The following transcript is provided by YouTube, mistakes are present. To hear the podcast episode click HERE.
[Music] foreign [Music]
Nation one of my favorite things about the rising tide Mastermind is a session
that we do called a full cup and a full cup is where we bring a tip or a trick
to each other that can really help improve our regular day-to-day and a few
months back Eric Russo member of The Mastermind and has been on the podcast several times he brought to us the
rocket book folks the rocket book is amazing the rocket book allows you to
take notes just like you would on any other notebook but it has a scanning
feature that turns what you write into searchable text it makes your notes able
for you to find this was a game changer for me and I know it can be a game
changer for you we have an affiliate deal worked out with the rocketbook folks so you can go to scalingup h2o.com
forward slash rocketbook and you can receive 15 off your first order of
twenty dollars or more [Music]
foreign to scaling up the podcast where we scale up on knowledge so we don’t
scale up our systems my name is Trace Blackmore I get to host this awesome podcast and Nation as you know we’re
well over 300 episodes now I received so many wonderful calls and texts and
emails so did my team congratulating us a few weeks back on crossing over the
300 threshold and I am just still amazed that uh this podcast has become what it
has become and not just a few weeks ago I was in Pittsburgh and I was speaking
at the associations of water Technologies conference and people were just so polite and coming up to me and
saying that they were congratulating us on being around 300 episodes we also had
some people there that said what there’s 300 plus episodes of this out there I
had no idea and I would say that that thought consumes my team because we are
always trying to find the next listener as you all know when we increase the
scaling up nation and if this is your first time listening to this show that is what we call all the wonderful
listeners of the scaling up H2O podcast we call them the scaling up Nation we
call you the scaling up Nation because we are a nation we understand what each
other is going through we don’t have to preface what we’re doing when we’re
talking about particular issues because you just get it that’s your job
and let’s face it there’s not too many venues where you can go to and get that
so when you listen to the scaling up H2O podcast you know you have other
co-listeners that understand what it means to be in the industrial water
treatment industry and that thought is just so amazing because now you don’t
feel like you’re alone and we all know driving from account to account
sometimes we get to talk to our customers sometimes we just talk to our
test kits and the equipment that’s there and that can get lonely that doesn’t
allow us to challenge ourselves sometimes so this podcast has filled in
that Gap and that was the original intent how do we keep people being part of a community how do we create a
community in the beginning and now our question is how do we allow people to keep being a part of it but in that
Community knowing that you are going to be challenged that you’ve got other people that are being challenged along
with you and feeling like you are not alone and at the recent awt Technical
Training in Pittsburgh so many people came up to me and they said those very
things and I know a lot of people will come up to me and they feel like they’re bothering me or I’m busy hey trust me I
live for those moments I am in my studio right now in Atlanta Georgia and it’s
just me some equipment and a microphone well I guess that’s equipment too but
that’s all I’ve got right now so when you tell me what this show means to you
what you want to hear on this show any guests that you have or just what you’ve
done by being being a member of the scaling up nation that makes everything
worth it so I want to thank everybody that came up to me and said something to me and I know there’s a lot of people
out there that have something in their head they just haven’t gotten it out yet so for all of you that are thinking that
thank you for thinking that and and ask that I have is we still have members out
there of the scaling up nation that don’t know about the scaling up Nation so I need for you to help me connect
with them please share this podcast with
as many people as you know and yes we’re in the industrial water treatment space
but I have to tell you there are so many people that listen to this podcast for the content that are not in the
industrial water treatment industry they maybe serve the industrial water
treatment industry or touch it in some way and they tell me they get so much out of it so by all means if you can
share the word that helps us grow stronger as a nation one member at a
time one listener at a time and hopefully one day I’ll go to awt and
everybody there will say yes I’ve heard of the podcast but so far that has not
happened so hopefully you can help me help all of you by getting the word out
there you know something else that is mentioned to me quite a bit is appreciation for our team here at the
scaling up H2O podcast and what they’ve done they’ve gone out and they’ve tried
to find all water related events so we can tell you about them here on the show
and then you can go to our show events page and you can see exactly what is
coming up in calendar format and then it has everything listed out so you can
simply click and get to the website so you can register or even put it in your calendar so very easy and of course my
staff did all of that to make it easy for you because we’re busy doing water
treatment every day we’re busy driving around so you don’t have a lot of time to try to rewind a podcast figure out
where it was that I mentioned a particular thing so they made it easy for you speaking of that all of the
podcasts have a transcript which means that they are searchable I hear from so
many people that are trying to write papers or maybe they’re trying to learn something more about a particular topic
more and more people are going to the scaling up H2O podcast to reference that
material so they can get the material quicker and start researching it in fact
we are are coming up more and more in Google searches where people are
searching for something and the first couple of responses will be from the scaling of H2O podcast I think that is
amazing again that is my wonderful team here at scaling up H2O making sure that
everything is put together properly and then putting it in a way that you can
find it very easily so let’s get back to some of the things that are coming up
that you might want to know and I wanted to say this earlier and I got off on that tangent one of the items that
people kept mentioning when I saw them at the recent awt trainings was how
convenient it was that they had a One-Stop place for all of the water
related events so here’s what’s coming up in the future so you can start to
plan so the odors and air pollutants 2023 three conference is taking place
May 16th through May 19th in Charlotte North Carolina that’s put on by the
water environment Federation and if you are involved with any odor or air
pollutants maybe some waste water this is a conference that you need to
consider attending we’ll have information on it but so many vendors
there so many papers on this topic this
is a One-Stop place where you can get a lot of information that is going to keep
you learning for a very long time and then the American Water Works
Association is having their Ace 2023 conference in Toronto Canada June 11th
through 14th so Ace is where the community comes together to learn connect and Inspire to solve Global
Water Challenges so we’ll have all of that information to learn more about Ace
2023 on our show events page and then finally storm con 2023 is taking place
August 28th through 30th in Dallas Texas so this is where the storm water
industry comes together and it brings together stormwater managers erosion
control Specialists engineers and at storm con this is where you get a lot of
vendors a lot of people exhibiting different papers different people that
are on the same mindset around storm water so if that’s something that you do
you definitely want to check that out on our events page well Nation as you know
this show takes a village and our good friend James McDonald is one of our
Village People you’ll have to guess which one he is maybe he’s the a cowboy
I don’t know have that visual in your head for a while anyway James McDonald is always trying to get us to learn a
little bit more so here is a brand new installment of periodic water table with
James hello and welcome to the periodic water table with James where we think
and learn about water chemistry drop by drop please use your week to search online ask your colleagues or even pick
up a book to learn more about each week’s periodic water table topic if you do at the end of the year you’ll be 52
water chemistry smarter so let’s raise the water table of knowledge together and get started
today’s topic is fluorescein let’s start off with why is
fluorescein used why is fluorescein typically used in boilers but PTSA used
in cooling systems what would be the impact if they were switched at what concentrations is fluorescein
used what is the chemical formula how does one test for fluorescein
can any Colorimeter or fluorometer be used or does it take a special one
what wavelength of light is being measured what can interfere with this test
can it be measured online how would the level of fluorescein be controlled with an online feed and
monitoring system remember knowledge is power and taking the time to learn more about water
chemistry each week will help make you a force to be reckoned with be sure to post what you learned to
social media and tag it with hashtag water table23 and hashtag scalingup H2O
I look forward to learning more from you James as always thank you for putting
those together thank you for challenging us to know just a little bit more about
the chemistries that we have in our industry so Nation if you have not been
keeping up with James’s weekly periodic water table challenges you can go to
scalinguph2o.com and see the ones that you do need to catch up on so you can
stay up to date and at the end of the year you are going to be 52 subjects
smarter about the chemistries that allow us to do what it is that we do
speaking of what it is that we do one of my favorite things to do on this podcast
is to interview people that are in this industry that are part of the scaling up
Nation so ladies and gentlemen here is our interview
[Music] today is Darius barkowskis from HOH
Darius so good to have you on the scaling up H2O podcast
thanks for having me Tracy it’s an honor and a pleasure Darius you and I have been working together for a couple of
years and I have thoroughly enjoyed getting to know you better and uh it’s
hard for me to believe that you have not been on the podcast before so I am glad we are finally getting that fixed
absolutely it’s a Avid listener and looking forward to contributing and sharing some knowledge well I’m sure we
are going to have no issue contributing knowledge with you on the program so we
will get started with that but I want to make sure that the scaling up Nation knows who they are listening to do you
mind telling us a little bit about Darius certainly I have a wife and two kids my
kids are nine and seven and I have the privilege of working for the only company I’ve ever worked for so I’ve
been working for HOH for just celebrating my 20th year so graduated from Purdue with a chemi degree so I’ve
been here ever since I I’m one of those people that fell into water treatment not necessarily born into it so it’s
been a pleasure I’ve had a variety of different roles over the years from a research chemist to a water treatment
professional role and now I’m a director of Technical Services for HOH and so I I
manage a group of managers and so I get all the Egos and all people problems but
I still occasionally love solving a water treatment problem out there so still a passion of mine Yeah you mentioned the two ways that
everybody describes getting into the water treatment business you’re either born into it or you fall into it nobody
ever says that oh I discovered it it’s always I fell into it why do you think that is
I don’t know maybe they were just hiring that day it’s like you’re walking down the street
and you didn’t see a hole and you fall into the hole that’s that’s how you find water treatment I guess exactly what we
found over the years though is hiring people have been involved in a lot of the hiring is really looking for the
right people so it we run EOS at HOH and so there’s this concept of right person
right seat so you have to be a right person to be on the bus so to speak and
then you can teach anybody the seat but uh you got to be the right person so that’s what we shifted to look for
instead of just looking for pure water treaters that’s a great way to hire a
friend of mine always says you hire the athlete and you teach them the game and
that’s exactly what you just described there of course having core values and hiring to those core values that’s what
EOS teaches us we subscribe to that as well and we’ve done a couple shows on EOS so that’s a great way to find if
somebody is going to fit your culture but I’m curious is there a particular
degree or job a previous job that best
suits our industry traditionally probably 10 years ago we
would primarily hire chemical engineers and we’ve been pretty successful at that but now I think it’s shifted a little
bit towards people that like to take care of customers and so we’ve had
varying degrees of success with like hiring people right out of college we’ve had people that but our our best success
has been finding people that have been working for another company not necessarily in the industry but one to
three years and just identifying like do they have the right skill set the right makeup
but as far as a degree goes any any science related degree is always a plus so it’s really hard to take like a it’s
probably harder for like an art history major I’m not demeaning that that major but having a little bit of the knowledge
of the science allows you to get back onboarded quicker get the knowledge base so not saying you couldn’t but it
probably just takes longer sure it’s just a question I’m always curious about I’ve always thought that
Material Science does really well as you mentioned chemical uh engineering Majors
environmental science Majors seem to do pretty well but I do think you are
definitely on to something because I think when somebody not just has a
degree but then they have experience outside of the water treatment industry
or maybe even just your company they can really appreciate what your company has
to offer and let’s face it we have some Liberties that we can take as industrial
water treaters to make things fit how we work and I don’t think every industry is
like that and if you just come into that I don’t know if that’s a value or not I don’t know if you realize that that’s
different from other places of work how do you know what you like right well
always curious and then of course we’re going through the hiring crisis where there’s just not that many people that
are looking for employment so you add that to the mix and everybody’s looking on top of that and we have the current
climate that we’re in and I would say I’m not a dinosaur but maybe part of the the tail end of a a
breed of employee that finds a company and sticks through it I think the younger generation is looking to move up
faster and so that we’re seeing a trend of like you know not necessarily like somebody leaves after like four or five
years but they need a new challenge once they hit that Mark otherwise they will go seek other challenges so that’s a bit
of a shift from since I’ve started working so people are looking for greater challenges sooner than maybe I I
received college courses are actually teaching people that in order to advance
their career they need to change who they work for multiple times that’s
actually in curriculum it’s disappointing it is disappointing it doesn’t breed loyalty it doesn’t breathe
loyalty you know and I think of you know of course the company my father worked for he was working for a water treatment
company they were extremely good to him my company we try to be really good to our people and when you think that’s the
curriculum that’s getting taught I don’t know how to unteach that and you’d like
to show people well you know with all the things that you have here you know hopefully you see that we’re trying to
take care of you we want you here long term but when that’s ingrained in somebody I don’t know how to overcome
that yeah and I’ve heard stories of friends that have worked in the software industry in Silicon Valley type
technology Fields they are taught that like if you’re at a job for more than two years you’re doing something wrong
and then start to percolate throughout all Industries and companies but for water treatment it’s not necessarily a
trade but it’s a learned skill and it takes time and you need a lot of reps just like if you’re weightlifting in the
gym to really get good at it and so how do you structure somebody’s onboarding when like it takes
somebody two to four years to get really good at it and then they’re gone and then we’ve invested all that time and money and and
we’re back at square one so we got to shift how we how we onboard people I always like the J curve analysis or the
uh analogy and Nation if you’re trying to think of a j so if we have a graph on
the x-axis would be time and on the y-axis would be work and right when you
hire somebody work is what it is so that’s the start of the J and then as
time goes on and you’ve hired somebody the J starts taking that downward slope
and then you get to a point where it starts going back up but you’re still not where you started at when you
originally hired that person so time keeps going on and then eventually you get back up to where work started and
then it exponentially gets higher that’s what Darius is referring to but I think
that’s also what the person is experiencing of course we talk from the employer standpoint but the person’s
experiencing that too and once they hit that upper Spike of the J curve they
feel more confident they can go out and they can get more business and they can train other people and they truly
understand and can appreciate this business not everybody gives time for
that J curve to exponentially shoot up on both sides I would say right anyway
so that’s uh I guess just a conversation and if you’re listening and you’re thinking well maybe I’m somewhere on the
bottom part of that J curve I would encourage you to you know stick it out
make sure you’re learning you’re asking questions I tell you every podcast I’m
sure if I asked Darius he would also tell you this is the best career ever this is the best industry ever you just
have to stick it out long enough to be able to realize that and do all the things that need to happen in order for
that J curve to take off like it will just give it time to do that great
analogy well with all of that you and I got to see each other briefly last week
and of course this show was recorded before it airs but I’m talking about the association of water Technology’s
Technical Training we are in San Diego last week and of course we all go to Sunny San Diego and what was it 50
degrees and raining every day yeah it’s just we can’t catch a break I I specifically chose San Diego for that
opportunity to experience some Southern California Sun and only briefly experienced it well we got the LED
indoor lighting all week and I guess that was the only Sun that that we received I had the honor of teaching
several classes there I did the sales class I did the math class I did some of the fundamental and applications classes
and you attended the asse 12080 course
can you tell our nation a little bit about that well I can tell you about both I actually did the water treatment
training but oh I apologize I apologize no no it’s okay I think this is my fifth
fifth or sixth tactical training so I’ve I keep coming back so it’s not just a one and done for me and well hold on
before you continue let’s talk about that because there’s so many people that think okay I’ve been there I’ve done
that I’ve got the T-shirt I’m going to move on and do something else you’ve been several times I’ve been several
times why is that there’s just a breath of information that you can you think of your brain as
a sponge you can only soak up so much in a window of time and so some of it gets missed and you can only bring so much
back with you and then when you get back to work you’re back in the Whirlwind you kind of forget about what happened what
you learned and she only pick up like little nuggets and I’m still learning I think only a few years ago I learned
about uh I knew about tonnage but no one ever taught me what a ton of cooling and
where that derives was how that was derived so the amount of energy to melt one ton of ice in 24 hours like no one
ever taught me that and that was eye-opening for me by any chance was either one that taught you that I think
you did yes so um and I guess you learned that in the math class
yeah correct I have a hard time with math if I don’t understand everything
that’s in that equation and for years and years and years and years it was
just run the equation the constants are the constants you don’t need to know what they are just know that they work
and run them and I just I I couldn’t get my brain to connect so when I was asked
to start teaching that course I decided that’s how I’m going to do this if I can’t totally understand it how am I
going to teach it to somebody so it took me forever to track down all of those
constants but that was one that I had to figure out why tonnage times three well because I said so okay Dad that’s great
but why why is that how does that work and in my research I found out that it’s
how much a ton of ice takes to to melt as far as BTUs and what a chiller ton is
into a tower ton and then and what a tower recirculation rate is on the average it removes 10 degrees across the
tower and you add all those and multiply all that stuff together and that’s how it works I just couldn’t explain that
until I understood that what was it that uh you referred to in the training the rules of thumb right
yeah you know everything’s a rule of thumb like basically the person doesn’t know how to explain it you know yeah
y’all worry about it it’s a rule of thumb that’s right my that was what my dad used to always say
somebody probably told him that you know probably I remember there was a really
older gentleman that used to work with my dad and I’m not sure if that’s who taught him the most in water treatment
but he had this he always had a cigar it was hardly ever lit and he just looked
smart except for the cigars I don’t smoke that’s probably not a good thing but but he always had this unlit cigar
and he always looked unhappy so I guess that’s when you know everything you’re
kind of unhappy and you don’t tell people where things come from and that’s where my dad learned it from I don’t know interesting well in some places
they call that job security if they tell them they’re smarter than me and they won’t have any use for me then right you
know that is a common mentality I think and of course you’re a member of the
rising tide Mastermind and one of our our tagline is a rising tide raises all
boats and if I keep something from you that means you don’t get to know it and
if I share something with you now you might know something more that you can
add back to me so I hope that that old way of thinking is an old way of
thinking and we’re all I’m still old but we’re now in this new generation you
know separate from my father’s generation and hopefully we are sharing more we’re not scared that if you learn
something it’s going to take something away from me no it’s going to add to our community and we’re going to add more to
our knowledge base if we do that yeah I certainly have learned that uh being a part of the rising tide and just being
more open with what we’re sharing it’s Freer and everyone gets better so like I
think you and I share the same personal mission just like we want to make everyone better than they were yesterday so you know you don’t have to work at
HOH for the rest of your career but I want your time here to be the best job you’ve ever had so you know things
change but we want to make sure we’re the best the best time that somebody had yeah I
love that because let’s face it I mean people are gonna gonna come and leave our corporations and when they do that
we want them to think wow that was the best job I ever had yeah I love that I
love that mindset and I think it’s a lot healthier to have that mindset too so many people uh we keep getting on back
on this hiring topic but with so many people when people leave it’s almost like oh that person’s dead to me
and that that’s an unhealthy way to think I’m sure people are hurt and they miss each other and all of that and
that’s how those emotions play out but it’s also a very scarcity mentality way
of playing those emotions out exactly reason why I’ve been doing some coaching
and uh when people are complaining it’s they’re not actually complaining they’re just not able to articulate what the
vision they want they want to be and so the complaint is derived from just not
being able to share with what the vision of what it should be and so it’s not
actually the complaint they’re just not seeing the vision come to fruition so Darius if somebody was talking with you
and let’s say they were complaining about something is there a technique to get them to shift to try to create that
vision now I’ve been asking more questions of usually I would just kind of I’ve got a
high red temperament for those that have taken the temperament I would go right to my Gap red weaknesses and just start
feeding it and it would just kind of get into a toxic kind of just raising tone and volume and we never get anywhere but
now the skill is just asking more questions and when you’re faced with a complaint ask the question of what do
you want it to look like or what what is your vision for here we’re obviously disconnected here what what’s your
vision for how this should go and have them sort of give that to you versus trying to figure that out and kind of do
a trial and error like well we should do this and then that doesn’t quite line up and then they start complaining even
more you know so you have to get it out of the other person by asking calibrated questions just
whatever they say I try to get in a rhythm of taking the last one or three words that somebody says and rephrase it
in a question and that just keeps that person talking and you get further and further along to what the real issue is
what the real issue is yeah I just did it on him ladies and gentlemen exactly
there you go so that’s actually from a book that you recommended to me about two years ago we’re we’re getting ready
to read the book in The Mastermind class and it’s escaping me the name uh Chris Voss is the author no never split the
difference never split the difference yes and he was an FBI negotiator and it
is amazing and I think it’s very important that uh people understand what we’re talking about here this is not how
to manipulate people this is how to get people to open up and be able to express
the why behind what they’re complaining about or what they’re emotional about
and when they feel that they are connected then they’re able to do that
and one of the techniques he gave was repeating the last three words into a
question and it’s amazing how well that works and it’s also amazing how
difficult it is when you’re trying to be a faithful translator and you’re trying
to empathically listen to somebody and you’re saying how do I rephrase their words in a way that’s acceptable to them
and sometimes you get caught up in that and just repeating the last three things that they say almost always puts them at
ease it slows their brain down and it slows your brain down so that you can actually process it
correctly yeah thank you again for that book recommendation I think that was uh that was one of the better communication
books as far as what to do that I think I’ve ever read and then you also turned
me on to his master class and that was exceptional as well and I cannot wait I
think we are reading that book in the third quarter this year in the rising tide Mastermind I can’t wait to do all
of that with our group absolutely I read it with my management team that I manage
and it was kind of eye-opening for them too and they actually used some of the tactics uh one of the tactics was they
were having trouble getting a customer to buy like a controller and they’ve tried all different types of
communications meetings and finally he based on what uh Chris Voss was teaching
he’s like write this email saying like are you giving up on this opportunity
and the way it was phrased there was no other way for the guy to answer other than no
and so the the customer applied no and then we got the PO like in two days and
we tried everything else to get this purchase order and it you just had to call attention like are you giving up on
me and the guy had to say no yeah I remember him talking about that in the book and there’s just something
when you’re they don’t have the option anymore they’re like oh my gosh I can’t
let that get away I I need to I need to do that and I think that is so scary for
so many of us oh my gosh what if they do say no yeah but I guess the reality is they’ve already said no without saying
no because you didn’t have a purchase order yeah exactly it’s a what he calls it counterfeit no no not really maybe
you know did we ever finish talking about awt training I know we kind of jumped we’re kind of segued a little bit
yeah yeah so jumping back into that so I attended the water treatment training again for the second time and I still
picked up more information the math started to make more sense to me and then also we had several members in the
asse what is that 12080 course and I had taken that class online during the covet
pandemic but it’s been a great class and been able to kind of diffuse a lot of the around water safety and like it or
not like water safety is going to be a part of any water treaters experience so you can’t quite ignore it anymore
and certainly really uh front of mine in New York but I was starting to see
pieces of legislation come through in other states I just happened to come
across one in Illinois that they’re considering getting more teeth behind it but the class itself kind of really
helps educate somebody on developing a plan not necessarily getting zero Legion
now that was the big light bulb for me it was uh it used to be like hey we want
zero Legion out right none we don’t want to find any and we even you know with those cooling towers ahead of time right
to make sure we get zero right we’ve all done that but the shift for me was necessarily zero Legionella isolated but
zero cases of disease and so that was the big shift for me like let’s strive
for zero cases of people getting sick versus trying to just get to zero or you
can’t say zero anymore but uh no Legionella isolated so Darius with that that was the big
shift for you and that is the big shift for everybody so you got there because you decided you were going to learn as
much as you could about the topic are customers haven’t gotten there yet how
do we get them to shift their thinking that it’s not about zero Legionella in
their systems it’s about zero cases what should that conversation sound like
it’s a bit of a grind to be honest Trace I mean it’s a conversation after conversation the customers we find the
most success in the space is you find the customer that wants to be proactive and actually take care of it and be up
to speed with regulations but then you get a group of customers that are just like well when they make me do it I’ll
do it type of mentality and so you gotta kind of sift through that Quagmire of
finding those customers that really want to do it or as can see the benefits from
it and then those others we’re just gonna have to come back to so but Shifting the conversation of customers
is just a it’s a one-on-one with the rep and the customer that hey we’re striving for zero cases of people getting sick
and Ill versus just trying to eliminate all racism because it’s virtually impossible to do that we’re going to
live in sterile environments I shared with Janet I think on the first episode that she came on which is really
one of the early ones I think we were in the single digits or maybe you know it was 10 12 somewhere in there that there
was a customer that said it was forbidden to say Legionella in her
building and she said if you had to use that language you would call it the L
word and she just did not want to hear about it and the fact that some of her
test results would have you know like 10 Colony forming units I mean that was
just the most horrific thing ever to her and all her water treatment was failing
and people weren’t doing their job and of course we know that we treat water to
make it efficient in the equipment to so we’re not eradicating you know all
species that would ever live in that water that’s not what we do in a typical water treatment program if we add some
sort of water management program to that then we’re still not going to be able to complete that but now we’re monitoring
how well the program’s doing against specifically Legionella throughout
different seasons and different areas of that system so with that she just she
just didn’t want to listen to it and it was very very difficult to have any conversations we ultimately decided it
was better for us to part ways there was another company that said that I guess they could get zero Legionella and I of
course we know that that’s not true but that’s what she wanted to hear and that’s what the company told her yeah so
people they get what they pay for right no that’s true and I can’t imagine what a service like that would cost because
you’d have to use some sort of Magic Water Treatment juice in order to do that and I don’t know where you buy the
Magic Water Treatment juice but I bet it’s pricey I’m certain someone’s coming up with a gadget you know the new Gadget
comes up every so often for that you know I wish they would I would how awesome would it be if you didn’t have
to restock product do all these tests and you could just slap something on and
like the Ronco food dehydrator you set it and forget it and all you have to do
is just make sure the customer is happy wouldn’t that be water treatment Nirvana that would be and of course it’s always
the same temperature every day it never rains you know equipment the tower fill
float never falls off you know so um we’re still straying away from awt training but we’re talking about every
topic around that so um you’ve been how many times I think this is like my fifth
or sixth time I’ve done every course and I’ve done water treatment training twice would you go back absolutely
so even after seeing all of that seeing every course there’s still more to learn
from that venue absolutely and you get to connect with other water traders that
are doing the same thing they want to get better to you increase their knowledge and um
we all experience different things in water treatment so getting out of like your normal Whirlwind and stepping into
someone else’s and understanding what they’re doing because people do different Industries like some people do
Pulp and Paper we don’t but I’m always curious to learn about new Industries
and the challenges other people have so a lot of ideas sharing yeah and when are
you ever in a room where everybody there knows exactly what it is that you do and you don’t have to explain what it is
that you do That Awkward elevator pitch that we all work on that almost anyone that doesn’t
know water treatment just doesn’t get it the elevator pitch is something that I have people work on in the sales class
that I teach and I think people forget the most important part of the elevator
pitch it’s not how techniqued it is if that’s even a word it’s not how smooth it is it’s at the end of it and it’s
called an elevator pitch because you’re telling somebody what you do between the
time it takes to go from one floor to another so you only have that amount of time and then they’re going to step off
the elevator but the whole goal to the elevator pitch is for somebody after you
complete it they say I want to know more tell me more so do you have an elevator pitch I don’t I would fumble through it
right now Trace like I ran into a guy randomly in Oklahoma in front of a hotel and he asked me what I was doing
and I fumbled through it and he’s like that’s terrible I was like that’s the most feedback I ever had because he
actually gave me really good feedback by just telling me how bad it was so it’s a constant you know iteration we’ll say Do
You Remember the movie Boiler Room yeah and and the guy’s eating cereal and the guy the telemarketer calls to try to
sell them the paper and he gives them instant feedback okay that’s the worst sales call I have ever received
I love that scene there’s a lot to be said when it goes to role playing and
I’m always shocked when I ask people because let’s face it whether you’re a technician or you’re in sales whatever
you do you are in a sales role if you were talking with people if you work for a company any company you are in a sales
role whether whether you realize it or not and if people don’t practice how they
communicate what it is that they do and especially what they want others to do
about it how are you ever going to get good at that exactly how awesome is it
that that guy on the elevator actually gave you feedback because most people would just walk away yeah they’re just
kind of nod their head and move on I’m gonna get on another soapbox here but I
think that there is something missing today where if somebody gives us constructive feedback
a lot of people are very quick to get offended instead of thinking oh wow I
never get this kind of feedback this person is giving me a gift let me not
get offended let me turn that off let me lean into this and let me learn something yeah we ended up talking for
like the next half hour 45 minutes like we struck up a relationship uh just
talking about it and he gave me his and I was like wow that was a really good pitch so yeah I agree totally lean into
that like when you feel stress it’s okay that’s a natural feeling feelings are natural but being able to lean in ask a
question beyond that I think is really valuable there’s something to the fact that we
can get all of our news in 144 characters or less and everything is a
sound bite and if we don’t get the sound bite that we are wanting we are very
quick to say no brain turn off get offended and I hope that that people can
stop that and just think oh wow this is this is valuable information I’m actually getting some feedback here
absolutely So speaking of feedback uh you are in the rising tide Mastermind we
already talked a little bit about that and we have a specific way that we
process issues just to make sure that we’re seeing things properly and the
person can take in that information can we talk a little bit about that sure so
I’ll tell you what why don’t you tell the scaling up Nation a little bit about that process and what that’s done for
you so every week most every week when we’re not talking about a book well somebody
will be designated to be what we call in the middle so and it’s not just uh everyone’s circle around this person
with a rifle getting ready to execute them you know uh but it’s really just kind of surrounding that person and
they’ll uh hopefully be vulnerable to bring up an issue that they’re dealing with sometimes it’s professional sometimes it’s personal and uh those
kind of state the issue as best they can and then we spend the first you know it could be up to half an hour just asking
clarifying questions so you’re not allowed to give advice or give your perspective on it and judge that person
you’re really trying to get to understand the issue and maybe you heard
differently than what they’re saying and you have to sort of clear that up and make sure that you’re understanding what
the true issue is and then after that period then uh then we go into so that
person is usually talking and giving answers to these questions and then after that everyone’s kind of
formulating a section for advice and go around the room and everyone kind of
gives their take on what that person should do next and then we’ll take account uh accountability for that we’ll
write it down or what they’re going to do next and then we we check in on that every week and see if they’re making
progress to it towards that goal it’s been a great experience for me I know I’ve had professional issues personal
issues and it’s helped me tremendously when I first started the rising tide
Mastermind I thought it was going to be more technical issues but it has
definitely in every single group and we have six groups now I think we have 62 64 members somewhere around there and
it’s a whole array of issues I mean yeah we talk about some technical stuff but
people use it as their personal board of directors and I know I’ve used it quite a bit I went 25 years without any kids
and my wife and I were fine with that and then all of a sudden we decided to adopt a 16 year old and wow what a
change in our home life and if I didn’t have the Mastermind group to get advice and hey what am I doing right what am I
doing wrong I I don’t think I’d be where I am right now oh absolutely you would probably be in
your red weaknesses just like me and yelling screaming going you know getting
upset with uh with your son and uh versus actually getting to the root issue I I’m a firm believer that uh I
think everybody deserves a coach and not necessarily your boss like you need some
sort of Outlet to vent or to get guidance somebody that’s
not going to judge you allow you to be vulnerable to give you that space to kind of work through the stuff you got
going on everyone’s got issues you know if somebody says they don’t have any issues they’re probably lying to you so
or themselves yeah or themselves that maybe they have issues they don’t know so
um it’s creating a safe space to get that coaching and practice that it’s a muscle
the course of how we process issues that you just took us through so many times
when somebody says this is my issue we jump straight to a conclusion and the
formula that you just laid out does not allow for that and we have to ask clarifying questions
we are not allowed to give advice and that’s what the facilitator’s job is if
somebody starts to give advice no no that’s not this part this is darius’s issue and you’re supposed to ask
questions to Darius so you can see his issue through his lens
and I know that works however I didn’t realize how much it worked until we were
at a live event for The Mastermind and every year we all get together here in Atlanta for a live event and there was a
spouse that came up to me of a mastermind member and thanked me for that because now their spouse listens
better and they’ve learned that it’s not about just fixing whatever the issue is it’s about understanding the why behind
the issue the way the other person is experiencing the issue and since then
I’ve also connected with some other spouses at the association of water Technologies conference that have said
the exact same thing so it’s it’s making us better husbands better wives it’s allowing us to
understand our partners a lot better understand our kids a lot better when we understand why somebody’s doing that or
I even have the the care to try to understand it really changes how that
person is experiencing their issue for themselves absolutely I know early on I’m a very
task oriented person so I’m trying to check off as many things I can off my list and the old me if somebody
presented an issue to me to me I would immediately rattle through my brain
figure out what the solution is give it to them and get them out the door within like 30 seconds to a minute you know
yeah hey that was efficient all right that was efficient awesome but they have I’ve learned that they have completely
experienced something different and slowing down and actually getting that
perspective still give maybe give that same solution but so they have a different experience I still fall in
that trap it’s occasionally but it’s it’s something I work on uh regularly and it doesn’t come naturally because I
like to give people Solutions versus try to understand what’s really going on
Stephen Covey said that you are efficient with things you have to be
effective with people and I think that’s how we’re effective we need to not just say all right I checked the box I gave
them a solution no I listened with the intent to understand and that person
gave me the stamp of approval that I did understand them correct yeah the methodology I think
that Chris Voss describes is called tactical empathy understanding a person
from their point of view not necessarily yours well part two of that issue solving
track that you described is receiving advice and uh the part I’m not sure if
you said this or not but whoever has the issue when they are receiving advice
they are not allowed to speak and that’s difficult for a lot so let me ask the
fact that you are not allowed to speak when you are receiving advice what does
that do for you well when I was first starting out in the first couple it would be really hard
almost painful to not interject and sort of volley back the grenade you know that
was like my my Mo I’m like somebody’s gonna throw a grenade at me I’m gonna throw it back as quick as possible so
you just have to employ the same listening skills and just be quiet take
it all in absorb it and then process so it’s about slowing your own mind down at
that point but that’s a that’s a great way to do that you have to force the person not to talk and I imagine it’s
awkward for most people because they want to kind of go right in defense mode probably early on in our group that was
probably the case but now I think we’re in a rhythm where people absorb that and have a chance to process before they
kind of talk about the next steps they’re going to take so I would say that’s growth
as the facilitator the interesting thing is is at the very beginning you know
nobody knows that format so I’m the only one that’s enforcing that and now that everybody knows it I don’t have to
enforce that because everybody else is enforcing that but there’s so much power
to the fact that okay I can just sit back I do not have to worry about
defending myself and when you’re not worrying about what you’re going to say to defend yourself you’re actually
opening up your ears so you can take that in and it just changes the entire
process so to get back to our original comment where somebody gave you a
critique on the elevator if you didn’t give them the opportunity to say what
they had to say and you were defending why you already said what you said you wouldn’t have gotten any of that
feedback most people would probably just say the same thing over again but just louder
and more fervently and that’s like people are stubborn like that so you
just you didn’t hear me so I’m just going to yell it louder so you can hear me you know so I do not
speak French not at all and we went over to Spain and we had a layover uh in in
France and they had shifted the gate and this lady came and she informed us what
they were doing in French and we’re of course the four of us were just staring at her we had no idea what she was
saying she sounded great as she was saying I had no clue what the words were so she did exactly what she said she
started getting louder and said the exact same thing over again and then she got even louder it did not change the
fact that I do not speak French that’s a great example so
and that kind of kind of goes into something else that you mentioned you mentioned the temperaments and that’s
one of the tools that we use in the rising tide Mastermind and Kathleen Edelman has been on this show three
times she is one of my heroes she has taught me more about every relationship in my life than anybody else on this
planet and she’s done that by teaching me to understand myself better and you
said that you are a fellow red a choleric and we respond with tone and
volume when we’re not getting what we need and there are other temperaments that shut down when people give them
tone and volume so just understanding that you know if I’m screaming at
somebody because they don’t understand French it’s not it’s not going to make them understand French and with a
certain temperament it’s actually going to make them respond in the opposite manner than what we’re hoping that they
would do so you’ve really embodied the temperaments you’ve introduced it to
your team uh you’ve introduced it to your family there are several episodes that we can uh we can go back and listen
to with the temperaments but can you tell us what your personal dealings with
the temperaments have been what they’ve done for you and then maybe do you recommend other people start using them
yeah I mean it’s I’ve taken numerous personality tests over over my life and
you know everything from Myers-Briggs to Clifton strengthsfinder and Clifton
strikes by there I think was one of the best for me until this came around and what I found was the temperament to
simplifies it and actually kind of overlays on the strings finder and you can see
and it boils everything down to like the four colors and just the way Kathleen presents it it’s actually very usable
information I still use it today a lot of our people still use it and I’m
constantly keeping that in the back of my head like going into a conversation if I know that person’s time permit I
have to make sure that they’re ready to receive the information and the way they want it and and if I’m not getting the
information in the way I want to receive it then it’s my job to to tell them that and so
where it’s been the most impactful it’s probably me and my son we got the workbook for children and you can like
you said before you can replace the children and use it on adults too it’s kind of like interchangeable so I like
you said I’m a fellow choleric and we found out that he is a high yellow temperament and I would give him like
several tasks to do because that’s how I want it right I can do like 20 tasks at
once he struggled and when he wouldn’t do it I would just yell get louder and
get frustrated and once we kind of dove into the temperaments and finally it’s kind of yellow that slowed me down a
little bit to say like I can’t give him like 10 tasks to do but if I give him
like one maybe two tasks then it was a completely different story and he was
actually able to do them and so it’s just he’s just not able to process that and we’ve had a much better relationship
and less stressful you know because he would shut down when I would get loud you know like most would
um so that’s been really helpful for me I really found well with my daughter though because she’s a I’m pretty sure
she’s a red I’ll give her those same like 10 tasks and she’ll do them so she’s she’s quite easy for me to deal
with but knowing what somebody’s temperament has been really helpful just learning someone’s communication style
and getting through to the pathways that they’re going to receive the information best
yeah I was going to give you some advice because I’ve been a father for 10 months now and I know everything so I I my
son’s also a yellow a very bright yellow and what I have found because I too oh
give me a task list and fill it up because I love checking those boxes off
and he does not like tasks he’s more people driven so if I ask him to take the trash out
sweep the floor or wipe the kitchen counters all of that stuff that gets lost on him but if I talk about how
wouldn’t it be awesome when your mom comes home and all these things are done
and she just feels so appreciated and then he now gets excited over the people
aspect and the tasks just become a part of that he’s really able to focus on
getting that done because he’s more people focused than task focused and that’s been a real game changer with how
I communicate with him that’s uh that is great advice and it’s probably the next iteration I have to
try is instead of kind of boiling it down to more simple tasks we kind of shift it to what it’s going to make him
feel or others feel about him and then as as you and I speak the language of
power and control the yellow would speak the language of people and fun so if you
use the language of people and fun I know it’s not our innate language and we’ve got to shift into that but if we
talk about the tasks that have to be done in that language it changes everything I would say it’s also good to
have a blend of people and not just like create a team of all reds or all Blues all yellows or all greens because I
think you miss out on that different perspective too so I would probably never try to build a team that’s
completely comprised of Reds because we’re going to be all task oriented we’re going to get the job done but we’re gonna probably miss out on
actually having fun that’s a great point you know that also brings up another book that we read in the rising tide
Mastermind the six types of working genius but Darius what I’d like to do is
bring you back next week we can pick up our conversation there and we still have a ton of things that we haven’t talked
about yet so can you join us next week I look forward to it awesome
Scout up Nation if you cannot tell Darius barkowskis is just an amazing
individual and we’ve got a lot to talk about and Darius is going to come back
next week so we can conclude our interview with Darius so hopefully you
can wait one more week for that conclusion in the meantime while you’re
waiting it’s my hope that you do go to our events page and you start planning
out some things that you want to do coming up in the next few months I gave
that challenge earlier this year and several people took me up on that and I
am amazed with the amount of information that people have brought back from these
conferences and very selfishly some of them have even given me people that they
want me to interview so by all means if you’re at one of these conferences and you to see a fantastic presenter and you
think you want to get them shared with the rest of the scaling up Nation let me
know who this person is we’ll reach out to them and see if we can get them scheduled on the scaling up H2O podcast
Nation I love bringing this show to you I love even more that you enjoy listening to it and we will have a brand
new episode next week until then have a great week folks
Skyline Nation you asked for it and it is here so many of you are taking the
certified water technologist examination and you’re wanting to get better
information on how to better answer the mock exam now this is the exam that you
get when you sign up for the cwt exam well I have heard your request and I’ve
done exactly that I have recorded a class that has exactly what you’ve been
asking for it is me answering each one of the questions and letting you know
why I chose certain answers and of course everybody wants me to do math and
I do all the math on the mock exam so you can see how to get the right answer
and I hope this is something that will help build your confidence so you can
get your certification you can go to scalinguph2o.com forward slash cwt prep
once again that’s scalingup h2o.com forward slash cwt prep get out there and
get your certification today [Music]