, ,

Commercial Service Contractors – Can You Reduce Busy Work in the Busy Season?

Busy season is here for many commercial service contractors.  Being busy is much better than the alternative, but this busy season may be a good opportunity for you to examine your current operations and workflows and ask, "What are my people…
, ,

Cyber Attacks in Fire and Life Safety

In 2019, there’s a fresh wave of ransomware hackers targeting US-based fire and life safety contractors that have legacy server systems. Several have been either forced to pay a bounty or face devastating disruptions when the cyber attack…
,

Avoid This Pitfall When Going Paperless

When we talk to commercial service contracting companies about going paperless, the conversation usually starts with how they envision paperless processes will benefit their back offices by saving time and money. They want to send invoices…

End of Quarter Questions for Commercial Service Companies

Think back to the start of the year - did you set goals for your business? Of course you did. But how do you know your goals are focused on the right things?  That you are monitoring the right numbers? To help make sure you are on the…
, ,

5 Questions to Help Service Contractors Build More Valuable Businesses

Much of the popular culture in management consulting today is focused on the customer experience. Matt Dixon, the author of one of my favorite management books, The Challenger Sale, is spending many of his cycles promoting another of…

The Data Gut Punch

January 14th marked the start of the AHR Expo in Atlanta at the 1.4-million sq. ft. Georgia World Congress Center. With 50-thousand attendees, that place was a madhouse. I, along with the rest of the ServiceTrade team, was engaged in back-to-back…
, , ,

Why I Write

Shelley Bainter asked me to write this blog post explaining why I decided I needed to write The Digital Wrap and Money for Nothing in support of ServiceTrade’s marketing strategy.  It’s a great question. Interestingly, the books are mostly…
, , ,

Service Contractors: Grow like a software startup

Every Sunday evening I receive an email from the software investment banking team at Key Bank Capital Markets. The subject line of the email is “Software Valuations,” and the email contains a link to a weekly report that details the valuation…
, ,

Good is Not Good Enough

Amazon does not settle for “good” in the realm of customer service. It is not enough for the customer to simply get what they paid to receive. Amazon wants customers to enjoy the experience in the same manner as a guest might enjoy a good…