The Gentlemen Project Podcast
Bi-weekly podcast highlighting impactful stories of parents and what they do to be successful at home and at work. Helping you turn the time you have with your kids into time well spent helping them learn the most important lessons in life. The Gentlemen Project Podcast is hosted by Kirk Chugg and Cory Moore-friends who are passionate about fatherhood and raising the next generation of great kids.
The Gentlemen Project Podcast
Build Then Bless- A Shift in Culture and Kindness with Greg Trimble and Derek Miner
Derek Miner and his business partner, Greg Trimble, take us behind the scenes of their company, Lemonade Stand, and their uplifting new initiative, Build Then Bless.
The importance of family and making the most of every moment is a recurring theme in our conversation. From building treehouses to balancing real-life connections with the digital world, Derek and Greg share personal anecdotes that illustrate the joys and challenges of parenting. Their "Build then Bless" initiative is a testament to how family values can seamlessly integrate into business practices, creating a culture where both employees and clients feel valued and supported.
Greg's leadership helped foster a philanthropic company culture that encouraged small acts of kindness, even in the face of adversity. Stories of generosity, like covering repair costs for strangers or providing meals to those in need, highlight the ripple effect of collective goodwill. Finally, we discuss how the Build then Bless platform transforms workplace culture by recognizing and celebrating individual contributions, showing that true happiness begins when selfishness ends.
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Welcome to the Gentleman Project Podcast. I'm Corey Moore and I'm Kirk Chug. We've got a repeat offender in the house today, derek Miner. He's one of our best Gentleman Project advocates. He was on the original board of the Gentleman Project and he's just always been an advocate for what we're doing. So grateful to have him back in the podcast studio. He brought someone with him today that I've always respected as well. He's also been an advocate for the Gentleman Project, greg Trimble. They're partners in business, great friends, and they're working on something really, really cool.
Speaker 2:About a month and a half, two months ago, we were all at the Kindness Summit. All four of us were invited by our good friend, curtis Bennett, and as we were listening to these messages, I got to sit by Derek, talk to Derek, and he said we're doing this, we have codified this, we've gamified this. This is culture that we've been working on for our biggest project right now, and I said why don't you come on the podcast and talk about it? And the next time I saw Derek, he sent me home with t-shirts and my wife's been wearing the t-shirts they're a great workout shirts, derek, by the way, and we're just excited to hear what you guys have been working on. So first, for people that haven't listened to your first podcast, derek, introduce yourself, and then let Greg introduce himself and kind of get a feeling for who you guys are. Family makeup real quick, and then we want to talk about build them Bless.
Speaker 3:Awesome, wow, thanks so much for having me back. You say you guys came.
Speaker 4:It wasn't hard, no, it was easy, it must've been really good.
Speaker 3:Oh, this is. This is awesome. So inspired by the work that you're doing right around things that matter the very most. I think now, when we're so connected with our devices and with technology, the opportunity to be truly connected not only with amazing people but also with our kids, with things and moments that matter the most. That's really as we've kind of zoomed out to saying what matters, what really matters. It was so fun I was having a conversation with he was six at the time my son and I said, bud, tell me, what are you thinking about right now?
Speaker 3:You know, and he said mattering. I'm like whoa, that literally just for me. I'm like what matters to him, it's just mattering, and I thought that's just so interesting. All of us want to matter in some way, doing something, doing important work, but so thrilled to be here again with you guys and just again inspired by what you do. By way of background, I love Utah and Utah can't get rid of me either. I grew up on a ranch and learned the value of what it's like to care for things, not only caring for animals, but caring for other people, learning the value of hard work, and one of the greatest blessings was learning how to work and learning how to build meaningful relationships, and I've tried to do that with my wonderful family. I've got an incredible family my son's in Argentina on a mission and my youngest little princess is five years old and she has this all wrapped around her finger.
Speaker 3:But love doing work that matters as well, and with incredible people so thrilled to have the opportunity to work with Greg and so many incredible people at Lemonade Stand and what we've been building and trying to make a difference in the lives of our not only our team members but also our clients, and that's kind of where Build. Then Bless came as a result of that.
Speaker 2:So give us a little background on Lemonade Stand so that people know what that is. Go ahead, Derek.
Speaker 4:Oh, okay. Yeah, it's kind of funny because when we tell people we work at Lemonade Stand, they're like what.
Speaker 2:You work at a lemonade stand. You're the kids at the end of the block. No, it's not in the street.
Speaker 3:It's my favorite because my kids are like what does your dad do for work? He works at a lemonade stand and everyone's like, wait, what yeah, I do for work?
Speaker 2:He works at a lemonade stand and everyone's like wait what? Yeah, yeah, Does he have a business permit? Though? Yes, we do. It's so interesting, right.
Speaker 4:All the, all the dynamics that go into running a business and the complications that go into that. But just quick little background on myself. I I started a tech company in college it's called simple tech. Um sold it, uh, in about three years. It grew pretty quickly, but it it just wasn't the style of business that I enjoyed the most. So I took a portion of that and then started lemonade stand and the.
Speaker 4:The foundation of that is that every single business essentially starts as a lemonade stand in some way, shape or form, right when you're. You have this great idea. You've you've dreamed a big dream. You need to execute on that dream. You've essentially made your lemonade and you need to sell it. You need people to find it. But what happens with a lemonade stand? You often have people on the side of the road sitting there with a sign. They have a full picture of lemonade and they often go back into the house with a full pitcher of lemonade, right. And so that's one of the biggest, most important pieces of building a business is building a brand that people can trust, that they can trust that that lemonade is good and it's clean and it's it tastes right and it's not going to make you sick and you know that's, that's the brand. And then how do you get the word out that what you've built and what you've created is something that is worth buying and worth people wanting to do business? I have this strong belief, especially nowadays with marketing advertising, that people want to do business with those that they know, like and trust and, at the end of the day, that's what it all boils down to, and I know that you guys know that as well. Your reputation is everything and that's what we've tried to do with digital marketing agency. We have most of our team in Utah, but we have team scattered out throughout the country. We do process payroll in about 15 or 16 states and, uh, hybrid and remote team. But it's awesome.
Speaker 4:I have an amazing family. Um, we're kind of freaking out as of today, today, right now, both of our kids we have two kids and they are on their way to bear lake their first time us being without them on their own, driving you know, know away, and so we're. We're just freaking out because we're going to be empty nesters here in about a year and, um, but we, we really have tried to be intentional with raising them. And for myself I can speak for myself being a good man and a good husband and a good father. That's what's most important to me above all. Um, that's my business. You know that's, that's the thing that I care most about, and you know that I if any of your listeners are over here four or five years ago um, that was the first book that I wrote was about dads. Dads who stay and fight, dads who stay and fight.
Speaker 4:And how important it is that, as men, we step up and do what we're supposed to do while we have the time to do it. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Those moments are fleeting. They go by so fast. Yeah, they do. I had one of those similar moments, like this weekend we drove up to the ranch and we needed some extra seats and I'm following my boys that were like I remember these little boys like just sitting up on their own and I'm like someday they're going to be men and they're in the truck in front of me, you know, driving on their own through the canyon over dirt roads, and I'm not worried about them. But I kind of had one of those moments like wow, they have grown up like just right before my eyes. So that's super cool. Thank you, and a shout out to you too, greg. Like when we were working on one of our projects, you said you know anybody who's involved with the gentleman project. Send me a spreadsheet of their addresses. I'm sending them a book. And he sent a free book to everybody who supported us. Well, that's killer.
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 2:And I'll never forget that. I've grown up kind of as a dad reading the words of Greg, because you were like an original blogger too. You know he almost everything you ever wrote on Facebook back then went viral and he's just got away with words. And so I kind of grew up as a young dad reading your words and I and I respected you for, for the things that you talked about and and the things that you you preached about family and faith, and so that means a ton.
Speaker 4:Thank you so much.
Speaker 2:It helped me as a young dad, not knowing what I was doing. I would, I would read what you wrote and I'm like this guy's. This guy's a strength to me.
Speaker 4:Oh, thank you. You think about the name of your podcast? It's that's. My wife says that all the time. Teach our son to become a gentleman. You know to do the things that very few men are doing across the world nowadays, which is to step up and to, to shape up and to be what has become a relic in our society to be a gentleman.
Speaker 1:So thank you for your work, do you guys? Do you guys look back now, where I know you still have a young one at home, but do you look back? But you also have older ones any young ones empty, empty.
Speaker 1:You know I'm looking at the empty nester thing and I'm probably, you know, six, seven years away, but I have my first one leaving for college in like three weeks. Do you look back on what you've done so far and you say, oh man, I'm glad I did these one or two things. Does anything stand out in your mind now that you've had some time under your belt where you go? Man, I'm so glad I did these few, one or two things.
Speaker 3:Wow. Well, I think in life there's two things we always say right, I'm glad I did, or I wish I would have.
Speaker 1:Sure.
Speaker 3:And I was talking with Kirk just last month and talking about something that he actually introduced to me because of the gentleman project, which was taking time intentionally with each one of my kids one-on-one and when you have six kids that can take a lot of time. But it was something that I intentionally tried to do and now, as I think about it, it's almost become a natural process. Oh, that's great when I can be with just one of my kids one-on-one, which is so much fun Because now I want them. I think ultimate success is that our kids want to hang out with us not only now but later, right.
Speaker 2:I think that that's.
Speaker 3:That's a signal that we're we've done something right, but that's that's something that I learned from from Kirk, and one of the things that I started doing, too, is I start writing down some of the things that my kids say that are just so great and, like I shared with my son, said I'm like this is so good and there's all these amazing things that they share and they talk about, so sometimes so out of context and so random, but it's just so pure. Those two things have made probably the biggest difference and impact in my life. One of the other things and I've gotten well mixed reviews None of our kids are on social media and they haven't. In fact, it was so funny when my, when my son showed up and he's like now that you're on a mission, you got to. You know it's.
Speaker 3:Here's your Facebook page. Like all right, can you teach me how to do this? In fact, he had to create his first LinkedIn profile because of a business class he took in high school, and so we were walking through that. He's like how does this even work? And some of his posts are some of my favorite, as I was thinking about that, um, but I asked my daughter the other day.
Speaker 3:I said hey, do you feel like you're missing out? She says no, she says that I like connecting with people in real life, and I think those are just a few things that we've tried to be intentional about. That, as I look back and we don't know the ramifications, what our kids have heard, what they haven't heard but it's these little moments that we have that I want to always remember. But small things, I always say small things multiplied by time, are what equal the greatest results. And it's doing these small things, repeatedly spending time one on one right, seeing them in real life. I love skiing and you can't go anywhere on a chairlift, so it's like, hey, what's up? And that was a decision that I made too but all these, all these little things that we don't get these moments back right, and so are we making the most of them, rather than being connected on a device, being connected in real life?
Speaker 4:That's awesome, I think. For me it's just been prioritizing them ahead of everything. There's this really quick story that I loved about Clayton Christensen, Harvard business professor, innovator's dilemma. I mean how?
Speaker 3:will you measure your?
Speaker 2:life. How will you measure?
Speaker 4:your life.
Speaker 4:I mean, some of the greatest lessons. Um, probably the greatest lesson I think I learned from studying him was that he he, him and his wife were were buying a new house. They bought a new house. They saw the plot of land, they saw this corner and they said, man, that'd be perfect for a little tree house. You know a little place, and his kid and they decided where they would build it. They specced it out and they were going to do all this. And the kids just loved it Every single day. They couldn't wait for dad to get home so that they could build that thing together. They waited for dad to get home so that they could build that thing together. They waited for him to get okay, what are we going to do? And that's all. It consumed all their time. That's all they wanted to do. And so he did that with them, worked along side by side with them to build this tree house. And he said, um, after it was all said and done, he said it was a highlight of his life, a highlight of his kid's life. His kids will always remember those times that they spent. And he said I shudder to think that I almost bought a kit from which I would have built that myself so that I could have got it done quick, so that they had a treehouse. They didn't want to hang out in the treehouse, they wanted to build and create alongside dad. And so for me that's been from day one.
Speaker 4:I've tried to prioritize and build and shape my lifestyle, my career, my business, even church callings or whatever it might be. Nothing takes precedent over the time that I need to take to make sure that they feel important and the time is like I have a year left and then they're gone. They're, they're gone, they're out and they'll never probably live with us again. I know that's sometimes that happens, but that's it. And in that book I actually wrote a chapter on the golden years. Everyone talks about the golden years. It's like those are the years you know kids are gone and your business is good and these are the years you can retire and feel, enjoy your life. I'm like your golden years. You have about 20 years. Those are your golden years and it might be hard, it might be stressful, there might be tons of anxiety, all these responsibilities, but those are the golden years and to not overlook those and to not take those for granted and to put every last ounce of energy into those golden years and then, when they're out, okay I'll, I'll work more, I'll, I'll do what. You know.
Speaker 4:You can do different things, but just making them keeping the main thing. The main thing husband, father, to be a good husband and good father, that's that's been my goal. Is that when I, when I die and death is, it feels like it's always before me. I always am. Maybe it's a fatalist. I think it's more being a realist, because every day you wake up and there's another friend that's down. Um, there's a passage that I love. It says our lives passed away, as it were, unto us a dream, and each of us, I think, if we're being real, we we understand that concept and to always make sure that you make every single second, every single day, every single year count during those years, with your kids as a family, to do those things. That's what's been most important to me.
Speaker 2:You guys talk a lot about the culture in your family and the things that you prioritize the most. You've also been very successful at translating that into business, and so I want to talk about Build, then Bless. Tell people what it is, because I think it's a revolutionary idea and everyone's familiar with the status quo when it comes to corporate culture and we talk mostly about taking corporate ideas and putting them into the family. We're kind of going backwards on this one just a little bit, but I think this is such a cool project that people should hear about. We want to give you guys a platform to talk about it man we're yeah, this is where we start.
Speaker 3:I just have to say one of the things, too, I get to learn from Greg every day. It's an incredible blessing because when he talks about being an incredible, you know husband and father and giving free books. You know, as you mentioned, I started with Greg after we stayed in touch for several years. We decided to work together and I joined Lemonade Stand on March 9th 2020, a week after the entire world unraveled and here Greg's just brought me on. Our clients were all panicking. No one knew really what was going to happen and people were pausing their budgets. And Greg looked at me and I'm like I remember this from 08, 09 being in this, but Greg's perspective always was this hey, for the clients who can't pay, we're going to continue to do work for them without them paying, and those are still clients of ours today.
Speaker 1:All right Pat.
Speaker 3:But it's not just, it's not how he shows up. How he shows up at work is exactly how he shows up at home, which is so inspiring to me. And when we joined, when I started, you know, when we were having conversations, I said tell me one of the things that you're doing outside of just making money to make a difference and to make an impact in the world. And he had an amazing answer you and to make an impact in the world. And he had an amazing answer.
Speaker 3:You know, most people are like well, we do some of these things. Literally, every one of our team members gives a portion of their paycheck and then we determine where we want that to go. And that's awesome. You know, a lot of companies and corporate giving is like that right. And as we started talking about what are these opportunities and we start, we we were talking about putting together an event and standing in front of a big check with our you know just us and a few of our team members and having the you know the team in the audience and it's like we're going to feel really good for 15, for 15 minutes and then we're back at it and most of the team doesn't feel the impact of that, because it's usually I.
Speaker 4:I mean, if you take a hundred, a company with a hundred people, each of them have different like notions or desires or things that satisfy their innate desire to become philanthropic or to to see a cause. I mean somebody might, they must, they might love the humane society versus you know, cancer research or homeless shelters, or you know cancer research or homeless shelters, or you know? I mean there's a myriad of incredible causes desires and think causes that get someone excited to give right. Go ahead. Sorry, no, this is great. Not at all.
Speaker 3:But what? What happened is we started asking ourselves questions how can we do more? So, inspired by Davis Smith and what he's done with Cotopaxi and you see, all those do good stickers all over, which is awesome.
Speaker 2:We've had him on the podcast.
Speaker 3:Davis is amazing. Let's go do good. But all of a sudden, when the opportunity presents itself, what do you say? Yeah, I would if I could. I don't have. And we said what if, instead of standing in front of this big check, what if we empowered every one of our team members to become the philanthropic arm of our company where they see a need, the opportunity to change that narrative and say can I help? And I can help and I can do good. And we started doing this really because of COVID in 2020. What can we do beyond just what we're doing right now for our business, but for each other? And the stories hundreds of them now from our team have been so inspiring. And now, instead of being inward minded, our team is outward minded and literally looking for opportunities to do good.
Speaker 4:Yeah, it's to see how it's impacted our team, because you have the whole gamut of people with backgrounds, whether it's religious backgrounds, cultural backgrounds, the way they were raised, whatever it is. We have members of various Christian congregations, we have atheists, we have agnostics. We have across the whole board. And that's probably been the biggest impact that we've seen is the change that's taken place inside of their own hearts. Right, because what we did is we allocated money. It wasn't their money, it wasn't coming out of their paycheck. We just said, hey, here's a budget that we're going to take, that we're going to empower our team to become that philanthropic arm of our company. Not that other philanthropic activities or philanthropies are not important, they definitely are. There's so much good that's done out there, but what could we do specifically for our team that will cause them to look outside themselves? Right, because in the process of looking outside themselves, they become better people.
Speaker 4:I got to actually share this quote because you know the great Bill Walton passed away, know, the great bill walton passed away, passed away, and he said he said happiness begins where selfishness ends. Right, he's always a happy guy. You know I'm who wouldn't be happy. He went to he's great career, just a great career, but always a smile on his face and thinking outward mind. I think that's the key, right. And so we've seen this process and when you have, you talk about one kind act a day, or you talk about Kodopaxi and do good, they do so much good, but sometimes it becomes hard. You, you get done with the happiness summit and you're like, yeah, you're on cloud, yeah, we're going to do this, we're going to do this, we're going to do this, we're going to do all this good.
Speaker 4:And then life hits you the next day You're busy and Monday hits you and you've got all these things to worry about and bills to take care of, and then you stop thinking about those things that you were thinking about, about doing one kind act a day. You pull back and you get inward and then, the moment you do that, you start to, you start to find unhappiness, right, and so what we've built is this platform that operationalizes all of that. That's what we actually told Curtis when he first, when we first met. He's like I got to see what you guys are building. He said we want to see what you guys are focused on. And he was like you guys have built a platform that enables all of this to continue forward.
Speaker 4:Um, we have one of our great friends, clint pulver. You guys ought to have him on the podcast if you haven't, but he's a great speaker, just a great individual, and he said the same thing goes into companies and talks. He'll do a huge. You know he's talking to Pepsi and NASA and Costa Vita and these huge companies and they come out of there. Yeah, we got to do this and and it's, but it's.
Speaker 4:It's operationalizing it, it's putting it into practice, it's a return and report. It's where your, your team members can be there and it's we say that we're we're accountability partners in doing good in this world. And as you do that as a team, you become better husbands and better fathers and better mothers and better wives and better community members and better future politicians and better church members and better everything. Because you have now it's become ingrained in you that you are constantly going to look for others, whether it's a waiter or a waitress that's having a bad day, or maybe they're just giving good service and they deserve more. Or maybe it's somebody on the side of the road, or maybe it's just somebody working behind the counter at Subway and you notice, man, and you know and you empathize with them. That's hard work and you say how is your day going? Or the bag checker at the grocery store.
Speaker 4:These are the hundreds and hundreds of stories that we're starting to accumulate from these companies, these organizations that have joined and become part of this, and our goal is to turn this really into the largest private social feed of people doing good in the world so that they can inspire others with the different ideas that they have. That happens all the time. One of our team members will report back on the good, on this experience that they had, and it inspires all of us. Oh my gosh, I never even thought of that sort of thing that I could do in order to to bless somebody else's life.
Speaker 3:It's so true. One of my favorite stories still was an early one, one of our newer team members. He's like I, kind of hesitated. Every week we have the opportunity in our. In our we call it lessons and blessings.
Speaker 3:It was our lunch and learn, but we have named by our team, which was so awesome. He said I don't know if this is a great story, cause I didn't actually use any money, to you know, to help anybody out. He says I was driving home and I saw this mom she had the back of her car open, baby in a car seat down below and just staring at trying to get something out of the back of the car. And he said, literally, you guys? The thought came through my mind is what would my team do? And he says I turned around and went back and helped her and, with tears running down her face after that, he helped her get this thing out of the car. She's like I am so grateful and so appreciative and there's these little we call them micro interactions that we see every day and an opportunity to do this and as, as Greg talked about, and I think, or you know, what kind of impact does this have at home as well?
Speaker 3:My son, prior to leaving on a mission, worked at a bike shop and he saw these actually, you know, see a lot of here, specifically in Utah two missionaries coming in and their bike was a mess. His front tire was wobbling and it was a broken spoke. The spoke is like three or four bucks, but the labor is like 40, you know to do this. So my son, seeing kind of what we've done with build and bless and how we're being outward minded, he went to his manager and he's like hey, can you just take that out of my paycheck, cause I know these missionaries have no money? And he's telling me this. I'm like hey, bud, I'm like you remember building bus, right? I said what's that invoice number? And so while he was at school, I drove to the shop and I said, hey, it's a manager here. I knew him really well and there was a newer employee there that didn't recognize me. He's like, yeah, is everything okay? I'm like, yeah, it's great, I just need to chat invoice number. And I gave it to him. He's like that was the missionaries. I said, hey, I want to pay for it. He's like what I said, my company allows me to do this, to do good.
Speaker 3:So I never saw what their reaction was when they came to pick up the bike. It's like, hey, it's taken care of. But I saw his face and we have these opportunities to see these moments that make a difference and then, going through, I picked my kids up from school. I'm like this is so great, I'm going to go take you guys to lunch. And we pull up to In-N-Out Burger, right, and the drive-thru line is forever long it always is and so we go in and have a great little lunch with two of my kiddos and as we're leaving, it's's a colder day and it's been raining, and you know they do that cool hot chocolate, you know, free hot chocolate on this day.
Speaker 3:But we were driving away and there was this guy standing on the side of the road and I, as I turned the corner, I literally the same thing my team do and I turned around. We waited in a drive-thru line and, instead of just giving him money, I handed, handed him something, and what was so interesting is you see a lot of these people. He literally took the food, started drinking the hot chocolate and went over and sat somewhere else and ate. And there's these opportunities those are some of the most clear that we see all the time but there's these small moments that can make a big difference in the life of someone.
Speaker 4:Yeah, it's been cool to see them show up for each other. They show up for their team more. Now they start figuring out ways to serve their team in creative ways that they didn't before. They find a way to start serving their clients in creative ways. Corey, you're talking about the airport building. You know, working on the airport Remind me of one of our favorite, shannon.
Speaker 4:It was her first month starting. So she's like what is this? Like company has given me money to go find people to do nice things. For what is this? So? She and talk about how it engages the whole family. She takes this money and she's flying to Park City. She's in Kansas and she's flying to park city. She's in kansas and she's coming to park city.
Speaker 4:And it was when southwest had their debacle you know just all the flights and and. But she felt empathy for all the southwest workers that were, you know, under the gun, feeling pretty bad. So she takes her money, she goes and buys a bunch of gift cards and she starts handing them out to all the Southwest. You know the gate agent, the baggage guy, all these people and her husband does the same thing. So they're together. She engages her whole family. She engages her husband, who are now, because of this philosophy and because of this platform, are going out and and improving the lives of these people. Like what? Like everyone's yelling at us. You're giving us a gift card. Yeah, because she says it sucks to get yelled at for something that you have no control over. Right Story after story after story. We could go on forever, but I'm sure I love them.
Speaker 2:I love the stories. They're so cool.
Speaker 4:The great thing is these stories away from the mic, but these stories are all contained and you can see them. You know you've got your your company feed that will show you everything that's happening inside of your own company, but then you hit the toggle switch and it says community. So now you're starting to see stories from all the different companies that are part of the build and bless community, from their team members, for their, their employees, their managers, their founders, their executives. They're sharing these stories and we actually have. If we, you know, if we had a video, we can show you on a map. But there's a map where you can see these things happening in real time all over the world. So you see this, it's almost like a little light that comes on and you can see the, the logo of, that of, or the face of that person with their associated company, you know. So you got this person over in kansas doing this and in socal, and maybe over in the philippines and down in texas. So these, these things are just blinking in real time. You can see these things because we grab, you know, ip information and and data. So it places it on a map so you can get a general idea of where these things are happening. So you're, you're visualizing the world. You know the company's always.
Speaker 4:We're in business because we're going to change the world, especially a lot of tech companies. A lot of tech companies like we're going to change the world with this technology that we create. We literally think that we can improve, truly improve, not just change the world. What does that mean? Change? Is it good? Change for good, change for bad? We literally believe that we can improve the world, one micro interaction at a time, as this takes place and it spawns out, and that you can actually visualize the effect. We say how do you measure culture? How do you visualize culture? We're making it so that you can visualize culture improving and the hearts improving of your team and then their communities, and then the effects of what it takes place, of what takes place beyond that, that's super excited about it and I have to tell you one of the coolest things, as we're rolling this out now to other companies this one amazing individual.
Speaker 3:he drives from Logan to Salt Lake to his office and you're going to go through people outside of Utah.
Speaker 2:That's about an hour and a half hour and 45. Yeah, there's some context. It's a long drive. I'll just say that.
Speaker 3:And he, he was getting his tires done, tires fixed and someone came in and was you know, I need help with my car. There was a front tire that needed to be replaced. I think she went in and out of the store Like I don't have money for this, I don't know what to do. As he got called up, he went up and he's like hey, can you tell me what's going on over there? And she doesn't have money to pay for her tire, she just needs one tire. And she's on her way. He's like can I take care of that?
Speaker 3:And the manager just sat there. He was, he was describing this like wait what? And he says we can do better than that too. And so he discounted the price and was able to let this person pay. And then he left. He said I probably wouldn't have even thought about that. I probably just would have looked at who's this crazy person like pull it together. You know what he says. This literally has changed my outlook on finding opportunities, and it was small. You know what he was able to do. But now I'm like, oh my gosh, that's the coolest thing, especially growing up on a farm. You look at tires and tread.
Speaker 2:I'm not crazy guy that will roll down my window and say hey, your tires are low.
Speaker 3:But I was just so inspired by these other stories now that are starting to come in and getting us thinking outside of ourselves, cause I think one of the greatest dichotomies in life is the degree to which we think about ourselves, the unhappier we are. But the more we think about others, the second we think about others and someone else. Not only are they helped and blessed, but we are too. How does that work? I don't know.
Speaker 2:Well, and there's a third wheel. In both the stories in the bike shop and the tire shop, not only were the person who blessed and went out of their way because they saw the opportunity and the person who blessed and went out of their way because they saw the opportunity and the person who received blessed, but the bike shop employee and the tire shop employee probably also saw an opportunity to be kinder that day and they were touched because of the kindness of someone else. So it's not just a two-way thing, I think, and you know, like the butterfly effect. You know, one of them probably went and had more of an, a penchant to go do something kind for someone else because they saw it, and then you repeat the action you see yeah, and it's not only internally, or not only externally, but also internally too.
Speaker 3:Um, my father passed away in sept September and that final week I was there with him and I was realizing. I was looking at my calendar that week and I was like I don't know how I've got to be here with my family, but I also have all these things that I need to do at work. And it wasn't just a text from Greg, it was a text from four or five other people on my team. They're like hey, but it was a text from four or five other people on my team. They're like hey, you focus on your family, we've got you.
Speaker 3:And to be able to step away and take that is one of the most incredible things ever. And those seven, eight days that I was with my dad and my family were some that you can't get back. And as we talk about these micro moments this is what life is built on are these small things that you remember? I remember when I looked down at my phone and saw that text. I remember how I felt when we see this and really you think about it we're all here for each other to try to help each other be just a little bit better, and isn't it a miracle that we can get better?
Speaker 3:in any way and what we're trying to accomplish.
Speaker 1:So how does? A listener access this if they want to. Is this a app? Is it on the internet? Is it both? And how do they access it? How do they get into your world if they want to?
Speaker 4:Yeah, so build them. Blessedcom is a place to sign up. We do all of the onboarding. Is a place to sign up. We do all of the onboarding. Um, there's, there's.
Speaker 4:Obviously, you know, there's gotta be a desktop version where people can access it on their computers. Um, we have an iOS app, android app, um, but we do all of the onboarding because we want to just take that hassle out of it. We also have um if, if companies or people feel like they need it, we have access to all kinds of training helping them figure out how to set core values were really big and important on having core values that are, like Derek likes to say, are the guardrails that keep us going in the direction that we want to go, towards our vision or or fulfilling our mission. Um, but yeah, they just just contact us. We do all all the onboarding and help that entire process. Everybody on the team we train. We have an entire curriculum that's done by some really cool um trainers.
Speaker 4:I don't know if you guys know Lisa, valentin Clark and your host, bonner, and Kirby Hayborn, who's the host of making good, a really cool TV show, sharon Prabacher.
Speaker 4:I mean really dynamic trainers that will take you through how to implement this and take pieces and every culture is different. We like to say kind of the first slide on our deck that says Build and Bless exists to make bad cultures good and good good cultures better and to change human nature, because we don't ever go into any company assuming that they have a bad culture. We just say you might have a great culture but there might be some things that we can add to it. Or there could be a really terrible culture where people are just jumping ship and want to get out of there quickly. Um, can we help fix that, you know, if they have the desire to fix that. And so both with you know some training and some philosophy around it. And then implementing the platform where there's this return and report and people are helping each other out. But we're there the whole way. People get an account manager.
Speaker 1:Is that done live, or is it done via zoom or?
Speaker 4:both it can be. It can be either or or both. Okay, companies can choose. Hey, we're good, we understand it enough, and maybe we're not that big. I mean, we've got 50 or a hundred people, we can do this ourself. Or maybe it's bigger. Company says, hey, we'd really like you to come in and bring some people and help train our people and implement it and help make sure everybody's dialed in and their profile is updated. Because that's another big portion of it's not just this portion of going out into the community and blessings. There's a very internal business portion of it where we feel a strong desire to get to know each of our team members really well and make sure that each manager and each director knows their team really well, because in order to serve them the best that they can be served, they have to know them. And so we start by building out an interest for him. So, like I know what dessert he likes, so I'm not sending him chocolate chip cookies when he's allergic to chocolate or something he sends me Rice Krispie treats yeah exactly.
Speaker 4:We do that with our clients as well, where we want to get to know them really well so that you know, if you have a birthday, we want to send you a text, we want to send you a gift to show you that we care.
Speaker 4:I mean, that's going full circle back to what Derek talked about being noticed. That's like Dale Carnegie 101, right, like the most, the most innate desire that each of us have as human beings is to is to feel important, to feel like we're, we matter, that we're noticed, and most people, when they have a birthday, come around or an anniversary or some big event in their life, they get a text from maybe their mom, maybe their wife or their husband, but sometimes their kids will forget them. I mean, it's the amount of people that, at the end of the day, remember important things and make people feel special. The amount of people that reach out to help people when they don't necessarily need something in return is very small, and so that's the other portion of it is that we want to try to build internally a culture of thinking about the other people, making sure that they feel important, making sure that they feel recognized, and so we've built that into the platform as well.
Speaker 1:That's killer yeah.
Speaker 3:One of the coolest things. I was thinking about this, uh, claude Silver, who's the chief heart officer for VaynerMedia. I had the opportunity to listen to her speak up in park city a few years ago and and the words she said on a slide in in the past, jobs were about muscle and work right, jobs are about muscle. Um, today they're brains and tomorrow they'll be about heart, and tomorrow is here.
Speaker 1:Oh, I like that.
Speaker 3:And it's so true to see people want, now more than ever, purpose in what they're doing and that I'm doing an important work that actually matters and makes a difference, and I think every one of us, no matter where we are, where we sit in any organization that's the beauty of it you can make a difference right. Small and simple things multiplied by time, equal the greatest results.
Speaker 2:I love that. Very quotable, derek, very quotable. Well, that's awesome. I feel like anybody who has a company that listens to this ought to look into this.
Speaker 1:Well, I'm going to. It's awesome for our company for sure, absolutely.
Speaker 2:I just think it's cool, Cause everybody is familiar with the big check scenario you know, and you feel kind of disconnected from that if it's not your thing.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, we've had that for years and we have multiple different offices and in construction then you're broken apart again, so you have offices in different locations, kind of have subcultures. Then you have projects where people are on projects, so we have about 2,000 employees, but those 2,000 employees are spread over everywhere, right, and so it's hard to get a feeling of unity, even when we're doing a charitable donation or a charitable cause or giving time to charity, right. So we typically have the different businesses and people have their own charities that we support, yeah, and then we do something globally as a company. But this is way more to the heart of the matter. I mean it. It just makes a lot of a lot of sense to me.
Speaker 2:And cool that you guys have given it a system that makes it easy, that you don't have to. You know you have to think about it, but once you plug into the system it kind of snowballs.
Speaker 4:And you get. You get to draw upon the ingenuity and the inspiration of each individual person. So imagine, as you're looking through your coming, you see, uh, you know, a person at office. 10, you know whatever it is, you know, you know that happens as you grow.
Speaker 4:It's like there's more and more officers, more and more places, and you're only one person, so you get. But imagine you're seeing this come in and and so and so did this thing, and you're, you key into it and you you're able to comment on it and say, oh my gosh, great job, and and you can encourage that behavior. And they start to do that peer-to-peer. Where they're, they're just, they're building their own positive communities everywhere that they are and it's contagious.
Speaker 3:That was the thing for us too, and when we talked about when the genesis of this started, I literally think about every one of our team members in their home, wherever they're at. How can they feel what we have when they're not here? And this became that was kind of the question we asked. Is I get to see Greg all the time, which is awesome. A lot of our team members don't get to see and experience what I do. How can we have something where we can all share, all celebrate, all shine a light on the amazing things that are happening? So kind of that.
Speaker 1:Well, the way that you guys have automated it and it's happening essentially organically and people can see it happening.
Speaker 1:The only way I could do that today is, let's say, like our Midwest team puts in a handicap ramp for someone, which is something they've done a couple of times Just awesome, being nice to someone in the community, right, great, great. The only way I the rest of my associates know that in any other office is that we put something together and we post it on our intranet or we post it socially or and then times that by however many offices and groups. It's basically an impossible task to proactively try to stay on top of all the great things people are doing, whether that be charity or just doing an amazing job at work, or just going the extra mile you name it winning a new customer. It's really hard at scale to have that communicated in any good economical way. So, in a real way, this is enormous um communication tool.
Speaker 4:Yeah, it's really cool we're actually taking all those experiences too, and at the end of the year we roll them up almost as like a yearbook, like here's all these things where. So you're documenting. Not only are you, are you inspiring and growing and building people, honestly you're, you're making better people at every single turn, but at the end of the day, you're able to document. You know so, when Big D, it's all said and done, I mean there's going to be lots of evidence of the fruit of the work, but to have that documented somewhere, you're like, oh my gosh, I remember when so-and-so did that. I remember when so-and-so did that. I remember when that person's life was changed. I remember when so-and-so did that. I remember when that person's life was changed.
Speaker 1:I remember that person's life was saved because somebody did such and such like so powerful to have that documentation. And we started to really focusing on mental health a couple of years ago which this is part and parcel to that in my mind and it made this enormous difference for us to just be okay talking about it, talk about it, talking about ways to deal with it, talking about ways to not deal with it, and I think this would go hand in hand with that. Right, you talked about, I think, muscle, mind and heart, and that's a heart thing. You've got to be pretty vulnerable and pretty open to say, hey, I'm having some mental health issues. More people are than you might think pretty vulnerable and pretty open to say, hey, I'm having some mental health issues. Yeah, um, more people are than you might think, and that's what we're realizing in today's society, right, but this is a wonderful way for people to open up to each other, to be more kind, to be more open.
Speaker 2:So killer job guys.
Speaker 1:It's a really good idea. Thank you so much Coming from these guys, I don't think I'm surprised. No, how long has the this been available to other companies besides your own?
Speaker 4:January 1st of this year. Okay, We've we've used it ourselves internally for, um, you know, two to three years and it got to the point where both small and large companies were asking us hey, can we use that? I?
Speaker 3:have to tell you.
Speaker 4:We're doing this internally, so we worked really hard. We've developed other platforms and applications before, but this is the one we're most passionate about, so it's sort of an organic. You know one of those situations where a really good product comes out of almost, you know, not expected. I mean, slack came out of a company that was doing like video game design and all these things, and so it's really just been sort of a demand thing where, like man, we'd love to implement that in our company.
Speaker 3:One of our clients didn't show up for a regular scheduled meeting and one of our team members sent them a spoonful of comfort. It showed up on their front doorstep Next thing. She's like who are you guys, Can you?
Speaker 4:teach me how to do this. I shined you at a meeting and you and you send me a gift. What?
Speaker 3:That's great, it doesn't happen. So that's where it kind of started to we're what? That's great, it doesn't happen. So that's where it kind of started too. We're like can we use this? Can you guys show us how to do this? Maybe we're onto something.
Speaker 1:You're definitely onto something I'm always preaching that if you want a loyal client, then you have to do something more than expected. Right? And the construction industry said look, team on time, on budget, high quality and safe. Those aren't easy, but they're prerequisites. That's what they pay us to do. They pay us to do those things. You have to go above and beyond and touch their heart. Right, you actually care, you got to care and you've got to make them feel like. I didn't expect that I like to use the word surprise, surprise and delight. Right, that I like to use the word surprise, surprise and delight. Right? So this is a way to make that a part of your culture.
Speaker 2:Right? That's cool, that's right. Yeah, very cool, super excited. Well, in a couple of years, um, maybe we need to have you guys back on and talk about the last two years of the explosive growth of build than bless, because I think it's going to be a cool story I think the funnest thing to you know to bring this, bring this back around teaching our kids to be outward minded, right?
Speaker 3:we have numerous stories of one of our team members. I can still hear it in my she's like their, their child saw a need, just like mommy. We need to help because of this, right, and that's what.
Speaker 1:That's what's so incredible about these You're creating awareness not just for your employees, but with their whole family.
Speaker 4:Their generations. Yeah, it is the most exciting thing. We have so many mothers.
Speaker 4:You know that, that work and because you know of the remote nature not every job can be remote, but that work, and because you know of the remote nature and not every job can be remote but some aspects are, and and so we've created this way that that these mother, you know, with young kids, can still work and and now they share these stories and they say, um, my kids don't know any different than to live this philosophy. So everywhere they go they're like who can we, who can we build them? Bless mommy.
Speaker 2:That's great, it's amazing, so cool. I'm a firm believer that you can't be a gentleman if you're not situationally aware. Yeah, because that's, to me, where all of the gentlemanly acts come from. When you, when you look outside yourself and see the needs of others, that's what makes you a gentleman. And unless you're aware of those around you which is what this is promoting and encouraging you can't.
Speaker 3:You can't be a gentleman because you're inwardly focused, so great job, yeah, and I think the true test of character right Is to be compassionate at every step, right.
Speaker 2:That's awesome. So I'm going to ask you again, Derek, because at the end of every podcast we ask what you think it means to be a gentleman. I know you've answered this, but it's been a couple of years, so maybe it's changed, and then we'll let Greg answer that question.
Speaker 3:I think I would say now is to be outward minded, right and always look for others and how you can help, because there are always needs and when you can lift someone up, make their day a little bit better, even with a smile. These small acts and micro interactions make a big difference in being seen.
Speaker 4:Yeah, oh man.
Speaker 3:I better answer this right.
Speaker 4:So when my wife listens, I'm trying to think of what she would say. I just I know how I feel and and for me, being a gentleman is is um, having respect for those around you, specifically your wife, your kids, looking for? We tell our kids every time they go to a dance, we say, find the loneliest person in the room and go, ask them to dance. So, situationally aware, being empathetic this is at the core of all this, the things that you're talking about. But being empathetic and placing yourself in the situation of others. I know this.
Speaker 4:I don't think this is a religious type podcast, but it's. You know, there's a scripture that I love where it talks about pure religion and undefiled before God is to visit the fatherless and the widows. And it's not like, why were those? Why is the fatherless and the widows? And it's not like, why were those? Why is the fatherless and the widows chosen? It's not just them that need. They were chosen as a representation and in our world today, we hear a lot about religion, and religion just broken down in the Latin as religare, which means to rebind or to reconnect, and I think that is, empathetically, at the core of all this is that you're able to go and reconnect and help bring things together and to be empathetic, reconnect with humanity and be situationally aware that you're able to, everywhere you go, be a light and be someone that leaves everything that you touch better than you found it. That that, to me, is the core of of being a gentleman Good job.
Speaker 2:I like it, I love it. Thanks, gentlemen. Okay, so build been blesscom If you're interested in the platform, which you ought to be if you own a company. Also, you guys have a podcast for the lemonade stand. They have some amazing guests on there. You want to do a quick plug for your podcast?
Speaker 3:Go ahead. Lemonade stand stories and we talked to a lot of people about turning life's lemons into lemonade and working on a Build Then Bless podcast too.
Speaker 2:So stay tuned. Hey cool, that's awesome. So go check them out. Drop them a rating and a review if you like it. Do the same for us. That'd be awesome, corey, and I would appreciate that. That gets us in front of more people, more eyeballs, and gets messages like Greg's and Derek's out to the world. So thanks so much for joining us guys. We really appreciate your time. Thanks for joining us on the podcast today and investing your time with us. I'm Kirk Chug and I'm Corey Moore. I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm.
Speaker 1:I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm.
