Colby Jardine and Levi Lawrence reveal the systems gaps, habit failures, and tech traps that quietly stall growing businesses, and how to fix them before they cost you.
GROWTH PILLAR: Leadership & Ops
WHO THIS IS FOR: SMB owners / Solopreneurs / Founders preparing to transition / Leaders building systems
WHAT THEY'LL GAIN: A clear look at why businesses stall, how to choose the right tech without getting sold, and what it actually takes to build a business that runs without you.
Most businesses don't fail because of a bad idea. They fail because the systems never caught up with the growth.
Colby Jardine and Levi Lawrence are partners at Iron House Pro and co-hosts of the Built to Last Podcast. They work with founders and business owners who have built something real — but find themselves stuck, overwhelmed, or completely unable to step away. Together they bring a rare combination: Levi's background in technology selection, organizational design, and systems thinking, paired with Colby's expertise in habit change, creative strategy, and human behaviour.
In this episode they break down the Death Valley Curve — the profitability dip that traps businesses between $2M and $5M — and explain why so many founders hit it without seeing it coming. They talk about artificial profit margin, technical debt, and what a real gap analysis looks like when someone actually knows what they're doing. They cover why people don't know what they need, only what they don't want, and how Iron House Pro acts as a people-first technology company that helps you choose tools based on fit, not sales pressure.
Key topics covered:
Connect with Colby and Levi:
Special thanks to Bernice Williams for making this introduction happen.
— PARTNERS ON THIS EPISODE —
@Hive — Real-world business networking, in person and online. Starter membership $99 CAD/year.
Profit10™ — Take the free Profit Snapshot. Ten questions. Find out what's really holding your business back.
Canada Growth Network — Business connections plus GoHighLevel CRM for $47/month CAD. Start your trial for $1.
Next Steps
Bernie (00:21)
question to the audience. Are you building your business on habits and systems or just hoping things hold together? So if that question is hitting home to you, you're not alone. Most of us build fast and fix later. And that's exactly when things start to crack. Today's guests know that feeling and they spent years helping people get ahead of it. So we have two guests here today.
And the first one is Colby Jardine is a partner at Iron House Pro and co-host of the Built to Last podcast. He works with leaders and business owners who are trying to make real change, better habits, clearer systems, and a direction that actually holds. It's not about quick fixes. He helps you build routines that fit your life and a business that doesn't fall apart under pressure.
His background in health and nutrition gives him a grounded, practical way of looking at how humans actually work and what it really takes to shift. Our other guest is Levi Lawrence, Colby's partner at Iron House Pro and also the co-host to Build to Last. His work is about helping you build something that lasts too. A brand, a community, a body of work that's true to who you are.
He works with service providers and business owners who want to tell their story and build from a place of purpose, not pressure. He's the kind of person who asked the question behind the question. And together they run Iron House Pro and produce the build to the last podcast.
You can find them at ironhousepro.com. Gentlemen, absolute pleasure having you here today. I appreciate it. We're having one of those busy weeks and but we made it. We finally made it, which is awesome. Do you have a fair quote or saying you want to share to the audience?
Levi (02:03)
my favorite quote is actually not a, it's not a quote, it's a paradox. I love, think life lives between paradoxes. And I apply it in the work world all the time. So for me, it's the following two statements, equally true. The little things in life matter most and don't sweat the small stuff. And between the, I just, love presenting like both those things are true and we gotta live, operate, build businesses and build ourselves between those two things.
Colby (02:27)
Mine, mine had for a while has been and I don't think there's actually a direct author from this. Somebody said it once. This too shall pass. So yeah, I take that in like, you know, it just applies in so many ways, know, you're caring too much about things and things are stressing you out. And yeah, it just kind of keeps me keeps me level.
Bernie (02:48)
like it. Colby, what was the moment you knew habit change was the real work, not the strategy?
Colby (02:53)
That's a very loaded question because I can answer it like personally and professionally. I guess from a professional standpoint, I had like natural capabilities that were that that made, you know, getting myself in a situation is easy, but the execution part was where I was starting to fall apart when I was as I got older, started to realize there was pieces missing from just riding the coattails of my natural talents.
So I think like that was a nice shift for me. Met some great mentors that kind of helped me develop some new habits. And I suppose that got translated into the business side. And that's what piqued the interest to get into this in the first place. And also when we met Levi a few years back, we actually merged companies. So then that kind of process side of things and habit change became even more of a reality in our own business.
We started off as a creative agency first. And that's the kind of the background that I had. was, yes, in the health industry as well, but we spent a lot of time making creative content in that other company. And it was great. We were making national ads and I got my feet wet with that whole thing. And then when that didn't end up working out, I was very young. And so when I shifted, it was like, let's start a creative agency. And then a few years later,
Matt Levi, and yeah.
Bernie (04:06)
And you're both still smiling. So that's really good sign. Levi, for you, when did you realize that most people were building brands that actually feel like them or look like them?
Levi (04:15)
Well, and it's not just brands, it's even just like building the organizations or the businesses or the brands as well. But most people, not everybody, but most people get into these things because of something they're good at or something they enjoy. know, chefs create sauces and restaurants and food products and, know, electricians start electricians businesses. and then you find out that like building a business is its own trade.
And so like what you're good at and why you get into business and then you become an entrepreneur, you become a business builder and they're two separate things. ⁓ and then, like my understanding is like seeing yourself as the, entrepreneur, the business owner as its own trade, it's not sometimes the same identity as what you saw before you get in. But then also, I don't know if anybody gets into business without a certain amount of like naivete or like they, they almost need to not know some things to jump in.
So there's always a little bit of that correction unless you're on your like second, third, fourth business or you come to it in a close family of business.
Bernie (05:11)
Speaking of the transitions, mean, you both transitioned into each other and became one company. What made you decide to do that? What was the trigger? Is it just you complemented each other? You had different skill sets that this works really good. What made that soup, that recipe come together?
Levi (05:30)
I think the stuff you just mentioned is why we sealed the deal. But I think the way it started is I had a separate company called Pragmatic Solutions, and it was really just around helping businesses adopt technology, change their systems, and become a little bit more modern and able to grow their business without depending on just the founder or the owner. And I was doing it on my own. I had a small team of five supporting me, and I just didn't want to do it alone anymore. I've had a fairly sizable business failure in the past.
I had a lot of opportunity and so I went looking for partners. And at the time, Colby and his existing partner, and still a part of our three-person company, Aaron, they were clients. And so we had built a relationship and we're working closely together. And so we started examining this one plus one equals three. Companies that need good marketing and creation exercises typically also need to improve their processes and systems to get the best advantage from
that good content and marketing and that's where it started, but I think it's grown and evolved since then.
Bernie (06:26)
So habits, Colby, this one's for you. People's habits keep falling apart. Why is that? Why does that happen? Is it lessons not learned or what?
Colby (06:35)
I think it could be a couple of things. I think that from an individual standpoint, maybe they're in the wrong job or they're not connected to the purpose and why they're doing it and they're not excited about the vision or not going towards a clear goal. It's just kind of, you know, just showing up every day is not enough for a lot of people. And I think that...
Like from a company standpoint, I think it's the same thing. Like it's, it's, you know, just the same as we, you know, we were talking before we started recording. It's like, you know, we all want to get in better shape. And it's like, I think when you really, when you can really nail down the why, it starts to become easier. And, yeah, I would say that's probably the number one way that habits keep falling apart is, I mean, I mean, there's also the idea of like, from a company perspective,
It could just be that it's a terrible culture.
Bernie (07:22)
So, but if a business owner is assuming that the culture is there, might need some alignment on how you view things or perspective.
But when do you find that the person, because when they reach out to you now, when a company reaches out to you now, they're realizing they're hitting some sort of brick wall. There's some sort of pain point involved.
What does that usually mean? Is it just a matter of the just need a HR manager in the back room massaging everybody's neck and tell them to calm down? Or is it a process? What or is the clients you know, they picked all the wrong client because all these three things are just touched on. Yeah.
Colby (07:58)
100%. Yeah. And Levi touched on it before where like, you know, this could be, you know, we're like a bit of a Trojan horse in a sense, where somebody would reach out and want a particular thing. Let's just call it like they want a CRM to manage their customers or something. And then when we go in and we start chatting with them, we care about the whole business, the entirety of it.
⁓ We might have gotten in there with one conversation, but we're poking and prodding, asking lots of questions. And then pretty quickly we can start to see that there's some other opportunities or challenges that we're seeing that might need to happen or be taken care of first. And we'll have that conversation then. we, you know, people are, if you go into a business and you're the technician kind of role, if you're an electrician, you start an electrician business, there's going to be gaps in your knowledge. And there's gaps in all of our knowledge and we need to bring in
advisors or hire the right people to fill in those gaps. I think a lot of people, I guess, maybe just don't see exactly what they're missing. So then they start reaching out for help. And oftentimes what they want isn't exactly what they need. And we can hopefully guide them in that conversation.
Levi (09:06)
It's funny you use the term Trojan horse because I think about it more from a like people. These symptoms and like we get to go through that diagnosis. So it's like two analogies for the same same things like like they know they're overwhelmed or they know they're frustrated or they know something's not working and they know people's unhappy. But then I don't know if we've ever had a customer being able to come in and say like this is what I need. They just come in with this is isn't happening. This is what's going wrong.
Colby (09:30)
Yeah,
Levi (09:31)
lot
of folks. It's just like acknowledging that people don't know what they need. They just know what they don't want.
Colby (09:36)
And a lot of folks will come to us because somebody said, hey, you should go talk to these folks. And they're just, because that's a trusted relationship, we end up having that conversation and it kind of goes where it goes. But I would actually argue like most folks wouldn't even really know where to start, like to Google, like to solve these issues. Like what exactly am I searching for when I'm trying to solve these issues?
And I understand that. Like, I get it. And there's some stuff we can talk about later in the podcast that is hopefully going to solve that problem.
Bernie (10:07)
So the other aspect that I understand is you deal with the tech stack. sometimes like you're mentioning earlier, somebody goes, well, I think I might need this. good advertising goes a long way, but all of a sudden you realize, and I've seen it myself, I ask the AI, this is what I have in the background. What can I use that I'm already paying for?
What can I capitalize on? And then I said, well, you should go to, and there's a platform and I want to mention the name because it's extremely, really useful, but the learning curve is incredibly long. And I don't want to get my doctorate in this particular software, right. And doing image editing, right. Apparently there's fantastic stuff. There's a six hour training video. And then I'm sitting there going, ⁓ no, no, it's not going to work. You know, anyhow.
How do you help someone work through that tech stock? Because if I rolled up on your desk and I'm going, hi, I've been using this platform, they kind of price themselves out of the market. And this was the ⁓ substitute coming up. And I'm going, my gosh, I recognize the pain point. So how do you help a business owner come through that going, OK, here you go.
Levi (11:16)
This is a place where I think I feel very strongly about.
an area where I don't think we realized we were really good at something until the customers started telling us that we were good. And then we looked at it like, you know, this is the one area where I would say we're one of the best in the world at helping an organization select the technology they should use from an agnostic perspective. We don't resell any technology. We don't have any stake in the game. And we approach it from a like, what fits you. And we need to know what you're trying to do, what you've already invested in, what your goals are, like what's success for you.
and profit for profit, whatever, and go through that as like an intentional exercise, because a thousand people are trying to sell you a widget every time you go online. So I feel really good about being there, but it's like really understanding where you're trying to get to what you've already done. The easiest analogy that everybody gets, and it's not the only software we do, but it's like Google versus Microsoft. is no, like people will tell you what's better or worse, but it's like comparing chicken versus steak. There is no one that is universally a
objectively better than the other. It's 100 % subjective to the situation and what else is going on where you're at. And so like being able to decide what system you should use and how much of it should you use, like that's a conversation. Like if we could just sell that, although like that's so connected with other stuff, but like that is the little nugget that I think we're the, know, everybody wants that what we're best in the world at. And I think that's where we really got it nailed.
Bernie (12:36)
I hear had another podcast from another person. He was saying that AI is coming to the point where you can have agents running in the background. And then he made another comment and I'm my gosh. And it almost reminded me of why you wouldn't want to buy a VHS tape anymore. Because it has a shelf life. The software has a shelf life. But if you have the entire database attached to that shelf life,
Have you saw you got to migrate it. So how do you help people pick software when he described this as software as disposable? It'll have maybe a three to four year lifespan. So if you're using AI agents now, right, to run certain tasks, if the company, you know, doesn't matter which one decides we're no longer supporting this because it's not feasible for us. But that's what you use.
You know, how do you manage that? To me, that's a disruption, right? And a planned ops less or you've not even planned it's less than what's happening when you don't want it. How do you manage that?
Levi (13:39)
Yeah, well, we enter the conversation like one of the things they say at the beginning is like change is no longer the constant. It's the acceleration of change that is the new constant. We can acknowledge it's only going to get faster. It really depends on where you're at. know for me, for most organizations, it means reducing your dependence on any tool, which means stronger processes and pulling, like, you know, if you're using Claude or Chatchapiti or Gemini or whatever, regardless of what you're using, if you are using an AI tool day to day is you pull out your prompts and you
pull out your context and you pull out your instructions as a team of how you're to use those tools and you don't store them within the tool. You store them outside so that you're more agnostic and you can switch tools easier. The brain of your organization isn't in one system that you can't migrate from and that's part of selecting. But at the end of the day, you don't want to increase dependence, but for some times you have to. Like we're going to some companies that they work with vendors or suppliers or partners that force them into it.
We just every situation is unique, but the change is going to happen quickly. It's it's a stock slowing down for sure. And even on the AI side, even if they don't change and you have to change your whole processes like expect a dollar bill payment to get there that you don't currently bet on. So that's going to change change the game for sure. The analogy I give a lot because we're usually like bringing complicated technology to people who are good at business, but new attack the way I try to say it is like you've.
always had the capability of hiring 100 students or getting 100 interns. Like there's always been capability for you to get more resources. But if you don't have really strong instructions, guidelines and onboarding and very specific, like this is exactly what I want you to do within these guardrails to be successful, which is what you should have for these tools. Then you're gonna become dependent on people as they gain expertise or knowledge. Reduce dependence by building better systems, not everything in people's heads.
Bernie (15:25)
when's the right time to build a system? Before you need it or after you feel the pain?
Colby (15:29)
Well, it depends how self aware we are. think everything that Levi just said kind of nails it. It depends what you want out of this as a business owner. It's like, if there's things that you're naturally good at and it's all just in your head and you're okay with that, and then you're like, well, I'm not really good at this, so I'm gonna go hire an admin assistant and whatever, depends on the size that you're at. at some point,
You know, people get sick and things get busy and things get forgotten. So I guess if you want a little less stress and a little bit more capability to grow or to step away, then I would say right now, best time to plant a tree, I think.
Bernie (16:07)
I hear you on that one. I totally hear you on that one.
Colby (16:10)
Yeah, yeah.
Bernie (16:11)
So solopreneur starting up, first off, what's your ideal type of client profile?
Levi (16:16)
So we have few of them. But I think like the one that I've been focusing on most, like we have some, we can do a lot of things for lot of people. But where I think we deliver the most value that gets me up in the morning, the reason why I started Pragmatic, much less Grow here is we call it the transitioning founder. Somebody who started something, could be a few people, you could be dozens or a hundred people, but you started something, you've got it to a certain point. And
you're coming up with a transition. could want to sell your company, you could want to transition, and you could just want it to depend on you less so you can focus on family or change your lifestyle. Whatever the transition is, you realize that you've built something around you that doesn't allow you to have that freedom. And you typically think about entrepreneurship and business ownership as being more free, but it's very easy to build those handcuffs around you that don't even see coming. That founder, typically you want a certain amount of complexity, so it's more five or 10 employees.
definitely up to the two, three, 400. You've built it. It's stable. It's profitable, but then you want a personal life challenge or change and everything's in your head or delegation isn't there or people aren't empowered or you don't have any data. You don't have any way. Like it's just, there's, that's where we come in. And that's, that's the type of customer that I really like. Cause it's not about helping you become a little bit more efficient and saving some dollars and increasing your bottom line, which are all things we can help you with. It's like, we can give you an extra multiple on selling your business for your
retirement, but we can give you back time in your week for you to focus on family or new projects or peace of mind, or we can make your life healthier. Like those value props, even in this business world, really like fire me up.
Colby (17:43)
Yeah, you know, and there's there's also that idea of like, you know, there's a lot of folks that might be in like the office side of things, like, you know, management and, know, people that have high paid roles, but are doing not so high paid tasks, like we can start to save time so that we can like keep the surgeon in the surgery room. It was probably the best analogy for that. Because there's a lot of that going on.
and that like kind of busy work and like we can help people do what they're great at and also help those key people be able to step back.
Bernie (18:15)
As we started the podcast before we started recording, you mentioned something that you're coming up with and we'll get into that in a second. Do you also look for the gaps in the business too? Where the pain points are and then find a solution that, yeah, you can go find the solution, but you're going to also offer that solution, which would lead us into the bookkeeping service that you're now launching?
Levi (18:38)
Well, I think it's value add, but sometimes I'm sure it's a frustration. But no matter what anybody buys us for, we can just do a website or we can do content or we can do training or what have you, or help you use AI. But no matter what they do, we start out with taking a bigger look at the entire business, start to finish. The number of times we've gone in and they want this, it's like, well, but this isn't good at work. The post-perfect piece of content is not going to work if you can't handle
build more on operations, or if you don't have a way to execute the sales process after you can lead. So we do take a bigger look. And so gap analysis, whether we call it that formally for all our clients or not, is a mandatory start of every engagement. And so even though we do some very specific projects, organizational gap analysis is in everything we do, just so we get a better picture of the Because nobody, have you ever heard that it's the Harvard that does the drill and the whole analogy?
Nobody ever wants to buy a drill. They want the hole. And so when they come to us for a CRM, nobody ever wants a CRM. They want more easier sales, or they want an easier, less headache, or they want to be able to delegate easier. The purpose of what they're coming to us for is never the tool, the widget. And we just go in knowing that. So gaps are everything.
Bernie (19:45)
part of this look though is not just, I've got a standard operating procedure here. I've got tech stack over here. I've got people over here. I got my books over here. So it's the brand. So do also help with the marketing element too? Do you wrap that into the overall package?
Colby (19:59)
Yes. Yeah. I love that stuff. the branding, like coming up with disruptive things, like I used to the first company that I had, we were selling a product that was expensive and it didn't taste very good and it didn't have a lot of science. So I had a lot of, a lot to work with from the marketing standpoint, but I learned a lot about like how people react to stuff and like how you can interject humor or something that like stops somebody from, you know, scrolling now, I suppose.
But yes, yeah, we love doing that stuff. It's not a huge percentage of the things that we do. But it's always playing some sort of piece or role in what we're doing as an overall project. Because I think the content creation, a lot of people think like social media, stuff that lives and dies really quickly. We like to create things that somebody can use for a long time. Say somebody wants to become the best place to work, an employer of choice.
Like we'd be able to build really great content so that they continue to get great staff applying to their business. More so.
Levi (21:01)
would just double click on that because like what I like about us versus other marketing agencies is like we understand marketing and strategy and digital marketing tools, but then a lot of our clients don't realize that that can apply to recruitment at all. Like they think of marketing and sales, it's just, need new clients. the bigger problem for a lot of like manufacturing and hospitality comes with dealing with, they have a bigger problem in finding the team than finding customers. And it's not a...
intuitive leap for lot of companies to think that like marketing strategy and marketing content and campaigns is equally able to be attributed to other aspects of the business. It's been great for us to able to like pull these tools to where the need is without being pigeonholed to certain types of industry.
Colby (21:40)
And we're not, we're not like, you know, this is, you know, people can think whatever they want about this, but like our demographics right now, like we didn't have enough kids, like millennials didn't have enough kids in Canada to like, fill all these positions. like, we're trying to solve almost two, two issues at the same time. It's like, okay. So the people that are here, can we attract them? And also can we make your company run more efficiently to like, you know, maybe you don't need as many people to do the same thing.
Bernie (22:07)
You find that companies make certain underlying mistakes. What you've seen, either in staffing or in, the tech stack that you come across and going, hi, don't do that. Or they're looking to grow, right? And they, if they say, I have an idea, it's all like the type of person wants. I want that candy, apple red car, but you know, they can't afford the fuel, the insurance and the, and more importantly, the speeding tickets to go with it.
Colby (22:32)
Yeah. I mean, just a couple of pop-in in my head is like getting the new shiny thing and then not doing adoption properly. Yeah. getting the team on, getting the team actually using things. So we're talking about habits earlier. Habits are tough, especially when you're busy. But yeah, that's kind of the thing that pops into my head.
Levi (22:52)
And not counter to it, but like we use a lot of like, I, again, I don't, gotta find out where I steal this from, but like the whole idea, have you ever heard of the death Valley curve for business owners? So like, cause you say the word mistake and I wonder if it's, cause I, like, I see it happen and it's unfortunate, but I also don't know if it's a mistake cause it's easy to happen. But it's the idea that you build something or start something, you get to a certain point and you're making money and it's successful. And then there's a logical point in every business that the general status, which are like two and 5 million.
⁓ where the systems and the technology and the administration you need to keep growing, like the investment kills your margin. And so you start to lose profit, you start to lose bottom line. And if you don't see that coming, you're not aware that it's happening, you start making poor decisions or delaying investments you should be making and getting other team members, getting an office manager, getting technology involved. And it's only when you hit the other side of the valley,
with the margins right side again. And so like all that overhead investment into operations and systems and tools, you're back at your margin, but like that's a very scary place that nobody teaches in any business school. There's no entrepreneurship that really prepares you for that. And getting into that, end up making not necessarily mistakes, you have really natural reactions to the things and stresses that happen. And some people make it through and some people don't. And just if you knew that there was a healthy point and you make a choice,
take the next steps into something that needs more structure. And I spent a lot of my time as a volunteer in groups to pass that message along.
Bernie (24:17)
So it'd be fair to say then the services you offer, I mean, you can look at the brand, you can look at the business operations, the tech stack, but also are you offering the level of advice?
almost like a mentoring package then in the process or coaching. Mentoring and coaching are two different things, I understand, but is that another element? And then you're also involving then strategic forward looking moments too. Like, you you're here today, five years from now, where do you want to be and how do we make that happen?
Colby (24:48)
Yeah, he's like.
Levi (24:49)
I don't.
Colby (24:50)
I was just going to say that we don't do that in every engagement. I mean, it happens in conversations, just in passing a lot of the time. But we do often get asked to run strategy. And it is an absolute blast. It's like, usually we try to do it over a couple of days, and we love doing it. Especially if that's where they feel most lost, and they've got that self-awareness piece of, man, I just really need to.
talk in a safe environment and open all these things up. not, know, some people want to be told what to do because they're a solopreneur and they're just like tired of their ruminating in their own thoughts, which is super fair. We don't love to tell people what to do as their business, but we can open up all those possibilities, put them up on a place where we can all see them and talk through them. And we love it.
Levi (25:35)
Yeah, the full strategic stuff is like a, you know, there has to be a willingness and a budget and time, but like I would actually suggest that we don't do any work without considering the strategy. And how it shows up is we don't do any work unless we ask questions about like, why are you doing this and what are you trying to achieve? And it's when they can satisfactorily say that, then great, we don't need to dive into Saturday strategy. But if they have no idea, they're like, a lot of them is like, well, no, we don't know. It's just, that's the thing we think we should be doing.
then we're like, let's pause because you really, I'm a big believer that all decisions should be filtered through what you're trying to achieve. There's no arbitrary definite success. What are you trying to do? And then let's help make the decisions today. it's strategic, like it's not, we don't call it a full strategic planning, but it's an element in everything we do for sure. The coaching and mentoring you mentioned is one that we struggled with because we only have so many people who could offer that really good coaching and mentoring. We're all members of peer groups. all,
try to do that level like free in our communities, coffee chats, we're very generous with time, but it's like, I'm worried about over committing. Like I don't know how, anyway, I'm very interested in where that goes, but like, how do you sell it? And it feels a little weird to sell and we use it as a generous thing that we do.
Colby (26:44)
I love it. It's one of my favorite things and it's a passion that I'm going to continue to go towards pretty heavily over the next couple of years. I think where we can help will obviously help in those coffee chats. Those are the chats we enjoy having, so it doesn't feel like work, right? It's like if people are...
Levi (27:01)
We
also have to get paid at some point, we gotta be careful.
Colby (27:05)
It's true though. go to these peer groups. I'm a part of the Canada Bridge Entrepreneurs' Organization. This is why we join those groups. We can talk about those hard things and give our perspective, share from our experience. If they can get something great, if not, that's fine too. But yeah, I'm definitely going to be getting into coaching more more.
Bernie (27:26)
I'm to serve right now.
Like the local or on the East Coast, a national here in Canada, you North American or you just, you're globetrotters. You're getting yourself your Bombardier jet so you can go south at the border or east or west.
Levi (27:41)
We're deeply rooted across the planet Canada. Like I think we're really well connected and do a lot of work in that region. And we've been making a lot of efforts to get inside of that region. So, you know, we met you actually on a business development trip to Ottawa and Ontario and Niagara and Toronto. We've made some efforts at West and BC and Alberta. We were looking at the States. We've kind of paused that for a minute in time.
We've done some outreach to the UK, but we really want to diversify. Because in Atlanta, Canada, it's a very, like all of Atlanta, Canada isn't the size of one city on a world scale. And one economic issue or one thing happening affects everybody. And so we really are making some efforts to get a little bit.
Colby (28:18)
The next kind of goal, Bernie, is to choose and tap into these other Canadian markets and then also the UK. Those are going to be the two focuses, hopefully doing a bit of both simultaneously.
Bernie (28:31)
I've been told in the past, and this is a guy that writes SEO or works on SEO, he goes, the riches are in the niches. Are you going to go into a niche or are you a broad spectrum? you know, are you working with people that make widgets? Are you doing working with people that create software as a service? Like, you know, I know business is a business, but, sometimes, you know, if you're
If you're a farmer, it's not the same thing as a mechanic. You might be fixing your tractor a lot, but yeah, but not the same thing.
Levi (29:04)
So yes and no, I mean, we have this conversation because it is zero market and grow a business if you focus and you find your niche. And I keep coming back to like, we are really by design right now generalists, we're really great generalists. We're able to see the big picture and connect dots, which for some, like, mean, I'm not calling us a doctor, but at some points you need a GP who can see the bigger picture and then find the specialist. And I think we have a lot of value in being that generalist if we've been under the hood of
well over a couple hundred organizations of all types, First Nations, government, for-profit, large, small, nonprofit, NGOs. And I would actually disagree that at the core level, everybody has the same problems. Everybody has some kind of strategy or future goal or purpose. Everybody has people, typically, the ones we deal with, everybody has people involved. Everybody has some kind of operations that need to get something accomplished. Everybody has money involved. Everybody has finance.
There's five pillars and we look at them and then eventually we get to some kind of specialization and we've just really invested in that network. So we have, you know, 50 or 60 people we pull in if needed, or we'll just say, we've identified you need this, let's go find you an expert because this area, but, there is so much recurring problems. You know, the person who makes a barbecue sauce over here and the person who does metal manufacturing over here and the person who has a SaaS company over here, all this difference is the metrics.
Like the actual fundamentals are all the same. And they're all using a lot of the same systems.
Bernie (30:27)
when you come up to a company or the company comes up to you in fact, how long does it take to kind of divine through typically? And again, I know this depends because we're not all built the same rate. know, if you're three feet tall and you're 30 feet tall, the clothing ain't going to fit right. And it's going to take time to suited up. But how long does it take normally for a company to come in and, you know,
and then start engaging and then getting results. What's your typical?
Levi (30:57)
Three
months to three years, Colby?
Colby (30:59)
Yeah, mean, I mean, like that classic answer, it depends. I, it's, this. But it's, it is. like, for, for people to, you mean to start seeing a difference like once they do engage with us?
Levi (31:13)
When
do they like, they become a customer? Sales cycle.
Bernie (31:16)
customer, but also at the same time, when are they seeing results? I'm mean, if I'm starting from ground zero, right, and I'm building out a new product, I'm coming in with brand new IP, and I haven't even got it patented yet, right? Or hopefully it's patentable. To someone that's I've been running, I've been running a business, I'm an electrician, or I'm a plumber, or I'm a business of some sort, you know, whether there's a commodity attached to it.
What does that cycle look like? Is that a couple of weeks and they can start seeing, again, depending on what you're fixing, right?
Colby (31:49)
Yeah,
100%. I get it. I get you now. I would argue day one. So the reason I would say that is because we've gotten really good at getting clarity and having a big trust building conversation where we can just open everything up. So if we can deliver a level of clarity, ask questions maybe that you haven't really thought about before, or actually give you the space to be able to think about them for a minute.
I would say day one you start getting those like kind of like, like I can actually see things a little bit differently and I can actually, I've met the people that can help me with this thing. So if that offloads a little bit of stress on the owner's brain, great. But as for, ⁓ you know, seeing like a return on in their investment or, or starting to save time, it kind of depends what we're doing. Like we can show them how to use certain AI tools that might save them time immediately.
But then if we're implementing a project management system, that might feel long because it's like, your workflows aren't actually written down anywhere. There's certain problems. Yeah, we're going to take six steps backwards, and it's going to feel like we're taking seven forward. But yeah, there's little wins along the way that we can do right away that will kind of start gaining that.
Levi (32:49)
it worse before it gets better.
Colby (33:05)
that confidence that like, okay, we're trending in the right direction. But like, you you see those huge companies implement those large ERP systems, which essentially are tech stacks that we're building for people are replacing those. And they're for mid-sized businesses and large businesses and small businesses. And those things, they take time. If you don't have processes written down anywhere, we got to start there so that it does, it can feel long, but there's so many small wins along the way, just from a clarity perspective that,
Yeah, mean, believe I have anything to add to that.
Levi (33:34)
Yeah, the answer is it depends short term and long term, but we do always look to make sure there are short term and long term benefits and understand them. there's just certain investments that most businesses need to make that aren't going to give you an immediate return. They're building structure for the long term.
Colby (33:49)
Well, you had a great way of describing that Levi that we call it artificial profit.
Levi (33:54)
Yeah, we talk a lot about the artificial margin and technical debt, which are terms from other industries, but artificial margin is you get to a point where you're hyper profitable, but only because you fail to invest in the things that will allow you to grow. And so you get like, and that becomes really dangerous. Like you might be hyper profitable, say at 1 million, you got a small company and you're like, I go to, but you don't want to spend. don't want to spend all this money. I'm making it's like, yeah, but you, should have spent and kept a regular margin. And then now you wouldn't have problems.
So you have an artificial or inflated margin and just talking about that concept and then technical debt is it's a software development term where you cut corners, you knew you cut corners, take advantage of an opportunity to you whatever but you like track it. Track it when you're cutting corners and making those heroic deliveries or those things that you're doing because it's accumulated risk and just know you have a debt and then justify some of that stuff that eventually you get a catch up to.
Colby (34:44)
Yeah.
Bernie (34:45)
Pay me now or pay me later.
Levi (34:46)
Yeah, exactly.
Colby (34:47)
Yeah, and that goes the same for the choosing the technology too. Like, like if we, if we don't understand their goals or if they don't understand their goals and they're trying to choose a technology and they're trying to grow, it's like, you're going to invest all this and learn it. And then it's going to be a waste of time.
Levi (35:01)
Those technology salespeople are really good at what they do. Like really good at what they
Colby (35:05)
And they all do everything now, Bernie.
Levi (35:08)
I'm not sure if you're sure.
Bernie (35:09)
It hasn't made me suffer in the last couple nights, I can guarantee you that.
Colby (35:13)
⁓ man, I'll send you one later.
Bernie (35:15)
The missus might be looking at me with the evil eyes going, what's this all about?
Colby (35:18)
Yeah, yeah. But it's true. the, you know, they, all of them, all of big ones are all doing everything and not everything. They can't do everything well. And, you know, there might be a company where we're actually, we consider ourselves like a people first technology company in a lot of senses where we need to get to know your team and what are you most likely to succeed at adopting?
And that is a big question, and it takes a lot of research. it's that front-loaded energy into these projects is going to help you in the long term a lot.
Bernie (35:55)
This begs the question, as you mentioned, as you made that last statement, is that sometimes not everybody starts off on the same footing. For example, if I were to train as a medic, if I've gone through college or university, college or high school, understanding biology really good, I stand a good chance. But if all I understood was poetry, not so much so.
And not to this either either end of the spectrum here. So do you offer training then to people? Listen, before you decide, because I know you're agnostic and you're going to say, listen, this might be the best fit. It's like getting recommendations on the type of clothing to wear when you're hiking, you know, in the Adirondacks or on the Alps or the Rockies or out on the East Coast somewhere. Right. The outfit might change and you might be offering something.
But is there a point where you tell the person, listen, you gotta, you gotta get yourself kind of spooled up and understanding what's behind the scenes. Do you, is that, is that kind of a dual thing or do you just go, you make it the, are you the easy button going high? This is the best fit for you.
Levi (36:59)
We internally have a mantra that we make our teams say at two team meetings every week. is it, it's we are to help our clients reach their future potential. And it's regardless of the contractor or so our team is all empowered to like make future proof decisions. We are the champion to raise the flag of best practice. But at the end of the day, we're to work with you. But if they're like, are you sure you want to do that? Or is there another way?
⁓ But we end up doing training and education for probably 20 % of everything we do. More often now, what we're getting really good at is we go into organizations and we build their training. like, let's use, go back to the Microsoft Google example, every, but almost every company in the world uses one of those two platforms. And, you know, I think we've got six projects on the go right now where all we're doing is we're not showing them how to use Google or Microsoft because they got the basics.
Is that we're helping the company build the onboarding guide and the usage policy of how that team's going to use it the same way. And usually it's like, how are you going to store shared files? And what are you going to name them? Are you going to use some of the chatter channels or texting threads? Are you going to manage projects through there? Are you expected to use email in this way? Are you expected to share calendar bites? Like we go through a really disciplined, you know, we're talking about 10, 15, $20 million companies, dozens to hundreds of people.
who still don't have that level of awareness on this tool they pay huge amounts of money for, and we help them build their own training for the next hire. And you get better and better at building training for them, your voice, their handbook.
Bernie (38:24)
Wow. That's a lot of moving parts. Again, having worked in corporate and going, there's HR, there's organizational development, there's the learning department, then there's facilities, and just the logistics. Each one of those boxes have their own unique strategies for success.
So is there any information you want to impart to people to say, listen, I got to reach out to Levi or Colby? Is there a flag that you want to put up and say, listen, if you're experiencing this, knock on our door?
Levi (38:56)
Well, I'll just be quick on mine because I'm like we do a lot of things we have a team we've invested in and so like at some point if we're gonna do a project of services But I'm a my mission in life is to make it easier to grow a business I think all like it's gonna be entrepreneurs sticking their hands in the ether of the world of making change is good at what fix like I don't think there's anything that isn't gonna be fixed by somebody and it just doesn't have to be a for-profit business and You shouldn't have to learn the hard lessons on your own
I've been through a lot. I've made a lot of mistakes and my time over coffee is free. I, LinkedIn is my love language and meet other people, join peer groups, have real conversations with people who get it. Work aside, love to work with anybody, but have real conversations with people who get it, who have done it and who have made mistakes because like almost all the mistakes I've had and see in our companies, everybody else has also.
So don't learn the hard way unless you have to.
Colby (39:48)
Yeah, I would second that too. Like there's so many things that you think you're going through by yourself. And unfortunately we are not that unique. And, you know, we've run into those same problems over and over again. And when I first joined a peer group, it was just incredible. Like, you know, I go in there and there's some of these companies are like 200 million in revenue. And I'm like, my gosh, I'm nothing. Like these, these guys are incredible. And then I, you start to hear some of these stories and you're like, my gosh, like,
exactly what I'm going through. just like, you know, it's just different levels and you know, it's just, it's really nice to know that and I just like same as Levi, like the door is open if people just want to like chat like, hey, I'm having this issue, like, let's just talk about it. If there's something there, there's something there. If there's not, there's not, you know, similar to you, Bernie, you just seem to love to have conversations with people and it just keeps
Levi (40:36)
It's a very lonely journey. It's
a very lonely journey.
Bernie (40:39)
It's not if you keep talking to people, not if you keep talking to them.
Levi (40:43)
I meet people who haven't yet talked about it like they keep it to their chest or new and I'm just like don't live in that stress like I just like like you got a Here you got to talk. It's got to be a little bit vulnerable
Bernie (40:50)
You gotta share.
Colby (40:53)
Yeah.
Bernie (40:53)
So you guys have a podcast that's out there. How do we find it? I mentioned the name earlier, but where do we find it?
Levi (40:59)
We should be everywhere. So if anybody can't find it, please message me. audio is on all the podcast places. And then we also put up the video on YouTube. Sometimes people really resonate to seeing faces when they talk. So we try to have both. And it's not really about our business. We both started it for probably different reasons. But it's hard conversations around, especially leaders who have business and personal things that are all intermingled.
And there's conversations with no easy answers. And we just want to have those conversations with people who get it. And so it's about change. It's about challenge. It's about overcoming. It's about, and built to last refers to companies and people. And so we're long format, long conversations about really meaningful things. And how else do you make 30 era friends after your thirties? Like I'm in my forties and get to have these two hour meaningful conversations with people and like things that I just don't get to do at a bar or a chamber.
And so it gives us a lot of joy.
Colby (41:50)
And the guests are from all over the world, which has been so fun for us because we get the perspective of different markets and stuff too, get selfishly educated on a lot of things that we're curious about. And I'll also say that I think that with social media, LinkedIn, all the social platforms, we're all putting our best foot forward and saying, celebrating the wins and all that stuff.
I think a lot of people like look at that and go, my gosh, like I'm doing such a bad job. I'm a mess. And it's like, if we can keep telling these stories, but like everybody's kind of a mess, then it's like, okay, not okay. That's validating. Great. That's good to hear. Like that means I can keep going because everyone is just doing that. They're just like, you know, can I just keep putting one foot in front of the other?
Bernie (42:30)
Yeah. Gentlemen, thank you so much for your time today. I really appreciate it. And you know, if the knack for business listener, if you're hearing this and something goes, hey, because you might have found something in this conversation going, I might be experiencing one part of the journey inside your business space. And then, you know, yeah, I also have this problem, or I have this issue and not necessarily a problem, but you know, or if maybe it's coming to be a problem soon.
reach out to Levi or Colby, you know, why not? They're findable on LinkedIn and listen to the podcast built to last. And I'd also like to extend some ⁓ thank you mention to Bernice Williams because she's the, she is the connection between the thread and ⁓ we all met at, at