Sept. 18, 2025

Laying the Groundwork: Innovation with Joseph Richards

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Season 3

In this episode of the Learnings and Missteps podcast, host Jesse interviews Joseph Richards, the owner and chief takeoff officer at Flooring Takeoffs. Joseph discusses his unique career path, transitioning from an English teacher to a business owner, and the challenges he faced along the way. He talks about the importance of transparency, learning from mistakes, and the role of AI in the estimating world. The discussion also delves into the value of social media in growing a business, the significance of transferable skills, and the necessity of being able to delegate tasks in order to scale effectively.

00:00 Introduction and Guest Overview

02:46 Joseph Richards' Journey to Flooring Takeoffs

05:07 Challenges and Learning in the Estimating World

15:18 Starting a Business: Support and Initial Steps

20:31 Delegation and Scaling the Business

28:30 Finding the Right Clients and Staying in Your Lane

34:32 The Struggles and Cycles of Editing

36:30 Teaching vs. Creating: Finding the Balance

39:12 The Importance of Social Media Presence

47:41 Navigating AI in Estimation

56:52 Joseph Richards' Services and Insights

01:00:29 The Promise You Are Intended to Be

Design the Life You have Always Wanted: https://www.depthbuilder.com/do-the-damn-thing

Download a PDF copy of Becoming the Promise You are Intended to Be
https://www.depthbuilder.com/books

00:00 - The Value of Making Mistakes

05:58 - From Teacher to Takeoff Specialist

14:35 - Finding Your Lane in Business

24:28 - The Challenges of Delegating Work

37:02 - Marketing Without Feeling Salesy

49:58 - AI and the Future of Estimating

59:31 - Flooring Takeoffs Explained

01:06:58 - The Promise You're Intended to Be

WEBVTT

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The only people that don't make mistakes are lazy people and liars, because they're either lying that they've never made a mistake or they've never tried or attempted anything of consequence in their life.

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What is going on?

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L&m family Back again with another amazing human being.

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He is the owner and chief takeoff officer at Flooring Takeoffs and no, we're not talking about taking off clothes.

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He's also a covert well, maybe not covert, but for me it seems like he's a little bit of a covert creator, podcaster.

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He's got podcast stuff.

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He's got a YouTube channel.

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He's posting on the LinkedIn.

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Mr Joseph Richards.

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Like I said, he is the owner of Flooring Takeoffs.

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We're going to get a little bit of insight on the estimating world and what that thing is and the unique flavor he brings, not just to his clients but to what appears to me, educating people in general.

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Maybe I'm overstepping a little bit, but we will see.

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He will set the record straight.

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And before we get to that, if this is your first time here, you are listening to the Learnings and Missteps podcast, where amazing human beings just like you are sharing their gifts and talents to lead this world better than they found it.

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Talents to lead this world better than they found it.

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I'm Jesse, your selfish servant, and we are about to get to know Mr Joseph Richards.

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Mr Joseph, how you doing, my friend?

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Hey, how are you?

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Oh man, can you tell I'm a little amped up.

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You're always amped up.

00:01:42.141 --> 00:01:43.504
man, I'm jealous of your energy, thank you.

00:01:43.504 --> 00:02:04.272
Well, let me just tell you most people, there's like a you've heard of the circadian rhythm, right, our circadian rhythm when we sleep, when we don't sleep, there's like a circadian rhythm of people's appreciation of my energy, and so six, anytime between 5am and 9am, very low appreciation for my energy.

00:02:04.272 --> 00:02:16.941
Nine to three I would say it's high, and then 3 to 6 it's like super high because people want more energy, and then after 6 pm again it drops down.

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Nobody really appreciated.

00:02:18.302 --> 00:02:23.360
And my problem is it's always redlining, spiking I caught you in a good.

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I caught you in a good window then.

00:02:25.024 --> 00:02:25.485
Yeah, you did.

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This is a good time where it's okay.

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I think people can tolerate it.

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I won't make you sick.

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So I was looking at, of course I was internet stalking you, looking at your YouTube channel, the website, your LinkedIn, and you seem to have a multitude of skills and interests, Plus you're engaging and kind of a relaxed cool dude, and interest plus you're engaging and kind of a relaxed cool dude.

00:02:49.342 --> 00:02:51.046
What's really curious to me is what is special about flooring takeoffs.

00:02:51.046 --> 00:02:54.133
How did that capture your attention?

00:02:55.194 --> 00:02:57.283
that's kind of a long story talking about before.

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Like, my path to construction was definitely not linear my background, so I have an english degree, so my first job out of school was teaching.

00:03:06.580 --> 00:03:08.144
I did that.

00:03:08.144 --> 00:03:09.086
I did a landman.

00:03:09.086 --> 00:03:11.592
I was a landman in streetport for a little while doing oil and gas.

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I worked for a chemical company for a little bit.

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I had various warehouse jobs all after college and then my wife and I moved to Austin and I just needed the job this flooring place was hiring.

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They're like the way they described it to me was it's kind of like solving puzzles, doing takeoff.

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I'm like I like puzzles, so I need a job.

00:03:35.548 --> 00:03:40.531
It sounds like a good fit and that was 13 years ago, wow.

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I've had a couple of detours, but I always just keep coming back to the takeoffs.

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So I finally, about two and a half years ago, just embraced it and kind of went out on my own and still trucking along and you're enjoying it Most days.

00:03:55.598 --> 00:03:58.382
Yeah, I mean it's a lot.

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I mean I kind of have a team around me now, but for the first basically two years it was just me, having no real business background.

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When they have my wife, who's a cpa and amazing and, yeah, business degree and all that and can help me.

00:04:13.014 --> 00:04:26.233
Yeah, yeah, but a lot of it's just learning on the fly and even then I think I gotta hang on things and I start like hiring people and it's like starting back from zero, because what I did when it's just me doesn't necessarily scale.

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So I'm constantly learning and revising and we're going through it now with our pricing, like I had a very specific structure that worked for me, because I work at a certain speed as I add more people that maybe don't work the same speed.

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It kind of falls apart and that's something.

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And plus, our business is like so niche, it's hard, there's no real models.

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There's some people out there and I've met a lot of people that do this.

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Not everyone is as open about, for obvious reasons, what, oh yeah yeah, what their setup is.

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I mean, it's a very competitive piece of the construction market.

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Yes, a lot of it's just kind of figured out on the fly.

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So oh man, I love that.

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So what was it about?

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Okay, so we understand, right, the path was teacher.

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You got a degree in english, which that's a shocker to me, but maybe not.

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This is kind of the your earnest way of communicating and caring yourself makes a little sense.

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I can smell it land man, which I'm want to.

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I'm definitely going to ask you more about that.

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And you were austin.

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You took the job because you like puzzles, which have been freaking awesome, I mean I didn't know.

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I knew zero about construction, like he mapped out.

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The gc will send the job out to us and then, so we do this like a whole pipeline and I'm like, okay, I don't know what, any of that means.

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But let's do it.

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So do this like a whole pipeline and I'm like, okay, I don't know what any of that means, but let's do it.

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So they were willing to train me and I'm like, okay, this and honestly, I need a job.

00:05:51.461 --> 00:05:58.060
It sounds interesting and I kind of took to it like it's a very specific personality.

00:05:58.060 --> 00:06:03.129
Agreed, we'll do takeoffs and stick with it, like we.

00:06:03.129 --> 00:06:08.750
We've had people I mean, I've been doing it so long but we had people like coming from the field and like, oh, I like to play video games.

00:06:08.750 --> 00:06:10.045
I can sit at a computer all day.

00:06:10.607 --> 00:06:12.744
It's not it's not the same.

00:06:13.045 --> 00:06:15.370
Yeah, they're like send me back, please send me back to.

00:06:16.461 --> 00:06:18.028
So why isn't it the same?

00:06:23.545 --> 00:06:31.855
I have a gamer, but I imagine because it's not as constantly engaging, yeah, yeah, and that's it.

00:06:31.855 --> 00:06:33.968
It's not stimulating constantly, right?

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Oh, it's, we're going through the plans, we're digging through that part.

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You have to be engaged.

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The clicking is kind of you zone out, to be honest, when you're drawing stuff out, and that's the part that most people hate.

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Yes, the clicking is kind of you zone out to be honest when you're drawing stuff out, and that's the part that most people hate.

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So, yes, that's the labor intensive part of it, that's the part people don't like to do, and I'm kind of the same way, but I mean, it's just part of the job, so it's work for me.

00:06:58.831 --> 00:07:00.591
I could never do that work.

00:07:00.591 --> 00:07:06.795
Not because I don't know how you already we already talked about my energy Right do that work.

00:07:06.795 --> 00:07:08.975
Not because I don't know how you already.

00:07:08.975 --> 00:07:10.596
We already talked about my energy right.

00:07:10.596 --> 00:07:12.959
I don't know how to be quiet and I don't.

00:07:12.959 --> 00:07:19.425
I'm deaf to how loud and disruptive I am, like, even when I'm in my most focused zone of work.

00:07:19.425 --> 00:07:21.774
People around me have told me in the years past they're like dude, please get the help.

00:07:21.774 --> 00:07:22.096
Like you are.

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You're freaking monkey, chill out.

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What are you talking about?

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I'm not even aware of how noisy I am when I'm 100% focused.

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It's like I'm noisier than typical.

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Anyways, my great respect for folks that are in the takeoff estimating space is I see them as individuals who have a massive capacity for delayed gratification and an intensely thick skin in terms of recovering from rejection.

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How does that land with you?

00:07:55.369 --> 00:07:55.930
Yeah, that's fair.

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That's really the way you learn.

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I mean, like anything else, you learn by missing things in the plans.

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Yeah, fair or unfair is something gets missed, no matter what review steps are in place.

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It's who didn't take off.

00:08:09.005 --> 00:08:13.495
yeah, yeah so successful we did it.

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If it's not freaking us.

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The burning, yeah, and it just is.

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It just kind of is what it is.

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So that's part of it and you kind of accept that early on.

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Good or bad, it's not for me to say, but it's just part of it, and the feedback you get in construction is not even necessarily what they're saying, but how they're saying it a lot of times so, for me not coming from that background, that was a bit of an adjustment, but I mean I found that if people know that you care and that you're trying your best, you can be mad that I made a mistake, but you're not going to be mad at me for not trying.

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It's like a learning experience.

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I guess, depending on how big that mistake was, but as long as we're not missing whole buildings or whole floors or people will work with you.

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I mean, you're going to miss things like we do at a certain volume.

00:09:03.484 --> 00:09:04.566
It's unavoidable.

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Right.

00:09:07.129 --> 00:09:10.033
But I think the key point there is do you give a damn?

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I made a post the other day.

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I think it was Craig.

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His safety guy out of Canada made the comment dude.

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The only people that don't make mistakes are lazy people and liars, because they're either lying that they've never made a mistake or they've never tried or attempted anything of consequence in their life.

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But the important thing is that you gave it all you had and that you learned from the thing.

00:09:33.443 --> 00:09:41.952
Right, and I think that's what you're saying in terms of that you care like OK, my bad, chalk that up, this was the lesson learned, let's go do better.

00:09:42.519 --> 00:09:44.043
Kind of back to the video game thing.

00:09:44.043 --> 00:09:53.022
The thing about video games is the feedback loops in those video games is super tight, like seconds.

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Right, I do an action, I get an instant feedback saying I did the right thing or not, and then I can adjust it.

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Now, an estimate, it's not the same, because you're calculating, counting.

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Then you got to package it together and then you got to mark it up and then you send it to the client or whoever has the request and then they, like I don't know, help me understand this.

00:10:17.571 --> 00:10:23.461
Once they review it, they will either accept it, that's feedback.

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But there's days, weeks, months between all the work and the actual feedback.

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And if they don't accept it, I don't know, do they give you like actionable feedback in terms of why they didn't accept it, or is it just sorry, we're not taking it, we're going with somebody else?

00:10:42.226 --> 00:10:46.562
So for that, I mean we don't submit, submit the bid, so I'm not on that end of things, but I mean there's.

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So part of it is it's really delayed feedback anyways, because there's a lot of steps between us and it's the middle and there's a lot of extra data that's going in there.

00:10:57.162 --> 00:10:59.386
So it may not be necessarily our numbers were off.

00:10:59.386 --> 00:11:00.971
It may be, but it could be.

00:11:00.971 --> 00:11:04.206
We were priced out of their price, out of that job, got it.

00:11:04.206 --> 00:11:06.745
It didn't matter what the numbers were in the first place.

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You're not going to get that job.

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Usually, if I don't hear anything, I just assume that we're doing okay, which is the best.

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I would rather have something, some kind of targeted feedback.

00:11:15.802 --> 00:11:31.870
But right, if clients aren't calling, yelling at me or sending me frantic emails, then I assume we're doing okay I want to to give the LNM family member shout out to Mr Tanner Heidly, who connected with me on the Facebook.

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He left this review.

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It's my first ever review on Facebook.

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I was like super, super excited.

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He says an industry professional that has concise delivery of his message.

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This review is to give him my support.

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And Tanner I actually got to have a conversation with him.

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We're going to have some follow-up conversations.

00:11:51.910 --> 00:11:53.602
He's in the welding field.

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He's now teaching at a welding school.

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Super awesome guy, super prepared.

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Anyways, tanner, thank you so much, man, for taking the time to do that and for consuming the content, because most of that stuff is focused on forming stuff and kind of field leadership things.

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And finally, somebody said hey, I like this stuff.

00:12:13.148 --> 00:12:30.909
And so, folks, for the rest of you L&M family members out there, whenever you send me a DM, a message, a review, even a share, like, I love to know about it because, one, I know somebody's listening and two, it gives me the opportunity to shout you out in the future.

00:12:30.909 --> 00:12:31.871
So please do that.

00:12:31.871 --> 00:12:37.813
Yeah, so massive discipline, that's what I'm hearing.

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You have massive discipline because you don't have a lot of rich actionable, or you don't get a lot of rich Because you don't have a lot of rich actionable, or you don't get a lot of rich actionable feedback, and so you just, okay, we're going to do the takeoff.

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This is our system, this is our process, this is how we do it.

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Let's keep doing that.

00:12:52.831 --> 00:12:58.755
And then, based on hit ratio and returning customers, that's the indicator.

00:12:58.755 --> 00:13:00.336
And man, that ain't easy.

00:13:00.336 --> 00:13:06.836
So that trait.

00:13:06.856 --> 00:13:07.580
I'm going to call it a trait.

00:13:09.524 --> 00:13:10.206
How did you develop that?

00:13:10.225 --> 00:13:17.826
I'm just very, I'm very like, stubborn, which makes me, you know, can see this through, but maybe not the greatest employee on the other on the flip side.

00:13:17.826 --> 00:13:21.299
So that was another reason for my transition.

00:13:21.299 --> 00:13:25.331
I mean, growing up I was always into sports, pretty much all I did.

00:13:25.331 --> 00:13:30.932
I mean you kind of have to develop a certain amount of grit to get through that good.

00:13:30.972 --> 00:13:44.684
I mean, with anything really that sports, you get that instant feedback a lot of times yeah I don't know if we just I've just always been very stubborn and my my hobbies, for the most part, have been pretty detail-oriented things.

00:13:44.684 --> 00:13:46.370
Oh, like what?

00:13:46.370 --> 00:13:47.625
It's just kind of what I like.

00:13:47.625 --> 00:13:53.384
Like I've always been big into reading, like I did before we started having kids, I did stencil art.

00:13:53.384 --> 00:13:57.115
Oh, it's probably the easiest way.

00:13:57.115 --> 00:14:01.851
So it's like banksy and shepherd fairy are like the two most famous in the world.

00:14:02.332 --> 00:14:14.147
Yeah, but the way that is, it's basically you print out the negative of an image and take an exacto knife and you cut it out by hand and it can be as detailed as you want, and I probably have some pictures I can send you.

00:14:14.147 --> 00:14:16.152
It's really hard to explain, kind of.

00:14:16.152 --> 00:14:28.347
But I mean, you can spend hours just like cutting it's basically just cutting holes in paper and you can hours and days and weeks just cutting one piece and then you spray paint it and you throw it away and then you move on to the next one.

00:14:28.347 --> 00:14:30.452
And it sounds ridiculous, doesn't it's like?

00:14:30.452 --> 00:14:30.902
Why would it?

00:14:31.143 --> 00:14:33.331
yeah, well it's a ridiculous hobby and I loved it.

00:14:33.331 --> 00:14:34.174
I did it for years.

00:14:34.174 --> 00:14:42.346
I just didn't have that free time anymore once we started having kids, but sure stuff like you know I'm good with delayed gratification for the most part.

00:14:43.067 --> 00:14:46.442
That's amazing, amazing man, and I'll say that's a massive superpower.

00:14:46.442 --> 00:15:03.873
Professionally, personally, I mean, I'm nowhere near the to the degree that you are, but I have increased my tolerance and the more I increase it as, oh wow, like I make better decisions and like I give things time to breathe and grow, oh shit, I could have.

00:15:03.873 --> 00:15:04.980
Why didn't I do that before?

00:15:04.980 --> 00:15:11.927
Anyways, all right, so you kind of have this makeup that the work was well suited for you.

00:15:11.927 --> 00:15:17.333
You were working for this company and then you decided to start your own business.

00:15:17.333 --> 00:15:19.557
What was the trigger?

00:15:24.120 --> 00:15:26.071
What was the signal that you saw that you said, ok, I just need to go do this on my own.

00:15:26.071 --> 00:15:35.312
So when I worked there, we actually used another service that did it and they were like super, they're still around, they're gigantic, but they were kind of really early in in that space.

00:15:35.312 --> 00:15:43.931
Ah, and we used them and it was before, like you didn't have teams, you didn't have zoom yep so it was a great concept.

00:15:44.331 --> 00:15:45.033
It made total sense.

00:15:45.033 --> 00:15:46.075
Like we couldn't find an estimator.

00:15:46.075 --> 00:15:49.750
This was probably I don't know eight years ago at this point.

00:15:49.750 --> 00:15:57.807
Yeah, we couldn't find anybody local Like there's two of us, we're overwhelmed, we're working day and night and we're not keeping up with the big calendar.

00:15:57.807 --> 00:16:04.028
And so they came in and it was great, but just the tools weren't there to make it seamless.

00:16:04.028 --> 00:16:05.653
Like it's all phone calls.

00:16:06.480 --> 00:16:07.404
We can't screens.

00:16:07.404 --> 00:16:10.466
We're doing email Well, all the things I hate.

00:16:10.466 --> 00:16:16.308
We're doing that to communicate and it's just you do the best with the tools that you have.

00:16:16.308 --> 00:16:23.553
At that point, but it was always in the back of my head because I talked to one of the guys and like this is also a problem with the market being so saturated.

00:16:23.553 --> 00:16:25.150
The startup for this is basically a problem with the market being so saturated.

00:16:25.150 --> 00:16:26.017
The startup for this is basically nothing.

00:16:26.017 --> 00:16:28.386
You have a laptop and you can afford the software.

00:16:28.386 --> 00:16:30.154
I mean, you're in.

00:16:30.154 --> 00:16:32.081
There's no, there's really no overhead.

00:16:32.081 --> 00:16:37.341
It's just always in the back of my head and I kept talking about it and talking about it if I'm out.

00:16:37.341 --> 00:16:40.508
My wife was like, well, just go do it already oh nice.

00:16:40.528 --> 00:16:44.302
So you had some work yeah, she's, yeah, I would have.

00:16:44.302 --> 00:16:48.533
Just I would have bitched about it for the rest of my life if she had not to go do it.

00:16:48.533 --> 00:16:53.385
She got tired of hearing it and it was most things.

00:16:53.385 --> 00:16:53.927
She was right.

00:16:53.927 --> 00:16:55.231
So it's working out.

00:16:56.120 --> 00:16:58.547
Yeah, oh, ok, I love that.

00:16:58.547 --> 00:17:07.124
I mean, I think that I want to say this you don't have to be married to have support, but having support is ultra awesome, right, I think it kind of.

00:17:07.124 --> 00:17:11.241
I think you had a leg up in terms of practical, practical approach to starting your business.

00:17:11.241 --> 00:17:16.740
Cause I did, I'm like I'm going to quit my job and I didn't have a plan.

00:17:16.840 --> 00:17:19.509
Really I was like, well, really Okay, I went and told her.

00:17:19.509 --> 00:17:21.361
I was like hey, I went in and quit my job.

00:17:21.361 --> 00:17:25.547
Really, I didn't think you were going to do it today.

00:17:26.007 --> 00:17:29.751
So Was it one of those you?

00:17:29.832 --> 00:17:32.455
said yeah, it was I love it.

00:17:33.259 --> 00:17:40.884
But because I went to a small business development council here they do kind of like free advice for people starting businesses, and yeah, they were like, well, a whole list of things, like, do you have any of this?

00:17:40.884 --> 00:17:43.708
I, and yeah, they were like, well, a whole list of things, like, do you have any of this?

00:17:43.708 --> 00:17:45.469
I was like, no, I don't have any of this.

00:17:45.469 --> 00:17:47.351
I didn't know any of this that I needed to do.

00:17:47.351 --> 00:17:49.554
So there was a lot.

00:17:49.554 --> 00:17:55.339
I mean, I gave them a long notice, maybe a couple of months, because the handoffs and yeah.

00:17:55.480 --> 00:18:03.490
Yeah, we had some people out on vacation and stuff and I was pretty generous with my notice, but there was a lot to get ready to be like legit.

00:18:03.490 --> 00:18:08.316
I got to file for my license with the state and stuff and then I have to get.

00:18:08.316 --> 00:18:17.708
I ended up getting like a registered agent to handle all the paperwork and I got to find insurance, which took me months and months because nobody knew what I was talking about.

00:18:17.708 --> 00:18:29.807
Yeah, it was the hardest thing I've done, oh, yeah, and so I called I don't know how many people and I ended up finally just calling an architect here in town because it's similar, see errors and omissions.

00:18:29.807 --> 00:18:33.045
I'm like, please tell me who you guys use so I can do this.

00:18:33.045 --> 00:18:36.857
Yeah, forever, because nobody knows what I'm talking about.

00:18:36.857 --> 00:18:38.583
So they don't call me back, which I get.

00:18:38.583 --> 00:18:39.705
They got plenty of business.

00:18:39.705 --> 00:18:44.923
This custom policy for this one person business hasn't even started yet.

00:18:45.324 --> 00:18:46.006
No, thank you Right.

00:18:46.006 --> 00:18:47.891
They don't know what the risk is, any of that.

00:18:48.680 --> 00:18:50.984
Yes, that was probably the hardest thing was figuring that out.

00:18:51.707 --> 00:18:57.682
Wow, oh man, okay, so since starting, so you've been in business.

00:18:57.682 --> 00:18:58.945
What a few years now.

00:18:59.507 --> 00:19:00.470
About two and a half yeah.

00:19:00.730 --> 00:19:01.211
Two and a half.

00:19:01.211 --> 00:19:10.863
Oh man, this is fresh.

00:19:10.883 --> 00:19:11.124
I love it.

00:19:11.124 --> 00:19:12.665
What have you learned about yourself since starting your business?

00:19:12.665 --> 00:19:17.090
That I am way more particular about how things are done than I thought.

00:19:18.031 --> 00:19:22.741
Ah I see like other people do them and not that they're wrong.

00:19:22.741 --> 00:19:27.266
Like you could be good work, but I just the way I like sounds so ridiculous.

00:19:27.266 --> 00:19:30.455
Just the way I like my materials ordered on my takeoff.

00:19:30.455 --> 00:19:32.461
I'm very particular about it.

00:19:32.461 --> 00:19:44.888
Yeah, so when I see somebody just go like alphabetically and then it's the carpet and the tile and everything's all mixed together, it drives me nuts oh, so you categorize it like all the carpets, all the tiles, when I'm going back a job like.

00:19:44.949 --> 00:19:46.192
I don't want to scroll through the whole list.

00:19:46.192 --> 00:19:47.486
I want to know this is a carpet.

00:19:47.486 --> 00:19:49.247
I need to go to this section or whatever.

00:19:49.247 --> 00:19:53.786
So I recoded our whole database, so now we can just order it all the same.

00:19:53.786 --> 00:20:02.309
Yeah, it just started with Nets, and then also, I'm not great at delegating, ooh.

00:20:02.309 --> 00:20:05.626
That is definitely something, especially as we grow.

00:20:05.626 --> 00:20:10.098
I'm having to let go of more things.

00:20:10.800 --> 00:20:10.961
Yeah.

00:20:12.851 --> 00:20:13.615
Which is kind of hard.

00:20:13.615 --> 00:20:20.799
So I like doing the estimating part, but it's also I don't scale doing that, because that's the time consuming part.

00:20:20.799 --> 00:20:28.880
Yes, I do so many takeoffs and I would love to be involved in more of them, but I just can't at a certain point.

00:20:29.604 --> 00:20:31.590
Yeah, okay, let's.

00:20:31.590 --> 00:20:42.463
I'm going to dive there because I want to say exactly why I think people have a skewed understanding of delegating.

00:20:42.463 --> 00:20:49.923
What I've experienced is people dumping a hot bag of poo on my desk and calling it delegating.

00:20:49.923 --> 00:20:55.473
Oh shit, I'm behind here, jesse, you do it, I'm delegating to whatever.

00:20:55.473 --> 00:21:03.338
That's not delegation man, and so I think a lot of people you don't have to run a business to understand or do it wrong.

00:21:03.338 --> 00:21:07.494
Right, you can be a manager or even just a crew leader or a peer.

00:21:07.494 --> 00:21:12.926
And so when you think about delegating, how do you think about that?

00:21:12.926 --> 00:21:18.900
What, maybe criteria, or what are the signals, the signs that this should be handed off?

00:21:18.900 --> 00:21:20.403
What's the purpose?

00:21:20.403 --> 00:21:23.518
What is it in your brain when you think of delegating?

00:21:23.518 --> 00:21:24.280
What does that mean?

00:21:25.691 --> 00:21:32.181
Really the hardest part is finding out what I'm comfortable handing off and what that whole workflow looks like.

00:21:32.181 --> 00:21:34.896
So I we just started with a VA last month.

00:21:35.519 --> 00:21:35.759
Okay.

00:21:36.451 --> 00:21:38.454
And that has been I apologize to your last week.

00:21:38.454 --> 00:21:46.439
I'm so sorry I haven't given you hardly anything to do because I'm really struggling basically figuring out what to let go of.

00:21:46.439 --> 00:21:57.605
Like I know it takes up my time during the day, but I'm also like, how critical is this to my day, cause, like at this point, it's all just a part of my day, right, it's just my.

00:21:57.605 --> 00:22:03.598
Is this something that everything's going to fall apart if I move it from my list to her list?

00:22:03.598 --> 00:22:03.912
Or is it nothing?

00:22:03.912 --> 00:22:05.396
And I should have done this six months ago.

00:22:05.396 --> 00:22:20.090
Yep, so that's where I'm at right now and that's been a struggle really just figuring out, like what, the critical parts of the workflow, because a lot of time, for the longest time it's just in my head, right, yes, it's just me, let's do it Now.

00:22:20.090 --> 00:22:22.499
There's like five of us kind of Wow.

00:22:24.450 --> 00:22:36.450
It's so I have, I have one in-house guy and then I have a couple of contractors to help us like the tracing part of it, just if we can't keep up with that right, and then I have an estimator contractor that helps with overflow.

00:22:36.450 --> 00:22:37.311
We just get hammered.

00:22:37.311 --> 00:22:39.376
Yeah, for the most part.

00:22:39.376 --> 00:22:42.731
I mean like 90 is like me and him still doing the actual takeoffs.

00:22:42.731 --> 00:22:44.336
So that's been, that's.

00:22:44.375 --> 00:23:06.242
My current struggle is, yeah, now what I can let go and being able to be okay with it oh, man, man, let's talk about this VA thing, cause I just recently acquired VA service executive assistant think we're three or four months in and I'm going to tell you like she has brought enormous relief to my life.

00:23:06.242 --> 00:23:20.241
But the reason I took me so long to make the decision, well, one, cause I'm cheap, but two is, like, how do I articulate what I need, what to hand off?

00:23:20.241 --> 00:23:26.378
Like I had an idea of what I wanted to hand off which ended up not being what I've handed off yet and I'll get to that.

00:23:26.378 --> 00:23:30.077
But how do I tell her or him at the point I didn't know it was going to be a here or she?

00:23:30.077 --> 00:23:31.041
Well, like, how do I tell her or him?

00:23:31.041 --> 00:23:32.307
At the point I didn't know it was going to be a he or a she?

00:23:32.307 --> 00:23:32.990
Well, like, how do I tell them?

00:23:32.990 --> 00:23:35.917
So this is what I did.

00:23:37.570 --> 00:23:44.941
I made a list of all the things that I did on a weekly basis, like, what are the things that I do every single week period?

00:23:44.941 --> 00:24:03.240
And when I made that list, I'm like because my biggest fear was and you said it was not keeping them busy, right, like just or maybe I shouldn't even say busy not helping them be productive, and not because of the cost but because I don't want to waste their time.

00:24:03.240 --> 00:24:05.135
And so I'm like, man, what do I give them?

00:24:05.135 --> 00:24:07.212
And one of the things that I do every single week.

00:24:07.212 --> 00:24:36.377
And I made a big old list and then I'm like, oh, there's some things in there that are easy for me to articulate the steps right and maybe map out the process which ended up being the production of the podcast, which the and that's why I say that she brought so much relief because the process is I do the interview and then I send it to dude on style, they do the editing and then at the time I would then get it, would.

00:24:36.377 --> 00:24:51.077
I was the bottleneck, because then I had to do the finishing touches and create the thumbnail and do the description and upload it into all the steps, and I always had to negotiate or make a decision Am I going to go to sleep early or am I going to process the podcast?

00:24:51.077 --> 00:24:52.491
I got a couple of flights this week.

00:24:52.491 --> 00:24:56.050
I'm probably not going to launch, release the podcast episode that I want to.

00:24:56.050 --> 00:24:56.332
So it was.

00:24:56.332 --> 00:25:02.252
I was like you know what I can build the skill of mapping out what the process is with the podcast.

00:25:02.252 --> 00:25:04.076
It's a low risk thing.

00:25:04.076 --> 00:25:11.656
It's a, it's consistent work, and so we started there and I talked her through it and it's brilliant, she's okay.

00:25:11.656 --> 00:25:21.419
Jess, can you record yourself going through all those steps, because they had to go from this to the script, to YouTube, to Buzzsprout, and I was like dude, I could record myself.

00:25:21.419 --> 00:25:24.721
She said if you do that, that would help me tremendously.

00:25:24.721 --> 00:25:26.055
I'm like no problem.

00:25:26.055 --> 00:25:38.224
So I did and boom, that was the last time we talked about it and so then it became okay, what are the other things that I do on a high frequency, that I can record myself doing, that I can give to her and then flesh that out.

00:25:43.199 --> 00:25:45.067
Now back to the idea of delegating.

00:25:45.067 --> 00:25:59.174
I think of it from two perspectives.

00:25:59.174 --> 00:26:01.640
Or attempted business owner is what are the things that only I can do right now?

00:26:01.640 --> 00:26:03.785
That's where I need to spend my time when.

00:26:03.785 --> 00:26:06.028
What are the things that other human beings can do?

00:26:06.028 --> 00:26:10.961
Those are the things I need to figure out what to delegate, to hand off to somebody else, and, of course, letting go is difficult.

00:26:10.961 --> 00:26:14.292
Now, as a manager, leader of people, I think of it a little bit differently.

00:26:14.292 --> 00:26:19.784
I think of it who do I want to build capability in?

00:26:19.784 --> 00:26:33.051
Who do I want to invest and grow so that they can grow their career, et cetera, and what are the additional responsibilities I can give to them that will help them build some more skill sets and some more capability?

00:26:33.051 --> 00:26:33.913
What do you think about that?

00:26:35.017 --> 00:26:36.160
No, that makes sense to me.

00:26:36.160 --> 00:26:36.582
It's.

00:26:36.582 --> 00:26:37.814
That's what I did this week.

00:26:37.814 --> 00:26:49.356
Actually, I we had our weekly call and I was trying to describe something to her and I'm just kind of thinking out loud and I finally just did a loom video and this is what I'm thinking, this is what is in my head.

00:26:49.356 --> 00:26:51.038
Watch this.

00:26:51.038 --> 00:26:53.502
If you have better ideas, tell me.

00:26:53.502 --> 00:26:55.953
Like I'm not married to this, this is just what I'm thinking could work.

00:26:56.576 --> 00:26:56.836
Yeah.

00:26:57.097 --> 00:26:57.940
And let's go from there.

00:26:57.940 --> 00:27:05.413
So that's, I mean I use and I don't know why I didn't do that before Like I use Loom for clients a lot, like especially our first couple of jobs.

00:27:05.413 --> 00:27:09.497
I like do a review of the job and I send it along with the deliverables.

00:27:09.497 --> 00:27:20.026
I'm like this is what I'm doing, this is why I did it, cause that's where I get in trouble, and especially stuff that's quick turnaround the first year or so, like I don't want to say no to anything.

00:27:20.346 --> 00:27:32.210
Oh, yeah, you get in trouble a couple of times and it's it's my fault for rushing the or skipping entirely the onboarding process and be like, oh, this is a job process.

00:27:32.210 --> 00:27:33.093
And be like, oh, this is a job, this is money.

00:27:33.093 --> 00:27:37.833
I should say yes and I do it, and then nobody's happy, like I'm not happy having to the quick turnaround and not doing my normal process.

00:27:37.833 --> 00:27:39.656
Yeah, just stuff like that.

00:27:39.656 --> 00:27:40.618
Now that makes a lot of sense.

00:27:40.618 --> 00:27:46.798
And it, yeah, it has to change, as I'm kind of transitioning more to the manager than the estimator.

00:27:46.798 --> 00:27:54.451
Yes, it's going to be a much, much harder thing for me to let go of, but at a certain point, hopefully, I mean it'd be a good.

00:27:54.451 --> 00:27:58.093
It'll be a good day, though, when that happens, because that means we're successful enough.

00:27:58.233 --> 00:28:20.804
We're busy enough that I have to focus on stuff yeah I don't know if you've read it and it's got some really good tactical things to do for entrepreneurs people that are starting their own business.

00:28:20.804 --> 00:28:28.211
That'll shift the way you think about things, just enough to take action and say, oh, I could do more of this.

00:28:28.211 --> 00:28:30.194
It's had a massive impact on me.

00:28:30.194 --> 00:28:36.064
Now you mentioned taking work that maybe wasn't optimal.

00:28:36.064 --> 00:28:36.944
We'll say that right.

00:28:36.944 --> 00:28:44.699
Or working with clients that weren't optimal, or taking work that wasn't optimal, and we also talked a little bit about scaling.

00:28:44.699 --> 00:28:58.346
What are some things people, aspiring business owners, startup folks what do they need to be thinking about or looking for when it comes to optimal clientele and this idea of scaling?

00:28:59.191 --> 00:29:09.823
I mean and I heard you say this yesterday on the webinar with Samantha Everyone will tell you to build like an ideal client profile and kind of have that in your head when somebody comes to you.

00:29:09.823 --> 00:29:11.394
But it's, you know when you're first starting it's hard.

00:29:11.394 --> 00:29:12.559
You don't have the same kind of lee that in your head.

00:29:12.559 --> 00:29:15.028
So when somebody comes to you but it's, you know when you're first starting it's hard.

00:29:15.028 --> 00:29:21.101
Like you, really you don't have the same kind of leeway to say no, like even now, like I don't want to tell people no.

00:29:21.101 --> 00:29:25.310
But you know, I've referred people to other services.

00:29:25.310 --> 00:29:25.952
I thought maybe a better fit.

00:29:25.952 --> 00:29:30.119
Or I had a client that we worked together a few months and I'm like this is not really.

00:29:30.119 --> 00:29:32.825
They were wanting stuff outside my scope.

00:29:32.825 --> 00:29:33.772
I'm like this is really just not.

00:29:33.772 --> 00:29:36.320
This is not going to end well to keep going down this road.

00:29:36.320 --> 00:29:38.337
So I referred them out to another service.

00:29:39.269 --> 00:29:40.413
So, it's hard.

00:29:40.413 --> 00:29:44.050
But yeah, you kind of got to pick your scope and kind of got to stick to it.

00:29:44.050 --> 00:29:45.135
Stick to what you're comfortable with.

00:29:45.135 --> 00:29:49.553
If you're really comfortable expanding your scope, then I say go for it.

00:29:49.553 --> 00:29:54.717
If you're doing it just because you don't want them to go somewhere else, it's probably not going to end well, but that's.

00:29:54.717 --> 00:29:59.540
It's really hard to stick to that in the first until you get some traction.

00:30:00.101 --> 00:30:00.820
Yeah, yeah.

00:30:01.642 --> 00:30:08.688
Especially that was my one regret is not like, and plus I was working in a job already where everyone's kind of in the same circle.

00:30:08.688 --> 00:30:14.336
It's a small network, so I didn't want to be like you know disrespectful about it.

00:30:14.376 --> 00:30:38.820
Hey, I'm leaving, I'm going to start my own, but at the least connected with more people on linkedin before I left, like because doing it after has been so much harder yes because they see my title and they're like I get a million of you a day in my DMs in my inbox and I don't pitch people on there, I don't cold email people, but I get it.

00:30:38.820 --> 00:30:42.460
I'm in that market and I'm lumped in whether I like it or not.

00:30:42.460 --> 00:30:49.480
So I would say doing that may help you avoid having to make those decisions or making decisions so hard early on.

00:30:49.480 --> 00:30:52.569
That's my big regret of not doing that before.

00:30:52.569 --> 00:30:55.520
I like just jumped in, like we'll figure it out.

00:30:55.520 --> 00:30:57.327
We're gonna have to dive into that.

00:30:57.347 --> 00:30:58.893
Your question at all, but that's just kind of.

00:30:58.893 --> 00:31:00.818
You know you did 100.

00:31:00.818 --> 00:31:04.088
Don't go outside your comfort zone.

00:31:04.088 --> 00:31:06.574
You know your strengths, you know the value that you bring.

00:31:06.574 --> 00:31:09.219
Avoid going outside of those boundaries.

00:31:09.219 --> 00:31:23.261
Let them be the bumpers on the bowling lane, because but in your first year that's very difficult because you got to make some money and I honestly believe it's just one of those lessons that we have to like actually live.

00:31:23.261 --> 00:31:33.997
Doing work that's way beyond our expertise and working with people that were, we got that initial gut feeling of, ooh, I don't know about this, we got to learn.

00:31:34.490 --> 00:31:35.554
Those are usually not wrong.

00:31:35.554 --> 00:31:38.080
Your first conversation with somebody is off.

00:31:38.080 --> 00:31:43.422
That usually doesn't get better, so, or it's just a personality, you just don't click.

00:31:43.422 --> 00:31:47.259
It's hard in the moment, but I mean, there's so many companies out there you can find another one.

00:31:47.640 --> 00:31:48.301
You can recover.

00:31:51.710 --> 00:31:57.143
Again, it's hard in the moment to be like this is not a great fit, it's not gonna I'll get money like this month, but it's just gonna be problems down the road.

00:31:57.143 --> 00:31:59.233
Yeah, but I mean I get it.

00:31:59.233 --> 00:32:01.077
It's hard but it's.

00:32:01.077 --> 00:32:03.784
We've been really good about staying in our scope.

00:32:03.784 --> 00:32:07.136
Like we're just division nine, we just use one software.

00:32:07.136 --> 00:32:12.989
We're very even in a very niche market, but I think that helps us.

00:32:12.989 --> 00:32:17.358
So people generally find us we're kind of exactly what they need.

00:32:17.358 --> 00:32:19.715
If they use a different software, I just send them somewhere else.

00:32:19.715 --> 00:32:21.246
I'm like this is just not, it's not a good fit.

00:32:21.246 --> 00:32:22.491
I'm not going to learn that software.

00:32:22.531 --> 00:32:30.878
I'm not going to be as good Like my people are going to be as good on that as we are with this software, and I'll refer you to somebody else.

00:32:30.878 --> 00:32:34.085
I have no problem, yeah man somewhere.

00:32:36.690 --> 00:32:41.516
So just the cost of me, like being half as good at some other software, I'm not going to be happy.

00:32:41.516 --> 00:32:46.537
Personally, not being as good with it, they're probably not going to be happy with it, so it's just not.

00:32:46.537 --> 00:33:01.598
Yeah, I decided that early on though this is our lane and, like we did some experiments with residential, I was like early on, didn't work out, it's a whole different animal from commercial, and I was like we're not doing that anymore.

00:33:02.161 --> 00:33:28.190
So, yeah, we're very much in our lane and I've been pretty protective of that for the past year, especially good, good yeah, I think if I and I haven't mapped it out, but if if I did getting clear I love the way you say it getting clear about what my lane is, getting clear about that helped me understand the characteristics of the best client for me to serve, like it wasn't the other way around.

00:33:28.190 --> 00:33:33.001
It wasn't identifying the client and then understanding the service.

00:33:33.001 --> 00:33:34.917
It was really understanding what is my lane.

00:33:34.917 --> 00:33:37.459
What do people appreciate about me the most?

00:33:37.459 --> 00:33:41.441
Where I have and provide the deepest impact or value.

00:33:41.441 --> 00:33:43.936
And then it's okay, this is it.

00:33:43.936 --> 00:33:45.856
What are all the people that are asking for that?

00:33:45.856 --> 00:33:47.195
Ah, okay, now I got it.

00:33:47.549 --> 00:33:53.792
So that helped me lean into the YouTube, especially Since that's what we focus on.

00:33:53.792 --> 00:33:55.238
I can kind of go deep on that.

00:33:55.238 --> 00:34:05.313
Yes, I've started like trying to branch out to do more general estimating, like reading plans, videos, but a lot of them are measure square, specific, that are kind of deep dives on different features.

00:34:05.313 --> 00:34:09.202
But being so focused on that kind of allows me to do that.

00:34:09.202 --> 00:34:14.835
If I'm spread across three or four platforms, I'm not really adding any value to what's already on youtube.

00:34:14.835 --> 00:34:18.972
So I feel I feel good about what I'm putting out now.

00:34:20.335 --> 00:34:33.092
And same thing like with the podcast, like I intended for that to be like a weekly thing, yeah, but then I became the bottleneck and I'm like am I going to sit and edit this and put my stupid memes in here for an hour or am I gonna go do something else and then I just so?

00:34:33.092 --> 00:34:35.056
But that's the only way I can get to.

00:34:35.056 --> 00:34:35.958
The editing is to.

00:34:35.958 --> 00:34:38.273
That's the only part that makes it fun for me is to put those in there.

00:34:38.273 --> 00:34:42.530
Yeah, yeah, because otherwise I'm like this is the only thing ever.

00:34:42.530 --> 00:34:45.795
Yeah, so definitely right.

00:34:46.536 --> 00:34:49.900
So so what's my opinion on editing?

00:34:49.900 --> 00:34:51.684
Do you like it?

00:34:51.684 --> 00:34:55.436
I don't like it, oh yeah, no, here's the way I kind of function.

00:34:55.436 --> 00:35:02.155
I like everything at first for about 30 to 60 days and then I get tired of stuff.

00:35:02.155 --> 00:35:13.496
So, like editing when I started, man, when I started the podcast, I was using Hindenburg to edit, which was only waveform and it sucks so bad.

00:35:13.496 --> 00:35:17.333
But, man, I just loved figuring it out, clicking and tinkering and stuff.

00:35:17.894 --> 00:35:21.835
Now I use the script and then it's like, oh my god, this is so awesome, it does all these things.

00:35:21.835 --> 00:35:23.501
And then I'm like, okay, I'm tired of it.

00:35:23.501 --> 00:35:32.844
Like I got it facebook ads in march I started, like I said, I decided I want to learn if I like Facebook ads and if they're a valuable resource.

00:35:32.844 --> 00:35:39.612
And, man, oh my God, it's had me consumed for about six months, which is three months longer than I planned.

00:35:39.612 --> 00:35:43.820
And now I mean just recently I'm like, okay, I'm tired of it.

00:35:43.820 --> 00:35:47.255
Yes, I want to do more of it, but I don't want to do the button clicking anymore.

00:35:47.255 --> 00:35:49.398
That sucks, let me get somebody else to do that.

00:35:49.398 --> 00:35:56.260
And so that's kind of my cycle of I want to learn something and then, once I get comfortable with it.

00:35:56.260 --> 00:35:58.150
It's okay, I want to learn something else.

00:35:58.150 --> 00:35:59.331
Somebody has to do this now.

00:36:00.492 --> 00:36:03.476
I used Audacity when I did my podcast.

00:36:03.476 --> 00:36:10.447
So this my daughter was born, so this was like eight years ago.

00:36:10.467 --> 00:36:15.226
Oh, you're an og in the podcast space yeah, I only did it for a year.

00:36:15.246 --> 00:36:15.829
I did a little of them.

00:36:15.829 --> 00:36:16.713
I did like one a month.

00:36:16.713 --> 00:36:19.362
But it was the editing was death.

00:36:19.362 --> 00:36:20.184
I hated it.

00:36:20.184 --> 00:36:30.664
It's horrible they didn't have all this cool stuff like they have now like descriptive oh man yeah but it was like very same as like the way it was very manual and I'm no, no fun, no fun.

00:36:30.784 --> 00:36:35.833
Okay, so we mentioned podcasting, youtube linkedin.

00:36:35.833 --> 00:36:37.141
So I have one question.

00:36:37.141 --> 00:36:53.690
I want to go a little deeper in terms of the business value of social media, but first I want to start with would you consider yourself a teacher or a creator when it comes to, like your, the stuff you put out on the social internet omniverse?

00:36:55.760 --> 00:36:57.106
I focus more on the teaching.

00:36:57.748 --> 00:36:57.969
Okay.

00:36:58.320 --> 00:36:59.585
I guess they kind of go hand in hand.

00:36:59.585 --> 00:37:00.648
But that's part of it.

00:37:00.648 --> 00:37:02.920
I mean, it's not entirely altruistic, obviously.

00:37:02.920 --> 00:37:03.925
It's like marketing for me.

00:37:03.925 --> 00:37:06.425
Sure, I also do enjoy it.

00:37:06.425 --> 00:37:08.443
I also enjoy the teaching.

00:37:08.443 --> 00:37:29.842
Like people email like hey, I can't figure this out, no-transcript, nice.

00:37:29.842 --> 00:37:30.704
Teaching him how to use the software, nice.

00:37:30.704 --> 00:37:31.931
So I actually really enjoy that.

00:37:31.931 --> 00:37:33.014
Creator, I guess.

00:37:33.014 --> 00:37:37.818
Yeah, it's all kind of lumped together at this point, but I look at it more as educational.

00:37:37.818 --> 00:37:38.382
But it is.

00:37:38.382 --> 00:37:41.173
I don't in that space, in this space, nobody else is doing that.

00:37:41.173 --> 00:37:42.320
So that was my initial thought.

00:37:42.320 --> 00:37:44.846
Yes, it's something a differentiator?

00:37:44.965 --> 00:37:55.393
hell yes, there's very, because we're all basically the same service, so there's got to be like little variations and that just puts my name out there a little bit more.

00:37:55.393 --> 00:38:07.791
I need to do a better job of the guy that emailed me, saw the videos, but he didn't know we were an actual takeoff service, so I need to do a better job of explaining that.

00:38:08.059 --> 00:38:10.306
But it's also I'm not great at selling.

00:38:10.306 --> 00:38:13.302
I have discovered so even on LinkedIn.

00:38:13.302 --> 00:38:17.197
My wife's always you gotta ask, you gotta ask for the sale, you gotta.

00:38:17.197 --> 00:38:23.831
And I just kind of feels gross, like I even but even if it's just one post a month, just needs to be, as we do.

00:38:25.034 --> 00:38:25.760
I just can't get over it.

00:38:25.760 --> 00:38:38.085
It's just like a mental thing and I just it's probably just because I see it all day and I'm like I don't want to just add to that noise, but it's also I'm probably leaving clients on the table because they're just like this guy.

00:38:38.085 --> 00:38:38.949
He's watched all my videos.

00:38:38.949 --> 00:38:39.583
He has no idea.

00:38:39.583 --> 00:38:41.460
This is what our business is.

00:38:41.679 --> 00:38:42.222
I'm like that's a.

00:38:42.222 --> 00:38:53.360
It's a massive failure on my part to have this audience, however small it may be, going through all 20, whatever videos and has no idea that this is the service we provide.

00:38:53.360 --> 00:38:56.992
He just thought I was like some random dude that really liked Metro Square.

00:38:56.992 --> 00:39:05.268
That's hilarious, but if he had never said that, I never would have.

00:39:05.268 --> 00:39:10.289
I just assume it's our name, like people are going to know what we do, but you know, that's not always the case.

00:39:11.039 --> 00:39:12.065
No, a hundred percent%.

00:39:12.065 --> 00:39:21.733
It's funny, I've had this podcast for I think five years now, since COVID, and there's personal friends that I've known since middle school that are like, do you have a podcast?

00:39:21.733 --> 00:39:26.869
And I post like crazy, right, I mean, from my perspective, I post a lot.

00:39:26.869 --> 00:39:37.108
So I completely appreciate the ooh, it feels stinky and icky and I also know that I mean hell.

00:39:37.108 --> 00:39:42.400
I post daily about the podcast and people still don't know that I have a podcast.

00:39:42.400 --> 00:39:52.132
So that gives me some comfort in terms of being more overt about whatever it is Now it's more like what's?

00:39:52.152 --> 00:39:53.076
what's that in my head?

00:39:53.076 --> 00:39:56.106
I feel like everybody sees it every day like what I post, which is not true.

00:39:56.106 --> 00:39:57.530
It is not true.

00:39:57.530 --> 00:39:58.010
That's.

00:39:58.010 --> 00:40:00.505
Another lesson I've learned is I was kind of hesitant to make all these changes.

00:40:00.505 --> 00:40:03.242
I'm like, oh it's stupid, I just did this, now I'm gonna change it.

00:40:03.242 --> 00:40:09.626
And I'm finally like nobody's really paying attention to you nope, that's true, you're not nearly as important as you think.

00:40:09.626 --> 00:40:11.389
You are on the internet.

00:40:11.990 --> 00:40:13.373
Yes, yes.

00:40:13.679 --> 00:40:15.126
That was just like a mental block.

00:40:15.126 --> 00:40:29.143
Just assume it's there and people are seeing it and they're probably not, probably have no idea that you did something totally different last week 100% and every now and then somebody does notice and that's like ultimate for me.

00:40:29.264 --> 00:40:30.106
Hey, I saw you changing.

00:40:30.106 --> 00:40:30.969
Oh man, you noticed.

00:40:30.969 --> 00:40:42.289
It's exciting because you don't get that kind of feedback Now on the idea of they're not obsessing about your content as much as you are.

00:40:42.289 --> 00:40:43.996
You think they're seeing it every single day.

00:40:43.996 --> 00:40:55.931
The reality is they're not and the value I mean you made this point earlier about you you wish you would have been more active on LinkedIn before you started the business.

00:40:55.931 --> 00:40:56.693
Why?

00:40:56.693 --> 00:41:05.670
What has LinkedIn provided you or benefited you and why would it have been different had you started sooner?

00:41:08.360 --> 00:41:12.992
I feel like you're just having that network going in accelerated things a little bit.

00:41:12.992 --> 00:41:24.545
I knew it was a crowded space, but I say this ironically underestimated how many companies are doing this and like how much noise there is to cut through and I'd always heard this.

00:41:24.545 --> 00:41:27.728
But like, referrals have been our biggest source of good clients.

00:41:28.349 --> 00:41:28.570
Yeah.

00:41:28.871 --> 00:41:31.998
And just having that, whether it's even they just see it on there, we're already connected.

00:41:31.998 --> 00:41:36.208
They say, hey, I know a guy, just having that introduction makes a huge difference.

00:41:36.208 --> 00:41:39.893
Yeah, so, and I didn't.

00:41:39.893 --> 00:41:40.840
I didn't even think about it.

00:41:40.840 --> 00:41:43.309
I didn't really use LinkedIn until I did this, which is another part.

00:41:43.309 --> 00:41:46.721
You see, somebody just hops on, they start posting all the time trying.

00:41:46.721 --> 00:41:51.503
It's kind of a red flag a little bit, but I just didn't think about it before I started.

00:41:51.503 --> 00:41:57.329
I'm like people will find me, they'll find me on the internet somehow, but it didn't work that way.

00:41:58.028 --> 00:42:02.572
So really this year I've started going to some in-person conferences.

00:42:03.213 --> 00:42:03.552
Okay.

00:42:04.094 --> 00:42:08.976
So that I think that is kind of an advantage I need to lean into since I'm here.

00:42:08.976 --> 00:42:26.407
Yes, so I went to, I went to, I went to surfaces in vegas, oh nice, yeah, that was a little much, that was a little overwhelming, um, but I went to an in-person one earlier this year and we're going to another one next month, so nice yeah I know what I've started going into just making those connections.

00:42:26.407 --> 00:42:29.003
Then I can come back to linkedin and connect and then it's a different connection.

00:42:29.344 --> 00:42:32.621
Yeah, yeah definitely my similar, same right.

00:42:32.621 --> 00:42:38.925
Like, the only reason I got active on LinkedIn was because I didn't get a million downloads on my first podcast episode.

00:42:38.925 --> 00:42:41.710
And I still haven't hit a million downloads.

00:42:41.710 --> 00:42:46.807
Anyways, started the podcast and I'm a month in and it was abysmal.

00:42:46.807 --> 00:42:51.708
I'm like, so I started kind of doing YouTube research, right, oh, you got to market it.

00:42:51.708 --> 00:42:52.800
I'm like, what do you mean?

00:42:52.800 --> 00:42:53.322
You got to?

00:42:53.322 --> 00:42:54.385
Oh, okay.

00:42:54.385 --> 00:42:57.331
And back then I said, okay, here's what I'm going to do.

00:42:57.331 --> 00:43:03.501
I'm cause I was already releasing an episode twice, like every other week, which was like monumental to me.

00:43:03.501 --> 00:43:04.800
Right, that's too much in my head.

00:43:04.800 --> 00:43:05.581
It was too much.

00:43:05.581 --> 00:43:06.742
People are going to get exhausted.

00:43:06.742 --> 00:43:12.304
So what I'm going to do is I'll make a post on the off weeks when I'm not releasing like one post.

00:43:12.304 --> 00:43:17.507
So it was two posts a month and I thought that was just it seems like a lot right.

00:43:17.847 --> 00:43:19.628
Yeah.

00:43:19.628 --> 00:43:22.690
And I'm like, okay, crap, that's not working.

00:43:22.690 --> 00:43:23.952
Okay, let me do one a week.

00:43:23.952 --> 00:43:25.753
Okay, that's a little bit better.

00:43:25.753 --> 00:43:43.659
And so, little by little, because and here's if it wasn't for the guests that I was interviewing, I would not have started marketing, right, I wanted people to hear the stories of the freaking people that I'm interviewing, because they're beautiful stories and that was my motivation.

00:43:43.659 --> 00:43:51.306
So then all of a sudden I was like, oh, people started reaching out for services and I'm like, man, I got, I got a job.

00:43:52.068 --> 00:43:56.184
At the time I wasn't even thinking about that, but it happened enough times.

00:43:56.184 --> 00:43:59.452
I'm like, oh shit, okay.

00:43:59.452 --> 00:44:04.199
And so then I started using my personal profile.

00:44:04.199 --> 00:44:11.722
I started posting a little bit more, just a little bit once a week, and I still had a job After I quit.

00:44:11.722 --> 00:44:15.965
It wasn't until maybe 18 months ago where I started posting daily.

00:44:15.965 --> 00:44:18.672
It took a long time on my personal profile.

00:44:18.672 --> 00:44:23.186
All that to say that I'm with you on that.

00:44:23.186 --> 00:44:25.070
It was difficult.

00:44:25.070 --> 00:44:26.833
I should have started sooner.

00:44:26.833 --> 00:44:34.425
And so folks, l&m, family out there, if you have a little side gig or you're starting a business, I know how uncomfortable it is.

00:44:34.965 --> 00:44:43.690
Joseph agrees, but tell everybody you know, you got to let them know and you got to let them know 3000 times so that they can remember.

00:44:43.690 --> 00:44:56.909
I know it now in hindsight is, even if you're an employee and you intend to be an employee, you don't want to start your own business.

00:44:56.909 --> 00:44:59.063
You're happy with the work you do, the people you work with.

00:44:59.063 --> 00:45:32.972
Being visible on LinkedIn and the other socials as well but I favor LinkedIn, but being visible on LinkedIn will increase your stock value, like your personal stock value within your organization, within your industry or the market segment that you play in, just by simply posting, and that is not a bad thing and it sets the stage for bigger, greater opportunities that you can't even imagine.

00:45:32.972 --> 00:45:33.693
I'll give you an example.

00:45:33.693 --> 00:45:35.206
I was just oh man, I don't have it.

00:45:35.820 --> 00:45:39.530
Tadson Robert, they published a book and I'm in the book.

00:45:39.530 --> 00:45:40.141
There's one.

00:45:40.141 --> 00:45:41.588
I got a like a chapter.

00:45:41.588 --> 00:45:44.628
Never in my life did I think I would be included.

00:45:44.628 --> 00:45:50.650
I've been included in a few books, right, and I'm like I was just thinking about it because they sent me a copy of the book.

00:45:50.650 --> 00:45:57.128
And I'm like I was just thinking about it because they sent me a copy of the book and I'm like this is like I never, but it's a result of me being visible on social media.

00:45:57.128 --> 00:46:04.541
It's not because I'm some credentialed smart guy, it's just because people see me and they say, hey, this dummy might be entertaining, let's talk to him.

00:46:04.541 --> 00:46:14.639
And then they put me in the thing, which I again the total privilege that I would have missed had I not been visible on social media, that I would have missed had I not been visible on social media.

00:46:14.639 --> 00:46:22.135
And again, like you said, it will salt or chum the waters in the event you were to start your own business or start your own little side gig.

00:46:22.155 --> 00:46:22.538
You agree with that?

00:46:22.538 --> 00:46:22.960
Yeah, for sure.

00:46:22.960 --> 00:46:33.702
I mean, even I had a company reach out a few weeks ago like a software company that seen one of my videos when we set up a call and I'm like, hey, would you maybe be interested in a partnership, Like stuff like that.

00:46:34.244 --> 00:46:34.505
Yeah.

00:46:35.007 --> 00:46:37.445
And I'm like this is ridiculous, like why wouldn't I just do this every day?

00:46:37.445 --> 00:46:39.425
Like my wife did it every day for two years.

00:46:39.425 --> 00:46:40.570
She started her business.

00:46:40.570 --> 00:46:41.923
We started about time.

00:46:41.923 --> 00:46:42.746
She's a.

00:46:42.746 --> 00:46:48.567
She's a crazy person and did it every day for two years and but I mean, it's a's a huge difference.

00:46:48.567 --> 00:46:51.751
I'm just like I just mentally I just couldn't get over it.

00:46:52.711 --> 00:46:53.193
It's tough.

00:46:53.193 --> 00:47:01.650
Get it, man, I get it, but you're doing I mean, here's the thing you are doing it you post with some regular frequency on LinkedIn.

00:47:01.650 --> 00:47:06.503
You post with the regular frequency on YouTube, like you're doing.

00:47:06.503 --> 00:47:14.695
I mean, hell, I'm sure you've heard the statistics right Less than 1% of people that have a LinkedIn account actually post content.

00:47:14.695 --> 00:47:20.333
So that dynamic of I'm scared, like whatever that is, the majority are there.

00:47:20.333 --> 00:47:22.646
It's the psychos like me that are like.

00:47:22.646 --> 00:47:23.427
That's the problem.

00:47:24.050 --> 00:47:24.632
That's the problem.

00:47:24.632 --> 00:47:26.688
It's like the construction bubble that I'm in.

00:47:26.688 --> 00:47:30.831
It's people like you and Matt that are killing it posting all the time.

00:47:30.831 --> 00:47:34.548
I'm like, okay, I'll do my one post a week, that's it right.

00:47:34.548 --> 00:47:35.592
Just start with these guys.

00:47:35.592 --> 00:47:36.402
Yeah, but yeah.

00:47:36.402 --> 00:47:38.710
So that's part of it seeing what you guys are doing.

00:47:40.681 --> 00:47:41.626
Oh man, I love it.

00:47:41.626 --> 00:47:48.710
Okay, I got one question about AI and estimating, and then we'll go into the Grand Slam question.

00:47:48.710 --> 00:47:56.572
So what do you think about AI in integrating with estimation takeoffs?

00:47:56.572 --> 00:47:59.168
Are you like for it, against it?

00:47:59.168 --> 00:48:00.525
Do you have any experience with this?

00:48:01.579 --> 00:48:03.827
Yes, I've been tracking it because it's coming.

00:48:03.827 --> 00:48:04.690
It's not there yet.

00:48:04.690 --> 00:48:06.768
Like it's, I have a subscription to one.

00:48:06.768 --> 00:48:08.646
I've had it for a year and a half.

00:48:08.646 --> 00:48:11.108
I just want it to automate the clicking.

00:48:11.108 --> 00:48:13.804
Me personally, I still want to do the takeoff.

00:48:13.804 --> 00:48:16.811
Yeah, I just don't want to click, so I don't.

00:48:16.811 --> 00:48:22.130
Some of the bigger ones like they can take off everything in 10 seconds.

00:48:22.130 --> 00:48:26.465
I don't want that personally, I want to be able to draw all the rooms.

00:48:26.465 --> 00:48:28.992
Save me that, and then I can still do my process.

00:48:28.992 --> 00:48:32.472
So I don't know how many people feel like me.

00:48:32.472 --> 00:48:35.443
And it's coming.

00:48:35.443 --> 00:48:36.746
I have no idea what the timeline is.

00:48:36.746 --> 00:48:40.722
It's, yeah, kind of just the simple things that I would like it to do.

00:48:41.623 --> 00:48:56.085
It just can't do because just the variability between pdfs apparently is a lot for them to handle um because, even so, when I do multi-family jobs, like the matrix is wrong most of the time you have to go through and count them manually.

00:48:56.385 --> 00:48:57.228
I asked one of the companies.

00:48:57.268 --> 00:48:58.411
I was like can you just do this?

00:48:58.411 --> 00:48:59.262
Can it do this?

00:48:59.262 --> 00:49:01.409
Can it go through and count the units and give me a matrix?

00:49:01.409 --> 00:49:01.929
And they're like no.

00:49:01.929 --> 00:49:04.804
And I'm like, okay, well, thank you.

00:49:04.965 --> 00:49:09.713
But thank you bye yeah, it's getting better all the time.

00:49:09.713 --> 00:49:18.291
That's part of I'm not super worried, but I also feel like takeoffs are already viewed as a commodity and they're only going to get cheaper.

00:49:18.291 --> 00:49:33.650
Adopting that so for us I'm trying to find other sources of income, get into consulting, more consulting, training, stuff like that because I see a day where the takeoffs is not going to be our main source, because I'm just not.

00:49:33.650 --> 00:49:36.835
I just won't be able to compete with those prices.

00:49:37.695 --> 00:49:40.547
Yeah, you dropping the bottom out because of whatever.

00:49:40.547 --> 00:49:41.009
Yeah.

00:49:41.088 --> 00:49:41.510
It's already.

00:49:41.510 --> 00:49:43.063
Yeah, Pricing is already a.

00:49:43.063 --> 00:49:44.168
It's hard for me to compete on.

00:49:44.168 --> 00:49:48.804
And then if you just add an AI on top of that and it's usable, it's going to be tough.

00:49:48.804 --> 00:49:50.286
It's going to be tough, it's going to be a tough sell.

00:49:50.286 --> 00:49:54.449
But you know that I work with people that don't use any software at all and they're not going to make the jump to AI.

00:49:55.431 --> 00:49:57.032
Right, not this decade, hell no.

00:49:57.353 --> 00:50:01.777
There's probably still enough companies that we could just do what we're doing and maybe that caps our growth.

00:50:01.777 --> 00:50:18.208
But that's fine, I don't want to be around with it.

00:50:18.208 --> 00:50:19.711
Well, we can't do this, can't do this.

00:50:19.711 --> 00:50:27.588
And if it's not doing that, on flooring, I mean flooring like the soft good side is kind of cut and dry, but tile is really detailed, a lot of stuff to look.

00:50:27.588 --> 00:50:31.563
There's a lot of pieces to pick up, so it's not close to being able to do all that.

00:50:31.563 --> 00:50:36.371
So I still got some time but yeah, but I know it's coming.

00:50:37.012 --> 00:50:45.222
You know this probably better me from who you talk to, just the way I see people talk about it on top of how everyone talks about we don't have enough people doing this.

00:50:45.222 --> 00:50:48.552
I do wonder if that's going to keep people from getting into this.

00:50:48.552 --> 00:50:55.331
Like we're going to use ai to automate the junior test instead of teaching somebody, yeah, to do that.

00:50:55.331 --> 00:51:08.288
So part of me worries that there's just going to be a bigger shortage down the road because we're not going to invest in those people to learn that way and I don't think then learning it on ai is super helpful, like my guy.

00:51:08.288 --> 00:51:14.989
So I met, I went and talked to a high school class last year and he was one of the kids in the class ah, help with him.

00:51:14.989 --> 00:51:17.541
And finally just brought him on the summer.

00:51:17.541 --> 00:51:24.764
Hey, let's just do this five, ten hours a week, whatever you got, and I'm teaching him, like from bottom, like, how to do that.

00:51:24.764 --> 00:51:25.927
We're gonna learn how to read plans.

00:51:25.927 --> 00:51:28.920
Yeah, just go teach any other new estimator.

00:51:30.324 --> 00:51:34.663
So part of me worries like that step will be skipped If you just teach them.

00:51:34.663 --> 00:51:37.405
Well, they can review the AI takeoff, but they don't know what they're looking at.

00:51:37.405 --> 00:51:39.869
Like he's tracing the plans, but he doesn't know how to read the plans.

00:51:39.869 --> 00:51:40.882
So is this a wall?

00:51:40.882 --> 00:51:41.704
Is this a column?

00:51:41.704 --> 00:51:42.728
Do I need to go around here?

00:51:42.728 --> 00:51:44.291
What does this mean?

00:51:44.291 --> 00:51:48.351
I feel like a lot of that is going to get lost at a certain point.

00:51:48.351 --> 00:51:59.288
So I don't know what you're hearing from people and I'm just in my little closet office with my deep thoughts, so I don't know what the actual world thinks about that, but that's just one of the things that I think about.

00:52:00.360 --> 00:52:27.001
Yeah, I think that the observation that people are going to like the transfer of experience and knowledge, like the foundational knowledge that's necessary to make like really good decisions or avoid really big problems it is being diluted because people are relying so heavily on automating whatever the hell they do which I get, I totally, because I'm trying to automate as much as I can.

00:52:27.001 --> 00:52:27.643
Also.

00:52:27.643 --> 00:52:47.056
Now, I think the problem for me and this is again a Jesse-ism, right the problem, I think, is the technology that we really need to master is listening and connecting and communicating with other human beings.

00:52:47.056 --> 00:52:54.487
Right, we suck at that and we think this digital technology is going to fix that, and it's not.

00:52:54.487 --> 00:52:55.608
I don't think it is.

00:52:55.608 --> 00:52:57.048
So I'll just say that.

00:52:57.048 --> 00:53:14.621
Now I also want to add to your point If you're on LinkedIn, of course you're going to feel anxious about not being an AI master other thing.

00:53:14.641 --> 00:53:17.646
But outside of LinkedIn, the majority of the people that I talk to that are very accomplished professionals.

00:53:17.646 --> 00:53:27.143
They could give a shit about AI, right, like the people that use it are mostly, generally speaking, are kind of just using it to answer questions faster, to do a little bit of research faster.

00:53:27.143 --> 00:53:33.260
And now we'll just look inside the construction industry the big giant, massive companies.

00:53:33.260 --> 00:53:37.224
Of course, they got R&D departments and whatever, and so they're going down that lane.

00:53:37.224 --> 00:53:42.929
But those big, gigantic behemoth companies are not the majority in our industry.

00:53:42.929 --> 00:53:56.144
The majority are $50 to $100 million a year of revenue and they have 10 to 15 people working for that of Revenant, and they have 10 to 15 people working for that.

00:53:56.144 --> 00:53:57.268
Those people very few of them are on the AI kick.

00:53:57.268 --> 00:53:59.856
So the urgency is fabricated specifically in our industry.

00:54:00.398 --> 00:54:01.481
Will it accelerate things?

00:54:01.481 --> 00:54:02.282
Absolutely?

00:54:02.282 --> 00:54:05.351
Will it develop capabilities in other people?

00:54:05.351 --> 00:54:31.514
No, but here's what I think about instead of being like poo on, it is okay if I'm not going to be building that foundational base that, like actual knowledge, experience from knowing it from the bottom up, that's going to create another opening of what is the special value, what is the thing that needs to be focused on so that we don't lose that?

00:54:31.514 --> 00:54:48.585
And so which goes back to your consulting and teaching What'll happen is people are going to be overly dependent on AI and then they're going to realize one or two generations in, and when I say generation, five years, 10 years, right, oh crap, this person has a new.

00:54:48.585 --> 00:54:53.134
They're hiring people now and they don't know how to onboard them and orient them to the work.

00:54:53.134 --> 00:55:10.630
I think at that point and when that happens, when that hits the teachers, educators, consultants are going to become more valuable, because there's very few people that have that knowledge base or ability to fill the gap that we created by over indexing.

00:55:10.630 --> 00:55:12.353
On optimization, what do you think?

00:55:12.833 --> 00:55:15.545
Yeah, no, I agree, and it's same thing.

00:55:15.545 --> 00:55:20.628
So I I'm in that bubble like I'm keeping up with this stuff, so I'm aware of it.

00:55:20.628 --> 00:55:28.927
But even the last flooring conference I went to so I use a Creo, it's like they're in the UK, it's an AI and nobody had heard of it.

00:55:28.927 --> 00:55:33.335
When I was talking to people, like zero people, I told 15, 20 people nobody had heard of it.

00:55:33.335 --> 00:55:38.733
So even in the industry that it's like targeted towards, there's not any.

00:55:38.733 --> 00:55:39.518
I mean, there's not.

00:55:39.518 --> 00:55:42.059
It's definitely not adoption, because there's no knowledge of it.

00:55:42.059 --> 00:55:48.565
So it's probably an unbounded fear, like just yeah, like you said, the false sense of urgency that we need to be ready for it.

00:55:48.565 --> 00:56:00.525
It's just probably in my head because I'm like so on top of it, because I know it's going to impact yes, e before maybe trickle down and impacts actual companies so, yeah, no, it's good when you're on top of.

00:56:00.545 --> 00:56:07.331
I mean, I think the key point there is you are on top of it and, for anybody listening, don't sleep on it, but also don't like getting.

00:56:07.331 --> 00:56:16.405
You're good, but learn about it, practice, tinker, like under, get an understanding of what it is, because it will be.

00:56:16.405 --> 00:56:17.206
Is it yet?

00:56:17.206 --> 00:56:19.371
Not necessarily, but I think it's coming.

00:56:19.371 --> 00:56:20.974
But I don't think it'll be.

00:56:20.974 --> 00:56:36.246
The capability and functionality I think is really there, like good adoption is not because people don't understand the capability of the thing and we're using it, we're under utilizing it and that's a matter of adoption and understanding.

00:56:36.246 --> 00:56:37.228
So we got time.

00:56:37.228 --> 00:56:38.672
It's just a big jump.

00:56:38.760 --> 00:56:41.465
There's a lot of people just even for flooring, use Bluebeam and Excel.

00:56:41.465 --> 00:56:43.449
Still they don't even use yes, it's not bad.

00:56:43.449 --> 00:56:44.931
I mean, that's successful, it works.

00:56:44.931 --> 00:56:45.693
Do it yeah.

00:56:53.280 --> 00:56:54.925
But they're not even switching to flooring specific software.

00:56:54.925 --> 00:56:56.009
So the jump that AI is, it's a big leap.

00:56:56.009 --> 00:56:56.711
So you mentioned measure square.

00:56:56.711 --> 00:56:59.681
I'm assuming that's the software that you use in the service that you provide.

00:56:59.681 --> 00:57:05.331
So, mr Joseph Richards, what service do you provide?

00:57:05.331 --> 00:57:07.983
What is it that you do for businesses out?

00:57:08.023 --> 00:57:09.268
there Sure.

00:57:09.268 --> 00:57:13.300
So we do takeoff quantity takeoffs for commercial flooring companies.

00:57:13.300 --> 00:57:16.550
So we cover basically all of division nine.

00:57:16.550 --> 00:57:20.300
So the soft goods tile is is mainly what we do.

00:57:21.342 --> 00:57:37.829
Okay, so if I'm a flooring company meaning I installed tile, carpet, these sorts of things on the floor in commercial buildings I can call you and say hey man, I need some help because my estimators are overwhelmed and we got a lot of opportunities here.

00:57:37.829 --> 00:57:38.932
Can you help us out?

00:57:38.932 --> 00:57:39.882
Can you pick up our?

00:57:39.922 --> 00:57:40.222
slack.

00:57:40.222 --> 00:57:41.527
That's mostly what it is.

00:57:41.527 --> 00:57:43.172
You just can't keep up with your bid calendar.

00:57:43.172 --> 00:57:45.184
You just need some extra help.

00:57:45.184 --> 00:57:47.972
So we have some that maybe hop on for a month just to catch up.

00:57:47.972 --> 00:57:51.429
They got, maybe they got somebody out, somebody sick, something like that.

00:57:51.429 --> 00:57:52.130
It's just temporary.

00:57:52.130 --> 00:57:55.579
I mean I've had a couple of clients that have been with me the whole time Nice.

00:57:55.579 --> 00:58:00.327
So it's really it's designed to be flexible, yeah.

00:58:00.327 --> 00:58:02.947
So, whatever capacity you need, I mean, we can handle.

00:58:03.710 --> 00:58:04.431
And you're remote.

00:58:04.431 --> 00:58:10.949
So anywhere in the country, anybody in the country, any flooring contractor in the country, you're like, you got their back.

00:58:11.891 --> 00:58:12.934
Yeah, yeah, they'll be that.

00:58:12.934 --> 00:58:14.014
And then we have one in Canada.

00:58:14.014 --> 00:58:18.351
I had one in New Zealand oh, send me something.

00:58:18.351 --> 00:58:20.387
But the metric on the plans broke my brain.

00:58:20.387 --> 00:58:27.510
I had to refer him somewhere else because I just couldn't.

00:58:27.510 --> 00:58:31.369
It was that, and then everything the materials were like called different things.

00:58:37.719 --> 00:58:39.768
So I just couldn't wrap my head around it and I'm like this sorry, I'm not the guy for you.

00:58:39.768 --> 00:58:42.380
Yeah, that is interesting, like I want to be international oh crap, I don't know how to like.

00:58:42.559 --> 00:58:47.121
It just happened he found me on youtube and just asked if I could help, and I'm like sure, and they sent me the plans.

00:58:47.121 --> 00:58:49.525
I'm like, oh no, it totally different.

00:58:49.525 --> 00:58:52.692
So I found somebody that could read that stuff.

00:58:52.692 --> 00:58:56.467
Yeah, I was like I could figure it out, but I don't really want to.

00:58:56.467 --> 00:58:59.608
So I'll help you out and find you somebody.

00:58:59.608 --> 00:58:59.949
Good though.

00:59:01.300 --> 00:59:10.271
I think that's a smart move, because what they need is speed, and if you don't know it, you're going to be slower to produce the outcome that they're looking for.

00:59:10.271 --> 00:59:15.925
You're better off saying, hey, man, man, let me give you somebody, because sure I could learn.

00:59:15.925 --> 00:59:25.681
It's going to slow you down, but it's also going to slow them, delay the delivery of the value to them, which I think is another key point that people out there need to think about.

00:59:25.681 --> 00:59:26.943
All right, so what?

00:59:28.045 --> 00:59:34.693
I was just saying having it, he would have to teach me basically, like what all this, these words mean.

00:59:34.693 --> 00:59:38.489
Yeah, I mean I can look it up, or it's going to be a lot of back and forth.

00:59:38.489 --> 00:59:45.373
There will naturally be some back and forth in the first few jobs, just to so you're on the same page, but this is like a whole different level.

00:59:45.619 --> 00:59:51.932
So just something like and like a year ago or something, I probably would just sucked it up and kept doing it.

00:59:51.932 --> 00:59:55.659
And like a year ago or something, I probably would just sucked it up and kept doing it.

00:59:55.659 --> 00:59:59.282
But at this point I've been through enough of those to know.

00:59:59.302 --> 00:59:59.822
That's just not.

00:59:59.822 --> 01:00:01.043
That's not fair to either one of us.

01:00:01.043 --> 01:00:01.244
That's it.

01:00:01.244 --> 01:00:02.246
It's not fair to either one of you.

01:00:02.246 --> 01:00:05.610
I love that, so I'll make sure we put the links for people can connect with you.

01:00:05.610 --> 01:00:18.726
Check out your website, Check out the YouTube, Check out the LinkedIn All of the things and folks when you do make sure you leave a comment for Mr Joseph and ask him to post more.

01:00:18.786 --> 01:00:19.527
Bully me into it.

01:00:19.927 --> 01:00:20.969
Yeah, yeah, bully.

01:00:20.969 --> 01:00:23.653
Yes, we're going to take the bully approach.

01:00:23.653 --> 01:00:32.644
So are you ready for the grand slam?

01:00:32.644 --> 01:00:33.329
Closing question yeah, let's do it.

01:00:33.329 --> 01:00:33.793
Okay, so you have a man.

01:00:33.793 --> 01:00:35.201
I never even asked about the landman stuff, that just sounds.

01:00:35.884 --> 01:00:58.949
Oh well, missed opportunity tell you it's just stuff like that, so that, like my english background like basically I just did title research for oil and gas all this stuff that you wouldn't think would apply to what I do perfectly applies to what I do helps me sift through plans pretty quick and just having kind of like a research background is a really transferable skill.

01:01:00.121 --> 01:01:08.266
So yes yes, not like you can learn the construction part, but if you don't have people that like that part of it, it's not ever going to be a good fit.

01:01:08.266 --> 01:01:12.954
So I will say that's how, and I really enjoyed that job too.

01:01:12.954 --> 01:01:18.231
So just kind of random stuff that I didn't think would pay off has been really helpful in this role.

01:01:19.039 --> 01:01:22.088
Yeah, man, and I love that you called out transferable skills.

01:01:22.088 --> 01:01:29.800
So you've had a twisted, windy road to being a business owner a growing and thriving business because you're putting people on.

01:01:29.800 --> 01:01:43.483
Maybe didn't know at the time, but along the way you've picked up transferable skills and the ability to recognize that you can pick up transferable skills regardless of what kind of work you're doing and where you think you're headed and where you actually end up.

01:01:43.483 --> 01:01:56.652
I think that whole experience and taking the leap into starting your business and learning what that is and should be, is going to color your answer to this question in an important way.

01:01:56.652 --> 01:02:02.590
And so here's the question what is the promise you are intended to be?

01:02:03.860 --> 01:02:05.246
So there's a show that I love.

01:02:05.246 --> 01:02:08.364
It's called Halt and Catch Fire and it's about have you heard of it?

01:02:08.364 --> 01:02:09.487
I have not.

01:02:09.487 --> 01:02:10.269
It was on AMC.

01:02:10.269 --> 01:02:22.228
It follows these people kind of through the tech of the 80s and the 90s, Starts with, like personal computers kind of ends off with the internet being created and there's a guy in there that says computers aren't the thing, they're the thing that gets us to the thing.

01:02:22.228 --> 01:02:28.713
So I kind of all the different stuff that I've done, none of those were the thing.

01:02:28.713 --> 01:02:29.742
They kind of get me there.

01:02:29.742 --> 01:02:34.793
So, even if this is not my thing, it's another step towards that.

01:02:36.242 --> 01:02:37.969
So growing up we always mowed yards.

01:02:37.969 --> 01:02:41.128
Like I didn't have a real job until basically college.

01:02:41.128 --> 01:02:43.463
Wow, and that was so.

01:02:43.463 --> 01:02:56.528
We kind of always had that entrepreneur thing and I felt like I kind of ran away from it for a long time because it's scary and if I didn't have my wife to be so amazing and supportive like I probably never would have done it.

01:02:56.528 --> 01:03:01.764
So I think just embracing kind of you have that spirit, whatever that ends up being.

01:03:01.965 --> 01:03:09.471
Like the specific business, nobody grows up hey, I want to do takeoffs for a living and then I want to start a business where I do it for other people.

01:03:09.471 --> 01:03:14.668
Nobody has ever been born that wants to do this from the time they were a little boy.

01:03:14.668 --> 01:03:18.847
So it's not at this point.

01:03:18.847 --> 01:03:28.188
For me it's not so much like what the actual activity is, because I know in maybe five or 10 years it could be something totally different, Maybe it's a different business.

01:03:30.260 --> 01:03:36.713
So I think at this point it's kind of and I have people they'll message me all the time and say like hey, how did you do this, how can I do this?

01:03:36.713 --> 01:03:41.807
And so at this point it's kind of like just teaching, it's encouraging, Like I tell them exactly what I did.

01:03:41.807 --> 01:03:47.789
I mean, they could be competing with me tomorrow, but I just think that's the way to do it.

01:03:47.789 --> 01:03:55.782
So I think, if nothing else, I'm trying to convey a different attitude about running a business.

01:03:55.782 --> 01:04:00.190
Whether that's good business or not, uh, remains to be seen.

01:04:00.190 --> 01:04:11.021
But I just feel like sorry, I just feel like being super open is kind of unusual and that's kind of what I'm trying to do.

01:04:11.762 --> 01:04:15.192
And whether it ends up being this business for a long time or it ends up being the next one.

01:04:15.192 --> 01:04:16.766
I feel like that's kind of going to be my thing.

01:04:16.766 --> 01:04:27.188
And then a lot of this stuff I got from the guys over at Basecamp project management software, and they're very open about everything too, because I'd never heard of like pricing especially.

01:04:27.188 --> 01:04:31.048
So I put it on my website, just stuff like that I want.

01:04:31.048 --> 01:04:32.311
Yeah, so I put it on my website, just stuff like that.

01:04:32.311 --> 01:04:37.501
I want to be very transparent and with that, with the teaching and the youtube, I think that's kind of what I'm trying to build, more than a takeoff empire.

01:04:37.501 --> 01:04:44.786
So if this is to go back to that quote like this is not the thing, you can take what I'm building here and go to the next thing.

01:04:45.148 --> 01:04:51.545
So, yeah, no, I love that I particularly not surprised, but absolutely appreciate.

01:04:51.545 --> 01:04:55.634
And then I am in support of the transparency right.

01:04:55.634 --> 01:05:03.365
Let me just I can hold everything close to the chest, which a lot of people do, but why like?

01:05:03.365 --> 01:05:04.630
Why not help people?

01:05:04.630 --> 01:05:08.972
Why not share your experience, your knowledge, your thought, like you're three years ahead of them?

01:05:08.972 --> 01:05:11.385
Let them, you got a headstart.

01:05:11.525 --> 01:05:11.965
It's okay.

01:05:11.965 --> 01:05:12.688
Yeah, it's okay.

01:05:12.688 --> 01:05:13.451
Yeah, it's part of it.

01:05:13.451 --> 01:05:16.449
Well, I mean, I get the hesitation and it's well, there's going to copy me.

01:05:16.449 --> 01:05:20.951
I'm like, well, if somebody is copying you, they're always going to be behind you, correct?

01:05:20.951 --> 01:05:24.681
Yes, that's kind of why I just yeah, even my, my estimate.

01:05:24.681 --> 01:05:26.543
He's like, why do you share all this stuff?

01:05:26.543 --> 01:05:28.565
Is everyone's going to learn how to do this?

01:05:28.565 --> 01:05:36.032
I'm like, I don't know, it just feels I enjoy it and it just feels kind of like the right thing to do 10-4.

01:05:36.693 --> 01:05:37.273
10-4.

01:05:37.273 --> 01:05:38.054
I love that man.

01:05:38.054 --> 01:05:38.655
Did you have fun?

01:05:39.255 --> 01:05:40.675
Yes, I loved it, man, I can't believe it.

01:05:40.757 --> 01:05:45.039
It's been that long You're looking at the whole shit.

01:05:45.039 --> 01:05:49.110
Oh man, Thank you for sticking it out all the way to the end.

01:05:49.110 --> 01:06:01.746
I know you got a whole lot of stuff going on and, in appreciation for the gift of time that you have given this episode, I want to offer you a free PDF of my book Becoming the Promise You're Intended to Be.

01:06:01.746 --> 01:06:04.460
The link for that bad boy is down in the show notes.

01:06:04.460 --> 01:06:04.842
Hit it.

01:06:04.842 --> 01:06:07.068
You don't even have to give me your email address.

01:06:07.068 --> 01:06:08.190
There's a link in there.

01:06:08.190 --> 01:06:10.742
You just click that and you can download the PDF.

01:06:10.742 --> 01:06:22.362
And if you share it with somebody that you know who might feel stuck or be caught up in self-destructive behaviors, that would be the ultimate you sharing.

01:06:22.362 --> 01:06:27.432
That increases the likelihood that it's going to help one more person.

01:06:27.432 --> 01:06:35.713
And if it does help one more person, then you're contributing to me becoming the promise I am intended to be.

01:06:35.713 --> 01:06:40.764
Be kind to yourself, be cool, and we'll talk at you next time.