Culture is more than just beers and BBQ’s. It is very easy for business owners to mistake fun for culture, they are NOT the same. It’s time that business owners learnt what real culture is, because it’s the reason some businesses are constantly growing, and winning, while other businesses remain stuck in the same place dealing with the same problems. It’s time you added this secret sauce to your recipe, and get it right. Not just any old culture, but the culture that is best for your team. A bad...
Oct 07, 2022•30 min•Ep. 37
This is one of those things that every business owner will have to deal with at one stage or another, so it is definitely best to be prepared. At the end of the day, it’s basic human nature, one of the most prominent human desires is to feel important. Most people feel important when they are appreciated, and most people associate appreciation with pay. The good news is there’s more ways to make someone feel appreciated than money. The labor market is extremely competitive, so your guys are alwa...
Sep 30, 2022•32 min•Ep. 36
Adrian Laing is the owner of Nelson Alarms in New Zealand, he is a long-term member of the Profitable Tradie program, having joined back in 2016. In his time with PT Adrian has put together a very impressive list of accomplishments, including his promotion from the Million Dollar Tradie program into our top-level Boardroom program, where he is considered a well-regarded and highly respected member amongst his peers. Just hearing about improving your business, or growing, or scaling, or getting m...
Sep 23, 2022•58 min•Ep. 35
It’s time to dive into all the myths around fixed pricing (price lists, price books) because the idea in your head is costing you thousands of dollars and causing you unnecessary stress. “I do too many different types of work”, “I don’t have time to create a fixed price list”, “I don’t want to price myself too short”… whatever your worry is, it’ll be tackled in the episode. Don’t get in your own way. Fixed pricing can help you get paid on time, save you time on pricing or travelling to site to q...
Sep 16, 2022•30 min•Ep. 34
This is something that even the legendary Tom Brady can appreciate and that he has actually used over the course of his career. If you want to know a little bit more about what it is, make sure you listen to this episode. The man was willing to sacrifice half of his salary over this thing so it’s obviously a big money hack. Sick leave, annual leave, holiday pay, leave without pay, injury, training, maternity leave, bereavement leave, vacation, public service, are all reasons that a staff member ...
Sep 09, 2022•26 min•Ep. 33
What are you built for? The human body is a very complicated machine, with lots of moving parts, and pretty much everything serves a purpose, even stress. Stress is part of the ‘fight or flight’ response, basically your heart races, your breath quickens and muscles get ready for action. So in prehistoric times stress is what would get you away from a sabretooth tiger, but it was short term, either you escaped the savage animal, or you became its breakfast. You’re not built to be stressed for hou...
Sep 02, 2022•38 min•Ep. 32
Get it out of your head! Take building a house… imagine if the first person to build a house was the only one who knew how to do it, and every time someone else wanted to build a house they would have to get that person to come and show them how to do it. Tell ya what… there wouldn’t be a hell of a lot of houses built, and the poor bugger would be so stressed-out racing around to show it to everyone and burnt out from repeating themselves. Instead, the process was documented and now anyone can f...
Aug 26, 2022•25 min•Ep. 31
Double your profit with a 10% change in price. Doesn’t sound right? Listen and be pleasantly proven wrong. It’s natural to think that putting your prices up will result in you losing clients but that’s not the case, and in the episode you will learn why. Other than having a top tier team pricing is arguably the most important thing to get right in your business. Think about it like this… when was the last time you bought a coffee? Or Tea? Or even a cheeky hot choccy? Was it more or less expensiv...
Aug 19, 2022•28 min•Ep. 30
You’re not the best version of yourself when you’re under the pump, it’s scientific, your body goes into ‘fight or flight’ mode and starts sending blood to your major muscles to help you ‘survive’. You essentially turn into a stupider version of yourself and will start making suboptimal decisions. That’s not even the worst part… because your brain often isn’t operating properly you won’t even realize that you’re stressed out causing you to get stuck in a vicious ‘overwhelmed’ cycle. Imagine you’...
Aug 12, 2022•29 min•Ep. 29
Does this sound familiar… things are a bit all over the place, you’re being pulled in 15 different directions, you know you need some systems in place to conquer the chaos, but are too busy dealing with the problems that the systems would fix. You’re not alone, it’s easy to get stuck on the hamster wheel, but just like that stick you stuck in the front wheel on your little brothers bike to send him flying over the handlebars, you need to do something to put a stop to the cycle. Every single pers...
Aug 05, 2022•30 min•Ep. 28
Everyone has had the saying “You only get one chance at a first impression”. So most business owners make sure to make eye contact, give a solid handshake, listen, all that good stuff, but what if the first impression is on the phone? It’s still a first impression, and if it’s the work phone, it’s a very important first interaction with your business. Being polite, energetic, and knowledgeable is a good start but that’s only scratching the surface. What if you could increase the chances of you g...
Jul 29, 2022•25 min•Ep. 27
“Luck”. It’s a term that gets thrown around pretty loosely. Someone grows their business, signs a big client, hires a top shelf tradesperson, and people say “man… they got lucky”. It’s easy to think that way when you didn’t see all the work that person put into systemization that allowed the business to grow, you didn’t see the world class service shown to the big clients before they signed, you didn’t see the hard work put into developing a culture that made the top shelf tradesperson apply. Wh...
Jul 22, 2022•23 min•Ep. 26
When the vast majority of Plumbing, Electrical, Glazing, Tiling, and other similar service based trades businesses want to increase profit, they look at the overhead costs and find things to cut. But is that really the best option? In almost all cases, trying to reduce overhead costs is the enemy of progress because when you’re running too lean you don’t have the necessary infrastructure to grow or operate at a high level. Think of it like this, when you were setting up your business you brought...
Jul 15, 2022•23 min•Ep. 25
For most owners of Plumbing, Electrical, Landscaping, Tiling, or similar service based trades businesses selling a business only happens once. That poses a few challenges but also some opportunities, with one of the challenges being that because you only do it once you’re not well prepared and probably don’t even know how to make a business more valuable and more profitable. You work hard anyway, so you might as well direct that hard work toward making the business more valuable, after all, it h...
Jul 08, 2022•28 min•Ep. 24
There’s a number of reasons that a business won’t grow, sales, systems, marketing, but very rarely will a business put their own team under the microscope. A lot of responsibility lies with your team, or at least as much as you are willing to give them. But like most owners you try to do everything yourself because to be fair, you’re good at it, that’s why you got to owning a business. But what cost does that come at? It's understandable because you want to ensure a high level of quality, but if...
Jul 01, 2022•26 min•Ep. 23
Sales has got itself a bad rap, often just mentioning sales and in particular upselling, will bring a bitter taste to the mouth. But that’s mostly because people think about the sleezy car salesman or a pushy real estate agent. Sales doesn’t need to be that way, in fact, when done right sales can actually be a win win, it’s all about the approach and how you frame it. It’s time to welcome in a new era of sales that has both the buyer and seller walking away knowing the process couldn’t have been...
Jun 24, 2022•28 min•Ep. 22
What would you give for a team that was loyal, trusting, productive, transparent, and got along great? (You might even think that team doesn’t exist). What if it only took 20 minutes to get that team? ‘The 20’ is one of the most underrated tools for building culture as it satisfies one of the most powerful human desires, that being the desire to feel important. Not only that but one on one time allows a team member to share things they wouldn’t otherwise feel they could share. It's not only good...
Jun 17, 2022•25 min•Ep. 21
It’s one of those things that no one wants to do, but has to be done, and when you started your business it became one of your responsibilities whether you like it or not. Choosing not to or putting it off can destroy your team culture, cause staff to lose respect for you, and cause issues to snowball to a point where they are out of control. Have you guessed what it is yet? It’s having difficult conversations (was your guess close?). It’s something that everyone seems to hate, but if it’s done ...
Jun 10, 2022•30 min•Ep. 20
Here it is, the second part of the 6 Week Break Strategy episode. If you haven’t already, make sure you go back and listen to Part 1 to get a bit of background and context. This strategy was taken from a session with the Profitable Tradie Boardroom members, it’s so valuable that it needed to be shared so that all trades business owners can work toward this goal and reap the rewards of the 6 Week Break Strategy. When carried out properly this strategy will do wonders for your business. At the end...
Jun 03, 2022•17 min•Ep. 19
Everyone has different business goals, but no matter how long you want to run the business, no matter how much you enjoy the work you do, no matter how big or small your business is, every business owner should have the ‘6 Week Break’ on their list of goals. Not just to give yourself a break now and again but also for the benefits it brings. The 6 Week Break Strategy is seriously underrated and isn’t talked enough about, because ultimately business owners should have the goal of not needing to b...
May 27, 2022•35 min•Ep. 18
Since what feels like the beginning of time business owners have been hardwired to think that working themselves to the bone is the only way to be successful but that’s not necessarily the case. Sure you have to do the hard yards to achieve big things but it doesn’t have to be all on your shoulders, and it shouldn’t come at the cost of your body, or mental health. A lot of business owners think to themselves “if I just get through this busy patch, then I will be able to relax”, but that an endle...
May 20, 2022•24 min•Ep. 17
Hiring new staff is never easy. You can put a heap of time, effort, and money into creating a job ad and trying to get it in front of as many people as possible. Maybe someone will share it with a friend, or will know the perfect person for your business, but nothings certain. It could be a timing problem, or that the right person just doesn’t happen to see your ad, but when you can’t find a good candidate it can be devastating for confidence, it could end your search and put you off hiring comp...
May 13, 2022•24 min•Ep. 16
The early signs are starting to show, in some parts of the world it has already hit, but a recession is more than likely on the horizon, it has the potential to cripple businesses and the construction industry. It is crucial that you prepare yourself for if tough times hit so that you don’t have to worry about things like being able to pay staff or debtors. Being proactive is the best defense, waiting too long means any action taken is more likely to be affected by lag, a concept that is discuss...
May 06, 2022•31 min•Ep. 15
Accountants… of course they have their purpose and play a role in assisting with your business, mostly with tax. But there are a lot of trades business owners that aren’t their biggest fans, and for good reason, they don’t always have the best interests of your business at heart. It is important to know what accountants are trained to do and why you shouldn’t always take their advice. In this episode you’ll learn why advice from accountants can sometimes results in your business going backwards....
Apr 29, 2022•24 min•Ep. 14
Learning to let go has to be the hardest thing to do in business. After all, we are hardwired to do the absolute opposite. We start our businesses on our own and make plenty of mistakes, learning and improving along the way, but we’ve had to do everything by ourselves so the business continues to grow and keeps moving toward where we want it to be. Plus we are responsible for everything that happens making it even tougher to let go of the reigns. But the benefits of being able to let go complete...
Apr 22, 2022•30 min•Ep. 13
Brad Martin is the founder and owner of Leading Electrical in Hamilton, New Zealand. Brad has been on the program for over 9 years, starting out as a team of 2 with himself and his apprentice Jesse. In 13 years, Brad has grown the team to 20, operating 9 vehicles and owns the building the crew works out of. Like many tradespeople starting their own business, Brad set up because he thought he could run a business better than his boss. He quickly realized what he had gotten himself into, when aske...
Apr 15, 2022•47 min•Ep. 12
You don’t get to choose whether or not you are a leader. The day you start your business you become a leader, and you’ve probably been one for a long time before that. While leadership can be pretty hard work, it’s something that can be easily worked on. It’s definitely worth doing because the results that come with good leadership are absolutely killer. Leadership is a tricky topic because it can be quite easy to get it wrong and the ripples of how that effects the team, results and behaviors c...
Apr 08, 2022•26 min•Ep. 11
Your team are the most important part of your business. Culture, quality, productivity, reputation, growth, and a number of other aspects are all at the mercy of your team. That’s why hiring is so important, getting it wrong can have you stuck with a bad egg for a very long time. Getting it right can take stress away from you as the owner, raise the level of quality, and even attract more talented employees to your business. In a time where good help can be hard to find, it is vital that your hi...
Apr 01, 2022•26 min•Ep. 10
Growing your business can be a tough one… who do I look for? Where is the best place to look? How much will a new employee cost me? When should I hire? Well me and Phil chucked on the headphones and stepped up to microphones to shed some light on the topic. The idea of hiring someone and not being able to keep them busy or the thought of just making yourself busier than before you hired is scary. Don’t worry, we tackle that too, there’s some bits of gold in there that will give you the confidenc...
Mar 25, 2022•21 min•Ep. 9
Is your business running as efficiently as it could be running? It’s very easy to let little things slip through the cracks, it’s like when you drop an ice cube and kick it under the fridge. Doing it once isn’t a big deal but after a few more take the one-way trip, you end up with a puddle, mold growing and a wall that’s rotting away. It's the same in business, the small things add up, and while it can be costly, it can also be a huge opportunity. Tony and Phil tackle exactly that in this episod...
Mar 19, 2022•19 min•Ep. 8
