Roofing Success
The Roofing Success Podcast is a show created to inspire roofing contractors to achieve optimal success in their roofing businesses. The host, Jim Ahlin, is the co-author of the book, "Internet Marketing For Roofing Contractors, How to TRIPLE Your Sales and Turn Your Roofing Website Into an Online Lead Generation Machine", and Co-Founder of Roofer Marketers, the Digital Marketing Agency for the roofing industry. On each episode, Jim will be sitting down with industry leaders to talk about their processes, the lessons they learned, and how to find success in roofing.
Roofing Success
Why Most Roofers Fail After Storm Peaks: Lessons From The Drop After A $21M Peak w/ George Boudreaux
Why Do Roofers Struggle After Storm Peaks?
Many roofing companies ride the storm wave to massive growth, only to crash when the storm-driven demand fades. In this episode, George Boudreaux of Pelican Roofing shares his real-life lessons from scaling to $21M and navigating the steep decline that followed.
Discover how George turned setbacks into comebacks by reinventing his leadership, rebuilding culture, and focusing on long-term stability.
Here’s what you’ll learn:
- The hidden risks of storm-driven growth.
- Why great systems and teams are your safety net.
- How self-awareness and leadership growth fuel success.
- The steps to redefine company culture and build lasting resilience.
If you’ve felt stuck in a revenue dip or lost clarity in your business, this episode is packed with actionable insights to help you bounce back stronger.
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How do you weather the storm when a hurricane fuels your growth but leaves a revenue vacuum in its wake? In this episode, we explore resilience and reinvention with George Boudreau, owner of Pelican Roofing, who has navigated peaks, valleys and everything in between. George is the driving force behind Pelican Roofing in Louisiana, with years of experience managing both growth and setbacks. George's story is a testament to entrepreneurial grit From scaling up after hurricanes to redefining his company's vision. George's journey reveals how to stay motivated, adapt and build a sustainable business that thrives under pressure. Today, we'll uncover strategies to turn challenges into opportunities. Today, we'll uncover strategies to turn challenges into opportunities. Let's dive in with George Boudreaux. Welcome to the Roofing Success Podcast. I'm Jim Alleyne and I'm here to bring you insights from top leaders in the roofing industry to help you grow and scale your roofing business. Welcome back, george Boudreaux. Man, you got the name of a Southern gentleman.
Speaker 2:Good pronunciation, little French. And actually is Alain French? It's not no Okay, because we would say that looks like a French name and we wouldn't say Alain, or however you say it.
Speaker 1:Honestly it could be. Honestly it could be. My birth father or my adoptive father is Slovenian, the name is from Slovenia and one of the things to know about Slovenia is, if you've, if you geographically, if you look at the boot of Italy, it's touching the upper right hand part of the boot. So in that region between France, italy and Turkey that people have crossed through there many, many times Napoleon came down that way, the Roman Empire, the Ottoman Empire, the you know there was a lot of, so the names probably traveled through those areas, right, yeah?
Speaker 2:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Well, awesome man, good to have you back on. It's been a while. Are you on Pelican Roofing down in Lafayette, louisiana? So you are a Southern gentleman, you don't just have the name of a Southern gentleman.
Speaker 2:You are a Southern gentleman.
Speaker 1:We live it Awesome, man. Well, we wanted to talk, I wanted to have you back on, because last time we were here, I mean we talked a lot about the ups and downs of the roofing industry and you guys really went through this revenue peak and then you came down and of course didn't come back down to zero, but kind of came back and hit another level on the way down in your restructuring and now have grown it back up and I wanted to talk a lot about that with you. What is it like it back up? And I wanted to talk a lot about that with you. What is it like? What is the? What is that journey of those peaks and valleys of the business? How do you make it through? How do you reinvent your business many times along the way? So you know, maybe from a kind of from a macro perspective, how do you, how did you guys reinvent your business?
Speaker 2:Yeah well, the short, quick answer is you get forced to, unless you're going to just decide to give up. You know, pain is the teacher, necessity is the mother of invention. These quotes stay around for a reason. So you know, most entrepreneurs are very resilient people Like it starts off small and we get. We get a little. We develop those calluses and develop pain points along the way.
Speaker 2:Just before we went on air, you and I are talking about how entrepreneurship is one of the quickest and guaranteed paths to self-development, along with having kids. You're just kind of forced into becoming better. So, yeah, it's almost like it was forced in a way, but yeah, so it certainly required a lot of resilience. But I think the reason we're able to be resilient and climb back up is because we have something that we're chasing. We all have some reason. We started the business. Some of us it's money, some of us it's freedom of time or financial freedom, or we need to prove something to somebody. For a lot of us, a lot of us, our fathers may be still trying to do that. So that thing is what kind of drives us, I think in the darker times kind of drives us, I think, in the darker times. And so, yeah, we went. You know, we had a pretty rapid climb up from 2017-ish up through 21, where we were doubling revenue every year, from two and a half to five to 10, to 21 in 2021. And on the tail end of that cycle were some large hurricanes that aided us in that increased revenue. But then after that, we learned the really hard lesson that many other roofers have learned about the vacuum that occurs post-storm, and I had no idea how much of a vacuum was going to be there, but it essentially sucked out half of our revenue. But we had built so much, so many good systems and brought in so many great people that I was just holding on for dear life because I believed every day well, it's about to change, it's about to get better, we're going to start selling more, and we worked our butts off and were able to hang on.
Speaker 2:But we had a couple of years there where we were either losing money or just barely profitable and we could have scaled down and let go of a lot of people and been profitable. And I knew that every day and I wrestled with it every day. I know I've got this manager, this manager and this manager, and they just don't have a whole lot to manage right now and I probably should let them go. But I just kept hanging on thinking, man, the dream is bigger, we want to do other things and these are special people. So basically we just put our heads down and went to work predominantly in sales, like figuring out sales, how to sell, how to develop the best presentation, how to have the right systems, daily systems in place so that we could start to generate that revenue again.
Speaker 2:But that was that was quite a long path.
Speaker 2:I mean, that was over a year of struggling through that and you know, in that process post hurricanes 21 going into 22, I was burnt out and a lot of our staff was too from all of that work and I started really reconsidering what I wanted for the company.
Speaker 2:Just personally, like for my day-to-day life, I really wanted about a $5 million company because I knew I could reduce overhead, be highly profitable and not have a lot of headaches and then I could go off and do some other things I was interested in because I was losing interest, very frankly, in the day to day operations of a roofing company. I liked what it provided for me, but didn't want to do that every day, and and so, as I was approaching that crossroads, I knew that our team and our great people needed growth. Otherwise they were going to become apathetic, stagnant, and the thing would eventually fall apart. So I was like what am I going to do? The company needs to grow. I don't want to. I don't have the energy to actually grow this company again and get it to the next level, and so I started to consider bringing on a partner as a potential solution for that.
Speaker 1:That's interesting. I want to go back to a couple of things. First and I think this is a common challenge that a lot of entrepreneurs face in their business is you get to a point and you kind of lose interest in a lot of things, and it could happen in a couple of ways. It could happen from getting to a place of success that you that path. I feel like it's like oh well, I got this down, I learned how to do this. My mind is I need to move on to another challenge or something like that. But then on the other side of it is that grind wheel of, like man, you just can't get this thing to work the way you want it to work and it eats away at you, and it eats away at you, and it eats away at you. Which, which losing interest was? Was it for you?
Speaker 2:Yeah, the former, the first you mentioned more. So, yeah, it was okay. So I kind of conquered that and I think there was also a part of me that much of my business was built on the back of insecurity. I came to realize, you know, kind of on the tail end of those years I realized that I was trying to prove to my father that I was worthy enough and get his approval, and I was trying to prove to some of my peer friends who were successful that I also could be successful. And I was trying to also prove to the guy in middle school who made fun of me, or the person on Facebook who I think may be doubting my intelligence or something, that I could in fact do it. So that was.
Speaker 2:I was unaware of that for a long time and then, whenever I achieved the success, it started to occur to me. It was like man, my dad actually always loved me and didn't need me to be. You know, my friends don't care, you know, and it doesn't really matter what anyone else thinks, so you know. So I was like so I don't, I don't, even so, i't have that driver anymore and it didn't matter. That didn't matter, and I moved into more of a place of what do I want to do.
Speaker 1:Life is short, yeah crazy man, like it's crazy. Those, those early think the stories that we make up in our mind. But a lot of entrepreneurs have those stories right. They have that narrative of. I'm going to prove that I can right like, I'll show you that's a man, that's a, that's a strong motivate, that is, it is fuel yeah I.
Speaker 1:I actually actually even heard it one time, george, when we talked about, you know, kids and kids in business or what bill you know, kind of create that personal development in yourself. That it's that the young adults who are more motivated a lot of times come from environments where they need. They are making up for that or they're trying to prove that and it's like, man, do I need to screw my kids up a little bit? Do I need right, like, what do I need to do here, george?
Speaker 2:And not the same questions over here.
Speaker 1:Wow, how can I give them that motivation?
Speaker 2:Yeah, but I would, I would. I would add this, jim Like yes, that that works and it's very effective, yes, that that works and it's very effective, like you can really move the needle because that that motivation is so strong and that fire is burning. But it's, it's one way and I've also discovered that there is another way. That's right. Look, I think we're all on our own journeys and we all have to go through whatever the things, whatever lessons life is teaching us, like we all have our.
Speaker 2:As one of my coaches that tells me, like, when I'm going through something difficult, like this is in your curriculum, this is, this is kind of destined for. You have to pass this test, you know like and. And so I had, I had to go through that, that journey. So I had to go through that journey. But I'm also hoping that my kids can learn some other ways, with a little more flow and a little less resistance, to get to where they want to go. So I don't know that it's necessary, but it's certainly a lot of fuel and I think it was the only path for me to get up to this point.
Speaker 2:But I'm no longer trying to leverage those things, although it is still tempting, like anger is powerful. Anger is a powerful force that can really get some things done, good or bad. But I'm in a process in my life right now where I'm learning a lot more about releasing that so that I can be in in complete flow and I can be an open vessel for all of the, all of the good things that you could insert life, god, the universe, whatever you like there wants to bestow on me, and so I think that's the most powerful way to progress is to be open, because there's this all loving, all powerful energy not to get too spiritual on you guys here, but that's just my belief, but I actually believe it is the sharpest tool on the tool belt to get where we're all trying to go.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I like that. You said it's your curriculum. I was just earlier this morning I was flipping through some motivational kind of clips and there was a story. It was Kenny Smith, the NBA star. He was in the NBA. Now he's a commentator. I think it was him who was telling the story that in the summers one of his roommates was one of the children in the Kohler family, as in the like every toilet in America, right, Like you know, plumbing fixtures and things like that, and and and, if I remember right, he asked him something like well, why, why are you, what are you doing here, sleeping on our you know, in our couch and our you know what I mean? Like well, his dad said well, you have to be a plumber first to work here. Why didn't your dad just give you an executive job? Well, because you got to you off camera about leadership and building that leadership muscle is you can maybe create some of that curriculum for someone Right, Like that they don't have to just be forced into that curriculum, like so that's right.
Speaker 1:This. This person's father said all right, you're going to become a plumber. Then you go on and your next you know your next class is this know, your next class is this, then your next class is this, then your next class is this. And then you can come into the company and be part of the company and that's the. You know you will get the curriculum one way or another.
Speaker 2:Yeah, you know, what I like about that is, yeah, like there are people who have been able to skip through parts of the curriculum and they have been handed that executive job or whatever it is and, look, things may be easier on them and they didn't have to struggle through it and all of that. But I also believe that there is a corresponding sacrifice in joy as a result of that, and so the lower you go or the harder a thing is, the better the experience on the other side, the more joy and appreciation and gratitude that we have on the other side. So one of my digital mentors uses this framework of a one to 10 scale, where one being the worst of days or the hardest experiences and 10 being the most joyful and joyful experiences and how most people live in the fours, fives and sixes, and he runs that cycle down. So one is at the top and 10 is at the top, but in the pit is four, five and six, which is like mediocrity. So whenever you're experiencing the pain or the hardship of a one, two or three, it allows for you to have the eights, nines and tens.
Speaker 2:Because we're all comparison making machines. That's what we do. We don't know how to not do that. We only enjoy the sunlight because it rains. You enjoy the warmth of the fire because you were cold. You don't go to the fire after you've been hot outside. So that that is a. That's a framework I like to use, also when I'm going through something that's hard or difficult is okay. Well, I'm going to really appreciate this on the other side so you can skip the test, but you're going to live without all of like that guy at the top that skipped the test. He, he ain't having as much fun man no.
Speaker 2:He's not going to be as light.
Speaker 1:And they. Always there's that kind of story of, like that second third generation, let's say, a business gets handed down and that second third generation, they don't execute as well. In a lot of cases and it's a lot of, they didn't get those ones and twos right, like they didn't get and and and. So there's a gap in. There's a gap not only in knowledge. There's a gap in that, in the, in the, in the drive. There's a gap in the, the resilience. There's a gap in right there. So the, you know, we and this is a great conversation to have for people you know we're going into the new year I don't know if this is going to air in the in queue, probably in quarter one of 2025. But coming into the new year, the new year is that regenerative kind of refresh in your mind and it's like man, it's the perspective, right, all of those things that are in front of you, all of those problems that you're facing, that's, and if you can look at them as as part of the curriculum, like man, I didn't like, I man, I really didn't like. You know, uh, algebra three in in in college or whatever it was, or in school, I, I mean, I really man, geometry was the worst, or you know that literature class was man, I hated writing those papers but you had to get through it, right, like you had to get through it and get to the other side of it and looking at those tests.
Speaker 1:So in that loss of interest and kind of reevaluation and you know you guys had peaked, you came down. You came down into a valley and you're like all right, where do we go from here? Do we go? Does this thing go down even further, right? Do we go back to sea level, or are we going to go up the next mountain, like which and in that it sounds like you're you started or you considered a partnership and now have taken on a partner in the business. Let's talk about that a little bit, because I think that a lot of times people look at partnerships as something that start from the beginning. It's not something that gets added into a business. So how did that come about as a pathway to you?
Speaker 2:Yeah. So you know, frankly, I spent the first year as we went from $21 million down to $10 million and did not decrease operational costs a whole lot. So that was a painful year and during that year was one of these tests for me. I had no way out and I didn't have a sales manager for much of that year. So I had to step back into that role and I had to do a good job, which meant I had to learn it from scratch. And I had to do a good job, which meant I had to learn it from scratch. So I studied and did all I was taking in everything I could to try to learn how to be a sales manager and just learn about sales. So that was a test I wanted to skip. I really, really didn't want to do that, but I just didn't have optionality. But during that process it wore me out even more and forced me to start thinking of other ways out. And so, you know, eventually found a sales manager. But I was like dude, what am I like? How am I going to take care of this company and take care of myself? And you know, I thought about selling to private equity at that point, but they typically want you to stay on for a few years and I was like I don't even have three years in my. I can't fathom doing this for three more years. And some people may not understand how do you run a company for eight, nine years and all of a sudden you just can't do it anymore? But my dad raised me and I grew up with this mentality of life is short. Let's do the things we really want to do. So after feeling that way for a long time and not being able to explore it, I was very uncomfortable and agitated. And you know, actually I spent. I spent a few days with a friend of mine at his ranch in Texas and he made a comment and he said you just need to get a few smarter people around you. And so I was like you know what? I'm just going to go find a partner and I know that I'll probably leave millions of dollars on the table by doing this, by giving up 50% of the company. But you know what? I may not even get it there with my energy where it's at right now.
Speaker 2:So I had an ad out for a sales manager, had just hired a guy and some guy in my community calls and says hey man, I see you have this. I'm in oil and gas. I'm kind of itchy for something to invest in and some new venture, I don't know. I'm just curious about what you have going on. We had done his roof in 2015. Nightmare of a roof, the way everything just drained into the center of the dang thing but, and so it leaked. Of course should have never taken the job, but did. And then we went out three, four, five times until we got it right.
Speaker 2:So there was a good impression left on him and he saw us in the community and thought we had a good outfit. And so he called, we started talking and you know I had three main check boxes. I had determined, like I identified exactly who I needed in a partner, and that was a number one. They had to be intelligent, because I could not, I didn't have an appetite to teach someone for two years. Number two I wanted to make sure that they cared a lot Like they. They would really care for the employees and the customer, so that I didn't have to lose sleep at night worrying about that. And then number three was like a high level of motivation, like something that was going to drive them during those, if another dark time comes, like how are they going to get through it? So this guy, nathan, he checked all those boxes really well.
Speaker 2:We spent seven months vetting each other and then signed papers in August of 23 for him to buy in at 50% of the company and since that point he's taken on the role of CEO, basically, and I've been able to step back. I initially took a break from the company for a few months. I initially took a break from the company for a few months. First I trained him for about six months and stayed in, but then after that, in July, I took a few months and really stepped out for the most part and that gave me a nice breather and refresher. And then it occurred to me, as we're moving forward into our next phase and with our next goals, that oh wait, the company actually needs to step back in and kind of a different role. This company can use some of my, my talents and energy and actually have it again to give in another way.
Speaker 1:So it definitely allowed that. Refresh, right, like, and what did you look for in term? Did like? I always think of great partnerships and having complimenting skill sets. Not not not the same skill set. A lot of times, two sales reps will start a company and they both know how to sell, but no one knows how to do the rest of the work. Right, I always think that great partnerships have have man, I'm really good at this and you're really good at that. Have you guys. Was that part of the vetting process where you're like oh, man.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I'm a visionary, you know, and he's an integrator. So, yeah, he likes getting into the legal fine print on things he can't stand to do it Like can I just go run a marathon instead of reading those eight pages today? Yeah, instead of reading that, those eight pages today, yeah, so, so yeah, he gets into the details and likes all of that stuff, which is which is important. As a CEO, you do have to start to to gain that high level. But he got in, came to understand the details very well and now he's starting to kind of raise up to that higher level of just managing KPIs for our managers and letting them run their divisions. But we certainly do compliment each other well there.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's awesome. What was the thing that you felt you could bring back, Like what was you know? You kind of had this man, I have a skill set here that I can bring back to the company, and what, what was that? That?
Speaker 2:that and that energized you to come back to the and execute on that came to realize that the company is only going to grow based on, on the belief systems of the people growing it. So we always have a ceiling we all have our ceilings in our belief systems around what we're capable of, and that influences the company in a large way. And I came to realize that we had kind of been hitting our head. So we went back up to 15, about 15 million this year and revenue is where we'll be, and we were trying to get to 20 this year and it occurred to me like the reason for that and I realized that as a management team we were still limiting ourselves a whole lot in terms of what we think we can do. A lot of these managers were there at two and a half million and so the things we did to get to five and 10 and then operate through the storms at 20 are not the same things that grow a company organically to 20 or 30 million. You have to step into a next level. So I have to become a different person myself first, and then our managers do. So it started occurring to me where these blocks were and I was like man, we're really going to have to have a shift in our culture, and by culture I mean the things that we believe, the way that we interact with each other yes, of course, but like the way we do things, the way we work. And so not only do we have goals of getting next year $25 million as the goal in revenue one of our goals, but we have goals beyond that. We want to be the very best roofing company in the United States. We want to be the very best roofing company in the United States.
Speaker 2:The main defining factor there is the way we do things, like how the customer feels. Is the customer experience the best? Are they in awe? Are our employees like I would never want to work anywhere else? Are our vendors saying, like dude, I will do anything for Pelican Roofing because they make my job easy and they're pleasant to be around? Like the community, like these people are wonderful, they're giving back, like we feel the care from this company. And that's our new cultural initiative and that's what I felt like needed to be injected into the company. Is this new culture, this new energy of like dude, we're going to be the best, we're going to care the most, we're going to be so proud of what we're doing. We know exactly where we're going. It's not just a revenue chase, but we know what we're doing every day and it matters to us, and so I felt the need to come back in and drive that initiative in a very systematic way too.
Speaker 2:Like I know that I can't just come in here and talk about that stuff. Like there has to be a system for how we give, when we give, how I support our leadership team. I'm a driver by nature. I look more like probably a football coach than a CEO in just the way that I like to lead, the way that I am with my kids. I enjoy being coached that way also to a large extent. So it's like hey look, we have this agreement, go do this, that's how I would lead.
Speaker 2:That doesn't work. That works at certain levels, you know, but there's like some fear that's baked into that stuff and so I'm learning also as a leader. Like I have to come in and I have to love my people. I have to. So they have to feel that I really want good stuff for them and that I'm there from that supportive place, not so much that driver like you got to, you got to do this. A lot of, a lot of these people had dads that did it. They they don't need another one, you know. So so, uh, yeah, it's a. That's that's the basics of it, jim. Is is a different energy and culture.
Speaker 1:Um, yeah, it makes me think of the analogy of the thermostat. Have you heard that Like, or you know, like, everyone has a thermostat, or or they're set to a certain level and you and you have to do things to reset that, and it sounds like that's. It sounds like that's what you, what, what you're, what re-energized you as saying man, let's turn up the thermostat on our business. I I'm going to make an assumption here that that there was a, there was a, that you had to turn up your thermostat yourself to realize that and to see it and to be able to, like you said, systematically execute that. Is that true?
Speaker 2:What has that journey been like?
Speaker 2:Yeah, this is one of those.
Speaker 2:Like we mentioned at the top here, this is one of those things that was kind of just brought to me by life.
Speaker 2:On a personal level, I went through something difficult about a year ago that just came into my world and jacked me up real good and it was painful enough to really bring me to my knees in a lot of ways, bring me to my knees in a lot of ways, and so through that process I started reaching out for aid, really just to relieve myself from the pain of the ordeal, and that looked like therapy and it looked like I went on some psychedelic assisted therapy sessions.
Speaker 2:That was very, very influential and impactful in my journey, one of the bigger forks in the road, because it opened me up in a lot of ways to see things differently, to have more compassion. So, you know, I've also found a few other tools along the way, breathwork being one of them, and all of these things have helped me to relax a lot from that you know where I come from of just driving and pushing and grinding to a place of relaxing and allowing and releasing a lot of resistance. You know that it's, it's just life's journey, life's life's lesson brought to me and needing to overcome it past the test personally, and then that stuff bleeds into the organization.
Speaker 1:So did the personal experience happen first, and then you went in and worked on your healing from that, and then you went now with these, with these new tools that I have now I could go back into the business, or did you? Is that, is that the path, that it was?
Speaker 2:Yeah, that was, that was the flow. Yeah, yeah, because it provided an awakening, within my business as well, on how I could be. You know, like those things provide a lot of humility too, and I can look at myself and really, really like I didn't want to, I didn't want to hear that I wasn't a great leader. I wanted to. I wanted it to be other people's faults why they just weren't doing what what I asked them to do. And you know, I brought, we had, we had someone, someone that had some interest in our company, recently coming from out of state, and they came to sit with us and talk to us and I watched how this individual broke down these personal relationships with leaders, how they managed and all of that, and that revealed to me also just some of my deficiencies there. And so, yeah, the humility, openness and the relaxing of the whole thing gave way to my own evolution, which helps me to bring that into the company.
Speaker 1:What? What were some of the leadership deficiencies that you realized, that I would assume a lot of us encounter? What were some of those ones?
Speaker 2:Yeah, the first one is just how I issued directives, that whole coaching thing that works really well on a football field baseball diamond, and I was trying to make that work in the business and I was trying to have the world adapt to the one skill set that I have, which was easy, and you could say that I just didn't want to do the work to learn how to do it a different way. But the way that I, you know, like if a manager comes in to my office and I want something done, I would just say the thing that I wanted done, I would probably follow it up in writing so that it was documented. But then when it doesn't get done, I get frustrated. I'm like did we not discuss this? Was I not clear enough in my directive? That was my whole approach. Yeah, and after it just doesn't work plenty of times. Well, maybe I'm the problem.
Speaker 2:For certain individuals it does work. There are a couple managers I have and it's interesting that these guys also played sports for very competitive environments and that tends to work a little bit better there, but not for everyone. So now what I'm trying to do is the whole frame changed for me Now, instead of like how can I get this done? It's like how can I be on your team to help you move to where you want to go personally? We know that all is going to help the company, but coming from that place of support and then there's all of like the science of this, like the ways to ask questions and to get committal commitments from people, and all of that Like there's a part of me that just didn't enjoy that.
Speaker 2:So I would just cut to the chase. Like I have someone, someone in my office, had someone in my office like a year ago and I was like look, dude, you know that we shoot each other straight and and I don't beat around the bush with things and look, you're just this. This person's a salesperson. I was like you're not good at sales, you're just not good at sales. I'm sorry if that doesn't land well, but we need to. We need to just we need to be real, truthful here and although people won't be able to say that I was being dishonest, it's just not going to get the thing done. As well as another approach, and there's probably a part of me that was tired and didn't want to spend the time to learn how to do that.
Speaker 1:That's one example Rosalind Vergeson, recently from Refinery. She's an HR coach. If you're not familiar with her, she's in the industry here. She said well, what if you tell a batter you're not hitting the ball? Like yeah, I know I'm not hitting the ball. Like you know what I mean.
Speaker 2:Like I, know I'm striking out. Yeah, you're not helping me.
Speaker 1:You're not helping me, right, like you're not helping me, you're not giving me that, you're not coming from a coaching perspective. It's that maybe it's the transformation into a coach from from a boss, Right, like yeah, yeah, you know if that's a good way to put it. Like, how did you learn how to ask great questions? Was it certain books? Was it certain things that you studied? Because I think that Boy, that's a skill set right.
Speaker 2:I'm at the beginning of that journey, James, I don't know, but that is my approach is learning from other people and finding other information. So there's, there's a few, like there's a few people on my radar to start studying, like John Maxwell is one older, older guy and been around for a while, but just good principles around that. So I've got to go to school again on that front.
Speaker 1:I've been looking at, paying attention a lot to Chris Voss's stuff. Never Split the Dipper a master negotiator but it's amazing the power in changing a few words around or the order of words or the question Like I changed the question from this to that and the response that you get. It's a fascinating. It's fascinating and it's amazing the people that they say that great CEO, great CEOs ask great questions. I think that's the same with sales people.
Speaker 1:I think that's the same with every position in your company. If people learn how to ask great questions, not just are we providing a great customer experience, but where are we failing at the customer experience and how do we get to the root cause of that customer experience? That all starts with questions, right, Do we have a great customer experience? I mean, that's subjective, right? Like yeah, yeah, we do we have a great customer experience, or do we have a maybe?
Speaker 1:it's do we have a great customer experience every time. Maybe not Right. Then why don't we have a great customer experience every time? What were the issues that we're facing in that customer journey, during those bad customer experiences, what can we like? And if you just continue to go down that rabbit hole? But the questions are man. Questions are powerful, for sure.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we just had our meetings with our leaders this week on kind of a year end wrap up and some goal setting for next year. So myself and Nathan, our CEO, we'll meet with our managers and then they'll do that with each person in their division, and there was a few different questions I had this year. Just from the little bit of studying I've done so far, like you know, how do you feel that the year went? This was one of our goals last year. We didn't quite hit that. What do you think was in the way of that? Why do you think that that happened?
Speaker 2:Instead of me, I have all these ideas around why it happened. What are we wanting to move towards this next year? What's in the way of that? What can we predict that would be in the way of that happening? What's the biggest obstacle to us sitting here one year from now saying that that happened? What are you committed to do in order to solve this problem? That's a big one. That's a new one for me. Instead of like all right, you willing to do this, like this is what is gonna, it's like letting them come up with the answers for that. Giving more autonomy in that is another thing. Yeah, yeah, the questions. And like all of the therapy I've done, my God, I've done so much therapy this year's unreal man they're, they're all such. They never give me any answers to anything, but the answers always come.
Speaker 1:they're always just asking questions answer yes somehow you get to an answer right, like yeah, what, what? What an art? Right, what did you do? Any like did? Were you all focused on personal therapy around the things that were happening in your personal life, or did you do business performance type of coaching in that regard? What path did you go down there?
Speaker 2:So I've done a little bit of both. The majority of it was on the personal side. But, man, I'll share one story with you of one of these psychedelic assisted therapy sessions that bled into business for me. So I'm doing psychedelic, mdma, blindfold headphones, seven hour session. I'm getting into the heavy early parts of this thing. And then I'm thinking about an employee, a manager of mine, who I was having some strife with. We were kind of starting to butt heads. The energy wasn't, we were on different wavelengths and I could see it was becoming an issue. And I had the previous few weeks. Every time I would think about this I wanted to just be like hey, dude, listen, this ain't working. Like you're going to have to fix your attitude. Like you're infecting the culture. It's toxic man, I need you to fix this. Like I've had enough Because I was aggravated by it.
Speaker 2:I get into this session where you know the way this medicine works. The brain slows down, the heart opens up and I'm using the heart intelligence. I've been using brain intelligence my whole life, for the most part, and I'm learning that the heart, maybe it's even smarter. So I get into this session and all of a sudden all of this compassion comes out for this individual, I was like he's in so much pain and I happen to know a little bit about this individual for decades We've known each other for like, this stuff's coming from pain, man, he's hurting, he's not trying to be an ass, he's not trying to mess something up, he's just he's dealing with his journey, man. So it completely flipped. Within days I'm sitting down with him in the office and we have a completely different conversation, because I come from a place of compassion instead of driving him to some new result, and he opened up and I'm teary eyed and he's teary eyed. And that's where progress occurs, like emotional movement, when the emotions are stirred. That's the signature of like some, some real change, something that's impactful that we don't forget.
Speaker 2:So anyway, so some of this personal stuff it all you know it's the business, is a huge part of who I am, and so all of that stuff bleeds together. So I went out to solve a lot of personal problems. The business stuff benefited as well. But then I recently hired a coach that I met at a roofing conference and I actually hired him. He's working with another roofing group to help them grow and I just connected with the dude and uh, and I left this conference I was like I don't even know exactly what this dude does, but I just got to work with him Like we were just we were just vibing together.
Speaker 2:And so I reach out to him and he does coaching and all this kind of stuff. So I do this one-on-one thing pay you know 20 to him and he does coaching and all this kind of stuff. So I do this one-on-one thing pay you know 20 grand to pay the guy to coach me and I think I think he's gonna help me not only with, like pelican roofing, but also with some other have other real estate endeavors and a few other business things going on, and then he's basically it's basically spiritual stuff, but it's like it all, like the business stuff, is just immediately impacted. It's like everything just comes from within. You want to change the world, change yourself. That whole concept. It's so much more just about doing this stuff, and so that's one of the cultural initiatives for our team this next year is we're leaning very heavy into the self-development. I used to stay away from that because I didn't want to impose my personal beliefs or habits too much on other people, whether it's fitness, physical fitness, or it's reading, or it's centering yourself and dealing with the anger from child or whatever the thing is. It just felt too imposing. So I would try to stay away from that and just offer some some little snippets from YouTube and I'd give my my opinions here and there. But now I'm leaning in. I'm like thinking about the Patriots.
Speaker 2:You don't have. If you're if you're an NFL player, you don't have to play for them. But if you do, you, you do things a certain way. You're not going to go run your mouth to the media about your coach or your other players. You're going to do the small things right every time. Now, if you don't want to do that, you can go play for the Browns or whoever lets you do whatever you want to do. But the way we're doing this because we're building an elite company, these are our standards and we're going to move our bodies You're going to feel real uncomfortable in our organization if you're not moving your body to make a better, healthier you. I don't care if you're 600 pounds, but are you interested in getting to 595? That's what we're looking for like progress in all areas of our life, because I believe if we work on that part of us, on that part of us, then everything else blossoms from that.
Speaker 1:It does, and I've had a lot of these conversations lately. Terry Gwaltney that wrote a book called Culture Near. He owns Integrity Roofing and Construction up in Illinois and they're in that area integrity roofing and construction up in illinois and they're in that area. He, like his team, will, you know, reads like they. They have books that they have to read, or you know what I mean and like things like that, like and and it's like.
Speaker 1:It's that going into the like beyond what's just showing up for work and helping people become better people, right, and he said one of them that they do all kinds of stuff finance and in different things and one of the guys was like got into like learning the financial aspects of his life, managing personal finances, and ended up leaving the company to go work for like edward jones or something like that, because it they really found his passion in it, like how cool, that's awesome, right, like that you could be a part of that.
Speaker 1:But it's that helping? We don't think about it, right, we don't think that that's like something to do at work. I know, you know, like Miller Storm down in Dallas, some friends of mine, jay Miller and, and like boy, their team is in the gym, like they are very committed to their personal fitness and have that, that, that correlation that this is. This is what leads to success in your, in your work life, is is having that, you know, having this physical fitness in your, you know in your personal life, and so it's you know you got to make these, these, these decisions, and and boy you know in your personal life, and so it's you know you got to make these, these, these decisions, and and boy you'll I mean you'll find out you know how far you should go into people's lives, and but then it also might be the who should be in your business, right, because some people may not make that that. That that's a cultural filter to your business at a certain point in time.
Speaker 2:Right, yeah, and if we're going to do good in the world and do good for our people that work for us, that's one of the greatest gifts that we can bestow upon them is the introduction to ways for them to become more free and grow. We were at the Best of Success Roofing Conference last week and we had a free afternoon after it was over, and so we brought this guy in from Naples, florida, to come and do this breathwork session for us, and I was like man I know there's some people on my management team like no one else had ever done breathwork at all but I was like some of these people are not going to want to do this at all. You know no-transcript If they quit Pelican tomorrow and they go somewhere else. I can feel really good about helping in that way, and that's that's important for all of us.
Speaker 1:So yeah, man, it's, it's a, it's a fun journey, right, george, it's a, it's a like, and that's what it is. I think you know the, the kind of back to the original kind of part of the conversation is how do you get through these ups and downs? How do you? How do you restructure, how do you reorganize, how do you re-energize, how do you reinvigorate the team? How do you do through? Because, man, there's a lot, there's a, there's, there's a lot of ups and downs in business. Right, it's on a, on a day-to-day basis. There's a lot of ups and downs, and it sounds like you're stepping back into the business and saying I'm going to help my team, from a cultural aspect, really grow and develop. That's awesome, I think you know. And so if you had to give advice to someone who was earlier in their journey, they're starting to hit those, the limits of their leadership. They're starting to hit the limits of their. They're feeling the thermostat. They're hitting the thermostat in their company. What's some advice that you would give to them?
Speaker 2:You know we're, we're all at different spots and the only thing to focus on right now is the thing in front of us. And so you know you might have someone out there that just did 300 K their their first year and they've got got a very specific challenge and you've got to pass the test that's in front of you right now. So you know, if we, if we avoid those challenges and and try to just not take that test right now, it will inevitably come back in another form, typically a little bit louder, maybe more awkward and harder. And so there's no escaping the thing.
Speaker 2:Entrepreneurship is very difficult. My words, not so much advice, would be like look man or girl, I know this is difficult. I hear you Anybody who tells you it's been easy, something's off, something's missing there. When me and other CEOs or owners get in the room, we can go on and on for hours about the difficulties and how we didn't know if we were going to make payroll one time and how we thought the business was going to crumble when a major manager or something left. Or we didn't know how to hire and when to fire the sales guy that's bringing in all of the revenue but he's toxic or like we've all had so many problems and that's a part of the thing. But keeping our head down and just dealing with the challenge of the day and trying to pass that test is crucially important.
Speaker 1:Awesome man. This has been another episode of the Roofing Success Podcast. Thank you for tuning into the roofing success podcast. For more valuable content, visit roofingsuccesspodcastcom while there, check out our sponsors for exclusive offers, shop for merchandise and sign up for our newsletter for industry updates and tips. Also join the roofing success facebook group to connect with other professionals and stay updated on the latest trends. If you enjoyed this episode, please subscribe, like, share and leave a comment. Your support helps us continue to bring you top industry insights. The website link is in the description. Thanks for listening you.
