Q & A Episode 18 - Overcoming the Beggars Can't Be Choosers Mentality
Episode #2 | Q&A with Mark D. Williams | Overcoming the Beggars Can't Be Choosers Mentality
In this Q&A episode of The Curious Builder Podcast, Mark jumps into the journey of transitioning from a "beggars can't be choosers" mindset to becoming a selective and niche builder. He emphasizes the importance of valuing your own time, setting boundaries, and knowing your numbers to identify and work with ideal clients. Plus, he shares personal insights on how to effectively navigate client relationships and the power of asking for help.
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About The Curious Builder
The host of the Curious Builder Posdast is Mark D. Williams, the founder of Mark D. WIlliams Custom Homes Inc. They are an award-winning Twin Cities-based home builder, creating quality custom homes and remodels — one-of-a-kind dream homes of all styles and scopes. Whether you’re looking to reimagine your current space or start fresh with a new construction, we build homes that reflect how you live your everyday life.
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Mark D. Williams 00:00
So I chose to come down to negotiate with the clients that fit into our schedule, right? It was at the perfect location. It was a good client, great designer, but at least I knew what I was doing, where, in years past, you wouldn't really be making that decision based on information or based on knowledge. You were making that decision based on your gut feel, which, honestly, your gut feel is usually pretty accurate too. But sometimes you get a little optimistic, and so you start saying yes to too many things, things you should really say no to.
Mark D. Williams 00:35
Welcome to cures builder Podcast. I'm
Mark D. Williams 00:36
Mark Williams. Your host today is Thursday's Q and A, and this a good one. How do you transition from Beggars can't be choosers mindset when accepting contracts, to being a highly selective and niche builder who is ready to identify your ideal client? And basically, I think what it is is like, how do you how do you get out of the beggars can't be choosers mindset, the client is always right to you know, you do great work, you charge accordingly, and you're working with your ideal clients. I think this is a golden question, that whoever wrote this, you could write a book on this, and I certainly wouldn't be the author of it. I would say that I think anyone who's an entrepreneur, regardless of what you do for a career, can identify with this statement. And and, you know, early on in your career, yeah, you chase everything. You know, I often liken it to, you know, golden retriever chasing a tennis ball down the road. Like you go everywhere that goes under a car. You go into the car, bounces on top of the car, you run in front of a car, like you do everything you can to get that ball. And you know, people would call you and you'd say, Yeah, I can come by later today. You know your time was just their time, and we have set such unreasonable expectations. I don't know if it's just building or remodeling or where that all came about, because I can't think of anything else where that's normal, other than, like an emergency room, which, you know, it's an emergency. And so, you know, you obviously pay very high premium for that as well. And so on top of all this incredible concierge service, they expect you to do it, or at least that's what they pay you early on, you know, not what your time is really worth. And I think that's one of the things. As you transition more and more in your career, you realize that that statement. I don't resonate with it, where the client is always right. I can't stand that statement. I think the intent behind it is okay, in the sense that, like you're we're obviously trying to make our clients happy. We obviously want to do a great job for them. But this idea that clients are always right, like others, very few always in anything, and it's certainly client is not always right. And so I don't like that expectation or that mindset from either side. I wouldn't want a client to think that they own you, that no matter what they say, that you do it like that's not going to be a good relationship. And as the builder, I don't think it's healthy for you to think the client's always right, either because you deserve to be paid for what you do. You deserve to, you know, be rewarded for the work that you do. And you know, most people, in my experience, are really hard workers. They're very diligent. They do a really good, you know, job at their craft. And I think they're very open minded. I think, as a client, those that ask for their builders help, oh, man, the customer service you get when you ask for help, and that goes both ways. I've asked clients for help too. I think it's incredibly empowering when you ask anybody for help. I've often argued that the word help is probably the most underused word in the English language, only because of how powerful it is. And I think there's a certain vulnerability that comes when you ask for help. And so people, I think it touches on people's humanity. I think they really respond really, really well to that, and if they don't, oh, man, that's a huge red flag, especially in a building relationship. And so I think if you're gonna transition away from chasing everything, it probably starts with you valuing your own time, I think when you realize that your time is valuable, not only for your other clients, but for yourself, your mental health, your well being, your family, you know, if you can't be present at home, you know if you're working nights and weekends all because your clients are sort of, you know, they say jump, and then you say, how high? Like, if that's your mindset, like, you're just going to get worn out, you know, you're not a rubber ball, and it's just not going to it's not going to end well. And so I think at some point you realize that in order for this career to be long lasting, you know, there has to be some boundaries. And I love this saying, you know, boundaries create freedom. And I know that some of the boundaries that I've put in place with help, mainly from my spouse and from those around me, that will prolong my career. And I think it's a little bit analogous to running a marathon versus, you know, 100 meter dash. You know, you can go all out for those. 910, seconds. You're an elite sprinter, but you are spent like you are done. And if you're running a marathon like you can't afford to put out that much energy, because this is a long duration. And I think home building is a lot like this. I mean, you are spending a lot of time in design. You are people don't talk actually enough about how much time is spent in pre con or pre construction, and I think as you gravitate up to the higher end homes, you need to allocate more and more time on the front end. And when there is more time in the front end, your build will be more successful. The actual build will be shorter in duration. The client is happier. Your team is happier. And it all starts with you as the builder, understanding your own limitations and really setting the expectations to win. I don't know why it took me so long to understand that it really was a detriment to my my team in the field. It was a detriment to me personally, and a detriment to the clients you know, they have a much better experience now, because rather than me telling them I like the saying that you can disappoint your client once, or you can disappoint them 100 times. And I often talk about that in terms of budgeting meetings like usually that first sit down is usually a pretty painful one. Things tend to be over budget. And so then you sit down and you say, Okay, here's what we've discovered in design, where would you like to go over mirrors, a very collaborative effort, and I think we talk about that letting the client know that it's likely we're going to have to make some decisions. So it's not a big scary thing, but it is something that you have to navigate together, versus you give them the answer that they want sign the contract and then for the next year, every single time you come back to them and say, Oh, by the way, this is more, by the way, this is more like, no one is going to enjoy that you as the builder are going to dread those interactions. The client is going to resent it, and it's just going to be a terrible bill. You're setting up the entire build for failure. And so I think, I think understanding your own numbers is huge. I think it's really, really important. As you get more and more sophisticated with especially with the software that's out there. You know whether using builder trend, whether we use a we use builder trend too, but we also use a company called adaptive to help us manage all our budgets. So knowing exactly where you're at is incredibly helpful, because if you are on firm footing, you can give your clients shocking, firm answers, real answers, a way to help direct them so they can make the best decision. You have to remember, you know, as builders like we've done this for, in my case, two decades. And you know, this is likely the homeowners, first time they've ever built the house like this is new to them. They haven't done this before, and I this is a lesson for myself. I need to be more compassionate and being more patient and and helping them understand, like I can walk them through the reasoning, walk them through the reasons why this, that and another thing. Because if I just assume that they know all the things that I know, it comes off a little presumptuous, and it comes off as entitled, and it's not coming off from a very good reason. So you're gonna, you're gonna have a bit of a friction with that client where you know, if you can obviously kind of go into it with more of an explaining, more of like a teacher role. I think that'd be really helpful to kind of win over those clients. I think too, you know, going back to the original question of, you know, how do you get away from Beggars can't be choosers, I think saying no, and for me specifically, has always been really hard. I usually say yes to everything, and I've taken a lot of small projects that eat up my team's bandwidth, because I feel like I need to do it for cash flow. And then sure enough, you know, we'll get a bigger job, and I'll say yes to it, obviously as well. But it just, you can just see the team sort of hemorrhaging from all the workload, or we're not doing as good a job, you know, with the client, and so they're not as happy with the service that were we should be giving them, or we could be giving them because we're overburdened with what we have. And I know every business owner struggles with this, and it's kind of this. It's a bit of a slinky, you know, you you, you extend yourself, and then you recoil, you extend yourself and your recoil. And I think as I've looked at some of my peers that do a really good job. I feel like they're much more even. And I think even the best contractors don't have it perfect. I don't know if there is a perfect way to do it, because life is not static, and it's very dynamic. And I think, you know, I was just having a project manager meeting earlier today, and we were asking him, you know, how many jobs could he handle? And we're talking like three to five range as a team. He's like, Well, as long as they don't all start or stop at the same time, and every builder out there knows what I'm talking about. If you, let's say, had three new builds and a couple remodels and you stayed in like, 30 days, well, if one of those jobs gets delayed in permitting or delayed with framers or delayed with Windows, sure, shooting, you know, house one and three all of a sudden line up with house two. And now you've got three homes that are exactly, you know, you had them spaced with 90 days apart. And now, once you know it, they're all at the exact same time, and it's just chaos. And you know, you had every intention of making that, you know, really segmented and different, but life happened. So. You know, I don't you know if that happens again, I guess we'll have to say that, you know what. We're gonna have to delay the start, or we'll have to explain to the client why we need that stagger and buffer. But you know, going back to how you accept contracts, I think you know, recently, we were bidding on a job where, you know, we know our numbers in and out, and we had presented a higher margin, and the we were competing against somebody else, and they were at a at a lower cost, plus they were operating on margin, so their number was quite a bit of a Delta bigger than ours, plus they were doing cost plus not margin, which adds another two 3% I've spoken previously on other podcasts about that, and I I at least knew where I was. So I chose to come down to negotiate with the client, because that fit into our schedule, right? It was at the perfect location. It was a good client, a great designer, and so but at least I knew what I was doing where in years past, it wouldn't, you wouldn't really be making that decision based on information or based on knowledge. You were making that decision based on your gut feel, which, honestly, your gut feel is usually pretty accurate too, but sometimes, like myself, you get a little optimistic, and so you start saying yes to too many things and things you should really say no to. And we worked it out with that client, and I felt like there was a negotiation for sure, and the client negotiated pretty hard, but at least we came to a place where they respected what we were doing. We they got what they wanted, and it fit the right timing, the right schedule for for what we're doing. If we had 10 other projects, you know, maybe we would have said no, but we didn't. And so we said, You know what? I think this is going to be a good fit. And so I think that even though there was negotiating going back on all negotiations aren't bad. Sometimes it's just getting clear on expectations. And you're going back and forth with the client, and you're saying, No, this is really important to me, and this is why. And it seems like I found more success with negotiating. You know, I don't know, really, any rich builder, so I don't know why clients always push so much back on, you know, what they think we're making, because it's cost, plus, you can see it, it's not that much. And so, so my joke often is, is like, you know, they will, they're fine with, you know, basically decreasing what the company will make, which they perceive to be you, not your company, but they, you know, they're fine with paying your people like, rarely do I have anybody say, oh, I want to pay less for a client or for cabinets or less for Windows, it always ends up going to operations. You know, can you do this for less, or can you manage more for less? And so I think it's just understanding your own value and your story and then effectively conveying that to the client. And I think when you can stand your ground and explain your own cost structure. And when you can explain your own value statement, the client believes that they, you know, there's authenticity in the way you're saying it. They understand that you you believe it and you do it. But then you have to really own it, like, if they, if you go part ways, like it's not like you can, like, sacrifice your dignity or I won't do that. I think that's going back to beggars. Can't be choose choosers. You know, I think if you present a price to a client and you kind of give them the whole value statement, and if it doesn't align with their values, like, let them go. That's not a good fit. That's hard to do. I know it's really hard to do, and I've probably failed at that more often than I've succeeded. I feel like maybe the last couple years, because I understand it better. I'm more willing to say no and to kind of let that client slide. Sometimes I wonder if there's clients we've said no to, or we didn't, we didn't get the job if it was meant to be, you know, we had one right now that was really, really, really hard for me to lose, probably the hardest one in my career, actually, and, um, but maybe just wasn't meant to be, and it just really, really hurt. And so, you know, I won't go into all the details of it, but the point of it was, is we don't know the full story there. And I think we can ask our clients. We can interview our clients. Sometimes, when I lose a job, you know, I'll ask the client, like, Is there something I could have done differently? Is there, you know, was it price? Is it value statement? Is it timing? Is it our team? Like, it's easy to say, Oh, you just weren't the right fit. Those are actually the hardest ones, because there's nothing really. I mean, it's not that I discount that, because that's a very valid thing to say, but it doesn't give you a lot to work on. So, like, how am I if someone says, Hey, you know, Mark, you weren't a good fit for us. Great. Can you explain a little bit more about that so that I could be a better fit for somebody like you in the future? And sometimes it takes a number of questions, and sometimes the client will give you the benefit of the time to work through those questions, but often they won't. And so then you're left wondering, you know, what could I do differently?
Mark D. Williams 14:41
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The second question here is, what is the biggest piece of advice you wish someone would have told you in your first and second year of business, wow. I have to go back 18 years on that one. I'm not sure what was I doing 18 years ago. Can hardly remember what I did last week. What's your best piece of advice if someone told you in year one or two? You know, I think knowing your numbers, I think just the things we just talked about, the problem is, is that even if someone told you, I mean, knowing your numbers is one thing. I mean, if you're doing fixed bid, that's pretty easy. Actually, just bid it and make sure you've got it. So maybe identifying your ideal client. I think when you're first in business, you don't really know who your ideal client is, because you're still trying to figure out who you are as a company. You know, whatever you are as an entrepreneur. I think it's a little bit like telling a high school kid, like, what do you want to do for the rest of your life? Like they don't know. How would they know? In fact, I'm almost more suspect of any kid that says they know exactly. That's way more rare. You know, if you ask, if you ask your your kids, you know, my kids are still pretty young, but it's pretty rare bird that knows exactly what they're going to do, and does it, you know, sometimes they might say they know what they're going to do, and it keeps changing. And there's this builder, we're actually going to have them on the podcast here pretty soon, Andrew Patterson. Patterson custom homes out in Newport, California, and he posts a video of his daughter every year in high school, of what her name is, how she spells it. You know, we started this when she was like, in second grade, and what she wants to be when she grows up. And every year it was something different. Now, the last couple years, you can see that she's getting older, is starting to get a clear line of thinking. But going back to like, why am I bringing this up? Is, I think those first years of business, like you are figuring out 1000 things, accounts receivable, accounts payable, who you're going to work with, who your client is, and you're honestly throwing everything at the wall. I think, I think the best piece of advice is, don't be afraid to try something new. And it's kind of like, if you're going to fail, like fail fast, it's okay to fail. In fact, I think failing is great. I think the only way many of us learn is by failing. And I think failure is the best. So don't feel failure. I think failure is what leads us to success. In fact, next year, we're going to do a panel, I think third or fourth quarter, we're going to do a live event with a we haven't released the names yet, but some pretty influential people in the build and design space, and the whole concept is going to be losers are winners, and we're just going to be talking about the way that we have all lost, the way that we have failed, the way we've done a terrible job, but what we've learned from it, how we've implemented it, and how it's led us to success in certain areas. But I don't I think if you stop failing, you're not you're not improving. And I think one of the the huge secrets to being a successful business is failing, learning from it and improving. It's not to say that you're not going to fail again. You obviously will, but I think just get rid of that fear. And I think when you lose the fear of failure, oh man, the how high you can go is just limitless. And so I think that really understanding that what do you really have to fear? I mean, we have so many wonderful blessings, especially when you get a little you look around the world, and you look at some of the chaos and some of the difficult situations that people are in, if you own a business and you're Yes, it's it's stressful, yes, these, this is your finances and but you know what? You can do it, and you know maybe failure is going to lead you to a better success later. And I think just keep trying, keep improving, keep working on it. And you know, if you're listening to this podcast, obviously you're most likely trying to improve your business, you're trying to improve your self worth, you're trying to educate yourself. I listen to tons of podcasts and books, all with the idea of, like, these little sparks in my brain, of like, oh, that's a good idea. Oh, that's a good idea. Like, you are currently taking your own advice. You're trying to be better tomorrow than you are today, and that will lead to success. Thanks for listening to the cures builder podcast. If you like what you listen to, please give us a five star rating and write us a review. It really means a lot. It's a great way for us to just understand what you like about the podcast and what we can keep doing so like and review and please share with your friends and family. Find out more at curious builder podcast.com
