Scaling a Trade Business Through Culture & Leadership

In this episode, we look at culture. We also discuss leadership and accountability. These help drive sustainable business growth. Josh talks with James Dean from 365 Property Solutions. They discuss how to grow a trade business from 8 to over 25 people. They also talk about strong client relationships. A good team culture is important too. Solid operations matter as well. This episode shares practical examples and lessons. It shows trade business owners how to build strong teams. It helps them develop leaders and grow their businesses. They can do this without losing quality or control.

Scaling a Trade Business Through Culture & Leadership to whole topic, we cover:

• Why Culture Is More Than Team Events Learn how clear communication and team growth help. Leadership training and a sense of belonging also build an engaged workforce. This leads to better performance.

• Growing from Tradesperson to Business Leader Learn how to shift your mindset from hands-on work to leading a team. Learn how to develop managers and build a scalable business.

• Building Long-Term Client Relationships James says clear communication is key. Reliability matters too. Taking responsibility for problems helps a lot. These things build strong client partnerships. Strong partnerships mean repeat work and long-term growth.

• Building Accountability with Leadership Systems Daily huddles keep teams on track. Weekly workshops help fix problems. Regular reports keep everyone in the loop. This boosts performance.

Want to boost your trade business? This episode is full of practical tips you can use right away. Growing your team? Developing leaders? Building a strong culture? These lessons can help. They will guide you to create a business that scales. You’ll do this with confidence and clarity.

Join us to learn how to build a great culture. Discover how to create strong leaders. Grow a trade business that people want to join and work with.

#TradeBusinessGrowth #ConstructionBusiness #Leadership #CompanyCulture #BusinessSystems #TradeEntrepreneur

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

Welcome to another episode of the Handle It Podcast. Join us to take the edge off business, cut through the noise, and give you practical mindset shifts, proven frameworks, and business strategies you can action today. You're not here to be lectured. You're here to learn, grow, and finally handle it. Let's get to work.

SPEAKER_01 0:18

Sit there and reflect and just understand what you're willing to sacrifice to actually put the time, effort, and money into it and understand whether escape plan or the end goal is right.

SPEAKER_00 0:26

You've got big decent businesses that you've had for the long term. How do you get such great clients?

SPEAKER_01 0:32

Don't make excuses, just keep them in the loop. Everyone's human, they understand that things happen. As long as you ring up with a solution, not just the problem, that seems to go a long way too, right?

SPEAKER_00 0:40

What do you do to sort of allow yourself to shop each day and run the business?

SPEAKER_01 0:44

Try and stick to 10 hours a day, delegate the work that I really know that I shouldn't be doing. And are you the cheapest? No, we're definitely not the cheapest.

SPEAKER_00 1:02

So today I just want to get a bit of a background of what you're finding is really helping you in business. Because I'm finding that a lot of businesses are really thriving at the moment or really struggling. So it'd be really interesting to your journey and what you're doing to solve some of those problems and capture the opportunity, especially here in Brisbane, right, with all the work coming in with the Olympic Games. But I think before we get started on that, tell me a bit about your background, where you came from and how you got started in business. Yeah, cool.

SPEAKER_01 1:26

So I'm New Zealand born and raised, uh, North Island. Uh my background is I sort of grew up working on farms from an early age into stock feed and things like that, and then found myself in the oil and gas industry. I spent 10 years throughout New Zealand and uh Australia doing oil and gas and geothermal energy drilling. So that gave me a good um a good crash course on yeah, really how to work and work hard to get the results. And then I got the opportunity to work into the trade businesses and uh complete maintenance and all that kind of bits and pieces that come along with it. So um learnt all that on the fly and then the opportunity came to sort of fell on my lap to run a business from not knowing much at all. And yes, I just jumped in all in and uh crash course from Res Vita has really helped me get to where I am now.

SPEAKER_00 2:15

So yeah, it's been really impressive to watch you actually like just trust the process, do the work, and see you develop the skills of a you know professional business builder. But what would you say to some people that are like either looking at getting into business or just started, what are some of the core skills you learned early on or recently that if you could do it again, would you you'd bring to the front to learn first?

SPEAKER_01 2:34

Uh, probably a lot around recruiting is is really been uh one of the struggles that I've been finding and trying to deal with in the in the time we have. So I started with eight guys, we're we're up to 25 at the moment. But yeah, all the little nuances and understanding you know how much guys can actually cost you in the long run. So make sure you're right. Oh yeah, yeah. Yeah, so there's been a decent amount of turnover, but to find those key trades is is um is what we're really looking for.

SPEAKER_00 3:00

So you've had some success recently with finding new guys. That was like a long journey, right? It's a real dry patch there. Have you tried have you changed anything or is this the market shift?

SPEAKER_01 3:09

Um we we try to change things on the fly. So we'll put an ad up for a month, we put it on multiple platforms and we'll modify it as we go through, which is the biggest thing. Um, directing it because we're such a diverse range of trades, we're looking for plasterers, carpenters, painters, um, and and solid labourers that have got a good skill set. So sometimes it's a bit of turn and burn, and you just got to take the opportunity when it gets there. And sometimes um, yeah, you'll find out a month later that you'd made the wrong call or get rid of them, yeah. Yeah, so if they're not a fit, they're not a fit.

SPEAKER_00 3:39

Yeah, and something that's impressive about you and 365 is once guys generally come in though and you find that good fit, they generally stay with you for the long term. So I know culture's big for you. What's some of the things you're doing to keep and train and develop your workforce?

SPEAKER_01 3:51

Yeah, so culture is huge. We we do a quite like a solid push on to um social club and trying to catch up on Fridays and stuff like that and stay connected with the team. So as a rule of thumb, we do a trade trade breakfast every month. Yeah, and we'd sort of go over what went what worked well last month, what do we need to focus on for this month, and giving them a I suppose a bit of insight into the business and and try and plan. So social clubs are a thing. We take our guys out once a month to do go-karts or paintball or gel blasting and or bowling, you know.

SPEAKER_00 4:21

And we sometimes you get a bit of pushback on that, though, right?

SPEAKER_01 4:23

We do get a lot of pushback sometimes. Sometimes the guys, you know, just don't really want to show up. They it can be far, far to go. If it's a Friday afternoon, you know, you've got to understand our guys are all over the place. If they're gonna drive an hour on Friday in traffic, they're probably not gonna count.

SPEAKER_00 4:38

But yeah, and then you do like every quarter, right? You bring or every three or four months, you're bringing your whole company together, right? And give them a bit of say into solving problems.

SPEAKER_01 4:46

Yeah, so we call that our summit, and that's just uh again more ins insight into the business and and yeah, bringing them up professionally and personally, just getting them to think about things a bit more, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 4:56

But it's ongoing, right? It's not like I said and forget it's like it's constant.

SPEAKER_01 5:00

It's always ongoing, there's always a bit of pushback. Some guys really don't like being in a classroom, they think that it's uh more beneficial just being on the tools non-stop, and that's all they want to do.

SPEAKER_00 5:08

But but you see the improvement in them, right?

SPEAKER_01 5:10

Like, yeah, we do, yeah, we do. As soon as we have one, it's just a massive upswing. And then by the time the next ones come around, it's yeah, you can generally feel it's time.

SPEAKER_00 5:19

So and what makes you keep doing them even if other people don't think it's the best thing? Like, how do you sort of you know culture's one of those things that you kind of got to have a bit of like belief in that what you're doing is right for a period of time.

SPEAKER_01 5:30

Yeah, it is just purely belief. Like I could like where where I've come from, like by committing myself to it and learning. Yeah, I've seen it, I've seen it in myself, sort of proof and the pudding, plus a lot of the other guys around me in the management. Um we've all come a long way.

SPEAKER_00 5:45

So yeah, I think one of the parts of 365 that does help the team retention tools, like having great clients. Like a lot of people, like I'm no doubt you probably get comments around how good your clientele is. You've got big, decent businesses that you've had for the long term. Yeah. So sort of help me unpack like how do you get such great clients and then how you're able to keep them for so long?

SPEAKER_01 6:04

Um, so we work on like a partnership model basically. So one one they've only got one point of contact, and that's you know, generally me as I've built a business. Yeah. Um worked with work worked and known with a lot of these guys for you know multiple years. Yeah. And um, I think the biggest selling factor is that we can control all our timelines because our guys are all in-house the full time. We've earned the respect that they know what they're gonna receive when they when they go with us, yeah. And that if there is any issues, we're pretty good at just fixing it on the fly and not charging for inefficiency. So and are you the cheapest? No, we're definitely not the cheapest.

SPEAKER_00 6:39

That's good for people to hear, right? Like it's not always about price, but yeah, I think you guys have really thought about the customer journey, which uh myself and Jackson spoke about a few times, right? Like it's like you could do a job that's 99% correct, but what do they see at the end, right? It's like the keys weren't dropped back or they damaged a sign or something, or yeah, and those things do happen, right?

SPEAKER_01 6:58

Everybody's human. Yeah, there have been instances where we've lost keys to a shopping centre before, but we c we came across that one and uh managed to get out the other side, not a problem. But um mostly the communication is what fixes everything. Everybody just needs to know what stage it's at and that it's being communicated and then it's being sorted for them.

SPEAKER_00 7:16

So yeah, because I think that's all you guys do well. And correct me if I'm wrong, it's like it's not that things don't go wrong, but you guys just need to jump on them and take responsibility and not not make excuses, right?

SPEAKER_01 7:25

Yeah, yeah, that's exactly it. Don't make excuses, just keep them in the loop. Everyone's human, they understand that things happen. And as long as you ring up with a solution, not just the problem, um, that seems to go a long way too, right? So yeah, thinking about it and just um not putting it to the side to make sure we lock things in, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 7:41

Yeah, and it's really impressive. You said like you've got eight people to 25, and you sort of float around 18, 90 for a long time and just chew glass, right, and suck the shit up. Yep. But it's like, tell me about what you've struggled with putting on like a level of like maybe not senior management, but definitely middle management, right? So you got like project managers, sales managers, ops managers, and the journey, the difficult journey of changing yourself as a leader.

SPEAKER_01 8:06

Uh well, yeah. I I suppose it's a it's a lot been a lot about identity for me. I was um when I was on the tools, I was a pretty reckless and like to go hard and never stop and just get things done. So um having myself sit back and then watch people and and realize, you know, people, other people's shortfalls and where other team members can help them out and sort of working them like that way is um is been a bit of a trick here in itself.

SPEAKER_00 8:29

And what about helping departments see eye to eye? Because I know that sales come gets frustrated with projects, gets frustrated with operations, right? You know, I've I've I've watched you guys go through these levels of misalignment and alignment. How are you finding it now? And I think it's getting better, right? Yeah, yeah, definitely.

SPEAKER_01 8:44

It's um I suppose the last probably 14 months, uh, we've we took on, you know, someone senior, like you say, straight into the projects role. Um, so that big churn burn thing is um sort of hits, you know, storm norm perform. Yeah, everyone sort of gets out of line and it's like a continuous thing. But um, yeah, I feel like we're really hitting our stride and working together as a team and everybody's taking more accountability.

SPEAKER_00 9:10

Norm, form, storm, perform. So form, storm, norm, perform, yeah. That storm was a big storm, right? Yeah, it was. I think it's like you've highlighted it really well. Like you might change someone on the as a labourer or a tradesman, there might be a little bit of disagreement, but when you take someone who's like one of the key pillars of your business, it's gonna take a period of time for everyone to sort of wigger out figure out how each other works and starting performance.

SPEAKER_01 9:33

Yeah, exactly. Yeah, it's a huge, yeah, huge, huge piece of the puzzle, and um can put a lot of people off side or onside more. So yeah.

SPEAKER_00 9:41

So then with your senior management team, I see you guys doing like your daily meetings, your weekly workshops, like you've got a bit of a meeting and reporting rhythm, which is critical, right? Yep. So what what is the meeting rhythm you guys meet on and what's some of the things you cover in each one of those?

SPEAKER_01 9:55

Uh so general rule of thumb, which I've been doing for years, is just a daily huddle. So that's a small five-minute, five-minute catch-up with um middle management. Everyone goes through sort of what their priority is and what they really want to see from the day. And it's the idea of us just to push out all the questions for the rest of the day and leave everyone to their role. So um, five minutes every morning, we do a weekly win workshop. Um, that's what we call it. So that's going through our metrics, our team, performance, what's upcoming with our partners, and um framing it in in a simple way. So yeah.

SPEAKER_00 10:31

And do you find that like I know you guys work semi-remotely? Is that still do you did your team see value in coming together for that time, or you still find it?

SPEAKER_01 10:39

Oh, there's always it it could be depend on the month and the and the workload as well, right? Everybody thinks it's not the important thing to do if it's real busy out there. Yeah, um, but hold it, I hold that line and it's I believe is the most one of the most important hours of the whole week, right?

SPEAKER_00 10:54

So yeah, and how are you finding at the moment like the market? So you're a lot of stuff around like cost of living, fuel, inflation. Are you finding that slowing down the sales or is that affecting your business in any way?

SPEAKER_01 11:04

Um, yet to see anything from the fuel crisis, people are still spending money. Um it's I suppose it's still giving us that time to allow, and we're really trying to upgrade our quotes and our our service and everything to go along with that. Yeah, figure out what's valuable and what's more important for them. And um, yeah, sales, sales are always sales, people always have money, and uh that's just we people yeah, we believe it, and we believe they need our help.

SPEAKER_00 11:30

So, who do you work for? Who's your ideal clients?

SPEAKER_01 11:33

Um, our ideal clients are commercial, um, shopping centres and things like that. So looking after all maintenance from plaster patches to bollards to bitumen repairs, line marking, pressure cleaning.

SPEAKER_00 11:44

And then what who does Tim look after your sales rep?

SPEAKER_01 11:47

Uh Tim, he's our younger sales rep. So he's um he's looks after all the body corporate. So things we do for body corporates is a lot of fencing, building repaints, uh safety report rectifications and things like that.

SPEAKER_00 11:59

And do you find they have two very different needs or you solve different problems for them? Like do you treat them differently?

SPEAKER_01 12:05

Yeah, yeah, we do. Um, so obviously the commercial clients we find that it's uh more of a personal thing. They you would just they want me or someone to go out and solve their problem. They walk me through it, show it, and we fix the problem. Um body corporates, they more online, email, and phone-based. Um, they don't really have the time to get out and catch up and do those things. They just want the the information and the job solved across their desk.

SPEAKER_00 12:30

Yeah, it's a bit of a different base, body corporate, right? A lot of people don't understand you've got to sort of commit three, six, nine months.

SPEAKER_01 12:36

Yeah, there's some yeah, terrible, terribly long lead times on some jobs, but um as long as you gauge that, we gauge that expectation of them, we we understand it. We've worked in that space for a long time, so we know we could be getting a job that we've quoted two years down the track, yeah, and just having them aware that there is a gonna be a cost change to that.

SPEAKER_00 12:54

Yeah, and um is that why you have the commercial and the body corporate sort of temper each other.

SPEAKER_01 12:58

Yeah, we do find um ips and flows with it. Uh commercial commercial sort of ramps up to the woods of end of financials or the start of the new financial with their budgets, and um body corps, the workload is a lot more linear than anything else, so it's it's sort of meat and potatoes versus the larger big jobs, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 13:17

Yeah, sweet. And how do you look after yourself and all this? You know, you got 25 guys, got a partner, got dreams and goals yourself. What do you do to sort of allow yourself to show up each day and and run the business? Um, I'm pretty strict on how how how much I'll work. Yeah, I'm pretty good like that, yeah. Yeah, unlike me, I'm just a sucker for fucking unlimited work, but it's always impressed me.

SPEAKER_01 13:35

Yeah, yeah. So Mondays I do try and take Mondays. I'm gonna work my way back into that. Um always, always on a catch-up, but yeah, try and stick to 10 hours a day and um delegate the work that I really know that I shouldn't be doing. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 13:48

Where I like to keep everything in inside, but I'll you realising how to delegate things and make sure they're done is I think it's a presence on some guys trap that I fell into time and time again was like just doing more, more, more, more, more, and then allowing people just to do less, less, less, right? To your detriment. So you've sounds like you've got a bit of a a good good boundaries there around I don't have to do more to get the work done. I need to make sure that my team is supporting me. I'm yeah, you know, not just doing dumb shit really.

SPEAKER_01 14:15

Yeah, a lot of it, like it's easy for me to grab it and just go and fix it. Yeah, but that's no one's learning from that. So um holding that back and making making sure that it's done and then tell them that what the standard is and making and checking, um, then that allows me more time in my days, right?

SPEAKER_00 14:31

So yeah, so what's next for you in 365? You've got to this sort of level of growth of you know, 24, 25 guys, which is great. What's the next 12 months look like for you?

SPEAKER_01 14:39

Uh the next 12 months is about probably just shrinking down and like really locking in our process. Yeah, start putting some money in the bank, figure out what's next. Is it to scale, is this to scale to 40 plus, or you know, what is it, what the direction is, what job size do we need to sort of look at, figure out where we're making money and where we're losing money.

SPEAKER_00 15:00

I think people go wrong. I do that all the time, I just keep on growing until I I just ran out of steam, right? It's just like important to grow, let it settle down from it. Almost let the team catch up to the growth too, right? Like let's just see where we're at, yeah. And and prepare and consciously choose that growth. Because if you want to go to 40, 48 people, buck, that's gonna take a lot of effort.

SPEAKER_01 15:18

Yeah, it's a lot of effort, it's a lot of time and it's a lot of money, right?

SPEAKER_00 15:21

And does it support your life and what your what your goals are?

SPEAKER_01 15:24

Yeah, yeah. So my goals is probably to work just w get to a space where I'm a lot more freer and I could just pop in and see see the business and catch up with the guys, right? Yeah, and have it have it seamlessly running. Yeah, that's that's generally it.

SPEAKER_00 15:39

And what would you tell if people there in wanting to grow a business, you know, like from say the hour around there, four, five, six people and they want to get to where you got to 24, 25 people. What what advice would you give your previous self to them?

SPEAKER_01 15:52

Yeah, probably um it'd be the biggest one would be just sit there and reflect and just understand what what you're willing to sacrifice to actually put the time and time, effort, and money into it, yeah, and understand where the where the escape plan or the end goal is, right?

SPEAKER_00 16:06

So yeah, what what are you actually willing to invest? Uh it does take a lot of time.

SPEAKER_01 16:09

And it changes changes all the way through business too, right? So yeah, I've I've had to reframe my thinking a lot a lot of the time over the last few years.

SPEAKER_00 16:16

So yeah, well it's been impressive to watch, impressive to be a part of, and we're grateful for it. And we can't wait to see the next 12 months unfold for you. Yeah, neither can I. Thank you. Thank you for joining us for another episode of the Handle It Podcast. Head over to resvita.com.au to join the handle it with resvita community, like hundreds of people, just like you have done, and gain access to grab free resources, tools, templates, and the blueprints you need to scale. Now you know it's your move. See you inside.