How to Find Your Dream Team

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Life as a business owner is full of twists and turns: the new hire can’t close a sale, you’re getting bad customer reviews or maybe Congress passes legislation that’ll disrupt the entire industry. It’s easy to overreact to a single problem while forgetting that you have larger interests at stake.

Since 1971, Rick True has had a major stake in running his company, Batchelor’s Service, by only focusing on what he’s good at, and then finding people who can do the rest. He’s had plenty of time to find good people in the industry, and on this week’s Cracking the Code True explains how he did it.

Audio Transcription (in Beta)

On today’s show, another amazing contractor interview with Mr. Scott Deming.

All right, let’s get going with today’s show with Scott Deming as he interviews another one of our successful members. Hello, my friends. Welcome to another episode of Cracking the Code, the official video interview series of Contractor University powered by EGIA. My name is Scott Deming. I’m your host and I’m very excited about today’s guests.

Let’s bring them right in. We’ve got Mr. Rick True of Bachelor’s Service. How you doing, Rick? I’m well. How are you, Scott? I’m great. And Rick, I know you’re busy. I can’t thank you enough for taking the time to do this with us today. Uh, if you wouldn’t mind, Rick, here’s kind of how we do this. Uh, you know, I, I like to ask the, uh, the people that I’m interviewing to just give us a little bit of history.

Uh, you’ve got a lot of history. Um, and, uh, you know, this is, I want this to be different today because usually, you know, I, I. Ask people to tell us what did you, you know, what did you do with your service agreements? And what did you do with this and that? But you’ve got such an amazing background when you and I spoke the other day, uh, that I would just like you to tell your story.

And if you can, Rick, because, you know, the whole objective of this. Program is to make sure that you’re offering some tips and tricks Uh for other contractors to use again, you’ve got a lot of experience Uh, you know some people in the industry that are giants and they have mentored you you become good friends with them So if you can rick Take us through your story.

Tell us what brought you to where you are today. And, uh, how did you find success? You’re a very successful man. You’ve done this a long time. How did you sustain and how did you sustain successfully if you wouldn’t mind? Sure. Happy to. Um, Well, I’ll start, uh, I got in this, uh, industry in 1971 in Birmingham, Alabama, I got hired by train the time they were, uh, attempting to get into the residential business and they started something called the train comfort core.

And, uh, so, uh, I was hired by the train company and trained by them. And then they placed me with the train comfort core dealer there in Birmingham. Um, that, that went okay, that’s, there’s just a lot of things about it, too long to talk about as far as why that really didn’t work. They had some really good companies, Peachtree Train in Atlanta is one of, probably the best, most well known company.

There’s a guy named Jackie Rainwater there, uh, he’s, uh, you know, and Jackie is unfortunately no longer with us, but he’s a, he’s a giant in the industry, uh, so there were people like that. And they also tried to just find people who weren’t. Air conditioning contractors and put them in business and get them to move train equipment.

Well, the thing that I didn’t understand about that is you had to be a contractor to be able to make money, not just a marketer. So anyway, long story short, one of the guys that I worked with in Birmingham got transferred to Mobile, uh, in Mobile, he ended up working with the contractor. And when he heard what was going on with the train comfort core, he called me and actually recruited me to Mobile.

And so he and I worked for a guy named Larry Batchelor, still a close friend of mine to this day. Uh, he had started, he and his dad had started, uh, Batchelor Heating and Air Conditioning in 1967. I’m, this was 74 when I came. And so, uh, And we just really just formed a really good team. Uh, Dave, the guy that recruited me was a mechanical engineering graduate.

I was a business school graduate from Ole miss. Uh, Larry was a typical HVAC contractor. He worked for a contractor. He was an installer and service that didn’t like what was going on and started his own business. And so, uh, first lesson, and I’m, I’m not so sure this was, uh, Intentional, but if not by accident first lesson when you’re when you’re hiring people Don’t hire people that are exactly like you because then you’re going to have to hire people They’re different, you know The the thing about being a good contractor is understanding what you’re good at and typically what you’re good at is what you like And so find people that are good at the other parts of the things that you don’t like And then you can form a really good team.

In our case, Dave was a mechanical engineer. I was a business guy, Larry was a contractor. So we met a really good team and we worked together for years and years. Uh, 1980, we, uh, ended up forming, changed from bachelors. Heating and air to bachelor mechanical because we’ve gotten so big in the commercial industry rick.

I got a question Going back to your to your uh your thought and and suggestion and recommendation on hiring people That do things that you don’t do you learn this from this gentleman, but Was this a difficult thing? Because a lot of a lot of issues that leaders have, the owners have is really delegating and imparting with certain responsibilities.

So was this something that was difficult for you? Or did you recognize pretty quickly that if I don’t learn how to share responsibilities and if I don’t learn how to just let things go in a lot of times, you have to let your ego go to let Other things go, uh, I’m not going to be successful. So was it, was it a bit of a, of a learning curve for you or was it something you recognized pretty quickly?

Not well, not for me because, and like I said here again, Scott, I’m not so sure how intentional it really was. I think it just, we were just blessed that it happened that way. And then looking back on it, I think one of the reasons that we were so successful is because we were so different. We had different skillsets.

brought together was a really dynamic team. So, but, uh, you know, my advice is just to understand yourself first, figure out what you’re good at because nobody’s good at everything. There’s only one person to ever live. It’s perfect. And so, uh, Understand that. And then to make your organization better, doesn’t it make more sense to get people that are good at the things you’re not good at than get people that are good at the same things you’re good at?

You know, some guys love to sell. Other guys love to, you know, fix things with their hands. You know, uh, other guys are really good at numbers. You know, other people aren’t. So just figure those things out. And then surround yourself with people that are, that, that’s, that help you. Be better at, at, at your job.

You know, Rick, the other thing that I, that makes sense, uh, when I’m doing my, when I’m doing my leadership programs, and by the way, that that’s some of the best advice that you could give anybody what you just gave. But one of the things that I’ve, I’ve, uh, really had to help a lot of folks with is, you know, okay, so let’s say you’re, you’re, you do some self-awareness.

You understand who you are, what your strengths are, what your weaknesses are, and you’re willing to share. The responsibility is based on talent, based on skill sets and all that. However, let me ask you this, because this is an issue with a lot of, a lot of leaders, uh, especially owners, how difficult was it for you to take?

advice from people who were not within the ownership realm. In other words, you had a staff, you had some people who had a better idea than you. A lot of people do not like to have others tell them what to do. A lot of people aren’t willing to, uh, you know, They think they’re the smartest person in the room, and if they don’t think it, they still want to pretend they are.

So they’re not willing to take, you know, that advice and some even even healthy debate, encouraging healthy debate with others so that you get you get kind of contrary ideas. Oh, my God, I never thought of it that way. Was it difficult for you to do that? Or were you? Did you always have the type of personality where you said, You know what?

Uh, I’m not the smartest person in the room. Tell me what I’m doing wrong. If I’m doing something wrong, I need to know it. Otherwise, I can’t fix it. Or Did you kind of fight when you were, especially when you were younger, did you kind of fight that? No. Well, you know, one thing that was different though, is that at first, those first few years here at Batchelor’s, you know, I wasn’t the one, I didn’t own the company, Larry owned the company.

So Larry was one that was getting advice from Dave and me and we were all sharing. So I guess that whole process and just the way we watched it all work. And then, uh, and then, and then he just, another thing, you know, he just figured out, Hey, these guys are really good. I’m going to make them partners. And when we started the new company, we were all equal partners.

And then from then on that we were, you know, we were always open to learning, uh, you know, uh, and then to get into the next part of our story. So we built a pretty successful mechanical contracting company and then in the mid 80s. Uh, Linux contacted, uh, Larry and myself and, and, and they had come up, uh, with the concept of, of the, uh, residential service and replacement, you know, because back in the 60s and 70s, most of the jobs that we did, residential jobs were putting in completely new systems, duct work.

Heating and air conditioning, because most houses, even here in Mobile, as hot as it was here, most houses weren’t air conditioned. So you got, and plus the new houses were starting to be built with air conditioners. So then, then you, you got the situation of, okay, all these things are starting to have to be replaced, you know, how do you go to market?

And so, we went up there, went to Atlanta, visited with them about it, and uh, we really liked the idea, came back to Mobile. And so I think, well, how, how can we make this work? Cause we had a pretty good customer base cause the company was founded on residential. And so we learned about a guy named Ron Smith.

And, uh, you know, and I said, look, Let’s, uh, if we’re going to do this, we could find a guy that already knows how to do it. It’d be better to go visit with him, find out how to do it and, uh, versus trying to invent the wheel ourselves. So we went down to, uh, got on a chartered a plane, flew to, uh, Fort Myers, Florida to visit with Ron.

He had just started Service America, really liked what he had to say. And so we were one of the first Service America, uh, franchisees. In the country in I think it was like 1986 or something like that. So that’s how we got into the the residential service and replacement business We just did a whole hog.

We were fortunately we were very successful So we had the money to do it. We went out. I mean we did everything we bought, you know We completely separated the residential and commercial we bought, you know new vans You know put all the service america stuff on them Uh had certain different service tax for residential different service tax for commercial different installers It was almost like two it really was like two separate companies and we just from day one Went to market that way and uh, and it worked out well then in the uh, the late Uh, nineties, uh, we sold Bachelor Mechanical to Comfort Systems USA, which is back when they were doing all those, uh, roll ups and Comfort Systems, of course, it was a commercial and industrial, uh, HVAC, uh, mechanical, uh, nationwide company.

It did really well. And so about, this is where the story gets interesting. So when we did that, the Bachelors, uh, He used to be called Bachelor Service America, but Ron had sold, uh, Service America to Roto Rooter, so we couldn’t use that name anymore, so we just dropped the America off and called it Bachelor Service.

And, uh, and so It really didn’t fit with Comfort Systems. So we sold Bachelor service to one of our employees in 2002. Uh, 2006. Uh, I retired from, uh, being the, uh, local CEO of Bachelor’s Comfort Systems. Um, and then in 2016, well, 2015, Edward, the guy that we, we, we sold bachelor service to. Uh, contracted, uh, Lou Gehrig’s disease got worse and worse in 2000, March of 2016.

I got a call from his accountant and his brother who was his lawyer and said, Rick, we need your help. Can you come in? Edward’s so sick, he can’t even go to work. And I’ve done some consulting for him, um, after I had retired anyway. So we had, of course we had a relationship cause he worked for us, uh, before we sold the business to him.

So anyway, long story short at, uh, at the age of 70 years old, I came out of retirement cause he passed away. And so since 2016, I’ve been running bachelor service, uh, for his, uh, Uh, hit the trust that, uh, benefits three children that, uh, now owns this business. Hi, I am Daryl Hinky. Hey, I am Bob Larkin. Many of our contractors meet with us monthly and new chances are have met with us monthly.

We found that members have deeper and greater needs, so we came up with next level coaching. Which is, we meet a lot more often, and there is accountability to deal with some of the issues of money, growth, finding employees, having an exit strategy to get off this roller coaster. These are the issues that contractors want answers to, and we can provide those answers in Next Level Coaching.

When you join Next Level Coaching, you’re going to find solutions that are easy to implement and logical. Most importantly, we hold you accountable to specifics. We’re going to meet twice a month and have specific to dos. And with those specific to dos, we’re going to discuss and dive into your financials in a very granular way.

You’re going to have a clear budget. We’ll be able to establish pricing. We’re going to help you create leadership programs that build your people. We’re going to help you find people. You may think of differing ways to engage employees that will keep them more involved by joining Next Level Coaching.

So if you’re interested in making more money, growing your company, finding good employees, And developing an exit strategy. Give Dell an hour call. We’ll be happy to talk to you about next level coaching, and we’re going to see you on the next level, Rick, the, uh, you, you and I, we had a conversation a few days ago and I, I knew Ron, uh, as I told you, I was one of the founding members of, uh, service.

Nation is round table and Ron and I was on the board and Ron was one of the founding members. He was on the board and he was just a giant. I mean, everybody looked up to run, uh, and you had the extreme, not just pleasure, the privilege of not only being able to call him a mentor, but you were able to call him a friend.

Um, the one common thread that I see when I talk to different folks in this industry, those who are very successful. And those who are not the common thread for the successful ones is this. They’ve all been willing to get a mentor. They’ve all been willing to go to training. They’ve all been willing to, to, to continue to learn.

You know, I always say our construction is never finished. You know, I don’t care how old you are. I’m sure at your young age, Rick, you know, you’re still learning. You’re still, you’re still learning things. You’re still excited to learn new things. Uh, again. Unfortunately, there are a lot of folks in this industry, whether it’s either they don’t feel like they have the, the ability to take the time, you know, they can’t afford the time to, to go to training classes or to, to try to find a mentor, or they don’t, they can’t afford it.

Uh, what would you say to people who are in this business? They’re at the young stage of their, of their career. And they’re and they’re trying to figure this out. What would you what would you offer to them in terms of figuring out a way to carve out the time to figure out a way to allot the money? How would you suggest they go about that if they’re kind of nervous there?

You know, look, let’s face it. If you’re trying to run a business and you’re working 16 hours a day, you don’t want to take https: otter. ai time out to go and sit in a training class for four or five days. You, if you’re, if you’re just barely making ends meet, you don’t want to have to take money out to, you know, to start paying somebody to, to help you out.

So how would you, how would you suggest somebody get around that and get, and get the, I don’t want to use the word courage, but you know, get, get the intestinal fortitude to, to take this stuff on the right way so that you don’t have to go through all the learning curves, uh, that you’re going to go through if you don’t do this.

Um, I don’t really, I don’t, I don’t look at it as courage or intestinal fortitude. I, you know, in our case, and I’ll go back to Ron a little bit. He knew, he knew stuff that we knew we didn’t know. And so do you want to go ahead and learn from somebody that already knows it and has the systems in place or you, or you just want to make, you know, find out if you, if you can overcome a bunch of mistakes you’re going to make doing, doing it, trying it your own way.

And the other thing, just like going back to what I said earlier about finding out what you’re good at. It’s the same way with the mentors figure out what you there are certain things that most people are going to be really good at that that they just learned or whatever or they just Inherently have you know, but other things they’re not so figure out what those things are Then then get people the funny thing uh When I came back, when I came out of retirement, the first person I called was Ron said, all right, believe it or not, I’m back doing this.

You know, what’s different. And, you know, we talked and stuff and, and he called me about a month later. And he said, okay. Well, it’s different. You know, I said, well, I know one thing, there are a whole lot more coaches, uh, now than there were when I, when I got out of the business and, uh, you know, so, and I, to this day, I still, I, I have his, his book, uh, HBAC Spellswell, uh, you know, I, I don’t, I know it backward and forward, but I still refer to it all the time because I’m a big believer And figuring out the way to do things right and then do them over and over day after day and don’t change from because I mean, pretty much everything in his book is still the same as it was it, you know, our big thing is we have a really large customer service base.

You know, I see, you know, on EGIA, I’ll see Gary or somebody talking about service agreements. You need to have service. That doesn’t change. I’ll never forget one time, Ron and I, we were at a, at a, uh, Well, it was before, uh, the EPIC, it was just an EGIA meeting, and Ron and I were there, Ron was there with, uh, with the vendor doing some signings and books and stuff, and he and I were talking at a cocktail party, and Gary Ellis walked up and, and said, uh, and, you know, he looked at my name tag and he said, I’m Bachelors, I remember you guys from back in the Linux days, and I said, yeah.

And we were talking, I said, I’m going to come to your workshop tomorrow. And, uh, he goes, well, you could probably teach it. And I said, what do you mean? He said, well, I learned 90 percent of what I’m going to teach tomorrow from Ron there. So, I mean, it’s just, you know, it doesn’t good. The good things don’t change.

They really don’t. Now. The way, you know, the, the big things that I’ve seen that changed the way you go to market back in the old days, you had a yellow page ad and, and, and mobile, you had to be on the country music station. You did those two things. You’re going to do great. Now you got to know how to do all the SEO and the Google ad words and all that stuff.

I’m not smart enough to do that. That’s one of the things I figured out I got to have help with. I know how to, I know how to get service contract customers. I don’t know how to, to get them through the digital age, right? So, you know, so that, so that’s one of the things I said I gotta, I have help with this.

And so, uh, you know, some guys, I know some guys that are great with all that kind of stuff. Of course, I’m 77 years old and so. When I grew up, I joked with my kids, when I was in college, the Texas Instruments Calculator hadn’t even been invented yet. So, you know, I’m not, I’m definitely technologically challenged.

Some of the young people aren’t. But they may not really know how to, how to sit down and talk to a customer and tell them how, how, how to, well, how important a service contract is. Well, there are people, you know, there are people you know. And, and, and the reason, uh, when I, uh, signed up for EGIA, uh, I did, we’re a Daikin dealer, so I, I, I got appointed with him through, and I started looking at all the stuff available there.

And, and I’ve got one of the children of, uh. Of the man who passed away that’s working for me. Hopefully he’ll take this business over one asset Golly, what an unbelievable library and stuff that when he comes in here to work that I can just say man, look You know, I told I told him when he came to work here I said look I had one week of training with the train company when I started and I had to learn everything else on my own Just the proof from the EGA library itself It’s unbelievable what what you can learn plus then you can see guys like Russ Horrocks.

I love his uh, His, uh, deal that he does on, uh, uh, training service techs to sell and, and talk to customers. And I, and I’ve got that and I, every new service techs that come, they have to sit and spend, you know, parts of two different days watching that. There’s some really great experts. And you don’t have to, you know, sign your life away to do that.

Uh, there you know all kinds of ways, but there’s plenty of good experts that you can find to uh, take it to help Now I forgot to put that on do not disturb. I’m, sorry, but anyway And and egi is great for that. You know, there are other places too that we all know but so I can’t really tell you what’s the one best way to do it, but you can find it because there there are a lot of I’ve had guys call on me and try to You know do this that or the other and I would trust them to do anything because they’re you know just just But but there are a lot of really good ones and egi has got some so, uh, Egi has got amazing amazing instructors coaches mentors, you know, gary russ drew Well, then Steve and his son.

I mean, they’re just really just incredible, incredible, uh, folks and they’re, they’re just a wealth of knowledge. So to not take and like I said early, they’re, they’re, they’re, they’re good at different things. And that’s the great thing about Absolutely. Absolutely. But so, Rick, when you were talking, you, you reminded me of something.

And in fact, I’m, I’m doing a presentation for an HVAC distributor in, in a couple of weeks. And one of the things that I’m going to be talking with them about is, and you brought it up, but you didn’t give it a title, but I’m going to, I’m going to title this here. You’re talking about when you say some things don’t change.

Some things don’t, and some things do. Technology and all of that. I mean, you’ve got, if you don’t keep up with the technology and you know, the refrigerant and whatever else is going on in the HVAC world right now, you’re going to get left behind. But there are two different things. There are hard skills and soft skills.

The hard skills are understanding the mechanical side of things, the technology, you know, how to do your, how to do your marketing, all of that. Those are hard skills. The soft skills, if done right, they don’t change, you know, how to talk to people, how to have a relationship, how to build an emotional connection, emotional brand.

These things don’t change. If there’s a human here and a human here and there’s an interaction or a transaction going on the process. for creating that trust, love and loyalty is universal and it’s and it’s evergreen. It doesn’t change. It doesn’t die. So I’m glad that you said that. And I’m glad that you that you you really kind of repeated a couple of times reiterated the importance of understanding that you need to understand your own strengths and your own weaknesses and bring in people who have different skill sets, different strengths and weaknesses.

Again, when looking at that, don’t just look at people who are either great with people or great with a, with a, you know, with, with tools, you’ve got to look at hard skills and soft skills for every single person you’re working with, hiring, uh, bringing in as a partner, et cetera. So those were phenomenal points.

Yeah. I mean, that’s, yeah, that’s what it’s all about. It’s all about people. I mean, when you get right down to it, it is, I mean, it absolutely is. Rick, I don’t want to keep you any longer unless you have more to add. But, uh, you know, this has just been so enlightening and so enjoyable. And we were on the phone the other day and I could have talked forever just because, you know, you’ve got such a, uh, such a background and you’ve known so many of the giants in the industry and, uh, you know, you’re just, you’re just a joy and a pleasure to, to, to be speaking with.

So do you have anything else you’d like to add before we close it out? No, no, I, I appreciate what you do, uh, after they asked me to do this, I, I’ve even spent more time looking at some of your interviews you’ve done, they’re really good and I think they’re very helpful for the industry and, uh, you know, I, like you say, I’ve been around a long time, but I, I try to do my best to, to go to different, well, I do have one thing to say.

I encourage people to go to the different groups like, like the EPIC, you know, I’m, I’m a, uh, also I encourage people to, to get involved with ACCA, ACCA. It’s the only organization that actually is in Washington that is speaking for us on a daily basis. And, uh, We need to, we, we need to understand that and, uh, support that and just the dues just for, for the lobbying alone is worth it because we need an advocate in Washington for sure as crazy as it is now.

But go to, go to some of those national meetings. The great thing about contractors is that especially if they don’t compete with you, they’ll share all kinds of stuff with you. And so take advantage of that. You know, I still love to do that. Rick, that is a really, really good point. And because as we’re encouraging The contractors who are watching this video to go to training and to, you know, to open your mind to new ideas and so forth, don’t be afraid to reach out to other contractors, especially if they’re not in your market, contractors love sharing ideas because you know, if you’re going to reach out to somebody.

They’re going to ask you questions that I’m sure they’ll, that you’ll have something that you can help them with as well. But, you know, even I know that some contractors have even started tip groups where they, you know, they do, uh, you know, once a month they get together, either on a zoom call or if they’re in the same market, they’ll sit around and have breakfast or lunch.

And they’ll talk about what some of the challenges are and what some of their wins have been and how did they get those wins? You know, don’t be afraid to reach out to anybody because people are, People in general, most people, most people, I’m going to, I’m going to make sure that I clarify that most people are very willing to share.

Uh, so don’t be afraid to reach out and, and, you know, great, great closing point. Hey Rick, listen, uh, I’m going to sign us off, uh, again, unless you have anything more to add, do you? Now i’m good All right, i’m going to sign us off but rick, uh, i’m going to come back to you. So don’t please don’t hang up Don’t disconnect.

Let me let me sign us off with the folks watching and I will be back with you in just one second Thanks so much. Rick really appreciate you. Thank you Well, my friends, that’s a wrap another episode of cracking the code the official video interview series the official video interview series Of contractor university powered by egia.

I’m your host scott deming and there it is right there with me today Uh rick true from bachelor’s service. What a great guy and man. I gotta tell you something just uh, Follow his in his lead his advice his recommendations, you know, he’s he’s got such great experience and After all the years that he’s been doing this, he can just continue to say the thing that I would suggest to everybody is don’t be afraid to go out and ask for help.

Don’t be afraid to go to training. Don’t be afraid to invest in your company and, and, and improving those bottom lines, those, those people skills, hard and soft. So thank you, Rick, for that. It’s really been a pleasure and a privilege talking with you and folks. Thank you. It’s been a privilege spending time with you until next time.

We’ll see you. Awesome content right there from Scott. As always. Now, be sure and share this on Facebook. And if you’re not a member, click the button below and get a free 30 day trial. Give you access to all of our amazing content. That’s our show for this week, folks. We’ll see you soon until then. Bye bye for now.