Juggling Lemons and Building Empires: The Art of Transforming Struggles into Success

When life hands you lemons, do you make lemonade, or do you learn to juggle? Joining me on Beyond the Tool Belt is the remarkable Ronnie Lollar, who not only juggled those lemons but built a lemonade empire. Together, we explore the symbiotic relationship between personal and professional growth, revealing how Ronnie’s Roof Warrior sales training became more than just a program—it became a catalyst for transformation. We also share deeply personal narratives, from my own battle to extinguish the smolder of cigarettes to the heart-wrenching care for a loved one facing cancer. These aren't just stories; they're our lives, laid bare to underscore the notion that our darkest struggles often lead us to the brightest paths.

Creating a culture where stumbling blocks transform into stepping stones is at heart of our conversation. Ronnie and I dissect the significance of nurturing an environment where failures are not the end, but the beginning of learning—a concept as true in the boardroom as it is on a skateboard ramp. Ronnie lets you in on the morning rituals that have become my secret sauce for daily success, including a dose of gratitude, a splash of hydration, and the vital connection with each team member that turns mere colleagues into a tight-knit community.

As the clock ticks, the balance between the tick and the tock—our work and home lives—becomes a dance we all must master. I share the beats of my time management routine, from carving out space for strategic vision planning to the sacred cadence of family time. Ronnie and I also celebrate the joys and hurdles of leadership, the echoes of advice from mentors and the resonance of a 'thank you' that can ripple through an organization for years. Tune in for a tapestry of conversations that intertwine the threads of business acumen, family ties, and the unending quest for a life brimming with purpose.

Transcript

Ty Cobb Backer: 0:00

We are live. Welcome back everybody to Beyond the Tool Belt, episode 225. We have another amazing guest this week. Stay tuned and we will be back after a short intro from our sponsors. Looping siding windows, gutters, solar For sure. Looping siding windows, gutters, solar TC Backer, tc Backer. Awesome, awesome, awesome. Happy wednesday, everybody, and thank you for joining us on your lunch break.

Ty Cobb Backer: 0:55

We have currently changed to 12 pm eastern standard time from our previous time at 7 pm Eastern Standard Time and this is our 225th consecutive episode. We have not missed one live episode since we've started this four years ago, a little over four years ago. And today my good friend Ronnie probably one of the most humblest people I know in the industry today he's a father, he's a leader, he's a coach Pillar within his community gives back just like we do. He's cut from the same cloth. I feel like our core values align a good bit. And now that I see you're getting involved with this Roof Warrior, sales, training and probably all kinds of other stuff that I didn't touch on, but I guess we'll find out what that stuff might be. And here he is, my friend Ronnie. How are you, buddy?

Ronnie Lollar: 1:48

Man, I'm having a great day. I'm pumped to be here.

Ty Cobb Backer: 1:51

Yeah, man, no doubt I know we're pumped to finally have you here. I know a couple of times that we kind of misconnected. Earlier, I was telling you about the headspace that I was in out there at Salt Lake, where we lost our equipment and had been on the road for a while and I was trying to quit smoking cigarettes, which finally I did. Uh, probably a year or so later I finally got off the cigs. And I do hit a vape occasionally, um, but nothing like I did with cigarettes. I was up to three packs back then and it was probably one of the most difficult things I ever had to do.

Ty Cobb Backer: 2:24

I've quit a lot of good, a lot of things, a lot of bad things, a lot of bad habits, um, in my lifetime, and cigarettes was definitely the one I mean. I've quit drinking. I've quit all kinds of other things over the years, and and cigarettes was definitely the one vice that I wasn't. I couldn't do it, I couldn't do it, I couldn't kick it. Man, it was just I guess I didn't suffer from any consequences.

Ty Cobb Backer: 2:48

Um, you know, health, health wise, I mean the consequences I did suffer with. You know, bad breath, stained teeth, uh, smelled like an ashtray, which, which was probably the thing that that annoyed me the most, especially if I was going to meet people or or if I needed to go someplace and if somebody asked if they wanted to drive with me or not or ride with me. Um, I smoked in my vehicle, you know what I mean, and it just was so uncomfortable when I didn't. You know, I felt like I was hiding you know I had to hide smoke cigarettes and it has become like this taboo thing that it's just not cool to smoke cigs Like it was back in the days when, when I started smoking cigarettes right but anyhow, we finally got you on the show.

Ty Cobb Backer: 3:30

Here you are and you know everything happens for a reason, I think. I think there's a reason, um, that that we we misconnected, you know, early on, when we first met each other. And I feel like there's there's a reason why, you know, maybe somebody's listening that needs to hear your message today, or whatever that might be. You know what I mean, but I do believe the universe works in mysterious ways and I choose not to try to figure that out or judge it. So, to lead into a story, I had the opportunity Jana and my wife got to take care of my mom. She was battling her second bout with cancer and this was about this February had been nine years since she passed away and we we went out to dinner and, of course, jana was taking care of her all day while I was at work, and then I would come home and I called it second shift. Basically, I just slept with a baby monitor next to my bed and if she needed something I'd get down and do it for her. And we went out to dinner one night and, of course, I was probably two hours late and finally got there, picked everybody up as they were sitting around the house waiting for me and we went out to Longhorn Steakhouse up in Mechanicsburg, pennsylvania, and my phone rang. It was 730. Phone rang and man I, just I was whipped I was. I was beating myself up on on a couple of different levels here. One, um, because I felt like I was dropping the ball at work. But the main thing was is that I felt like here's my poor dying mom, right, that that I haven't seen in 16 hours because I had been at work, probably. You know. Um and um, the phones ring in. They waited for me for two and a half hours. I'm looking at Jana, who's, who's my rock taking care of my mom.

Ty Cobb Backer: 5:14

And, um, she said two things to me when I I red buttoned it for probably the first time in my life I had ever read buttoned anything, because I felt like God, if I, if I don't answer this phone call right now, we're not going to have enough money to provide for our family, right? It was just this nonstop insecure financial insecurity, which I don't know why. I just had it, you know, I guess cause I'm not for money and and just I don't know. I just had this, this real big financial insecurity about everybody else and and and always put my family to the side. I felt like, but I thought I was doing the right thing. But she said two things to me. She said and they're not real, earth shattering things and we've heard them all over our lives. And and the first thing she said to me was is Ty, you need some help? And boy, she was right, but she didn't know how right she was when she said I needed help, I needed mental help, I needed all kinds of help at this time. What sad thing was there? There's another part to that, but but the other thing she said was to me was is that life is is too short, tyrus, and at that point in time and that's, like I said, not very earth shattering, but it hit. It just gave me goosebumps right now.

Ty Cobb Backer: 6:22

When I said that, that was like wow, because my mom, who killed herself in the bar and restaurant industry my family has owned a bar. This Christmas was our 41st Christmas that we were open. So I grew up at a bar and a restaurant and we were open 365 days a year. I literally watched, looking back now, watched her business kill her. Yes, she passed away from cancer, but all of those years of neglecting her body, her health. She was diabetic, type two diabetic, like. I didn't learn anything from that, you know, watching her.

Ty Cobb Backer: 6:59

But that's just how we were raised Gen Xers and baby boomers, right, that's, that's, that's how we were raised. You work your ass off at a job the same job, most of them dead end jobs or whatever um, to provide for 12 fricking people in the house. Now, there wasn't 12 of us, but that that's kind of like the picture, the picture perfect. Uh, you know, baby boomer lifestyle, um, but, and I went on a mission at that point in time, right, like so the first part to that was is that I needed help? I had help. There was people standing outside my office door every day just waiting for me to tell them what to do. I had trained them on, on on how to think not necessarily what to think on their own Right, and I probably said that backwards, but it was like I had to help and the culture was great, but that's just how we were. All kind of trained was like, hey, we wait for us to tell us what to do every day, right, and I did everything.

Ty Cobb Backer: 7:49

I mean, I was, I was the service department, I ran the service department. I would do service even though I had a service department. I ordered every bit of material, whether it was stock material, cause we got our own gutter machines. Um, I ordered all the inventory. I ordered the jobs, the roofing. I called the subcontractor to show up. I scheduled the in-house crews. I was accounts payable, receivable. Even though I had receivables and payables, I just had to say, nope, pay this one, don't pay this one. Yep, only pay half of that one, pay the full in this one. I, just, I was everything 15 hats that eventually actually created 12, 50 hour full-time jobs for people. And and that was about nine years ago, nine ish, 10 years ago.

Ty Cobb Backer: 8:36

Um, when she said that to me and I had gone on a mission and it wasn't an easy mission to go on to let go and not and not be an Indian giver I call it an Indian giver, whether that's politically correct or not, but like I would give somebody something and take it back from them You're not doing it fast enough and like critique the shit out of it because I was, you know, I felt like nobody can do it as good as I can. Um, uh, this is my baby. I built this thing. I, I, I, I.

Ty Cobb Backer: 9:04

It was pretty selfish way to think, even though I thought you know, um, you know, and that's funny. That's the funny thing about selfishness, it's so cunning and baffling. You know, I thought I was so giving and caring, you know what I mean, but really at the end of the day, I was, I was, I was being really selfish by not delegating these tasks and improving the quality or giving them empowerment and ownership in in helping build this thing. It was like no, I'm going to build it and then you're going to you're going to do it.

Ty Cobb Backer: 9:31

You know what, what little bit I'm going to give you to do, or whatever my, my thinking was just was was of old mindset, of of the old way mentality, of of doing things. I guess it wasn't right, it wasn't wrong, it was just the way that it was done back in those days.

Ronnie Lollar: 9:47

Well, the crazy thing is with that, like you mentioned, nobody could do it better than I could, or that was your thought at the time, right Was? I'm the guy, I know all of the things and it's going to save me time if I didn't do it. If I have to show you how to do it, then it's going to take time, which in the moment is probably true, but in reality, for long term, it's actually not true, right? Because if you just keep doing that right and there's probably some owners right now that are sitting here listening to this you know being able to learn from you and see, like that's exactly what I'm doing right now. But the reality is we're not equipping our people if we do that right, we're shortcutting their opportunity to grow into the next level of leadership and person that they're going to become, and we're also shortcutting ourselves as leaders as well, because we're not kind of that EOS model of delegating and elevating right, like it's that upper left quadrant that you really want to work in. Otherwise, we're kind of doing everybody a disservice when we're not kind of releasing and letting it happen, because I think one of the most important things that Heath Hicks ever told me was like I need you to fail and I was like, excuse me, I don't like failing at anything, so hard pass, bro, I'm not failing. And he was like, no, I need you to fail and I need you to let other people fail around you. I was like this of our core values is to learn, improve and refuse to quit, not refuse to fail, refuse to quit. And so that's one of our core values at Avco is I need you to fail.

Ronnie Lollar: 11:37

I remember talking to one of our new sales guys just last week and I was looking at his numbers and they were kind of so-so numbers for his first, you know, four to six weeks and you know kind of had a conversation with him and he was afraid of rejection, right, he was afraid of failure. He was afraid of, you know, had a fear of man, right, there's certain core fears I think that we all as individuals have, you know, fear of the unknown, like I don't know what's going to happen, and that's a super scary one, cause, like the milk, there's a bajillion different things that that could be, you know. Uh, the fear of failure, fear of man, like people's opinions, and all those things and trying to figure out what it was. That was the crux, that was kind of holding him back. And so I remember having a conversation and being like hey, josh, I need you to be willing to fail, and being like, hey, josh, I need you to be willing to fail. And he was like no boss has ever told me or given me permission to fail. I need you to fail because it means you're trying, it means you're actually wanting to get better. Now does that mean that I want you to continue to fail the same thing every single time? No, I want you to learn from that failure, improve and then refuse to quit.

Ronnie Lollar: 12:43

You're failing is not actual failure. Failing is learning or it's winning. Those are the two things that failure actually brings about. Right, it's not the context that we generally see it as where failure is a negative thing. It's not a negative thing, it's actually opportunity. It's either I am going to win this opportunity or I'm going to learn from this opportunity.

Ronnie Lollar: 13:04

It's one or the other, and so I think it's one of those things where, as leaders, you know you did yourself a service and you probably feel better than you felt even nine years ago, even though you're nine years older, like your cortisol levels in your body are probably substantially less than what they used to be.

Ronnie Lollar: 13:20

You're probably more pleasant to be around, I would guess. Probably Jana would be a great person to ask if that's true, or Vic would be another good person to ask him whenever it comes down to it. And I think that all of those things kind of bring about freedom at the end of the day, and it equips those people, because then it gives them that platform to to know. Well, you know, ty or Ronnie or whoever they empowered me to do this and I know that they're going to have my back even if I screw something up, right, like I have that conversation with our leadership team all the time Like, hey, I'm totally fine If a customer calls in and they're really frustrated about X. The reality is, you know, hey, we're going to be able to learn from those opportunities and we're going to move on and we're going to get better. So I think that's a great nugget of wisdom to share there.

Ty Cobb Backer: 14:05

So so good Ronnie, oh, so good man that was so good. From failure is the experience right, and that's why I have the experience that I have today is is from the failures that that I've, you know, have completed or incompleted. You know failures and that it's. It never rang so true in my ears listening to you say that it's a you know not that I really necessarily encourage like go out and just fail, right, but it failure. You know you have to create a work atmosphere where they're not going to get in trouble if they do fail.

Ty Cobb Backer: 14:40

Okay, and just, you got, and you got to put faith and trust in people that they're going to make the right decision. But you had mentioned core values and the importance of core values is to allow them to make decisions on their own, as long as it falls within the core values.

Ronnie Lollar: 14:54

Right.

Ty Cobb Backer: 14:55

You're not going to make a bad decision.

Ronnie Lollar: 14:57

Right.

Ty Cobb Backer: 14:57

You know what I mean. And if there's a little bit of failure in there, that's where your experience grows, that's where you become seasoned. Without the failures, you can't achieve anything. It's like when we used to ride skateboards right, if you weren't falling, we call it busting. If you weren't busting your ass, if you weren't falling, you weren't skating. You had to try and attempt and do things to overcome fear or whatever obstacle was in the way. It's not always going to turn out the way that we thought it was going to turn out, but most of the time it was. It turns out the way that it was supposed to turn out. You know, and it, that's so good, so good.

Ty Cobb Backer: 15:34

So what is what? Would? What would you say? Okay, obviously you're, you're, you're in a higher level position today. And what would you say? Your daily routine is now, or, or? What is your role right? Like, do you mainly just like work on yourself to become a better leader? Or what? What task do you do today? Because obviously I don't at least think that you're working in the weeds or working on the business today. I feel like you're, you're or in it, you're working on it today. So, so what? What does that look like on a day-to All?

Ronnie Lollar: 16:04

right, um, do you want me to go like to when I wake up, or you mean like when I get to the office?

Ty Cobb Backer: 16:08

Cause I want to yes, morning routine, definitely Personal, professional. Let's go.

Ronnie Lollar: 16:14

Sure, all right, cool. So usually five to five, 15, five, 20 wake up time, um, first thing I do in the morning is I do, um, five minutes of gratefulness. So before I get out of bed, I think about three people, um, and I think about something specific that I'm thankful, uh, for who they are in my life, or that particular characteristic, uh or trait that they have, and then I actually think about it and I pray for them before I do anything, before I get up and drink water, before I look at my phone, any of that kind of stuff. So I do that for the first five minutes and then later in the day, I love the voice text where you can send on an iPhone, where you can record your voice and you can send it in a text message. I send multiple of those a day to people just to let them know I was thinking about them, right? So I want to continue to perpetuate that view and output of gratefulness and thankfulness. So I start there and then I drink about 16 to 20 ounces of water, like first thing in the morning. And then, thankfully, um, I have a fully functioning gym at the house, so I have a detached two-car, oversized two-car garage that my gym equipment's out there so I don't wake up the family uh, being loud or noisy. So I throw on some shorts and I usually go out to the gym um the next hour to hour and a half, depending on, like, what I'm training for at the moment, and during that time I'm usually listening to a podcast, I'm usually listening to maybe the audio Bible or a mixed mixture of things audible, anything along those lines. And then I do, depending on the type of year, time of year, I'll do a cold plunge in the morning. So I have a cold plunge um out, uh, in the back, uh, on our back patio. I actually made mine um, because I didn't want to spend the $6,000 on the plunge version of that Um, but uh, it works, it functions really, really well. That was a lot of fun. I do either cold plunging or I do a cold shower, depending on the time of the year that it is, and then from there my first hour.

Ronnie Lollar: 18:37

Like I'm a very calendar, very disciplined schedule type of person, I'm very methodical. I pretty much do the same things every single day. I mean my calendars. Maybe boring is not the right term, but it's just consistent. So, eight o'clock to nine o'clock, when I first get to the office, it just says connection, connection. So my first hour I don't allow any meetings to be in that first hour of my day I go and I connect with everybody in the company throughout the office space, and so my first hour is just connecting with every single person and I've done that for the last seven years, something like that, every single day. That's what I do and that first hour is dedicated to that's. That's what I do and that's that first hour uh is dedicated to, um, connecting uh with people.

Ronnie Lollar: 19:23

Because at the end of the day, like we might have a roofing company but we're actually in the people business, like that's actually what we do. We just happen to put shingles and low slope application and repairs and gutters on people's houses right? Like the reality is the exchange rate that we actually are transacting? Is relationship Right? And how do you, how do you create relationship? Time spent equals relationship. So I don't spend that time with those people. I don't get to know them. So therefore, you know, whenever things are going on that are in their life that are hard, I wouldn't know that because I have no connection point. I only have that relationship as a end product of what they're going to give me and how profitable or how much money are they going to save the business. I look at it kind of different. So that hour that's like a non-negotiable for me. Anybody that's ever worked for me knows that. They know that that's how I do it every single day. And then from there, yeah, you're right, I'm not really in the weeds of the business.

Ronnie Lollar: 20:22

Thankfully, I have a lot of really fantastic people that work for us, that are department heads and our leadership team, that they're really more the ones that are running the business. We have a director of sales. His name is Matthew and he's fantastic at his job and he oversees all the sales managers, which oversee all the salespeople. Then we've got Alex that oversees our productions, and Bruce oversees our operations and insurance and supplementing team, and Emerald's my executive assistant, but she does a million other things than just that and it helps out on the marketing side. We've got a marketing team, so on and so forth.

Ronnie Lollar: 21:00

So we have a lot of really great people that it's been cool to see them from when we hired them on and I might have been the person that interviewed them for when they first hired on for pretty much all of those people I just listed and seeing their progress and their growth has been so cool over the years to just see them grow into the roles and most of them have been promoted, if at least once, if not multiple times at this point in time in their career but it's been so cool to see other aspects of their life growing and so seeing people you know sharing my going to a mental health therapist for the first time ever you know, a year ago or whatever it was and sharing my story and sharing and being vulnerable with them and seeing that a lot of them have come to me and be like, hey, I actually now that you talked about this openly, like I've actually been seeing a therapist and it's been helping me a ton, and so being vulnerable, I think, is another one. And then from there, yeah, we have we're kind of a based off an EOS platform so we have weekly L10s and then every department has a L10 meeting. So our leadership team, which is myself and four other people that make that up, and we meet for 90 minutes to go over the health of the business and then, from there, every single department has one of those and, honestly, and then from there, every single department has one of those and, honestly, from there it's yeah, now it's me just pouring into people and building relationships. How can I help them become better?

Ronnie Lollar: 22:28

And then a couple other things. About two times a week I have a scheduled 60 to 90 minute block that it's just like vision planning to, where I just try to just sit in my office by myself, close doors, which I don't normally keep my door closed, unless I'm having a closed door meeting. I pretty much keep my door open all the time. But that's one that's kind of like sacred for me is. I want to think outside of the box, like what are, what are things that we could do differently? Marketing wise, what are the things we could do for incentivizing our, our people? Or like, how could we get our name out in the community more often? Like, what other kinds of events could we be doing? How do we get, you know, the people's families involved? All these different things, and so that's kind of quickly what I do.

Ronnie Lollar: 23:14

And then, after that come home, every one of the boys has a a daddy day or a daddy night every single night, and so, uh, mondays, wednesdays, fridays, each kid has a uh evening with me that they get dedicated one-on-one time. So, instead of just like spending time only together as a family, they get dedicated time with me to where we'll go play pickleball or tennis, or go to the batting cages or watch a movie, or play video games or play board games, whatever they want to do. Whatever, uh, that time looks like for them, I do that with them. And so, um, uh, and then of course, I do at least one designated date night a week, uh, with my wife as well, where it's just going to be me and her um, with my wife as well, where it's just going to be me and her um, which you know, as you know, being being a dad.

Ronnie Lollar: 24:07

Um, it was really difficult early on in our marriage because we were pretty broke, if I'm going to be honest, and you know like it was really difficult to afford going out and affording a babysitter.

Ronnie Lollar: 24:13

That was kind of not in the cards early on in our marriage and so, trying to be creative with that kind of stuff, you know whether we did where we would do a picnic and we would take food, or we would, you know, not do a sitter and just, you know, do a designated time in our room only, or hiring the sitter and then only staying in our room because we couldn't afford to go places, right, whatever it was, but being creative. So that way we had that connection time. My wife's love language, one of them is, you know, they say it's quality time. Hers is quality quantity. Time Like that's actually you know as many times as she can spend with me is what her preference is, and so that's kind of a quick nutshell of kind of what the day looks like, and then usually in the evenings I also like to run, so I'll usually go on a run about five days a week right now.

Ty Cobb Backer: 25:05

So gotcha Now, would you say. Are you putting, are you putting in, actually, let me, let me get back a little bit here. How, how long I mean in your career over the years. Like did this, did this routine happen a year ago, like five years ago? Like, how long did it take you to finally graduate, to know, like, what your role is within the company?

Ronnie Lollar: 25:27

Yeah. So that's something I actually I'm constantly evaluating, like, is there an area of the business that I should interject myself a little bit more into right? Like, should I pay, like right now? I was kind of having that vision planning session last week and I was thinking I actually am kind of excited. I want to kind of jump into marketing and I want to put some of my thoughts and efforts, things that I've been learning, you know, between mastermind groups or just other people that I interact with, that I want to like put my concerted effort behind marketing and I want to help the marketing person with some ideas and stuff. So I know, for moving forward, like that's going to be that Now my morning routine, for like parts of that have just kind of been added over the years, like the gratefulness one.

Ronnie Lollar: 26:13

I've been doing that for like the last two or three years, which has helped me wake up in a better mood, because I don't look at my phone like other than just putting my podcast on or, you know, audio Bible or something like that. Like I don't check my emails like till after nine o'clock and honestly, I don't even generally check them then Um and so, uh, different parts of that has kind of grown over the years and kind of adapted Um and and then, yeah, just trying to figure out what, what is it that I enjoy, that I want to do, and what is it that I'm actually gifted in that I could actually help somebody else in the business so they can be successful. Like I love sales, like I'm a diehard salesperson I know operations just because I kind of had to. But like I'm a diehard salesperson, I love selling stuff Personally. I've even went door knocking this year because we've had some good storms and sold stuff after I left the office, just because I love selling stuff. So I've sold quite a bit this year, just for kind of kicks and giggles at this point in time.

Ronnie Lollar: 27:14

But I know that I have a great person that I can trust in Matthew to be able to lead that and I'm not worried about it. I just want to support him in whatever ways that I possibly can. That's going to help him better and help him to be able to win and grow and get more successful for himself, because they all have dreams when it comes down to it, right. So all of our people we're not the only people that are visionaries. If you're an owner and you're having to be a visionary.

Ronnie Lollar: 27:40

We're not the only people that have that. Everybody has hopes, plans, dreams, promise for a future, and so finding out what that is for those people and hey, is there a way that I can help support them in that aspect of their life or those areas of their life? Maybe I can be able to do that, maybe I can be a blessing to them and be able to give them something that you know, that I've learned over the years. You know, kind of gleaning some kind of wisdom. Doesn't mean that I'm the smartest guy around, but I've definitely made my fair share of mistakes and in doing so, hopefully they can learn from my mistakes and not be able to replicate those on their own Right.

Ty Cobb Backer: 28:17

For sure, For sure. What, what style of leadership do you, do you think you have, and and what? What techniques do you use or follow?

Ronnie Lollar: 28:30

So I'm. I mean, I guess it depends on what book we're talking about here at the moment, but I'm a little bit more from the front kind of leader.

Ronnie Lollar: 28:40

I like leading by example, I like showing and then letting them try to do things and kind of mirroring it for them and then let them mirror it kind of back to me to see if they're kind of understanding. But yeah, I'm more of a by example and from the front kind of leader. I'm usually a pretty talkative person, as you probably can tell, but for me I'm a big supporter. My coaching style for my people is I've never yelled at anybody, even in firing people, even if it was a terrible situation. I've never yelled at anybody ever at the office, never cussed anybody else out at the office, ever. It just never happened. That's not how I like to receive feedback and I don't know that that's really received all that well, especially with the younger generations nowadays. Right, like I grew up, you know, like I wanted, like my football coach, I was expecting them to yell at me or wrestling coach or soccer coach. Right, like that was kind of the thing was like you're going to be yelled at and then you're gonna be cussed at and then you're gonna have to, you know, do some kind of physical activity to pay for whatever you did wrong. But the reality is like I want to make sure I understand where they're coming from and hope, coach them through that, and if it's not the right fit, then it's not the right fit, and so at that point in time it's it's time to move on. And so I just want to make sure that people have that opportunity for that correction. And if they they don't want to do it, then it's kind of that core value thing that we alluded to earlier.

Ronnie Lollar: 30:12

It's kind of the hiring and firing based off of core values Cause, unfortunately, like we have had some, you know, turnover over the years and some of it is because, honestly, like we didn't really hire and keep people based off of core values. It was more like what's their capacity and what's their capabilities, and it wasn't culture, right, it's kind of those three C's of like you know, like they have high capacity, okay, but they're also an absolute dick to people, so that's probably not going to end up being well over the time right. Or their capabilities they're a fantastic salesperson, but they ruffle everybody else's feathers and they're kind of a cancer. Nowadays I can say, looking at the company as a whole, we don't have those people and going to work is so much more fun. People and going to work is so much more fun. Now, not to say that some of that stuff wasn't my fault, because my leadership wasn't what it should have been at that time and I didn't evaluate through culture and through that lens, but now I look forward to really going to work. It's enjoyable, it's exciting and that's what gets me excited about going to work is the people.

Ronnie Lollar: 31:19

I actually don't really care about shingles all that much, to be honest. I mean, I've been in the industry for 17 years, so I know all the things that we need to know, but I don't have three kids, or this is, you know, putting a roof on over somebody else's uh, home. That, um, you know, is there, more than likely their number one asset. We want to be able to provide, you know, an amazing experience that they want to tell everybody else about that amazing experience and we want to be a blessing to them. Um, and so I think about it a lot more in that kind of a context than, like we're a roofing company. No, we're actually a people company is what we actually do.

Ty Cobb Backer: 32:02

Yeah, for sure, a lot of good stuff in there that you just you touched on so many different things between core values, leading by example and leading from the front. And, like you said, you know which book am I reading this week? Right, you know what I mean? Is you know, where am I being influenced? How am I being influenced? And it's funny you said that because I want to ask you a couple of questions about you know. You know who is what organization or who has influenced you. But before I get to that, I just recently joined up with Eric. Oh, he's doing this cult culture movement thing. He'd asked me if I would sit in and be a guest speaker on that, and then he asked me if I would keep coming back. And I was like, of course, and one of the criteria is to read a book, so I was way behind. So I had to catch up quick, quick and and we read uh, jocos, uh, strategic, uh, what is it?

Ronnie Lollar: 32:59

leadership, strategic, uh, strategic, uh, and uh, shit yeah, I haven't read that one yet, but I know which one you're talking about.

Ty Cobb Backer: 33:08

It's good, it's good. So I hurried up and blazed through that real quick, but there was so many, so many good nuggets in that. But then now we're reading Buy Back your Time. I can't think of the name Martel I think is his last name, martel Such a good book. It's my second time actually going through it and I'm glad I did, because, again, this is another one that they talk about the 10-80-10 rule.

Ty Cobb Backer: 33:36

Okay, a lot of us heard of the 20, 80 rule and stuff like that, and this, this isn't really like that, but this is the 10, 80, 10. And recently I got to experience this where you know, like I would start something right and then hand it off, let them do 80% of it, and then I would come back in and complete like the, you know, just put my little final touches on it or approve it, or something like that. And I thought you know, and what's cool about reading books and stuff like that? Sometimes it solidifies. Okay, yeah, so I have been doing it. Good, you know the right way. But then other times it kind of like opens my eyes, like hey, I just, I just did something like that, but I couldn't articulate what it was that I was doing or identified. You know what it was that I was doing. So now I can actually put a name to it, like it's the 10, 80, 10 rule. You know what I mean that? Like it's it's my job today to like if I see there's a deficiency someplace, but I know I can't get in the weeds. Um, and it hasn't come apparent to anybody else that we need to do this.

Ty Cobb Backer: 34:38

Whether it's adding a column into the KPI flowchart or whatever the case might be, in this instance it was actually a KPI flowchart. We created this KPI flowchart that's actually on one dashboard. We have KPIs, but you've got to go four different places to look at Sure Right, have four different places to look at sure right, so so I went into apple um numbers, created this flow chart in there now and handed it off to to tam, and she nerded out with with google, it's kind of like excel, because she's a master spreadsheeter. Not that I couldn't have did it, but it would have taken me three months that's taken her three days to abstract all this data from these four locations and put it in there. And of course I'm I, you know. I check in on her and say, hey, how you doing? And she's like what do you think of this, what do you think of that?

Ty Cobb Backer: 35:27

So there's a couple things going on here. There's empowerment, right, um, we've empowered her, she's got ownership and she's actually building this thing. I just planted the seed and every now and then I just got to go back in there and water that thing, I mean, and make sure that it blossoms and flourishes. And, and what I learned from the Jocko book both books I read extreme ownership and strategic tactics and training or some it's called something like that. But but was, um, you know, taking extreme ownership, right, like, they get all the credit, you know, and it's cool, even though I planted the seed, somehow, they, they, they feel like this was their idea, because it was their idea to add all of these columns. It was their idea to put headers, and what color the headers were would mean and and the graphs that she's using and all this stuff that she's doing, like this is her baby.

Ty Cobb Backer: 36:16

Now, you know, I was just. I had a moment one night. I came back from, oh, I came back from one of our locations down in Greenville and I came back and I was like we got four locations now and it's easy for me to call upstairs and get a report. But what if Mike needs a report?

Ronnie Lollar: 36:32

Right.

Ty Cobb Backer: 36:33

Down in Bluffton and it's like we we need a platform where it's just one dashboard that he can review If it has to do with sales, he can follow all the KPIs and follow up with his team and its accountability and it helps us reach our goals each month, each quarter, annually. All of those things and it's all right there and it's certain a lot of it's just questions and accountability things that you put in place and and you know, as as we grow as individuals, you know, at least for me, like I don't need to take the credit for for all of this stuff anymore. I don't really care. But but the catch 22 is is that if this fails, guess who's taking the blame?

Ronnie Lollar: 37:11

Yeah.

Ty Cobb Backer: 37:12

You know what I mean. So there's a fine line of like okay, when do I jump in, when don't I jump in? Do I let them fail? And how bad do I let them fail? You know what I mean. Kind of like you were talking about earlier, because it sounds super easy until you're actually in it and you watch them make a $2.5 million mistake and then it's like, how do you respond to that? You know, what did you guys learn from that? I'm supposed to act all happy, joyous and free and ask the question Okay, so what did we learn from this? Right, right, right. You know what I mean. So there, I agree.

Ty Cobb Backer: 37:44

Yes, there are times we have to lead from the front, but there's also times that we have to lead from behind, and you definitely do this, especially if you're allowing them to make mistakes. Right, you know what I mean. If we're not allowing, then we're not leading from behind. We're the one that likes to talk all the time. We're the ones that hold the meetings hostage. I don't know the last time I actually ran the meeting. You know what I mean.

Ty Cobb Backer: 38:06

We might be holding meetings that I called for, but that doesn is is, I don't have to make all the decisions anymore. Yeah God, what a weight that is being lifted. That that I I let the fear, the ego, the, the anxiety of all that. Just, you know what guys we're in this together. You know we're all working just as hard as as one another to keep a roof over our heads and not just our heads, but those that that come here and ask us for our services. We're also. We also have the opportunity to put a roof over their head.

Ty Cobb Backer: 38:44

Right, is the cool thing about the journey that I've gone this far and it sounds like you're, you're on the same same journey that that I'm on, and so getting into the organization or or who who influenced organization or or who who influenced what was it, gina Wickman? Was it what? Like who? Who really do you think that you model most of your stuff from? Because I know you probably read a lot of books and you take what you need and you you leave the rest. I think we probably only remember 10% of the, the the whole thing anyhow, but like who has been like that galvanizer for you?

Ronnie Lollar: 39:17

Yeah, so I think that a couple things or a couple people like my grandfather, my paternal grandfather, my paternal grandfather so my dad's dad he probably had, single-handedly, probably the most impact on me. He grew up kind of tail end of the Great Depression and you know he was kicked out of the house by the time he was 12 years old and was told he's old enough to take care of himself and he's got a. You know they've got to provide for his younger siblings and so you know, like he was on his own pretty early on, he started smoking when he was 11, because of that. So but yeah, he was just a super hard worker but also a very caring person and he loved his wife and I always saw how he loved my grandmother and that was an example that I'll never forget, cause I was like, okay, this is something that's different than a lot of other people I see interacting, especially even by the time I was old enough to remember I mean, they had already been married for 40 plus years, 50 plus years at that point in time and that for me was such a key thing to see. You could tell he didn't just love her, he liked her as well, he wanted to be around her as much as he possibly could and enjoy her company, and so he was a big time influence. I learned part of my work ethic from him and from my dad, but my organization and calendar management and all that stuff he was that way. A job wasn't done until the tools were clean and they were put up. And so I grew up actually I'm a third generation contractor. My dad's a master plumber, master electrician, so I grew up as a grunt laborer. I was sweating copper by the time I was 13 years old and all that kind of stuff, and so my grandfather for sure made a huge impact in my life early on.

Ronnie Lollar: 41:16

A couple other guys that I really One of my buddies. His name is Jason Kingery. He lives in Denver and just seeing how he's conducted business over the years, he's a real estate broker who decided to also get into roofing now, to also get into roofing now. But he's another great example of being wildly successful in business but also being wildly successful at home, and so I really try to look at those two things, because there's a lot of really successful people in one or the other and honestly, it's really hard to probably see A. A lot of people want to be private, and I get that. But I would think that if we looked at the totality of the people that were super successful professionally and at home, I think that number is a lot less than we might think, and so for me those are two people that really kind of stand out to me, and then from there I kind of pull things from different individuals, I different individuals Like I've, uh, read the book atomic habits pretty much at least once a year.

Ronnie Lollar: 42:21

That's one of my all time favorite books, um to to read. Um, I read extreme ownership by Jocko, um, uh, probably, yeah, about the same, about once a year, 18 months. I'm currently reading the Subtle Art of Not Giving an F, since we're live on the feed here, and so I'm currently reading that one and then another book that I'm going to probably butcher the title, but I think it's something along the lines of the skill of learning how to change your mind, um, and so, um, I'm reading that one uh as well, because for me, I like to work on my mindset pretty regularly and, um, I think that your mindset kind of dictates a lot of things uh, in your life, um, if you think that you're a winner, um, and you start to you, you know it's kind of that. Uh, I'm a big sports fan myself and you hear about all the greats talking about um, you know envisioning themselves, you know throwing that, you know final touchdown and fourth quarter in the super bowl and all those kind of things and the talk that they have. Or you know walk watching, uh, you know the um, the Bulls Michael Jordan documentary where he talks about he even made up stuff to make it in his mind that he was going to be great because this person said this about them.

Ronnie Lollar: 43:48

But the reality is, your mindset really builds a lot of those additional things of who you are. And so I'm kind of constantly, always, always, working on that and you know being being mindful of like, what is it that I can do, how can I grow and how can I help other people when it comes down to how to develop their mindset, because I think there's a lot of things there that are generally the hold up and it's kind of that like that last lever. If you just kind of turn that lever just a little bit, that it actually frees that up, because you've been putting so much time and effort in all these other areas. But you got this one little thing. That's just kind of the key that needs to be unlocked and if we can change that, you might. You never know what might happen from there.

Ty Cobb Backer: 44:33

Love it, I love it. So continuous education, sharpening your skills, expanding your mind, all that stuff, I love it. I mean, I think that's what's, that's what's going to get us where we want to go, you know, and the moment that we stop learning and stop growing and stop pushing our minds to, to expand, I think that's when you know, our team, team, or those people that were trying to influence us, actually start to outgrow us.

Ronnie Lollar: 45:00

Agreed One hundred percent.

Ty Cobb Backer: 45:01

Yeah, and I don't know if you've ever kind of like sense, that experience where it's like, oh man, I need to. You know that maybe maybe I'm just a little more insecure than than most people, but it's like you know, I got to try to stay one step ahead here a little bit, you know, so I can continue to pour into my team, and I think that's why I stick around as long as I do is because I feel like there's still so much more that I have to pour into my team, where I just feel like you know that that I want to inspire other people, because I like what you really said earlier about you know, you know helping someone, like let me ask you, like, what, where do you want to be in life? Like, let me let what can we do to help you get there? You know, through my experiences and stuff like that, I mean that's, that's so good. And I knew, like I said, early on, it's like I knew that our core values, personally and professionally would, would definitely align well. Earlier, you know, when I, when I introduced you, and how humble you are because, you know, not one time did you say, you know we got this the hemoth of a thing you were more like your people. And the other cool thing, ronnie, that you said was it wasn't an author, it wasn't, you know, a speaker or a coach or a mentor opposed to.

Ty Cobb Backer: 46:08

You know, your, your grandfather, like you said, family members, like you know, not only did my grandfather, was he organized now, not only was he a hard worker, but he liked my grandmother, he loved, he was still in love, and how he treated her. What great mentorship, especially from another family member. And for you to say that, because I asked that question a good bit, and everyone goes right away to like, you know, jocko, simon Sinek, you know, boom, boom, boom, boom, they go. And even I'm guilty of that too. And you know, jocko, simon Sinek, you know, boom, boom, boom, boom, they, they go. And even I'm guilty of that too. And you know, and and it's funny because we're going to start an award this year, it's it's it's called the horse cockshaw backer award.

Ty Cobb Backer: 46:44

And horse cockshaw was my great grandfather and I want to create this, this golden horseshoe, but like, but, but very significant. Like I don't want a cheap piece of crap, like, I literally want like a gold plated horseshoe, to, to, to represent my grandfather, because my grandfather was, was hardworking, and so is my dad. My dad's one of my heroes. I think he's one of the smartest people I've ever known and has always been a greatest coach, mentor, uh advocate of of what it is that we do. We're first generation roofing contractoring contractor, but I am from a long line of carpenters and my grandfather just drilled it into my dad I've had to hear this my entire life was a job worth doing is worth doing right.

Ty Cobb Backer: 47:30

Job worth doing is worth doing right. And we added onto it the first time has been our motto since day one, and so that's going to be the job worth doing, worth doing right the first time has been our motto since day one, and so that's going to be the job worth doing, worth doing right, the first time award, or the horse cocksaw award or something like that, and it's going to be like a Stanley cup where each, each location, gets to hold onto it for the year. But it's going to be the highest award, you know, awarded to a location, and I just thought that would be some kind of way one to, because it really has meaning. I mean, that's to me anyhow. Hopefully everyone else shares that same sentiment. You know, sentimental, sentimental value in that, as as I do, and I'm sure we got such a great culture and I know that's going to mean so much to that particular location.

Ty Cobb Backer: 48:13

And then we'll have other awards and we're going to do a peer award too, because most of our awards go towards sales. So a lot of people that work in marketing isn't necessarily going to get an award for, and then with the KPI system that I was telling you about, so each we're going to grade it on a curve. So then, even though we've been more seasoned and have branded ourselves more predominantly in York than we have any of our other locations, our other locations can't use that against us and say, well, you guys have been in business since you know 2000,. Whatever you know up in PA, and are not going to be a match. Well, if it's based on percentages, along with the KPIs, then any location can win. You know, the next three awards.

Ty Cobb Backer: 48:55

But we also want to have a peer award, and the peer award will go out to somebody that follows the core values, right, and I don't. I don't know if we want to do that quarterly or annually or how we're going to. You know, give that word out, but. But I'm looking forward to and, like you were talking about earlier, that's, those are the things when I when I lock myself in my office, that's and it's usually on a Saturday or Sunday is where I really, really get those those creative quality changing.

Ty Cobb Backer: 49:24

You know ideas that make, make the quality of the company, the quality of it, the quality of the people, just better. You know to to to really solidify and galvanize the, the, the culture that we're, we're really trying to to grow here. And and you know to to to really solidify and galvanize the, the, the culture that we're, we're really trying to to grow here. And and you know words and things like that, things that we can all collaborate in and and work towards. And, plus, it creates a healthy competitiveness.

Ty Cobb Backer: 49:49

You know atmosphere, too. That that you know you have to, you don't have to, but it's, it's good to have in in a sales atmosphere. You know you have to, you don't have to, but it's, it's good to have in a sales atmosphere. You know, or, sales job is is to have that healthy, that healthy competition that people can work towards. You know work for that stuff. So we're uh, but anyhow, we. I feel like I could keep talking to you for a whole nother hour where we're. We're about an hour and two minutes into this, um, but before we get off here, I know you dropped golden goose eggs all over this podcast that people can take away from this and use and apply in their life today. But is there one last thing that you just want to leave everybody that might be listening now you know, live, or on the playback, that you just want to leave with them that you know that has really helped you along over the years.

Ronnie Lollar: 50:40

Yeah, I think that, um, you know, kind of continuing that conversation of always being a lifelong learner is also being teachable, um, because they're not necessarily they're, they're kind of synonymous in some ways. But really teachability comes down to I can learn from anybody, um, I learned from my kids all the time. Um, they'll say something, uh, and I'll be like, wow, um, that's something I could definitely apply in my life. And being teachable, I think, is a uh, a characteristic that, um is kind of wildly overlooked um, nowadays. Um, because, like I said, we can learn from anybody.

Ronnie Lollar: 51:19

Just because we have years experience in doing whatever we're doing Doesn't mean that we can't learn from somebody else that's just getting into the industry, and so I try to take that and apply that in my professional life as well as my personal life, because, at the end of the day, I never thought I would have to apologize to my children as much as I have over the years, but for me, it's one of those things that I heard a quote the other day that I thought was really impactful, and we started with personal stuff and I'm going to end with personal stuff, and the reality is that I get to parent my second, third kids because I learned, uh, as I grew as a parent with my first child, right, and I have to tell him all that all the time, like you're kind of the Guinea pig, kind of you know joking, but the reality is like I'm learning and I'm growing just at the same time as they are.

Ronnie Lollar: 52:14

And making sure you're making space for that in your relationships with your kids, I think is really, really vital.

Ronnie Lollar: 52:21

Like I said, I've had to apologize a lot for doing things the wrong way or being too harsh or not choosing the right thing or whatever the thing is, but making sure that always trying to have that relationship because, at the end of the day, I only have them for a certain amount of time, right, and like when my 16 year old, like that's, I have him a lot less with me outside of you know, our home once he moves out and has his own thing and realizes like hey, yeah, my, my parents are here for my betterment and um, that ultimately they want me to succeed because you know there's plenty of a-holes in the world, like we don't need to create any more of those. Like my goal is to, um, hopefully create young men that are going to be a cultural add to society. They're going to love people that are going to put other people first. They'll be selfless and they'll be caring, generous, kind individuals. They'll be able to make an impact into the world.

Ty Cobb Backer: 53:28

Oh man, I love that. I love that so much Can be. Be a continuous learner, be a be be a continuous learner, be a, be a uh, how do they say it? Be a steward of leadership. Um and uh, dude, I, I love that. I, especially with the kids, and I've I've learned so much from my kids as well, too.

Ty Cobb Backer: 53:46

And, and saying that, I've learned, I personally learned a lot from from this today, and and I'm sure other people have gotten a lot from this too and just the way that you know it's probably things I've heard before, but the way that you articulated it, ronnie, I think that you know you've done a lot over the years and you're not like, hey, look at me, look how big my jock is over here. I'm Ronnie with Avco Roof and all that stuff. So, man, I appreciate everything that you do, I appreciate everything that you stand for and the change that you're trying to make in our industry, and this you know. I like how you said to like you're in the people, you know people business, right, You're. You're not in the roofing business necessarily, and we used to say when you said that, we used to say like we're no longer, you know, a roofing business that does marketing, we're a marketing business. That that does roofing and I kind of feel bad for saying that because, um, not really, but I mean cause we are that too. But but I like how you said that, because we are so much more than a roofing company we, we, we're, we're a people company.

Ty Cobb Backer: 54:50

You know we're creating, we, we've created a co-leadership. You know development culture here. Like everybody under this roof is is a leader, and it is our job and it's your job to to create, your and develop. You know the people that you work around, or, and especially, your children. You know, and I, we had the honor and the privilege to take rocket with us to win the storm this year.

Ty Cobb Backer: 55:12

You know, and that's that's just a small part of of us developing him into being the next generation of leaders that are coming up through right, Like that's, that's our moral. You know responsibility as as as good human beings, is to develop. You know good, good human beings. So great job, brother.

Ty Cobb Backer: 55:31

I love what you're doing over there, man, and and let's stay in touch, yeah, absolutely, cause you're just, you're just a great dude and you're doing over there, man, and let's stay in touch, yeah, absolutely, because you're just a great dude and you're definitely somebody I need in my circle of people that will help level me up and just become a better person in general man. So thank you for everything you're doing. Thank you everybody that's tuned in for this amazing episode. If you didn't get to check it out, go back to the beginning and listen to this, because Ronnie just put some really good stuff on the internet right now that everybody, anybody whether you're a parent, managing a household or you're a manager within a business or you're an entrepreneur you need to come back and listen to this episode, because Ronnie just put the fire out. So thank you, ronnie, thank you for everything that you do and thank you for everybody that's tuned in this afternoon with us.

Ronnie Lollar: 56:17

Yeah, Thanks for having me Ty. It was an honor. Appreciate it.

Ty Cobb Backer: 56:19

You're welcome, brother.