An Owner Who Live’s By ”Do As I Do”

Mark Schneider is a true "Do and I Do", not "Do and I Say", kind of owner. He leads by example so that all the people that work at his company understand that they are there for a common purpose. To get the job done well and on time for their customers while still making it home on time to be with their families. We can all learn a little from this amazing conversation. 

 

Contact Mark

LinkedIN – https://www.linkedin.com/in/mark-schneider-39906a19/

Phone Number – 262-784-1010

Website – www.osccinc.com

 

Leighann Lovely  00:20

HR professionals, business owners and operations at all levels are struggling to figure out what needs to change. Our system has been shocked practices have been questioned, and conversations are finally happening. We all know there has been a huge shift in what people want. inclusion and diversity are common phrases. But often misunderstood generations are coming together more than ever on what's important. Mental health has been brought to the forefront of everyone's mind. Let's humanize these conversations. Let's talk about what's important for employees to be successful in life and at their job and how companies can create an environment to allow them to do both because successful people will make up a successful workforce. I'm Leighann lovely. Let's get this conversation started.  I am honored to have this guest come on and talk with me today. I have been after him to come and talk to me about how he runs his business and creates the environment that he does for his employees. Mark Schneider is the owner of one source construction Corporation, a design build commercial building contractor located in Brookfield, Wisconsin, and covering all of Southeast Wisconsin. Mark has a Bachelors of Science in Building Construction Management from UW Platteville and has been in the industry for over 34 years. One source has been in business for over 16 years, and currently has five employees. The underlying culture at one source has always been how do we help the employees have a family life, but still get the work done. Mark, welcome to the show. I am so excited to talk with you today. I feel like it's been a long time coming for this to finally happen.

 

Mark Schneider  02:10

Well, thank you for having me.

 

Leighann Lovely  02:14

So why don't you start off by telling me a little bit about yourself?

 

Mark Schneider  02:19

Well, my name is Mark Schneider, I am the owner of one source construction. We are a commercial general contractor located in Brookfield, and we've been in business coming up on 17 years, I have been in the industry for over 34. And we provide construction services to all things commercial, whether it be retail, restaurant, offices, warehouses, pretty much everything in that realm. And we handle all southeastern Wisconsin from the border up to Fond du Lac from the lake all the way out to to Madison.

 

Leighann Lovely  02:58

Awesome. And I love you. And I've had the opportunity to talk actually multiple times. And the reason that I'm so drawn to you is because unlike a lot of business owners, you you are very intentional, about a couple of things that just are wildly interesting to me. One, the size of projects you bring on the size of your business, and the way that you run your business. And so I want to dive into a little bit, you know, of each, each piece, and each one of these things, has really created the company that you are today. You know, as a business owner, obviously, you wear a lot of hats, right?

 

Mark Schneider  03:51

Yes, that is true. The one thing

 

Leighann Lovely  03:53

that I'm interested is your your approach when you're hiring people and driving them, you know, to to be interested in your company. So let's, let's start, let's start there. How do you how do you create, you know, interest or buzz about, you know, working for you?

 

Mark Schneider  04:15

Well, let me let me back up a little bit. So you have a foundation for why it is the way it is. So 16 years ago when I was nudged by a good client of mine to start the company. One of the factors that played into this was that I had five children under the age of 12. And I wanted to still make sure that I would have time to be with them even though I was going to start a business run a business. And so the premise of everything is making sure that myself and my employees can get home and get a good time for dinner and to be able to leave and go be with their family during the day if need be. So let's say they're two I'll have some program happening at school, they'd be allowed to leave and go be with their, their child for their program. Yeah, maybe they come back later, maybe they don't whatever, at the end of the day, we all know we have to get our work done. But our office typically is a ghost town about 515. And that's great. The pause in the show earlier was that I just, I'm currently looking for an additional site superintendent, and it doesn't say, you know, on my invite or my job posting, it doesn't say, General Superintendent, do you know, position open? You know, it says, Do you want to get home at night for dinner with your family? Do you want to, you know, have more free time and not have the stress of being overworked? It was the things that were important to me were top on the list, because second or third down on the list was, Do you know how to do this type of work? So the first part was, what are your goals? We all need to make money. And that's understandable. However, I wanted to be able to capture the people that had family as as more important than money, that family was something that they could work, you know, work towards, instead of you don't want to, what does it work, you don't want to work to live, you want to live, I'm sorry. To get it wrong. You want to you want to be able to live life and work is secondary, necessary. But secondary,

 

Leighann Lovely  06:33

Right, you don't want to live to work, you want to work to live,

 

Mark Schneider  06:37

Correct. And so that is that's been very important to us all along, to try very hard to keep that. It's not, it's, it's not uncommon for my employees to say, hey, I want to take off Tuesday, and I'd like to go to the bureau game in the afternoon or whatever. And basically, it's like we can we'll work that out, well, you got going on, I'll cover for you or somebody will cover for you. And that happens on and off throughout the year with various things.

 

Leighann Lovely  07:09

So let me let me stop. Let me stop you for a second. Because what a novel idea 17 years ago? Yes. So what a novel idea. 17 years ago, somebody starts their business and says, Hey, let's create a business that caters to the individuals who want to actually have family life, above and beyond a work life, which is what everybody wants. Now everybody's talking about it. I mean, not to say that people didn't want it back then. But now everybody's talking about it. Now. You were already there. 17 years ago.

 

Mark Schneider  07:49

Yeah, it's you know, and it's a work in progress. Always. I would say over the course of a given year, there's probably 10 times 10 days of the year that maybe I'm working until about six o'clock. And I know that that's in my former place of work, which I really liked. It was not uncommon for me to be there till seven 730 on a somewhat regular basis. And that was a bummer, because I still had we still have the children at home. But my wife did a fantastic job, you know, helping take care of them. And and that maybe it stems from hers. In my personal life. We had decided years ago once we had three kids in daycare, and daycare was not really the right method for us. And she was working just to go to just to pay for daycare. So that didn't make sense. But that was a decision we made. And of course, there were tough times, but we worked through it to do our own thing. So it's a culture that I continually am trying to improve on. I'm not perfect. The employees will tell you what I've explained to you. But they'll also say, yeah, there's times where we're working a little harder here there. But nobody, I will say nobody works late into the day. But do they get called on a Saturday maybe to check on something that's kind of the life of a superintendent that happens from time to time. I, as the owner get called all the time whenever I'll address it, but I don't generally jump in the car and go somewhere. But that's the life of a business owner

 

Leighann Lovely  09:24

Right now here. Let me explain. Let me tell you a story. When I was 16 years old, I was working at a gas station. It was Thanksgiving. I was the the top employee at the time and the owner of the gas station called me on Thanksgiving and said the employees there can't figure out how to close the store up. Can you go in and they looked at my dad and I said well what should I do and he goes, You're a hourly paid employee I was making $4.18 $4.18 And he goes you are not going anywhere. or, and I'm like, well, but but the owner of the store is calling me telling me that he needs me to go in. And he goes, Yeah, because he doesn't want to leave his Thanksgiving dinner. Because, you know, nobody wants to have to do those. Now, my dad would not allow me to do it. I was 16 years old. Right? And so he figured, oh, let's call the 16 year old who knows how to do all of the operations? You know? Well, not all of the average. But I did all of the, you know, cash, cash drawer checkouts, I did all of the at 16. Right. You know, even you know, the owners don't want to do it. If you have somebody to delegate it to. That's great. But it is such as the life of an owner that if nobody else can do it, who do you call?

 

Mark Schneider  10:50

Well, the other the other side of that, too, is it this is what I do. I lead by example, if if if I'm walking around a jobsite, whether I'm wearing nice clothes or not, if I see something that needs to be picked up, or get a broom, or do something to make it safer, or just cleaner or present better to the customer, my superintendents know that I will do it, I will jump in and help out no matter what I'm dressed in, because they know well, he owns a company. So he just does it. So now that means there's nothing to there's nothing to nothing below me, I guess I'm trying to think in the right terms. But I will do whatever whatever it takes to do it properly and put the customer first.

 

Leighann Lovely  11:32

And there's never any pointing fingers of well, that's not my job. There's never anybody who who can possibly say at any point, will you go and do that, because it's not my job. You know, and when you create a mentality of employees, who basically at any given time, are all willing to pitch in and do whatever it takes to make the job get done, and get done well, because the owner is the person who's showing by example, are leading by example. That's an extremely powerful force. Because I've walked around manufacturing floors, I've walked around businesses of all different kinds. When those individuals, they look at the owner as an untouchable, they look at the owner, as somebody who comes in walks around once a month or every quarter, you know, and they're in a suit, they walk around, they don't know the employees names, they don't know anything about anybody who works for them. And every time that person walks around, they feel a little bit uncomfortable. Like, is he scoping me out? Like what what's going on? Why is he Why is he walking the floor, and it becomes almost uncomfortable, I guess is the only is the only reward and when that when that person is not engaged, when that person doesn't know what's going on. There's there's not a sense of camaraderie, as much so as if the owner is willing to walk around and do what needs to be done just like any other employee.

 

Mark Schneider  12:53

So, so yes, Leighann, we were talking about, you know, management or business owners that appear to be unapproachable or feel that employees feel that they're unapproachable. And that's another caveat to our company, is that I've got a relationship where my employees, at least I believe they do, and I know one of them has told me to my face, that they're able to tell me what they're thinking without worry about repercussions, they want to tell me, hey, they're gonna call me out, I'm doing this wrong, or I could do this better. So both of us, you know, have this, we'll have our little discussion. And then we move on and, and it's he's been nine or 11 years, this particular employee, so he's been around long enough that we're comfortable. And I hired him out of the construction industry, but the residential side. So we've been, he's been learning from us all along. And he's gotten, he's one of my senior guys now. And so that's, I think, a part of the culture that makes a big difference, not just for the family, but that your employees are actually they work with me, I don't, I don't introduce people as somebody who works for me. And a boss of mine years ago, had introduced me that way. And it stuck with me for oh, gosh, an hour, probably on 23 years that, you know, my employees don't work for me, they work with me. And, you know, at the end of the day, maybe I'm the one that has to sign something, but they still work with me. They do they do everything that that I do. So, that's a big part of the culture.

 

Leighann Lovely  14:33

And it's interesting that you say that because I made that mistake early on in my career where and I meant it in no disrespect, but, you know, with being a salesperson, you know, I had recruiters whom I worked with, and I made the mistake of saying, Oh, I'm going to pass you on to my recruiter, which is possessive. Like as in my recruiter, and what I didn't mean as in mind that I owned that I in any way A, but it was taken in a, in a negative sense from the person from the recruiter. So I very quickly realized, wow, I shouldn't do that, that's, it's inappropriate, because I have no owners we are equals. And by saying mine, I'm putting myself above them. Right. So quickly change that language from mine to, you know, my partner, or to just make sure that I'm putting them at the same level as me. So that there's no ownership, you know, I'm going to do introduce you to my partner, versus, you know, calling that, and therefore, it's, you know, again, just switching a word from recruiter to partner, partner is then an equal

 

Mark Schneider  15:55

Well, and you can say, recruiter I worked with, you know, a lot of it has to do with respect, I run into many, many, many different people in what I do, from, you know, the business owners, who, you know, maybe they earned a little more, but they get a little more respect from me, then, I don't know that what I'm trying to say is, they're the same as you and I, it's just that they've accomplished a little more, sometimes a lot more, you know, but, you know, I ran into judge lift skis, the CEO of Northwestern Mutual, his kids go to the high school that my kids went to, and he was at an event and I said, Hi, and everything. So I didn't treat him like, Oh, he's something special, but he's in charge of a very large company, you know, and he's done fantastic things and all of that. But at the end of the day, I have a company that does, you know, between eight and $10 million a year, he Okay, his does a billion dollars a year, but we still each run a company that is multimillion, for him his case, billion, but, and he's a very down to earth guy. And the cool thing is, I say this a lot about certain honors, you'd never know that he is in charge of so much, because he doesn't carry himself any different. He carries himself just like you and I. And that's what I try to do. I don't try to walk around, I drive a truck that's nine years old. You know, my employees have some vehicles that are newer than mine. That's okay. I, you know, I'm not I don't want to be the showy guy that shows up in the Mercedes, because that's not what it's about. And that's, that's kind of, I think, done well for me in the past, and I'm just not, I don't do things, I don't earn money for things I earn money for my family, or to be able to do an experience with my family is kind of how it's evolved. And so I went to a coach, business coach one time, and they were touting how, you know, you could fly a helicopter to work every day, if you do this, and this and this. And I said, I don't care about that. That's not what I'm, that's not me. So we got to come up with some different motivating factor, because we flying it on a helicopter to work every day is not what I care about. So that's, that's what that's that's the work in progress for the culture. That's a work in progress for how I wanted to be a business owner, a boss, and it's very challenging. HR is one of my least favorite things to do, but I'm trying to get better at it. Go ahead. It's one

 

Leighann Lovely  18:34

of your least favorite things to do. And you're doing it as well as you are. And I'm not saying about the like the technical stuff when it comes to we're not talking about that I'm talking about the people leader thing. There are people leaders out there who are not doing it as well as you. And again, I'm not bashing anybody, you have a team of six,

 

Mark Schneider  18:54

Simply have six people right now I'm trying to hire seven.

 

Leighann Lovely  18:58

You have a team of six. And the way that you describe your people leader skills is far above the way that others that are people leaders, and coin themselves people people lead hers, do it. Because you you and I don't want to say humility. I don't know your you know, I don't know your full backstory, but I believe that people who have come from nothing, starting your own business from the ground up and building it to success and having it where you want it to be. And, you know, continuing to nurture that gives you a you know, not you I'm speaking in terms of but most people gives them this this humbleness of, yeah, I created this. And, you know, most business owners know what that struggle look like in the book. Beginning because most people, it wasn't just handed to them, there's a struggle that goes along with the first year, the first six months, the first two years, the first, what they say, when you hit the five year mark that you can usually breathe a little bit lighter. But I've also seen companies that have been in business for 30 years, have to close their doors. So I do believe that most business owners have a little bit of humbleness, that they usually keep at bay when in front of people because of, but you clearly have that you have a humbleness, you don't drive the fancy car, you don't show up saying, Hey, I'm a business owner, you know, you you introduce people, as as partners as people I work with, not as my employee. That's that humbleness that makes you human, that makes people want to talk to you that makes people want to work with you, that many of those others that can throw around, not that you can't, but that can throw around a ton of money. And people think, oh, I want to be friends with that guy, because he has so much money. But in reality, and I'm not saying everybody, in reality, are they really great people, if they're just throwing tons of cash at everybody and showing up in fancy cars, a lot of them that have to do that are not great people. Some of them

 

Mark Schneider  21:28

I have seen that too, through the years,

 

Leighann Lovely  21:31

Some of them can outright be assholes. And the reason that they have a following is because they buy people that give the give stuff away to people. And people are like, Oh, I'm gonna go and be friends with that guy. And or gal shouldn't just say, guy, you know, and that's the way they get their following. That's the way that they continue to stay. You relevance. But then there's the ones that truly care. And they don't need to fight to stay relevant. They stay relevant, because they're good people. And obviously, you have to have a successful business and all I mean, there's, there's other things that you have to do other than just be

 

Mark Schneider  22:13

more, right still have to do the work, right.

 

Leighann Lovely  22:17

But I mean, and unfortunately, the ones that are, you know, kind of fall in the asphalt, they're going to be a flash in the pan, eventually, you know, they're, they're going to, they're going to drift away. And when they're no longer out there throwing your own money doing the flashy things, people will start to forget about them. But the greats the ones that will remain as the legends are the ones that one did the great work, to actually made a difference in people's lives by being great people, and caring. Those are the ones that will be known as, you know, their names will be remembered years after they left the industry as being somebody who Oh, man, I worked with that, you know, that company, the owner of that company was not only did he do great work, he was just such a great guy to work with, you know, I Oh, yeah. You know, and I've met those people. I've met people whose names you still mention, and they're, and I hear people go, Oh, I remember that person. Didn't they retire like five years ago? Yeah, yep, they did. And that I would, I would hope that we would all aspire to be or run a business, where you're remembered for doing that not remembered for, you know, blowing through employees.

 

Mark Schneider  23:32

And we have long said, you know, and I worked one of my employees that's been here. For years now. I worked with him for seven years at a previous company. And then he retired and I pulled him out of retirement to come work with me. And for all the years that I've worked with him, we've always kind of gone by the mantra if you do the right thing, you do what's right for the customer, that the the money and everything else will follow. It just will. And so we've gotten our our partners or vendors in construction to think the same thing. If they see something that doesn't look right, tell us because at the end of the day, we'll make it right, we'll let the owner know that, you know, we've made it right. And it'll come back around even if it doesn't come back around on that project. It'll come back around because he'll tell somebody else about us. He'll tell somebody what we did. And so that kind of goes it's even the golden rule to treat people how you want to be treated while somebody is doing a project for me. I'd love it if they would tell me if I'm doing something that's not quite right or whatever, for the betterment of the project. Don't just try to go I'm gonna make an extra 50 bucks this you know, this this job and I'll make more money great. I get to have 10 bucks in my pocket as part of my bonus. i Our guys are not compensated by how much money the job makes, they're compensated for doing the right thing. And so I try to really take care of them at the end of each year. When we're doing profit sharing and things like that, to say, you know, thank you, if I made $1, I'm making sure that they get something to because I'm if I if they made me $1, I wouldn't have had that dollar without them. So that once again is, you know, that's the they're helping me. So I really want to take care of

 

Leighann Lovely  25:19

You just use sparked a story here. So I have a plumber that they've told me multiple times I need to find a new plumber, because I'm outside of their service area. I was inside their Soviet service area in the last house that I that I lived at. And every time I call them, they're like, you know, he really outside of our service area really should find somebody new. And I'm like, I don't want to find somebody. I don't want to find a new plumber, like I like you guys. And oh, and their plumbing and electric. And so the reason that I go back to them, it's It's shrimp plumbing, okay. It was started by the by the father, who's now I think he's fully retired, he might be fully retired, anyways. And then he had a son, two sons, one was the electrician, and one was the plumber. And I, I've called him multiple times, where I'll say, Hey, I've got this issue going on. And he's like, Oh, that's your what I have a well, in my home. He's like, it sounds like it's your well. And he ended up spending an hour on the phone with me an hour, troubleshooting the issue to figure out that it was my Well, which they don't do work on. They don't do plumbing on wells they so then he gave me a referral. And then he said says to me, call me back. Because I'm really interested in what exactly is wrong with your well. And I just I just want to know what a curiosity. But the fact that for free, for free. This man spent an hour troubleshooting all of these issues on the phone with me to determine that it was not my plumbing. It was in fact, my well then gave me a referral. And he did this with me twice. After I had bought my new house, I'd called now, this is going wrong. It's insane. No other plumber that I know of.

 

Mark Schneider  27:14

No, you wouldn't have gotten past the receptionist. Correct.

 

Leighann Lovely  27:17

They would have been like, Okay, we're gonna schedule a service call, it's gonna cost you 75 bucks just for them to drive to your house and probably 150 Now, just for them to drive to your house. They are outside of my service area, and don't charge or haven't church. Maybe that's because of a past client. But haven't charged me extra for coming to my house, when they've done some plumbing and electrical work for me. And they still continue to tell me that we're gonna electrician. But, and that's why I won't call anybody else. That is the kind of service. And that's why I'm shameless ly plugging their company. Because that's the kind of service that lives on forever in my head. When anybody ever asks me, Hey, do you need a plumber? Or do you know a plumber or an electrician? I'm like, Yep, I do. I do. I do you. Where do you live? I absolutely 100% I'm like, Yeah, this this guy is he's awesome. And the sons I've met both of the sons, they're awesome. And they don't overcharge, they charge. You know what they should, and I don't mind paying, you know, a decent amount for their service, because they come in, they do a good job. They're personable. And that's what that's what it's all about when you go to your clients, your end. And I had an issue in my own home where the guy was, did things himself and they came in and they said, Yeah, this is not the code. Like if I touch it, it's going to cost you three grand. Oh, don't touch it. Right? I mean, those are the types of things that like, just do the right thing, do do the best for your client, be honest with your clients, and you will have a repeat client, and then that client will go out and be your salesperson.

 

Mark Schneider  29:12

So the hardest, the hardest part, not the hardest part, a difficult thing to instill and repeat is to get your employees to do that too. Because in a way they're selling but they don't realize it. And if you can get them to take care of the customer and do what's right. They don't even realize it, but they're creating more leads for you down the road. And in my industry. I mean, yeah, there's times where I can get a job in a month. But most of the stuff I do is three, four months of cultivating before they decide or think about it and other stuff that it could take, you know, years that I've just stayed in touch and all of a sudden it was the right time and they're going to add on to their company or they're going to do whatever they're going to do and And then they call me. So it's part of it is trying to keep your company at front of brain. That's why we all do marketing and networking and things like that. Because you know, you're not going to get a job at that marketing event, you're going to get a job, because they thought of you or saw you a month ago and said, Oh, yeah, I saw you know, Liane color. So, you know, that goes back to the culture, you will take care of them, they'll take care of you, they'll take care of the company, which is kind of like taking care of you. And, and that's, you know, that's always served me well, even as an employee all those years prior to starting the company. I did what was right. And, and, and didn't, I did have an instance where I threw all them. 60 was like 75 bucks. And I'll never forget that little story that I, I unfortunately said, No, he owes me 75 bucks. And the owner said, you can send them the bill, go ahead and do that. But I'm gonna tell you that I think you'll regret it. And I was doing my job. So I sent the bill for 75 bucks. And he wrote a little note with the 75 bucks and said, I hope this makes your companies here. And the owner knew already that my honor had already kind of rearranged us. And I think they had talked and it was it was early on in my career. And that stuck with me too. And so there's those little things that you hope you take with you that helps you be a better person and and helps you to not worry about the little, little things. Look at the bigger picture. And sometimes unfortunately, some things do cost a lot of money, and there's just no way around it, I have to charge $300 For this lock is just what it costs, I can't do it for free, even though you can go to Menards and get a residential one for $39.

 

Leighann Lovely  31:48

Right. And, and that's wildly interesting that you brought that up, because it is really just as easy as it is to make a client extremely happy, and have them become a salesperson for you. It is just as easy for it to completely go the other way and have them all of the sudden be like, don't, don't ever use them. Because that has also happened to me. Yes. Where somebody has come to my home actually happened with my I have a generator of a permanent generator in my home. And I even called them and this kid walked kid me young. When did I come to an age where I'm calling 20 year olds kids. He comes to my home. And the first thing he says to me when he walks to the back of my house and looks at my generator is I've never seen a generator like this before. And you're gonna fix it.

 

Mark Schneider  32:44

Yeah, no, when you want to hear no confidence there,

 

Leighann Lovely  32:47

right? So two hours later when it's not fixed. And I get a bill for 250 bucks. And then they come back a second time. And they don't fix it again, and then try to charge me $575 I call them and I say I'm not paying this. Well, yeah, but he was out there. And I said, you're gonna haggle over $575 When you were out here twice, for five hours total, didn't fix it. And the first thing your technician said to me was I've never seen this generator. Well, and I'm like, Ah, I said, you know, it's been fixed by another guy who was here for 20 minutes, and charged me 175 bucks. And they're like, Oh, really. And then they wanted to know the name of the company that came in fixed it. And that's all they started caring about, well, who was it? Well, who came? I'm not telling you that. And then I had to actually call the maker of my generator and say, you know, XYZ company was here for x amount of time. They didn't fix it, do you? Is there a reason? You know, a reseller of this? Should I pay their bill? And they said no, I called the company back and said, You know, I've already contacted XYZ company. You're the reseller of them. Are you still going to charge me 575 bucks? I got an email from them saying we're really sorry about the misunderstanding. We will not be charging you. I'm like, Wow, all of that work. Right? You could have just simply said, Hey, we're really sorry about this. I could have been could have maintained a relationship with them, but because they pushed it.

 

Mark Schneider  34:40

You'll never call them and you'll never recommend them.

 

Leighann Lovely  34:43

I will absolutely positively. Never call never recommend. But I did you know talk to the kids supervisor and say it was not his fault. He was nice. He was polite. You sent him back a second time when he didn't Know the product? What is wrong with you? Yeah. Like this is

 

Mark Schneider  35:05

he was unqualified to look at it

 

Leighann Lovely  35:07

correct. And I told his manager, this is on you, you sent a guy who clearly told you in his notes that he didn't know the product, and you sent him back to my property to fix a product he had never used. Well, we do that for training on your dime on my right. And he even tried to upsell me on a new one.

 

Mark Schneider  35:31

Oh, geez.

 

Leighann Lovely  35:34

Right. And the guy who came and fixed it in an hour and a half or an hour or whatever, he was like, Oh, this thing's got years of life left.

 

Mark Schneider  35:45

There you go, right. So it does circle back around to culture, culture and the right people. And I've had, and I've had, I'm not perfect, I've had people come and work for me. And then they said, it's not a fit, and they've left. And that was, it was kind of good on both of us. He was, he was glad to leave. And I was glad that he left. And, you know, because we're a smaller company, I do kind of need people that are on their game, almost right away. It would be hard for me to take an intern that doesn't know anything under my wing, although I'd love to mentor somebody. And that might be what I do later in life. When I decide to sell the company or retire, whatever, I don't think I'll retire, I'll want to be a mentor to somebody to show them how to do this, how to do what I what I do. So

 

Leighann Lovely  36:40

that's awesome. That's absolutely awesome. So now you we've obviously talked a great deal about your culture and everything else. What about, you know, you and I talked a little bit about the size of the projects that you take on. And I think that leads a great deal into you being able to really maintain and being intentional about, about that. Because, you know, if you companies when they grow to a certain size, it is harder, obviously, as an owner to be able to intimately know each one of their employees, you know, I pick on these monster sized companies, and how dare the owner not be involved? Well, obviously, they have to step back, they're not able to be in the day to day every you know, all the time. And as you grow to even bigger at all.

 

Mark Schneider  37:30

Well, even even with six employees, there's times when they're not going to do it the way I would do it, even though when I started the company, I was doing everything. So you have to number one, allow them to do it their way to a degree to get to the end result. You know, we I purposely keep the company at a at a size between really five and $10 million, our end, but we've had some larger projects through the years we've had, we've done a grocery store development that was $7.2 million. Now that might sound like a lot, because he that's three quarters of your top volume of the entire company. But in construction, I'm doing virtually the same. I'm doing the same things for say $2 million project that I'm doing for a $7 million project, it's just that the pieces of the pie are bigger. If the electrician was doing $100,000 worth of work on that $2 million project, he's doing $800,000 worth of work on the $7 million dollar project. So I'm still dealing with one electrician. So but backing up here, I've made sure and sometimes there's some challenges to do this, that, okay, I'm not going to bid these couple of jobs because I don't want to grow so big that I lose touch and I lose the ability to have this culture, there's been a number of times where Oh, I could grow it to $20 million, then I'd have to, you know, of course, hire more people. And that's how that works. And then I have more people to manage. And then I have layers of management. And then I'm no longer really in touch with what's happening. And my former employers, there were projects where I did the whole entire project and the boss never showed up at all, I got all done at the end of the case to the to the future, the customer and he was happy and they moved in and I went on to the next job it was that's just how it was. Now, maybe my owner met with their owner behind the scenes and I didn't even know that that happened. But I know he never showed up on the job or anything like that. Because my superintendent and I would say we've never seen so and so was never here so so there's that challenge. You know, we talked about the guy from NML you know, he hasn't met all 5000 people and that company can't but you know, but it doesn't mean he wouldn't be nice and and the same kind of person that you know that I met when he didn't know me from Adam and I was one of three Are people from the local high school that was at an event that he was at? So, you know, I guess it's, it's stay yourself no matter what. And you pointed out, you know, being humble, if you're a business owner, that's probably the best thing you can do is to, you know, sir, sure, treat yourself but I tried to treat myself quietly or or, you know, I don't know, I don't know the right term, but just don't flaunt it if you have something, but I don't. But things have never been my thing. So there's nothing really for me to flaunt.

 

Leighann Lovely  40:36

You don't want to drive around in a in a Mercedes or No, How about how about a Yvette Corvette? No, does not

 

Mark Schneider  40:45

interest me in the least in the least. And I am starting to look at my next used car. Because

 

Leighann Lovely  40:53

they're just, they're just as expensive as, as new cars.

 

Mark Schneider  40:57

They are, I'm just having some I'm starting to have some mechanical issues. And I'm like, do I let them snowball into a big one? Or do I just, you know, upgrade to something a little newer, and so, so it's, you know, the size of the company, and like I said, when the employees help us, you know, maintain or, or get, get to a volume, that's wonderful. I also, another thing that I do is, I pay my employees, whether we're busy or slow, the busy part, maybe I'll throw it, but if we're slow, and I'm like, go home, be with your family, or work in the garage, or cut the grass or do whatever, I'm still gonna pay you because I value you all year round, whether we're busy or not. And so there's some times where maybe they're gonna work 50 hours a week, but then there's a lot of other times they're only working 38, or whatever. And that's fine. They've come to they've come to know that I will take care of them there isn't there isn't on the lay you off. And so that's something else. Yes, I'm taking money out of my pocket to say, you know, there's very few times that that has happened. But that's, that's what we've decided to do. No, we're going to take care of you no matter what. Because they still have expenses. And I know And with today's today's world, I know that they could they could get a job somewhere else. I know somebody would hire them. They're all great, great people, and I want to keep them. I want them to stay with me as long as they want to stay with me. That's great.

 

Leighann Lovely  42:31

That's great. So we are coming to time, and I have a question of the season. I hope you had the opportunity to look at that. So if you could change something about your job or the practice that people have in your role, what would that be?

 

Mark Schneider  42:50

Well, in my position, I'm wearing all the hats. I'm marketing I'm, well, I know marketing, I'm not I actually get help with marketing from from some people. HR is the one thing that I would love to change, I'd love to be better at remembering to remembering to not just think I think my employees often verbally, but I'd like to do more. And I'd like to do more of such as, hey, here's a gift certificate for you and your wife or family to go out to dinner. And so it probably comes in spurts. My employers might tell you, yeah, we don't hear anything from Mark and then all of a sudden, we'll get a gift card out of the blue. And hopefully that's a, that's a nice thing. So if there was one thing that I could change it would be to remember, and it's probably as easy as just putting something in the calendar, but I haven't done it to remember how to continually thank my employees for what they do. And, and make them understand that they are valued. That's probably the biggest thing. You know, I don't want to get into the complaining that I don't like HR, but

 

Leighann Lovely  43:59

well, you're, hey, you're not alone. You know, most people did not start a business to you know, have to do the, the HR stuff to have to do even the marketing the sales. Most people start a business because they love the thing that they do. Right.

 

Mark Schneider  44:21

Right. But I love construction. I love what I do. I love helping people get into their buildings. You know, I say you dream it and we'll build it. What do you what do you want to do? I help people with their dreams, all the different businesses that I have helped those people get into buildings, or spaces in a strip mall or whatever. Their dream was to have a club Pilates or to have a Dunkin Donuts or to have a nail salon or hair salon or all these different things that I've gotten in through the years. That was their dream and I was part of their dream, you know, and and many of them have refer me to their friends that were trying to have their dream to do. Yoga six down in Oak Creek. That was the latest one that we finished. I never thought you'd do yoga in 100 degree room with 40% humidity, but that's what she's got going and people love it. So

 

Leighann Lovely  45:18

I am not a big fan of sweating and being hot and

 

Mark Schneider  45:24

there's a lot of different fitness categories out there. You know, I'm going to be starting a rumble in Brookfield soon that that one's punching bags and barbells and things like that while somebody yells at you with music playing really loud.

 

Leighann Lovely  45:38

Is that Rachel? It is Rachel. So she recently was on my podcast talking about about Rambo. That is awesome. So you're helping her with is this location

 

Mark Schneider  45:50

to the Guitar Center on Blue Mountain Calhoun in Brookfield.

 

Leighann Lovely  45:54

Okay, so I thought she had one location built out or was that just a preview? I think that was a preview. Okay. All right. So she had some areas set up where she gets one,

 

Mark Schneider  46:03

but she's, I thought she was looking to do three eventually.

 

Leighann Lovely  46:06

Awesome. Yes, I think she is. Yep. She's gonna be expanding and awesome. Well, that'll be fun. I can't wait to see how that turns out when you're finished with that. Yeah. Well, Mark, if somebody wants to reach out to you, how would they go about doing that?

 

Mark Schneider  46:21

So a couple of ways. One is to call us at 262-784-1010. The other way is to look us up on the web, of course, www, that all osccinc.com and then that'll have all our email addresses and everything on there free to find us and you'll be able to see a whole pile of pictures and descriptions of projects that we have done.

 

Leighann Lovely  46:48

Awesome. This has been an awesome conversation. I really appreciate you coming on and talking with me today.

 

Mark Schneider  46:54

Thank you for having me.

 

Leighann Lovely  46:56

Thank you again for listening to Let's Talk HR. I appreciate your time and support. Without you the audience this would not be possible. So don't forget that if you enjoyed this episode, to follow us, like us or share us. Have a wonderful day.

 

Transcribed by https://otter.ai

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SUMMARY KEYWORDS

employees, years, call, owner, company, business owner, work, business, brookfield, walk, starting, project, job, plumber, money, culture, humbleness, family, service, client