41. Learning New Skills With Sky Stephens

If anyone's just like, you know, I took a break, you're sort of like, oh, you're already behind because some other people started learning. Everyone is busy. Every single person is busy. They would just say, I can't do this. I'm just a builder.

Do I have a message that I can take to the world? And will they actually believe me?

Mindset is such, such a big topic. It didn't just happen. We to consciously plan it.

This is Professional Builder Secrets, the number one podcast to help you grow your building company safely and securely, brought to you by the association of Professional Builders. Join us every week as we talk to industry experts and your fellow professional builders on everything you need to know to generate more leads, more sales and higher margins while improving the building experience for your clients. Hello and welcome to the Professional Builder Secrets podcast, a podcast by the association of Professional Builders for building company owners, general managers, VPs and emerging leaders. Here we discuss all things running a professional building company from sales, processes, financials, operations and marketing. Hello and welcome. I'm joined today by co founder Sky Stevens for the association of Professional Builders. Sky, it's been a hot minute. Great to have you here on the podcast again.

It has. How are you, Bosco?

I'm doing well, do well. Really excited to have you and discuss about, you know, everything we want to do around how to learn new skills and upskill. Tell me a little bit about. Why is it so crucial today to prioritize learning new skills when it comes to running a residential building company?

Well, firstly, let's just get out of the way. Learning is not a very sexy word to many people. It can sound super boring, but it's absolutely critical to prioritize. Maybe if we even just call it like growing. Learning is growing. And the reason why it's so critical is because everyone does know this deep down. But what got us to where we are today, it's not going to get us there, like over the mountain or anywhere in the future because too much has changed. Even look at what's changed in the last two years, let alone 10 years. Non negotiable in this landscape, unfortunately.

And what you're alluding to is how people have had to reinvent themselves and really dig deep and change things as well.

Yeah, I was talking to someone literally just the other day and they were just talking about they're so exhausted, they're so burnt out, they literally just want to take a break and it's really interesting. So I was talking to someone literally, just a friend, they work in businesses, so they don't own a business. They don't own a building company or anything. They work for other companies. And they're saying, you know, we know when Covid hit, especially when you're interviewing a lot of people, you see massive gaps in resumes. And the biggest question is more so, like, what were you doing in that period? I get the world completely changed. But even if something was out of your control and, you know, there was a redundancy or anything, there's a gap. What happened? And if anyone's just like, you know, I took a break, you sort of like, oh, you're already behind because some other people started learning. And so unfortunately, doing nothing doesn't mean you stand still. You're actually moving behind everyone else because everyone else is learning and moving forward and growing. And I think that's the exact same in the race of professional builders and owning a building company, because unfortunately, if we're not learning and we're not growing, others are. So we're not even standing still. We're just moving further behind.

Well, let's talk a little bit about the concept about being a student. And obviously you are around so many businesses, builders. Your network has grown significantly in the last few years. But when you talk about people growing and learning through these entities, what do you think is the biggest challenge that comes with acquiring new skills?

I think every skill is learnable. Like, we can see that. Like, our whole membership and every single one of our builders proves that. I think the biggest challenge that stops any one person from developing and learning a new skill, maybe there's two. I think first of all, it's discipline, because it doesn't just come. It's literally called learning a new skill. So it's the discipline to work at it and actually just keep going and improving. But then on the flip side, probably mindset, because depending, there are so many factors that can go into this. Certainly our environment and even how we were raised plays a big part in that we can have a particular mindset that just believes we have a fixed mindset. I'm just. I've never been good at this, so I'm not good at it. And that is such a barrier, because every skill is, like, learnable. And so if we just had the mindset of, like, you know, I can learn anything, it might take me a little bit longer than other people, but I can learn it. Those two people are already so fundamentally different, and it's just because of how they see what's in front of them. They see it as an opportunity rather than A challenge.

Well, you've picked my curiosity here. So let's get into what are some of those barriers that really challenge people? Are they common fears or excuses that you hear from the members and the builders around you when it comes to learning new skills?

Well, to talk about, like our members, members of apb, I would say they don't have too many excuses, otherwise they wouldn't join an organization like apb. You know, we're very much. It's a, it's a coaching organization. So we're literally coaching our members on improving their systems, their processes, their mindset, anything. So I think there's a very particular type person and building company owner that is drawn to what we do. So maybe if we talk like, as a whole, like, I think professional builders literally are looking for growth and trying to improve. So there aren't too many excuses. They sort of get left at the door. But if you look at other builders or very average builders or builders just that aren't there yet because again, you can change. It's more so their mindset and their belief in themselves that they can even do it, I think that's probably the biggest excuse deep down. And maybe it's just, you know, we kid ourselves and we bring out other ones. Like, we're too busy. I can't, I'm too busy to learn a new skill. Like, I don't have time or, you know, there's just too much going on in my life. Maybe I'll, you know, have more time next year. They're the excuses. But I think deep down it's, it's that self concept, maybe it's, it's not really thinking they can do it. And I think we always want to avoid failure. So you hear a lot of people say this, right? I don't like things that I'm not really good at. And I think we've all kind of said that at some point as well. I'm sure you've said it like, I've said it like, it's, it's. We like being good at things. And so when you try something, you're not immediately good at it. It's sort of like, oh, that's, it's not as fun. But you just got to have that mindset of like, all right, well, let's get good at it. Like, it's, it's okay. Nothing bad happened. I'm just going to get better.

Yeah. And I think I enjoy reflecting back on things that I practice and gotten better over time. Right. You look back and go, yeah, I remember the time when I used to do this this way and you know, it'. It's been a while since things have changed as well.

And it becomes such a good story as well. I mean, how boring would life be if everyone was just really good at everything they picked up?

That's true, that's true. There's no diversity at that point. So it sounds like you help navigate people through the coaching program. APB helps really take people through these thought processes and help them become more disciplined and sort of reshape the mindset. That's what I'm getting. From what you're telling me right now.

Certainly a lot of what we do at a base level is just, here's all the gear, here's everything you need to deploy into a building company, and here's training on how to implement it. We do have mindset trainings and time management and efficiency trainings. Sure. But the training is sort of already there. It's very much a self journey for every single individual that comes in contact with what we teach. They are learning and developing like we can't do anything for anybody. So it's very much. They're taking control of it themselves. But it's definitely that growth mindset of I can do it, it might just take me a bit longer or I certainly can learn it and I'll figure it out. Compared to, oh, I definitely can't. Because if you have that mindset, you're not really involved in any kind of coaching or learning to begin with.

Yeah, sky, look, I've been through your backend coaching program. It is phenomenal. There's so much to learn from, there's so much skills that you offer out there. And I picked up on something really quickly that you need to make the time for this because you have all the resources available to your members. And I was in awe at the level of detail that you provide for all your builders. Now, before we get into exploring how to learn new skills, I want to ask a really important question, and that is what is likely to cause more people to fail? And it's a bit of a sensitive subject for some people because it's going to trigger some point. But in your opinion, what do you feel causes people to fail?

Obviously, a lot of things. So my answer may sound very oversimplified, but if I were to pick one thing, certainly based on the hundreds of builders that have come into our programs, we're actively working with over 500 building company owners at the moment. So genuinely, just from the builders that we've seen and have been coaching, I'd probably say self sabotage. Brian Tracy talks a lot about this in his books and his presentations and talks a lot about this from a sales perspective. He talks about self concept and self concept is the way you see yourself and the way you think about yourself in every area of your life. And if we do not believe we can do it's mindset again, right? If we do not believe we can do something, we can start self sabotaging ourselves so that we never achieve that. And so unless, and this, this is why certainly in our private program as well, when anyone works with us one on one, mindset is such, such a big topic because we need to just dispel a few myths or lies we've even told ourselves before we get started. Because unless you truly believe that you can run a building company doing 10 million, 20 million, doesn't even matter how big or small you want it to be, unless you truly believe you can be that building company, owner of a building company of that size, making a certain amount of net profit, you will never be able to get there because we will start to self sabotage either by not making time to learn or making silly mistakes because we probably should have learned this skill to get there and we didn't because we purely, quite simply do not see ourselves as that. So I think self sabotage is a big reason why people can fail, but it's because of their self concept, if that makes sense.

Yeah, I mean, I remember when I first started speaking one of my biggest lies. I love that you mentioned the self lies we tell ourselves. For me, one of the biggest lies was, you know, you go through this imposter syndrome. Do I have a message that I can take to the world and will they actually believe me when I present it on stage? And I remember when I was doing my TEDx talk preparation, which took tons of hours to prepare on, I remember that was the most important part that I was battling with when I first started going into this. I'm just curious, you know, it sounds like we're not just dealing with mindset, we're talking about people's self identity and self worth. You know, does education play a part with builders? Am I a good business person or a leader? I'm just curious, when we look into the business owners that you're working with, what are some of the most common self identity concepts that they're battling with every day?

Well, what's really interesting and there are going to be different things that are said depending who we're talking to, but a very big Portion of builders that we work with, especially if they've gone the very, very typical route of they had an apprenticeship or, you know, was essentially a trades. Tradesperson to then running a carpentry team and then eventually setting up their own building companies. They weren't just subcontracting to other builders. That's a very typical or generalized journey. That's so many building company owners have gone through. And I recall hearing this on the phone so many times, they would just say, I can't do this, I'm just a builder. And that is so interesting because we believe at apb, as a builder, you're doing one of the most complex jobs on the planet. And to devalue yourself in that statement, I'm just a builder, but we don't stand for it, we don't accept it. And we'll say what you are doing is actually incredible. You are bringing together hundreds of materials and people and scheduling it together to build an entire structure for somebody else. And you're not only doing one of them, you're doing multiple at a time and a lot in a year. So that's actually incredibly difficult work. And so it's those statements that are really insightful because it shows that self concept. I'm just a builder. And you're so much more than that. And you absolutely can be. Our builders are building homes for some really successful people. Think of the really massive luxury homes that are getting built or even anyone that can afford to build a home. Let's be honest, you are just as much a professional as they are. It's that self concept. And so I think we can fully see this transformation in our members and our clients when they're growing into becoming. You know what? I have grown. I've developed. I've learned leadership skills and financial management and I can run this business so much better. They transform from this statement of I'm just a builder to no, I'm a businessman now. You actually change your entire status and that's when you just fully shatter that glass ceiling of limited self belief.

And it's so true because even with the builders that I've interviewed and have the pleasure of interviewing for this podcast, they've hit a level of confidence and they really believe in themselves. I hear the words I'm worthy through how they present themselves and they love what they do. And you know, you've got so many great stories. I remember the story of Ty coming to mind and we were interviewing him and he said to me, he suffered with dyslexia and he really Just transformed his business. And he looked at that and really just made something out of it. It was really inspiring for that interview as well. And you've got, you know, owners that didn't go to school and have built a successful building company as well. And, you know, education was something that they really were worried about when they first got into it. So it's amazing to see these stories that come out of the membership too.

So beyond inspiring, Ty is such a good example of that because it's just, it was all mindset. It was like, okay, that's not going to hold me back. And I have to say, as well, a lot of building company owners, we're talking about a majority here who went through that path of being basically the trades and the skills and moving up to being the building company owner. I've also spoken with a lot of building company owners who actually have come from engineering backgrounds, who have come from, you know, the quote unquote, professional backgrounds, you know, even have degrees. It doesn't necessarily help you in the running of a building company. And so there's still like, as long as you have the right mindset to open up and learn that, you know, whether no matter what your background, if you left school early to pick up this trade versus you finished school and even went to university to get an engineering degree, you can still have the exact same building company, the exact same profitability, because there are different skills you need to learn to get to that place. And so it's 100% possible. And yeah, just going back to what you said before as well, it's a complete mindset shift. You just said. You can see it in our builders. They're just thinking, I'm worthy. And you can totally see that because when you learn these new skills and when you learn about your whole building company and how to manage it and your financials and you really see that growth and you're that building company owner, you're not going to settle for lower than the benchmark of net profit. You really see that? No, we've earned it. We're professionals. We are not going to make any less than this net profit. The contract's not worth it to us. And that's a big shift that happens.

Well, let's get into the secrets of success. And obviously success emulates success. You know, it mirrors success as well. People are driven and inspired by success. Is there a winning formula and process to learn new skills? You know, is it time, is it energy? What percentage of that goes into the field of learning and growing new skills? Or is this something that you would guide people on when it comes to that formula of learning new things?

I don't know if you could put this as a full on step by step formula for learning new skills. This might be a little bit softer as an answer as you might be trying to get. But I think taking a complete step back is the most important thing. Because if we can first understand what is the end goal, what are we trying to achieve? Because you can see these people that are just addicted to learning, some people that have never really gone out into the world because they've done all these degrees and then Masters and then, I don't know, PhDs and even more, but they're just like addicted to studying and learning. And knowledge is great, but it's very futile if you don't do anything with it. So before you even think about learning a new skill, I think it's really important. What we recommend is take a full step back and think what is the end goal? What am I actually trying to achieve here? Because it's almost like that whole start with why and I know Simon's the next book is coming from a different perspective, but I think it's quite valid here. Start with why. Like what are we actually trying to achieve? Why are we doing this? Because then a, we can find that real reason as to why we do it. Because it's very easy to quit learning or quit doing something if there's no real emotional why behind it. But if we know where we're trying to go, we can persevere through learning this skill because we know what the outcome is going to be. So I think that's really important. Otherwise you can look and this can happen, right? You can get started in any program. But take ours for example. In membership there's all these courses available and you're like, right, I'm going to learn. And you just start going through them one by one. That's completely futile. You need a plan. What is the plan? What are we trying to achieve right now? And we need to learn that specific skill. But then secondly, in terms of a plan, once we've understand what the end goal is and why we're trying to do it, I think we really need to give ourselves permission to learn. And by permission I just mean scheduling it in. Because unless it's in our calendar, unless it's something we have scheduled in advance to do and commit to, it's very easy for it to get pushed to the side and because we've got all these other priorities screaming at us Waving at us throughout the day like everyone's busy, every single person is busy. But the most successful people know how to prioritize. And if we know that learning that new skill because that end goal is so important, that becomes a priority. So giving ourselves permission to learn it, that is scheduling regular time into our day to work on it, learn it and then implement it, and then refine it and make it better, that will give us success because we're actually doing it. Learning is one thing, implementing is another. So yeah, learning what is the end goal? Having permission to learn it, so scheduling it in and then really making that roadmap. Okay, how am I going to do this? It's, it's business planning, essentially. What's my 10 year goal, my three year goal, my one year goal? What do I need to do in 90 days? It's all getting broken down. So it's the same with learning a new skill, otherwise it's just a big mountain and you have no idea where all your base camps are.

I really resonate with the permission to learn. You know, when I was going through the Learning Hub for apb, it really just came down to setting the right time. And for me it was early in the morning, having a cup of tea and just putting the one hour to go through it because there was so much content. There was. And no distractions. I put my phone away and knowing my environment was so important. Someone asked me, what do you do when you prepare for a TED Talk? And I said, for me it was two showers a day. And everyone looked at me, what do you mean by that? And I said, well, typically I rehearse in the shower. Now that also prompted for a very expensive water bill. But essentially I practice my delivery lines in the shower morning and evening for three months. And so I really resonate with what you just said there. But giving yourself permission to learn, it really hits home because most of the time it's the procrastination that prevents us from learning.

Definitely. And I think just hammering that point home. Everyone is busy, every single person is busy, but the people who make leaps and bounds have prioritized it. It didn't just happen, you know what I mean? They weren't just saying, you know what, once XYZ is finished, I'm going to have more time. Because life just doesn't work out like that. So to actually even begin, begin to learn something new, you have to make time to prioritize it. And it's kind of like, you know, people say this all the time. You see these amazing Musicians are a really good example. Oh, you're so lucky you're so good at violin. Like, I wish, you know, I wish I could be that good. And they're like, you know, I practice like a million hours every single week. Oh, but you're so lucky. I wish, I wish I could play like that. You've got a natural talent. And they're just sitting there. Like my fingers are bleeding. Like I'm practicing every single day, you know, so it's like that's exact same thing. Like, I wish we could have a building company that's successful or have more people on our team to take the workload off. It didn't just happen. We have to consciously plan it. And even to get to whatever goal we have, we have to learn something new. So we have to be open minded enough to know that what's gotten us to where we are today isn't going to get us to where we want to be. Okay, so we have to learn something new. What is my goal? Okay. What is the end goal I'm trying to achieve? Okay, then what do I need to learn to get there? When can I learn it? Let's schedule it in and where are my deadlines? And that is how we can get the ball rolling. Otherwise it's always just a thought and an idea.

Right. So what are some of those winning habits that you try to instill onto the builders that work with you when they come in and how do you transform them through those winning habits? Do you.

Winning habits a scheduling it in. That's a really easy answer there. But going a little bit deeper, definitely having an open mind and that's definitely a habit we teach at apb. Avoid learning specific processes and specific tactics without having a really good foundation because. And this is quite common, you can sit there thinking, all right, I know I need to get better at my marketing. So I'm going to learn all about Facebook ads. That's a skill that's really specific. That's a really specific thing to start learning. But unless you have any kind of foundation, it's so futile, it's just going to fall over at the first obstacle. We teach this pyramid, you can call it, at the very bottom in our mindset training, at the very bottom of this period, we have self awareness and this is, it's essentially mindset, right? Being so aware of our thought patterns. Because when you're so self aware, you can catch yourself in that negative talk. Because you could go into that Facebook ads training and you're hearing something and you're like, oh, well, I don't know how to do that, or I'm not really good at copywriting. And if you have good self awareness, you can catch that negative self talk and you can have a way better foundation a that will help you learn a lot better. The next layer up from that is some good mental cognition. And that's literally like your ability to prioritize, like having the ability to do some strategic planning, strategic thinking, the ability to solve problems. It's developing your mind in such a way that when you encounter a roadblock, you think of a solution, not an excuse why you couldn't do it. And this is literally how we can acquire and understand new information. Then the layer up from that, we talk about business principles and this is what's going to guide you. And these are things like, what are your values, the company's core values? What are the priorities in the building company? These are the principles of where are you trying to get to? Because the tactic that you just thought you might want to learn might not even align to that just yet. So if we are self aware of, you know, we're catching ourselves when, you know, our thought patterns and our belief systems and our whole self concept, then we have the ability to prioritize because we've worked on that and our ability to solve problems and think a few steps ahead, then we need to think about the business as a whole. Where are we actually trying to go with this? What's our mission? What's our purpose? What's the whole objective for the building company? Then we can get into business disciplines and this is how we learn about understanding construction financials as a whole. We want to understand the financials in our building company and we're well rounded enough to understand. All right, I understand how marketing a building company works. I understand big picture, you know, construction financials. And once you've built that, then you can go really deep on a tactic like Facebook ads. But because there are so many different tactics you can learn, if you just start picking and choosing each one of those tactics, it's just going to fall down because you have no foundation, you have no real ability to learn or grow or problem solve. And when you run into a problem, can you even push through? And typically you don't. If you don't have those foundations in.

Place, it's almost like a funnel process. So you've got the self awareness and the mental cognition, which is sort of that identity process. And then you go into the business principles, the disciplines, and then you get into the actual tactics. So it's actually a reverse way of doing it because most people make them mistake of just going right directly to the tactic. There's a lot more that you have to do to get there.

And this is why again, so many people can fail at learning new skills. Because you know, like Facebook ads is a really good example. Because if you just go straight to that tactic, if you don't have a bigger understanding of even just one layer down marketing as a whole, well, the ads probably not going to be successful because we haven't learned about our messaging and our building company and where we're going with it and what our the whole point of it is. Are we trying to just generate awareness here? Are we trying to actually generate some leads? What's our entire sales process? You know what I mean? We're too granular. We need to understand the building company as a whole. And to even understand the building company as a whole, we need to attack and fix up our self concept so that we don't get to the stage where we are self sabotaging because then we'll never be able to learn anything. A little roadblock and you know what I mean? It's just, it could be a very vicious cycle if we let it.

It's really about recrafting your perception as well of learning. That's what I'm getting from this as well. It's just understanding a deeper layer to the regular side of things as well.

Definitely, yeah. There's always way more to it.

Are there any popular topics of interest from the builders? I'm just curious because I've seen the Learning Hub and there's so much. It blew my mind. I was like, oh my God. You have spent literally hours and hours. It's almost like a Netflix channel for training for builders. We'll call it the Netflix for Builders. What are some of the most common topics or what are some of the most common skills that builders are so interested in? First when they come, you know, when they come into the membership and they want to really perfect where. Where do they struggle the most to begin with?

I think a lot of builders are drawn to APB for the financial management side. Certainly the tools, the calculators we have, you know, the work in progress, accounting, adjustment. We've talked about that in an episode. We've talked about construction slots and properly planning your availability. I'm pretty sure we've talked about how to price your jobs and net margins. So I think a lot of builders are very much drawn to us because it's very much based on Data, a lot of financials. And even if they end up going through any one of those courses first, it's a very specific tactic. Everyone does gravitate to our time management and efficiency training because you get to the point where you can do one action plan and then you have to implement it, and you sort of realize, I'm not sure if I can fit this in. Like, everyone is busy when they join apb. I don't think anyone. The builders who join us versus the builders who don't. It's not as if one of them just has more time. Everyone's busy, but they've prioritized it. They've given themselves permission to prioritize it, schedule it in, and you know what, even if it's only a couple hours a week initially, so because they're all busy, even if they complete a different module first, they all then get drawn to the how to manage your time and efficiency training that we have. And it's a very simple way of just removing as many things from your plate that you do not need to do. And it's essentially a training on prioritizing your hourly rate. What should you be doing and what should you be completely removing or delegating or automating? So I would probably say that training in itself, because it's relevant for every single building company owner, no matter what problem it is you're trying to solve. Because, you know, maybe it's not financials, maybe it's marketing, maybe it's a sales problem, maybe it's, you know, the leadership skills that time and efficiency training tends to draw everybody in, because that's one thing everyone can do better and always just try and learn.

And we've talked a little bit about some of the builders that have actually overcome some of their challenges and barriers to. To have some success stories. But how does APB measure success with the builders that you work with? How do you help them create that success and establish that accountability? There's so much that comes out of this program, but what's the first sign that you're seeing success with the builder?

That's a really good question. And I actually recall one of our coaches, Clint, on our podcast, he was asked a question on how do you get success for the builders? And I loved his answer when you just said, first of all, like, I don't do anything. It's all our builders. We are literally just here to guide them in the right direction, but they are the ones putting in all the work, getting it done, prioritizing it, scheduling it, implementing it. And then optimizing it. So it's. It's very much. We are the support system. We are here. We can guide all of our builders to what can help them, seeing them actually implement it. You can lead a horse to water, but you can't make it drink. So there quite literally is only so much we can do, but we do as much as we possibly can. Even in our private program, there's so much accountability. So to see a builder's success, it's all them. It's literally the success when you see them go through their first action plan and implement it and get that win. Like, we're really big. We talk about celebrate the wins. It's a company core value we have in our private group. It's a hashtag, celebrate the wins, so you can find everyone's wins. And it's just like, let's just celebrate. And it could be massive or it could just be. You know what? I didn't have to do the qualifying phone call. I've systemized that part of the building company. So now anyone that calls in our receptionist can now take that first phone call and do the qualification that has saved me two hours every single week. And then they put that two hours into training. It's just. It's hearing it back because they were able to implement something. Learning is great, but unless you do anything with it, it's completely futile.

Yeah. I think the common identity that I've seen with your success stories, because I have interviewed so many different builders from different parts of the world, the most common fabric that I see is the level of calmness. And even though there's chaos in business every day, it's sort of this level of organized chaos and calmness. And there isn't that frantic entity because they trust in the people, they trust in the systems, they trust in what they've built. And it was interesting. We had our first Canadian builder on our last season and they were so honest and they said, we're building a growing business, but we still need more staff. And we know this, but we're not worried about it because we know what the problems are and we know how to overcome it. It was so humbling to hear someone say, success is continuous. It's not just we've hit this milestone and we're there. You know, that was really inspiring to see, to hear as well.

You know, the second everything is out of your head and in a plan and, you know, you're just working a plan, that is a lot more relaxing to know there's still that Drive and you know there's going to be day to day things and we all have our own lives that's happening. But my goodness, having the plan in front of you and then suddenly you just know you're working the plan. I think quarterly strategic planning, like company planning, learning new skills, everything. As soon as you give yourself permission to do it, it's like a budget. When you do the forecast for your building company. We've talked about this in marketing and advertising episode. As soon as you have a budget in place for your handovers, for your advertising spend, it's like permission to spend it. Whereas if you didn't have that, you're constantly questioning, should I spend it or should I not? So yeah, give yourself permission to not only have those budgets in place, you can do a proper handover process so you can spend money on advertising, give yourself permission and time for learning and implementation of new skills.

Let's talk a little bit about mastery, shall we? So obviously at APB you have different layers of mentorship and builders start to progress as well with, with their skill sets. How do you know that your builders are starting to go from one level to the other? And how do you know professionals say you've got to put 10,000 hours in your industry to become an expert. Is there a magic formula for mastery? Is there? Is it based on a sign? Is it based on numbers? You know, where do you look for mastery when it comes to professional builders?

I'm not sure about the mastery question because I think a lot of people that have hit mastery, it's because they've been publicly recognized for it as well. You know, it's winning awards or winning championships and winning gold medals. So if we try and relate it to running a building company, how do you know you're improving? Well, something that we put in place, quite frankly, so that we could really make sure every single building company was set up for success and just rock solid. We call them the professional builder levels. You can actually see them on the website. We'll chuck a note, a link in the show, notes to it. I think that'd be really helpful. But we call them professional builder levels and it's set up in such a way there are 10 levels and then you get to being like, yeah, you're completely certified professional builder if you've achieved every single one of these and you can unlock the next level once you've achieved it, essentially. And so it just starts like the first level is calculating your work in progress, accounting adjustment every single month and you're on level One, once you've done it three months in a row, because that is fundamental to running a building company. Now, maybe you are hitting the industry benchmarks for gross margins. You're a lot higher than that in A level. But unless you are calculating your work in progress accounting adjustment, you will always be seen as a level one builder because it's so fundamental and it was so beautiful for us to implement the professional builder levels because it really allowed us to see there's a $20 million building company making maybe great gross profit and net profit. But if they're not calculating work in progress, they are truly no better off than a much smaller building company who's maybe not quite hitting the benchmarks, but they are all over that liability. And so it really allowed us to say, okay, what are the most important things we then need to work on and coach on? And it really brought back and grounded a lot of the builders we were working with that this is actually the most important thing. And so that's a really easy way, I can say, for us to measure any of our builders success when we can see those level ascensions and we track those level ascensions on all of our private clients. Any member can do it personally themselves because all these levels, any builder can. You can go on our website and see the professional builder levels and just really see where you fit and stand. And then there's just. It's a very easy roadmap of like, okay, how am I going to get there? Okay, the next level is three to six months of my fixed expenses as working capital. Okay, well, how am I going to get there? I need to really look at my construction funnel and look at how many sales I need to get and what are my margins. And you don't take all the money out of the company and so on. So you get to make your plan from that level based on where you are at. So that was a really easy way for us to see that success. Another way is certainly when we work with builders in our private program, they're not staying for a couple of months. When we work with a building company, we're working with them for years. And the reason is because maybe you focus on implementation and you get it all done really quickly. Maybe it only takes you 12 months, maybe it's 12 to 18 months. You're not done. Because once you focused on implementation, you need to go redo everything. Because now your focus is optimization. Because we're really big on progress, not perfection. And if you were striving for perfection, I actually saw this quote the other day and I might butcher it. But perfection is just like. It's just another word for procrastination.

That's actually. That's a pretty good way of looking at it.

Yeah. And it will never allow you to move on or get better or do anything else, let's be honest. Because you're just trying to be perfect in that one thing. Whereas, no, if we could just focus on implementation of everything we need to do in the next 12 months, I know I get to circle back and optimize it because let's be honest, nothing is ever finished. Ever.

Yeah. And I think if you ask anyone out there, you look at some of the secret confessions that we have to ourselves about how do we grow. A lot of it really just came down to making time for it. Because it really, when we talk about success and failures of growing. And I look back at my career as well, everything I've made time for, every single thing I've made time for, I developed some really strong skills around it. But it really just required me making that first step and then having the discipline of prioritizing it every single time. So I really, really resonate with that quote as well.

It's like not just to throw another quote at you, but you know that quote, the secret to success lies in your daily routine. It's because that's where your time is going. So if you can see in your daily routine, there's just wasted time somewhere, let's fix that and direct that energy somewhere else that can take us further.

So how do you feel the pursuit for excellence? We've talked a little bit about the habits, we've talked a little bit about that, making the time frame. But how do you really level up? How do you get your builders to really level up when it comes to the coaching program on top of the personal practices that go with it?

I mean, accountability helps, but only to an extent. You can lead a horse to water, you can't make it drink. So it really comes down to individuals. And once again, anyone who's drawn to something like APB and what we do here, you're looking for change. You have a growth mindset. You're looking to take the building company to the next level. You are incredibly busy already, but you're willing to make a sacrifice somewhere so that you can make your one year goal or whatever it ends up being. So what fuels mastery or your question? There is time. You just have to make time for it and it just keeps circling back. Give yourself permission. And I think that's the Biggest barrier because everyone, everyone this year, last year, 10 years ago, is the busiest they have ever been. You're never going to get less busy. So you just give yourself permission. And you know what? Everyone has a different amount of hours. Someone's hours can be very different to the amount of hours you have in a week because they have more people to delegate to so they can get a multiplication factor and maybe you don't have that just yet. And so we've been very open about this. I remember in a blog article we wrote years ago was, okay, work longer hours. It's not a long term solution, but it's really the only thing you can do short term to then create more time for yourself later on. So give yourself permission to do it and schedule it in. Honestly, the amazing things that can happen from just two hours per week with focused work, working on the building company, learning a new skill and then implementing it. Learning's one thing. Implementing is the most important. So just two hours a week? Maybe. Maybe it's a two hour block on a Saturday morning and I know a lot of people that have just said, oh no, that's family time. That's a non negotiable. Well, it's just short term, it might not be forever, but I don't know how we can expect to get so much further ahead if we're not going to find that time anywhere else. So if you really don't want to do it later on Friday night or Wednesday night or Monday night, get up earlier in the morning, you have to find that time. But amazing things can happen and you use that compound effect, two hours every single week. Maybe you can only do an hour, but then it goes to two, maybe it goes to three, maybe it then goes to five. Because you do a one hour sprint every single day of the week when you're at work. You know what I mean? Amazing things can happen.

You talked a little bit about the tier side of things as well. And I just wanted to know, obviously the coaching program has grown. There's so many members now from different parts of the world. Where did you find the inspiration to tier up the levels? Was it through what you were seeing with, with what people were overcoming? How many layers are there and where can builders find this information about how they go from one stage to the other as well when it comes to the levels of building?

So you mean the professional builder levels, like how we created them?

Yeah. I'm just curious, did it come from the front lines? Did it come from a vision that you had? Where did the inspiration start honestly, it.

Was so that we could have a way of leveling the playing field for every single building company. Because it didn't depend on revenue or how many employees were there or even the location you are based. These are all 10 fundamentals to running a professional and profitable building company. And so we just needed a way of really leveling it out for every single one of our clients, but every single builder out there. And so you'll see it's not based on revenue, it's on percentages, it's on running a professional building company. So that was the main reason and need for it. And then I think implementing it and actually seeing people realize, I suppose be taken aback because they thought they had a much more successful building company, but because they would not calculate the work in progress accounting adjustment and because they didn't implement it into their financial reports, their building company was based on really rubbish data. They were really able to take a step back and actually realize how important it was. And then, you know, they just got so much pride and then ascending a level and just getting better and better and better because it was that confidence of okay, I am doing the right thing and all it is is a plan, right? And it's just a guided roadmap and here's the next step and here's the step after that. And I think it just gives people confidence and where to go next, like what the next goal is because it's very easy to get a bit lost. We've got personal goals, but where should the company be going? Is it aligned Sky?

We've covered so much. You've talked about this full stack mindset cheat sheet as well that is there a place where we can get this information? Because there's so much levels of theory that you've covered today. Where can our listeners get some of this information about upskilling?

I see. I'll see if I can pop a link to that pyramid that I just talked about. It'll just be like a one page just so you can visually see what I was trying to explain. I'll pop it in the show notes. I think we can do that. But of course a full training on it is available to all of our members. If you're a private client, there's a lot more trainings on Mindset just to dispel some of our self concept and think a bit bigger. We put out so much information on our blog as well. So if you're not a member, you can definitely get a lot of information from there. And obviously regular Podcast episodes also.

That's awesome. My final question for you, bit of a curveball, is you talked a lot about the art of practice. You talked a lot about what you make time for. What are you making time for today, either professionally or personally? And what are you feeling as far as your curiosity when it comes to the skills that interest you today? Where are you spending your time the last few weeks?

Me, personally. Oh, wow. Okay.

Yeah.

Well, what I'm learning at the moment, the books, all the books I've read in the last couple of weeks are on leadership.

Okay.

Because our team is growing and learning is such a big thing for our entire team. It's a culture of learning. So for our client, like, we teach learning, so we roll this out to clients. So in our team, it's that weekly. All right. It's learning time. This is built into everyone's calendar because we have to learn, we have to get better. And so what I'm learning is leadership. So the books that I've been reading, a lot of, John Maxwell, great books, lots of podcasts. So that that's my main focus at the moment.

How much time does everyone at APB spend on learning? It sounds like it's part of the culture as well. Because everything you know is about developing and learning new things. You know, it sounds like you guys really inspire this with everyone that works with apb.

Well, it's a two hour block in the working week.

Okay.

That's actually scheduled in. However, everyone has book lists, and you can't achieve the book list just by doing it two hours at work. So there's a lot of reading done outside of work. So we provide books and audiobook logins, and we literally have dozens of books available for the team. And this is a really big point as well. That's just what we do in our company. This is what every company should be doing, and this is what we want to see building companies do as well. As the leader of a building company, you want to be upskilling yourselves, but roll this out to your teams also. And this is why investing in assets like books for the company, like give them to the leadership team in your building company, like swap books, talk ideas, you see a great podcast episode, share it with your team and discuss it. Because we all need to grow. It's not just down to the leader of the building company to grow. There's a very good. I read this book a while ago, but it was a John Maxwell book and it was the 21 irrefutable laws of leadership. Might be 22 actually might butcher that title, but one of them was the law of the lid. And it's talking about how, say, our skill level, like, as a leader, I'm a five out of 10. I can only lead fours, maybe another five, but fours and threes. And so if I want to get people on my team that are like 8 out of 10, 9 out of 10, I need to be a 9 or a 10 to get there. So we have to grow. And what you'll find is, as a building company owner, as you are growing, maybe the people on your team aren't growing as quickly. That's okay. It just means you've outgrown them so that you can get other people on your team. Like, as you grow and you become an eight, so you can get some sevens, you become a nine, you can get some eights, maybe a nine, and you can get to a ten. And I really, really enjoyed that concept because the whole point is to grow, and you want your team to grow with you, but they have to do what you're doing. They have to put the effort in also. And if they're not interested, they don't want to, it's okay. You can set them free to do what they want to do, but it's not going to stand in your culture. And if you build that as a culture, they're not going to come with you on that journey.

That's a really good way of putting it, too. Good framework, too. Well, Skye, it's been a pleasure as always. Thank you for inspiring a culture of learning and sharing it with our listeners today as well. And thank you for being here.

That's okay. Hopefully I made it sound a little bit more interesting than the word learning.

Absolutely. Absolutely. I think you're going to have a ton of resources from this interview as well.

Yeah. Yeah. Well, it was awesome, so thank you. Thanks for today, Bosco.

Cheers. Thank you for listening. Remember to subscribe to Professional Builder Secrets on your favorite podcast platform and leave a review. To learn more about how the systems at the association of Professional Builders can help you grow your building company, visit associationofprofessionalbuilders.com See you next time.