Soften your senses.
Ways to become a better speaker, listener, and follower.
This episode brought to you by ServiceLogic, commercial HVAC and mechanical services.
Learn more at ServiceLogic.com.
Thank you all so much for joining us today.
We're hanging out with Greg Crumpton, straight out of Crumpton.
How are you, sir?
Hey, buddy.
I'm doing well.
It's a good day.
It's a beautiful day.
I'm looking out the window.
There's a lot of green.
There's a lot of, as we said earlier, pollen.
So it's that time of year, but I'm super stoked and glad to be talking with you this
morning.
You know, we were sitting here having a conversation about things to give back to the industry.
And one important topic is softening our senses and being receptive to talking to people and
communicating with people and being more than just technicians.
We can be the best technician in the world, but if we can't communicate what's in our
brain, are we really serving our customers and our students?
So let's dive a little bit deeper into good communication.
You know, such a great topic.
We do, our schools that we go through for technical training, our factory OEM certifications,
they teach us to be technicians and tacticians and component specialists.
What we have done as an industry, in my opinion, is we've not recognized the importance of
that communication skill, the importance of properly communicating, even down to just
announcing yourself when you get to a job, letting people know who you are, why you're
there, best way to contact you, just normal things that make life go easier.
And that's one thing I think we could really dive into of how to improve on that piece
of the industry.
Absolutely.
You know, we've had a lot of conversations in these last couple of years with changes
in just the world in general and civilization.
And now that people are more open to conversations and more open to having other faces and voices
involved with our industry, we have a lot more ladies joining our workforce.
And the one thing you always hear from contractors is, I wish I could have another dozen women
for everyone that I've hired because they know how to communicate.
You know, it's so true.
So true.
And when, you know, I had a company that I ran for many years and our whole company administratively
ran on women power.
We had a VP of operations was a lady, the office manager was a lady.
I think our dispatch crew were all female, our sales crew were female except for one
guy or two guys.
Because of that, you know, I've been married for almost 40 years.
Oh, congratulations.
Thank you.
To the same person.
I always like to add that.
So I have over time grown to appreciate the power of what women bring to the equation.
And I was talking to a female that works for one of the service.
Logic companies out in California.
And she just had a baby.
So Jen Graham.
And it's really funny because we were talking about just that of the difference between
her as a female service technician and building automation versus her male counterparts of
what came naturally in communication when they arrived at a job site.
It was profound the differences.
But it's important.
You know, you think I always like to look at this stuff, Clifton, we are consumers.
You know, we buy a lot of stuff as humans.
We go to the store, we get a car, whatever.
You know what feels good to you.
You know how you like to be communicated to you know, that this is good communication
when you get it.
I think if we learn to replicate what we like, it's easier to deliver.
I agree with that 100%.
You know, and we've seen a change in society.
And a lot of educators, I would say a lot of educators in our industry are in my, you
know, in the Gen X age range.
You know, right now we've seen a lot of that here at our own conference this year.
We had about 500 new educators that were both Gen X and millennials.
So we have a significant amount of teachers in our industry, whether you're at a post-secondary,
a vocational, whether you're at a contractor and you're a technical trainer at a contractor,
that is now speaking to a variety of generations.
Great point.
I think we have five generations in the workplace right now.
Yes.
So that tells you right there, we can't deliver the same message to the same people consistently.
You know, the law of communication is communicate in the language that is being heard.
And you can't speak five languages at one time.
So I'm the last year of the baby boomer.
I was born in 64, so I'm the youngest baby boomer.
And then we're all the way down to the new crop coming in now, which are alpha or A.
And when you look at the breadth of that generation and what each generation finds valuable, what
their beliefs are, what they need to be connected to a company, which is our ultimate goal to
make people want to be with us, not have to be with us.
Exactly.
You really have to learn how to be, I don't know what the word for five languages is,
but you have to be diverse.
And it's so important because, you know, we were talking about this recently, I was on
a camping trip and what worked when I was an apprentice, my journeymen, the way they
taught me and even the way they spoke to me, they would go to jail now compared to what
we have learned and how to speak in a nice tone or what have you to our upcoming stars.
But it's so important to realize those differences and be able to communicate at the level, not
technically only, but maturity, where they are in their life.
There's nothing greater to me than being able to help a young tech, male, female, whatever,
buy their first home, buy their first car, welcome their first baby.
Those are life changing events.
And when they look back in life and they think, where was I working when little Madeline happened?
You better be on the right side of that equation as far as how you acted as a leader, as a
mentor, as a friend.
And those things stick forever.
You know, it's so interesting that you brought up that five generations of workers.
I literally just wrapped up an online class as like a follow up for our conference.
So it's part of our virtual conference on the five generations of learners and talking
about how that has changed.
And a lot of people don't realize that Gen Z in particular communicates more like the
maturest than most people would realize.
They are very much about communicating one on one and having that relational, that personal
conversation that has validation within the conversations.
And if we look at say my generation, Gen X, we're not the best communicators.
We're not the best speakers.
We grew up at that introduction into technology where we spent a lot of time playing video
games and learning new technologies and as it transitioned down the line, we forget how
important proper communication is, particularly to Gen Z and Alpha that is now coming up.
These two generations like to communicate.
They like to be recognized and they like to be validated when they do things correct.
Your generation and my generation, it wasn't necessarily that way.
You got told when you did things wrong, not necessarily when you did things right.
And that has changed in our society and being more comfortable communicating with different
generations that receive criticism and validation differently is key to having that proper communication.
So it's like picking up another tool for our tool bag.
Absolutely.
Yeah.
Well said.
You know, it's amazing to me that we forget these little things because we get caught
up in the moment of the day or the crisis de jure and you revert back to bad habits
because bad habits have historically been quick, succinct, and you got to the meat of
the problem in a hurry.
That's great if you're talking to you, but if you're talking to me, I don't give a crap
about your problems.
I'm trying to solve mine.
It really comes down to taking that pause.
And my wife and I were talking about it this morning, actually, when you have something
that occurs before you try to communicate, take a 10 second pause and just get your crap
together before you start talking.
Whether it be friends, family, work, home, whatever, that's almost a fail proof way to
kind of reset just for a moment.
And it's a little bit of an exaggerated pause, but it's not earth shattering.
But it gives you time to collect your senses.
And the other thing, Clifton, is the amount of folks that, you know, we've got 5,600 employees
or something like that across the country, across all five generations.
What I like to remind our up and coming stars, because I feel like we have a lot of them,
you know, people talk about all the time, young kids don't want to work.
They don't want to do this.
There is a tremendous glut of young, talented, hardworking folks that are ready to rock and
roll.
Absolutely.
We just have to light the fuse for them.
They're on the path.
We just got to light them up.
But always talk about eye contact and proper communication.
Because if I can look at you in the eye and I communicate a message to you, you may not
want to hear it.
Like I just told you, you have a failed compressor in your rooftop unit.
But if I'm looking at you and I'm delivering good solid facts, good solid communication,
I put you at ease much more than if I'm looking down at my phone or my tops of my feet mumbling
about what I found on the rooftop and oh, by the way, it's $27,000.
That's not the way to make people feel secure about what's going on.
You want them to feel confident.
You want them to feel heard.
So they say $27,000.
You got to tell me more.
You got to be able to deliver on what you're offering with good, succinct details.
And that's where that pause comes in before you walk in to talk to the customer.
Get your mental script ready if you would.
Or at least bullet-tie his points so you don't have to vomit ill-prepared vomiting is a better
way of saying that.
I like it.
I'm absolutely taking a break for a second.
And if we're talking about generations that haven't quite learned those different communication
skills, I always try to break it down into there's really two different responses that
many of us have been programmed into.
Validation as a response and invalidation as a response.
And if we look at how, say if we take Gen X, take my generation, we very much grew up
in an invalidation.
And what I mean by invalidation is we're looking for solving the problem in our response.
That has taken a shift.
Started in the millennials and moved into the Gen Z that are more trained for taking
that moment and finding a solution.
And that is where there is sometimes a disconnect in the way that we are communicating between
different generations is what is the outcome.
Because you're very much, you're right.
Many of us, Gen X and of our boomers, we tend to as a response have the solution.
We want to provide the solution in our response.
But when we start talking about millennials in Gen Z, they're very much about finding
a solution as a team and not necessarily looking at that exact answer.
So an invalidating response is this is what I found, this is what's gonna have to happen.
Versus this is what I found.
Let's talk about some solutions for this.
And it is a little bit of a learning curve.
Such a valid point.
My wife tells me all the time, I'm just telling you about my problem.
I don't want an answer.
Isn't that a learning curve?
I mean, that's that that comment is so germane to just good communication.
Yes.
But part of listening, if you train yourself on proper listening techniques, is listen
and then give you feedback on what I heard.
And I can't do that if I'm preparing the answer.
So if I'm listening to the question, active listening, all those skills to go with that.
And if I can't do that, if I'm formulating the answer off of your first 10 words in your
description of the problem.
And that comes that is a retraining you have to do this because our generation, as you
said, here's problem, here's the answer.
And that doesn't work.
And it doesn't have to work because I use this all the time.
And our company, we have many, many operating brands.
So our company in Denver operates as a name.
Our company in San Diego is a name.
And they're they're all good at what they do, but they all do it differently.
I always like to remind myself there's 50 right ways to run a mechanical service company.
One answer is not good for anything this day and age.
Everything can be a hybrid.
You can take a little bit of this and a little bit of that, formulate a successful solution
as opposed to just, you know, picking one option.
I guess it's ABC or all of the above.
And I tend to go all the above now because I have more tools in my brain.
I have more tools online.
I can learn how to communicate.
I can I can watch a 20 minute, you know, deep dive on listening skills on Saturday morning,
driving to the hardware store and act better when I get in the store, when I get there
and they say we don't have any two by fours you're looking for.
OK, don't get mad.
Figure out the solution based on what you just learned driving there.
So I think it's a continual learning curve of how to communicate.
The platinum rule is what we want to treat others like they want to be treated, where
the golden rule is treat others like we want to be treated.
Nobody cares about how you want to be treated.
They care about how they want to be treated.
And I've all you know, I learned that from a guy years and years ago, Price Pritchett.
He puts out these little mini books.
They're probably 100 pages max.
And he gives you life skills that you can learn.
And I always remember the platinum rule of treat others as they want to be treated.
And it's the same in listening.
Communicate how they hear you.
Wow.
So important things to learn for changing generations and how to speak to new generations
and being willing to learn some new skills, because some of these are going to be new
skills for us.
You know, a lot of times we hear that complaint of this generation doesn't want to do anything.
And I think it's almost just the opposite.
I think that the generations actually want to do more.
They want to solve problems and they look at a short answer.
If that's the only solution, they look at that as narrow minded.
So we have to look at ourselves.
Are we being narrow minded by providing our invalidating response?
And I think many times we are.
That's a good point.
You know, I think going back to speaking different languages, our industry, we are losing a lot
of my generation people.
And I think that that's good in a way because our industry is chock full of people who were
closed minded about sharing their information.
They were closed minded about helping young people grow more quickly than opposed to sending
them to the job trailer for a left handed pipe wrench.
Show me some real skills while I'm on the job with you.
Don't treat me like a first year donkey and help me.
And I think that, and I know it's bad to say that it's good that some of our people are
retiring, but it is.
I know some that I'm glad they're out of the industry because I don't think that they were
helping the situation.
And I think the more people who are committed to the skilled trades industry, the HVAC industry,
the electrical, whatever your niche is, if you're in it, like at my age, you're in it
for the right reason, I think.
I'm not trying to pay for my truck out here.
My job is to help the young people get to where they're trying to go quickly or quicker
with less scar tissue than I had to go through and help them see the way to prosperity and
to serving well, because that's what our job is, in my opinion.
That's absolutely it.
Greg Crumpton, we thank you so much for joining us today and helping us understand a little
bit better about our own senses and ways to soften them.
Well, I've certainly enjoyed talking with you.
I love the skilled trades environment.
I love our people.
We're a misunderstood group because people think of us as one thing or another, but we're
real humans with real needs out there battling every day for the common good.