You Also Need a Good Teacher
Back in February, Gene was having second thoughts about being in business. As he whined to his friend David over a cup of coffee on a Saturday morning, their previous employer, Larry, happened in and joined them. Then Mike, a local self-employed electrician, came in. Before they were done with their coffee, they all realized they were dealing with similar problems. They decided to get together the following week and invite some additional construction people to see if they could figure out how to fix these problems.
The next week, the group doubled. Now their group included Craig, the roofer; Doug, the concrete contractor; Steve, a general contractor; and Carl, the HVAC guy. It didn’t take long to discover that they, too, had similar problems. They all wanted to know how to build a better business.
Steve shared a story from early in his business about how he took a $7,000 hit on a project, and when it was all over, the customers were unhappy. The group could all identify with his experience. As they tried to figure out how to prevent these kinds of things from happening, David had an idea to reach out to his current employer. It seemed that he had things figured out. They agreed to meet back at the coffee shop the next week and see what David found out.
The following week, the group met again, and this time there were a couple of new guys: Scott, who ran a company that builds pole barns, and John Lavell, the owner of Straight Line Construction and David’s boss.
After everyone had their coffee and introductions were made, Gene asked the question:
“Do any of you struggle with knowing how to do the construction that you do?”
The group agreed that, for the most part, they didn’t.
“What about the business part? Do you struggle with that?
The group nodded in agreement—this is where the challenge is.
“That is the purpose of this time together,” Gene explained. “To figure out how to get control of the business side.
John points out that building a better business isn’t easy, but it’s worth it.
He shared that he had been where they were, but after his accident, he decided to do things differently. He looked around the table and said, “Building a business isn’t simple. It starts with being aware of the problems, and it’s evident that you guys are aware of the problems. Then you need to understand them and what it takes to fix them. That’s what’s going on here. You’re trying to figure things out.”
“The next—and most important—step is taking intentional action. This is the hardest part, but the most critical. If you keep doing things the way you always have, nothing will change. You’ll just keep trudging back and forth in the same rut, making it deeper and deeper.”
John went on to explain that most builders are aware of the problems, and some understand them, but few do anything to change them. They’re busy with the physical part of the business and don’t feel that they have time for anything else.
The group understood and identified with this.
John agreed to meet with the group weekly for coffee and work on these issues. The problem was that the next week, only half of the group showed up. Then the next week, it was just Gene. They continued meeting each week for coffee, but Gene was the only one who kept showing up.
After a few weeks of these meetings and seeing Gene’s interest in learning, John suggested that they schedule a separate one-on-one training session. Gene agreed to this.
They’ve been meeting for a while now, and John has been explaining how a successful business is about a lot more than just business. It’s also about who we are and how we manage our lives.
The first business tool that John shared with Gene was Building a Better Proposal. These lessons included how a proposal is foundational to a successful company, an overview of the proposal, how a proposal provides a scope of work, pricing the project, and finishing the proposal by bringing all the pieces together.
The first proposal that John helped Gene put together was for a large project. John explained that large projects needed to have regular payments because contractors aren’t banks and shouldn’t be funding construction projects.
That proposal was signed, and now Gene needs to learn how to use the Payment Application. So, they’ve scheduled a meeting next week to implement the Payment Application.
If you would like to learn along with Gene, you can join us next week at the meeting.
In the meantime, if you would like to learn about some of the other tools you can use to build a better business, take a look in the Business Building Toolbox.