Roger Wakefield: How to Succeed in the Trades Industry
Roger Wakefield—plumbing legend and trades influencer—shares how to become a plumber, grow your brand, and start a successful plumbing business.
Host Andrew Brown sits down one of the most recognized names in the trades industry, Roger Wakefield, to break down how to become a plumber, succeed as an apprentice, and build a powerful personal brand as a trades professional. With millions of views on YouTube and decades of hands-on experience, Roger shares what it really takes to thrive in the skilled trades: from plumbing apprenticeship tips to starting a plumbing business that stands out.
Whether you're just entering the trades or looking to scale your own company, this conversation delivers real-world, no-fluff skilled trades career advice from a leader who's done it all and taught thousands to do the same.
IN THIS EPISODE:
● (00:02:10) – How to Become a Plumber: Roger’s first job with zero plumbing experience
● (00:08:45) – Personal Branding for Tradespeople: Why it’s no longer optional
● (00:19:20) – Plumbing Apprenticeship Tips: Interview tactics that get you hired
● (00:33:10) – Starting a Plumbing Business: Data-driven marketing and strategy
● (00:47:35) – Career Growth in the Trades: From apprentice to owner
● (01:01:00) – Human Skills > Hard Skills: Why soft skills drive trades careers
Key Takeaways:
● You can start your plumbing career with no experience—how to become a plumber is more about mindset than credentials.
● Personal branding for tradespeople builds trust, visibility, and long-term opportunity in the skilled trades industry.
● Use these plumbing apprenticeship tips to stand out in interviews and get hired fast.
● If you're starting a plumbing business, you need to understand pricing, strategy, and your KPIs—or risk failing early.
About the Guest:
Roger Wakefield is a licensed plumber, YouTube creator, keynote speaker, and fierce advocate for trades careers. With over 45 years in the trades industry, he’s helped thousands understand how to become a plumber, launch a plumbing business, and leverage personal branding for tradespeople to grow their reputation and revenue. His content has made a global impact, proving that being a plumber today means much more than just turning wrenches.
Keywords:
How to Become a Plumber, Plumbing Apprenticeship Tips, Skilled Trades Career Advice, Personal Branding for Tradespeople, Starting a Plumbing Business, Skilled Trades, Trades Industry, Roger Wakefield, Andrew Brown, Toolfetch, HVAC, Carpentry, Electricians, Plumbers, Millwrights, Construction, Tradespeople, Craftsmanship, Problem-solving, Creativity, Advocacy, Trades Careers, Contractors, Education, Skilled Trades Advisory Council
Resources:
LinkedIn Profile: https://www.linkedin.com/in/rogerwakefield/
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCGIMKh92vaL0_Yc0u4GYhHA
Website: https://rogerwakefield.com/
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Transcript
I knew nothing about plumbing, but yet I still walked into a plumbing company
Speaker:and applied for a job and said, look, I want to be a helper, I
Speaker:want to be an apprentice. I want to be whatever you call it, I work
Speaker:hard, I'm willing to work hard. And they're like, okay, you
Speaker:got a job. And I showed up at the job and I started learning.
Speaker:That's as easy as it can be.
Speaker:Hi, I'm Andrew Brown. You're listening to the Lost star of the Skilled Trades podcast.
Speaker:Podcast, a show that shines the spotlight on
Speaker:careers in the skilled trades that are high paying, honorable,
Speaker:rewarding and fulfilling. The trades are the backbone of the
Speaker:economy that keep us running. And without them, our world
Speaker:would cease to exist.
Speaker:Today we have a special guest, Roger Wakefield, lead ap.
Speaker:Welcome, Roger to the show. Andrew. Thank you for having me here,
Speaker:brother. It is wonderful for you to be here, Roger. You
Speaker:know, personal branding for your trades business
Speaker:is almost a non negotiable today. Years ago
Speaker:in your plumbing business, I remember talking to you about this. You had
Speaker:said, I just wanted to make the phone ring. And you spent certain amount
Speaker:of money on a marketing firm and you were sitting in a conference
Speaker:when someone said, YouTube is the second largest search engine.
Speaker:How did hearing that change your life, your business?
Speaker:And who said that to you? Well, the person who said it was Darrell Eves.
Speaker:He is currently one of my YouTube coaches. The thing about a brand
Speaker:and building it now as a speaker, and I say as a
Speaker:speaker, but whenever I'm talking to entrepreneurs and social media people,
Speaker:I tell them, guys, look, I'm a plumber and I have a 43
Speaker:page brand book. And they're like, wait, what if you
Speaker:came to work for me today, Andrew? Or even if I hired you and said,
Speaker:look, I want you to redo my website, I want you to redo this, I
Speaker:want you to redo this. And sent you my brand book. You'd be able to
Speaker:go through it and be like, God, I know his colors, I've got his hex
Speaker:codes, I know what fonts he likes, I know what. And really it's not just
Speaker:what fonts I like, because we did research on it and said, look, what
Speaker:fonts do the best websites use? What colors do the
Speaker:best websites use? We didn't just copy them, but we went through and looked
Speaker:at a lot of the top performing sites and decided we're going to build everything
Speaker:off that because we wanted to use data. We didn't want me to just
Speaker:say, gee, I want my favorite colors are pink and
Speaker:Purple. So I'm going to make a pink and purple website that's probably
Speaker:not going to be the best performing website.
Speaker:So when I started growing, we knew what brand
Speaker:we wanted to do. You know, if you remember, back whenever I had Texas Green
Speaker:Plumbing, I had these same shirts with Texas Green Plumbing on them. I
Speaker:believed in the logo. I believed in what it stood for. And I
Speaker:think that as a company owner, you've got to believe in everything you're
Speaker:doing. And Andrew, you've seen me at events. I wear this
Speaker:shirt at every event I'm at and I say this shirt. I've got
Speaker:a lot of them, but I wear this shirt. And if I'm
Speaker:speaking that day, it's probably a red shirt. If I'm not speaking, it may
Speaker:be a black shirt, but I normally wear red too, because that's what most people
Speaker:are used to seeing me in. But I love what I get to do. And
Speaker:I think building this brand has helped me
Speaker:become recognizable or more recognizable globally.
Speaker:I was at a Mastermind conference the other day about
Speaker:mindset, and so many people come to me and they're like, dude, I know
Speaker:you from somewhere. And then they look at my shirt and say, oh my gosh,
Speaker:you helped me fix my toilet or my garbage disposal or whatever it is. So
Speaker:it's just, it's really neat. And I love what building everything the way I've
Speaker:done it, I love what it has helped get me to. Well, you're making a
Speaker:huge impact. But if you can go back X amount of years when
Speaker:you were running your plumbing company, I mean, could you have
Speaker:managed to believe that you would be at this
Speaker:point in the game? Because there's so much that has happened in between. And I
Speaker:remember watching you years back when you had about 20,000
Speaker:subs on YouTube and I remember that I was like, wow, okay. And I was
Speaker:watching, I really enjoyed the videos that you put out. But then all of a
Speaker:sudden I was like, now he's got a hundred thousand. Like, where'd that come from?
Speaker:But you've been working on this. And then just a month or two later it
Speaker:was 200,000. I mean, I went from like a hundred thousand to
Speaker:250,000. I want to say overnight it wasn't, but it
Speaker:felt like it. And I think what it was is we just, we got to
Speaker:where we were doing things right. And I love what you just said because literally
Speaker:it was seven years ago this month, matter of fact,
Speaker:seven years ago this week, that we really started
Speaker:posting YouTube videos. We had had a couple up there. That's what was
Speaker:funny. When that guy came out and talked about YouTube being the second largest
Speaker:search engine in the world, I thought, this guy's stupid. He doesn't even know what
Speaker:he's talking about. YouTube is just where I store my videos. And
Speaker:that was Derral Eves. And I have learned so much from him.
Speaker:And like I said, he's still one of my coaches. But if you'd asked me
Speaker:that day, Andrew, Roger, where are you going to be in five years? I said,
Speaker:well, Andrew, I'm going to have a great plumbing company in Dallas, Texas.
Speaker:We're going to do things right. We're going to be branded, we're going to be
Speaker:marketed. We're going to be using social media to help
Speaker:people be more aware of our company. What we specialize in, what
Speaker:we're good at, why we do things better than most people
Speaker:do. That's what I would have told you then if you'd have told me seven
Speaker:years ago today, Roger, one day you'll be in a studio every day
Speaker:shooting video, talking about plumbing. I'd have said, andrew, brother, I love you,
Speaker:but what have you been drinking? It ain't gonna happen. I'm a plumber,
Speaker:and it's completely changed. I do love that you do say, I'm just
Speaker:a plumber. I love when you say that because you're very humble about
Speaker:things and, you know, your success, I'm sure, didn't come
Speaker:easy. But people don't see the behind the scenes. People don't see how much
Speaker:work goes beyond. Because I remember, you know, when I visited you
Speaker:and had podcasts, you know, I saw sort of the peak behind the scenes. We
Speaker:got to talk and it was like, wow, you know, there is a ton of
Speaker:work that goes into. You can't just show up. You know, you need to have
Speaker:a strategy. You need to know what videos you need to be scheduled
Speaker:out ahead of time. Because the amount of content that you put out, you
Speaker:know, you have to be organized. I think what the audience
Speaker:would really benefit from, especially somebody who is a
Speaker:business owner. And it could be plumbing or welding or any trades person.
Speaker:But how do you get started? Let's say you're afraid to actually be
Speaker:on camera because a lot of people are. I mean, you and I, like, just
Speaker:like, camera goes on, smile goes on, lights, like, whatever.
Speaker:Like, what would you say to those people who are a little bit put
Speaker:off about putting themselves on social media and having a business?
Speaker:It's really not hard to do if, you know, just a few simple Things.
Speaker:And you see, right now, I'm looking straight into my camera
Speaker:lens. And the reason I do that is when you're watching
Speaker:me right now, it looks like I'm looking at you, if I'm looking down here,
Speaker:because this is where your video is. Well, I mean, this is not a very
Speaker:good look for a viewer, so. And it was so neat because one
Speaker:of the security people at Brendan Burchard, and like I said,
Speaker:I was with Brendan Burchard and Ed Mylett the last four days, and one
Speaker:of the security people, he saw my shirt, and he knew who I was. And
Speaker:other people had told him, yeah, just talk to Roger. He's got these pens.
Speaker:So I gave him a pen. And we're standing there talking, waiting on the door
Speaker:to open. And he says, how do you get comfortable in front of a camera?
Speaker:And I said, it really. It comes down to three things, and if you'll learn
Speaker:this, it makes it so easy. But number one, look straight into
Speaker:the camera lens. A lot of people, whenever they hold up their phones to
Speaker:shoot a video, they want to look at themselves. And I'm like, no, look at
Speaker:the green dot over at the side. That's where the camera lens is. Look
Speaker:at that. I showed him why. Because it's like, either looking here or
Speaker:imagine the whole time I'm talking to you, I'm looking over here because that's where
Speaker:the monitor is, and I want to see how pretty my mustache is or whatever
Speaker:I'm looking at. It's just. It's not a good look. So I told him, look
Speaker:straight into the camera lens. The next big thing is say the word you.
Speaker:Because you're only talking to that one viewer that's watching you,
Speaker:and that's all that you're talking to right now. And I've got
Speaker:videos with millions of followers or millions of views,
Speaker:and I still say the word you. Because that one
Speaker:person that you're looking straight in the eye right here, if you say you,
Speaker:you're connecting with them, and that's what this is all about.
Speaker:And then the third big thing is talk to them like they're your best friend.
Speaker:If I was trying to teach my best friend how to use the remote
Speaker:control to turn on the tv, I'd say, man, look, just point it right at
Speaker:it. Up on the top left, there's the power button. Just press that and you're
Speaker:going to be good. And it's so funny because, Andrew, people come up to me
Speaker:when they see me, and they're like, look, Roger, what I love about you is
Speaker:you didn't talk to me like I was stupid. You literally. You just talk
Speaker:to me like I'm human, and you didn't make me feel stupid when you were
Speaker:teaching me how to do this stuff. And I thought that was
Speaker:phenomenal. But I think it's these three things that
Speaker:make that happen. It's literally just look the camera straight in the eye,
Speaker:say the word you, and talk to them like they're your best friend.
Speaker:And it makes it easy to do. I literally used to have signs up
Speaker:pointing like, hey, look here. Or a name above it, like, hey,
Speaker:you're talking to. And then underneath it, it was say you. And
Speaker:those three things there that'll convert so many things over. And it's really funny,
Speaker:because I was coaching the other night and doing one of my classes, and a
Speaker:guy asked me. He said the same thing. He said, roger, look, I'm on video
Speaker:all the time. He says, but when I sat down with you, you
Speaker:changed the way I did it. Because this guy owns a big
Speaker:financial investment firm. He's on television all the
Speaker:time, and he says, whenever you taught
Speaker:me to look into the eye, say you, and treat them like your best
Speaker:friend. Our views went up, our calls went
Speaker:up, everything we did went up. Because people said, oh, my God, I
Speaker:connected with you. When you were on TV the other night, literally the
Speaker:first time I sat down to do a podcast with him, and I said the
Speaker:same thing. Remember, look at the camera. And he'd start talking, and all of a
Speaker:sudden, he's just turning, staring off into the blue. And he's just talking. I'm like,
Speaker:whoa, stop, stop. And he looks at me. He's like, what? I said, dude, what
Speaker:are you doing? He said, well, I'm answering your question. I said,
Speaker:nobody's over there. Don't look over there. That's the viewer right there.
Speaker:It blew his mind. He said, roger, I've been on TV five years. Nobody's ever
Speaker:told me that. I said, because you're paying to be on their shows. I don't
Speaker:care. You want to do it right? You want to connect with people, do it
Speaker:this way. And then we were in coaching the other night when I had my
Speaker:group in there, and he's literally like, dude, that changed
Speaker:everything for me. It works. You don't realize if you don't
Speaker:look in the camera or straight in, people lose a little bit
Speaker:of, you know, that authenticity goes away. It's just something about
Speaker:not making full eye contact. It's like talking to someone face to face. But like
Speaker:looking over here, kind of lose that person. But I like the fact of like
Speaker:you're talking to that one person. I felt it was weird a
Speaker:couple years ago when I started doing videos, talking to the camera. Like
Speaker:you're not talking to anybody, right? You're just talking to a lens. And a lot
Speaker:of people find that that's very difficult to do to carry
Speaker:on a conversation. Then I got kind of comfortable with it and just kind of
Speaker:let it roll. I do feel that being authentic and I see this on
Speaker:social media quite often, you know, especially like TikTok, these
Speaker:straight talking videos of talking directly into the camera. It's
Speaker:not scripted, there's no real editing. I found, at least for
Speaker:me on a TikTok side has completely blown up my
Speaker:TikTok account. Before it was all edited, it was all polished and nobody
Speaker:wouldn't get much views. Now I get millions of views for just being
Speaker:authentic really goes a long way. You know the thing people
Speaker:buy from people they know, like and trust. I've always said people buy from
Speaker:people they know, love, trust, and they're connected
Speaker:to. If you'll look at that lens, you can connect to people. I
Speaker:mean, think about it. People will take you on a drive with them. They'll get
Speaker:up and work out with you. They'll have you on their iPad
Speaker:or something. I do it whenever I get up and get on the treadmill or
Speaker:the climber, either one. I've got my iPad in front of me and I'm
Speaker:watching, I'm listening. But that's me inviting them
Speaker:to spend time with me. Why do stuff that I want to do while
Speaker:work out? Why walk? Why do my cardio, whatever it is.
Speaker:And you can be that person too. So whenever you
Speaker:learn things like looking at the camera, saying the word you and
Speaker:talking to them like your best friend, it's like whenever I get on here with
Speaker:you and me and you've been together in person, this is the same me. I'm
Speaker:no different. You're no different. This is exactly who we are. But then you see
Speaker:these people that they walk in, all of a sudden the camera's on. Hey, here
Speaker:we go, guys, we're gonna do this. And I'm like, dude, what are you doing?
Speaker:You never act like that. And they're like, yeah, but I want to be powerful,
Speaker:I want to be bold, I want to jump out there. It's like, dude, just
Speaker:be you. That's what people love about you. So when you talk
Speaker:to someone like they're your best friend, I mean, I would never walk to the
Speaker:homeboy, dude, if you want to turn on the tv, all you got to do
Speaker:is grab the remote control and do this. And I'd be like, dude, what is
Speaker:wrong with you? Just be you. And Ed Mylett said
Speaker:that two days ago. He literally said, look, there's so many people out here
Speaker:that they want to be somebody else. Even if you're them pretty good, you're never
Speaker:going to be 100% as good as they are. Just be you. That's what the
Speaker:world is looking for. Somebody unique, original, that's
Speaker:real, that can just connect with them. And to me, man, what a way to
Speaker:do it. And that's what it's all about. You know, it's about being yourself. Because
Speaker:it's really hard to show up, you know, on camera and just I look, people
Speaker:play characters and such and, right, they're not really that person in.
Speaker:In real life. But, you know, I've met you, and you're the same person. It's
Speaker:not like it's any different. That's why people connect with you. That's why
Speaker:people connect with me. The feeling of the
Speaker:impact that's made. And sometimes, and I'm. I don't know if you've kind of gone
Speaker:through this yourself. You know, sometimes there are days where you're shooting
Speaker:video, like, why am I doing this? Like, nobody's listening, not making an
Speaker:impact. But then you get a DM of some
Speaker:sort. And someone said, you know, I was thinking about going to college, going to
Speaker:the trades, but guess what? I'm going to go to the trades route because I've
Speaker:been listening to your videos, but I didn't even know they didn't like my stuff.
Speaker:They never commented on my stuff. And all of a sudden you're getting that.
Speaker:You know, someone's telling you that, and it's just. It's an unreal
Speaker:feeling. You Talked about the DMS. My YouTube coach.
Speaker:I was with him in Utah two weeks ago, and he says,
Speaker:roger, you are probably the only person I know that goes to as
Speaker:many or more conferences a year than I do, because I
Speaker:go to social media conferences, I go to trades conferences,
Speaker:I go to business conferences, I go to speaker conferences.
Speaker:We just hit April 7th. I fly
Speaker:southwest Airlines. Most of the time. I'm already a list preferred
Speaker:for 2026 because of the miles and points I've got this
Speaker:year. And it blows my mind to walk in
Speaker:these conferences and have grown men walk
Speaker:up to you, I mean, with tears in their eyes, saying, oh, my God, you
Speaker:Changed my life. I was working in a fast food restaurant
Speaker:and I saw your videos and you said, look, you can be a plumber, too.
Speaker:It's not that hard. Just get in, get the job and learn how to do
Speaker:it. And these grown men are. I've had grown men come up to me just
Speaker:crying like, look, you completely changed my life. I'm making
Speaker:more money than I ever have in my life because I saw a video you
Speaker:did, and then I started watching you, and it's like, wow. He just keeps
Speaker:telling me, I can do it. And Andrew, that's the impact that we have on
Speaker:the world. It's phenomenal. We need more people in the trades
Speaker:and anybody watching and listening. This video, this
Speaker:podcast has the same opportunity. Me and you do. I know you
Speaker:and I know me. We're nothing special. I don't mean anything bad by that.
Speaker:But we turned on the camera and started telling people, look, this is what it's
Speaker:like. This is really what it's like. And, man, when you're like that with people,
Speaker:they'll buy in. They're on board with you. You now have a community.
Speaker:Like you said. Never thought years ago, that wasn't really the
Speaker:intent. It was just to put the information out there. We probably
Speaker:both are not neutral on things. We take one side or the other. I
Speaker:feel like the vanilla stuff, that if you just put vanilla stuff out, it doesn't
Speaker:really resonate. And sometimes people are not going to like what you say.
Speaker:Some people are going to like what you say. There's haters out
Speaker:there. It's just what it is. And I'm sure you've navigated a bunch just like
Speaker:I have, but I think that's just a part of the job. I mean, that's
Speaker:just. You got to field all that type of stuff. Haters are always going to
Speaker:be there. They're always going to hate you no matter what you do. You know,
Speaker:I love it when they get in and tell me, you know what? If you
Speaker:did that on my job, I'd fire you up. So you're like, well, you'd be
Speaker:stupid because I made companies millions of dollars. But you got to do.
Speaker:You do whatever you want to do. So I do. I like the controversial
Speaker:stuff because I'll tell you exactly what I think. You know me. It's not like,
Speaker:wait, you voted on the other guy? Well, I'm going to unfriend you. I'm never
Speaker:talking to you again. It's like, okay, why'd you vote on him? I'm
Speaker:curious why did you vote on this person? Because I voted on this
Speaker:person and I can tell you why I did. But I'm not going to hate
Speaker:you. I'm not going to talk bad about you. I'm not going to be. I'm
Speaker:not going to block you on social media. The world we're in
Speaker:today is crazy. But still, I don't mind. I have people
Speaker:tell me all the time, well, this was a stupid comment you made. I'm going
Speaker:to unsubscribe to you and never watch you again. Okay, You've been
Speaker:watching me for five years and I made one comment. You think stupid and you're
Speaker:leaving. Bye. Have fun. I hope you find what you need.
Speaker:Somebody that's perfect and thinks just like you each and every day.
Speaker:That way I'll just say, how's your day? Yep. Yep. Mine too. Okay,
Speaker:we're good again. That's gotta be boring as all get out.
Speaker:I don't mind talking about what other people say is right. If
Speaker:it's not, I'm like, no, I don't think it is, y' all, but that's me.
Speaker:Everybody's gonna critique. You know, I follow somebody, a plumber on
Speaker:TikTok, I think it's called Boston Plumbing Monster. And
Speaker:I watch his videos and he gets, you know, in the comments and
Speaker:what he does, but he's just showing a day in the life and what he
Speaker:does. And he's really blown up over the last couple years,
Speaker:but he just rolls with it. It's just part of the job. It's just part
Speaker:of what it's being on social media. It's not a bad gig.
Speaker:I wanted to transition over to. We talked about, obviously,
Speaker:someone getting into a business and being on social media. But I want to
Speaker:speak about people who are interested in being a plumber itself.
Speaker:If somebody is interested working with their hands, wants to be a
Speaker:plumber, but doesn't know much about being an
Speaker:apprentice or how to scale up or maybe want to run their
Speaker:own business one day, what would you kind of say to them? How would you
Speaker:walk them through the process? If, let's say it's somebody in high school
Speaker:and they want to start working in the plumbing field. I have this conversation a
Speaker:lot and, you know, people talk to me about social media and
Speaker:I'm like, did y' all know that YouTube is the second largest search engine in
Speaker:the world? Did y' all know it was owned by Google, the largest search engine
Speaker:in the world? And they're like, yeah, yeah, yeah. Why? Okay, Y' all know more
Speaker:about social media than I did when I started. But look where I'm at. So,
Speaker:Andrew, let me ask you this. Do you have a toilet anywhere in your house?
Speaker:Do you have a lavatory, a faucet, kitchen sink,
Speaker:anything like that? You know as much about plumbing as I did when I
Speaker:started. I mean, you do. I had that too, but I
Speaker:knew nothing about plumbing. But yet I still walked into a plumbing company and
Speaker:applied for a job and said, look, I want to be a helper. I want,
Speaker:I want to be an apprentice. I want to be whatever you call it. I
Speaker:work hard, I'm willing to work hard. And they're like, okay,
Speaker:you got a job. And I showed up at the job and I started learning
Speaker:that's as easy as it can be. And I've got
Speaker:a little deal on my YouTube channel, you may have seen it, where I've got
Speaker:the little free course that asks them, do you want to do
Speaker:residential or do you want to do commercial? And I explain
Speaker:what residential and commercial really are. Then I talk to them about do you
Speaker:want to do service work or do you want to do new construction? And I
Speaker:explain what those are. And then I ask them, do you want to be union
Speaker:or do you want to be non union? And I explain what those are. Now,
Speaker:in each one of these, I give pros and cons of that
Speaker:particular niche, because you can be any one
Speaker:of those combinations of things. Luckily for me, in 45 years of
Speaker:plumbing, I've done it all. I feel like I can talk about any one of
Speaker:those for hours at a time and never say the
Speaker:same thing twice. That's what it's all about, is
Speaker:you don't have to join the union to get in the trades. You don't have
Speaker:to join a company that's a member of PHCC to get in the
Speaker:trades, or you don't have to just walk into a plumbing company and apply for
Speaker:a job. There's multiple ways to get in and if you really want
Speaker:to do it. And I know that we're talking about plumbing, Andrew, but it's plumbing,
Speaker:electrical, H vac, carpentry, masonry,
Speaker:elevators and escalators. Now that's mainly commercial, but those are some of
Speaker:the highest paying jobs in the nation for tradespeople. So
Speaker:any of these things are great opportunities. And if you're like, look,
Speaker:I don't want to go to school every night, I don't want to go to
Speaker:school two nights a week with the union, okay, then don't join the union. But
Speaker:if you want to be a Commercial plumber. They're probably going to teach you how
Speaker:better than an open shop company that has no training
Speaker:system set up. So there's so many different ways to get in the trades right
Speaker:now. I've heard some feedback. Well actually for quite a few people
Speaker:that most companies are looking for experience. So if
Speaker:somebody's coming out of trade school and they want to start
Speaker:and they want to get in an apprenticeship,
Speaker:you know, some of these individuals are saying, well it's,
Speaker:they're looking for a couple years of experience and I'm not getting any
Speaker:callbacks or anything like that. What would you say to those individuals? Like
Speaker:what do you need to do? Do you need to be a little bit more
Speaker:assertive than just obviously sending a resume in
Speaker:today versus years ago? How would you get around that?
Speaker:I teach people how to go through the interview process. In one of my courses,
Speaker:I sat down with a lady fieldedge, I think does a
Speaker:conference here in Dallas and I got invited to it. Grant Cardone's
Speaker:guy, Brandon Dawson was speaking at it and somebody said, hey, you know, you need
Speaker:to come see this. So I went over there and one of the
Speaker:people recognized me. They're like, oh my God, you're on YouTube. So the field Edge
Speaker:people, the lady says, look, can I interview you? I said, sure. And we talked
Speaker:about this because to me, if I had no service at all, I mean no
Speaker:experience at all, if I walked into a company and even if I
Speaker:did have experience, but I can give people with no experience
Speaker:a leg up because literally if you'll go down and
Speaker:fill out the application and if you can get into an
Speaker:interview, you can get the job. Because when you walk into that
Speaker:interview, if I was being interviewed by you, Andrew, I would walk into the room
Speaker:and reach down, shake your hands and say, Mr. Brownlock, thank you for the
Speaker:opportunity. Whether I get the job or not, I just want you to know
Speaker:I appreciate you taking the time to listen to me, to
Speaker:interview me and to let me apply for this position. And then you
Speaker:sat down and you go through the deal where you're pitching me on
Speaker:how great your company is, how amazing it is, how whatever. And then at
Speaker:the end when you say so, do you have any questions for me? Well, yes
Speaker:sir. And you open up your notebook and you say, as a matter of fact,
Speaker:I do. You mentioned coming to work here would be good for me. Can you
Speaker:explain to me why would coming to work here be better for
Speaker:me than going to work for your competition? What is it your
Speaker:company's gonna do to make me a better plumber. Because
Speaker:I wanna be a leader in this industry. I want to be a leader at
Speaker:the companies that I work for, but I also want to be a leader for
Speaker:my family. And if I'm not getting training, if I'm not getting educated,
Speaker:I'm not going to grow much. And I understand that. And then let them answer.
Speaker:Now, if they've already told you how they do their training, how they do everything
Speaker:like that, don't ask a question they've already answered. But if you ask something like
Speaker:that, I like to ask another question. It's like, okay, look, if I came
Speaker:to Word Care and you look back five years from now
Speaker:and said, that is one of the best hires I ever made,
Speaker:what would I have done to make you think that and actually listen
Speaker:to what they say? And then when you. When you're done and they say,
Speaker:any more questions? No, I'm good, thank you. It's like, okay, you can say, well,
Speaker:I do have one more question. Based on the questions and answers we've had today,
Speaker:have I given you enough information to determine if I'm the right person for the
Speaker:job or not? And if not, can you tell me what I did wrong?
Speaker:And they're like, no, we've got other people interview, whatever it is. And you get
Speaker:up and you go over again and say, Mr. Brown again. And you reach out
Speaker:and you shake their hand. And if there's five people there, you
Speaker:remember all their names. And you go through this process with each and every one
Speaker:of them. You say, Mr. Brown, again, I want to say thank you for this
Speaker:opportunity. I know we've been in here for 30 minutes or so.
Speaker:I know you're a busy person and running a company like this, it takes a
Speaker:lot, but I just want to tell you again, thank you so much for the
Speaker:opportunity. You'll never know how grateful I am for it. And
Speaker:you start heading out the door and they're like, wait a minute, you're hired.
Speaker:And I told this lady that. And Andrew, by the time I'm talking, her jaw
Speaker:is dropped. And she's like. And I'm looking at her and I said, so I
Speaker:got a question. How many people have you interviewed this year? She said, probably
Speaker:two dozen. I said, how many did something like that? She said,
Speaker:none. I said, so what if this person walks in and interviews in front of
Speaker:you? She said, they're not leaving. They're hired. They've got a job.
Speaker:We want real people, but we want people that care. We want people
Speaker:that aren't just hey, I'm just here for a check. How much money do I
Speaker:make? How much money do you start me out and when do I get my
Speaker:first check? Those are questions you should never even worry about. You ask
Speaker:questions like I'm telling you you're going to get hired and they're going to be
Speaker:like hey, we need to put him with them because they'll help him
Speaker:grow. What do you think? Will that work for you? Those little
Speaker:things? It's even just the soft skills that people don't have
Speaker:necessarily. It's one thing being a business owner myself and
Speaker:being on tons of interviews and people have come in, some people don't
Speaker:even show up on time. That first is a red flag. You're 10 minutes, 15
Speaker:minutes late. Look, if something happened, you had car trouble, that's fine. But you
Speaker:show up, you look obviously presentable, you
Speaker:shake someone's hand, you look em in the eye. I do this with my kids
Speaker:too. Like I just, I make it a point. And you ask questions. You know,
Speaker:I've been through interviews where you don't have any questions about the
Speaker:company or anything about what you're going to be doing day to
Speaker:day. It leaves an impression on you as person who
Speaker:is the employer versus the potential employee.
Speaker:But those soft skills are extremely important. That sometimes
Speaker:is a miss that some of these kids don't have. And I was thinking
Speaker:about an example. I was up at the Williamson College
Speaker:of the Trades about a year, year and a half ago. It's a school that
Speaker:brings in about 300 kids and it's tuition free and they learn
Speaker:a trade and they go through three years of schooling. So they
Speaker:come out with like multiple, multiple offers from
Speaker:all these big name companies. What I found
Speaker:walking around there and meeting these kids, each one you
Speaker:shook their hand, they looked you straight in the eye, they spoke well, they said
Speaker:Mr. Brown and these are future tradespeople
Speaker:coming out. But they were taught the soft skills. There's a miss there that I
Speaker:feel sometimes with the younger generation that they're coming in
Speaker:and they're let down, like why didn't I get this job? Well one, you didn't
Speaker:show up on time, two, didn't ask any questions, you didn't look presentable.
Speaker:You know, how does it gonna feel on the other side like the employer
Speaker:when they're you know, reading all these things about you. So all those
Speaker:things are extremely important about showing. It's one thing to note what
Speaker:you know in sort of whatever trade that you're in, but the other side of
Speaker:you Know, having those soft skills is extremely important. And I love this. And I
Speaker:look down for two reasons. Number one, I call it human skills.
Speaker:Soft skills are great, but we need human to human. And to me, if you
Speaker:can master that, they say the, the highest paid people in the world are
Speaker:the people that can make the most money in the world, have the best emotional
Speaker:intelligence, the eq. If you can learn eq,
Speaker:not worry about iq, you can do great. But there's one thing that I
Speaker:teach people also in that course, and I wanted to pull up my notes here.
Speaker:You've all seen the things, 10 things that require zero talent.
Speaker:Be on time, make an effort, be high
Speaker:energy, have a positive attitude, being passionate,
Speaker:use good body language, be coachable, do
Speaker:a little extra, be prepared, and have a
Speaker:strong work ethic. These are things that they don't take
Speaker:any skill, they don't take any talent. It's easy to
Speaker:do. A lady here in Dallas called Julie Jones, she's got
Speaker:a company called Today's Professionals. She'd be great for you to interview.
Speaker:She used to work for one of the best practice groups.
Speaker:So she teaches professional etiquette, and she's
Speaker:worked with some of the biggest plumbing companies in the world and
Speaker:trained them on how to do things better. So
Speaker:there's so many things that we can do to grow that don't take
Speaker:a lot. You know, Brendan Burchard, years ago, I worked with
Speaker:Brendan for a while, but he used to say, when you look at people,
Speaker:imagine that they have see me, hear me,
Speaker:acknowledge me and love me written on their forehead.
Speaker:And if you treat every person in the world that way, you'll win
Speaker:the game every day. It is about having a human interaction,
Speaker:and that's extremely important. And to some degree, I
Speaker:feel like it's very different today, you know, with the kids on their phone and
Speaker:just being distracted. And we can go down a whole other path
Speaker:there. But I do see that quite often. I do think that that kind of
Speaker:holds kids back, you know, especially when they want to get a particular job. And
Speaker:they say, why am I not good in these jobs? Well, you need to learn
Speaker:all these different skills that you may not have learned growing up.
Speaker:That's in order to really succeed in life,
Speaker:besides sort of the technical skills. I mean, if you're going to get into plumbing
Speaker:or any trade, especially in plumbing trade, like residential, you're knocking
Speaker:on doors, you're going to people's attics. Like, you got to deal with people, right?
Speaker:I got to talk to people. I, I remember I had, I
Speaker:Don't know if you know a plumber girl by the name of Plumber Paige?
Speaker:Paige Knowles. Yeah, she's great. She works for Skills Jam out in
Speaker:Skills usa, who I'm going to be working with when I'm down there in June.
Speaker:And, and just listening to her, what she had to go through.
Speaker:She was telling me about that she was knocking on doors and the
Speaker:person would open up and would it be, you know, the mom or dad
Speaker:of the household? Like, wait, wait, wait, you're here to fix our plumbing?
Speaker:You're like, plumber? Like, I don't understand, like, do you need help with that? And
Speaker:she's like, no. But she had really good soft skills, really
Speaker:good human to human interaction. And you could tell that she kind
Speaker:of was able to, you know, sort of navigate that whole
Speaker:sort of situation. But again, especially if you run a business and
Speaker:I'm sure in your own business you have to deal with customers, you have to
Speaker:deal with issues. And it's not just you go in and you fix something.
Speaker:You want to take care of your customers, but you've got to be able to
Speaker:talk to people and communicate properly. The best salespeople are great
Speaker:communicators. I used to tell people like, I never sell. And
Speaker:I'm like, but Roger, your ticket averages are higher than everybody else's.
Speaker:I'm not trying to sell. I walk in, I see the problem. If I walked
Speaker:in your house and I was looking at
Speaker:replacing a toilet for you, I would look at it and say,
Speaker:Mr. Brownlock, we can rebuild this toilet. But this toilet's kind
Speaker:of old. You see how big that tank is. It's costing you a ton of
Speaker:water every time you flush it. I would say instead of spending the money to
Speaker:rebuild this, let's put that money towards investing in a toilet that's
Speaker:going to save you money. And your toilet's not very
Speaker:tall and it's the round one. Let's take you into
Speaker:a comfort. They call it ada Comfort Hot. I'm not
Speaker:ada, I don't need ada. But I love the comfort hot toilets
Speaker:and I like the elongated. So here's what we can do.
Speaker:And I just tell them, look, if you were my sister or my mother,
Speaker:this is what I would be recommending and that's it. If they don't buy, I
Speaker:don't care. I want to give them what they want. I want to make them
Speaker:happy. But I'm the professional in that
Speaker:situation and if I don't share my professional knowledge with
Speaker:them about what's even available, I Haven't done them a good service.
Speaker:And that's all it is, is communicating with your customers, trying
Speaker:to provide what's best for them. I don't push them in a direction.
Speaker:If you want me to rebuild it, I'll rebuild it. But you're going to keep
Speaker:flushing 5 gallons of water down the drain every time you use
Speaker:it. That adds up. We've got toilets now that'll flush
Speaker:0.8 gallons of water and you're flushing 5. Just think
Speaker:about it. And normally they're like, you know what? I like that. Let's go.
Speaker:You know, another issue that keeps popping up in
Speaker:really all trades, but I'm just thinking of in the plumbing trade is wages.
Speaker:And I see this a lot on TikTok. A lot of people say, well,
Speaker:I can't make money. I'm looking at the apprentice wages
Speaker:and I'm making 18 an hour. I can go make $22 an
Speaker:hour at Chipotle or McDonald's. And then the other side of it is that
Speaker:I get in and there's, you know, people there who are not
Speaker:treating me right. I'm kind of being razzed by, you know, some of the older
Speaker:guys on site. And what do you say to somebody who
Speaker:says that you can't make money in plumbing? If you go
Speaker:to work for Chipotle and make 20 bucks an hour,
Speaker:in two years, you're going to be making about 20 bucks an hour. You may
Speaker:get a little raise here and there. You may get a 50 cent raise or
Speaker:a quarter raise or something. They think, man, you're crushing it. But here's the deal.
Speaker:In plumbing, you can go from $15
Speaker:an hour to 20 an hour to 21 an hour
Speaker:in about that same amount of time. If you're willing to learn,
Speaker:if you're willing to do those 10 things I talked about, you can make
Speaker:more than that. I know people around here that are still paying apprentices anywhere
Speaker:from 15 to $20 an hour. Starting out those $15 an
Speaker:hour apprentices, if they come in and hustle
Speaker:and do those 10 things I was talking about, man, you're going to get to
Speaker:20 really, really quick. That's a 33% raise,
Speaker:and you can get there pretty quick. The union does cost of
Speaker:living raises every year, and then you get your union raises every
Speaker:year. And, man, I thought the union was great because about every three or four
Speaker:months you're getting another. About every four months, you're getting another
Speaker:$1 52 an hour raise. When I started in
Speaker:the union, I was making 8, 10 an hour as a journeyman. When
Speaker:I got out of the union, I was making over 51 an hour as a
Speaker:director of operations. You can make whatever kind of money you want to make
Speaker:anywhere. You know, Jim Rohn taught this really well, said that the
Speaker:company I work for, you know, I can't make any more money here. He says,
Speaker:wait, what do you mean you can't make any more money? He says, well, here's
Speaker:how much they pay me. And he said, wait, so they don't pay anybody at
Speaker:your company more than you? He said, well, yeah, they pay these people. He says,
Speaker:so why aren't you one of those people? You know, you can grow
Speaker:and I teach people. You can learn your way up out of anything.
Speaker:If you don't like your neighborhood you live in, learn your way up. You don't
Speaker:like the job you have, learn your way up. Do something different. The
Speaker:only way you're going to make more than $20 at Chipotle is if you become
Speaker:a manager or something. I think the national average for plumbers right now on the
Speaker:PayCheck is about 35, almost $40 an hour.
Speaker:You may start at 15, but you're not going to be there long. In
Speaker:five years, you're going to double that. It's up to you what you do,
Speaker:but learn your way up. I feel people get stagnated. Like, I just
Speaker:feel like I'm in this situation. I'm working for a company. I'm
Speaker:only making this. But I don't want to better myself in a sense of, like,
Speaker:either I need to go somewhere else. And sometimes maybe you need to travel
Speaker:and go somewhere else. That might be the case. But I do see
Speaker:a lot of people just saying, this is just what it is. Well, take
Speaker:the bull by the horns and make that change. If
Speaker:you want to level up, level up your skills, get around people.
Speaker:You have a mentor of some sort. What is your goal? You know, if you
Speaker:can get around someone who's been in the field 25, 30 years
Speaker:and is successful, don't try to reinvent the wheel. Do
Speaker:what they did, or at least they can help you cut that time in half.
Speaker:Otherwise, you're just kind of drifting around. I always find that
Speaker:it's best to get around people who have been there, who have done that.
Speaker:Otherwise, I feel like it's hard to do it yourself. I like the way you
Speaker:put that because that's something my son and I talk about a lot. He was
Speaker:a pipe fitter. And, you know, normally when you go to work at
Speaker:A new company or they move you to a different job or something like that.
Speaker:The superintendent will take you and walk you around. And you know, here's so and
Speaker:so, so and so. Here's so and so. And that's the old grumpy guy. That's
Speaker:the one you don't want to work with. My son's like, no, that's the one
Speaker:I want to work with. And they're like, nobody wants to work with him. He
Speaker:says, no, no, no. He's grumpy because he wants things done his way. And he
Speaker:knows ways to do it that some of these other people on the job hadn't
Speaker:even learned yet. That's the one I want to work with. Because if I can
Speaker:make him happy, I can make anybody happy. And that's exactly the
Speaker:way he looked at it. And I mean, think about it, Andrew. I'm 61
Speaker:years old, I've got 45 years experience,
Speaker:and if you had a choice to work for me, and I'm grumpy, I want
Speaker:things done my way. I want it done right. You do it wrong, I'm going
Speaker:to tell you did it wrong. I'm not going to try to bust your
Speaker:tail about it. But it's not going to be, oh, sweetie,
Speaker:you messed that up. Let's try again. It's gonna be like, dude, come
Speaker:on, I told you how to do this. Let's do it right. And when you
Speaker:look at that, you know you asked that question earlier about kids that want to
Speaker:get in the trays. Look, these older guys know how hard this work is,
Speaker:and I kid you not. I used to have a plumber that had a toolbox.
Speaker:It was three feet long, 12 by 12. He built it all out of like
Speaker:three quarter inch plywood and had a rope handle going
Speaker:from one end to the other. We were running sewer lines
Speaker:every day. But he still had every pipe wrench in
Speaker:there, every tool he needed to solder water lines in
Speaker:there. He had every tool he needed in there to do anything on this
Speaker:job. And we parked, it was in Dallas. We parked about a quarter of a
Speaker:mile from the job, and he said, grab my toolbox out of the back and
Speaker:let's go. Because I rode to work with him. So next day I thought, man,
Speaker:I'm going to be smart when he pulls up by the job site. I said,
Speaker:hey man, look, why don't you let me out right here? No, no, no. I
Speaker:don't let my tools out of my sight. We'll drive down there, we'll park, and
Speaker:you Carry my tools back over. And I'm like, dude. Well, that was part of
Speaker:learning and growing. And I remember going down to get fittings. He's like, look,
Speaker:don't wait on the buck hoist. Don't wait on the elevator. Go down the stairs.
Speaker:And then I go downstairs and I get the fitting, have it on my shoulder.
Speaker:I'm sitting there waiting for the elevator. They're like, I need to holler down. You
Speaker:ain't got time to wait on that. Come on. Come on upstairs. It's like, dude,
Speaker:is there an easy way to do anything? He's like, and really there's
Speaker:not. Just understand. Those grumpy old men know more than most other
Speaker:people, and you really can learn a lot from them. Not a bad deal.
Speaker:It's not a bad deal as long as they're open to help you. And
Speaker:you should pay it forward. Look, everybody was new at some point, and
Speaker:you should pay it forward. There's something about that fulfillment, about helping somebody
Speaker:who really wants to learn. There is that sense. Like, I. I've
Speaker:helped people just kind of throughout sort of their career. Just, you
Speaker:know, I'm not looking for anything. But you're hungry and you, you want to learn.
Speaker:I'm happy to help if I can. It's a great feeling when somebody
Speaker:really reaches out and wants to help somebody who's much younger who
Speaker:sees something in them. You could really escalate up
Speaker:a lot quicker in your career. I like this, Andrew, because one thing that
Speaker:I've always been taught is, look, show up for your success. You've got to show
Speaker:up for it. And if you think about it, if I've got a person doing
Speaker:those 10 things, be coachable, show up with a positive
Speaker:attitude, be on time, be prepared. If I've got somebody
Speaker:like that, chances are I'm not going to be busting their tail every day
Speaker:because they're showing up now. If you come in
Speaker:and I'm like, hey, I need you to drill those holes for the
Speaker:anchors, it's like, okay, how do I do that again? Dude, I've showed
Speaker:you the last two mornings in a row. Do you still not remember? No.
Speaker:Really wasn't thinking it was that big a deal. Just show me again. Would you
Speaker:get grumpy with somebody like that? Maybe. Maybe.
Speaker:I want people to want to learn. I can't make anybody learn
Speaker:anything. They've got to show up and want to learn. And that's one thing that
Speaker:I teach, too, is, look, when somebody shows you how to do something,
Speaker:remember it's for Your good to remember that way, when you come
Speaker:in tomorrow, they're like, I'm not sure what I'm going to have you. Do
Speaker:you want me to grab that drill and start doing the anchors again? You know
Speaker:what? Yeah, go for it and see what they do. I just want
Speaker:people to want to. Learn and also be helpful. Just sticking back
Speaker:on wages for a quick second. Is there a point where you hit a
Speaker:ceiling being in the field? And if you
Speaker:do hit a ceiling, what's the next step? If you want to make
Speaker:more within plumbing, where do you navigate towards?
Speaker:I think it depends on what kind of company you work for. If you work
Speaker:for a company that's just straight hourly pay, you'll hit a ceiling. Their price
Speaker:structure is based on or should be based on. Here's
Speaker:what it would cost me to hire the best plumber in this town. And there's
Speaker:a formula that you go through to set your pricing based on that. And if
Speaker:their pricing is based on that, if they go over that price, then it starts
Speaker:getting into the profit. It starts getting into the money that the owner should
Speaker:make. But if he wants to pay you more, he can always raise his
Speaker:prices more. Now you can't just as an hourly person, say,
Speaker:hey, look, I want to make a hundred bucks an hour. Although I think that
Speaker:we're getting there, we're going to be there before long. But I think
Speaker:that if you're working at a company, there is no way for you to move
Speaker:up and make more money, go to another company. Because there are companies
Speaker:out there that do commissions, companies that have
Speaker:referral bonuses. Like if I show up at a house and I
Speaker:go up in that attic and look at the water heater, which here in Texas,
Speaker:for some reason we started putting them in the attic. But if I go up
Speaker:in there and I see that their air conditioner is like on its last leg,
Speaker:it sounds like it's straining to put out cold air or warm air. Might say,
Speaker:hey, you know, I was looking at your air conditioner. It's 30 years
Speaker:old. We do H Vac too. Would you like me to have somebody come
Speaker:out and just look at yours, maybe service it or possibly give you
Speaker:a price for another one? Well, I've worked at companies that you got a 10%
Speaker:referral fee for doing that. They didn't add 10% to the price. The
Speaker:owner just said, hey, our plumber sold this. We're going to give him 10%.
Speaker:So there are ways to make money, but it may not be at the company
Speaker:that you're at I know h vac people that also do
Speaker:sales, they make 2, $300,000 a year.
Speaker:But they are amazing at what they do. And they walk in and they're great
Speaker:communicators. They have human skills. And they come in, they
Speaker:sit down and talk and say, look, you know, I took your system apart and
Speaker:here's some pictures. And look, that doesn't look good because it's not in a brand
Speaker:new system. And you explain it to them and show it and take them up
Speaker:there and show them and let them see. So you understand you're breathing the air
Speaker:that comes through this every day. And as a communicator,
Speaker:that can be good. But you know, most plumbing companies these days
Speaker:don't charge enough for what they do. Almost every plumbing company
Speaker:that I coach, we go and look at their price book. It's like, you can't
Speaker:pay people this much and be only charging this much.
Speaker:And when you go through and show them the formula and make it make sense,
Speaker:they're like, wow, that's why we're losing money every day. Yeah, it's got a lot
Speaker:to do with it. I'm sure you see this all the time, you know, especially
Speaker:somebody who's doing business. I want to go back to just being in
Speaker:the field to make that leap. To be a bit like, all of a sudden
Speaker:you're like, this had this aha moment. Like, I don't want to work for somebody
Speaker:else. I want my own business. How does someone make that leap? And
Speaker:what kind of skillset do you need if you're just in the field working, you
Speaker:know your stuff. But to make the leap to business
Speaker:owner, what kind of skill sets do you need to have? Well, first of all,
Speaker:you gotta be crazy. Think about it. As a company owner, it's the only job
Speaker:in the world. Will you work 100 hours a week and not get paid
Speaker:just so you don't have to work 40 hours a week for somebody else and
Speaker:get paid? I remember one of my best friends, the guy who actually got me
Speaker:into plumbing, whenever I got ready to open my own company, I called him, said,
Speaker:man, look, I'm gonna open my own company. I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna do
Speaker:this. And he said, get ready to work harder than you've ever worked in your
Speaker:life. And I thought, dude, you're crazy. I'm opening my own company so I don't
Speaker:have to work as hard. It's not what it is. You're going to work
Speaker:harder for at least five years to Try to stay in
Speaker:business, to keep the doors open, to do things right, to make that
Speaker:jump. You've got to understand that the buck stops with you.
Speaker:Everything about that company, every decision is now your decision
Speaker:and there's nobody else to push it off on. You can hire coaches, you can
Speaker:hire consultants, you can do things like that. But that is hard to
Speaker:do. I mean, I've had grown men call me crying. They're like, roger,
Speaker:we're not going to make payroll, we're not going to make labor. It's like, well,
Speaker:what are you doing? And you start looking, it's like, well, why'd you do this?
Speaker:Like, well, man, it just seemed good at the time. Well, your budget didn't tell
Speaker:you that that was good at the time. And they're like, yeah, but you know,
Speaker:I just thought if I did this, I could do this, I could do this.
Speaker:Like, those are not data driven decisions, those are
Speaker:feeling decisions. I want this new tool, so I'm going to go ahead and
Speaker:get it. That's not a good way to run a business. You've got to be
Speaker:able to look at numbers, know your KPIs, possibly join a best
Speaker:practice group, learn from other people that have been there and done it.
Speaker:It's hard to do. Do you think that's one of the missteps that you see
Speaker:when you're working with business owners? KPIs are something and
Speaker:it blows people's mind. Because I'm at conferences, I speak to business
Speaker:entrepreneurs, I speak to speakers and coaches and consultants and
Speaker:all kinds of people. And I always talk about KPIs,
Speaker:because to me, it doesn't matter if you're doing social media, it doesn't matter if
Speaker:you're plumbing, electrical, H vac, you've got to know your numbers. There's
Speaker:a special on TV about a guy in Detroit, Clarence Avant, who is like the
Speaker:king of Detroit, the King of Motown, the Godfather of Motown I think is
Speaker:what they actually call him. And he used to teach people, look, know your numbers,
Speaker:know your value, because if you don't, you're never going to get it.
Speaker:And if you don't ask for it, well, you, you don't get anything you don't
Speaker:ask for. So numbers are huge. KPIs, man.
Speaker:I sleep thinking about KPIs. Yeah, you need to know your numbers. But
Speaker:yeah, I mean, if you don't ask, you don't get.
Speaker:Now the tools. Of the trade, you know,
Speaker:Roger, I could speak to you for the next hour. This has been
Speaker:an amazing conversation, but in Every episode,
Speaker:we always ask our guests a tools of the trade.
Speaker:What's one piece of advice you can give someone
Speaker:who is struggling in their plumbing business to
Speaker:start getting it to grow? I know you touched upon it, but I want to
Speaker:go a little bit deeper into it. God, there's so many different things that come
Speaker:to mind. One of my favorites is find a mentor, find a
Speaker:coach, find a mastermind. Find something that you can get in. And it
Speaker:doesn't necessarily have to be a best practice group. You could
Speaker:literally call another electrician, a
Speaker:roofer, an H vac. And this is, if you're a plumber,
Speaker:get you a company owner in the other trades,
Speaker:reach out to them, say, look, I'm wanting to put together a mastermind. I want
Speaker:to meet once a month, and we meet for about an hour, depending on how
Speaker:many people's in it. And each month that we talk,
Speaker:we're going to talk about what you're trying to do, what
Speaker:you've done right, that's really helped you move the needle,
Speaker:what problem you're facing right now and what
Speaker:you really need help with. So there's three people in a group. You say, okay,
Speaker:20 minutes each. You spend five minutes on each one of those, and
Speaker:it may be five minutes of just saying, I need help with invoicing. Who can
Speaker:help me with invoicing? And the other three or the other two get to say,
Speaker:okay, here's what I use. Here's how we use it. We don't even know what
Speaker:we don't know. And that was a hard thing for me to learn. I thought,
Speaker:you know what? I'm a good plumber. I'm really good. I've made these companies
Speaker:a lot of money as a superintendent, as director of operations.
Speaker:But when you open your business, you don't even know what you don't know.
Speaker:And that's not a good position to be in. This is something that I
Speaker:would recommend to anybody. If you're just starting your own company, maybe your
Speaker:first coach or mentor is somebody who owns the biggest company in town doing what
Speaker:you do, they're not going to be afraid of you. If you come in and
Speaker:say, man, look, I know this sounds weird, but I'd like to talk to you
Speaker:and see what I need to do to do things right. I did that with
Speaker:that electrical company. And he said, bring your price book. And I brought it in,
Speaker:laid it down. He looked at it. So you're not charging enough. I said, well,
Speaker:my CSR and my office manager, which is my wife at the time well,
Speaker:they're going to tell me I can't raise prices that nobody will pay. Well, then
Speaker:you need to get rid of them. You need people that believe in what you
Speaker:do, believe in what's right. And, and you're not charging enough. I said, how
Speaker:do you know that? He said, because I do this in Dallas. I know what
Speaker:it costs to do business in Dallas and you're not charging enough. I'm like,
Speaker:wow. I actually say this very similar thing, like,
Speaker:what you don't know hurts you. Getting a mastermind, I think
Speaker:that's so smart because you're getting around other people that
Speaker:might not be in the same industry per se. And I'm thinking,
Speaker:what I do, I'm part of a CEO group called Vistage. And
Speaker:it's just a nationwide group of CEOs. I have one Wednesday
Speaker:and I meet with 15 other business owners but in different industries.
Speaker:And I get my head handed to me each time. I go sometimes and I'm,
Speaker:I'm totally cool with that because I'm like, damn, I didn't know that. And
Speaker:then you come away and you're like, wow, I didn't even know that.
Speaker:Sometimes you just gotta be open and honest and just say, I just, I don't
Speaker:know. I really don't. Because you don't know. You gotta be a little
Speaker:bit foolish to be like, I'm going to try to do it
Speaker:myself and nobody else is going to tell me anything.
Speaker:But if you're open minded and you take the advice
Speaker:from the people who are much further ahead of you in
Speaker:your journey and you just got to listen. But if you're going to be close
Speaker:minded and you're not going to listen to these different ways of doing
Speaker:things, you might not get to where you want. So I think sort of the
Speaker:mastermind, the coaching, getting around all other CEOs or
Speaker:business owners is extremely valuable. Have you read the
Speaker:book Think and Grow Rich? It's on my list. I would move it to
Speaker:the very top. That book has done more for more.
Speaker:You asked the shark tanks, Damon Johns. I heard him speak
Speaker:at an event, PHCC event. Damon
Speaker:John spoke one night and he said, I've read that book
Speaker:23 times and every time I read it I hear something
Speaker:new. It talks about the mastermind and how to put it together
Speaker:and what you do and the way to do it. But I think that that
Speaker:book right there has probably helped me more than anything. We've
Speaker:got to become students, we've got to learn. It's the only way you're going to
Speaker:grow. And unfortunately, most tradespeople, once we get that professional
Speaker:license in our pocket, we quit learning. Hey, I'm just a plumber. Just let me
Speaker:go plumb now. And we don't realize that if we continue
Speaker:to learn, we can continue to grow and we can really do some good
Speaker:things. So that's a book I recommend to everybody is
Speaker:Think and Grow Rich. I remember I was actually speaking at an
Speaker:event in White Fish, Montana, and I
Speaker:saw a deal on Facebook and it was the Think and Grow Rich, the legacy
Speaker:movie or whatever. It was about 70 or 90 minutes
Speaker:and I'm watching it, I'm like, why don't I know these things? And it blew
Speaker:my mind. I ordered the book right then and I used to carry it
Speaker:around with me because each of the different chapters talk about different
Speaker:things. But that is a great book to have on audible to just
Speaker:listen while you're driving down the road. It's a game changer.
Speaker:It's on my list now. It's going to be on top of my list. I
Speaker:appreciate that. And you know, some of these books just are game
Speaker:changers for yourself. I mean, I have a huge list. But
Speaker:you have to continue learning, growing,
Speaker:developing self improvement across the board if you want to get to
Speaker:where you want to get to in life. Some people don't do that
Speaker:and you need to do that and you need to be open to really
Speaker:get to sort of the level you want to, you want to get to.
Speaker:Roger, if people want to find out more about you, your YouTube channel, where do
Speaker:they go to find out more information about you? Yeah, it's really funny on YouTube.
Speaker:Just go to YouTube and search plumbing. You'll find me. Just look for the big
Speaker:white mustache. If you want to connect with me, I've got my
Speaker:LinkedIn page, you can find me there. And that's the one I pretty much do
Speaker:myself. So if you message me, chances are I'll see it.
Speaker:And if you just want to find out about everything we do, you can go
Speaker:to rogerwakefield.com and check them out on Saturdays. What time is your live
Speaker:Saturdays? We've switched it over. We now we've got a second
Speaker:YouTube channel called the Trade Talks and we go live
Speaker:every day at 10 o' clock Central Standard Time. And what that is.
Speaker:Did you ever watch the Pat McAfee show, the sports Guy? Yeah,
Speaker:yeah, yeah, yeah, sure. He was on ESPN and on YouTube.
Speaker:Well, we've done that on YouTube. We have about 11
Speaker:different topics we talk about each day. It may be what's
Speaker:going on in the world Today website reviews, material,
Speaker:equipment and technology, mechanical, electrical and plumbing.
Speaker:We've got different topics that we talk about. We're
Speaker:talking to some really big sponsors about coming in and doing different segments
Speaker:and we do that every day. It's on our second YouTube channel called the Trade
Speaker:Talks. Every day, 10:00 Central standard time. And we talk about
Speaker:all the trades, not just plumbing, electrical and H
Speaker:vac. And it's really pretty cool. Yeah, definitely. Check it out. I mean,
Speaker:Roger's knowledge base and just, you know, just overall
Speaker:and just your. The impact that you're making. Thank you so much for what
Speaker:you do and thank you so much for really you're changing people's
Speaker:lives. So thank you, Andrew. Thank you. I love what you do for the trades
Speaker:community. Anytime you call, I'm always like, yeah, whatever I can do for you, let
Speaker:me know. So thank you. I do appreciate what you bring to. The trades
Speaker:and thank you to our listeners. If you want more valuable insights and
Speaker:trades related information, head over to andrewbrown.net and join
Speaker:our Trades Movement newsletter where we advocate for the trades, we share
Speaker:inspirational stories. Like Roger Wakefield, we provide resources
Speaker:and you join a passionate trades community. Don't forget
Speaker:to subscribe to the podcast so you never miss another episode. We'll see you
Speaker:next time.
Speaker:Thanks for listening to the lost art of the skilled trades. Visit
Speaker:us@AndrewBrown.net for more resources and tips.
Speaker:Join us next time for real stories and meaningful initiatives
Speaker:as we celebrate our men and women in the skilled trades and shape
Speaker:the future together.
