Loaded: The Hahn Ready Mix Podcast

A podcast for the employees of Hahn Ready Mix

Loaded: The Hahn Ready Mix Podcast

63. What Makes a Good Teammate?

May 11, 2026 • Griffin Hahn & Andrea Meier • Episode 63

0:00 | 24:49

Andrea and Griff walk through the traits of a good teammate. Also: interstates and highways are our friends, idling notifications, and a question on concrete hydration!

SPEAKER_00 0:09

Welcome to Loaded, the Hahn Ready Mix podcast with Andrea Meyer, Griffin Hahn, and producer Lex.

SPEAKER_03 0:16

How's it going today?

SPEAKER_00 0:18

Okay. We're doing okay.

SPEAKER_03 0:20

We're doing okay. That's the level we're bringing today. Okay level.

SPEAKER_00 0:24

Well, it's busy. It's busy. The weather is nice, which is great, but that just makes squeezing in this very important podcast.

SPEAKER_03 0:33

Yeah. We this was one of the toughest as far as like finding, you know, 30 minutes to sit down together.

SPEAKER_00 0:40

Yes.

SPEAKER_03 0:40

Uh that's a good problem to have.

SPEAKER_00 0:43

Let's not let people think that that means we're not prepared.

SPEAKER_03 0:46

Very prepared. Very prepared. But yes, it's hard to make our schedules align sometimes. Yes. So, but this is a labor of love, right?

SPEAKER_00 0:55

We're all happy to be here, even Lex. Turning his head away from the microphone when I ask him questions.

SPEAKER_03 1:03

I'm here. All right. I'm ready. He's here and he's okay.

SPEAKER_00 1:07

Okay. Let's start with some announcements. What's happening?

SPEAKER_03 1:12

Uh, I'm excited to catch up on uh a few new hires we've got we've hired over the last two weeks. So Corbin Burns is down in Muscatine and Luis Cobos Granados and Nick Bryant. Both those are both of them are here in the Quad Cities. So yeah, so welcome to the team if they're listening and if you see them around, uh certainly help them out and keep them coming.

SPEAKER_00 1:36

Yeah. Like we said before, those referrals are great. Um, I know your dad, Brian Hans, coming back to town, I think, in the next week or two, and he's already been messaging me asking me how many drivers we have, how many more guys we can get in trucks. So I love to see that number increasing and to let him know we still have people in training too. So yeah. That's great.

SPEAKER_03 1:56

I'm glad that's your singular reason for doing those things.

SPEAKER_00 2:00

It's just to make sure that you I have to have the right answer to that very specific question all the time.

SPEAKER_03 2:06

Yeah. Shh. Cool. What else you got?

SPEAKER_00 2:09

Um, another exciting thing update is we had the cameras turned on to remind people to turn off the truck when they've been idling too long in the yard. And you know, I was ready to open up a hotline for complaints when people started calling and talking about it, but I actually have not had any complaints. Knock knock on wood.

SPEAKER_03 2:29

This is your invitation.

SPEAKER_00 2:31

No, I have confirmed that it is it is working, at least in in some locations, people have heard the message and have responded appropriately. So that's a good sign.

SPEAKER_01 2:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 2:41

I think we had a meeting with that company and they showed us just how much money we're wasting on fuel again and just reinforces that we need to be working on it.

SPEAKER_03 2:50

Yeah, for sure. It's important, especially diesel costs continue to spiral out of control. So yeah, everything we can do is is a big deal. Lex, I assume you're very excited that our night work is complete for the spring. Um, I'm the only job that I'm aware of that we have nightwork. So uh thank you to everyone that was involved with working day and night in some cases to to get that job done. Lex, you included. So I know that is we've talked about it a couple of times, highly disruptive, but just really appreciate it. And hopefully you can get some good night's sleep, Lex.

SPEAKER_00 3:29

Bring me back, bring you back to your usually sparkling daytime personality. You're gonna have to help me out with this announcement. This is coming from dispatch, and you know how I am with directions. So let's do it. Is it by the Taco Johns? Yes, yes. That's where we're that's where we're going here. Um if there's a job out by the Betplex, right? This is a very common area, high, high destination for us that we're going to frequently and will be all season long. I think there's some people that think that the most direct route straight through town is the way to do it.

SPEAKER_03 4:06

Negative ghostwriter. Uh I disagree.

SPEAKER_00 4:09

That's yes, that's the announcement we're trying to make. Through town is not the way out there.

SPEAKER_03 4:13

No, take 74 up to 80.

SPEAKER_00 4:16

Or 280 around the other way. Just not division is not it. Bridge is not it.

SPEAKER_03 4:22

Well, okay, if it was coming from here, 280. Yeah, sure.

SPEAKER_02 4:25

280. But I don't know. From the river plant, going up Devil's Glen is not a bad route to middle road. Uh just do not go to 53rd.

SPEAKER_00 4:32

Yes. Yeah. Do not go up division. That was the other message from Discord.

SPEAKER_02 4:36

Or do not go up division.

SPEAKER_00 4:37

They're for from here.

SPEAKER_02 4:39

Why would you go all the way to the Q to B T.

SPEAKER_00 4:43

Maybe that's what Google Maps is telling them to do. I don't know. But either way.

SPEAKER_03 4:47

Interstates are our friend.

SPEAKER_00 4:49

Yes.

SPEAKER_03 4:49

When we have long travel times.

SPEAKER_00 4:50

So for long travel times and for the trucks, it's good to get trucks up to speed.

SPEAKER_03 4:54

Yes. Once in a while. Take the interstate if you can. Yes.

SPEAKER_00 4:58

And if you have questions, if you're looking at a route on a map and you're like, I don't think this doesn't make any sense, just call dispatch and they'll tell you where to go. They can update the route on your map and make it easy for you. So when in doubt, phone home, get some help.

SPEAKER_03 5:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 5:12

Definitely don't call me because I don't know.

SPEAKER_03 5:15

Directionally challenged. Yes. Yes. Uh, we're still looking for you'll be shocked to hear this, but I was absolutely not swamped with feedback from favorite jobs. So uh still still wanting to do something with that. So uh send in your favorite project you've been a part of uh since since you've been here, and hopefully we can do something fun with that.

SPEAKER_00 5:38

That reminded me I was also going to send out a survey question, I think last week or maybe this week about trucks that need to be chipped out, and I didn't get that done either. So we have to keep giving people opportunities to get us that feedback.

SPEAKER_03 5:50

Yeah. Anything else and announcements? Are we ready to do that?

SPEAKER_00 5:52

Let's move on.

SPEAKER_03 5:53

Okay. I think our topic for today is what makes a good team member. And and we we, you know, we talk about a lot of things on here that kind of all encompass that or cross over that. But uh as a specific topic, I think it's worth asking the question, you know, when we're hiring somebody, what are we looking for as we assess ourselves? We could say, uh, you know, are we the best team member teammate that we can for our coworkers? So I kind of wanted to go through that that kind of concept, if that makes sense.

SPEAKER_00 6:25

Let's do it.

SPEAKER_03 6:26

All right. So the first thing I had on what makes a good team member is pretty obvious one, and that's reliability, right? So someone who's reliable shows up on time, does the job consistently, follows through with the things that they say they're gonna do. You know, they're not up and down, they're consistent every day in how they show up. They're they're steady and dependable, right? So um the best teammates, you know, don't make extra work for other people, right? They're they're handling their their business and they're you know, predictable in that they're gonna be at work, they're gonna be on time, they're gonna do the job correctly.

SPEAKER_00 7:10

Yeah, I like I like that one a lot. And of course I get super tech tactical on my thoughts on reliability as it relates to attendance and that whole thing. But thinking about how you like we want to be as flexible as we can to allow people the time off that they need, but working together with us on how you schedule things makes a huge difference. It's way easier for us to help you get to a doctor's appointment at two in the afternoon than it is at 8 a.m. So, like thinking about how you can be reliable by, you know, I know everyone doesn't have flexibility to schedule appointments exactly when they want to, but whenever you can, yeah, if you're shooting for early outs in the afternoon, that's way easier on us for sure than early mornings or full days. Same thing, you know, Fridays are sometimes our busiest day. Uh so I everybody wants a three-day weekend and having Friday off, but a Monday off is better for everybody than a Friday.

SPEAKER_03 8:05

Yeah, most of the time. Not always. Keep that in mind.

SPEAKER_00 8:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 8:08

Yeah. I mean, if that is that is definitely true. And, you know, we understand that those doctor's appointments and things like that have to happen. And having to go to the doctor doesn't make you unreliable, but communicating, it's when we don't know when there's surprises consistently, you know, uh it is when that reliability piece starts to really weigh on others for sure. Okay, the next kind of aspect of a good teammate is having an awareness of others. So not just thinking about me, but thinking about the we, right? And I really I think about this a lot when the when I the language that I use, I try to do we statements, right? To include myself in the situation we might be in, or or or you know, you know, I notice that when you come ask me a question and you say, Did we get this done?

SPEAKER_00 9:02

And what you're really asking me is, did I get it done? But I like how you're inclusive of yourself in that situation.

SPEAKER_03 9:08

You know, you feel less uh under threat when I say that, right? Yeah. Yeah. So people that have an awareness of others understand how their role impacts other people, right? So if they don't get their job done, what that means for someone else. An example of this would be if a driver takes uh the the wrong turn and goes through town on the way to middle road, and then uh a customer calls and yells at someone in dispatch and they get chewed out, or the quality control person on the site gets chewed out or whatever, because a decision that they that one person made impacts somebody else, and they end up kind of bearing the the brunt of that. So uh understanding how their role impacts others, you know, doesn't operate in a vacuum. Nothing, our whole business or whole industry relies on everybody working together. So we don't have, even though we have a lot of people that are doing independent tasks, those tasks are all intertwined. Yes, there's one person driving a truck, there's one person batching a plant, but we cannot make and deliver concrete without those things working together. So just understanding that we don't work in a vacuum and having a willingness to ask for help, especially for the new folks around here, it is not the expectation that you understand and are able to do everything that the job might require. So, but you have to tell us when you need help. So ask for help when you need it, whether that's physical help to accomplish something or um better instructions or just advice, whatever that is, you know, put yourself out there and ask, and and people will not think less of you because you asked for help. They'll think more of you that like they actually care about getting this done.

SPEAKER_00 10:58

Yeah, I don't I don't know if this is the best example for your topic here, but I also think about this in terms of individual actions when multiplied over everyone really can turn bad. So uh if if you think about, you know, we have issues at the river plant with everything going on there, and we've been talking a lot about not discharging any water or anything. If one person does it, you know, you could be like, oh, it's not really a big deal. And then you think about how many trucks we have there, how many times a day, how much that adds up. Like everyone has to do the right thing to keep everyone on track. You know, if someone sees someone doing it, then they're like, Oh, I'll just I I guess that's okay. Now I'll do that too. So just thinking about being the example for everyone else and everyone doing things the right way. Absolutely as a team.

SPEAKER_03 11:46

Uh yeah, there's a accumulative effect and a multiplier of of bad bad decision making, right? That it's it's sometimes one if one person does something not correct.

SPEAKER_00 11:57

You might have a very good reason why you're doing it or think it's an exception to the situation, but then when everyone else starts adding on to it, it goes way wrong.

SPEAKER_03 12:05

And one way to combat that is number three, the third facet here, which is just helping you. Yes, yes, great segue is communication. So a good teammate communicates well. So um when we talk about communication, we've we've definitely talked about it on here before about clear communication, clarity, you know, has been a topic, uh, proactive communication. So, you know, that's the situation where if you if you do have to do something strange, you know, don't wait for them to ask you about it or someone else to ask you about it. Say, hey, I'm doing this because of XYZ. Um, and helpful communication. Let's pass on information that can help others, right? So uh we want to speak up early and not late. So that's that proactivity. We don't need to hoard information, right? So you often accuse me of being too verbose, and that's because I don't want to hoard information, right? I want everybody to have always sharing, always thinking of others. Yes, yes. So yeah, I I think it's important, you know, there's there's a tendency sometimes for people to kind of, I don't know, protect their job or their importance by being the solution or somebody the the person that they can come to and and fix a problem, right? And we're all better off if we are constantly teaching each other and training each other so that we have ability to do everything that needs done around here, right? So I mean I'm I'm not giving any good examples on that, I know, but but there's a lot of things that we do that maybe one person knows how to do, right? And and what that's really been a throughout the organization, uh an emphasis to try to get redundancy, right?

SPEAKER_00 13:52

A lot of office document processes. Yeah. Right, Lex?

SPEAKER_03 13:56

You know, I think of I think of like in the front office, there's a lot of things that maybe Marla is the only person that knows how to do it right now, or Sandy or uh Donnie with the plant reports and things like that. That we're like, okay, that's a precarious.

SPEAKER_00 14:09

Darren with every printer in the company.

SPEAKER_03 14:14

Yeah. So, you know, that that leaves us in a precarious place as an organization. So let's share that information um and teach each other.

SPEAKER_00 14:24

Yeah, this is one that I've definitely been working on. I'm uh admit to being an under-communicator. I would rather just do the thing than talk about doing the thing most of the time. But what I've been thinking through as I'm working on it is if I consider saying it or sending the text message, always do it. You know, sometimes you think, should I send it? And you're like, uh, I'm like, no, nobody cares. Like even today, I almost always go to Muscatine on Wednesdays and I wasn't gonna be able to go today. And I thought about not saying anything to anyone, and then I just sent the message to everyone saying, Hey, I'll be there tomorrow.

SPEAKER_03 14:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 14:57

Yeah, that's just easy to just say one more thing and it helps everybody out.

SPEAKER_03 15:01

Absolutely. Okay, the next facet is something we've talked about a lot on here, but is positive attitude. So uh teammates that are not negative, not complaining constantly. Um you know, we don't want to bring the team down, and we gotta handle tough situations like a professional. So you don't have to be like loud or outgoing, but you do have to be someone people want to work with, right? So that's it's certainly a topic we've talked about a lot, but I think it's really important if you want to be effective and want people to engage with you and work with you, you gotta be approachable and you know, friendly in those in those circumstances.

SPEAKER_00 15:42

Yeah, I used to love that when I was on job sites more than I am now, and a truck would pull up and everybody on the job was like, Oh, yes, I love this guy. Yeah. It's great feeling uh to know that there's people who they view as part of their team as super cooperative and easy to work with, and we want to work towards getting everybody to be viewed that way.

SPEAKER_03 16:01

Well, I try to tell that whenever we have a group of new hires, been like, okay, the the best thing you can do is get to know our customers and just, you know, how ask them, how are you? How are you doing? You know, you know, I'm I'm Joe, Schmoe, whatever. And this is my first day, but I'm really excited to help you out and whatever. Just having that attitude and being proactive with our customers changes the way that they interact with us and more quickly gets them to the point where they are excited when when someone shows up. All right. The next one is one of our values, actually, which is takes ownership. A good teammate takes ownership. So this is about like no finger pointing. It's owning our mistakes, it's fixing problems instead of deflecting them. And good teammate that takes ownership doesn't say that's not my job, right? They're um they're tackling problems themselves. No notes, good. Okay. The next one is kind of the we said uh uh earlier we said a willingness to ask for help. The next one is a willingness to help. So having kind of a team first mindset, right? So if you see someone struggling, a good teammate will step in and help. So a good teammate doesn't keep score, right? So certainly there are KPIs and things we track here. You know, what what that means is if I help you, Andrea, three times this week and you help me one, that I'm not lording it over you that, like, oh, you know, I had to help you more than you helped me this week. I mean, I definitely would do that, but we all have things to work on.

SPEAKER_00 17:40

If that ever happened, I would I would let you take that.

SPEAKER_03 17:42

Yes. Yeah, but that's not a good thing. Also, I think there's a a bit of empathy required in this that like we have to understand that not everyone is at their best every day, right? So everyone has tough J's. The best teams are built by people who help others even when they don't have to. So I think that that is I think we have that spirit around here. And I I just yeah, I'm proud of that happens, but we just need to always be fostering more of it.

SPEAKER_00 18:10

Yeah, I think that's generally true. Um, I think it's easy to get dragged down into comparison, right? A lot of the things are sort of luck of the draw, right? Like what loads come up at what time?

SPEAKER_01 18:21

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 18:21

Um, and it's easy to get down or to fall into not being a great teammate by comparing yourself to someone else. Like a, why do I have to go do this job? This guy's been in the yard longer than I have. So I think being a good teammate is taking what you get and doing your best with it and knowing that it's gonna be someone else's turn the next time. Yeah, it's it's all gonna work out.

SPEAKER_03 18:42

Yeah, for sure. And the last facet I have is good teammates pull their weight. You know, they hustle, they're productive, uh, they don't waste their own time and they don't waste other people's time. And they set an example for others to follow. So I think that's really important. We talk a lot on here and in this organization about kind of soft skills and how we interact. But um sometimes I think the focus also needs to be on like, let's just get things done. Like we have to, we have a job to do. Let's let's just get to it and get it done. So um, that's that's where that's important that if we're gonna be effective as a team, the individuals have to have to push too.

SPEAKER_00 19:24

Yeah, I love to see this in the shop sometimes. You know, someone will bring their truck in for you know something that they need a mechanic to do.

SPEAKER_01 19:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 19:30

And a lot of times I'll see a driver jump in and do whatever the mechanic was doing. I know last week we were scraping stickers off of something or chipping away at something. And if you can jump in and help with that so that frees someone else up to do what they need to do for you, like that's that's the best kind of teamwork. I love to see that.

SPEAKER_03 19:46

My closing thoughts on this, I guess, are that you know, none of this is really complicated, right? This is pretty simple stuff, but that doesn't mean that doing all these things are easy.

SPEAKER_00 19:56

Yeah, it's easy to say it, it's not always easy to do.

SPEAKER_03 19:58

They're easy concepts, but they're not easy uh in in practice.

SPEAKER_00 20:03

Everybody gets caught up in what's happening to them right now.

SPEAKER_03 20:06

For sure. You know, the like the perfect teammate doesn't exist, but we we talked a couple weeks ago about kind of self-assessment, and this is another spot to like assess ourselves and say, how do how do I score, you know, on these different facets on uh of being a good teammate and where can I put my focus on on doing better because we all could, you know, because at the end of the day, people don't just remember like if you were good at your job, but they remember what it was like to work with you, and that's what all this is about. So we want to have a positive impact on each other, and that helps the whole organization find success. So this is a good roadmap to do it.

SPEAKER_00 20:46

Got it. Good topic. Speaking of positive, we actually did get a question on the podcast this week.

SPEAKER_03 20:53

Yes.

SPEAKER_02 20:55

I'm very excited for the loaded question for this week is how hot does concrete get during hydration, especially in the drums? And why is temperature control so important during the summer months?

SPEAKER_03 21:13

That is a good question. So, you know, the hydration process can start in the drum, especially as concrete gets old. The reason why the drums turn is that if you keep the concrete agitated, you're kind of arresting that hydration process from happening for a little while. And obviously we have chemicals and things like recover to slow that down. So, you know, we relatively often take like every day, take concrete temperature tests, and we see concrete that gets really old, you can start to feel it heat up in your hand, right? So you can you think about the human body is whatever, 98 degrees. I don't know what the average temperature is, but it's around there, right there. Yeah. Um, and so it's If you pick up concrete and it is noticeably hot in your hand, you know, it's probably well over a hundred degrees at that point. And that is the first kind of warning sign that it's about to set up in your drum, and that we need to get that concrete off the truck. Um, or if that's not possible, get sugar in the load, right? Uh so that is a way of completely stopping the hydration processes using sugar. I don't know the exact like how hot does it get in the truck, could it get? But, you know, it probably in the low 100s, right, is is what you would see with moving plastic concrete is is kind of an upper limit. Now, as concrete hydrates in place, right, once it's poured, there's really, I don't, I don't know if there's a theoretical upper limit, but there's an upper limit of where the concrete starts to damage itself. And I'll get technical here, Andrew, because you'll love it. So above 170 degrees Fahrenheit, you can have what's called delayed etronite formation. And what happens is uh there's this naturally occurring compound uh when concrete sets called etronite. And above 170 degrees, that uh etronite will basically dissolve into a different product. But that different product takes up less space. And so what happens is if you get above 170 degrees, this etronite will dissolve and then will reform later after the concrete has found its final shape, right? But then that etronite takes up more space, and so it kind of explodes the concrete from the inside. So that's why when we do mass concrete, uh we do everything we can to keep the hydration temperatures below 170, because it's a danger zone for um having basic structural concrete failure. So yeah, so that's the kind of the upper limit. You know, it's really common, I would say for most pores, we're probably hitting 120 degrees, you know, on a flat work, uh, unless, you know, in the core of those types of things. Um, but you know, not hot enough to cook a steak, I think, you know, warm. It it definitely can generate enough heat that if you have, you know, just a blanket or something over it in the winter that it'll protect itself. But yeah, it doesn't get crazy hot unless you got mass concrete.