How to Step Off The Tools Transcript

Greg: [00:00:00] Welcome back to our podcast. This episode may resonate really closely to you if you’re currently looking at your jeans and they’re full of cement and dust and maybe a bit of paint all over them. There’s probably a little bit of frustration that you’ve got there having to pull those same jeans on day in and day out and heading out of the door.

And maybe you’re still swinging that hammer and you’re picking up that trowel. still working on site, even though you promised yourself that you would step off the tools by now. I know when you probably started your construction business, you, most people start businesses because they want a bit of freedom to choose what you want to do, freedom to choose your hours, freedom to make more money, freedom to enjoy life with your family.

If you’re still pulling on those jeans full of cement and paint, you probably feel a little bit trapped, stressed, and no doubt exhausted. It’s not easy working physically like that so

 

 

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if that’s how you are right now, I understand it. I understand exactly where you are because I’ve been there. I’ve been there and done it myself and worked on the tools physically for many years.

But the good news is you don’t have to stay stuck. So we’re going to put a change to all of that. That in this episode, you are gonna get a clear step-by-step plan where you can finally put down that hammer for good. Get rid of that trial once and for all, and show you how you can hire tradespeople to replace your physical work so that you can change to the role of a CEO of your business.

That means more holiday time, more precious time with your family, and you’re not gonna be sacrificing your health and happiness just to keep your business afloat. So let’s jump in. To a few of the things that we’re going to show you today, a few of the strategies on how we’re going to help you achieve this.

And before we do, I think we just need to understand firstly, getting very clear about why staying stuck on the

 

 

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tools is actually dangerous. Not just for your business, but it’s actually dangerous for you personally. Now I know some people, they don’t like me saying this because they just love working on the tools and that’s the best thing, that’s why they got into the industry in the first place.

I certainly wasn’t like that, it was a bit of a means to an end for me. But even if you do like the craftsmanship side, we need to think about why it’s dangerous because firstly we need to think about your health because staying on the tools comes at a high cost. Construction is physically tough. You’re lifting up heavy materials, you’re climbing ladders you’re working in really uncomfortable positions.

I remember when I used to do loft conversions, we’d be lifting these steels around these, wherever they were 200 kg steels or more. And you’re cramped in this weird triangular section of a roof, lift in, your back’s not straight and it’s dangerous. Really dangerous. So every tradesperson knows this, don’t they, that you really put your body through

 

 

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some physical damage when you’re working on the tools day in and day out.

And your body isn’t designed to withstand that kind of physical damage forever. It might feel manageable today. You might be getting up with no aches and pains at the moment. But fast forward 5, 10, 15 years. then you can start seeing what a toll on your health this could cause. There’s just so many trades, people with chronic pain, reoccurring injuries, back problems, even stress related injuries and illnesses are becoming common realities today.

And I’ve just seen it countless times where business owners who just actually cannot keep going anymore. That’s sometimes the catalyst because they’re physically in so much pain that they just have to step off and be a CEO. By then it’s too late. They can’t reverse that damage by then.

So that’s the first thing. And it’s not just your health it’s your health and it’s also your wealth that you are affecting because being on the tools limits your earning potential. If you are working

 

 

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physically on site, you are capping your income and your hourly rate. Even if you’re the best trades person, you’re gonna be earning, let’s say, I dunno, 30, 40 pound an hour that might seem decent, but you’ve gotta consider what you’re missing out on.

You’re missing out on better projects, more profitable projects. You’re missing out on networking with. High value clients, you’re not building those strategic relationships, you’re not putting your business first and bringing it, making it go forward, all of that costs you serious money. So when you choose to stay on the tools, you’re actually turning your back on how to build real scalable wealth.

Your company cannot grow with you being involved in the daily operations like that. So it massively affects your wealth if you stay on the tools in a big way. So that’s your health and that’s your wealth. The last thing it does, And this is probably the most important, it affects yourself or your sense of self.

And the reason we say that is because so many start a

 

 

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business because they want more time, they want more money, they want more freedom with their families. But when you’re on site every day, you miss out on it all. You miss the holidays, you miss the family outings, you miss being able to take a day off to do this and do that.

You’re sacrificing those personal moments just to keep the ship afloat. And every time you do that, and every time It’s another year where you haven’t quite achieved it. It chips away at your confidence. It chips away at your identity a little bit. You stop feeling like a successful business owner and now you feel like an exhausted, stressed worker.

And that was the exact thing that you wanted to escape in the first place and why you started this business. So that’s the hidden cost of staying on the tools. It’s your health, your wealth, and yourself. That’s what it does. It slowly robs you of all of that. And today we want to change that. We’re going to break down how you can finally do that.

How you put down that hammer, how you can bring the right people on board so that you can step back and be a CEO of the

 

 

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business.

So if we know those reasons, maybe you’re listening to this and thinking, yeah, look Greg, I know that and in my heart I know that. Why is it that so many business owners stay stuck on the tools for so many years? Why are they stuck on site working when they desperately want to step away? Usually it comes down to three reasons.

The first reason is you actually it saves you money. It’s natural to think, let me just do it myself. I haven’t gotta pay someone else to do it. I’ll just get it done. But you might save a few pounds or dollars here and there in the short term, but you are actually losing thousands over the long term because your focus isn’t on growing the business.

So you end up working harder and not smarter. So that’s the first thing. It doesn’t save you

 

 

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money. The second reason is they worry about the fear of quality slipping. You hear the old phrase, no one’s gonna deliver my standard of work. I can’t trust my reputation to someone else. It’s people can ruin your reputation.

It only takes one job to ruin it. All of that. And I get that. Your name and your reputation is on the line. But at the same time, what you need to understand is if you do set clear standards and you do communicate your expectations carefully and you build simple systems to monitor your team, then your team can and will

We need to get rid of that mistake. Probably the last mistake is that some people don’t understand the maths behind how many employees you need to actually step away comfortably off the tools. They’re worried that if actually if I stop working physically I’m just not going to be able to pay myself a proper wage.

I won’t be able to replace my wage. So there is a way of calculating that and we’re going to run through that in as we go through this podcast. But

 

 

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really those three things are completely false reasons. It doesn’t save you money. The quality isn’t going to drop and you can work out how many employees you need so that you can replace your wage.

Probably the first thing we need to work out really is or discuss is the mindset shift that has to happen when you transition from a tradesman to a CEO because there is a big mental shift. You’ve got to stop thinking like a trades person and start thinking like a CEO. And if you are on the tools at the moment, your identity, your daily identity probably revolves around your trade skills, your ability to physically complete projects to the best standard and you feel responsible for every screw, nail, brick and tile.

You might. I get all that, I was exactly the same, but the truth you need to understand is that trades people build projects,

 

 

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and CEOs build teams and systems that build the projects. Yeah, just let that sink in for a second. Trades people build the projects, but it’s the CEO that builds the teams and systems that then build the projects.

And that’s the shift in mindset. It’s not just a nice idea, it’s absolutely essential that your mind is on it. shifts if you want to scale your business. You’ve got to start identifying as the business leader, not the best trades person on site. And the role of a CEO is different to what you’ve been used to.

It’s the, if you’re acting as a proper CEO of your company, then it’s all about your vision and your growth and your delegation and your training your whole job role. Now, your full time role should be ensuring profitability, winning new business, managing client relationships, hiring the right trades and people.

Just a few practical ways on how you can do this. One thing that’s really good to do is actually define

 

 

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your new daily tasks. Write down what an ideal work day now looks like for you as the CEO. What should you be doing every hour of the work day? And that will be quoting jobs, meeting clients, managing the schedule, marketing, all of that.

Be really specific as to how your day should look. And that’s one mental shift when you actually understand what you should be doing. The second thing you want to do is set really clear boundaries for yourself. You want to commit to yourself and set yourself a boundary that you’re not going to be dragged into these low level on site tasks.

They’ve got to be delegated to someone else. And we’ll talk about delegation a little bit later as we go through things, but that’s an important identity shift that you set boundaries for yourself. And really, the third thing is you want to try and visualize your new CEO. Really picture yourself, turning up in your car, not in your work van, in your car to a nice clean office and smart clothes.

You’re sitting down at the computer

 

 

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reviewing the quotes and schedules. Feel real pride and confidence knowing your team is on site actually delivering the quality of the work without you having to micromanage every step. Really visualise yourself in that role and what that means for you.

And once you start to make this identity. T shift, you’ll start to see your business from a new perspective and a new angle. You’ll really realize that sometimes it is literally the mind that holds you back and traps you. And if you can elevate yourself out of that mindset of being a trades person, then you’ll start thinking much freer.

And you’ll have more of a growth mindset if you can put yourself in that CEO position. So that’s, it’s absolutely crucial. You’ve gotta shift your mind from tradesperson to CEO. It’s not easy. But absolutely necessary if you want to make this transition. So we spoke about understanding how and when you can make this transition to actually coming off the tools.

And one of the big questions really is, how many trades people do I

 

 

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realistically need working for me before I can comfortably step away and have my income replaced? Now there’s, I was thinking about how to answer this question really. And it is an important question and you could, I could go into some real complex maths here on.

How you can work this out properly, but just for the sake of this podcast to keep it nice and simple, I just want to break it down into real simple maths and questions that you’ve got because you’re, worried, is my salary going to be covered? Will I be losing money? All of that sort of stuff.

Can I really stop working physically? So the way to work this out is first of all, think about what you earn as a trades person each year. I’m not talking about your total earnings. I’m talking about what you contribute as a trades person. tradesperson. If you were going to pay someone like you as a trade to come and work for you, what would that wage be?

So maybe your wage, let’s say is 50k a year. All right. It might be much more than that, much less than that. But let’s just say it’s 50k a year. You

 

 

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value your trade at 50k a year. So we need to think, what do you, how many trades people do you need so that you can step away? One simple and a rule of.

thumb really that I’ve used for many years, a simple rule, is that I always say that you generally need around five trades people full time working for you in order to replace your income. That’s just a general rule of thumb. It’s going to be different for each industry. And the reason I say that is because each tradesperson should be able to deliver two and a half times their annual salary, at least.

So let’s imagine you bring on a tradesperson 40 grand. All right you’re worth 50 grand. Let’s imagine you bring someone on a little bit less than you and you pay them 40, 000. If they’re generating two and a half times their income each year in revenue, they should be earning you a hundred thousand a year.

Now you’ve got to take off their wages, obviously, and we’ve got to take off overheads and things like that. Everything else that’s on the job

 

 

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materials and whatever else. But overall, what we’ve got to think a simple way of thinking about it. is if that trades person was generating you 10 percent net every year.

Sorry, I made a mistake there. Let’s go back. If you’re editing this, just go back a section. So let’s imagine for a second that you earn yourself 50, 000 a year. You rate your time as a trades person at 50k a year. If you employed five trades people that were earning you an additional 10k of profit a year, then they’ve, which, which is like super. achievable by the way and super conservative. If they could earn you 10, 000 additional profit a year and you had five trades people that would replace your income of 50, 000 a year that you were worth.

So it’s a really simple calculation. We could go into much more detail than

 

 

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that but that’s just a really nice easy rule of thumb. Generally speaking it’s around five people that you need that means you can then step away. Now you could do some more complex maths on that and you may find for your industry or for your business, you only need three trades people or four trades people or six, but you can work it out yourself where it’s going to be.

But if you had a rule of thumb of five, you wouldn’t be far off from that. And that’s really the sweet spot for you to be able to step away completely from not working again. So if you’ve reached five trades people, you’re probably financially ready to put down the hammer and the trowel for good. So how do we do that?

How do we make that step by step process? How do we? transition you off of the tools. The first mistake that people make is they don’t listen to that word gradual. So some go from working full time on site to then zero overnight. And it

 

 

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really works because your business isn’t ready yet. Your team isn’t prepared and you’re probably not prepared for it either.

So they step away too fast. They don’t earn any money and it doesn’t quite go as well as what they wanted. So let’s talk about how you do it gradually. So phase one, start really small. Let’s start first of all by employing one trades person, one trades person that you work with. You work with them for a month or two, show them exactly how you want things to be done and how you do things.

Demonstrate your standards, demonstrate your quality and efficiency and how you communicate with them. clients and all that sort of stuff and then that person is molded to work exactly as you work. Then maybe after a month or two take one day off a week completely off of site. Yeah, they’re replacing you for that day.

You take a day off and let them just work. And during that day, you do work that focuses only on pricing new jobs and improving your marketing and looking for new opportunities, things like that. And then let your trades person just get on with

 

 

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doing their role. So that’s the. The first phase.

Phase two is then you’ve got that one, once you’ve got that one comfortable trades person, now hire your second and third trades. Again, spend a bit of time training them, working alongside them, communicate your standards. And then each new hire gives you more time off of site. Now you can, instead of doing the one day a week, now potentially you can do two or three days off of work a week.

And each step reduces your daily physical involvement and helps you build your team gradually and helps them build their team. Air independence. So that’s really just a real simple way of doing it. Start building it that way. And then gradually you just wanna test your independence. And we’ll talk about testing a little bit later, but test if it worked or not.

As you take that day off and you’ve spent your time on business development tasks, just have a look and think how did things go on site? Did it go as well as I wanted? How did my day go? Was I productive doing my marketing and doing my business development, things

 

 

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like that. So actually look at what you’re doing and test how it’s all going and then you’re just gradually going to improve every single day.

So now what this does, this steady deliberate approach just makes that stepping off the tools not just achievable, but now it almost seems inevitable because you’re gradually moving towards it each time. We’ve got to avoid the trap of micromanaging though. As you step off the tools, You do need to watch this temptation of micromanaging because we know this business is your baby.

You’ve built it personally on reputation and quality and craftsmanship and letting go can feel uncomfortable sometimes terrifying having to let go. I’ve said this saying before, but micromanaging might save you minutes, but delegating saves you years. So we’ve got to avoid that. We’ve got to avoid that micromanaging trap.

So one way we do that, is by clearly defining outcomes, not methods. So what we mean by that is we,

 

 

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rather than telling the team exactly how to do every single task, just communicate the final outcome and then trust them to get there in their own way. So maybe instead of saying I want you to install these cabinets exactly how I show you, maybe just say, I need these cabinets installed level and flush to this standard.

I’ll leave it up to you. Here’s the drawing. All right. That gives your team a sense of ownership. It gives them a bit of confidence and initiative. The second thing you want to do to stop micromanaging is set some clear guidelines and boundaries. So maybe you can say to your team here’s the boundaries I want you to operate within.

You can make any onsite decision that costs less than 500 and you don’t need my approval for that. Something like that. You might want to start off with clearly state to them when you do want to be involved. If there are large decisions to be made or big client issues or major variables.

Then your team needs to know when you want to be involved and when you don’t want to be. So make sure you communicate that to them too. Otherwise you may not

 

 

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be kept up to date with things that really do matter to you. Another way to avoid micromanaging is to ask for solutions. And don’t provide them yourself.

So if an issue arises on site, which trust me it will 100%, your first instinct might be, Ah, let me just drive down there, let me jump in, and I’ll fix this. You want to resist that impulse, you don’t have to be the cleverest person in the company. Ask your team. What do you think we should do? What’s the best way of handling this?

What do you recommend? How would you approach this if I can’t get there? It just gets your team to think really independently and not rely on you for every single decision if you do that. Have regular check ins with your team as well. That stops micromanaging. So maybe just have a morning appointment with them, maybe even an evening appointment, just a short update and just simply ask what’s going well, what issues are you facing, where can I support you, that just keeps you informed without you constantly having to interrupt your team all day long.

And

 

 

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be patient with them. Let your team grow. They’re going to make mistakes. Things are gonna happen. It doesn’t mean it’s a failure, it’s a learning experience. So let them make those mistakes, as if they’re small, that’s fair enough. And and just be patient. Let them grow. And if you do that, you’ll build a really capable team where you’re not having to micromanage them and you’re not having to be on site every second, because if you’re on site all the time, the temptation to pick up the tools is just too great and you’ll wanna do it.

So we wanna get you off of site and actually doing things in the office that really matter. So gradually over time, you want to test that independence. We spoke about that earlier, but excuse me, you want to know it’s difficult, but even stepping away for the first couple of days, you might feel a bit nervous about it.

Is it all going to fall apart? You’ve got to get away from that. So rather than going on a two week holiday straight away, just do it gradually. Pick one day a week, communicate your team that you’re not going to be available for that day. Try not to pick up your phone and answer the phone every hour to them.

 

 

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Just resist that a little bit. Give your team a little bit of space to try and resolve those issues independently. And then you can ask yourself, how did they get on? Did they do well? Or do I need to help them solve anything next time round? And then gradually increase that time off of sight. Move it to two, move it to three days.

And eventually, step by step, you’ll move that to five days. And then you want to try and take a short break. Maybe go away for a long weekend. and don’t have your phone with you or push it a little bit if you want and go on a week’s holiday. That’s really what you want to do. If you can take a complete break away from the business without having to check your emails and do lots of calls, you really are moving away from being on site, having to do it all yourself.

And now you’ve really created a business that operates without you. So if you do it gradually, it builds your confidence. It builds the confidence in the team as well. And slowly, you’re going to start testing how it works. How much your team members can handle

 

 

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without you being there. Just think for a second, this is a lot of work obviously to come off the tools, but we want you to think what life is like when you’re no longer on the tools.

Because it’s really important just to get that in your mind of why you’re doing this. Because picture this, you’ve got your life back. You’re waking up in the morning without an alarm necessarily going off at dawn. You don’t have the rush to put all those things together. Those cement stained jeans on and those muddy boots.

Instead you get dressed, you go downstairs, you have a coffee, you’re in smart, comfortable clothes. You’re enjoying breakfast with your family. You’ve not got a site emergency that’s interrupting you because you’ve got a team that’s handling it for you confidently. Then think about being able to take that holiday, a real holiday without constantly checking your phone, without worrying that the team is managing okay.

Imagine just taking your family on a nice, warm, sunny holiday. You’re fully present. in the moment, watching your kids

 

 

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playing at the beach or in the sea, knowing that your business is running smoothly and your business is paying for this holiday for you. And then think about your health. You feel great.

Your back pain has gone. The tension in your shoulders has disappeared. You feel a bit more rested, a bit more energetic. You’ve given years to spend in physical stuff in your business, but now finally you can have a bit of time for yourself. You can invest in your fitness again, you can go down to the gym, you can take up hobbies, And enjoy a much more balanced lifestyle.

And then think about the mental benefits, the mental wellbeing. You’re not stressed at night realizing that you’ve got unfinished jobs that you just have to get done before you get paid, or you’re not stressed, that you’ve gotta do a full day’s work physically, and then come home and do all the paperwork.

But no, instead your mind feels nice and clear, nice and focused, relaxed. You can breathe again. You’ve really traded that daily stress for a life of confidence and calm because your business now runs efficient.

 

 

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Without you physically having to be there. And then think about the money side and the real financial growth.

You are now winning larger, more profitable projects. You’ve got much more time to be able to focus on those strategic large projects. You can land better clients and your profits are improving. You are now starting to build genuine wealth and financial security for your family’s future. So just think about all of that.

All of that, the hobbies that you can do, the passions, the interests that you’ve put aside for far too long, the traveling that you can do, all of that, you can finally do it all. This isn’t a distant dream. This is exactly what you’ve been working towards by following a clear practical steps that we’ve discussed in this podcast today.

If you really set your mind to it. and come off the tools, you’re reclaiming the life and business that you really deserve and your happiness. And that’s all I want for you that’s listening to this. So as we just recap on

 

 

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this episode, really we just need to really say that if you keep doing what you’ve always done, you’re always going to get what you’ve always gotten.

Does that make sense? You can have long days, stress filled nights, miss family moments. We’ve got to change what you’re doing. And if that means coming off the tools, you’ve got to do it. Today we’ve looked at the critical mindset shift that you must make from transitioning from CEO from a tradesperson.

We’ve got to shift the mind first. We’ve looked at how to work out how many trades people you realistically need, as we said usually around five, to replace your on site salary. We then spoke about how you can gradually step away from the business. Don’t do it all at once. One day at a time is a great way of monitoring things.

And then we’ve looked at how you can avoid. Micromanaging your team so that they can get on with tasks on site without you having to jump in and solve it for them. If you’re looking down at those cement stain jeans at the moment, how about taking them off tonight when when you get

 

 

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home. Chuck them in the bin, get yourself a smart pair of jeans on tomorrow.

Tomorrow can be the first day that you don’t work on the tools and you start building a business that you truly deserve. So I hope that’s helped a little bit. Just a few tips there. I know I’ve managed to do the transition. It wasn’t easy, but it was the best thing I ever done. I’ve never looked back since I’ve stopped working on the tools.

Just has helped me think at such a high level with my businesses and I just want the same for you. So hope that helps. Leave me a comment or a review if you found this interesting and we’ll see you on the next podcast.