. If I hear about clients that are upset and, you know, it's Roxy or Patrick, some of my project managers are involved and I'm happy to coach them, I'm happy to walk them through it.
Rick: But unless they ask for Rick Holtz, I'm going to try to stay out of it because I think any opportunity that I interject myself on a situation like that, whether it be with a client or whether it be with an employee, I'm taking away from their development, right? They need that experience. Now if it's a catastrophical thing that happened on a job severe damage or something like that, and you'll know it, you'll know that I'm not, I don't want to be involved.
Rick: I don't want to be the first answer. And even when they call a lot of times and ask to speak to the owner, Kelly, who's my [00:27:00] operations manager, he'll interject himself in and try to take care of it before I even know about it. And sometimes I won't even find out about it
Scott: Yeah. Now just remind the audience how big is your... What's your head count now company-wide?
Rick: We're about 65 strong, 55 in the field, 10 support in the office. Yeah
Scott: Yeah, so, every year at C4C we have a retreat. We rent this huge 15-bedroom house down in Florida, and we all stay under the one roof and have fantastic planning and just some great teaching with one another, and then some great food and It's a great time.
Scott: But Rick is y- obviously part of that, and we always are kind of watching him and to see, like, how much time he spends on the phone or, you know, is his phone blowing up. And we're always shocked, like, " You didn't spend any time on your phone at all today." And
Rick: Not at all. No
Scott: And I, I remember this one situation, and it's probably four years ago, where He did receive a call. I think if my recollection serves me, there was a pipe that had been hit with [00:28:00] a screw or something. There was a leak in a basement or something, and he got a call, and he was frustrated. He goes, "Why are y'all calling me? I'm not going to do anything about that. That's your... You know, you guys can take care of that.
Scott: Figure that out. Deal with that." He did not pick that ball up and run with it. He's like, " I'm not... i'm out here in Florida. I'm not going to... i'm not going to take care of that situation. That's your situation." And he just pushed it back to them and they handled it. And he, as far as I could tell, he didn't think of it much again at all.
Rick: No. No, I'm pretty adamant about that, and it's kind of funny. My children are grown. My youngest, Lily, is in college. She's still got two more years, but my boys have both graduated, and if they're around me, if they see me on the phone and it's work-related, they'll give me the hardest time. They're like, "Why are you on the phone?
Rick: Why are you talking about work? Don't you have people that do that?" So it's kind of funny to see how they hold me accountable, you know, to uh, to let people do what you pay them to do. And people want to do that, right? They don't want, they don't want somebody [00:29:00] above them, their boss or supervisor or whatever, to swoop in and do things that, that they're responsible for.
Rick: They're take- You're taking away opportunities for them, and you got to look at it that way
Scott: Yeah, I love that.
Coaching Not Rescuing
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Scott: One of the things I want to just really reiterate to anyone listening is what Rick said is that he is not interjecting because that means he took the opportunity away from the employee, project manager, whoever, to learn. And what he's doing is he's empowering them and actually then forcing them to come up with some solutions.
Scott: He did not say, " I would not help them make a decision if they give me some options or they ask me for coaching." He said, "I'm not going to solve their problem. I'm going to coach them and encourage them and nurture them or whatever to solve the problem, because that's why they were hired. That's why I believe in them.
Scott: That's why they're in position." And I think there's some [00:30:00] things that if you're listening to this and you have that problem I would suggest use a couple of sales techniques. One of them is the questioning model. Just ask a question. When someone calls you and tries to get you to do their job or solve their problem, just ask a question.
Scott: I don't know. What would you do? Give me some options. I'm not sure. I'm not there." Not in a hostile or arrogant or demeaning way, but force them to process, because I think there's a couple of things. There are people that are straight up lazy, and they just don't want to deal with it.
Scott: They just want you to tell them what to do. And I think things are hard. You could have a frustrated customer or a non-performing employee and they're like, "I don't want to deal with this. I'd like someone else to please help me." And so they're trying to pull you into it, and what you're saying is, "No, you're going to do this, but I- I'll help you.
Scott: I'll coach you. You're not alone, but this is your job." And so when you don't give, you know, use some tool like the, you know, "I don't know, give me some options," then you take away their ability [00:31:00] to learn and then you're just going to handhold them for the rest of your life. So if you're a person that's going to solve every problem, then just know you're going to solve every problem forever, they're always going to call you.
Scott: True, Rick?
Rick: I know this was me. I like, I love to interject myself. I loved to solve problems for people, and I loved to be the one that got everything straight. And It took me a while to realize that I was taking away opportunities from the people that were working with me. And then I would get frustrated that the people that were working with me weren't of a certain level or didn't behave in a certain way, and I blamed it on them until one day I realized it's really me.
Rick: I mean, if you think about it, if a project manager has an issue with a client and we interject ourselves in that situation and not, don't give them the opportunity or the tools to take care of it themselves, it's like button in line in front of somebody at Starbucks, right? You're just saying, "I have no value for you.
Rick: I'm just going to take care of this myself because I don't believe in you."
Scott: Yes
Rick: [00:32:00] Or, "I think I'm so important and so much better than you." And it's just like when you think about it that way, you're like, "Wow, that's awful. I can't believe I behaved that way for so long." But see, those were skills that we needed to get our business off the ground and running, and then it takes transformation of us to then show these people what their value is in our company so that then they can develop and then your phone doesn't ring
Scott: Yeah. Yes, exactly. Another thing that I coach a lot of people, and especially non-owners, so project managers, because I think we didn't really talk about this, but I do think a lot of people, and owners included, are have Superman complexes. So a little, a l- some smoke starts, you know, festering somewhere, and you just drop everything, jump in your truck, and go out there.
Scott: And you say, "I here, I'm here. I'm here to save the day." And I think there's a couple things. Some, if you're controlling, if you have this sense of if the customer's frustrated, I failed, and they're not going to like me, and not refer me, and all [00:33:00] that's, I think that's head trash. I think that we're all just emotional people and the, the customer had a moment.
Scott: And we could solve it in a lot of ways. It doesn't have to be you running out there. And I think you could just you know, calm down for a second and say, "Okay, let me get the facts, and let me s- let's see if we can resolve this with the personnel that are already there."
Rick: Yeah, for sure. And then they've learned something. You've invested in them. They've grown. It's growth.
Scott: Yeah.
Block Your Calendar
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Scott: So I think, you know, controlling that urge, and then the other w- thing that I suggest for people to do is to block their schedule with activity that will help the future be better.
Scott: In other words, scheduling, materials ordering, and have that on your calendar. This comes specifically out of Michael Hyatt's book, Free to Focus, but when I have scheduled from 10:00 to 12:00 to work on my schedule for next week that's an appointment, right? And so when you call me and you say, "Hey, I need this or I need that or I h- I have this issue."
Scott: I say, "Man, [00:34:00] Rick, I would love to help you, but I, I'm unable to because I have an appointment." And y- and you know what happens is if you study time management, is people are s- spending, spend too much time in urgent and important and not stay in the quadrant which is not urgent, but it's important. So th- I planned to make my schedule for next week.
Scott: I let you hijack my time, so therefore the schedule didn't get made. So next week, everything's on fire. And I think holding that time sacred and just telling people, "I'd love to help you," that's empathy, right? I mean, I would li- I understand you're struggling. I'm going to have to help you on the phone here.
Scott: Give me a couple of your ideas and we'll talk through them together. That's using your strategy of I'm going to coach you, but I'm not going to come s- I'm not going to come, you know, steal this from you. And what that will do is that will train people to stop calling you, and they'll solve your problems.
Scott: Now, when I was running the last company I ran, you know, [00:35:00] managing 30-some painters I actually would never answer the phone when they called. And I'd let it go to voicemail, and they would never leave a voicemail almost ever. And then I would see them later and I'd say, "Oh, I, I saw you called. Did you need something?"
Scott: "Oh, yeah, I figured it out." Isn't that interesting, right? So the what they... Yet they always figure it out. And now if they left a message, I'd take care of it, but the point was I was forcing them to solve their own problem, and they did every time. So they had it within them. The last thing I'll say is I think sometimes people call because they are isolated and they, there's no community in our companies and they're...
Scott: And so they want to just talk to you. They feel alone. So to make sure you have space in your company to have meetings, these all company meetings, some coffee and donuts or a pizza or barbecue once in a while. These are the times where people get connected because they really are alone often.
Rick: Absolutely. And you want to make a big impact as the owner of a company, you go to a couple job [00:36:00] sites. Just find some time. I try to find some time every week to go to a couple job sites, and I'm not going there for any other reason to just see the wonderful work that we do, really, and to touch base with the employees that, that work there, that work with us, because I feel like they're one of...
Rick: They are. They're our biggest asset, and I don't want them to feel isolated, just like you said. You need to make sure that they feel a connection from the top to the bottom and everything in between.
Scott: Yeah.
Lead Yourself First
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Scott: I'd like to finish up a little bit with you talking about how you've grown, because you're, you've done such a great job of moving through the business, doing all the roles and now really acting like a true CEO.
Scott: And before we started recording today, you and I were talking about a situation where a high-level person in your company was just going to jump in and do a role for a couple weeks because there was someone on vacation and you challenged him on that decision. How can people listening hone their coaching [00:37:00] skills?
Scott: Or what are s- what's some advice you would say to really pressing your management team to become better managers versus just going out there and putting out the fire like we're talking about?
Rick: Mm-hmm. It's going to sound, I don't know, maybe it sounds a little backwards, but it really, it has started with me. You know, I wanted to be a better owner. I wanted to be a better person. And if you aren't comfortable in working on yourself, you are never going to be able to develop other people. You're just not.
Rick: It and I mean, I know it's so cliche, but it all starts with you. I wanted to have better balance in my life. I wanted to have better balance in my work life when I was at work. I didn't want to feel stressed and upset. I didn't want to feel like I was a time bomb ready to go off. And I started really looking at, what are the things that made me feel that way?
Rick: And it was me being dissatisfied with my [00:38:00] team, being dissatisfied with what we were doing. And at the end of the day, I finally realized that it was me that needed to change, right? if you're frustrated with your team, then you need to look at why you're frustrated and you need to invest in them.
Rick: You need to walk with them. You know, some people, like I said, they'll jump in line in front of their team. They'll get behind their team and push them. Maybe they'll even get in front of them and pull them. But what we need to do is walk with our team, right? And if we haven't done that, they're never going to be good.
Rick: They're never going to be to our satisfaction, and we're not going to get the freedom that we want out of our business. We're just not.
Scott: Yeah.
Thanks for Listening to Success Beyond The Brush!
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Scott: Fantastic conversation, Rick. Thanks for your time today. If anything you've heard today resonates and you'd like to talk to either one of us just about your situation, if you'd like to talk about how you might get coached on some of these issues we're talking about, we have a link in the show notes where you can schedule a, a discovery call.
Scott: [00:39:00] It's no pressure just a conversation. We'd love to help you if we can. Rick, as always, thanks for your time. You bring so much value and wisdom to these podcasts, and appreciate you being on the team and appreciate you.
Rick: It's always a pleasure. Scott, thank you so much for the opportunity.
Well, that does it for another episode of Success Beyond the Brush. Remember, protecting your time is not just about improving your calendar. It requires better planning, clearer responsibilities, stronger systems, and a willingness to let your employees solve the problems that they were hired to handle in the first place.
To learn more about how Consulting4Contractors can help you build a more profitable and less owner-dependent business, schedule a free discovery call with Scott using the link in the show notes. Be sure to subscribe so you never miss an episode. Thanks again for listening. We'll see you in the next one