The Best of Contractor Radio Season 2

Hey, I'm Jim Johnson, your host here with Contractor Radio, and I want to thank you for taking the time today to listen to our show. And our show is all about you, helping you get control of your business so you can grow your business and find that personal and financial freedom you're after. So hang on tight.

Episode's about to start.

Hey, everybody, it's Jim Johnson here with this week's episode of Contractor Radio. Our broadcast for contractors to help them with their strategy, help them with their game, to kind of get an edge, hopefully on their market. And today we have somebody very near and dear to my heart. I posted on Facebook yesterday, I said, this is the best sales rep that I ever hired. And there's a little story to it that I recruited him for like a year and a half. It took a year and a half. I told him he was going to be good at it. He wanted to keep working at, I think it was a Pizza Hut, and so he wanted to keep working at Pizza Hut, and so he did that somewhere. But I kept working on him. We played basketball together and finally got him into the game. So, everybody, this is Dan Walreck or Wally. Welcome aboard, Dan, glad to have you today.

Thank you. Appreciate it. Humbled introduction you gave me there.

He's. He's. He's a rock star. And we're going to find out today some of the reasons why he is a rock star. But, Dan, just kind of tell us the story. Like, how'd you get into this? I kind of led into it a little bit. But bring us up to speed with where you are today. 20 years now. Is that. Is that right?

21.

21 years, man. And most of that is a sales guy, right? Most guys.

The sales guy, yeah, I. 21 years of doing sales and I mean, even when I owned my own company, it was sales. I sold, sold, sold. So how I started off doing this is like Jim said. I was in college, got my degree in physical education, health and fitness. I got a couple minors in coaching and adapted PE and outdoor rec. And Jim gave me the old line for about a year and a half. You'd be really good at this. You'd be really good at this. And I'm like, you know, it sounds too good to be true. You can't make money doing that. Nobody's going to do that. I don't sell vacuums. That's not my niche. Right, six. No, man, you'd be really good at this. I promise. So that was my graduation, was it? Didn't you finally hook Me or we went out to dinner.

Yeah.

I know the place.

I don't know.

Remember the name Copper kettle. There you go. So we went out to dinner and finally I said, all right, I'll give it a shot. I'll do it for the summer. You know, I'll, you know, whatever, whatever it is for the summer. I got nothing going on. I had a teaching and coaching gig all lined up, ready to go. And then we went out to Oshkosh, I believe, and I gave it to summer and I made more in, you know, three, four months. And I would have made an entire year of teaching at a 22 year old kid. That was a pretty good deal. So then I pretty much was hooked after that. Nobody ever told me that up north here that what you sell sometimes you have to bank over for spring. So I had all these jobs left over for spring. That was money in the bank starting off in the spring.

So that's how we suck you in, man.

That's how they got you on it. So then I had to cancel my teaching thing and 21 years later, here I am still doing the same thing and 20 years of straight million plus producer.

Well, I, I think you kind of got both of it in. You got this life that is pretty cool. But you still do a lot of coaching and stuff, right? Like you're heavily involved with your kids. Football, baseball.

I run the booster program up here for football and I coach, traveling, baseball. And I'm the seventh and eighth grade head football coach up here. See, I do a lot of work.

Best of both worlds, right? Like I got to make some.

Yeah, it wasn't like that at the beginning though, you know that.

What are all those other coaches that work there at the school or teachers.

Think about, like they have a good time. They, they know that I'm passionate, I'm aggressive. I suppose I take that into work too. You know, I'm passionate, aggressive about work too. And see a lot of things come and go in this business. It's like it's, it's a soap opera, you know what I mean?

But it's cool that you bring that up. Like what are the things like 21 years ago, what's changed from then?

Oh, goodness. Well, and in the sales part of it, I mean, all these new guys now are just, they take a lot of stuff for granted. You know, we were out there plugging the streets. We were out There, you know, 7:00' clock in the morning till 7:00' clock at night. You're sitting on a tailgate, you Know, and you had to generate your own jobs. You know what I mean? Nowadays, jobs get generated for you. They tell you where to go, they put you in the spot. And back then, we had to go look for leaves on the ground, we had to look for dents on car hoods. I mean, we were driving around everywhere trying to find it. But once you found it, guess what? You kept your mouth shut, because that's where you sat and you worked and you worked and you worked and you. And you made it. So.

Yeah, it was kind of all about owning that neighborhood, right?

Oh, yeah.

That's why you're there at 7 in the morning.

That was some of the first things we taught is like, don't, like, scatter yourself all over a city. You know, find that neighborhood, work that neighborhood, own that neighborhood, make that neighborhood your office. And you were really good at that. And one of the reasons why I recruited you is your ability to make friends easily. Like you. You're just now going naturally outgoing. Were you always that way as a kid too, or did that come on?

Yeah, I've always been outgoing. You just. I just relate with people, you know, and it doesn't matter what that person's, you know, into or whatever. You just relate with them. I mean, as a salesperson. I mean, the first thing you should do as a salesperson driving up to a person's house is if they got the garage door open, look inside. I mean, I think you taught me this.

Look.

If they've got a fishing pole hanging up, talk fishing. If they've got packer colors, talk packers. If they got whatever, make them feel comfortable with you as a person before you start trying to go into a niche on what you do. You know what I mean? Because it is what it is. I mean, you start talking to people and make them feel comfortable, that person's gonna be more open to talking to you.

Yeah, it's one of the mistakes I think a lot of salespeople make is they get right into it really fast. You know, hey, you know, going around, we're meeting homeowners I'm working with so and so over here. I'm here doing free inspections. Would you like me to do one for you? And they skip that part about being likable, being somebody that's creating themselves as another human being, maybe even their next door neighbor, possibly a friend, before they start talking about why they're there. And that's always been one of those things. Like, I try to try to look at each person as a possible new friend, a new Relationship. I'm still friends with my very first person I ever sold, Tom Wicks. I still talk to that guy to this day. He's a uber Viking fan. And if you remember back in the day, I had a yellow truck with a green and white stripe right down the middle of it. It was the Packer truck. And I drove up to all those houses in Minneapolis that were all Vikings fans with that truck. Talk about a conversation start. It was like, man, instantly started conversation. And we talked football for five or 10 minutes before we even get into talking about what we were there for. Well, I'm here. I might as well go ahead and inspect your roof, right? Yeah, sounds good. Go ahead, man. And I don't know if people really look at that rapport building as importantly as what it is. It comes down to human behavior. If expectations aren't set like we set that from the beginning. Our expectation was we are going to get after, we're going to go, we're going to work, and we're going to be hard at it every day. And if people weren't like that with us, they didn't stay very long with it. You'd see me scoot them out the door. And so when you set that type of expectation and you also do that, like you saw me in there every day, I work my butt off. And you set that example. And people tend to do it because it was set from the beginning. But when we don't set a standard like that or an example like that, we tend to see some of that type of stuff that guys don't take it as seriously as they probably should. I think a little bit of that is because they don't understand the opportunity that's in front of them and how fleeting it really is. Like, you get a big storm and it all seems so easy. But if you don't hammer it, and I mean hammer, hammer and build that network and build those connections, build that giant network of people through that opportunity, and you just take what comes to you, take what's easy. Well, when it dries up a little bit, you're going to be the first one that has to leave because you aren't making any money. And I see that as a big issue today. This. This idea of having a scheduled time to do the things you need to do to create that knowledge.

I list these three pillars because among all these three pillars, I personally believe that sales is. Is unique in the massive impact that sales, or lack thereof, has on the trajectory of the business. If sales are going well and sales are up and sales are high. We have revenue to grow the company, to reinvest, to build, and to get bigger. As we see sales decrease and we see sales go down or stay at a certain level, the company will follow suit in its own growth and expansion. I think that because of this massive impact that sales, essentially revenue has on and what happens to a business. I also believe that sales uniquely impacts the culture of the company's overall culture. And I've noticed a few different types of sales cultures that exist. Now. I'm not trying to oversimplify things, but I do tend to see two primary sales cultures that exist out there in the world. I've been a part of some of these sales cultures. You guys are probably going to recognize some the. Of some of these sales cultures. I've named these sales cultures. I have one that we call the prima donna sales culture. And then I've got the one that we call the monkey sales culture. I'm gonna start with the one I see most first. The most common sales culture that I see is the prima donna sales culture. Now, the prima donna sales culture, I think, is primarily born out of almost an over attention to sales, sometimes out of just plain fear. The idea that sales needs to have all of the focus, all of the resources, and everybody needs to bend around sales. Because if we upset sales in one way or another, right. We might upset the revenue, and then upset revenue upsets everybody and everything in the company, right? Well, oftentimes this leads to a fear of actually holding salespeople accountable. And oftentimes they tend to become prima donnas, right? Some things that mark a prima donna sales culture is that oftentimes the people in the sales culture tend to push everybody else around. Oftentimes, prima donna salespeople don't treat others very well. If you've been in a company that has this kind of culture and you've worked on the administration or the production or the support end of some kind, you might have been on the short end of some of that treatment in the past. Oftentimes these salespeople get what they want. When push comes to shove, either the thing that you need has to go or the thing that they need has to go. And the thing that you need is the one that's got to go. Because sales is so important, right? The other marker of a prima donna sales culture is that the salespeople run the show, they run the place. Oftentimes they'll run roughshod right over the owner. Once again, I think primarily out of fear that if we upset this group of people, we upset the revenue, and the revenue is everything, right? So you may or may not be identifying with this particular culture. There's another culture out there that I think is a little bit less prevalent in the construction industry, but it still does exist. I call this the monkey sales culture. Now, what I think causes a monkey sales culture is when you have a product that is so good, it is so tight, it's so clean, it is so desirable that the product sells itself, or at least in the mind of the people who made it, and the product sells itself so strong that we don't really need salespeople. We just need monkeys who can pick up a phone and explain the product. They can go on appointment and explain the product. And if they do that, then people are just going to throw their money at our monkey. Now, some of the markers of a monkey sales culture are that people in a monkey sales culture are not often viewed as the talent or a talent in the business. The talented people are all the people who create the product and who are delivering the product. But this person is just a monkey who takes cash from people. And so as a result of not being viewed as talented, they're also not viewed as being very valuable. Right? They're easily replaceable is one of the ways that they're seen as a result of that. Salespeople in a monkey sales culture often tend to see their incentive structures or their compensation packages messed with a lot. Right? Because we can't overpay the monkeys, because after all, they're monkeys. These people are also typically seen as a necessary evil because the truly talented people are developing the product and delivering the product, and they don't have time to pick up a phone and tell somebody about the product and have cash thrown at them. Hence the need for the monkeys. Now, these two different sales cultures are on either end of a spectrum, and your company might be somewhere on that spectrum in that space. But no doubt, if you've been in sales or or in business for any amount of time, you've probably seen or experienced one or the other types of these cultures. This is where I'd like to introduce you to the concept of the hero sales culture. The hero sales culture is marked by salespeople who are willing to make sacrifices. They're willing to sacrifice their ego, they're willing to sacrifice their time, they're willing to sacrifice, oftentimes their resources, and oftentimes they're willing to sacrifice their money. I know with this particular company, for the most part, the salespeople were the first People through the front door every single day. And generally they were the last ones to leave. That did not go unnoticed amongst the rest of the company because they would come in and they knew, that's Nathan's car. That's so and so's car. That's so and so's car. We know those are the sales guys. They're already here. And then when they're on their way out, they can still see those cars in the parking lot as well. Now, I know some of you don't work at a central office, right? But you get the point that I'm getting at. Hero salespeople are also willing to stand in the gap if somebody's upset, somebody's angry. You're willing to be the lightning rod. You're willing to be the punching bag. Because if you're willing to do that and you're willing to take those hits in order to keep the peace and keep a healthy relationship through departments in the company between customers and the other team members in the business, then people will see that and they'll recognize that you're concerned about them making sure that they can do their job. And the hero salespeople are honored to be in that position. They're honored and humbled to be in the position of having everybody else's success and weight laying on their shoulders. Now, you might be asking yourself, how do I get this kind of sales culture? Like I said before, it's not particularly easy, but I would like to give you some of the that go into doing this. As per usual with Contractor Coach Pro, everything starts and ends with leadership.

Okay?

So we're going to start with leadership. It is leadership's job. And I'm talking to you owners, leaders, managers, all of you guys. It is your job to communicate to your salespeople, especially the new ones, how difficult and what goes into the jobs, the other silos in our business. How hard it is to work in production. Oftentimes being outside in the heat with no ac, right? Not driving around in a truck, oftentimes how difficult it is to deal with customers who don't communicate back to you. How difficult it is for missed scheduling or man, when it rains and all the jobs have to get pushed back, or when your salesperson doesn't communicate to you all the things that you need to do your job correctly, and you have to figure out how to make this thing work. How difficult it is to be in the administrative or to be in the production side of the business leadership. You have got to communicate that to your salespeople so that your salespeople have an understanding and appreciation of what these people do. Likewise, leadership also needs to communicate to the other departments how difficult it is to be a salesperson. It really isn't that easy. Most of us salespeople hear no more often than we hear. Yes, Most of us salespeople deal with people constantly questioning our motives. Even though we have the customer's best interest at heart, the customer thinks we may just be trying to make a buck off of them. Sometimes salespeople go through dry spells. Sometimes things are great, sometimes things are just horrible. And so leadership, it's your job to communicate to production and administration the importance of sales, the fact that without sales and revenue, none of the rest of us have a job and how difficult their job actually is. So that's the number one thing for leadership. The number two thing for leadership is we need to demonstrate and be an example of the advocacy. I've talked about. Being the punching rat, being the punching bag, being the lightning rod standing in the gap. You, as leaders need to demonstrate that we do not allow our departments to go to war with one another. If one department has a problem with the other, we stand in the gap. We take that hit, we take responsibility, and then our salespeople are able to see us modeling that and the fact that we're strong, we can handle it, and we move through the challenges. And because we're the ones who are able to take the lightning, be the lightning rod, then the rest of our departments have an easier time working peaceably amongst each other. That's leadership. We need to start there. Alright, number two salespeople, number one thing, Advocacy, punching bag, lightning rod. You get the picture. Now, this primarily happens for you between your customers and the company. If the customer's upset, take that hit. Literally take that hit. If the company is upset, take that hit and protect the customer. I, at one point, I had one of my support people come up to me and they were laughing and they said that they were talking with one of their regular customers that they deal with in their particular role. And they said that they wanted to make sure that they were extra polite to that support person because they never wanted to hear from an angry Nathan for treating one of their support people unkindly.

We have a true superstar in the roofing industry with us today. One of the most magnetic personalities that I've met. A lot of respect for him. There is a little disclaimer here. He has been one of our clients. So keep that in mind as we go through and talk about this. But Heath Hicks, welcome aboard today from Avco Roofing, fastest growing roofing contractor in the nation. 2019 or 18.

18, I think it was. Yeah, yeah.

So welcome aboard the Contractor Radio. Glad to have you. That's the thing about you. You are a very contemplative type person. You tend to spend a lot of time alone, quiet, and really thinking about things. What do you think that's brought to the game for you, that maybe other contractors might be missing out on?

Well, understanding, you know, understanding is the beginning of wisdom and so taking time out of your life to really think through everything, be slow, you know, digest it all, process it all. I would say understanding and knowing your own heart is probably the biggest challenge you could ever have in life. And you can't do that if you don't sit still, you know, so sitting still allows me to do that, allows me to find the wisdom and strategy in a situation that you really are not going to find that level of that without doing that. I by nature enjoy doing that. I know some people don't, but I started out doing that, you know, from a young age. I really like meditation and. Yeah. So that kind of thing, I guess, is natural for me. It came from living in a very, very tumultuous and abusive household. And so I had to find moments of peace outside of all that stuff. And so, I mean, I can remember being 8 or 9 or 10 and going out as far away as I could get in a reasonable amount of time and climbing up in a tree and just sitting there, just trying to relax and be peaceful, you know. So that started pretty young. Of course, I went to a good church, too, that really talked a lot about, you know, reading the Bible and praying and spending some time alone, working through that stuff too. So from a young age, I guess, like I said, it was kind of natural for me, but it has allowed me to gain understanding, which produces wisdom. And there's no shortcut for that part. I don't think. You can't read somebody else's book and get wise. You may gain knowledge, but you're not going to gain wisdom that way. You got to figure out how to take it apart piece by piece, apply it to your own life, make the changes that you need to make internally and in yourself first, and then that'll be a fruit into the life around you and into the lives of people around you. But you're not just going to read a book and get wise.

I could not agree more. I've read a lot of books, more books than most, and there's a lot of knowledge, but the wisdom comes from taking that knowledge and knowing when to use it and how to use it. Not necessarily for your own benefit, but for the benefit of others. It brings back so much in reward that you're not even looking for. It's just, it's super cool how that works. My grandfather was, was the wisest man I know. And just on a. So simple. It's really, you know, if you look at life, it really is. Wisdom is actually a fairly simple thing, it seems to me in most cases. You talk.

Well, I will interject. Can I interject real quick before someone out there listening gets this idea that I'm some like, great Christian? I'm not. I am a piss poor Christian. You know, I hesitate to even use that term at this point in my life because of all the connotations it brings. You know, I do have my own faith. I do try to walk it out, but I am not good at it. So I'm not necessarily somebody that's trying to tell people to follow me, you know, but I'm just sharing with you what's, you know, what's worked in my life so far.

Yeah, that's actually super interesting that you say that because it's not the way I would perceive you. I perceive that you're. You're more faithful, stronger Christian than I am.

I know, I know my own heart and I know the stuff I do that nobody knows about. And I'm just not a great example of everything. So I don't want anybody to get that impression. Send a lot of people out in social media land or business success land are trying to draw people to themselves to get followers. You know, that's not my motivation at all. So I'm doing this because you asked me to. And I want to help you and I like sharing with people, but.

And I appreciate that it's not. You notice I don't post a lot of stuff all over Facebook and things like that. It's not why I do what I do. I genuinely want to see people succeed. I hope this podcast gives people like a conversation today. This is some enlightenment on things that it's not all about. Fast, fast, fast. Go do it, go do it, go do it. You know, I hate the word grind. I really hate, like, if it's a grind, stop doing it. That sounds terrible. Just doesn't sound like it's enjoyment at all. And why even own a business or run a business if you're not going to enjoy it? I liked what you said earlier too, about the time to slow down and think. I always think of it like this. Think slow, act fast. And so I take time, get the thoughts right, get the action right, get what we're going to do. And then when I decide, then it's bam, bam, bam. Let's go. Let's get after it.

Yeah, I would say.