#118 - 'Jack'ed' Up Leadership: Powering Through Home Service Business Challenges

I'm John Wilson. Welcome to Owned and Operated. Twice a week we talk about home service businesses, and if you're a home service entrepreneur, then this is gonna be the show for you. We talk about our own business in residential plumbing, HVAC, and electric, and we also talk about business models that we just find interesting. Let's get into it. Hey, so just give me your email. Hey, so just give me your email. Hey, so just give me your email. Every Friday we drop a newsletter from Owned and Operated called Weekly Insights, and inside that newsletter we talk about our business, we talk about lessons learned, we talk about projects that we're working on. So go to ownedandoperated.com, enter your email, and get some drops every Friday.

Welcome back to Owned and Operated with your hosts John Wilson and Jack Carr. Crowd goes crazy.

Oh my God, these guys!

What's going on, John?

Dude, I'm ready. I'm ready to— I'm ready to chat it up. Ready to get my chat on. Today we're talking— today we're gonna be talking developing yourself as a leader, which, as I have this conversation, I want you to know that I'm not looking at you as Jack. I'm looking at you as like— All— or like the way I'm like thinking about how I talk is like all the people on my team and like my past self, how I wish— like the things I wish I would have done years ago to develop myself to be prepared for the seat that I'm in today.

Oh, that's cool. Yeah, I'm open to that. I mean, I'm coming from a little diff— a little bit of a different spot, right? Because I'm still very young in this specific career path. I mean, we've— I've owned the business for just under 2 years. So we're still kind of figuring that leadership style out. But this is interesting that you bring this up, um, and the way you bring this up, because we've actually had this, this conversation between the management team and why, um, I'm moving to that who, not how, and more of a delegation style leader.

Yeah.

Um, it's not because I actually like delegating. I'm someone who doesn't like delegating, but because I don't want to undercut other people's leadership abilities. and growing them into leaders. So this is— this will be interesting. I'm, I'm interested in the framework you're bringing to the table today.

All right. Yeah, we had a, uh, the, the business— I think that, yeah, so where I want to start this, um, is our business grew fast. And we didn't have a lot of things dialed in. Me especially didn't have a lot of things dialed in. When I took over, I was 25 or— yeah, I was 25. And I was leading managers at 27, 28, and still really figuring it out. And I'm still figuring it out. I don't think I've done by any means. And each new stage of the business has required a new me. And I think we've talked about that, how I have to sort of reinvent whoever I am or whatever I am for the current needs of the business, usually dictated by size or strategy or are we going through acquisitions, is this organic? And One of the most challenging ones that I've had in my career so far is the one that I'm currently in, where we're moving from— we now have a group of leaders leading leaders. And that's been really challenging for me to help support them in the way that they need it. So I'll give an example today. We referenced it in our last But we had this failure of options recently where we weren't holding up our end of the bargain on what we were doing. And I don't know that we need to go into that part very long, but the crux of the issue wasn't even that. The core issue was we weren't holding ourselves or our peers accountable for what we expected to do. What we were expected to do. And that's like from me down. So like I wasn't driving the accountability that I expected, so the next layer wasn't driving the accountability they expected, so the next layer wasn't driving the accountability they expected. And all that that ends up doing is creating this sort of like chaos throughout the whole organization where everyone's trying to run around and like they're playing in other people's sandboxes and it's because other people aren't performing their tasks and— And that's a part of the who, not how, is like, do you have people that are going to be accountable? Service Scalers is running a promo right now where if you sign up for a year of service, you get a free website, which is awesome. We just did this in one of our businesses and it really helped a lot. It was a brand new look, plus we got great SEO with it. And PPC to help. So make sure you check out servicescalers.com, promo code OWNED.

Yeah. And do you— I mean, that, that I think people— you've glazed over a huge point there. And I'm curious as to the background of where some of this information comes from or where you get these ideas from. But this, this trickle-down effect of not having the accountability over your managers and then the managers not having accountability over their subordinates. Um, I think that's a huge step, is, is if you're not finding the key tasks to be watching, or the key— I mean, we talk about dashboard and we talk about metrics all the time, but what are the metrics for, you know, your managers? And then how do they split that up for their, their either their leaders or their leads or their techs to make sure that that's Um, kind of filtering through. And so we, we were actually having this conversation similar recently, and, um, we, at least the culture in our, our business, we, uh, we've been trying to push and, and trying to really embrace, um, the extreme ownership, Jocko Williams, I believe it is, um, kind of mentality of, well, if our people aren't doing what they're supposed to, like, what did we do wrong to not set them up for that success? And, and I try to view that as like all the way up the ladder to me being the ultimately responsible one for why, you know, Johnny didn't put in his extra lead or his extra opportunity, um, or offer. Um, is that where yours stems from or where, where does yours stem from this kind of framework or mentality?

Basically the same thing. So like I was watching over the past few weeks, like we had this failure of options, which like doesn't sound like a complicated problem. Right. It's like, hey, we, we were, our average options had really sunk. Which was shocking for a few reasons. It was shocking because, one, that's so fundamental to our business. Not even that, but part of our core values is transparency. We're going to sell through education, not fear. And the way you sell through education is by offering options. So this is a core part of our identity, is that we are going to educate our customers on how their home works. And offer options that will help increase comfort or reduce pain. So us failing at that from top to bottom was enlightening, because as we looked at what caused that to happen— so we weren't giving 3 options in the field. The managers who were accountable for making sure that happened let it slip. The managers that were accountable for those managers making sure it happened let it slip. All the way up to the executive level that allowed that to slip for 45 days. From me down, we missed this for weeks, a fundamental core part of our business, our values. And the way it manifested was, where is everyone else's time going if we're not doing this thing? And are we having these uncomfortable Conversations. One of the things I'm super blessed with and I'm so grateful for, and I'm not saying this because they listen to the show, because I actually don't know if they do, but if you guys do listen to it, I mean it. I love the team that I get to work with, with my leaders. They're so much fun and we get along. And I think that that's one of our superpowers as a leadership team is that we do all get along and we can hang out and we can get stuff done. The problem is, because we really get along, sometimes we are afraid to have those uncomfortable conversations where we say to each other as peers, or we say to each other as subordinates, hey, you missed on this thing and this is where I think you could have done better. And that feedback isn't received as well because sometimes— get along too well. And that's what I started noticing throughout the whole place is that the culture is so camaraderie, so like high-fivy, so celebratory, so like, like let's have a good time, that we missed a portion of the accountability piece.

Would you say that you focused too much on the wins and not enough on kind of where you're slipping or missing? Is that, is that what you mean? Or is it more so actual the camaraderie?

Yeah, I would say so. And like the way that— so the downstream of it Is we are failing our teams. So if I don't hold my team leads accountable and they don't hold their technicians accountable, then the field professionals are being held back in their careers. If they don't offer options, they will sell less. If they sell less, their compensation will go down. They can't invest in their 401.

100%.

They can't buy the house. They can't get the car they want to buy. They can't live the life that they want to live. And our promise to people is that we're going to provide a workplace of opportunity. And then if they're not hitting their numbers, then the manager's not going to hit their numbers, and then that manager's not going to hit their numbers. And it's all the way up, all because we're not nailing down this sort of leading.

And so not to beat the dead horse here, but as you grow too, this problem exacerbates, right? So it's much more difficult for you as kind of the top of the pyramid, the, the ultra owner, executive, whatever, president, to make sure that you're— I know, right? Uh, that you're, that you're being able to manage kind of the key points of the tech or kind of vicariously through the chain, uh, the organizational structure, the organizational chart. So what is your plan moving forward to, like, how do you view this? Growing as you grow, is there a framework that you're looking at to really implement?

Yeah, I think so. The bigger the organization gets, the less direct interaction you get with most of the team. And it takes— sorry, I got distracted. Kristen deleted the chat. I like totally blanked. Because what are you going to do?

What are you going to do as the business grows? So as you get to $100 million, this problem gets worse.

Yeah. Yeah. And it definitely needs to be put in place now. So this problem is a reflection on me. I ineffectively led my team. My team wants to do an incredible job and they're all incredible people. So this is a reflection on my failure, which most of our problems are.

Extreme Ownership, all of them are.

Yeah. So this is a reflection on my own failure because as a business grows, it's my job to instill our core values and my core values into our leadership team. so that they can instill our core values into the rest of our team. Now, obviously, it's my job to do that with the rest of the team too, but managers are the conduits through which we deploy our core values and hold people accountable.

So do you view that as— sorry to interrupt, but I think this is important. Do you view that as a big key there is growing, I guess, the education of the managers to understand those core values better? Where was that missed specifically? Because I feel like they— I've been to your They, they know what the key— the—

yeah, they, yeah, they, they get it. They're, they're mostly aligned. I think I was listening to— I'm gonna shout out Chad Peterman's podcast.

I know.

Yeah, it was cool. And he's gonna come on the show here soon, which will be like really good. But he had an episode on levels of leadership, and it was really good. It was a good episode. And the idea is that there's 4 levels of leadership, and I think that is probably the the stem of some of the problem. So with Brandon and I mutually, we're at level 4. There's an implicit level of trust because we've worked together for 5 years and we've taken this business from 25 people to what it is today, and we're going to continue to ride the bus. There's a full level of trust there.

I love that term.

And with level 1, The only reason that you do what I say is because I'm your boss, or my name's on the truck, or my name's on the bill. So I think that that is a part of it, is like, yeah, some of it's totally education. But the problem with education is it still doesn't drive the why, and it still doesn't drive the adherence, and it still doesn't get the core value across. Because our core values are a reflection of what I believe personally. Of betterment, accountability, teamwork, transparency. And that is me. So I think, yes, part of it's totally education, but a book doesn't tell you all of it. And I think the thing that I have been missing is I'm not personally spending enough time developing my level of leadership with each of my team leads so that they understand more implicitly what I mean, and they can more fully embody our values and then live them to the team. So that was sort of my takeaway was, okay, yes, education's a part of it, but education is still just like, do this because I'm your boss, and not necessarily do this because you trust me, because we have gone through Hard things together before. Does that make more sense?

Yeah, I mean—

Or like, you trust that I have your best interest in mind.

Yeah, so I mean, that makes sense. It's just in my mind what I'm trying to wrap my head around is, right, so this problem gets bigger. I mean, there's no way that it doesn't get bigger as you grow. So then the answer really is that you are now, you know, you're training the next level below you, and then they're able to get that out because you're never going to be able to have That kind of relationship with the lower-level managers? I would assume at $100 million you have 50?

Yeah. I mean, I think one, I think you should try to.

Agreed.

But 2, I think that's a whole part of the problem, right? So if I'm not doing what I need to do with my layer of leaders that report directly to me, then are they doing— what are they doing with their leaders that report? So if all we have is people that listen to each other because they're the boss, Then no one's getting what they need out of that relationship. And what we're wanting is people that want to go on the journey with us, that want to go to $100 million, that are bought in. So yeah. And that was the way we sort of went through this earlier was like, hey, if our next leaders are already inside our organization, I don't know where, But they're there somewhere. Like, we've got 140-whatever people, like, they're in there. Our next team leads, our next managers, our next trade leaders, they're already inside the organization. And if we don't hold each other as peers accountable, and if we don't hold each other as leaders and cohorts accountable, then, like, they won't personally grow to the point where they can step into that next—

Mm-hmm.

position, and our total pool of potential leaders will be even smaller. Uh, so we— I, I see it as a— I see it as by me doing my part with the first layer and second layer, more layers will fall into place because they will begin doing their part, and then, uh, it'll become a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Yeah, I mean, that makes sense from a theoretical standpoint. I, I try to view it, right, so at I've worked for PepsiCo, Frito-Lay, great company. Um, but as a lower level manager, like I could, like there was just no ability to have that relationship with, you know, the, the—

Yeah. You and I talked about this like a few months ago. And I think like my example, I don't know if it's a good one, but my example at the time was like Elon Musk can drive culture quickly.

True. And I think it was the culture episode too, is where we got this. And it's, it's caused me to think really deeply about this, this kind of subject and leadership and how you want the culture surrounding your company to look. Um, and, and so with this, where, where did these ideas come from for you? So, I mean, you can ruminate on things all day long, but being in kind of like a singular point, it's kind of hard. I mean, you have books, but—

Yeah.

How do you, how do you view, like, where are you gaining a lot of this? Not only institutional knowledge for like how to run an HVAC company, but also leadership, culture, Stuff like that. Where's all that coming from?

Yeah, we, um, we've been— I think I've talked about this before, but early on in our business growth, we were part of this like peer network thing locally held by a supplier, and that inspired a lot of what we did in our business, but it also inspired a lot of what we do here at Own and Operate. Because it wasn't until like 5 or 6 years into my journey that I found more resources. Like we found CertainPath or we found Nextdoor, we found more peers and we met people on Twitter. And most of those years were like alone figuring it out because the resources that are available now just weren't available.

Man, I could not imagine. Like I've talked about our explosive growth in the last 2 years. Like I could not, I legitimately could not imagine being in The pitch black, trying to figure this out without Twitter.

That was the majority of my career, was figuring it out. Like, how do— oh, hey, you know, me at 26 trying to figure out how to buy multiple companies.

Yeah.

Uh, trying to figure out like literally what is gross margin, uh, how do you hire and train a manager? Like, I had no idea. I read blogs or books or, um, whatever. So, uh, a lot of the most impactful stuff that's happened in my career has come from peers. So like, we're a part of these peer groups, and that's part of what we have tried to like do here at Owned and Operated. And that's why we like, one, we create content, like we want to be the resource that I didn't have 8 years ago. And we want to give a little bit of a roadmap, but we also want to link people up, we want to connect them. And that's part of the cool thing about the workshop or like this Facebook group that we just launched, which like really took off, which was awesome. Is that you can learn from the other people. So I've had peer groups for years. You're in one of them. And it's been hugely impactful for me and my business, and they challenge me and they make me better. And when I have questions about something like this, I call up somebody inside those peer groups and I'm like, hey, here's the issue. What do you think? What did you do in your business when you had this issue? And that, that's been huge.

Yeah, I mean, it's also a great outlet too for kind of along this leadership, um, role. It's not only from a technical standpoint, like, yes, I mean, if you go back and listen to Jack's first podcast, I was— it was out of a storage unit, like, with 3 employees. It's just massive differences in 8 months or however long we've been doing this. Um, but the point being is there's also a kind of emotional side to this too, is like, this business is hard.

Yeah.

Like, running a business is hard. There's so many ups and downs. And like I said, being in the dark without any resources or anybody to talk to— I think I've called Rand, um, just specifically once or twice and was like, dude, I'm having a mental breakdown. Not legitimately, but just the frustration that builds up in these kind of moments, um, where you can get overwhelmed. And, um, it's not my personality. And so who— where do I turn? It's not something I'm going to burden my family with. Um, and so I feel like these, these peer groups are not only great from a technical standpoint, but from an emotional standpoint too, to deal with stress, anxiety. Um, how do you handle getting home? I mean, I think one of our questions in, um, my— one of my peer groups, not the one you're in, was revolving around like, how do you separate when you get home, you see your wife, your kids, whoever, um, and you have that anxiety ball in your stomach and like How do I get rid of that? How do I sleep at night? Like, what are you guys doing to burn this, this kind of issues? And so I think that there's a, there's an emotional, mental side to this as well that, that's extremely important that you're allowed to be vulnerable with, with groups of like-minded individuals who are running through the same issues you are.

Yeah, they're all, they're all going through it. Like, I'm having, I'm having a tough week and Um, yeah, like I'm, I'm bringing it home. Yeah. And it's a challenge.

And I'm not going to say who it was, but somebody posed a question in one of our groups, um, that was, does the financial burden ever go away? And there was businesses much larger than me saying no, like you don't ever lose that stress. And in my mind, like my hope got crushed a little bit, but at the same time it felt good because I was— because, you know, we have that burden daily of like how to make payroll, how to fiscally— you were fiscally responsible for 100 people, um, and their families. So how do you— like, does that ever go away? And the answer no is rough in one sense, but in the other sense it's like, well, I'm validated in that I'm feeling this way and that I need to figure out how to come to grips with this because it's going to be a situation.

Yep. Yeah, it's a forever problem. Yeah.

So I mean, I, I know that we were running that new Facebook group, which I'm really excited. 120 people.

Um, yeah, no, it's 100 and like 60, 160 people. It was crazy.

And there's some, I mean, I've seen some names in there that are definitely recognizable. So there's some, there's some, it's cool. There's some big, big heavy hitters in there that, um, are running large businesses. Shout out Kylon. I saw he was in there. Um, I mean, he posted already, so I'm sure he's fine with saying it. Um, but like some big businesses, like these guys know what they're doing and I'm hopefully that they stick around and help, help, help people out.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. This was, uh, this was good. I appreciate the discussion. Um, if you like what you heard, listener, check out ownthenetwork.com. And help me make my mom proud so that I'm popular on one section of the internet and give us a 5-star review wherever it is that you listen to this show.

We are trying actively to become like G-list celebrities or even like J or K-list celebrities. We're trying to move up the ranking from the lower, lower level celebrities we are.

We were maybe a Y, now we're an M.

Yeah, and, uh, definitely if you are interested in these kind of groups, I mean, they're naturally formed through the, uh, Breaking $5 Million Workshop. I mean, once again, they're all similar size companies to yourself. Huge valuable resource. There's a, like I said, a group chain going on of 18 individuals that I, I get emails from daily, um, which is awesome. I love it. They're— we're answering questions and we're able to keep in contact and see how they're doing. So that's definitely a great resource as well.

Yeah, 100%. Awesome.

Awesome, John.

Tune in for our next episode. Thanks for tuning in to Owned and Operated, the podcast for home service entrepreneurs. If you enjoyed today's episode, please hit the like button and subscribe to the podcast. If you have any questions or topics you'd like us to cover, feel free to reach out. You can find me on Twitter at @WilsonCompanies. I'll see you next time.