November 13, 2024 • 45 mins
Discover the power of turning a lifelong passion into a thriving business with Richard, the founder of Powell Fabrication. From learning welding as a 12-year-old on a farm to overcoming countless entrepreneurial challenges, Richard’s journey is fuelled by resilience, faith, and strong support. Hear how early influences and a pivotal job opportunity set the foundation for his successful fabrication business in Northwest Arkansas.
Richard shares insights into launching a welding business in a small town, the importance of a supportive partner, and his approach to mentoring employees through hands-on experience. Whether you’re pursuing financial freedom or nurturing talent within your team, Richard’s story is a testament to the rewards of perseverance and commitment in the entrepreneurial world.
NOTABLE QUOTES
"I'm a very big person on ‘it's my way or no way.’ I've grown out of that now thankfully." – Richard
"No matter if you're one year or 20 years into the business, there's always these levels of difficulty." – Philip
"I feel very bad for a lot of those people who don't have [the] companion like I do." – Richard
"It's a joint decision because we know if it makes us better, it was because we both wanted it, and if it makes us fail, it's because we both wanted it." – Richard
"It's our money rather than that's my money, that's your money." – Philip
"I hate for those couples who value everything off of dollars." – Richard
"Ninety percent plus of all her problems come down to a lack of communication." – Philip
"There's only two ways of doing it–you're either going to succeed or you're going to learn lessons." – Richard
"I like to help that underdog or that person that's really kind of overlooked a lot of times because that's how I've always felt all my life like I was always overlooked for that opportunity and I had to find ways to create that or just go about doing it myself." – Philip
"I get a good enjoyment out of seeing other people succeed." – Richard
"My dad always used to preach hard that, “I can give you all the lessons to life, but if you don't fall on your face, you're not going to learn anything.’" – Richard
"Most people are only going to screw up so many times before they get it right." – Richard
"Wouldn't you rather do only 10% of the work, like going back and checking, and maybe you do a thing or two here versus 100% of it?" – Philip
"He was teaching me just as much as I was teaching him." – Richard
"Good salary is always nice, but the culture, to me, is what keeps people within a company." – Philip
RESOURCES
Richard
Website: https://www.pfnwa.com
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100087184264148
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@powellfab.3357
Philip
Digital Course: https://www.speakingsessions.com/digital-course
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/iamphilipsessions/?hl=en
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@philipsessions
Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/philip-sessions-b2986563/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/therealphilipsessions
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
What's up guys?
Welcome back to another episode.
We've got Richard here and heis a welder from Northwest
Arkansas, a big dreamer,sticking to the plan, literally
living out his life that heplanned at the ripe old age of
12 years old.
He is the owner of PowellFabrication, which is a CNC
(00:22):
plasma cutting and customfabrication company, and he is
there in the shop right now thathe dreamed out.
But we're going to be talkingabout how he went through his
dream, how he communicates as aleader and business owner and
husband and father andeverything, and just have a
really good conversation heretoday.
But, richard, welcome to theshow.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
Thanks, man, glad to be here.
Speaker 1 (00:44):
Yeah, and this is.
You said your second podcast,right, so you're a huge expert.
Speaker 2 (00:51):
Yeah, I shot the one a few weeks ago and it was here
Yep, here's your name.
And he's like, yeah, best thing, just hop right into it.
And I was like, okay, but afterthe end of it I kind of got a
little stiffy for him it's kindof fun.
So.
Speaker 1 (01:04):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know we had talked about
scheduling it and everything andyou're like, yeah, I'm hooked
on it.
So talk to me about that realquick, because I think a lot of
people find podcasting daunting.
Maybe hosting is definitelydaunting.
Guesting, I would say, is alittle bit easier, but it's
still kind of a scary thing Likewhat are we going to be?
Asked what's going to happen onthe podcast, and, of course,
every podcast a little bitdifferent.
(01:25):
But talk to me about thatexperience and how that got you
actually hooked on wanting to beon more podcasts yeah, so I uh
reached out to a friend in therbo deal and and said and got it
scheduled.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
and uh got on there and was pretty nervous
beforehand.
But you know, just like talkingwith you, it's like talking to
an old friend.
You know, devin done a reallygood job and I just, I don't
know, I got in there and heasked a lot of questions that
made me think a lot.
So it hasn't came out yet, so Idon't know if I looked really
good or really stupid, but butyeah, it was really fun to just
(01:57):
to dive into this stuff.
That is very important to meand I think I have a good aspect
on it.
It may not be everybody's orthe most popular opinion, but uh
, but yeah it was cool to diveinto it and I don't know kind of
made you feel like somebody, Iguess, a little bit.
So I guess that's probablywhere it uh where made me the um
(02:19):
most attracted to it?
I guess would be the nice wayto say it.
Speaker 1 (02:22):
Nice man.
Well, I'd let your wife knowthat she needs to start making
you feel more special, becauseotherwise you got to keep going
on podcasts.
Speaker 2 (02:33):
Just kidding there.
Speaker 1 (02:34):
Yeah, podcasts are always so much fun.
It's definitely a joy to be ahost and host people on the
podcast, especially people likeyou that haven't been on
podcasts too many times.
But then also having theexperience people but then also
getting on people's podcasts.
It's always a pleasure to beable to be on somebody's podcast
, whether they're a veteran atit or they're fairly new also
and Devin is an awesome guy,awesome podcast host and
(02:57):
everything Great.
First one to be on, excited tohave you for the second one.
Speaker 2 (03:01):
Yeah, for sure it was .
It was cool to see hisperspective of doing stuff and,
uh, I don't know, like I said,if I can put my two cents out
there and hopefully it helpssomebody.
Um, yeah, hopefully, hopefullyeverybody gets to get a positive
out of both of them.
Speaker 1 (03:13):
So yeah, yeah for sure.
So let's let's take things back.
So you started your journey at12 years old, having this vision
, and clearly you're living outthat vision now.
So how did that come about?
I mean, and I guess for someperspective, how old are you
right now?
Speaker 2 (03:30):
Uh, so I'm 28,.
I'll turn 29 here in about amonth, a little over a month.
And uh, yeah, so my dad uh grewup, my dad was uh, drove race
cars and stuff my entire life.
And you know, just like I saidbefore, you wreck race cars and
you got to fix them up and uh,so that's where the fabrication
side came from.
And then, kind of growing up onthe farm stuff, um, you know,
(03:53):
you don't have enough money topay everybody to do stuff.
So you, you, obviously youlearn how to fix stuff and adapt
and overcome.
But uh, yeah, me and my dadactually, um, were driving past
this piece of property to gofishing and uh, dad lives about
a mile and a half down the road.
And I told dad I was like, man,I'm gonna buy that someday.
And dad was like, yeah, youknow whatever.
Well then, you know, multipletimes driving by it, I stopped
(04:16):
and walked up on it and kind ofstarted mapping it out and, um,
yeah, at 12 years old may havebeen 13, but I'm pretty sure it
was 12.
I went home and drew up a set ofblueprints and it had a 5,000
square foot shop and an L-shapedhouse off of it.
The only thing that changed waswe moved the house from one
side to the other so that youdidn't have to drive by all the
(04:38):
construction crap to get to thenice house.
So, yeah, we've stuck to theplan and a lot of doors have
opened up.
As far as the welding side, Istarted this business three
times, failed three times andthen finally PalFab started and
it stuck.
So we're right at four yearsactually, october was kind of
(05:00):
the birthday for for four yearsand, yeah, just going hard and
living the dream every day andtaking everything that I can and
taking lessons and failures andturning it into good stuff.
Speaker 1 (05:14):
Talk to us about that .
That's very interesting thatyou started and failed three
times and still went for afourth time especially, I think,
nowadays we think that you'vegot to have instant success,
that it's just an easy thing,you're overnight millionaire
success, all those things andclearly it might almost seem
(05:35):
like idiocracy or something thatyou went and redid the same
business essentially four times,but finally that fourth time it
was successful.
Business essentially four times, but finally that fourth time
it was successful.
So talk to us through thatmindset behind that, because
that seems very bizarre forsomebody to go and redo the same
business and I know I'm sureyou learned from that as well
(05:56):
like you literally made the samemistakes but you still tried
and tried and tried again untilyou started finding that success
.
Speaker 2 (06:03):
Yeah, I'd say.
I mean really.
It may sound stupid to somepeople, but to me the biggest
thing was faith.
So I started the business threetimes in a little town I was
living in and at the time anddoing farm work and stuff,
didn't know how to priceanything, didn't know how to
keep cash flow stuff going, andjust kind of bouncing in between
(06:25):
jobs on the road and thought,oh, I got enough money saved up
to try it this time and I coulddo it for five or six months and
then obviously all the cash isgone.
I just tried to do it coldturkey every time I started and
it just obviously, as everybodyknows, that's not how you do it.
And then so the same story allthree times.
(06:46):
Thought I had enough cash tostart it, thought I had enough
clientele base built up to do it, which was like a whole
whopping five people.
And then actually I was settingon this property the dream
place we call it and a guy pullsup in the yard just to
introduce himself just you know,be neighborly.
Up in the yard, just tointroduce himself, just you know
(07:07):
, be neighborly.
And I had on a shirt that saidPowell Welding Company or
something.
I don't remember what it was atthe time and he said hey, you
know, I work for a place downthe road.
And he said we need welders andor a welder.
And I said I kick rocks, dude,like I'm not interested.
I just came home off the road.
I was ready to be done with it.
A friend of mine owned a remodelbusiness and I was going to go
(07:31):
help him build his company up towhere he had something to
bounce back on and this guy justkept showing up.
About the third or fourth timeI finally was like okay, you
know, like I'll look at what yougot just to shut you up.
I'm tired of hearing from you.
I go down there and it's abunch of work right off the bat.
Enough money to buy machinesand get everything off the
(07:58):
ground the right way.
We established another LLC andwent for it yet again, didn't
really know how it was going togo this time, but knew I wasn't
going to fail.
Um, so I bounced back and forthin between the welding company
and a church camp.
I was helping out them um, justdo general maintenance stuff.
And uh, actually April of Ithink it was 21,.
(08:18):
Me and my wife came togetherand she was like, hey, you know,
you got to do what makes youhappy.
Um and and and, go whole hog atit, like I was getting kind of
frustrated with what I was doingand some of the stuff that was
going on and uh, just on thechurch camp side, or just that
fact you're yeah yeah, just theway it was.
Not that anybody was doinganything wrong.
(08:39):
I'm a very big person on it'smy way or no way.
And uh, I've grown out of thatnow, um, thankfully.
But uh, it wasn't going.
You know, they'd ask me and Iwas like this is the way it's
going to be and they wouldn't doit and it just made me mad.
Um, but yeah, the big man, he,uh, he kept pointing me in the
right direction and we said,okay, in april we were gonna do
(08:59):
it all on our own.
Um, this was where my heart wasin the business.
And like, the next day thephone rings and it's a quarter
mile offense and that that jobfloats us for three months or so
, and it gave me enough time toget the next job started and the
next job started and now we'rebooked out three months.
So it's, it's been a journey,it's been a blast.
Speaker 1 (09:22):
Yeah, that that is awesome and it's funny how
things just really kind of startlike that and unfortunately,
you had all these hiccups at thebeginning I'll call them
hiccups lessons learned andeverything there at the
beginning, but whenever it wasfinally, it was that time that
was supposed to happen.
I think that faith is reallywhere that set in.
You had other plans like inplace, where it wasn place,
(09:43):
where you solely depended onthat, and so you really had
something else that made it,where you weren't almost
desperate for that work andeverything.
But then just how that workends up coming along and then
you're just more prepared for itthat time.
Okay, we're going to see whatwe get here, but we're going to
save up.
But then also that support ofthe spouse, this huge thing that
(10:05):
is so beneficial.
And I mean being in mastermindgroups like we're in.
We hear about people all thetime whether they're male or
female.
It tends to be more males inthese groups and so then it's
more of the female spouse.
That isn't on board necessarily, and that is such a huge
disadvantage for these businessowners, because it is a
(10:27):
difficult journey.
No matter if you're one year or20 years into the business.
There's always these levels ofdifficulty and everything.
So talk to us about that,because was your wife kind of on
board throughout each one ofthese individual ventures until
the finally the successful one,or was it not really till that
(10:47):
fourth attempt that she started?
Speaker 2 (10:49):
it was like, okay, like she's on board with you and
everything no man, I, I tell mywife that she's uh, she's
probably the worst wife as faras money goes, because I can
come to her with an idea andwaste a lot of time and a lot of
paper and and it's a hundredthousand dollars.
But I know that it's going tomake us this and she goes okay,
do it like I.
(11:10):
I believe in you.
You know, if you truly believethat it's going to work, it's
going to work and we've beat ourheads against the wall on some
stuff and and it's uh likegetting our house paid off.
You know it's, hey, I want tospend x amount of dollars a
month, um, and by June of nextyear, our house is going to be
paid off, you know, and it'slike, well, it's gonna, we got
(11:31):
to sacrifice for a little bit.
But if you think this is whatit's going to be, you know she's
always been, um, I've been withher for 10 years, almost 11
years now, and every aspect itdoesn't matter if it was race
cars or business or, uh, justbuilding the house or whatever
it was always she was rightthere by my hip and I I feel
(11:51):
very bad for a lot of thosepeople who don't have that
companion like I do, cause man,when the big man, when the big
man made my wife, he uh best,best woman on the face of this
earth by hands down.
She's a big man in her all, allthe gratitude for the success,
the littlest success that I'veseen.
(12:12):
I couldn't do without either oneof them, for sure.
Speaker 1 (12:15):
And it sounds like there's a lot of communication
there as well, which is a reallyimportant aspect, especially
when it comes to the businessand finances and everything.
Finances is like the first orsecond thing reason why most
marriages end in divorce isbecause of finances.
I think there's it's one or twoand I can't remember which is
the other of those, but yeah, Imean, it's a, it's a huge, um, a
(12:40):
thing that makes a marriage notwork, and everything.
And it sounds like you're verygood at communicating these
things, even even if they'rewild.
You know, you just uh, wildhair idea that you just had and
everything.
So how how do you typically goabout communicating those things
?
Good, that's important for usas leaders, as business owners,
(13:01):
as husbands, for us to reallycommunicate with our spouse.
So how are you going about thecommunicating these different
things?
Speaker 2 (13:09):
I mean, like in the beginning it was always.
You know, I just got a wildhair and this is what I think is
going to happen, and then nowit's hey, you know, this is the
idea.
I come to her with pros andcons of everything.
Sometimes there's more consthan pros.
She's not all the time justhappy-go-lucky of oh, it's
(13:32):
always going to work and this isalways going to be great.
Sometimes it's like, hey,dipshit, we need to reel this
back a little bit and let's waitthree months.
Right now, probably.
Right now probably isn't themost the best time.
You know we're about to hit thelittle bit of slow season.
So you know it's going to behard to put the bill on this, or
if we use up all of our cashflow, you know.
(13:54):
So she's always that other sideof that.
That token, I always try tobring the like I said at least
four or five pros and four orfive cons of every idea that we
do.
Like I said at least four orfive pros and four or five cons
of every idea that we do.
And then she kind of thinks onit for a few minutes or maybe a
couple of days and we kind ofcome back to the table and it's
probably just how much I bringit up, whether she says OK, you
(14:16):
know, do it and shut up, or orthis, probably you haven't
brought it up enough, so weprobably got to wait on it a
little bit.
Speaker 1 (14:24):
That's funny, yeah, and women have a very good
discernment when it comes to alot of these things as well.
But then, like you said,sometimes if you're bringing it
up enough times, you've probablythought through a lot of it or
something that you maybe maybeit's just you're really
passionate about it and you wantto try it out, and so it's one
of those things.
Okay, you know there's a lot ofpassion there.
Richard has that passion.
(14:45):
Let me go ahead and give thatapproval, so to speak, and
everything.
Even though y'all are apartnership, it's still nice to
get the kind of all clear kindof thing and everything.
That's something that we shouldwork on, and I think that's
something as well a lot of timesthat as adults, we feel like we
don't necessarily need thatquote unquote approval from our
(15:06):
spouse, and it's not necessarilylike approval to say, okay, I
can do something, I havepermission from the authority
figure, but it's more just like,hey, are we on the same page
before I make this decision?
Because it is both of us atthis point in everything and and
I guess you know, with thesituation, is it like just
you're the one making the moneyor she also doing her own thing
(15:27):
too, or what's that situationthere?
Cause that that changes thosedynamics as well.
Speaker 2 (15:36):
Yeah, she's an RN, so she, uh, she does very well.
Uh, we, uh, from the beginning,um, we've I had a school
teacher.
Um, I worked with her husbandpouring concrete for one winter,
just helping him.
And I was talking aboutproposing to Grace and, you know
, making a life out of it, and Isaid, but we'll keep separate
accounts.
My money is my money and hermoney is her money.
(15:57):
And he looked me dead in theeye and he said if you can't
trust the woman that you lovewith something as stupid as a
dollar bill, he said it'll neverwork.
And I was like man, that's.
You know, money is so high oneverybody's priority list and
today's day and age you can'tlive without it.
But my wife and I we always.
(16:17):
She was buying clothes thislast weekend, which she never
does, but she was buying clothesfor herself and it was like
babe, it's $200.
You know, I don't know that wecan spend the $200, you know
it's on me and I'm like it'smoney.
You know like, we're not stupidwith our money, you deserve it,
you know.
So, everything it's not like.
It's not like I'm going to aboard meeting and I'm trying to
(16:39):
sell an idea every time we talkabout stuff, but it's it's a yes
or no from from both of us andit's, uh, 95% of the stuff.
Um, it's a joint decision.
Um, because we know if it, ifit makes us better, it was
because we both wanted it, andif it makes us fail, it's
because we both wanted it.
Um, we don't go into anythingwith fingers pointed at the
(17:02):
other way of of uh, oh well.
Anything with fingers pointedat the other way of of uh, oh
well, you said this or you saidthat it's no, we made this
decision together and uh, andwe're sticking to it.
There's no, there's nothingthat comes in between us, and
damn sure not a dollar bill.
Speaker 1 (17:15):
Yeah, yeah, man, and my wife just went out with some
friends like she's actually anRN also and went out some like
nursing friends and everything.
And one of them was talkingabout, yeah, you know, we're
going on this cruise and youknow we've got to split it, or
I've got to get the alcoholpackage because her husband
wants it, but they have alltheir bills separated.
It's like they went out to eatthe other night and he paid, and
(17:38):
now she's got to pay him backand all this stuff.
And it's like that is justcrazy.
And and that was one thing,like at first, my wife, you know
, we got married and, like youknow, we were I was 28 and she
was 30 when we got married, so alittle bit older, I guess, if
you will and so it was like kindof that independence.
And then we were trying to andit's that that kind of dance.
(17:59):
At the beginning you're tryingto figure out like what's going
to work, what systems work andand how y'all work together and
everything.
Now that you're combiningeverything after marriage and
that was one of the things I'mlike no, we are combining the
account, like I don't care, likewe're combining it now.
But it turns out that, like youknow, I'm just huge spender and
all I do is just spend all themoney.
We never have money that's, orvice versa.
(18:19):
Then, okay, maybe then weseparate it, but we're not like
that.
So it was like, just put it allin and we make about the same
right now.
So it's not like, oh, I'mmaking 400,000 a year and she's
only making 40,000.
So there's a 10 timesdifference.
But that was actually somethingI got advice from a friend
(18:40):
colleague when I was an intern,one of the engineers where I was
working at.
He was talking about that Like,hey, just put it together,
because what happens if you'retrying to split everything, if
you have all your billsseparated?
Now you split everything andgoing back to the $400,000
versus $40,000.
So do you have to payadditional to be able to meet my
10% for housing allowance?
(19:01):
Or do I have to get less of ahouse so we can get it at your
10% of your income housingallowance, so to speak, kind of
thing.
And so it's like somebody has tocompromise.
So, rather than doing that,just say, hey, here's our money,
$440,000 a year.
What are we going to do andspend on it?
And it just it makes it so muchmore simple and then so much
(19:23):
more transparent too, becausethen you can see where that
money's going, what's happening.
Not that you're trying to watchit over, you know, and comb
through it and look through itwith magnifying glass, but it's
just, it's there, it's our moneyrather than that's my money,
that's your money, and how arewe going to split bills?
I mean, that's yeah, it makesit so nasty not to do that.
Speaker 2 (19:43):
My wife's definitely the breadwinner and she'll hate
me for saying that, but she's.
She's helped float all my crazyideas.
And, yeah, there's none of thisBS.
At the end of the month, well,you spent more money than I did,
you know.
Or vice versa, which nine timesout of ten with me, especially
with business, it's I'm spendingmore money than than she is,
but there's, there's none ofthat.
(20:04):
I hate, I hate for thosecouples who, uh, who value
everything off of dollars.
Cause I got a lot of friendsthat are married and uh, yeah,
it's the same way.
We go out to eat and it's like,well, you need to pay me back
20 bucks for your steak later on.
It's like, what in the world,you know?
Um, at least treat them like wewere in high school and at
least pay for their dinner, forGod's sakes, you know, right, I
(20:24):
don't agree with it, but that'sjust me.
Speaker 1 (20:27):
Yeah, yeah, exactly, you know everybody's got their
own way, but I really I feelthat's the better way overall.
But once you're married, ifyou're dating, that's a totally
different story.
And I think in today's societynow it's it's hard to have only
one side pay for that andtypically society now it's, it's
hard to have only one side payfor that and typically that's
(20:47):
been the man that said to payfor that.
But that is so difficult.
Even do that.
I still think the first datethe guy should be paying for it.
But then after that, like splitit or like my wife and I, when
we were dating, it was back andforth, like I'd pay one time,
she'd pay another, and we justkind of went back and forth and
made it work out until we gotmarried and then we combined
everything and then it's justit's been so much better, so
it's yeah, but money is such animportant thing.
(21:08):
That's something we startedtalking about before we got
married too.
You know, we actually in likeshe brought up how much she made
first and want to know how muchI made and all this stuff, and
that was a little awkward atfirst.
I'm like, well, hey, you know,if we're gonna get serious like
let's have the conversation andtalk about that.
We talk about debts and stufflike that because I mean, that's
a big thing.
You could be in some serioustrouble if you marry somebody
(21:31):
thinking they're all debt freeand then it turns out they've
got hundreds of thousand dollarsin debt that they got to pay
back in a couple of years.
That could change finances veryquickly.
Speaker 2 (21:42):
Which for my wife and I, you know, it's a lot
different because we're highschool sweethearts We've
literally been there with nomoney.
I'm not going to say lots ofmoney.
Lots of money is skewed a lotof different ways, but what we
call a lot of money.
We've been with each otherthrough it all and never once
mad at each other cause wedidn't have any money, or mad at
(22:05):
each other because we had a lotof money.
Um, it's uh, it's always justbeen about us and, um, the money
is the money.
Um, if we want to go dosomething, and we have the money
for it, we do it.
Um, if we want to go buysomething, we have the money for
it, we do it.
We don't, uh, we don't live outof our means.
So that's really nice.
Speaker 1 (22:23):
Yeah, Like you said, you know you, you plan it, but
you also like those times whereyou just kind of spend the money
but it's not like you're goingand dropping I don't know, you
know a million dollars on aLambo or something like that,
Like you're not going crazy withit but you're getting something
that you can afford it yeah,means or anything like that.
But then also, like you talkedabout earlier, okay, hey, we're
(22:44):
wanting to do this, we're goingto pay off the house, so we
can't do some of these otherthings right now and everything.
But again, it's all about thatcommunication for sure.
So now you said you have oneemployee.
Actually you picked up a secondemployee here recently, kind of
helping doing some admin stuff,and you run a second business
doing garage doors.
So there's clearly a lot ofcommunication there as well.
(23:06):
I've been loving the spousalcommunication, which I think is
a huge thing, especially asbusiness owners we need to get
better at.
But we also need to get betteron the business front too, and
I'm a big advocate of sayingthat 90% plus of all her
problems come down to a lack ofcommunication.
So how are you communicatingwhen it comes to the employees
(23:30):
you have and now that you havetwo separate businesses I know
the garage one's still kind oflike up and coming.
It's a pretty fresh thing, buthow are you planning with that
as well, on starting tocommunicate that and really
separate the two businesses andworkloads and everything?
Speaker 2 (23:46):
My, uh, I don't know I, when we talked about it
before, um, the guy that worksfor me now, you know he kind of,
he just fell into my lap.
Um was working on a job and hewanted to learn how to weld.
And, uh, we took it from there.
And I, whenever he firststarted helping me at the shop,
he said, well, what do you wantthis to be?
And I said, man, just justenough for me.
And you, you know, um, we'llmake decent salaries.
(24:08):
And uh, get it up to where wecan make decent salaries and
we'll just quit it there.
And then, uh, you know mydreams as they are, they keep
getting bigger and bigger.
And um, I came to him and I waslike, hey, you know, in in a
year, this is you, I'm done withthe welding company, it's all
you.
And he was like, man, I don't,I know nothing about business,
like I'm going to crash it intothe ground.
(24:29):
And I was like, okay, well,that's probably not the right
way to do this.
So, um, learning over the lastfew years for sure with him, um,
instilling that faith in himthat he can do it, um, I mean,
he does everything on thewelding side.
Now I've probably put a hood onfor maybe 150 hours this year,
(24:50):
um, which is nothing as far aswelders go.
He does everything you know,and it making sure he knows
where he's appreciated.
Um, make sure he knows that, uh, when he's doing a good job and
that kind of stuff and uh, notlike this whole build him up to
give him a big head.
But you know, if he kills it ona project, just do you freaking
killed it.
You know, um.
But also that when he screws up, you know, don't you idiot?
(25:15):
You know, get out of here.
You screwed this up and youcost me money.
Um, us growing together andlearning together.
Um was a circuit boardtechnician actually before he
came to work for us or for me,and I taught him the welding
trade and, like I said, he doeseverything now, so kind of
getting to mold him to the waythat I think it should be done
(25:38):
and he has his own way of doingstuff for sure and knowing too,
just in business, that, yeah, itcan be yours, yeah, you can be
that dick hard person of it's myway or no way, but that's not
always the right way.
He came into the shop zerofabrication skills at all and
(25:58):
he's making suggestions on stuffand my pride is like, well the
hell, no, this is my businessand I've been doing this for 14
years now.
You know well, you're not goingto tell me how to do this.
And then it's like man, thatwas better, um, and that's a
tough pill for you know,especially somebody like me.
Like I said with the church camp, deal it, uh, I always wanted
(26:19):
it to be my way or no way, um,and there's plenty of ways to
skin a cat.
It's all just in, um, and howyou want to do it and how much
you want to listen, um, somaking sure that he knows his
voice is heard.
Um, or even my sister, she'sthe one that I hired on as the
admin, um, she's new to it, shewanted to start her own business
, so I hired her and, um, shecomes to me with an idea and
(26:42):
it's like, I don't know, I havean opinion on it, but ultimately
, I'm giving that responsibilityto you.
So if it fails, we'll figure itout, we'll learn the lesson and
move on.
There's only one way, only twoways of doing it.
Speaker 1 (26:58):
You're either going to succeed or you're going to
learn lessons and it sounds likethe these two, the people your
sister and the other employeekind of fell into your lap, but
it's also these been people thatreally don't have the
experience but you're kind oftaking them under your wing.
Why, why do you think that thatis that you're doing that,
(27:20):
rather than, especially with thewelder, really getting
something, somebody withexperience, and just kind of
molding them into more of whatyou want for the business?
Speaker 2 (27:31):
Yeah, I had a welder instructor through Votek.
I just wanted to be a welder,knew that I could make a bunch
of money doing it and I had adecent concept of how to do it.
And, uh, he was an oldpipeliner and he, he took me
under his wing, man, and there'sa.
There's been a lot of peoplewho have done that for me.
(27:52):
Um, and life changing.
Um, doors open, whatever youwant to say, you know I can give
them all the credit in theworld and they'll say, oh, you
know, it wasn't me, it was you,but the the doors opened, and I
don't know that that's been avery big thing in my life.
(28:12):
Um, whether I fell intosomebody else's lap in the right
time and it just happened to uhmold me the right way, um, or
whatever.
But a lot of people took a lotof chances on me, I feel like,
over the years, um of being agreen welder or uh or whatever,
um mechanic or whatever it was Iwas doing at the time and uh
took me under the wing andtaught me and uh, I felt like I
was smart enough to shut up andlisten, um, when they were
(28:35):
trying to teach me those lessonsand uh, I just happened to have
two of them kind of fall intomy lap and, uh, I guess paying
my dues would be the only way Icould put it, giving back to
what's been given to me.
Speaker 1 (28:46):
You know, what's interesting is, I feel like
that's a similar thing for me,that I like to help kind of that
underdog or that person that'sreally kind of overlooked a lot
of times, because that's howI've always felt all my life
Like I was always overlooked forthat opportunity and I had to
find ways to create that orreally just go about doing it
myself and then somehow gettingthe recognition or getting into
(29:10):
the right spot and everythinglike that.
So I always try and do that forother people or, as I'm given
that opportunity to leadsomebody or, you know, mentor
them, I make sure I give them asmuch as I can and give them all
the advice that I can as well.
Because of that, because it'slike I wish I would have had
that in that same position andeverything.
(29:30):
It's funny how we do that.
Speaker 2 (29:32):
It probably sounds a little stupid to some people,
but you know five years ago whyI think the other businesses
didn't go as good as it wasmoney.
I was very money hungry.
I wanted all the money off, allthe jobs and I was going to pay
nickels and dimes to everybodyelse whether it was a friend of
mine who helped me or my dad, itdidn't matter, I wanted it all.
(29:52):
So now I get the mostfulfillment out of it.
Yes, the business makes money,yes, whatever.
But whenever he does a job thatthis you know, this week he's
been working on some enginestands for a sprint car company
or sprint car team and uh, he'snever been pipe, really, you
(30:12):
know, he's never, um, welded abunch of round tube, um, and it
kicked his ass, you know.
And but at the end of the week,the, the job's about done and,
uh, they're killer, they lookgreat, they, they fit up, fit up
great.
He done an awesome job.
Yes, he had some problems goingthrough it, but looking at the
product, he's never done thisbefore and he's getting in there
(30:36):
, he's figuring it out and he'smaking it better.
It just I get the gratificationout of that and seeing, you know
, when we do we done a big 70foot wide entryway on a big shop
um up in Missouri and I go upand really high profile client
and he, uh, he walks up, man,he's patting me on the back
about how great everything looksand I'm like I didn't do
anything, like all I did washauled it up here today for him.
(30:57):
He built it all in the shop andI helped him move it out with
the skid steer, that's it.
And then he goes over there andhe starts praising him, you
know, and uh, to see his eyeskind of light up.
You know, yeah, I did that, youknow that was me.
Um, damn right, that was me.
You know, kind of get a littlestep in his step a little bit,
where, where he knows thegratification.
So I get, I get a goodenjoyment out of that seeing
(31:20):
other people succeed.
Speaker 1 (31:21):
Now yeah, and that is a great feeling, like Like when
you're there you know you couldhave done the work, but
somebody else did it instead,but you were there kind of
guiding them or giving them thatopportunity to be able to do
that.
I mean, it's just that's anamazing feeling.
Speaker 2 (31:37):
Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 1 (31:39):
Yeah, definitely that's how I feel with some
interns that I've led and stufflike that, other people that
I've led, and then even with myemployees as they get those
opportunities to do that andeverything.
It's just amazing to watch themget excited and light up,
especially with the new businessthat I've started and
everything.
Really just giving employeesthat opportunity to be able to
(31:59):
work with other business ownershas just been awesome to see.
It's like such a win-winsituation, I guess.
Win-win-win situation becausethey have an opportunity to do
the things that they like to do,but then also the business
owner gets to get rid of some ofthe things that they don't want
to do or get some things thatare actually going to start
actually being done that theyhave been kind of neglecting
(32:20):
because they didn't have thattime and everything.
So it yeah, it's just awesometo be able to see that.
But even with my interns asthey figure things out and they
go through and work out theproblem.
Or even my, my daughter uh,really cool to be able to see
that as well, though she wasprobably I don't know one and a
half, two years old, somethinglike that at the time, and she
was trying to get a stuffedanimal out out of her crib and
she kept trying to like lift itup.
And then she gets to the top ofthe crib.
(32:40):
And she kept trying to likelift it up.
And then she gets to the top ofthe crib and she gets stuck on
the rail.
I'm like, look, you know, reachover with the other hand and
grab it.
And then she finally did it.
I kind of had to help her, showher, and then she figured it
out and the next time we go inthere she grabs it and I was
like that is so cool just to seeher figure.
(33:03):
They start to develop and growlike that and everything.
Speaker 2 (33:06):
Yeah, yeah, he has to , uh, he definitely has to
remind me like, hey, you know,I'm I'm not really a welder and
I'm not really a fabricator.
Um, because I do, I put allthat that uh responsibility on
his shoulders now, and, andhe'll come to me every once in a
while.
It's hey, I, I've never donethis.
I'm like, oh go, do this.
Well, I've never done that.
I, I don't even know how tostart that process, oh crap,
(33:28):
okay, well, let me help you, letme walk you through it for just
a second.
And then, typically, he does itand and, as bad as I hate to
admit, 90 of the time it'sbetter than what I would have
done.
So, uh, because he's still,he's so attention to detail.
And I'm thinking, hey, get itit done, get it out, get it done
, get it out.
You know he, he wants toperfect everything.
Speaker 1 (33:46):
Yeah, yeah, and so talk to us through that process.
I mean, it's with welding,obviously it's a very physical
thing, uh.
But I I think about, you know,like standard operator
procedures and stuff like that,things that are maybe more
technical, or like websitedevelopment, stuff like that.
That's more like acomputer-based thing, maybe a
(34:10):
little bit more difficult to youknow, show hands-on if you will
, and and get somebody trainedup.
But how do you work throughwith him like hey, I'm giving
you this task, and then yourealize, oh, he doesn't know
what he's doing.
So what does that process kindof look like of how you go about
training him up so he can thentake it on and do it himself?
Speaker 2 (34:29):
I mean, a lot of this stuff is just, you know, uh,
you know this is the way I woulddo it and and kind of roll
through the way I would do it,you know, like bending out the
pipe or whatever, um, or runninga bead for the first time.
You know, hey, this is how I doit.
Um, I'm not going to say thatit's the best way.
There's definitely more ways toskin a cat than one.
Um, do what fits you, you know,and he'll do it, and it might
(34:49):
look like crap or he might screwit up, and we both come back to
the table and, okay, um, Iwould change this, this and this
.
You know, and you might do this.
Um, if it's running a bead andyou know you're pulling it too
fast, slow down, you know, orwhatever it may You're turning
your wire, speed up, um, he'lltry it and and just learn.
Um, because my dad always usedto preach really hard that I can
(35:11):
give you all the the lessons tolife, but if you don't fall on
your face, you're not going tolearn anything.
Um, so that I'm a very bigbaptism by fire type person.
It uh, you, uh, you're going tolearn the fastest and the best
whenever it's it's crunch timewhen you're, when you're putting
all that helmet, pull out onthe track.
(35:32):
So, um, whether it's the rightway or not, I don't know, but it
definitely is the way I learnedthe best, um, and it's worked
out okay for him so far.
Speaker 1 (35:40):
So, yeah, yeah, I mean, that's how I am too, but
I've noticed a lot of businessowners.
It's like they want to makesure the SOPs in place, that the
all these things are theretogether, and while that's, I'm
not going to say it's not a badthing.
Not, it's not a bad thing to dothat.
But I find a lot of times thatbusiness owners it's really
their, their crutch, it's a wayfor them to procrastinate.
(36:02):
Actually delegating that taskor getting somebody else to do
that work is oh, I got to createthe SOP.
No, I think the way that you doit and that's the way I like to
do it too, hey, here's a task,start working on it.
If you've got questions, let meknow, or maybe we'll review it
a little bit real quick.
Depending on what the task is,how complex it is, we'll go
through it real quick or I'lltry and show you an example.
(36:24):
Or even like one thing I dowith, like social media.
Like, hey, here's an idea thatI want to do that I get my VA to
start doing, and then it's likeokay, here's some examples of
like some reels or posts orwhatever it is.
Let's see if we can replicatesomething like that.
Okay, cool, and now they've gotan example and they try it and
then I review it afterwards.
It's not like, okay, go aheadand post it when you're done,
(36:46):
like no, let's review it andeverything, make sure you know,
ask those questions.
But yeah, really that thatbaptism by fire, like you were
saying, I like that saying tolearn is really a hands-on
approach.
So you actually did it and nowyou can know what you need to
(37:06):
actually work on.
Speaker 2 (37:06):
And yeah, when you're like him with this job that
we're doing now, he comes to meand he's like, hey, we need you
know, I don't know how much itwas.
It was like we need 300 feet oftubing and it's like, let's go
ahead and order 400 feet.
Well, we don't need that much.
This is our first time doingthis.
This is your first time doingthis.
This is your first time doingthis, like, let's just order
some extra, it'd be okay, we'regoing to learn, you know, and,
(37:26):
oh, we ended up going through,you know, 60 feet to try to get
it down.
Or you know, whatever it is.
It's arbitrary numbers, but weended up going through some
material to learn how to do it,but it's 100% perfect.
You know they're're, they lookperfect, they're bent, perfect,
they're nice and straight.
Um and that, that, thatlearning.
You know, I can go down therefor him and I can give him those
(37:48):
measurements and all that um onjobs, but he doesn't know how
to get those on the next oneyeah, um, so if it's a, if it's
a bend radius and it's going togrow x amount of inches on the
bend, um, I can tell him that.
But baptism by fire, you don'tlearn that until you screwed it
up.
Um, and most people not all,but most people are only going
(38:09):
to screw up so many times beforethey get it right.
Um, uh, they're not going tojust keep screwing it up, just
to keep screwing it up.
Um, and I got lucky with him.
He's a perfectionist and helikes it in certain ways, so
he's, uh, he's going to screw itup a couple of times, but the
third or fourth time it's goingto be just all the perfect.
Speaker 1 (38:26):
So, and that's another good point right there.
I think that's another reasonwhy people don't delegate things
or try and get somebody else tostart taking over those tasks,
because it's like, well, it'sjust going to cost more, like
whether material or additionaltime that it takes, but it's
also you're not having to dothat now, Like now somebody else
is doing that, whether they aretechnically paid less than you
(38:49):
or not, you can go on and dosomething else.
Yes, you might have to go backand check on them, but wouldn't
you rather do only 10% of thework, like going back and
checking and maybe you do athing or two here versus 100% of
it?
Let somebody else do 90% of it,even if it takes them 150%
longer than you would have taken.
Speaker 2 (39:10):
Dustin Hooten was a big one.
Me and Dustin are pretty goodfriends and when I was starting
to grow and got Greg to comework for me, I was like man, I
can't let go.
I want to do every weld, I wantto do every cut, I want to do
every bend, I want to do every,everything, you know, I can't
let go.
And he said dude, you're,you're screwing yourself, you.
You can't do that.
You know, as far as yourdelegation there, it, if you do
(39:34):
everything, you're not teachingthem anything, it's you have to
let go of those reins and youhave to if you're going to grow
and you're going to getemployees.
You're going to go through atime span there where you feel
like you're hitting your headagainst the wall of.
You know, man, I could havedone this better and it would
have saved me money and I couldhave had X amount of $100 more
on this job.
But he still doesn't know.
(39:55):
So you're still having to do it.
You're still having to be underthe hood all the time.
You're still having to do 95%of the work.
So rip the freaking Band-Aidoff and let's learn.
I'll learn how to help you, youlearn how to do it, and let's
both learn together and let'sgrow this business.
And again just got lucky thistime around and all the cards
(40:16):
lined up and it worked outperfect.
He was eager to learn and hewas eager to learn, and and I
was eager to uh to learn, and mylearning was to let go and, um,
you know, stuff's going toscrew up and there is more than
one way to skin a cat.
Um, I don't care how many timesyou tell me that I still don't
like it.
Um, I want it to be my way, buthe's, he's proving me wrong.
(40:38):
Um, every day.
Uh, he, he does it as good, ifnot better, than I do, day in
and day out.
Speaker 1 (40:51):
And yeah, hard to say , but it's the truth, yeah, I
love it.
And so, besides Dustin tellingyou you need to get out of your
own head, how did you changethat mindset to start actually
giving that work away, and notyou just constantly feeling like
I got to be in it?
Speaker 2 (41:03):
that work away, and not you just constantly feeling
like I got to be in it, I got todo it myself, kind of thing.
I don't know, I got a.
I got a really big um.
I hate to say stiffy, but I gota really big um interest, I
guess, in teaching.
You know all about that time too, um, so going to, uh, you know,
if we were going to go run aweld or whatever, teaching him
how I do it, and then he'd say,well, let's try this.
(41:25):
Oh, dang, now I'm actuallylearning a little bit from him
as well.
So we kind of both of usbecoming the teacher student
there, I guess in an aspect ofyou know, I've got 15 years
experience.
But it's one way I was kind ofraised by those Vietnam people
that it was this way and thatwas the only way, and damn it,
(41:46):
you're not going to do it adifferent way, um.
But whenever you start doingthat back and forth, he had a
fresh new look on it.
Um, looking at it from theoutside, he had a little
different perspective, I guesswould be the right word to say,
on how to complete a task and uh, so more or less or less, I
mean, he was teaching me just asmuch as I was teaching him um.
So I think that's probably whatmade it go so great.
(42:09):
I can't say if if he wouldn'thave been as uh apt to want to
learn, it may not win as smooth.
So I will say, some of that wasI just flat out got lucky yeah,
yeah sounds like a little bit,but I mean it sounds like you.
Speaker 1 (42:22):
you definitely opened up and obviously talking with
business owners like Dustin andeverything really helped you
really get over that ledge andget out of your own way.
Really let that ego you know,get that ego and check and
everything, so you couldactually do that.
And so what's next?
I know we briefly mentioned alittle bit, but what's next for
Powell Fabrication and thegarage business?
Speaker 2 (42:45):
Oh, I got big goals, big dreams.
I lost a huge manufacturingcontract last year, just not
knowing how to bid and stuff.
So I've got an arbitrary numberof where I want the companies
to be in a few years, number ofwhere I want the companies to be
(43:07):
in a few years.
But as far as my heart goals is, I want to have two employees
on both sides full time and thenI want everybody to be making
good salaries to where, wheneverthey have those bad days that
they turn around and look attheir bank account.
It's like it really wasn't thatbad I can go back tomorrow.
You know, because, uh, being apeople person a little bit more
now, um, I want to grow the, thecircle I guess I call it.
(43:30):
You know, the people around me.
I want to grow that to a reallygood group of people.
That's unstoppable.
I feel like that would be, um,you know, in the next couple
years that'd probably be thebest um business, business move,
essentially that I could do Umform that group, make sure they
know I have their back and uh,and vice versa, and we can all
(43:50):
just build and go dominate.
Speaker 1 (43:53):
I like it, man.
So some great goals right there.
I know you got more than thatin the, in the picture and
everything, but yeah, greatright there.
You know, really working onbuilding out that culture would
be huge to help with that.
I mean, good salary is alwaysnice, but the culture really, to
me, is what really keeps peoplewithin a company.
Of course, security also goodpay, but yeah, I mean there's a
(44:15):
lot of things that go into it.
But yeah, I know you'lldefinitely do that.
But Richard man appreciate.
But Richard man appreciate youcoming on the show.
If people want to follow yousee what you're doing with the
business and everything, where'sthe best place for them to
reach out to you?
Speaker 2 (44:27):
Pal Fabrication on Facebook, pal Fab on YouTube and
then pfnwacom.
So, yeah, we've got a fewYouTube videos out there from
shop projects and stuff we'vedone and hopefully in the next
year these cars behind me willbe doing a big expansion and
those will be sitting on aconcrete second floor and anyway
(44:49):
, yeah, cool stuff in the making.
But anyway, that's for anothervideo.
Speaker 1 (44:54):
Well, sounds great, man.
Richard, thanks again forcoming on the show.
Speaker 2 (44:57):
Yeah, thanks man, I appreciate it.
Thanks for having me.
What's up guys?
Welcome back to another episode.
We've got Richard here and heis a welder from Northwest
Arkansas, a big dreamer,sticking to the plan, literally
living out his life that heplanned at the ripe old age of
12 years old.
He is the owner of PowellFabrication, which is a CNC
(00:22):
plasma cutting and customfabrication company, and he is
there in the shop right now thathe dreamed out.
But we're going to be talkingabout how he went through his
dream, how he communicates as aleader and business owner and
husband and father andeverything, and just have a
really good conversation heretoday.
But, richard, welcome to theshow.
Speaker 2 (00:43):
Thanks, man, glad to be here.
Speaker 1 (00:44):
Yeah, and this is.
You said your second podcast,right, so you're a huge expert.
Speaker 2 (00:51):
Yeah, I shot the one a few weeks ago and it was here
Yep, here's your name.
And he's like, yeah, best thing, just hop right into it.
And I was like, okay, but afterthe end of it I kind of got a
little stiffy for him it's kindof fun.
So.
Speaker 1 (01:04):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, I know we had talked about
scheduling it and everything andyou're like, yeah, I'm hooked
on it.
So talk to me about that realquick, because I think a lot of
people find podcasting daunting.
Maybe hosting is definitelydaunting.
Guesting, I would say, is alittle bit easier, but it's
still kind of a scary thing Likewhat are we going to be?
Asked what's going to happen onthe podcast, and, of course,
every podcast a little bitdifferent.
(01:25):
But talk to me about thatexperience and how that got you
actually hooked on wanting to beon more podcasts yeah, so I uh
reached out to a friend in therbo deal and and said and got it
scheduled.
Speaker 2 (01:37):
and uh got on there and was pretty nervous
beforehand.
But you know, just like talkingwith you, it's like talking to
an old friend.
You know, devin done a reallygood job and I just, I don't
know, I got in there and heasked a lot of questions that
made me think a lot.
So it hasn't came out yet, so Idon't know if I looked really
good or really stupid, but butyeah, it was really fun to just
(01:57):
to dive into this stuff.
That is very important to meand I think I have a good aspect
on it.
It may not be everybody's orthe most popular opinion, but uh
, but yeah it was cool to diveinto it and I don't know kind of
made you feel like somebody, Iguess, a little bit.
So I guess that's probablywhere it uh where made me the um
(02:19):
most attracted to it?
I guess would be the nice wayto say it.
Speaker 1 (02:22):
Nice man.
Well, I'd let your wife knowthat she needs to start making
you feel more special, becauseotherwise you got to keep going
on podcasts.
Speaker 2 (02:33):
Just kidding there.
Speaker 1 (02:34):
Yeah, podcasts are always so much fun.
It's definitely a joy to be ahost and host people on the
podcast, especially people likeyou that haven't been on
podcasts too many times.
But then also having theexperience people but then also
getting on people's podcasts.
It's always a pleasure to beable to be on somebody's podcast
, whether they're a veteran atit or they're fairly new also
and Devin is an awesome guy,awesome podcast host and
(02:57):
everything Great.
First one to be on, excited tohave you for the second one.
Speaker 2 (03:01):
Yeah, for sure it was .
It was cool to see hisperspective of doing stuff and,
uh, I don't know, like I said,if I can put my two cents out
there and hopefully it helpssomebody.
Um, yeah, hopefully, hopefullyeverybody gets to get a positive
out of both of them.
Speaker 1 (03:13):
So yeah, yeah for sure.
So let's let's take things back.
So you started your journey at12 years old, having this vision
, and clearly you're living outthat vision now.
So how did that come about?
I mean, and I guess for someperspective, how old are you
right now?
Speaker 2 (03:30):
Uh, so I'm 28,.
I'll turn 29 here in about amonth, a little over a month.
And uh, yeah, so my dad uh grewup, my dad was uh, drove race
cars and stuff my entire life.
And you know, just like I saidbefore, you wreck race cars and
you got to fix them up and uh,so that's where the fabrication
side came from.
And then, kind of growing up onthe farm stuff, um, you know,
(03:53):
you don't have enough money topay everybody to do stuff.
So you, you, obviously youlearn how to fix stuff and adapt
and overcome.
But uh, yeah, me and my dadactually, um, were driving past
this piece of property to gofishing and uh, dad lives about
a mile and a half down the road.
And I told dad I was like, man,I'm gonna buy that someday.
And dad was like, yeah, youknow whatever.
Well then, you know, multipletimes driving by it, I stopped
(04:16):
and walked up on it and kind ofstarted mapping it out and, um,
yeah, at 12 years old may havebeen 13, but I'm pretty sure it
was 12.
I went home and drew up a set ofblueprints and it had a 5,000
square foot shop and an L-shapedhouse off of it.
The only thing that changed waswe moved the house from one
side to the other so that youdidn't have to drive by all the
(04:38):
construction crap to get to thenice house.
So, yeah, we've stuck to theplan and a lot of doors have
opened up.
As far as the welding side, Istarted this business three
times, failed three times andthen finally PalFab started and
it stuck.
So we're right at four yearsactually, october was kind of
(05:00):
the birthday for for four yearsand, yeah, just going hard and
living the dream every day andtaking everything that I can and
taking lessons and failures andturning it into good stuff.
Speaker 1 (05:14):
Talk to us about that .
That's very interesting thatyou started and failed three
times and still went for afourth time especially, I think,
nowadays we think that you'vegot to have instant success,
that it's just an easy thing,you're overnight millionaire
success, all those things andclearly it might almost seem
(05:35):
like idiocracy or something thatyou went and redid the same
business essentially four times,but finally that fourth time it
was successful.
Business essentially four times, but finally that fourth time
it was successful.
So talk to us through thatmindset behind that, because
that seems very bizarre forsomebody to go and redo the same
business and I know I'm sureyou learned from that as well
(05:56):
like you literally made the samemistakes but you still tried
and tried and tried again untilyou started finding that success
.
Speaker 2 (06:03):
Yeah, I'd say.
I mean really.
It may sound stupid to somepeople, but to me the biggest
thing was faith.
So I started the business threetimes in a little town I was
living in and at the time anddoing farm work and stuff,
didn't know how to priceanything, didn't know how to
keep cash flow stuff going, andjust kind of bouncing in between
(06:25):
jobs on the road and thought,oh, I got enough money saved up
to try it this time and I coulddo it for five or six months and
then obviously all the cash isgone.
I just tried to do it coldturkey every time I started and
it just obviously, as everybodyknows, that's not how you do it.
And then so the same story allthree times.
(06:46):
Thought I had enough cash tostart it, thought I had enough
clientele base built up to do it, which was like a whole
whopping five people.
And then actually I was settingon this property the dream
place we call it and a guy pullsup in the yard just to
introduce himself just you know,be neighborly.
Up in the yard, just tointroduce himself, just you know
(07:07):
, be neighborly.
And I had on a shirt that saidPowell Welding Company or
something.
I don't remember what it was atthe time and he said hey, you
know, I work for a place downthe road.
And he said we need welders andor a welder.
And I said I kick rocks, dude,like I'm not interested.
I just came home off the road.
I was ready to be done with it.
A friend of mine owned a remodelbusiness and I was going to go
(07:31):
help him build his company up towhere he had something to
bounce back on and this guy justkept showing up.
About the third or fourth timeI finally was like okay, you
know, like I'll look at what yougot just to shut you up.
I'm tired of hearing from you.
I go down there and it's abunch of work right off the bat.
Enough money to buy machinesand get everything off the
(07:58):
ground the right way.
We established another LLC andwent for it yet again, didn't
really know how it was going togo this time, but knew I wasn't
going to fail.
Um, so I bounced back and forthin between the welding company
and a church camp.
I was helping out them um, justdo general maintenance stuff.
And uh, actually April of Ithink it was 21,.
(08:18):
Me and my wife came togetherand she was like, hey, you know,
you got to do what makes youhappy.
Um and and and, go whole hog atit, like I was getting kind of
frustrated with what I was doingand some of the stuff that was
going on and uh, just on thechurch camp side, or just that
fact you're yeah yeah, just theway it was.
Not that anybody was doinganything wrong.
(08:39):
I'm a very big person on it'smy way or no way.
And uh, I've grown out of thatnow, um, thankfully.
But uh, it wasn't going.
You know, they'd ask me and Iwas like this is the way it's
going to be and they wouldn't doit and it just made me mad.
Um, but yeah, the big man, he,uh, he kept pointing me in the
right direction and we said,okay, in april we were gonna do
(08:59):
it all on our own.
Um, this was where my heart wasin the business.
And like, the next day thephone rings and it's a quarter
mile offense and that that jobfloats us for three months or so
, and it gave me enough time toget the next job started and the
next job started and now we'rebooked out three months.
So it's, it's been a journey,it's been a blast.
Speaker 1 (09:22):
Yeah, that that is awesome and it's funny how
things just really kind of startlike that and unfortunately,
you had all these hiccups at thebeginning I'll call them
hiccups lessons learned andeverything there at the
beginning, but whenever it wasfinally, it was that time that
was supposed to happen.
I think that faith is reallywhere that set in.
You had other plans like inplace, where it wasn place,
(09:43):
where you solely depended onthat, and so you really had
something else that made it,where you weren't almost
desperate for that work andeverything.
But then just how that workends up coming along and then
you're just more prepared for itthat time.
Okay, we're going to see whatwe get here, but we're going to
save up.
But then also that support ofthe spouse, this huge thing that
(10:05):
is so beneficial.
And I mean being in mastermindgroups like we're in.
We hear about people all thetime whether they're male or
female.
It tends to be more males inthese groups and so then it's
more of the female spouse.
That isn't on board necessarily, and that is such a huge
disadvantage for these businessowners, because it is a
(10:27):
difficult journey.
No matter if you're one year or20 years into the business.
There's always these levels ofdifficulty and everything.
So talk to us about that,because was your wife kind of on
board throughout each one ofthese individual ventures until
the finally the successful one,or was it not really till that
(10:47):
fourth attempt that she started?
Speaker 2 (10:49):
it was like, okay, like she's on board with you and
everything no man, I, I tell mywife that she's uh, she's
probably the worst wife as faras money goes, because I can
come to her with an idea andwaste a lot of time and a lot of
paper and and it's a hundredthousand dollars.
But I know that it's going tomake us this and she goes okay,
do it like I.
(11:10):
I believe in you.
You know, if you truly believethat it's going to work, it's
going to work and we've beat ourheads against the wall on some
stuff and and it's uh likegetting our house paid off.
You know it's, hey, I want tospend x amount of dollars a
month, um, and by June of nextyear, our house is going to be
paid off, you know, and it'slike, well, it's gonna, we got
(11:31):
to sacrifice for a little bit.
But if you think this is whatit's going to be, you know she's
always been, um, I've been withher for 10 years, almost 11
years now, and every aspect itdoesn't matter if it was race
cars or business or, uh, justbuilding the house or whatever
it was always she was rightthere by my hip and I I feel
(11:51):
very bad for a lot of thosepeople who don't have that
companion like I do, cause man,when the big man, when the big
man made my wife, he uh best,best woman on the face of this
earth by hands down.
She's a big man in her all, allthe gratitude for the success,
the littlest success that I'veseen.
(12:12):
I couldn't do without either oneof them, for sure.
Speaker 1 (12:15):
And it sounds like there's a lot of communication
there as well, which is a reallyimportant aspect, especially
when it comes to the businessand finances and everything.
Finances is like the first orsecond thing reason why most
marriages end in divorce isbecause of finances.
I think there's it's one or twoand I can't remember which is
the other of those, but yeah, Imean, it's a, it's a huge, um, a
(12:40):
thing that makes a marriage notwork, and everything.
And it sounds like you're verygood at communicating these
things, even even if they'rewild.
You know, you just uh, wildhair idea that you just had and
everything.
So how how do you typically goabout communicating those things
?
Good, that's important for usas leaders, as business owners,
(13:01):
as husbands, for us to reallycommunicate with our spouse.
So how are you going about thecommunicating these different
things?
Speaker 2 (13:09):
I mean, like in the beginning it was always.
You know, I just got a wildhair and this is what I think is
going to happen, and then nowit's hey, you know, this is the
idea.
I come to her with pros andcons of everything.
Sometimes there's more consthan pros.
She's not all the time justhappy-go-lucky of oh, it's
(13:32):
always going to work and this isalways going to be great.
Sometimes it's like, hey,dipshit, we need to reel this
back a little bit and let's waitthree months.
Right now, probably.
Right now probably isn't themost the best time.
You know we're about to hit thelittle bit of slow season.
So you know it's going to behard to put the bill on this, or
if we use up all of our cashflow, you know.
(13:54):
So she's always that other sideof that.
That token, I always try tobring the like I said at least
four or five pros and four orfive cons of every idea that we
do.
Like I said at least four orfive pros and four or five cons
of every idea that we do.
And then she kind of thinks onit for a few minutes or maybe a
couple of days and we kind ofcome back to the table and it's
probably just how much I bringit up, whether she says OK, you
(14:16):
know, do it and shut up, or orthis, probably you haven't
brought it up enough, so weprobably got to wait on it a
little bit.
Speaker 1 (14:24):
That's funny, yeah, and women have a very good
discernment when it comes to alot of these things as well.
But then, like you said,sometimes if you're bringing it
up enough times, you've probablythought through a lot of it or
something that you maybe maybeit's just you're really
passionate about it and you wantto try it out, and so it's one
of those things.
Okay, you know there's a lot ofpassion there.
Richard has that passion.
(14:45):
Let me go ahead and give thatapproval, so to speak, and
everything.
Even though y'all are apartnership, it's still nice to
get the kind of all clear kindof thing and everything.
That's something that we shouldwork on, and I think that's
something as well a lot of timesthat as adults, we feel like we
don't necessarily need thatquote unquote approval from our
(15:06):
spouse, and it's not necessarilylike approval to say, okay, I
can do something, I havepermission from the authority
figure, but it's more just like,hey, are we on the same page
before I make this decision?
Because it is both of us atthis point in everything and and
I guess you know, with thesituation, is it like just
you're the one making the moneyor she also doing her own thing
(15:27):
too, or what's that situationthere?
Cause that that changes thosedynamics as well.
Speaker 2 (15:36):
Yeah, she's an RN, so she, uh, she does very well.
Uh, we, uh, from the beginning,um, we've I had a school
teacher.
Um, I worked with her husbandpouring concrete for one winter,
just helping him.
And I was talking aboutproposing to Grace and, you know
, making a life out of it, and Isaid, but we'll keep separate
accounts.
My money is my money and hermoney is her money.
(15:57):
And he looked me dead in theeye and he said if you can't
trust the woman that you lovewith something as stupid as a
dollar bill, he said it'll neverwork.
And I was like man, that's.
You know, money is so high oneverybody's priority list and
today's day and age you can'tlive without it.
But my wife and I we always.
(16:17):
She was buying clothes thislast weekend, which she never
does, but she was buying clothesfor herself and it was like
babe, it's $200.
You know, I don't know that wecan spend the $200, you know
it's on me and I'm like it'smoney.
You know like, we're not stupidwith our money, you deserve it,
you know.
So, everything it's not like.
It's not like I'm going to aboard meeting and I'm trying to
(16:39):
sell an idea every time we talkabout stuff, but it's it's a yes
or no from from both of us andit's, uh, 95% of the stuff.
Um, it's a joint decision.
Um, because we know if it, ifit makes us better, it was
because we both wanted it, andif it makes us fail, it's
because we both wanted it.
Um, we don't go into anythingwith fingers pointed at the
(17:02):
other way of of uh, oh well.
Anything with fingers pointedat the other way of of uh, oh
well, you said this or you saidthat it's no, we made this
decision together and uh, andwe're sticking to it.
There's no, there's nothingthat comes in between us, and
damn sure not a dollar bill.
Speaker 1 (17:15):
Yeah, yeah, man, and my wife just went out with some
friends like she's actually anRN also and went out some like
nursing friends and everything.
And one of them was talkingabout, yeah, you know, we're
going on this cruise and youknow we've got to split it, or
I've got to get the alcoholpackage because her husband
wants it, but they have alltheir bills separated.
It's like they went out to eatthe other night and he paid, and
(17:38):
now she's got to pay him backand all this stuff.
And it's like that is justcrazy.
And and that was one thing,like at first, my wife, you know
, we got married and, like youknow, we were I was 28 and she
was 30 when we got married, so alittle bit older, I guess, if
you will and so it was like kindof that independence.
And then we were trying to andit's that that kind of dance.
(17:59):
At the beginning you're tryingto figure out like what's going
to work, what systems work andand how y'all work together and
everything.
Now that you're combiningeverything after marriage and
that was one of the things I'mlike no, we are combining the
account, like I don't care, likewe're combining it now.
But it turns out that, like youknow, I'm just huge spender and
all I do is just spend all themoney.
We never have money that's, orvice versa.
(18:19):
Then, okay, maybe then weseparate it, but we're not like
that.
So it was like, just put it allin and we make about the same
right now.
So it's not like, oh, I'mmaking 400,000 a year and she's
only making 40,000.
So there's a 10 timesdifference.
But that was actually somethingI got advice from a friend
(18:40):
colleague when I was an intern,one of the engineers where I was
working at.
He was talking about that Like,hey, just put it together,
because what happens if you'retrying to split everything, if
you have all your billsseparated?
Now you split everything andgoing back to the $400,000
versus $40,000.
So do you have to payadditional to be able to meet my
10% for housing allowance?
(19:01):
Or do I have to get less of ahouse so we can get it at your
10% of your income housingallowance, so to speak, kind of
thing.
And so it's like somebody has tocompromise.
So, rather than doing that,just say, hey, here's our money,
$440,000 a year.
What are we going to do andspend on it?
And it just it makes it so muchmore simple and then so much
(19:23):
more transparent too, becausethen you can see where that
money's going, what's happening.
Not that you're trying to watchit over, you know, and comb
through it and look through itwith magnifying glass, but it's
just, it's there, it's our moneyrather than that's my money,
that's your money, and how arewe going to split bills?
I mean, that's yeah, it makesit so nasty not to do that.
Speaker 2 (19:43):
My wife's definitely the breadwinner and she'll hate
me for saying that, but she's.
She's helped float all my crazyideas.
And, yeah, there's none of thisBS.
At the end of the month, well,you spent more money than I did,
you know.
Or vice versa, which nine timesout of ten with me, especially
with business, it's I'm spendingmore money than than she is,
but there's, there's none ofthat.
(20:04):
I hate, I hate for thosecouples who, uh, who value
everything off of dollars.
Cause I got a lot of friendsthat are married and uh, yeah,
it's the same way.
We go out to eat and it's like,well, you need to pay me back
20 bucks for your steak later on.
It's like, what in the world,you know?
Um, at least treat them like wewere in high school and at
least pay for their dinner, forGod's sakes, you know, right, I
(20:24):
don't agree with it, but that'sjust me.
Speaker 1 (20:27):
Yeah, yeah, exactly, you know everybody's got their
own way, but I really I feelthat's the better way overall.
But once you're married, ifyou're dating, that's a totally
different story.
And I think in today's societynow it's it's hard to have only
one side pay for that andtypically society now it's, it's
hard to have only one side payfor that and typically that's
(20:47):
been the man that said to payfor that.
But that is so difficult.
Even do that.
I still think the first datethe guy should be paying for it.
But then after that, like splitit or like my wife and I, when
we were dating, it was back andforth, like I'd pay one time,
she'd pay another, and we justkind of went back and forth and
made it work out until we gotmarried and then we combined
everything and then it's justit's been so much better, so
it's yeah, but money is such animportant thing.
(21:08):
That's something we startedtalking about before we got
married too.
You know, we actually in likeshe brought up how much she made
first and want to know how muchI made and all this stuff, and
that was a little awkward atfirst.
I'm like, well, hey, you know,if we're gonna get serious like
let's have the conversation andtalk about that.
We talk about debts and stufflike that because I mean, that's
a big thing.
You could be in some serioustrouble if you marry somebody
(21:31):
thinking they're all debt freeand then it turns out they've
got hundreds of thousand dollarsin debt that they got to pay
back in a couple of years.
That could change finances veryquickly.
Speaker 2 (21:42):
Which for my wife and I, you know, it's a lot
different because we're highschool sweethearts We've
literally been there with nomoney.
I'm not going to say lots ofmoney.
Lots of money is skewed a lotof different ways, but what we
call a lot of money.
We've been with each otherthrough it all and never once
mad at each other cause wedidn't have any money, or mad at
(22:05):
each other because we had a lotof money.
Um, it's uh, it's always justbeen about us and, um, the money
is the money.
Um, if we want to go dosomething, and we have the money
for it, we do it.
Um, if we want to go buysomething, we have the money for
it, we do it.
We don't, uh, we don't live outof our means.
So that's really nice.
Speaker 1 (22:23):
Yeah, Like you said, you know you, you plan it, but
you also like those times whereyou just kind of spend the money
but it's not like you're goingand dropping I don't know, you
know a million dollars on aLambo or something like that,
Like you're not going crazy withit but you're getting something
that you can afford it yeah,means or anything like that.
But then also, like you talkedabout earlier, okay, hey, we're
(22:44):
wanting to do this, we're goingto pay off the house, so we
can't do some of these otherthings right now and everything.
But again, it's all about thatcommunication for sure.
So now you said you have oneemployee.
Actually you picked up a secondemployee here recently, kind of
helping doing some admin stuff,and you run a second business
doing garage doors.
So there's clearly a lot ofcommunication there as well.
(23:06):
I've been loving the spousalcommunication, which I think is
a huge thing, especially asbusiness owners we need to get
better at.
But we also need to get betteron the business front too, and
I'm a big advocate of sayingthat 90% plus of all her
problems come down to a lack ofcommunication.
So how are you communicatingwhen it comes to the employees
(23:30):
you have and now that you havetwo separate businesses I know
the garage one's still kind oflike up and coming.
It's a pretty fresh thing, buthow are you planning with that
as well, on starting tocommunicate that and really
separate the two businesses andworkloads and everything?
Speaker 2 (23:46):
My, uh, I don't know I, when we talked about it
before, um, the guy that worksfor me now, you know he kind of,
he just fell into my lap.
Um was working on a job and hewanted to learn how to weld.
And, uh, we took it from there.
And I, whenever he firststarted helping me at the shop,
he said, well, what do you wantthis to be?
And I said, man, just justenough for me.
And you, you know, um, we'llmake decent salaries.
(24:08):
And uh, get it up to where wecan make decent salaries and
we'll just quit it there.
And then, uh, you know mydreams as they are, they keep
getting bigger and bigger.
And um, I came to him and I waslike, hey, you know, in in a
year, this is you, I'm done withthe welding company, it's all
you.
And he was like, man, I don't,I know nothing about business,
like I'm going to crash it intothe ground.
(24:29):
And I was like, okay, well,that's probably not the right
way to do this.
So, um, learning over the lastfew years for sure with him, um,
instilling that faith in himthat he can do it, um, I mean,
he does everything on thewelding side.
Now I've probably put a hood onfor maybe 150 hours this year,
(24:50):
um, which is nothing as far aswelders go.
He does everything you know,and it making sure he knows
where he's appreciated.
Um, make sure he knows that, uh, when he's doing a good job and
that kind of stuff and uh, notlike this whole build him up to
give him a big head.
But you know, if he kills it ona project, just do you freaking
killed it.
You know, um.
But also that when he screws up, you know, don't you idiot?
(25:15):
You know, get out of here.
You screwed this up and youcost me money.
Um, us growing together andlearning together.
Um was a circuit boardtechnician actually before he
came to work for us or for me,and I taught him the welding
trade and, like I said, he doeseverything now, so kind of
getting to mold him to the waythat I think it should be done
(25:38):
and he has his own way of doingstuff for sure and knowing too,
just in business, that, yeah, itcan be yours, yeah, you can be
that dick hard person of it's myway or no way, but that's not
always the right way.
He came into the shop zerofabrication skills at all and
(25:58):
he's making suggestions on stuffand my pride is like, well the
hell, no, this is my businessand I've been doing this for 14
years now.
You know well, you're not goingto tell me how to do this.
And then it's like man, thatwas better, um, and that's a
tough pill for you know,especially somebody like me.
Like I said with the church camp, deal it, uh, I always wanted
(26:19):
it to be my way or no way, um,and there's plenty of ways to
skin a cat.
It's all just in, um, and howyou want to do it and how much
you want to listen, um, somaking sure that he knows his
voice is heard.
Um, or even my sister, she'sthe one that I hired on as the
admin, um, she's new to it, shewanted to start her own business
, so I hired her and, um, shecomes to me with an idea and
(26:42):
it's like, I don't know, I havean opinion on it, but ultimately
, I'm giving that responsibilityto you.
So if it fails, we'll figure itout, we'll learn the lesson and
move on.
There's only one way, only twoways of doing it.
Speaker 1 (26:58):
You're either going to succeed or you're going to
learn lessons and it sounds likethe these two, the people your
sister and the other employeekind of fell into your lap, but
it's also these been people thatreally don't have the
experience but you're kind oftaking them under your wing.
Why, why do you think that thatis that you're doing that,
(27:20):
rather than, especially with thewelder, really getting
something, somebody withexperience, and just kind of
molding them into more of whatyou want for the business?
Speaker 2 (27:31):
Yeah, I had a welder instructor through Votek.
I just wanted to be a welder,knew that I could make a bunch
of money doing it and I had adecent concept of how to do it.
And, uh, he was an oldpipeliner and he, he took me
under his wing, man, and there'sa.
There's been a lot of peoplewho have done that for me.
(27:52):
Um, and life changing.
Um, doors open, whatever youwant to say, you know I can give
them all the credit in theworld and they'll say, oh, you
know, it wasn't me, it was you,but the the doors opened, and I
don't know that that's been avery big thing in my life.
(28:12):
Um, whether I fell intosomebody else's lap in the right
time and it just happened to uhmold me the right way, um, or
whatever.
But a lot of people took a lotof chances on me, I feel like,
over the years, um of being agreen welder or uh or whatever,
um mechanic or whatever it was Iwas doing at the time and uh
took me under the wing andtaught me and uh, I felt like I
was smart enough to shut up andlisten, um, when they were
(28:35):
trying to teach me those lessonsand uh, I just happened to have
two of them kind of fall intomy lap and, uh, I guess paying
my dues would be the only way Icould put it, giving back to
what's been given to me.
Speaker 1 (28:46):
You know, what's interesting is, I feel like
that's a similar thing for me,that I like to help kind of that
underdog or that person that'sreally kind of overlooked a lot
of times, because that's howI've always felt all my life
Like I was always overlooked forthat opportunity and I had to
find ways to create that orreally just go about doing it
myself and then somehow gettingthe recognition or getting into
(29:10):
the right spot and everythinglike that.
So I always try and do that forother people or, as I'm given
that opportunity to leadsomebody or, you know, mentor
them, I make sure I give them asmuch as I can and give them all
the advice that I can as well.
Because of that, because it'slike I wish I would have had
that in that same position andeverything.
(29:30):
It's funny how we do that.
Speaker 2 (29:32):
It probably sounds a little stupid to some people,
but you know five years ago whyI think the other businesses
didn't go as good as it wasmoney.
I was very money hungry.
I wanted all the money off, allthe jobs and I was going to pay
nickels and dimes to everybodyelse whether it was a friend of
mine who helped me or my dad, itdidn't matter, I wanted it all.
(29:52):
So now I get the mostfulfillment out of it.
Yes, the business makes money,yes, whatever.
But whenever he does a job thatthis you know, this week he's
been working on some enginestands for a sprint car company
or sprint car team and uh, he'snever been pipe, really, you
(30:12):
know, he's never, um, welded abunch of round tube, um, and it
kicked his ass, you know.
And but at the end of the week,the, the job's about done and,
uh, they're killer, they lookgreat, they, they fit up, fit up
great.
He done an awesome job.
Yes, he had some problems goingthrough it, but looking at the
product, he's never done thisbefore and he's getting in there
(30:36):
, he's figuring it out and he'smaking it better.
It just I get the gratificationout of that and seeing, you know
, when we do we done a big 70foot wide entryway on a big shop
um up in Missouri and I go upand really high profile client
and he, uh, he walks up, man,he's patting me on the back
about how great everything looksand I'm like I didn't do
anything, like all I did washauled it up here today for him.
(30:57):
He built it all in the shop andI helped him move it out with
the skid steer, that's it.
And then he goes over there andhe starts praising him, you
know, and uh, to see his eyeskind of light up.
You know, yeah, I did that, youknow that was me.
Um, damn right, that was me.
You know, kind of get a littlestep in his step a little bit,
where, where he knows thegratification.
So I get, I get a goodenjoyment out of that seeing
(31:20):
other people succeed.
Speaker 1 (31:21):
Now yeah, and that is a great feeling, like Like when
you're there you know you couldhave done the work, but
somebody else did it instead,but you were there kind of
guiding them or giving them thatopportunity to be able to do
that.
I mean, it's just that's anamazing feeling.
Speaker 2 (31:37):
Yeah, for sure.
Speaker 1 (31:39):
Yeah, definitely that's how I feel with some
interns that I've led and stufflike that, other people that
I've led, and then even with myemployees as they get those
opportunities to do that andeverything.
It's just amazing to watch themget excited and light up,
especially with the new businessthat I've started and
everything.
Really just giving employeesthat opportunity to be able to
(31:59):
work with other business ownershas just been awesome to see.
It's like such a win-winsituation, I guess.
Win-win-win situation becausethey have an opportunity to do
the things that they like to do,but then also the business
owner gets to get rid of some ofthe things that they don't want
to do or get some things thatare actually going to start
actually being done that theyhave been kind of neglecting
(32:20):
because they didn't have thattime and everything.
So it yeah, it's just awesometo be able to see that.
But even with my interns asthey figure things out and they
go through and work out theproblem.
Or even my, my daughter uh,really cool to be able to see
that as well, though she wasprobably I don't know one and a
half, two years old, somethinglike that at the time, and she
was trying to get a stuffedanimal out out of her crib and
she kept trying to like lift itup.
And then she gets to the top ofthe crib.
(32:40):
And she kept trying to likelift it up.
And then she gets to the top ofthe crib and she gets stuck on
the rail.
I'm like, look, you know, reachover with the other hand and
grab it.
And then she finally did it.
I kind of had to help her, showher, and then she figured it
out and the next time we go inthere she grabs it and I was
like that is so cool just to seeher figure.
(33:03):
They start to develop and growlike that and everything.
Speaker 2 (33:06):
Yeah, yeah, he has to , uh, he definitely has to
remind me like, hey, you know,I'm I'm not really a welder and
I'm not really a fabricator.
Um, because I do, I put allthat that uh responsibility on
his shoulders now, and, andhe'll come to me every once in a
while.
It's hey, I, I've never donethis.
I'm like, oh go, do this.
Well, I've never done that.
I, I don't even know how tostart that process, oh crap,
(33:28):
okay, well, let me help you, letme walk you through it for just
a second.
And then, typically, he does itand and, as bad as I hate to
admit, 90 of the time it'sbetter than what I would have
done.
So, uh, because he's still,he's so attention to detail.
And I'm thinking, hey, get itit done, get it out, get it done
, get it out.
You know he, he wants toperfect everything.
Speaker 1 (33:46):
Yeah, yeah, and so talk to us through that process.
I mean, it's with welding,obviously it's a very physical
thing, uh.
But I I think about, you know,like standard operator
procedures and stuff like that,things that are maybe more
technical, or like websitedevelopment, stuff like that.
That's more like acomputer-based thing, maybe a
(34:10):
little bit more difficult to youknow, show hands-on if you will
, and and get somebody trainedup.
But how do you work throughwith him like hey, I'm giving
you this task, and then yourealize, oh, he doesn't know
what he's doing.
So what does that process kindof look like of how you go about
training him up so he can thentake it on and do it himself?
Speaker 2 (34:29):
I mean, a lot of this stuff is just, you know, uh,
you know this is the way I woulddo it and and kind of roll
through the way I would do it,you know, like bending out the
pipe or whatever, um, or runninga bead for the first time.
You know, hey, this is how I doit.
Um, I'm not going to say thatit's the best way.
There's definitely more ways toskin a cat than one.
Um, do what fits you, you know,and he'll do it, and it might
(34:49):
look like crap or he might screwit up, and we both come back to
the table and, okay, um, Iwould change this, this and this
.
You know, and you might do this.
Um, if it's running a bead andyou know you're pulling it too
fast, slow down, you know, orwhatever it may You're turning
your wire, speed up, um, he'lltry it and and just learn.
Um, because my dad always usedto preach really hard that I can
(35:11):
give you all the the lessons tolife, but if you don't fall on
your face, you're not going tolearn anything.
Um, so that I'm a very bigbaptism by fire type person.
It uh, you, uh, you're going tolearn the fastest and the best
whenever it's it's crunch timewhen you're, when you're putting
all that helmet, pull out onthe track.
(35:32):
So, um, whether it's the rightway or not, I don't know, but it
definitely is the way I learnedthe best, um, and it's worked
out okay for him so far.
Speaker 1 (35:40):
So, yeah, yeah, I mean, that's how I am too, but
I've noticed a lot of businessowners.
It's like they want to makesure the SOPs in place, that the
all these things are theretogether, and while that's, I'm
not going to say it's not a badthing.
Not, it's not a bad thing to dothat.
But I find a lot of times thatbusiness owners it's really
their, their crutch, it's a wayfor them to procrastinate.
(36:02):
Actually delegating that taskor getting somebody else to do
that work is oh, I got to createthe SOP.
No, I think the way that you doit and that's the way I like to
do it too, hey, here's a task,start working on it.
If you've got questions, let meknow, or maybe we'll review it
a little bit real quick.
Depending on what the task is,how complex it is, we'll go
through it real quick or I'lltry and show you an example.
(36:24):
Or even like one thing I dowith, like social media.
Like, hey, here's an idea thatI want to do that I get my VA to
start doing, and then it's likeokay, here's some examples of
like some reels or posts orwhatever it is.
Let's see if we can replicatesomething like that.
Okay, cool, and now they've gotan example and they try it and
then I review it afterwards.
It's not like, okay, go aheadand post it when you're done,
(36:46):
like no, let's review it andeverything, make sure you know,
ask those questions.
But yeah, really that thatbaptism by fire, like you were
saying, I like that saying tolearn is really a hands-on
approach.
So you actually did it and nowyou can know what you need to
(37:06):
actually work on.
Speaker 2 (37:06):
And yeah, when you're like him with this job that
we're doing now, he comes to meand he's like, hey, we need you
know, I don't know how much itwas.
It was like we need 300 feet oftubing and it's like, let's go
ahead and order 400 feet.
Well, we don't need that much.
This is our first time doingthis.
This is your first time doingthis.
This is your first time doingthis, like, let's just order
some extra, it'd be okay, we'regoing to learn, you know, and,
(37:26):
oh, we ended up going through,you know, 60 feet to try to get
it down.
Or you know, whatever it is.
It's arbitrary numbers, but weended up going through some
material to learn how to do it,but it's 100% perfect.
You know they're're, they lookperfect, they're bent, perfect,
they're nice and straight.
Um and that, that, thatlearning.
You know, I can go down therefor him and I can give him those
(37:48):
measurements and all that um onjobs, but he doesn't know how
to get those on the next oneyeah, um, so if it's a, if it's
a bend radius and it's going togrow x amount of inches on the
bend, um, I can tell him that.
But baptism by fire, you don'tlearn that until you screwed it
up.
Um, and most people not all,but most people are only going
(38:09):
to screw up so many times beforethey get it right.
Um, uh, they're not going tojust keep screwing it up, just
to keep screwing it up.
Um, and I got lucky with him.
He's a perfectionist and helikes it in certain ways, so
he's, uh, he's going to screw itup a couple of times, but the
third or fourth time it's goingto be just all the perfect.
Speaker 1 (38:26):
So, and that's another good point right there.
I think that's another reasonwhy people don't delegate things
or try and get somebody else tostart taking over those tasks,
because it's like, well, it'sjust going to cost more, like
whether material or additionaltime that it takes, but it's
also you're not having to dothat now, Like now somebody else
is doing that, whether they aretechnically paid less than you
(38:49):
or not, you can go on and dosomething else.
Yes, you might have to go backand check on them, but wouldn't
you rather do only 10% of thework, like going back and
checking and maybe you do athing or two here versus 100% of
it?
Let somebody else do 90% of it,even if it takes them 150%
longer than you would have taken.
Speaker 2 (39:10):
Dustin Hooten was a big one.
Me and Dustin are pretty goodfriends and when I was starting
to grow and got Greg to comework for me, I was like man, I
can't let go.
I want to do every weld, I wantto do every cut, I want to do
every bend, I want to do every,everything, you know, I can't
let go.
And he said dude, you're,you're screwing yourself, you.
You can't do that.
You know, as far as yourdelegation there, it, if you do
(39:34):
everything, you're not teachingthem anything, it's you have to
let go of those reins and youhave to if you're going to grow
and you're going to getemployees.
You're going to go through atime span there where you feel
like you're hitting your headagainst the wall of.
You know, man, I could havedone this better and it would
have saved me money and I couldhave had X amount of $100 more
on this job.
But he still doesn't know.
(39:55):
So you're still having to do it.
You're still having to be underthe hood all the time.
You're still having to do 95%of the work.
So rip the freaking Band-Aidoff and let's learn.
I'll learn how to help you, youlearn how to do it, and let's
both learn together and let'sgrow this business.
And again just got lucky thistime around and all the cards
(40:16):
lined up and it worked outperfect.
He was eager to learn and hewas eager to learn, and and I
was eager to uh to learn, and mylearning was to let go and, um,
you know, stuff's going toscrew up and there is more than
one way to skin a cat.
Um, I don't care how many timesyou tell me that I still don't
like it.
Um, I want it to be my way, buthe's, he's proving me wrong.
(40:38):
Um, every day.
Uh, he, he does it as good, ifnot better, than I do, day in
and day out.
Speaker 1 (40:51):
And yeah, hard to say , but it's the truth, yeah, I
love it.
And so, besides Dustin tellingyou you need to get out of your
own head, how did you changethat mindset to start actually
giving that work away, and notyou just constantly feeling like
I got to be in it?
Speaker 2 (41:03):
that work away, and not you just constantly feeling
like I got to be in it, I got todo it myself, kind of thing.
I don't know, I got a.
I got a really big um.
I hate to say stiffy, but I gota really big um interest, I
guess, in teaching.
You know all about that time too, um, so going to, uh, you know,
if we were going to go run aweld or whatever, teaching him
how I do it, and then he'd say,well, let's try this.
(41:25):
Oh, dang, now I'm actuallylearning a little bit from him
as well.
So we kind of both of usbecoming the teacher student
there, I guess in an aspect ofyou know, I've got 15 years
experience.
But it's one way I was kind ofraised by those Vietnam people
that it was this way and thatwas the only way, and damn it,
(41:46):
you're not going to do it adifferent way, um.
But whenever you start doingthat back and forth, he had a
fresh new look on it.
Um, looking at it from theoutside, he had a little
different perspective, I guesswould be the right word to say,
on how to complete a task and uh, so more or less or less, I
mean, he was teaching me just asmuch as I was teaching him um.
So I think that's probably whatmade it go so great.
(42:09):
I can't say if if he wouldn'thave been as uh apt to want to
learn, it may not win as smooth.
So I will say, some of that wasI just flat out got lucky yeah,
yeah sounds like a little bit,but I mean it sounds like you.
Speaker 1 (42:22):
you definitely opened up and obviously talking with
business owners like Dustin andeverything really helped you
really get over that ledge andget out of your own way.
Really let that ego you know,get that ego and check and
everything, so you couldactually do that.
And so what's next?
I know we briefly mentioned alittle bit, but what's next for
Powell Fabrication and thegarage business?
Speaker 2 (42:45):
Oh, I got big goals, big dreams.
I lost a huge manufacturingcontract last year, just not
knowing how to bid and stuff.
So I've got an arbitrary numberof where I want the companies
to be in a few years, number ofwhere I want the companies to be
(43:07):
in a few years.
But as far as my heart goals is, I want to have two employees
on both sides full time and thenI want everybody to be making
good salaries to where, wheneverthey have those bad days that
they turn around and look attheir bank account.
It's like it really wasn't thatbad I can go back tomorrow.
You know, because, uh, being apeople person a little bit more
now, um, I want to grow the, thecircle I guess I call it.
(43:30):
You know, the people around me.
I want to grow that to a reallygood group of people.
That's unstoppable.
I feel like that would be, um,you know, in the next couple
years that'd probably be thebest um business, business move,
essentially that I could do Umform that group, make sure they
know I have their back and uh,and vice versa, and we can all
(43:50):
just build and go dominate.
Speaker 1 (43:53):
I like it, man.
So some great goals right there.
I know you got more than thatin the, in the picture and
everything, but yeah, greatright there.
You know, really working onbuilding out that culture would
be huge to help with that.
I mean, good salary is alwaysnice, but the culture really, to
me, is what really keeps peoplewithin a company.
Of course, security also goodpay, but yeah, I mean there's a
(44:15):
lot of things that go into it.
But yeah, I know you'lldefinitely do that.
But Richard man appreciate.
But Richard man appreciate youcoming on the show.
If people want to follow yousee what you're doing with the
business and everything, where'sthe best place for them to
reach out to you?
Speaker 2 (44:27):
Pal Fabrication on Facebook, pal Fab on YouTube and
then pfnwacom.
So, yeah, we've got a fewYouTube videos out there from
shop projects and stuff we'vedone and hopefully in the next
year these cars behind me willbe doing a big expansion and
those will be sitting on aconcrete second floor and anyway
(44:49):
, yeah, cool stuff in the making.
But anyway, that's for anothervideo.
Speaker 1 (44:54):
Well, sounds great, man.
Richard, thanks again forcoming on the show.
Speaker 2 (44:57):
Yeah, thanks man, I appreciate it.
Thanks for having me.
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