Create Leaders Before You Scale Your HVAC Business
As your HVAC business grows, the same leadership approach that got you started can quickly become the thing holding you back. When every decision runs through the owner and team members are not empowered to lead, growth stalls, priorities get lost and the business becomes harder to manage.
In this episode of Cracking The Code, Geno Gruber, President of ProfitsUP Inc., explains why contractors need to develop leaders before they scale. He shares how to identify when the owner has become the bottleneck, empower employees to make decisions, use mistakes as learning opportunities and build a leadership team capable of moving the business forward.
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00:00:00:07 – 00:00:07:20
You can’t grow your business faster than you can grow your.
00:00:07:22 – 00:00:36:16
Welcome to cracking the Code. I’m David Holt, the director of education and coaching for Aggies contractor University and Hvac distributor University. And today we are super excited to have a really an industry icon on the podcast with us today. Mr. Gino Gruber is with us today. Welcome, Gino. Thank you Dave. Man, it’s really a long time coming. We’ve been talking about this for a while.
00:00:36:16 – 00:00:57:14
Glad we were able to finally get our schedules together and get this podcast recorded so we can share share some wisdom with the industry. Tell us a little bit about your background in the Hvac industry, Gino. Well, I ran a company for ten years. Each Hvac company that made some noise in the industry. Yeah, we got a lot of magazine attention and stuff.
00:00:57:14 – 00:01:23:15
And then, then it broke out, to be a coach. So I’ve been doing that for almost 20 years now. That is cool. So you’ve worked with contractors from around, you know, million and half on up to 30 million plus and a lot of a plus above some of those things. So what are some of the biggest things that you see that actually slows their growth?
00:01:23:17 – 00:01:50:01
You know, it’s kind of a loaded question in a sense. So depends on what stage they’re at. Right. So that first initial stage after they’ve been the guy in the truck and now they’ve got a few employees, the holdups usually them. So they become the bottleneck. Right. Oh yeah. Every time I’m hey you know, I’ll never forget my very first, client.
00:01:50:03 – 00:02:13:09
When I went out coaching, I get to his place, and he immediately sent me out to, the field is, to to ride with the sales guys. And so I did, and that was back by noon after doing two sales calls, which says, something already, there’s a problem. Anyway, he said, so, the sales guys are the problem, right?
00:02:13:09 – 00:02:31:13
I said, yeah, they need some work. I said, but, who’s who’s their boss? Who’s the sales manager? He says, why am I so. Well, then you’re the problem. And, I saw his neck get all red. I thought he was going to come across the desk at me. And if you were to talk to him, he said, well, I almost did that, he said, then I thought about it.
00:02:31:13 – 00:02:53:16
And you’re right. And, and that relationship went on for till he sold his business. Oh, yes. That’s awesome. Team 17, 18 years later. And so, you know, when, when we have and I’ve run into the same thing in my coaching career as well, where, you know, the the man in the mirror or the woman in the mirror is, is really the problem.
00:02:53:16 – 00:03:12:05
And they don’t they don’t even really recognize it a lot of times because, you know, they’re kind of comfortable in their skin and that’s, that’s just reality. Right. So when you when you think about that and you think about so really what we’ve talked about is leadership, right? So what are kind of the early warning signs that a company has outgrown its leadership.
00:03:12:07 – 00:03:37:15
Well, it should be for that individual for the owner if that’s who’s listening here. If you’re banging your head against the wall, you’re getting nothing done. Your day’s running you rather than you running your day. That’s an indication that your your is stall point right there. You’re not going to go past where you’re at. So you have to have help.
00:03:37:17 – 00:04:07:12
And that’s the hard part for some of these guys and ladies is giving up some control. You know, you have to trust people to be able to, and let them fail. You know what? If they won’t let them fail, that that’s part of the learning process. But that seems to be the the first obstacle in that, you know, I’m going to call it the steps because it is there’s always this.
00:04:07:14 – 00:04:30:12
It’s never the gradual line. It’s. Yeah. You know, sometimes it’s it’s like it is like crawling over a wall. Sometimes it’s not just a simple like a typical stair step that, you know, you see going into a building or whatever. It’s like, yeah, I mean, this is a, this is a heavy lift to get from point A to point B, you, you’ve, you’re famous for, for making a statement that goes something like this.
00:04:30:12 – 00:04:59:04
It’s not perfectly what you said. I don’t remember exactly, but you said something like, you can’t grow your business faster than you grow your leaders. Right? And it’s like the leadership side of of the business is is critically important when you transition from you’re looking at your whole company. When you look in the mirror to now I even if I just got one other person, you still have to lead, you still have to lead them.
00:04:59:04 – 00:05:32:19
And and that’s not a yeah, that’s not an obvious thing to a lot of people unfortunately. And we in the industry, we just don’t do a good enough job of empowering and equipping technicians with leadership skills. And yet they start a business and now they’re a leader the minute they hire somebody. Talk to us about, you know, what are the kind of things that you see that are kind of, I guess, exhibiting poor leadership that’s that’s causing people to to be stagnant in their business.
00:05:32:19 – 00:05:59:03
I mean, what, what things, what things are happening? I mean, I know you mentioned already. Well, you talk this is about you. Well, it’s interesting you bring this up and it immediately makes me think of now on the complete other end, larger clients. So I, work with the company for about the last ten years. And in that ten years, they’ve gone from 12 to, you know, they’ll do well over 70 million this year.
00:05:59:03 – 00:06:31:08
But about three years ago, well, up to three years ago, they’ve been adding members to the team. Now in the early stages, it’s always somebody from within that you grow into that management position. And he had to hire from outside into the management team. And it was an uncomfortable thing for them. It’s like, hey, these guys are going to be going on the trips because, you know, when they they hit benchmarks still like we went to spring training one year and you know, stuff like that with just the the leadership team.
00:06:31:10 – 00:06:59:22
So in that time he was hiring some excellent, excellent leaders. In fact, I in one of my I have a mastermind group. We meet once a year with all my clients. And I brought up this that, you know, we have if I were to cherry pick, you know, my own company, I’m starting a company fresh and I’m going to pick from all your managers.
00:07:00:00 – 00:07:21:06
I said most of them would come from this company. And I said, however, if I had to just pick a team, it wouldn’t be them. And that was kind of a slap in the face for them in awakening. And and it was a true statement. They weren’t functioning. I mean, if they were all key in they still are.
00:07:21:07 – 00:07:51:23
They’re all very capable people, but they weren’t at the time functioning as this awesome team. And that’s what I think the next phase is, is, first of all, when you start growing, you have to start having meetings and, you know, company meetings and management meetings. And this was a company that really wasn’t having much of those. They, it took me forever to get them to start their daily huddles.
00:07:52:01 – 00:08:17:08
And then the, you know, the weekly manager, you’re just getting that stuff is a a routine for them was difficult because we’re all too busy. Right? Like, you have to find the time to do that. You have to talk. And now that that company is, I mean, they are functioning as a team now, and, they’re they’re getting accomplished.
00:08:17:10 – 00:08:42:06
I mean, they can double their size right now. Yeah. And here’s a really important point that I think we ought to make on this is, meeting for the sake of meeting is not productive. Right? It’s not just about meeting. It’s about meeting with a purpose. Meeting with an agenda. Meeting with intent to, you know, knock down some rocks that are in your way and to, you know, it’s clear the path to get some things done and all that for sure.
00:08:42:07 – 00:09:10:01
But meetings for the sake of meetings are not productive, and it can actually work just the opposite of what you’re hoping for. I know I’ve worked in a company where, there was a daily huddle and the daily huddle was just you just were grit in your teeth the whole time, like I 1000 or the things I could be doing than listening to something that’s not really moving the needle, thinking about, the contractor and you talked a minute ago about the, you know, the bottleneck.
00:09:10:01 – 00:09:34:04
And I think the perfect example of the bottleneck situation with leadership is if you’re if your organization chart on paper looks like a dartboard where you’re in the middle and everybody points to you, that’s not an organizational chart, right? If you’ve got 17 people that are reporting to you when you ought to have maybe 3 or 4, that’s an indication you got a problem.
00:09:34:04 – 00:09:59:20
Right? So what are what are 2 to 3 things that if I’m, if I’m a contractor right now listening to this presentation, what are the 2 to 3 things I can start doing this month right now to develop leaders who can actually help me scale the business? Well, the first way to start developing them is empower them to make some decisions and let them fail.
00:09:59:21 – 00:10:27:08
Don’t chop their head off if they do something wrong, you know, use it as a training experience. You know that often those things I think that book, The One Minute Manager, it’s like a 90 minute read it, it talking pace. I mean, it’s a small book. But the simple, premise of the book is, you know, when someone comes to you with an issue, ask them, what would you do?
00:10:27:10 – 00:10:45:00
Okay. It sounds like you got to figure it out. Don’t bother me with that kind of issue again. Let them go do it. And so, so teaching people how to think. What a concept. I don’t just come to me with a problem, come to me with a, you know, raise the issue for sure. We want to we want to know about problems.
00:10:45:00 – 00:11:03:10
But come to me with a good solution as far as you can come up with one. And and maybe, you know, the owner leader, me manager can can make it slightly better because there is wisdom in the crowd. Right. But yeah, come to me with a with a solution to the problem. Don’t just come to me whining about.
00:11:03:14 – 00:11:28:02
We got a problem, boss. What do we what should we do about it? Oh, we got a problem. Here’s my thoughts. Right? Yeah, and that’s usually a product of the fact the manager is going to be hard on them if they do something wrong. Yeah, and if that’s the case, doesn’t matter if you tell them what what would you do if you’re going to beat them every time they make a wrong decision they’re going to stop making decisions.
00:11:28:04 – 00:11:53:22
Yeah. And that’s why I keep saying, you know, you got to let your people fail. Let them be comfortable in failing. Like, again, you have to talk. If they do the same mistake a couple times, that’s a different issue. That’s right. But letting them know that they can go out there, make decisions and not get their head chopped off if they made a mistake, it’s God knows we’ve all made mistakes.
00:11:54:00 – 00:12:13:01
Well, clearly, yeah, there’s nobody perfect walking the planet that I know of right now. Anyway. So the first step really in my mind, based on what you’re just saying to turning a good employee into someone who can actually lead is, you know, to challenge them to fail. Almost. I don’t go out there and, like, just trip over a piece of something just because you think that’s a failure.
00:12:13:02 – 00:12:36:04
No, no, come try something. Let’s see if it works. If it works, that’s great. If it fails, let’s figure out what the lesson is in that failure. That’s actually really good advice. Yeah. In fact, I think General Patton said it way before I did. He said, you know what? Let your people give your, people the opportunity to fail and they might surprise, you know.
00:12:36:06 – 00:12:56:22
So how do you how do you get people how do you kind of free people up to, like, take ownership of a situation instead of always coming back to the owner? Well, again, start with that one minute manager role is like, hey, well, what would you do? This make sure they we spend enough time with them too. Depends on the role.
00:12:57:00 – 00:13:20:17
Yeah, of how much time you’re going to spend. But here’s how I do it. Here’s how I think about it. And hopefully through osmosis, they should pick that up, right? Yeah. So it start there letting them make decisions and then congratulating them. Hey, that was great choice. You know, and not micromanaging them. Oh, I’ll manage in my meetings.
00:13:20:19 – 00:13:39:20
It’s like hey the other day with this. How did that turn out? Great. You know move on. Or why isn’t that resolved yet? Okay, let’s let’s up the urgency on this matter. You know, we don’t want to let hang out there. And, you know, whatever the situation is, you know, prioritization is a huge part of it, right?
00:13:40:02 – 00:14:05:07
It’s like and sometimes the owner needs to be clear on setting those priorities because, you know, a lot of times, I know I’ve worked with people in the past where it’s like they say, I need something by, you know, let’s say the 15th of the month. Okay. What they really said, what their expectation is, is have it to me two weeks before the 15th so that we’re done with the decisions about what changes need to be made and all that.
00:14:05:07 – 00:14:23:00
We’ve come to an agreement on what it’s going to be on the 15th. So it’s like, okay, why didn’t you say that to begin with? Like after the first few times that I didn’t meet their expectation, I finally uncovered the real expectation, which was, give me two weeks to chew on your new idea until we make a final decision.
00:14:23:02 – 00:14:47:03
Right? That’s different. Right? It’s two different things. Having it ready to go on the 15th is one thing, but having two weeks to talk about it before the 15th, that’s another thing. Right? So being clear in the expectations I think is one way that we can solve that, you know, kind of issue. And that’s really when you think about the challenge of growing people, without really overwhelming them or running them off, which is, you know, that can happen too.
00:14:47:04 – 00:15:02:13
It’s like all of a sudden you they’re in a role that they’re not comfortable with, right? We’re trying to grow leaders. So let’s say we’re taking a service tech. And we said, hey man, you’ve been doing a great job. You’ve been with us a long time. I’ve got an opening as a service manager. I’d really like you to consider doing that.
00:15:02:13 – 00:15:19:12
Well, service tech’s not going to want to disappoint the boss, and a lot of times they’ll take that opportunity. But they’re completely unprepared for it. And the boss doesn’t do anything for them. Well, that can actually cause you to lose a great tech right there. Right? Yeah.
00:15:19:14 – 00:15:44:00
Yeah. We we often overlook the, the important thing for the more urgent thing. And then we allow those urgent things to run our business and you know, depending on the size of the business, I’ll be telling guys, okay, at this point, you know, you’re, well, there’s a guy I was working with, great guy. He grew really fast.
00:15:44:01 – 00:16:08:01
He went from nothing to 24,000,000 in 6 years. And that’s pretty incredible. Yeah, he was still so deep in it. Like, you are not going to be able to grow unless you’re able to free yourself. And then he’ll say, well, I did. My wife and I did take six weeks off one time. Okay, well the place ran, but you came back and then it’s it can’t run without you kind of situation again.
00:16:08:01 – 00:16:32:16
It’s it’s like you got to be able to let go. Like when we’d have our coaching calls. He was always distracted. It just wasn’t going anywhere. It’s like, come on, you got to be able to spend this time. If you can’t, that’s an indication of why you need to spend this time, you know? And, and it’s really hard for some, some guys, without a doubt.
00:16:32:16 – 00:16:56:19
I know I was personally, very, very, guilty of that when I started my first company back in the 1980s. And, it wasn’t until I got slapped in the face a couple of times, physically and emotionally by my wife that said, dude, you need to you need to set some time aside to develop you and develop the business instead of always working in it.
00:16:56:19 – 00:17:16:14
Right. And this was before this was even before E-myth came out. So she didn’t know how to say, you know, stop working in your business, start working on your business. She didn’t, but she said exactly that. And and she’s an educator. She’s an early childhood education teacher. And, I was being an early child back then. Right? And I was just like, oh, yeah, I guess that’s probably important.
00:17:16:14 – 00:17:35:11
Yeah, I went to business school. I should know these things. But some things you learn in the trenches, right? Yeah. Well, tech business school, a lot of those teachers have never actually led anything. That’s that’s exactly right. That’s exactly right. So, Gene. Oh, man. This has been pretty informative, man. I really appreciate getting you on the show today.
00:17:35:11 – 00:17:58:12
And and also, I look forward to having you, be a part of Edgar’s contractor university faculty and start getting some good training programs incorporated into the platform. So so our contractors can then gain traction in their business by learning through the experiences that you’ve had and running a heating and air business, and also coaching contractors for the past couple of decades.
00:17:58:12 – 00:18:16:04
So I really appreciate your participation, man. Looking forward to it. Thank you Dave. It’s a lot of fun. You bet man. It’s going to be good. So, cracking the code is what this is all about. We’re trying to figure out ways to help you as a contractor be better tomorrow than you are today. And cracking the code is one way that we can do it.
00:18:16:06 – 00:18:33:15
Make sure you like and subscribe to this podcast and, get your friends involved with it, too. Or sharing information that’s available to you at no cost to you so that we can help this industry do better tomorrow than it is today. David, hope and Gino Gruber saying, see you next time.
