The “Why” Behind Your Business

Does your company have a greater purpose that your team can get behind?

What truly drives your business? The “Why” behind your company gives a foundation to shape your culture, strengthen your community, and rally your team.

In this week’s episode of Cracking the Code, Drew Cameron shares insights on investing in your company culture and discovering your greater purpose. Find out how to elevate your brand and create an environment where your employees feel valued and motivated to contribute to a shared vision.

Don’t miss out on this opportunity to transform your workplace into a thriving community. Check out the video and start building a purpose-driven organization today!

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00:00:00:00 – 00:00:10:04

Does your team know the why behind your business? Learn all about it on today’s show.

00:00:10:06 – 00:00:26:14

Now. Last week, Drew Cameron talked about recruiting for results. In this week, we’re going to continue that conversation. Today Drew’s going to talk about the why and making sure your employees understand it. Make sure your people know their role and the impact it makes and why. You need to create a career path so they know where they’re going to take it away.

00:00:26:14 – 00:00:50:07

Drew. So what is the mission of your business? Is the company. Is the company why? Purposeful and clearly communicated now more than ever, your Gen Ys and your Gen Zs. They want to know why they are the literally the why generation of the millennials are the, you know, generation Y. They want to know why. Why do you exist.

00:00:50:07 – 00:01:09:17

And it can’t be to make a buck. It can’t be because of what you do, okay, that that’s your vocation. And making a buck as a result. What’s your purpose? What are you trying to change? What impact are you trying to have within people’s lives and in the community? Maybe even in the world? Okay, you need to go and look no further than Trader Joe’s.

00:01:09:22 – 00:01:30:28

Were the aisles at Whole Foods and just start reading some of the packaging on some of these things, and some of the restaurants that pop up and some of the the craft brew places that are popping up. Right. Everybody has a purpose, including if you watch Shark Tank, bombast socks and Toms shoes or Patagonia clothing. Right. What is their social mission?

00:01:30:28 – 00:01:52:02

It’s not just the mission of why they’re in business, it’s what impact are they trying to make? Because nowadays this generation will more readily volunteer. They will not want to knock off, you know, three, 4 or 5:00 and go volunteer for free, then work for you for overtime. And I saw a gentleman post yesterday on Facebook, one of the Hvac groups, the.

00:01:52:04 – 00:02:14:23

He’s expecting his people to work from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m. and also Saturdays, and he can’t understand why. He just had a mass exodus yesterday and he happens to be a member here at EGA. And so I have a coaching call with a gentleman this month, and I’m going to have to help him understand that you drove these people out of your business because you didn’t reimagine the way you need to deploy your workforce, okay?

00:02:14:23 – 00:02:31:29

People want to work with an associate and be with people who believe what they believe. They want to know that you believe what they believe about the world and society. Okay. Does each coworker on your team know their role and the impact that they make, not only in the work that we do, but the impact that it makes in the company and the impact that it makes?

00:02:32:02 – 00:02:54:23

And what it is that we do within the community there. It’s got to be larger than money nowadays. Okay, you may say otherwise, but I would tell you that you’re wrong because, again, I grew up in this trade. I’ve been in this trade for 45 years. I started at the age of 12. And what I can tell you is, while I may have a hard, hard work ethic, and I may have been about, you know, money and success and excellence and whatnot.

00:02:54:28 – 00:03:11:11

Today’s generation is about societal impact, and it’s about the life that they can have. Like I said, works a concept. It’s not a place you go, right? And you need to create career paths for these people. If people don’t know where they go, they might as well go. They want to know where they can go with your organization.

00:03:11:11 – 00:03:27:21

The day that they start. You have to paint this picture, this vision for them. They want to know what the next five, ten years of their life is going to look like. And if not, they might as well leave. And those that are on your team want to know, where are we going? What are we doing? That’s why you have to have open book management.

00:03:27:21 – 00:03:43:05

You have to share the results of the company and the success of the company. And that’s what having this culture is going to allow you when you go out to the market to recruit people to come and join you, it’s you’re going to have this nice shiny object to be able to tell people we share everything with people we meet.

00:03:43:06 – 00:04:01:22

We meet once a month with the company. We share all the numbers with everybody. We let you know. You know how you’re on track for a departmental as well as individual bonuses. Departments meet month. We meet weekly huddles daily, one on ones as needed. You got to let people know, you know, the communication that they’re going to have, the access they’re going to have the leadership.

00:04:01:26 – 00:04:21:01

People want to know that they have the ear of leadership. Nowadays, more than ever. So create those career paths. This is all part of culture. Are your vehicles, your facilities and your work environment world class. If I was to show up at your place of business, okay, and you were saying that okay, there’s David introduced me, this rock star of the industries coming to town.

00:04:21:09 – 00:04:45:12

Would you have to clean up for me to be there? Put on your Sunday? Best if you will. Where’s your place in that state every day? Because it should be, as should your your vehicles. You were on camera every day for your customers and for your potential internal customers. Which is your coworkers, right? You are on display and people are judging you every day, by the year, by the book.

00:04:45:19 – 00:05:00:18

You know the cover of the book, if you will write. What does a building look like? What do the vehicles look like? What do your commercials look like? What do your billboards look like? You know, what are your uniforms look like? Customers are judging you. If you want customers refer people to, maybe you want a customer to possibly become a a coworker.

00:05:00:18 – 00:05:23:07

At some point, you got to realize the, you know, the camera is on 24 over seven. There’s there’s no work in professional life anymore. There is life and it is on show, every day. So what is my day to day experience going to be like within your organization? What would a day in the life look like as being a technician, installer, salesperson, a salesperson, a CSR?

00:05:23:10 – 00:05:39:03

Do you offer more value to coworkers, customers, and the community than others would even dare consider? You might think that you do, but I would challenge you to revisit that. Okay, because you might. If I ask you, what is it that you’re doing? You could probably list all the things that you’re doing. And if I were to ask you, well, what else could you do?

00:05:39:04 – 00:06:05:14

I guarantee you there’s a list of things that you could do. And if I asked you again a little bit further, well, what’s the most extraordinary things that you could do? And then you even have a deeper, better list, a more rich list. And if you did this with all your people on your team as well, when you talked about this in every aspect of your business, not just benefits and compensation, but processes and, marketing and roles and resources, if you ask those questions, what are we doing?

00:06:05:16 – 00:06:26:29

What else can we do? Okay, what’s the most extraordinary thing that we can do if you ask those questions, you will get answers that basically tell you that you’re playing small. Because this last question, what’s the most extraordinary thing that you can do is the thing that you should be doing. That’s when you become compelling. That’s when you become a destination place of employment.

00:06:27:01 – 00:06:52:03

And that’s when people become, you know, they come knocking at your door. You don’t have to go recruitment, marketing, people are knocking at your door. You’ve got a steady stream of people, the best contractors, the United States, in Canada, they’ve got people knocking at the door, picking up the phone call. Send an email showing up. You know, looking for jobs is their passion, passion, energy, fun, success, celebration, you know, buzz about your organization.

00:06:52:06 – 00:07:18:14

Meaning if you think about this, if I’m going to spend 50% of my life doing something, it better be valuable, exciting, engaging, challenging, adventurous, rewarding, fulfilling, fun, exciting. You know, meaningful to me, meaningful to my family, right? I mean, think about that. And when you think about, like, you know, you know, these technology companies like Google, they build a campus, you know, out there on the West Coast where people basically live there, you know, and they shower there, they sleep there.

00:07:18:19 – 00:07:38:00

They have their friends there. I’m not saying that’s what we need to necessarily do with our place, but do you have facilities like that? Do you have a gym? Do you have a locker room? Do you have a place where people can get showered and can get changed? Where they can gather and have some fun, maybe where you can have some cookouts or, you know, play some games and you know, they can meet and socialize because that’s what this is.

00:07:38:00 – 00:07:59:09

Nowadays, people’s people’s lives are so taxed with their with their going on with their kids. Our kids have a better social life than we do nowadays. Right? And so our work becomes our place of societal interaction in many cases. And so you’ve got to make your, your place a destination place where people see that they’re a part of something bigger than just the work that it is that they do.

00:07:59:10 – 00:08:31:23

Action item number three. Stop looking for the unicorns. All right? You’re all looking to get this next great salesperson who already knows Hvac, the technician who already knows Hvac or can do tune ups, and is a selling technician and can flip leads and sell service agreements and sell add on accessories. You’re looking for unicorns, my friends, right? Here’s the thing if a unicorn gets loose in your marketplace, meeting a superstar from another company, odds are that you know that company did something to irritate that person and really tick them off.

00:08:31:25 – 00:08:57:23

Now, what are the odds of that happening if I’ve got superstars on my team, do you think I’m going to do things and as leadership to drive them out of my company? No. If somebody is responding to your recruitment marketing in many cases and they’ve got the education and talent and skills, you know, that you’re looking for within the trades, odds are you’re getting somebody else’s headache and heartache, somebody who’s just been problems somewhere else.

00:08:57:23 – 00:09:12:29

They probably job jump. If you look at their resume and you’re thinking, okay, I just need a body that can do some things. Okay, well, again, think about that. This is your brand and reputation out there, and you’re going to send these people into customers homes. Are you going to allow them to possibly infect your workplace? I think about that.

00:09:12:29 – 00:09:34:10

That’s why we hire for attitude. And then we teach the skills that it is that we need. So stop looking for the unicorn. Widen your lens. This is a male, Caucasian dominated industry. Just is what it is. All right, I’m not judging. I’m just saying the statistics prove it out. Hispanics 18.1% of the US population and we don’t target them.

00:09:34:13 – 00:09:55:06

Right. Well, maybe you’re not a Hispanic speaking company, but maybe you should hire somebody that can, you know, teach people English, maybe, you know, maybe teach, you know, have somebody who can teach any of the languages necessary, depending on what your community offers, there and the and the customer base that’s out there. African Americans, 12.6% of the population.

00:09:55:08 – 00:10:14:21

Asians, 4.8% of the US population. And women are 51% of the population. And they’re all underrepresented in our industry, all underrepresented. And that’s on us. We’ve not done a good job messaging. We need to be better at this. We don’t. We can’t put the finger at the target. Right. It’s never the target’s fault. When we missed the target.

00:10:14:28 – 00:10:34:21

It’s our fault, right? All these other industries are appealing to these people. Why not us? What about changing your geography? Yes. I have no problem if a unicorn is loose and looking to relocate. Relocate across the country, okay. For a better life or, you know, for schools or, you know, to be closer to some family or whatever the reason is.

00:10:34:27 – 00:10:54:11

Again, sometimes you can get people that are really skilled and they’re relocating, pay their relocation expenses. Yes. Pay them signing bonuses, all kinds of things that you can do here. This content is a subset of a larger presentation that if you become a member, that I have no problem sharing with you, with a lot more tools and resources and ideas in it.

00:10:54:13 – 00:11:13:18

I’m just going to give you a snippet of some of the ideas that we have available to you here at MGA. Retiring military get paid to hire them and train them. Okay. I’m going to give you a resource here in a little bit where you can basically get paid, by the government. There are some programs out there that you can look into, and the government will pay you to, to train these people.

00:11:13:20 – 00:11:33:03

And then, of course, you can also hire them as well. I would meet with your local Veterans Affairs office and make sure that you have that contact there, be that person that they’re reaching out to as people are coming home, right, and coming and, being unemployed, if you will, and retiring from the military, get them before they do retire schools for troubled teens.

00:11:33:06 – 00:11:48:22

Hey, these are not bad kids, okay? Maybe they maybe they’re just in a bad situation. These need to be taken under their wing, and they looking for you to take a chance on somebody. People freed from prison or parole. Okay? And be selective and check with your attorney as to what you can do and what you’re willing to do.

00:11:48:22 – 00:12:06:09

Also, check with your insurance company. You know as well. All right. Well and long, who’s a member of our staff here at Gea, is somebody that I recruited as he was coming out of prison back in 2003 for a company right here in Colorado Springs. And I was the consulting, consultant that this company had hired to do the recruiting, hiring, training of salespeople.

00:12:06:11 – 00:12:23:21

And, yes, welder was, you know, coming out of prison even fully disclosed what the situation was. And we wrestled with that long and hard, but we said, hey, if everybody if everybody deserves a second chance, okay, then we’re hypocrites. If we don’t give somebody a second chance, as long as we’re we’re doing it mindfully and thoughtfully and we put them in a great situation.

00:12:23:25 – 00:12:42:04

And he went out and represented that company for a year and a great job. And then he started his own business and many of you know, his success story. And again, it wouldn’t have happened if we didn’t open our lens a little bit wider. All right. Let’s tap into the high school guidance counselors and maybe think about giving scholarships out of high school.

00:12:42:07 – 00:13:02:18

You know, at high schools, local high schools are partner with the technical education program within the high school, where they go out to do a location there for, provide scholarships, paid training and a starter kit of tools. You could even work with your suppliers to get that starter kit of, tools, you know, provided for you higher graduating seniors that are taking a gap year as interns.

00:13:02:18 – 00:13:25:04

Some people, including myself. After I graduated high school, I actually got sick with, mononucleosis. And I had to take a year off. Right. And, of course, what did I do? I went to work, and then I, you know, went to, into the, college and again, they may get so intrigued by what it is that they’re doing in the fact that they’re making money and not going into debt.

00:13:25:09 – 00:13:46:09

And they see a career path that they say, you know what? Maybe I don’t need to go to college. Maybe I don’t want to go to college, but that’s up to you. Get them into the ecosystem to start as an intern there. And sure, the school has the edge. Scholarship information on the website. We have a foundation DJ foundation, and we provide 2025 scholarships every year to people going into the trades.

00:13:46:12 – 00:14:10:23

And I make sure that the, you know, even a high school, that I went to has this information so that they can promote this to the trades and you can even sponsor a scholarship if you wanted to do that and make sure that they have that present at Back to School night, I would go to the school and say, listen, I want to present it back to school night for juniors and seniors and give them, you know, let them know about the opportunities that that’s the time and the window at which they’re really looking hard at colleges.

00:14:10:23 – 00:14:33:15

I think we should go earlier than that for certain and get our messages out, even at a younger age there. But definitely at the junior and senior level, we need to be presenting that to people. You know. I also talk to the high school about having a career night, you know, of a job, job fair with speed dating format, right, where you maybe you can get a bunch of employers in town to take part in a career night at the high school.

00:14:33:15 – 00:14:54:26

You set up a bunch of tables, and these people can kind of come through, and you each get five minutes to make your pitch right, almost like speed dating. And, again, you can be the champion of that. So these are some pretty unique and aggressive, and like I say, alternative approaches that get you creative in thinking beyond a box, not outside the box, but beyond the box.

00:14:54:28 – 00:15:12:17

But once we have these people on our team, we got to teach them the skills. And I’ve got a whole packet of, technical education schools, all the United States, you know, state by state as well. And some of these are, you know, six month and multi year programs. Yes, they’re vocational type programs. A lot more theory and concept.

00:15:12:19 – 00:15:33:14

And then there are some of them like these that are here, that are hands on quick turnaround classes making maintenance taking two weeks. Make a van service technician in another two weeks, make an install installation technician in two weeks. And so here are some of the some of the schools that are out there. Many of these you may not even be aware of that Hvac career now.com that is a clearinghouse of training schools.

00:15:33:14 – 00:15:48:12

Meaning there’s all kinds of list of training schools out there. So if you don’t have a lab within your, within your warehouse, we can get these people hands on training, and you don’t want to send them out with your people because maybe you don’t have great people, or you need to fast track these people and get them up to speed very quickly.

00:15:48:12 – 00:16:14:05

These are training entities that you can go ahead and associate with to get these people on board and up to speed very fast. Ultimate Technician Academy down there in little Rock, Arkansas. Mark Hardwicke does a phenomenal job. I even sent my own people back there in the 90s. The Perfect Technician Academy. This is an organization that you can work with that will work with you and the GI Bill to get the tuition to train these people over a six week program.

00:16:14:07 – 00:16:37:16

You know, down there and I think in Texas, either Oscar Houston and they will go ahead and get the money from the government for someone that is, you know, like I say, retiring from the military and pay that roughly $20,000 in tuition. Now, what you have to do is you have to pay them, obviously, their wage to go down there and work, obviously, and get the education for the six months or six weeks excuse me.

00:16:37:18 – 00:17:02:29

And also pay for their accommodations, their, their expenses and then get them their, their starter kit of tools as well. And here’s the cool thing about this. They sign a contract where they to stay with you for 18 months. Right. So it’s up to you to be this destination place of employment to keep them thereafter. But that’s a really unique, way of going about trade Academy virtual technician, Hvac.

00:17:03:05 – 00:17:24:14

And then these last two are organizations in which each area has partner, or is partnering with these organizations to bring to you this technical training interplay, which is the virtual, learning and online learning portal there. And then, Joe Cunningham, who’s down in Houston, Texas, that is I believe that’s a relationship there were process of cultivating as well.

00:17:24:16 – 00:17:43:24

Will you be able to send your people down to Houston for plumbing and Hvac, hands on training, as well as soft skill training? That’s Joe’s does some of that. We do that at Dia as well. But that’s why those two are highlighted right there at the bottom right action item number four. Re recruit your raving fans. Right. Don’t overlook the people that are on your team.

00:17:43:24 – 00:18:04:10

The reason you got a hole in your buck and people are leaving. You’re not re recruiting them okay. It’s the same with our own customers. We don’t even send our customers a newsletter. We spend an average of $75 to get the average customer, average lead, I should say average opportunity in about $500 to acquire a customer. And then we don’t even send a $2 newsletter to keep them and retain them and communicate with them on a regular basis.

00:18:04:11 – 00:18:27:13

We wonder why our customers leave us while your employees are the same way you take them for granted, and the things that you take from grant for granted tend to get taken from you. Okay, that was said by Reverend Run from Run-D.M.C., right? So don’t take your people for granted, all right? Your coworkers are a great opportunity. Find out why they came to work for you and why do they stay?

00:18:27:16 – 00:18:49:22

What do they like about your place? What if they think you could improve? And what could be better? What do we need to start doing? Stop doing. Keep doing it and improve and innovate and optimize. Right. And so if we find that out about our people, we become this destination place of employment, not only to the people that we’re going out to market to, but also the people that are on our team.

00:18:49:24 – 00:19:04:08

Awesome content right there from Ju, as always. Now, if you like this episode, go ahead and share it on your Facebook. If you want to unlock more premium training content to take your company the next level, click the link in the Facebook post for a free 30 day trial. That’s it for now, folks. We’ll see you next week here on Cracking the Code.