2341 - Streamlining Your Construction Business for Better Engagement with Leyah&Co.'s Leyah Valgardson Hostetter

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0:58With us right now, it is Leah Dalgardson Hostetter. Leah, you are the founder and principal consultant with Leah and Company. Your website is leahco.com. We've got the spelling of that in the show notes for this episode. Leah, it's great to have you. Thank you for having me, Josh. Happy to be here. Well, it's so fun connecting with you in the green room. Before we talked to this, we found out we have a lot of things in common. Right now, it's really important that we talk about your superpowers for folks that are looking to get to know the work that you do. And Leah, before we get into that, you know, I always love just kind of finding out what high level leaders and achievers do when they're not at work, you know, the kind of the passions and hobbies and things that we geek out on movies, TV shows, books, that sort of thing.

1:45What have you been into lately? Okay, so I just got married a couple years ago, and my husband introduced me to a lot of like rock art, native, native rock art and things like that. We have a side-by-side and we live in Utah. So we go out exploring all the time and we love to get off trail and just wander and explore. And we love to find really cool rock art and native ruins and things like that. So that's been really fun. What is rock art? Petroglyphs, pictographs. Yeah. Got it. Got it. So basically, like rock for me, well, you're living in the perfect place. Utah is spectacular. To someone, obviously, Bryce Canyon, Zion, what are your favorite spots?

2:29So if you have someone, it's like, look, I've never experienced this before. What are some of your favorite, maybe like two of your favorite destinations if folks want to see some spectacular formations in art? Now, Josh, you're asking me to give trade secrets away. Okay, maybe not the two favorites, but yeah. We'll share. I mean, Utah's incredible. So if you ever have a chance to come here, please do. Newspaper Rock is actually really cool. And that is near Monticello, Utah. That's probably the closest little community. It's maybe 40 minutes away from there, but it's this rock that's massive.

3:05It's probably the size of maybe my wall over here. And it is just littered with rock art. It's really, really cool. You know, they always assume that it's probably like a sacred space or maybe like a spot where people would come to hunt and stuff. But there's just all kinds of figures and cool stuff there. So that's a fun one to go see. Well, listen, if you're looking for a place with great Instagram presence, go to Southern Utah. You'll definitely find a lot of it. That's it's just I don't care how silly looking you might be in real life. You're going to look amazing when you're getting photographs in front of, you know, rich geography like that.

3:46Well, Leah, tell us about the work that you do with Leah and Co. Yes. So I I work primarily with construction business owners and I have been in the industry really my whole life. My dad was a general contractor, grew up on a job site doing work with him, grew up out of college working for some large production home builders, and then started on my own about seven years ago and have coached over 150 construction business owners, really helping them to get systems and processes in place. And one of the things that I've realized over the last year is that also a big part of my career has been the customer experience.

4:22And so now I lead with that, beginning with the end in mind. So when I work with construction business owners, we plan out and detail their client experience first, and then we're able to kind of come back through and see, okay, there's some gaps here. There's some holes here. There's some things we need to get fixed behind the scenes so you can deliver a great experience for your clients. All right. Give us some stereotypes about what business owners and leaders in that industry are like and why you coming along is likely really valuable. I'm not trying to tip my hand too much into what I know, but I'm sure you know way more than I do.

4:59Yeah. Well, I'm actually going to answer that two parts because first I feel construction, the industry, it has a reputation problem. We all know this, right? You go, you consider maybe building a home or doing a remodel or renovation in your home. What do you always hear? Oh, it's going to be like over budget. It's going to be over the timeframe. It's going to be hard to get the information you need, all the things that come along with construction. So knowing that, But what I do when I work with contractors is I help them to iron out all of that behind the scenes. This is what I call behind the scenes in front of stage.

5:31So working on their systems and processes and getting things dialed in, making sure they have the right people in the right positions and that they know what they need to do and they're following a process consistently. So when a client comes to you, we can deliver an exceptional experience as well as a very high quality build or remodel, whatever the case may be. Leah, I hope you don't mind me asking this, but I have to. I think of home construction as being a very, very male-dominated space. You're not a male. I am not. So to other female leaders in maybe traditionally male-dominated spaces, I'm sure that you've had to learn some things along the way.

6:13And again, you were raised in this environment anyway. What advice or tips would you give to other? and really, quite frankly, anyone that's maybe, you know, coming into a space that maybe traditionally that they're not representing the majority. We'll just call it that way. And any ideas and tips? Yes, absolutely. And spot on. Being a woman in this industry has come with some challenges. There's also some benefits to being someone who's a bit of a minority in a group, if you will. And I can share some of that too. But one of the things I would say is know your job and know it well. Like become an expert in what you do and do your job really well.

6:54One of the things that I've experienced in my career, even if I stepped onto a job site and I was maybe a senior member of a team or sometimes the senior member of a team, I would always be a second guest on my knowledge or I would have to double prove myself more so than maybe some of my male counterparts. And unfortunately, these are the biases that happen and it just is what it is. so the advice I would say is if you're in a scenario like that what good does it do to get upset there's there's nothing that's going to come of that so what I've done in those scenarios is I have taken the opportunity to use them as coaching opportunities because I don't believe most humans are terrible sexist racist cute people they're really good people and sometimes we say or do things that are not meaning to make a cross a certain way but they do so I always like to share this story.

7:43Actually, one of my last corporate roles, I was in a team with all men. We were all at the same level in our leadership, if you will, except for our boss. And anytime we had a team meeting, everyone would turn to me and be like, Leah, you got the notes, right? And I'm very organized. I take good notes anyways. So I was like, sure. Yeah, I got them. And then after a couple of times of that happening, I was like, wait a minute. Why am I doing the secretary here? Yeah. Yeah. And I could have gotten upset and yelled at these guys, but I know them and I know their hearts and they're good men. They're also very good friends.

8:15And so I used it as a coaching opportunity. And I said, Hey guys, how come you're always asking me to take the notes? You know, kind of razzed them a little bit. I'm like, is it because I'm the woman on the team? And the look on their faces, it was like the moment that they realized, oh my gosh, that actually was really sexist of us. Unconscious. Yeah. Unconscious bias, unconscious bias. And I love the way that you've shared that. I'm so sorry. I interrupted Leah, the end of the story. But I think you've illustrated that beautifully and quite, and I would say inspirational to any of us who find ourselves again, kind of stepping in, you know, I could say, you know, the inverse was a little bit true for me on my last company, Savings Angel, 80 plus percent of our clients were female.

8:57I was the only, no, I was one of two men, you know, in a company of 40, definitely providing a service that were, I had a lot of things to learn. I had a lot of biases that I needed to check so that I could truly connect and not make some of those unfair assumptions. Leah, do you mind sharing a little bit more about your role today with Leah and company? So when you are coming in, what sorts of pain points are your clients typically mentioning or having issues with? Yeah, good question. Pretty similarly, I hear this almost across the board. It's chaos. Like every day feels like I'm firefighting.

9:38If I have a team in place, all of it has to go through me because everything's in my head. I know everything and my team doesn't necessarily know all of that. Sleepless nights that, you know, I don't have a life outside of this. I'm working multiple, many, many hours a week and it just feels exhausting. And to the point where even some of my clients are like, I just don't know if I want to do this anymore. Like I'm, I'm ready to throw it. Yeah. And, and, and the, do you hear that from owners too? Oh yeah. Oh my gosh. Yeah. And now how, how sad that is. And listen, all of us can get there and, and, and, and what patterns do you see leading to that and how do you fix it?

10:21Well, I think uniquely, maybe not uniquely in this industry, but a lot of my clients started because maybe they were a framer or a plumber or whatever the case may be. They actually were the trade and they were really good at it. And so they thought, I can do this. I'm going to start my own business. So they start a business and they don't necessarily understand how a business should run. They might be a really good craftsman, but they don't understand all of the things, again, behind the scenes using a term that I often use. And so what I help them do is to get things organized, to get processes in place, make sure they have the right team on the right people on the right, excuse me, the right people on the team and the right people in the right positions on the team.

11:02And then having a process that they're following consistently. So not only are they going to deliver a beautiful remodel, a renovation or home build, but the experience isn't going to be so chaotic for their clients. So that reputation problem that we're talking about gets repaired for that particular builder. Leah, here we are getting at the very end of 2025. What trends have you been seeing in your industry and what do you predict 2026 might be? I know it's really hard to say because as of when we're recording this and your industry is not unique. There's a lot of movement. There's a lot of turbulence based on a lot of different factors, and there's a lot of disruption going on.

11:56But what are you seeing as you look ahead? Yeah. So I think we're coming off of a unique time with everything that happened in COVID, especially it was a pretty booming time for construction, right? A lot of people were home. They were spending a lot of time at home. They were seeing all of the things around their home that they necessarily didn't like, or they were like, I'm ready to move. I want something different. So I'm not diminishing what contractors have done, but in many ways, it was pretty easy for them to get their client base for the last several years. Well, that is slowing down a little bit.

12:28The industry is a little tight. People are just feeling unsure about a lot of stuff, and that is affecting a lot of folks in the industry. and what I am, my argument, if you will, is how do you stand out in the sea of sameness? Well, if our industry has a bit of a reputation problem and people are being more careful with where they're spending their money, how are you gonna stand out? It's gonna be through your reputation. It's gonna be through referrals from other people. It's gonna be through people saying, hey, you gotta go with this particular contractor because it's easy. They promise things and they keep them.

13:04They communicate effectively and efficiently. your project will be done on time. It's not this headache that you're used to. And so that's part of what I'm doing is helping my clients. Hey, let's start with your clients. What do you, how do you want them to feel when they work with you? And we're designing what that journey looks like. And then, like I said, we kind of go behind the scenes to see, are you prepared to deliver this? And if not, what do we need? What do we need to fix? What do we need to make better? yeah and leah um you know in terms of uh how our friend that's been listening to our conversation um i know you've got resources i i know that you make it real easy uh to be of service can you share a little bit about your presence online and and how you connect and serve others yeah yeah of course so my are you talking about like where they can find me essentially well yeah and also So, you know, if someone's like, well, I don't know that I want to book a call just yet, but I want to learn more.

14:02Yeah. So I've got a couple of resources. I actually, on my website, there is a downloadable resources you can get today. And it is called, let me make sure I title this exactly correct, Five Steps to Designing a Standout Client Experience. So it will take you through these five things that you can do today to start thinking about what's the experience that I want to provide for my clients and how is that going to help me and my reputation. uh so if you go to leahco.com you can download that today i also do offer a complimentary calls just to talk through and have some strategies um if that's something you're interested in and then i have an ebook that speak that will be coming out and probably in the next month or so i don't want to over promise but that might be out right now yeah you gotta go to the website and find out yeah i'm just i'm just wrapping up a couple things but this is actually going to be a complimentary tool initially.

14:52And it is called Beyond Construction, Designing Client Experiences that Build Loyalty, Trust, and Legacy. And I'll be leaning heavily on my industry experience of over 20 years and telling some stories about what that looks like. And there's also really practical tools that you can download directly from the book to be able to start to implement some of these things in your business. So stay tuned for that if you're interested in it. If you download that free tool, then you'll be on the waiting list. You do something as well called the experience blueprint. What is that? Yeah. So this is kind of my signature offer.

15:24I come in to work with a client and their team. It's a one day workshop. And through that workshop, we are designing that experience where we're saying, all right, team, how do you want your clients to feel? We lead with that. We're now maybe renovating or refining what your values are for the company. But now we're looking to your clients to figure out what that is. So how do you want them to feel? What are those main touch points that you and your team are committing to creating a great experience for your clients with? Then we start to look behind the scenes and say, all right, do you have the processes that you can deliver that?

15:58Who's going to be responsible for this? What's the timing for it? So it kind of helps to give you a full view of your business from the client's perspective, and then helps you to see what needs to be done to actually make that happen. All right. Well, Leah Valgardson-Hastetter. Again, your website is leahco.com. We've got the spelling and all of that in the show notes for this episode. Leah, it's been a great conversation. Thank you so much for joining us. Thank you for having me.

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