Latest / The Inspired Stories Podcast / Joel Carver's Journey from to ‘Nobody Likes You’ to Hospitality Staffing Revolution

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Joel Carver's Journey from to ‘Nobody Likes You’ to Hospitality Staffing Revolution · The Inspired Stories Podcast

0:04
Welcome to another edition of the Inspired Stories podcast,
0:08
where leaders share their experiences so we can learn from
0:12
their successes and be inspired by how they've overcome
0:15
adversity. My name is Anthony Kotaspodi,
0:17
and today's guest is Joel Carver, president and CEO of The
0:21
Carver Companies. They were founded in 2013 and
0:25
are based in Atlanta, GA. They focus on executive and task
0:29
force staffing solutions for the hospitality industry.
0:32
They help organizations find the right talent quickly while
0:36
building strong, lasting partnerships.
0:40
Under Joel's leadership, the company has built a reputation
0:42
for delivering personalized solutions that drive success for
0:46
both clients and job seekers. Joel earned a spot on HSMAIS Top
0:52
25 Most Extraordinary Minds in Sales and Marketing list in 2007
0:57
and received the 2011 Diversity and Business Award.
1:01
He also served on the HSMAI America's Board of Directors in
1:05
2012. He's written a book called The
1:08
People Effect and does motivational speaking, which we
1:11
will hear more about. Now before we get into all the
1:14
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AD back benefits.com. All right, back to our guest
1:59
today, the President and CEO of this Carver Companies, Joel
2:02
Carver. Thanks for making the time to
2:04
Share your story today. Thanks for having me, Anthony.
2:06
I'm looking forward to it. So Joel, before starting the
2:10
Carver Companies, you were working your way up through the
2:12
hospitality industry. You worked a number of different
2:15
sales and marketing roles in a variety of hotels.
2:18
What first drew you into this industry?
2:22
The easy answer to that is by parents owned a restaurant when
2:25
I was a kid and and that sort of gave me my first introit.
2:30
If I think about that, that was sort of my first classroom.
2:34
Forget forget college and university, but I think that was
2:37
my first classroom. But I also sort of say that I
2:41
grew up in the Blue Room at the Fairmont in New Orleans, which
2:44
is now the Waldorf Astoria, and that was the place we spent all
2:47
of our holidays when I was a kid.
2:50
So Christmas and Thanksgiving and Easter when we celebrated as
2:54
a family. So that gave me an exposure to a
2:57
world that I hadn't seen and a different world than the the
3:01
level of my parents restaurant. It also introduced me to the
3:04
world of hotels, which is where my love really occurred.
3:09
And so you got a little taste from, you know, being around
3:12
your parents restaurant. You took holidays in New Orleans
3:16
where you got to see a beautiful facility there, kind of infected
3:20
your system and you decided to get your first job in the hotel
3:24
industry. When and where?
3:26
In the 1980 In 1985 at the Capitol House Hotel in Baton
3:31
Rouge, LA, I started as a sales manager.
3:36
The Capitol House was a wonderful historic hotel,
3:39
although by that time a little down at the heels, it was
3:42
actually operating as a veteran possession when I worked there.
3:46
And I worked for an amazing individual, Ira Babin, who made
3:51
his world in Louisiana tourism and went out to make a name for
3:55
himself in the state. But he really gave me my start.
3:59
In the capital House was the hotel where I sort of say I cut
4:02
my teeth. And what was it that you loved
4:06
about it? A hotel in many ways is like a
4:10
mini city. I mean it a full service and
4:13
especially the larger hotels have everything going on that a
4:17
city would have. They have restaurants, they have
4:19
bars, they have rooms, people stay, they have rooms that
4:23
people meet. And it has an entire executive
4:25
team and leadership team that function very much like the
4:28
leader, you know, of a city or a a larger organization.
4:32
And it was. I just found that it was fun.
4:36
I have loved. I can't say I've loved every day
4:39
of my time in the industry, but I've loved a lot more of them
4:42
than the days that have made me crazy.
4:45
What's one key lesson that Ira passed on to you that you still
4:49
hold near to your heart today? Stand on The Dirty spot in the
4:53
carpet. Explain.
4:57
Well, you know, as I said, the Capital House was tiring at that
5:03
time. I know it was struggling
5:04
financially. It was a rough time in the
5:06
industry, but it was also a rough time for that particular
5:09
hotel. And we had some rooms that had
5:13
been renovated, some rooms that hadn't.
5:15
As you give companies or organization tours of hotels,
5:18
you're not always able to show the perfect situation for
5:23
everybody. And so Mile and this held me in
5:27
good stand for the rest of my career because it was true
5:30
whether it was the Capitol House or it was later a five star
5:33
hotel in My Portfolio. But sometimes there's something
5:37
that's not perfect. And if you stand on that Warren
5:40
spot in the carpet and you share with people what's going on
5:43
around them, they're going to focus on you and what you want
5:46
them to focus on, not necessarily Warren spot that
5:50
would stand out otherwise. So is the idea that you're kind
5:54
of covering up the warm spot? I think the idea is that you're
5:58
focusing on the positive. You redirect their attention.
6:02
You redirect their attention. You're not hiding the warm spots
6:04
because that's what we are. We're all a part and parcel of
6:08
of our experiences. So I think that's you're not
6:11
hiding it, but you are focusing on what is the positive.
6:16
Let's pick one other stop along the way before you come to start
6:20
the Carver Companies, something that was particularly formative
6:24
for you. I, I think that's we'll have to
6:30
pull that apart if we're talking about something that happened at
6:34
the hotel industry at the actual property level or something that
6:38
happened once I moved away from the property level and into the
6:41
corporate level and into the more global world because.
6:44
Yeah, Let's talk more about the corporate level since that's a
6:47
little bit of a different transition.
6:49
That's a little bit of a different transition.
6:52
I think the biggest thing and the hardest thing for me was
6:58
during the 2008 economic struggles, I just joined CSM out
7:04
of the Twin Cities as their Vice President of Marketing and Sales
7:08
and I was charged with making sure that we could clearly
7:13
identify a return on the owner's investment for every sales
7:19
effort that we had. And that required really
7:22
defining a program that measured accountability and performance.
7:28
And this was an organization that had a great reputation for
7:32
sales, but in sort of a warm and fuzzy way.
7:35
And we were going into the work one of the worst economic times
7:38
in history. And I had just had to justify
7:41
every person on my 100 + 100 plus person sales team.
7:48
And that required defining returns on their investment and
7:51
then holding those folks accountable.
7:54
And there were a lot of folks that were good sales
7:56
professionals that weren't exceptional sales professionals.
8:00
And that was a time in history where we had to have only the
8:03
very best. And it worked.
8:06
We were able to increase market share by eight points during
8:09
what's arguably one of the worst recession times in our history.
8:14
And we did it by focusing on the return on the investment for
8:18
every individual in the in a section.
8:20
But that had to have been hard. You're I'm reading between the
8:23
lines. Sounds like you had to let some
8:24
folks go. Had I was, we, we say today,
8:29
looking back on it, that there was a time there where I was the
8:32
most hated man in the Twin Cities.
8:37
But we did it, and we did it with honor and with integrity
8:40
because we clearly set goals for every individual.
8:44
And if that individual was not making the goals, there was an
8:47
entire process. Could we recast them?
8:49
Could they work in a different way?
8:51
Could they focus differently? How could we do that to correct
8:54
it? But yes, there were, there were
8:56
more than a few times where unfortunately at that point we
9:01
had to make a decision. We made the right decision for
9:03
the ownership and their return on investment.
9:07
So how did the idea to start the Carver Companies come about?
9:10
I mean, you've got this experience in the hotel space
9:13
and obviously you're working on staffing.
9:16
You know, you've got teams to build employees, but I don't
9:19
know, it seems like a little bit of a leap to go from hospitality
9:23
into now I'm starting a staffing company.
9:26
Well, except we never left hospitality because that is all
9:29
we do. Although now we have a little
9:33
bit of a, a foot in the door of healthcare and we can talk about
9:37
that in a bit. But hospitality has always been
9:40
our focus and the how did I make the leap is very interesting.
9:46
I was reaching a time personally when I had a father that was
9:50
aging who was living in South Mississippi and I was living in
9:54
the Twin Cities. And it was not just a quick car
9:58
drive to get from one place to the other.
10:00
And his help began to fail and I knew I was going to need to
10:03
focus more on that. And I began to look for a job
10:08
within about a six hour radius of South Mississippi.
10:12
And that just really didn't play out.
10:14
There were not a lot of companies that would that were
10:17
the perfect match for me or odd for them.
10:19
And So what I decided was instead of looking for a job,
10:25
maybe I can create my own job. Maybe I could find 4 smaller
10:30
hotel companies who maybe could not afford a full time Joel
10:34
Carver, but they can afford 1/4 time Joel Carver.
10:37
And I could just support four different companies at the same
10:40
time. But where that really
10:43
transitioned was Charlie Carter. And Charlie had worked for me in
10:47
a task force role at CSM. And when she heard what I was
10:52
planning on putting together, she picked up the phone and
10:54
called me and said, hold on a minute, I'm with you.
10:57
I think what you're doing is a great idea, but I think you need
11:01
to look at it from a bigger picture.
11:03
Not only could you do this, but there are a lot of folks out
11:07
there who are providing task force services and there are
11:10
some other task force companies out there.
11:13
And she said if we can build that model, I think we can do a
11:18
better job of it. And so that's how the Carver
11:21
Company started. It started as Carver Hotel Group
11:24
when we were building the world of how could we provide task
11:28
force services, How could we provide on demand services for
11:34
mid level management and up in a quick, literally possibly the
11:39
next day model. I mean, it does seem unusual.
11:42
I've had the opportunity to interview a lot of great folks
11:45
on this show that focus on either executive recruiting,
11:49
right? We find you somebody and I think
11:51
you guys do this kind of thing as well and or they focus on,
11:56
hey, you've got, you know, some frontline folks where there's,
11:58
you know, quite a bit of turnover in those roles.
12:01
We help you to supplement your staff, but what you're and, and
12:05
you know, a lot of those folks can, you know, they're be ready
12:08
for work very quickly, right? And, and you can fill those
12:11
roles very fast. But what you're talking about,
12:14
it is sort of something in between where you're talking
12:17
about you can fill a role very quickly.
12:20
But this is not sort of like the frontline worker.
12:22
This is kind of your mid level manager and up, yeah.
12:26
So anything from a front office manager, a front office
12:30
supervisor to a general manager or managing director of a hotel.
12:36
I and we do a lot of work with management companies or brands
12:42
that are transitioning. They're bringing new portfolios
12:44
in or they're exiting portfolios from their grant brand or their
12:48
management company. But a great, my best example of
12:52
this is a a long term friend and colleague and long term client
12:56
at the Carter companies called me a few years ago and said,
12:59
Joel, I've got a rough situation coming up.
13:02
I've got a general manager situation in a large convention
13:08
city and convention location who manages multiple assets for us,
13:14
who we found is in a unfortunate situation.
13:18
We're going to have to make a transition tomorrow, and I need
13:22
a leader of his capabilities, his skill set, his background to
13:28
step off the plane with me when I fly in to make the transition.
13:31
Can you do it? And the reality is, we can and
13:35
we did. It seems impossible.
13:38
How do you find somebody of that caliber like that?
13:41
Well, we don't find them like that that we'll start with that
13:44
again. Today we have about 3500 of
13:47
those folks that are already in our database and they are folks
13:51
who want to do this every day. They don't want to work maybe 12
13:55
months a year. When we first started, I used to
13:59
say there are a lot of people that look a lot like me out
14:01
there, folks that had sort of are in their St. cred.
14:06
They worked all the jobs they wanted to work and they didn't
14:09
want to work 12 months out of the year, but they were glad to
14:11
go in and help somebody for three weeks or six weeks or six
14:14
months. And six months is actually the
14:18
Brett, the window for task force.
14:21
You can't have a person on a task force assignment for
14:24
greater than six months because that changes with the employment
14:27
law. So you can go up to five months
14:30
and 29 days, which is our longest assignment.
14:34
And so we began by just building that core together and looking
14:40
for those folks and ended up coming to us.
14:43
It really Carver started with relationships and it started
14:47
with a lot of the folks that I'd worked with in my career or
14:50
Charlie had worked with in her career that had reached that
14:53
point. Now things have changed.
14:58
It's a different world. So yes, there's still a lot of
15:01
folks that fit that model, but there are a lot of folks of a
15:04
younger generation who have more of a gig mentality.
15:08
You know what, I'd like to be in San Francisco for three or four
15:11
months working there, and once that assignment's over cheap,
15:14
let me hold my hand up for an assignment in New York or Miami
15:17
or New Orleans or Omaha for that matter.
15:24
So we do have a full recruiting team that focuses on making sure
15:30
that our wheelhouse is full every day.
15:33
But more often people come to us.
15:36
Then we have to go out and looking for and saying, this is
15:39
something I want to do, how do I do it?
15:42
And it has to be the right person and the right personality
15:46
and the right skill set, and they have to have the right
15:49
desires and goals. And so you've got a database of
15:52
these folks and they may be placed.
15:54
Let me see if I understand this, because there's this six month
15:56
threshold where something changes in terms of employment
16:00
law. So could they be in a three
16:02
month assignment in Omaha and then raise their hand and say
16:05
Joel and I'd like to check out something on the West Coast and
16:09
then they can take another three month assignment but not have
16:11
any gaps in between? Well, and they can even do it up
16:14
to five months to 29 days. We just, and we can replace, we
16:18
can put another consultant in if for some reason that position is
16:23
open for a longer period of time.
16:26
Although our guidance is if something's going to be open for
16:29
longer than six months, unless there's an extraordinary
16:32
situation, then we really want to engage our executive
16:35
recruiting team and we want to help them do a permanent fill
16:38
for it because task force is not designed to be a permanent fill.
16:42
Task force is to be an immediate fill for an immediate need or a
16:46
transition need. And so the we as a company, we
16:52
actually offer three levels at that point.
16:54
We have our task force which can be immediate.
16:57
We have executive search which is based out of our Twin Cities
17:01
location and Peggy Olson leads that division.
17:04
And we also have a hybrid model which is tasked to perm if we
17:09
have a consultant who would be willing to consider a full time
17:12
position. And then we have a request which
17:17
we know is going to move into a full time need, we could
17:20
actually assign the right task force person there.
17:23
That's kind of a task to perm. So they can spend up to five
17:26
again, the five months and 29 days as a task force person.
17:30
And then if it's the right fit, the hotel or hotel company can
17:35
just simply make them an offer to come on full time.
17:38
And at that point, we don't charge a recruiting fee or an
17:40
executive search fee or anything like that.
17:42
Oh wow. It's just, you know, you, this
17:45
person spent a lot of time with us and you as a client have have
17:49
had been there for a period of time.
17:50
If it's the right fit for you, we're going to bless that and
17:53
say go on with it. I mean, I think that says a lot
17:55
about what you were just touching on before Relationships
17:58
has really meant a lot to your business to get to this point.
18:02
Can you say more about that? I can, and I can say it also
18:05
forced my hand and made me start the company about 45 days sooner
18:09
than I planned on it. OK, let's hear about that.
18:12
So we decided in May that we were going to launch Carver
18:16
Hotel Group in May of 2013 and Charlie Carter and I had built
18:20
the model and we brought Susan Hart who would become our CFO.
18:24
Susan and I'd worked together in Florida when I was the SVP of
18:29
Marketing for Vistarchy and she was the CFO down there.
18:32
And Susan was now then being a stay at home mom in Atlanta and
18:37
we brought Susan in and help. She was the one that really
18:40
helped us build the foundation financially of the company.
18:43
How are we going to do that and make sure we did it in a really
18:48
fundamentally solid way. And so we had planned on
18:52
launching the company in the middle of September.
18:54
And relationships being what they're being, Mark Carrier, who
18:58
is leads the BF Sol Company hotel division out of DC that
19:03
I'd spent seven years working for, knew what I was doing.
19:07
He was one of the mentors. He was one of the people I
19:09
reached out to when I said, this is what I'm thinking about
19:12
doing. Walk me through how you would
19:15
respond to this. And he said we'd respond really
19:17
well. And this was in May.
19:20
And about the third week in July, he called me and he said,
19:23
I know you're not ready to do this, but I need a director of
19:26
sales for the Holiday Inn Dulles Airport and I need the next
19:29
week. Can you do it?
19:33
And I said, let me get on the phone to Charlie and see what we
19:36
can do. And Charlie actually agreed to
19:39
do the assignment herself. And we launched the first week
19:43
in August, some six weeks earlier than we planned.
19:46
And you're able to fill that spot in a week without having
19:50
sort of your systems and your processes and everything set up
19:53
and ironed out. This was just a one off like I
19:55
got to be ready. We did not have those in place
19:58
yet we we barely had banking in place and.
20:03
One of the models that has really set us apart from the
20:07
other organizations that do task force and soon this was Susan's
20:12
idea in the early stages and it stood us in a really good stand
20:16
is but a task force consultant supplies their invoice for the
20:24
service they provided for the previous week.
20:27
If they provide that invoice to us so it's for their services
20:30
it's pretty expensive. You know if they've had to have
20:32
cabs or you know other expenses they've had anything they
20:36
invoice us on by midnight on Monday and this has been true
20:41
since day one and we were the are still I believe the only
20:44
task force organization in the US to do this if we received
20:49
their approved invoice by midnight on Monday, the money is
20:53
in their account by Friday morning.
20:56
OK. And every other task force in
20:58
the organization was paying invoices on a two week cycle was
21:03
the best and the worst was we we're seeing them pay them six
21:07
weeks later. Wow.
21:08
And that really wasn't what task force was all about.
21:11
It was you provide an immediate service and you really deserve
21:15
your compensation as quickly as possible.
21:18
And so ours was and still is actually.
21:21
Now it's midnight on Tuesday and it still appears on Friday
21:23
morning. Oh, you've been able to cut that
21:25
time even more. Yeah, and with gigs,
21:28
interestingly enough, as that launches that will be same day.
21:33
OK. So before we talk about gig,
21:36
you're talking about invoicing. So these are 1099, they're not
21:40
your W2, OK. 99 They're independent consultants, they
21:43
work for themselves. We like to say they're in
21:46
business for themselves, just not by themselves.
21:49
We effectively are the agency that does the placement and so
21:54
they invoice us, we pay the invoices and then pass the
21:58
invoices on to the hotel or the hotel company.
22:01
Yeah. OK.
22:01
So we've got executive search, we've got task force solutions,
22:07
and now we've got something new that's coming called Gig.
22:09
Tell us about that. So Gig really is the Uberization
22:14
of the hospitality world and this is really cool.
22:18
We're we're very excited about this.
22:20
So you asked earlier about the line level support.
22:24
So if a hotel needs a front desk person, if a restaurant needs a
22:28
server, if a restaurant needs a line cook, if a senior living
22:32
facility needs a support person, they may not know that till the
22:36
day they need it. So we have an app which is now
22:40
the Carver Gigs app that has just been launched.
22:43
It is now available on the app stores.
22:46
People who would like to work as a gig worker in the hospitality
22:51
world simply go in. They build their profile.
22:56
We do put them through a screening process to make sure
23:00
that they are qualified and it's going to be the right fit for
23:03
our clients. The client then let's just pick
23:07
a restaurant says, well I'm going to need a server tomorrow
23:10
because I've got somebody that's had a death in the family and
23:13
they've now called out for a couple days and I don't have a
23:16
backs bill for them. They can simply log in to the
23:20
portal. Now that's slightly different
23:22
than the app. The clients log into a portal
23:24
where their profile is built and we've already opened an account
23:27
for them in the past and they simply go in and check this.
23:32
These are the hours I need the person.
23:33
This is the background of the skill set.
23:36
If they need a specific technology certifications like
23:42
APMS system in a hotel or a specific server system in a
23:45
restaurant, they need those that can be just clicked in.
23:48
That request is effectively built right online.
23:51
It goes out automatically to everybody within the Geo area
23:55
that is qualified for that position and that person can
23:58
simply accept it or decline it on their app.
24:02
It's seconds, not minutes, not hours.
24:05
Yeah. So this is exciting.
24:06
I'm going to guess, correct me if I'm wrong, but you have to
24:09
sort of do this geographical region by geographical region,
24:13
right? Because you want a certain
24:15
density of workers that are available and at the same time
24:19
have a certain density of opportunities that are available
24:22
to them to sort of keep people interested in participating in,
24:26
in, in this transaction. That's absolutely correct.
24:30
It is. It is completely Geo based and
24:33
there is we have a program built into the app which is called
24:36
geofencing when I'll get to that in a second.
24:40
But we are starting the launch markets are is the state of
24:44
Georgia, so Atlanta, Savannah and the surrounding areas and
24:49
then the Columbus, La Grange area down this part of the
24:52
state. And those are the ones that
24:55
launch first. And then after that we have a
24:58
couple hotel companies that have their hands up going.
25:01
This is where I'd like to see you launch next.
25:04
So we are actively working with those hotel companies and a
25:08
restaurant company to say, OK, we're going to look at those
25:11
markets and decide which one. Again, to your point, how can we
25:14
saturate those markets quickly and make sure we've got enough
25:17
folks in there that can provide for the demand.
25:20
So we have to have make sure the supply exists for the demand and
25:23
if those work then we'll begin to move into those markets.
25:27
So I think you just answered the question that was rattled around
25:30
in my head, which is chicken egg, which comes first.
25:33
And I think it's you've got to have that relationship with the
25:37
hotel, with the hospitality center, with the senior care
25:40
center to say, hey, we want this, please, we're raising our
25:43
hands, bring it here and then you guys can go.
25:47
And whatever it is that you do to recruit the workers to bring
25:50
them into the network afterwards.
25:52
That's sort of Part 2, right? So there's that's a one step, 2
25:56
step and I, I want to go back just a little bit.
25:59
Our position is that is the first step we are taking.
26:02
So as we look at other markets, we have about 22 other markets
26:06
identified that we believe are the next stages after the
26:09
Georgia market launch. And some of those have been
26:13
identified through hotel company partnerships or restaurant
26:16
company partnerships. We're not closed to other
26:20
geographic locations. As a matter of fact, we think we
26:22
will go into them. But our first step is where we
26:25
already have partnerships and they have a defined need.
26:28
So if they can bring us the defined need, then we can do, we
26:31
can do the recruiting part. We've got that down.
26:34
And I will say gig recruiting is very different.
26:37
I was going to say this is you're saying you got it down,
26:39
but this is a a whole different you.
26:41
Know a different world, right? Gig recruiting is very grass
26:45
roots, so we actually have recruiters working in vertical
26:49
markets to make sure that we're bringing the right folks in to
26:53
begin positions. Whereas task force, we've been
26:55
seasoned. We've been doing that for you
26:57
know 12 1/2 years now, soon to be 13 and that is just a well
27:03
oiled machine. Gigs has been a new world and
27:06
we're learning something new every day.
27:09
But but we have built our recruiting model and it's done
27:13
exceptionally well in Atlanta. We were able to fill the funnel
27:21
in about 3 weeks to have a base amount of gig workers.
27:24
We knew what we needed in order to fulfill the initial position.
27:28
So that's fast. Yeah, it's fast and but it's it
27:33
is a different world. You're exactly right.
27:35
It requires boots on the ground and actual in market work.
27:40
So it's not so. This is, I'm sure that there's
27:42
some element of like running online ads, but that's not the
27:45
only thing because you said you've got to have people there
27:47
in that market, right? And eventually once you get
27:50
known, it may be just that, but as we launch markets, we're
27:54
doing it with boots on the ground.
27:57
So, and we have people working with very diverse backgrounds
28:04
and we also partner with educational groups.
28:08
And so Goodwill is an example. Goodwill does a lot of
28:13
recruiting and job training and getting people into the right
28:16
places. So we partner with Goodwill in a
28:19
number of open positions and say, OK, you've got folks that
28:23
are looking for positions, they have this background, let's do
28:26
the let's work on this together and we're able to do that.
28:29
So it's not just Goodwill. There's also, you know, state
28:32
Department of, of jobs and, and those kind of things.
28:35
So we can partner with a lot of groups to make sure we find the
28:38
folks we need. So how quickly do you?
28:41
Put folks to work. Yeah, yeah.
28:43
Which is what everybody wants, right.
28:45
So, so how quickly do you think you can step into new markets?
28:52
Based on the data we have for the George Georgia market, after
28:58
the demand is identified, it's about a 90 day build out process
29:05
and that's based on the data we have in the markets in Georgia
29:08
that we're penetrating. OK.
29:10
So you think based on how your process went kind of first time
29:14
around that once you've identified the demand, once you
29:17
have the client base there about 90 days before you can be up and
29:21
running, which is fast. But there has to be like an
29:24
economic sort of bottleneck here too.
29:28
I would imagine you don't want to go 10 markets all at once
29:32
because like you said, you got to have feet on the ground.
29:35
And so I'm guessing you sort of want to do one get it working,
29:38
do another one, get it working, correct?
29:42
And that's exactly right. And we don't want and because
29:45
again, to quote my friend and partner Charlie Carter, we don't
29:48
know what we don't know. We've learned a lot from the
29:52
Georgia roll out, but we fully expect to learn as much from the
29:58
the next roll out that we learned from the Georgia move
30:01
out. And so everyone it's it's one
30:05
step at a time. It is not we want to watch 10
30:08
markets at the same time. We want to launch the market,
30:11
stabilize the market, and then launch the next market.
30:15
That makes a lot of sense. Step by step, what's exciting
30:20
having you guys move into like a completely different area here
30:24
and being able to move into, do you think where you're going to
30:28
go there, geographies where you guys are already operating with
30:32
your other services or not necessarily?
30:36
Well, so our other services are literally North American based.
30:42
We just did a a map of where we've hotels, where we've
30:45
supported them with task force consultants since 2013 and we
30:51
put little Carver logos at every spot on the map.
30:55
And I got to say the map was pretty well covered.
30:58
The East Coast is completely saturated.
31:01
The West Coast was very, very saturated.
31:04
Midwestern cities and southwestern cities very heavily
31:08
penetrated. We less heavily penetrate the
31:11
smaller towns and the smaller communities.
31:13
They just don't tend to have as much meat.
31:16
So when we have, when we sat down and targeted where we
31:23
thought the largest markets are, we went to the same thing.
31:27
We we looked at gateway cities, we looked at major convention
31:30
cities in the US, cities that are heavy restaurant cities or
31:34
resort cities, that's kind of thing.
31:36
So we've used a similar to your point Geo targeting as to where
31:43
we have the the largest consultant base, but that's so
31:46
broad and and in truth because we've had consultants outside
31:50
the United States as well. We've also supported hotels in
31:53
Canada, we've supported hotels in the Caribbean, we've
31:57
supported hotels in Mexico. So but but for gig this is
32:02
strictly AUS based model at this point.
32:05
Because at this point with with a gig setup I'm going to guess
32:08
they're URW 2 employees then. No, the gig setup will also be
32:13
1099, also 1099. Again, if you very much think of
32:16
say the Uber model or the Lyft model where they're providing
32:19
drivers and services. Ours is providing people and
32:23
it's just a short term model. And again, where they have to be
32:27
in business for themselves, just not by themselves.
32:31
I like that it's a good tag line.
32:33
Joel, I've heard your peers often call you both a dynamic
32:37
leader and a strategic mind. Can you explain for us your
32:42
approach to leadership? That's probably the hardest
32:47
question you'll ask. How so?
32:50
I think for I'll, I'll answer the strategic question, which is
32:55
a little bit easier for me to answer clearly the first day I
33:00
walked into CSM. We'll go back to that example.
33:05
Rob Dan, who was the President of Hospitality and residential
33:10
at the time, came into my office and he closed the door and he
33:13
said, I'm really glad you're here.
33:15
I think you're going to shake us up.
33:17
And he said, here's my challenge to you.
33:20
I want you to get it right 51% of the time.
33:25
And that kind of shook me up. I thought 51% of the time I'm
33:29
not used to winning. 51% of the time I've got a much higher win
33:33
ratio than that. And Rob said to me, if you're
33:37
winning too much, you're not trying anything new and
33:40
different and you're not taking any risks.
33:44
And he said we're entering a time where we're going to have
33:46
to take risks to get it right. So if you're going to play it
33:50
safe and think you're going to win every time, we've got
33:53
another challenge. And so as we begin to move
33:58
through this economic time and begin to develop strategies,
34:03
that was something I really kept in mind is could we get it right
34:06
every time? And that's the thing that I
34:08
realized today that we can't. And to go back to your question
34:11
about temporary staffing, right, the true temporary staffing
34:16
model, I told you that we tried that model a few years ago
34:20
before COVID and we opened what was then called Carville World
34:24
Temps, which was a true staffing model.
34:26
And we just could not provide the level of service that we
34:30
were used to providing and the quality of people that we were
34:33
used to providing every day. So we, we launched what we
34:37
thought would work. It worked to an extent.
34:40
It created a great amount of revenue for the company, but it
34:43
didn't create a lot of value for the company.
34:46
So we had to go back and go, OK, this is not what we want to do.
34:50
Now had the world been different and we've been able to launch
34:53
what is now gigs, it would have been a very different world.
34:56
And that's where we learned, we built strategy.
34:58
So my strategy piece, I give a lot of credit to Rob Dan who
35:02
said identify it, work through it, make sure you know what
35:06
you're going to do and then take the risk.
35:09
And I think while we can build strategies and we can be as
35:12
defined as we want to, we've got to be a little bit of a risk
35:15
taker. And that's part of being an
35:16
entrepreneur, I think, as well. Is it the dynamic leader part of
35:21
the question that has you feeling uncomfortable?
35:26
I think that's where you have to be.
35:28
I have to be really honest with myself.
35:32
When I first became a director of sales, I was not a very good
35:35
one and I wasn't a very good. As a matter of fact, my boss
35:39
came to me one day and she said when we hired you, we expected
35:43
you to know what to do, what you're doing, and you do.
35:46
That's the good news. Bad news is you're not very well
35:48
liked, she said. The problem is you either always
35:55
have the answer or sometimes you wing it and people will respect
36:02
you more if you'll just admit you don't know what you don't
36:06
know. And I think part of becoming a
36:09
lead, that was the biggest part of me truly understanding how to
36:13
become a leader, is to lead with what we know, be strong about it
36:19
and be honest about it and be willing to look our team in the
36:23
face and say, well, I don't know.
36:27
We'll see if we can figure it out.
36:29
But right now, I don't know. And I think that was probably
36:34
the watershed moment that helped me move from a mediocre to poor
36:41
leader to become what some will now call a dynamic leader.
36:47
Is is really honesty. It's also meeting people where
36:53
they are. Well, I think that's a great
36:58
example there and I'm glad you shared it, Joel, because it's a
37:01
good reminder for folks that just because we're not amazing
37:05
at something right out of the gate doesn't mean that we can't
37:09
be right. It's this difference of a growth
37:12
mindset versus a, a fixed mindset.
37:14
If you had been in a fixed mindset when somebody said, hey,
37:17
you're not very well liked, you know, there are parts of this
37:19
that you're not doing well and you would have just thrown up
37:22
your hands and said, well, that's just how I am.
37:25
That's just how this is going to be forever.
37:27
But I'm going to guess it was really uncomfortable to hear
37:30
that feedback, but you took it to heart and you were able to
37:34
learn from it and grow from it going forward.
37:37
It's true. It was was one of the hardest
37:39
moments professionally of my life.
37:41
And again, this was the time I was in Texas.
37:45
We were dealing with the oil crisis, we were dealing with the
37:48
banking crisis. We were dealing with banks
37:50
failing every day. We were dealing with them
37:53
calling loans on hotels. There was there were a lot of
37:57
things going on. And to be dealing with all those
37:59
dynamics and then to hear and by the way, you're not very good at
38:02
what you're doing was wrong. But had somebody not had the
38:07
guts to say that to me, I probably would have just kept on
38:11
doing what I was doing and and thinking that was the way to
38:14
manage because it was a way I had see I had been managed
38:18
earlier in my career. And so you know, we learned by
38:23
example. Was there something about the
38:26
way that message was delivered to you that allowed you to
38:31
receive it, to process it, and to use it as a leverage point to
38:36
make yourself better, versus if it had been delivered in a
38:40
different way, I wonder if you would have been less receptive
38:44
and more defensive. So it was delivered about as
38:51
directly as I've ever delivered a message in my life.
38:54
OK. And interestingly enough, later
38:58
in my career, I had to deliver that same message to someone and
39:03
it was not sugar coated. It was prefaced with the when we
39:09
hired you, we expected you to know what you're doing and you
39:12
do. But then here's the other part
39:17
of peace. You're not doing it.
39:19
You're not well received by your team.
39:23
And I think that did two things for me.
39:28
Did I receive it really well? I kind of doubt I did.
39:33
I don't remember that part exactly, but I remember having
39:37
to take it to heart and I remember working to turn that
39:42
team around and I don't think I ever really did.
39:45
I don't think it really manifest itself in my career until I
39:50
moved to the next team and I had a fresh start.
39:54
But I could learn. I could take what I learned and
39:57
go, OK, I'm going to start with this from the beginning.
40:01
This is going to be me from the beginning.
40:04
And so the employee that you later had to deliver that same
40:06
message to, what did they do with it?
40:08
How'd they process it? I've delivered it.
40:11
Twice, OK. I have delivered.
40:15
I delivered it once, truly, in the hotel world, and I've had to
40:19
deliver it once since we founded Carver to a Carver team member.
40:23
OK. So that was really personal and
40:30
the one in the in the hotel world received it probably about
40:34
like I did, which was not well that they took it to heart.
40:38
And I know they've become an exceptional leader in their own
40:41
right and we're still in contact And I, I think the world of her
40:46
and and that's done. That's been great for her.
40:50
Unfortunately on the Carver side, in early Carver years, we
40:56
had a person who who had the same issue and she was on a, on
41:01
a client, in a client facing role with Carver.
41:05
And we had to sit down and have the very same conversation.
41:08
You know, you're really good at what you do, but nobody likes
41:11
you. And she did not ultimately turn
41:17
out to be a long term player for Carver.
41:19
OK. So part of what I was trying to
41:22
get at with those follow up questions is I'm curious if it's
41:27
the delivery that really matters or if it's more the recipient
41:31
and how they're wired. And I know we're talking about a
41:35
very small sample size here, but I'd be curious to hear your
41:38
opinion. Well, since I don't think I
41:44
delivered the message any better than it was delivered when it
41:49
was delivered to me, I suspect it's the recipient and it's how
41:55
the what the recipient wants to do and how they want to engage
42:01
to really figure that out. I I I don't think I have the
42:08
best answer for you on that one. Well, again, it's a small sample
42:11
size, but if we're sort of judging based on just, you know,
42:14
those few examples, I would tend to agree with you that it's more
42:17
about how the recipient is hardwired.
42:20
I mean, I, I don't think that gives, you know, carte blanche
42:23
to the person making the delivery of the message, right?
42:26
Like, you know, there's there's a responsible way to do that.
42:31
But yeah, these are the things that fascinate me is sort of,
42:34
you know, the human psychology behind why some people seem to
42:38
take one, you know, hard piece of feedback like that and and go
42:42
1 positive way with it and somebody else takes it and can't
42:47
use that as a leverage point for themselves.
42:50
Now I think it's it's interesting a a mentor one time
42:54
talked to me and I heard this word used about my father later
43:00
in life about the word grace. And do we do how we deliver
43:04
messages, no matter how hard they are with grace and to
43:09
remember the person and put ourselves in the shoes of the
43:13
person that we are delivering the message to you.
43:17
And for many years I've tried to do that.
43:22
I've not always succeeded. And sometimes the message has to
43:26
be a little more strongly delivered than one that we might
43:30
otherwise consider really delivered, being delivered with
43:32
grace. You know, we've already talked
43:35
through a number of challenges here so far, Joel, but you know,
43:42
my favorite question I and I let you know this is I, I love to
43:45
talk about a, a hard challenge that somebody's overcome.
43:47
And I think you've got a different one in mind that we
43:51
want to go through here today and and talk about how you got
43:55
through it and what you learned. And there we all have challenges
44:00
in our lives and we have personal challenges in our lives
44:02
and we have professional challenges in our lives.
44:05
And certainly the you're not very well liked.
44:07
That was a real professional challenge.
44:09
But the the one that was hardest to me is one that that I have to
44:17
set the stage with. My mom was a nurse before I was
44:22
bored and my father was in the military and later in law
44:24
enforcement. And they decided to open a
44:27
restaurant in a small town in South Mississippi.
44:31
They did it right after they had built their dream home and the
44:35
restaurant was not an immediate success.
44:38
It was very much a long term success, but not an immediate
44:41
success. And they found themselves in a
44:44
significant financial situation where quite honestly, they were
44:48
about to have their home repossessed and they had to make
44:53
the decision, do we try to save our home or do we save the
44:58
business? And they made the decision to
45:02
save the business and let the home go, and they did it.
45:07
And that has always been a story that's been in the back of my
45:11
mind, and I know how hard it was for them.
45:14
And ultimately, the restaurant they opened was a wonderful
45:16
success, and it certainly allowed them to do all the
45:19
things in life they wanted to do.
45:20
And it paid for college for me and for cars in high school and
45:24
all those kind of things. But not until after they'd gone
45:28
through that really rough foundational moment.
45:33
So when we jump forward to COVID, we have a horrendous
45:37
situation where the world has stopped revolving on its axis,
45:41
its business axis. And Carver supported hospitality
45:46
and the hospitality industry was horrendously hit.
45:49
And we didn't know if Carver was going to survive.
45:53
And then, and I do all of our most serious talking in the
45:59
pool. That's just where we do.
46:01
I don't know why, but for some reason it's it's a playing field
46:06
that keeps us relaxed and it keeps us able to have real
46:09
conversations without them turning into arguments or, or
46:13
any of those kind of things. And we were in the pool one
46:16
night and I said, I don't know if Carver's going to make it.
46:23
And his response was really direct.
46:26
And he said you do whatever you need to do.
46:29
If you need to sell everything we have, you save Carver because
46:35
it is the long game. And luckily enough, thankfully,
46:40
thankfully to to PPP loans and EIDL loans and all those kind of
46:45
things and banking relationships where we had a great
46:47
relationship with our institution, Carver was able to
46:50
make it. We, we Susan Hart, our CFO again
46:55
could make a nickel last longer than I've ever seen, but we did
46:59
it and we did it and we came out of it not only relatively
47:03
unscathed, but the next year we had a 50% growth over the
47:08
previous years of revenues. So, but it was that same
47:15
conscious decision that my parents had faced some 40 years
47:20
before that said, we're going to save the asset.
47:26
And just to to tie that back, I told you about Ira Babin, my
47:30
first boss. He had a great aunt that was
47:34
woven into our story a little bit.
47:36
It was a great friend to a lot of people.
47:38
And she had a line that at first I thought was all about money.
47:42
And then I realized it's about something else.
47:45
And her line was sell a lamp if you have to, but don't ever
47:48
touch the principles. And when she was referring to
47:52
that, she was talking about investments.
47:55
But in looking at in the bigger, the more global picture, her
48:00
line is you do what you've got to do, but you protect the
48:04
assets that are there for the long haul.
48:07
That's what my parents did. That's what we do.
48:10
Unfortunately, you didn't have to sell everything, but how
48:13
wonderful was it that you had the support of your partner to
48:16
say whatever you got to do? I'm behind you.
48:22
Yeah, that is truly, I think that was the hardest moment in
48:26
business and it was the most emotionally intense looking back
48:31
on knowing that same conversation was held in two
48:33
generations. At what point did you realize
48:39
we're going to be OK? Almost as quickly as we began to
48:49
see the world beginning to reopen, Carver came back.
48:56
Interestingly enough, task force never went to zero.
49:01
We never had a week where we did not have a task force consultant
49:04
out there. Even when hospitality was
49:06
closed, we had hotel companies going.
49:09
We still have to have support doing things.
49:12
So we say we went down to one, but we never went to zero.
49:17
And almost immediately, as the industry began to recover, we
49:21
started to recover. And because they were not, the
49:24
industry was not prepared to start rehiring and bringing
49:27
everybody back. And people had made changes and
49:29
started doing other things. They came back to us.
49:33
And as I said, we went from, you know, a $10 million organization
49:37
to a $15 million organization almost overnight.
49:46
Let's Where do I want to go? I want to talk about your books.
49:51
OK. So you wrote already.
49:56
There's a book available called The People Effect.
49:58
I I co-authored that with Mary Weber, who was Mary and I became
50:04
friends when we worked at CSM. She was the vice president of
50:07
human resources and I have sales and marketing.
50:10
And we began to work together and that developed a friendship.
50:15
And when later we were both gone from CSM, we started talking
50:19
about we'd like to partner on something together and, and that
50:24
was the the job. The job was how do we write this
50:27
book? How do we come together?
50:29
And the people effect was an interesting book and it was
50:31
written from 2 perspectives. It was written from a fictitious
50:37
person perspective in that we have characters that play all
50:40
the way through the book and we see them work through real world
50:45
scenarios in hotels and then we come back in real technical and
50:51
application processes of how do you support that And complete
50:55
with forms and resources that help people manage people and to
51:00
find the best of the best and keep the best of the best.
51:03
So like a workbook in some sense.
51:05
It is. It's a little bit.
51:06
It's a little bit of a, a fictional story with a workbook
51:09
combined in it. It did did very well, but that
51:13
was, it did publish right before COVID.
51:16
We've just sold out of the first printing and I think we've
51:19
decided it. It's still available online,
51:23
it's still available in Kindle, It's still available in Barnes
51:27
and Noble online and some of the other online applications.
51:30
I don't think we're going to go back through another printing of
51:32
that particular because the world has changed so much that's
51:35
there that there's still a lot of fundamental good work there,
51:39
but I think we'd have to rewrite it before we republish that one.
51:43
Pull out one thing that's changed that would kind of make
51:46
the the content a little bit dated, if you will.
51:54
Folks in the industry and I think more globally have, have
51:59
had a couple of things change. Number one, we've changed
52:00
generations. So we've seen a new generation
52:04
come up and the new generation is I think correctly a lot more
52:10
focused on their well-being and their family's well-being than
52:14
the previous generations were focused on our careers.
52:18
I look at my generation and we were focused on career and
52:22
family took a a second physician.
52:25
In a lot of ways, the the younger generations are are
52:30
doing I think a much better job of saying I'm going to take care
52:33
of me and I'm going to take care of my family and my job is the
52:37
conduit to accomplish that. So we really have to look at
52:45
those relationships differently. And I think that's one thing
52:48
that we would do is we would, we talked a lot about millennials
52:53
in that book and that that was completely accurate and
52:57
completely on point. But there are a couple other
52:59
generations that are coming into play now.
53:01
And we'd have to go back and say we're not just focusing on
53:04
millennials. We're talking about other
53:05
generations as well and how those generations are going to
53:08
interact and how they're going to support themselves and their
53:11
families and how they're going to intertwine that with their
53:14
careers. And I think that's part of the
53:16
reason we're seeing the gig economy the way it is.
53:20
And I personally believe that we're going to see over the next
53:23
24 to 36 months a lot more focus on the gig economy and a lot
53:28
lighter focus on what we would consider traditional employment.
53:33
Oh, interesting. Is that specifically in the
53:35
industries that you guys are anchored in or do you see that
53:39
just sort of big picture outside of that as well?
53:41
I see a big picture outside of that.
53:44
I talked to a lot of folks who support staffing or employment
53:51
or gig in a lot of industries and I'm seeing them work more
53:56
and more and more. Even in our town of LaGrange,
54:00
GA, which is a town of about 35,000 people, we are very
54:04
heavily dependent on the automotive industry and I see a
54:08
lot of that beginning to to float into the automotive
54:11
industry. It's not a world I play in, but
54:14
it's a world a lot of colleagues play in.
54:16
Interesting. And so these folks who want to
54:19
transition into more of a gig where they work when they want
54:22
to kind of a thing, what's the thought process behind benefits,
54:28
insurance, retirement? How?
54:32
How are people wrapping their heads around that?
54:34
Well, there are a lot of things. And then part of that is your
54:36
organization, right? There are professional
54:42
organizations that they can become members of and they can
54:45
look for support in that way. So how do I get health
54:48
insurance? How do I get medical insurance
54:51
or vision insurance? How do I get the typical things
54:54
that we think of as employment resources, right?
54:59
For many years, thinking of my own career, I could if I needed,
55:05
I would certainly get health benefits through my employer.
55:09
Now we have to look for through partner organizations or
55:12
associations that can provide and can help folks find again
55:16
health insurance and even as deep as going to retirement
55:20
planning because now the world is very different today than it
55:24
was in our parents time. In our parents time there was a
55:28
pension plan in our world. There were not largely in the
55:32
corporate world pension plans. Some companies still have them,
55:35
but in hospitality, we focused on 4 O1 KS and how did we build
55:40
our retirement that way. And so now we're looking for
55:44
other organizations like yours. And I see a lot more
55:47
partnerships coming on and I see a lot more ability for folks to
55:53
make personal empowerment decisions that I think is not
56:01
without its challenges because people are going to have to make
56:05
informed decisions and the right business decisions.
56:09
And just because we're good at doing something doesn't mean
56:12
we're good at the business side of making those decisions
56:16
ourselves. Yeah, and I hear that from a lot
56:19
of guests, from a lot of clients that, you know, even when
56:23
they've got through those W2 employees, they're not gig
56:26
workers. They're, you know, they have a
56:27
hard time explaining to them and helping them sort of see that
56:31
this is the right path forward. And so for folks who are sort of
56:34
on their own, I could see that being an an even bigger
56:38
challenge. But it'll be interesting to see
56:41
how this unfolds in the next two to three years, like you said.
56:44
It will and, and seeing now delving into the gig worker
56:49
piece and, and a little we saw this a bit when we tried the
56:54
staffing model, the amount of the American population that is
56:58
unbanked. That's a a very rudimentary
57:02
thing. We think.
57:03
Oh, well, you just tried down to the bank and open checking
57:05
account. We'll know.
57:07
First of all, we're seeing a generation that doesn't relate
57:09
in the same way to brick and mortar banks.
57:12
We're also seeing a number of people who quite honestly don't
57:17
qualify to be a traditional banking customer.
57:20
And for as many years as we've been able to do that, we've
57:24
worked with financial institutions and other
57:27
professional organizations to say, OK, how can we provide the
57:31
services to these independent consultants or the resources to
57:36
them so they can make the right decisions for themselves.
57:41
Well, I understand that you're working on a new book, Joel.
57:44
Are you we ready to talk about that yet?
57:47
I think we're as ready as where are we going to be, OK?
57:50
What's the inspiration? Is there a title?
57:52
What's this book about? There's the title and the title
57:55
is the inspiration. But to do that, I have to to set
58:00
a stage and go back to my family, my mother's family, my
58:05
mother. My mother's mother was one, one
58:09
of nine children. And it was they were a very
58:14
conservative family in rural South Mississippi.
58:17
Most of them were farmers. My grandparents were dairy
58:20
farmers, and this family, again, in so many ways, were
58:27
conservative, but they had a saying in this family.
58:31
And that saying was peace is about to cease and all Hell's
58:33
going to break loose. And as I started looking over my
58:39
career, I realized that my life and my career had followed that
58:45
saying in so many times. Just when I thought something
58:49
was great and everything was going along well, then all hell
58:53
broke loose. It was, you know, a boss that
58:56
sat me down and said, you know, you're not very well liked.
59:01
Or in the, the banking, in the oil crisis, we thought
59:07
everything was good. And then a hotel was repossessed
59:09
or a hotel was sold. And where I thought I had a
59:14
foundation, a rug was pulled out from under me.
59:18
So I looked through, I took that line and I started looking for
59:21
correlations all through my life of where peace seized and all
59:25
hell broke loose. And that's become the title and
59:29
the the foundation of the book. And I think I'm in about chapter
59:33
15 of probably what's going to end up being 22 or 23 chapters
59:38
in the first round. And I'm hopeful that that'll go
59:42
to the publisher end of the year.
59:45
OK, so early 2026, maybe we'll see this book out.
59:50
I think so. And if people want to get
59:54
updates, they can. They can certainly sign up on
1:00:00
carver.com or the carvercompanies.com you'll
1:00:03
they'll be updates published there.
1:00:06
They're also there is my my speaker and my author site,
1:00:10
which is meet joelcarver.com and they're always updates there and
1:00:14
they can sign up for updates on that side as well.
1:00:17
So let's talk a little bit about the speaking that you do.
1:00:21
Who hires you? Where do you go?
1:00:23
What do you talk about? So it's interesting that has
1:00:27
turned out to be a much more entertaining, no pun intended, a
1:00:30
piece of my life. And I really thought it started
1:00:34
in the university classroom and it started with me being invited
1:00:38
to speak to to college classes. My first one was at Johnson and
1:00:42
Wales and it was a partnership between Johnson and Wales and
1:00:46
Hotel Sales and Marketing Association International and,
1:00:51
and that was a group I really enjoyed and I still enjoy the
1:00:55
college classroom. This year I got to work with the
1:00:58
State College System of Georgia and work with some groups there
1:01:03
and speak to them and that was a lot of fun.
1:01:05
But I also now get to speak to hotel brands sometimes when
1:01:11
they're having their annual conferences.
1:01:14
I've been invited to speak there certainly to property management
1:01:17
groups of when they're having their annual conferences with
1:01:19
your managers and directors of sales.
1:01:23
I always have the most fun talking about selling, but
1:01:30
probably the most entertaining is now to be able to weave the
1:01:34
people component or the people effect from the book into the
1:01:38
other component and into the selling side for me.
1:01:41
So it's a great it, it's a great marriage.
1:01:45
Like it? Joel, I've just got one more
1:01:47
question for you. But before I ask it, I want to
1:01:49
do a few things. First of all, to get in touch
1:01:52
with our guest today. We heard a couple of the options
1:01:54
there already. There's meet joelcarver.com if
1:01:57
you're interested in his books or his speaking opportunities.
1:02:01
There is the carvercompanies.com for the staffing company that
1:02:05
we've spent the bulk of the time talking about.
1:02:07
They've also got a phone number where real human being answers,
1:02:11
I'm told. Every time.
1:02:13
And the number for that is 404-254-3130.
1:02:18
Again, 404254 3130 will include links for all of this in the
1:02:24
show notes. But in case you're driving and
1:02:25
you're listening and you've got a good memory, 404-254-3130
1:02:31
Also, if you want to get more employees access to benefits
1:02:34
that won't hurt them financially and carries a financial upside
1:02:37
for the company, reach out to add back benefits.com.
1:02:40
And then if you want to take just a moment, leave us a
1:02:42
comment or review on your favorite podcast app.
1:02:45
We will be forever grateful. All right, Joel, last question
1:02:48
for you. You and I reconnect one year
1:02:50
from today and you are fist pumping in the air excited about
1:02:54
something. What is this big thing that
1:02:56
you're going to celebrate one year from today?
1:03:01
Well, that's looking into the future.
1:03:03
So we're going to we're going to make a guess and I'm going to
1:03:07
guess that it's the what's now a pyramid and it is task force, it
1:03:19
is permanent placement relationships and it's providing
1:03:26
true on demand workers through the gig world.
1:03:30
And at the end of the day, no matter what it is, it's all
1:03:34
about people. And it's all about making sure
1:03:38
that the supply and the demand sides meet and that every place
1:03:45
that an organization needs people, those people are
1:03:49
provided when they need it, where they need it and with the
1:03:52
background they need. So for me, the fist pump moment
1:03:58
is going to be seeing those three come together and I
1:04:00
believe that's going to happen in 2026.
1:04:04
I'm excited for you, looking forward to it.
1:04:05
We'll have to reconnect to make sure that that's actually on
1:04:08
track. Well, thank you.
1:04:10
I appreciate it. It's been a great time.
1:04:12
This has been fun and it's been, it's been interesting actually
1:04:15
having to think through the answers to some of these
1:04:17
questions. And I, I wish that I'd had time
1:04:20
to, to, to tell the honest story about after forming Carver, as
1:04:25
we were going through growth moments, Susan Hart and I
1:04:29
struggled to work together. And to, I was always considered
1:04:39
and defined as an early adapter, right?
1:04:43
I could, could look beyond what we're doing today and say, you
1:04:45
know what? I can see that.
1:04:46
Let's take a shot at that. That's good.
1:04:49
And Susan was driven completely by a number.
1:04:53
And what she couldn't see made her very, very nervous.
1:04:57
And it, it got so bad at one point that she and I struggled
1:05:03
to work together. And I went to our director of
1:05:06
human resources at the time. And I said, I'd like you to find
1:05:10
a, an industrial psychologist to see if we can, if they can help
1:05:15
Susan and I more become more effective leaders together.
1:05:19
And interestingly, if you couldn't find an industrial
1:05:22
psychologist in Atlanta at the time.
1:05:24
And he came back and he said, I didn't find that, but I found a
1:05:28
marriage counselor that's willing to work for the two of
1:05:30
you. And so Susan and I went to
1:05:32
marriage counseling. Wow, Three months.
1:05:36
And at the end of that time, we came out of that much stronger
1:05:41
and able to communicate much better and work together much
1:05:44
better. And it not only made a
1:05:45
difference in our relationship, it made a difference in all of
1:05:49
Carver's relationship because they were all feeling the
1:05:51
pressure of two senior leaders battling each other.
1:05:56
And and we walked out of that. And the psychologist said the
1:06:00
last day, she said, I got to tell you I've had more fun with
1:06:03
you that I've had with a lot of married couples.
1:06:06
She said because you 2 both came into this going, we want this to
1:06:09
work. OK.
1:06:11
You, neither of the two of you ever pointed a finger at the
1:06:14
other one and said she's doing this or he's doing this.
1:06:17
You both came in and said how do we look at ourselves to make the
1:06:21
change? And when we walked out, she said
1:06:25
I feel great about the two of you.
1:06:26
And the company responded to that and people came up to us
1:06:29
and said it's a whole different world seeing if you interact
1:06:33
together now than it was. Before this.
1:06:36
So at its core, was it mostly about each of you figuring out
1:06:41
how to talk in the other person's language?
1:06:44
Like how can I communicate my vision in a way that you can
1:06:49
understand it or or or or not? I think it was more fundamental
1:06:53
about how do we meet the needs of the other person in
1:06:55
relationship to ourselves. OK.
1:06:58
So as another boss and find used to say, when I asked you what
1:07:02
time it is, I didn't ask you how to build a clock.
1:07:06
It's important for Susan when I asked her for a number, to build
1:07:12
that number logically and justify each piece of that
1:07:16
number. That's not important to me.
1:07:21
What's important to me is if I want to say, if I say what's our
1:07:26
gross margin for this month, I'm looking for an answer.
1:07:29
I'm looking for a number, right? I don't need to know every
1:07:33
component of that. What Susan needs to be able to
1:07:36
say and to articulate to me how she got to that number.
1:07:41
So part of that was I had to learn to have the respect for
1:07:44
Susan to let her work through the process.
1:07:48
But Susan had to learn how to answer the question by telling
1:07:51
me what time it was and then saying, now I'd like to walk you
1:07:56
through how I got there. Gotcha.
1:07:58
If you're willing to if you're ready to receive it.
1:08:01
And I had to be ready to receive it.
1:08:02
So we both had to learn to meet each other where we were.
1:08:06
And, and we always laugh and we give great credit to this
1:08:10
wonderful counselor who talked us through that and helped us
1:08:13
understand what being a partner means, not just in our spousal
1:08:18
relationships, but that business relationship.
1:08:25
Folks, that's a wrap on another episode of the Inspired Stories
1:08:27
podcast. Thanks for learning with us
1:08:29
today.