The Value of a Coach - Pate G. Smith

Hey, everybody, it's Jim Johnson here, the head coach at Contractor Coach Pro with another episode of Contractor Radio. And we have one of my favorite people in the industry with us today. We're going to be talking a little bit about coaching, which I know kind of sounds a little bit self serving, but we want to talk about it from the perspective of its value to you as an individual, whether you use a company like Contractor Coach Pro and maybe some of the things those coaches have done for you over time. And we're going to be talking to somebody that has a lot of experience on the side of things. He's been a business consultant before, slash coach. He's had them in his life. And so we want to talk about what that kind of does for somebody. Help having one of those people in place. It may surprise you a little bit of the conversation today. And so I'd like to welcome aboard the rock star from McClinney, Moseley and Associates, the man Pate G Money Smith.

G Money. I love that.

There we go. Good. Now we got your audio. So, man, first off, awesome to have you on board. This, this whole Covid thing is driving me crazy. I don't get to hang out with my buddies and you're definitely one of those guys I enjoy hanging out with. We've had several side conversations, just you and I on this coaching and consulting thing. I know you have a passion for it. And when I reached out the other day about, hey, let's get you online, I said, I don't want to talk anything about roofing. I want to talk about like getting better as a person, getting better as a business and, and what some of those things were that you were kind of passionate about. And you're like, hey, let's talk about coaching. I'm like, well, that seems self serving, but let's go for it. Let's see what we can bring with this coaching side of things because I think it brings a little bit of a connotation of pride into the equation. Like you almost have this feeling like, well, I don't need a coach, I want to do this on my own type of feel. I'm going to kind of dig into that today, but give us a little background on this business consulting side of things that you did for a while and why you're so passionate about it.

Yeah, so my second year of law school actually between, like, maybe it was between 1L and 2L year, right when it started, I was getting coached by a guy. I ran like a male professional development blog at that Time where we talked about using sales techniques to kind of like increase whatever he did. So if it was like dating, if it was studying, if it was, you know, you were working at like a marketing firm, whatever, there were these incredible, let's say sales books that had been out through the years. You know, I was a little bit of a nerd in professional development. I love it because I think, I think it's Tony Robbins that says to stand on the Giants, the shoulders of the giants that came before you. Could be wrong, could be somebody else, I don't know. But I love that, I love that quote, right? And so I'm like, why am I going to reinvent the wheel? So starting about 12, I used to hang out in my parents basement and play Metal Gear Solid and Twisted Metal and instead of having the volume on, I would listen to like Zig Ziglar or whatever and there would be these giant cassette boxes with like 15 cassettes. You know, this was way before you could, you know, legally download these. Shout out Napster, shout out Limewire. That's how, that's how I kind of got into it. And so at that point in time he had, the coach I was with had guys, he was like, could you do this? I was like, yeah. I kind of started getting some steam on a professional development blog. So I started taking on a couple clients. They were like, whoa man, like this is really helping my business, the business side of my life. I'm a huge proponent of high volume interaction with individuals. Going back, looking at the interaction and asking the question like why did that interaction not go well? And then using information that was is out in the world basically for free or that a coach can provide something that's distilled down and really become a student of person to person interaction, sales interactions. And then last but not least, being a student of yourself. And I think that a lot of people need coaching. I needed coaching, right? Like I wouldn't, I would not be where I am right now without coaching. Not like on a schoolastic level, but professional development taught me to speak, right? Like I said I suck at this. And I didn't suck, I just wasn't where I want to be. One of the things that I learned how to do was like flow spit state speaking engagements which is like one of the most fun things I've ever done. I said, you know what, I don't know people, many people in these particular cities. I'm going to rent out a conference area or a part of a hotel and I'm going to advertise try to get people to show up and if I have five people or I have 50 people, it's a win because it's free for them to go to. Let's ask in a couple hundred bucks on each one. Hotel, yada yada, food. That's cool. But then I generate a client base and I generate experience for myself and yeah, so I did that. Grew a client base and I coach clients even on to the time of my last job. Now I don't take on any clients. I feel like every contractor and PA in the country that calls me every day is my client now. So, you know, I feel like I've committed to that game and given my life, you know, to serve that. Although I do man, like I have had some pretty good successes in businesses in the past and sometimes I look in and I just like, I'm like, man, I could, you know, really flip that particular business around, but I don't. But yeah, that's, that's kind of been my past and finished law school, never practiced and just ran the coaching company up until my last, my last gig.

Well that's kind of what you're up to now. If I understand things correctly, you're kind of finishing up that whole getting studied for the bar and like going to go, go do it.

Yeah. So I plan on passing the bar and being the greatest first party attorney of all time.

Look out, John Hoteling. Right. Like this pace going to be in the game, so you better watch out.

I mean I don't step in to not be the greatest. Like why even get up?

Hey, 100 on that. That's been like my own personality. I think that's why we align so well is like we're both super competitive. Like if I'm going to go in and get into something, I want to be great at it.

Yeah.

And that's this whole thought process of both building your knowledge. Knowledge is great, but if you don't use it, execute it and improve upon it, it does no value for you or anybody else that you come in contact with. So you had a lot there. I want to unpack. But before I do that, there's a question I always ask early on in my interviews because I think they play a big part in the overall interview is to, to date, like as of today, not what you might do in the future, but what's, what's your greatest achievement that Pate's been able to accomplish, not including getting married and having kids, family stuff. Like those are easy things that we can always, that we have to fall back to, because if we don't, our wife will shoot us. So other than that, what's. What's your greatest achievement?

I think, like, accepting that I am enough for whatever I want to do. I know that's not, like, a particular achievement, but that was probably the hardest thing I ever had to get over, was, like, realizing, like, I am enough. And that was the catalyst of a trillion successes. And I don't really think I've done a whole lot. You know, I look at people that are my mentors, and I'm like, man, I'm like, nothing compared to these people. But that being said, I think that acceptance of I am enough just put in the work that was my greatest achievement because it was a realization of, one, I can do it, and two, the work is necessary, and, like, nothing is given, but nobody's stopping me but me. And I think, you know, as cheesy as that sounds, that's my greatest accomplishment because it was that, like, mental attitude that took me, takes me to where I am. You know, like, there's a lot of times where you don't want to do. You know, I work, like, a lot, and then there's a lot of times where I don't want to do those barbary videos. I don't want to answer 50 more questions, or, you know, a contractor calls me at, like, 11, and I don't, you know, I don't want to answer the phone, but it's like, what should I do? What do I deserve? What does the me of tomorrow deserve? And I think that that mindset has been my greatest success because it's a hard one to have.

Yeah, I. That's. That's wild, because I don't know. That happened about 15 years ago for me, like, that. I am enough today for who I am today. I am enough for today. Tomorrow I'm going to be a little better, and then that'll be enough for tomorrow. And I try to do that every day. Like, can I get a little better today? It doesn't have to be a lot. Could just be a little move in the needle. But it's a little bit better than it was before. I feel like I didn't get better today. I failed myself, not anybody else. I'm not comparing myself to anybody else. I don't worry about competition or, you know, trying to be as, quote, unquote, well known or as good as somebody else. I just want to be as good as Jim Johnson can be. And.

And I always say this. How do I be a nugget better.

Yeah, it gives you freedom, having that. Yeah, you get a little freedom with that attitude of, like, hey, who I am is enough. And so that's super cool. I think we could just end the show right there, because, like, if everybody just got that part about their lives, I think it'd be a lot better situation for them.

So that wasn't an easy thing to arrive at. You can't just, like, wake up and.

Oh, I'm enough today.

But, you know, I think there was some serious introspection. I mean, I can definitely thank my wife for putting me in that mindset, like, as much as my wife, my family, my parents. But until you believe, doesn't matter. And until you're, you know, like, willing to do what it takes to have that mindset and then apply the thing, apply the things around it. I mean, it's an exhausting existence sometimes, but it's one that I think, you know, you can even, like, think about this biblically, but, like, all the greatest people, at the end of the day, they're surrounded by tons of people, but it's in a long existence because you're the one that's out there doing the work, right? So, like, you know, when you're sitting there trying to get better at three, Steve Kerr, you know, that was a lonely existence, right? Steve Kerr sat there and shot those threes. Reggie sat there and shot those threes. And it's not about, like, do I put in the time? It's, do I have the mindset to be great? And, you know, I think Drake said it best when he says, I'm not the greatest, but I'm headed for it, right? And so the way you're headed for it is that mindset. Like, am I gonna do what it takes? Am I gonna put in the work? Am I gonna surround myself with the right people to do it on Saturday? Am I gonna study for the extra four hours? Am I gonna work the three hours? Am I gonna call it, make the callbacks I need? Or am I just gonna say, screw it, I'll do the whole day at the lake? Because I can tell you what's easier. It's not the calls.

No, not at all. Like, it's the effort, right? Like, there's effort to improve. Like, Vince Lombardi is one of my favorite people on the planet as far as the way he approached things, not just because I'm a Packer fan, but just in the way that he. He did things. And one of the things he said is, you can't. We can't achieve perfection, but we can try to get as close as we possibly can to achieve mastery. And that's what I'm always after. Like, I want to master whatever it is that I'm about. Like, I'm trying to master this coaching thing. I'm, I'm far from that. I got a lot to learn and still improving every day. We're getting better at it. Our customers do pretty well, but there's more that we can do. We can get cleaner, faster, better able to understand, to simplify things. There was something else I heard the other day that I thought was kind of interesting. And you, you kind of touched on it for a second. This concept of failing forward, right? Like being on your own and saying, hey, on my own, I'm going to just keep trying, keep trying. And one way or the other, I'm going to get through that obstacle. I'm going to figure it all out. But why would you do that if somebody already has the information? You can just go there right now. You can go there and not have to go through all of that. And then the things that you do learn through failure are those bigger things, those things that push the envelope even further forward. It was, it was kind of an interesting way of looking at things. Cause I've always thought, like, fail forward, man. I'll just keep trying things until I figure it out. But if somebody's already figured out that thing, I might as well go get some of their advice and get there quicker. How do you feel about that?

1,000% agree. So in my living room right now, I have a professional video studio. I've got like, you know, super expensive mics, a soundboard. I knew nothing about this world. I have what's called a Miracast. Don't even really know what that's. That is. But I wanted, I could have screwed around. Took me six months to arrive here. But instead I was like, who do I pay to have the situation I need for the large loss lounge so that I can come on and provide value, right? So that I can provide a weekly cast that is deserving of McLean Moseley Associates. So I could screw around and figure it out, or I could go right to the person I need that has that info. Business is no different, right? When I need something, I'm going to go to the person that already knows it and expedite my success. I'm 35, right? I know that I've got like another maybe good 30 years, maybe 35, right? I saw my dad, I saw, like, how effective he was up and until his 70s and then he became slightly less effective. Slightly less effective. Slightly less effective. So I know there's diminishing returns and I fully believe that with like health science, right? Like I'll be able to stay where I want to be. Maybe with some sort of like, you know, like blood work and hormonal achievements. But that being said, like, I'm gonna expedite every single thing if you want to be great, if you want to take your business to the next level. Eric Obram is one of my really good friends and I really still don't know how to pronounce his last name. But that being said, I mean, he surrounds himself with incredible coaches, right? Like business marketing. The guy has taken the comment and I don't even know if he's done this purposefully. But you are the five people you surround yourself with the most. And I like to expound that. So I like to. Huge fan of tribal theory, right? And so Dunbar's number of you are the 100. You have 150 people that you have in your head and then you effectuate life for those 150, right? My goal is to be in as many people's 150 as possible. I can only have 150, but how I'm in 150,000 people's 150, right? But that being said, in my 150, what incredible mentors do I have? What people do I surround myself with that bring me down and what people do I surround myself with that bring me up what people say, things that make me better. If you, you know, I like the standard coaching model of I spend time with an individual. That individual sole purpose during the week is to make me and my company better. I love that idea. I love that concept because you know what? Usually it's only me, Karen, and now I have somebody else that takes the knowledge of all the people he has distills that and boo. So sorry, I hit the mic and you know, what do you get then, right? You have an individual that's going to expedite your success. I think I've done it in every single business that I've touched and sometimes I do it because I out effort the thoughts. So like problem X and it's not something I know but I can effort figuring it out. Like how do we figure this? And we spend enough time on it, you get an answer, right? And most people never spend enough time on it. So they never come up with an answer or not in a quick enough fashion. So that's why Coaching is important. That's why surround yourself with those. Mentors are important. I would guess I don't know a ton about your business. I've spoke at one of your events. But I would guess that when you step into a business, you can show a tangible roi.

Oh, yeah.

It takes time.

Yeah. We're a little bit different about what we do. Like, I feel like my feet need to be held to the fire at all times. And so we don't do contracts or any of that kind of stuff. It's a pay as you go thing. And if we're not providing value, you should fire us. If we're not making you money, you should fire us. If we're not making your business better, you should fire us. And we're okay with that. It keeps us on our toes. It keeps us learning every day, keeps us taking the information from the hundreds of contractors that we've coached and distilling that down to the right action at the right time for your particular situation. Because I've been fortunate. It really is a situation where as a contractor did well as a commercial contractor did well. With Acculinx, I thought I was going into something where I knew everything. I knew how to do this thing better than anybody on the planet. And so I started going in and meeting all these contractors. I went into the offices of over a thousand different guys, much like you have with all these contractors you've met. I got to see all these ways that they were doing business. And the epiphany to me was there's not a right or a wrong way in most cases. There's definitely right actions and right and wrong actions. But the way that you believe in is the right way, the one that you can actually get some belief in, because then you start to take action. So we don't coach like here's Jim Johnson's system or the contractor coach pro system. There's this framework to what we do. We believe there's 12 different aspects of your business that you need to have a pretty good strategy in. But that needs to fit your resources, your abilities, your tools, your skills, and grow those skills where you're at right now. And so you can't coach a million dollar company like you'd coach a $65 million company because they all have different resources, tools and skills available to them.

Okay, so this is one thing that used to drive me crazy. So let's go back 2000, probably 13, 14, 15, and you look back at these. I'm not going to say the name of this national company but there was a particular national company that crushed in coaching and literally they would hire people out of college that had no professional development experience and be like, this is the playbook. Fill this sheet out. And so I knew I would get a client when somebody says, oh, yeah, no, I actually am coached by this particular company. And I'm like, oh, are they doing this? Yeah, they are. Do you ever feel like those sheets that you're filling out, that you're filling them out and you reflect on them, but there's no future, like, follow up? Yeah, I do kind of feel like that. Do you ever feel like they're trying to make a cookie cutter model of what's a very personal thing? Because coaching is a very personal thing, right? Like I can spend a day with a person and that's one thing that I used to do is if they got like one of my larger packages, I would fly out. We'd spend like a Thursday, Friday, Saturday, and we'd work on whatever that was. And I would get to know that individual and I would get to know their company, and that was kind of like my highest package. And then, you know, for six months we would work on those particular issues. Unless we expedited so quickly we were like, boom, next issue. But 100%, man, like, the cookie cutter model of coaching doesn't really fit everyone. I think when you look at somebody like a Sam Taggart and Sam has his. Not more. 100% agree. I'm a knot more person, not just on doors, not more with being better. Introducing yourself to people that's, you know, knock another door in getting in front of property management. If you're in the contracting game, you know, fail 50 times, who cares? Like, go fail. You think you're going to get worse by doing it? You're not. Would you reflect? Yeah, you should. But you know, one more rep is, is always better than no more reps.

Oh, you, you, you got to the. That was a great segue because you said one more rep. And I can remember that from my coaches know in school. And I wanted to talk to you about that from an athletic perspective. You put, you played sports. What'd you play? Back in the day?

I played basketball all through. I was probably a better basketball player than anything. I actually stopped playing sports at all in 10th grade. So I went up through the years and yeah, 10th grade, it just. The juice wasn't worth the squeeze. I was. Had a little entrepreneurial couple things going on then, and I thought I was like, you know, the man. So, yeah, in 15, I started my, like, first little Pate Smith company and kind of just wanted to go down that route. I love sports, but I was at that point in time, I was like, I can drive if I want. I was playing in men's league at that point in time, and you couldn't play men's league and school league, and men's league was basically year round. And so I was like, I can do this while I do all of my other endeavors. And I really like dating girls and practice was like, super problematic. So I was like, you know, killed you, killed your.

There was the difference between the two of us. Don't get me wrong. Absolutely love girls. Super shy, like, completely unable to even talk to the a girl in any way. And so I focused on sports and I got to play through high school and a little bit in college and stuff, and it was a lot of fun. But what do you remember about those coaches? Like, what was it that kind of sticks out that might apply in the business world? Like, how are they similar?

So I can look for. Look at it from like two different angles, right? So I had some great coaches through the years, ones that adequately pushed me that, you know, coaching is a combination of improving a particular task plus adequate motivation, right? So, like, if we want to look at those two sectors, and I think that's what made good coaches. And then I think you look and you had horrible coaches that were just there to, like, pick up a check and, you know, you'd be like, okay, well, why are we doing this particular drill? Right? Like, you would ask yourself that particular question and you may even say, like, coach, hey, what's this drill for? It's because you need to do it, okay, why do we need to do it? Like, and I get, get that, like, in the time of practice. But, like, from a theoretical standpoint, like, I was a person, like, oh, what are we trying to learn here? Right? Because I was like, super inquisitive as a kid. And then one time, one of my favorite things ever is one of the coaches told my dad he would be surprised if I graduated high school or and would be surprised if I could get into college. This was in, like ninth grade. I can never forget that. And so, like, sometimes if I don't feel like doing something, like, that's one of the things that pops into my head. I've got like, probably 25 of those, and that's one of my 25.

Okay, so. So those would be, I think, some examples of not the greatest coaching in the world, right? Driving you by negative Reinforcement would be a bit of that. Like you took that, internalized it, and it's what drives you forward today. What are some of those?

I would say that's a minor driving factor of all driving factors. Sometimes you're like, you know what, like, this one's for you, dog. What's up? Like, I'll give it another 40 minutes.

Yeah. What is it that, what is it that makes a good coach?

A person that is able to use their senses, scientific method and come up with an application to make an individual better.

So, so unpack that a little bit. What do you mean, what do you mean by that? That was, it sounded good, but let's, let's clue the folks into what that is.

Okay. So I think a coach, he listens to an individual and he listens to their goals and he also can foresee what they might, may not know about their goals. So one thing that I would always like to say was a person's goals, their first month with me is not going to be their goals from that point out. It's usually, Their goals are usually so below their potential, they just don't have an expedited way to get there. And minor adjustments will put them on the path so quickly they begin to think, oh, wow, what else is possible? And so I think that it's not just about helping a person get to a point they want to go. But you have to listen and you have to look. You just use your senses when you coach, when you're a coach and you say, okay, what does this person really want? And then you look and say, what is this person's actual potential? Right? Because coaching linearly to a goal, cool, good job. But taking somebody past that in an expedited manner and having them completely reassess, you know, maybe themselves, their business, how they go about achieving their business model. Maybe they're like, oh, I want to work 60 hours a week or whatever it is and be successful. Maybe it's not. Maybe they applicate some sort of Tim Ferriss four hour workweek model to where they're able to do the 60 hours and 20. I hate the four hour workweek model, but I love the efficiency portion of it. That book probably changed my life more than any to make me more effective as a person. But as a coach, you know, use those fits, use those senses, watch the person use what, you know, come up with an application to get them to success and realize maybe they're even greater than they, they think. And that's what I mean by that is, you know, You. It's not just about what they want, but how do you make them achieve what they can, and that's greater than what they want?

A lot of times, yeah, I would say that's a struggle for us as coaches is getting people to believe in themselves as much as we believe in them and their ability. A lot of times they're trapped by preconceived notions and their experiences prior to being involved with you. They don't realize what their true potential is. And it takes a little time to build that up through steps of belief. You get that first step of belief, and you take this action, and that thing happens, and you see it and you're like, wow, okay, that worked. What's the next thing? And you get a little more and a little more. They really start to believe in themselves that they can actually achieve those things. And for us, it's not about, like, all business. Like, grow my business, scale it as big as I can, all that stuff, which is great and wonderful. We all want to make money. I get that. But what do you want out of life? What's the goal? Why are you doing all this in the first place? What are you gonna do with all that money? You're gonna do something impactful. You're gonna roll around in your bed with it. What do you.

What's the reason that the other day I was like. She said something, and I was like, no, we're not gonna do that. And I was like, why? And I was like, why the hell do you think we work as hard as we do? It's not just to have money and crap like what you like, we want a nicer table. We want a nicer couch. I don't care. Right? It's the. The goal for reaching potential isn't to have.

I would say it's not to have more, it's to do more.

Yeah, exactly. So that's my whole. My whole thing is. I mean, I think I work hard, and I love the W's, right? Like, I love achieving things that people don't think can be done. Like, it bothers me. Like, I can remember the first time. I was like, I'll never get a claim. That's a million dollars. Like, I can remember that, right? And I can remember, like, struggling and struggling and then finally getting one. And then I can remember when, you know, when that passed, this thing that, like, had held over me for months, I was like, well, what now? Right? Like, what did that even do? And I was resetting my goals in December of 2019, and I was, you know, sitting in bed with my wife, put the kids down. The battle of that. I don't know if you've ever put twin three year olds down, but I'm just saying when you actually, you know what, when you said, what's your greatest accomplishment? Getting them to sleep? Because I'm gonna tell you what, there's been wars one easier than that sometimes. But you know, I was looking and I said what do I want to do this year? And, and you know, I've had years where I just said X amount of RCV that I bring into X company and this year I don't have that. I just, I, I want to every single day wake up, do what I have to do to put my family in the best possible success as possible, as successful as possible, you know, and I don't want to have my wife and kids worry about things. And if I can do that, that's a win for me. And I do, I think I will be the greatest first party attorney ever. Yeah, I think I will be. Do I think I'll do it like sooner than later probably because it's like my goal and maybe I'm not but you know, I'm headed for whatever I want to do and maybe that changes, right? Maybe five years from now I'm like why would I ever want to do that? Let's start something else. But if I have the potential and I can do it and it serves society, I think that's a good goal. And I think that's why when I, when we were looking at our goals for 2020 MK and I, I was, and she was like, how many million do you want to put up this year? And I was like, I don't care, I won't do what's right and I will wake up every day, I will put in the effort that I have to put in in every single portion of my life and the rest takes care of itself.

How have the results been with that approach versus the money type of goal setting situation?

I'll just say this. Good. I mean this is my best year probably ever as far as marketing and providing value for a company that drives in business. I think that's partially because I'm working for a company with such good people. I mean it's like literally you have to be like, oh really, look at this, look what we do. And it's just like, oh wow, yeah, we can help. But I mean, yeah, it's been, it's been awesome because I don't care like if I do X one day. I did. I'll tell you this. Let me give a shout out to Michael Gogan because he put me in check hard yesterday. He was like, hey man, I know you've been really stressed lately. And I was like, yeah, I hadn't seen my kids in like four weeks. I just get up, work every day, work out, cook meat, and get up and do it again. I'm like doing a fight camp against the Alabama bar exam right now. So I'm treating it like I'm a UFC fighter. It's just me versus this bar exam. I get, you know, a good four to eight hours of work in and then a good four to ten hours of study. But man, I will say this, give a shout out to Gogan because yesterday, man, he called me and text me and he was like, hey, I know you're stressed out right now. He was like, let everything else go. He was like, just do. He was.