I want to take just a second and thank the four companies that make HGH C school possible. So you hear at the beginning of every podcast that talked about these four companies, but I just want to real quick say what I think needs to be said here, which is the testo carrier, rector seal and Mitsubishi PCB. She comfort have stepped up to make this possible because a lot of people have asked me. I get these questions a lot.

Are you gon na charge for courses? Are you gon na? Do you know all these different things? Are you gon na? Are you gon na sell products and, and really the answer to that is for HVAC school? No, what you see on the website, what you get in the daily tech tip emails and what you get here in this podcast as well as what you see on YouTube. I want to continue to produce really high quality product. It's something that that's gon na help you something's gon na benefit technicians day in and day out, and I don't want to have to charge technicians for it. I don't wan na have to charge contractors out there, for it.

I mean you're having a tough enough time right now, with the skills gap and trying to find technicians and - and you experienced technicians out there, trying to find people who actually are interested in working in this trade is a challenge, and I know that so that's why I didn't want to charge you for this. I wanted to find partners and these partners are these four companies. These are all four companies that I really do a lot of business. With that I like working with that I've done business with since I first started my business Mitsubishi carrier rector sealant test.

Oh, are all great products test, Oh makes some of the best test, instrumentation and a very affordable high quality test. Instrumentation carrier is the product that I've sold ever since I started my business, it's a it's the product that I came into the marketplace wanting to sell now, because it's perfect because no brand is perfect but because they invested in me a lot. I got some great training from carrier early on when I was a new technician. I mentioned this many times the Keith Ledford and Ray Johnson were two of my heroes at carrier and those guys kind of led me to trust the brand and not to trust that.

It's perfect, like I said, but to trust that they care about doing the right thing as far as making this product that they can Mitsubishi. I've worked on their products for years. I've been a diamond contractor with them for, for many years, really appreciate their product and then rector, CEO, James, Bowman, from record who's kind of their head of training for rector seal he's a guy who really invests in technicians across the country. He goes around all around the country, teaching technicians, about things that aren't necessarily even rector seal related.

I mean he actually teaches some installation and servicing best practices for ductless systems, which is something that heaven knows. We need a lot of and a lot of other topics that really are there to help technicians, grow and, of course, not along the way they want to sell products. Obviously - and I would - and I would ask you to support these brands, because I think they're showing a commitment to the industry at a time when you know we need these brands as brands, who, who have the budgets to spend on these things. Instead of you know putting an ad on television, let's invest in the trade itself, let's invest in, and the technicians who are coming up through the trade that they can learn.

They can do a better job and that's what these brands have done with HVAC school. So I thank them, and I thank you for supporting them and for listening to the HVAC school podcast beat zoom on the 10 second flame free refrigerant, fitting from parker reduced labor costs by sixty percent, with no brazing no flame had no fire spotter discover how Siouxland Can help you be more efficient and productive visit zum lot, comm for more information, here's the guy who talks about test Oh 6:05 eyes and delivered capacity in his sleep, and maybe Jim Bergman, but he swears. It was just one of those I'm flying and my friends were all there sort of dreams, nothing weird Brian or hey. You found yourself here on the HVC school podcasted.

I don't know when you're listening to this exactly, but it's right after Christmas 2017 today when I'm, when I'm recording this it's actually the day after Christmas, and so I wanted to do a quick, quick episode, something that I think is on everybody's minds as they come Into the new year and they're thinking about their work and they're thinking about meaning and they're thinking about Christmas and New Year's resolutions and all that sort of stuff I mean - maybe I'm overthinking this, but a bit every year, as I kind of take the time to Spend more time with my family a little bit more time away from work. Of course you know we're in the service business so who are we kidding? It's not that much time away from work, but but usually a little bit of time away from work or if you've been working all holiday, then you're probably wondering what you're doing with your life and how you got into this position to work all holiday either way. You're, probably thinking about your career, so today's podcast is not about something that you forgot to remember in the first place or forgot to know about air-conditioning technical stuff. This is a podcast that taps into more of my managerial experience and my experience as an owner and I'm gon na kind of pull back the curtain and hopefully show you some ways that you can make more money.

But through both your pay raises and bonuses and then also how you can get promotions if you work in a business now, and also this kind of hopefully will help inform managers and business leaders of what you want to look for when you're communicating with your employees. In order to achieve these things, because, in order for us to really succeed as a business or to succeed as a trade, we have to not only be interested about our pockets. We have to be interested about our brethren, who are working in the industry, whether that be the rank and file technician all the way down at the bottom doing maintenances or whether that's senior Tech's, whether that's managers, supervisors owners. We have to be concerned that everybody does well that everybody succeeds right, and the sense always is that other people are doing better than you are, but I think you'll find if you walk a mile in someone else's shoes, that every job has its good parts and It's difficult parts and those of us who have enough perspective, I think, can kind of see that so, let's talk a little bit about raises bonuses and promotions.

So here's the first thing, the first thing that you have to assess and if you are working as a technician in a business, it may be hard for you to do this and may be hard for you to step back enough to really assess this. But it's an important step in this process. Is you have to think about, or at least come to an understanding of? Are you dealing with a pragmatic company, / leader, /, whoever it is you report to whoever you interact with whoever has the the real decision-making power over you and what you do for a living? Are you dealing with a person who is pragmatic and pragmatic just means? Do they use logic in order to make decisions? Are they illogical human being? Because in some companies, you may work for a really nice person, but they may not make logical decisions regularly and again, don't keep? You know because this is where technicians like oh yeah, they sent me across town and crisscross and whatever there's this whole piece of the backend of an air conditioning company that as a technician, it's really hard to get a handle on how many moving pieces there. Are.

You always have a sense that everybody else is goofing off in the office and you're out there doing the work. Trust me. I had that same sense when I was a technician until I flipped over and became a manager and then an owner and so you're always gon na have a little bit of that sense. That's not what I'm talking about.

What I'm talking about is. Does the business in general promote the right people? Do they think do they make decisions based on what's really best for the company and an example of working for a company that is not a pragmatic company would be somebody who gets into a leader who gets into an argument with one of their best technicians and Then fires them that's, not a pragmatic decision, because everybody eventually is going to have a conflict. I've had conflicts with the leaders in my business multiple occasions, people who I trust, people who I care about in many cases family I mean some of my biggest fights have been with my father and with my brother, who are you know some of my best partners In business, some of the people who I look to the most to to help the business succeed and truly are partners in the business as well, and at times your tempers flare right and so in a company. That's not pragmatic would often fire someone because they're emotional and then on the other side there would BV company that is afraid of conflict and so they're, not pragmatic, and so they never let anyone go they always let things go way too long.

There's the person working there who everybody knows, isn't carrying their weight, but they keep them on because of some sense of guilt or duty to that person. Instead of you know, making a clean cut and making happen. What needs to happen? That's also a sign that you would have so a clear sign that you're dealing with somebody who's, not pragmatic, and I feel like you need to address this. The reason why I felt like I needed to say this is your: is your employer pragmatic thing right off the top? Is that when I kind of talk about some of these rules - or I talk about some of these ways of of a being that will help you succeed in your career, help you get raises, and bonuses and promotions, if that's what you're looking to do? Of course there's nothing wrong if you are happy where you are, and you don't want those things but again, like I said New Year coming a lot of times.

You may be thinking about this, but the reason why I think I have to establish that first is that a lot of you are gon na. Listen to this and you're gon na say well. That won't work where I work. Okay - and I want you to know that, there's really only two good reasons that that wouldn't work, and the one reason is, is that your employer is not pragmatic.

So you want to kind of assess. Are you working for somebody who's pragmatic? Do they make decisions based on reason and logic, or do they make decisions based on emotion or some other some health or outside factor that I'm missing here, because you want to work for a place that makes decisions based on based on sound logic, sound reasoning right And then the other side of things is you want to assess? Are you working for good people? Are you working for people who care about the people who work for them and that again a slippery slope? Because in the moment, like anytime, that I tell somebody know about anything, you know they request a vacation and - and I can't give it to them, because we have too many people off at the same time - and I say no, their sense in that moment will always Be that I don't care about them, I'm a bad person that I don't care about my people whatever and that's natural. We all feel that way when somebody tells us no, and somebody doesn't give us what we want right, and so you have to be an adult enough to recognize the difference, but you will work at places at times that are, they can be very manipulative. They can use lots of tactics in order to keep their employees around, but it lacks the soul of actually caring about the human being.

That's underneath you know, companies that strictly see their employees as nothing more than an asset like a forklift or anything else. You'll know that when you're there overtime, you'll you'll see that everybody sort of has that sense about the company, that's not a good place to work and in general, those types of companies are also not pragmatic. They may think they are, but a huge part of pragmatism. When you're dealing with human beings is recognizing their their value, their intrinsic value that people have value because they're human, not just because they work for you and people, have a lot of things going on in their lives.

So you have to have a measure of patience with them. You have to talk to people with respect, all that. That's all a peep, a part of pragmatism, because raw pragmatism, just literally just looking at dollars and cents, is what a lot of times gets criticized. But the fact is is that if you treat people like humans, you treat them well and you and you care for them as people, then that is actually the most pragmatic decision, because you're gon na keep your employees longer.

They're gon na be more productive, and so that's that's a part of pragmatism. People who are just cold and calculating you may think of them as being strictly logical, strictly pragmatic. But the truth is: is that they're not because that isn't actually good for business? That's not a good way to build a business, so this is where we start. I don't want you to assess whether you're working at a perfect place, because none of us do none of us ever.

I mean I, I owned the company that I run and it's not a perfect place and I am NOT a perfect boss to myself. Sometimes it's just you know. People are never perfect and you're. Always gon na have a measure of emotion that drives decisions and people are gon na have personality conflicts and you're just gon na have to get over that that's part of being an adult, and I think in the past previous generations understood this.

My generation, the millennial generation and younger kind of always want work to be perfect and everybody to always be happy and big, smiling faces and drinking mocha chai lattes everywhere they go and that's just not how it works, especially not in our trade, because it's it's you Know, there's a there's an element of hard work to what we do even no matter what you do, there's an element of hard work, no matter what your position is, if you're good at it, there's gon na be work associated with it, whether it's mental or physical And stress comes along with that. You can't eliminate stress from the work place as much as you may try and so you've got it. You've got to recognize that when people are in a distress, sometimes they're not gon na make the best decisions. That's that's normal! So your leadership, whoever it is that you're working with you - need to give them that grace.

But you do need to assess. Am i working with logical people? Am i dealing with people who care about other human beings who have those who have those values? And I think you'll find that most people do care about. Humor means deep down, but they've been burned and things have happened in business, and so they think they've got to be hard and all that and some of what I'm gon na address here will help. You kind of break that down, but you got to assess that first, if it's neither of those two things and honestly frankly, I mean then maybe think about working somewhere else, because there's a lotta there's a lot of good jobs out there, especially in this trade.

Right now, you'll find somebody who will treat you well, if you you know, if you're working in a place where they're not making good good, pragmatic decisions about business and they don't care about human beings, and I would maybe think about moving on but again the advice Here is not is not and in that direction in that vein, but it is important that you assess that first, because if, if you don't know whether or not they're gon na function rationally, then sometimes doing, some of these approaches may actually backfire. In your face - and I don't want you to end up on the street because you're doing the things that I'm telling you because you're because your employer is not rational, all right, so here's the first thing. The first thing is a lot of people. You probably a lot of you, have this sense in your brain in your head.

If should I ask for a raise, you know, it's been a while, since I've had a raise - or I know this other person who makes more than me - that's that's generally the two triggering events that that makes someone feel like they're due a raise or they're owed. Arrays and so they'll either say it's been a long time since I've had a review, and I think I should get a review every 90 days or every year or every two years or whatever it is that you have in your head of how often you should Get a review off and you should get a pay increase because, let's face it when people say they're do a review, what they mean is they're, do a pay increase, and the other side is is that you find out? Somebody else makes more than you and that's tough, you know, especially if you feel like you were superior to them and and again we're human beings. So we tend to assess our own worth our own value higher than that of others, and so, when we find out somebody else who does a similar job to us makes more than us. We get a sense that we're being treated unfairly, so that kind of drives that desire to ask for an increase, so we're sort of starting with this raises question, because that's one of the more common things that come up in our brains is you know, okay, I Want to ask for a raise here's what I'm going to tell you never ask for a raise.

I just let that sink in a little bit, because here's what I'm not saying, I'm not saying, never put yourself in a position to get a raise, but going in and saying I think, I'm doing a raise. I think I'm Oda raised. I think I deserve arrays and here's. Why is almost never the best way to do this, because there's a couple different things in play here again, if you're dealing with a pragmatic company there's a couple reasons why they may not have given you a raise, one may be that they'll have just overlooked it.

You know they just got busy and they just you know your skills have increased and they just haven't. Given you the increase yet because they haven't, they just haven't gotten to it. Yet I've been at that position a lot of times right. I've been a little too long and giving someone an increase literally because it just slipped my mind, and I got behind on on doing that, and so that's one reason.

The other reason would be that maybe they're on financial difficult times and so giving anyone an increase is difficult. That happens a lot in small businesses where you they may have some some employees who are overpaid, but they can't get rid of them because their workload and then they have some underplayed and paint employees, but paying them more could potentially in some cases realistically put them Out of business, and so they may be in a really tough, tough spot, and I think a lot of small businesses find themselves in this position. And then you have the you know: sort of third option which again it's the non pragmatic option, which is that they're. Just getting as much as they can out of you and they're, not gon na pay, you more unless they have to.

I know a lot of you listening to this have a sense that that's how every business operates. I can assure you that that is not the case, most most people who are good people. They want the people who works them to make as much money as they possibly can. But they've got all of these different competing narratives competing things that are going on, that they have to try to figure out and they don't want to make a mistake, and so often that leads to them.

Just being you know, frozen in place and they don't make it they don't act, so they don't give you an increase. So when you walk into your employer's office - and you say, hey, I think I'm doing a race and as soon as you sort of give your reasons that you're do arise, then their guard goes up immediately, and this is a. This is just a good general communication. Skill, like no matter who you're talking to is that you don't want to say things that trigger people to put their guards up, especially when it, when you want something from them, and in this case, what you want is something that you believe that you're owed right.

You believe that you deserve it, but what I'm telling you is just wipe that from your mind, that idea of being owed or deserving or whatever put the past in the past and now think about from this day forward. And so, when you're having a conversation with a leader about pay compensation, whatever always talk in terms of from this day forward, not from this point back because here's what a lot of people make the mistake of - and I've done this and I've seen people have done This to me, hundreds of times, is that they come in and they start talking about themselves like I've done this. I've done this that this person makes. This has been this so long since I had a review so on and so forth.

Now again, I'm assuming here in this case that there wasn't an agreement that was broken like an actual agreement. Now, there's a lot of these sort of loose agreements. When someone hire someone - and they say hey, you know I, you know after a couple years, you should be making this amount or you should be making this dollar amount and that doesn't come to fruition. That doesn't count we're talking about like actual written agreements.

If someone wrote something down agreed to something and then didn't do it well, then yeah you bring the paper in and you say: hey, it's been this amount of time, and this hasn't happened because now they're in breach of contract and that's a different thing, and I Also want to keep. I want you to hear me clearly on this, what I'm not saying that an employer shouldn't keep their verbal agreements, but in many cases it had been a long time since they made a verbal agreement and they've probably forgotten, and your memory of that may also be Imperfect so as an employee, if you are going to ever make an agreement of something important like pay increases or whatever always get it in writing, otherwise, don't even attempt to hold them to it, because it's not it's just gon na create a fight, and it's gon Na create a situation where you call each other liars and neither of you think you are, and you think the other person is that's just how human interaction works. But if you have something in writing, you get an email. You got something well, then bring it in bring it to their attention.

That's totally fine! I'm not talking about that! I'm talking about you feel like you're owed and increase, and your employer hasn't. Given you one it's not that he agreed to give you one and then didn't it's that you thought you were. You think you're owed one. You feel like you're to the point that that one is owed to you and you're looking for an increase.

So when you go into that meeting, so call ask for a meeting request, a meeting pick a time of there and then, when you go into that meeting your employer is gon na. Think you're going to complain. Ask for a something like that. Don't do that! Instead, talk about your vision for the future, okay, not their vision for the future, your vision for the future.

Now, if they've recently spoken about things and the way things are going to change, then you can you can kind of play into that. You know. I heard you saying this, and this is what I was thinking, but you say you know I have a. I have a vision for how I think XYZ can work and how this is gon na look moving forward and here's the trick, because if you refer to the way that things have been - and you say I've done this - I've done that I've done this.

I've done that then it's all me me me and it's going to come off badly because you're, making an assessment of yourself assuming that your employer hasn't made the assessment of you. Okay, now pause real, quick. I know most of you out there who think of yourself as honest people I'm doing air quotes here, I'm just an honest person. I just tell it like it is okay that way doesn't work that whole, like I'm, just an honest person, I'm just telling you the way it is right here.

Nobody wants to be spoken to that way when you're talking. This isn't true of just like when you're dealing with a superior and business is true of anybody. Your kids don't want to be spoken to that way. They don't want to be dictated to how it is, especially when they were there to observe it themselves.

So you have a perception of yourself: that's meaningless! What matters if you're looking to get an increase is what their perception is of you and you have control over that. In this moment, you have a opportunity to help mold that perception, and so a big part of that is. Is you want to create a vision, something that they really like? The sound of that you are an integral part of I'm gon na say that again, you want to create a vision, something that your employer is very excited by really likes the sound of that you are an integral part of. So if you're, let's say your service technician, you're just working day in and day out, residential service technician, mid-tier in your business, you may think: well, how am I gon na? How am I gon na do that right? Well, here's what you have to do! You have to figure out what it is that your employer wants right now.

What are the things that? What are the challenges that are being faced? So let's say that it's customer satisfaction. Let's say it's employee morale. Let's say that it's that it's quality of workmanship, let's say that it's callback right whatever it is whatever it is inject yourself into that story and say you know, I've really been thinking that I remember this is this is a meeting where you're hoping to get a Increase to pay increase, you're welcome to say you know I really wanted to meet with you, and I wanted to talk about the callback rate and I cuz. I know you know callback rate is such a huge burden on the business.

It's something that I, that is really greatly impacts the business, and so I was thinking that you know three or four things that would really help our callback rate out of ease and something that that I would like to do personally for myself, as I would like To really push forward in implementing these and proving my process to help reduce my callback rates and then also help others in the same way and then get the get the buy-in. So because, almost always, if you're talking about something like that, something that universally your employer will agree with then get them to buy into that. And then that's when you can say you know. Another thing that I want to mention to you is that I think that I'm at the point now with this new, with this new initiative that I would like to see in the next month as I as I do this, and as I improve this, that you Would consider giving me a pay increase, and so, if we can set up a time a month from now or maybe two months, whatever you think is fair to sit down and talk about that again after we've worked on some of these things, I would really appreciate That now, what is your employer gon na say? Are they gon na say no, I'm not gon na have a meeting with you now.

Some of them may give a whole litany of excuses about why they haven't. Given you an increase in why it's so hard and life is so hard business, and all this and and truthfully a lot of that is that's their truth. In most cases, they're speaking because a lot of small businesses - and when I say small, I'm talking like me - have 30 employees and under are really struggling. It's hard to be a small business, and so they may speak some of those things and you just say no look.

I understand, but let's work on this together and then in a month we can come back and we can talk about it. Your odds of getting an increase and your odds of getting an increase that that's significant are much higher than even if you've been a high performer. This whole time. Let's say that you already have the lowest call back right.

Well, you can point to that. You can say you know, as you know, I've worked hard on call backs. My call back rates really low and I want to continue to get better at that, but I also want to help me into our business get better at that. So here's what we're gon na do and it doesn't have to be anything super complicated.

It's not like you have to come in with a binder full of ideas, but you can just highlight you know three of the common causes of callbacks and again I'm not gon na insult your intelligence. You know what those are if you're a technician, and so that's that's just a very simple thing for a technician, but that's true of anybody. That's true of an early stage, employee, let's say if you're a helper or apprentice, you want to paint a vision of how you can get into a truck and the things you're gon na do to make sure that you can get into a truck and become a Profitable, employee and now, if I do those things I'd like to have a meeting with you in 30, 90 60 days whatever from now, and I would like to talk about my compensation at that time, it puts you in a much better position. So much more long game where you're tying yourself to their success, you're tying your pay to their success.

That is the overall idea here is that when you're talking about pay pay, especially but we're gon na talk about some others, here, always tie your your compensation. How, well you do to the success of the person you're talking to, because that makes a story about them, and people are much more prone to invest in the future of the business, the future of themselves that they're a part of than just a single person, because I'll tell you a lot of managers a lot of owners when they, when they think of paying someone, even the really good ones, they're thinking about the they're thinking like they're robbing Peter to pay Paul because for let's say you're in a position where you really are Owed an increase you're at that point that it increases is inevitable right when that, when that manager, even if he's a really good person gives you that increase he's, he or she is thinking about five six. Other people who also are owed increases and then also thinking about that invoice that hasn't been paid for $ 5,000 on that change on all these other things. There's all these worries that come to mind, but if you can tie yourself to a future that has success in it, instead of worry in it you're much more likely to succeed, and so let's talk about some things that you can do some some of the ideas That you can bring to bear that will help you kind of give this pitch.

We tell this story that you want to tell it basically you're telling a story in which that would that benefits the company that you're working for the manager who you were talking to, but also kind of injects yourself. You write yourself into the hero role in this story and not not directly, not overtly, because in from their perception, you're making them the hero, but you're really making yourself an integral part of it. So, let's talk about that huge issues that companies have right now that you can tie yourself to recruiting, recruiting and training every company out there is having trouble, recruiting and training people. If you can somehow make yourself part of that, recruiting and training story maybe offer to go to trade school and and recruit some people maybe offer to come in early and do some classes on the topic that you happen to have some expertise and whatever it is.

Those are things that you can that you can put on the table. You can talk about things to improve revenue and there's a lot of different ways that revenue can be improved and that's always something that's on the mind of a business. How can we increase the revenue? How can we increase how much money we're bringing in there's a lot of different ideas that I'm sure you have of ways that you can do that, and those are conversations that your employer will always be interested in so recruiting and training revenue, callbacks work, quality, the Ability to do the job right, the first time, that's training, but it can also sometimes be processes. Sometimes it can be.

You know that you offer that hey I'd, be willing to to help write down some processes to save some steps or I'd be willing to give a quick stand-up talk to the other texts about some ways that you can reduce, callbacks or whatever the case may be, Or it could even just be as simple as that: you're going to be active influence to help reduce callbacks help reduce quality. Another is to cut cost, because in a lot of cases, businesses do have costs that they don't understand fully cost. That you're, aware of in the field you know of waste, that's happening, you know, of of technicians who might be taking parts off the truck and things like that. I'm not telling you to be a you know to be a snitch.

We all know snitches get stitches and wind up in ditches, but you can help your you can help your employer cut those costs and when you can bring things to attention ideas of how to do that, you're gon na be seen as more valuable. The other thing is increased efficiency. If you're able to set up your van in a way, that's more efficient and you're able to help others do the same. That's something that you can highlight that you're gon na that you're gon na help push towards and here's what I don't want you to think.

When I'm saying this, I don't want you to think that I'm telling you then every time you want to get a raise. You have to work a thousand percent harder or something like that. Often it's gon na be highlighting things that you were going to do anyway or things you already are doing, but by painting it in the future, as opposed to the past. It changes the conversation from a deserve conversation, saying that you owe me this, which always puts up guards to saying here's.

What the future looks like here's, the positive future now. Can you help me be part of it by making sure I'm well compensated for doing it? It's just just it's just a much more hopeful way of communicating it relax the negativity that often is off-putting and prevents managers from from making that decision to give you an increase, so you can increase efficiency, you can cut cost. You can improve revenue. You can help with recruiting and training you can help with with quality customer service.

You can help with morale. Sometimes morale is just offering that you know hey. I've noticed recently that a couple of the technicians, their attitudes, are going a little bit south and here's. Why? I think it is.

I've had some conversations with them, and so I want to be part of the solution and so here my suggestions of what we can do to help improve this situation and oh by the way you know, I also have something that I would like to address, which Is my pay? When can I set up a time that we can once we work on this? I can set up a time that we can talk more about it. It's a very mature way of framing a conversation, so speaking of awesome tools that I really believe in I've always been a fan of the Bacharach leak detectors, and so I've been a user of the H 10 way back all the way to before it was Bacharach When it was Yokogawa GE, the H 10 leak detector, which became the H 10 G, which is now the H 10 Pro, but we're not talking about that leak detector. We are talking about the Mac Daddy. Basically, the most accurate high quality leak detector made on planet earth as far as a portable leak detector when you can actually carry around, and that is the Bacharach PGM IR, and you may ask yourself, you may say well what is special about the PG Mir and I'm here to tell you it actually has a display on it, so an LCD display that shows you the parts per million of a particular refrigerant when you're measuring.

That really is the most awesome thing about it is you can actually, as you're, getting closer to a leak source, you can actually track the parts per million of a particular refrigerant type, and you may say: well what you mean is is an HF C or CFC. No, no and a specific refrigerant so like you can put in r410a or our 22, or anything that you want our 407 C, whatever you, whatever type of refrigerant you're working on you can put in that specific refrigerant and the PGM IR will tell you with incredible Accuracy, how many parts per million there are in that particular vicinity, which means that you can actually start to sense a leak when you walk into a building. In many cases you can actually like walk into ice, a convenience store into a house and you'll start to pick up refrigerant if there's a leak in an evaporator coil, and so you can actually trace that thing down to the edge of the source and we tried It we've used it in a couple different applications, and it was just incredible. It also has just incredible resolution.

So when you talk about accuracy or resolution, it can read down to one part per million with almost every refrigerant that exists out there today, and so it's just a credible level of accuracy and gives you that readout on the display and you can actually select the Refrigerant yourself, I'll tell you it's not an inexpensive leak detector because it's a super high quality leak detector. But if you work in large commercial, you work in grocery store applications or you want to have just literally the best leak detector. That's out there. I mean it saved us.

We had a job that we were gon na, have to do a line, isolation test to prove that the leak was an aligned set, but with the PG Mir, we could pinpoint exactly the concentrations of refrigerant down a line chase, and we actually did a video of That, if you go to true tech tools and look at their YouTube channel, you can you can check that out and see that video of us using and demonstrating the PG Mir and you can get the PG Mir from true tech tools. So you go to true tech tools: comm you can get an excellent discount by using our offer code get schooled at checkout also if to find out more. This is what I'm gon na suggest to you to find out more so you're gon na want to you're gon na want to pause this. So you can get a pen to write with let's pause it real quick go to my Bacharach comm, which is BA CH AR ACH my Bacharach com.

/H VA CR school. So that's my Bacharach com, /h IVAC our school to find out more all right now. To finish this off, let's talk quickly how this can work with promotions or with bonuses with bonuses. It's it's even more simple, but you always have to have skin in the game.

So here's when it comes to you're asking for chunks of change for something you can't just ask for money just because you always have to show if I'm able to do this. Can I get this so if I'm able to accomplish this task, cut callback rates, create an employee training program, help with marketing whatever it is that you're wanting to do. You know say: you're good at shooting videos and you say hey, you know, I've noticed we don't have a good YouTube channel and so customer acquisition is huge. That brings in revenue, and so I'd like to do some videos that you can use and I'll manage the YouTube channel, but once I get 10 of them up, I would I think a fair exchange would be for you to compensate me two thousand dollars for that, Because if you go to the open marketplace, it'd be far more than that, and so that's two hundred owners, a video, I think that's fair or whatever that's a just an example of something that I literally just made up.

But for a pragmatic business, pragmatic business owner, especially for a small business that doesn't have a YouTube channel, that actually makes a lot of sense. That's that may seem like a lot of money to you, but I'm telling you that's actually a tremendous value. So, there's just a lot of things like that that you can, that you can do that are assigned to bonuses. Let's say that you can improve customer satisfaction and you can prove it by getting you know: ten customers, feedback forums or whatever filled out whatever, whatever objective that there would be, or let's say that you say it'll all help you get the technicians Nate certified.

So I'll do the training to help them get me certified and once I do that, and I accomplish that - here's the amount that I think would be fair and that can very well be a great conversation. I, generally speaking, those things happen when you have a better relationship with management, but but again I don't. I wouldn't shy away from asking for the big number in those, but it's only with a result. You don't ask for the big number just because you asked for it tied to a result.

The next thing would be would be a promotion and it's the same thing with a promotion so with a promotion. You have to think about what are the objectives of the business and how can you work towards that thing by proving your results? So what is it that you could do? Could you reduce the callback ratio? Could you increase revenue? Could you whatever and then you just agree that if I'm able to accomplish this, then I would become the full-time manager, and this is again very true with smaller companies you may have a company where they don't have a really intact management structure. You know there may not even be a service manager, really there may just be the owner and what you're wanting to do is kind of become the second-in-command. For example, you think you've earned that at that point you don't come to the person and say I think I've earned it make me the service manager.

You come to them and say hey. I have some ideas here. You lay it all out if they're well, formed they're gon na be excited you're gon na work together, and then you say you know what, if we can accomplish this in six months, if we can actually work towards these goals, what would you think about me becoming The service manager and then once that's established that you work on the bonus compensation based on percentage of profit or whatever else so being proactive in those areas, puts you in a much better position to win now. Why don't more tech nisshin's do this? Why don't more employees do this? The reason is because it takes work.

You can't just rely on what you've done in order to get what you feel like you deserve. So here's where I want you to think and and again I know, I'm gon na come across a lot of people who disagree with me on this. Of course, I have both the technician and an owners perspective on this, but if you come into any conversation or anything with an expectation where you feel like you deserve something and you're going to force their hand and give you what they does, what what you deserve, Unless you have a written contract, something that that really does force the you know force the subject in that case, of course, you're gon na go with what go with what you have written if you've got it written down, but unless you have that you're very rarely Going to win in those circumstances, it's gon na be very hard for you to win now. Obviously, if you're just the very best at what you do, you have a lot more leverage, the better.

You are your job, the more leverage that you have, but here's what I want to encourage. You never rely on loyalty or position to get you. What you want always rely on your ability to execute. So if you aren't willing to put some objective to it or actually put some thought into what it's going to take to help the company succeed, then you're not in a good place, in the same way that if a employer isn't putting themselves in your shoes and Thinking about what you've done and in your value and all that you know you would say well if, if they don't care about me, I don't care about them right, but at the same, the other way is true too.

If you don't care about the success of the business enough to put a little bit of work and thought into how you're gon na form these things, so that really is a win-win. I mean, and you know, a win-win is kind of a silly. You know platitude. That's used in corporate America, but legitimately like where the company does better has more customers has your call backs, has fewer issues better quality, better customer service, which relates to more profits right company does better.

When those things happen, then your success is tied to that. But if you're, relying on what we've been friends for so long or I've been working here, 20 years or I've been doing this third five years or I have this position, and so I'm owed this. If you rely on those that type of thinking, then it's not gon na go well for you in the long run, either because they're not going to give you what you're asking for, or they do give you what you're asking for. But it hurts the company and I don't think any of us if you really are good at what you do.

You don't want to be a burden to the company. You don't want to be the one who's overpaid overcompensated put into a position that you don't belong in. You would rather get to a place that you've earned it that you've actually you've actually accomplished it, because if your skill, because of what you've done right and so when you're, when you're formulating these conversations, do the legwork beforehand, don't start with. I want to raise a motor raise.

I deserve a raise. I deserve this. I deserve that and the other hand, because I've seen people do this to me before to I've, had people who come to me and they say they're gon na leave and I'm like. Why are you gon na leave well, and they make up some excuse? Oh it's because of this or that or whatever, when in reality, it was because they didn't feel cared for, they didn't feel like they were compensated properly.

All you would have to do is have that conversation frame that conversation build the future that you want to be a part of instead of just leaving, because the truth is is that you know the grass is not greener on the other side is industry. I mean you may find a different segment of the industry and that's a different conversation. Let's say: you've always wanted to be in commercial refrigeration. The company you're working for doesn't do commercial refrigeration, and so you switch to commercial refrigeration.

That's different, you know you want to work on chillers, you got to work for a company that does chillers, that's understandable and so they're in different segments of the business do have different advantages and disadvantages of the business. If you, if you don't like talking to people, then you shouldn't be in residential service. You know, for example, if you don't want to have any soft skills and don't mean residential service, so you may have to switch segments, but it's job hopping from job to job. A lot of these problems are gon na, be wherever you go.

You're gon na find that these things exist wherever you go, and so in order to really be successful, you you want to adjust your approach, change your approach, make the approach much more about communicating your vision for the company and how you can be a part of It and then once you've once you've shown some something that you both can comparatively look at and see how you've done. Then you can win because otherwise they're looking at you from one angle, you're looking at you from the inside, seeing all of your Ben it's and they may not be seeing it, but the worst thing to do is go in and start pitching yourself just start talking Yourself up because that comes across as is false. It always does you know it's like you know. I come into you you're, the so we're gon na roleplay here, you're the manager and I come in and say: hey I've been working for you for five years.

I've done this and that I've been on call I've. I've worked my butt off worked all these hours and I think I should be paid forty-five dollars an hour and you're thinking the whole time I've watched you and in and you're thinking. I remember the time that you called in sick when I really needed you. I remember this.

I remember that and so that person is gon na put up a guard and they're immediately gon na start thinking of the negative things about you, whereas if you start from today and work forward into the future, then you come up with a future that you both Agree on so hopefully that's helpful. I know it's this isn't you know hard training stuff, but it's something for the new year that I want you to think about, especially if you want to. If you like your job, you like what you do in general, but you want a new position, you'd like to get some more bonuses, you'd like to be paid more. This is the way to think about it that I think you'll find is much more successful.

It's like any other skill. It takes time it takes work. It is not easy. What I'm telling you to do here? It takes a little preparation.

Talk to your spouse's talk to people who you care about when you come up with an idea, actually formulate it. Don't just do it, you know, don't just go in half-cocked because you're being quote-unquote honest with your with your employer, I'm not telling you to be dishonest, but I'm telling you to think think about ways of speaking to other people that doesn't trigger them negatively, but instead Puts them in a position where you're gon na get what it is that you're asking for we've seen this work time and time again in both in my career and in the careers of my employees when they formulated things in this way. Hey thanks for listening to the hvac school podcast. I hope you have a great 2018.

I think there's a lot of really cool things that are happening this this next year. Again, I wan na. I want to thank all of our sponsors. I would encourage you just support them now.

One thing that I want to mention is come visit me at the a HR conference in Chicago at McCormick Place this January, where I'm gon na be up there for all the days to the show. Actually, the Sunday before the show starts, I'm not gon na give you dates and stuff. Just look. It up go, go look up the HR conference, but on Sunday we're gon na do a little meet up with a lot of you who listen to the podcast and also our fans are true tech tools.

I mentioned true tech tools. A lot if you haven't been there, go to true tech tools, comm and you'll, see why I like it so much. That's key. Are you tech tools? Combo bill spoon from there is gon na, be there? I think we're gon na give Jim Bergman there as well.

I wouldn't guarantee it he's see that guys all over the place, but I think he'll be there on Sunday night and then Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday I'll be there all three days, I'm gon na be at the rector steel booth on Tuesday at 2 p.m. doing a Demo of the new pro fit kit, which I hope to see you there I'll be around at the testo booth, probably Mitsubishi and carrier a little bit too, but thank you for all those companies for supporting us. Thank you for listening. I wish for you for 2018.

Is that your troubles will last as long as 2017 s? New Year's resolutions did thanks for listening and we will talk again next time on the HVAC school podcast.