Q & A Episode 55 - Quotes to Lead By: Building Better Businesses and Lives, One Insight at a Time

Aug 20

Episode #55 | Q&A with Mark D. Williams | Building Better Businesses and Lives, One Insight at a Time

In this episode, Mark Williams gets real about his go-to quotes and how they’ve helped him run a better business (and just live better, too). He talks about tackling problems together, not letting perfection trip you up, and why jumping in and taking action really matters. With plenty of relatable stories, Mark offers friendly advice for building better businesses—and lives—one small improvement at a time.

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
For those that have been listening to curious builder podcast, you know how much I love the contractor coalition Summit. It's been the single biggest force multiplier in my business over 21 years. We're excited to announce again that we're coming back to Chicago November 7 through the 10th. All the details can be found at the contractor coalition summit.com and under the promo code for a $2,500 discount, type in curious builder we'll see in Chicago. You
Mark D. Williams 00:28
know, you could have a series of goods, and I think you'll you could equal the best. I don't think it's realistic to say I'm going to have 10 Best things and it's going to equal the best, because I just don't think it's possible to get 10 Best things, like you know, the best cabinets, the best windows that you know, the best project manager, the best architect. You just unlikely you're going to get the best in every single category. Welcome
Mark D. Williams 00:57
to the curious bidder Podcast. I'm Mark Williams, your host today our normal Thursdays, we're doing our series of losers or winners. I had a canceled interview, so we're not able to do that, so I was going to go back to something that we've done previously for some of these Thursdays, is I basically keep a list of all these quotes that I love, and they apply to business, they apply to life. And so I've riffed on this before. So anyway, if you're into quotes, I think you're gonna like this one, and I'll try to relate it to business and life. Actually, this came out today. I had a really difficult situation today. I won't go into it and a ton of detail on this particular podcast, probably the future, I will. But anyway, I was, I reached out to a good friend of mine, Drew Beeson. He's been on the podcast before. He's really good friend of mine. And I said, I called him. I said, I need a little pep talk. And before I went into this conversation with a client, and he said, to explain the situation, and he used this quote that's going to be one of my favorites. It's be tough on the problem and easy on the people. I think that's a great quote. I think it's really impactful for business owners in particular, but honestly, you could apply it to interpersonal communications with, you know, your family, your spouse, friends, anything. And I think oftentimes we get so fixated on the person that they're doing this, or, you know, the language we even use, like, Hey, you're not doing this. Or, you know, it's, it's, you're attacking the person. And most people, I don't think I'm unique. I know men in particular tend to put up their guard quicker, maybe than others, but you know, we put on our armor pretty quick. If you accuse somebody of something, you know, they're going to get pretty defensive, and that's usually not the greatest way to, you know, to get through to somebody. But if you say, Hey, here's the problem, how can we attack the problem? Now it's not so personal, and you can really speak to, hey, here's the issue that we have. How do we achieve it? So this particular example, you know, the budget. And I love what I love what my friend Drew. Texted me. Said, go get them. He said, let's, you know, let's both attack the budget. And so I like that, like, you know, as a builder, we're trying to present something to our client, and, you know, we're doing the best we possibly can to give them a great price, a great value, really, more so than a great price. And we're balancing so many different things. And you know, and the client is they don't. They're not builders, they're not interior designers or architects. So they don't. There's a lot of things that they don't know, and that's okay. They trust a talented team, and rightly so. And so it's up to us to really convey that information and make sure that they feel trusted, that they feel, you know, secure, and so I just like that that, you know, it's, I think when you have mutual respect, which, you know, I certainly do with the client that I'm thinking about like, I really think that they're really good people. I really, in particular, love the way that they treat their family members. I think that's, it's really important to me, frankly. And I told them that, and I said, But you know, the in this case, the budget is the enemy. How can we both attack the budget so that you know me as the builder, I'm not the bad guy, because the the cost is the cost, and the client isn't the bad guy because they don't want to, they don't want to spend their money on that. How can we come together and work? And I think when both people are on the same side, you can achieve almost any issue. And I'm reminded of the quote that Linda Engler, a designer here Minneapolis, had shared with me. Think I've shared it before, but just that, you're going to have you know, the designer, the architect, the client and the builder. Let's all be on the same team, because the project is on its own team, and the project is constantly going to rear its head and try to fight the four of us. But if the four of us stay together, we can beat the project, but if we start getting divided, if a few people fall in love with the project, you know, let's say the architect or the designer so fell in love with their design that they lost sight of the budget. Now you've got the designer and architect with the project against the builder and the homeowner. That's not a good scenario. I've had it before where, you know, the builder is on the project against the other ones, or maybe the client, maybe the designer, architect and builder on one side, and the client is with the project, saying, my project, you know, is this, that another thing and just it's not a good scenario. So I love the idea of being unified, and I love that we can be hard on the problem and easy on each other. Another quote is. Is, and I've thought of this a lot, actually, and I can argue almost any point, but best is the enemy of good. And I think the problem is, is, like, when I think of, like, high end, you know, construction, and like Trim Carpentry in particular, like, I'm not okay with good, like, I want great. And so from that standpoint, I sort of disagree with the quote, however, in the grand scheme of things, you know, the reason the best is the enemy of good is if you always wait for the best, like maybe you're going to go for a run, and you're only going to wait till the weather's perfect, you might never go for a run. And so good, good enough is good enough. You know, I think starting a business is a little bit like this. If you wait for all the circumstances to be just ideal for you to start a business, you'll probably never start one, and so at some point you just have to get up and just do it. And I do think there's a ton of value in just activity and action. I do think activity breeds activity, but in particular, if we're waiting for the best version of everything. And a lot of people get trapped in this cycle. Clients can get sucked in it. Homeowners, business, I should say business owners, get sucked into this a lot. You know, let's say you're going to do a spec home, and you just want the best of every product. But before you know it, you go down this road and, you know, maybe, maybe good would have been just fine, because now the best of everything. No one's going to buy it. And so now you're left with a home that, you know, people aren't going to buy because they can't afford it. And so I think that's where really value comes into a lot of it. But to me, the essence of this quote is, you know, when you've got something that's good, like, proceed doesn't have to be the best. Not everything's going to be the best. That doesn't mean, I do think you could have, I'm sure this math won't line up. But you know, you could have a series of goods, and I think you'll you could equal the best. I don't think it's realistic to say I'm going to have 10 Best things and it's going to equal the best, because I just don't think it's possible to get 10 Best things, like, you know, the best cabinets, the best windows that you know, the best project manager, the best architect. Just unlikely you're going to get the best in every single category. I mean, you look at a you look at a basketball team, you know Michael Jordan, you know he's the best Mike, you know Scottie Pippen at the time. Let's just say, you know, top five in the NBA. And very, very good. And the rest of them are role players. However, they were the best team by far. And so you can make the argument that, you know, yes, you had, you had some best, but you had a lot of good in there too, and because at the hole, you had the best, I think the same is true as football, you know, I think Tom Brady was the best quarterback that's, you know, ever played football. I don't think every single person on his team was the best ever at their position. I think he had a lot of really good people. I think they had, I think they had probably one of the best coaches, which helps a lot anyway. So I just, I like these analogies, because it helps frame up. You know, when we should go, when we should stop, and when we should reevaluate. The next quote, is, motion is good. Action is better. Do I like that? You know, I think of honestly, I don't know a better example than thinking about the podcast. I had no idea what I was doing with the podcast. I just said I went on a podcast. I wanted Brad Levitt podcast, aft construction podcast at the time. Now, it's been renamed the Brad Levitt and, you know, I'm like, This is amazing. I love talking to builders. Obviously, I always like talking and I like talking about entrepreneurship. And it was a whole new platform. I said, Let's just go. You know, I didn't think a lot about it. I had a lot of good things going for me in terms of, like, I was in the middle of rebranding my company, so I had a lot of things that it was just the right time. But, I mean, I could have said and just kind of paralysis analysis. I could have planned it out for a year and but maybe it would have been better. I don't know. Maybe it would have failed again. Don't know. But I think there's a lot of value in just trying, just, do you know, again, activity breeds activity. But I like this, that motion is good. Activity is better. I think if you get, if you're going in terms of sales, you know, it depends if you're trying to create another revenue stream, like, I've often thought about buying a home. I know a lot of builders do this in remodelers, you know, buy a home, fix it up, and then rent it out for, you know, residual income, you know, get to the point where you have, like, five or six of these homes, they're cash flowing. I think it's a great business model. I've sort of been paralyzed waiting for enough money to do it that kind of the interest, like really understanding the pros and cons, you know, to be the best way, if I was really serious about it, is just go buy a house and do it, like, enough motion, like, go get the activity. Go, just go get it done. We learn, at least I do. I learn way more by doing it than by, you know, analyzing it. I just I've always been that way. And I'm not saying that there's not a lot of value in researching understanding. I'm certainly not saying just don't go off half cocked. But like, I think if you just sit there and think about it all the time, you never get anything done. And so I'm guessing I'm preaching to my entrepreneurs out there, because I don't think anyone's an entrepreneur if they did say, let's go do this. So anyway, keep doing what you're doing, people.
Mark D. Williams 09:54
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This quote is from Renee Keller, interior designer in Minnesota. I think she has one of the best quotes, burn the candles, use the China. I love that quote. It's one of my favorites. And I just think of like, my own house, you know, we have tons of candles that sit in the top drawer of our, you know, buffet. They come out for, like, birthdays and, like, I don't know, maybe Christmas. I don't even know when we use it hardly ever. And I remember going out to Hood River on Oregon with my cousin and his wife when we were expecting our first child. Kind of little baby. Moon vacation with two couples. And we stayed at forget her name. She worked in the ER, and she her whole house. I mean, it was a fire hazard, if I ever saw one in my life, a no lie, 200 candles all lit just giant mounds of like wax burning and melting. It was just this coolest vibe. She had no lights on the house. It was like being in a castle in medieval times. It was really cool. She definitely lived into building, burning the candles and using the China. You know, I think of like, you know, a lot of people, when they get married, they get China for their wedding gifts, and nobody ever uses them. Or you I remember this just comes to me now. I told my mom and dad, if there's any left when they pass, that I would like them. So when my mom and dad were married, my mom had worked for a very well known she was a designer. What she did? She helped start GNC nutrition. Anyway, she gave her these hand painted tulip crystal glasses. They're super cool. The stem is green. They've got these pink floral patterns on the side. I've seen them break. It seems like every other Christmas they're broken. I don't know how many are left. I mean, these things are 50 years old, so I don't know how many are left. But my point is, is my mom regularly uses those when we come over, because if they just sat in a cover, you'd never use them. And so I guess, going back to the origin of this coat, quote, you know, burn the candles, use the channel. Like, don't just save everything. Like, use it. And this has always been a family philosophy of ours. I've always sort of believed that if you use it, it's worth the cost. I've often used the analogy of a Ferrari in Minnesota. You know, obviously people know it's cold, a lot of salt on the roads. Probably not seen a lot of Ferraris drive around the wintertime. But for me, and this is just my own personal statement, there's no judgment here. If you agree, great. If you don't, great too. But for me, I think it's a shame if you own a Ferrari and you drive it 10 days a year, or five days a year. I mean, you have this beautiful car, you love the car. Like, why not drive it? Why not use it? I understand it's probably more valuable if you don't use it, just leave it in a car collection. But, like, I just think things should be used. That's my value statement. And so to me, I love it when I see somebody, you know, you get a sunny day in February in Minnesota, you see some guy out there with his Ferrari or nice Porsche or whatever. Like, I'm like, yes, that guy loves it. He's using it. I love to see people use things. Because how many things, if we're honest, you know, if we went down to our storage room and we had something down there, we just don't use it. I mean, I have two beautiful Stand Up Paddle Boards that I bought right before I bought had kids. Bought kids. That's weird. I had kids. I have one that's carbon fiber and one that's not. They're huge, like 18 feet long, so they're kind of unwieldy. I wish I had inflatable ones. I just don't make it a priority to go use them. It's like I have 100 other hobbies that are sitting down there. I would be better off just getting rid of. Them than just sitting downstairs or make a thing of it. Like, take the kids on a hot day, guys, I know this isn't really what they're set up for. Let's, let's pile three kids on this thing and paddle board them away. Now, someday, if we put a little cabin, we'll just stack them up there. But I guess the whole point of this quote is like, use what you've got. If you've got something, use it 1% improvement. Now this is actually, I mean, this actually applies to a ton of things we could do on a whole podcast on this. What comes to mind is there was a famous British Cycling Team, and basically what the, you know, they were getting pummeled by the world, the world, you know, peloton and the Tour de France, as well as the Olympics. And this coach, I can't remember what book I read this, and this is years ago, and basically he came as the coach and said, We aren't better than these other countries. They're killing us in the Olympics. So here's what we're going to do. We're going to get 1% better in these called 50 categories, so our shoes 1% lighter, 1% quicker to put on and take off. You know, that aerodynamic helmet, we're just going to be 1% better than what's out there. You know, our gloves 1% better. More cushion, more aerodynamic whatever. You know, the the oil we use to lube up our chains on our bike 1% better. You know, the skin suits that we use and we race in. We're going to put them in a wind tunnel. We're going to get 1% better. You know, 1% is not that much. You do 101% you're 100% better. You can do the math here. It's not rocket science. Anyway, long story short, I forget how long it took this coach do it, but they started winning Olympic cycling, track cycling. Think that we even had a few Tour de France winners now, from England. So anyway, just it's super, super powerful. I was Scotty Bowman is that was the coach of Michael Phelps. He coaches a French swimmer now, who's kind of the dominant swimmer. And he, I just saw an interview that he was giving, and he said, you know, the big goal of like, hey, I want to win eight Olympic medals. That just that goal keeps you going and keeps getting you out of bed at four o'clock in the morning or five o'clock in the morning to get in the pool 365, days a year when nothing else will because the real winners have to train when they don't want to train, right? But he said, we have to make it much smaller. Like you don't go to the Olympic and say, I'm going to win eight. Yeah, you may put that out there, that's the goal. But no, you have the 200 freestyle in 10 minutes. Like your only focus is the 200 meter freestyle. And guess what? Even that's too big. So how about this? You trust your training. You trust all the things that you've done day in and day out. That's the one percents. You show up at you practice, and you give it your full effort, you know, you show up, you know, at a meet, and you give it your full effort. You eat better, you sleep a little bit better. But, you know, breaking it down to each turn, like reduced to the ridiculous, the small improvements will lead to big gains. I think that's true in business, you know, I know I'm not alone in this, but as business owners, I'm constantly looking at ways to make my business better. I would probably be far better off, and maybe, maybe, I guess, all business owners sort of do this. We're constantly tweaking things, and I don't think we give ourselves enough credit of looking in the rear view mirror of how far we've gone as business owners, because we're constantly, you know, you got a little, you know, got a little bit better in estimating. You got a little bit better on, you know, pricing. You got, you know, you you picked up better architecture partners. You picked up better subs. You had a better better you hired a better employee. You let an employee that wasn't great go. We're constantly tweaking our company, and if you look back, if you're not innovating, if you're not changing, if you're not getting better, like you need to get back to the small things. Because I do think the small things, that's what leads to the big successes.
Mark D. Williams 18:32
This is a good one. Risk is a byproduct of competence. I think that's a really good one. You know? I guess I'm thinking about skiing. I like to downhill ski, you know, when I'm skiing down a mountain or, you know, through trees. You know, maybe you're, you're in the powder, skiing through trees, going 3040, miles an hour, or whatever it is, you know, I've done that a lot. I've done it for decades. Like, I feel very comfortable, like I don't think that's risky, because I'm very comfortable doing I've done it for years. Someone who doesn't ski a lot might find that behavior very risky, you know, maybe they're afraid of running into the tree, and so I think the more competent you are, yes, is there risk? Of course, there's risk in anything. But I think the perceived, the perceived risk versus real risk, I think are two different things. I think that's true of you know. I mean, if you're gonna relate to business, you know, maybe it's doing a spec home. You know, maybe your tolerance for risk is greater than somebody else's. I know, historically, I have not. I've been a very conservative business owner, and it's probably hampered my growth, not because I wasn't competent, but probably because I just wasn't comfortable with exposure. You know, financially, some people look at it differently. Some people like to be leveraged to the max. They're very comfortable with risk, you know, they're very competent. They're very used to sort of, you know, operating without a net below them like a trapeze artist. You know, think about mountain biking. If you really think about the danger of a mountain bike, it's actually pretty dangerous. You know, you're flying down a trail at, you know, again, 2030, miles an hour, maybe. More, but you're tight in the trees. I mean, you blow a tire, you hit a rock, you do a little twist your face is right in the middle of a tree. I actually think mountain biking is way more dangerous than skiing, maybe, but that's also competence. I feel much more comfortable on a pair of skis than I do on a mountain bike. So anyway, there's 1000 analogies I can think of this water is a good one. I grew up on a lake, spent a lot of time in the ocean as a swimmer my whole life, and so when I get into the ocean, I feel much more confident, like if I'm surfing, even though I stink at it, if I get pummeled by a wave, I can hold my breath for a long time. I don't panic when I'm being pinned down to the bottom of a reef, because I'm comfortable holding my breath. That's risk and consequence. I feel you know, I feel comfortable. I know a lot of mountaineers my you know, my dad kind of got us into mountaineering as a family, and people used to look at him as very risky. Actually, he wasn't. My dad is very cautious in the sense that, like, Yes, his risk is probably a lot higher than other people's, but he's very competent in the mountains. He taught us a lot about how to respect the mountain, respect elevation, respect cold, respect water, and so by just being very in tune with your surroundings, yeah, other people might looking on, if they're not used to it, might think that's really risky. It's actually not. I think you're taking very calculated, you know, tap in what you're doing. I think that's true in business. I think it's very easy, especially a business you don't understand. You might look and say, Wow, that's really risky, but maybe they're just really competent at what they do, you know? Maybe, yeah. So anyway, I think I've killed this with analogies. I think we all understand that risk is a product of is a byproduct of competence. So this one's pretty good. We'll end on this one. Mother Nature always sides with the flaw in your plans. I think this is pretty funny again. I think a mountaineering if you go into the mountains and the weather report says it's sunny, and you decide, sure, shoot, if you leave your rain jacket at home, it's going to rain. And you know, if you leave your gloves and beanie, because the mountain, the mountain, weather can really change. And so all of a sudden you're up there and it snows. I mean, you can get hypothermia, you can die. You've lost your respect of the mountains. You lose your respect of the mountains like that might be your last day in the mountains. I was just running around Mount Rainier training for this big race I'm going to do last weekend, and the guide service that we used cooked our dinners at night, and they would move our tents and sleeping bags from camp to camp. We'd set it up, but then when we're done running all day, we'd come into camp and we'd set our stuff up and whatever, anyway they there were certain things we had to have in our backpack. We had to have a emergency kit, first aid kit, emergency blanket. You had to have, you know, a warm puffy of some sort, for insulation. You had to have gloves. You had to have a hat. It was probably 45 to 75 so I never actually used anything my pack for those three days. However, it was perfect weather. But again, going back to the deal of making sure that you've got, you know, some some prepared level. And I was thinking about Mother Nature, like I tried, I know, not to do this. I tried a new pair of shoes, and I had the worst case of plantar fasciitis for 25 miles. It was terrible. My my foot just killed. And so, you know, I've known many times where you, you know, when you go out into the mountains, I just, I've been thinking spending a lot of time in the mountain. So that's all my analogies, but, and they can apply to business, if you want them to. But ultimately, usually, when you go into the mountains, you start really early in the morning, because you just don't know how long your day is going to go. You'd rather start early and have time at the end. But my sister is notorious for starting late. She also has a very unique ability of, if you're going to be stupid, you better be tough. My sister is super tough, and one of the one of the most hardcore people you'll ever meet. And she can really she can suffer like nobody else. And I swear, Mother Nature is always messing up her plans, like she'll start at like, one o'clock, 11 o'clock in the afternoon, she'll get in like midnight, you know, maybe she had a headlamp, maybe she didn't, maybe she brought one granola bar, maybe she had some food. Maybe she found some berries on the trail. Like she is constantly letting Mother Nature, you know, mess up her plans. And so I guess the point is, is make sure you you have some you're prepared, and make sure that you understand what your worst case scenario is, whatever the situation is, I think of even like, you know, remodeling. There's a home down the street from misah, who's and they pop the top and they're waiting for a 14 day window to pop the top on a second story of a home. It's like you're never going to get 14 days of no water, so, you know, mother and sure shoot and they open it up and it rains the next day, or, you know, something like that happens. It just kind of like, you know, hope for the best, but plan for the worst, and you'll probably be just fine anyway. Hopefully this was enjoyable. It was for me. I love quotes, and we'll see on Monday at our next podcast. We've had the podcast now for two and a half, almost three years now, and we have a consulting page, one to one consulting you can book my time for one hour. Perhaps you've heard a guest where you like one of the topics. Maybe you want an introduction to some of the guests that I've had on. Perhaps you want to talk about branding or marketing or anything that. We've covered on the podcast over the last two and a half years. You can book a time at curious builder podcast.com thanks for tuning in to curious builder podcast. If you like this episode, do us a favor. Share it with three other business owners. The best way that we can spread what we're doing is by word of mouth, and with your help, we can continue to help other curious builders expand their business. Please share it with your friends. Like and review online, and thanks again for tuning in.