117. Systemising a Building Company With David Jenyns

Just because you don't systemize it doesn't mean it's going to magically stop happening in your business. What you don't realize when you fast forward 1 year, 2 year, 3 year, 5 year, is it's actually easier to build them when you realize, but in the moment it's easier to not.

Welcome to Professional Builders Secrets, the podcast for building company owners wanting to grow safely and securely. I'm your host, Will Blunt, and today I'm joined by Dave Jennens from Systemology. Dave, welcome to the show.

Hey Will, it's a pleasure to be here.

Absolute pleasure having you on. I was just mentioning before we jumped on that I've been listening to your voice in audio form, listening over your audiobook, which has been a really enjoyable experience. Can you start by sharing with the audience a bit of a background about where you've come from?

Yes. I've been a business owner all my life and I've tried numerous different things, everything from selling pieces of the MCG to having a rock and roll clothing music store that we franchised and built up a few stores, to running a digital agency, and then that's not to mention all of the little side projects and things like that. So always been a business owner and then most recently in the business Systemology and System Hub, kind of taking a lot of those early learnings and then really rolling it into the current business.

Yeah, perfect. So what does your business System Hub or Systemology do?

Yeah, so we help business owners get out of the day to day operations of running their business. Primarily we do that by focusing in on the systems and processes, really thinking about what are the essential, repeatable, delegatable tasks that we can identify and really help to document and then transfer those on to other team members. I feel like it's a particularly weak point for a lot of business owners and something that hasn't really had a huge amount of attention put on it and a lot of business owners struggle with it. So that's the problem that I really go to work on and make that as easy as possible. And to do that, we've developed a system to help someone extract and organize and optimize that best practice.

What made you stumble across this type of business? And was it, was it your experience with those other brands that you mentioned and the systems?

Look, I, when I look back now, I realized I've always been a systems person. I think maybe it came from my dad. I remember one of the very first systems I ever saw was a system that he put into place for My brother and I, and it was basically to gamify life. We could earn points by doing different activities around the house. And then at the end of the week he'd calculate it up and then we'd get our pocket money. So that's the first system that I ever remember seeing. Then after that I was got interested in the stock market education space and that was all about trading plans and getting systems into place. And then the planet 13, the rock and roll clothing music store, we franchised that. So that was all about systems. So I realized that systems for me to a certain extent came a little bit naturally. And then when I got into the digital agency space, I realized working very closely with a lot of business owners, how most business owners really suck when it comes to process. And that was my big insight to go. Here's a really big problem that is solved or very poorly addressed and an area where I thought I can make some really solid contributions. So in that transition period when I kind of stepped out of the digital agency, I thought to myself, what do I really want to do? And that's when it just kind of became obvious to me. A few other things sort of fell into place and I just said, yep, this is the direction I'm headed.

What's that? How do you identify that you're not systemized enough? I mean, as a business, I've run my own business for almost a decade as well. And I don't think I realized until much later on in the piece that that was the problem I had because you know, I would just. It was like I couldn't give up control or something like that.

Yeah, I've started to realize that effective business systems development is the master skill of the business owner. Really that is the ultimate skill because it touches all aspects of the business. And I have this belief that every problem that you have in business is a systems related problem. So if ever you want to fix anything, if you don't have enough leads, if you are having trouble with staff, if you've got finance troubles, you want to just trace it back down to the system level and then go to work on it at that level. So for me, I kind of realized that this is something that every business owner needs to master. And it's a skill I think that you need to build into the DNA of your business from day dot because the bigger you grow, the harder it is to start to change culture and the way that team members do things. So I actually think this is just a way of thinking when an approach to business that the Business owner needs to take on board. Sometimes the symptoms of not being systemized become more obvious at certain points in time. Like when the business owner can't take time off work, or maybe when they're thinking about exiting, or maybe when a key staff member leaves and they realize how much they relied on that person and how much IP just walked out the door when that contractor that you had working for you or that apprentice now, you know, grows up and then decides they want to go off and start their own business. And then that's when you go, oh, wow, like, I just lost a huge amount of knowledge. So there's a few trigger points that it happens, but I actually think it's something that someone needs to work on and master as quickly as possible.

Can we just take a step back? How do you describe what a system is?

Yeah, so I use some of the phrases interchangeably because there are sop, standard operating procedures, process, how to documents, systems, and part of all of those different words, and they do have varying definitions that contributes to the confusion people have when we talk about creating systems and processes. So when I say systems, I'm really just talking about. It's a series of steps that when followed, create a consistent outcome. And what I like about that definition is it works on a very small level and it works on a very big level. So on a small level, it might be the step by step system on how you issue out an invoice through Xero, but it also works at a very high level, like. Well, maybe it's like an overview system that details the key milestones that you go through when you're building a residential property. And while you might not go into the micro detail in that overview system, it has the high levels, it's a consistent set of steps that you follow that produce the outcome and then you can actually build in more detailed subsystems underneath that. So it's that definition of a consistent set of steps that produce this consistent outcome.

Yeah, I like that. As you were explaining it, I was almost visualizing a layer. It's like you've got an overarching system and then you've got systems within that.

That is exactly the picture. So, and that's the wording. I try and use that idea of the overview system. So it immediately clicks in someone's brain. And what that does is it actually makes it much easier to go from something that's very complex, like building a house. Very complex, lots of moving parts, lots of different contractors, and sometimes a builder might go, how on earth am I going to Systemize that. Whereas if you start off with that overview system in mind and just like you said, levels, I think that makes it much more accessible and achievable.

Yeah. How do you approach that? Because it might seem overwhelming if you've got, you know, next to no systems in your business and you're starting from scratch. That feels like a lot.

Yeah, look, there's a few different mindsets that you approach it with. The first one is just because you don't systemize it doesn't mean it's going to magically stop happening in your business. Your business is already kind of working. So the aim of the game is applying 80, 20, you know, that rule of what are the most important 20% of the systems that deliver the bulk of the result? And what in your business do you feel like you want to have done a certain way? Because it's really important to deliver great outcomes for your clients. So you identify those and you go to work on those first. So a lot of it just has to do with. You have to start somewhere. Well, let's start with some of these really most important systems and processes or areas in the business where you know you've got a problem. Like I said, all problems in business really are just systems problems.

It makes a lot of sense. I like the idea of starting with the client and the systems around that because it's like essentially what makes your business run.

Yeah. That's another thing. I think, like in my book Systemology, the first step, we have a tool we call the Critical Client flow. And it's just about mapping the linear journey that the client and prospect and business goes through to deliver a core product or service. And the whole premise is if you can deliver a core product or service that doesn't have key person dependency that's consistent and you can make that happen without you, the business owner. Owner. Then the business can make money. Once you have cash flow coming into a business and it makes money, you can actually solve just about any other problem in business because then you can go hire the consultant or the team member or the person that can solve those other challenges in the business. So you really want to first focus on how can you make your business repeatable and consistent in delivering a core product or service and remove that key person dependency. So there's money coming in, rain, hail or shine, and whether you're in the business or out of the business.

So we've been talking more generally about business and you've touched on how it relates to building companies a little bit. But could you Go into more detail about the risks of not systemizing a building company and how maybe these problems do play out in this industry.

I definitely think it's more obvious in the building industry because you've got a lot of apprentices, for example, who grow in this industry. And when I think about a system and a process, it's really just to transfer knowledge. How do you make someone productive and valuable in your business in the least amount of time so that they can deliver to a better standard so you can reduce waste and errors and double work, which runs rife inside the building industry. And that's exactly what systems do. They look to define the standard and the way that something's done so that projects don't blow out. And I know there are a lot of different challenging circumstances in the building industry at the moment with inflation and staffing and all the rest of it. When you get rock solid systems into place, it's a better experience for your staff, it's a better experience for your client. Your business runs more efficiently. It actually makes your business also more resilient. So as these different changes and things are getting thrown at you, you're more adaptable to change. So that's kind of like a. From a day to day operations from a survival perspective. But even beyond that, like if you want to scale, you can't scale without systems and process like it's hand in hand. And why I said that it is the master skill. Because systems and process, they're the building blocks of business. And whether it's a documented system or an undocumented system, you're still following systems like your contractors, they have a way of doing things that stuck inside their head or their team members are doing things a certain way. So all we're talking about is unearthing that and then and making it more transferable knowledge.

Yeah, I'm sure there's a number of builders out there listening that have attempted to grow previously and almost got a bit frightened by the fact that, you know, things are going a bit haywire and they don't have those systems in place. So they just, you know, go, they default back to going, you know what, I can just keep it small and still make decent money out of that.

Scale really just magnifies whatever results you're already getting. So if you've got staffing challenges or client problems or finance or whatever it is, scaling up and growing doesn't reduce those problems, it just magnifies them. That's why oftentimes people get it wrong when they think about growing and Scaling. They think, oh, I just need to hire a few more staff members and I'll get them on board and that'll free me up and then I'll have some extra time and then I'll be able to go work on this. But it doesn't quite work like that. You, you want to have the systems and processes in place so that the business system can actually handle the scale. Otherwise, it's just going to magnify all of these little problems and you'll just be seeing a lot more of them and they become a much bigger problem.

Yeah, definitely. So with all these benefits of systemizing to put you in a better place so you can scale or you can take more holidays or you can sell your business, why aren't more builders, you know, taking the steps they need to, to systemize their business?

There's a few reasons. Sometimes the business owner thinks I'm not a systems person. Like, especially in the building industry, maybe they've tried it in the past and it didn't quite work. Or a big common one in the building space is that the business owner sometimes started out as the technician. They were the builder doing the things so they understand things in really great detail. And because of that, like, they're. It's too easy for them to slip back into this technician mode of just doing the work work. As, you know, you start to grow your building business, you start to realize that there's a whole bunch of other skills required to grow a business. And there are these business skills. So it's. Once you kind of recognize that. And I know, I mean, a huge part of your community knows this because that's, I mean, that's why they come to you guys, because they start to realize, oh, there's, you know, other skills I needed to learn around building the business, but it's oftentimes that they don't see themselves as a systems person. And maybe, you know, oftentimes in the building space, we see these husband and wife teams where they. Any admin or any. Sometimes it's the finance stuff gets shipped off to the wife and she's kind of handling that, whereas you've got the, the builder that will go out there and, you know, be on, on site and those sorts of things. So it's almost like just handballing that responsibility, thinking, oh, well, that's, that's not my responsibility. That's, you know, that's my wife's responsibility or someone else's responsibility. So, yeah, a big, big part of it is, is that and common things. Not knowing where to start thinking that systems won't work for their business because maybe their business is too complex. Or when I grow and scale, I'll get to that later. Like there are all, there's all this baggage as to why, because oftentimes it's not something like when you build out systems, they take time, energy and there is work that has to go in upfront and you don't necessarily see an immediate ROI on that. And it's important, not urgent work. And you know you've got a client on the phone saying, oh, I need this swimming pool built by Christmas, I've got a deadline, you got to get it done. You know what's going to get the attention first? Like in the building industry, this 50 million things pulling at your attention and systems and processes is always important, but not urgent. And then you never get to it.

Yeah, I think that's exactly right. And it's, it's easier to, it's easier not to do it.

Yeah, I reckon that's the, the biggie. And it feels that way in the moment. What you don't realize when you fast forward 1 year, 2 year, 3 year, 5 year is it's actually easier to build them when you realize, but in the moment it's easier to not. But all of the rewards that come from having a systems driven business, they're felt one year, three year, five years down the track. And then when you actually look into a business that's systemized versus not systemized, it's a night and day difference. And once the business owner actually gets it, you can't unsee it. And then you go, I could never imagine building a business any other way. But you have to first see it first before you can really embrace it.

So if there is a little bit of that, that unwillingness to take to bite the bullet and actually start building out your systems, how do you encourage builders to lean into the process and take that first step?

There's a few things. Firstly, you need the business owner to get effectively bitten by the bug because they need to go all in on this. That's the first step. You need to see that this is the way and then really commit to it. One of the ways I explore, the more I do this is like, what's the ROI on the effort? And helping business owners to understand where the payoff will come. So we try and work through that a little bit. It's sometimes a bit hard though, because systems are far reaching and they touch all aspects of the business and there are a lot of unintended or second order consequences that have from putting this into place. But once they make the commitment that yes, they want to do this, then some other things they can do to lean into the process is things like getting an accountability partner. Like, I mean, they're in your community. This is perfect to find another builder that decides they also want to do this. And you commit to each other. What a perfect time of the year. You know, start of the year or whenever you're listening to this to go, yep, I'm going to do this. And then you just need to keep it front and center long enough till your habits start to change. Because that's the biggest thing here. It's easy to listen to this podcast or go do an event and get all inspired and pumped up about doing this. And then you go back on Monday morning, day to day, and the client's calling again. You got staff that are asking you questions and you forget this. So we need to think about how does it get on the calendar? How do we create accountability? How do we present this to the team? Probably the biggest hack I've got here is again, depending on the size of your team. But it's identifying what we call a systems champion. This needs to be someone's responsibility and the business owner will lead it. But the systems champion is the person who helps to document the process, meets with the knowledgeable workers, stores things in a central location, mentions it on a team meeting, celebrates when one of the staff follows the process and gets a great outcome. But that systems champion really is one of the biggest leverage points that I see.

They need to be someone that's pretty brought into the process and loves their systems.

I think, yeah, like you hit the nail on there, it's someone who naturally sees themselves as a systems person. They're the organized person even before you introduce them to systemology. That, like, this is just how they do things. They're organized at home, they're organized at work, and they can't help themselves. They are the perfect person. The other combo that I love, I actually quite like apprentices for this job because if they've got the background skill of the industry, they understand the language and the lingo. Oftentimes apprentices are young and hungry and they want to learn. And if you can pair them up with knowledgeable workers and they watch what they do and they record and document, it's a great experience for that systems champion, that new apprentice, as they're coming into an industry to learn more about how does this actually work? What does it look like to run A building business and gives them tremendous foundations.

Yeah, I love that. One challenge actually in the industry at the moment is apprentices coming in and then leaving. And I think something like that could actually aid the future of the industry because they're buying into something which is they can see a well run business and then they can see a future for themselves in that.

Yeah. I have seen numerous people that start off as systems champions and then it becomes like a career path because they get a level of that understanding but hyper focused to a specific industry and then they can take that knowledge to another business or to consult or like that's one of my big missions over the next couple of years is really to carve out this role, build up its value so the business owner sees it and then make it very attractive for apprentices to want to go through it so that they can see it as a career path. Because I see that is such an important leverage point that could be revolutionary in numerous industries and really just all small business worldwide.

Yeah. Well, think about the value you add to a business if you can enable them to scale, enable them to hire, enable them to not be reliant on any individual compared to just doing, you know, your, your linear job.

And what a great way to get known by all of the most knowledgeable key team members because you're working with them and you're helping to solve a problem that the business owner has struggled with for years because they might not see themselves as a systems person. Like you then start to look like the golden child because you're able to do something that they can't or haven't been able to do. So yeah, it's great to kind of hear that. My initial thoughts there, you can see it as well. Like that's my. Actually my next book, My first book was Systemology which is written for the business owners. The second book I'm working on is called Systems Champion and it's written for that person.

Interesting. But the way I was looking, I was looking at it from the building company owners lens as well because all those things you were talking about is how they would motivate the Systems Champion to actually get involved as well.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, I love it. I'd love to explore a little bit more. I know there's quite a few people in your community that have Systems Champions and kind of following the Systemology way, there's probably some stories. So if anybody's listening to this and they would love to be a case study. At the moment we are interviewing Systems Champions and putting them on our YouTube channel, because I want to give business owners examples of this is what a systems champion looks like. This is what they do. Like you'd be seeing that firsthand with some, some of the clients.

Yeah, absolutely. And I think the other place that people can get inspiration is, as you mentioned, just speaking to other builders that have already gone through the process and they've systemized a lot of their business. And to be honest, any, any of our clients that have achieved above average results over, over many years, it's all come from their systems.

Yeah, yeah. I think the longer you're in business, the more you start to realize the importance of systems. It's generally newer business owners that sometimes you just have to earn your stripes and have the school of hard knocks to actually see the value of systems and processes. But again, once you see it, you can't unsee it.

Yeah, I guess there's nothing wrong with that. It's all learning experience, like being in business anyway.

So, yeah, yeah, that's it. Make it up as we go, but.

Don'T keep making the same mistake. Yes, yes, get into systemology. You mentioned complex systems and obviously in a building company there is a number of complex systems and lots of moving parts. How do you go about systemizing those complex systems?

It goes back firstly to the idea we touched on earlier with these overview systems. Whenever there's a level of complexity or overwhelm when it comes to systems and processes, the best thing that you can do is just chunk up, as in look at it from a higher level, because the detail in some of those more complex processes can be discovered over time and added and built upon. So the very first system you might create would be for a more senior team member that might know some of the ins and outs. And it's almost like for a project manager. Here is an overview system for a project manager to know the key milestones that must be followed to complete a particular project. What a great starting point. Then over time you might go, you know what milestone number two that actually fits with this other team member over here. And I want them to do it and I just want to give them a checklist on 30 things that they should do in that particular milestone. Well, that then becomes version number one of that subsystem. And this is why systems and processes, it's not a one and done. And we're talking about changing culture and the way that the business works. Because these systems are living documents and they can be videos or documentation that will grow and evolve over time and you will add new things in. So you, that's why you have to build a culture that the team follows to do it. And then you'll just find initially in your business it feels a little bit like whack a mole. And like you mentioned, you're solving one problem, then you're onto the next problem, then you're onto the next problem. Oftentimes then you go back and you have to solve the same problem again. So you're constantly solving lots of these same problems as you start to fix them at the system level. And you fix that problem once and for all. Because now you've got a little checklist in it. Next time another little problem pops up, you might make a small addition to that system and then that ceases to become a problem. And over time the problems get less and less and less because they're handled by your process. And then what ends up happening is that's when the business owner levels up and then starts to solve higher quality problems. Like the problems never stop in business or challenges or whatever you want to call them. But you don't want to keep solving the same level low value problem again and again and again and again. You want to slowly work yourself up this ladder of problems so that you are working on the highest value tasks. So it's just a, an iterative process that you do step by step. And whenever you're overwhelmed, you just chunk up and start at a higher level first.

Interesting. What level of detail are you putting into a documented system? And the reason I ask that is because I imagine there's a sweet spot. If you go too light, it's probably going to have too much gray area and maybe it doesn't actually work. And then you might go too detailed where you just spend so much time and then it might be overkill.

What a great astute question, because this speaks to one of the misconceptions people think about when you think of a systemized business. A lot of people start to think about McDonald's. McDonald's is a great poster child for business systemization. Now McDonald's oftentimes they are recruiting 15 year old kids off the street to teach them how to flip hamburgers. So there's a level of detail that they need to go to in their process to train that team member up. And they'll go overkill on process because of the team member that they're hiring. Not to mention they've also been doing it for 60 years. So they've been spending so much time when, when you're thinking about your business, you need to think about the role and who's doing the task to determine the to what level of detail might you go? Maybe if it is a brand new apprentice and you teaching the super basics to get them going, you go more detail in those. Maybe there are other tasks where you're going to have a higher skilled team member who's been in the industry for X number of years and they need just more of a checklist, a higher level thing. Maybe your bookkeeper has been with you for the past 10 years. You don't need to tell her to go to the login button and enter in zero and do the two factor authentication and then click okay and then navigate to the P and L before you. Like you, you don't need to go to that level of detail. So often you want to think about how important it is for the business. Are mistakes happening in that area that maybe you need to address? Who's going to be doing that task? What likely level of turnover is there going to be on that task? How frequently does it happen? There's a range of different things that you might need to consider. Generally speaking though, starting off lighter first and then considering it version number one is a better way to go. And then you build the complexity over time. You don't start with the complexity.

Yeah, I like that. I think that overcomes the pushback on. It's going to take me too much time. If you just get a really light version one out there and then slowly chip away at it, then there's nothing holding you back, right?

Yeah. And there's other little hacks. I talk about it in the book. Things like especially in the building industry, we have a client called Dave Porter, he runs a company called Portavac. They clean commercial and residential roofing gutters and they hop up on the roof and those sorts of things. Now in his industry there's a lot of the tradespeople and things, they're not overly techie necessarily. Like a lot of them are on the tools. And what we ended up doing with him is we got that systems champion, the apprentice who went out in the field and took a GoPro and followed one of the expert tradespeople around for a day and recorded a whole bunch of little videos of them doing different things, setting up the truck, greeting the client, checking all the safety equipment, packing it all down, like all those little things and they just ended up being little videos. So sometimes it can be little simple checklists, sometimes it could just be the first version, might be a simple 10 minute video. So you ideally Want to make it as easy as possible for your knowledgeable team members. And that's why we talk about the idea of a systems champion. Because they're often very busy and not everybody likes to document process. Like there's a lot of people probably in the building industry where the last thing they could imagine ever wanting to do would be building process. So we don't force them into doing it. We go, how can we make it easy for them? And maybe that's a video, maybe that's someone else watching it and creating the checklist for them.

Yeah, well, if you've got that systems champion, that makes a lot of sense. That GoPro idea is really cool, actually, because you just, they're just doing their job and so you can pull them around and then. Yeah, makes a lot of sense. Rather than saying, thinking to do video, you need to book out a whole day, go to a studio, you know, do all this different stuff. You don't.

Yeah, just do it on an iPhone, make it a rough and ready video. Understanding that this is an internal video anyway. It's not like you're going to post it on YouTube. No one needs to see it. Even if it's super, super crap, you delete it. Like you. Yeah, a lot of people often overthink it. Sometimes you're better off just recording it. And then you can determine afterwards whether or not you want to use it or not.

Well, you could get quite fancy. You could get the transcript of that, upload it to ChatGPT, get it to write a script.

Yeah.

Manual for you.

I can tell you up to date with the current trends. We're seeing a huge revolution in documentation through some of the AI services. So chat GPT, that whole transcript ID idea, and you make a video and then you might say, you take the transcript, you feed it into Chat GPT and you say, I want you to make a step by step documented process and you stick that underneath the video and that again, it's just version number one, where most people struggle is just getting started. We need to make this as easy as possible and then we need to start to sow the seeds and build this culture inside your organization. And we needed to keep it front and center until the habits change. Once the habits change, then this will take on a life of its own. And you'll find that the team do get behind this. It's all about how you present it, how you frame it, how they see that this benefits them. That's the other big one that a lot of business owners get wrong is that they position this and the team member thinks, should I be worried? Is the business owner trying to find out all of the things that I'm doing and documenting it so that they can get another team member to do it or ship my job offshore or whatever it might be. Whereas you want to let the team members know that, hey, I know there are going to be times when you're sick and you need to have leave. And I want to make sure that you can completely disconnect and we have another team member step in and take over this task so that things can keep moving so when you come back, you can hit the ground running and you don't have to be catching up on everything that wasn't done while you were sick or another way you could position it. With team members. You say, this is how you work your way up in our organization. You capture what you're doing. You systemize it. You delegate it down to a more junior team member, a apprentice. Then that frees you up to work on higher value tasks. You have to think about the team member, have to think about what connects with them and then position it in a way that they see that this is a win for them.

Yeah, yeah. I mean, there might be an opportunity to offshore stuff or outsource it if you do systemize it very well. So that's not necessarily a bad thing. But you got to frame it the right way to the team member is what you're saying.

Yeah. And helping them to understand, even if that does happen and you offshore things, that doesn't make you less valuable to the team. That makes you more valuable to the team. Like if you can. If building effective business systems is the master skill, which it is, if you get really good at that and you can codify something and transfer it offshore or to a more junior, less skilled, lower cost team member, then that frees you up to work on higher value stuff. It sounds counterintuitive, but it actually makes you much more valuable to a business owner.

Yeah, definitely. So, Dave, tell me a bit more about your business. How do builders work with you? What does it look like?

Yes. So best place to start is always the book. So you head over to Amazon and you can grab a copy. If you're listening to this, you're probably an audio person. So like Will mentioned, you could grab the audible version. That gives you an idea of the Systemology framework. And then if you need a little bit of extra hand, you can go to systemology.com got a couple of different ways that we can work. We have the World's first and only training for systems champions. So we have an online academy where systems champions go through and get trained up. We also have some group programs we run where we can work with the business owner and the systems champion together over six months. And we also have some systemologists. We actually have some coaches and consultants that get trained up in our methodology and then they can also work one on one with businesses. So it's kind of like a do it yourself group program or a done for you. That's the ways that we can help.

Yeah. And the book is a great place to start. Highly recommend having a listen or a read however you like to consume content because it'll put you in the right mindset to start thinking about your systems. For our members out there as well, Systemology is a rewards partner. So if they register their interest through there, we'll get that info across to Dave and the team and they can get a cash rebate.

Yeah. Rock and roll.

Yeah.

We've worked with a few people from your group and as I said, I'd love to get more case studies. That's probably the biggest thing. The best way I can help business owners and builders is to get some great case studies from clients and share that message. And then that inspires other builders. They see that and then they go, oh, I want to do what they did. I want that result. So, yeah, very cool.

Well, any other advice you've got for builders out there looking to systemize their business?

Biggest thing is just to get started. I'm hoping what we covered today lit a little bit of a fire inside you to see the value and recognize that you've really got to lead this. That was something I remember Michael Gerber told me, the author of the E Myth. I got to work quite closely with him on a project. You'll hear about it in the Systemology book. But he had said to me, dave, don't let the business owners off the hook. Because when I wrote Systemology, I made it sound like, oh, you just handball everything to the systems champion and you don't have to do anything and this is all going to magically happen. And after that, he said, the business owner's got to lead this. You've got to get bitten by the bug. You've got to recognize that this is important and you've got to project it to the team. That doesn't mean you have to do the documentation. That doesn't mean that you're going to be the one recording the videos. Like, there's a lot of things that the systems champion will do. But you are the leader of the business, so you've got to let the team know that this is important and this is how we do things here. I'm hoping that's one of the big takeaways that people took from today.

Very good. Yeah, that Michael Gerber story from the book is one of the great stories. So even if they just get the book and read that, that'd be well worthwhile. Yeah.

Fun, fun. Magical carpet ride, that one, that's for sure.

Magical carpet ride. Good way to describe it. Well, Dave, thank you so much for coming on Professional Builders Secrets today. I've had a ball. I've learned a lot myself and I'm sure the builders out there have got a lot to take away. They've taken tons of notes. So we really appreciate you coming on.

Yeah. Absolute pleasure and a big thank you.

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