5 Business tips to Help You Move from Contractor to CEO
Andrew Houston, President of Profit for Contractors, spent time at the Jobber booth at AHR Expo talking to attendees about making the move from contractor to CEO.
He shared his “recipe” for business success, explaining where business owners need to focus their time and energy to move from field tech to true CEO. There were a lot of takeaways from his talk, and here are a few that stuck out to us:
1. Spend your time on profitable activities
If you consider your time as 100%, everything you’re doing—or as much as possible—should be spent on profitable activities. If you’re spending 40% of your time dealing with difficult customers and callbacks, you’re not leaving much time for profit-making activities like sales and marketing.
2. Always be recruiting
You need to recruit 365 days a year! That way you have a bench warmer ready when you need to bring employees on permanently. Don’t wait until you’re already short someone in the field.
READ MORE: Hiring and recruiting tips to attract employees that stick around
3. Know your numbers
You need to know your break-even margin to ensure you’re truly profiting on jobs. Are you considering your overhead, materials, labor, etc. as a full picture when you’re quoting and tracking jobs?
4. Market to your team and new recruits as much as you market to customers
You need to market to your team as much as you market to your customers. Struggling to hire? Assume potential employees are looking you up before they apply. Do you have a bunch of great reviews indicating steady, quality work? If the answer is no, start asking customers for reviews.
5. Show your customers the value you offer
Show your customers the value you’re bringing them on paper. They don’t know about the technical details of what you do, so get all the checks and processes you do to ensure a great, safe job on paper, and tell them to ask your competitors if they follow the same standards.
Looking to hear more from Andrew? Visit www.profitforcontractors.com for more info and to download a few tools to help you see through the advice we took away.