Matt Weber on Developing Authentic Values at Alpha Overhead – EP.288

(00:00:00) – Intro
(00:00:54) – Growing up in the garage door business
(00:02:52) – Leaving Montana and returning home
(00:05:40) – Coming back to work in the family company
(00:09:44) – Communication breakdowns with parents
(00:11:12) – Leadership lessons: it’s not about me
(00:14:48) – Getting buy-in from the team
(00:17:17) – Heroes and historical influences
(00:18:06) – Core values rollout at Alpha
(00:25:10) – Team reception and proving it
(00:28:52) – Delegating operations to Jonathan
(00:33:18) – Making it less lonely at the top
(00:35:15) – Vision for regional expansion

Matt Weber: But I think a lot of times business owners get stuck on, “Well, are they bought into my dream?” That’s great. That’s fine and dandy as long as you’ve communicated well enough to make that happen, to make them bought in. And some of them won’t. Some of them won’t ever be bought in. Some of them enjoy the process of the job, and that’s all they wanna do.

But, you know, the, the fact of the matter is, is, is going back to what I’m learning a lot of, it’s not about me, and I’ve gotta take into consideration when I communicate, when I have meetings, when I’m thr- casting out vision, that some of the people might not want to be a part of that. Or they might say, “Great.

Prove it.” That’s where follow through has to happen.

Alex Bridgeman: Matt, thanks for coming on the podcast. Absolutely. Thanks for hosting me in this really unique apartment up in your, in your office. Right? This is awesome.

Matt Weber: Above the offices.

Alex Bridgeman: Yeah. Yeah. Can you share more about how you got into this business and what you were working on before?

Matt Weber: I mean, I’ve been … I grew up in the business, so I’m a second generation garage door guy. And 10 years old, first year. I could probably take you to the s- the house that I installed the, the garage door in.

Alex Bridgeman: Is it near here?

Matt Weber: Uh, it’s in Columbus. It’s down the road about 50 miles. So-

Alex Bridgeman: Wonderful …

Matt Weber: um, that’s where we were living at the time.

And so it came out of … What ended up, how Garage Doors came about is my dad opened up a construction supply company called Valley Construction Supply, and this was in the ’90s. And, you know, we sold, and like a lot of construction supply companies in the smaller areas, we built pole barns. You know, supplied, packaged pole barns, and then we, we would, we would build and install them.

And so most of the companies around here, they outsourced the garage door install. Well, we didn’t. He would buy the garage doors as part of the package, and we would install the garage doors into those pole barns. So that’s how Garage Doors started. And then mid-’90s, housing market crashes. Building materials are worthless, and he ended up selling off the company but stuck with garage doors because everybody’s got garage doors.

Everybody needs to get in and out of their house, and garage doors need service, and new construction is still going, just at a much slower pace. So that’s how we got into Garage Doors full time. And so working with the family, um, as a family, as a technician and, and coming up into that, obviously I wanted to leave the family business.

Of course. I wanted to leave Montana. Back then, you know, at 16, 17 years old, there wasn’t a lot for those kids. You know, obviously there’s hunting and hiking and things like that, but without connection, I was homeschooled as well, and so without a bunch of different connections and having those, having those things, Billings was not a place for kids.

Got in a lot of fights back in the day around here. Some of them, uh, I might have picked, but anyway, it was- … sidebar. So I was ready to leave, and swore I’d never do garage doors in my life again, and swore I was never coming back to Montana. So I started my journey at 17. I left home with my parents’ blessing.

It wasn’t a F-you mom and dad type thing and, and leave And so I went to Phoenix ’cause w- my family had moved to Phoenix when I was six for four years till about 10 years old, and then moved back to Columbus. That’s when the construction supply company got started. So in Phoenix beforehand, came back to Montana, and so I went back to Phoenix for a little while and lived down there.

Decided I wanted to be out in LA for a little bit, so I moved out to downtown LA, uh, with some friends. Chased a girl across the country to Westminster, Maryland. Started school in Pensacola, Florida. Let’s see, I was- You hit

Alex Bridgeman: all four corners …

Matt Weber: at, at, at that point in time, let’s see, I was 20. I turned 21 in Pensacola, Florida.

So I was 20 years old by the time I ended up in Pensacola. Went through Hurricane Ivan in 2003. That was a whole crazy experience in and of itself. The eye of Hurricane Ivan came right over the top of Pensacola, and it was just … It was insane, the aftermath of, of what everything looked like. And so decided to change hurricanes for tornadoes and moved to Oklahoma.

I had, uh, some cousins that lived there, an aunt and uncle, and some cousins that lived there, and I was like, “You know, I’m just gonna… I’ma, I’ma give that a shot.” So that’s where I ended up going, starting school or continuing school at the University of Central Oklahoma in Edmond, Oklahoma, and graduated from there just recently actually, just graduated.

I left there. I walked across stage, but I left without my diploma. I was dumb. Didn’t matter. I wasn’t going in the field that I chose to go into, and I had two classes that I had to finish up and never took them until recently. And so last year I actually officially graduated-

Alex Bridgeman: Nice …

Matt Weber: with, uh, with my degree, so.

Alex Bridgeman: Well, how-

Matt Weber: That’s how I ended up back here. In 2010 is when I moved back to Montana, and almost 10 years gone, and s- came back to work in the company. My parents gifted me 20%. Which I very quickly earned. Me and my parents have a great relationship now. We did not have a great working relationship kind of later on just for different reasons, but we got a great relationship now.

You know, they’re, they’re grandparents. They love my kids and, and so that’s important. And… But yeah, I quickly earned that 20% and started moving from just a working technician into, into management, into, hey, maybe I do wanna take this thing over. I, it kinda came at a, at a fork in the road. I had somebody, another garage door company out in Eastern Washington actually offered me a very, very good job, and I almost took it, and I’m thankful today that I didn’t.

I had that conversation with my wife of, “Hey, what, you know, this is what it could look like.” And so glad I didn’t take it now. But, so came into this as, uh, you know, kind of the managing partner for… Let’s see, I’ve owned it outright for five years, managing partner before that for about four years, and yeah, that’s, I guess that’s how I’m here.

A long around way to get to where I’m at now. Yeah.

Alex Bridgeman: So did the family business take you back to Billings from Oklahoma?

Matt Weber: Yeah. I gu- I– ’cause I, I graduated middle to end of the 2008 recession, or didn’t graduate, but walked and couldn’t find a job.

Alex Bridgeman: What was your field in?

Matt Weber: Uh, history education, actually. I went to, I went to go get a degree to teach history.

Nice.

Alex Bridgeman: My dad’s a history major.

Matt Weber: Nice. Awesome. And so yeah, it was, it was something that I’d sent out a ton of applications everywhere, and half of those got back to me and said, “Sorry,” you know, when school’s actually downsizing and, you know. So had an opportunity to come back and work. It was supposed to be a part-time deal, but ended up being long-term and seven, almost 17 years later, here I am.

Alex Bridgeman: Was there a, a, a part of history you were most curious about or spent more time-

Matt Weber: Yeah. I love, like colonial period America and, uh, World War II. I mean, everybody loves World War II history, so Of

Alex Bridgeman: course, we have aircraft carriers now.

Matt Weber: Right. Air- You know Yes, exactly. We just had the Blue Angels here this last week, so- Oh, nice

this last weekend. It was incredible. Lot of fun. I,

Alex Bridgeman: I missed them in Portland. They came o- over. There’s a annual, like Hillsboro air show that’s this- Okay … giant airshow. The Blue Angels were also there-

Matt Weber: Nice …

Alex Bridgeman: last weekend. I missed them.

Matt Weber: Yeah. Yeah, they, I think they came here from there. But yeah, it was, it was a good time.

Good time. Yeah.

Alex Bridgeman: Have you been to Colonial Williamsburg over in Maryland? Or, um, Virginia? Virginia? No,

Matt Weber: actually, I haven’t spent a ton of time on the East Coast, which is crazy as a history, you know, part of that, part of history being it, but I haven’t spent, I haven’t gotta spend a ton of time Over there. I was there for a couple years, but didn’t do a ton of traveling at that point in time.

But I’ve been to Boston and did that whole walk, you know, the history walk there in Boston, and love to make it to New York and, and Philly and those areas. I ma- I did make it to Gettysburg, which was amazing. Nice. Uh, so yeah. Yeah.

Alex Bridgeman: Yeah. The… I’ll, I’ll show you later, but Colonial Williamsburg is a lot of fun.

It’s, uh, like a whole, like … Uh, it’s like a Disneyland for colonial times- Really? Where the whole, like, the whole city ar- this whole part of the town is all set in that time period-

Matt Weber: Oh, okay …

Alex Bridgeman: with actors and food and- And

Matt Weber: kinda like a working, a working amusement park type thing? Nice. Yep. Nice.

Alex Bridgeman: Yes. That’s

Matt Weber: cool.

Alex Bridgeman: They got chickens everywhere. Love to

Matt Weber: check it out.

Alex Bridgeman: It’s

Matt Weber: great.

Alex Bridgeman: Yeah. So you mentioned also that you didn’t have early on the greatest working relationship with your parents. What, what did you kind of… What’d you guys disagree on? Or what caused most of that, you think?

Matt Weber: I think it was a f- a fundamental lack of communication, which that, I mean, that can go every…

You know, you can use that for every interaction, every disagreement, e- you know, just people not being on the same page. And not really being clear with expectations or being clear with motives or movements or doing things without asking permission and then, you know, going back and saying, “Well, here’s what I did.”

Great. Would love to know about it. But anyway, just, uh, probably that fundamental lack of communication is probably always, in every relationship, whether it’s business or marriage, even relationships with your kids and, and things like that, is the source of frustration across the board, I think.

Alex Bridgeman: Yeah. I bet.

There’s a, there’s a good podcast I can send you about communication with kids.

Matt Weber: Yeah.

Alex Bridgeman: And the one key point of it was kids are pretty smart. They’re gonna pick up- Mm-hmm … on your emotions and that there’s something wrong. And so if you say, “No, no, I’m fine,” like they’re not gonna believe you. They’re gonna kinda make up their own story for why- Mm-hmm

you’re not doing well, and they may blame themselves. And there’s a lot of communication nuances, um- For sure … an episode you’d probably like. But given that you’re now on the opposite side of the table, and you’re running the business, how does that influence the way you communicate to your team and customers these days?

Oh

Matt Weber: man, that’s probably… I can give you an answer, and then you could probably ask them the same question and be different answers. Um- Just go run downstairs and.. You know, it… I think a lot of it has to do with understanding, this is something that I’ve been learning a lot lately, is it’s not about me. It’s not all about me, right?

Yes. I own the bus- Ton of risk involved with that. But understanding that these people, my employees, they don’t hold equity in this company They can leave, they can get fired, they can go somewhere else and get another job. I cannot do that. But I can’t take that attitude into conversations. I can’t take that attitude into disagreements.

I can’t take that attitude into meetings because again, these people don’t hold equity in the company. And you know ultimately they’re employees but I think and feel more than that. But I think a lot of times business owners get stuck on well are they bought into my dream That’s great. That’s fine and dandy as long as you’ve communicated well enough to make that happen, to make them bought in.

And some of them won’t. Some of them won’t ever be bought in. Some of them enjoy the process of the job, and that’s all they wanna do. Businesses still need those types of people, you know? I hear a lot of business, “Oh, I just want A players.” Great. You also need Bs that are consistently and consistent, in my opinion.

And so I think there’s a lot of, there’s a lot of that in the business world of, “I just always need top performers.” Well, top performers also have contentions. Top performers also argue a bunch. Top performers aren’t the greatest listeners all the time. And so… And that may not be th- the direction I wanted to go on this podcast, buthere we are where we are.

But, you know, the, the fact of the matter is, is, is going back to what I’m learning a lot of, it’s not about me, and I’ve gotta take into consideration when I communicate, when I have meetings, when I’m thr- casting out vision, that some of the people might not want to be a part of that or they might say, “Great!

Prove it.” That’s where follow through has t- happened, and that’s where I haven’t been the greatest, I’ll bet, if you ask my team. You know, I have some great ideas and, you know, ri– you know, “Here, we’re gonna do this and this and this,” but then it falls flat because I didn’t communicate it well enough to the people below me and get their opinions and get them on board that, you know?

Napoleon was only successful because people followed him. Now, if a business owner is out there in front without making sure that they have communicated what they’re doing, where they’re goin’, why they’re doing it, nobody’s gonna follow ’em.

Alex Bridgeman: If

Matt Weber: y- You gotta be compassionate. You gotta have that heart for people to let them know that you also understand where they’re coming from.

I mean especially right now. It cost me $275 to fill up my truck. People are paying a whole lotta money right now for things and, you know, sometimes they just look at it

Alex Bridgeman: like, “Oh man, what… How am I gonna make this work?” So … When you compare times where you have gotten that buy-in – Mm-hmm … for a new initiative or idea than a time where it fell flat, what stands out as kind of the differences between the two or how you approached them

Matt Weber: I would say it would be all in how I executed research, steps, consequences.

You know, asking myself what happens if I don’t succeed here? What are the consequences? If this fails does the company fail? Do the people under it fail? And having that understanding again of hey, this is a, this is a job to most people. I mean that’s really what it is. This is a job to most people and while I get along with all of my staff, while we have fun, where we get together and- and come around different visions and different ideas of where we wanna go ’cause I’ve got, I’ve got big dreams of what I want to do on a scale that’s you know pretty large regionally.

And you know understanding that I’ve gotta know what they want to bring it in. And so how… To correlate the two it would be frankly just thinking it’s all about me and that’s, that I’ve gotta get outta my head, and that as- as leaders they’ve gotta get out of their head and yeah, I still struggle with it.

I still struggle with that. Nobody’s perfect. Nobody ever arrives, you know everybody wants to talk about the summit and getting to the summit but nobody ever gets there. It’s always dream and a vision because what would you do when you get there? What would you do when you reach the apogee? What’s next

Right? That’s why I think Matthew McConaughey in his, his acceptance speech, you know, his Grammy acceptance speech that’s out there is, you know, “You always need somebody to chase. You always need somebody to look up to, and you always need a hero to follow.” And he talked about himself being the hero to follow or so- excuse me, the someone to chase because 10 years from now, I wanna be…

I know where I want to be 10 years from now, but I don’t wanna just be there in 10 years. What, what am I gonna look forward to next? And so I think that’s what he was alluding to or talking about when he gets there, and so nobody ever arrives, so.

Alex Bridgeman: Who are some heroes you follow and look up to?

Matt Weber: Oh man, I mean, there’s for like as a history buff, George Washington is, yeah.

I love the movie Young Washington. It’s an incredible, it’s an incredible movie. You’ve got, you know, you’ve got, um, but y- I mean, you’ve got pioneers all through history. You know, uh, people could talk about Aristotle and Socrates and the early philosophers and, and things like that, and I think it’s just people who really had conviction for who they were, uh, like the George Washingtons, like the Abraham Lincolns, people who wouldn’t negotiate their morals, wouldn’t negotiate what they knew to be right to be popular.

Alex Bridgeman: Mm.

Matt Weber: So, yeah.

Alex Bridgeman: Speaking of kind of morals in that, in that sense, you’ve mentioned at our lunch there’s a set of core values you have at Alpha. Mm-hmm. Can you talk through them and kinda what each one means to you?

Matt Weber: Yeah. So actually what’s funny, ’cause we just last Thursday we had a company ha- all hands meeting, so Missoula, Butte, they all came here, and we kinda had a rollout of some new core values.

And I don’t know- It’s good timing … does this have an E underneath your podcast? Does it have any E ‘Cause there’s certain- Some of that choice language in some of them.

Alex Bridgeman: All kinds

Matt Weber: of things have been said on here. Um, but people are point. We know that behind every invoice, behind every job, behind every day, there’s a person And we do what we do because of those people.

Trying to remember the order of them, man, ’cause we put them in care… There we go. We put them in CORE. After we rolled them out, we made an acronym for them, but it’s CORE. Nice. CORE values, right? So care is the first one. People are the point. O is own. Own the room. You bring the energy, the accountability, and the presence that the moment requires.

Whether you’re the top dog in the room or whether you’re there to listen and learn, you bring the, the certain energy. R is real. Be fucking real. Because it is– we’re honest with who we are, we’re honest with you, we’re honest with each other, and understanding that if I have done something or if somebody else has done something that are not living up to own the room or not living up to people are the point, then we have those conversations.

And then the last one is elevate, which is get better on purpose. That we’re always striving to understand, to know where we’re going, and understand that we have to develop ourselves as people, as leaders, as, uh, as employees, to continually move ourselves forward and go towards that apogee or go towards that pinnacle that we wanna drive for.

And, and the cool thing about all these is if you’re every single one of them, you know, people can take that be fuckin’ real And just turn out to be assholes. If that’s the only value that they wanna pick up, they can be that, but they’re … They can just be assholes. But if you look at, uh, every single one of those and they’re striving to understand that people are the point, they’re really wanting to own the room, you know, owning their responsibility to that room, they’re getting better on purpose, then that be fucking real is a heart-to-heart conversation, and doesn’t mean you’re an asshole.

You can come in and say, “Hey, I care about you, and so this is what I see right now in you, and this is, this is where it’s at.” Or it allows them to come and understand, hey, I wasn’t owning the room, or I didn’t realize people were the part, and I’m ap- I apologize. So yeah. So we just rolled those out. Those are brand spanking new.

The other ones, I could name them, but that’s about all ’cause they weren’t… You know? They were just posters up on the wall. They were just words up on the wall. In fact, if you looked down… Ah, no, I think they took it down after that. It used to be down there. It used to be our whole mission thing and here’s our values: integrity, relationships, consistency, and growth, right?

But nobody knew what they were. Nobody understood what they… You know?

Alex Bridgeman: Mm-hmm.

Matt Weber: Yeah. There were words on the page that explained them, but I couldn’t tell you what they were. And so, yeah. So we switched them up, just rolled them out. I

Alex Bridgeman: like these. They’re more specific.

Matt Weber: Very specific.

Alex Bridgeman: And they’re, они made individual.

Like, they’re made for… If you read them, like, you could imagine how each of these affects how you approach your day in, in your business.

Matt Weber: Mm-hmm.

Alex Bridgeman: It’s not a, a broad, like, “We have integrity at this business.” Right. Okay, well- What

Matt Weber: does that mean? …

Alex Bridgeman: what does that mean for me? Like, what am I supposed to do? I don’t-

Matt Weber: That d-…

It’s not corporate speak. That’s what I liked it.

Alex Bridgeman: Yes.

Matt Weber: The other ones were corporate speak, and they were like, eh, okay, cool. But yeah, we took them and made them personal. Uh, they, they actually come from my wife and I. We’re the ones that sat down and dug in to really, what do we want to be known for? What do I want my family to be known for?

The effing part we left out of our own- …. at home values, you know, for the sake of kids, but, you know, that, it really worked here.

Alex Bridgeman: Oh, so these are family values too. Yeah.

Matt Weber: These were

Alex Bridgeman: family . Your, your, your kids are… Be real kids.

Matt Weber: Yep.

Alex Bridgeman: So- Son, son.

Matt Weber: Yeah.

Alex Bridgeman: I, I guess did the, did they start as family values and you brought them to business?

Matt Weber: It’s something that we, Alicia and I have been working on for the course of the last year and a half probably. We’ve kinda really… As we, you know, as a family there’s a lot of correlations between kids and employees which is funny. There’s a lot there’s a lot, there’s a lot of, a lot there. But un- just really understanding where we wanna go as a family, and how we can look at my oldest son Lane and be like, “Hey, you’re not owning the room right here man.

You’re not coming with the integrity and the humility that this moment requires. And I need you to, I need you to check that.” It, you know, it allows me to go my, to my middle son and be like, “Dude You gotta l- you gotta get better on purpose, man. You can’t just fly by, you can’t just have fun at school and be the, you know, be the fun guy.

You gotta get better on purpose. Or my youngest kid, “Be real.” Just s-… Just did you do it or not? Just tell me

Alex Bridgeman: if I… I love, I love the idea of having family values. I hadn’t thought as explicitly about that. My wife and I, Michelle, we don’t have kids just yet. We have two dogs, but that doesn’t really, really count.

Yeah. It’s hard to teach values to a dog.

Matt Weber: Right.

Alex Bridgeman: But I feel like another one that’s, that’s been useful has been, like, assume good intent.

Matt Weber: Mm-hmm.

Alex Bridgeman: You know, some- whether you’re … If we’re both, you know, working in the middle of our days and, like, texting back and forth or, you know, this happened or we forgot this or that.

Hmm. Like, there’s, th- y- you make mistakes all the time, and usually if you just assume, like, they were trying to do it the right way and-

Matt Weber: Absolutely …

Alex Bridgeman: that helps with time.

Matt Weber: Yep, absolutely. And that’s part of, you know, that, that could fall under that hey, people are the point, you know? True. It’s not about you, it’s about the situation.

And behind every text is somebody who probably means the best and n- is not being an asshole through text messages. Yeah,

Alex Bridgeman: they’re not trying to be, usually.

Matt Weber: Right. Yeah. You can definitely tell when they’re trying to be, for sure. But for the most part I think most people assume good intent.

Alex Bridgeman: What’s been the reception from the team for values so far?

Matt Weber: You know, I think it’s, you know, it- it’s tough because there’s been a lot of up and downs over the course of the last five years since I bought the company. And again, culture starts at the top. And what people don’t understand is you have a culture, period. It’s either a good one or, or a bad one. And sometimes you can get so lost in the weeds, you can get so lost into financials or operations or things like this that you forget people are the point, which then starts degrading the relationships that you have with people.

And so focusing on, on that, I m- I’m h- what I hope came out of this is that they’re saying and looking at this and saying, “Okay, prove it.” And, you know, with that follow through and the desire and because it is something that’s ingrained in my family now, and it’s something then, then Jonathan, he’s my second in command.

He actually runs operations. He is the one, him and the branch managers, the, uh, production manager, they’re the ones that run operations. I don’t run operations anymore. And it’s a good thing. I think the team likes it. And getting my fingers out of that and letting them play, and that’s, that’s the problem that, man, that’s…

I made this mistake, and I hired somebody to do something because they were better than me at it But I still wanted to be involved in what they were doing and not allowing them to do what I hired them to do. And so there’s been a, there w- there has been a lot of up and down and you know Jonathan’s…

He’s had that, that be freaking real moment with me and sat me down and said, “Look man this is where it’s at. You gotta do, you have got to let me do what you hired me to do. I’m gonna prove to you that I can do this.” I think I proved it over the course of the last few years. “I’m going to do this because I’m here, I’m committed, I have personal goals for myself and this is where I see me being able to fulfill those but you gotta let me do it.”

And so yeah we’ve got that and having that conversation. The other, and then the other thing is, is, is I strongly believe in working with mentors. Business mentors both personally professionally you know? That’s why we exist Alpha. We exist to open doors for people both personally and professionally. We use garage doors to do it Like it.

And so Because I care about pe-… I care about people. I care about uh my staff. I care about the people who work under me and sometimes it’s easy to lose focus when things aren’t going well you know? It’s easy to lose focus of that and forget the people are point and that’s where things really … Then if its not going well and people don’t feel like their the point wha-what are they–because this is a job to them What happens next?

Things don’t get fixed and so I’ve got some very unfortunate to have some incredible team members and some ahh some incredible people that have worked around and have stayed committed cause they could There’s been a few times that ,that they could easily left and my dreams would’ve had to start over again and I’d have pivot m-and make things happen But I think you know having those people around are also key t-to success

Alex Bridgeman: Is there an example that comes to mind of some task that you would try to get involved in that was counterproductive for you being there? Yeah i dont think it was any specific task I think it was just

Matt Weber: wanting to put my or have certain operational influence or something to that I c-don’t think there was a specific task But, you know, feeling like, “Okay, well who’s my boss?”

There it is. Who’s my boss? So branch managers, they don’t answer to me. They’re not my direct reports. But if I go directly to them and say, “Hey, what’s going on here? What’s doing this?” They’re like… Even though I might be legitimately just talking and feeling like I’m a- uh, just having a conversation, the outlook is like, “Oh, well, you’re asking for things, asking for what’s going on here when you’re not my boss.”

Alex Bridgeman: Yeah.

Matt Weber: I mean, ultimately I am, and I think there can be some of that, but unless it’s established, then I’ve gotta keep my hands out of it. I’ve gotta go through the proper channels. If I wanna know what’s happening here in Billings on a certain thing, I’ve gotta ask. Yeah. And then sometimes he’ll tell me, like, you know, everybody’s got trackers in our vehicles.

There’s trackers in every vehicle we got. Every– GPS trackers except for mine. And I’m like, “Hey, um, put one in mine. I got nothing to hide. I don’t care,” you know, “if people…” Like, because eventually my truck’s gonna turn into a, you know, into a, into a work truck, into a service truck or an install truck or something like that.

And just having that accountability of hey, you know, because it is a company vehicle all of our company vehicles have, have GPS in ’em. Doesn’t matter if it’s the owner’s vehicle, branch manager’s vehicle, or the, you know, the technicians’ vehicles. It’s gotta start at the top. And if I’m asking somebody to do something that I’m not willing to do That creates culture.

Alex Bridgeman: It takes a extra clarity to even just checking in on someone on your team, making sure that they know like you’re not expecting a r- polished report or you’re not telling them to do anything. Right. You just… You’re just there to check in- Mm-hmm … see how they’re doing. It’s-

Matt Weber: Yep.

Alex Bridgeman: There’s an extra level of

Matt Weber: communication.

So I gotta change that. I, I got some feedback of, “Hey, just don’t go sit down in their office. If you want a quick two to five minute conversation, lean against the doorpost,” ’cause when you sit down it brings a whole different level to the game. It brings a whole … And then it becomes a meeting-

Alex Bridgeman: Yeah …

Matt Weber: you know, in people’s eyes.

Alex Bridgeman: That would be a little nerve

Matt Weber: wracking. Which can stan-… You know, uh, the owner, you know, ’cause the way, the way some of the desks sit their backs are to the door. So if I come in and sit down, the owner’s sitting there and they’ve gotta swivel around, stop what they’re doing, have a conversation. But if I’m just coming in to check in, don’t sit down.

Just- … lean against the corner, you know, have a casual conversation because me not sitting down means, hey, I’m leaning in the door. I’m gonna be leaving here pretty quick. I’ll just give a, you know? Yeah. Saying hi, saying what’s up, seeing how they … if you need any help or whatever, so.

Alex Bridgeman: Yup, I’m here for 40, 60 seconds.

Yep. Say hello, check in.

Matt Weber: Yep.

Alex Bridgeman: Yeah. That would be pretty nerve racking if they go in and you’re just sitting there, you know, not even looking at your phone or anything, just sitting there waiting.

Matt Weber: Yeah.

Alex Bridgeman: No. They’d be like, “Oh no.” . “Matt’s really upset this time.”.

Matt Weber: No.

Alex Bridgeman: Yeah, and

Matt Weber: not, not at all what, what I would mean by it.

And so, but the feedback was, you know, from my staff that they would hear from them is, “Hey, just I don’t mind coming in and checking, but if I’m in the middle of something and he sits down, I gotta feel like I’ve, I’ve got to address or sit and talk. And if I’m in the middle of trying to do something, I don’t feel like I can just sit here and say, Hey, I can’t talk to you right now.””

Yeah. So it was good feedback and it, it’s not something, and again going back to the it’s not about me You can’t take that stuff personally. It’s hard sometimes, you know? It’s hard as an owner ’cause y- you hear it all the time. It’s, it’s lonely at the top, but that’s because a lot of people take it personally, and they…

It, it makes it all about them. And so I’m learning a lot of that lately, and coming to the understanding that my relationships are better with the people around me when I realize it’s not all about me.

Alex Bridgeman: What makes it less lonely at the top for you?

Matt Weber: My wife. She’s a rock star, and she has stood by and supported me through ups and downs, and, you know, just being a, being a rock that I can come home and bitch to if I need to bitch or support me when I need support or just not ask about the day if I don’t wanna talk about work

You know? The… So she’s more inv- She’s a little bit more involved now. We’re working with a mentor who … He’s like, “No, she is an owner, and she deserves a seat at the table,” and I think she brings some valuable, valuable things to the conversations, and she does, and it’s great. So she’s more involved now, not in setting policy or direction or anything like that, but really being able to ask outside the leadership group context and bring that in and be like, “Well, what the, the heck does this mean?”

And how does that look to everybody else that’s under you? Because she hasn’t been involved in that, so she’s a little bit more involved now. And but yeah, she’s been a rockstar for sure.

Alex Bridgeman: Yeah. I found that Michelle has a lot of complimentary skills. Mm-hmm. Like, she’s really good… I’ve told her a lot, she’s really good at reading people within just a couple minutes-

Matt Weber: Oh, yeah

Alex Bridgeman: and getting to a, a conclusion for

Matt Weber: somebody. It’s that, it’s that intuition.

Alex Bridgeman: Yeah.

Matt Weber: It’s that woman’s intuition that- She- … you always hear about …

Alex Bridgeman: she figures things out about someone, the same conclusion that would take me a month or two to get to. Hmm. She gets there-

Matt Weber: Yep …

Alex Bridgeman: almost instantly. I

Matt Weber: can feel it.

Alex Bridgeman: Yeah. I

Matt Weber: can feel it.

Alex Bridgeman: There’s a sense- For

Matt Weber: sure.

Alex Bridgeman: Yeah. She’s very good at it. I told her she’d be really good at business and would be a great manager and leader, and so- Yeah … it’s like, hey, you know, that’s a, that’s pretty useful skill.

Matt Weber: Yeah. Yeah. It absolutely is.

Alex Bridgeman: Yeah. You talked about a big vision for yourself, and we, we talked about al- all kinds of other things outside the business last time.

What, what do you see for yourself?

Matt Weber: Well, I wanna… I mean, I wanna be a, a regional player in the Northwest.

Alex Bridgeman: Yup. Yup.

Matt Weber: And so, and I’ve had… You know, I’ve had a dream bigger than what it was. Yeah, we could have stayed small. We could have stayed in Billings, done well, but that’s not what I wanted to do. And so, you know, a year after buying the company, I opened up Butte Year and a half after, year and three months after that, Missoula.

And you know, now we’re kind of going back and we did it unconsciously competent. So I ha- have, I’ve had a few business mentors who have, have came and went. The, my very first one ended up passing away and was one of the most genuine and most kind people that I ever knew. And we had a couple in between him and, and where we’re at now and, and experiencing that growth, experiencing that, that quick step up and…

You know, ’cause we were growing, ’22. I mean everybody was growing in ’22, so if you weren’t growing in ’22 something was going on. You know, ’21, ’22, ’23 we were growing over almost 30% every year, which is hard to sustain, and if you don’t have the proper foundations in place it really shows itself down the road, and it did.

And so, you know, we grew Butte. We grew out Butte without a playbook and just did it, but I was the, I was the branch manager out there. So I spent a year and a half, five days a week, four days a week, four to five days a week out there for almost a year and a half building Butte. And y- you know, I was on an island out there ’cause Jonathan, my general manager here at Billings , he’s like, “How do I manage you?”

Like, “You’re not … You’re more than just a branch manager. You’re not, you, you know, you’re the owner of the company who’s out there doing his thing and building it.” And so we did. I mean, you know, branches, if they break even the first year, you’re doing pretty good. And so we made money the first year out in Butte and…

But it was a lot of hard work. And so, but we built so much that there was some foundations that needed… There’s some foundations, there’s some stuff that we’re currently doing that are building to scale even better. I don’t know about faster. I’m hoping it’s faster, but you can’t scale fast without, without good systems.

Alex Bridgeman: Hmm.

Matt Weber: Can’t scale fast without great playbooks and great, “Hey, I’m gonna pick this up. I’m gonna take it there. I’ma make it work.” So that’s what we’re, that’s what we’re doing a lot of right now.

Alex Bridgeman: I love it.

Matt Weber: And so yes, we grew, but we grew because we were unconsciously competent. We knew what we were doing, but we did it in such a way that we were just like, “Let’s go,” and we were just good at it.

So now we gotta build some foundations up. Nice.

Alex Bridgeman: Love it. Matt, thank you for coming on the podcast. This has been super fun.

Matt Weber: Yeah, man.

Alex Bridgeman: Thanks for sharing your time.

Matt Weber: Yeah, absolutely. Thank you.

Alex Bridgeman: Thank you for listening. I hope you enjoyed today’s episode of Think Like an Owner. If you enjoyed the show, please consider leaving us a review and telling a friend to help more folks find Think Like an Owner. For full episode transcripts and our weekly newsletter, please visit our website at tlaopodcast.com.