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Join host Carol Pankow in this thought-provoking episode of Manager Minute as she sits down with VR fiscal powerhouses Katie Marchesano, Chris Merritt, Allison Flanagan, and Sarah Clardy. Together, they unpack the pressing fiscal issues shaping the vocational rehabilitation (VR) landscape, including: ·  Navigating fiscal forecasting challenges · Addressing technology gaps · Strengthening collaboration between program and fiscal teams The conversation highlights the vital role of policies, training, and institutional knowledge in sustaining VR programs while anticipating future shifts, such as technological advancements, fiscal constraints, and potential WIOA reauthorization. Don't miss this episode, packed with actionable insights and expert reflections to keep VR programs thriving!   Listen Here   Full Transcript:   {Music} Katie: I'm really excited for that tool to be shared, and I think it's going to be a really helpful tool for the agencies.   Carol: This job takes constant attention to detail in what is happening. It is always going to be work.   Chris: More people are going to be reaching out asking for fiscal forecasting and understanding how to look at this program in the future.   Allison: One of the things that pops in my mind that might happen over the next three years is reauthorization of WIOA.   Sarah: I think we're going to see some new resources, hopefully in the technology world develop, that will assist our agencies so that their focus can remain on the customers where it belongs.   Intro Voice: Manager Minute brought to you by the VRTAC for Quality Management, Conversations powered by VR, one manager at a time, one minute at a time. Here is your host Carol Pankow.   Carol: Well, welcome to the manager minute. Joining me in the studio today are my colleagues Katie Marchesano, Chris Merritt, Allison Flanagan and Sarah Clardy. So this might be a little bit of calamity for our listeners, but we're going to do it. So how y'all doing today?   Sarah: Great   Chris: Great.   Allison: Good.   Katie: Wonderful.   Carol: Awesome to hear it. Well, we have had quite a journey on the QM for the past four years. The fiscal focus was a new aspect of the grant, and we are so grateful to then Commissioner Mark Schultz for realizing that TA in this area was an essential element to the work. And since we're in this final year of the grant, we wanted to have a chance to visit together, share our insights with the listeners into the whole fiscal picture across the VR program, and discuss our perceptions and perspectives. So buckle up, folks, and we're going to dig in. So I want to start with how you each found your way to VR. And I'm going to start with Chris to talk about your journey into VR.   Chris: Well thanks, Carol. Mine's a little bit different than most people. I did not start in VR. I have a very different background. All fiscal for the most part. But I came to work at a fiscal state unit and learned about VR there. Loved it, loved it, loved it. And then was kind of asked to be part of this Ta team and couldn't say no because it's just an incredible program and it's a little complicated. So being able to help the states understand it better is what brought me to this team.   Carol: Well, not you, and you're being modest now. Tell them about like a little bit more of your background because you have an interesting educational background and all of that.   Chris: Yeah, I do. So I'm an environmental engineer by trade. Worked in that field for a while. Learned that sampling sludge was not a cool thing to be doing. So went to work for a small business that was just starting on Department of Defense World. Loved all the fiscal part of that. Went back to school and got my MBA and have been doing fiscal stuff ever since. So yeah, it's a long road that brought me here, but I'm happy I took it.   Carol: Yeah, we're glad you're here. How about you, Miss Allison?   Allison: Well, it's kind of hard to believe that I have over 30 years in this VR journey, and it actually started out in the field as a VR technician, and I just fell in love with the mission and purpose of VR. So I quickly changed my direction to be a VR counselor, and then that evolved to other promotions and positions throughout the year, where I ended up being director of both Kentucky Blind Agency and then moved to Florida as the General Agency Director. And when the VR TKM opportunity came about, I was ready for a change, especially after being a director through the pandemic and through the implementation of WIOA. I was looking forward to just a new opportunity, new learning areas, so this has been a great jump for me. I've enjoyed it very much.   Carol: Why don't you tell them too about your other gig with NRLI a little bit. We'll make a plug there.   Allison: Yeah. So part of the VRTAC-QM is the National Rehabilitation Leadership Institute through San Diego State University. I have the honor of continuing Fred McFarland's legacy, who began this program about 25 years ago. And it is a program that is building the future leaders in the vocational rehabilitation field. And it's been a joy to see these leaders be promoted throughout their careers. Being stepping up, having an interest at that national level, the issues that are facing VR. So it is definitely a part of my job with QM that I hold near and dear to my heart.   Carol: Yeah, it's good stuff, I love it NRLI of our favorite things to participate in when we get to do training. So Katie, over to you next.   Katie: Well, my journey with VR started when my brother was receiving VR services, and he actually is who inspired me to go and get my bachelor's degree in psychology and work in social services. That led me to Department of Workforce Services, where I spent 13 years in various roles and capacities, which ultimately led me back to VR.   Carol: Awesome sauce. And last but not least, Sarah Clardy.   Sarah: So I started out about 24 years ago out of college. I was working in banking full time and going to school full time, and had an opportunity to come on with a state and Missouri vocational rehabilitation, had an opening for an assistant director of accounting and procurement. They had some systems and processes that were a little out of whack and needed some help with reorganizing pretty much the whole accounting structure. So I came over at that time and started in with Missouri, and then spent 20 years there and got to spend half of that time in the field directly with our field staff and counselors and really take this program to heart, and then had an opportunity four years ago to join the VRTAC-QM. I had said for a long time we needed technical assistance in the fiscal realm for years and years. I was thrilled that Mark Schultz saw the vision and made it happen.   Carol: Good stuff. Well, now we're going to enter the danger zone because I have some questions for you all. Not exactly sure how this is going to go, but we are going to do our best. So y'all jump in when you want. So what has been your biggest realization or aha moment since you started with the QM. And Allison, I'm going to have you kick us off and then other folks can jump in.   Allison: Honestly, Carol, there's been a lot of those aha moments for me over the last, you know, almost three years with the Technical Assistance Center since my experience in VR started in the field and I was a counselor, kind of the program side is where my comfort level is or my knowledge and experience. So when I joined the fiscal team there, definitely there was a lot of those aha moments, mainly a lot of the things that I did not know or did not realize even as a director when I came over. So one of those aha's is the director. Even though I received these beautiful monthly budget reports for my fiscal staff, even though I had a leadership team that we reviewed budgets with, understanding the fiscal requirements in and out, the uniform grant guidance and all the regulations. And, EDGAR, all of that, I think, is critical for any director or their leadership team to have knowledge of. And that was definitely one of my aha moments. And one of those things I go back, wow, if I could go back and be a director, I would be a lot smarter after being on the technical assistance side. And like I said, there's been a lot of those aha moments. I could share tons of them, but a couple other ones that jump out is just that critical need for that program side of the House and the fiscal side of the House, to always be communicating and always making sure they're checking with each other. On whether it's a new implementation, whether it's expenses, contracts, doesn't matter. There needs to be that collaboration happening at that level. And then probably the technology challenges is another one of those constant aha moments in the year that we're in and how reliant we are on technology. I am still amazed that there is not technology out there that will do what VR needs it to do, right off the shelf.   Carol: Amen, sister. You said it all. No, but I'm sure there's people that want to say some more.   Chris: I found it interesting when I came over that not every single, not a single state has it right. I thought that there would be more that are fully knowledgeable and are running with it and doing all the great things they are doing, the great things. They just don't have 100% right.   Carol: You are making me laugh with this because I'm just going to say I have to jump in on that. Sarah and I right away, in the beginning, anytime we had met with RSA we learned something new, we're like, uh, I gotta call back to Minnesota, tell them, because we realized, like, hey, we thought we were sort of doing it right, but we all realized things. We went, uh, yeah, we had a little slight misstep on that.   Katie: I would agree with that. Like, we came from a state that was in an intensive agreement. And, you know, I was like, man, we really got it wrong. But then, you know, it's a huge learning curve and there's a lot of people that are putting in their best effort, and they're still just a few things that aren't quite right.   Chris: Absolutely.   Katie: Another realization that I had was we have this table of contents for a grant management manual that we send out to agencies. And when I received it in Wyoming, I was intimidated by all the things that needed to be included. But my aha moment was when you break that down into individual items and you really look at it, it's things that are already in place, the policies and procedures that you're already working on. It's just finding a way to get that on paper and put it into some sort of policy and procedure and internal control. So realizing that states have the capacity to do that, just figuring out how was an aha moment for me.   Sarah: You know, when I came in, I was thinking back to 2017 and RSA came out with guidance on, I'm going to say it, Period of Performance. And it dominated our whole agency for a good nine months, trying to understand the guidance, looking at systems. We had to do a whole overhaul with the way we looked at obligations, just we spent a massive amount of time and effort to right size our systems, internal controls and all of that because prior to performance sets the beat for all of financial within a VR program. So coming into the QM, I really assumed that more agencies knew of Period of Performance and had gone through at least similar steps, or at least had internal conversations. And what I found was completely the opposite. Somehow a lot of folks missed the memo and that work hadn't been done. And of course, we've been running Fred Flintstone style, trying to help agencies get up to snuff. So that's the piece. I think that's been the most interesting. I think for me.   Carol: I think along that same vein for me was really that realization states are more different than I thought because I figured we all had the same information. We all kind of operated sort of the same. You might have your own internal systems, but I remember, Sarah, you and I talking that first year just going like, oh my gosh, everybody is organized so completely differently. They approach their work so completely differently. There isn't just one size fits all. Like, hey, you should do it this way. And like, everybody can do that. Uh uh, it is like having an IPE for how the fiscal is managed. Individualized we need to give very individualized TA. So what do you guys view as the number one challenge facing our programs nationwide? And Sarah, I'm going to have you start us with that.   Sarah: Okay? I'm going to say it I think Allison said it earlier. We are lacking in the technology space. I think a couple of things we have, the pendulum has swung to the other direction and before it was spend, spend, spend, a lot of agencies made adjustments so that they were increasing their spending. The large carryover balances weren't so large. Now my concern is how are we looking at our finances to see if we can still sustain that. And in order to get accurate projections and for leadership teams to have the conversations about where they stand financially, we have to have technology systems in place that are reliable, are tracking period of performance, can provide those fiscal calculations in terms of where we stand on all of the different requirements, so that we have a constant pulse on where do we stand as an agency. And I liken it to being in private industry and a CEO knowing at all times how much does it cost to make the widget? How many widgets are we making and what amount of time? All of those kinds of things. And I feel like in that space right now, we have agencies that are trying to figure that out, and we have some that are in a very delicate position, and it can cause a lot of catastrophe and crisis if that's not solidified. So really, it goes back to having reliable technology that will take care of all of that. And that includes our CMS, our Case Management Systems space. A lot of our vendors are struggling in that Period of Performance area, and we're not there yet. We have a lot more work to do.   Carol: Well, it's like a $4 billion industry, you know, and I feel like we're still using an abacus or something in some cases for tracking the money. It is the most insane thing I have ever seen.   Allison: And, you know, related to that technology challenge, though, is knowing that, that challenge is there, knowing that the technology is not correct. I think what adds to the complexity of that is the fiscal staff or the just the staff within the VR agency. They lack the fiscal knowledge enough to know if their system is working correctly or not, or know how to go in and make the adaptations needed to assist them. And that's a challenge within itself.   Chris: And I will piggyback right on that, because the thing I think that we've struggled with is we have lost so much institutional knowledge that people don't stay in jobs like they used to. And so if these policies and procedures are not written down, you get new people coming in, they don't know what they don't know. And if the technology is not working right, they don't know that that's not something that they can handle. So it's a lack of that long time knowledge that used to be in this program.   Katie: Yeah, Chris, that is exactly where I was going as well, is the loss of staff and institutional knowledge is huge, and it really highlights the importance of getting policies and procedures in place and not waiting till that person has their foot out the door and is ready to head out to make sure that you're getting that in writing. You know, succession planning and really building up success in the team.   Carol: I think for me, one of the things I see, because I love that whole organizational structure and non-delegable responsibilities, I love that area. I think one of the biggest challenges facing the program is the whole shift in how things are organized between if you're in a designated state unit within a designated state agency, and that centralization we have seen of all the fiscal functions along with IT and HR and all of it, but I feel like VR has lost control. And so as these services are centralized, and not that they can't be, but that they get centralized to a point that the VR program has lost complete input control direction. I mean, you've got directors being told you can't spend anything over $5. It has to go through 40 layers. You can't hire anybody. Staff cannot travel to go see customers like all of that. If we can't fix this structure of how things are put into play in each of these states, I really see kind of the demise of the program. As we see things get buried, the program gets buried down within these big agencies. The lack of control ends up leading to problems with them and being able to carry out the mission. And it's really hard to get a handle on that. And I know Congress has given, you know, this leeway so that states can organize like they want. But boy, the way they're organized right now, it's pretty tough.   Allison: It's a double edged sword when you think about it, because you're probably like me Carol, as former directors, we wanted more money going into the consumer services. We wanted it going to support our customers. We wanted to find ways to reduce any kind of administrative type expenses so that that money can go there when the centralized functions were really being pushed at the state levels. In my mind at first, I will say this, at first I saw, yes, this is a benefit because we're going to have these shared services, we're going to be able to spend more of our funds on our customers. And I still somewhat agree with that approach because it is a cost savings. But what has to happen, though, is that balance, what you talked about, the balance where VR still has control over the decisions or they are included in those decisions and the restrictions that have been put in place has to be lifted. But I do see the benefits of those shared services as long as the structure gets set up right.   Carol: Right. And that's been few and far between.   Allison: That needs a national model.   Carol: It does. And that's been a problem. I mean, if there's anything anyone can work on, little congressional assistance in that or whatever, you know, getting some of that rewritten, how that looks.   Sarah: Well, and I came from an agency that was able to retain an entire unit of 13-ish folks when all of those consolidations were occurring because within our Department of Education, our commissioner understood the complexities of our award and knew that if all of those positions rolled up to a department level, they weren't going to be able to support the program and were able to coordinate with our state leadership. And it served the program very, very well. So I think we have a little bit to be desired still in that space to get agencies the support that they need 100%.   Carol: So what has been your favorite thing to work on or accomplishment in your role? And Katie, I'm going to kick that to you to start us off.   Katie: Well, I've really enjoyed my role here with the QM. There's a lot of things that I enjoy, but the task that I've enjoyed the most is really having the ability to dig into the new uniform grant guidance that went into effect October 1st of 2020. For one of the things that I did while doing that was I took the old uniform grant guidance and the new ones and did a side by side where all of the things that were taken out were redlined and all of the things that were added were highlighted, and I'm really excited for that tool to be shared with the agencies right now. That's with RSA to get the stamp of approval, but I've used that tool already to help update all of our things on the website and all the tools that we're sharing with everyone, and I think it's going to be a really helpful tool for the agencies.   Carol: I love that tool, Katie, so much because even when we were down doing to last week and some of the just the nuance pieces that came out, when you're reading it and you go, okay, that language did change. Like there is a slightly nuanced variance to this that I hadn't completely grasped until you see it in the red and the yellow, and it all highlighted up. I mean, it was pretty nice.   Katie: Yeah, they did a lot of plain language changes, which is really evident when you look at the side by side.   Chris: I'll jump in here and tell you what my favorite thing is. And it's when we were working with a state intensively and, you know, we've been working with them for a long time, and you get to know them really well and you understand their environment and how things work, and they come to you and say something really profound, like, I was watching this training the other day and they got this wrong, and they got this wrong and they got this wrong. It is like a proud parent moment. When you go, they understand what the program is supposed to be doing, and they understand when other people not necessarily are getting it wrong, but mostly they're able to recognize what's not absolutely correct. And it just makes you feel like, oh, we have come so far.   Carol: It's like fly, little bird, you're flying.   Chris: Yes.   Allison: That's probably one of my favorite parts too, Chris, is the state work that we've done and how you get to know these state people. There's so many amazing VR staff across the country, and their hearts are all in the right place, and they want to do good. That's what I've enjoyed is getting to know these people better, broadening my network as well because I learn from them. But just being that resource I do like, I'm one of those weird people that likes digging into the laws and regs and finding where is that gray, vague area that we can interpret a little better. So part of the TA work, you know, really digging into some of the laws and some regulatory guidance I've enjoyed as well.   Carol: I have a story I love to share. I was having a breakdown probably a year ago, Sarah's laughing at me, I had a breakdown. You know, you're providing TA to state you're so ingrained with them, especially when they have a corrective action plan, you feel like you're part of them. I always say we, you know, when we're talking because I feel like I'm part of their team and we've been working on a particular piece of it, and nothing that we sent in was anything RSA wanted. All I knew was that this was not what they wanted, but we couldn't exactly figure out what they wanted. And it was driving me crazy. And I'd called Sarah and I said, I think I have to quit being a TA provider because I suck at this. I'm not able to help them. I haven't been able to figure this out. I am done, and I went to bed that night. I actually was on site with another state and I woke up at two in the morning and I do my best thinking as I'm sleeping. It's so weird. I've done it my whole career. I wake up in the middle of the night and have an idea. I woke up at two in the morning. I'm like, oh, I know what they're talking about. And I got up and I typed, I typed for like three hours and then got up for the day and got ready for the other state. But exactly what was needed was that, I mean, when we ended up meeting with the state and then they met with RSA, and that was the thing. It was the thing that was needed to get accomplished. And I felt super proud that we could kind of like, figure it out. It took a while. I almost quit, but, we got there in the end.   Sarah: You know, being in the final year of the grant, everybody's asking the question, what comes next? And of course we don't know what comes next. But I think my favorite part is looking back and building the relationships. So kind of touching on what all of you all have said. Relationships are important to me. Building the trust we are learning alongside of them just like they are. I always say there's no top of the mountain that any of us are ever going to reach when we've arrived. It's a daily learning process, but the program financially is so complex and trying to take those federal requirements And each of the state's requirements, which we've acknowledged already are all different, and bring that together in the center. And there's never been a resource to help agencies get down in the weeds, look at their systems, look at their processes, and help them navigate through that. And so just having something to offer and having directors send an SOS text at 9:00 at night, or we've talked to directors who have been in tears or excited because something really great has happened, and they want to share the success. It's all of that. Just being able to provide that valuable resource and support them along the way has been very rewarding for me. I know, and you all, but especially I think for the States.   Carol: So if you had a crystal ball, what would you predict regarding the financial state of the VR program over the next three years? And Chris, you get to start us on that lovely prediction.   Chris: Okay. Well, since I don't have a crystal ball, I think Sarah touched on this a little bit earlier. So for several years, the message from RSA and from Congress has been to spend, spend, spend. And so there's been a lot of changes in all the agencies to be able to spend more, to spend quicker, to do everything quicker and faster. And I think the spending is catching up. And I think that it might go too far. Like Sarah mentioned, the pendulum is going the other way, and I don't think the fiscal forecasting is robust enough to be able to predict when it's going to get hard. And since most directors do not come from a fiscal background, most directors come with the VR heart that you know is what a counselor has, paying attention to that. Fiscal forecasting is going to be a critical, critical point. And I know that most states are not doing it right. So that's my prediction. More people are going to be reaching out asking for fiscal forecasting and understanding how to look at this program in the future.   Sarah: And I think to tack on to that, I think we're going to see new technology and new resources emerge that will assist our agencies. Again, like Carol said earlier, some days it feels like we have our big chief tablet out and we're still doing things old school. And I think the only direction to go is up. So I think we're going to see some new resources, hopefully in the technology world develop, that will assist our agencies so that their focus can remain on the customers where it belongs.   Allison: And I would have to say ditto to both of that, especially the fiscal forecasting and the pendulum swinging the other way. And a lot of states considering order selection or going into order selection. But one of the things that pops in my mind that might happen over the next three years is reauthorization of WIOA. I know the discussions are happening with Congress right now, and if that implementation happens, you know, what's it going to look like? Because ten years ago when WIOA was passed, it was a huge impact on VR. And it still is. I mean, we're still challenged with trying to get everything implemented, trying to spend the minimum of our 15% on Pre-ETS. There's just so many things that we're still working on through. So very interested to see where that's going to go.   Carol: And I definitely think like nothing ever stays the same. So we always think like we're going to get to the place and it's just going to be even flow, like it's all going to be cool. We don't really have to pay a lot of attention, and I don't think that's ever going to be the state of the VR program. Like it's going to constantly need people paying attention. Whether the pendulum is one way and we have loads of money or it's the other way and we have no money now, like we have to somehow try to like even this out with the fiscal forecasting and all the things you're doing. But if you think you're going to get to the place where like, oh, I've reached it, Nirvana, it's all great. That's never going to be like this job takes constant attention to detail and what is happening. And so it is always going to be work. It's going to take a lot of effort from a lot of people. And as all the new people keep coming and going, figuring that out for the team so that you can sustain the practices and things that you have that help you to understand what's going on.   Katie: Yeah, I would just agree with everything that everyone already said. One of the big pushes that was brought up at CSAVR, is technology, and I think it is going to be interesting to see what kind of technology is introduced in the next three years that's going to help assist our programs.   Carol: So what is your best piece of advice for our listeners? And I'll let anybody open that one up.   Allison: I'm going to say you need to have a deep bench of leaders who are adverse in the financial requirements, maybe incorporating fiscal training for all staff on an annual basis, whether that's just refreshers or making sure new folks being hired understand all the requirements. But fiscal needs to be part of your ongoing training with staff. It's just critical.   Carol: I'd say, for directors coming in, I know the tendency is to want to be like, I have to know everything. I'm the director, I need to know all things. And even when you don't know the things, you pretend, you know the things. Don't pretend you know the things you don't know. Like you need to be humble and figure it out and learn and be willing to learn. For a lot of folks that are growing up in the VR system, having that sort of physical part of your brain, it may not be completely there. You're like, I went into VR because I didn't want to do math, and now you're in charge of, you know, $300 million in a program. And so you've got to just continue to learn and chip away and figure out how you can gain that really strong understanding, because you cannot just hand that off to some other group and think someone's managing that for you, because the buck really does stop with you in the end. As far as the responsibility over the control and allocation of the VR funds. So please keep learning, as Allison said, and be open and be humble when you don't know things and ask.   Sarah: There's a song by the Beatles called With a Little Help from My Friends. Everybody needs a Little help from time to time. And I know over the years we've worked with most of the agencies, but there are some that we haven't, and I've always assumed they're good. They don't need us. They're fine. It's not always necessarily the case. So acknowledging if I pick up a phone and call a peer or a fellow director, or hopefully the TAC continued to exist beyond this grant cycle. Reaching out and asking for help is okay, and it's encouraged.   Katie: Yeah, mine will be through the lens of policy and procedure. That's where I keep hitting. That's my passion on this QM team. We have a ton of resources available, and if you're struggling, you're looking at that table of contents saying, I can't do this. Reach out, give us a call. We can help you with prompting questions just to get the thought process going. And you can do it. It's going to be okay.   Chris: Ok, my piece of advice is to make connections. And I think everybody has kind of said that in their own way. But make those connections so that you have people you can reach out to and ask questions of whether it's us at the TA center, other states, other fiscal people. You need to be able to ask, how do you do this? What do you think of this idea that I have? How would you handle this? I mean, being able to have that connection and that type of conversation is critical 100%.   Carol: Well, I sure appreciate you all. And while we're still around, all our listeners can still connect with us. And we do have a QM fiscal email address. I will spell out for you. It is QM f I s c a l at v r t a c-qm.org. So qmfiscal@vrtac-qm.org. So please do reach out. We still are around for a little while and we can be your phone a friend. So thanks for joining me today guys I really appreciate it.   Chris: Thank you Carol. This was great.   Allison: Thanks for having Us.   Sarah: Thank you.   Katie: Thanks.   {Music} Outro Voice: Conversations powered by VR, one manager at a time, one minute at a time, brought to you by the VR TAC for Quality Management. Catch all of our podcast episodes by subscribing on Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts or wherever you listen to podcasts. Thanks for listening!

We hope you all had a heart-warming Valentine's Day full of love, including love for yourself! To celebrate February, the month of love in all shapes, American K-sisters continue their talk about relationships. We put together two awesome K-wives: Linda and our special guest Sandra. You might ask, “What is a K-wife?” We define K-wife as a Korean woman married to a non-Korean partner. In this episode, Linda and Sandra shared marriage stories, including pushbacks from their families and unforgettable unique weddings. Share this episode with your romantic partners and friends rocking in their international, intercultural, and interracial marriages!   [Time Stamps] (00:24) Today's topic (03:01) Fun wedding parties (25:22) Challenges - family issues (39:20) What's special about your marriage? (51:45) Wrap-up & next episode   fun way to push people out of their comfort zones and learn more about their preferences. Heena and Linda chose 10 questions related to dating and relationships to celebrate love abound in the month of Valentine's Day. Ranging from high school crushes to love languages, their talk knocked on every corner of their hearts. Join in with your favorite sweets or a cup of hot chocolate!    [Time Stamps] (00:23) Today's topic (02:41) 100 messages a day or 1 message a month? + more questions! (22:38) Are you up for a marriage proposal in front of thousands of people? + more questions! (42:38) Wrap-up and next episode   [Mentioned in This Episode] - Check out episode 22 'Celebrating Holidays as an International and Interracial Couple' (Special Guest: Linda's Chris)   [More on American K-sisters] - Website: AmericanKsisters.com - Instagram: @AmericanKsisters - YouTube: YouTube.com/@AmericanKsisters - Email: AmericanKsisters@gmail.com        - Music: MissChristineMusic.com

Jack sits down with longtime friends Todd Stern and Chris Courville to discuss their greatest lessons learned on the journey to establishing their own forensic engineering firms.Todd Stern spent his entire career in the construction industry. In May 2022, he co-founded Orlo Forensics alongside Patrick Snowden, where they specialize in collapse, fire, flood, hail, wind, and disaster investigation and design. They're brought onsite to complete investigations and compile reports to be submitted to insurance companies, contractors, or attorneys.Chris Courville is the owner and CEO of United Environmental LLC, a mold remediation, air quality testing, water mitigation, and emergency response company established in October 2018. The team at the interior damage consulting firm brings 40+ of combined experience to the table.Listen in as Todd and Chris give their thoughts on the lack of professionalism and accountability that was unfortunately quite prevalent in the mitigation industry when they got their start at the turn of the century.Too many professionals focus overwhelmingly on getting the sale over hitting key metrics with a view to keeping the company healthy. In other words, they take on claims with the intention to “win the battle, lose the war”, which may lead to short-term financial gain but a bankrupt business in the long term.Todd and Chris also share how they've been navigating the challenges of running their companies with those of keeping their personal relationships healthy. Asked about the keys to creating a legacy business, the pair talk about the importance of staying high-touch every step of the way and passing on client-focused values to the next generation. A Glimpse of What You'll Learn:[04:01] An introduction to Todd and Chris[12:45] Building a legacy business[18:08] Todd and Chris on the lack of professionalism in the industry when they got their start[23:46] The value of focusing on the little things over the outcome[27:05] Implementing The Art of War into business[34:02] The importance of time management and establishing a routine[41:53] Managing healthy personal relationships in the mitigation industry[48:40] The most satisfying thing about the business[54:29] Passing on a legacy company[58:10] Advice that Todd and Chris would give their younger selvesMemorable Quotes by Our Guests:“If you surround yourself with good people and good mentors, you're going to be successful. It's bound to happen. You're bound to get your break.” ~Chris“More money has not made me any happier.” ~Todd “If we don't go into work every day and work on these claims as if we're going to war, then we've lost. It's a mindset thing.” ~Todd “If you're only as good as your next check, that's a shitty way to run a business.” ~Chris“Our profession demands our attention. If you don't give it the attention it deserves, it can crush your life.” ~ChrisFollow Todd at:https://www.linkedin.com/in/todd-stern-569930114https://orloforensics.com/Follow Chris at:https://www.linkedin.com/in/chris-courville-428287187/

Christmas Bonus Episode! 1999 was a big year for cinema. One highlight came from The Wachowski's, who introduced us to the world of The Matrix. A film that unlocked a thirst for stylish, thought-provoking films in LDP's John C. Lyons and Dorota Swies. In this episode, Chris More, who John met in the late 90's while they were both studying Computer Science and Mathematics, takes a trip down the original trilogy rabbit hole. A fresh and original revisit care of the new film: The Matrix Resurrections. Knuckle up! Patrons of Lyons Den Productions will receive the complete conversation in the coming weeks. For more information go to www.patreon.com/lyonsdenproductions. 00:00 - Meet Chris More 11:55 - Revisiting The Matrix Trilogy 20:37 - Preparations for The Matrix Resurrections 25:12 - The Matrix Resurrections, Bugs and Nostalgia 29:40 - What's a Modal? 32:01 - nu-Morpheus 40:33 - Original and Fresh Meta Commentary and Digital Self Images 47:48 - Truth, Control and the Analyst 51:21 - Neo and Trinity 4ever 56:21 - Weaponizing Everything and Everything is Fiction 1:02:44 - Overall Impressions 1:10:39 - Possible Glitches in The Matrix Resurrections 1:19:48 - Agent Smith 1:22:58 - Closing Thoughts and Animatrix 2.0 Wish | Published on January 5, 2022 | Produced by Lyons Den Productions | Hosted by John C. Lyons | Music by Tony Grey | Support CINEMACTIVIST and Lyons Den Productions by becoming a Patron at www.patreon.com/lyonsdenproductions --- Send in a voice message: https://anchor.fm/cinemactivist/message

After the last episode where database switching was discussed, a number of listeners reached out with thoughts. In particular, one listener gave a reproducible example of how to make things better. Chris talks about why he always moves errors to the left, and Steph gives a hot take where she admits that she is not a fan of hackathons and explains why. Steph and Chris also share exciting Bike Shed show news in that we now have transcripts for each episode, and tackle another listener question asking, "How do you properly implement a multi-step form in a boring Rails way?” Chris talks about his experiences with multi-step forms and gives his own hot take on refactoring: he doesn't until he feels pain! Database Switching in Dev Mode Gist (https://gist.github.com/danott/e698435bb4e1d34bc70853514ba681a7) In Relentless Pursuit of REST – Derek Prior (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HctYHe-YjnE) Transcript: CHRIS: Happy Friday or whatever day it happens to be in your future situation. STEPH: Happy day. [chuckles] CHRIS: Happy day or night. I'm sorry, I'm done. [laughter] STEPH: Shut up. [laughs] Hello and welcome to another episode of The Bike Shed, a weekly podcast from your friends at thoughtbot about developing great software. I'm Steph Viccari. CHRIS: And I'm Chris Toomey. STEPH: And together, we're here to share a bit of what we've learned along the way. Hey, Chris, happy Friday. How's your week been? CHRIS: Happy Friday to you as well. My week's been good. It's been busy. I am taking next week off for a quick vacation. So it's that…I think I've talked about this every time before I go on a vacation on the podcast, that focusing lens that going on vacation gives you. I want to make sure everything's buttoned up and ready to hand off, and I'm not going to be blocking anyone. And so, I always like the clarity that that brings. Because a lot of times I can look at well, there are infinity things to do, how do I pick? And now I'm like, no, but really, if I'm going to be gone for a week, I must pick. And so yeah, I'm now very excited to lean into vacation mode and relax for a bit. STEPH: Yeah, that's awesome. I hear you. I always go into that same mode pre-vacation. CHRIS: But in tech news, after the most recent episode that was released where we talked about the database switching stuff, a number of listeners were very kind and reached out with some thoughts. In particular, Dan Ott is one listener who reached out not only with just some generic thoughts, but he also gave a reproducible example of how to make things slightly better. So the particular thing that a few folks honed in on was the idea that I was describing the feeling of in production; we can occasionally run into these ActiveRecord read-only errors, which is a case where you have a GET request that happens to try to create or update a record. And as a result, you're going to get this ActiveRecord read-only because you're using the follower database, which has a read-only connection. All of that is fine, but ideally, we would want to catch those before production. We want to catch them in development. And broadly, the issue that we have here is that in production, our system is running in a different way. It's running with two different database connections, one for read-only, one for writing, and that's different than in development, where we're running with a single connection. As an interesting thing, a lot of the stuff that I see on the internet is about using SQLite in development and then Postgres in production. And so that's an example of development production parity that we've really...I think thoughtbot is definitely a place that I internalize this very strongly. But you've got to have the same database, and especially because it's relatively straightforward to run Postgres locally, I'm always going to be running the same version of the database locally as in production. But in this case, I'm now getting this differentiation. And so what Dan and a handful of other folks highlighted was you can actually reproduce this functionality in development mode with a fun little trick where you end up creating a secondary connection to your development database, but you mark it as replica:true. And so, by doing that, Rails will establish a read-only connection. And then, all of the behavior that you configure for production can also be run in development. So now, as you're building out a new feature, and if you happen to implement a GET request that does some side effect in the database, that'll blow up in development as opposed to production, which is very exciting. STEPH: Yeah, that's awesome. I love that Dan reached out and shared this example with us. I actually haven't read through all of the details just yet. In fact, I just opened it up, and I started going through it, and there's a lot of really...it looks like a lot of great notes here and a really nice example that walks you through how to have that production parity locally. So this is really neat. I appreciate Dan sending this to us. CHRIS: Yeah, this is a wonderful little artifact actually that's interesting just in and of itself. We'll certainly include a link in the show notes to the gist that Dan shared. What's interesting...I think I knew of this, but I've never actually seen it before. This is a single-file Rails application, which is a very novel concept, but it's got a bundler/inline call at the very top. And then there's an inline gemfile block, and then a set of requires to pull in the relevant Rails stuff. And then it configures the database connection, configures a single controller or actually a handful of controllers, it looks like, and then it renders inline HTML. And so it has all of the pieces. And I didn't realize that at first, but then I pulled it down and I just ran it locally. So it's just Ruby and then the file that this just represents, and suddenly I had a reproducible Rails app. I believe this is used in reporting issues to Rails so you can get the minimum reproducible test case. And that's why this works is, I think, the Rails core team, over time, has pushed on any of the edges that wouldn't have worked and made it so that this is possible. But it's a really neat little thing where it's this self-contained example. And so running this file just via Ruby does all of this stuff, installs everything that's necessary. And then, you can click around in the very minimal HTML page that it provides and see the examples of the edges that it's hitting. And again, this is in development mode, so it's pushing on that. But yeah, it's both a really interesting tip as to how to work with this and a really interesting way to communicate that tip—so double points to Gryffindor, aka Dan Ott. STEPH: Double points to Gryffindor. I love it. CHRIS: I'm cool. [laughs] STEPH: That's very charming. [laughs] I've never seen anything like this either, in terms of one file that then can reproduce and run in a Rails app. Agreed, double points to Gryffindor, aka Dan. CHRIS: Aka Dan. STEPH: [chuckles] I hope Dan's a Harry Potter fan. CHRIS: I hope so. And I hope he's a Gryffindor, who knows? Maybe Ravenclaw. It's really up in the air. But the other thing that is interesting that I haven't yet figured out here is this works for development mode. I've tested it in development. It's great. I was able to remove the fix line that I had in my code where I had one of these breaking controller actions and run with this configuration in development mode. And then boom, it blew up in development, and I was like, yay, this is great. Move those errors to the left, as they say. But I realized there are some other edge cases, known ones actually. Another developer on the team mentioned something where he knows of a place that this is happening, but that code path isn't running right now just because it's a seasonal thing within the app. And I was like, oh, that's really interesting. I wish there were a way to test all the behavior. Oh, tests, that's what I need here. And so I tried to configure this in test mode, but I wasn't exactly clear on what was failing. But at a minimum, I know that the tests run in transaction, so I think that might make this more complicated because if you have two connections to the same database, but you have transactions, I feel like that might be conflating things, and it wouldn't necessarily map perfectly in. But if we could get that, that would be really great. Moving forward, any new development the development configuration will cover what I need. But retroactively, as I'm introducing the database switching to the application, it would be great if the test suite were a way to find these edge cases. So that's still an open question in my mind. But overall, the development fix is such a nice little addition to this world. And again, thank you so much to Dan for sending this in. STEPH: Yeah, I agree; having this in tests would be wonderful. I am intrigued not having read through the full example that's been provided. But I'm wondering if this is one of those we default to read-only mode, although that feels like too much because we're often creating data for each test. So maybe we default to...yeah, you have to have both because you have to have your test set up where you're going to write data. So you can't default to just being in read-only mode. But then say you want to run a controller action or something else in a read-only mode. So then you would have to change your database connection for that action, and that sounds complicated. You also said something else I'm intrigued by. You said, “Move errors to the left.” CHRIS: Yes. Now that you're asking me, I'm trying to remember the exact context. But it's the idea that there are different phases in your development and eventually getting to production life cycle, and so a bug that a user sees that's all the way to the right. That's as far along the development pipeline as it can be, and that's the worst case. You don't want a user to see a bug. So QA would be a step right before that. And if you can catch it in QA, you've moved it to the left, which is a good thing. But even better than that would be to catch it in your automated tests, and maybe even better than that would be static analysis that's running in your editor, and maybe even better than that is a type system or something like that. So the idea of moving to the left is to push those errors or when you're catching the errors closer to the point where you're actually introducing them. And that's just a general theme that I like or a Beyoncé song. STEPH: I was just going to say, all right, move over, Beyoncé. There's another phrase in town, moving to the left. [laughs] CHRIS: I'm really going for a lot of topical pop culture references today. That's what I'm about. STEPH: We've got Harry Potter, Beyoncé. We've got to pull out one more at some point. CHRIS: We'll see. I don't want to stretch myself too thin right before vacation. But yeah, thanks again to Dan and the handful of other folks that reached out either on Twitter or via email to point me in the right direction on the database switching stuff. At some point, I should definitely do a write-up on this because I've now collected together just about enough information that it feels like it's worthy of a blog post, or at least that's the story in the back of my head. I got to cross a certain threshold before I'm probably going to write a blog post. But yeah, that's a bit of what's up in my world. What's going on in your world? STEPH: I love it. You're saying write a blog post into the mic, so then that way you know it's going to encourage you to write it later. CHRIS: That's the trick right there. [chuckles] STEPH: Let's see, today's been a lovely day. It's been a lovely week in general. Today is especially lovely because it is thoughtbot's Summit, and Summit is where we all gather. We do this once a year. So the whole team, all of us across all of our...I was going to say offices but now just across all of our home offices. And we get together, and we have a day filled with events, and we usually have a wonderful team that helps organize a bunch of events that then we get together for. So a number of those fun events are like paired chats, which is one of my favorites because I often talk to people that I haven't talked to in a long time or perhaps people that I haven't even met yet that have just recently joined the company. We also have lightning talks, and I know I'm very biased, but I think we have some of the best lightning talks. They are just hilarious. So I love our lightning talks. We're also doing escape rooms. Oh, speaking of which, there's a Harry Potter-themed murder mystery that's happening. We have Nintendo Switch parties and a professional tarot card reading, which I've never done, but I'm actually doing that later today after we're done chatting. CHRIS: Wow, that is an adventurous day. And I like that it's fun, and it's connecting people and getting to know your teammates and all those nice things. STEPH: Very much. I also have a hot take. I don't know if I've shared this with you, so I'm going to share it here with you on the mic in regards to this. So previous years, for Summit, we used to have more coding projects, too. They were often opt-in, but that's something that happened. And specifically, we have Ralphapalooza, which is our hackathon. And it recently came up where a number of us were talking about Ralphapalooza, and I have come to the potentially contentious point of view that I don't like hackathons. I'm not a fan of them. CHRIS: Hot take. I like that you led in calling it a hot take, and then you provided said hot take, so I have to respond as if it's a very hot take. STEPH: That's true. Maybe it's not a hot take. Maybe people disagree. What do you think? Do you like hackathons? CHRIS: I have enjoyed them in the past. But I will say, particularly within the context of Summit or Ralphapalooza, I always felt a ton of pressure. It's so hard to right-size a project to that space, to that amount of time. You want to do something that's not trivial. You want to do something that at the end of it you're like, oh cool, I did that. Either it's like a novel thing that you're creating, or you're learning something new or whatever, but it's so hard to really do something meaningful in that amount of time. And often, people are shooting for the moon, and then they're just like, “Ah, so it's just a blank page right now. But behind the scenes, there's a machine learning algorithm that is generating the blank page. And we think with enough inputs to the model that it'll…” and it is actually super interesting work they did. But there's the wonderful pressure at the end to present, which I think is really useful. I like constraints. I like the presentations; they're always enjoyable, even in a case where it's like, this project did not go well, let's talk about that. That's even fun. But it really is so hard to get right. I've never gone to a hackathon outside of thoughtbot, so I can't speak to that, but I know that I have heard folks having a negative opinion of them. And I don't know that I'm quite at the hot take level that you are, but it's complicated, if nothing else. It's a lot of fun sometimes. I particularly remember the Elm project that you and I worked on. Well, we worked in the same group. We didn't actually work together, but same idea. That was a lot of fun. I liked that. STEPH: That's a good point. Even within the context of Ralphapalooza, our hackathons are more...I'm going to use the word sustainable because they're nine-to-five hackathons where we are showing up; we are putting in the work. There is pressure, and we do want to present. But it's not one of those stay up all night and completely leave your family for a day or two to hack on some code. [laughs] Sorry, I'm throwing some shade right now. But even with that sustainable approach, I've always felt so much pressure. I enjoyed that green space and then getting to collaborate with people I don't typically collaborate with, but it still felt like there was a lot of pressure there, especially that presentation mode always made me nervous. Even if it is welcoming to say, “Hey, this didn't go well,” that doesn't necessarily feel great to present unless you are comfortable presenting that scenario. And I also really look forward to these company events as a way to connect and have some downtime and to just relax because then the rest of our days are often more stressful. So I want more company time for me to connect with colleagues but then also feel relaxed. So I was always, in the beginning, I was like, yeah, Ralphapalooza, woo, let's go. And now I'm just like, nah, I'm good. I'd really just want a chill day with my colleagues. CHRIS: Is there an option to go for a walk with friends? Because if so, I will be taking door number two. STEPH: Cool. Well, I feel better having gotten that out into the ether now. But switching just a bit, there is something that I'm very excited about where we now have transcripts for each episode. This is something that you and I have been very excited about for a while and wanted to make happen but just weren't able to, but we now have them. And so people may have noticed them as we're adding them to the show notes. And I'm just so excited for a number of reasons, one, because there are a number of times that I have really wanted to search the shows or an episode for a particular topic and couldn't do so. So I'm just sitting there listening, trying to find a particular topic. There's also the fact that it will make the episodes more accessible. So for anyone that is hearing impaired or maybe if English isn't their first language, having it written down can make the episode more accessible. And there's the massive SEO boost that's always a win. And then I don't know if this is going to happen, but I'm excited that transcripts may help us repurpose content because there's a number of our topics that I would love to see turned into blog posts, and I think having the transcript will make that easier. CHRIS: Yeah. I'm equally super excited about the addition of transcripts, and across the line, SEO is cool, I think. Yeah, that sounds nice. Being able to reuse the content is very interesting to me because this is definitely my preferred medium. I find that I can just show up on the microphone, and it turns out I have opinions about a lot of stuff but trying to write a blog post is incredibly difficult for me. The small handful of good things that we might have collectively said over the years if we can turn those into more stuff that sounds great and honestly, just the ability to search for and find older episodes now based on like, I know we talked about inbox zero. I remember that was an episode, but I don't know which one, now that's searchable, and that's a thing that we can find. I actually still use the Upcase search for…I know I said something. I know there was a weekly iteration where I talked about some topic. And I built the search on Upcase for me as the primary user because one, I'm often referencing content on Upcase, and I want to be able to find it more easily, so I made the search. I also put a SQL injection vulnerability into the search in my first implementation so, go me. But then I got rid of it shortly after. STEPH: I love when people bring that energy of “I introduced this issue, go me,” because I find that very fun and also just very healthy in terms of we're going to make mistakes. And I have noticed a number of times at thoughtbot standup that whenever we make a mistake, or it's like, I accidentally sent out real emails on production for a job that I thought I was testing on staging. Sharing those mistakes in a very positive light is a very honest way to approach it. So I just had to comment on that because I'm a big fan of that. CHRIS: I'm glad you enjoyed my framing of it. I really enjoy that type of approach or way to communicate, although I think it is a delicate line. Like, I don't want to celebrate these sorts of things because an SQL injection vulnerability is a non-trivial thing. It shows up in tons of applications, and we need to take security seriously and all of that sort of stuff. But I think the version that I think is good for that type of thinking or communication is the psychological safety. If we're scared of admitting that we introduced a bug, that's bad. That's going to lead to worse outcomes longer term. And so having the shared communication style openness to like, yep, that happened yesterday. And there should be a certain amount of contrite in this where it's like, I feel bad that I did that. I even feel worse because when it happened, I recognized that it happened, and then I tried to exploit it in development mode to prove it to myself, and I couldn't exploit it. So I was like, I feel doubly bad as a programmer today. I both introduced a bug, and I'm not even smart enough to exploit it. But I know that an uber lead hacker out there could, and so I got to fix it. But that sort of story is part of the game. It's a delicate equilibrium, but having the ability to talk about that and having a group that can have a conversation, I do think that's very important. STEPH: Yeah, well said. I do think there's an important balance to strike there. Pivoting just a bit, we have a listener question, and this question comes from Benoit. Benoit wrote in to the show, “How do you properly implement a multi-step form in a boring Rails way?” I'm very interested in this question because I am working on a project that has a multi-step form. There are probably about maybe six, seven steps, and those steps can change based on different configurations. And our form is not implemented in a boring way at all. It's a very intricate, confusing design, I would say, which I think is fairly common when it comes to multi-step forms. I'm curious, what experience do you have with multi-step forms, and what's your general feeling with them? CHRIS: Well, I happen to be working on one right now. So generally, I don't have an oh, I got this, I know the answer. This is one of those that I'm like; I feel like each time I reinvent it a little bit. But the version that I'm working on right now is an onboarding flow. So we create a user record, which at this point I only have email associated with, and then from there, when a user lands, they need to provide a bunch of profile information, and it is a requirement. They have to fill it out. We need to have all of it before we can actually start doing the real stuff of the application. And so, the way that I've ended up modeling it is interesting. I'm going to use the word Interesting. I think I like it, but I'm not sure. So I have this model; let's call it a profile that we're going to associate with the user. And the profile has a bunch of fields: first name, last name, address, phone number, and a handful of other things. And again, I need to have these pieces of information. So I want those to be non-nullable columns. But as someone is walking through this form, I'm not going to have all the information. So there's going to be a progression. We'll get first name, then we get last name, and then we get the next piece of information. So I need a nullable storage, but I don't want to just put it into the session or something like that, which I think would be an option. So what I've done is I've introduced a secondary model. So this is a full ApplicationRecord database-backed model called partial profile. And it is almost identically the same interface as the profile, but each field is nullable. There's also a slight difference in that the profile field has an additional status column that talks about once we've gone through all of this, we can add some status and track other things. But yeah, that main difference of in the profile, everything is non-nullable, and the partial profile is nullable. So then there's a workflowy object, a command object, as I like to have in my systems these days that handles the once they've gathered all their information, turn the partial profile into a profile, send it out to an external system that does some verification and some other lookups and things like that. And then, based on the status of that, mark the status of the profile. But one of the things that I was able to do is make that transition from partial profile to full profile. I'm doing that within a transaction. So if at any point anything fails within all of this, I can roll the whole thing back, and I'll be back to only having the partial profile, which was a very important thing. I would not want to have a partial profile and a profile because that's a bad state. But a lot of this for me is about data modeling and wanting to tell truths with the database and constrain what are the valid states of my application? So one solution would be to just have a profile model that has nullable columns for all of these fields. But man, do I hate that answer. So I went what feels like an extreme take of having two fundamentally different models, but that's where it's actually working out well. I'm able to share validations across them. So as new data is added, I can conditionally validate as new things are shared, and I'm able to share that via concern in the two models. So it's progressively getting more constrained as I add data to this thing. And then, in the background, there is a single controller that skips through all of the steps and has an update action that just keeps pushing data into this partial profile until, eventually, it becomes a profile. So that's focused specifically on the data model stuff. I think there are other aspects of a more workflowy type thing in Rails, but that's our thing. What do you think, good idea, bad idea, terrible idea? STEPH: [chuckles] One, I love that you have this concrete example because I have some higher-level ideas around this particular question, but I didn't have a great example that I wanted to share. So I love that you have that, that we can talk through. I really, really like how you have found a way to represent the fact that each valid state of your application as you refer to it….so you have this concept of someone's going through the flow and their address can be nullable at this stage, but by the end of this flow, it shouldn't be nullable anymore. So you have that concept of a partial profile, and then it gets converted into a profile. I am intrigued by the fact that it's one controller because that is where I am feeling pain with the multi-step form that I'm working on where we have one very large controller that handles this entire...I'm going to call it a wizard since that's how it's referred to, and there are seven or eight different steps in this wizard. And the job of this controller is each time someone goes to a new step; this controller is trying to figure out okay; what step are you on based on the parameters that you have, based on some of the model attributes that are set? What step are you on, and what should we show you? And that has led to a very large method and then also complex, lots of conditional-based code. And instead, I would really like to flip that question around or essentially remove the what step am I on? And instead, ask what step is next? So instead, take the approach that each step of the form should have a one-to-one mapping to another controller. And that can get really hard because we're often conditioned to the idea that we should have a one-to-one correlation between each controller and an ActiveRecord model, but that's not necessarily what happens in our form. You have the concept of a partial profile versus being able to map to a full profile. So I am very much in favor of the idea of trying to map each step of the form to a controller. So that, to me, makes the code more boring. It makes it more understandable. I can see what's happening for each step. But then it's not boring in terms that it requires creativity to say, okay, I don't have a perfect ActiveRecord model that maps to this controller, but what resourceful controller can I make instead? What is the domain object that I can put here instead? Maybe it's an ActiveModel object instead. So that way, we can apply ActiveRecord-like behavior to plain old Ruby objects, or maybe it's using a form object. That way, we can still validate all the fields that the user is providing to us, but that doesn't necessarily map directly to a full profile just yet. So I really like all the things that you've said. But I am intrigued by the approach of using a single controller. How's that feeling so far? CHRIS: That part is actually feeling fine. So a couple of things you said in there stand out to me, one, where it's a very big controller. That is something that I would definitely avoid. And so, I have extracted other pieces. There is an object that I created, which at this point is just in-app models because I didn't know where else to put it, but it's called onboarding. And so the workflow that I'm trying to introduce, the resource maybe is what we would call it, is the idea of onboarding, but it's not an ActiveRecord level thing. At the ActiveRecord level, I have a profile and a partial profile, and then there's an account, and there's also a user. There are four different database level models that I want to think about. But fundamentally, from a user perspective, we're talking about onboarding. And so I have an object that is called onboarding, and it contains the logic around given the data that we have now, what step comes next? Is this a valid step? Should the user go back? Et cetera, et cetera. So that extraction is one piece that definitely makes sense. Also, thus far, mine is relatively straightforward in terms of I get data in, and I just need to update my partial profile record each time. So the update action is very straightforward. But I've done different versions of this where there are more complex things that happen. And so what I've done is basically make a splat route. So it's like onboarding/ and then the step name and that gets posted or gets put, I guess, along with everything else for the update. And so now the update says, “Well, if I'm updating for this, then handle it this way; otherwise, just update the profile record.” And so then I can extract maybe another command object that handles like, “Oh, when we're doing the address stuff, we actually have to do a little bit of a lookup and a cross-reference and some other things, but everything else is just throwing data into a database record.” And so that's another place where I would probably make an extraction, which is this specialized case of handling the update of the address is special. So I want to extract that, be able to test around that, et cetera. But fundamentally, the controller thing actually works out pretty well. The single controller with those sorts of extractions has worked out well for me. STEPH: Okay, cool. Yeah, I can see how depending on how complex your multi-step form is, having it all in one controller and then extracting those smaller objects to then handle each step makes a lot of sense and feels very friendly to read, and is very testable. For the form that I'm working in, there are enough steps and enough complexity. I'd really love to break it out. In fact, that's something that we're working on right now is taking each of those chunks, each state of the form, and introducing a controller for it. So let's say if you are filling out an appointment and we need to get your consent for something, then we actually have a consent controller that's going to handle that part, that portion of it. And I'd be intrigued for your form if things got complicated enough that it's the concept of onboarding or a wizard that leads us to having one controller because then we think of this one concept. But there are often four or five concepts that are then hiding within that general idea of an onboarding flow. So then maybe you get to the point that you have an onboarding address or something like that. So then you could break it out into something that still feels RESTful but then lets you have that very boring controller that does just enough and essentially behaves like a bi-directional linked list. So it knows, based on the route, it knows the step that it's on, and it knows where to go back, and then it knows the next step to go forward. And then that's all it's responsible for, so it doesn't have to also figure out what step am I currently on? CHRIS: I like the bi-directional link list, dropping knowledge bombs right there. STEPH: Pew-pew. CHRIS: It's interesting. I don't necessarily feel...right now; I don't feel that pressure. I feel fine with the shape of the singular controller. This is perhaps not necessarily even a good thing, but I think my bias is always to think a lot about the URL structure and really strongly embrace the user point of view. I'm going through the workflow. I don't care if I'm picking from a calendar and setting up a date versus filling in an address field or how you're storing those on the back end; that's your job, developer people. And I try as hard as I can to put myself in that mindset. And so the idea that there's this sequential thing that knows how to go back and forward and shows like, show which page we're on, that feels like it belongs in one controller in my mind, or I guess I'm fine with it being in one controller. And splitting it out feels almost more complicated in that I then need to share some of that logic across them, which is very doable by extracting some object that contains a logic of what goes back, what goes forward. But I think I like to align URL structure to how many controllers as opposed to anything else. And because I'm keeping a consistent URL structure where it's /onboarding/name /onboarding/address, and I'm stepping through in that way for all of those things, then it makes sense to me that those go to my onboardings controller. But I'm interested to see if I start to feel pain somewhere down the road because I expect this onboarding to get more complicated as time goes on. And will I bump my head on the ceiling? Probably. It seems likely. But for now, I'm liking it. STEPH: Yeah, it certainly makes sense. It's one of those areas that you want to start small and then build out as it feels reasonable. But in regard to the URLs, I'm with you, where I very much want there to be a clean, nice URL for the user to see. And then we handle out any of those details on the back end since that is our work to do. But I am still envisioning that there is a clean URL. So it may be you have an onboarding/address and then onboarding/consent, borrowing from my previous example, but then that maps to where you have an onboarding namespaced controller that is then for an address or for consent. So you don't necessarily have an object that's having to be passed along that stores the state and the next step that the person is on. But that way, you do definitively know from the route okay, I am on this step. And so then that's how you get away from that question of what step am I on? Because that's already given to us based on the URL and then the controller. So then you only have to care about validating the input that's provided on that page, but then also being able to calculate dynamically okay, if this person needs to go back, what's the previous step and if they go forward, what's the next step? CHRIS: What you're saying totally makes sense. And I'm now worried that I'm going to wake up a few days from now and look at my controllers and be like, I hate this. Why did I ever do this? I think the hesitation that I had, and this feels like a terrible reason, but in terms of what the config/routes.rb setup would be for this, it's namespace onboardings. And then within that, a bunch of singular routes and inside of that, inside that namespace, would be a bunch of singular resources so like, resource address, resource blah, blah. And I don't know why, but I don't like that. I don't like that. I don't like that. Now that I'm saying it out loud, I'm like, yeah, that actually would be a pretty clean mapping. And right now, I have implicitly what those available routes are but not explicitly. It also feels like there would be a real explosion of controllers there because there's a bunch of steps and growing in this controller or in this namespace. And they're all going to do the same thing, in my case at least, of just adding data in. But that's not a reason to not make...like, controllers are cheap; I should make controllers so, hmm. STEPH: Yeah. So I think that's the part in my mind that maps to the boring part is because we are creating controllers. There's maybe an explosion of them, and it's boring. Like, the controllers don't do very much. And then that feels a little bit wrong to us because we're like, okay, I created this controller, it does very little. So maybe I should actually group this logic somewhere else. But I think that is the heart of it and how you stay boring is where you have just that code be so simple that it almost feels wrong. CHRIS: That right there, that sound bite that we just had, that was a knowledge bomb drop, and I liked it. Now I've got to go back and refactor to the form that you're talking about because I am sold. STEPH: Oh, I'm glad you like it. I am intrigued if you do refactor then what that would look like and how it feels. But I also totally understand you're busy, so if you don't, that's cool too, no pressure. CHRIS: My honest answer is that I almost certainly won't refactor until I feel the pain. It's one of those things where like, okay, maybe I've now decided that this code is not the best, but the time to refactor it isn't when that code is just humming along working fine. It's a general thing that I think we share in terms of how we think about it. But the preemptive refactoring, I guess broadly speaking, I'm not a fan of preemptive factoring. I'm a fan of refactoring just in time or as we're feeling the pain, which is the counterpoint to that is let's not extract tech debt tickets because then they turn into preemptive refactoring again. It's like, ah, I'm not really feeling...I'm not in there right now. But the version of the code that I have now is probably fine. I don't think it's a problem although I am convinced now of the boring way. I want to go back to the boring way, but it will feel like it's worth changing down the road when I feel any pressure in that system or need to revisit it. So it's like that. That's how I think about that sort of thing. STEPH: Yeah, I wholeheartedly agree. It's one of those if you refactor...if this is a side project, if you want to refactor just for testing new software theories and then reflecting on what that new refactor looks like, that's awesome. In terms of any other refactors, then I wholeheartedly favor waiting until you feel that pain and it feels like the right thing to do; otherwise, it's unnecessary code turn. And while I strongly believe in experiments, I don't believe in putting teams through those personal experiments. CHRIS: More hot takes from Steph. I like it. STEPH: Circling back just a bit and talking about having one controller for each step of the form, that part I struggle with it frankly because it is hard to think about this is a concept, but what do I call this? Because it doesn't necessarily map to something necessarily in my database. There's a really great talk by Derek Prior that's called In Relentless Pursuit of REST, where Derek does a great job of providing some inspiration around how to create routes that don't necessarily feel like they could be RESTful, or maybe they're following that more RPC format. And he does a great job of then turning around and saying, “Well, this is how we could think about, or this is how we could shift our thinking in turning this into a more RESTful route.” So then it does map to something that's meaningful in our domain. Because we have thoughtfully, or likely very thoughtfully, grouped this form together in a meaningful way to the user. So then that's inspiration right there to give us a way to name this thing because we are showing it to the user in a meaningful way. So then that means we can also give it a meaningful name. That's all I got on multi-step forms. [laughs] CHRIS: That feels like it was a lot. We've covered data models. We've covered controller structures. We fundamentally reoriented my thinking on the matter. I feel like we covered it. STEPH: Yeah, I agree. Well, Benoit, thank you for sending in this question. I hope you found our discussion very helpful. And on that note, shall we wrap up? CHRIS: Let's wrap up STEPH: The show notes for this episode can be found at bikeshed.fm. CHRIS: This show is produced and edited by Mandy Moore. STEPH: If you enjoyed listening, one really easy way to support the show is to leave us a quick rating or review in iTunes as it helps other people find the show. CHRIS: If you have any feedback for this or any of our other episodes, you can reach us at @bikeshed on Twitter. And I'm @christoomey. STEPH: And I'm at @SViccari. CHRIS: Or you can email us at hosts@bikeshed.fm. Thanks so much for listening to The Bike Shed, and we'll see you next week. All: Byeeeee. Announcer: This podcast was brought to you by thoughtbot. thoughtbot is your expert design and development partner. Let's make your product and team a success.

Beer Pong 101 with Chris…More on Nebraska football players suing the Big 10…Tailgating in the SEC this fall…’Wiki-Pete-ia!’…. The post 8/27 4 o’clock hour appeared first on 99.3 ESPN.

This episode goes deep into the mind of Chris More, one of the top growth strategists in the world. He considers himself a “T-shaped” person (see Medium article), having multiple skill areas with one very deep area. He’s also an expert in unlocking the potential of your products with scientific, repeatable strategies. We get into his background as he shares insights from his 20 years in experimenting and perfecting processes to create sustainable growth. He details the secret spots of growth and how to develop strategies to generate real growth. Over the past 10 years, he moved across areas in Mozilla, always with growth and product development as the core of his role and focus. He is a sought-after speaker and thought leader in both disciplines, and balances both the art and science of growth hacking. A true innovator, he also shares his unique love for experimenting and building modeling to help predict and anticipate growth activities. Links mentioned in the podcast: T-shaped blog post: https://medium.com/@chrismore/i-am-t-shaped-an-origin-story-a91bf5a546c6 v2.0 announcement I made of the growth model when I spoke in Ukraine 2019: https://medium.com/@chrismore/announcing-growth-model-v2-0-8bc096729773 Chris More: Linkedin:  https://www.linkedin.com/in/chrismore/ Twitter:  https://twitter.com/chrismore   Subscribe to: http://www.Marketer.eco for exclusive marketing content from top marketing experts.   About the Host / Scott A. Martin I have spent 25 years in strategic marketing roles as an agency owner and as a marketer.  Recently I have launched The Groundswell Marketing Podcast sharing insights from the top industry leaders helping marketers and entrepreneurs navigate the future, and build sustainable programs that are positively impacting the world. I help entrepreneurs to control their marketing spend and predictably grow their business by leveraging high impact unconventional strategies with common sense.   Groundswell Marketing http://www.Groundswell.fm (podcast website) http://www.Groundswell.Marketing http://www.Twitter.com/Groundswell_m http://www.instagram.com/Groundswell.Marketing Scott Martin Twitter: http://www.twitter.com/ScottAdamMartin Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/scottadam... Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ScottMartin.org Medium: https://medium.com/@ScottMartin    

Hello! We are your Millennial hosts, Chris and Hope, and in this inaugural episode of the Millennials in China podcast we introduce ourselves, the podcast, and talk about the flavour du jour - coronavirus! Chris - More than 8 years living in China, from teaching English to managing schools to video game studio Chief Operating Officer! Hope - More than 4 years living in China, manufactured products for his e-commerce business and worked in a bitcoin exchange! Coronavirus pandemic: How it transpired in China in the early days (January and February). China’s draconian but swift and effective containment measures. “It’s just a flu” narrative by political leaders and mainstream media. Wearing masks and debunking MSM myths. Taking preventative action and slowing the power of exponential growth. Being considerate of the elderly and loved ones (not just about yourself!). Effects of COVID-19 on the Chinese economy, supply chain, and global markets - is this the “Black Swan” event? Related Links: https://hopefreiheit.com/2020/02/25/inside-observations-on-the-coronavirus-epidemic/ https://hopefreiheit.com/2020/03/18/covid-19-economic-meltdown-dealing-with-2020/ https://gisanddata.maps.arcgis.com/apps/opsdashboard/index.html#/bda7594740fd40299423467b48e9ecf6 Chris' Twitter: https://twitter.com/ChrisWood1821 Hope's Twitter: https://twitter.com/hope_freiheit Podcast Twitter: https://twitter.com/MillennialsCN Podcast Facebook: https://facebook.com/millennialsinchina Podcast Website: http://millennialsinchina.com

Published Nov 13, 2017 Chris: Good day, world. Chris Hogan and Andrew Groat coming to you live from the MeMedia studio here at Burleigh Heads for "Get Fact Up" episode number 68 - on important marketing metrics to track. How you going, Andrew? Andrew: Good. How are you? Chris: Good, mate. So website traffic is probably the number one metric that people tend to track when they're looking at - obviously their marketing reports. And we know that being that high a level probably isn't good enough. Andrew: Yeah, traffic's not really that important. There're other things that you should be looking at. Chris: Cool. So we've got some example Google Analytics snapshots that we've got here from the Interwebs. And we wanted to just have a look over those and break some of them down. So here we have the Google Analytics snapshot of acquisitions and channels, it's real easy to find. And it's breaking down that high level traffic into multiple different channels... Andrew: The different marketing streams, yeah. So this one's eCommerce business, and straight off the bat you can see that something's wrong here, ‘cause you've got paid searches as the highest traffic. But, you need to circle a few things here, so the problem here is the bounce rate is massive. Paid search, high bounce rate, a lot of money's gone down the drain quite frankly. Chris: So let's talk about bounce rate while we're on that. So between 55% and 70% bounce rate is considered high. Anything over 70% is considered pretty much extreme. So it's time to bring that down. Andrew: So just to explain what a bounce is, it's when someone comes to your page - doesn't click on anything and then they leave. So someone that didn't interact with your page at all. Chris: And bounces can happen a lot. Especially in search and social - ah sorry, in paid search and social, because people have searched for a particular product. Andrew: They may not necessarily wanna see it. You might have put it in front of them when they don't want it. Chris: In paid search they've searched for a particular product, they've clicked on that link to that paid page and they've seen what they wanted to see - probably priced, they're shopping around, boom they're gone again. If you didn't entice them to click through to another page, then essentially they've bounced. And they could've been sitting on that page for a long time. In fact, they could've been sitting on that for hours, all day, reading all the content that you had to offer, but if they didn't click through to another page it's called a bounce. So the same thing can happen in social, right? Because... Andrew: Yeah, we say this all the time that social's people's down time. And if you're putting ads in front of them and they don't realise it, they've clicked through to an ad, they're often just gonna bail back out of that. Social traffic tends to have high bounce rate and lower engagement metrics because of that. But, it's a great branding opportunity, it's not a right off there. You just have to be showing the right sort of content, maybe not necessarily trying to get someone to buy something straight from Facebook. Chris: And then we've got on that same slide we've got their conversion rate, and 3.11 conversion rate. Conversions categorised as 2% as average, 5% is good and 10% plus is great. So they're sitting between averaging good. Now if we were going to say, for example if the client said, "Hey, while I'm getting lots of traffic on paid search, that's great, I'm gonna increase my spend." Andrew: Well I would say don't even bother. Especially when you have a little bit further down that email traffic is a 10.24% conversion rate. I would be saying do more email campaigns, 'cause that's obviously working really well. And then maybe have a look at bringing this bounce rate down, put a bit of work into that. Make some more relevant content, have a look at your page load potentially and have a look at your targeting - maybe you're showing your ads to the wrong people. Chris: There's so much you can do in eCommerce. Show that there's a sale on and that it's a limited time. For example, there's a counter there just above the "add to cart" button that says buy now or you'll miss out. For instance... Andrew: Get some more testimonials. Get some more reviews and writings and things like that. Chris: More content on that page essentially. So that is called conversion rate optimisation. Improving your page to improve conversions. If you can improve those conversions then potentially go back and invest more dollars into that paid advertising. Andrew: I would also say maybe get a heat map or a screen recording software installed on the website and actually get some hard data - hard evidence about what's going on there. It might just be as simple as there's no calls to action above the fold, it might be a real easy fix. Chris: Could be an error. Paid search - don't forget if you've got so many heaps of campaigns, that's a very high level view. You could have one campaign that's absolutely tanking because for whatever reason your products are no longer available, discontinued or something like that. Andrew: Yeah, that's right. Especially with AdWords, it could just be one keyword's just ruining your entire campaign. It's really important to be looking at those metrics as well. Chris: So let's move on to slide 7 where we've actually got a different eCommerce business where their highest traffic source is organic. Andrew: Whoa, yeah, they're doing really well. 11% conversion rate. Chris: And they're converting 11% on that organic traffic. That's really good. Essentially then we looked at paid searches, their second biggest paid channel. And they've got a 7% conversion rate there. And so therefore they're advertising campaign on AdWords needs tweaking and improving because obviously there's a good conversion rate happening in organic. There's not a lot wrong with their pages, but that conversion rate indicates to me that maybe their actual advertising campaigns wrong. Andrew: Yeah, that's what I think. Maybe they just needed to tighten up what they're targeting there. Another good thing that I've seen with this one - we've got a great ad, but they've got their revenue filled in there. So they're actually pushing data of all their sales back, which is awesome because that means they can actually measure ROI properly, so you can have a look at your AdWords page and analytics - you can see how much you spending and what you're getting back for it, then you get that ROI metric. That's awesome if you can actually get that, it's not possible for everyone. Chris: Which comes down to cost per acquisition. Andrew: That's right, so if you know that then you can scale as far as you want. Chris: So cost per acquisition is basically cost per sale. Andrew: Mm-hmm (affirmative) Chris: Instead of tracking cost per click, track cost per acquisition. If you bring that down... Andrew: Yeah, exactly. Also, here their bounce rate is incredibly low on this one. Chris: Yeah, 19.43% on organic search and 14.78% even on paid, which is just awesome. Really good. Andrew: Two other metrics I think worth mentioning here because this is so high on this one I just want to say. Under behaviour on here, you've got bounce rate, pages per session, average session duration. Pages per session is really important, that's how many - for each person that comes to your site, that's how many different pages they go on there. And if you're above 2.5% that's pretty good. Their average pages per session across all channels is 6.89%, that's great. That means people are really searching around going through everything. Chris: Yup. Andrew: Also, the session duration: 3 minutes, that's great too. If you've got above 2 minutes that's awesome. People spending a lot of time on their website. They've obviously got a lot of really good related content, a lot of good internal linking. I'd say they've got a really good interface there as well. Chris: So, on product pages you may also be interested in if they're doing blogging then potentially they've got interlinked pages. Here's the product we're talking about - go and check it out in the cart, all that sort of stuff. Andrew: They've got a great funnel, that much is obvious. So yeah, they're doing great. Chris: Slide 8, we've got a service based business, and obviously which means no eCommerce tracking on the site. And the highest channel - highest volume of traffic coming through is via organic for this one. Now, they've got a 56% bounce rate on their organic and 2.12 pages per session. Andrew: It's not bad. Chris: Yeah, that's right. Andrew: But there's room, room to improve, that's for sure... Chris: There is room for improvement. So, with bounce rate, like we said, that people are coming in and their not exactly seeing what we wanted them to see and they're leaving. But with 2.12 pages per session on organic - they kind of are finding what they are wanting to find. They're not really that eager to make an inquiry because their actual conversion rate is low, in the 2%'s, so it's an average conversion rate. Andrew: Yeah, so maybe there's a trust issue there and that's where I'd say probably maybe looking at getting some reviews, testimonials, that sort of thing - maybe having a look at the form, reducing the amount of fields in the form. Just to bring down all the barriers, make it easier for an inquiry to happen there. Chris: Really good point you've made there, Andrew, about the barriers to inquiry and completing a form. Those - Don't ask for too much information, what do you really need from people? Name, phone number, email address - that's pretty much it. Andrew: Yeah, like that's it. Even have a request to call back can be a better option than having an inquiry. Sometimes people don't feel that comfortable about filling all that information in. Chris: An optional message field is good. I think leave that one optional. So the top 3 required and an optional message field, boom. And then that could absolutely increase the conversion rate on those inquiries. Andrew: If I was to give these people any advice, though, it would be look at they're social campaigns, though here. Cause you can see there that their conversion rate is .9% on social. Bounce rate's 84%, like obviously they're sending the wrong message out there or maybe just reaching the wrong people. There's massive room for improvement there. Chris: Yeah, hard one, I'm with you on that. There's definitely some improvements that are needed. I mean, what are they sending people to this site for? Is it to consume content? They're not really clicking through to other pages on the site. It's - pages per session 1.6, time on site a minute ten. They really do need to reconsider why they're sending people there and... Andrew: Obviously sending them there for maybe promoting blogs or something like that. But then you just have to look at what they're doing next. Chris: They need to encourage and click through... Andrew: Calls to action in their blogs. Chris: Yeah, super important. Cool. Slide 9, we've got another service based business. So again organic search is the highest traffic source. Bounce rate is lower, 48%, that's great. It's good, rather. And 2.39 pages per session, which is pretty much average there. And a conversion rate of 4.84%. So, their conversion rate's obviously better than the last. And that means that their calls to action are much better and their barriers... Andrew: Mm-hmm (affirmative)... Chris: Their forms are probably better. They potentially got testimonials or some kind of - they've developed some kind of trust with the audience to encourage that inquiry. Maybe there's some sort of free offer, potentially round that... Andrew: Yeah, their funnel could just be better overall. And it might just be a type of service that people are more interested in, in general, you never really know that. Chris: Industry comes in... Andrew: That's right, yeah like some people just have a tough industry that you always have to consider. Chris: Exactly. So apart from website traffic sources we wanna focus on what's happening out there in amongst the other - I guess campaigns that we could be running. So, obviously social is probably the most popular and most common activity that people are undertaking when they're doing marketing. I think we've spoken about this before, but just to recap, what's some of the metrics people need to be tracking when they're doing social campaigns? Andrew: Okay, big thing for me is always engagement, especially the social. You wanna say that people are actually interacting with your content. Clicks through the website not always that important, 'cause you can see that they might be doing nothing when they get to the website. Most important thing is that they're having a good time on the social platform first and foremost. And then something that people don't often look at is one called "social clicks", which is a sort of like the viral effect. It's when someone's interacted with your content and then their friends doing it or maybe they've shared it to someone else. That's that sort of roll off growth effect that happens on social, that's a really important one, cause that means that the community's accepting it. It means it's getting shared around. Chris: And another really important metric that people need to be targeting - I'm sorry, monitoring when they're looking at their reports, their monthly reports, is search into results pages. So the results of their ranking of their keywords in search. Andrew: That's right. So you can look at your traffic for organic and that's great but you really wanna know where it's coming from, because you wanna know what you wanna optimise for on what you should be creating more content for. If you're not using a software for tracking your search engine results, you can go into search console and everyone should have search console. Google search console set up. You can have a look at your keyword report in there and that'll show you all the traffic that's coming in for different keywords and it will also show you the impressions for different keywords. So you can see who's seeing you for different keywords. And that at least is very important because that data's not in Google analytics anymore. Chris: It's not a complete picture because Google has wiped out a lot of the keywords that people actual typing in under a category called, "not provided", but... Andrew: It shows a lot more than Google analytics at least. Chris: Exactly. Andrew: So you get something there. Chris: Yeah. Is that all we got time for? Look I think this is a very high level view. Still, we've sorta dived in a little bit. But, with eCommerce there's so much more you could be looking at. Once you've got some of that conversions - what's happening with the conversions? Well potentially people are getting to the cart, and they're abandoning cart. So you need to look at the exit pages and what can you do there? Well you can be running automated email campaigns. You can be running remarketing campaigns on Google AdWords and social. There's lots of opportunities there. But again we said we're gonna have a high level view, and I think we've done that here so hopefully that's - I guess helpful. Anything to add, Andrew? Andrew: You know what? We could just go on forever. But I think maybe we'll do one on each specific channel, in the future, I'd think it'd be good. Chris: Yeah. Great! Well, thanks very much for your time. That was "Get Fact Up", episode 68. And you're here with Andrew Groat and Chris Hogan from MeMedia, here at the Burleigh Heads Studio's on the Gold Coast. Cheers.

This episode is the the second in the series of interviews exploring how entrepreneurs scale up their Serviced Accommodation businesses. In this episode Chris interviews Graham Lindley as he talks through moving from being a mobile engineer to forex and crypto trading, and then finding his passion in Serviced Accommodation and Property. Chris and Graham then look at how the journey Graham has been seen him scaling up his Serviced Accommodation business, and how it has happened. Graham is managing director of Prim Short Stays in Nottingham, UK.   Show Notes: The Serviced Accommodation Podcast is a show brought to you by Chris Poulter and Ritchie Mazivanhanga aimed at new and experienced property investors alike. With each show we help you Start, Systemise and Scale your Serviced Accommodation Business. If you would like to ask us a question or discuss anything in this episode, please join The Serviced Accommodation Podcast Community on Facebook, and ask away. To listen to more episodes or get more information go to www.thesapodcast.com. Find out more about Graham’s business here: https://www.primshortstays.com/     Transcription: Chris: Hi, I am Chris. Graham:  And I am Graham. Chris: And welcome to the Serviced Accommodation podcast.   Chris: For continuing our series on scaling up and how to scale up your Serviced Accommodation business successful, today I am going to talk to Graham Lindley. So Graham, thanks for joining us. Graham:  Hi, thanks very much, it’s my pleasure. I have been listening since the beginning, so it’s quite strange to now be inside here. Chris: The strangest thing is when the podcast is released and you sat in your car listening back, and it’s like, that’s my voice. Graham:  Oh really. Chris: Yeah, I am sure. Graham:  I have got all that to look forward to. Chris: You do. Absolutely. So could you give our listeners just a little bit background on yourself, like where you kind of came from, from a profession, and where you are based in the country. Graham:  Okay. I live in Nottingham, being there around eleven years, after growing up in Kent. And I have been an engineer all my life, since I left school, in fact, I started when I was still at school — and that was very good, I enjoyed it very much. I was always in different places, meeting different people, whether a country man or a council or state, I always find a way of getting on with everyone, and really finding ways to help people and being resourceful. And so I was a mobile engineer with my van and that’s what I did. Chris: So when you say engineer; what type of engineering was that? Graham:  So I did security and fire, I guess the technical term would be a technician. In the trade we all call each other engineers. So for the first part I was mostly installing and then transitioned more towards maintenance side of it, so I didn’t really have to call around lots of space and things like that anymore. Chris: No, but at the same time I imagine like, diagnosing and repairing stuff is a lot more difficult than installing in the first place. Graham:  Yeah. Really it was the thing of diagnosing and fault finding was something that I did excel at and that is a matter of just breaking things down and working out process of elimination, really. If you have got a huge fire system of course, a massive factory, with a random fault in it you can just keep breaking the system down into half and then walk out where the fault is and then go to that half and split it again — you know, it is possible. And I think once you get the idea of how to find faults then really you can apply that to anything, and that’s something I had really try and teach my apprentices was, focus very much on the process not on the kind of particulars; if that makes sense. So you can then apply that skill to any system, whether you have seen it or not before — you can compare working parts with non-working parts and just work out where the fault lies. So yeah, that was something I enjoyed doing but it also meant I had more time on the road and a lot of people wouldn’t like that, but for me, if I had to go and help someone on an installation I would really notice actually being on site for ten, twelve hours, something like that, and then a little driving at the side of the day. I had noticed the difference really in the fact that I couldn’t listen to all my podcast in audio but a lot of sites now have banned earphones, so even doing that was impossible. So for years I have been doing the job that I could do and to be honest with you, I had got to the highest point I could without then going more office based or more managerial, and I kind of knew it was something I had always done and so I could do it easily but not necessarily something I always wanted to carry on doing. So I kind of consciously decided to plateau, I guess, and have that quite nice space in the fact that, I was entrusted and I did do a good job and I did the very best I could, but it allowed me to focus a lot of time or mental energy — at least — on other things — my real passions — and that was initially a lot of forex trading, and stocks and shares, crypto, and later I have got into property and that’s when I really found my true passion. So listening to business development podcasts and various audio books, I really started to kind of get an idea that that’s what I wanted to do and it certainly wasn’t going to be carrying on being an engineer, and I couldn’t see myself starting my own business in that field either because it’s quite a mature market and you have to start very small, you know, it would take a good ten years, I think, to start scaling in that industry I was in. So yeah, that’s where property really started to make a lot of send to me. Chris: So when did you first become interested in property then? Graham:  I have always been interested in property: definitely. I mean my dad certainly always was. And I made a big mistake and I bought my first home, it must have been around ’06/’07, I spend a lot of money doing (it out). And then we just moved to Nottingham, we weren’t that familiar with the areas and it turned out to not be a great area and we weren’t very there at all. And we put it on the market and the end we just wanted to get out of there, I mean I briefly consider renting it out but we just wanted to wipe our hands off it, so we sold it for a loss. And then went into renting, supposedly just for six months. And five years, I am (certain), I think (the one after), you know, trying to kick myself away from what the value would have been, what my mortgage would have been if I had put tenants in. So it did turn out to be a really good thing and they do say everything for a reason and certainly I won’t be where I am or living where I am now if I hadn’t made that decision but yeah, in the end it was six years of being in rented — which initially, you know, it was very nice, but once we had started a family and we wanted to settle and I only wanted to focus on the business, it didn’t make much sense. The actual trigger for really deciding to become a property investor and focus some more time on that space was… I guess was really be committed to being a successful-professional forex trader and I was spending a lot of time on self-discipline, on proper strategy — that was my root financial freedom, as I thought. But also the guy, my mentor, the guy that I was learning from, he was maybe thirty-six/thirty-seven, gone fully grey from the stress, sitting in front of six PC monitors for twelve hours a day — you know, it would be a Sunday afternoon; his family would be out, having a barbecue he would be preparing for the markets to open the next day. And I am starting to think, you know, I am not really sure this is the future kind of future I want. And my wife asked me a funny question — she was reading some book — and she said; “what is it you are doing when you lose track of time, because that’s where your true passion is?” And I didn’t much over it, I was just thinking yeah, forex, but only when I am winning, when I am not I am kind of getting up at 01:00 AM to check the yen against the dollar and you know it wasn’t healthy. So we got offered single buy to let property, and at the time I didn’t know about property education, I didn’t know about the courses, and didn’t know a lot really. However, I knew it was something that we wanted to do and we were still at the time, so I was a strange. When I spoke to the broker he said well, there is not many people that don’t own their own home already and they are trying to get into buy to let, in fact, there was only two lenders that would even consider us — Natwest being the one that we went with. And yeah we got offered buy to let, and that was, I nearly bought a dud actually, my whole strategy was going to be buying twenty percent below market value — I think I might have heard something someone was doing — and my way of doing that was going to be finding what had been on Rightmove for the very longest and of course I had been the most desperate, so I am more likely to accept an offer. And I thought I had found a gem and I would start to hold it up in my head that I was going to be buying it at a twenty percent below, I didn’t even consider that you might not want to go for that. But my main concern was why I hadn’t been on the market so long, I really thought it was a Call KA, and you know, I had accepted at face value what the agent was telling me for rental figures. And yeah, I was just putting up the word about, you know, I was speaking to people saying, look, I am going to be going into property, I want to get a buy to let. And having that random conversation with someone he said to me, very randomly, I think there is something going on at Trent bridge cricket ground at the business centre there, I think it was a property event on tonight, you ought to pop along. So I went down to that — and I guess technically that was my first property meeting — but it was out on by state agents and really they were just talking about the state of the property market — this was 2015 — and I found it very interesting. And I just reached out to a guy, he was in a suit, and I said, I am looking at getting into property — I have seen a property I think it’s call KA, I am not sure entirely why it’s still in the market. He said, “you know what, I love looking at property, (focus on viewing), and I am just going to come down and join you, you know, I will just do that”. It really was a nice thing for him to do. And he came down, and he pointed out a lot of defects. And a year later, I found all his notes that he had given me and he was absolutely right and everything he was saying was just… I understand why I would have done very badly if I had went for that. So, well forwards, we got a different property: bought well. And we got quite lucky, we bought one that was (Hecks) house and association, and it was just a matter of treating a state agent professionally as potential business partners almost, if you are buying property you are going into business with that person, so having respect for conversations with them and also involving the when you are doing viewings. And I was doing that and I think we had already kind of made enough to own a place because I am naturally (knee jerk) because of them, and then I thought hang on, let’s just see what else is out there, we went for another viewing, mentioned the (impulse) that we were scaling up and we were going to be buying our portfolio, just telling the agent everything they needed to hear. To then say, I might have something you are going to be interested in, it’s not gone on the market yet but we have just put the sign on the outside and the neighbours asked for a viewing, I am going there now and I said, “I am coming with you.” It was great, (Hecks) housing and association. Fuchsia pink all over. It hasn’t been touched since the seventies, and yeah, very good price. So we had the agreement and principle done, we had the deposit proof of funds on the desk of the agent by 09:00 AM that next morning, they couldn’t really go to market with t at that point, so we didn’t have to complete. And as I understand it was about two hundred investors that are after this (Hecks) housing and association properties, where they are offloading their old stock and buying newer stuff, and so we were very lucky there. So yeah, well forwards, it took a while to get through conveyancing, throughout that whole time I was on eBay and I had gone through every night and buying stuff that I thought I would need for the renovation. I was an engineer, I had a big van, I had tools, and we had the company van as well, so it meant we could quickly — if we sort of (bargain) — go and get stuff. I think the best part was we got a brand new bathroom suite from B&Q, it was the guy that bought it, left it in the garage, didn’t need it. Put it on eBay with a spelling mistake and we got the whole lot for thirteen pound, just amazing. The next first thing we got a second hand kitchen, but it was a high-end kitchen, with grounded worktops, appliances included — that cost £250. And then we sold the old one which was horrible, 1970’a kitchen; we just though you know what, we will try it on Gumtree for a hundred pound, someone bought it. And then we are just going to use it in the garage, you know, art studio, and for them it was perfect. So net it was a hundred and fifty pound grounded worktop kitchen. But at the time I knew, I had no concept of leverage or anything like that, I did all the work myself, so I was working every day and then going to the property at night, working from 05:00/06:00 PM till 10:00 or 11:00 PM — annoying the neighbours — and yeah, it was hard gruelling work. Chris: Was it annoying the neighbours who wanted to buy the property? Graham:  Maybe that’s why they gave me such a hard time. Chris: Possibly. Graham:  No, I was pretty respectful, but it was hard work, and I would probably age myself five years during that process. I got to the point where I was actually resenting the property, I was going in and just feeling empty; it was horrible. My wife thankfully… I just wanted to sell it, it wasn’t even ready and I said look, let’s just put it on the market I have had enough. And we had an agent man that said look, you at ninety-nine percent, just finish it and then we would value it properly. And my wife said look, you didn’t do this to sell it and really after legals, forget home under the armour, when you look at what you are going to make after everything, even though we had only spent maybe four grand (£4,000) and had done everything, and we have made a very nice home for someone. We won’t have made much money at all, it certainly wasn’t worth all that effort I had gone through, and she said look, this isn’t why you did this, it was to start in your property journey so let’s just it, find a tenant. So thankfully we did that, it took us two months, we were very (fassy), more (fassy) than we needed to be, but of course it was our precious first ever property. Chris: Absolutely. Graham:  So we got a couple of teachers and then we went for a year. That was nice actually. And after that whole endeavour, I had totally had enough of properties though, we got tenants in and I was like forget about that for at least a year, let’s see what happens to the market and I will start thinking about it; the (tiling) for next year. And that was my time to really then start getting into forex and really double down and focus very hard. The biggest thing I have got out of that was the self-discipline. My mentor, he did meditate before even looking at any charts in the morning, he was very, very disciplined and focused and so I really kind of started to develop that side of myself, which I had never known before — to be honest with you — and that was really useful. So I was really trying hard to be a very successful forex trader, and I wasn’t losing a lot to be honest with you but I was really trying to hone my skill before putting any significant amount of money in, but whether you are twenty pounds down or twenty grand (£20,000) down, I think once the emotions kick in they are very, very dangerous. So I was just learning to try and separate decision making from emotions. And I think the truth is I wasn’t really enjoying it and my wife asked e the question of; where do you lose track of time the most? And I wanted to answer forex but I didn’t really know the answer. Coincidentally, that night I had seen on meetup.com, a weird thing I had never heard of before, it said property networking event — I was like not really so interested in that but I am quite interested in listening to the guy that retired in his early thirties using other people’s money. I thought well, he is either a corny man or he has got something that I could learn, so let’s go and hear him. And I would never forget, I said to my wife, you know what, it says networking from 09:00, I will be home just after 09:00, I am not interested in all of that. And I went along and it was quite a forced thing, there was the ringing of bell every couple of minutes and making you go and talk to someone else. Chris: Be networking… Graham:  I had never known anything like it, and you know what, I met some really good people, some people that hadn’t gone into property, so I had advice to offer them and people that had been in it twenty years and twenty plus properties, and I loved it, I absolutely loved it. I met some good people, I met a plumber that I was getting on really well with him and you know people have been on these courses and I was arguing with them, you know; why would you do that. When that can be out towards a deposit and they were arguing with me saying well, how long I it going to take you to save another deposit before you can buy another property. And that’s how far detached I was with being a real property investor. But the guy, you know what, the guy spoke — he was good — I wanted to say hi to him, there was a couple of people I wanted to follow up conversation with, afterwards. 11:00 PM we were getting kicked out of the bar, at 11:30 PM we were still kind of raveting on — to be honest with you. And I was really energized, I was buzzing, and I went home and say, I know where my true passion is, I lost track of time and I could have talked all night with those guys, though I have never met before and it was all around property. And I really knew my passion from there on, and in fact, this is it, this is what I am going to be doing, and it was very nice to have that kind of inspiration, if you like. Chris: Yeah, definitely. So you kind of find your direction and in terms of property; and what was it really that attracted you to SA, you know, how did you go from this point where you go right this is what I want to do to actually establishing Serviced Accommodation, would sit you write well? Graham:  There was a guy that actually was doing a thing called Serviced Accommodation, not really heard of but I have heard of Airbnb, so I kind of understood it. We have been doing Airbnb from our spare room at times, it wasn’t something we enjoyed doing, but my grew up in a guest in New York and so for her it was always kind of a dream to go back to that, whereas for me that was just a nightmare that I do lots of strangers in your home and I was just not ever enjoying that, whereas Airbnb can be a bit more picky and choosy, enquiry only, for example, I was travelling a lot for work so we did have women only if we let it out at all while I was away. And so I was exposed to that and then I had met a guy that was doing it more professionally, I just assumed with his own property. And I was aware of this thing that everyone at the time was doing rent-to-rent and HMOs, and it was quite funny actually because I had heard about that when it first… Well, when I first heard about it, it was getting going in London quite big and it was around 2013, and my mind-set is to show mind-set shift, at the time I just thought I went on too late, these people are already doing that, you have to be the first, otherwise, no point. And that’s where my head was out at the time. And a while forwards, years and years, and everyone is talking about rent-to-rent, I am like oh yeah I know what that is. And I don’t really know, I don’t know if it’s arrogant, but I thought I had a brainwave, I thought I had a really good idea that no one else had had, what about if you combine these two strategies: rent-to-rent, but instead of putting HMOs, what about rent-to-rent for Serviced Apartments. And I spoke to someone, I then got to go another couple of networking events and I said to someone, oh I have got this idea and they kind of laughed at me, and they went yeah that’s what everyone is looking to do, I was like oh okay, cool, cool, cool. So that was it. I will go back to an agent I met — the guy who first helped me out with that property I nearly bought — me and him kept in touch, I involved him in the buying of the successful purchase and the renovation, in fact, I invited him around when it was complete so I could show him everything and also he had me help him. He had a couple of offices and I did security lamp, CCTV, that kind of thing, so we got a business relationship going on and so that was good and keeping in touch, and we enjoyed each other’s company. I do remember being at one of his offices and doing a repair, and (seeding) of the Serviced Accommodation thing, I said have you heard of this thing that people are doing and he said that sounds similar to the corporate lets, but you know that sublettings are kind of not allowed and it’s definitely frowned upon, I said oh yeah, I know. But I didn’t really move it forwards from there. Well forwards many months and I get a phone call from him, I was his go to guy I guess and looking back — having now read Daniel Priestley’s book –his key person of influence within anything that was technical. And he had just acquired a block of apartments, just four apartments, and he was going to be giving the block management. And he asked me, he phoned me up, and he said look; what’s going to be my requirement for fire safety? And I said what have you got? And he explained. And I said you know what, it would be easier if I come down and meet you in person. Chris: Of course it will be. I’ll have a look! Graham:  Yeah, brand new renovation in a listed building, not in the market yet, four high-end one bed apartment. I thought yeah, you know what, I am going to pop down. So I went down in the afternoon and I had a look round and it really was stunning — very, very nice, oak everywhere, massive windows; very, very central in Nottingham; fantastic location, and yeah the place was stunning. And I said to him you know what, I am interested. And he said “what do you mean?” Is everything alright Graham? If you didn’t split up with your wife, why do you want a one-bed flat in the centre of the town? I said no, no, no, I am interested in taking the block. And so he kind of looked at me and he… I was a little bit gone out to be honest with you; to let you know no offence, eighteen months ago you were about to buy your first dod property; and now this? I was like yeah, you know, Serviced Accommodation; do remember that thing I was telling you about? So he was the first challenge, to honest with you, and my knee-jack thing was to phone that guy I had met at that very first networking event that was doing that thing called Serviced Accommodation, and he very quickly recognized it as a good opportunity and was right in my house that night. And actually we met with the agent quite quickly afterwards and you know what, he did a very, very good job of… He had been on the courses, he knew what he was doing and it just was getting going and he is very, very prepared, and he did a perfect job of convincing the agent that it was first of all a legitimate thing to be doing with the building but second of all, it was actually the better thing to be doing with that property, it would have worked better as SA a it would have worked under AST, which the owners were looking at. So that was fantastic, you know, the idea was to be doing some form of JV, it didn’t end up working out mostly because the guy really had to focus on his own properties which was quite a sensible thing and that was he advice he had received at the time from his mentor. Now, I also saw the importance of having a mentor, and I wasn’t sure about doing the course, so I bypassed doing the course and I actually reached out to Mark Stokes — at the time he was quite heavily involved in Serviced Accommodation — and I said to him; would you mind mentoring me on the side? And from there that was very useful and I was getting to learn a lot. And the way I have always been is I do real deep dive in any subject. I would never forget; I wanted  to buy s mountain bike, I had spent three months researching, I had to know about every single component, every single (back) on the market, the price points, the pros and cons, everything — and that’s just how I am, and of course then started my journey into Serviced Accommodation really. And it was a bit of a blessing really, the owners weren’t too interested, they (popped) some cash in this big block and their main focus was on their business which needed their attention, so nothing was happening for months actually; however, the agent was fully on board and was representing us, he was the guy selling it to the owners, not us — and so that was very, very useful. Well forwards, I was probably at risk of being the most qualified bystander in all of Serviced Accommodation in the UK and every day I was working towards it, no matter what; whether it was researching, or testing software, or reading books, and I was really focused on business development, I wasn’t using this as a property strategy. And I think, looking back now that was a sensible thing to do and I think that’s possibly not what everyone in the space has done — they have got their single lets, they have got their HMOs, and then they have jumped into Serviced Accommodation as the next best thing to do. And possibly some people might not have the right mind-set around everything when taking that journey; whereas, I was very much focused on, okay we are going to be starting a business here; how do we do this successfully. And yeah, I was using the time very wisely but it took a very long time before we finally got that call the agents saying, “make yourself available 08:00 AM next week.” And Mark was kind enough to join me but it was like Alan Sugar’s boardroom and talking some very big successful guys about (capital allowances), it was a little but intimidating, so I was glad to have a partner by my side. And long story short, we got the block — they didn’t trust us — we had proper business plans and everything, we have done a lot work towards it and they could recognize that. Equally, I recognize that we were taking a chance, we really were. We hit the ground running, we opened up and we were prepared and did everything right, and very quickly we were getting very good reviews and getting a good turnover. And we got offered quite quickly — by the guy we nearly did a JV with — another property. Chris: Yeah, I did say what’s quite interesting there was these three key events which kind of happened prior to getting going which some people would call luck, but I think if you examine closely, it’s not really luck at all, it’s kind of point yourself out there and being in the right place at the right time. The first of all was being saved from buying the (dead, few at first) buy to let property. And you could say yeah, it stroke a lot but at the same time if you hadn’t been in that network building, if you hadn’t put yourself out there you wouldn’t meet the person that you then come along and say, actual you need to worry about this. Similarly with the agent who kind of brought you your first single let property, it was kind of lucky, but again if you hadn’t been there, if you hadn’t been putting yourself out there, talking to the agents, being in that position with then when they said oh yeah, I got this one, you know, you might be interested in, then it would happen. And very similarly with when the block came through; exactly the same situation, if you hadn’t been building that relationship, maintaining that relationship with that person over time then it just never would have come through, really. And I think it just highlights the importance in property, it’s a cliché to say but it’s completely a people business; isn’t it. Graham:  One hundred percent, yeah. Chris: You know it’s not about (a person motto) at all, it’s completely about people. Graham:  Yeah, a hundred percent. Even we didn’t talk about tenants but a big part of my success was is having really good tenants and looking after them. So yeah, it’s definitely a people business. Chris: Yeah, absolutely. So when you kind of started out then, what was this thing that you struggled with the most — do you think? Graham:  Initially, when I was still working, my hand was fun… Chris: Struggle when you were running full properties. Graham:  Full properties and a full time job which was very demanding, there were long-long hours, I was doing sometimes eighty hours a week. A lot of those hours where on the road, I could make phone calls, but my hand was forced quite quickly to get help, so, it was a struggle but it was also what I needed, it was a kind of blessing really. Chris: One of those blessings in disguise is what it’s like because you can’t do everything yourself, you are then forced to kind of leverage early; right. Graham:  Absolutely. So I found a UK based VA, and I was struggling to find one. Again, my wife was instrumental in helping me find my first VA. And she persuaded me to reach out to a contact in London who was growing a multi-million pound, massive, very successful business. And she said, “why don’t you ask Lauren?” And I said well, we are at very different places, I am not really sure he is the best person to ask. But you know what I did; and he said my very-very best PA has left, very annoyingly she has left to have a baby and she has now had a baby and is wanting to start working from home which I can’t do, I need someone in the office in London; and so why don’t I connect you. And I said, thank you very much. And so that was Emma, so Emma joined us very-very early, initially just for a few hours a week, and it was research and it was this and it was that, and quite quickly I got her trained up on some of the software we were using, and it became a more regular position for her, and she enjoyed it. And it was something different for her — she had always been a PA — PA’s are fantastic at organizing things. However, she always wanted to double check everything, which was fine, you know, I was available in the phone most of the time, so having that job and being able to do it quite easily because I had always done it, allowed me to have the mental capacity to say well do this, now do that, and I almost micromanaged but it meant I had someone there available — and that went very well. So that was that was the struggle. I am trying to think of something else but that was probably the main thing at the time. Absolutely. Chris: Yeah, because I mean you were quite well prepared. I love that phrase: “the most qualified bystander” and all of those accommodation. Because you basically spend about a year working on that deal before it came to a (finish). Graham:  Probably a good nine months. And really towards the end actually, certainly by the time mentor, I mean during that process as well we actually bought our first home, so that was going on, I renovated that, I had learned the concepts of leverage and using other people’s time while I was going off at doing what I was good at. And also we had got our second buy to let as well by refinancing the first one with the added value. So by doing all that work myself in the first place, it did build in the value, and so, looking back it was the right thing to do but it’s not something — I am not sure — I would like to do it again, if I am honest. Chris: So the three stages that we talk about like start, systemize, scale, so you obviously got started, it sounds like very early on you had to start leveraging and to leverage you really need the systems in place; don’t you? Graham:  Yeah. Chris: That was absolutely key if you are going to be working with other people, you are not just handing responsibility over to someone, you are putting the systems in place, you are plugging the right people into those systems and then you are kind of monitoring their performance on them. So at what point did you then start scaling the business from these four guaranteed rent properties you have taken on? Graham:  Well, very-very quickly actually, the guy that we nearly did the JV with, he introduced me to a landlord, at the time he was at full capacity himself and this other landlord he needed some investment in the property, he needed furnishing and decorating — nothing too major — but he didn’t have any. And it was his first buy to let, he was a London investor and he had had experience with Serviced Accommodation, so he knew what he wanted to do, and he needed help bringing it to standards which we were in a position to do. However, my whole conversation was around how much rent do you want, and he just didn’t want to do that. So he wanted the reward from Serviced Accommodation, that’s why he wanted to do Serviced Accommodation. So really, we ended up doing management for him, and looking back we did actually set it up perfectly, he was an accountant by trade anyway, and it was a very simple management contract. But yeah with the gentleman’s agreement on the side, you know, of a zero percent loan, so you get going, so that loan was going to get paid back from the income of running it as a Serviced Apartment. Chris: And what party was that to, was that from you to him to get it going or…? Graham:  Yes. Chris: Okay, cool. Graham:  And so, it was very quickly, we were adding some portfolio, I think that was within the first couple of months. In fact, I think we had only just gone live when I first met him, I remember him coming, I did an introduction and showed him around our first block, and we had literally just furnished it and started getting guests at that point, so it was very-very early, we were adding to it. So very quickly, I recognised the importance of systemizing and I knew that was going to be essential. I have got another friend who was local to me in Nottingham, who was growing a very-very successful business completely separate, they are coders, they are in the games industry. But he put a book unto me, The E-myth. For him, as a developer, it’s what he needed to stop developing and look at the high picture, and look at the chaos around him, and starts putting things in order, and from there that’s when his business started getting successful. So he said to me right from the get go, read this book and follow it — and really if you have not read it, it’s about really the franchise model and looking at what’s good about that, lost franchises succeed, most small businesses fail, and the main difference is the fact that franchises are systemized, you are buying a system and that is a set of instructions really. And if you are to break your business down and everything you do in that down into a set of instructions, then you can start to then give those instructions to others. And so I had to do that very early, I had no choice. And that’s where we started to really build our own systems and processes and found our way of doing it. I had someone build me a flow diagram, I showed them everything I was doing, and they build me a flow diagram of — we called it guest work flow — and from initial enquiry all the way through to check out. And you know what, there were so many kind ifs and buts, you know, if it was an Airbnb, can we do this; and if it was a high value (booking), can we do that — and there was a lot of variables. And I also very quickly realized the flow diagram was not the best way of doing it. For example, if a guest and we have to 4.1 in the flow diagram and then no action to take for three months, you know, how are you going to record where they are on that journey and trigger the next action? And so we looked at alternatives and that’s where, really, I started to build something and teach it to Emma and have her run it for me. And so yeah, that was how we got going for the whole systemization. Chris: That’s cool. I think when we started working together; do you remember you have the four properties on the block plus one on the management, and you were going a bit crazy at that point looking (at those) different stuff, where you going to have a look at a hotel when we first had our meeting? Graham:  Yeah. I got to know a property sourcer who is based in Manchester and he had a contact that was struggling with a very small boutique hotel, near Manchester airport. And, I thought yeah, you know; why not? Chris: In fact, it’s a couple of hours journey, yeah, whatever. Graham:  Yeah, sort of that. Don’t worry. He was quite local too, where it was located, and it would have had an office space which was what he needed — so he was going to be my guy on the ground. So there was some logic around it, like teach him the systems and the processes, and actually I was going to be sharing the management with him, and there was that, but also I had started to speak to some large property investors around my area in Nottingham. And one of them had muted the idea of just testing market with twenty-five studio apartments. And so, I was like okay, I need a mentor because my time with Mark is always going to be just three months — that was just to help kick-start me — and that was months previous really. And so at the time I was then thinking I need a mentor. And so, I was just thinking, okay, I need to say yes to everything but I don’t know how I am going to do it; we have got systems but they are not ready for this amount of scale — we can’t go from five to thirty apartments in one hotel. One of which was in Manchester. So I reached out to Chris after listening to the podcast and after hearing him advocate management which by the way really started to recognize the benefits of that. Because everything we were doing was scalable, our systems were scalable, our processes were scalable. But also, I had been advised against taking the block because it was a big risk to take on the liability — you know, for me and my wage, it was more than what I was earning, so if it didn’t work, it was going to be very-very costly, especially after buying my own property. So I did recognize that that sort of things was not scalable. And so management landed in my lap, if you like, and from there I recognized it as being a much more scalable strategy. Yes, we (are making) less per property of course, but yes it was scalable. So my mind was on that, I then was listening to this podcast and I heard about how great management was from you, Chris, I remember I reached out to you and said look, I have ended up doing management and I would like to learn a bit more about it, and also I am not sure I am going to kind of take on all these new properties that are coming my way. So I still remember, it was here in Heathrow actually, first ever board room session with other operators. And the advice was quite strong, Manchester does not sound like a good idea at all. And there was a few red flags around it, which I was maybe glancing over. Chris: Yeah. The key one I remember was that the guy who was still going to be living on site and that to me sounds like an absolute nightmare because when you do management, there is got to be a real clear distinction, what the roles are and who is doing what. If your person is still living on site, then clearly you are going to get involved and basically with everything that you are doing, so that was the biggest one for me. But there are some other ones around it, (not a list of all) like I say, Nottingham to Manchester is not a short journey, it’s not very close and having had experience running hotel before, it’s not very much fun. You are going have to be doing quite a lot of work around it, very hands-on, even hands-off hotels were remarkably hands-on, so there is a lot of stuff to do around there. So I think that was kind of clear, kind of realigning of focus a little bit and obviously you realize that scaling up using the management model was going to be the way to go for you. Now, generally, the challenge with management is… Although the model works brilliantly for you, as a management business; it works brilliantly for like an operator, developer, landlord — at the same time it’s a lot harder to kind of come across the deal; isn’t it. Because you are having to push people a lot out  of their comfort zone to kind of understand how it works, compared to; oh yeah just give me this and that rent each month. Instead of saying well, I am going to manage it for you, it can go up, it can go down, you are probably going to make more money, but at the same time you are then going to be the actual operator, so you have got some liability around that etcetera. Well, like I say that the management model is brilliant, the challenge most people have with scaling that up is; where do I find my clients? So how have you found your clients as you have scaled up the management model? Graham:  Well, it was actually a long while, so although we went from four to five very quickly, going beyond five took a long time and it was — I am trying to think really — it was a random comment on one of the Facebook groups, and it was an operator in London asking for cleaners in Nottingham. And so I reached out then I just asked how I could help, and they explained that they were actually trying to help someone else that was doing rent to rent in Nottingham. And so that’s how I got introduced to another London investor, this time instead of buying property in Nottingham he was renting property in Nottingham to run serviced accommodation. So I met him and he had actually been using another agent and they already had one property of his and then he acquired a second property –giving them the keys — and it had taken a month for not much had happened and he was getting frustrated. He met me on the Saturday, on the Monday we had contracts drawn up and signed, and by Friday we were furnished and live, and Saturday night we got out first guest, so he was very-very happy with that. Chris: No messing around then. Graham:  That’s it just kind of being ready to just absolutely hit the ground running, you know, and I guess that’s where having systems really helps as well; step one do this, step two do that. To be fair, the on boarding process — as I call it — was chaotic, but everything else was just what we were already doing, so that bit was quite easy. It came naturally and I also had people that could do that and I could focus on the on boarding. But yeah, in my mind, probably a bit more chaotic that it should have been and it’s a bit like oh yeah we need to do that definitely. So I was already thinking this needs systemizing. But from there we got to know another operator who was also using another agent, the same other agent, and yeah, they weren’t doing the very best job actually and although they have been growing for about a year on a block of apartments, the actual owner of the apartments haven’t really made much money. And the difference in the way that we structured, you know, complete transparency, and almost an open policy versus the setup he had, it looked like a breath of fresh air. Furthermore, the owner, he was a developer, he wanted to focus on development, he had a team in place to help with the development, although he had given the block to a management agency. A lot of his resources and time was continued to be used on looking after his block, and it’s because the agency was in a completely different part of the country, trying to manage something in Nottingham. Chris: And that’s a fundamental issue with the national management companies; isn’t it? It’s actually very hard to have people on the ground and to have the same level of local knowledge with a local business. Graham:  Yeah, a hundred percent. So issues with cleaner, you need to find a new cleaner (please). You know, light bulbs going in the bedroom, a cleaner can’t reach; do you want us to send the call-out engineer, a hundred and forty pounds, or do you want to go down and sort tell light bulb and you know, it just comes through things like that. And then with the potential, I would say, just lack of clarity around other things as well. I guess my introduction to him was a breath of fresh air for him and it was just what we needed as well, I was already kind of getting to the point where it was going to be handing my (notice in) at work. And so, it all happened together to be honest with you, we went from six properties to me handing in my (notice in) and on boarding another seven properties and it all happened very quickly. From there we also got the second property from the first guy as well. So yeah we were then really putting our systems to the test and on boarding more staff at that point as well, we had separated out the companies of course — operations with the first block and management — and that happened quite a bit earlier actually. Chris: You mentioned like creating your job there, so that was something you have been putting off for a while; what impact do you think that had on your growth? Graham:  Yeah, massive. And I think it changed from; can I do everything? To should I be doing everything? So yes, I could do everything, I could have a full time job but I was at work for twelve to fourteen hours a day and run as successful business because of having the help and people, the very-very good people. Emma by now, by the way you know she had come on to working six hours per day, I think at that point, and she was a very-very high standard, high calibre. Initially her only weakness wasn’t really a weakness, it’s where she has always been a PA and she just want to double check things  and that’s what being a PA is; should I do this, should I do that? And entrusted her, I said look, this is your thing. And I guess for me, going back to the whole fault finding, when things went wrong it wasn’t a matter of like whose fault was it, it was more like well, which bit of this system is broken, and how can we stop that happening again. Chris: I think that’s really critical. Most people when something goes wrong they inclination is to kind of blame someone. My first question is; what didn’t we do which would have stopped this from happening? As opposed to it’s this person’s fault. So if you have a cleaner that doesn’t turn up at your property, for instance, to create that massive problem in an SA business — now, most people turn on to blame the cleaner and go… Graham:  Well, we had it happen. Chris: Yeah, absolutely, and that’s the thing. The correct response to that is okay; what haven’t I done which would have stopped this from happening and it might be that you didn’t have clear enough communication around, when you didn’t give the assistance to make it very-very easy, to see exactly what it is, you didn’t have the confirmations in place so that you knew a hundred percent that they knew about it etcetera. And it’s a very different response, of course, in way that’s kind of a natural because that kind of human nature just wanting to blame someone straight away. But once you kind of take that step back and start looking at things like that, you start developing your business very quickly; don’t you. Graham:  You have got to take responsibility and that’s it, it’s your business, it’s your responsibility, and it’s your fault if something goes wrong like maybe it’s the wrong person role but… Chris: But you appointed them in that role. Graham:  Who appointed them? Chris: It’s definitely your mistake. Graham:  Have you given them clear instructions then ask them to follow them and have they gone against those. And if they have gone against them, is it because you haven’t trained them well enough. So it might be the person but most of the time it’s not, actually. You know, that cleaner that did forget a second time as well, and that’s ends being a (full wave) onto the guest and moving yet if you can; it’s really embarrassing. But yeah we have got much more solid systems around the turnarounds now, things cannot get missed, and if it looks like they may have been missed, we have got four hours warning and everyone in the company is getting alerted to the fact that maybe we have got a cleaner that is not of the cleaning today. And so it’s very-very… Good systems we have got around that and those only come off the back of something going wrong, otherwise we would have just carried on, we (are) just letting them know when their cleans were, without any feedback knowing that they were aware of the cleaning the first place and knowing that they (off from) site. Chris: Yeah, I think that kind of feedback in the business is critical, whether it’s things going wrong, whether it’s listening to your guests, listening to your staff as well, of course, but that feedback is critical to really grow and improve your businesses into. Graham:  Yeah, absolutely. Chris: There is one thing I just wanted to pick up there. And with management you have really got two kind of different (avatars): one is focusing on people within — you might call it the property education community, the people who are kind of active and involved in what we are doing like this — and the other is people who are more kind of traditional landlords and developers. Now, how will your clients spot between those two and how do you find those two different (avatars) to work with? Graham:  Actually, I think the first avatar, as you call it, the guys that are in the industry already, that’s word of mouth, people get to know. And that developer that moved over to us he did a lot of due diligence with us and I think people really trusted him and of course then got his feedback as well — we had done a good job and that did reach other people. And actually coincidentally, that first guy that I was going to be doing a JV with ended up being one of our clients, it was great for us and it was great for him. And that’s what real business is about, it’s creating win wins, and Serviced Accommodation is a win, win, it can be a win for the property owner, a win for the guests — getting much nice accommodation than hotels — and it’s a win for us, as much more it can be a much better cash flow strategy. And that for me is a real win, win and that’s where real business is. And so creating ways for other operators to come to us, to leverage our systems and our team, to then really help them kind of focused on what they want to do — whether it is acquiring more Serviced Apartments or focusing their other businesses or their other property strategies — really by enabling that connection to happen and finding a way that it really will be to the true mutual benefit, that’s where we have grown a lot to be honest with you. So we have had four, I guess… Other operators join us now as clients, which is great. Yeah, working with the landlords is… We don’t really do any marketing, I mean we are getting a big and better name for ourselves now, and so we are becoming the kind of go to guys within Nottingham. So it’s much more about personal connections rather than random marketing to be honest with you. Chris: Yeah. And what has been your experience with the developer market; has that been something hard to break into? Graham:  Yes. Quite often because a lot of developers in Nottingham are building to sell right now, and you can’t blame them with the (passes) they have been getting, and actually if they are building to keep, they are then looking to refinance off the back of that and so it’s more difficult to then convince there lenders that Serviced Accommodation is a legitimate way of kind of having this work. And you see, because we are not offering any sort of guaranteed rents to developers, they really then kind of struggle. So yes, it needs much bigger developers to be honest with you; who don’t need to finance out of the back of each deal and can park some cash, or have got better and bigger relationships with lenders. Chris: Yeah. And if my understanding is right, so you haven’t done any deals with developers outside the property education community, so far, but you have been working on these relationships for a few years now and you have got stuff now coming up the pipeline; is that right. Graham:  Yeah, absolutely. We have got two blocks of sixteen apartments in different areas of the city. Chris: That’s sixteen each block. Graham:  Sixteen each. Yes. And we have got another block coming, it’s really early days but it will be a block of twenty-eight, we will get first (refuse) the number of apartments we would want to take in that block — and again, at a completely different part of the city. And so I think we will definitely be taking fourteen there because of the way he building is split, but we are going to be able to adjust the market there and potentially take more from that point as well, even if some go to (YST). But those relationships take a long time and I think developers will tell you their deals take a long time, a lot longer than they anticipate as well. So whether that’s the acquisition, the legals, or the kind of planning process, or even getting contract as on site to then finishing the site. Everything takes much longer than anticipated. One of those blocks of sixteen was going to be ready before Christmas and it’s isn’t now, here we are in June, six months. So it’s just a couple of weeks away, so we will see on that one. Chris: So it sounds like the kind of process you have gone through scaling up, it has been working with other operators, helping local people who were already involved in SA, and then continuing those relationships of course. But starting to build the relationships with the developers, which is really going to then escalate and take the growth to another level, you know, if you are taking on blocks of sixteen to twenty-eight at a time, as opposed to maybe individual properties at blocks of four/five, that type of thing. Graham:  Yeah, absolutely.  But you see a lot of individual ones as well in much bigger blocks… Chris: More issues around it, isn’t it. (Free holes), neighbours, etcetera. Graham:  Access. And look it is where we are very much found above board and everything is being done right and so, if you are not meant to do it in a big block then just don’t do it, it’s not really worth it. Chris: There enough places out there which you can do it legitimately and it’s not worth the time, or effort, or money, which you are essentially going to waste if someone turns around and says, you can’t do this right. Graham:  Yeah. And look (Riggs) are coming, (Access Riggs) are going to be getting tightened up and you have got to be prepared for that. And I think doing SA where it’s not really allowed is going to be one of the first areas of attention from the authority, so it’s just not worth it. Chris: Brilliant. So you have kind of taken us through the whole journey and show people how you scaled up, which I think would be really useful for people to hear. So what would you say was the most important elements to start scaling successfully? Graham:  Definitely the systems and processes. I mean we were absolutely over (queue), initially, on our processes and our systems. I mean I remember showing someone and he said, “well, you have just got five properties and you are doing all that.” And it’s like yes, but this will handle fifty easily without even thinking twice, and really we just need to plug the staff in. And that really is breaking everything down into like, step one do this, step two do that. And all those variables and having that system in place where we have got accountability within it, we know who has done well and when, so if there was something that’s going wrong, we can go back and just have a look again at the training and so on and so forth. But also if we need to slot more staff in, we have systemized the training now as well, and so we can just add people, (as in when). Emma, she is ops manager now, so she is absolutely full time, plus, plus. Chris: But you say she is ops manager but kind of really, she is more of, almost, general manager (to help you out); isn’t she. She is kind of essentially running the business for you with some oversight from you I would say. Graham:  Yes, certainly more recently. I think initially she came on full time as ops manager but I think… Chris: It’s a role which is developed often, I have been absolutely critical with having one person who has that kind of responsibility for overseeing; right. Graham:  Absolutely. Chris: And it kind of almost started as a PA role and then it evolved into an ops manager and now it has evolved into a kind of general manager. Graham:  Absolutely yeah. So she is handling all the girls: the coms assistants, the bookkeepers. Although I have got a relationship within, they know I am very open, an easy to speak to guy. You know there, I don’t have much to do, if I am to be honest with you. Chris: You are not their line manager. Graham:  I am not their line manager. I mean I have a very much instilled company values of team work and we are all equal. I have taken my cleaners out to dinner, multiple times. We wouldn’t have a successful business if it weren’t for the cleaners doing a very-very good job in turning up. Chris: And most people only appreciate that, when they do a bad job and they see the impact it has on the business. So, it is really-really important when the staff (going well), and to also appreciate the importance they have in the business and then reward that when that’s having it’s impact on what you are doing. Graham:  Yeah. So systems but also the team work, it has been essential. Emma has had, I have asked her what she wanted, and we have created the wall around her family life and requirements. So it meant that she is much happier in her role, she is being more responsibilities all the time, but she is rising to the challenge (at hand); the amount of money she can earn also rises with that. So it is a good thing to have. And really instilling in everyone that if they have got good suggestions, make them, and if it’s an improvement, we are going to implement it across the business. Chris: So kind of feeding on from that; what advice would you give to someone who is scaling up their business? Graham:  I don’t want to keep saying systemizing. Chris: You can keep saying systemizing, that’s absolutely fine. Graham:  Well, how do you systemize? I guess that’s the question. Chris: Yeah. Graham:  It’s teach someone. Even if you have got no one to teach, maybe do a screen recording on your laptop and read out the instructions of what you are doing. Because actually you will find those little bits in your head that you are just doing them without much thought, and maybe you have got three ways of doing the same thing, and it depends which day of the week and what mood you are in, as to the one you are doing. So actually; what criteria would you do this or do that. And when you really break it down, I would say do ten minute videos, I aim to do lots of ten minutes videos and then you can even get a VA off People Per Hour or such like and get them to write a set of instructions from that video. And that’s the start of the systemizing, that’s getting it out of your own head and putting it into a process, do this if that, and so on and so forth. And that’s absolutely essential because if you are going to add staff as you start scaling, they need to know what to do. And so you can then start identifying the higher value stuff and the lower value stuff. You know how Emma is being instructed to leave most of the comms and focus on the high value stuffs, so when we have got guests requesting a late check-out, it’s a science — you go to the cleaners, and you check their schedule, you check the next check-in, and you speak to the guest. And that’s a science where there was great management, maybe that’s a bit more of an art, and that’s high value. Chris: Art-science; isn’t it. Graham:  Yeah. And so that’s a high value task. So we wanted to be able to focus on that without keep getting distracted about having an extra hour in the apartment. Chris: I think when we look at how you have been able to scale up that quickly, I think it has been three elements really, and it’s again the things that we always all about when we talk about leverage it, putting systems in place — and you have clearly had those basically from day one — and getting the right team around it with the right culture and the right attitude, and tell following up with the accountability. And again, a lot of the accountability with what you are doing comes from the systems you have in place: using things like Slack where you can communicate easily with the team, you can also see if something hasn’t been done, if there is a problem, etcetera. So it’s getting all the three elements right, which has allowed you to scale quite quickly; isn’t it? Graham:  Absolutely. Yeah. Definitely. Chris: Brilliant. Well, hopefully that has been very useful for everyone and thank you for joining us today Graham. Graham:  It has been my pleasure. Thank you very much indeed. Chris: Cheers.   Don’t forget to subscribe to the podcast, to hear the latest on Serviced Accommodation. If you are looking to start systemize or scale your serviced accommodation business, visit www.thesapodcast.com to see how we could help you further.    

So you want to be a better leader or manager? Have we got a show for you! On this episode Eva Attia, the Director of Retail Operations for Portland Roasting Coffee, is our guest. Eva is just an amazing professional and today she shares her insights & advice gained from 20 years of coffee retail management and leadership, 16 of which was spent at Pete's Coffee and Tea where she worked her way up from Assistant Store manager all the way to Director of Retail Operations. I was quite encouraged an energized by this discussion. Eva also gives us a list of 5 things she feels are the most important to practice if you want to be a great manager or leader.  1. Select Carefully 2. Treat People Differently 3. Have High Expectations 4. Show Courage 5. Put others before yourself   Buckle up and enjoy!   -Chris More show Notes are available at www.keystotheshop.com/resources  You can reach out to Eva via email: Eva@portlandroasting.com Or connect with Eva on Linkedin   John Maxwell: 21 Laws of Leadership Book: Situational Leadership  

On this episode we begin with The Producers Club birthdays and then move in to The Great Florean Fortescues Ice-Cream Debate from Chris More. In the news, we discuss the Universal land purchase, Mardi Gras, an introductory offer for Sapphire Falls, ticket price rise, Give Kids the World and Myth Explorer. We then head in to Jurassic Park with Maureen for another Autism at the Park. Travis calls us from Diagon Alley to tell us about Butterbeer Fudge, we then read some emails and wrap up with this months Universal Orlando ride audio. Check out all we have to offer. The Unofficial Universal Orlando Podcast. You can listen to us on the following platforms: Apple Podcasts  LIBSYN  STITCHER   SPOTIFY  Don't forget, if you're booking a trip to Orlando to give our friends at Mouse & Muggle a try. Planning your next trip to Universal Orlando or a Disney destination? Whether you're a mouse or a Muggle, Mouse & Muggle Travel Company can help make your next vacation simply magical! And their services are FREE to you! Just go to mouseandmuggle.com and fill out a no-obligation quote request to get started. Also go and give our podcast partners, The Theme Park Duo a listen, for all your West Coast info FOLLOW US ON :  FACEBOOK INSTAGRAM TWITTER PINTEREST

Nick joined musical director, supervisor, dance arranger and adaptor Gareth Valentine to discuss his work for the West End. We also welcome back Chris More to the MusicalTalk Studio.

Nick joins new presenter Chris More to discuss the new hit show in town: Sister Act. They also discuss Spring Awakening's early closure, Eurovision and The Producers in Germany.