1 00:00:03,800 --> 00:00:06,120 Speaker 1: Everybody is Bill Courtney with an army of normal folks. 2 00:00:06,120 --> 00:00:11,200 Speaker 1: Shop Talk number twenty five. Nope, you didn't hear anything else. 3 00:00:11,280 --> 00:00:14,040 Speaker 1: It's shop Talk number twenty five. Today we're going to 4 00:00:14,080 --> 00:00:17,400 Speaker 1: talk about character, and I'm going to share with you 5 00:00:18,160 --> 00:00:21,440 Speaker 1: one of the most trying times in my life and 6 00:00:21,520 --> 00:00:28,720 Speaker 1: how we dealt with it, maybe as an example to 7 00:00:28,720 --> 00:00:31,280 Speaker 1: what I mean when I talk about character. And we'll 8 00:00:31,280 --> 00:00:47,720 Speaker 1: do that right after these brief messages from our general sponsors. Everybody, 9 00:00:47,800 --> 00:00:54,680 Speaker 1: Bill Courtney, chop Talk number twenty five. Is that a bell? 10 00:00:55,800 --> 00:01:04,920 Speaker 1: Oh my gosh, one more bell? Shop Talk twenty five. Yay, 11 00:01:05,200 --> 00:01:11,240 Speaker 1: we're quarter of a century there. That was unbelievable. Audio 12 00:01:11,360 --> 00:01:15,360 Speaker 1: visual editing Alex, thanks so much for that. I don't 13 00:01:15,440 --> 00:01:19,480 Speaker 1: know what you're being paid, but it's too much. Okay. Character, 14 00:01:20,040 --> 00:01:28,119 Speaker 1: so you've heard me say if you've seen the movie Undefeated, 15 00:01:28,160 --> 00:01:31,360 Speaker 1: if you had it, I'm gonna say it now. Football 16 00:01:31,560 --> 00:01:37,119 Speaker 1: doesn't build character, It reveals it. That really can translate 17 00:01:37,200 --> 00:01:41,280 Speaker 1: to this, Tough times don't build character. Tough times reveal character. 18 00:01:41,760 --> 00:01:44,680 Speaker 1: What I mean by that is you build your character 19 00:01:44,840 --> 00:01:49,960 Speaker 1: by surrounding yourself with tenants and fundamentals that build a 20 00:01:50,040 --> 00:01:53,280 Speaker 1: proper foundation. To lead your life, and then when the 21 00:01:53,320 --> 00:01:56,760 Speaker 1: world hits you in the mouth, that's the opportunity to 22 00:01:56,840 --> 00:02:05,080 Speaker 1: reveal your character or lack of it. And no matter 23 00:02:05,160 --> 00:02:08,320 Speaker 1: how much work you've done, there are going to be 24 00:02:08,400 --> 00:02:11,800 Speaker 1: moments that test you more than others. And I just 25 00:02:11,800 --> 00:02:14,639 Speaker 1: want to tell you about a story from July two 26 00:02:14,720 --> 00:02:18,080 Speaker 1: thousand and six that I learned that very valuable lesson 27 00:02:18,120 --> 00:02:23,480 Speaker 1: all too well. My company, Classic American Hardwoods was in trouble. 28 00:02:24,320 --> 00:02:26,600 Speaker 1: The profit and law statements for June showed that we 29 00:02:26,720 --> 00:02:30,040 Speaker 1: lost one hundred and eleven thousand dollars that month, and 30 00:02:30,120 --> 00:02:32,840 Speaker 1: the numbers for July were likely to be even bleaker. 31 00:02:33,760 --> 00:02:36,640 Speaker 1: Prior to June, we had never posted one month in 32 00:02:36,680 --> 00:02:39,160 Speaker 1: the red, and I started my business in September of 33 00:02:39,240 --> 00:02:43,680 Speaker 1: two thousand and one, ten days before the World Trade Center. 34 00:02:44,840 --> 00:02:50,119 Speaker 1: And despite all of that, I'd never not made at 35 00:02:50,200 --> 00:02:53,560 Speaker 1: least a dollar and been in the black every single 36 00:02:53,600 --> 00:02:57,560 Speaker 1: month since the first month I was in business until 37 00:02:57,600 --> 00:03:00,760 Speaker 1: July two thousand and six. Most people think the housing 38 00:03:00,840 --> 00:03:03,600 Speaker 1: crisis was seven or eight, but when you're the lumber business, 39 00:03:03,600 --> 00:03:06,239 Speaker 1: you're kind of a leading economic indicator of building in 40 00:03:06,320 --> 00:03:09,400 Speaker 1: times to come. So July two thousand and six was 41 00:03:09,400 --> 00:03:11,320 Speaker 1: when it hit us in the face before it hit 42 00:03:11,400 --> 00:03:14,560 Speaker 1: most everybody else in the face. Orders had slowed to 43 00:03:14,600 --> 00:03:18,840 Speaker 1: a trickle, and really they weren't coming at all. To 44 00:03:18,919 --> 00:03:22,239 Speaker 1: those of us in the lumber industry. We knew a 45 00:03:22,320 --> 00:03:25,440 Speaker 1: recession was coming before the smart people in DC did, 46 00:03:25,919 --> 00:03:28,040 Speaker 1: and even when we tried to warn them, they wouldn't listen. 47 00:03:29,400 --> 00:03:32,520 Speaker 1: I laid in bed the night I reviewed the June statement. 48 00:03:32,600 --> 00:03:36,600 Speaker 1: I kept wondering how I could figure out how to 49 00:03:36,640 --> 00:03:39,360 Speaker 1: tell lease in our kids that I'd failed them because 50 00:03:39,400 --> 00:03:43,520 Speaker 1: I knew we were going broke. I thought we were 51 00:03:43,520 --> 00:03:45,360 Speaker 1: going to have to leave the house that we loved. 52 00:03:46,200 --> 00:03:48,120 Speaker 1: I also worried about what kind of job I was 53 00:03:48,120 --> 00:03:51,760 Speaker 1: going to find in the worst economy of a lifetime. 54 00:03:52,400 --> 00:03:54,720 Speaker 1: I'd be damaged goods, to say the least, I ran 55 00:03:54,760 --> 00:03:57,760 Speaker 1: my own business in the ground. In addition, I wouldn't 56 00:03:57,760 --> 00:04:00,600 Speaker 1: be able to coach football anymore because be my own 57 00:04:00,680 --> 00:04:03,200 Speaker 1: bass and be able to set my own schedule. I 58 00:04:03,240 --> 00:04:05,000 Speaker 1: didn't know where the kids were going to go to school. 59 00:04:05,600 --> 00:04:08,480 Speaker 1: Would my players feel abandoned? I mean I would if 60 00:04:08,480 --> 00:04:12,320 Speaker 1: I were them. I even went as far to start 61 00:04:12,480 --> 00:04:16,799 Speaker 1: thinking about my goodbye speech and lecturing them one last 62 00:04:16,800 --> 00:04:19,360 Speaker 1: time about the values of characters, not how you saying 63 00:04:19,400 --> 00:04:22,880 Speaker 1: you your successes, but how you're anger your failures, And 64 00:04:22,920 --> 00:04:26,200 Speaker 1: now I was being tested in that very thing. Then 65 00:04:26,240 --> 00:04:31,000 Speaker 1: it suddenly hit me, what was I thinking? How could 66 00:04:31,000 --> 00:04:34,320 Speaker 1: I utter a word about character while laying in bed, 67 00:04:34,360 --> 00:04:38,760 Speaker 1: feeling sorry for myself and wilting under the pressure some 68 00:04:38,920 --> 00:04:43,119 Speaker 1: shining example I was. I guess I needed to live 69 00:04:44,000 --> 00:04:47,680 Speaker 1: what I was preaching. So at three in the morning, 70 00:04:48,000 --> 00:04:51,480 Speaker 1: I literally jumped out of bed for as much as 71 00:04:51,520 --> 00:04:55,000 Speaker 1: a two hundred and sixty pound guy can jump, and 72 00:04:55,080 --> 00:04:57,479 Speaker 1: over the next five or six hours, I sat at 73 00:04:57,520 --> 00:05:04,680 Speaker 1: the kitchen table crunching numbers. I'm serious. I was searching 74 00:05:05,040 --> 00:05:08,920 Speaker 1: for every dollar, every way to save as many positions 75 00:05:08,920 --> 00:05:12,640 Speaker 1: as I could without sacrificing the whole company. I took 76 00:05:12,680 --> 00:05:17,159 Speaker 1: a short break for church, I guess, hoping for some 77 00:05:17,240 --> 00:05:20,480 Speaker 1: divine guidance, and I assure you a ton of prayer, 78 00:05:21,640 --> 00:05:23,560 Speaker 1: and then I returned to the table for another five 79 00:05:23,640 --> 00:05:27,040 Speaker 1: or six hours. By Monday morning, I'd come up with 80 00:05:28,839 --> 00:05:31,200 Speaker 1: this is still hard for me to say. With fifty 81 00:05:31,200 --> 00:05:34,560 Speaker 1: four jobs that I had to eliminate out of a 82 00:05:34,640 --> 00:05:37,560 Speaker 1: workforce of one hundred and twenty, I came up with 83 00:05:37,600 --> 00:05:40,960 Speaker 1: another seventy five thousand dollars a monthly expenses we could cut, 84 00:05:41,760 --> 00:05:45,000 Speaker 1: and for every single person remaining of the one hundred 85 00:05:45,040 --> 00:05:48,279 Speaker 1: and twenty from the fifty four i'd cut, they'd all 86 00:05:48,279 --> 00:05:51,920 Speaker 1: have to accept a ten percent pay cut. That Monday 87 00:05:54,640 --> 00:05:58,120 Speaker 1: was in the top five most painful days of my life. 88 00:05:58,960 --> 00:06:01,880 Speaker 1: I was letting people go for no reason related to 89 00:06:01,920 --> 00:06:04,200 Speaker 1: their performance, some of whom had been with me from 90 00:06:04,200 --> 00:06:07,000 Speaker 1: the beginning. I laid off one woman in the office 91 00:06:07,000 --> 00:06:09,840 Speaker 1: who'd been married for three weeks. She couldn't stop crying. 92 00:06:10,000 --> 00:06:11,960 Speaker 1: I don't know how we're going to manage, she said. 93 00:06:12,640 --> 00:06:15,039 Speaker 1: Another woman I fired was taking care of a pregnant 94 00:06:15,120 --> 00:06:18,960 Speaker 1: daughter who wasn't married. The women's husband. Meanwhile, I had 95 00:06:18,960 --> 00:06:21,279 Speaker 1: lost his jobs a few weeks earlier, and there was 96 00:06:21,440 --> 00:06:23,560 Speaker 1: just nothing I could do. Her job had been to 97 00:06:23,560 --> 00:06:26,440 Speaker 1: answer the phone, and I didn't need somebody to answer 98 00:06:26,480 --> 00:06:30,520 Speaker 1: the phone. The automated system could handle it. I knew 99 00:06:30,560 --> 00:06:33,159 Speaker 1: I was sending men home to look their wives and 100 00:06:33,240 --> 00:06:37,640 Speaker 1: children in the face and say I wasn't valuable enough 101 00:06:37,680 --> 00:06:46,880 Speaker 1: to keep It was awful. I bawled driving home that night. 102 00:06:47,800 --> 00:06:50,760 Speaker 1: I thought of the employees I'd let go and I 103 00:06:50,800 --> 00:06:53,680 Speaker 1: thought of about the ones who remained and the sacrifices 104 00:06:53,760 --> 00:06:56,039 Speaker 1: they had to make for a smaller paycheck when a 105 00:06:56,080 --> 00:06:59,599 Speaker 1: recession was happening. I thought of the vendors whose products 106 00:06:59,600 --> 00:07:03,719 Speaker 1: and services I'd canceled all day long, and how I 107 00:07:03,880 --> 00:07:05,800 Speaker 1: was the first of many to come because I knew 108 00:07:05,800 --> 00:07:12,400 Speaker 1: this thing was coming. And I thought, you know, gosh, 109 00:07:12,440 --> 00:07:16,320 Speaker 1: you know how many lives have I turned upside down? 110 00:07:17,960 --> 00:07:20,400 Speaker 1: But on the other hand, I was grateful for one thing. 111 00:07:21,000 --> 00:07:24,960 Speaker 1: We were still running. Before too long, we were black 112 00:07:25,800 --> 00:07:29,880 Speaker 1: into black again, And believe it or not, within four 113 00:07:29,960 --> 00:07:33,040 Speaker 1: or five months, with the cost savings, I was able 114 00:07:33,080 --> 00:07:36,040 Speaker 1: to handle a hire a few dozen of my former 115 00:07:36,080 --> 00:07:40,840 Speaker 1: workers back. Within three years, I'd restored the ten percent 116 00:07:40,880 --> 00:07:44,120 Speaker 1: pay cutting wages and added five percent to it. And 117 00:07:44,240 --> 00:07:48,320 Speaker 1: since that day, while my industry is shrunk, ourselves have doubled. 118 00:07:49,280 --> 00:07:51,960 Speaker 1: How do we do it? I think we did it 119 00:07:52,000 --> 00:07:54,840 Speaker 1: by responding the right way to our most difficult challenge. 120 00:07:54,880 --> 00:07:59,680 Speaker 1: Why the crisis didn't build our character, it's certainly revealed 121 00:08:00,200 --> 00:08:04,160 Speaker 1: my company's character. It taught us a valuable lesson. We 122 00:08:04,280 --> 00:08:08,120 Speaker 1: have the ability to survive anything if we're willing to 123 00:08:08,720 --> 00:08:11,320 Speaker 1: make the tough choices We've got to make stand bying, 124 00:08:11,720 --> 00:08:19,520 Speaker 1: be honest, be kind, be graceful, work hard, and and 125 00:08:19,640 --> 00:08:23,720 Speaker 1: prepare for the tough times, for the next tough time. 126 00:08:26,600 --> 00:08:32,640 Speaker 1: So when I say football doesn't build character, reveals it. 127 00:08:33,840 --> 00:08:43,240 Speaker 1: And when I when when I talk about the value 128 00:08:43,440 --> 00:08:49,840 Speaker 1: of character, you know, anybody can be a champ when 129 00:08:49,880 --> 00:08:53,520 Speaker 1: things are going well. True character is revealed when the 130 00:08:53,600 --> 00:08:57,800 Speaker 1: tough times hit. As I say in my book Against 131 00:08:57,880 --> 00:09:00,960 Speaker 1: the Grain, the true measure of a p since characters 132 00:09:01,040 --> 00:09:05,480 Speaker 1: how one handles his failures, not his successes. So as 133 00:09:05,520 --> 00:09:08,800 Speaker 1: you ball up those three ideas of what real character 134 00:09:09,000 --> 00:09:14,480 Speaker 1: is and how it's revealed, and you hear the story 135 00:09:14,480 --> 00:09:18,120 Speaker 1: of the people that surrounded me in my business and 136 00:09:18,280 --> 00:09:24,520 Speaker 1: the toughest times of all, you know, yeah, we worked 137 00:09:24,520 --> 00:09:27,280 Speaker 1: harder and everything else, but I genuinely believe it was 138 00:09:27,960 --> 00:09:29,920 Speaker 1: the character of the company and the character of the 139 00:09:29,920 --> 00:09:33,000 Speaker 1: people that in it that helped us survive. And now 140 00:09:33,040 --> 00:09:37,080 Speaker 1: in twenty twenty four, we've tripled our size and we 141 00:09:37,160 --> 00:09:39,920 Speaker 1: do more business, and we're a healthy company. And many 142 00:09:39,960 --> 00:09:42,160 Speaker 1: of the very people that took those pay cuts back 143 00:09:42,160 --> 00:09:44,760 Speaker 1: then are still with me today, making lots more than 144 00:09:44,760 --> 00:09:47,640 Speaker 1: they ever made back before. They're ten percent pay cut, 145 00:09:47,640 --> 00:09:49,480 Speaker 1: and a lot of the people we had to lay off, 146 00:09:49,520 --> 00:09:52,200 Speaker 1: we hired back and are back. And I will say 147 00:09:52,840 --> 00:09:56,199 Speaker 1: that all of those lives, including my own, and the 148 00:09:56,240 --> 00:10:01,160 Speaker 1: health of this company, was all made better because of character, 149 00:10:02,200 --> 00:10:07,280 Speaker 1: because of what characters revealed, and how we handle our failures, 150 00:10:07,559 --> 00:10:11,160 Speaker 1: not our successes. Because anybody can be a champ when 151 00:10:11,160 --> 00:10:15,600 Speaker 1: they're successful. What does somebody do when failure and tough 152 00:10:15,640 --> 00:10:18,720 Speaker 1: times hit you? Have they built the right foundation of 153 00:10:18,840 --> 00:10:22,640 Speaker 1: character to handle the difficult times so that when the 154 00:10:22,760 --> 00:10:27,920 Speaker 1: opportunity to reveal character presents itself, it can be revealed 155 00:10:27,960 --> 00:10:31,000 Speaker 1: in all of its splendor, so that everybody can survive 156 00:10:31,840 --> 00:10:37,520 Speaker 1: and prosper further after the difficult times have subsided. So 157 00:10:38,120 --> 00:10:39,800 Speaker 1: as you go through your week and you think about 158 00:10:39,840 --> 00:10:44,079 Speaker 1: your challenges, have you built yourself ready? Do you have 159 00:10:44,880 --> 00:10:48,760 Speaker 1: character ready to be revealed? Have you built the right foundation? 160 00:10:49,880 --> 00:10:53,960 Speaker 1: Is the foundation of those surrounding you proper? Because tough 161 00:10:53,960 --> 00:10:56,760 Speaker 1: times are going to hit us, and when the opportunity 162 00:10:56,800 --> 00:11:00,640 Speaker 1: for character to be revealed hits, I hope you'll be 163 00:11:00,640 --> 00:11:03,079 Speaker 1: able to reveal the proper character to see yourself through 164 00:11:03,080 --> 00:11:05,160 Speaker 1: the touch time so you can prosper down the road. 165 00:11:06,040 --> 00:11:09,600 Speaker 1: That shop talking number twenty five. If you have any 166 00:11:09,640 --> 00:11:12,720 Speaker 1: ideas about thoughts, or current events or anything else you 167 00:11:13,440 --> 00:11:15,840 Speaker 1: like to hear me comment on. If I think I 168 00:11:15,920 --> 00:11:20,320 Speaker 1: have value, I'll comment on them, and I'll plug you 169 00:11:20,800 --> 00:11:22,600 Speaker 1: as a person who gave me the idea. You can 170 00:11:22,640 --> 00:11:27,840 Speaker 1: reach me anytime at Bill at normalfolks dot us. If 171 00:11:27,880 --> 00:11:31,280 Speaker 1: you like this episode, rate it, review it, join, subscribe 172 00:11:31,280 --> 00:11:35,280 Speaker 1: to the podcast, help us out, become a Premium member. 173 00:11:36,360 --> 00:11:40,160 Speaker 1: Join the ranks of an army of normal folks. That's 174 00:11:40,200 --> 00:11:43,360 Speaker 1: Shop Talk number twenty five, thanks to our producer, iron 175 00:11:43,440 --> 00:11:46,640 Speaker 1: Light Labs. I'm Bill Courtney. I'll see you next week.