Episode 100 - How Brad Levitt Balances Business and Health in Episode 100!
Episode #100 | Brad Levitt | How He Balances Business and Health in Episode 100!
In this special episode of The Curious Builder Podcast, host Mark Williams celebrates the 100th episode with guest Brad Leavitt from AFT Construction. They dive into the highs and lows of managing a construction business, discuss the importance of scheduling and goal-setting, and touch on personal growth and wellness. Mark and Brad also explore the value of community and networking through industry events like IBS and the Curious Builder Collectives.
Listen to the full episode:
About Brad Leavitt
Brad Leavitt is President and Founder of “A Finer Touch Construction” - a Scottsdale based luxury residential and commercial builder. AFT Construction, as known throughout the industry, is an award-winning construction firm and has been nationally published in magazines such as: Fine Home Building, Luxe Interiors and Design, and Professional Builder. Brad was awarded as an “Icon” in the AZ building industry by Sources for Design in October, 2019. He was also recognized as a 2022 Phoenix Titan 100. The Titan 100 program recognizes Phoenix’s Top 100 CEO’s & C-level executives. They are the area’s most accomplished business leaders in their industry using criteria that includes demonstrating exceptional leadership, vision, and passion. Collectively, the Phoenix 2022 Titans have a combined total of annual revenue of $32B and employ more than 85,000 individuals.
Brad Leavitt is an energetic public speaker and ambassador for many national brands including Kohler, Louisiana Pacific, Rinnai. Pella, Subzero-Wolf, Buildertrend, Cambria, and Elkay. Brad completed a Bachelor of Science in Construction Management from BYU in 2005 and worked on notable projects around Phoenix, including the Omni Montelucia in Paradise Valley.
His Podcast, “The AFT Construction Podcast”, is focused on bringing value to its listeners, no matter their industry. The topics are focused on marketing, social media, entrepreneurship, organization, building science and construction. AFT has continued to exceed industry standards and create strong client relationships based on integrity, reliability and quality. Brad is married to Ashley Leavitt. Together, they have 6 children, 5 girls and 1 boy. Brad is active with all 6 of his children, serves in his local community, and loves all sports
Resources:
Find AFT Construction’s Website Here
Follow AFT Construction on Instagram
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Brad Leavitt 00:00
When you get together four times a year, once a quarter, with other builders, you highly respect. I mean, fortunately, we're having our first one in February that you help coordinate mark, and we have an incredible lineup of guests that are coming. So you get to sit there with some of these incredible people for an hour and bounce ideas and pain points and projects you're working on, and maybe trade partners, you know, sharing those. And so you go through all that, and you see quickly that, you know, we're all dealing with the same thing. I think that's unanimous between all of us, is no matter what position of the ladder you're on, as far as your business, you still have a lot of the same pain points.
Mark D. Williams 00:42
I Today we had Brad Levitt on from aft construction podcast. This is a third time guest episode, 100 pretty awesome to have Brad on. I want to talk a lot about the 24 highs and lows, but this one got really deep on scheduling actually, which was unintended benefit in the beginning, but then the rest of it was very personal. What is it like to manage a business, and how do you create boundaries so that you have freedom? So without further ado, here's Brad Levitt with AFD construction. Welcome to curious bird Podcast. I'm Mark Williams. Your host today we have a very special guest, a three time guest, Mr. Brad Levitt out of Phoenix, Arizona. Hi, Brad, hi. Maybe Third time's the charm. The first two probably weren't as good, so hopefully they were tanks. We almost got canceled. It was a problem. So yeah, I wanted to have you on because, as luck would have it you, I didn't realize you come on pretty much every January. Now they don't warm me up because it's negative 25 here today, and it's not that cold in Arizona, but it's your episode 100 so it's kind of fitting, because your Episode Five, your episode 50, and now 100 so basically, I can probably have you just on even 50s here once
Brad Leavitt 01:50
a year. Man, that's awesome. Well, in fairness, I know I had you on my podcast, and then, of course, here we are 100 episodes later for Mark. Man, you're killing it. I mean, this is
Mark D. Williams 01:58
your fault. So if anyone is annoyed with me. If anyone is annoyed, my wife, could probably raise your hand right now. Anyone that has an issue with me, I'd like to appoint the blame to Brad's Google page. You could leave a complaint there, because without you inviting me onto your podcast, this would never have existed.
Brad Leavitt 02:14
Yeah, it's long overdue. We should have had you on much sooner. Man, anyone
Mark D. Williams 02:19
that wants to get the back story on aft construction. If anyone doesn't know who that is, at this point, you're hiding under a rock, but I'm sure there's a few newbies out there. Go check out Episode Five, Episode 50. I brought Brad and Nick on to talk a lot about contractor coalition, so I thought this one would be a little bit different, having just been done with the new here. I don't know what your Christmas looks like. We could talk a little bit about that, but basically we'll start out with kind of 24 highs and lows, and we'll talk a little bit about 25 and then we'll probably kick it off with some health stuff. So why don't we start with what was your highs and lows in 24 and do you spend much time thinking about that over the holiday break? Do you actually take a break? It's a
Brad Leavitt 02:55
good question mark. I don't think I so much. Take a break thinking like over Christmas and New Year's, thinking about maybe the year retrospectively. I think something I've been pretty adamant about is, as we finish each project, we do an autopsy, right? We do an evaluation of the project and how it transpired. I think it's really important to do it all throughout the year, not just maybe at one point in in the calendar, per se. The reason being is the company evolves. What I'm thinking in December is much different than July and probably February, right of that year. And the reason being is it's very fluid. That very fluid that the projects we build are super complex, so much risk, there's so many challenges. Not only just be an entrepreneur run a business, but also company culture and hiring and turnover. And as you ask that question, I think a lot of thoughts run through my head. Is that one thing I do with my leadership team, and I work with Becky Hines, who used to be part of our builder 20. She's been consulting me since she retired from the builder 20, and has now retired from her building career in Seattle. But we do set goals for the year. The goals have to do with leadership. The goals have to do with team. They have to do with projects. They have to do with profitability. They have to do with overhead. They're multifaceted, even personal growth, right, which I'm sure we'll get into wellness and health and family, all these things that play into it. But as I look back at like last year mark, look we there's no perfect recipe. I feel that we have a great system. I feel that we have great people. I feel that we are always striving every day to be better, whether it's pushing aft, locally, nationally, whatever it may be, but there were a few key members that had left due to different opportunities that they had, and it was really trying to figure out, what is what does our operation look like? What does our organizational chart look like? How can we both be most effective and but it definitely over, over the year of 2024, took a lot of streamlining to get that to a point where we feel like we have the right players on board in the right seat on this has really been three years coming that we've been working on this.
Mark D. Williams 04:51
I feel like change. It takes a long time. When we first met, you were at 17 employees. When I interviewed you last year, you were at what 27 are you? What are you at? Low 30s? Now? What are you at in. Yeah,
Brad Leavitt 05:00
we're at like 29 right now. Yeah, so you weren't my right? That you were above 30 at one point we were, yeah, we were, and that's what has to do with a bounce up. Yeah. I think the most we got to is 31 so it's not like a huge change, and really, it's really getting to that healthy balance between volume backlog, right, and the staff to hold it and then making sure that they have a decent work life balance, that they're not overworked. There's a fine balance of, as I mentioned, having the right people. And the reason I say three years ago because I had my Swat. It was my builder 20 came out. They evaluated my whole company and essentially said, Brad, here's your strengths, your weaknesses, your opportunities and your threats. And really the consensus overall was that we had a lot of the right people that were in the wrong seat, and so there's a lot of shuffling and changing roles, and it moved quickly. And so as you've pieced through that, we are where we are today, and I feel we're in the best spot we are looking back over the last few years. Out of curiosity, I know you pretty well, and I think you do a phenomenal job of opening up how you run your company, which I think I don't think a lot of people need to guess at what your strengths are. What out of curiosity, what were some of the weaknesses? Yeah, I can tell you one off the bat, I feel that I can connect with my people. I think that we do connect. I think there's a lot of respect between anyone that's at aft and myself. I hope so at least that's the feedback I get. I try to listen and stuff. But I can tell you right away the weaknesses is that I tend to move very quickly with things, right? And I'll go, I'm involved a lot in continuing education and other networking events. And so these ideas come in, these either building practices, theories, ideas, I come back, and it's just like a Tasmanian devil. It's like this whirlwind. And so that's part of it is really like implementing things too fast before we even have coming back saying we're changing software, we're moving accounting systems or integrated into village. I'm like, these are major moves, right? And it takes as people are finally getting used to one, and then you change it. It can be demoralizing, in a way. And I think the second part from a weakness, just maybe it's just part of being a type, maybe it's part of being a male in general, is that I'm not at times the best listen. I'd say. I'm always what's the problem? Okay, sorry,
Mark D. Williams 07:07
I missed that. What'd you say?
Brad Leavitt 07:12
Yeah, on cue there, Mark. But the point being is that, like, people would come to me and be like, Brad just seems like he's too busy for us. He just, he's not really. He hears us out, and then he gives a solution and moves on. And it's, it wasn't really that, that back and forth, that contemplation, that thought, how does this impact them? It's really people would come to me with items and I just want to resolve it and move on to the next one. And that's a personality trait. And so I've had to learn over the last couple years, one I put my leadership team together, so that's really important, right? That it's there's a sounding board. I have people over each department that we meet regularly, and we bounce ideas and we talk about something, how big is your leadership team? Well, at what point it was as big as four of us? Well, let me think 122, as five, and now it's three, right? So it can be two, it could be three, it could be four or five, whatever. We found that three is a good number because everyone has a good feel on certain areas of the company. And so we meet discuss the State of the Union. You know, maybe there's a discriminant employee, maybe there's systems that aren't operating. Maybe there's some pain points for each, you know, employee, and so, and then if I run ideas like, Hey, I'm thinking about X, or I'm thinking about y, you know, they can push back and say, yeah, it's a great idea. No, I don't think we should do that right now, or maybe we should hold until this is done, and so that sounding board is important.
Mark D. Williams 08:26
My company's too small. I'm only three. We're gonna be soon to be four. I think ultimately my leadership team exists outside of my company, right? People like yourself, honestly, people that you're friends with, that you run ideas by, and I But listening to you, it dawned on me that you can't be the best at everything. And one of the thing, one of your superpowers, and I recognized it early on. And I think a lot of entrepreneurs have it actually, is the creativity side of it, right? So we're very influenced by, I think the easiest people to sell to is sales, salesman, right? You ultimately are sale. You're selling aft all the time. And I think we hear a new thing, and we think it's gonna and so we get really excited. We're very passionate people. And I have the same faults. I don't know if it's a fault. I have the same aspects of my nature as you do, where I'll come back. It's almost like my team's like, Oh, great. Mark's going to another contractor coalition. Oh, great. He's going to IBS. Oh, great. Now he's on solar. Oh, great. And so the problem with that is it also is what makes you you, and so it doesn't mean that we couldn't slow down, or, in your case, you have the management team help you with that, but I would say some of it you can't change, because it's also what makes you an entrepreneur, makes you great, and to have a little grace with yourself, because you know, one of your biggest superpowers, in my opinion, and I've asked you this many times is, how do you stay you have multiple companies, and how do you stay on top of it all? And your advice to me, and I'm sure you've told many people, is you deal with something in the moment you move on, and you're very quick at dealing with it so it doesn't stack up. But you just lamented the fact that one of your concerns is that you don't give people enough time. And I can relate to that, because one of my goals last. Year, I was so busy trying to get business that I felt like I left no time for my team at all. And like every time they try to get some of my time, I'm not a dismissive person by nature. It wasn't intentional, but it was like I am was so focused on sales because we needed it because and so it's like I now, it's almost like I need to come into the office and realize that, hey, if my team asked me something, I need to be available to them and but it for me, it has to be kind of like a conscious choice. Otherwise, it's pretty clear on my demeanor, like I'm in focus mode, like it's go time, and it doesn't really invite conversation. Anyway, I anyway, there's pros and cons in this, so I don't know if that any of that hits with you.
Brad Leavitt 10:38
Yeah, it's funny. I mean, you mentioned either the time or the delegation. I know one comment you made mark is when we were out golfing at one of the coalition summits. And, yeah, I think you were driving as a passenger. I'm like, bossing you around, unless you're driving, yeah, and then you we went around the corner, we saw the people next Boston around, and you're like, Yeah, this is the problem. You have a bunch of business owners trying to play golf, and anyone's boss each other around. Well, there's an element to that. To the delegation, I think you have to be a good delegator to some expect right to grow and run a successful company. But at the same point that delegation, or that maybe you mentioned time, I think that time is probably the most sacred resource that we have, and it's really hard, especially I look at now, I'll give one example. We had a business owner come in, and he runs a fast food restaurant, right and spoke to our team at a production meeting, and very involved right in running. And it's actually of anyone that knows In and Out Burger. So not business owner, but they run a store. So their store manager, of in and out, which is a burger chain out west, has a amazing business philosophy about they're overstaffed, not overstaffed. But you could see that if you're to go to most fast food restaurants, they have 234, people working. They go to in and out at a busy time. They have 19 or 27 like substantial everyone has a smile, they're clean. It's like kind of this establishment. They have their operation. They don't have freezers. Anyways, the point I'm going to make is that store managers, like, we have 100 employees they kind of circulate through that range, from high school, 16 years old, up to 65 so all throughout different ages, and me as the owner, like they're by my arm. So as they're training and onboarding, they're with me for the first four days or the first five days, or to see how we clean, to see how we communicate the customer, how we smile, how we everything I expect, and they're by my side, and I'm sitting here thinking, I don't have that turtle. I don't have 100 employees out 29 they haven't spent four hours with me if I'm 40, definitely not four days. And so they want that, and it's hard to give that time, but how important it is. Is there an extension of you? Why not make that time? I think I
Mark D. Williams 12:39
mentioned before we came on camera. Our schools are canceled, and so my six year old is with me, Simon, and we so he ran road shotgun with me as a parent. And it'll be a point to the story, which is unusual for me, I know, but, but I'll get there. But where I'm going with this is a lot of times, as a parent or an employer, we think we need to carve out dedicated, special time, or we're waiting for that one event where we have time. And the secret is we never are going to have that time unless you block it out for it, even then sometimes it gets obscured. But I've just spent four hours. Simon has been doing nothing but sitting in drawing. One of the architects had a Lego set, which was super cool. And when we're done, he goes, Dad. I really love just daddy and Simon time. And it was really special, like he was sitting there. And by there's it's also a good opportunity for him to learn how to be around architects, to be around clients. And there's a humanity to it, plus a dad. There's so many different things where I'm going with this is you have 29 employees. How cool would it be if in the course of a year you could find four, sorry, 29 half days, or 29 or take two at a time, decrease it. And literally, there's every other Friday, usually a golfing in the morning, but let's call it Thursday, whatever day you want to pick. And they would just ride with you that day. It'd be sort of a cool way for you to spend one on one time. And it would be, you're a very open person to be they'd be seeing you check your phone that you'd be posting stuff, you'd be calling, you'd be hitting ignore on my phone call, and anything that would normally happen during the day, they would observe that might I would actually that when you said that, that's the first thing that popped into my mind. It's interesting.
Brad Leavitt 14:08
You say that I think time's really important. And you kind of balance having your son with you today, what he sees. And I think what's really important, and having six kids is I, again, I have to understand and prioritize so that there is time for my kids, right? And they go through different stages. Again, I have my oldest is almost 21 my youngest is seven. And so six kids, they need different things at different points of their life. And you they go through these different rotations where they love dad, they want them all the time, and they don't like that, and they don't want them around, right? So you find that fine balance, but there's still those meaningful times, and even if it's short windows or long windows, or in some ways, maybe you're just there at one of their sporting events watching them, and they know Dad's there, but you know, and I think employees are the same, and that's something I can just tell you. One of my goals, which is funny you bring it up, is that I need to spend more time, or at least check in more with my team. Whether I call them or visit them or FaceTime them, or, you know, have someone on one time, I think it's it's highly valuable, because it's easy for that to get lost in the whole part of running a business.
Speaker 1 15:10
Listening to you speak about it, I'm reminded of, I forget where I read it, but I found it to be true that you'd mentioned a couple people left for opportunities, which sounds, I assume good ones, but people rarely leave a company over money. Meaning, obviously, if you could get a huge opportunity, that's a little bit different, but it seems, if you see, like the ratings, it's appreciation, it's validation, it's the leadership, it's how they feel in the company. I've seen reports that money is like fourth, five, six on the list down, where a lot of times, as employers, we think that money is one of the chief things, but honestly, it's appreciation. It's a handwritten note. It's Thank you. And it's funny every time that crosses my mind, I usually call my people, and I'll be like, Hey, Mike, I just want to let you know that you did a really good job. And some of the people, it seems like the people, longer than not, you don't feel like you maybe have to do it as much, but that doesn't mean that it still shouldn't be done. Mike, my PM, I've known him since I was six years old, actually, so I've known he's a very stoic. He's like my opposite in terms of, like, temperament. And so it's he doesn't he's just very he's just very steady and but he did something the other day that was really good, and I just happen to have this thing, and so I dropped him a quick note. I said, Hey, well done. Like, really good job. He never responded to the email. I hope he got it. But I guess my point is it's really important for us to to validate those things, because we obviously tell people when things aren't how we want them. I think we need to communicate very appropriately and in front of others too, and don't they always say, like, administer, admonish behind the scenes and applause in front of people that type of concept. Oh, 100% and I think there's something to be said about gratitude. How many times is your phone ringing throughout the day mark of just fires and issues, and how many times has your phone ring where there's mark? You're awesome. Just appreciate you. That's probably pretty small. That emotional bank accounts pretty low. And same thing for our team. I don't a lot of times we're giving them constructive criticism or telling them what they could do better, or we're giving feedback and training and but how many times we just say, Hey, Mark, you do a phenomenal job. So grateful to have you as part of Team. We couldn't do without you. This specifically is something you did. It came back to me. I just want you to know that and have a great day. There's something about we just in our society, we have so much critical nature, just maybe it's inherent to us as humans, and less ability to edify others.
Mark D. Williams 17:31
This episode is brought to you by adaptive. For over two years now, I've been using adaptive. It's an incredible game changer. It's AI technology based. It helps you with bill pay. And as a builder, there's very few things that anger our subs more than not being paid on time. Well, those days are gone. Not only do you know exactly where you are, but you can pay people through your ACH channels, making draws extremely quick with one click of a button, which used to take hours, my office staff is now able to generate a draw to the bank or to the client in literally seconds. The thing that I appreciate the most about adaptive is their ability to keep changing. We've given them three or four feedbacks on things that we need as builders, and within just a few months those they're rolling those things out. This is saving us hours per week and days per month in terms of our efficiency. If you're looking to upgrade your business, I'd highly recommend adaptive. You can reach out to them@adaptive.com or listen to the curious builder Podcast, episode 15 or episode 80, where we dive into their origin story. This episode is brought to you by Pella Northland. For 20 years, I've been using Pella windows, and I couldn't be happier to call them as a business partner, a trade partner, and someone that really supports us in our quality builds. You know, we use wood windows and doors on every single one of our homes, and 98% of every home that I've ever built has been a Pella window. I've gotten to know their team here, locally as well as nationally, and the way that they support us as a craftsman as well as they support our homeowners with their lifelong guarantee. It's actually been a game changer for me. So when people ask me who I use, I recommend Pella. If you want to hear more about Pella story, you can listen to episode one, where I interview Peter and Ed from Pella Northland about their journey into the Pella ownership. We had our curious builder collective in Minnesota here last the day we're recording this. I guess it doesn't matter, but it was all about sales and Dylan from Kenzo construction here in Minnesota, sent me the nicest email just thanking me like this really heartfelt out of the blue email, and it really meant a lot to your point of that emotional bank account being a little low. And I sent it to the other heads of the collectives. You being one, so you're leading our Phoenix collectives. I've got Brad and Vince in Atlanta, and then the penskes down in San Antonio, Austin, and the reason I shared it was a lot of times we do things, whether it's the podcast or other things, that there's not sure. Sometimes there's financial incentives, but most of the time you're doing it because you're passionate about it. We're trying to elevate the industry, and to receive an email completely unsolicited. That means. Full and that deep was, like, it hit super hard. I've told a number of people about it because it meant a lot to me. And I think it's to your point. I think it's important, when we get that, then how can we return the favor and do it to somebody else?
Brad Leavitt 20:12
Yeah, and just as your point, I think edification is such a valuable tool that we just don't use, like society just doesn't use that watch any political show. It's like you have to take these strong stances in opposition. And it seems every aspect of life and we just don't spend time edifying each other enough.
Mark D. Williams 20:30
No, I agree with that. What are your for? Going back to the root question of the 25 highs and lows, or, sorry, 24 in 25 as you look to this year, are there any kind of big milestones? Obviously, you finally completed project. Blow your mind after five decades. And I don't know that's, yeah, that's all big project. But anyway, how do so many of your projects are multi year, is it? And some people like goals. I don't really love the it's funny as potato, I don't love the world reward, resolution. I like goals. Again, they're the same thing on a professional level. Are there things in 25 that you're pretty excited about in terms of, like, maybe a specific objective?
Brad Leavitt 21:09
Yeah, I think specifically as it comes to the organization. And again, you go back to the weakness, not only just from a management style, which I spoke about earlier. I think from just an efficiency or operational is building schedules. The reality is, we've for a lot of reasons, that's the core of unintended, successful businesses scheduling. And you've attended the summit, I believe, Timothy Wingate, and he's account by trade, and he works with people in industry. And is interesting, he always poses a question. He says, what's more important to a company estimating or scheduling, and most of us just think estimating. We've all had terrible bids or we missed something, and how catastrophic that can be right to your bottom line by missing something on the bid and or even if your cost plus and technically it's quotation marks, not your fault, have that discussion with the client and see the reaction about still, even though they understand the risk involved. Doesn't mean they're excited to pay for it to some extent. And the point being is that he's always like, scheduling. That's what kills you. As I look back and audit my company last year and 24 and years before it's scheduling, it's killed me. It's killed projects. It's killed bottom line, it's killed
Mark D. Williams 22:17
because, can you clarify that? Is it? Because not enough time, too much time. What do you mean by scheduling specifically? Sure, I
Brad Leavitt 22:24
think there's a lot of variables, right? Any of us understand that on a big project? Yeah, there people get burned out. That's just part of it. And so the subs too. Working on a 25,000 square foot house, they get overwhelmed. Where do they start? How do you detail drywall at 35,000 square feet on the roof? And there are people too. They've had bad days. They've had breakups or going through divorces that are sick, like they don't show up and ready to put their bags on. It's 120 degrees in the summer. It's right now. It's 30 in the winter. It's not negative 25 like you. But the reality is, it's you have to balance these things. And so my point being is that scheduling just will kill you. And again, I guess I should not, maybe use the word kill, but it can really hurt you as a business owner and running construction. Company, because one example I can give, if your cost plus, and you go to the client and say, Mark, we're going to build your house, we figure this is going to be 18 months. We're going to whether you're doing a time card or monthly allowance, whatever, for your supervision. Hey, Mark, we're going to bill you 10 grand a month for supervision, just as an easy number there, for 18 months, 180 grand. Well, if you're not done in 18 months, even though it's cost plus, and maybe the client main changes, you didn't document it, you didn't notify them, you didn't add delay days to the change order, whatever. And now you're pushing 2021 22 months, a client's not going to be too happy about paying another 40 grand of supervision, along with your cost plus, along with all the other fees. And so what do you end up doing? Mark, you end up saying, Okay, I want to be in good standing. Either we fight about it and I have a better view and I have a disgruntled client, or I just eat it, and I'm like, You know what? We're just gonna, you know, finish this project at no supervision. And if you have that of four or five projects and no supervision, and you're extending, you know, four or five months, I mean, you're operating a major loss. And so as you think about scheduling, it can make or break the project in so many ways. And so go ahead. Well, let's talk about this.
Mark D. Williams 24:06
Specifically. It wasn't where the podcast was going, but I think this is really helpful and really relatable to most people. So maybe I'll just give it an example for myself and let you react to it. So if i i Look around at other builders in my market, we build really high end homes, and I really probably, I'm not a real task master, a real harsh on that. And I see some people build a home that, let's say, would take me 1012, months. They'll build an eight. None of their subs like them. They have a terrible reputation. But you know, if that's a spec home, people don't care. I mean, not not people, the client doesn't care. They come in, maybe it's hard to, let's just assume that they still do decent quality. I want a repeatable process, and I want my people to have a life too. I don't feel I feel like it's a bit hypocritical for me to ask somebody to do something I'm not willing to do, or if I'm up here talking about wellness and health and boundaries, create freedom and all these things, and then I ask someone not to do it, that's I think being hypocritical. And I can't, I certainly try not to. Doesn't mean I don't. But I would try not to live a life that way. Where I'm going with this is, if I leave, let's say this 12 month schedule. I say, You know what? Let's not have this conversation. Let's factor in 15 there. Most people are gonna guess what? Most people are gonna say, Oh man, I have extra time. And guess what? It takes that long. And if I set this, and if I set it, what it's supposed to be, inevitably, you might it might go a little longer than you want to, and if you set it too low, everyone fights it. It seems like no matter how you schedule, I'm talking about the beginning. Obviously we make micro adjustments all the way through. But what's your experience? If you put too much, they take it. If you put too little, everyone dislikes it. And if you do what you think it is, it's never that anyway. So scheduling is just a magic show?
Brad Leavitt 25:41
Yeah, in some ways it is a magic show. And really you can't as even though you have lag and you have fluff in the schedule, call it, or you you plan for delay days, things go sideways real quick. Look at COVID, right? The pandemic, what that did to us. And then you come out of that, and everyone's so busy that build times are taking way longer because you're way something that took your crew, sizer smaller. But the point being mark is that estimating. This is why estimating is very tricky, and why it's hard to have good estimators for companies. Because, yeah, in theory, it's pretty simple. 12 month build. We're going to plan 15 or 16 months to the client. Sounds great, but the client may know because they built before, which many of my clients have. They may have just recently built. They may have friends that are building. They may have personal things happening where they a timeline you're trying to hit that has to be realistic. But also, again, as a cost plus builder Now again, if you are a lump sum, and you're not showing your price, still that if you're doing 16 months as opposed to 12, you better factor in that four months of overhead that's going to cost you into that fee. So that means you're going to be more expensive across the board at a lump sum, if your cost plus same thing, you're going to plan four months of supervision, and someone's going to be like, Why is your supervision about 400k and this guy bidding is 250 once, yeah. Is there value going to 80 or Mark Williams, yeah, possibly. Is it enough for me to spend that? I don't know. And so you're trying to balance as close as you can, to be accurate, and then at the same time, give yourself appropriate leeway. But it's just complicated. And here's the fact that matter, Mark. And this is just again, I try not to show all the warts here, but the reality is that the team's busy. They're busy in the field, and they let things relax, and their schedules are updated. And so a lot of this is just self inflicted that they're not keeping on it, they're not staying on it, even though they're pushing trades. But, yeah, it's easy to push that three week look ahead of the next three weeks, but if you're not forecasting and really pushing everything to a final date and making sure you're in your each phase of the project, you're going to miss those dates if you're not planning for it. No,
Mark D. Williams 27:40
I agree. One of the biggest things that having, I think, four or five contractor coalitions, one of the things that was really helpful is your 00, day change orders, because clients never remember the skip the scope, or unless it's massive, or the time that they add in delays, like we had one recently. We're on a remodel, and it was a competitive bid situation on the front end. And anyway, they probably delayed 30 days on the front end. Well, what would have started, let's say end of October ended up starting, like right before Thanksgiving. So now you have a double holiday in that first 30 day window, which is just not ideal, because you talk about and even though they're not living in the house, they live nearby, they're there all the time, and they're really, they're fine. I mean, they're nice, but it's like they're constantly asking my project manager, when is the schedule gonna update it? And here's on top of it, they were adamant, going against our process. But it was like it was, it was either myself or this other builder, and we really needed the report, so it wasn't really a I understand, like listening to this is pretty easy to say, well, you should have every selection made. You should have everything designed, which is how we'd like to do it, obviously. But we weren't really given that choice. And so the client went into it knowing, oddly enough, this client negotiated their fee before we even had a contract or even priced it. They said, We know what you're going to charge, because I told them, and they said, we'll we're going to negotiate. Now, in some ways, it was sort of refreshing, because you negotiated your fee before he even designed it, and then, you kind of but as luck had it, when it came back, he renegotiated again, as you can imagine. So I maybe felt, maybe I fell into that one. But the point of it is, is like we're still making decisions, and he keeps asking, when is the in the homeowners delaying things and then, and then, it's just not. It's really difficult. I guess that's why we get paid, quote, air, quote, air quote, big bucks, because I'm not getting paid the big bucks here is like you go and you're the ones that has to deliver this. It's all in the nuance of how you say it and what you say, because if you tell a client, hey, so and so, the reason your project's delayed is you're not getting us answers. You and your wife can't agree on a solution. We can't keep you a price. And by the way, when you decided to price this out against somebody else three months ago, and then you took 45 days, or 30 days to get going. This has a giant ripple effect in 30 days three months ago. It's turning out to be 60 to 90 days today, because it's like a force multiplier. Everyone thinks that once they decide that you can start the next day, man, if you push back, push back, start and order dates, you could easily have a couple months where you really should just wait. And in hindsight, I'm not sure. Could have done anything different, because the situation that we were playing in, it just was what it was. But now you have a frustrated client, and we're dealing with it, and they're fine, but it's not it's just not as smooth as we would like it to be, and that's just the reality. I'm not sure, even though I know all those answers and I know what I would have liked to have done, I still couldn't affect the outcome. It still is the same, the same as it is, unless I had just said no, they would have gone to someone else and just dealt it with someone else. Yeah,
Brad Leavitt 30:24
and there's an element to that, and that's what's really hard about being a business owner in the construction field. On going back to the example, for a long time, I was a firm believer in the $0 change order, right? That, yeah, the clients are making these changes, and even if you don't charge them, or you put in the days, and so at the end, you could show them where they're at, how they delayed the project. I found over the years that's still not enough. And what I mean by that is they still going back to my example earlier, the supervision you had planned 180 Why is it 200 now? And so what I've learned is with our team, and then again, this goes back to goals and focuses this year, is that when clients are making changes, we have to fully understand what that change order is and how that impacts the schedule. And not only, even if we're just traditional cost plus, not only have the cost plus, but we have to add supervision onto that change order. If I'm telling you, Hey, Mark this change is going to cost me two weeks, and I've negotiated 14,000 a month for supervision, not a flat fee, or maybe it's a flat fee, as some do, or an approximate guest, and I better have 7000 in there for supervision as well, because otherwise you get to the end, and again, it's that, that number that no one wants to pay, no one wants to pay supervision and but yet, it's costing you, as a business owner, to extend it. I think
Mark D. Williams 31:32
the answer is probably, maybe it's not easy, but it's simple. It's communication. I think you're constantly telling the client, where you're at, what things are happening. And I think there's so much more gracious and everyone, if you just don't withhold information, you just say hey. And sometimes it's not pretty. It's like you have an open heart surgery and you want to be awake for it. Not advisable, but this is what we're doing. And so at least we can, at least we can tell you the view from the scalpel. Just because I have 10,000 questions, we'll maybe move on one of them that I want to talk to you about, and I haven't caught up with you a little bit. Little bit a while on this is a couple years ago. You were planning and reaching out to several other markets, other states, and you were going to set up some aft personnel there and expand. Are you still planning on doing that, or is that sort of changed?
Brad Leavitt 32:15
Yeah, it's a good question mark. Would have that was a huge goal that I had to do was to move in some of these other markets that sense, I've, I've scaled back for a couple reasons. One, as you as the Phoenix has been a very healthy market, right? And it will continue to be, because a lot of businesses you know have moved here and relocated. There's a lot of opportunity at Sunshine State. We've seen just a substantial amount of growth. We continue to we don't have natural disasters. It's hot, but like continues to be a place where people love to come. So one, in our backyard, we have a lot of great projects. So that's one aspect. Two, even as we work to develop our systems and stuff, you have to have the right people, they're going to be able to go be a general manager, run that division, and to really be successful, at least in my opinion, you have to set up a satellite office and have some sort of sort of sort of footprint that you're there for long term, really. So you can have great trades, great suppliers, start building those relationships, as well as architects and design communities. So there's some effort there. But I think this goes back to what I said, the best resource is time just being open Father's Day. Year and a half ago, I had a stroke, right? Father's Day weekend. And so as I look at health and time and travel and running my business and having time for my kids, as we mentioned. And I don't know how long my shelf life is going to be. I feel very healthy today. I don't know how that'll change. And so spreading myself out too thin is that probably the best decision for my family, which is a big part of why we do what we do. So I think there are other variables as well, just a couple people that I'd plan to put in that position, in those locations, things changed for them, where their spouses weren't ready to remove across the country, right? And it's about family. I don't want to put in a position where there's a strain on their relationship and families. All those being said for now. I have no plans to extend outside of Arizona. We're here in Phoenix. No, it's
Mark D. Williams 33:57
interesting. I know some of the backstories on some of these, and it's interesting, because everyone is driven by different things. You're such a good leader and you do such a good job of scale. Some people are motivated by a scale, and that's what interests them, is building, and you're really good at building people. And it's interesting, what there's there's different glass ceilings in everyone's career milestones. Maybe it's a revenue, maybe it's people, whatever it might be. And my favorite quote last year, people that have tuned into the podcast are probably so tired of this quote, because it was my quote of 24 I got to find a new quote for 25 but so far, it's boundaries create freedom. And one of the one of the things that's been so helpful is you ran into this boundary, but this boundary now creates freedom for you to be like you know what? I'm going to refocus on aft in Phoenix, and I'm going to look for other opportunities, or to become better, or whatever, or obviously, anytime we have a life scare or a mortality scare, I think it's important, when I go to funerals, I try to bring my kids. And for one thing, a child at a funeral is like one of the most joyful things there can be. They ask such innocent and beautiful questions, and that's a part of life and the brevity of it. And. And what's comforting for not only for yourself, but for other people. And I think just reminding that life is pretty short, as I feel like, especially our age demographic, but I feel like the message of wellness is is just getting louder and louder and louder, and it's on a record. Some people maybe tune it out, but it's not going away, and it can't go away because the distractions in life are getting harder and harder and harder, and as we're constantly being pulled by our business and responsibilities and all the things that we're into, like, how do you how do you get to a place of peace? And I feel some people are defined by their business, like their business is them, and some people define their business by their personality. And I think sometimes you're on both end of that seesaw. Sometimes there's days where you become your company. And that's everyone can make their own decision whether that's good or not. For me, personally, I wouldn't want that. But that doesn't mean that when you are the personality that informs your business, it goes back and forth. And I think sometimes it's our spouse, sometimes it's our kids. You hear these stories. Someone in my builder 20 their daughter wrote them this absolutely heart crushing letter that just basically the cats and the cradle Cat Stevens thing, like, Dad, I need you to spend time with me. And, man, it usually I text this person. I called them immediately after that. That was a, I need a phone call. This an emergency heart rescue kind of thing, just to talk about it, because it's heavy. Anyone that has children and you're balancing this, it's balancing this, it's not easy, and we often get it wrong. And so anyway, hearing you say that, actually, as your friend, I'm glad to hear that, because it allows you to maybe refocus on yourself and your health and the things that are so important.
Brad Leavitt 36:34
Yeah, there's a few points that I thought of. One, I know who you're speaking about, and it's so close to home, right? Hearing that, and I think business, the realities of an entrepreneurship that your day changes every five minutes, right? You could be as happy as can be, and then all sudden, as low as can be, and the highs and lows are extreme, and it's lonely, right? It's a lonely, lonely journey. And there's points in your life where maybe you have to be involved in your business to get it going. There's times where you can maybe scale back a little back a little bit as other focuses are important and kind of to your point, the boundaries create freedom. I think the best way to categorize this or explain this is that you and I are fortunate to work for some incredible clients, right, that have done very well, built incredible businesses, very successful have. I can't think of one client I've had that was born into what they have. Every one of them worked really hard to achieve what they have. They've wanted to create this vision, this dream they've had their entire life, to build a home this magnitude and fortune with us. And because of that, they're employing a ton of people, ton of suppliers, ton of people. They could just let that sit in their savings account and watch that number increase. They could travel. They could do a lot of things where they always say they could go buy a personal jet, which maybe impacts a few people, including the salesperson, but they go build a house and impacts 1000s and 1000s of people. The point being that even them, I think if money and property doesn't define who you are, it doesn't mean that you can't appreciate having a Lamborghini or a nice house or a nice Chanel bag or whatever it is. But if that doesn't define you, if that doesn't make you feel that you have self worth it, it doesn't become something that you have to do. And you spoke about this mark, did it fit for me? I don't want to say money's not important, because it is important, right? You have to sustain your family. All of us like to travel and to maybe have time to go work out or whatever. You can't do a lot of these things without the resources necessary. But it doesn't define me. I don't I don't feel although aft is my baby, doesn't define me. I don't feel that any form of success defines who I am. And so I'm not bound by it. And so I can make 500% agree with that. Yes, I can make other decisions based on where I'm at in my life, or where my family's at, or where my kids are at and or maybe my employees, maybe it's benefiting them a little bit more.
Mark D. Williams 38:51
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Brad Leavitt 39:47
Have you ever asked yourself the question of what drives you? Yeah, and I know what drives me. I think it's easy. I mean, I've said this a lot to my team. I think maybe you've heard me say this. Market, a coalition Summit. I can't remember. Did you come to Scottsdale? Wonder, is that why I missed Austin and Scottsdale? Yeah, so Scottsdale, they actually asked me that, and I got a little emotional in front of the group up there. But I care about my people. Like I do like, I don't know what it is. I just for all of them that were the aft brand and how hard they work, I just, I work really hard to make sure that they have a good livelihood. I want them all to stay with me forever. I know that's not reasonable. I don't so much worry about legacy outside of aft. I appreciate anyone I can help because many have helped me throughout the years, wisdom imparted with me and how that's how my business. I hope to always do the same and be a resource for anyone that needs it. But at the end of the day, I my legacy are my people like I I care for them greatly. They know that, and I know they feel that deep down and outside of my family, which I think most of us are number one, or maybe God or whatever. And I want to say whatever, but those are staples for anybody. But I think what drives me are my pea pod and they don't. Again, I appreciate nice stuff, but that it doesn't drive me for nice stuff. I
Mark D. Williams 41:01
think it's a byproduct of a different pursuit. And Ian, I guess I have not answered the question. I actually don't know the answer for myself. That's why I asked the question. I spent I interviewed someone a couple years ago, and they we shut down the company for two weeks after I interviewed him. I'm like, not a lot happens between Christmas and New Year's here anyway, so let's just get everyone to shut down. And I completely shut my computer down. I got a notebook, and it was really cathartic. I'm not someone it's hard for my brain to be quiet, as you well know, and so I found it actually very peaceful just writing all these thoughts down, I don't have the answers, but sometimes just writing them down. I don't know what they're doing in the background. So sometimes you ask questions on the podcast, or in general, because you want to know you're I'm being informed by your answer to some of mine. I know maybe not the business wide, yes, I know some. But if I was to say that we always want, like, one, like, one little, tiny, little saying, this is the saying, that would be great if you could sum up that what, I don't have that personally, so we're talking professionally and personal, but like personally, like, what drives you to be healthy, what drives you? I know you're a lifelong athlete, but I feel observing you. I'd say, if I had to guess, I'd say, the last four months in particular, I've noticed not more consistency, because you've always been consistent. I just feel like there's something different, like you are working harder, longer, whatever it is, I feel like there's a more dedication to your health and wellness. Is that is my observation accurate?
Brad Leavitt 42:28
Yeah, for sure, I can, I don't think anyone plans to have a showcase 43 or let me think at the time, I was 42 and so here I am now. So that was the catalyst, was that, yeah, I think, in fairness, Mark, I've always been fairly healthy. Like, Oh, great. 100% Yeah, yeah. I used to run half marathons, play a lot of basketball, but I found there were just other things that were missing and but the point being, for sure, in the last called six months, there's been a huge focus on what I eat, working, lifting and working out, and how I feel like I just My body feels better. I feel more alert. I feel that I can deal with stress a lot more. Last year was a pretty stressful year for me. Business wise, I think probably one of my most stressful for a lot of reasons. I think this year has been in some ways the same, and so balancing that work stress with just personal health and children and family, as my kids are getting older, I've found how important health is and so it's a great outlet for me, and I've definitely taken a lot more serious as far as not only being regular, but also watching diet, how that plays a role, and then how those allow me to just be more
Mark D. Williams 43:32
effective. Again, you've been a lifelong healthy person and very active on so many different sports as well in the last six months. Are there like, one or two observations you've made about yourself? Because sometimes you do, you change a lot of things in you don't know what it is that that actually did something like, maybe, Hey, you took a multivitamin or a drink a gallon of water, or you went to bed an hour earlier, maybe you saw on a regular and the thing is, like, all of those could have moved it. So it's hard to know which one in the last six months. Is there anything that sort of stands out, as you know what? This has made a big and true improvement on either my energy, my and it could. It's obviously very personal. Everyone's body is different in what motivates them. Is there anything that kind of stands out, or you have not really observed that?
Brad Leavitt 44:15
Yeah, there's a few. I'll speak to the mental side in a second, but the physical side, I've been to a cold plunge regularly, and whether it's a placebo or not, it works for me as a placebo. I'm telling you just that how I feel coming out of that water. And I hate cold. It's Mark. I think you're very well aware I'm not. I'm in cold temps now, when I've traveled and doesn't bother me like I just there's a mental strength to say something I've had in my whole life, is cold water, and be able to sit in 3538 39 degree water for for a long time, I'll say a long time, read four minutes, but right to be able to do that, and not really what
Mark D. Williams 44:45
time? Out of curiosity, because I've heard so many mixed things about that in terms of the timing. Now, there's studies saying that it actually doesn't have much effect at all, but the placebo effect, if it works, obviously, that's a very strong but I've heard stuff like, Hey, if you lift weights, don't do cold right after. Because you're actually nullifying the effect of your muscle burning and things like that. I'm just curious, from your own personal use, how are you utilizing it? And it sounds like more mental discipline, if anything, is the after effect of some of this, as well as, like, a shock to your system.
Brad Leavitt 45:12
Yeah, I try not to do it either right after. I work out. Some physician I've spoken said you should do it right before. I don't like it before. I feel like I'm very tight, especially trying to do it before basketball or something. It's not a good idea. So I off hours later in the day or something, or maybe I do it in the morning, then work out later in the day. But the place I have a hard time with because for me personally, you want to talk about just a mental aptitude or confidence or ability to overcome things like it's there, and when you get out of the water, you do feel rushed. There's a rush of dopamine that's Wow. My body just feels completely different. But so that's part of it. But I think going back to tracking, seeing your strength increase, whether it be weights and different things, is you you feel yourself a lot healthier. You can feel you can see results. But I think more importantly is that what those both have allowed me to do is I'll tell a funny story, and I've told my team this, and I don't know if I've shared this on my podcast, but I can tell you I was in my early was in my early 20s. I was working at Monte Lucy at this resort, and I remember this framer came in, and he's like, Brad, you have really thin skin. And I was like, super offended, right? And as I'm super offended, he told me that I had thin skin. I thought about that. I'm like, of course, I was offended. He said, have thin skin, because I have thin skin, so I'm offended by him saying,
Mark D. Williams 46:21
so funny, yeah, like pointing it out. And
Brad Leavitt 46:23
I think a lot of us, I don't want to say, worry about what other people think, but a lot of us, we focus on our failures. That's just the reality. We look at our shortcomings, Look what we made mistakes. How many of us look at points in our life of regret, or I could have done this better. I should have done this. And we live in this like whirlwind of mental anguish on ourselves, as opposed to an architect Mark Handley, that said, people don't focus on that. No one focus on Mark's success or failures. They look at your successes. And a lot of people from the outside are looking at their successes. They don't know the issues I had with Project blow your mind or other projects, they just look at, man, that's that's a staple, like, I can't wait to do that. What an incredible project. And so we feel the pain a lot more than others, and we let that bring us down, emotionally, physically, mentally. You know, maybe, you know, there'd be times where I'd get an email, as many of us do at 5pm 6pm I'm with my kids, and your whole mood changes be on the weekend. And what I've learned in the last six months from working out and cold plunge and sauna is that those emails don't stop. They don't stop. I get them off hours. I get them on the weekends. I get bad news today. I had before this podcast. Today's been a rough day. You know, three things I was hit with this morning. But I Don't wallow in it. I don't go to this bottom pit anymore. It's like I can just deal with it. I can compartmentalize it. I can set it aside. It doesn't take the emotional toll it did for the previous 44 years.
Mark D. Williams 47:40
You know, I and everyone has to do it differently. I've, and I've mentioned this many times, but one of the things, and this will tie into boot camp of why I'm doing it here in a minute. But, and again, I'm not perfect, but I have found great comfort and clarity in this. You know, the social dilemma is a well known movie. I don't even know how many years ago now, four or five years, right? Just the distractions of your phone. And as business owners, yes, we understand that we have to be available and help people and things like that, but you can't pour out of an empty cup. Everyone's heard play hard, work hard. And if you're going to be your best self for your clients, for your architects, for your people, you need to the most Nick Schiffer talks about all the time, the time, the most important person, he said, is in himself. And it drew a bunch of controversy, but what he meant by it was is like you and I are not filling the bucket for ourselves. How can we be good dads? How can we be good husbands? How can we be good all of those things, and everyone's struggling with it. It's never perfect. It's constantly in motion. But I can only speak for myself, I have found great comfort in I don't I turned off every notification on my phone other than my cell phone, so you can call me shocking. But like my texts, don't think my emails don't ding because the amount of attention where it jogs you away. Some people might say, mark your ADHD drives me nuts. However, I would say it's almost a superpower in this sense, because, because I'm aware of it, I have to minimize distractions, because I'm so easily distracted, and I already do a terrible job anyway. And a bird flies by the window, and I like my Ooh bird, but so I can't function if I don't bring some quiet and I have I keep saying this to other people that I care about you being one of them, because I feel like this is something that would help so many people. And yeah, if you're on the I know everyone's been on it, you get a call on the weekend, or you check your phone. And I'm telling, I try to tell people stop, stop checking your phone if it's an emergency. And I remember one time I got after someone pretty hard, thinking actually it was my girlfriend, who's now my wife at the time. I think she called me one time and said it was an emergency, and it was definitely not emergency. And I rarely ever lose it from anger, because that's just not my DNA. And I lost it, and I said, there are only two emergencies. I said, but if you tell me there's an emergency, Heaven and Earth is going to move, because I will be there, but it better be an emergency or he might end your life when I get there. Like, I'm thinking, like, do. Me the emergencies. There is blood shooting out of your jugular, and my hand is the only hand that can stop that blood from ending your life. That's an emergency. Anything to do with your kids, that's also emergency. Like every parent has felt their heart skip when they see on their caller ID, like their school, like you automatically go to worst case scenario. It's the worst feeling ever. I hate it. But other than that, a frozen pipe, yeah, it's bad. And sure, is it emergency. It's not life and death. Like, we'll figure it out. We have people, and so I'm speaking pretty forcibly about this, because as owners, it's super important, like, we are not a 24/7 call 365, or I don't think we should be. That would be my position. Maybe other people disagree, but I don't think we should be, and because you can't call the doctor or the dentist, maybe a better example, because you don't call the dentist at 930 at night saying, hey, my tooth aches. Now, if there's an emergency line, you got to go in. Guess what? You go to the ER, that's what it's there for. And so I just feel like having some boundary screening, freedom, understanding that, that it can help you protect your mood. And guess what, you will show up better for your clients by doing this. And again, there's always exceptions to the rule. I'm sure some people listening will be like, This guy doesn't know anything, but I'm telling you, if you can set some boundaries there, it'll create some mental freedom. And I've learned it the hard way. I haven't always been that way, and I can tell you, the last couple years have been much more peaceful doing that, and I feel like I'm doing a better job than I did previously. The
Brad Leavitt 51:21
reality is boundaries do create freedom. You take out vices in your life, no matter what they are. I remember going back to the monolith. See example. There's a super that I worked with that he could never give up smoking. He's in his 50s. He'd never been able to and this is not some high horse saying. I'm just saying that. The point being is that he's Brad. Do you ever Why don't you smoke like why isn't that never a request of you? You ever feel like you're missing out because you can't smoke, like you don't have you don't have this option where you can I say, I actually feel like I do have the option. Like you don't have the option to not smoke. I have the option. But the point being of your boundaries. Boundaries to go to the gym during the day, boundaries to spend time with your kids, boundaries to different things, they are going to create freedom and healthy practices. And at the end of the day, it's not that you're being selfish about you, but if there's no Mark Williams, there's no team, right? And there's some truth to that, to what Nick said, Yeah,
Mark D. Williams 52:12
I think one of the things that we all do is, when we're passionate about something, we like to share it, right? And so one of the things upcoming here in May we have what? First time I've tried it, what is the builder doing the Well, in this space, I'm like, why not? When I actually started the story, but it was at contractor coalition at Huntington Beach. I've told the story many times. Caleb McDonald and I met in the lobby at like, 531 morning before and I was joke, Nick was coming back from Equinox with his iced coffee. You've been up for five hours doing whatever. And so Caleb and I said, Hey, let's go for a run on the beach. I was like, great. He's a way faster runner than I but it was like 35 mile winds. It was miserable. It was raining, and it was like, almost like a sleet. It wasn't cold, it was just this really hard driving sleet. And then the wind was blowing in our eyes. It was miserable, and we remember just laughing, and we today, I just talked to him earlier this week. He had a question about branding or something. We were chatting about IBS, and I brought up that story again. I said, I talk about that all the time, and that was the seed that grew into what is now the curious builder boot camp. And what I wanted to fight is there's the stereotype of builders being fat, hairy, lazy, alcoholic, flannel wearing workaholics. And sure, are there those out there? Of course, I don't know very many, if any, if anything, everyone, they're working out in the gym early morning, before contracted coalition or before IBS. You go down the gym and things packed because you've got people are way more focused on their health. And you can see it in the beverage industry. Non alcoholic drinks are just going through the roof, because people are realizing whether you have alcohol or not, at the sin of judgment on that. It's just that if it affects your sleep, it affects your performance, it affects it depends on what you're focused on, and everything is an opportunity cost. If you choose to focus on a new home, maybe not as good at remodeling. If you focus on commercial, there's always by choosing one thing, you're saying no to another thing. And again, this isn't meant to be like a line in the sand. Make your choice. I'm just saying Be aware of what your choice is. And so sometimes I like to shock people and just push them over the edge a little bit. And I go up to the bonder waters, which is in northern Minnesota, you're in the middle of nowhere. You get in a canoe, and there's a hard rule that I have. There's no cell phones. If you bring a cell phone into the Boundary Waters, you will not be invited back the next year. I'm serious, because it's like the three days of quiet, and everyone has been to the place where you check your phone instinctively, without thinking about it, and you're patting an empty pocket. We're so conditioned, we're like Pavlov's dog looking for a phone. And so I felt like it's I get a lot of ideas when I'm in the mountains running. That's why I'm so passionate about this stuff. So anyway, boot camp, essentially is that you get off the airplane where we'll see if anyone signs up. But basically it's no phones. You check them in. We'll have one phone for emergency contacts. There's no alcohol. We'll do two day workouts. And again, I don't care if you can run a five minute mile or 20 minute mile, that's not the point. We'll be in Zion National Park and we'll have healthy meals, and you're just going to connect with other builders around the country. Talk about life, talk about business, talk about whatever you want to talk about, but you know what you're not going to be doing is taking cell phone pictures. And trust me, I mean, what? Obviously, all in the social media game, we have to be but like, for three days, get off the grid, get back in touch with yourself, and surround yourself and just get human connection. And so I don't know, I'm pretty passionate about it, and I hope some people come.
Brad Leavitt 55:14
It's amazing. It's a hard request, especially in this day and age, but the value is there. As you mentioned, there's something as you were just speaking about being there with your colleagues and being able to speak about business and family and life questions, whatever they may be. Without technology there, there's tremendous value. All of us have had some, maybe experience with that, and it's very long lasting, the friendships that are built through that.
Mark D. Williams 55:34
Think about the time that you were because I know you were in the missionary down in for your two years or three years down in Argentina. And that was before that would have been, what, early 2000s It was, yeah, 99 to 2001 so there was internet cafes. I remember because, right, you're bad AOL, internet, all that stuff, but you're the time of your life, but you're like you weren't. It's a tool. So a phone is it's just something that we struggle with. And I honestly think the younger generation might change a little bit. We'll see. Because obviously the computer industry is pretty powerful on how it hooks people, but I've talked to some parents recently about that. They told their children, if they don't have a phone and they don't ask for a phone when they're 16, they'll get a car. And I thought that was pretty cool, and my kids are still too young, but now I'm starting to think, what are things that we can do as parents? Just engage like they're only kids for a very short period of time, and you want to stay connected, and how do you do that? And I don't know if any parent knows how to do it right, just figuring it out. But as I ask older people that have older kids, you'd be a great one, because you've got a big range. Is how do you manage this? And there's no perfect answer, but it's interesting to think about and how we engage with our community, our children, our lives and ourselves, like what limits we put on ourselves so that we have our best life? Because you only have one life to live. This is it? This is the one you got.
Brad Leavitt 56:47
Yeah, and to your point, it's really balanced in all things. It's hard to have balance, but the more you can find balance, whatever that means, whether it's just retreat with you, Mark, it's there's so much value in
Mark D. Williams 56:57
it. If nobody shows up, it'll I don't, I don't, I won't be able to tell us if they just didn't want to go there with me, or they just didn't want to
Brad Leavitt 57:04
go at all. Maybe you should rethink that. The alcohol brings a line of coca, some Red Bulls for them, and maybe they'll be in. We'll get
Mark D. Williams 57:09
Tyler and Nick to come. Actually, it was funny. You say that when I first posted that story about us doing that, someone said it sounds like peyote or some Indian or Native American ritual. We'd be off the grid, which is interesting. So my sister, we're still looking for a speaker. So my sister is in Bureau of Land Management for the federal government, and she was working a lot with Native Americans around the country, and I actually asked for a native speaker to come. So one of the nights, we haven't found the speaker yet. So if anyone listening knows someone, please put them in touch with me. But we're all the land United States was obviously at one time, belonged to a Native American tribe, and I actually wanted them. I love stories. I what we want to do one night is have a fire where we would hire a native storyteller to come tell the story. I just think that'd be super powerful, and we're gonna still try to do it. And so anyway, again, just something more that's just interesting, a little bit different.
Brad Leavitt 57:56
If you haven't sold anyone else, I think you saw me. I again, as I mentioned, I need to move some stuff around date wise, but it's going to be a credible
Mark D. Williams 58:03
experience. There's only two people in the world who need this more. Mike Weaver, who's coming and you're the most responsive people I know on the planet with their phone, which is why I need to get you away from it for three days. That's all I'm asking. Yeah, be good for you as we land this airplane here bumpily, one thing that I meant to ask is I'll be seeing you here shortly at IBS. You have gone to IBS for a number of years. You bring your team. You speak a lot. What do you get out of IBS? What do you enjoy about it? And then the second part of this question is, you're so busy, I feel, even as I would consider myself a personal friend of yours, it's like I usually give my personal friends that are busy just space, because there's so many people that don't get to see your friends, right? It's almost like you end up going to the periphery, because you have so many demands on your time. How do you navigate IBS, as Brad Levitt, the person not AFD construction? Yeah,
Brad Leavitt 58:52
I think as far as navigating others, it's tough because you get stopped as you're in between going maybe to your next speaking to parents, or whatever it is. And that's that's one thing that's fine. But what I the value I found over the years is the relationship with our vendors, right? I There's so much value to seeing them every year. A lot of times, a lot of these companies, I use a lot of their product, been fortunate to be an ambassador for them in a lot of cases, right? And so some of those friendships that have been built over the years working together, I may not see him then, maybe in Wisconsin or Michigan or New York or, you know, Florida, and so I don't get to see him very often. And so that shows where we get to connect and catch up. And so some of my builder 20 goes and we do some things together. I bring my team, and the team building is huge, because whether they get a whole lot out of it, per se, as far as far as new product, or what's the latest and greatest, or networking, they get to rep the brand. They get to see people recognize them. They get to be there together where those friendships are built one on one. But just like your point of the retreat, when you're spending time all day, breakfast, lunch and dinner spending on the hotel, there's just bonds that are built between everyone, and it just adds a lot of value. You to the team building, and then our relationship with our vendors, it's like the Super Bowl of construction the United States, if not, the world, is massive. One thing here, maybe we'll end it on just because we haven't talked a ton about on the podcast, you're tell us a little bit about do you graciously accept it to be one of our ambassadors for the curious builder collective, and it's on our website, if those are interested, we have three states, Atlanta, San Antonio and Phoenix. But tell me a little bit about the why did you say yes, and what are you finding? Why is this? I feel like it's just a match to the gasoline. Like everywhere you you get small groups of builders together, there's such a hunger and such a thirst to get together. You have such a good pulse from the contractor coalition to now these collectives, and in the builder 20s, they all live in kind of this space together, where it's very synergistic, but they're all slightly different. Tell us a little bit about the collective, like the people that are signed up for it, and a little bit like, why is there such a hunger for this in our industry? I just think we don't. Again, you and I have been fortunate to go the summit. We've been fortunate to go to IBS, K biz in Vegas, a lot of builders don't they just don't know where to go. They're, again, that's a lonely island. They don't who they going to network with. There's just not a lot of these unless they're active on social media and they're doing Instagram meetups or whatever, which who's going to organize? It is tough. We're all busy. So when you get together four times a quarter a year, once a quarter, with other builders that you highly respect. Unfortunately, we're having our first one in February, in February that you help coordinate mark, and we have an incredible lineup of guests that are coming. So you get to sit there with some of these incredible people for an hour and bounce ideas and pain points and projects you're working on, and maybe trade partners sharing those. And so you go through all that, and you see quickly that we're all dealing with the same thing. I think that's unanimous between all of us is, no matter what position of the ladder you're on, as far as your business, you still have a lot of the same pain
Mark D. Williams 1:01:50
points. I'm excited for it. Excited to see it. IBS one respect your time. And obviously we could do one of these once a week, but I guess we'll see you next year. Episode 153, 50. Just block it off. Tell you what, I'll time block you for the next decade. Actually, that'd be pretty
Brad Leavitt 1:02:04
funny. It would be no and Mark, he would do that. So it's not surprising.
Mark D. Williams 1:02:06
Oh, don't worry, it's coming in hot. That's a real promise, right there. Thanks again for coming on. We'll have everything in the show notes, and we'll see you soon. Thanks, Mark. We're excited to announce that the curious builder collectives are going into three other states. For those not familiar with what the collective is, it lives between what the contractor coalition is and a builder 20 group. What we do in each state is we have a group of 25 to 30 builders that get in a room, and you break up into groups of nine. You spend 45 minutes talking about a set topic, whether it's branding, marketing, contracts, whatever that set topic is for that day, and then you talk for 45 minutes, you get up, you mix up the groups, and you do it again, and you're out of there. You'll be out in under three hours. We're going to be going to Phoenix, Arizona. Brad Levitt is going to be leading a curious collective in Phoenix, Arizona. We are going to San Antonio. We've got David and Angela Penske from Penske homes, leading a group down there, and we have Brad Robinson and Vince Longo in Atlanta, Georgia, also leading a collective as well as obviously me in Minnesota as well, for our second annual collective. So you're interested in collaborating with other builders, if you really want to dive deep on your business in a person to person relationship, ask a lot of questions. The collectives are for you. We also have in Minnesota interior design collective as well as the architect collective. Check out the Events page at the cures builder podcast.com thanks for tuning in to cures builder podcast. If you like this episode, do us a favor. Share it with three other business owners. The best way that we can spread what we're doing is by word of mouth, and with your help, we can continue to help other curious builders expand their business. Please share it with your friends. Like and review online, and thanks again for tuning in. You.
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