Contracting.com

View Original

The mindset of the most successful contractors

The final lesson I learned from the millionaire contractor was probably the most impactful.

See when I first started out, I didn't own a business, my business owned me..

No matter what I did, my tires just spun faster and faster; I wasn’t going anywhere.

Taking a week off to spend some time with my family felt like standing still in quicksand; I did not want to stop moving.

But by the end of my time shadowing this contractor, I was able to take a week long vacation, without my business skipping a beat.

And today, I’m going to share with you exactly how I was able to do that.

But the truth is, you already know how to do it.

If you’ve read through the last 5 blog posts, I give you the exact roadmap.

All the information is right there for the taking.

First, you need to focus on hiring rockstar employees.

Second, you need to know how to find consistent work.

Then, you need to have strong profits and even stronger cash flow.

And finally, you have to decide to change.

And that’s what I want to talk about in this post.

Because in order to change, it’s not ONLY about getting more information.

If it was, no one would be overweight.

We all know how to lose weight, it’s not complicated.

Work out more, eat less. Burn more calories than you consume.

But if it’s not only about getting new information, what is it about?

It’s about changing who you are.

Here’s what I mean.

There are 2 versions of any successful contractor.

The master craftsman The Business man

The master craftsman loves their tools and their trade. They love the action of woodworking/plumbing/tiling/etc. This is where a lot of contractors are. You take pride in doing the work yourself,

If you are a master craftsman you have 2 options:

  • become the most expensive and charge the most for your time, or

  • become a businessman

The reason one of the options is that you need to become the most expensive is because if you don’t charge what you are worth and increase your prices you will never make more money.

Mark W. and Robert D. are two contractors that work with us that choose to be mastercraftsmen. They make around $250k a year and choose NOT to hire any employees. They work 40 hours a week and are booked up usually 8 months in advance. They have a solid bidding process, and have unlimited leads coming their way. (we helped them with both).

The upside to this is that they never have to manage employees, they can only worry about themselves, they can turn off their brain when they show up on a jobsite and just enjoy “swinging the hammer.”

The major downside of this option is that their income is 100% tied to the hours they put in. If they take 2 weeks off, they make $240k that year… a $10k loss. Yes that's right, for every work day they take off, they lose $1,000.

God forbid if they burn out or if their back and knees start to give out, their income will slow down or completely stop.

Your other option?

Learn how to be a businessman.

The business man loves having infinite upside and freedom. If you are good at running a business you can make as much money and have as much time freedom as you want. The business man see’s systems and procedures as their ‘trade’.

Want to take time off to go on a vacation whenever you want? Done. You have the employees and team to support you.

Want to make more money? Easy. Just crank your marketing systems and let your assistants and sales reps handle the calls and bids for you.

If you can learn to fall in love with the process of running a business, then this is all possible.

If you want to become the business man, you're gonna have to learn to work less with your back and more with your head.

The key to doing so is to implement everything I’ve taught you on this website, but that will only be possible if you are willing to become someone different than who you’ve been.

If the current version of yourself was capable of building a business as successful as you dream you can; you would have already done it.

The only way to be able to reach a different level of success is to become a different version of yourself.

Someone who:

  • Is a leader of people, not a do-er of everything.

  • Owns a business, not a job.

  • Is willing to slow down in the short term to win the long term

  • Is willing to learn from others

  • Is eager to try new things

Changing your business has to start by changing you first.

A craftsman spends his time on the tools, picking up materials, and meeting with customers,

A business man spends his time in the office, picking up books, and meeting with other successful business men.

And if you want to take your business and your life to the next level and become more of a business man than just a craftsman then, book a business call with me or my team.

We will show you exactly how you can implement everything you’ve learned,give you more of the details in between, AND build you a 6 month plan to get you real business freedom.

So that you can have the business working for you, and not you working for it.

Book a call here.