← Service Business Mastery for Skilled Trades: HVAC, Plumbing & Electrical Home Service
Service Business Mastery for Skilled Trades: HVAC, Plumbing & Electrical Home Service
How Storytelling Can Solve Your Skilled Trades Recruiting Crisis
00:38:32
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- [00:00]
Ryan Cascadin
Hey, want a cookie?
- [00:02]
Krista from Marketstorm
Oh, I know you just ate so you're craving something a little sweet. Besides, one cookie isn't gonna kill you.
- [00:09]
Ryan Cascadin
How about half?
- [00:10]
Krista from Marketstorm
Just a bite. Bite it. Bite it.
- [00:14]
Tersh Blissett
Bite it.
- [00:15]
Ryan Cascadin
Food noise isn't fair, but Mochi Health is your affordable glp. One source that puts you on a path to successful weight loss by quieting food noise.
- [00:23]
Tersh Blissett
Bite it.
- [00:25]
Ryan Cascadin
Learn more@joinmochi.com Mochi members have access to licensed physicians and nutritionists. Results may vary. They struggle with what is good about this work. And the thing that's been consistent that I've heard when when a job goes right, there's no better feeling than knowing that they solved a no heat call and solving problems. It's problem solving literally three, four, five, six times a day. That message had to be in my mind boiled down to children and that vocabulary. And how do you explain that? But also just telling it in a story driven plot of making a solved problem real for children. And when I first wrote the book series, I just said to myself, I think there's potential here. Let's see what road this goes on. That was five years ago and here I am now. Four books later, educational toolkits and lesson plans for educators, all sponsored by the air conditioning contractors of America.
- [01:13]
Tersh Blissett
Today's episode is brought to you by one of our show partners, upfrog.
- [01:17]
Joshua Crouch
Upfrog is the OG when it comes to pricing transparency online. They find system replacement leads through paid ads and have developed an entire system to drive those hard to find system replacement opportunities. Nurture the leads and book them into sold systems before your team arrives to
- [01:32]
Tersh Blissett
help you grow your business.
- [01:33]
Krista from Marketstorm
Hey, I'm Krista with Marketstorm and we work with home service companies across the country. Quick question. If another H Vac or plumbing company in your area starts influencing homeowners before they ever hit Google, who gets the first call? By the time someone searches plumber near me, they've already been researching the problem. We use AI to detect those early intent signals and put your brand in front of them. So when they do search, your name already feels familiar. Visit Marketstorm AI or text us at 213-575-5448.
- [02:09]
Tersh Blissett
Hello everyone out there in the podcast world. Hope you're having a wonderful day. You're listening to or watching a service Business Mastery podcast. I am one of your hosts, Tersh Blissett, sitting virtually next to my co host Joshua Crouch. And we have Ryan Cascadin. Does that say it right?
- [02:23]
Ryan Cascadin
You said it perfect.
- [02:24]
Tersh Blissett
All right, perfect. We got Ryan on the show today.
- [02:27]
Joshua Crouch
Eat My words.
- [02:28]
Tersh Blissett
Yeah, I know, right?
- [02:29]
Joshua Crouch
Yeah. I totally thought church was going to butcher it.
- [02:31]
Tersh Blissett
So, so I'm excited to talk to Ryan today. I, I saw you recently in Las Vegas. Is that right? We were in Las Vegas at Aca.
- [02:42]
Ryan Cascadin
Yes. At the, at their March event in Los, In Caesar's Palace. A beautiful interior with the statues and architecture. It was awesome. I loved it.
- [02:50]
Tersh Blissett
There's, you could get lost in that place. It's, it's massive. Uh, but yeah, and we are going to talk a little bit about one of your passion projects and actually having children's books about the trades and I love this concept. I've met one other young lady that's done something similar and I, I, I've, we've talked about it in the past. I'm really excited to because we all talk about we need like the trades are getting older and older and older and need to bring some young blood in. And a lot of times whenever we talk about that, our immediate thought process is to go to 15, 16, 17 year olds and like try and browbeat them into getting into the trades or convincing them how fun it is. But we don't really consider the younger like, like pre teens or anything like that. And I love the concept of, of like really not indoctrinating them but almost like just at least educating them when they're really young and getting them interested into the trades. So with that being said, could you share a little bit about yourself, your background and how you even got into doing what you're doing now?
- [04:00]
Ryan Cascadin
Yeah, absolutely. Well, first of all, thanks for having me on. It's, it's such a pleasure to be here. And yes, this is a passion project. I'm in year five of this crazy idea I had one day post Covid and it's still riding this train as long as we can. Yeah, my background, I'm 15 years in the plumbing h vac industry. Just a myriad of of jobs I will call it, I will say this as my wife always tells me, I'm a wannabe technician. Okay. I've never been in the field, I've never turned the wrench. But my, my brother in law is a master plumber in New Jersey. My dad was an electrician. I grew up in a blue collar area, never mind being in the industry, but I've never been in the field and I've always said to myself what would that be like and how can I help? And so you Fast forward the 15 year career I've had. You know, tersh, as you mentioned, clearly we have A workforce development challenge. And it all stems from perception change. And a lot of this perception change starts with so many issues that you have to. It's like an onion, right? You take back the layers and you find more and more and more. But really one of the biggest problems that I saw and why I wanted to do children's books was we just don't do enough to explain the emotional side of working in the skilled trades and meaning. It's a good thing to do, it's noble, it's appreciated when completed. And I kind of came with this idea when I'm talking to my brother in law and I have two children at home. He doesn't have any kids, but I have my two kids to him, his nephews. I said to him, could you explain what you do as a plumber to my kids? And he looked at me just shocked by not knowing exactly how to describe what he does every day. He wasn't sure. And the more you talk to plumbers, H vac techs and others without being very technical, it's really hard for them to explain what it is like to do this work and how it makes people feel. Because frankly, most of the time they're getting yelled at, you know, by the homeowner, the building owner or some other issue about not showing up on time, charging too much. Right. And so they struggle with what is good about this work. And the thing that's been consistent that I've heard is that they just when, when a job goes right, there's no better feeling than knowing that they solved a no he call. There's no better feeling than hey, you know, the water wasn't working correctly, now it is. And solving problems, it's Problem solving literally 3, 4, 5, 6 times a day potentially. And so absolutely that message had to be in my mind boiled down to children and that vocabulary. And how do you explain that? But also just telling it in a story driven plot of making a solved problem real for children and being appreciated, you know, from these technicians that solve it. And so again, I'm a marketing guy by trade, grew up in and around this and I said someone's got to tell their story like my brother in law. And that's when these ideas start hitting me with the children.
- [06:57]
Tersh Blissett
So why, why children? Like what? Why start with the kids?
- [07:01]
Joshua Crouch
That was my thought. It was like, you know, church.
- [07:03]
Tersh Blissett
You alluded.
- [07:04]
Joshua Crouch
We've, we've interviewed people that go to like the trade schools. We've, we know business owners that talk at trade schools or they go to church. You've done some stuff even like middle school age.
- [07:12]
Tersh Blissett
Yeah, yeah, I signed up. Yeah, Well, I signed up to go to career day at the school. I show up at the high school and they're like, no, you're supposed to be next door at the middle school. And I was like, whoa, wait a minute, I didn't realize I was going to middle school. But you're, you take it even a step further and you're like even younger.
- [07:31]
Ryan Cascadin
Yeah. And the reason I did that, and you alluded to this in the beginning, was it's sort of a wide open market right at the moment, which is there's a lot of activity that's happening or tries to happen in middle school and high school, both legislatively, to apprenticeship program at the contractor level, to grants and funding. Right. And, and certainly there's more we need to do there. And there is so much more that we can sort of unite, which is going to be another theme we'll talk about is this fragmentation on this issue is so rampant. And I'll talk about what I mean in a second. But to me it was like, wait, kindergarten through fifth grade. Not only is it sort of wide open, it's an opportunity to really explain something in a much more easier fashion. Like, okay, what is a piece of ductwork? What is plumbing? Right. And it's a more longer term play certainly, because as I know and you guys know, contractors don't need a technician in 10 years from now. They need them tomorrow or yesterday.
- [08:26]
Joshua Crouch
Oh, yeah.
- [08:26]
Ryan Cascadin
So, right. And so but my play on this was, okay, how do we kind of change the hearts and minds of these folks, the parents, the role models, the guardians, the teachers, even in that situation, K through 5, to not close the door sooner because frankly, Hollywood has not done us any service there on kindergarten through fifth grade. They haven't done anything really. And so this was a way in my mind that we could sort of keep the door open longer to get them closer to maybe some of these existing programs or activities or things that were happening middle school, high school and up. So again, like any good entrepreneur, you're like, okay, idea. What's the target market? There's people playing in that space already. Again, there's more you could do to disrupt that. But here was a space that nobody was in. That's when I said, wow, I'm a marketing guy, I can write that story. No one's there. Let's go after that. And that's kind of been the inspiration ever. Yeah.
- [09:24]
Joshua Crouch
It's interesting, you say, you know, like Hollywood, but there was a recent incident with the, the new DHS Department of Homeland Security nominee. He was a plumber.
- [09:34]
Tersh Blissett
Yeah.
- [09:34]
Joshua Crouch
By trade. And then he was getting mocked.
- [09:36]
Ryan Cascadin
Yeah.
- [09:37]
Joshua Crouch
By certain, I don't remember certain members of Congress or whatever people how they, how a plumber shouldn't be able to be something in government or something like that. Well, the guy's worked like just because he started diploma doesn't mean he's who he is. You know, he's obviously worked his way up and done some good things. But it's, it's just a cultural thing. It's, it's really sad to see because some of the best, like some of the best hard working, salt of the earth people.
- [10:05]
Tersh Blissett
Yeah.
- [10:05]
Joshua Crouch
Work in the trades and they get
- [10:07]
Ryan Cascadin
their hands dirty every day.
- [10:08]
Joshua Crouch
And so what if they get their hands dirty and they're not sitting behind a computer? Doesn't mean they're a bad person. It doesn't mean they're lesser than. But it's always felt like that. And I'm Ryan, I'm a lot like you. Ter literally has parts of cars all over his sleeve. Like he's a gearhead. I'm not. I was always kind of a wannabe. Like I, like, I had to really rely on my team when I was in the H vac industry because I, I could talk a good game, but I couldn't do what they did. I was a good grunt. I essentially ran tools for them when I needed them and lifted stuff because that's a model I could do. But I really respected that they could do what I could not and how good and proficient they were. But it's sad when you see this stuff play out. Especially like something like, you know, DHS has been in the news a lot this year and you see something like that and then everyone's like, well, I don't want my kid to be a plumber because plumbers are getting mocked online and they get treated like lesser than. It really sucks to see.
- [11:06]
Ryan Cascadin
And I would tell you, I think the stereotypes are real, but they are starting to change a little bit. Generally speaking, I think there's been some generational shifts there, particularly around AI, believe it or not, as AI, you know, eats away at white collar work. I'm sure a lot have talked about this. It's really hard to automate a job that needs to be local, on site, in a home to AI. Right. AI will assist you, but you can't automate that. And so I think some of the newer generation, even more progressive parents and role models look at that. And Go, why wouldn't I at least have my kid look into that as an option versus having that stereotype put out there? And the other thing too is I love this story. So I have some neighbors, they're both lawyers, they have three children. They like me and they like my family. And so I gave them copies of the books, the kids books. I just said, hey, you should read these to your kids. You know, no pressure, no whatever. Their youngest child will not stop talking about being a plumber in an H Vac tech. And to the point at one point they kind of called me and was like, I'm kind of mad at you about that. I thought they were going to be in a white collar job and at this stage in their life, they're talking like plumber and toilet and water heater and all this stuff. And I'm like, but isn't that the point, guys? I mean, again, you're smart people as lawyers, you understand that, you know, how they earn a living ought to be really up to them. And your job as a parent, at least to a certain degree at that age, is to not close doors, but to keep them open as long as. As you can, right? At some point they're going to have to make a decision or be pushed down a path. But what in the world do they need to be pushed and shut down sooner at K through fifth grade? So I, so I would. I am with you. The stereotypes are real, but I do think they're changing. But I also think there's a lot that we all can do to help minimize that perception challenge. And one comment about that, again, I'm, I'm try to make this argument not on the rational side. I think there are so many messages out there about less in, you know, less debt, more income, you know, all this rational messaging which we need, but we always miss this emotional connection piece, which is, it makes you feel good. On some jobs, I know it's not every job goes well, but on some
- [13:14]
Joshua Crouch
jobs to actually probably doesn't make you feel real good.
- [13:17]
Ryan Cascadin
Well, right. I'm not saying you're good in that all the time.
- [13:21]
Tersh Blissett
Like the third callback and you're like, oh, this job is going to be the bane of my existence. But then you're exactly right though. The dopamine drip that you get, like, you get that, that instant and hero. You're the hero of the story. Like, not like when we were. When you're talking marketing, you know, when you talk about Donald Miller building a story brand, like always make your client the hero and like you're just the guy, you're the guide of the story. But as a technician, you become the hero. You are the one that saves them from being like stuck in 100 degree house, you know, in the middle of the summer for two weeks and you just solve the problem after being there for an hour or so. So that's definitely, that's what people don't talk about enough whenever it comes to the trades is, is that the appreciation that you get from it and the self. Gratitude, gratification that comes along with it?
- [14:18]
Ryan Cascadin
Exactly.
- [14:19]
Joshua Crouch
I've had texts tell me that like they, they, they feel like they're wearing a cape when they're able to solve, especially if it's a more complex problem. They just. And you know, if it's a little old lady, a widow, like just the stories and stuff that you hear from them and how it makes them feel. I mean, imagine that like, you know, white collar work sounds nice. Cause you sit at home and there, there are definitely perks to it. Or you sit in an office and maybe you got your own office on the corner or something like that. But the work you do doesn't. You don't get that because somebody, you're not helping someone one on one, you're doing paperwork or accounting or you know, whatever it looks like, you're not helping someone one on one. And that one on one fact of like you really helped a family that needed you today. And there's a, there's a ton of gratification that comes along with that that otherwise wouldn't be talked about. And it's, it's interesting because. So Tersh's oldest has been riding along with him. So I have, I have two sons, my stepson and my son. My stepson loves cars, wants to get into. He's having trouble. He just turned 18. Nobody. Arizona's a little weird with hiring, but he wants to get into something with the trades, whether it's auto mechanics or H Vac, something like that. And my son wants to be an electrician. So your point about the changing landscape, like I didn't push these things on them. It just happened like they came somewhere along the lines. They're hearing, seeing, listening to something somewhere that is saying, you really should give this a look. Which is really great to see because for those that are listening to this, the next generation is starting to look your way. But the other problem we have in the trade, it has changed a lot. And Ryan, you've probably seen this church. I know you've seen this because you've been in trades a long time is the way we train those young people and how we treat them once they get into the trades. They are a completely different personality than someone who's been in the trades for 25 years. It is different. And the education that needs to come along with that for our businesses and how we interact with those people and how we train them and how we. Things might need to be a little softer approach than the way of like, man, you're like that one up, like,
- [16:34]
Tersh Blissett
what do you think?
- [16:34]
Ryan Cascadin
And like, right.
- [16:35]
Joshua Crouch
You know, slap them inside the head. You can't do that stuff anymore because then they will want to quit. And they like, dad, this isn't for me. And that, that becomes a. Then we just literally reverse the cycle. And then all these people are like, this sucks. I tried it. It was terrible. So there's, there's a lot of, there's a huge dynamic there that again, you talk about things that don't get talked about. It's also how we train and how
- [16:57]
Tersh Blissett
we approach these people going into like what, what Josh just mentioned there. What, what do you think the industry gets wrong when it comes to trying to attract the younger audience?
- [17:07]
Ryan Cascadin
Yeah, I, I, funny enough you asked that. Because I've, I've thought a lot about this and I think that there's a lot of desire and want. But again, they're, everybody is so busy and so in the, in the business that they're not working on the business sometimes where it's like, look, I'm literally taking care of what the next phone call was instead of, I just got to get out of the business. And, and I think that both the contractor load, but also everybody up and down the vertical has been, this is what I mentioned earlier, has been so fragmented in this approach and frankly has been so sales driven, I'll call it, or just introspective on their own business efforts. Right. Like, and I, and I can say that with authority up and down the vertical with manufacturer, wholesale distributor going to
- [17:54]
Tersh Blissett
benefit me right now.
- [17:56]
Ryan Cascadin
Yep. I'm going to put out a $10,000 scholarship. I'll get a blip on the trade media, publications. And look at me. And it, frankly, it probably did nothing. Really did nothing. Right. And I mean it with all due respect. I think there are some great programs out there. But also, my gosh, what if we pulled together all of that funding, all that effort, all that enthusiasm and this became not a competitive issue. It became the singular defining issue of the entire industry, which was, we all say it's a Problem. But we're on this echo chamber, but we're not willing to work across aisles on this because of all conflicts, right? Like oh, will you sell to this person that, that's this dealer of that thing? And there's all these issues there when really it should, those differences should be put aside and it should be whole way up and down the generations to say why is this industry great and what can we do about that? And the likely place frankly that something like that exists probably is more NGO nonprofit trade association route than individual manufacturer, individual wholesale distributor, individual contractor. But the reality is is everybody's doing their own version of this and then pounding their chests.
- [19:03]
Tersh Blissett
And there's actually, there's a program that I am so proud that, that we Service Business Mastery have, have been a part of for several years now. And it's Excel and they, they do a trade show but it's all high school focused. And so like these are, they'll do welding competitions and I'll tell you, the welding industry, they have taken like full advantage of this. They have like manufacturers of all the equipment are like non stop. They, they're out there in full force and they're, they got welding trucks and trailers and everything else and they're trying to get other trades involved as well. But it's a Christian based nonprofit just like you said. And this is their full time job is they, they literally are educating the youth on the trades and, and, and doing it hands on too. And there's some of the, the, the youth who are underprivileged, but there's others that are coming from like my kid, my children's school is part of that competition as well and I get to go there and in person and interview the teachers and some of the, the donors. And like there's a really big car dealership here in Savannah that they, they donate like vehicles to the, that organization and they're at every one of the organizations talking to these youth and they're like yeah, we need technicians, but ultimately we just need better people in world. And so like as long as we're doing that then it's kind of like a giver's gain. As long as we're making better people in the world, they're naturally going to come see us at the dealership when it comes time to work on vehicles. You know what I mean?
- [20:43]
Ryan Cascadin
That's awesome. That is so good. But again that's a good example of where imagine if the, our industry just funneled dollars just into a group that just grew that. Right? And it Eliminates the conflicts, the barriers and it's like okay, we're showcased. So the problem with that approach frankly is that so there's two ways of attack it. You can either do outreach which is very funding heavy and also hard to measure. Right. Like how do you measure that activity? Describe as the welding, like did that person end up or the child end up in the welding vocation. We don't know. It's too long of a cycle to measure it. So but that's one approach is okay, it's outreach and takes a lot of funding or you have to go the other route which is legislative or regulatory fixes. Right. Which is mandates requirements. And I'm not advocating for it but I'm just saying there's two levers. There's two levers. You have really here. And Frank, like some good ideas I've heard at least on the legislative side is stuff like hey if you're going to go to a four year college, let's eliminate you know, basket weaving. I know it's please. Yes, eliminate that. Right. But the elective ought to be you need to go to the local attack. Right. So, so the plumber learns the hand skill but also learns business management. Like okay, that seems like, that seems like a very easy practical thing to do. That doesn't seem, it seems like it would benefit a lot of parties and I'm not sure who it would harm frankly. So but so my point is like if we all thought more critically about that we probably could come up with solutions on both sides.
- [22:16]
Joshua Crouch
Right.
- [22:16]
Ryan Cascadin
Outreach or programmatic. And then also on the legislative regulatory side. Yeah.
- [22:21]
Joshua Crouch
Well Brian, I was gonna so talking about changes and potential changes. Have you anyone that you've talked to or even in contractors worked with you? Like because one, they're in homes every single day.
- [22:33]
Tersh Blissett
Yeah, right.
- [22:35]
Joshua Crouch
Most homes that they go and serve probably have kids. Majority, not all, but majority. And I mean what an easy one. What an easy marketing thing. What a, what a way to get them to know like and trust your company versus hey, handing the, having the, handing the kids a, a book something that's, that's valuable. But has anyone come to you have, have talked to anyone about doing something like that on the ground level like with contractors of because I know like a lot of contractors will they bring dog treats if they got dog. It's just, you know, it's a know like and trust thing. So that way they like wow, I really feel comfortable with this company. They like dogs.
- [23:06]
Tersh Blissett
Are you comparing dogs to kids? Like you're giving dog treaties they do
- [23:13]
Ryan Cascadin
poop and eat a lot. That's right. As I always tell everybody, I know you never invest in anything that eats. Okay, Dogs, kids, wife, plants. And my problem is I've done all of those, but probably, like, you guys have, it sounds like, yeah. As far as what are the strategies for contractors with, like, a tool like this? So this is where I think when I first wrote the book series, I just said to myself, I think there's potential here. Let's see what road this goes on. And that was five years ago. And here I am now, four books later, educational toolkits and lesson plans for educators, all sponsored by the air conditioning contractors of America. And that very concept, Josh, that you mentioned, is kind of where their head went for their members, which is, okay, there's a myriad of uses for this kind of content, books, these toolkits, lesson plans. And I have been blown away not only by their level of enthusiasm and engagement and sponsorship, but also of their members, but also what their members do that I never would have envisioned. Okay. Like, I go to their event that, you know, I know Tertia mentioned prior, and they have. I'm talking to some of their members. One of their guys is like, I have a community program. It does Easter eggs. It's like 20 kids. Every year, I bought 20 books to hand out to my next set of kids next year.
- [24:31]
Tersh Blissett
Right?
- [24:31]
Ryan Cascadin
And they put a sticker in, Right. Like, I've heard folks that are like, look, I literally just called up my local county here, I got a directory of all of the elementary schools, and I donated a copy of each one of the books into the local schools library. You know, so there are just so many things you can do with this type of content that. Yes. Can I think, attach and tell the contractor story? Right. If they're not able to, but also they can use it as. As a marketing tool, you know, as well. And I just didn't even envision that. All I wanted to do was tell their story as I saw it. And immediately, for people that get it, I love the grinds. The gears start grinding right away in their head and they go, I know exactly how I'm going to use that in my company without me having to explain to them how to use it. Right. They're just like, oh, yeah, I got this right away. Oftentimes what I hear from the contractors isn't, yeah, I bought it because I have kids. I bought it because I have grandkids. Again, there's certainly uses for that, and I've heard that generally, but it's the other side which is like they apply it immediately to examples like you mentioned like I give it as a leave behind or I give it out as an employee gift almost as a thank you at the end of the year to give give to somebody and donate into your local rotary club or whatever. It's so incredibly cool to see the uses that these guys are very creative. They can be very creative and how they approach marketing and this is one of the things that some choose to do and they use it for
- [25:57]
Tersh Blissett
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- [26:42]
Joshua Crouch
Today's episode is powered by Cirrus Systems.
- [26:44]
Tersh Blissett
Sarah is all about removing the clutter and unnecessary touch points to run your home service business profitably.
- [26:49]
Joshua Crouch
They use AI dispatching to get the right tech to the right call automatically and job time efficiency to ensure your entire team runs like a profit generating machine.
- [26:58]
Tersh Blissett
Get a tech upgrade for your business at Get Sarah Tech Service Business Mastery. Brian, what happens in 10 years if every contractor treated recruiting as a community education instead of just job posting?
- [27:17]
Ryan Cascadin
Oh my God. Wow. What a question. First of all, I would think, I would think we would resolve this issue in Matt. You know, it's a great question because I think that's really at the heart of this, which is just like a lot of things in life. As I mentioned earlier, you have two levers to help change this. I think outreach and then also legislative. Just like finding your next technician is. It's a next day activity, it's a year plan or it's a ten year plan. Right? So. So you have to do all three of those. I think well and from a place of good intent to actually change this issue. But you know, again I think it kind of it all starts at both the kitchen table. It starts at, you know, in the schools, it starts at online, it starts at digital, it starts at all those things to change this Narrative which has been out there for too long, which is this is not sexy work. It is hard work on the body. It is, you know, frankly, the rejects of society, as a bunch of people have told me and I've heard, which is a side thread to that. I will comment on this. I talked to one of a well known national trainer at a manufacturer in our industry and when he saw the kids books and he made this comment to me, he said, I have ADD and I have ADHD. 80% of the people that I train in my program, again representing the manufacturer, which is mostly contractors he's training, he said 80% of these people have ADD or ADHD. And I said, why do you.
- [28:48]
Tersh Blissett
Right?
- [28:48]
Ryan Cascadin
And he go. And I, he goes, I asked him why do you think that is? And he said, there's two things actually. One is it is a skill or a something that can actually help them dramatically in this work because they can focus, they could take apart things, put it back together as is. He goes, it's a benefit or an enhancement. But secondly, and this is part of the perception challenge is that most kids because they were banned in school were pushed down the VOTEC route because they had ADD and adhd and they're the bad kids and they're the ones that have to go and do these programs. And it's like in hindsight, as a consequence. As a consequence and not as a benefit.
- [29:27]
Tersh Blissett
Right.
- [29:28]
Joshua Crouch
Here's the ironic thing. I literally just saw a post like this yesterday talking about like the school systems and stuff like that in Grant. I've been on like a big health journey and I realized that most of the reason that our kids all have these things that didn't exist a long time ago is called crap in our food like bar non. That is literally one of the biggest problems we have, which I'm glad that there's some, some movement on changing eating the whole foods and not the garbage crap that they put in a can and whatever. Yeah, but the post I was referencing was, oh goodness, I shouldn't have talked about the food thing. I lost my train of thought. Um, it literally was talking about how.
- [30:07]
Tersh Blissett
Damn it.
- [30:07]
Joshua Crouch
What were you just talking about? Ryan literally just went right, right out my head.
- [30:12]
Ryan Cascadin
Oh, we talking about add, adhd, kind of like pushing people down a certain path based on add. Yeah,
- [30:21]
Joshua Crouch
yeah, no kidding. It's not coming back to me either.
- [30:23]
Ryan Cascadin
Hey, what's the.
- [30:24]
Tersh Blissett
Ryan, what's the name of all your books?
- [30:26]
Ryan Cascadin
Yes. Yeah, thank you for asking. So they are called. It's part of our next up trade series so that's the name of the books. And we have the Air Came to a Stop, which is the English version of an H vac story. And then there's the Water Came to a Stop, which is a plumbing version, but also an English story, language story. Then we have both those books in Spanish. That's why we say we have four. So both those are available in Spanish as well. And yeah, the idea being is like, how do we kind of showcase plumbing and H vac to children, both these technicians as the people that solve problems. And we appreciate it. But also that vocabulary embedded in the stories. You know, stuff like water heater and PEX pipe to ductwork and vent and refrigerant capacitor, and then reinforced with a thing called a word association exercise at the end of the stories to help them kind of understand. Oh, wait, you talked about, you know, a refrigerant. What is that? Is this what it looks like? Yes, that's what it looks like. Which, by the way, the Akka team was amazing at verifying that R32 looks like this. Okay. Not the old R22 Freon stuff, you know, so very accurate in terms of today's lexicon with everything as well, making sure that it was accurate. But. But that's what the books are called. And part of our. Part of the program.
- [31:44]
Tersh Blissett
That's cool.
- [31:44]
Ryan Cascadin
Yeah.
- [31:45]
Joshua Crouch
Ryan, I remember what I was going to say now.
- [31:47]
Tersh Blissett
I figured you would.
- [31:48]
Joshua Crouch
So the ADHD thing that you mentioned, there was a post about the fact that you would talk about AI, and we talk about AI a lot on this show. The way kids are rewarded in school these days is by memorizing stuff.
- [32:02]
Ryan Cascadin
Yeah.
- [32:03]
Joshua Crouch
Essentially memorizing different things. Being able to take a test, which, of course, a lot of it's recall and memory and things like that. And there's a lot of people that just not that good at that. Like, literally, I've two kids, they're both completely different. One did not do well in school, can't memorize anything. He's the one that wants to go in the trades. The other one, I honestly seriously think she has, like, photographic memory because she, like, can see a map. And then she just, like, recalls the information. I'm like, was impressive. So she breezes, like, literally breezes through school. She barely has to try and A's and B's and. But that's. That's how society's like, oh, you're. You're smart, you're a good kid, versus you're not a good kid. And then that.
- [32:41]
Tersh Blissett
Not.
- [32:41]
Joshua Crouch
Not a Good kid might. And I've. We've both Ter and I have shared experience. We've had some kids that in our households have gone down paths and done some things that we wanted them to do.
- [32:51]
Ryan Cascadin
But I also think some of that
- [32:52]
Joshua Crouch
societal pressure of them just be feeling like they. They were an outcast, and then they go down that outcast route because they're not. They're not good at school or they can't sit still or they can't exactly, you know, whatever, memorize facts and f. You know, things like that. And it's, It's. It's really sad to see. I. I feel like there's a lot bigger push and maybe I just feel that in Arizona here, but for online school, for private schooling, for homeschooling, if I had kids older when I. Because I didn't have money when I was, or any sort of success when I was younger, I would have probably homeschooled my kids if I had to do it over again and have them a lesson plan that was a little bit more curated for them, that was more experimental, versus let's go memorize some stuff in textbooks. Because AI literally can do that stuff better than any of what any of us anyway. So what's the point of memorizing that stuff? It's like, back in the day, like, we used to. Can't use your calculator on a test. Remember we had like, ti.
- [33:47]
Tersh Blissett
You won't get to carry that thing around your every day.
- [33:50]
Joshua Crouch
Yeah. Well, now it's literally like, hey, Siri, what's this divided by this?
- [33:54]
Tersh Blissett
Like, you.
- [33:56]
Joshua Crouch
You literally don't have to even know math or even English to. You just speak it into the phone and it tells you exactly what you need to know.
- [34:04]
Ryan Cascadin
Yeah, Josh. I love all that because I think there's a lot of truth in there about how we learn and how this next generation learns and what will replace what it was traditional learning. I definitely. I've seen a trend myself, both with two boys at home, 7 and 9. Like, how do they learn? How do they memorize things? And what will AI do there? And what's the policies gonna be about? AI? One thing, as you were talking, it kind of reminded me I wanted to mention I've learned and this is my experience with my kids. But I also, I would say to any contractor and anybody that wants to show folks this industry the path to get into their heart and their mind is literally through your phone and what do I mean, Iot and connected product is by far one of the. Like, they understand this stuff immediately. My, my kid, I showed them the thermostat when we were on vacation recently. Like, oh, look at the thermostat at home. It's, you know, 75 degrees or whatever. And my kids are just like, wow, that actually connects at home. We can change it and do all this. And like, yes. Now imagine if that was your job, you know, child of mine and say your job is to, like, work with people, to both set up these controls once they've been installed, but also to install the systems that do that. All of a sudden the spark, like kind of like lights up. So, like, I feel like there's, there's something to this IoT connected product and children and connecting them earlier to like, it isn't just a button I push that makes it work, but it's a button that tells it to do something that I can go fix that thing that there's a piece there that no one has tapped yet, I feel like. But also there's that gamification approach as well, which even adult learners love gamification. But, oh, sure, children particularly love gamification. Okay. Like points awarded for doing activities, which now ranks me against my peers. If you do that and we think about learning in that way, especially with our industry, I think we'll succeed. One of the challenges, as you guys, I'm sure know, is that our education system, when it comes to Votech, forget about the everyday K through 5 for a second. Vodac hands on in, you know, community colleges and other places, look at who are teaching these kids. Again, I love them, okay. We grew up with them, we know them. They're. But they're not the generation that's closest to representing the 7 and 9 year old anymore. How do we close that gap, too? In addition to closing the gap and keeping the paths open for as long as we can, you know, for these kids, there's a lot there to be said about the entire system in terms of how they get exposed to H Vac and plumbing, frankly.
- [36:43]
Tersh Blissett
Yeah. Like it. That's a really good point.
- [36:45]
Joshua Crouch
Josh.
- [36:46]
Tersh Blissett
Do you have anything else?
- [36:47]
Joshua Crouch
I was going to ask the best place to find to.
- [36:50]
Tersh Blissett
That's, that's what I was going to
- [36:51]
Joshua Crouch
get your books or to at least take a look at what they are and stuff like that. Where's the best place for someone to find.
- [36:57]
Ryan Cascadin
You got it. Well, first of all, thanks for having me on your podcast. This was a pleasure. I love the conversation.
- [37:02]
Tersh Blissett
Absolutely.
- [37:03]
Ryan Cascadin
And if, yeah, if any of your listeners are interested in the children's books or the lesson plans or what we're doing with the ACCA, you can always start on my website, www.nextuptrades.com that will get you in all the right places for the books. Akka's program ordering discovery kits, we call them now, not educational toolkits, but discovery kits. It's a really neat program that Akka has, but if you're also an ACCA member, if you're listening to this, everything's listed on their website as well, so please visit there too. I'm very active on LinkedIn and and Instagram, so if any of your listeners have an interest to go to those sites as well, message me. I'd be so humbled if anyone has any interest in this stuff or I can help you in any way to tell the next generation about all the work that you do as contractors. The work I wish I was doing some days, frankly. So that's best places to find me.
- [37:55]
Tersh Blissett
Ryan, we appreciate you hanging out with us. I mean truly, this is, this is a breath of fresh air. Speaking on this topic. Josh, you got anything before we wrap up?
- [38:05]
Ryan Cascadin
No, no.
- [38:05]
Joshua Crouch
I really enjoyed reading. I. I didn't realize someone had this out there. So it was great to find out and learn about it.
- [38:12]
Tersh Blissett
Yeah.
- [38:13]
Ryan Cascadin
Awesome.
- [38:13]
Tersh Blissett
Awesome. If anybody, if you have any questions at all, don't hesitate to reach out to Ryan and he's obviously a wealth of knowledge and is very passionate about this project. So with that being said, I hope you have a wonderful and safe week. Until we talk again. Next time. We'll see you later.
- [38:30]
Ryan Cascadin
Thank you for listening to this episode of Service Business Mastery. Now that you are equipped with essential business advice from this impactful conversation, you are one step closer to becoming the successful owner of your dreams. If this episode has been helpful to your business journey, don't forget to subscribe to the show, leave a rating, and share it with other owners as well.
- [38:51]
Joshua Crouch
Visit servicebusinessmastery.com to learn more.
- [39:02]
Krista from Marketstorm
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Tersh Blissett
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