Transcription

• Speaker #0

  Hello and welcome to the Skilled AF podcast, a podcast elevating the voices that are shifting the face and future of the skilled trades. I'm your host, Amanda Lucchetti, founder of the Skilled Project, a platform shaping how skilled trades and construction careers are seen, accessed, and experienced. You can learn more at theskilledproject.com. Today's guest is Wilson Batonsas, an electrical contractor turned educator, author, and founder of Energize Us. With 17 plus years in the field, Will has made it his mission to reimagine what skilled trades education and workforce development looks like for this next generation. In this episode, we talk about the experiences that inspired Energize Us, the core problems impacting recruitment and retention from his eyes, the new education model he's building, and what he's doing to rethink culture and leadership in the trades. Wherever you're at in the world, we hope you enjoy. Well, welcome to another episode of the Skilled AF Podcast. We are live from Connecticut. I'm with Will Batonsas, who is founder and CEO of Energize Us. He's also an author. He's an electrical contractor. He is a huge advocate for what this new generation of skilled trades leaders are going to look like in this industry. And I'm so excited to have him on the podcast.

• Speaker #1

  I appreciate it.

• Speaker #0

  Welcome to the show.

• Speaker #1

  Thank you, Amanda. Thank you. Thank you.

• Speaker #0

  You've had a journey. Like you're an electrical contractor. You still are and spent 17 years in the career. And now you've switched in and you're getting really involved in education. Can you share a bit about what that journey has been like for you? Did you always know you wanted to be an electrician? Where did it begin?

• Speaker #1

  So my story, it's kind of unique. So I grew up over here in the Northeast. So I'm from New York City, born and raised. I had a lot of great guys. And I always tell everybody, I always had like a key person in my life through every phase. So I can't even take all the credibility. Everybody has pushed me into a direction. And I just listen. I was that kid who always just listened to older people. I had friends who were in the union. After I graduated the union, I was in the union. Foreman always took care of me. Foreman would always say, go for your license. Don't stay complacent in the union. Then when I got into contracting, I got into business development. There was always a key figure in my life and I always listened to them. And it was always fun because I always kept telling myself, I can avoid all these headaches if I just kept listening to them. And then I saw the good side of it. And I'm like, oh, and then in the trades, everyone has that stigma or... It always started with like everyone wants to be known as the hard worker. Everyone wants to be known as I had to crawl for it. You know, and there's a side to that that really speaks, you know, that work ethic. But then it's like everyone makes the trades like a dirty job. And it is it's physical and all these different things. But for the most part, I always looked at it as like, hey, there's an opportunity that we can grow here and I want to do things different. There's these different types of stigmas revolving around the trade that make it seem like it's a lower class job. And I think we have to just switch that up. So that's where Energize Us, the idea of our trade school came from saying, hey, not only can you get a job, but at the same time, we can switch and break these stigmas that are tied to the trades. So that's where everything basically from a nutshell came about.

• Speaker #0

  And with like going back to like you personally, you have Hispanic background, culture. I read your book. That was part of my, on my flight, I read your book. I recommend reading it. It's a great quick read and you break it down very easy in regard to like your learnings and what you recommend people to do differently. But you've brought up your culture and like some of your family upbringing and how that shaped, I mean, it shaped you. What were some of the limiting beliefs that you had to overcome in order to get where you are?

• Speaker #1

  I think it's just... The way that we're raised, like it or not, some way, shape, or form, it sticks with you as you grow up. So for me, being Hispanic, it was always like, save your money, save your money. It was always scarcity mindset. It's like, we don't deserve this. Someone asks you to do something, it's like, just say, yes, sir. Right now, I'm the redheaded stepchild when it comes to my family, because people are saying, do this. And I'm like, no. People are saying, stay quiet. And I'm like, it's that personality clash now. And of course, there's good and bad. There's extremes, right? You're not saying F you to everybody. You're not going around just starting fights. But at the same time, if you can handle yourself, communicate and say, hey, I'm going to do this. I don't think it's right for me. That's just not within the culture for some reason. So then when it starts coming into going to business for yourself, when it starts going into the trades, you have these mindsets where someone's like, go do this. And then you just go do it. And you're not asking, why am I doing this? Or even as a contractor, hey, go change this because the homeowner said so. The customer is always right. And you go change it. And then you bill them for it. They say, I'm not paying for it because you didn't communicate. You see where I'm getting at. So it's all these things that how we were raised.

• Speaker #0

  And then you stay quiet or like what? You just eat it?

• Speaker #1

  You don't want to cause friction, I would say. You know what I mean? So everyone's scared of the money conversation because no one knows how to manage money. No one wants to tell a homeowner they're wrong, you know, but once again, there's an extreme. Hispanics are also very warm-blooded, hot-blooded, heat-passionate on both extremes. You know, you can either be fighting or you can be, you know, the other side of it. And what's so funny is they don't know how to dial that. Sometimes when you're dealing with someone and a customer may be irate, they want to avoid that. So they just go to the extreme of cough, soft, submissive. Instead of just having a conversation. So with all these things, it applies onto the job site too. Because think about it, you're an apprentice. Who are you to tell that journeyman, explain to me what's going on? Nine times out of 10, journeyman don't know himself. So it's just this culture of everybody, people, communicating, culture clashes, industry stigmas, and it's all happening at the same time. But what's beautiful is that you can have buildings like these. So just imagine like 90% of us are all messed up in the trades and yet we can, we still reach the moon. Stuff like that is still possible, which is crazy. So when we come in as a whole, me as an individual, I want to look at things of like, okay, if 90% of us all are messed up and we can make it to the moon, we can figure out how to tweak up the trades a little. And that's basically everything, especially with our background.

• Speaker #0

  Yeah. You talked about a beginning of how that kind of came to fruition. Your day-to-day life, I'm curious how that's changed. because you were at like a job site before this. Yeah. But you're wearing this hat as an educator. I mean, did you see yourself at this part in your life transitioning into the education space?

• Speaker #1

  Not at all. And I don't want to be doing what I have to do. I'm passionate about the trades. I know what it can offer. I've seen both extremes of good examples and bad examples, but I never thought myself of doing this because I just enjoy doing what I'm doing with the work. talking to the crews, working with them, getting to know their family. The way I'm doing business is night and day. My day-to-day does not make sense when it comes to as a contractor, because a contractor, once again, the stigma says you should be working from day to night. And then everyone's like, how do you have time for this? How do you have time for this?

• Speaker #0

  How do you have time for your family? Yeah.

• Speaker #1

  It doesn't make sense to the average contractor. And I'm trying to explain to them, dude, it's because you're doing it wrong. And then there comes the clash again, because now it's like, no one works harder than me. No one's saying that. But what you have to do is divide your time up to do this, this, this, to make sure you're the more important things. But I did not see myself becoming an educator. I'm truly pushing this one because I know it's a way of life that people are going to love. I know people are going to love what the trades have to offer. But at the same time, I got a little petty in me when I'm like, there's not we're not doing enough with what we're facing. And I'm saying this as a contractor, me trying to hire someone. and the pipeline of people that's coming in. And I'm like, okay, yeah, this isn't working. I need to do it on my own. So it's like, I'm doing it because I'm forced to, because the powers that be aren't doing it for them. So it's like, I'm making a personal mission for myself to do this, if that makes sense.

• Speaker #0

  It does. And I'm curious about all of that. You're jumping into the space because you're seeing a gap in this workforce development pipeline and how we develop people. Can you explain actually? energize us with what it is, what you offer and how it's set up?

• Speaker #1

  So it's almost like Star Wars. We have to say our end goal and then work our way backwards. So I'm not coming into this. I'm not risking everything. I'm not building everything from scratch just to say I'm a trade school. I'm fixing the industry as a whole in the sense where there's a lot of gaps. And what I view is we need a revamp. And there's a phrase that I always tell myself. Every time we have our board meeting, we always start off with saying, what got us here won't get us to the next level. And we keep telling ourselves that. Why? Because what got us here helped. It established a pattern, a foundation. Perfect. If we want to go to this next level, we have to switch things up. Nothing has grown by just being the same.

• Speaker #0

  Yeah.

• Speaker #1

  So that's the motto when we come in. So we're saying, so who has done it already? Cool. What have they done? done this. Where does it get them? Here. All right. What do we have to do different? So we acknowledge it. We're not talking crap about the union, non-union, ABC, none of these guys. We genuinely appreciate what they've done. But to get to this next part or get to this next puzzle, get that next corner piece of the puzzle, we have to do something completely different. And just following suit isn't going to help us. Just like my culture coming up, just saying yes to every time a job comes up, just yes to avoid problems. That's not going to help us. We have to have these hard conversations. So as Energize Us, when we're coming into things, we want to say, what's the issue on the industry? And we know it's the pipeline, the people coming in, we know the retention issue, but at the same time, we know the end result. What's the end result? That's like the post I made the other day. What's the four things you're going to do in the trades? You're a worker, you're a contractor, you're an educator, or you're going to be an inspector, right? You come in, that's your next 30 years. Why is that the case? But also, who's telling the people that? No, because they're telling them to come in, put your head down and go work. They're not seeing the value of a license. So we have to shape and talk about all these different aspects. And that's the three pillars of Energize Us. So media, education, and professional development. Those are our three pillars. Those are our three services that we're offering. Media, stirring up interest in the trade. How do we get people into this pipeline? Education. Now that they're in the trades, how do we give them the formal education that they need? Certifications, licensure. We help them through that roadmap and not professional development. Now you've been in the trade four or five years and you got your license. How do you become a successful contractor?

• Speaker #0

  Yeah, that mentorship aspect too is massive.

• Speaker #1

  And we literally got that formula from watching Toy Story. Because as you watch Toy Story, Andy grows, but Woody stayed the same. Woody is the industry. Woody's always there. Woody's the need, but Andy grew. And you're seeing how Woody interacts with Andy throughout his life. They're making a new, I just found out, they're making a new one where... but Andy has a kid now and he wants to get Woody back. Like this is like what, but what I'm trying to say is that attaches to people because you're growing with your audience. If we're saying the same story 10 years ago, 20 years ago, 30 years ago about skills shortage, skills shortage, skills shortage, people are coming into the trades because they think there's a shortage and then they don't end up staying because they don't see what the trades have to offer. Or they're still a glorified apprentice 10 years in without a license. So these are the types of stuff that we're trying to add on it. industry level. So we're not talking about, oh, we're looking for a class for 30. No, we're not looking for students. We're looking to attack this as an industry as a whole.

• Speaker #0

  Yeah. Well, was there like a moment in time where you're like, this needs to happen? Was there like a specific experience or a meeting with a person where Energize Us was where you're like, I have to go do this?

• Speaker #1

  Yeah. It's safe to say COVID was like a timestamp and everything. and enduring COVID. everybody and their mother. If you had a screwdriver in a garage, in a toolbox that you all rusted out, someone asks you, hey, do you do handyman work? Everybody was busy during COVID. So that just put a spotlight on the need of skill trades. People were paying over, asking people double their rates and they were getting, it was insane. Now COVID's winding down. I wouldn't say we're in a recession, but people are now just, instead of saying, I need this done now, people are saying, I want to start this next week. In that one week period, contractors are going out of business now. Why? Because they thought just working was enough. Now contractors are closing down business because guess what? The homeowner has a week to now choose you or somebody else. And then what's going to be the differentiating factor? No one cares about it. Good work should be on standard. You understand? People are like, well, I do the best work. I've never heard a contractor say, I do crappy work and got the job. You understand? So if everyone's saying the same thing, that's stigma. what's going on. So what we're seeing as a whole, we have to attack this in these different waves.

• Speaker #0

  So pandemic was one of those turning points to develop this. Was there another experience that you were like, yeah, this needs to exist, energize us, have to be born?

• Speaker #1

  Yeah. So at that time, that's when in my book I was talking about, I started getting my business advisor and I started working with him and he's helping us with our business. He's helping us develop, energize us. And once again, pandemic was that pinpoint where it's like, okay, Trades are needed. That's guaranteed. Now we started going into, okay, this is what I'm going to do because my electrical business, I was hiring at the same time. So we're growing and we're like dealing with these guys who are coming in.

• Speaker #0

  And you're trying, yeah, you're trying to develop your own pipeline.

• Speaker #1

  Exactly. But it seemed like every time I hired somebody with the, once again, go back to a stigma of three to five years experience, because I want to throw them on a job site. And then it's like, whoa, whoa, these guys are, if you did, first of all, the trades were needed during pandemic. I think we all agree that. All right. if you didn't have a job during the pandemic and you were in the trades I think that's a red flag because everybody boomed. So if you were like, you're a worker and you didn't have a job, why is that? Yeah, but nobody thought about it like that. Everyone's just like, great, I have another applicant. So I started thinking, I was like, okay, I'm hiring these guys. They're not sticking around and I have to undo all these bad habits that they have. So that's when I started saying, I'm going to just create my own pipeline. I'm going to make my own standards. And literally, we sat down with our business advisor. on social media, pull up your contractors. And if everybody's hiring right out on the board and out of 200 contractors that were hiring and posting that they were hiring, it was like 198 of them said, I'm looking for somebody with three to five years experience. So he goes, why is everybody looking for three to five years experience? And we broke it down. Well, it's because the training, they don't want to invest into training one. They want to throw them in the field, but he goes, everybody says the same thing when they're hiring. I'm looking for a journeyman, journeyman, journeyman. And then we broke it down. Like, why is that? Why doesn't no one want to invest into training? And it came down to, well, you can only teach what you're comfortable with. You can only teach what you believe in. And we're saying 90% of contractors have troubles with these things.

• Speaker #0

  The soft skills, you're saying. Soft skills and possibly like the time, right? It takes a lot of time and investment to train people.

• Speaker #1

  Exactly. So we're seeing that as an issue, as a bottleneck. So people want to avoid that and just go with three to five. So he goes, perfect. Let's create a system. Let's create a business where now you train them where, yes, they're not going to have all the experience, but you're going to take that pain point away from them. So you help them with the soft skills. You help with the leadership. You develop them. So when someone says, I graduated, energize us, a contractor is going to be like, that's fine. I want him. So that's where the needs started coming. But then we started saying like, okay, what's this, One of our business advisors, a lot of people know, is Patrick Bedavid. So he's the owner of the Yankees over here on the East Coast. He's a very vision-driven guy. If I mention money, like, oh, this is how much it's per, he's like, why are we talking about that right now? You understand all the work you're doing, you're not getting nothing for it for like five years. He goes, that's how far ahead we're planning. When this individual from this letter organization reaches out to you, this is what we're going to do. And this is how we'll use this media. And so he's like, have these conversations. You have to get into these rooms where you're not looking at them. You're talking to them. You're trying to figure out something solution. Because at the end of the day, we all need workers. Union needs workers. ABC needs workers. Non-union shop needs work. We need workers and we need workers to stay.

• Speaker #0

  Yeah.

• Speaker #1

  Not just come in for year one and then drop out. So that's what we need as a collective. How do we do that together? And then very down the road, if like, if this is not. catered to, this is not answered to, this is not being addressed, then you view people as competitors, if that makes sense.

• Speaker #0

  It does make sense.

• Speaker #1

  But as a whole, we're all bleeding. And as a whole, once again, we see what we can end up building if we all work together.

• Speaker #0

  Yeah. Collaborative spirit.

• Speaker #1

  Yeah.

• Speaker #0

  I know your thing is bigger than just electrical trade, right? But just starting with electrical, and you're not trying to compete with the IBEW, going through your program. Where are you intending to place people? Or like, what's the vision of, is it like a pre-apprentice program? Is it registered? Like, I have a lot of questions around more of like how you're trying to develop that.

• Speaker #1

  Yeah, it's everything. So we're doing everything from safety, certifications, pre-apprenticeship. Right now we work with NCCER. So we have a registered program, the level one through level five electrical apprenticeship. That's what we're pushing right now because it's my bread and butter. We can argue it, defend it, talk to and give people that mentorship that we mentioned before, what the trades have to offer. So our program, our curriculum is approved. We're also here in New York. We just got approved for New York State, and now we're starting our own company-sponsored apprenticeship program. So we're working with a company out in Buffalo and training their entire workforce. So in one year, we already have one company sponsored, got that all approved within the year because of NCCR's curriculum already. So that's the exciting part when it comes to our training program.

• Speaker #0

  And with like thinking about it too, from the union side, are you in the room talking with them? Like, what did they think? I'm just curious.

• Speaker #1

  I think we're all on the right path. At the end of the day, we need to have these conversations because we're not having these conversations. We're in a special time when it comes to not only the trades, but just like in life and everything's media. So who's going to be talking about it? And who is that person? Are they genuine? Are they authentic? You have to see and want to see that someone has the best interest at work and no organization, no person can be bought and say, hey, talk about the trades. And if it doesn't sit with them. If they don't relate to the people, people are not going to see them as a role. You can't make somebody an influencer, if that makes sense. You can't make someone an advocate. You can sponsor them, yeah, but at the end of the day, who are people going to respond to? It's the people who are on the job sites, the people who go, hey, this is what the trades have to offer. You understand?

• Speaker #0

  Yeah, from a recruitment standpoint, yeah, I get what you're saying.

• Speaker #1

  So it's a very special place to be in, and right now we're just trying to tackle everything when it comes to media. Having all the hard conversations, we're talking about things that like, hey, avoid this if you want to be a good apprentice. Do this if you want to be a good journeyman. If you've been doing this for 30 years, try this. So we're tackling everything from all these different angles because, once again, they're not being held. These conversations are not being had. So that's where a lot, as you can imagine, a lot of the conflicts come in. And, you know, all these private messages that we get on the side is pretty fun because we're challenging those stigmas.

• Speaker #0

  Yeah. Well, you're challenging ways of working. That's been done historically for a very long time. It's so dependent to location wise. I'm thinking about like the shortage. Like I've talked to unions in my area and they're like, we don't have a shortage. We have a 3000 person wait list. But yeah, we know there's this need, you know, if somebody goes through your program, they in essence or essentially could go either way. They can choose to go, I want to go an onion route, I want to own my own company, or whatever, I want to do this route. I've done this pre-apprentice program. I really want to go into a union. It's really like you're trying to support the directions that anyone's going, but we need in general, this baseline starting ground that we need to build from. And if we can start there and develop leaders too quicker than that compounds as these people are going through further on their journey to become whoever they want to become within the trade or the construction industry.

• Speaker #1

  Exactly. And then. You can peel that like an onion because then it goes, what is a leader? Is that just a title? Is that just a license? What type of character? There's just so many different avenues within the trades and just leadership and just in life.

• Speaker #0

  Let's talk about, good segue. I want to talk about this leadership thing because we've talked about this in past conversations. Like you posted something about this image of a blue collar worker and it like blew up, right, on your channel. and there's a lot of like Not hateful things, but like conflict. Like, I don't believe in this. I believe in this. Yeah. But what you're doing, you're poking the bear. Like you were. Yeah, that's great. I love poking the bear. But you were really at the end of the day. This post was about the fact that I think the image of a trades person was like an overweight older man. And then you're like, what does this new leader look like? How can we embody that? What are we teaching there? So I guess in your... mind and what you're trying to do, talk to me about the leaders that you are trying to develop.

• Speaker #1

  So at the end of the day, what did we say? Leadership is not a title. Just because you got your journeyman card doesn't make you a leader overnight. Oh, you passed it. You understand? So as a whole, we all have ways of improving. That's number one. No way am I trying to even call myself as a leader, but we have to understand leadership is taking action and understanding. what you have to do, how to get better when something's wrong, accountability, all these different facets of leadership. When we made those posts, we were literally talking to individuals and just trying to poke the bear in the sense of, once again, these stigmas. When you go to a contractor, when you go to a homeowner, when you go to any job site, you're going to hear someone say, I've been doing this for 30 years. As in, that's the, you can't tell me.

• Speaker #0

  I don't want to change.

• Speaker #1

  Yeah. You don't have to tell me what to do. I know what I'm doing. I've been doing it through. And then at the end of the day, I keep saying, what the hell does that mean? Okay, give me a paper. Give me something on paper. What does that mean? You understand? Because if you've been doing something wrong for 30 years, no one told you. You understand? Like, I always hated that flex. Like, it made no sense to me. Or I charge this because I've been doing this for 30 years. When we see I've been doing this for 30 years, you kind of see the same type of contractor saying the same thing, which is the picture which poked everybody. That's where I'm like. Like, well, I don't want to look like that. And that's just me personally. You understand?

• Speaker #0

  Totally. I think for me, I'm in the business of storytelling and media as well. The thing that I always think about is just like, you think of a person, like, what's your image? And unfortunately, that's our societal image right now. Or that's how it's been for a very long time. And so you're like, why? Like, that shouldn't be the default. Like, what's this new default?

• Speaker #1

  This new default, it's whatever you make of it. and once again Not saying anybody who looks like that or portrays themselves like that is going to be like that at the same time. There's both extremes. What we're trying to say is we always want to take the approach of self-development. And what does that look like? It can be in anything. It can be an attitude, character, physical.

• Speaker #0

  There is no answer.

• Speaker #1

  But I'm just saying this is what we have right now. And that shouldn't be the face. So that's what I'm just saying. And I'm like, let's now work backwards. You understand? We'll tackle this one thing at a time. Now, are there guys who are doing excellent in other avenues? Absolutely. Let's highlight that. So that's just the approach I just want to take. But it was enough to get. Remember, we're also. in the trade. So everyone has thick skin. I just broke that skin and I touched people's inner child with that post. Do you understand that? People were genuinely fighting in that post. And I'm like, okay, guess what? But if we're thick skin, how do we get through those layers? It's like a rhino. How do we break through them to say, hey, let's have a conversation now. Because even the way they were commenting.

• Speaker #0

  The defensiveness. Yeah.

• Speaker #1

  But that now that shows, cool, we're onto something. Now with pain, you can also encourage. You understand? So how do you break that, but also give the remedy? How do you break that and open up a conversation for them to think about?

• Speaker #0

  Maybe this hasn't happened yet, but like for some of these folks that are, let's say, interested in what you're doing, they have 30 plus years in the industry. They decide they want to change. I mean, what was that point for them, realization where they're like, I need to do things differently. It was the time in their business where they, I don't know, they hit bottom or I don't know. I'm just like trying to understand like, what is it where they're... where it's like, oh, I'm ready to do things differently?

• Speaker #1

  I think it's a lot of the younger guys. It's the new ones coming in. Our sweet spot is contractors who've been in it for four years plus now. They're coming in and they're recognizing, okay, I'm working, but I feel like I'm stressing. Something's wrong. Sadly, the ones who've been doing it for 20 to 30 years, they think that stress is just part of the job. Normal, yeah. Yeah. it's normalized yeah they're like and they're yeah they're like what are you what are you talking about this is exactly that's exactly exactly you see where i'm getting at now now that's a stigma you see where why aren't you working at 10 o'clock at night you understand and now that is the clash where people are like well will's doing this during the middle of the day he must not be successful and i was like no you can do both yeah and at the same time you don't have to be working till like but then one guy will call me up saying if you're not working at 10. I don't view you as a man. I'm like, well, you can have that thought. We're in this meshy ground of trying to break that.

• Speaker #0

  You're also probably having to develop people to be like those comments. As a business owner, you're trying to change mindsets, right? To like, oh, where you're taking it away from the scarcity fear mindset too. That's a big thing within the industry with humans in general. But you're like, how do we pivot that to be like, no, this is the way I work. You either work with me or just... screw off, right?

• Speaker #1

  Oh yeah.

• Speaker #0

  Build those boundaries and those systems in order to survive.

• Speaker #1

  Just like what you said. Like, that's why I said, we're not looking for students. We're like filtering contractors out. We're like, sorry, we don't think we're a good fit for you. And we built a chart. I don't know if you've seen that. If anywhere, I'll show you afterwards. I built a character chart for hiring, for what type of customers you want to do work for, for any single thing, we built a chart and we broke it down. We actually had the chief HR officer of the Ritz-Carlton Hotel do a presentation for us. And they said they did a case study for the last hundred years of hotel customers. And they said, if you don't know the Ritz-Carlton, what they're known for, it's the gold standard of hospitality. So when you check into the hotel, they said before, and as you take, and while so funny, we went to the Ritz-Carlton in White Plains, I went down in Miami just to experience it. just to see if it was like legit or not. And when you check in to, you get to your room, they want to know three things about you and not just name where you're from. They want to know why you're in town, what's something you're passionate about and, you know, family life, something personal. And then they give you a gift at the end of your stay on one of those three things. Like if you're here, like I'm here on our honeymoon, I'm here to take a business class. They'll get you like a catered gift. for that occasion. So it now shows that like I paid attention, here's this for you. And then retention of coming back is like through the roof. But they said they broke down human nature and there's five avenues people want to always portray or show off. And it's work ethic, skillset, trust, vision, and character. So these are like five natural needs. Our goal is to be perfect at all five. Everyone wants to, nobody wakes up and says, I want to be a man of low character. No one says that. No one. Everyone wants to always be optimistic. No one wants to say like, well, I'm just dealing it with day to day. No, that's low vision. Then trustworthy. Everyone wants to have you have my word. Then work ethic. I'm a great worker. I'm a hard worker. I'll work all night.

• Speaker #0

  And then he goes, humans have a need. And this is through hundreds of years. Strangers, people you work with, people you're intimate with, they always want to display those five qualities. So when it comes to hiring, how do you base off of those five qualities? In the trades, we already said three to five years experience. Work ethic, skill set, they want high. But character, trust, vision is low. So then you hire someone, they don't stay with you. Because they don't see the longevity of what the trades have to offer. They have low trust in you because the contractor doesn't have character. And he's over-promising under-delivering. Or he says, I'm going to give you a raise and he doesn't give you a raise. So now your trust is low based off the character. You see where I'm getting? So we basically flipped it. And we said, how do we hire, deal with someone? How do we work with someone? What type of person and contractor do we want to work with based off character, trust, vision? And then work ethic. That's what an apprenticeship is all about. You're learning the skills.

• Speaker #1

  Somebody,

• Speaker #0

  right? There we go. We're literally teaching someone the curriculum.

• Speaker #1

  You can see potential. Yeah.

• Speaker #0

  So we've completely flipped it. So now, once again, 200 contractors looking for someone with three to five years experience. We're saying, nope, scrap that. How do you hire for character trust vision? And then if they're going to stay with you, if they're man of their word, women of their word, if they're going to show up every day, every success story we heard, what was it? When it comes to superheroes, when it comes to any successful contractor, anybody in the trades, they always said, someone give me a shot, man. True or not? Every story we hear, someone gave me a shot. Now you're in the position to give somebody a shot and you're saying, nah, screw that. I want three to five years.

• Speaker #1

  Why? Yeah.

• Speaker #0

  You see where I'm getting at. So that's the bottleneck. Think about it.

• Speaker #1

  You want the bottleneck.

• Speaker #0

  Yeah. Every story we hear, we're like, wow, I want to be in the trades because of that guy. Now you're in the position. You're like, nah, I'm looking for someone three to five. You just stop passing that blessing on to someone else because you want something for yourself. And that's what no one wants to talk about. In the job site, a few things always piss me off. One of them was the guy with the keys. I always hated a guy with a lot of keys because they always had a key to every door. And I would be like, I got to go into this room. And the guy would be like, well, I'll be there around two o'clock. And I'm like, man. I had to wait for permission for him. Oh, can I just get the key and open it? Oh, whoa, whoa, whoa. It's the same with gatekeeping, right? There was guys who would take the plans home with them. So they wouldn't allow someone to get their 10 minutes earlier tomorrow and just say, what am I going to work on? They don't want nobody else to know what's going on on the job so that they couldn't outshine the guy. Basically, if he banged out the project stop, if this guy didn't have the keys that day, no one opened up a door. That's what the trades are. And that pisses me off. So I'm over here saying,

• Speaker #1

  it does not need to be this way. We're making it way too hard for ourselves.

• Speaker #0

  That's what I'm saying. But at the same time, so then I'm like, okay, what can I do that really piss people off? And it's like, all right, I haven't been contracting 30 years, but I know a thing or two. Let me start talking about those things or two, because these guys who are gatekeeping want to hold it, sign up for my mentoring class to know this secret. And I'm like, Hey guys, for free, you did it. And now they're like, well, you can't tell people that. So I'm like, guess what? I'm telling everybody now. So that's the way we're trying to shake it up. So now we're saying, how do you hire? Hey guys, hire based off of this. Well, I had somebody from Indeed saying, oh, can we have that for our thing? We want to revamp our thing. And we really appreciate that for skilled trades. Guess what? We're having these conversation openly because at the end of the day, when you type it up, who's the first person who's going see you now. So as a whole, this is just the path we're going down. And it's just sad, but it's exciting because it's never been done before at this level with this perspective. So I don't know what's coming from it, but we're just having fun. And a lot of people have been reacting positively overall. And the people who are not receptive of it, it's still giving us data on how to tweak it, if that still makes sense.

• Speaker #1

  It does. Yeah. Well, I want to talk a bit about... more on the culture. I know we were talking a lot about it, but the retention, the recruitment, attrition, I research a lot on it. I talk to people about it, but I would like your perspective. And you mentioned something recently. I've used this in pitch decks when I talk to people, but the fact that for every five, it's like five electricians retiring or five trays, I believe, as a whole to enter. But you made a comment. Which I don't think people are talking about enough about the fact that, great, we're getting people in, but they leave within the first year.

• Speaker #0

  Yeah.

• Speaker #1

  And actually, it's like within the first six months. Yeah. It's really, when you look at the data, it's really quick that these people leave. And it drives me crazy where these like research institutions that are very reputable make comments that these apprentices didn't know the job that they had, the job opportunity they had. Like, well, maybe it might be the system. Maybe there's more to this story and we're putting the whole blame on the individual. It doesn't seem right.

• Speaker #0

  Yeah.

• Speaker #1

  And so I'm curious, like labor shortage wise, like, yeah, there's this shortage, but. For me, I keep thinking it's more there's a culture and retention problem. That's a part of this. And if we can send people in and then we lose them, what are we doing?

• Speaker #0

  Exactly.

• Speaker #1

  And so I guess, like, what do you think are the biggest factors contributing to these for people not staying in the industry?

• Speaker #0

  I think number one, it's culture. Culture, especially with our new generation. Everyone goes to SANE. the new generation doesn't want to work. Once again, there's extremes to everything. I just view that what I love about hanging out with my friends and my nephews, they're just like, you remember that show, like the kids say the wildest things or the darndest things. I just view that on steroids now, especially with social media. Like kids are just, they just say what's on their mind.

• Speaker #1

  You have kids too, right? Yeah.

• Speaker #0

  But no, I'm talking about they're like. two years old. So it's like, I don't know what they're saying, you know? But what I'm trying to say is like now, like if you meet a kid and I got roasted in high school, I think I would die if I got roasted by a kid today in high school, because the level is just, it's to the extreme now. Like it's beyond personal. Like I heard one kid roast another kid. I cried and I'm like, damn, you know, that's like stings. What I think is they're just more vocal. They're more vocal. and they're saying, why would I want to dig a ditch at five o'clock in the morning in a blizzard or be in an attic mid-July for minimum wage and I can start at Target for 20 an hour in the AC? I think that's a genuine question. And that doesn't mean they don't want to work. They're just going to be vocal and say, it's not for me.

• Speaker #1

  Yeah, it doesn't make sense. Yeah. Yeah. I was wondering, there's some low wages and it depends again on area and where you're at.

• Speaker #0

  Exactly.

• Speaker #1

  But I think is lack of mentorship. Imagine if you had somebody in your corner day one and you're starting an apprenticeship.

• Speaker #0

  Well, I told you in my life, I always had a mentor and that's saved one of the youngest kids to get their master license in Connecticut because he's saying, dude, just focus on that. I'm telling you, that's a big part of it. That is extremely a big part of it because they're telling you, no, you got to do this for four years. Focus on that in overtime right now. Okay, cool. Just focus on that. Then people are like, oh, don't go to this. Don't do that. I agree 100% mentorship, 100%. That's a big part of it.

• Speaker #1

  I know that there's other like cultural challenges with this. Like there's tons of stigmas, as you've pointed out. Are these reasons for people leaving? And obviously like there's a lot of women. There's these statistics and I got to fact check some of this stuff. But I've talked to women in the construction industry and they said that there's probably of all the people that quit each year, there's 40% are culture quits.

• Speaker #0

  I believe it.

• Speaker #1

  Yeah. And so it's like, well, we got to fix that and figure it out. Because especially for bringing in new blood, for bringing more women into these careers, it's like they're not going to stay.

• Speaker #0

  Yeah. And how do you fix that? It's conversations. How do you fix that? It's letting them know, hey, you may run into this and then let them decide if they want to get in. Because when people keep saying there's a labor shortage, I always hated that.

• Speaker #1

  So do I.

• Speaker #0

  And they always keep defending it. I'm like, shut up. First of all, if there's a labor shortage, a contractor is not complaining because that means work and that means money. So if there's a shortage, that's fine. My project, instead of billing it for a year, I'm going to bill for two years now because we need more time to do the work. You see what? No one's going to complain at the end of the day that there's a shortage. The people are complaining are the schools who are trying to get students in just to push them along. Once again, as a school, as Energizer, we don't want to just push them on. We're trying to keep people up. I'm telling people, no, you don't fit our curriculum. I'm trying to push me. I want to be the Harvard of trade schools. I want to be like, sorry, there's, there's a wait list or you got to apply to get to this trade school. Why? Because we want people to stay in it. We want retention. We want vision. We want longevity out of these guys. When you go on the DOL website for apprenticeship.org, 50 to 60% dropout rate.

• Speaker #1

  Yeah, that's nuts. I like,

• Speaker #0

  and then they're saying, no, we have a shortage. We're in the trades. If there's a pipe, And you're losing 50% of your water. And at the end, true or not, if it's past the meter, you as a homeowner still got to pay for that water. So I'm over here thinking as a business and as an owner, why am I paying for 10 gallons if I'm only getting five? Something's wrong. It's not the supply. I got to fix that pipe. You understand? I got to stop the leak because I'm paying more out of it. It's more of a cost to me. So what are we doing when it comes to the trades? We're seeing people speak on the trades who aren't in the trades, so they don't have to eat the cost of somebody not staying in the trades. Me as a contractor, I can say, why am I putting all this money into recruitment? And none of these guys say, I would be pissed too. You see where I'm getting at, right? It's not hitting the people in the pockets where it. They are now going to say, let me change something. So that's what we need more of. We need people who are on the field, in the field, who can speak on, hey, this is directly affecting us. Once again, it's not that affecting the contractor. It might hold or slow us down. But guess what? We just update our contracts. And instead of a year project, we're making it two years. And we need people to stay. Because if we don't, that's when we're going to start seeing these problems five, ten years from now. Because the people who do stay. Let's say now they fall into the stigmas and they don't want their license. They don't want to become contractors. So it's just a snowball effect of more issues down the road. The tip of it is the people leaving. And if we don't fix that, the last remainder who do stay, then they're going to get swallowed up by the stigmas, not want to get better, no self-development. You see where I'm getting at.

• Speaker #1

  Yeah, and then it's like they're the ones then that are going to attract people. And it's just who you're going to attract.

• Speaker #0

  Exactly.

• Speaker #1

  Yeah. So back to Energize Us. And we're talking about culture. We're talking about retention. What are you all doing on the ground to like it could be new programs that you think will help with keeping people, especially in that first year of an apprenticeship?

• Speaker #0

  So what's unique that we're trying to do is not only through the media, get them in, show them what the trades have to offer and give it the different perspective of the normal narratives all about. But at the same time, we're trying to understand people's pain points. So when it comes to a contractor, what are our pain points? If you're an apprentice, what are your pain points? Why do you not want to stay in the trades? And that goes back to what we're talking about where, you know, there's clearly an issue with the pipeline. And what do you say? And what did you say? A lot of people say, oh, it's the new generation. They don't want to stick it out. As somebody who works with, remember, self-development, leadership. if your first response is other than we are failing, there's a problem there. Every time something fails in my company, I'm like, what did I mess up at?

• Speaker #1

  Yeah, you take accountability of it. Yeah.

• Speaker #0

  So when people aren't staying, I'm thinking, where did I go wrong? Then I empathize. Why would I want to stay with you? And then I started thinking about it. I was like, well, minimum wage, that's a big one. I'm like, well, I can pay you 30 an hour in five years. Yeah, but my mortgage, my rent is at the end of the month. You see where I'm getting that pain point? What's that pain point? People don't change unless there's a pain point. People are going to leave if they can't pay their bill, period. So how do you do that? So when it comes to energizers, once again, we're looking at everything from the other person's perspective as in what is that pain point? One is that finances. Okay, the DOL broke down the pay scale for a reason. I can't just pay you $30 an hour today. Why is that? If you get the money at the same time easy without putting in the work, you're not going to appreciate it. That's just human nature. True or not. At the same time, I can't expedite the five-year curriculum. That's just the way the standard is. So how do you put skin in the game, but at the same time, learn to have the appreciation for what the trades have to offer? So I said, okay, call our board, call our investors. How are we going to remove these pain points? What's the number one pain point? You got to pay your rent. You're looking at a thousand, two, three, four. Housing. What can we do to offer affordable housing for people who are already in our network working with contractors in our builders association? You see where I'm getting at? So if you want affordable housing, you have to be employed. by a contractor who's taking our courses.

• Speaker #1

  Got it. And so you have, there's Energize Us, and then you have a builder's association called Build. And so, okay, just to clarify for people listening. Yeah.

• Speaker #0

  So there's a whole bunch of different facets where this goes down. But what we're trying to create, remember, Andy, Toy Story, we want to grow with our audience. So we have a media division, then we have our education division, then we have our professional development. And each one is an ecosystem to the next. So if we get a student, let's say he's 18, I'm with him for the next 10 years. Guaranteed. Why? Because he saw our content. He's now in the apprenticeship four or five years. Now he's going for his license. I want us to build his own. And the end goal is he's a successful contractor hiring his first person who's he's going to sell. You see where I'm getting at. I'm just creating an ecosystem. So what we're trying to do is remove that pain point. So if you are thinking about coming into the trades and you're saying, I want to work. I want to trades. That's fine. Come in. If you now are employed by one of our contractors in our association.

• Speaker #1

  So they could be on the ground, like first year apprentice. Is that it called employable? Like I'm just trying to understand like what is employed.

• Speaker #0

  Every company is going to have their own policy. So for example, if you go into John's electric and he's one of our contractors, he may say, Hey, you have to pass probation for six months first. After that, we'll invest you into the apprenticeship program.

• Speaker #1

  And then at that point, you have access to the affordable housing option.

• Speaker #0

  The contractor will then speak with us on that. As you can imagine, my relationship is with contractors. I'm not trying to fill up 30 seats. I'm trying to fill up 30 contractors, if that's priority. So his, the way he has it broken down, then that's how we would break everything down. So we offer that affordable housing. We take that pain point. So if you're in a state that I can't control the curriculum, I can't control the pay scale. I can control your biggest bottleneck though. So if I can say, hey, come in that bill that you have of $2,000 a month, guess what? We're just going to make it 500 a month. You move in with us. We have facilities. We're going to have campuses. And guess what? In that campus, you do your normal job because you're already employed. So I know you're good for it because I'm helping the contractor developing him so he can now keep you employed. We're all working together. After work, you come into the apprenticeship six to nine. If you've got kids, we've got daycare. Yeah.

• Speaker #1

  If you can figure out the childcare, I think the key secret is like you figure out childcare. Everyone's coming to the trade.

• Speaker #0

  Exactly. Exactly. And then think about it. You're working every day to pay that rent of $2,000 a month. Now imagine and you're at minimum wage. That's going to choke a lot of people out. And they're going to say, no, not because I don't want it, not because I don't see it, but because I just physically can't handle it. So now they're coming in and they say, hey, that minimum wage that we can't control right now, but it will change every six months you get a raise, that minimum wage goes a lot further because you don't have that 15 extra hundred dollars a month you have to pay. So now you can appreciate it. You're still working hard for it. Remember, you're not bumping your pay up. You still have to work for that. But it just goes further, if that makes sense.

• Speaker #1

  Especially at that age. I mean, yeah, especially at that time in your career. Yeah.

• Speaker #0

  Exactly. Exactly. Because what do we see a lot of people do? They do want to stay home because that expense isn't there. But at the same time, you want to branch off, do something on your own. At the same time, you may be in a different state where you don't have your family to help you out. So we're just looking at all these different pain points of what's going to hold someone back.

• Speaker #1

  Totally. And it's like that first, that first six months, like if we, yeah, our first year, like I think housing is huge. I think child care is huge. I've spent, I talked to an organization, they're a pre-apprenticeship program in the Bay Area. And they're like, we'll buy your tires on her car. We will do whatever it takes to ensure that we can at least help, especially in that first few years of employment, so that you have the support that you need.

• Speaker #0

  And then it also shows commitment. Because if you want to leave the program halfway, you see what comes with it. You know, okay, if you want to just go somewhere else, well, these benefits are for people who want to see them. That's why our screening process is going to be so, it's going to be very tough.

• Speaker #1

  Yeah.

• Speaker #0

  because We want to make sure if you're coming into the trays, it's for the right reasons, for the longevity of it. So there's going to be commitments involved. At the end of the day, we need to make sure the contractors that are part of our association are going to hold those high standards. Because it's just going to be a dynamic clash if we're both looking at things two different ways. So that's why it all comes with shaping the culture, the mindset of what everything's going through right now.

• Speaker #1

  Yeah. The thing that I think is just so different that what you're doing, I mean, you're building community, right? I think that's a big missing piece in this community belonging support, but like having a community of folks to turn to, you can be vulnerable with, especially vulnerabilities. Like that's not, that's good. I feel like it's been like taboo in this industry as well. I think a lot about the community aspect of what you're doing.

• Speaker #0

  Yeah, that's a big part of it. And like we already touched on that because, you know, we're in a thick skinned industry. We're in a hard skill dominated industry and we got to throw a little soft skill in there. So that's where the clash comes in. but at the same time like hazing is i know we talked about that also like it almost seems like you have to go through the hazing. And sometimes I want to call it bullying. Sometimes it's just culture. Sometimes it's just shooting the crap, you know, with some people. But there's always that fine line. I think we're in an industry, we're in a tough enough industry where you got to bully the bully sometimes just to get to break that armor. Just like with the post we talked about. How do you break that armor? There's no way that dude was going to ever think that I'm anybody on a normal day. Because I don't have 30 years. That's his defense. You blow through that defense. Now it's like, now we can have a conversation. Even if it's an argument, we're still communicating now. True or not, with your spouse or with my wife, if my wife is pissed at me and she's arguing with me, I know I'm going to go to bed good. You know, I know I'm asleep on the bed. If she ain't talking to me, then I'm like, I'm on the couch. I know that's going to happen. Why? Because when communication cuts off, that's when nothing happens. You see where I'm getting at? So I'm like, okay, if we're fighting, even though it's not the type of conversation I want, I know we're still going to be angry. And I can still learn from it. I can see where he's coming from, even if it's pain. You understand? If he just doesn't say anything, I'm not trying hard enough, or I really messed up. So that's my gauge. If someone is communicating, even if they're angry, I'm like, all right, we're hitting a soft spot. So let's keep going.

• Speaker #1

  What is your long-term vision for the trades? Do you have one in mind where you're like, this is what I want the trades and the construction industry as a whole to be?

• Speaker #0

  To be, no. Because just like every other project we go to, I love building. I love showing up to a job site. I love hearing the sounds of a job site. I love everything about construction.

• Speaker #1

  And so I think it's like the evolve. You want to continue to evolve. You don't want to stop. Yeah.

• Speaker #0

  I don't want to stop. I love everything about construction. I love how we can take something that's broken. We can fix it. I love how we can build something from nothing to something. And I believe it's artistic at the end of the day. Like you go around the world, you'll see all these buildings. It's beautiful. I don't want to say this is what the trades have to be because that's the beauty about differences. You know, I want to see people create things out nothing. I love that. do want to see different and what we're pushing towards it's beyond work it's beyond school it's beyond monetary what we're trying to do and people may think i'm crazy it's i want to run department of labor i want to run i want our school to be like the consultant for department of labor you're manifesting this shit right now so keep speaking it when it when it comes to state level I'm talking about on a global scale. Yeah. And right now. We're in a world where media can get you. If you knew the stuff that I'm doing next week, it's unheard of. And I started this less than a year ago. Unheard of. Literally next week, what we're going to be doing, I'm like, wow. And all of that started from making stupid videos and getting people pissed because we have to break that armor. We have to have these conversations. And I may be right. I may be wrong. If people want to have this conversation, I love having these conversations because at the end of the day, people have to choose what they want to do. But as a whole, we want to be that mentor for government. We want to be that mentor, not just as an apprentice coming in. We want to be that mentor for states. We want to be that for the US, for worldwide on what the trades can do for you. And we want to be able to give resources to organizations, to countries, just all around the world. We want to be able to give you the tools that you need. I want to be on every project, but I can't do that. So if I can make a book. If I can make an app, if I can make a software, if I can make a course that's going to help you get better, that's what we want to do. So when it comes to that, I'm talking global.

• Speaker #1

  If you could give your younger self one piece of advice, knowing your journey and anyone that's early in their journey, like one piece of advice at this moment in time, what would it be?

• Speaker #0

  So I was fortunate. I had a lot of mentors in my life growing up. I had a lot. And it got me to a point where I'm very impressed. I'm very proud of myself. But I always told myself, it's like I'm operating. I like genuinely when I look at myself, I feel like I'm at 50, 60%. Like even if I just gave it another 10%, I would. There's like, there's days where I'll sit down and I'll just turn the TV on just for no reason. And I'm not trying to say it's always work, But I do take a lot of breaks on myself. If I was to tell myself someone is just be intentional with everything. If you want to have a conversation with someone, if something's bothering you about someone, talk about it, get over it, be intentional. Don't steam over it for two months and just be like, and then keeping, you know what I mean?

• Speaker #1

  Let it go.

• Speaker #0

  Yeah. It's just be intentional with everything. If you want to say something, say it. If it's good, good. If it's bad, all right. Just understand there's a consequence for everything.

• Speaker #1

  Yeah. You're living with it.

• Speaker #0

  Yeah. Go back to the wife analogy. I'm pretty sure you can relate to this. If you tell your husband, take out the trash and he goes, I'll take out the trash and you wake up and the trash is there. You're going to be like, hmm, interesting. Hey, baby, you didn't take it out. Oh, I'll do it today. And he doesn't do it. You're going to be like, okay, then you take out the trash. Now you're upset. My wife then will go, hey, we'll take out the trash. I don't take it out. And then the next day she does, you didn't take out the trash. And I go, you're right. I was wrong. I still have respect because I had owned up to it. And then I take the trash out. I know I'm going to sleep on the bed. You understand? There's two ways you can even handle. When things go wrong, you can still handle it the best way possible. And that's why I want to be remembered for just being very intentional. Even when I screw up. All right. I can either just shut up and act like I'm not at fault. Or I can just own up on it and still keep all the respect. You see? So that's what I want. I want to remember, I want to pass that down and just be intentional with everything I do, even when you mess up.

• Speaker #1

  That's a great answer.

• Speaker #0

  I appreciate that.

• Speaker #1

  I always end my podcast with a note of gratitude. So is there one person in your life that you want to thank?

• Speaker #0

  So I went to Thomas A. Edison High School in Queens. It's one of the few vocational high schools left that are free. When I came into, I was approved for like automotive. And I was like, I hate automotive. And I was just skipping school. I don't think I told anybody that I was just like shop class is stupid. I'm not going to be a mechanic. Cause if you think electrical is bad or plumbers are bad mechanics, I feel like that's still wild west. They have their own battle. They have to fight. You know what I mean? That automotive world, they have their own battle to fight. And then the, I don't know what you call it. The Dean of the apprenticeship program, the director, whoever's in charge of all the classes is like, dude, you're just skipping school, bro. And I was like, I just hate automotive. He's like, well, I'll put you in electrical. I was like, huh? All right, cool. If it wasn't for that switch and him just switching me into another class, I would never have been an electrician. I have buddies who are in electrical. They told me to go to that school, but no one told me what craft to pick. So I just didn't like automotive. And he was like, all right, let me switch you to electrical. And that's where everything else clicked. So what's his name? He's actually the principal, Mr. Mejia.

• Speaker #1

  The principal Mejia.

• Speaker #0

  Principal Mejia.

• Speaker #1

  Word of thank you to you.

• Speaker #0

  Yeah, I think like three, four years ago, he just became the principal of the school. So I was like, holy, so he's passionate about that. So he cares. So yeah, Thomas Hedison in Jamaica, Queens.

• Speaker #1

  Oh, well, Will Batonsas, thank you so much for being on the Scalding F podcast. You are an inspiration. What you're doing is you're trailblazing. You're carving a path here and you're building the plane as it's flying. that's what Good entrepreneurs do too. It's very exciting to see what you've been able to do in a very short amount of time. And I know the impact that you're going to have in the next generation is going to be incredible. The impact that you're going to have on this industry is going to be incredible. So it is an honor to be in this room with you and to have you on the podcast.

• Speaker #0

  It really means a lot.

• Speaker #1

  You're skilled AF. Keep putting power to skilled in that word. And thank you so much for your time.

• Speaker #0

  Appreciate you. Thank you.

• Speaker #1

  Thank you so much for tuning into this episode of the skilled AF podcast. If you enjoyed it, please rate, review, subscribe to it, wherever you're listening. And if you want to stay connected, partner, you name it, head over to the skilled project.com or follow us on social media at the skilled project until next time. Stay skilled AF.