CEO's You Should Know x PJ Fitzpatrick

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:02):
iHeartMedia Presents CEOs you should know. Hi.

Speaker 2 (00:06):
I'm John Denkell, founder and CEO of Dnkele Business Development
and former president and publisher of the Baltimore Business Journal.
This is Iheartradios CEOs you should know and I'm here
today with James Freeman, CEO of PJ Fitzpatrick. Welcome James,
and thanks for being here.

Speaker 1 (00:22):
Thank you for having me John. It's a pleasure.

Speaker 2 (00:24):
Yeah, yeah, looking forward to our conversation. I thought I'd
start off by just getting to know you a little
bit and know the organization a little bit more so
those who might not be familiar. Could you tell us
more about PJ Fitzpatrick.

Speaker 1 (00:36):
Absolutely my pleasures. PJ Fitzpatrick is a forty five year
old company founded in nineteen eighty by Peter John Fitzpatrick.
You know, he had a belief that if you wanted
to provide a quality service, quality products to a customer
match by quality service, you shouldn't be afraid to put
your name on it, and he did just that. It's

(00:56):
a wonderful business. We do exterior products roofing, siding, windows
and doors, as well as gutters and gutter protection. Inside
the home. We do interior wet area based system. So
if you think about a person who has a tub
and they want to convert it to a low entrance shower,
that's the type of work that we're doing. We're corporately

(01:17):
based in Our original home base is in Newcastle, Delaware,
about twenty minutes outside of Philadelphia, and today we have
offices in Philadelphia, in northern Delaware serving the Philadelphia market, Harrisford, Pennsylvania, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, Fairfield,
New Jersey serving northern New Jersey, Long Island, New York.
And we also have an office in Bouie, Maryland that

(01:39):
serves the Baltimore as well as the DC and Northern
Virginia markets. And you know, we've been growing rapidly and
we're excited to be in the in the in the
capital market.

Speaker 2 (01:48):
Yeah wow, that's amazing. Congratulations on that growth too. Definitely
looking forward to talking a little bit more about that
later on. Tell us about your your kind of your
typical clients and maybe is there a percentage roughly that
that you do with commercials compared to residential.

Speaker 1 (02:05):
We're one hundred residential, okay, So you know, it's it's
very difficult for companies, at least on a larger scale
to navigate the ins and outs of residential versus commercial,
and ultimately, we believe that focused efforts drive results, so
we focus on residential remodeling. Our average client when I
got here, tended to skew a little bit older. It

(02:28):
tended to be a customer who had already gone through
one or a series of home improvement product projects and
probably getting right worked with somebody a low cost provider
or somebody that didn't provide them the level of service
that was committed to them during the buying experience. So,
you know, our customers are coming to us because they
want to get the job done right the first time,

(02:49):
and they want the peace of mind that on the
back end that we're going to be there to be
able to support them in their time and need if
it arises. And you know, so that's been our customer
really for the past, you know, for the first forty
years of the business. As we've expanded and grown our
business over the past five years, we've been broadening that out.
And there's some interesting dynamics in terms of the emerging

(03:11):
buyers that are coming into homes, the millennials and their
buying patterns, which are kind of mimicking more of the
older buyers of the past. So it's it's a really
interesting time and we're seeing our average customer expand because
we're speaking to them in different ways and meeting where
them where they are in different ways so that we
can we can be a little bit more focused with

(03:33):
each person based on what their needs and their buying
experience once are.

Speaker 2 (03:37):
That's neat. I appreciate sharing that tell us about a
little bit about how you're different from your competitors.

Speaker 1 (03:45):
Well, a couple of things, you know. Ultimately, as a business,
you know, people talk a lot about culture, and I
think it's a buzzword that isn't really always representative of
the results you want. But you know what sets us
apart first and foremost is our people. I've got an
amazing staff of professionals who strive every day to meet

(04:08):
our core purpose. We are core purpose is to make
life better, one home at a time, and a lot
of times people focus about the big picture, and we
work with our teams to slow down and take care,
love the one you're with, take care of the customer
that's standing in front of you. And then from our people,
we differentiate ourselves via our technology the way we use
technology both during the sales process to make it clear

(04:32):
and compat very easy for people to understand what they're purchasing,
meeting their needs and being able to have a quality
experience for them. We use technology throughout the remainder of
our business to be able to ease the experience for
both our people internally as well as for the customers.
But one of the biggest differentiators is that get the

(04:52):
job done right the first time and be there when
customers need you. So one of the examples of that
would be that you know, if you think about you
see it often like a lifetime warranty. So while use
a roof, for example, a lifetime warranty and a roof
is fifty years if the right if you install the
roofing system the right way with the right components. Now,

(05:12):
most companies you know would then in turn not offer
a labor component that's a manufacturer warranty for the materials. PJ.
Fitzpator doesn't believe that that's the right thing for customers
because if you have something that's not working to the
way it's expected to in your home, it's not performing
at the level that you that brings you the comfort
you need, you shouldn't have to worry about any additional

(05:34):
costs down the line. So we actually match all of
our customer our manufacturers warranty with a full labor warranty,
so that when those customers encounter those moments, they are
truly no cash out of pocket if they legitimately have
a warranty scenario. So, you know, we differentiate ourselves with
our people. We differentiate ourselves with technology. We differentiate ourselves

(05:56):
with the warranty experience for customers when it's necessary, you know,
but it's really when it comes down to it, we
have a team that's all rowing the same direction, and
when we're rowing the same direction, we can provide the
highest level of quality of our customers. And that's you
see that in our over thirteen thousand Google reviews with

(06:18):
a four point eight four point nine in most markets,
we're we're putting ourselves out there that we're going to
be the best, and then we're matching that experience for
customers and they're glad to share it along the way.
So those are a couple of little things that could
go on forever ago. Those are a few things that
I think separate ourselves from the pack.

Speaker 3 (06:37):
Yeah, those are great.

Speaker 2 (06:38):
Now, I appreciate you talking about that. A couple of
things that dig in a little bit. One was the
kind of the people part. It sounds like culture is
a big part of your success and why you've grown
so much and so rapidly. Talk to me a little
bit about what you're seeing, you know, kind of the
younger generation, whether it's you know, kind of this gen

(07:00):
Z or even the millennials like wanting to get, you know,
into the trades or there just seems to be a
little bit more of an emphasis on that these days.
And you know, everybody needs to go to college and
do the four year degree.

Speaker 1 (07:12):
There's so much.

Speaker 2 (07:12):
More out there and more opportunity. It just seems that
the trades are finally getting looked at again as that
career opportunity and a good one at that. So could
you talk a little bit about that and maybe how
that have you seen that trend? And you know what,
what how would you how did you comment on that?

Speaker 1 (07:31):
So, I mean, college education is a wonderful pursuit for
the for the right person, sure, but along the way
of college education being moved to the forefront, we we
somewhere along the line demonized the people who use their
hands to be able to earn a living and provide
for their family, and that became really I think the

(07:53):
precipice of where that really team to to to its
peak was at the beginning of COVID because as people
were as a lot of business in the homer modeling
industry got pulled forward into those periods because people couldn't
spend those dollars elsewhere. It opened up an immediate gap
between what we could sell and what we could produce.

(08:13):
And it was really clear for me in twenty twenty
when I got here that we couldn't wait for the
veterans of the industry. We had to be able to
produce our own talent. And that was both from a
sales perspective as well as from a production installation experience.
So one of the things that we did is we
put into place what we call PJA University. It's a

(08:35):
dedicated education organization within our business, led by a learning
and development leader who's with dozens of years of experience
guiding organizations to build education and ongoing education in our business.
And as we did that, we started to have every
single person that came into our business flowing through the

(08:57):
same cycles. It enabled us to be to really put
a lot of controls about how we move people through
the on the the training program to be able to
get into the field. But four years into it, what's
become even more clear is we can train and bring
people into the field, but we also have to treat
these professionals just like we would any other professional, which

(09:19):
is ongoing education, recertifications, bringing them in for small groups
to be able to help elevate their performance. And ultimately
that allows us to build a lot of energy around
taking people off the street and putting them into a
successful role in short time, and then bringing a spirit
of lifelong learners into the process where we continually educate

(09:41):
and elevate ourselves. And I'll just add one piece a
very very key component of that PJA University, which we
do technical training. What do you need to do on
the job developmental training, things that are going to make
you better as a professional, but also make you better
as a person. We do leadership training. There's a great
book called First Break All the Rules, and one of

(10:01):
the topics within that book is promoting people to their
level of inconfidence and it talks about, hey, you have
a great salesperson, they should be a great sales manager.
Well that isn't necessarily a direct correlation, but what happens
more oft than a not if you don't prepare that
person for the role. So now they're a manager. They've
never ever had to provide constructive criticism, they've never had

(10:24):
to show empathy. They've never had to deal with a
challenging customer and have to be able to resolve that
in an amicable fashion. So our third component of RPG
University is our leadership program, which is focused on giving
our teams not only the tools to be able to
do their jobs, but also to prepare them for their
next steps. Because as we've grown from one hundred employees

(10:44):
in twenty twenty to five hundred and fifty getting close
to six hundred and twenty twenty five, we cannot continually
run the rat race of recruiting. We need to develop
our own leaders that bleed our culture and can take
that mission that we've all agreed to out to new
markets and be able to be successful there. So we
have been able to be very see a lot of

(11:06):
success around. We don't have production problems, and from a
staffing perspective, today because I have a continual stream of
people who are rising in their roles, taking their next steps,
and then I have to fill the gaps along the way.

Speaker 3 (11:22):
Got it.

Speaker 1 (11:23):
That's great?

Speaker 3 (11:23):
I love that. I love that.

Speaker 2 (11:25):
Another piece, Thank thanks for sharing another another piece you
mentioned about kind of a differentiator with technology. Where where
do you see you know, automation, artificial intelligence, machine learn?
Where where is that?

Speaker 3 (11:42):
Where do you see the future of that in your organization?

Speaker 1 (11:46):
Well, from a technology standpoint, we have a very very
deep set, a deep tech stack across. What I try
to do is, as the leader of the businesses, look
at everything in from a visual of our customer journey.
So when I look at our tech stack, we have
supporting technology that allows not only for customers to have
better experiences, whether it's visualization, whether it's the you know,

(12:08):
the in home presentation. From a sales perspective, we have
a lot of technology that enables our teams to be better,
to have more information around what they're doing right and wrong,
and that feeds that coaching and and and consultation cycle
to help elevate our teams. But technology is not going anywhere.
And as I look at any challenge in our business,

(12:31):
before I talk about a body to be able to
address that challenge. I want to understand our are our
processes right, and our other supporting technology that could enable
us to be able to tackle that challenge without having
to add an additional body or an additional burden to
the people we have. So it's an ongoing ultimately, it's
an ongoing conversation. It's that's driven by we're a curious organization.

(12:55):
We don't we don't believe that our egos don't get
in a way, and how ourselves to believe that we
have all the answers. We think of ourselves as scientists
when we when we don't have the right answer, we're
one step closer to the right answer, and we get
excited in those moments because that's the energy that keeps
us moving forward and challenges us to be better, you know,
be great today, be better tomorrow.

Speaker 3 (13:17):
Yeah, Yeah, I love that. I love that great.

Speaker 2 (13:19):
Well, we're actually kind of starting to dabble in this
a little bit. I love talking about the leadership angle
and wanted to talk to a little bit about you
and how you're leading the organization.

Speaker 3 (13:31):
And the first question I.

Speaker 2 (13:32):
Think I would ask is like, how would you describe
your your leadership style.

Speaker 1 (13:38):
I would call myself a hands off enabler, you know,
like the business. The business I need to as as
the leader, ensure that each part of our business I
have someone who is able to not only be competent role,
but is far exceeds my capabilities in that role. And

(14:00):
I'm not afraid of that. I want the best thing
I can do for our businesses surround myself with really
really smart people. And we've done that. Between the people
that I absorbed when I took over and some additional
people that I brought in along the way, I've built
this group of really strong leaders who can manage their
part of the business as as kind of a CEO

(14:22):
of marketing, the CEO of sales and so on. And
what I do is I spend time ensuring that they
get that same level of support, education and training that
I was talking about with our sellers and our producers
early about PJA University. I am focused with my managers
on being problem solvers, being able to see, you know,

(14:46):
one of the things I've tried to help focus on
to see the problem before it's a problem, so that
you're not reacting, you're actually getting ahead of it and
finding the solutions. So what I try to do in
my role is ensure that I'm there, present for my team.
That's ultimately more than anything is being there for them
when they need me. But I also challenge them to

(15:09):
think through the thoughts and action is necessary to solve
the challenges of our business before they bring me into
that conversation. So I am a leader that's present, I
listen to them. I'm not the type of leader who
comes into a room and well I was the type
of leader who came into a room and dominated the conversation.

(15:29):
But I like to sit in the back of the
room and take in the comments of my team, and
if I see them driving the result the right way,
I can keep my mouth shut and then just be
there to be able to support them as they go
through through those next steps. So I don't want to
be a micromanager. I tell my team. If I have
to be, I will be. But I luckily have a
really really strong leadership team. I have a very strong

(15:51):
team of leaders underneath them, and I've got sellers and
producers as I termed them for the salespeople in installation,
who are committed to the same uh the same mission,
and that's part of us all row in the same direction.
So again, I'm I try to be hands off, but
I I I believe that I do a great job
of helping elevate my people to achieve expectations they didn't

(16:13):
believe were capable for themselves.

Speaker 3 (16:15):
Yeah. Yeah, well, I thank you.

Speaker 2 (16:17):
I appreciate sharing that. And there are a lot of
a lot of really good stuff in there. One thing
I would point out was was the you know, being present.
And I don't hear that a lot. Sometimes we'll hear that,
and and maybe it's described in a different way, but yeah,
being available to your people. I I I seen situations

(16:37):
where you know, the CEO is almost untouchable by their
their their their folks.

Speaker 3 (16:41):
They're too much in the business, their own project.

Speaker 2 (16:43):
They're they're they're they're not available to their managers to
to talk to and to be a guide for them
and you know, continue to nurture and cultivate them and
mentor them and all.

Speaker 3 (16:54):
That kind of stuff. I think that's a that's.

Speaker 2 (16:56):
A really big thing, and and it's great that it
sounds like you're doing you know, those things, and that's
been hugely beneficial to your leadership.

Speaker 3 (17:04):
Team.

Speaker 2 (17:04):
So that's uh, I just wanted to kind of pull
that out, So I thought that was an interesting comment.

Speaker 1 (17:09):
It's it's it's difficult because it's not being in the room.
It's being committed to that person in the conversation you're having.
So it's putting your phone down, it's it's it's not
being distracted by other things that are going on around
you and your business. But you know, it's it's hard
for people to do, but when you do it well,
you can really drive more from what you expect from

(17:31):
your team.

Speaker 3 (17:32):
Yeah, for sure.

Speaker 2 (17:34):
You know, resilience seems to be kind of the buzzword
these days.

Speaker 3 (17:37):
You know, what what does.

Speaker 2 (17:39):
Resilience mean to you? And how would you say you
demonstrate that leading your team.

Speaker 1 (17:47):
You know, I think that I think that comes back
to what I you know, you and I were talking
in it earlier before we got started. Yeah, you know,
I think how we drive resilience in our business is
by being honest about what business in life is. Like.
We talk in the language I said that to you

(18:08):
earlier before we got on this call about we talk
in the language of successful outcomes, So we state what
we want to do. We're intentional about it, then we
plan accordingly. But what we spent a lot of time,
like I said before, was talking about what could get
in a way of our succes and what are we
going to do to be able to achieve that. And

(18:28):
we have what's called Green Carpet Orientation. Every single person
that starts with our company starts in the same room,
whether you're a call center agent or the CFO or
the CEO, because we want everybody to get a common
experience when they come into our business. And I do
a presentation on opportunities, success and adversity is as what
gets in a way During that gCO, the one thing

(18:49):
I say, one of the things I say during that
is there is a common theme. There's one thing that
everybody in this room is going to do over the
next thirty days. What is it? And they all look
at me and I say, you're going to fail. It's okay,
And it's perfectly okay because it's not about when we
fall short. It's about the lessons we learn in those
moments and how we reapply those lessons to win the

(19:11):
next time. So our honesty about the reality of life,
the fact that you win and you lose. But we
talk in the language of win and lessons, because lessons
a lot of times can fuel your success, your future success,
more than the short term wins that we experience along
the way. So I think resiliency is about how you

(19:35):
approach the experience with honesty, how you motivate your team
via planning and coming together on where we're going and
then being there and like I said, being present being
you know, for me, that's leading from the front. I'm
out in front of the business making sure that when
they catch up with me, if there were any road bumps,

(19:57):
they're smoothed out or at least smoothed down as much
that the and can step over them. And I think
it's a it's an experience that takes everyone from myself
down to any person in the business for us to
be able to achieve success.

Speaker 2 (20:09):
Yeah, that's great, that's great, And I love what you said,
you know, kind of win and less then as opposed
to win and lose.

Speaker 3 (20:16):
That's that's great. That's a great, great tidbit.

Speaker 1 (20:19):
That insertion of that language has been game changing in
our business. Yeah, it's it's simple. Sometimes it's the little
things you do along the way that have the most impact.
And just reframing the way we say things has has
led to a lot of success for us.

Speaker 2 (20:37):
Yeah, agreed, agreed, that's great, all right, So so what
gets you excited about the future of p J Fitzpatrick.

Speaker 1 (20:46):
Well, I believe when PJ. Fitzpatrick comes to a new market,
customers win. They win because we elevate the expectations of
what their experience should be like. We bring technology and
in avation into the experience for them and it forces,
you know, other people in the market to catch up.

(21:06):
And that doesn't that's not in every market. There's some
markets we come in and there are people who are
similar to us, But I do believe that we win.
What gets me excited more than anything, though, is the
opportunity I'm creating for my team. I've got five hundred
and fifty families today that count on me to make
the right decisions at the top for our business. And

(21:28):
you know, when I can help our people become comfortable.
And what I mean by comfortable is they're comfortable where
they're working, They're comfortable with the sustainability of our success.
They're able to make life decisions that require comfort. So
right now, I've got a slew of people buying homes,

(21:49):
getting married, having children, and they don't do that if
they feel insecurity in their workplace and their career. So
for me, I want more of that because the most
addictive things that I've experienced in business is helping others
and that just gets me so jazzed up. And it
gets me jazzed up that we have, you know, hundreds

(22:11):
of people who have been promoted and are taking those
life steps in the past five years, and I want
to do more of it.

Speaker 2 (22:18):
Yeah, yeah, I agree with you that That's that's why
I do. What I do too, is just to help people.
It's every day like how can you You've got a
huge team, you know, leadership team and then obviously everybody
that reports to them, and so just yeah, anything else
you can do and in that day to help someone
on your team, just yeah, must make your day.

Speaker 3 (22:39):
That's great. What what?

Speaker 1 (22:41):
What?

Speaker 3 (22:41):
What keeps you up at night? You know?

Speaker 1 (22:46):
I try to not spend a lot of time focusing
on external conditions that I over the past thirty days,
I've probably spent more time thinking about them. What keeps
me up at night is is I think it's it's
the unknown, you know, as when you're leading a business,

(23:07):
you're not generally blazing the path of what's known for
that business. So you have to get really comfortable in
the thoughts of of of what could be without knowing.
And I think that's important. I say that because that
when I got when I gained comfort that it's okay

(23:30):
to be unsure at moments as long as I'm in
the pursuit of knowing. I've spent less time up at night.
And I will say that I've spent less time up
night personally since we've incorporated that win and lesson because
I don't dwell. I don't dwell on my shortcomings or
where I fell short. I focus on what could be better.

(23:53):
So you know, I sometimes get more lost in my
thoughts than I do worry about it now that I've
reframed that thought, that that that process in my mind.

Speaker 3 (24:02):
Yeah, that's great, that's great.

Speaker 2 (24:03):
Well, thank you well to Tanda wrap things up. Is
there anything else you'd like our listeners to know about you?
And and PJ Fitzpatrick?

Speaker 1 (24:12):
Now, I just I would say for for me, you know,
it's it's it's interesting because I think, uh, you know,
if I I couldn't imagine myself sitting in my seat,
and I think for myself, I would say keep grinding,
keep working that you know, That's what I've done throughout
my entire career. I wasn't the person in high school
or in college that you necessarily looked and goes, man,

(24:34):
that guy's going to run a you know, quarter billion
dollar company. But via hard work and a commitment to
being a little bit better every day along the way,
I've been able to position myself and and and be
in that role. So strive, believe in what you're capable
of and strive for it. Just try to be a
little bit better every day. And as for p J. Fitzpatrick,
I just want thet you know that the consumers in

(24:55):
this market has known that we're here, we're here for
good and the experiences that we've provided for the past
forty five years in Philadelphia to hundreds of thousands of customers,
we're really excited to be able to provide that same
experience to the customers in Baltimore, Washington, and Northern Virginia
and along the way. We want to ensure that not
only do they get the right experience, but they see

(25:17):
the value that they get by making the choice bye
by making that decision to reach out to PJ Fitzpatrick,
And we're committed to doing right by the customers whose
market and being good stewards of our brand in the market,
meaning that we don't want to be a company that
is there just looking for customers and taking We want
to be a company that gives back and brings our

(25:38):
culture and our commitment to philanthropic thought to this market
in the long run. And I'm looking forward to the
next forty five years here.

Speaker 3 (25:47):
That's great.

Speaker 2 (25:47):
Well so are we, And well, what's the best way
to for our listeners to get more information about PJ
Fitzpatrick Trust.

Speaker 1 (25:55):
PJ dot com com, tr Ust PJ Peters John dot com.
That's our website and there's a lot, there's a great
amount of information. I would encourage them to, you know,
cause word new we're into the market. Feel take a
look at the Google reviews and the experiences that our
customers have had, and you know, make the make the

(26:16):
choice to give us a chance.

Speaker 2 (26:18):
Awesome, Well, thank you so much, James.

Speaker 3 (26:20):
I was great talking with you.

Speaker 2 (26:21):
I could probably fuck you the rest of the afternoon
about all this stuff. So I really do appreciate you
taking the time out and and Thank you. Welcome to
the you know, the Buttimore, Washington capital market and you know,
let us know where we can help you.

Speaker 1 (26:34):
Don absolute pleasure and hopefully have a chance to chat
with you again in the future. This has been iHeartMedia
CEOs you should know