Ep. 71 - Why 2025 Humbled Me

Want proof that small, consistent moves can change a business and a life? We open the year with a candid reset: what worked in 2025, what flopped, and why culture, systems, and storytelling will drive everything we do in 2026. No buzzwords. Just real lessons from a crew that learned to document the process, own mistakes, and turn that transparency into relationships, opportunities, and a stronger company.

We walk through the journey from kitchen-table recordings to a growing media flywheel, where YouTube, TikTok, and the podcast help us translate white-collar frameworks into job site language. You’ll hear why one piece of content can spark a career shift, how mindset beats hype, and where we’re doubling down: core values, short-term priorities, and a five-year target that forces better systems. We also share shout-outs to mentors and tools that moved the needle, from WIP reporting to cost controls and construction finance support, because profit follows process and process follows clarity.

Looking ahead, we preview standout guests who refuse the “that’s how it’s always been” script, and we map Q1 plans for ConExpo, including meetups, booth interviews, and a call to spotlight overlooked products and crews. We’re gearing up for our 100th episode milestone and want your ideas, your questions, and the problems you want solved on air. If you build, sell, or support blue-collar work, this is your space to learn practical strategies, avoid expensive mistakes, and find the confidence to speak up about what really matters.

Subscribe, share with a friend in the trades, and leave a review with the one system you’ll fix first this year. Your feedback shapes the next conversation, and might be the spark someone else needs to get moving.

Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome And Gratitude
• 1:44 Media Growth And Community Impact
• 4:32 Upcoming Guests And New Projects
• 6:36 Start Creating: Stories From The Early Days
• 10:45 Goals, Culture, And Mindset Shifts
• 14:21 Resources, Mentors, And Systems
• 17:44 Q1 Plans And ConExpo Meetups

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:09

Hey guys, welcome to the Blue Collar Business Podcast where we discuss the realest, rawest, most relevant stories and strategies behind building every corner of a blue-collar business. I'm your host, Sy Kirby, and I want to help you what it took me, trial and error, and a whole lot of money to learn. The information that no one in this industry is willing to share. Whether you're under that shade tree or have your hard hat on, let's expand your toolbox. What is happening, everybody? So good to have you back here in 2026. Kind of a low-key episode today. Really just wanted to thank you guys. The numbers here lately have been crazy. And uh the DMs and emails and the calls, just the uh the impact, I believe is the word I'm looking for that this show is having and is unbelievable. And I wish I could go back and I wish I would have started earlier because it's helping so many people and it's helped me in so many ways. Like, truly, and I've loved learning with each and every one of you. And I can't thank you enough for tuning in every week, whether you're a YouTube sub, whether you catch the short content on TikTok, whether you're an avid listener on Spotify. Apple Podcasts is also another big one. And I just wanted to tell you guys thank you. And I truly hope you had a wonderful, Merry Christmas with you and your family. We have been off at SciCon since before Christmas, and uh we do that every year. We call it the Great Reset and uh really recharge everybody. And while their family's in town, it's it's the one thing we can do. And this year was tough. This year was tough, no doubt about it. 25, bye-bye. I'm so glad to be in 26. But, you know, this morning, I uh a little bit about everything that we've got going on to catch you guys kind of up to speed because over the next couple of months, things are gonna get a little crazy around here, no doubt about it. Uh and over on the Scicon presence, online presence side as well. If you haven't found us on YouTube yet, go check us out at Sycon. Uh, we just hit, I believe, 32,000, 31.5, something like that, guys. It's unbelievable. Getting some pretty large consistent views and uh getting to highlight our team and the guys and our trade in general and some of the errors and mistakes we make, um, highlights of the team, just unbelievable stuff, man. And um I'm truly grateful. This is not only hopefully helping you guys in your lives, but this this whole media stuff is just literally changing my life a little bit. It's insane. And when I speak of that, I'm not talking about monetarily yet, hopefully. But I'm talking about the relationships and the opportunities from the guests I've had on this show to the people I've got to meet from you guys just listening and tuning in the show. Sai, thank you so much for the content. Keep it ripping. And I would have never believed you that I would be doing this five, ten years ago. And I've got some interesting things happening this month. Um, some big keynotes happening, and you guys will hear about it later in the month. Some things that we've been cooking up behind the scenes. An endeavor we have been diving deep off into and uh with our time, and we ain't we don't have much of that, so it's been an oddball hours, and but it's been so worth it, and I can't wait to share that with you guys later that later this month. Check back around January 23rd. I don't know if we'll be releasing a special episode for that or what we'll be doing, but check back around there and you'll hear just specifically about that. But man, our first episode of the year uh should I apologize if it's not first, depending on how the recordings fall, but I do believe it'll be Mr. Aaron Witt. We've had it on the books for a little while now. Um, as you guys know, huge fan of Der World Summit. Changed my thinking and my mindset being there. And uh, they're my kind of people, they're my people, like industry, non-settling mindsets in this industry of oh well, that's just how it has been. These guys are trying to push the corners of the boundaries and ask the questions and encourage people to tell their story. And man, I just learned so much. And there's some other really, really unbelievable people heading for this show, and I can't wait to shine light on them. They deserve it. And I'm sorry, I'm just kind of captivating like, what if I didn't do this? What if I didn't look at Will and was like, oh, we need a podcast now because you're doing YouTube. But all the people I have met, just from sitting behind a microphone trying to share a message, I would encourage you this year. Doesn't have to be in a being beautiful podcastvideos.com studio. I encourage you. Um, they take care of you really well. They help you along your journey to stay consistent and stay committed. But at the same time, it can be from your kitchen. That's where this all started. That's the whole reason I even talked about the whole studio. We we ran eight or nine episodes. We ended up, I ended up sitting on a news nation national interview about Gen Z and blue-collar trades and which one, et cetera. And then NPR wrote an article about me and Sarah, and it was unbelievable. And this this wasn't this year, this was almost two years ago. Like all the crazy things that's happened just because we started putting ourselves out there. And this is just general contractor local guys, or uh, I believe I had some of our team. It was like early OG show days. And if you've been hanging here since then, drop a comment down below. Um, because I I really want to find a way to thank you. Uh, you OGs have been here a year and a half at this point. We're pushing two years. We're 75 episodes. We're gonna hit a hundred episodes for this year and find find uh a way to get us a comment. What do you guys want for this hundredth episode? I need to put up some polls. I'm really looking forward to that in the middle of this year. It's one of the goals for this. If I was gonna do it, I wanted to do at least 100 shows. I knew the impact that I could carry, not from a view standpoint, but from the people that were helping the you guys that are driving down the road trying to figure out how to be better, how to implement this, how to what is this that they're talking about? And here's a good way to sit across. Cy's gonna sit here and make this white-collar guy speak our language, and he's gonna ask the tough questions. Yeah, there's there's I'm gonna bring you products that I believe in, and and just honestly built this to show spotlight on the working men and women in this wonderful country and Canada. Shout out, but they need help, and this was a resource, and if it's helped you in any way, let me know. Share it with me. Uh, send send me a message on LinkedIn. I encourage you guys. Um, you guys have impacted me severely. I can't even tell you. Um, and I'm so amped up for 2026. Not to get all sitting here mushy gushy, but uh we're booked out. I believe she said we were booked recordings until April. We're sitting here first week of January back, and man, I had a very long day. You can probably tell by my voice, it doesn't sound the same. I started at 4:30 this morning and uh went over core values with our team, talked about our short-term company goals and our long-term company goals, and uh I introduced a five-year goal. I'm so excited to get to that point as a team and doing things just drastically different because nothing changes if nothing changes. And can't even take credit for that one, but man, I've lived by that one. And uh Jaco was the one that said it to me. Shout out. But uh I encourage you this year and I challenge you, start putting yourself out there. You don't know you are one piece of content from changing your life. One video could change your entire life. I know that's not what we're chasing here, guys, but I'm it could bring awareness to something you may actually change the industry for bringing awareness on this said subject or this transaction or this or whatever. That's what this is about is fixing this industry, helping the younger tradesmen, the entrepreneurs that are trying to succeed. Some of the things I've learned in 25, I will tell you, I am not sitting here saying that this year, this last year was my most successful. It definitely wasn't from a monetary standpoint, but I will tell you it was the most successful year from a mindset shift, from a company perception shift, a culture shift, humbling year again. And I thought 24 was my humbling year. Guys, you uh you have sit here every week, every single week, faithfully tuning in, watching me, but I can't tell you how many doors we're unlocking from the process and the procedural standpoint. And I know a lot of you guys are from a business background as well, and you're like, dude, well, that's that's everything. Like, yeah, man, but these guys don't know that. There are great people online, John's coaching seminars, uh Buildwith, I can go on, excavation academy, uh, all these different types. Like, there's some resources out there. Um we're also gonna bring one for just the specific pipe guy. So uh be tuning in for that. A 26, some of the guests are just blue-collar men and women, just like me and you. And there's some high-level big names coming to the show. And it's crazy. All the people and the goals that we met for, but from a media's perspective, we met just about every goal. And I can't thank you guys enough from Sikon's perspective. We didn't hit every goal, but from a culture's perspective, a people perspective, a profitability perspective, we are trending in a majorly right direction. And there's some people that have helped guide me this year. I gotta I gotta give a major shout out to Shalina. She came in and sat there, 4G Enterprises on LinkedIn, by the way. She came in, built systems, processes, and set her foot down on some things that I really needed to change my mindset and my shift or shift my mindset on, just perspective-wise from the field. And Miss Julie, such a great help on the Sikon side. And now with Josh, Lou Becker, and the construction CFO team, SPM, and they have helped me build systems and processes. I wish I would have had an understanding five years ago, 10 years ago when I started. But I hope this has been a resource like Mr. Nick Peters and the WIP report. Go back and check that one out. That was a great episode. John's episodes. Like I can go on and on about some of the guys that have been on this show, but truly trying to break down systems and processes to help you go out tomorrow and maybe fix something within your business or properly deal with something that you didn't know how to deal with because we talked about it on this show. That is what the show's purpose and design is. And I don't ever want to stray away from that. And I hope you guys don't let me get there. Um Okay. I hope I got my point across with the thank yous. I wanted to talk about uh let's talk about quarter one. Like, but Con Expo is in like 57 days. If you guys don't know about Con Expo, it is the largest construction industry trade show in North America. Comes every three years. March 2nd through the 7th, uh, me and Will would be out there. We're looking to do a podcast uh every single week, and we've got a meetup. Couple are already scheduled. If you're a company and you're listening or a vendor that's going to be there, you're a fan of the show, or you've supported the show, or our YouTube, don't feel any way, reach out media at psychonexc.com and or through the website at blue collar businesspodcast.com. Either one is fine. Just find your way to Will and he'll get you in touch and kind of figure out if uh we can fit in our schedule. Literally, we're we've got a couple of podcasts filmed at certain booths looking to maybe do two more, like one a day. Um, and I believe I'm joining a couple sessions, but I'm also gonna be doing some meetups from the YouTube side. And if there's a booth, obviously we're gonna be at some of the big ones, but um, if there's a key product, um key manufacturer, we need to bring some spotlight on that's probably not gonna get as much. Let me know, shoot me a DM, email me, get a hold of Will, and I want to shed some light because uh if there's something out there that needs light shined on it, I want to do it while we're out there and hopefully get to meet some of you guys. And if you're out, if you're gonna be out there in Vegas, want to be all over um call an expo, and I am so jacked about it. That's where all of this really started was January, and I'll wrap up and I'll close here my ramble sesh, but January three years ago, almost to the date. I bet you if you go look at our first YouTube video, I looked at Sarah and I just said, Hey, it's been snowing for a week and a half, we ain't done nothing. Come out here, we're starting YouTube channel. What? Just come out here, filmed it with my phone, threw it up on YouTube, and uh at 79 subscribers landed one of the largest projects we've ever seen in our lifetime. And opportunities I can't even express to you. But three years to the date, and here we are. It's unfricking believable. I'm so excited for 26. I'm praying for y'all's success in 26. Just overall, guys, I can't thank you enough for every DM, email, comment, like, share, sub, follow, all of it. Just share it with somebody that you know might need it. And uh I hope uh the value this brings you this year from some of the guests I'm so fired up about to bring you guys on to bigger and better things. Keep fighting out there, keep fighting the good fight. We will be back next week with a full episode here at the blue collar businesspodcast.com. I can't thank you guys enough for everything. Until next week, we'll see you then. If you've enjoyed this episode, be sure to give it a like, share it with the fellas, check out our website to send us any questions and comments about your experience in the blue collar business. Who do you want to hear from? Send them our way, and we'll do our best to answer any questions you may have. Till next time, guys.