How to Manage Your Brokerage's Profits in Market Cycles | Episode 305

How can freight brokerages stay profitable in the toughest market in modern history? In this episode, we break down real strategies—like cross-training staff and maintaining a growth mindset—that help companies survive downturns and stay competitive when margins shrink.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
All right, welcome back.
It's another episode of Freight360 Podcast.
We're up to episode.
How do I make this sound funny?
Pitbull, right, mr 305?
Isn't that his nickname, mr 305?

Speaker 2 (00:13):
Yeah, that's Miami's area code, right.

Speaker 1 (00:16):
Episode 305.
We made it to Pitbull status aspodcasters.
So if you're brand new, clearlytons of other content.
The library on our website isthe best way just to kind of
search through and find whatyou're looking for, since there
is so much.
So if you're new and you'retrying to find out how to
prospect shippers, just type inprospect or sales or shippers

(00:38):
and you'll find all the relatedcontent that has those keywords
in there.
If you're maybe a carrier salesrep and you're looking for
carrier-related things, justsearch like carrier or sourcing
or procurement, whatever, andyou can pull that stuff up and
consume it as it best fits whereyou're at in your journey.
So, yeah, check out the websiteand then there's the Freight
Broker Basics course.

(00:58):
While you're there, if you'relooking for a full in-depth
training for yourself or foryour team, and share us, leave
reviews comments of fullin-depth training for yourself
or for your team and share us.
Leave uh reviews comments, allthat good stuff and uh, we
appreciate it.
So, ben, how's uh speaking of305, I mean?
I mean I know you're not 305,you're north of that, but how's
uh south florida and late julyhere as we head into august

(01:19):
pretty, uh toasty, it'sdefinitely warm um it's been
like unbearably hot up here.
Man, I can't imagine.
I'm not one to complain aboutthe heat.
I'll embrace it and just likebe uncomfortable.
But it has been a hot summer,that's for sure it might be
hotter where you're at.

Speaker 2 (01:33):
To be honest, Like I still catch Pittsburgh's weather
usually like every morning fora little bit, and I think their
high was like I'm like lookingat our high right now is like 92
.
And I think it was like 94 inPittsburgh was expected high
today.

Speaker 1 (01:46):
We are coming off of a hot streak.
Pittsburgh's probably hotterthan Buffalo, but we hit like
low 90s over this past weekendand it's been like 80s this
whole week, so it's going to beupper 80s all next week.
I think I could be wrong.

Speaker 2 (02:01):
No, we're going back into the 70s.

Speaker 1 (02:03):
We're a little cool off.

Speaker 2 (02:05):
Do you see the uv index, similar in the summer to
what you see when you're downhere, like because I know you
and I look at that when you'redown here often.
I look at the home screen of myiphone.

Speaker 1 (02:14):
I don't know if you could see it.
The uv index is right up in themiddle there.
So I always uh, I got somemessages there.
I always have it.
I'm like because I always wantto know like, do I need to wear
sunscreen?
Do the kids need to wearsunscreen?
Yes, it gets.

Speaker 2 (02:26):
Um, it gets way higher in the summer here than
it does in the what's yours hittoday, what's yours expected
when you look at the graph uh,eight, and then, like we've hit
nine and ten this summer butit's usually have like between
seven and ten in the summer okayso it's pretty similar, like
I'm pretty red man.

Speaker 1 (02:44):
I, I played in a golf tournament over the weekend and
, um, it was hot and it wassunny and I put on sunscreen
once in the morning and that wasit.
And yeah, I just got, uh, I gottoasted.

Speaker 2 (02:57):
So dude, I put that stuff on like religiously.
Now I also got the stuffwithout benzene because
apparently like that's supercancerous now.

Speaker 1 (03:04):
Yeah, my wife buys all that stuff for our kids.

Speaker 2 (03:06):
Yeah, so, dude, I won't go out of my house now
without it and I'm like it'svery noticeable because I'm like
it's so intense and if I go out, even if I go play tennis, at
like 5, 30 to 6, 30, it like theheat index or the uv drops off
at six, basically when the sunstarts going down, but like I
still will get like sunburn onlike the back of my ears, like
just being out for like 20, 30minutes.

Speaker 1 (03:27):
All right.
Well, sports we're approaching.
Well, by the time this releases, the MLB trade deadline will
have passed.
So I'm curious if there's anybig, big moves in baseball as we
head into the later parts ofthe season.
We're getting ready forfootball.
I went to Buffalo Billstraining camp on Monday of this
week and this Friday, the daythis drops, I'll actually be

(03:48):
going to the stadium for thefirst scrimmage for the Bills.
So it's kind of like it'sduring their training camp but
they, instead of going totraining camp, they actually do
it at their home stadium, yeah,at Highmark Stadium stadium.
But is this?
They just play each other.
But it's like kind of fun, likewe're gonna take the kids and
stuff and get back into it.

Speaker 2 (04:10):
man, then it's, then it's preseason, we're back we
used to do that a lot inpittsburgh.
They have training camp atsaint vincent college um, I
think it's art rooney field, butlike one, it's like super cheap
to be able to go and it's likea really fun day because, like
you're literally like next tothe field walking around and we
were a little like we used toget autographs all the time.
I think the last time I wasthere, if I remember, my buddy

(04:33):
and I I got Yancey Thigpen'sglove because he, like you know,
they give away their glovesthat they're wearing for the
receivers.
Yeah, and I think I had aCordell Stewart jersey
autographed.
And I think I had a CordellStewart jersey autographed.
Like it gives you an idea oflike time frame of how long ago
that was.
But, dude, they were good times, especially with the kids.

Speaker 1 (04:49):
Yeah, so Netflix did a pretty timely dropping of the
quarterback season two and, tocredit to Steven, I'm enjoying
watching Joe Burrow and kind ofgetting to see what the guys are
like off the field, so playingpiano and buying a Batmobile and
then and then canceling theorder or whatever.

(05:10):
But yeah, good stuff, stephen,have you watched it all?
I'm yourself, I want to getyour take.

Speaker 3 (05:16):
I haven't watched it yet.
I've got it.
I've been so bad.
I've caught some of thetrailers and stuff, but the only
thing I've watched on Netflixoutside of the kids shows was
Happy Gilmore 2 that came out onFriday.

Speaker 1 (05:29):
Yeah, we watched that the other night too.
I thought so.
That was the next thing I wasgoing to say Ben, have you seen?

Speaker 2 (05:34):
Happy Gilmore 2.
Yet I intentionally haven'twatched it yet because I wanted
to actually like have the timeto do it.
I was like super excited I wasgoing to put it on late.
The night it dropped and I'mlike no, like I actually want to
like have the time to like sitand enjoy it, Cause I've been
looking forward to this for like20 some years.

Speaker 1 (05:48):
But the amount of cameos that they, that they
pulled off I thought wasincredible.
I enjoyed it.
I talked to some guys yesterdaythey were like, yeah, it was
whatever.

Speaker 3 (06:05):
And I'm like, well it's.
I'm Like it's just funny.
You know what I mean.
So when it, when I heard it wascoming out like, I went into it
with the expectation that it'snot going to be good.
But it's.
It's going to be like a bunchof callbacks and it's just going
to be.
It's going to be fun for theactors more than the audience.
Yeah, yeah, and it blew myexpectations away.
Like setting a low bar was thebest.

Speaker 1 (06:23):
I think that's the key here Set low expectations.

Speaker 3 (06:26):
But talking to the cameos, I think I think I saw
this yesterday that there was itwas either 72 or 75 cameos.

Speaker 1 (06:36):
Oh my God, it was like watching an episode of
Entourage, like it's just onefamous person after the next.

Speaker 3 (06:39):
It's beautiful.
It was so good.

Speaker 2 (06:41):
The analogy somebody used this morning.
I heard they were talking aboutit because they were comparing
it to like the new Naked Gunmovie coming out and they were
like, well, they were like, ifI'm going to lunch at Taco Bell,
like I'm not expecting, Ruth,Chris, Like you know, like it's
your expectations, what it isand like a lot of why that was
so funny in the first place wasbecause nobody really did that
comedy before the first one,which is why the first one was

(07:03):
so good.
And it's like you can't dogroundbreaking round two 20,
some years later and have ithave the same novel like new
impact.
Because, like I've watched someof those movies where I
remember like something aboutMary was like probably one of
the funniest movies I've everseen in my life.
When it came out, like laughedthe whole time and I watched it
again later and like it's stillfunny.
But like part of why it's sofunny is because, like that

(07:31):
comedy wasn't done prior to likesome of those movies.
So, whatever it is, I'm withSteven in regards to my
expectations.
I'm going to enjoy it, nomatter what.
They had a lot of the cameosthey showed on full swing on
Netflix when they were filmingHappy Gilmore with a lot of the
PGA pros that were going to beon it.
I heard john daly's like livingin his garage.
Like I don't really want anyspoilers.
I'm like super excited to seeit.

Speaker 1 (07:47):
But yeah, no, I won't give any spoilers.
And I would say to steven'spoint when you, when you set the
bar low, you have to remember,like when you've got 70, some
cameos like these are not actors, these are like athletes, right
.
So when you put them in a roleto act and have them do things
that aren't natural themselves,you're going to get kind of that
goofy performance.
But it is.
I just thought it was hilarious, so yeah.

Speaker 2 (08:08):
Bob Barker got in a fist fight in the first one
right the chances or odds ofthat happening in any movie was
just like the shock value madeit hysterical, right.

Speaker 1 (08:17):
Price is wrong bitch yeah.

Speaker 3 (08:20):
The one thing I do want to say for the last six
years, because there's likerumors that they're the one
thing I do want to say for thelast six years.
Um, because there was.
There's like rumors thatthey're doing water boy too.
Um, and I, I don't want waterboy too.
What I want is I want them todo a 30 for 30 on how the mud
dogs won the bourbon bowl.
That's what I want.

(08:41):
Don't don't do a number two.
Do a documentary on the teamand bring all the actors back.
That would be pretty funny.

Speaker 2 (08:47):
That'd be really funny.
Actually, that's a really goodidea, oh all right, shifting
gears to news.

Speaker 1 (08:52):
The big one, um DAT, a big, another big acquisition
this year picking up a convoy.
Well, it's really Soundvoicetechnology.
Right is what it broke down tothe platform.
So, ben, what was your take onall that yesterday when the news
came out?

Speaker 2 (09:07):
I mean, honestly, I'm really going to be excited to
interview them.
We were talking with their teamand their PR team at DAT
yesterday and I just emailedthem right before this episode.
We're probably going to eitherbe interviewing the CEO at DAT
or the person who I think wasrunning this at Flexport.
I was talking with Kevin Hill,too, about this yesterday and he

(09:30):
said one he's like that guy issuper sharp and it's going to be
a really good interview.
So, no matter who we end upbooking in the next week or so,
I'm very curious to hear whattheir plans are in integrations.
I've heard some really positivethings on it being used at
Flexport.
I mean Bill Dreger and hemanaged the relaunch of the
convoy platform under Flexport.
Like I heard really good things, at least from Ryan Peterson on
interviews on them using it atFlexport and also huge shout out

(09:54):
to Ryan Peterson because thatis a huge win.
I think he bought that platformfor like $16 million and sold
it to that, for I think it wasreported around like 200 million
.
Craig at Freightwaves did anarticle yesterday and honestly,
like it was pretty comical, likehis take on the whole situation
and like he kind of announcedin his article that's why I sent

(10:15):
it to you guys that, like,apparently Triumph and Highway
are going to launch, or Highwayis launching, a load board
partnered with Triumph, and tome I can't really make sense of
why you would do that.
I mean, so I'm way moreinterested in what that is going
to be doing with Convoy and howthey're going to start pulling

(10:36):
this together, because they'vegot some really interesting
acquisitions over the past year.
They picked up the factoringcompany, they picked up trucker
tools and now they have theConvoy platform, which
apparently has some like reallygood technology.

Speaker 1 (10:48):
Third big acquisition this year, then yeah.
So I remember 10 years ago whenConvoy launched was it 2015?
Does that sound right?
I remember writing an articleon LinkedIn about you know
everyone's like digital freightmatching is going to replace
brokers, and I was like no, it'snot.
I wrote this whole articleabout like it's like it's going
to change the way that weoperate, but it's still human

(11:09):
beings and relationships thatare going to drive everything,
and like.
That is held true a decadelater.
So yeah.

Speaker 2 (11:15):
And I think it's super fascinating because, like,
I interviewed and almost took aposition at one of the bigger
load matching firms in like 2017.
And the thing that I foundreally fascinating was when I
actually got behind the scenes,like their algorithm was really
impressive and they were able tomatch a lot of freight really
efficiently, but the type offreight they were able to match

(11:37):
wasn't really freight thattypically was spot freight or
brokered freight, like it wasmostly contract freight and
matching up efficiencies withlarge carriers and large
shippers, and it worked reallywell in that scenario.
Now, when you try to push likespot freight through it like I
mean you're looking at theresults of like Uber freight
like it just doesn't work thesame way and it's for what

(11:57):
you're saying, nate, like itmoves too quick.
And it's not that the techcan't move that fast, it's that
the communication can't happenthat fast.
And, at the end of the day, toactually get that truck to pick
up a load in an hour or twoinvolves talking to a human, and
part of that is, I think,because the drivers also need to
be spoken to, which is thepiece.
But I think, even once you havedriverless trucks, whenever that

(12:19):
does start to roll out orbecomes a part of the industry.
I still I've I've been thinkingabout this for years and, like
I think I can kind of picturehow some of this might work, but
I still think what you'resaying is going to be very true,
nate, in regards to the humanaspect, the relationships and
how and which these things aredone.
I mean, tech is going to play abigger piece in this, but it's

(12:41):
going to be really interestingto see how this starts to take
shape, I guess, yeah totally Allright.

Speaker 1 (12:47):
Well, that's the the big news.
Oh, on that whole note, like,if you think back like 10 years
to today, like think about thethings that didn't exist and we
talk, like when we, when wecoach TIA and we talk about
technology, we're always like,hey, it's an ever evolving
landscape, like 10 years ago.
We talk about technology.
We're always like hey, it's anever-evolving landscape.
Like 10 years ago, um highwaydidn't exist.

(13:07):
Uh, gen logs didn't exist.
Dat in its current state didn'texist.
Uh, half of your sas load ortms platforms didn't exist.
Like this stuff is crazyspeaking of gen logs you see
ryan joyce's email to us alittle shout out, we got on, uh,
yeah, the uh reddit framebroker reddit page.
Uh, it's funny, like you know,people always ask like, hey,
what's good training?
Brian Joyce's email to us alittle shout out, we got on the
Reddit Freight Broker Redditpage.
It's funny, like you know,people always ask like, hey,

(13:28):
what's good training forbrokerage?
And people are like don't payfor crap, like it's all garbage,
and so I was glad to see thatpeople were given for.
Both are, you know, are freeand paid content, like people
giving good feedback.
So glad to hear that.
And thanks for the shout outfolks paid content, like people
giving good feedback.
So glad to hear that.
And thanks for the shout outfolks.
And um gen logs you see theyreleased the the dray or the

(13:50):
intermodal is it the dray edge?
The ports overlay now and youcan.
You can see where all thecontainers are moving and stuff
and it's actually reading likecontainer numbers.
It's really interesting.

Speaker 2 (13:59):
Yeah, I'm still in a lot of the weekly meetings on
how this is all starting to takeshape, and I've been really
excited for that since itstarted because to me, like that
was one of my favorite thingsto do in this industry was doing
container moves.
Like and specifically in 2017,when the ELDs happened there was
so much stress and strain onthat whole industry that it was

(14:19):
like probably one of the mostfun periods I've had as a broker
in this industry.
Just working your way throughit, understanding and learning
how those pieces really cometogether, how they interact with
everything from warehousing tothe trucking side, the ports,
and how all of these thingsreally work together.
To me is like I just find likeone of the most interesting

(14:39):
aspects of our whole industry,and I've been really excited
working on this with some ofthem there because I think this
is going to be a super powerfultool that's going to bring a lot
of use cases in the industry.

Speaker 1 (14:49):
Absolutely Well, cool man.
Let's get into our content.
Today we're going to talk aboutprofitability, more so on the
brokerage side, but I want toalso let this bleed into the
carrier side too, with running aprofitable company and how to
adjust the way that you'reoperating as the market around

(15:10):
you operates.
So to kind of set the stage foryou and I've had discussions
similar to this with Pierce,where I work as the market has
shifted and, as you know, we'vekind of seen it over the last
handful of years when you're amargin-based business as a
freight broker.

(15:30):
You know, I remember during thesurge after COVID, right, and
that people would be like youknow how's that impacting you
guys?
And I'm like, honestly, it'sgood, like when rates
unfortunately right.

Speaker 2 (15:44):
We're problem solversvers.

Speaker 1 (15:45):
When there's more problems, we have more work to
do, exactly which is good forbusiness on top of that, when
rates go up, when we're amargin-based business, the
profit, the dollar amount,naturally just goes up before
margin-based right.
So like if, if a lane wasrunning just give you an example
right if we're making 15 marginon average?
Right, if a lane was runningfor just give you an example
right, if we're making 15%margin on average?
Right, if a lane was runningfor $1,000 and our margin is 15%

(16:10):
?
Right, that's $150 profit.
Okay.
If those rates go up 50%, right, and you keep a 15% margin,
well, that $150 just became $225, right For literally the same
lane, right.

Speaker 2 (16:27):
But more work.

Speaker 1 (16:29):
It usually results in more work trying to source the
capacity to get that lane moved.
But then when you look at theopposite market right, like the
market we're in now, where rateshave contracted and kind of
held at a steady lower end for afew years now, you're going to
have the exact same thing justin reverse, right.

(16:49):
So what used to be paying you$225 in profit is now paying you
$150.
So when I track profit per loadon average for our company and
I've tracked it for years and Iremember being close to $400 a
load, you know, right beforerates started to go down, and
I've seen it in the high twossome months and I think I have a

(17:12):
guy like spraying my plantsbehind me.
I don't know if you can see thatI can.
Yeah, it's like a pest control,it's like their quarterly
service.
Anyway, don't, don't look outmy windows, but that's kind of
like setting the stage.
So when in the profit dollars,that's really what our revenue
to pay our expenses is right,because we pay the carrier and

(17:33):
that's what we have to operateoff of, right.
So I'm going to add one thingto that.

Speaker 2 (17:37):
The other piece and this is a thing that my, I guess
, mentor manager used to teachand talk about a lot about the
markets when I was coming intothe industry was I started in a
very loose market, meaning likeit was very easy to find a truck
pretty similar to now but itwas really hard to find shippers
that had enough problems to bewilling to add a broker Right.
And especially when you have nobook of business, you feel like

(18:00):
that's the worst situationbecause, like you don't have
customers yet and everybody'slike well, everything's kind of
fine and we just don't reallyneed any help solving anything
right now.
But we'll keep you in mind andI'm like I like vividly remember
saying this to Jason and goingman, I just wish the market
would tighten up so that, likesome of these doors would open
that I've just been likeknocking on for like weeks and

(18:21):
months in some of them.
He's like care for what youwish for.
He's like because on the otherside of this you'll get
customers, they start sendingyou loads, but you'll see, like
you know, metaphoricallyspeaking, like knife fights over
carrier relationships, becausenow you're going to start really
working super hard to get thosetrucks in those lanes, they're
going to fall off more often.
You're going to have moreissues on running the loads.

(18:43):
There's never really like theperfect scenario, because we're
in the middle, right, like ifit's loose on the carrier side,
it's hard to get shippers.
When it gets really tight andhard to get carriers, the
shippers start opening theirdoors and onboarding you, but
then it gets two or three timesas hard to find the trucks.
So like there's not, I feel,like a perfect way.
But I would say that youpointed out like there is a

(19:04):
benefit.
If I've got to work hard, nomatter what.
At least if you're working hardand your margins are better
because just overall lane ratesare higher, that's probably a
better solution.
And most brokerages grow inthose markets.
Like if you look at the verybig companies, they are not
grabbing market share in a loosemarket.
They tend to only grow andratchet up.
As the market tightens up andit gets really hard to find

(19:25):
carriers, they acquire morecustomers and they grow Right.
So yes.

Speaker 1 (19:29):
So here's.
Here's where I want to kind oflean in, though, is when, when
the market shifts to a loosermarket meaning, you know,
customers are having lesstrouble having less problems to
solve because the capacity isthere for the, you know, and
we're less trouble having lessproblems to solve because the
capacity is there.
And we're talking about likenationwide Right.
We're not talking about amicroeconomic, certain region or

(19:52):
market, we're talking likenationwide overall capacity is
is not tight right now, it'sloose, generally speaking, so
it's not terribly hard to find atruck in general, right.
It's loose, generally speaking,so it's not terribly hard to
find a truck in general, right.
As the market shifts that wayand rates contract, if they do,
you are now going to have less.
If your business maintains itscurrent level without growing,

(20:15):
your business is going to have areduced amount of funds to
operate off of Less dollars inthe door.
So if you've seen the headlinesthe last three years, you've
seen trucking company goes outof business, brokerage goes out
of business, brokerage files,bankruptcy, trucking company
files.
You keep hearing all this andpeople you ask the question like

(20:36):
what happened?
What's going on?
And I'll tell you what I thinka lot of it is at least on the
brokerage side, where we'remargin based and we're an
intermediary, we don't have toworry about truck payments and
maintenance and stuff like that.
That's a different conversationfor for asset based companies,
but for a brokerage youliterally have to scale back
what your expenses are.
Right, and a lot of times thatjust means you know, ideally

(20:58):
just a hiring freeze would belike best case scenario and you
just have your natural attritionif people quit or find a new
job and it reduces your, your,your workforce, but it could
ultimately mean laying offpeople that don't have the work
to do anymore.
So if you know, if you have,you know, let's say, two hundred
K a month in payroll and nowyour operating revenue went down

(21:22):
by 50%.
I'm just making this up you'vegot to find a way to either pay
the people and have less companyprofits or you've got to reduce
your costs by maybe layingsomebody off.
Either way, something has togive for your company to be able
to do that.
Now what I've seen and we'vedone this at Pierce is we've

(21:46):
chosen the long game of we'lloperate at a reduced workload
for our folks and you know whenthe time comes and things pick
up or whatever.
Whatever they're there, right,but we've also continued to grow
so we haven't really seen thatkind of that issue with it.
But you've seen companies justgo out of business like a lot of

(22:06):
times they they hired when themoney was there and it was good.
They hired when they didn'tneed the people.
And now it's just exposed Like,yeah, you didn't really need
them.
Then you brought them onbecause you could afford them
and it was nice to have thatextra, like that layer of
redundancy for, like, maybe,billing people or for you know,
whatever the case might be.
And then when, like, you reallylook at it, you're like how

(22:28):
much work is this person doingevery day and why are there two
of them when really one could dothe job and when that one is
off, this third person couldcover for them if we just
cross-train them, right.
So you have to look at thosethings and I think a lot of
brokerages probably overspent ontechnology, didn't wisely
reinvest money into theircompany or keep retained

(22:49):
earnings.
I think that's kind of like thebig picture of what happens
when the market cycles.
And again, this is like theweirdest market cycle that I've
ever seen.
It's the longest, most drawnout that I've ever experienced
in my entire career in logistics.
What is your initial thought onthat concept?

Speaker 2 (23:08):
I agree.
And the other analogy that Ithink and there's a couple of
companies you consult with,we've gone through exactly that,
looking at like, okay, well,you have like four accounting
people, but like your loadvolumes are 75% of what they
were when you needed for, like,how many loads are each of them
processing?
And it's like, oh, they're allkind of working 40% of the day

(23:28):
now.
Well, okay, like, and again,these are tough, difficult
conversations to have, but likeyou've got to be able to also
shrink the company and sometimes, when the load volumes aren't,
there is one and like the otherthing I think about cause this
is like think personaldevelopment world or like
coaching, however you want tolike define that.
But like there's this analogyright Of like you will get more

(23:51):
done almost all the time undermore pressure, right, and I
think that's true with just likeall human beings meaning like
if you're getting chased by adog, you will run faster than
you've ever run, for longer thanyou ever thought you could,
without even thinking aboutwhether or not you're going to
stop, because that thing is thatbad.
If it catches you right Now, ifyou just want to go, start to
run, you're probably going toquit half that potential, like

(24:14):
there's always more in there,like David Goggins talks about
that.
Like everybody's got 30% morein the tank even when they want
to quit.
And I think that holds true tooin work.
Right, like the amount of workthat I've been able to do as a
broker and I look at like themost stressful periods of like I
don't know early 2017 ELDs.
Like I have like four peoplewhen we're moving like 250 loads

(24:35):
and we're check, calling all ofthem, negotiating all of them.
Yeah, we're working more hours,but like we are capable of so
much more.
And I think, as work sometimesshrinks in a company, everybody
just keeps moving the bar backand then you get to a point
where you're like, well, wait aminute, everybody's just kind of
working at 40% and there's lessdollars coming in and nobody's
trying, nobody's reaching theirpotential either, and I don't

(24:57):
think that's good for the worker, I don't think it's good for
the company and I don't thinkit's good for the economy, which
is why I always like.
To me, that's one of thebiggest benefits of a lean
market and capitalism.
It has to cycle, it's got togrow and expand and then it's
got to contract.
When it contracts, that's whereyou see what a company's made
out of and what a performer'smade out of.
When it gets, when it grows,everybody can work a little bit

(25:19):
less because it gets a littleeasier, right?
You kind of need that leaningout and growing to keep cycling.

Speaker 1 (25:25):
Yeah, it's like burning a tree.
You know what I mean.
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (25:34):
And we have not.
We have been in this leanmarket now for the longest
period in its modern dayexistence.
The way the industry functions,where, like, it's never been
this low for this long, and Ithink companies need to start
looking at these things andreally identifying them.
And the other thing that reallycomes to mind is like how and
what people do changes in amarket like this than in a
market during COVID, where it'slike a ton of freight to move
and not enough resources to doit.

(25:54):
In a market like this, likesales becomes way more important
, like in an industry in ourindustry, peak COVID you got a
lot of account managers thatcould be earning 150 to 170
grand a year just booking trucks, negotiating and track and
trace and managing operationsRight.
But when you're in a marketwhere, like it's harder to get
freight, a different skillset isrequired, where, like some of

(26:17):
the people that are a great fitin that market can't provide the
same value to an organizationand a market that is like this,
because, like now, you need anaccount manager that can also
pick up the phone and developmore relationships, full blown
sales, but like you can't have,I think in a lot of companies,
call it in the 15, 10 million to$50 million range.

(26:38):
Like you need more of the Swissarmy knife, of people in your
company.
You need somebody that can doall of these things and it's
like the cradle to the gravemodel prepares somebody to be
able to do all of it.
Like you can book your truck,you can track and trace, you can
vet a carrier, you know what tosay, you know how to manage
those operations, but you canpick up the phone and you can go

(26:59):
and develop rapport with theother point of contact you
haven't met yet at that company.
You can find the othercompanies that are like that
company and then you can bringin more business and the folks
that were trained to just dohalf of it.
I think we're going to have aharder time in a market where
it's like the pod model I thinksuffers, I think faster because
you have segmentation and Ithink in a very tight market you

(27:22):
get a benefit of efficiencywhere you need it right.

Speaker 1 (27:25):
Yeah because they're the expert.

Speaker 2 (27:27):
They're very good at what I think is so to your point
.

Speaker 1 (27:32):
You just you named or you brought to mind two people
inside of, uh, my company thatlike, literally, are that swiss
I'm gonna have.
So, like one of the guys wehave, he was in billing um,
that's where he started off,like just billing customers, you
know, receivables, and now,like he does claims, he does uh
customer credit checks, he doesum carrier overrides and

(27:56):
approvals and things like that.
Um, so he, he wears a lot ofhats and guess what, if we need
someone to go back to billing,he knows how to do our billing.
We've got another guy that onour trucking side used to be a
dispatcher and then he startedto kind of cross train over,
started doing a little brokerage.
Now he also does some backoffice with like credit and
carry related matters whenneeded.

(28:18):
So we've got a couple of SwissArmy knives in our back pocket
that, like we can move aroundwhere needed and then you know
you've got.
I even think about like my like,because we're agent based and
we hired the guy that helps meout.
He was the first guy I hired tohelp myself out with like

(28:39):
managing the pool of agents, hisoriginally like all he did was,
like you know, train him on howto use our software and like,
answer basic, like you know, faqtype stuff.
And now, like he's learned overtime, like here's how something
works with ltl, here's how, um,something happens with the
damage or a claim or a tone, orlike you start to develop them

(28:59):
in these different roles and Ithink if you only keep someone
segmented into one area, thatbecomes a vulnerability for you,
um, when the market changes.
Right.

Speaker 2 (29:08):
It's job security.

Speaker 1 (29:14):
It's a disservice to them because you might be faced
to either a lay them off whenthe market goes down or be you
know you've got to bite thebullet and you're paying someone
who doesn't have work to doLike.
Think about, like people thatare just billing reps Right as
freight volumes decreased andthere was less issues that
happened with, like re or, youknow, accessorial chart, like
you think, during like the peakof covid, like there was so much

(29:35):
going on with like detentionand layovers, and like customers
get all confused and actuallyanother pain of tone.
Like you have all thesedifferent invoicing activities
that are increased, not tomention the increased amount of
loads that you're doing, youknow most likely.
And then that contracts, theymight be your billing team, like
you said, might be sittingthere doing having 40 of their
day full of work and 60,literally more than half of

(29:59):
their day of just like twiddlingtheir thumbs, playing sudoku or
whatever.
Um, yeah, it's, uh, it's abusiness choice.
So, like you, this is the time,I think, when you know you got
to find a way to like not justweather the storm but like fight
through it.
So you got something before,because I'm about to pivot here,

(30:20):
but what do you got?

Speaker 2 (30:21):
Because the thing that always comes back to me is
the human nature of lookingoutward to blame your situation
on external circumstances.
I can't get customers becausethe market's this.
I can't get this because thisis happening.
If this happened, this would allbe easier, right, but if you

(30:42):
really flip that on your headand we've talked about this a
lot it's like your brain isalways going to try to protect
you and make you feel safe andcomfortable, and if you just
pick the harder thing every timeyou have a choice of two, like
a lot of these problems will goaway, which to me, is always.
It's like the recipe foractually living long-term,
fulfilled life is to kind ofjust always doing the hard thing

(31:04):
, and it's like there's a cliche.
It's like do the hard thingtoday, tomorrow gets easier.
Do the easy thing today,tomorrow gets harder.
Right, and you just extrapolatethat on, Because to me, like
the advice I would give anybody,because there was also a report
that college graduates are nowgetting jobs at the same level
as non-college graduates,meaning like that is literally

(31:26):
that bar has literally gone away.
Like recent college graduatesare getting the same amount of
jobs as people without a collegedegree, right?
So like if you know-.

Speaker 1 (31:35):
On that note, when you started in brokerage did
they require a four-year degree.

Speaker 2 (31:39):
They did, or at least in associates, I think.

Speaker 1 (31:42):
Okay, Side question yeah.

Speaker 2 (31:44):
Yeah, and it's like thing I think is true.
Is it like, yes, the companyhas a responsibility to oversee
these things?
Because, like what you use likeI always kind of used a ship as
an analogy like, hey, we're allgoing to get on this boat
because we're all in thistogether and we got to get to
there wherever there is Right.
We got this amount of supplies.
We can stop this amount oftimes along the way to get what

(32:05):
we need, but we've got to makeit there.
We can stop this amount oftimes along the way to get what
we need, but we've got to makeit there.
It's the captain or the CEO orthe owners or the manager's job
to make sure you can feed allthe people on the boat.
Because guess what, if you havetoo many people on the boat and
everybody's going to diebecause you're going to starve
and you don't have enoughresources.
So you got to make sure you'reproperly staffed to get where
you need not have too manypeople, but also not have too

(32:25):
few that you can't row the boator, you know, fix the sails to
sail where you need to.
Right, and like, I feel like acompany that is the ownership or
management's responsibility toknow when to add people and when
to get rid of them, and to tryto predict the weather changing
as much as possible.
You won't predict it a hundredpercent, but a person has a
responsibility working on theboat.
Take the same analogy If Istart just rowing, it is my

(32:53):
responsibility to go to you.
If you're the captain and goinghey, when I get done rowing,
can you show me how to work thesails?
Hey, when I get done rowing,can you show me how to work in
the kitchen?
I need to be creating value,the galley.
But like, where I'm getting atis like.
Everybody has a responsibility,not just ownership for these
things, but individualcontributors of your.
If you're not asking to be crosstrained, if you're not

(33:13):
constantly being curious andwanting to learn how to do the
next thing, to keep adding value, you're the first guy that when
that boat stops at the nextport they're going to go hey,
look, man, we don't got enoughroom on you to take you to where
we need to do.
You're going to have to findsomething here because, like, we
literally can't feed all thepeople.
These guys now are rowing,fixing the sails, working in the
galley, they're swabbing thedeck and they've learned all

(33:34):
these jobs so that, like, we'reable to actually move the boat
with like 15 people instead ofthe 20 we needed and we can't
feed all 20 anymore, so we'vegot to run it at 15.
And if anybody out there is acontributor and worrying about
whether it's AI or the marketthat's going to affect whether
or not they have job security,like, you've got to take that
initiative.
And second of all, if you end upleaving this company, you

(33:54):
become more employable.
If you learn three or four moreskill sets, you're beefing up
your resume.
So when the next ship comesinto port, you can be like hey,
look, man, can I get a ridethere?
And they go.
Well, what can you do?
The guy who can just row, orthe guy who can row, cook, fix
the sails and do whatever otherjobs?
Who do you think the next boatcaptain is going to pick to add
to his crew when he needs morepeople to sail where he's going

(34:15):
to?
Yeah, and like to me, that's apersonal choice that everybody
either makes or doesn't make ona daily basis that ultimately
they're responsible for, andmost people that won't make that
choice are going to blame themarket, they're going to blame
the captain, they're going toblame the weather and they're
never going to look inwards andgo.
Well, what did I do to makemyself more valuable for the
next boat, whether I'm with thiscompany or the next one that

(34:36):
pulls in?

Speaker 1 (34:37):
Yeah, 100%.
So I think one of the mindsetsthat I've always taken, that has
been helpful and I'm going totry to pull up some.
I want to give some roughstatistical numbers that I've
tracked.
Um.
So here you go.
Um, in the right before, oh,this is perfect.
Right before uh rates startedto contract in 2022, average

(35:02):
revenue per load we were justshy of three thousand dollars a
load.
Today we're.
It's about half that that'srevenue per load, right, and
when you're margin-based,you're- 10% of 3,000 is 300
bucks.
We were able to increase ourmargin percentage over those
last three years, so we didn'tcut our profit per load in half,

(35:23):
but it did shrink, like it wentfrom roughly 350 to about 270
per load.
Right.
So to combat that, what I havealways done and this has always
served me well is, when thingsare good, when things are
neutral, when things are not sogood, always a mentality of
growth.
And how do we get to the nextlevel?

(35:44):
Right, and by tracking thingslike load count, revenue per
load, profit per load, marginpercentage.
Those are the things that youput them all together and you
can start to see where, like,all right, we're starting to see
a contraction for our companyalone in this certain area.
What do we have to do to focuson the next thing?
So, with a constant growthmentality, what you don't wanna

(36:09):
do is, when times are good,don't take your foot off the gas
, right, because you see people,who they do that.
And then you know the tide goesout and they're like what?
Like you weren't growing, youwere just living off all that
fat there.
And now that fat's gone andyou're used to this lifestyle of
making this good money, and nowthat that that income just got
cut in half potentially.

(36:29):
So you've got to be growing thewhole time and people right now
are like, well, it's so hard toget customers and it's like you
know what?
This is a massive industry.
You just have to be like the50th percentile or better and
you will grow Like that's all itis.
You have to find a way to bebetter than everybody, or just
half, just be better than halfof the industry and put in the

(36:50):
activity, make the calls and youwill grow.
And what we've done at our levelwith an agent based company is
like we've.
We have in the last 18 monthsin a down market, have hired,
agent, recruit, have grown byadding agent recruiters.
So it's not just myself runningan agent program.
We've got actual people thatare out there, you know, seeking

(37:12):
out the best candidates outthere and outside of that, we're
taking our back office staffand turning them into Swiss army
knives so they can kind of, youknow, work in different
positions and we're out theremaking sure we've got the best
software and automationavailable so our back office is
efficient, so our the brokersthat we can attract are have the
best available, you know,technology and services and

(37:35):
support available to them.
So I mean, it's all of thatRight, and that's in the good
times.
And when things contract, youhave to always try to be growing
, because if you don't, that'swhen you're going to be one of
those next brokerages.
That's either in the headlinesfor filing bankruptcy or hey,
so-and-so, just acquiredso-and-so.
It's not because you know itwas necessarily the best fit.

(37:57):
It was because, hey, man, theywere in trouble and the price
was cheap.
So I'm going to strike whilethe iron's hot and acquire this
customer while I can, for acheap price.
So, or this brokerage for acheap price, so yeah.

Speaker 2 (38:10):
There was a line and the movie came out right when I
got in the industry or close toit, the movie War Dogs, and
there's a scene in there wherethey're sitting at the hot dog
stand, I think, eating like apiece of pizza.
And he's like like how are wegoing to make money at this,
like you know, basically dealingwith the US government and like

(38:30):
the entire arms industry, whichis like enormous Right.
He, and like the entire armsindustry, which is like enormous
right.
He's like how are we going tocompete?
We're like two people with thisjanitor closet in Miami and
we're competing with likeHalliburton and like the largest
companies in the world, right.
And he goes dude, do you knowhow big that pie is?
He goes we don't need the wholepie.
He's like we don't need halfthe pie.
He's like we don't even need aslice of the pie.

(38:51):
He's like we need a crumb.
He's like a couple crumbs istens of millions of dollars.
He's like that's all we need.
We have to find the littlepieces and we can make more than
we would ever make doinganything else.
And like for some, like thatimmediately.
That analogy to me held so truewith like transportation.
It is an eight, arguablybetween $800 billion and a

(39:13):
trillion dollar a year industry.
Like if you are a 50 million orarguably even a $500 million
company or arguably even abillion dollar company.
Like that is such a smallportion of a trillion dollars.
That, like to your point, nate,like all you've got to do is be
better than half of the peopleand I love Leffler's line on our

(39:35):
episode where he goes think ofthe average person's
intelligence that you know andrealize that half the people
you're competing with aren't assmart as that guy.
So, like all you've got to dois have like a little bit of
advantage, whether it's someintellect.
You definitely need effort, butif you outwork your competitors
every day consistently, youdon't need to burn yourself out.

(39:58):
But like you just need to do alittle bit better than everyone
else every day and eventually,like you'll keep growing.
And there are plenty ofcompanies are growing.
We've added more companies inthe past six months than we did
like all of last year and Ithink now something like 60% of
our revenue, like today, isbusiness we brought in year to

(40:18):
date, like in 2025.
So, like for sure there arecompanies you can bring in, for
sure there are ways to grow andlike you can use all of those
negative things we talked aboutin the market to your advantage.
Because, guess what, some ofthe other companies you're
competing with aren't cutting,aren't making sure their
employees are working that hard,they're not making the phone
calls.
So if you are working even atthe same level you were last

(40:42):
year, like you're probablyalready better than 50% Like you
can outwork your competition ata pretty low bar when
everybody's used to living onthe fat to your point, right,
everybody was able to eat,nobody had to work and
everybody's getting fatter andnobody's really learning to hunt
anymore, but you just keephunting a little bit every day.
Guess what, when they all runout of meat, you at least know

(41:03):
where to find it.
And you've been looking for itand you know exactly where that
hunting spot is, because youweren't just sitting back
waiting for the next whateverelk to come moseying through
your, your village.
Otherwise you have nothing toeat.
Right, like you've got to staysharp and you've got to keep
doing those things if you wantto survive in a good market or a
bad market.

Speaker 1 (41:21):
Yeah.
So I want to, I want to getyour thoughts on.
So the trucking side.
I'll kind of give you what wehave done with our trucks.
We have done with our trucks,um, and I'm not very involved at
all in that side of it outsideof like understanding you know,
you know what our capabilitiesare, um, but we in the peak had

(41:44):
somewhere in the neighborhood oflike 35, uh trucks that were
all running and over time thelast few years have slowly
sliced that down to a level thatmakes sense and is manageable
for a variety of reasons.
One, the lanes that aren'tprofitable anymore we're not

(42:04):
going to service those right.
The amount of headaches thatcome along with throwing a fleet
of that size like, we can getrid of a lot of those headaches,
right.

Speaker 2 (42:15):
And the beautiful thing about Just stop right
there.
If a trucking company is going,we can't service this lane
anymore because the customerdoesn't pay enough, right?
And theoretically your companygives back 10 loads a week just
for a round number, right, thoseloads are now available in the
spot market to another brokerthat was actually making the
spot market, to another brokerthat was actually making the
phone calls to the company thatyou are ultimately going to give

(42:37):
the loads back to, right?
So when people want to know,where's the freight going to
come from if there's not, ifit's not growing, there are
trucking companies that aregoing.
We can't service this for thatanymore, right?

Speaker 1 (42:47):
And then now those loads need picked up or they go
out of business because they'rejust they aren't making any
money Correct.
They're losing money, right,that's like the worst game
changer for them.

Speaker 2 (42:53):
So now these loads hit the spot market, they're
going to go to a broker, atleast for some period of time,
to make sure they still getpicked up next week, and that
shipper might actually have topay market rate, like that
doesn't mean that shipper theshippers always, and this is why
everybody says in and themarket rate is $2,400.
Yeah, wants to pay, but guesswhat, if nobody can move it for
$2,000, he's eventually going topay $2,400.

(43:15):
Or his customer never gets thelight bulbs they bought, or
whatever it is they're shipping.

Speaker 1 (43:19):
Yep.
So I mean, that's really theway that we've done it, because
one of the beautiful thingsabout a trucking side and it's
not as fast, obviously, as abrokerage to scale it but you
can scale it back up, right, if,if the market dictates hey, you
know there's more money in thetrucking side, well, hey, you

(43:41):
can go either put some of yourtrucks back on the road that you
have parked or, if you had soldthem, you can go lease or
purchase trucks again, so youhave the ability to flex that up
and down trucks again.
So you have the ability to flexthat up and down.
And I think what a lot oftrucking companies probably did
wrong in the last few years isthey didn't look long term.
They didn't, they didn't aimhigh in their steering.
If you want to give it ananalogy, they were only looking

(44:04):
what's right ahead of them rightnow Right.
But if they can see, hey, Ican't operate this same way for
an extended period of time if Idon't change something.
Right, if they don't do that,eventually at times in the
coming you're going to have amonth where you didn't turn a
profit and now you've got toanswer to, you know, either
shareholders or creditors,whoever that might be right.

Speaker 2 (44:25):
Smaller company can't make payroll, so exactly right.

Speaker 1 (44:28):
So you're going to end up having, you know, I got,
like I said, worst case scenarioyou shut the doors, which we've
seen a lot of that in the lasthandful of years but then it's
like abruptly having to likeslice things instead of just
planning ahead of time.
Right, if you've got folks thatare leased on in your, in your
asset based carrier like you canlet them know like hey, we're

(44:49):
going to, we're going to have anend date for this lease
effective whatever date, um.
So now you know like you canhave that attrition planned out.
Or you know, what I think a lotof people did too, is they
didn't keep retained earnings intheir, you know in their bank
um, or they went out and boughtyou know a bunch of crap.
They didn't need um becausethey thought the money was just

(45:09):
gonna always be coming in andrates were always going to be
four bucks a mile or whatever,and it's like no, here's what I
think.

Speaker 2 (45:16):
I was just going to segue to exactly what you were
saying, but give some peoplesome practical ways to do this
Right, and this works forliterally any business, whether
it's a trucking company orbrokerage or, honestly, a pizza
shop is.
And this is fundamentally likewhat a bank does when they're
going to lend somebody money.
Right, and you do likesensitivity analysis, but that's
just a fancy word for sayinglike, okay, this business brings

(45:38):
in 50 grand a week.
Okay, we spend, and all of ourexpenses, all of our payroll and
to pay everybody else 40 grandand the owner takes 10 grand.
Maybe that's retained earningsor, in a small business, like,
that's literally what the ownertakes out of the company to live
on, right, as a paycheck.
Okay, so now you go okay, well,the business is bringing in 50,

(46:00):
the owner needs 10.
That's what he's living on, andthe whole company takes the
other 40 every week.
Then what you do is go, okay,you pick a number above it,
which is your goal, and go okay,well, how long do you think it
would take to start bringing in60 grand a week?
Okay, and what would we need todo?
The other way you look at thatis okay, well, we're bringing in
50.
What happens if we startbringing in 40?

(46:22):
And then you go if I'm at 40,right, and everybody needs 45,
how much money like fancy wordretained earnings?
Simple way to look at it is howmuch savings do we have before
four weeks at 40, grand burnsthrough all of our savings and
we can't pay our staff.
How long can you do that at 40?
Then you go well, what if it'sworse?

(46:42):
What if it's 35?
Now how long can we go?
What if it's 30?
And then you go 60.
And then you basically go upand down and you figure out, in
the worst case scenario, howmuch savings can you live on
before you have to startliterally letting people go or
canceling company subscriptionsor whatever it is, getting rid
of your office, whatever that is, and how fast you need to run

(47:03):
to keep up with this right.
That will at least give yourbrain a conception of like how
much time risk is there in theworst case?
And then how fast do you got torun and work to hit the best
case right?
And then the thing you outlinedbetter even before is like
there's really just two waysthat you make money in a
business you bring more in oryou spend less.

(47:24):
Right, like AI is good atspending less by being able to
do things more efficient, butit's not really that great at
bringing in more yet.
And now there are some ways wego down.
But, like the reality is likeyou need people.
You need people talking insales, talking to new customers,
getting more business fromexisting customers.
That effectively helps bringmore in.

(47:45):
But then you also got to look at, like, okay, of the 45 grand we
spend for all of the things inour company, which of them are
absolutely necessary?
What are nice to haves?
What are needed?
Right, and of the nice to haves, which ones would we cut?
First, if we start hitting 40 aweek instead of the 50, right,
then you have a plan.
Okay, well, now, if we keephitting 40, which of the people

(48:07):
can we now overlap and go?
Well, this person, like yousaid in your instance, can do
billing and claims, all right.
Well, we have a claims personnow, but we haven't had a lot of
claims and we got a billingperson.
What if one person learns bothjobs?
Okay, now, at least we have aplan to train both of them to
see what makes sense in theworst case scenario.
And then you start looking atthese things and at least then,
if you even just have it in yourhead, even better in writing.

(48:29):
Every week you start evaluatingthis Okay, next week we hit 50.
What did we do to bring in sales?
Did it work or didn't it work?
What do we do to look atcross-training our employees in
a worst case scenario, the guyin the boat we're teaching
everybody that rows to also workthe sales.
Right, and now we're teachingeverybody that used to work the
sales to also row.
Then you just keepcross-training.
That is what helps you planbetter and make your business

(48:52):
more likely to still be around ayear from now Instead of just
like cause.
Steven brought up a scenariowhere we were talking with, like
some other companies, like theowners just kept taking all the
money out and it's just likeokay, well, if the guy at the
captain just keeps taking allthe resources out of the boat
but everybody else is starving,eventually everybody stops
rowing and then eventuallyeverybody just can't survive.

(49:12):
And yeah, the captain lives alittle longer, but now he's on a
boat by himself, can't row ithimself and he's eventually not
going to live either.
Right, like you kind of needall of it to work, otherwise the
boat is just in the middle ofthe ocean, with no food, nobody
to row.

Speaker 1 (49:38):
And you're hoping some tide pushes you back to
safety.
Yeah, the last thing I'll sayon this, this whole topic is,
like the importance of knowingthe health of your business, the
like, the financial health ofit.
Who's doing what?
People's workloads?
There are two.
I'll try to make this as generalas possible without, you know,
making myself sound like anidiot, but there's really two
types of um employees in yourcompany revenue producers and
people that are expense on your,you know, on your income
statement.
So you, when, when times aregreat, right, it's often, uh,

(50:01):
people, they don't necessarilydo it on purpose, but it's, it's
easy to add more expenseemployees, right, I don't want
me to call them out like in anegative way, but those that
cost money to bring on becauseyou can afford it, it's easier
to do that and not really see it.
But then, when you knowbusiness isn't as profitable,

(50:23):
you need more revenue producersand you need less, you know,
expense type employees.
So, just, you know, I alwayssay keep an eye on that.
And when times get, you know,when the times are great, you
keep adding more revenueproducers because you want to
take advantage of the time whenyou can stack up that business
so that you can, you know, sothat you can actually ride those

(50:45):
waves as things shift the otherway.
So that's my big take on it is,you know, lean into your
revenue producers and keep aclose eye on.
You know how many employees youhave that are costing you money
and how, what's their workloadand how efficient are they?
Are they doing their job?
Do you need them?
Can you cross train people?
Again?

(51:06):
I never want to see anybody getlaid off.
It's an inevitable reality insome instances and we saw that
with the initial COVID shutdowns.
But you can also rememberthere's natural attrition in any
company, right, people willdecide they don't like our
industry and go find a differentcareer.
They could get picked off by acompetitor of yours and go work

(51:26):
over there.
They might have a life changeand they're moving across the
country with their spouse andfamily because spouse got a job
somewhere else.
Like these things.
They might retire.
These things happen and thatnatural attrition is also a way
for you to, you know, trim thefat without having to fire or
lay somebody off.
So there's a lot of ways to dothis.

(51:47):
There's a finesse to it.
Being a strong, talentedbusiness owner and leader is a
totally different skill set thanbeing a good salesman, and I
think that it's very importantas you grow your brokerage and
maybe you're killing it at salesbut you want to make sure that
you're putting the right peoplein the right seats so that you

(52:07):
don't have those blind spots.
Right, like, if you grow to youknow, 20 or 30 million, well,
you probably want someone strongin leadership that can help
keep an eye on the books,changes in numbers, personnel
management right, because youcan't be the owner and also be
great at everything else that'sgoing on inside your company.
When you get to a level of thatsize Like think about the

(52:28):
brokers that you work for nowLike there's a reason that
you're there.
You know what I mean Like youneed to have extra sets of eyes
that can see throughout thecompany and and and you know see
where things are going and andall that good stuff.
So that's my take on it.
Any other, uh, any other thingsyou want to hit on?

Speaker 2 (52:45):
And I thought about that a lot.
You know, what I was thinkingof yesterday is like they're
very different mentalities andmindsets, and I think this is
also true is that, like, evenwhen you get good at both and
I've made it, I've made aconcerted effort to get better
at being a leader and a managerof the past, whatever decade
Right In my twenties I wasreally good at sales, and why I

(53:05):
think I was really good isbecause, like I had that I don't
give a shit mentality If youtold me no, like I just don't
care.
But like having that type ofmentality of being able to just
get emotionally punched in theface and not and just shake it
off also makes you lesssensitive to just other human
beings and I think inherently,like they are kind of like
mutually exclusive.
Like that's why I was a badmanager, because, like, in order

(53:27):
for me to deal with beingrejected 150 times a day, I
wasn't really good at connectingwith people I was managing and
when I was first a sales, aproducer and a manager, like I
then switched to just trying tolearn how to be that and I was
just not good at sales anymorebecause, like I felt so
sensitive to being rejected,that I didn't want to do it, but
I got really good at connectingwith people and I think you can

(53:48):
learn both.
But I do think there's a verygood case to make that.
Like, you kind of do need tofocus on some things as you're
growing or changing.
Because, like you were justpointing out, like why I'm at
this company now and the guy whoI work with, who owns the
company, has been up here forthe past three or four days.
We talk a lot.
I'm like dude, like if I'mbuilding automations in these
tech things, I'm like I can'tfocus on something that takes

(54:11):
three hours for me to just startto understand how we're doing
it, let alone get it to work,and then jump off, negotiate
with a carrier and then jump ona sales call, then jump back
into this deep focus.
Like it's a different brainstate and I'm like I literally
can't do it and I'm like, soyou've got to deal with the
people internally for the timebeing.
I will go focus on this because, like it's just a different

(54:34):
level of focus, like it's notthat I can't do both or that he
can't do both, but I'm like itmakes no sense for us both to be
doing both, because I'm likewe're both just jumping back and
the cost to transition isexhausting.
I'm like I am twice as tired atthe end of the day If I switch
every two hours between thesetasks.
If I just pick one day and dothat thing the whole day, like I

(54:54):
feel like at the end of the dayI'm like almost energized
because, like you get thingsdone and you can stay in that
focus.
It's the switching and I thinkthat's also why Cradle of the
Grave burns you out so quick isbecause, like you're literally
doing everything and you'reconstantly context switching
throughout the day and there's ahuge, there's a calorie burn,
there's a mental cost.
Getting your brain to be ableto focus back on those things

(55:16):
requires a ton of energy, and Ithink there's a lot to be said
about what you're saying is likelooking at folks that are
really good managers and leaders, right, and making sure they're
also not being saddled with aresponsibility that is like
almost counterintuitive to theother tasks you're expecting
them to do.

Speaker 1 (55:30):
Yeah, absolutely Well .
Hopefully this gave some goodcontext and takeaways for folks
out there.
And if you're not at that pointyet, where you're, you're
leading the brokerage or you'reat that growth stage maybe
you'll listen to it in two years, who knows.
But hopefully you got some good, some good little nuggets here
from us.
So, ben, final thoughts.

Speaker 2 (55:51):
I'll add one last thing too Like, even if you
aren't at that stage and you area producer right.
Like you are your business,what you create and value is
what you get to take out of it.
Right and like maybe that's notlooking at how all of the
business and who needs to dowhat where, but like that also
includes like are you eatingwell?
Are you sleeping well?
Are you taking care of the toolthat you use to make money?

(56:13):
Right, are you exercising?
Like if you're not sleeping,you're eating like crap and
you're wondering why you'restressed out and you can't make
phone calls every day.
Like you also have someresponsibility to look at, just
yourself and your ability to beable to perform at what you
expect of yourself, and I thinkeverybody has the ability to do
those things.

Speaker 1 (56:32):
Yep Agreed, all right , good episode.
What do you got?

Speaker 2 (56:34):
Whether you believe you can or believe you can't,
you're right.

Speaker 1 (56:38):
And until next time go Bills.