How This Builder Caught a $100K Blowout Before It Hit His Margin

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Welcome back everyone to the Builders
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Coach Show. This is Jess, your host, and
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this is our first episode of season 2 of
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the podcast. We had a small break, but
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we are back for more now. And this very
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first episode is uh Kurt interviewing
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one of his Builders Coach clients, Joe.
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He will talk through his challenges and
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amazing results. So, enjoy the
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interview, and I will see you in our
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next episode.
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>> So, at one point, Joe, you had like
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13-person team, um about 5 mil turnover,
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strong referrals across two regions, uh
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Sydney and Newcastle.
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And um some big, yeah, projects in front
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of you.
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So, like from the outside, a lot of
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people would think that's like you guys
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have made it, right? Like it's uh very
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successful, but but internally,
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um you were saying that the clarity was
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was one of your biggest challenges. So,
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tell us a bit more about what was
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happening behind the scenes. Give us
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some more context.
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>> Well, I suppose uh I suppose it's
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interesting cuz from the outside in,
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yeah, it can always look like that, but
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the the businesses that I've dominated
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I've come from a sort of uh
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billion-dollar-a-year businesses or
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500-million-dollar-a-year businesses.
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So, so it's a so we're sort of uh so it
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certainly doesn't feel that way to us.
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You sort of feel like you're tripping up
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and and and that it's that it's sort of
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got a long way to go.
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Um
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But yeah, just I suppose around the Don
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runs the Newcastle side of the business,
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and I run the Sydney part of the
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business. Uh they're all they're the
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divisions anyway that we obviously run
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it together, and and in the last couple
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of years, Dad's come moved down to
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Sydney as well, so he's involved in the
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business, and we've got uh Mom does a
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bit of safety and a whole heap of admin
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stuff, and uh we've got another brother
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on the tools, got a couple of cousins in
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the business, so it's
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so you know, it it gets quite confusing
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with with
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with with just lack of clarity I
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suppose. You bring a lot of sort of
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personal relationships into the
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business. So
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so it's been a
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>> [clears throat]
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>> it's been a really important part of the
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business for us really getting some
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clarity around roles and just KPIs
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generally. It's sort of this isn't a
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conversation between two brothers, this
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is two business owners or
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just whatever it might be. So
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Yeah, that that's been massive getting
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clarity around the business, getting
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sort of getting um
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names in front of roles, who's
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responsible for what and and trying to
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sort of sort of sail with a bit of
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direction I suppose.
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>> Yeah, that's fascinating. I mean just
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going back to what you said before about
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coming from, you know, businesses that
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do like 500 mil turnover, no doubt um
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that helped in terms of you
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understanding process and and how those
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bigger operations run. But with the
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family setup, I mean that's yeah, I mean
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there's there's that that old saying,
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you know, don't don't go into business
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with family and friends, but
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getting clarity, [clears throat]
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particularly role clarity, which is so
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important, right? Was that a complex
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process or was it pretty self-evident?
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Like this person's going to be, you
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know,
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um
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better at this based on their unique
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abilities and that person's going to be
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the better GM. But was it easy or was it
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was it a difficult sort of process to
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get that role clarity?
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>> Oh, it was a mix it's sort of I wouldn't
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say it was completely easy because we're
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sort of Don's in Newcastle and I'm in
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Sydney. So that's
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well we've had to sort of spend a lot of
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time thinking about actually what are
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the practicalities around it. But
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ultimately there's things that I enjoy,
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there's things that he enjoys and so we
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sort of lend to to what we prefer and
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and do it going going about it that way
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made it a lot easier. Like he prefers
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site-based things and you know, I prefer
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the office and business side of things
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and and
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yeah, so it's sort of things just things
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just
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it's sort of died a bit of a natural
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death, I suppose.
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>> Just to get a better perspective, like
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if you go back to sort of the beginning,
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how many people on the team?
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>> Right now, there's about 18 in the team
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between sort of between Sydney and
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Newcastle, yeah.
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>> And when you started out, what what was
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it looking at?
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>> When when we started, how many were in
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the team?
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>> When when we when we sort of
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when you're doing it around the 5 mil.
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>> Oh, yeah, there was around sort of 10, I
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suppose. 10 or 10 12 around then, so
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yeah, we've done a bit of we've we've
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got a couple more jobs since then, and
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and and you know, that's sort of you
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know, it's allowed us to sort of unlock
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sort of yeah, different style of system,
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and we've got an estimator, internal
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bookkeeper.
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We've sort of nailed nailed some of
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those roles that we've just sort of been
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fluffing around with ourselves, I
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suppose.
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>> Yeah. And
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yourself and and Don, what are the How
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do you guys divide those
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responsibilities now? You're obviously
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in different locations.
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Are you Yeah, what does it look like?
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>> So,
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there's [clears throat] still a whole
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lot of things that we have to sort of
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overlap, but ultimately I'm I'm looking
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after a lot of the pre-construction, and
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Don does a lot of sort of construction
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and post-construction. When you break it
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down to sort of its very sort of
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sort of very basic levers, but that's
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sort of that's sort of yeah,
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how we manage it. Although, like you
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know, there'll be a lot in
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pre-construction, and sort of you know,
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estimating and winning jobs and all that
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sort of stuff. Obviously, in Newcastle,
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Don has to then go and do the site
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visits and actually meet the people, so
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there's a lot of crossover and vice
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versa. In Sydney, I'm actually on site,
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so I've got to be I've got to go to
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sites and check things out, but
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but Don's responsible for sort of
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monitoring KPIs and and the process
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around our jobs getting delivered and
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and safety and and those sorts of
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things.
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>> Yeah, yeah. Lots to manage.
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So, give us a bit of an idea of the type
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of jobs and the job sizes that you're
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involved in.
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>> Um so, we our biggest jobs are $10
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million sort of luxury renovation. And
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then and then all the way down to sort
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of, you know, 4 or 500 grand. And in
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fact, we're just wrapping out of
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$200,000
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renovation. It's probably what sort of
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just sort of worked out now. That was a
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residual job we were doing at a couple
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of million dollar remedial job to a unit
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block. And and that $200,000 job was an
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individual unit within that unit block.
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So, it sort of made sense to build, but
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um yeah, it's a different uh it's very
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challenging to do those It's It's sort
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of And I think sort of look with a lot
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of discussions with you, it's you sort
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of um yeah,
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our our starting point would be a little
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bit bigger than that now. We probably
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wouldn't sort of go down to that
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$200,000. It's almost just as much
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effort managing that little job as there
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is managing a big job. And in fact, the
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the smaller job, it's it's you deal with
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They They lost They
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They struggle to get all their money
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a lot more because they can't see the
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big picture sort of thing. As funny, a
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lot of people ask, "What's the
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difference between managing a big job
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and a small job?" And I expect it to be
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like an architect or the finish and yada
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yada, but ultimately, it's the client
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whether they got money or not. That's
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it. The client has more money, then it
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would be a big job. And and if they
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don't, it's a little job. So, that's
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ultimately what it is.
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>> Yeah, so that's uh makes it easy
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decision you're going to target that
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that higher end of the market.
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Yeah, yeah. They've got more money to
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spend, yeah.
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>> Yeah, and better jobs and they
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appreciate sort of
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things finishing
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well. And and there's never uh you know,
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whilst there's a lot of other pressures
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on those jobs, there's never the
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pressure of I'll just do it this way,
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you know,
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my dad is a handyman and he could do it
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like X sort of thing. There's none of
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that. It's just here are the plans,
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build it to the plan, and and and that's
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it sort of thing.
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>> Yeah.
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So, just in terms of like uh your
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workflow, profit, cash flow, workflow,
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with workflow um
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what are you guys doing to ensure that
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you guys got a full pipeline? I know you
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were getting a lot of work through
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referrals from clients and and
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architects.
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And and you know, without being too
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proactive with your marketing, um
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so what's what's the situation now? Like
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are you Do you How many marketing
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channels do you have? And how much are
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you reliant on referral type work?
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>> Yeah, so referral type work is a big
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part of the business.
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Um but there's yeah, we've got we've got
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paid ads on Google and Meta. We've got
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we've got sort of the lookbook and
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and and
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lot of letter dropping and there's a
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whole heap of sort of different types of
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marketing that I suppose that we
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sort of work through now. So, we're not
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necessarily reliant on one. Definitely
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referral is our main one, but it's we're
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not as we're not as necessarily fully
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reliant on one. We've got a really nice
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job that just came through Google Ads
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that we're that we're working through
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now. So, that was just that was a weird
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one to to to to to jag one from from
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Google. That was that's been just sort
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of good experience, I suppose.
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>> Yeah. So, I think it's crucial to have
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as many channels as possible
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so that you're not just reliant on on
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one or two. Yeah, you really sort of
00:09:05.839 --> 00:09:07.510
leave yourself exposed when you do that,
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right?
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>> Yeah, exactly right. Right.
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>> Yeah.
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Oh, cool. So, let's look a bit at
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like your your systems. Cuz obviously
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you guys
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you've been working on the business,
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putting some structures in place.
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Um and doing it properly as well,
00:09:23.760 --> 00:09:25.910
putting best practice process in place.
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When we did your original reflection and
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review, I think you scored around 58 out
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of 100 overall.
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Just despite having good job delivery,
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cuz your you guys you pride yourself in
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in delivering quality work with a with a
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strong team.
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And tell us a bit about your financial
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assistance cuz I know that's like it's
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such a crucial part of the business and
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so many builders struggle to get their
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the numbers right. So, yeah, what have
00:09:51.040 --> 00:09:52.750
you sort of have
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have you sort of worked on getting that
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part of the business at uh at the right
00:09:57.440 --> 00:09:58.430
level?
00:09:58.440 --> 00:10:00.230
>> Yes, I suppose we Yeah, there's a lot of
00:10:00.240 --> 00:10:02.790
effort that goes into our you know, our
00:10:02.800 --> 00:10:04.750
our financial literacy, I suppose. We've
00:10:04.760 --> 00:10:05.630
got
00:10:05.640 --> 00:10:07.350
a we've got our weekly dashboard which
00:10:07.360 --> 00:10:09.550
which sort of which which not only does
00:10:09.560 --> 00:10:11.230
the financials but just just sort of
00:10:11.240 --> 00:10:12.550
monitors the health of the business
00:10:12.560 --> 00:10:14.910
generally. And we try to do that on a we
00:10:14.920 --> 00:10:17.790
do do that on a weekly basis to to
00:10:17.800 --> 00:10:18.950
uh you know, if we if we don't have
00:10:18.960 --> 00:10:20.550
leads coming in or if we haven't made
00:10:20.560 --> 00:10:21.870
enough if we haven't done enough of the
00:10:21.880 --> 00:10:23.390
leading indicators, then we'll have
00:10:23.400 --> 00:10:25.430
issues later on. So, uh so we've got our
00:10:25.440 --> 00:10:27.550
weekly dashboard. We've got our like
00:10:27.560 --> 00:10:29.070
we've got an internal bookkeeper now.
00:10:29.080 --> 00:10:31.110
That's been massive just to have have
00:10:31.120 --> 00:10:32.230
someone who can get all of our
00:10:32.240 --> 00:10:34.190
information to us at the at the press of
00:10:34.200 --> 00:10:36.110
a button. And [clears throat]
00:10:36.120 --> 00:10:38.830
um and and and ultimately it's I suppose
00:10:38.840 --> 00:10:39.990
I suppose all of the information that's
00:10:40.000 --> 00:10:41.870
in the dashboard like it had how much
00:10:41.880 --> 00:10:44.550
we're converting, our our weekly
00:10:44.560 --> 00:10:46.790
profitability per job, sort of knowing
00:10:46.800 --> 00:10:49.390
what that number is. If we you know, if
00:10:49.400 --> 00:10:51.230
a job [clears throat] doesn't if a job
00:10:51.240 --> 00:10:54.190
starts getting delayed, what that does
00:10:54.200 --> 00:10:57.150
to our profitability over time. So,
00:10:57.160 --> 00:10:59.670
um yeah, all all the a lot of the time
00:10:59.680 --> 00:11:01.190
yeah, you know, you're getting harassed
00:11:01.200 --> 00:11:03.270
by clients when a job's going over
00:11:03.280 --> 00:11:05.590
budget. But for us, that's the last
00:11:05.600 --> 00:11:07.430
thing we want because the the each week
00:11:07.440 --> 00:11:10.710
a job a job drags on cuz you know, you
00:11:10.720 --> 00:11:13.670
get the margin erosion that that um
00:11:13.680 --> 00:11:15.270
yeah, it really digs into your profits.
00:11:15.280 --> 00:11:17.267
So, uh yeah, having that clarity
00:11:17.277 --> 00:11:17.829
[clears throat]
00:11:17.839 --> 00:11:19.350
on a weekly basis has been sort of
00:11:19.360 --> 00:11:20.950
paramount for us for our future
00:11:20.960 --> 00:11:22.630
forecasting and and and [clears throat]
00:11:22.640 --> 00:11:25.510
and just scaling generally. If you're if
00:11:25.520 --> 00:11:26.870
we're sort of not monitoring those
00:11:26.880 --> 00:11:27.950
numbers which we haven't been in the
00:11:27.960 --> 00:11:30.070
past, then it's hard to grow a sort of a
00:11:30.080 --> 00:11:31.710
strong uh
00:11:32.960 --> 00:11:33.910
uh um
00:11:33.920 --> 00:11:36.070
just shooting into the wind, I suppose.
00:11:36.080 --> 00:11:36.990
>> Mhm.
00:11:37.000 --> 00:11:39.270
Yeah, it's it's sad that I
00:11:39.280 --> 00:11:40.590
for the majority of builders out there,
00:11:40.600 --> 00:11:42.230
they they sort of flying blind. They're
00:11:42.240 --> 00:11:43.350
running their business out of their bank
00:11:43.360 --> 00:11:45.550
account. So, crucial to have a handle on
00:11:45.560 --> 00:11:47.030
the numbers like that. I mean, having
00:11:47.040 --> 00:11:50.830
that weekly update on jobs is is key.
00:11:50.840 --> 00:11:53.430
And and yeah, margins one thing, but
00:11:53.440 --> 00:11:55.590
speed of job delivery is another. So,
00:11:55.600 --> 00:11:57.270
it's great that you've got that
00:11:57.280 --> 00:11:59.110
awareness and you're you're able to
00:11:59.120 --> 00:12:00.510
track it.
00:12:00.520 --> 00:12:02.150
There was a story about uh how your
00:12:02.160 --> 00:12:03.630
financial control sort of helped you
00:12:03.640 --> 00:12:05.790
identify a a cost blowout. I think it
00:12:05.800 --> 00:12:08.270
was about 100 grand on a job.
00:12:08.280 --> 00:12:10.230
Uh do you remember that story?
00:12:10.240 --> 00:12:13.070
>> Yeah, we do. We uh there was a a job
00:12:13.080 --> 00:12:14.590
that we are finishing up in Newcastle
00:12:14.600 --> 00:12:17.110
now, actually, but it was uh it was the
00:12:17.120 --> 00:12:18.550
house was the house needed to be
00:12:18.560 --> 00:12:22.350
re-stumped and uh it was it's sort of
00:12:22.360 --> 00:12:24.270
you know, to do the re-stumping work was
00:12:24.280 --> 00:12:26.750
was a massive amount of time. So, to be
00:12:26.760 --> 00:12:29.390
able to stop and and look at see how far
00:12:29.400 --> 00:12:30.830
that was going to push the job down the
00:12:30.840 --> 00:12:32.630
line, you can see what that was going to
00:12:32.640 --> 00:12:34.829
do to the margin and you know, allow us
00:12:34.839 --> 00:12:36.829
to price it properly.
00:12:36.839 --> 00:12:37.178
>> Mhm.
00:12:37.188 --> 00:12:37.430
>> [clears throat]
00:12:37.440 --> 00:12:38.710
>> So, that allowed us to price the
00:12:38.720 --> 00:12:40.390
variations properly.
00:12:40.400 --> 00:12:41.110
>> So,
00:12:41.120 --> 00:12:42.550
you ident- What was it like
00:12:42.560 --> 00:12:44.590
communicating that to the client? Like
00:12:44.600 --> 00:12:45.390
um
00:12:45.400 --> 00:12:47.590
cuz you know, that most builders are
00:12:47.600 --> 00:12:49.470
terrified of of going to a client with
00:12:49.480 --> 00:12:51.910
like a $100,000 variation.
00:12:51.920 --> 00:12:53.310
>> You would don't don't have to deliver
00:12:53.320 --> 00:12:54.990
the bad news, but ultimately he got it
00:12:55.000 --> 00:12:58.190
nice and early and and you know, it was
00:12:58.200 --> 00:12:59.550
the client took it really well because
00:12:59.560 --> 00:13:01.870
he he you know, before it it wasn't
00:13:01.880 --> 00:13:03.230
something that he was playing catch-up
00:13:03.240 --> 00:13:05.350
for with it. It was it was the the the
00:13:05.360 --> 00:13:06.870
job that stopped with identifying the
00:13:06.880 --> 00:13:08.829
problem and within you know, within a
00:13:08.839 --> 00:13:10.870
week he was able to say to him, "This
00:13:10.880 --> 00:13:12.190
This is where we're sitting. This is
00:13:12.200 --> 00:13:14.750
what's going to happen. This is why." Uh
00:13:14.760 --> 00:13:16.670
and have all the information with with
00:13:16.680 --> 00:13:18.710
you know, the estimated man hours, the
00:13:18.720 --> 00:13:20.590
invoices for all the quotes from other
00:13:20.600 --> 00:13:23.150
subbies and and and ultimately the the
00:13:23.160 --> 00:13:24.550
the client was really happy with it. It
00:13:24.560 --> 00:13:26.510
wasn't a yeah, it wasn't a big issue. In
00:13:26.520 --> 00:13:28.310
the end. In the past, we've had this
00:13:28.320 --> 00:13:29.750
issue.
00:13:29.760 --> 00:13:31.710
Uh, we've had plenty of times where
00:13:31.720 --> 00:13:33.150
variations have come through in the past
00:13:33.160 --> 00:13:34.430
and we're delivering the bad news too
00:13:34.440 --> 00:13:36.710
late and it's, uh, you know, you know,
00:13:36.720 --> 00:13:39.070
some don't get paid. Certainly all of
00:13:39.080 --> 00:13:41.750
them are appreciated, so that was a that
00:13:41.760 --> 00:13:43.550
was a really sort of
00:13:43.560 --> 00:13:45.990
just having that open having those, uh,
00:13:46.000 --> 00:13:47.910
that communication open early was a was
00:13:47.920 --> 00:13:50.310
a, yeah, great thing.
00:13:50.320 --> 00:13:52.270
>> Man, it's absolutely pivotal. I was
00:13:52.280 --> 00:13:53.590
actually just talking to someone about
00:13:53.600 --> 00:13:54.710
it yesterday. Like, you know,
00:13:54.720 --> 00:13:57.390
communicating these things early
00:13:57.400 --> 00:13:59.270
and well, the way you did you know,
00:13:59.280 --> 00:14:00.630
here's the thing. Like, here's the
00:14:00.640 --> 00:14:01.870
issue, here's what we're going to do
00:14:01.880 --> 00:14:04.790
about it, here's the numbers. Um, it
00:14:04.800 --> 00:14:06.270
really like strengthens the
00:14:06.280 --> 00:14:07.950
relationship, right? Like, that that
00:14:07.960 --> 00:14:09.750
client obviously you you would have
00:14:09.760 --> 00:14:11.750
gained respect, I'd imagine.
00:14:11.760 --> 00:14:13.430
>> Yeah, it does. And all of our jobs now
00:14:13.440 --> 00:14:14.910
it's a pretty simple sort of process
00:14:14.920 --> 00:14:16.230
that we follow, but, you know, if
00:14:16.240 --> 00:14:18.750
there's any variation, it's people any
00:14:18.760 --> 00:14:20.310
variation to the scope, not necessarily
00:14:20.320 --> 00:14:21.910
variation, it's it's we're tracking the
00:14:21.920 --> 00:14:24.510
time on that. And, you know, as we spoke
00:14:24.520 --> 00:14:25.870
about earlier, or it's if we know that
00:14:25.880 --> 00:14:28.710
the job is meant to be a a 40-week job
00:14:28.720 --> 00:14:31.910
and you know, this beam wasn't drawn by
00:14:31.920 --> 00:14:33.150
the engineer and that now needs to go
00:14:33.160 --> 00:14:34.829
and that's 2 days, we're tracking that
00:14:34.839 --> 00:14:36.550
time and tapping it on at the end and
00:14:36.560 --> 00:14:40.350
and and in the margin process, so um
00:14:40.360 --> 00:14:41.990
historically we haven't been doing that
00:14:42.000 --> 00:14:43.350
and you get to the end of the job and
00:14:43.360 --> 00:14:44.670
you think, "Shit,
00:14:44.680 --> 00:14:46.070
this job's made no money. Like, what
00:14:46.080 --> 00:14:47.870
what's going on? It on paper looks like
00:14:47.880 --> 00:14:49.870
it has, but you know, we thought it was
00:14:49.880 --> 00:14:51.190
going to be a 20-week job and it's now a
00:14:51.200 --> 00:14:53.550
40-week job and it's it's it's sort of,
00:14:53.560 --> 00:14:55.350
um, yeah, it's a lot of it's your
00:14:55.360 --> 00:14:57.750
overhead weekly costs that, as you know,
00:14:57.760 --> 00:15:01.230
stays the same, so it's, um, yeah, you
00:15:01.240 --> 00:15:02.390
know, that's that's been a massive thing
00:15:02.400 --> 00:15:03.990
for us.
00:15:04.000 --> 00:15:06.270
>> I love it, man. So, what, uh, what would
00:15:06.280 --> 00:15:07.950
you say that experience taught you about
00:15:07.960 --> 00:15:10.070
the relationship between your financial
00:15:10.080 --> 00:15:13.270
controls and client communication?
00:15:13.280 --> 00:15:14.470
>> Yeah, they're they're I suppose that
00:15:14.480 --> 00:15:15.750
they're two of the same. Like, you just
00:15:15.760 --> 00:15:18.190
got to be up to speed with the with the
00:15:18.200 --> 00:15:19.950
financial controls and you can't have an
00:15:19.960 --> 00:15:21.350
honest conversation with your client
00:15:21.360 --> 00:15:23.910
unless they are up to speed. So, you
00:15:23.920 --> 00:15:25.390
need you need to be talking to your
00:15:25.400 --> 00:15:27.870
client super regularly particularly in
00:15:27.880 --> 00:15:29.990
the space that we play in. They the
00:15:30.000 --> 00:15:31.550
clients want to make changes. They want
00:15:31.560 --> 00:15:32.710
to
00:15:32.720 --> 00:15:34.630
you know or it's a renovation or change
00:15:34.640 --> 00:15:36.630
just happening but you can't sort of
00:15:36.640 --> 00:15:38.750
inform them accurately if you're not
00:15:38.760 --> 00:15:40.710
completely up to speed. Like on on
00:15:40.720 --> 00:15:42.070
pretty much every one of our job the
00:15:42.080 --> 00:15:44.630
client will you you start the job and
00:15:44.640 --> 00:15:46.430
they start increasing what they want.
00:15:46.440 --> 00:15:47.950
It's just it seems to be something that
00:15:47.960 --> 00:15:49.790
happens and
00:15:49.800 --> 00:15:51.390
and if you're not giving them accurate
00:15:51.400 --> 00:15:52.870
information about what is actually
00:15:52.880 --> 00:15:54.670
costing they're increasing the price but
00:15:54.680 --> 00:15:56.150
the the job might be going over
00:15:56.160 --> 00:15:58.270
naturally so it's really important that
00:15:58.280 --> 00:15:59.110
that
00:15:59.120 --> 00:16:01.270
uh they're they're two of the same in in
00:16:01.280 --> 00:16:03.990
around that way.
00:16:04.000 --> 00:16:05.830
>> Yeah Ben I think a lot of guys they they
00:16:05.840 --> 00:16:08.310
just they're not aware of that the
00:16:08.320 --> 00:16:10.830
importance of that link between you know
00:16:10.840 --> 00:16:12.510
accurate financials and then that
00:16:12.520 --> 00:16:14.790
proactive client communication as it
00:16:14.800 --> 00:16:16.470
relates to
00:16:16.480 --> 00:16:18.310
it obviously trust
00:16:18.320 --> 00:16:19.710
uh with the client but also the client
00:16:19.720 --> 00:16:21.230
experience.
00:16:21.240 --> 00:16:22.990
It's it's pivotal.
00:16:23.000 --> 00:16:24.910
>> Yeah exactly.
00:16:24.920 --> 00:16:25.870
>> Well I mean you
00:16:25.880 --> 00:16:28.110
>> All right like that that aren't like the
00:16:28.120 --> 00:16:29.829
tough conversations not like we don't
00:16:29.839 --> 00:16:32.829
like delivering it but but it's better
00:16:32.839 --> 00:16:34.470
it's better at the start or as soon as
00:16:34.480 --> 00:16:35.910
you find out because ultimately you can
00:16:35.920 --> 00:16:38.470
stop and say well you know
00:16:38.480 --> 00:16:39.910
you don't have to go ahead with this or
00:16:39.920 --> 00:16:41.350
if it's a renovation I do have to go
00:16:41.360 --> 00:16:43.030
ahead with because it's a a structural
00:16:43.040 --> 00:16:44.430
engineer might be putting beams or
00:16:44.440 --> 00:16:46.870
something. They can carve something else
00:16:46.880 --> 00:16:48.350
out of the job but if it if it gets to
00:16:48.360 --> 00:16:49.590
the end of the job and all the money's
00:16:49.600 --> 00:16:51.470
gone to then plus some and they're
00:16:51.480 --> 00:16:53.710
finding out it's not a good
00:16:53.720 --> 00:16:55.190
Yeah it's not a good position for anyone
00:16:55.200 --> 00:16:56.510
to be in.
00:16:56.520 --> 00:16:59.470
>> Yeah no exactly. So and and then the
00:16:59.480 --> 00:17:02.150
uncomfortable conversation you have
00:17:02.160 --> 00:17:04.590
um is 10x less than what you'll have
00:17:04.600 --> 00:17:06.390
later if you if you try and sort of you
00:17:06.400 --> 00:17:08.150
know delay
00:17:08.160 --> 00:17:10.270
uh you know communicating or yeah just
00:17:10.280 --> 00:17:12.030
leaving it till you know six to eight
00:17:12.040 --> 00:17:13.910
weeks later whatever it is yeah.
00:17:13.920 --> 00:17:16.069
>> Yeah yeah sure.
00:17:16.079 --> 00:17:18.150
>> But you mentioned like timely tracking
00:17:18.160 --> 00:17:19.510
of financials, and obviously if you're
00:17:19.520 --> 00:17:22.390
growing quickly, as you guys have been,
00:17:22.400 --> 00:17:24.429
um it's crucial, but
00:17:24.439 --> 00:17:26.949
um most guys wait for like they they
00:17:26.959 --> 00:17:28.990
they're looking back at the numbers, and
00:17:29.000 --> 00:17:30.230
it's way too late. They're waiting for
00:17:30.240 --> 00:17:32.670
an accountant or an external bookkeeper
00:17:32.680 --> 00:17:34.350
to bring them numbers, which doesn't
00:17:34.360 --> 00:17:35.670
really help.
00:17:35.680 --> 00:17:37.310
Um what what information are you guys
00:17:37.320 --> 00:17:38.830
looking at like every week? And what
00:17:38.840 --> 00:17:39.990
what are you what are you What are the
00:17:40.000 --> 00:17:42.510
most important metrics that you look at
00:17:42.520 --> 00:17:45.550
like week to week that doesn't rely on
00:17:45.560 --> 00:17:47.910
your accountant or bookkeeper?
00:17:47.920 --> 00:17:49.830
>> Well, I suppose it's sort of uh there
00:17:49.840 --> 00:17:51.990
there's there's Well,
00:17:52.000 --> 00:17:53.870
a lot of them are, but we're looking at
00:17:53.880 --> 00:17:57.870
uh the the we're we're looking at the
00:17:57.880 --> 00:17:59.590
Well, aside from just the numbers, I
00:17:59.600 --> 00:18:01.430
suppose we're looking at uh quotes that
00:18:01.440 --> 00:18:03.230
have tenders that have come in, quotes
00:18:03.240 --> 00:18:05.550
that have gone out, our conversion rate.
00:18:05.560 --> 00:18:07.790
We're looking at We're tracking our
00:18:07.800 --> 00:18:10.230
uh debtor days. We're tracking our uh
00:18:10.240 --> 00:18:12.710
We're tracking our our
00:18:12.720 --> 00:18:15.750
our revenue as it goes out in relation
00:18:15.760 --> 00:18:18.870
to our subcontractor payments, and then
00:18:18.880 --> 00:18:20.750
the amount of man hours working on the
00:18:20.760 --> 00:18:23.830
job. Just just general like hours, and
00:18:23.840 --> 00:18:25.590
and sort of all of that information goes
00:18:25.600 --> 00:18:27.230
into it. It all just goes into a
00:18:27.240 --> 00:18:28.790
spreadsheet on a weekly basis, and we
00:18:28.800 --> 00:18:30.990
get an overall score,
00:18:31.000 --> 00:18:32.790
like a health score of the business for
00:18:32.800 --> 00:18:36.350
that week. And, you know, if if if in um
00:18:36.360 --> 00:18:38.870
if if if one week, say for the last 4
00:18:38.880 --> 00:18:40.270
weeks, you're you're getting a below
00:18:40.280 --> 00:18:42.750
average score for tenders going in, and
00:18:42.760 --> 00:18:44.950
then uh and then tenders going tenders
00:18:44.960 --> 00:18:46.750
going in the season, tenders being sent,
00:18:46.760 --> 00:18:47.950
then you know you've got a marketing
00:18:47.960 --> 00:18:49.030
problem.
00:18:49.040 --> 00:18:50.590
Um if you're if you don't have enough
00:18:50.600 --> 00:18:52.430
working hours
00:18:52.440 --> 00:18:54.630
going out, then you've got a um yeah,
00:18:54.640 --> 00:18:56.150
you've also you you've got a like you've
00:18:56.160 --> 00:18:58.910
got uh resourcing problems, and yeah, so
00:18:58.920 --> 00:19:00.870
there there's there's sort of 10 key
00:19:00.880 --> 00:19:02.270
metrics that we're tracking on a
00:19:02.280 --> 00:19:03.910
week-to-week basis.
00:19:03.920 --> 00:19:05.430
Yeah, so you're tracking your revenue,
00:19:05.440 --> 00:19:07.710
you've obviously got a gross margin that
00:19:07.720 --> 00:19:10.270
is consistent. Is it consistent across
00:19:10.280 --> 00:19:11.630
all of your jobs?
00:19:11.640 --> 00:19:13.470
>> We're try We're trying to get it
00:19:13.480 --> 00:19:14.870
consistently across most of our jobs.
00:19:14.880 --> 00:19:16.550
Some, you know, you have some jobs that
00:19:16.560 --> 00:19:19.470
are just for whatever reason they they
00:19:19.480 --> 00:19:22.270
they you know, if a job just drags on
00:19:22.280 --> 00:19:23.390
then you can't help it because of
00:19:23.400 --> 00:19:25.630
weather and certain things, but we have
00:19:25.640 --> 00:19:28.030
been tracking our weekly margin per job
00:19:28.040 --> 00:19:29.990
regardless of how good it is, I suppose.
00:19:30.000 --> 00:19:32.110
Yeah, and our revenue and
00:19:32.120 --> 00:19:33.950
yeah, cost of goods sold on a weekly
00:19:33.960 --> 00:19:36.230
basis and yeah.
00:19:36.240 --> 00:19:37.910
Fantastic. Yeah, so that I mean that
00:19:37.920 --> 00:19:39.590
actually drives margin and then knowing
00:19:39.600 --> 00:19:41.230
your other things which you guys do
00:19:41.240 --> 00:19:43.070
allows you to track your break even and
00:19:43.080 --> 00:19:45.390
then you can also look at you know, your
00:19:45.400 --> 00:19:48.030
monthly weekly invoice amounts and then
00:19:48.040 --> 00:19:49.990
wash that up against a monthly break
00:19:50.000 --> 00:19:51.830
break even point as well.
00:19:51.840 --> 00:19:53.790
And then cash flow, you know, looking at
00:19:53.800 --> 00:19:55.790
what's in the pipeline, obviously what
00:19:55.800 --> 00:19:57.230
you're quoting, making sure that you've
00:19:57.240 --> 00:20:00.190
got enough coming through.
00:20:00.200 --> 00:20:01.710
Yeah, and so you obviously your your
00:20:01.720 --> 00:20:04.470
variation exposure as well. Yeah.
00:20:04.480 --> 00:20:05.750
Yeah, yeah, that's right. That's
00:20:05.760 --> 00:20:07.030
something particularly then on the
00:20:07.040 --> 00:20:09.310
delivery side we're tracking that. Our
00:20:09.320 --> 00:20:11.950
extensions of time, our
00:20:11.960 --> 00:20:13.390
you know, our
00:20:13.400 --> 00:20:15.630
program deadline dates. Has the client
00:20:15.640 --> 00:20:17.550
Has the client given us our
00:20:17.560 --> 00:20:19.830
our tap wear order by this date or have
00:20:19.840 --> 00:20:22.150
we Did we achieve X, Y, and Z in the
00:20:22.160 --> 00:20:24.030
program this week? If not, why not? How
00:20:24.040 --> 00:20:25.950
do we catch back up? So, not not that
00:20:25.960 --> 00:20:27.470
that's tracked in the dashboard, but but
00:20:27.480 --> 00:20:28.590
the other metrics that are tracked
00:20:28.600 --> 00:20:31.030
within the business. Uh
00:20:31.040 --> 00:20:32.790
that's sort of
00:20:32.800 --> 00:20:35.470
like understanding of your financials
00:20:35.480 --> 00:20:37.590
and and that sort of tracking it
00:20:37.600 --> 00:20:39.270
obviously gives you clarity, it gives
00:20:39.280 --> 00:20:42.150
you power, gives you confidence. And and
00:20:42.160 --> 00:20:43.750
it's interesting how like people can see
00:20:43.760 --> 00:20:45.790
that. Like you know, if you've ever
00:20:45.800 --> 00:20:47.510
spoken to someone and you can you can
00:20:47.520 --> 00:20:49.270
sort of you get a sense they they don't
00:20:49.280 --> 00:20:51.550
know the subject matter really well or
00:20:51.560 --> 00:20:52.310
they don't really know what they're
00:20:52.320 --> 00:20:54.230
talking about.
00:20:54.240 --> 00:20:55.830
You can just get a you can get a sense
00:20:55.840 --> 00:20:57.910
for that and no doubt your clients can
00:20:57.920 --> 00:20:59.710
can sense that as well. Like you you've
00:20:59.720 --> 00:21:02.710
got a handle on the numbers and you can
00:21:02.720 --> 00:21:04.110
you know, talk with confidence around
00:21:04.120 --> 00:21:05.590
where how things are tracking, where
00:21:05.600 --> 00:21:06.830
they're going.
00:21:06.840 --> 00:21:08.590
And I from my experience, most most
00:21:08.600 --> 00:21:10.910
builders can't. They don't have that
00:21:10.920 --> 00:21:12.510
financial clarity.
00:21:12.520 --> 00:21:14.470
And and obviously it impacts confidence
00:21:14.480 --> 00:21:16.030
and mindset. And again, all of that
00:21:16.040 --> 00:21:18.470
comes across in client communication.
00:21:18.480 --> 00:21:22.350
And then that causes that that mistrust.
00:21:22.360 --> 00:21:22.550
Yeah.
00:21:22.560 --> 00:21:24.190
>> Yeah, that's completely Yeah, that's
00:21:24.200 --> 00:21:25.670
exactly right. It's
00:21:25.680 --> 00:21:27.910
often you get that with uh with with
00:21:27.920 --> 00:21:30.150
when you know, when when a job is going
00:21:30.160 --> 00:21:31.990
getting delayed for whatever reason, you
00:21:32.000 --> 00:21:33.110
can when you can sort of say, "Well, you
00:21:33.120 --> 00:21:33.990
know,
00:21:34.000 --> 00:21:35.990
it is going to help us one and be that
00:21:36.000 --> 00:21:37.710
my my working margin was X and now it's
00:21:37.720 --> 00:21:39.510
going to be Y because we because of
00:21:39.520 --> 00:21:41.670
these delays. You can they can sort of
00:21:41.680 --> 00:21:43.230
understand that yeah, you that we're all
00:21:43.240 --> 00:21:45.190
pushing for the same goal and just
00:21:45.200 --> 00:21:47.150
having that clarity actually is a good
00:21:47.160 --> 00:21:49.830
thing for for the whole combined team, I
00:21:49.840 --> 00:21:51.950
would say. And also you guys on the site
00:21:51.960 --> 00:21:54.070
when they know that you're riding them
00:21:54.080 --> 00:21:55.990
for for this reason, that's that's
00:21:56.000 --> 00:21:58.550
that's uh yeah, it's good.
00:21:58.560 --> 00:22:01.070
>> Yeah, I mean it also gives you um
00:22:01.080 --> 00:22:03.270
that uh that confidence to have those
00:22:03.280 --> 00:22:05.110
conversations, I'd imagine with clients
00:22:05.120 --> 00:22:07.750
up front like before job start.
00:22:07.760 --> 00:22:10.710
Um getting selections in, um helping
00:22:10.720 --> 00:22:12.750
them understand the importance of
00:22:12.760 --> 00:22:14.950
decision-making, yeah, ideally
00:22:14.960 --> 00:22:17.270
minimizing variations, and
00:22:17.280 --> 00:22:19.630
you guys programming the jobs well so
00:22:19.640 --> 00:22:21.550
that it can run smoothly and and you can
00:22:21.560 --> 00:22:23.830
say that with conviction, not just
00:22:23.840 --> 00:22:25.630
paying lip service to it, right?
00:22:25.640 --> 00:22:27.550
>> Yeah, exactly right. That's 100% spot
00:22:27.560 --> 00:22:28.710
on, yeah.
00:22:28.720 --> 00:22:30.830
>> Yeah. So with um
00:22:30.840 --> 00:22:33.030
the job delivery side, so you guys are
00:22:33.040 --> 00:22:35.710
what your job delivery tool that you're
00:22:35.720 --> 00:22:38.230
using at the moment and you know, what
00:22:38.240 --> 00:22:40.190
made you decide on using it and how's it
00:22:40.200 --> 00:22:41.670
all tracking?
00:22:41.680 --> 00:22:43.990
>> We are using Wonder Build now. Um we
00:22:44.000 --> 00:22:46.270
were using Build Exact and and and I've
00:22:46.280 --> 00:22:48.470
used Procore and and and Job Pack and
00:22:48.480 --> 00:22:50.630
all sorts of various ones, but uh but
00:22:50.640 --> 00:22:51.790
sort of Wonder Build is probably more
00:22:51.800 --> 00:22:54.190
suited to to lock it sort of space that
00:22:54.200 --> 00:22:56.230
we operate in. And the main reason why
00:22:56.240 --> 00:22:58.190
we switched was the forecasting tool.
00:22:58.200 --> 00:23:00.630
So, it's got a it's It's a it's got a
00:23:00.640 --> 00:23:02.110
really good
00:23:02.120 --> 00:23:04.230
forecasting essentially that that that
00:23:04.240 --> 00:23:05.910
some of the others don't have and it
00:23:05.920 --> 00:23:07.630
just allows you to be on top of your
00:23:07.640 --> 00:23:10.570
numbers. It's It's very easy to
00:23:10.580 --> 00:23:10.590
>> [clears throat]
00:23:10.600 --> 00:23:11.390
>> um
00:23:11.400 --> 00:23:12.950
just from our experience but more more
00:23:12.960 --> 00:23:14.750
so in past employment we had a value
00:23:14.760 --> 00:23:16.510
I've seen
00:23:16.520 --> 00:23:18.630
where a job was forecast incorrectly or
00:23:18.640 --> 00:23:21.470
not forecast properly and the margin
00:23:21.480 --> 00:23:22.990
that the that the builder what we
00:23:23.000 --> 00:23:25.030
thought we were operating on was
00:23:25.040 --> 00:23:26.830
significantly worse than the reality.
00:23:26.840 --> 00:23:28.030
So, you know, it's always been really
00:23:28.040 --> 00:23:29.950
important for us to be able to forecast
00:23:29.960 --> 00:23:31.950
and entire jobs properly and how that
00:23:31.960 --> 00:23:33.710
sort of fits in holistically to the
00:23:33.720 --> 00:23:36.470
business. So, yeah, it's One Build
00:23:36.480 --> 00:23:37.950
ultimately because of the forecasting
00:23:37.960 --> 00:23:39.350
tool.
00:23:39.360 --> 00:23:41.510
>> Yeah. No, that's fantastic and and like
00:23:41.520 --> 00:23:42.910
it's so important to have your cost
00:23:42.920 --> 00:23:45.430
codes feed into your job scheduling tool
00:23:45.440 --> 00:23:47.870
so you can track the cost versus actuals
00:23:47.880 --> 00:23:49.270
then have that feed into your chart of
00:23:49.280 --> 00:23:50.870
accounts and bookkeeping system which
00:23:50.880 --> 00:23:53.550
we'll get to in a sec but you would have
00:23:53.560 --> 00:23:56.190
no doubt had to transition across from
00:23:56.200 --> 00:23:57.630
BuildExact to One Build. So, you're not
00:23:57.640 --> 00:23:59.510
using BuildExact anymore, is that right?
00:23:59.520 --> 00:24:00.230
You just
00:24:00.240 --> 00:24:01.390
>> Yeah, that's right. Now, we're not using
00:24:01.400 --> 00:24:03.230
it anymore. We were using it for It's
00:24:03.240 --> 00:24:04.790
got a really good estimating function
00:24:04.800 --> 00:24:06.750
and it's it's a pretty good you know, I
00:24:06.760 --> 00:24:08.190
think the bloke
00:24:08.200 --> 00:24:09.950
who uh who I speak to a little bit he
00:24:09.960 --> 00:24:11.390
was asking we just went over his
00:24:11.400 --> 00:24:13.150
business over the weekend and I'll say
00:24:13.160 --> 00:24:15.550
to him that he should use BuildExact cuz
00:24:15.560 --> 00:24:17.470
it's cuz it's pretty good but uh yeah,
00:24:17.480 --> 00:24:19.150
not not for us anymore. We've got We've
00:24:19.160 --> 00:24:21.270
gotten rid of it completely.
00:24:21.280 --> 00:24:22.910
>> And what was the transition like cuz
00:24:22.920 --> 00:24:24.350
obviously a lot of guys that move across
00:24:24.360 --> 00:24:26.030
from you know, different systems whether
00:24:26.040 --> 00:24:27.710
it's BuildExact to One Build or
00:24:27.720 --> 00:24:30.870
something else. Were were you you using
00:24:30.880 --> 00:24:33.350
both for a period of time or that caused
00:24:33.360 --> 00:24:35.790
some issues? What was it like?
00:24:35.800 --> 00:24:38.590
>> Oh, yeah. It was uh It's just spoils of
00:24:38.600 --> 00:24:41.070
war I suppose. Like it wasn't
00:24:41.080 --> 00:24:43.310
uh It wasn't uh
00:24:43.320 --> 00:24:46.670
Yeah, it wasn't the obviously separating
00:24:46.680 --> 00:24:48.910
from anything midway mid-use is never
00:24:48.920 --> 00:24:50.430
ideal but yeah, we were able to make it
00:24:50.440 --> 00:24:52.510
work and and um
00:24:52.520 --> 00:24:55.110
yeah, it was it was it was painful but
00:24:55.120 --> 00:24:57.070
it was it was manageable I suppose.
00:24:57.080 --> 00:24:58.510
Yeah. Well, in fact, there were some
00:24:58.520 --> 00:24:59.830
jobs that we just had to say, "Right,
00:24:59.840 --> 00:25:02.190
we're going to finish them off on Build
00:25:02.200 --> 00:25:03.670
Exact." And then some of the jobs that
00:25:03.680 --> 00:25:05.670
were just at the at the start, we
00:25:05.680 --> 00:25:07.030
they're the ones that we had to just
00:25:07.040 --> 00:25:09.470
sort of cut loose and go again. But but
00:25:09.480 --> 00:25:10.510
mind you, when the builder is pretty
00:25:10.520 --> 00:25:12.350
good, they they
00:25:12.360 --> 00:25:14.150
they've got a support team that sort of
00:25:14.160 --> 00:25:15.670
they they've got a really readily
00:25:15.680 --> 00:25:17.670
available support team. So, you know, we
00:25:17.680 --> 00:25:19.030
probably spoke to them for 10 hours a
00:25:19.040 --> 00:25:20.270
week for
00:25:20.280 --> 00:25:22.110
you know, which is a lot
00:25:22.120 --> 00:25:24.670
for like 6 months. So,
00:25:24.680 --> 00:25:26.350
yeah. So, all all in all, it was pretty
00:25:26.360 --> 00:25:28.470
pretty smooth. And now that we're
00:25:28.480 --> 00:25:30.350
completely transitioned, it's yeah,
00:25:30.360 --> 00:25:32.670
we're we're really happy with it.
00:25:32.680 --> 00:25:35.030
>> Yeah, fantastic. Just tell us a bit
00:25:35.040 --> 00:25:37.030
about the importance of like your cost
00:25:37.040 --> 00:25:40.590
codes flowing into your job scheduling
00:25:40.600 --> 00:25:43.790
tool, and then using your purchase
00:25:43.800 --> 00:25:45.550
orders,
00:25:45.560 --> 00:25:48.550
and and tracking your jobs that way.
00:25:48.560 --> 00:25:50.750
>> Yeah, so I suppose that's the the So,
00:25:50.760 --> 00:25:52.710
our estimator,
00:25:52.720 --> 00:25:56.110
he uses our We've got our
00:25:56.120 --> 00:25:58.670
company cost codes. The estimator
00:25:58.680 --> 00:26:00.470
it starts off in the estimating process.
00:26:00.480 --> 00:26:02.670
Then if that job we win the job, that
00:26:02.680 --> 00:26:05.110
then becomes a job. And the and the cost
00:26:05.120 --> 00:26:08.350
codes are sort of automatically there.
00:26:08.360 --> 00:26:10.230
So, for instance, if we're So, any
00:26:10.240 --> 00:26:11.150
dollar
00:26:11.160 --> 00:26:12.008
So, we
00:26:12.018 --> 00:26:12.310
>> [clears throat]
00:26:12.320 --> 00:26:14.230
>> on all of your in We can get into Xero
00:26:14.240 --> 00:26:15.910
and look at our
00:26:15.920 --> 00:26:17.550
you know, how much we're spending on
00:26:17.560 --> 00:26:18.950
concrete
00:26:18.960 --> 00:26:20.790
on each individual job, or say how much
00:26:20.800 --> 00:26:22.470
we're spending each year on concrete
00:26:22.480 --> 00:26:24.950
combined. So, having that having that
00:26:24.960 --> 00:26:26.470
having that
00:26:26.480 --> 00:26:28.190
visibility has been really important.
00:26:28.200 --> 00:26:30.590
It's mostly important for labor, we
00:26:30.600 --> 00:26:32.390
find, because we you know, we track sort
00:26:32.400 --> 00:26:34.310
of 10 different categories of labor. And
00:26:34.320 --> 00:26:36.270
particularly in the renovation space,
00:26:36.280 --> 00:26:38.230
it's really hard to say how much is how
00:26:38.240 --> 00:26:40.230
much is this job going to
00:26:40.240 --> 00:26:41.990
how many man hours are we going to spend
00:26:42.000 --> 00:26:44.270
on the labor here? And and because you
00:26:44.280 --> 00:26:45.710
know that you can open up a wall, and
00:26:45.720 --> 00:26:47.070
stuff like that can be different to to
00:26:47.080 --> 00:26:49.110
what you thought. So, it's really good
00:26:49.120 --> 00:26:51.230
to be able to get the 10 jobs prior and
00:26:51.240 --> 00:26:53.950
say we spent x amount of man hours in
00:26:53.960 --> 00:26:55.790
carpentry labor, and skilled labor, and
00:26:55.800 --> 00:26:57.350
unskilled labor, and sort of apply that
00:26:57.360 --> 00:26:59.590
to to a job that we're looking at. So,
00:26:59.600 --> 00:27:02.070
yeah, having those having the cost codes
00:27:02.080 --> 00:27:04.190
where you can get that information
00:27:04.200 --> 00:27:06.070
readily available, that's that's
00:27:06.080 --> 00:27:09.070
paramount. And then having the having
00:27:09.080 --> 00:27:11.030
the purchase orders set up properly at
00:27:11.040 --> 00:27:12.310
the start of the job, that's something
00:27:12.320 --> 00:27:14.070
that's been
00:27:14.080 --> 00:27:15.230
you know, when when you're busy, that's
00:27:15.240 --> 00:27:16.950
something that you can easily not do,
00:27:16.960 --> 00:27:18.990
which we have done in the past, but it's
00:27:19.000 --> 00:27:20.470
something that we really focus on now is
00:27:20.480 --> 00:27:22.430
just getting the job set up. We we don't
00:27:22.440 --> 00:27:25.070
like to start a job unless it's 90%
00:27:25.080 --> 00:27:27.270
procured, and things like shower screens
00:27:27.280 --> 00:27:29.510
and whatnot, they might
00:27:29.520 --> 00:27:30.870
that that that's probably not as
00:27:30.880 --> 00:27:32.630
important. You can just sort of you can
00:27:32.640 --> 00:27:33.790
do that a little bit later in the job,
00:27:33.800 --> 00:27:35.950
but it's like but but ideally having
00:27:35.960 --> 00:27:38.230
purchase orders sent trades, for the
00:27:38.240 --> 00:27:41.070
like demo, excavation,
00:27:41.080 --> 00:27:43.030
sort of all the services, concrete,
00:27:43.040 --> 00:27:44.630
structural steel, whatnot, having them
00:27:44.640 --> 00:27:47.710
signed up to our subcontract and our our
00:27:47.720 --> 00:27:50.070
tender interview process, so so that
00:27:50.080 --> 00:27:52.150
everyone's in complete agreement on the
00:27:52.160 --> 00:27:54.430
scope, and what's included, and what's
00:27:54.440 --> 00:27:56.070
excluded, and and whatnot before you
00:27:56.080 --> 00:27:58.110
start, cuz
00:27:58.120 --> 00:28:00.670
yeah, it's really important.
00:28:00.680 --> 00:28:03.230
>> Mate, oh yeah, I I I can't emphasize
00:28:03.240 --> 00:28:04.990
enough how important it is to get the
00:28:05.000 --> 00:28:06.390
the the labor right, the labor
00:28:06.400 --> 00:28:07.710
component, including supervision and
00:28:07.720 --> 00:28:09.630
project management, which anyone has
00:28:09.640 --> 00:28:11.470
followed like my content, they would
00:28:11.480 --> 00:28:13.470
have hear me harp on about that all the
00:28:13.480 --> 00:28:17.150
time where yeah, I I see guys probably
00:28:17.160 --> 00:28:19.230
half the builders I speak to on day one
00:28:19.240 --> 00:28:20.990
under costing any supervision or project
00:28:21.000 --> 00:28:22.670
management at all.
00:28:22.680 --> 00:28:24.590
So, it just comes out of their margin,
00:28:24.600 --> 00:28:26.470
so whatever margin they do have is is
00:28:26.480 --> 00:28:28.870
like a fake margin, it's not real.
00:28:28.880 --> 00:28:30.230
But it's also an area where there's lots
00:28:30.240 --> 00:28:32.590
of overruns. So, yeah, getting getting a
00:28:32.600 --> 00:28:34.990
handle on it requires, you know, moving
00:28:35.000 --> 00:28:37.070
towards keeping timesheets.
00:28:37.080 --> 00:28:38.430
Is that what you guys have done? What
00:28:38.440 --> 00:28:40.070
does it look like, and
00:28:40.080 --> 00:28:42.390
yeah, how do you manage the
00:28:42.400 --> 00:28:44.710
timesheet component of things?
00:28:44.720 --> 00:28:46.990
>> Yeah, so we've got the the guys uh guys
00:28:47.000 --> 00:28:48.710
use the One Build time sheets, and then
00:28:48.720 --> 00:28:50.870
they'll allocate themselves to the time
00:28:50.880 --> 00:28:52.270
that what what what they've been doing
00:28:52.280 --> 00:28:54.030
for that week. And then in the back end,
00:28:54.040 --> 00:28:56.390
we then reallocate it like
00:28:56.400 --> 00:28:57.830
more often than not, it's pretty good,
00:28:57.840 --> 00:28:59.510
but then often we'll reallocate it to
00:28:59.520 --> 00:29:01.390
where we think that it to to where it
00:29:01.400 --> 00:29:03.150
cost that it goes.
00:29:03.160 --> 00:29:04.630
Um and
00:29:04.640 --> 00:29:06.110
and then that will track our actuals
00:29:06.120 --> 00:29:07.750
versus budget, and then it says as you
00:29:07.760 --> 00:29:09.830
say, it's absolutely um
00:29:09.840 --> 00:29:11.630
yeah, labor is the biggest one. It's the
00:29:11.640 --> 00:29:13.590
I think they sort of say that old
00:29:13.600 --> 00:29:15.270
quantity surveying
00:29:15.280 --> 00:29:16.630
I was studying
00:29:16.640 --> 00:29:18.790
construction management at uni. I was
00:29:18.800 --> 00:29:20.150
working as a quantity surveyor for the
00:29:20.160 --> 00:29:22.070
four years that I was studying, and
00:29:22.080 --> 00:29:24.830
back then and then I think we worked at
00:29:24.840 --> 00:29:28.710
35% of the job was labor, and 65% was
00:29:28.720 --> 00:29:29.950
material.
00:29:29.960 --> 00:29:30.510
Um
00:29:30.520 --> 00:29:32.590
so, if a pallet of bricks turned up on
00:29:32.600 --> 00:29:34.230
site back then, you could say, "Well,
00:29:34.240 --> 00:29:36.670
that's 65% of the job
00:29:36.680 --> 00:29:38.950
complete." Whereas now, it's like I
00:29:38.960 --> 00:29:40.910
think it's now like for us at least,
00:29:40.920 --> 00:29:42.110
it's it's
00:29:42.120 --> 00:29:44.710
you know, 50 more than 50% of the work
00:29:44.720 --> 00:29:46.870
is now labor, I think. Yeah.
00:29:46.880 --> 00:29:47.750
So,
00:29:47.760 --> 00:29:49.910
I'm getting that right, it's just it's
00:29:49.920 --> 00:29:51.350
massive.
00:29:51.360 --> 00:29:52.470
>> Yeah, I mean, at the end of the day,
00:29:52.480 --> 00:29:54.630
it's about accuracy, right? It's
00:29:54.640 --> 00:29:56.310
uh yeah, it's it's in making sure that
00:29:56.320 --> 00:29:58.430
it's costed in correctly.
00:29:58.440 --> 00:29:59.110
>> Yeah.
00:29:59.120 --> 00:30:00.470
>> And again, if you're if you're flying
00:30:00.480 --> 00:30:02.190
blind, you're just not going to know
00:30:02.200 --> 00:30:03.910
where you're hemorrhaging. Yeah.
00:30:03.920 --> 00:30:05.790
>> Yeah, exactly. Exactly. Yeah, it's a big
00:30:05.800 --> 00:30:07.190
one. You get to the to the finish of the
00:30:07.200 --> 00:30:09.230
job, and yeah, you you finish the job,
00:30:09.240 --> 00:30:11.950
but it's it's gone four weeks over. You
00:30:11.960 --> 00:30:13.470
think you had decent money on it, but
00:30:13.480 --> 00:30:14.950
you're not sure, and then and then you
00:30:14.960 --> 00:30:16.510
get to the end of the
00:30:16.520 --> 00:30:17.870
job essentially, and you look at it and
00:30:17.880 --> 00:30:19.190
think, "Shit, there's no money on it."
00:30:19.200 --> 00:30:21.350
And it's and it's yeah, it's kind of
00:30:21.360 --> 00:30:22.510
pricing your project management
00:30:22.520 --> 00:30:23.390
properly, your [clears throat] labor's
00:30:23.400 --> 00:30:25.110
gone way over, and it sucks up cash
00:30:25.120 --> 00:30:26.510
pretty quickly.
00:30:26.520 --> 00:30:27.990
>> Mhm. Mhm.
00:30:28.000 --> 00:30:28.670
But, there's [snorts] two main
00:30:28.680 --> 00:30:30.030
components. Well, there's financials,
00:30:30.040 --> 00:30:31.390
which is such an important part. Like I
00:30:31.400 --> 00:30:32.750
said, a day one conversation with any
00:30:32.760 --> 00:30:34.070
builder that I speak to. There's the
00:30:34.080 --> 00:30:35.670
structure, which is like your cost
00:30:35.680 --> 00:30:37.990
codes, your job codes, cost codes, the
00:30:38.000 --> 00:30:39.230
purchase orders we just talked about.
00:30:39.240 --> 00:30:40.750
And then all of that feeding into your
00:30:40.760 --> 00:30:42.670
your bookkeeping system
00:30:42.680 --> 00:30:44.470
so you can you can track the numbers
00:30:44.480 --> 00:30:46.750
overall for the business. But then the
00:30:46.760 --> 00:30:49.630
second part is that the data entry. So,
00:30:49.640 --> 00:30:51.710
like so you Did you say it's weekly or
00:30:51.720 --> 00:30:54.310
fortnightly that you guys are tracking
00:30:54.320 --> 00:30:56.670
uh the numbers on jobs and and reviewing
00:30:56.680 --> 00:30:57.750
costs?
00:30:57.760 --> 00:30:59.270
>> Well, we do it weekly. We do it on a
00:30:59.280 --> 00:31:01.270
weekly basis. But yeah, yeah, some
00:31:01.280 --> 00:31:02.630
things like we don't necessarily send
00:31:02.640 --> 00:31:04.910
out invoices on a weekly basis. So, it
00:31:04.920 --> 00:31:06.110
it was
00:31:06.120 --> 00:31:08.750
for us uh and for anyone in in in the
00:31:08.760 --> 00:31:10.670
sort of area that we are. So, there
00:31:10.680 --> 00:31:12.630
there are things that are determined by
00:31:12.640 --> 00:31:14.350
the client or by the bank. Like some
00:31:14.360 --> 00:31:16.950
jobs that monthly progress claims,
00:31:16.960 --> 00:31:19.190
others are you know, if if it's up twice
00:31:19.200 --> 00:31:21.110
then we do it fortnightly. So, obviously
00:31:21.120 --> 00:31:23.070
you can't track your your revenue weekly
00:31:23.080 --> 00:31:24.310
if you're only sending out an invoice
00:31:24.320 --> 00:31:26.070
monthly sort of thing. But um but yeah,
00:31:26.080 --> 00:31:27.870
we'll track it on each individual
00:31:27.880 --> 00:31:30.950
project in a spreadsheet that then all
00:31:30.960 --> 00:31:33.590
talks to one da- da- dashboard across
00:31:33.600 --> 00:31:36.070
the business in its entirety. Yeah.
00:31:36.080 --> 00:31:37.950
>> Yeah, and
00:31:37.960 --> 00:31:40.150
it's it's so important to to obviously
00:31:40.160 --> 00:31:41.830
stay on top of it and not drop the ball.
00:31:41.840 --> 00:31:43.590
Like I've seen guys yeah, they're
00:31:43.600 --> 00:31:45.350
checking yeah, every week, every
00:31:45.360 --> 00:31:46.350
fortnight and they do the
00:31:46.360 --> 00:31:47.870
reconciliation.
00:31:47.880 --> 00:31:49.470
And [snorts] some of them have like um
00:31:49.480 --> 00:31:51.630
two checkpoints. So, someone checks it
00:31:51.640 --> 00:31:53.390
on a Thursday night then a Friday gets
00:31:53.400 --> 00:31:54.710
checked again
00:31:54.720 --> 00:31:56.430
by either an internal or external
00:31:56.440 --> 00:31:57.750
bookkeeper.
00:31:57.760 --> 00:31:58.830
Um
00:31:58.840 --> 00:32:00.590
but if you drop the ball, like if you if
00:32:00.600 --> 00:32:02.790
you miss three or four weeks, it's it
00:32:02.800 --> 00:32:04.230
can get away from you. It become a like
00:32:04.240 --> 00:32:06.630
a total mess. So, what does your process
00:32:06.640 --> 00:32:09.670
look like? Do you have yeah, like do-
00:32:09.680 --> 00:32:11.910
double checking or multiple checkpoints
00:32:11.920 --> 00:32:15.390
or you Yeah, what what's the process?
00:32:15.400 --> 00:32:17.190
>> Yeah, we do. Dom and I do this one
00:32:17.200 --> 00:32:19.150
ourselves. So, um so he'll do the
00:32:19.160 --> 00:32:20.830
Newcastle ones and I'll do Sydney and
00:32:20.840 --> 00:32:22.590
then we and then we sort of uh and then
00:32:22.600 --> 00:32:25.470
we we will check each other's and yeah,
00:32:25.480 --> 00:32:26.870
it's pretty it's a pretty straight like
00:32:26.880 --> 00:32:29.750
the way the process is that you know, I
00:32:29.760 --> 00:32:31.750
I don't caught out by him and he doesn't
00:32:31.760 --> 00:32:32.950
want to be caught out by me sort of
00:32:32.960 --> 00:32:35.070
thing. So, it's a it's a it's sort of
00:32:35.080 --> 00:32:37.670
the self-pleasing. But we are as our as
00:32:37.680 --> 00:32:39.950
our bookkeeper gets more uh more sort of
00:32:39.960 --> 00:32:41.550
comfortable with what we're doing, we're
00:32:41.560 --> 00:32:43.030
looking to palm it off to her
00:32:43.040 --> 00:32:45.070
completely, and and then uh and then
00:32:45.080 --> 00:32:46.470
we'll just do the checks and balances
00:32:46.480 --> 00:32:47.750
from there. But but it's something that
00:32:47.760 --> 00:32:49.350
I enjoy doing, and I think Dom does as
00:32:49.360 --> 00:32:51.230
well to to you know, make sure the
00:32:51.240 --> 00:32:52.870
numbers are right. It's it's cuz it's
00:32:52.880 --> 00:32:54.710
pretty unenjoyable when it's going
00:32:54.720 --> 00:32:57.870
wrong, so it's yeah, it's it's Yeah,
00:32:57.880 --> 00:32:59.430
it's all of it.
00:32:59.440 --> 00:33:00.870
>> No, that's that's good to hear. So, I've
00:33:00.880 --> 00:33:02.590
got a sibling rivalry there as well. Try
00:33:02.600 --> 00:33:03.990
to catch each other out. See who
00:33:04.000 --> 00:33:05.030
>> Yeah.
00:33:05.040 --> 00:33:06.950
>> Same thing.
00:33:06.960 --> 00:33:08.710
It's No, that's that's good, man,
00:33:08.720 --> 00:33:10.710
because a lot of guys don't realize that
00:33:10.720 --> 00:33:12.470
yeah, as the business owner, you you
00:33:12.480 --> 00:33:14.070
need to stay on top of it, man. You've
00:33:14.080 --> 00:33:17.270
got to check it. Otherwise, it can get
00:33:17.280 --> 00:33:18.990
away from you so quickly. With your
00:33:19.000 --> 00:33:20.790
forecasting, so you use cash flow
00:33:20.800 --> 00:33:23.510
forecast a 12-week cash flow forecast,
00:33:23.520 --> 00:33:25.830
and then you also keep an eye on what's
00:33:25.840 --> 00:33:27.190
in the pipeline, right? What's coming
00:33:27.200 --> 00:33:29.190
through. So, that way you can you can
00:33:29.200 --> 00:33:31.950
gauge where it's heading in terms of the
00:33:31.960 --> 00:33:33.550
volume of work, right?
00:33:33.560 --> 00:33:35.390
>> Yeah, we do. We So, we've got to track
00:33:35.400 --> 00:33:36.830
it over two like it's all it's all
00:33:36.840 --> 00:33:39.670
combined in one one system, but it's but
00:33:39.680 --> 00:33:41.270
it's broken up to one city and
00:33:41.280 --> 00:33:42.790
Newcastle.
00:33:42.800 --> 00:33:44.550
And it's broken [clears throat] up from
00:33:44.560 --> 00:33:46.470
from jobs that are like got contracts
00:33:46.480 --> 00:33:48.030
signed, but we haven't started. Like in
00:33:48.040 --> 00:33:49.230
the current climate, we've had a few
00:33:49.240 --> 00:33:50.830
jobs that are contract signed, we're
00:33:50.840 --> 00:33:52.750
ready to go, we've got guys allocated
00:33:52.760 --> 00:33:54.110
for the jobs, and then they've fallen
00:33:54.120 --> 00:33:55.150
over.
00:33:55.160 --> 00:33:59.150
Um so so in in that instance um it's
00:33:59.160 --> 00:34:00.590
we've just in recent times we've had to
00:34:00.600 --> 00:34:02.390
just rejig things. So, we've got jobs
00:34:02.400 --> 00:34:03.870
where contracts are signed, then we've
00:34:03.880 --> 00:34:05.710
got other jobs that are super warm,
00:34:05.720 --> 00:34:07.110
where where where where
00:34:07.120 --> 00:34:08.270
we're feeling confident that we're going
00:34:08.280 --> 00:34:09.669
to get the jobs, and then there's uh and
00:34:09.679 --> 00:34:12.110
then there's jobs that are um
00:34:12.120 --> 00:34:13.710
and then there's jobs that need more
00:34:13.720 --> 00:34:15.510
attention, I suppose. So, we just Yeah,
00:34:15.520 --> 00:34:18.350
it's just traffic light uh color
00:34:18.360 --> 00:34:20.909
coordinating sort of thing, and yeah, so
00:34:20.919 --> 00:34:22.590
so that's that's and that's something
00:34:22.600 --> 00:34:24.790
that we're that we're we're start with.
00:34:24.800 --> 00:34:27.230
We're right on top of currently because,
00:34:27.240 --> 00:34:28.669
you know, it's pretty easy to run out of
00:34:28.679 --> 00:34:31.030
work once your team starts growing.
00:34:31.040 --> 00:34:32.590
>> Yeah.
00:34:32.600 --> 00:34:34.990
So, the next thing I want to touch on is
00:34:35.000 --> 00:34:36.750
it's relevant to a lot of builders I ask
00:34:36.760 --> 00:34:39.310
here a lot it's rife, man, and that is
00:34:39.320 --> 00:34:41.669
like a builder being a bottleneck. And I
00:34:41.679 --> 00:34:43.350
think this is where
00:34:43.360 --> 00:34:45.990
um you having worked for a for a bigger
00:34:46.000 --> 00:34:48.190
company would have been beneficial. Like
00:34:48.200 --> 00:34:49.990
you you you seen the processes and how
00:34:50.000 --> 00:34:52.190
they siloed and everyone has different
00:34:52.200 --> 00:34:53.990
roles. So, you've got that perspective
00:34:54.000 --> 00:34:56.590
which ultimately it it's like a mindset
00:34:56.600 --> 00:34:58.270
thing where
00:34:58.280 --> 00:34:59.150
um
00:34:59.160 --> 00:35:00.750
if you think of the
00:35:00.760 --> 00:35:03.150
the average builder doing everything,
00:35:03.160 --> 00:35:04.510
they're like the bottlenecks. They're
00:35:04.520 --> 00:35:06.230
all the information the clients and the
00:35:06.240 --> 00:35:08.150
guys on site, the office, they're all
00:35:08.160 --> 00:35:09.830
contacting them.
00:35:09.840 --> 00:35:11.550
But then their mindset around that is
00:35:11.560 --> 00:35:13.190
well, they have to be that person
00:35:13.200 --> 00:35:15.550
because they're the decision maker and
00:35:15.560 --> 00:35:17.150
if they if they're not, then things
00:35:17.160 --> 00:35:18.590
could go wrong.
00:35:18.600 --> 00:35:19.350
It
00:35:19.360 --> 00:35:22.470
you have a realization around that um
00:35:22.480 --> 00:35:24.190
in our reflection and review exercises
00:35:24.200 --> 00:35:25.990
that donkey on the bridge
00:35:26.000 --> 00:35:27.550
uh question. I've got the donkey on the
00:35:27.560 --> 00:35:28.790
bridge, the thing that's in the way that
00:35:28.800 --> 00:35:29.950
you need to get rid of. And you said
00:35:29.960 --> 00:35:32.070
that it was your belief that you had to
00:35:32.080 --> 00:35:33.510
do everything.
00:35:33.520 --> 00:35:34.950
So, what was uh tell us a little more
00:35:34.960 --> 00:35:36.390
about that?
00:35:36.400 --> 00:35:38.190
>> Yeah, I suppose everyone feels that way
00:35:38.200 --> 00:35:40.390
or or at least it's understandable why
00:35:40.400 --> 00:35:43.390
people feel that way with uh with um you
00:35:43.400 --> 00:35:44.670
know, with your babies, sort of thing.
00:35:44.680 --> 00:35:46.470
You you you you want things done a
00:35:46.480 --> 00:35:47.910
certain way and you want to be in
00:35:47.920 --> 00:35:50.030
control of everything, but
00:35:50.040 --> 00:35:50.710
um
00:35:50.720 --> 00:35:51.990
yeah, it just gets to a certain point
00:35:52.000 --> 00:35:53.350
when you realize that you just can't do
00:35:53.360 --> 00:35:55.619
that and and and you know, then
00:35:55.629 --> 00:35:55.910
>> [clears throat]
00:35:55.920 --> 00:35:57.430
>> people have to step up into the role.
00:35:57.440 --> 00:35:58.870
And I suppose that's one thing for us
00:35:58.880 --> 00:36:01.350
that is uh the advantage of having
00:36:01.360 --> 00:36:02.510
family in the business. There's a lot of
00:36:02.520 --> 00:36:04.110
people in that business who we can trust
00:36:04.120 --> 00:36:06.590
with it to to step up and to pass over
00:36:06.600 --> 00:36:08.110
responsibilities. So, there's, you know,
00:36:08.120 --> 00:36:10.310
me, Dom, Dad,
00:36:10.320 --> 00:36:12.910
um another brother on the tools.
00:36:12.920 --> 00:36:13.670
Um
00:36:13.680 --> 00:36:14.710
there's just
00:36:14.720 --> 00:36:16.550
that and and there's people who we
00:36:16.560 --> 00:36:18.270
really trust within the business and and
00:36:18.280 --> 00:36:20.110
so giving them more responsibility,
00:36:20.120 --> 00:36:23.110
clearly defining their roles, who who's
00:36:23.120 --> 00:36:25.950
responsible for what. Don't call me for
00:36:25.960 --> 00:36:27.990
that problem, call the project manager,
00:36:28.000 --> 00:36:30.190
um etc. etc. All of that is just flat
00:36:30.200 --> 00:36:31.550
out your job, figure that out sort of
00:36:31.560 --> 00:36:33.190
thing. And having that And And then
00:36:33.200 --> 00:36:35.590
having a having a place where where
00:36:35.600 --> 00:36:37.990
we're reviewing jobs actually been a big
00:36:38.000 --> 00:36:39.670
thing for us, reviewing the jobs at the
00:36:39.680 --> 00:36:41.550
end. And people
00:36:41.560 --> 00:36:43.110
You know, cuz I've got my
00:36:43.120 --> 00:36:45.430
um view on how the jobs are going and
00:36:45.440 --> 00:36:46.990
and how the roles and responsibilities
00:36:47.000 --> 00:36:47.990
are going. But you get to the end of the
00:36:48.000 --> 00:36:49.790
job and and the site team will say, "Oh,
00:36:49.800 --> 00:36:51.310
you know, well, you know, we need a bit
00:36:51.320 --> 00:36:53.550
more support here or or
00:36:53.560 --> 00:36:54.910
uh we need more clarity there." And so I
00:36:54.920 --> 00:36:56.310
don't having having you can sort of
00:36:56.320 --> 00:36:58.270
refine that on a on a sort of
00:36:58.280 --> 00:36:58.990
uh
00:36:59.000 --> 00:37:01.630
on a sort of uh
00:37:01.640 --> 00:37:03.510
regular basis.
00:37:03.520 --> 00:37:04.750
>> Yeah, yeah.
00:37:04.760 --> 00:37:07.550
Um yeah, that's uh
00:37:07.560 --> 00:37:10.310
So so letting go of issue of being the
00:37:10.320 --> 00:37:12.750
bottleneck and doing everything.
00:37:12.760 --> 00:37:15.190
Um I I know that just cuz I've been in
00:37:15.200 --> 00:37:16.510
this for a long time, it's difficult for
00:37:16.520 --> 00:37:18.270
a lot of builders and business owners
00:37:18.280 --> 00:37:20.870
for like all the reasons you described.
00:37:20.880 --> 00:37:22.350
Um but then the the next question is
00:37:22.360 --> 00:37:23.630
what once I get past that and they
00:37:23.640 --> 00:37:25.070
realize, "Okay, like enough's enough.
00:37:25.080 --> 00:37:26.550
I've got to I'm going to have to let go
00:37:26.560 --> 00:37:28.590
of something because this unsustainable,
00:37:28.600 --> 00:37:31.150
you know, doing 60 80 hours a week."
00:37:31.160 --> 00:37:31.830
Um
00:37:31.840 --> 00:37:34.510
and the process that I would encourage
00:37:34.520 --> 00:37:36.590
guys to to use and it's not a like you
00:37:36.600 --> 00:37:38.350
don't it's not you have to do it this
00:37:38.360 --> 00:37:40.790
way, but ideally let go of the the
00:37:40.800 --> 00:37:43.750
low-level tasks first, right? Low skill,
00:37:43.760 --> 00:37:45.670
low fun tasks. You know, if there's
00:37:45.680 --> 00:37:47.430
anything you can pay someone $50 an hour
00:37:47.440 --> 00:37:49.070
less to do, you really as the owner of
00:37:49.080 --> 00:37:50.590
the business should not be doing that
00:37:50.600 --> 00:37:52.990
task, right? So that's a good place to
00:37:53.000 --> 00:37:55.590
start. Like you don't start by going, "I
00:37:55.600 --> 00:37:56.830
can't I'm going to bring someone in and
00:37:56.840 --> 00:37:58.590
pay them, you know, 300 grand a year and
00:37:58.600 --> 00:38:01.110
let them just you know, be be a BDM and
00:38:01.120 --> 00:38:02.830
and take a whole lot of things off me."
00:38:02.840 --> 00:38:05.510
Like you bring on another apprentice or
00:38:05.520 --> 00:38:07.790
you bring on an an office admin person
00:38:07.800 --> 00:38:10.390
part-time or VA, something like that.
00:38:10.400 --> 00:38:11.590
But you guys, you brought on a
00:38:11.600 --> 00:38:14.070
bookkeeper and estimator and then
00:38:14.080 --> 00:38:15.950
uh a content creator, right? A marketing
00:38:15.960 --> 00:38:17.910
com- quite quickly. What was your
00:38:17.920 --> 00:38:19.630
decision-making process around that for
00:38:19.640 --> 00:38:20.670
bringing those people on? How did you
00:38:20.680 --> 00:38:23.110
know they were the right people?
00:38:23.120 --> 00:38:24.750
>> I suppose yeah, doing that exercise with
00:38:24.760 --> 00:38:25.990
you was pretty like, you know, you
00:38:26.000 --> 00:38:28.310
realize that you're doing a lot of
00:38:28.320 --> 00:38:31.830
$50 an hour tasks or less and so having
00:38:31.840 --> 00:38:34.150
that sort of visual understanding sort
00:38:34.160 --> 00:38:35.510
of helps you
00:38:35.520 --> 00:38:37.070
helps you make a move pretty quickly. So
00:38:37.080 --> 00:38:38.510
you have the the bookkeeper that was a
00:38:38.520 --> 00:38:41.110
good one. We we we did have a bookkeeper
00:38:41.120 --> 00:38:42.390
but they just weren't right for the sort
00:38:42.400 --> 00:38:43.750
of they didn't sort of needed to grow
00:38:43.760 --> 00:38:45.510
with us, I suppose. So sort of
00:38:45.520 --> 00:38:46.790
understanding that and then
00:38:46.800 --> 00:38:48.110
transitioning that was that was a
00:38:48.120 --> 00:38:49.750
massive.
00:38:49.760 --> 00:38:51.550
Yeah, getting someone to do some content
00:38:51.560 --> 00:38:53.470
that was massive because that's actually
00:38:53.480 --> 00:38:55.150
for anyone who does it that's super time
00:38:55.160 --> 00:38:57.470
consuming. More more time consuming than
00:38:57.480 --> 00:38:59.510
you can possibly imagine.
00:38:59.520 --> 00:39:02.710
And and uh
00:39:02.720 --> 00:39:04.550
bookkeeper
00:39:04.560 --> 00:39:07.790
um content creator and yeah, admin in
00:39:07.800 --> 00:39:09.710
the office and then we got an estimator
00:39:09.720 --> 00:39:11.670
and and the estimator was massive
00:39:11.680 --> 00:39:13.630
because that freed up so much time. So
00:39:13.640 --> 00:39:16.350
between those four functions it was uh
00:39:16.360 --> 00:39:18.470
yeah, it freed up so much time and it
00:39:18.480 --> 00:39:20.230
you know, allows you to get bring more
00:39:20.240 --> 00:39:22.630
work into the door and yeah, and
00:39:22.640 --> 00:39:24.630
actually sort of high value tasks, I
00:39:24.640 --> 00:39:25.870
suppose.
00:39:25.880 --> 00:39:27.190
>> Yeah, yeah.
00:39:27.200 --> 00:39:29.590
Um and obviously yeah, bringing them on
00:39:29.600 --> 00:39:32.270
impacts you know, your your overhead if
00:39:32.280 --> 00:39:34.310
they're in the office, office space. So
00:39:34.320 --> 00:39:36.030
again, having the financial tracking and
00:39:36.040 --> 00:39:37.790
understanding break-even point and where
00:39:37.800 --> 00:39:39.350
your margin is
00:39:39.360 --> 00:39:41.710
um it's easy for you to see
00:39:41.720 --> 00:39:43.750
you know, what whether you um are
00:39:43.760 --> 00:39:45.630
staying within that we're talking about
00:39:45.640 --> 00:39:47.990
the 8 to 12% of turnover for overhead,
00:39:48.000 --> 00:39:50.430
whether you're in that bandwidth
00:39:50.440 --> 00:39:52.190
and then you're not top-heavy. So you
00:39:52.200 --> 00:39:53.070
obviously
00:39:53.080 --> 00:39:54.150
that allows you to move forward with
00:39:54.160 --> 00:39:56.310
confidence cuz some people go, "How do I
00:39:56.320 --> 00:39:57.710
know that I'll be get off? How many
00:39:57.720 --> 00:39:59.110
people should I have in the office? How
00:39:59.120 --> 00:40:00.110
do I know if I'm top-heavy? Do I have
00:40:00.120 --> 00:40:02.030
too many people or not enough?" It's
00:40:02.040 --> 00:40:03.510
well, look at your overheads as a
00:40:03.520 --> 00:40:04.830
percentage of turnover and make sure
00:40:04.840 --> 00:40:06.710
you're looking at an accurate number.
00:40:06.720 --> 00:40:08.950
And and often they're at a 6 or 7%,
00:40:08.960 --> 00:40:10.310
which means they can afford to spend
00:40:10.320 --> 00:40:12.870
more, bring on someone to help like a
00:40:12.880 --> 00:40:14.870
bookkeeper or office admin
00:40:14.880 --> 00:40:17.030
and free themselves up to go and then do
00:40:17.040 --> 00:40:18.630
higher dollar product returns at the
00:40:18.640 --> 00:40:20.110
front end, like networking with
00:40:20.120 --> 00:40:21.990
architects or whatever it is.
00:40:22.000 --> 00:40:23.710
>> Yeah, yeah, exactly. You're exactly
00:40:23.720 --> 00:40:25.270
right. That's the Yeah, knowing those
00:40:25.280 --> 00:40:27.750
numbers is absolutely so paramount.
00:40:27.760 --> 00:40:29.310
>> Yeah, it allows you again just gives you
00:40:29.320 --> 00:40:30.870
that confidence to make those decisions.
00:40:30.880 --> 00:40:32.550
Um so
00:40:32.560 --> 00:40:33.830
and then as you bring people on then
00:40:33.840 --> 00:40:36.510
your your and Dom's roles change, right?
00:40:36.520 --> 00:40:39.750
So you your job descriptions change um
00:40:39.760 --> 00:40:41.510
and and then you know, we we look at
00:40:41.520 --> 00:40:42.950
that everything through the lens of
00:40:42.960 --> 00:40:44.910
80/20. 20% of the things you do give you
00:40:44.920 --> 00:40:46.550
80% of your results.
00:40:46.560 --> 00:40:48.550
And I mean those are essentially your
00:40:48.560 --> 00:40:51.350
KPIs, key performance indicators for for
00:40:51.360 --> 00:40:53.950
everyone including yourselves and then
00:40:53.960 --> 00:40:55.310
put all of those into your weekly
00:40:55.320 --> 00:40:57.990
calendar as like a default diary.
00:40:58.000 --> 00:41:00.350
Um it's all a process there and stand up
00:41:00.360 --> 00:41:02.630
meetings as well where there's rapid
00:41:02.640 --> 00:41:04.550
growth. Are you guys you guys using
00:41:04.560 --> 00:41:07.270
stand up meetings and you know, what why
00:41:07.280 --> 00:41:08.870
why is that important?
00:41:08.880 --> 00:41:10.190
>> Yeah, we are and they're they're just
00:41:10.200 --> 00:41:11.470
good because as you know, as we're
00:41:11.480 --> 00:41:13.150
growing it you can't get to every single
00:41:13.160 --> 00:41:15.430
job or you can't get to every uh you
00:41:15.440 --> 00:41:16.990
can't be everywhere at any one time and
00:41:17.000 --> 00:41:18.538
you can't be talking to one
00:41:18.548 --> 00:41:19.710
[clears throat] site manager or one
00:41:19.720 --> 00:41:21.830
project manager about all their problems
00:41:21.840 --> 00:41:24.510
just on an ad hoc basis. So having that
00:41:24.520 --> 00:41:26.150
sort of recurring time where you're
00:41:26.160 --> 00:41:28.630
catching up for each job site and people
00:41:28.640 --> 00:41:30.470
telling you what they're doing
00:41:30.480 --> 00:41:32.430
um you know, what they're what what
00:41:32.440 --> 00:41:34.070
they've got coming up and and you can
00:41:34.080 --> 00:41:35.630
sort of see whether they've got a handle
00:41:35.640 --> 00:41:37.350
on the job or not, what they're what
00:41:37.360 --> 00:41:38.270
they're you know, you can look at the
00:41:38.280 --> 00:41:39.630
master program. They're telling you that
00:41:39.640 --> 00:41:41.110
they'll get there. The plumber's coming
00:41:41.120 --> 00:41:42.190
this week. They're going to be at this
00:41:42.200 --> 00:41:44.390
part of the framing. If it doesn't align
00:41:44.400 --> 00:41:45.870
with the master program, you can sort of
00:41:45.880 --> 00:41:47.590
just look back and uh
00:41:47.600 --> 00:41:49.070
you know, have a quick conversation or
00:41:49.080 --> 00:41:51.070
just see where they're at with it. So um
00:41:51.080 --> 00:41:53.030
it's it's been really uh important just
00:41:53.040 --> 00:41:55.950
to stay abreast of the the
00:41:55.960 --> 00:41:58.070
the the happenings of the the jobs on
00:41:58.080 --> 00:42:01.110
individual job basis without being there
00:42:01.120 --> 00:42:03.430
without being there sort of at the uh
00:42:03.440 --> 00:42:04.830
24/7.
00:42:04.840 --> 00:42:05.710
And they're
00:42:05.720 --> 00:42:06.990
they're coming back and telling you what
00:42:07.000 --> 00:42:09.270
they've done for the the day before and
00:42:09.280 --> 00:42:11.710
they're sort of saying at a very micro
00:42:11.720 --> 00:42:14.150
level are they getting each day are they
00:42:14.160 --> 00:42:15.750
doing what they are what what what what
00:42:15.760 --> 00:42:17.710
we're planning to do sort of things. So,
00:42:17.720 --> 00:42:19.550
it's uh yeah, it's a good good thing all
00:42:19.560 --> 00:42:20.830
around.
00:42:20.840 --> 00:42:22.030
>> Yeah, it's great accountability. So,
00:42:22.040 --> 00:42:23.750
this is for anyone listening and it is
00:42:23.760 --> 00:42:25.830
yeah, it's a quick turnaround type
00:42:25.840 --> 00:42:27.790
meeting. Could be face-to-face on the
00:42:27.800 --> 00:42:29.110
phone.
00:42:29.120 --> 00:42:31.070
And you know, like on a Zoom call like
00:42:31.080 --> 00:42:32.590
this and it's yeah, what what happened
00:42:32.600 --> 00:42:34.910
yesterday? What's happening today?
00:42:34.920 --> 00:42:36.550
Are there any blockers, any issues? And
00:42:36.560 --> 00:42:38.070
if you're doing those, you know, every
00:42:38.080 --> 00:42:39.750
day or every other day, ideally every
00:42:39.760 --> 00:42:41.710
day, it's 15 minutes.
00:42:41.720 --> 00:42:42.590
And
00:42:42.600 --> 00:42:44.470
they're they're accountable for for what
00:42:44.480 --> 00:42:46.390
they're doing. Um
00:42:46.400 --> 00:42:48.790
I heard uh so, Elon Musk does that. Like
00:42:48.800 --> 00:42:50.910
he he'll spend Yeah, that guy's got the
00:42:50.920 --> 00:42:52.150
insane work ethic, but I've heard he
00:42:52.160 --> 00:42:54.390
does like 5-minute meetings with And and
00:42:54.400 --> 00:42:55.750
it's what did you do last week? It's not
00:42:55.760 --> 00:42:57.070
even the three questions. It's what did
00:42:57.080 --> 00:42:59.070
you do last week? And I I believe they
00:42:59.080 --> 00:43:01.670
did that with the um
00:43:01.680 --> 00:43:03.550
when they went into the government. It
00:43:03.560 --> 00:43:05.710
was a lot of people are like uh
00:43:05.720 --> 00:43:08.030
like you can imagine in a government
00:43:08.040 --> 00:43:09.870
setup in [clears throat] a bureaucracy,
00:43:09.880 --> 00:43:11.550
uh they haven't done probably for a
00:43:11.560 --> 00:43:13.030
month. Not all of them, of course. You
00:43:13.040 --> 00:43:14.390
don't tar them all with the same brush,
00:43:14.400 --> 00:43:16.790
but yeah, just it's if you know that
00:43:16.800 --> 00:43:18.270
question's going to be asked every
00:43:18.280 --> 00:43:20.070
morning, what did you do yesterday? What
00:43:20.080 --> 00:43:21.430
are you doing today? What are the
00:43:21.440 --> 00:43:23.630
blockers? When an issue comes up as
00:43:23.640 --> 00:43:24.990
well, that third question of what are
00:43:25.000 --> 00:43:26.910
the the the blockers or things that are
00:43:26.920 --> 00:43:28.310
you know, blocking you from from moving
00:43:28.320 --> 00:43:29.310
forward.
00:43:29.320 --> 00:43:30.990
If if you're going, "Oh, no, none none
00:43:31.000 --> 00:43:32.830
none." and then there's a problem, you
00:43:32.840 --> 00:43:33.990
can look back and go, "Why didn't you
00:43:34.000 --> 00:43:35.790
say anything?" You know, so that's the
00:43:35.800 --> 00:43:36.870
accountability.
00:43:36.880 --> 00:43:38.750
>> Yeah, you catch them things just as
00:43:38.760 --> 00:43:40.190
they're happening. It's it's sort of
00:43:40.200 --> 00:43:41.830
saves you getting to the end of the week
00:43:41.840 --> 00:43:42.950
and guys are like, "I've
00:43:42.960 --> 00:43:45.110
got tasks that's not actually moving the
00:43:45.120 --> 00:43:47.590
needle forward from a from a from a
00:43:47.600 --> 00:43:49.750
critical path programming um
00:43:49.760 --> 00:43:51.550
standpoint." Cuz often that's what we
00:43:51.560 --> 00:43:52.950
find. The guys will keep themselves
00:43:52.960 --> 00:43:56.190
busy, but it's but it might not be
00:43:56.200 --> 00:43:57.910
um to get the roof on so you can start
00:43:57.920 --> 00:43:59.910
jacking and da da da da so it might be
00:43:59.920 --> 00:44:01.350
just you know, that stuff. They'll find
00:44:01.360 --> 00:44:02.550
something else where you can sort of
00:44:02.560 --> 00:44:05.590
steer the job how you need it to go.
00:44:05.600 --> 00:44:06.830
>> Yeah, yeah.
00:44:06.840 --> 00:44:08.310
No, that's great. And you guys You guys
00:44:08.320 --> 00:44:10.470
work on deadlines and so who does what
00:44:10.480 --> 00:44:11.670
by when?
00:44:11.680 --> 00:44:14.350
Um as opposed to we we need to get this
00:44:14.360 --> 00:44:16.590
done. It's It's more sort of
00:44:16.600 --> 00:44:18.950
you believe in sort of accountability
00:44:18.960 --> 00:44:21.630
and then meritocracy, right?
00:44:21.640 --> 00:44:23.350
>> Yeah, that's right. That's right. Yeah,
00:44:23.360 --> 00:44:25.390
exactly right. It's sort of that that
00:44:25.400 --> 00:44:26.750
that that everyone's not equal to
00:44:26.760 --> 00:44:28.790
getting things done. It's It's Yeah,
00:44:28.800 --> 00:44:30.950
it's absolutely we
00:44:30.960 --> 00:44:33.510
base things on on who's doing what and
00:44:33.520 --> 00:44:34.670
when are they going to get it done by.
00:44:34.680 --> 00:44:36.710
So, it's it's exactly right.
00:44:36.720 --> 00:44:37.550
>> Yeah.
00:44:37.560 --> 00:44:38.910
I love it, man.
00:44:38.920 --> 00:44:40.350
Um
00:44:40.360 --> 00:44:41.990
just for people that are they're they're
00:44:42.000 --> 00:44:43.910
they're probably wondering how you guys
00:44:43.920 --> 00:44:46.510
are managing the Newcastle Sydney setup
00:44:46.520 --> 00:44:48.350
between yourself and Dom.
00:44:48.360 --> 00:44:50.150
Um how do you split the general manager
00:44:50.160 --> 00:44:52.230
like sort of responsibilities?
00:44:52.240 --> 00:44:54.870
Is it um yeah, what does it look like?
00:44:54.880 --> 00:44:57.030
>> Um so, yeah, like
00:44:57.040 --> 00:44:58.550
basically I'm I'll look after the
00:44:58.560 --> 00:45:00.510
pre-construction side of things, which
00:45:00.520 --> 00:45:02.310
is up until the job gets started and
00:45:02.320 --> 00:45:04.670
then Dom looks after from there after.
00:45:04.680 --> 00:45:06.030
So, which is sort of all the systems and
00:45:06.040 --> 00:45:08.670
process with construction, safety,
00:45:08.680 --> 00:45:10.350
handover, quality control, all that sort
00:45:10.360 --> 00:45:12.190
of stuff. Um
00:45:12.200 --> 00:45:14.790
then I'm I'm I'm running the Sydney side
00:45:14.800 --> 00:45:17.190
of things. So, it'll be more and then
00:45:17.200 --> 00:45:18.830
and then he runs the Newcastle side of
00:45:18.840 --> 00:45:20.230
the business. So, there's a bit of a
00:45:20.240 --> 00:45:21.830
handover that once the job's actually
00:45:21.840 --> 00:45:24.110
started and I've got to follow the
00:45:24.120 --> 00:45:25.150
system and make sure things are
00:45:25.160 --> 00:45:27.830
happening as per his system and but same
00:45:27.840 --> 00:45:29.870
as when when we're meeting clients in
00:45:29.880 --> 00:45:32.110
Newcastle, he or I can't get to all of
00:45:32.120 --> 00:45:33.870
them. So, he'll have to he'll have to be
00:45:33.880 --> 00:45:36.510
there, but having a clear delineation is
00:45:36.520 --> 00:45:38.710
what's It is what sort of allowed us to
00:45:38.720 --> 00:45:41.830
unlock our sort of growth, I suppose.
00:45:41.840 --> 00:45:43.470
Before we were trying to do everything
00:45:43.480 --> 00:45:44.910
individually based and it was just
00:45:44.920 --> 00:45:46.790
getting too hard.
00:45:46.800 --> 00:45:49.150
Yeah, getting way too hard to to
00:45:49.160 --> 00:45:50.190
It was sort of like two separate
00:45:50.200 --> 00:45:52.150
businesses essentially.
00:45:52.160 --> 00:45:53.150
>> Yeah, it just comes back to role
00:45:53.160 --> 00:45:54.550
clarity.
00:45:54.560 --> 00:45:57.430
And then you guys yeah, focusing on
00:45:57.440 --> 00:45:59.350
those two those two areas, the pre-con
00:45:59.360 --> 00:46:01.950
and the and the job delivery side.
00:46:01.960 --> 00:46:05.110
Looking at shifting over to non-client
00:46:05.120 --> 00:46:06.990
work or doing your own developments.
00:46:07.000 --> 00:46:08.230
Yeah, the best I would say the best
00:46:08.240 --> 00:46:09.950
business model I've seen
00:46:09.960 --> 00:46:11.790
Yeah, but is that
00:46:11.800 --> 00:46:14.590
well, seven-figure club sort of client
00:46:14.600 --> 00:46:16.150
work coming through good margins and
00:46:16.160 --> 00:46:17.710
good cash flow and then feeding that
00:46:17.720 --> 00:46:20.670
into your own developments.
00:46:20.680 --> 00:46:23.150
You guys have a long-term goal of moving
00:46:23.160 --> 00:46:26.790
towards a 50/50 split in terms of client
00:46:26.800 --> 00:46:28.670
work and non-client work. So, so why
00:46:28.680 --> 00:46:30.590
developments? What what sort of
00:46:30.600 --> 00:46:32.790
led to that
00:46:32.800 --> 00:46:34.870
that goal or outcome?
00:46:34.880 --> 00:46:36.630
>> Uh ultimately that's where
00:46:36.640 --> 00:46:38.950
that's what we want to get into just to
00:46:38.960 --> 00:46:40.110
you know, start doing our own
00:46:40.120 --> 00:46:41.830
developments and and just getting on
00:46:41.840 --> 00:46:43.550
that side of the that side of the line I
00:46:43.560 --> 00:46:45.230
suppose. But you know, ultimately we
00:46:45.240 --> 00:46:47.510
enjoy client work. We making money doing
00:46:47.520 --> 00:46:49.070
it and that's not something that we you
00:46:49.080 --> 00:46:50.750
know, we we enjoy working with clients
00:46:50.760 --> 00:46:52.390
and we enjoy sort of bringing an
00:46:52.400 --> 00:46:54.750
architect's vision to life. So, so so we
00:46:54.760 --> 00:46:56.870
don't want to get rid of that. It's also
00:46:56.880 --> 00:46:59.710
you know, it also funds developments and
00:46:59.720 --> 00:47:02.110
whatever else it may fund. So, so it's
00:47:02.120 --> 00:47:04.230
not like it's you know, we often talk to
00:47:04.240 --> 00:47:05.350
you know, you'll talk to people and say
00:47:05.360 --> 00:47:06.550
oh, we'll just we're going to start
00:47:06.560 --> 00:47:08.110
developing that or that. So, if you got
00:47:08.120 --> 00:47:10.390
something that works,
00:47:10.400 --> 00:47:12.550
that's that's that's so we're so really
00:47:12.560 --> 00:47:14.550
we do custom renovations. That's what
00:47:14.560 --> 00:47:16.110
that's what we do for clients and
00:47:16.120 --> 00:47:17.430
ultimately that's what we want to do for
00:47:17.440 --> 00:47:18.750
ourselves cuz it's what we build out.
00:47:18.760 --> 00:47:20.350
It's what what's what our whole business
00:47:20.360 --> 00:47:22.550
revolves around. So,
00:47:22.560 --> 00:47:22.722
you know,
00:47:22.732 --> 00:47:23.790
>> [clears throat]
00:47:23.800 --> 00:47:25.270
>> you know, we we we can do it for cheaper
00:47:25.280 --> 00:47:26.470
than anyone else. We can do it quicker
00:47:26.480 --> 00:47:28.390
than anyone else. So,
00:47:28.400 --> 00:47:29.670
yeah, that's that's what we're setting
00:47:29.680 --> 00:47:30.990
up to do to start doing a custom
00:47:31.000 --> 00:47:32.550
renovations but from a development side
00:47:32.560 --> 00:47:33.990
and yeah,
00:47:34.000 --> 00:47:34.950
um
00:47:34.960 --> 00:47:36.510
just you know, we feel like there's a
00:47:36.520 --> 00:47:37.910
lot of potential in that in that space
00:47:37.920 --> 00:47:39.510
and we feel like we'll be good at it.
00:47:39.520 --> 00:47:42.230
So, that's what we're yeah, going for.
00:47:42.240 --> 00:47:44.070
>> Yeah, fantastic and it's a great it's a
00:47:44.080 --> 00:47:47.150
great way to get your your money to work
00:47:47.160 --> 00:47:49.750
for you like once you are profitable.
00:47:49.760 --> 00:47:52.350
And it's important that you know, from a
00:47:52.360 --> 00:47:54.830
a duty of care to your clients that you
00:47:54.840 --> 00:47:56.830
are financially sound.
00:47:56.840 --> 00:47:58.590
So, if you can you that, it's just going
00:47:58.600 --> 00:48:00.350
to put you in a a better and better
00:48:00.360 --> 00:48:02.910
position financially, which again is
00:48:02.920 --> 00:48:05.270
building credibility and trust. And like
00:48:05.280 --> 00:48:06.910
you know that from working with those
00:48:06.920 --> 00:48:08.350
those big builders. You know, you go to
00:48:08.360 --> 00:48:10.150
their websites and they sort of lead
00:48:10.160 --> 00:48:11.270
with
00:48:11.280 --> 00:48:13.030
financially sound they are, how liquid
00:48:13.040 --> 00:48:15.270
they are with cash and and whatever else
00:48:15.280 --> 00:48:16.550
because
00:48:16.560 --> 00:48:17.830
you know, there's
00:48:17.840 --> 00:48:19.310
uh there's obviously a lot of fear and
00:48:19.320 --> 00:48:21.030
and concern out there
00:48:21.040 --> 00:48:22.790
with clients. Yeah, that is the builder
00:48:22.800 --> 00:48:24.110
going to be around, you know, like are
00:48:24.120 --> 00:48:26.150
we going to be able to finish the job?
00:48:26.160 --> 00:48:27.230
But, if you're doing some of your own
00:48:27.240 --> 00:48:28.750
work on the side and then setting that
00:48:28.760 --> 00:48:30.630
up properly as well with the right
00:48:30.640 --> 00:48:32.310
accounting structures and financial
00:48:32.320 --> 00:48:34.510
structures and you've got like a
00:48:34.520 --> 00:48:35.910
an area of specialty like you just
00:48:35.920 --> 00:48:37.270
described,
00:48:37.280 --> 00:48:39.470
yeah, it's it's it's all uh I mean, you
00:48:39.480 --> 00:48:41.670
can show showcase your work as well as
00:48:41.680 --> 00:48:43.910
well as build wealth, yeah.
00:48:43.920 --> 00:48:45.430
>> Yeah, exactly, right. That's that that
00:48:45.440 --> 00:48:47.710
is the end goal, but but like, you know,
00:48:47.720 --> 00:48:48.950
you know, again like like we're sort of
00:48:48.960 --> 00:48:50.070
saying you talk to people and they want
00:48:50.080 --> 00:48:50.990
to do
00:48:51.000 --> 00:48:51.830
um you know, they think it would be
00:48:51.840 --> 00:48:53.070
grander and doing and they want to get
00:48:53.080 --> 00:48:55.190
into building apartments, but but not
00:48:55.200 --> 00:48:57.390
real apartments for themselves. So, how
00:48:57.400 --> 00:48:58.550
how are you going to compete with
00:48:58.560 --> 00:49:00.830
someone who does this day and day out?
00:49:00.840 --> 00:49:02.390
It's it's for us where we're just you
00:49:02.400 --> 00:49:03.350
know, we're we're just going to keep
00:49:03.360 --> 00:49:05.190
doing what we're doing and some of the
00:49:05.200 --> 00:49:06.590
jobs will just happen to be for
00:49:06.600 --> 00:49:08.990
ourselves and and and some of and some
00:49:09.000 --> 00:49:11.070
of it might be, but yeah, we
00:49:11.080 --> 00:49:13.270
like I said before, we really enjoy
00:49:13.280 --> 00:49:14.910
uh the the working with the architects
00:49:14.920 --> 00:49:16.670
we're working for currently. We yeah,
00:49:16.680 --> 00:49:17.950
we've got really good relationships with
00:49:17.960 --> 00:49:19.590
them. It's nothing better than when
00:49:19.600 --> 00:49:21.230
you're building a house and it's painful
00:49:21.240 --> 00:49:23.470
for everyone. It's stressful, but then
00:49:23.480 --> 00:49:25.510
the client moves in and they're uh happy
00:49:25.520 --> 00:49:27.390
with the end result and then it's a very
00:49:27.400 --> 00:49:29.190
satisfying sort of
00:49:29.200 --> 00:49:31.630
a satisfying feeling. So, definitely
00:49:31.640 --> 00:49:33.590
don't want to throw that all in, but but
00:49:33.600 --> 00:49:36.070
but um yeah, what as you say, want to
00:49:36.080 --> 00:49:38.310
set ourselves up and and take that jump
00:49:38.320 --> 00:49:40.350
into the sort of development space,
00:49:40.360 --> 00:49:41.110
yeah, surely.
00:49:41.120 --> 00:49:43.430
>> Yeah. Yeah, no, fantastic. All right,
00:49:43.440 --> 00:49:46.550
lads, one of the things that's um
00:49:46.560 --> 00:49:47.910
I've noticed in yourself and and
00:49:47.920 --> 00:49:49.470
obviously jeez, I've worked with that
00:49:49.480 --> 00:49:51.550
many builders over a thousand. But, for
00:49:51.560 --> 00:49:53.670
a young bloke, you've got a strong
00:49:53.680 --> 00:49:55.790
identity and you know, we had our our
00:49:55.800 --> 00:49:57.310
boardroom session recently and some of
00:49:57.320 --> 00:49:58.790
the other guys actually mentioned that.
00:49:58.800 --> 00:50:02.550
Like, your belief, um your mindset, your
00:50:02.560 --> 00:50:04.310
discipline, like
00:50:04.320 --> 00:50:05.870
going important. Like, I heard recently
00:50:05.880 --> 00:50:08.390
like professional sport, um and I always
00:50:08.400 --> 00:50:10.190
point to professional sport and then
00:50:10.200 --> 00:50:11.710
things like, you know,
00:50:11.720 --> 00:50:13.710
um special forces,
00:50:13.720 --> 00:50:15.350
as I said, yeah, the the parallels are
00:50:15.360 --> 00:50:17.590
strong between business. Um especially
00:50:17.600 --> 00:50:19.550
if you're going to achieve sustained
00:50:19.560 --> 00:50:21.750
success in business. And I heard someone
00:50:21.760 --> 00:50:23.430
recently say that it's it's pretty much
00:50:23.440 --> 00:50:26.390
the same. Achieving sustained success in
00:50:26.400 --> 00:50:28.510
business is pretty much like, you know,
00:50:28.520 --> 00:50:30.030
40 team, like the All Blacks or someone
00:50:30.040 --> 00:50:31.950
that's achieving that sustained success,
00:50:31.960 --> 00:50:34.550
not just a one year where they do well.
00:50:34.560 --> 00:50:36.270
And you've definitely got a yeah, a
00:50:36.280 --> 00:50:39.230
strong belief in yourself um from a
00:50:39.240 --> 00:50:40.470
leadership perspective. Where did that
00:50:40.480 --> 00:50:42.310
come from? What's your process around
00:50:42.320 --> 00:50:43.950
that or
00:50:43.960 --> 00:50:47.710
developing a strong identity, I suppose?
00:50:47.720 --> 00:50:50.950
>> Uh cheers. Probably comes from like
00:50:50.960 --> 00:50:53.070
always the dad a builder and and and
00:50:53.080 --> 00:50:55.550
growing up watching uh just like for him
00:50:55.560 --> 00:50:57.550
it's just been it's it's it's sort of
00:50:57.560 --> 00:50:58.950
once you tackle something it's just a
00:50:58.960 --> 00:51:00.830
matter of taking like how do you eat an
00:51:00.840 --> 00:51:03.150
elephant? One bite at a time. So, I've
00:51:03.160 --> 00:51:05.110
always had that sort of I've always had
00:51:05.120 --> 00:51:07.110
that on display, I suppose, to to sort
00:51:07.120 --> 00:51:09.510
of see that that, you know, things are
00:51:09.520 --> 00:51:11.670
possible and couple that with working
00:51:11.680 --> 00:51:13.590
for these bigger builders where where
00:51:13.600 --> 00:51:14.550
they
00:51:14.560 --> 00:51:15.310
um you know, where they where they're
00:51:15.320 --> 00:51:17.550
turning over serious amounts of money
00:51:17.560 --> 00:51:19.550
and and and and super profitable
00:51:19.560 --> 00:51:20.630
businesses. So,
00:51:20.640 --> 00:51:22.470
being able to see that with a with a
00:51:22.480 --> 00:51:23.550
with a
00:51:23.560 --> 00:51:24.830
with a mentality that everything's
00:51:24.840 --> 00:51:25.870
possible or
00:51:25.880 --> 00:51:27.750
how do you eat an elephant? It's it's
00:51:27.760 --> 00:51:29.950
pretty easy. Then playing sport, I
00:51:29.960 --> 00:51:31.670
suppose, has been a big part of it as
00:51:31.680 --> 00:51:33.790
well. You you you you having that
00:51:33.800 --> 00:51:36.030
teamwork, seeing, you know,
00:51:36.040 --> 00:51:38.630
I've I've played a lot of rugby and
00:51:38.640 --> 00:51:40.350
yeah, the team, you know, when you've
00:51:40.360 --> 00:51:42.270
got a leader who's negative, who thinks
00:51:42.280 --> 00:51:43.510
you're going to get smashed by this
00:51:43.520 --> 00:51:45.710
team, who who, you know, they're never
00:51:45.720 --> 00:51:47.430
happy with this, never happy with that.
00:51:47.440 --> 00:51:50.270
It's very uninspiring and and you know,
00:51:50.280 --> 00:51:52.070
and you never want to be there. So, I've
00:51:52.080 --> 00:51:53.790
played in plenty of teams like that
00:51:53.800 --> 00:51:55.670
where we just get bashed from pillar to
00:51:55.680 --> 00:51:57.270
post and
00:51:57.280 --> 00:51:59.270
and also I've played in a lot of teams
00:51:59.280 --> 00:52:00.230
where
00:52:00.240 --> 00:52:01.870
uh where you've got the you've got
00:52:01.880 --> 00:52:03.310
people who are really competitive, who
00:52:03.320 --> 00:52:04.990
are positive, who are trying to get
00:52:05.000 --> 00:52:06.790
better and and are trying to bring the
00:52:06.800 --> 00:52:08.790
team with them. And ultimately, those
00:52:08.800 --> 00:52:10.750
teams are that that I've played in have
00:52:10.760 --> 00:52:12.830
always been much more enjoyable and more
00:52:12.840 --> 00:52:14.670
successful. So, sort of when you when
00:52:14.680 --> 00:52:15.990
you come have all of those things, I
00:52:16.000 --> 00:52:18.190
suppose, it's um yeah, that's it. And
00:52:18.200 --> 00:52:20.510
having like working with Don, having
00:52:20.520 --> 00:52:22.270
someone who
00:52:22.280 --> 00:52:24.110
as you want, that's that's pretty good.
00:52:24.120 --> 00:52:25.336
And then, you know, having mentors
00:52:25.346 --> 00:52:25.870
[clears throat]
00:52:25.880 --> 00:52:27.470
and
00:52:27.480 --> 00:52:29.350
having mentors is a big one because it's
00:52:29.360 --> 00:52:30.750
people who have done as you say you've
00:52:30.760 --> 00:52:32.430
worked with with over a thousand
00:52:32.440 --> 00:52:35.390
builders. So, you know, you can talk to
00:52:35.400 --> 00:52:36.990
you and see what's worked, what hasn't
00:52:37.000 --> 00:52:39.270
worked and and and or you get an idea
00:52:39.280 --> 00:52:40.670
and you can sort of
00:52:40.680 --> 00:52:41.950
you can
00:52:41.960 --> 00:52:44.430
sort of wrap and test a few ideas just
00:52:44.440 --> 00:52:46.950
by having conversations. So, it's yeah,
00:52:46.960 --> 00:52:48.910
it's a it's there's
00:52:48.920 --> 00:52:50.710
a bit of a cauldron of things, I
00:52:50.720 --> 00:52:53.190
suppose, that that that is yeah, what
00:52:53.200 --> 00:52:55.350
get my sort of personality from, I
00:52:55.360 --> 00:52:56.510
suppose.
00:52:56.520 --> 00:52:59.630
>> Yeah, and we all like we we're products
00:52:59.640 --> 00:53:01.030
of our environment. So, it's a
00:53:01.040 --> 00:53:02.430
combination of your upbringing,
00:53:02.440 --> 00:53:05.190
obviously the sport that you played. Um
00:53:05.200 --> 00:53:07.630
yeah, the impact your dad had on you as
00:53:07.640 --> 00:53:10.190
well. But um yeah, it all shapes your
00:53:10.200 --> 00:53:12.270
beliefs and um
00:53:12.280 --> 00:53:14.110
yeah, you you you've got that belief
00:53:14.120 --> 00:53:16.630
that anything's achievable. Plus the
00:53:16.640 --> 00:53:19.070
contrast of having been been in those
00:53:19.080 --> 00:53:19.910
you know,
00:53:19.920 --> 00:53:21.750
that environment where you know, 500
00:53:21.760 --> 00:53:23.270
million turnover or whatever. So, that
00:53:23.280 --> 00:53:25.470
that would have made it easier for you
00:53:25.480 --> 00:53:27.470
looking at a $10 million resi job,
00:53:27.480 --> 00:53:29.190
right? It almost looks small, whereas
00:53:29.200 --> 00:53:30.550
the most guys listening are like, "Shit,
00:53:30.560 --> 00:53:32.670
$10 million job, that's huge."
00:53:32.680 --> 00:53:33.230
>> Yeah.
00:53:33.240 --> 00:53:35.190
Yeah, yeah, that's right. It's that
00:53:35.200 --> 00:53:36.990
that's one thing that we get like, you
00:53:37.000 --> 00:53:38.910
know, when people
00:53:38.920 --> 00:53:40.910
builders like I've I've been a person in
00:53:40.920 --> 00:53:43.070
the past or if I see a job that I like I
00:53:43.080 --> 00:53:44.790
will go up and pull up and see if the
00:53:44.800 --> 00:53:46.990
builder will have a yarn here and now
00:53:47.000 --> 00:53:48.550
we're getting that with this job because
00:53:48.560 --> 00:53:50.190
it's so big people will pull up and they
00:53:50.200 --> 00:53:52.790
want to have a sticky beak and stuff and
00:53:52.800 --> 00:53:54.510
and it it's just it's a funny thing at
00:53:54.520 --> 00:53:56.070
war can't believe like you know it's too
00:53:56.080 --> 00:53:58.870
big da da da da da and it's like well
00:53:58.880 --> 00:53:59.630
um
00:53:59.640 --> 00:54:00.550
it's
00:54:00.560 --> 00:54:04.350
a horses courses I suppose.
00:54:04.360 --> 00:54:05.870
>> Right I see
00:54:05.880 --> 00:54:07.750
>> my old boss he's doing a job that's a
00:54:07.760 --> 00:54:09.270
billion dollar job he's going to do it
00:54:09.280 --> 00:54:11.670
in 13 months or he's looking at a job
00:54:11.680 --> 00:54:12.990
that's a billion dollar job and he'll do
00:54:13.000 --> 00:54:15.110
it in 13 months so it's like you know
00:54:15.120 --> 00:54:16.830
when you have it's a big data center so
00:54:16.840 --> 00:54:19.110
when you have that as comparison you
00:54:19.120 --> 00:54:20.270
think
00:54:20.280 --> 00:54:22.190
and [clears throat] I talked to him I've
00:54:22.200 --> 00:54:23.750
talked to him fair bit he's been very
00:54:23.760 --> 00:54:25.630
very generous with his time and he loves
00:54:25.640 --> 00:54:27.590
just saying I know he just loves hearing
00:54:27.600 --> 00:54:29.590
about my problems cuz they're so
00:54:29.600 --> 00:54:31.350
infinite infinitely small compared to
00:54:31.360 --> 00:54:32.790
his but you know I'm I'll be telling him
00:54:32.800 --> 00:54:34.310
about something then
00:54:34.320 --> 00:54:36.270
he'll just slip that in he's got a
00:54:36.280 --> 00:54:38.070
a billion dollar job to do in 13 months
00:54:38.080 --> 00:54:39.430
and it's like right
00:54:39.440 --> 00:54:40.922
I'll stop complaining.
00:54:40.932 --> 00:54:41.230
>> [clears throat]
00:54:41.240 --> 00:54:43.950
>> Put it in perspective uh phenomenal. But
00:54:43.960 --> 00:54:46.430
um thank you so much for your time I
00:54:46.440 --> 00:54:49.030
know you got to run and congratulations
00:54:49.040 --> 00:54:50.870
on everything you've achieved so far
00:54:50.880 --> 00:54:53.550
plus the future's looking bright man.
00:54:53.560 --> 00:54:54.870
>> Yeah cheers dad appreciate your time
00:54:54.880 --> 00:54:56.070
thanks for all your help and and yeah
00:54:56.080 --> 00:55:03.193
thanks for having me good good chat.
00:55:03.203 --> 00:55:05.223
>> [music]