S.2 Ep.26 TMH Rex Miller - Mental Health in Construction
In what has always been a high-pressure industry, now more than ever, teams in the building industry are facing breaking points and burnout. Everyone seems to be too busy, feeling overwhelmed, and can barely keep up with the fires from day to day. It's not sustainable and an industry with a poor quality of life won't attract the bright young people we need for the next generation.
Rex Miller joins the huddle to talk about creating and maintaining healthy construction teams that place an emphasis on mental health and wellness. Rex is passionate about helping leaders transform "the grind" into an inspired performance that leads to more energy rather than burnout. His experience with construction professionals in particular makes him a perfect fit for this discussion.
Transcript:
00:00
Speaker 1
We need to get back to work.
00:02
Speaker 2
And work is one of the ways.
00:03
Speaker 1
That we contribute to this country, that we grow our gdp, we grow our tax base, we contribute to each other effectively. We help finance our national security, our homeland security, our infrastructure. I had key employees that really wanted to be leaders in the company, but they didn't want to have any ownership in it, responsibility that way. So I just had to start researching.
00:25
Speaker 2
Out and figuring out, well, how do I market my company?
00:28
Speaker 1
Go to your local school board for one hour twice this year. And if you can have even just 10 or 15 employers show up and do that at the same school board every single month, there's two contractors filling out a little card to give your 30 seconds at the podium that says, I need your help and we have great jobs. Eventually they will hear you. But if everyone just did two hours a year, that's how we change this. Stacey, how you doing this morning?
00:51
Speaker 3
I'm doing great.
00:53
Speaker 1
She loves it. I ask the question every time. She's like, I'm fine, dude, just a little much.
01:01
Speaker 2
And I say to that owner, I.
01:03
Speaker 1
Said, sue, you're not willing to invest in yourself. You're not going to invest in yourself. You're going to invest in companies you have no control over, whereas your company, you control and you don't have the confidence to pour the money into that. When things are busy and they're looking for their GC friends to sit down and negotiate a project on a GC and a fee, and they're more excited about building the project, and then all of a sudden the model, the market swings, and now the developer market is wanting to go out and they're going to hard bid the same project to two or three different GCs. And that's where. That's where it starts going. It's morning huddle time. Hey, how's everybody doing? We got Stacy and Rex here this morning. I'm Chad Prinky. Rex, Stacy, how are we doing today?
01:55
Speaker 3
Doing good.
01:56
Speaker 2
Yeah, we're good. I got to walk the creek this morning, so that's great.
02:01
Speaker 1
I'll take that walk in the creek. Want to hear more about where the. I'm actually heading up to the creek tomorrow in my world.
02:08
Speaker 2
Yeah? Yeah.
02:09
Speaker 1
Good man. So it's episode 26. It's episode 12 of season two, which means today's our last episode of season two. And Rex, just before we started, Rex said, typically in the season finale, one of the characters die.
02:26
Speaker 2
Yes. That's. I mean, that brings the suspense and tension for the next season.
02:32
Speaker 1
I'm betting it's Stacy. Like, no offense, Stacy, but I feel like. I feel like it's probably make me.
02:37
Speaker 3
Start coughing this nasty call for a week. So I might be hearing.
02:45
Speaker 1
Yeah, she's the one that's going today.
02:47
Speaker 3
Yeah, unfortunately.
02:50
Speaker 1
All right, so it's also the start of summer. It's the solstice. Love that longest day. We'll take it. That's. I'm going to make good use of that this evening, hopefully. And I want to introduce Rex Miller. So Rex is the author of several different books, one of which I think I've even told Rex was extremely influential and, you know, shaping my outlook on the opportunities for the building industry to improve. It's a book called the Commercial Real Estate Revolution. He's a CEO, he is a construction industry revolutionary and he is a mental health advocate. He's currently the head of a company called Go Mindshift. And. And he's. And he's got a pretty cool ranch from what I understand down in Texas that I got to get down to visit. Where are you in the world, Rex?
03:46
Speaker 2
So Glen Rose is 90 minutes southwest of Dallas. It's a small little town of about 3,000. The old little town square. We've got a river that goes through it. There's a dinosaur state park. And so we're known for dinosaur footprints, fossils, clean river. And we used to be the moonshine capital of Texas.
04:10
Speaker 1
You used to be or can you still procure some of that moonshine down here?
04:14
Speaker 2
There's a new distillery called Sledge and they're bringing it back.
04:19
Speaker 1
Nice. Yeah, it's moonshine, but legal this time. That's awesome. And for what you. One of the things you've described is sort of what drew you down there and what project you're working on. I just think it's cool. Want the audience to hear about it. What do you. What do you have going on down there?
04:35
Speaker 2
Well, it's kind of a convergence of circumstances. My wife and I said, God did it. But were down a year ago in April, spring break, we drive through the town. My wife sees this little two story stone house and says, oh, they've lowered the price. And I had no clue what she was talking about. And before I knew it, we bought a 15 acre ranch. And then we said, now what do.
05:02
Speaker 1
We do with this?
05:04
Speaker 2
And it had seven buildings on it. We've added one. So we've built it into a leadership retreat center. We've had clients down here, individuals, and it truly is a magical property. It's on the river, twenty foot bluff. It's got a creek that cuts it in half. And we're just excited. It's a whole new stage for us in this period of life for us now people can come to me, we can curate the experience and we can do it Texas style. And so that's what we're looking for.
05:39
Speaker 1
That sounds great. Anytime I hear Texas style, I imagine just really good food.
05:44
Speaker 2
Oh, my gosh, the food. Yeah.
05:47
Speaker 1
Fantastic. Well, cool. All right, so Rex has joined us today to talk about mental health in the building industry. And, and Stacy, per usual, except this time I know you're just like holding back a cough, so you're dying to get off. We'll bring you back on, you know, make sure that we get the great questions from the audience and comments from the audience and make sure that we get an opportunity to, you know, bring today's content to a custom level for those guys. So with that, Stacy, we'll see in a bit. And Rex, let's. Let's dive in. So.
06:18
Speaker 2
Sure. Yeah.
06:20
Speaker 1
The construction industry, the statistics are real, right? The building industry is one of the more challenging industries. From a mental health perspective, why does the construction industry take such a toll on people's mental health?
06:37
Speaker 2
Well, Chad, you know, it always has. And so I think in our research and were researching mental health and physical health in the corporate world, but the problems that have been chronic and growing, the pandemic just made them acute. And it just exposed all the vulnerabilities and the adversarial nature of the industry. The vulnerability of the sub trades as being kind of the. They don't have the same level of clout and voice in the process. So they just have to take what they get. The disruption of supply chain, I mean, we're building on our property and I'm experiencing on a micro scale. It took me five months to get the lumber for the trusses to the barn.
07:30
Speaker 1
Right.
07:31
Speaker 2
So you and I know that a construction project is interdependent. And so one item, one key item can hold the whole thing up. And so the pressure there, owners who have their budgets and their business plans, and now those get shot to pieces. So the pressure runs downhill. There's no escape. And we still haven't adapted yet to look at how do we take care of first responders. It's essentially the same, the kind of pressure cooker we're in. What kind of rotations do we need? What kind of breaks do we need? You and I talked the other day about FAA air traffic Controllers how intense it is that they can only be on a scope for four hours and take a two hour break because of the stress and pressure they're under.
08:22
Speaker 1
Right. When's the last time a superintendent or a foreman got a two hour break in the middle of the day?
08:27
Speaker 2
Yeah, absolutely. We've got to start recognizing that and unfortunately we're starting to see the sad statistics and suicides. I mean, you and I both know I, I can name a half dozen large construction firms we all know well who have said I had somebody die, kill themselves and family, you know, stress and pressure, divorces, coping, unhealthy coping. I mean it's a real problem.
09:03
Speaker 1
It is, yeah. I think I've heard comments along the way of like, you know, so of course I'm divorced, you know, that's a part of the construction industry. And it's, when you hear that kind of comment, it's jarring and concerning for, particularly for those of us like. And I, you know, I feel like I'm very much a part of the construction industry, but peripherally, right. Like I'm not a practitioner, I'm a consultant. I'm not in it, I'm around it, I climb into it, but I don't have to sort of stay there. And, and you know, there's a, a picture that I get in my mind with this travel, high intensity time away from family, you know, kind of environments. A lot like the military, right?
09:48
Speaker 2
Yeah, very much, yeah.
09:50
Speaker 1
And, and so our, you know, being in the building industry has these sort of, as you said, chronic built in challenges. Let's get more into some of those chronic challenges. One of the things that this book, and it's literally sitting behind me right here. One of the things that this book, Sorry, I promise Rex didn't ask me to plug that. But you know, one of the things that book brought to the surface and put into clarity for me in ways that it hadn't before I read it was the running downhill that you described. Take a moment and describe how the, the nature of, you know, decision making in the industry and sort of purchasing in the end is all that stuff how it compounds and amplifies some of the pressures.
10:53
Speaker 2
Well, the traditional process is that most of the decisions are made on the very front end and yet 80% of the knowledge. So you've got your designs, you've got the owner involved, the architect and the GC and By the time the sub trades get brought into it, that's 80% of your cost, 80% of your knowledge. The decisions are set, you know, and you can have a little bit of fluff and play and how many contractor meetings or team meetings have you had where people walk out, say if only they had brought us in at this stage, we wouldn't be having this problem. So projects are so complex, you know, 80 years ago most companies were self performing. We didn't have all the trades.
11:49
Speaker 2
Reed Construction data estimated that on a good sized job there can be up to 250 contractors sub trade specialty and another 250, you know, manufacturing items. The complexity is way beyond the model of design, bid, build. It, it's, it was way, it's way beyond that model and we just cannot manage the details. And so what happens is we manage problems, you know, we, it's problem solve it. There's not a day that doesn't go by that you're not putting out fires, solving problems and then all of the drama that goes with that. The model that we saw, and that's in the book is having more of a team base, collaborative, get that knowledge in on the front end. So you're not so dependent one or two key players, you know, the project manager.
12:47
Speaker 2
And that's why if the project manager goes down, the job is sunk. You know, they've got the relationship with the owner and the client, everything depends on them. They're they're the air traffic controller, so to speak. But this collective knowledge and collective decision making process is part of the integrated project delivery process, part of the progressive design build process. So we have models that allow that. What we don't do is we think that if we just push everything out, we can get the lowest price by just bidding all the sub trades against each other and then try to put it together after that.
13:34
Speaker 1
Hence the term mind shift, right?
13:36
Speaker 2
Yeah, absolutely.
13:37
Speaker 1
If we're gonna make that shift, what do we have to start thinking instead? So if I'm gonna make this shift from, you know, going out to bid, gotta be competitive, make sure that I'm getting the lowest, best price, lowest qualified. If I'm gonna make this shift to saying, going to build a team, we're going to collaborate, we're going to get in early and I'm going to select people based off of totally different criteria because there's no plans to bid yet. Right. What's the mind shift that has to happen?
14:04
Speaker 2
Well, that is the process because all those assumptions that you said are part of the current mindset. You know, that in order to get due diligence, I've got to competitively bid it and take the lowest price. You know, you're told that we're going to take best value, but you only make that mistake once. If you're a vendor, you know, you. You come in with a good price saying, we've got all this other stuff and you don't get selected. So the biggest issue we had, I mean, when we brought everybody together for the very first meeting and, you know, we want to change the industry, and I opened up the conversation and asked, what does the problem look like from your seat on the bus Now? We had a graphic scribe mapping this out.
14:52
Speaker 2
We had columns for each of the stakeholders, the owner, the developer, the gc, the architect, all these different. And we had them in the room. The very first words from the contractor were, if only the damn architect could give us complete drawings, we wouldn't have these problems. I had two principals from the largest architectural firm in the world in that room. And the other one said, well, if only the contractor knew how to read the plans and understood design intent, we wouldn't have these problems. And then gsa, if only the owner wouldn't change their mind then. If only the developer would give us the right number. If only the MEP would just get their stuff in on time and not wait till the last minute. If only the AIA would give us contracts that were neutral and.
15:37
Speaker 2
And didn't put a thumb on the scale. And that was two hours of tense conversation. Then the person who started food fight, he said, wow. And he was watching the graphic scribe connect the dots and find that basically everyone's pressure point, pinch point of frustration was similar. And he started saying, we're all experiencing similar frustrations. And he said, and this is where it changed for me, too. It changed my career. He said, there's something about the system that drives this. We had never thought about this as a system. We always thought about, you're the problem, Chad. Now we're starting to think, what's the system? What's the system? And then we started tracing upstream. Where do we go up? Where does it start? And it starts with the owner and the bid process. And so the. The rules to win.
16:40
Speaker 2
What are the rules to win, Chad? You know the rules to win. If you're competing for a project, what do you have to do to ensure that you're going to win the project?
16:49
Speaker 1
Get low.
16:50
Speaker 2
Okay, all right. So that means everybody's playing that Game cutting. I mean, I was just a conversation with a contractor yesterday. There's an incentive clause that they have in there that if they do all these value add things, they get a certain number. They, they're counting on that to get them back to whole again.
17:12
Speaker 1
Absolutely. Yeah. They got to participate in the savings there. And, and they, the way that they bid the job, they're not, they would make no money if they didn't have an opportunity to participate.
17:22
Speaker 2
So they have to hit all the, they have to hit 100%. And so that's risk. And, and so we play these games to win, hoping, you know, we're bidding on schematic level information, 20%. So we know there's another phase of design that's design development. And I know, and I used to play the same game. I knew that if I win, I had to find little weasel clauses in the bid. Any little thing that I could legitimately take something out of what I was offering knowing that they actually wanted it because I'm reading the letter of the law and I had to do what was legal and what I could sleep with. And then if I won, I knew, oh, there's going to be another round of design. And that door that I bid on now has some details to it.
18:14
Speaker 2
It's a wood door and it's got a certain lock. Oh, well, I didn't bid that. Now with this new detail, so the price goes up and now the owner hires a third party because, you know, to beat everybody up. And so what we decide is the system is designed to create distrust and fragmentation and designed to create adversarial relationships. It's designed to do that. So a great job. We've all been on good jobs, but they happen more by accident. You know, 70% of all projects come in late and over budget. And so a good job happens because people go against the grain. Or you have an owner. I'm on a project out in California. The owner is fair, wants to play a game where everybody brings their best to the table, but the number that came in was much higher than they had anticipated.
19:24
Speaker 2
So now he's second guessing. Oh, you know, I'm letting the fox guard the hen house type of thing. So all these suspicions and things like that. So the question is, how do you design a process that begins with the stakeholders, the people, the key people who have a stake in the outcome, where they decide the rules of the game and they validate the cost and the pricing. They, they work with the owner based on the business case, we need to know the business. What are you trying to accomplish here and now that informs me as to what kind of solutions I can use to help you accomplish that. So everybody holds their cards close. We're guessing.
20:07
Speaker 2
We have to build all that guesswork in our numbers and risk and contingency and so we, went to 18, what we call outliers, people breaking the rules, getting better results. And what they were doing is bringing people in early, making decisions before they started designing, even in your market. The DPR offices in Reston, Virginia got a well gold certification, but it only cost them a half a percentage more than traditional construction. Now how do you do that? What they did is they brought the highest cost, the MEP folks, the highest cost people in early and said, here's what we're trying to accomplish. How do we solve this problem before they design? So it, we have to redesign the process.
21:05
Speaker 1
It's, and so I love this discussion. I feel like it's such a different and equally, if not more valid take on mental health in the building industry than what I've heard. Because what we're saying is that in a system that is broken, that is designed to create, you know, conflict, negative conflict and you know, people, you know, kind of protecting and attacking and distrust and all that type of stuff, the trickle down effect is massive. It impacts everybody in the chain. It's, you know, you can't, you know, if, if to merely survive. Right. You have to do things that are less than ethical.
21:57
Speaker 2
Right? Yeah. One person said the system causes good people to do bad things.
22:02
Speaker 1
Right. Right.
22:03
Speaker 2
Now let's go back to Edward Deming. Deming said a system is perfectly designed to get the results that it's getting. So I can't tell you how many Team kickoff partner meetings I'm brought in on and we're bringing them in and we always say we're going to build these great relationships, but we're building them in the same old system.
22:27
Speaker 1
Yeah.
22:28
Speaker 2
And so we have the warm and fuzzy, get to know each other. I believe we do things better in that area in terms of getting to know each other in the process, but it's still in the same system. So we actually, in our partnering meetings, we plan for the disasters happening. I mean we say in this system we're going major disruption problems and things and people get mad. How do we plan for that and.
22:59
Speaker 1
What we do, this is a solution that comes from. I think you Were saying the health care industry when we talked emergency room. So, so the idea is that we kind of, we pre plan for the disasters we know are going to happen. This is a way to decrease stress and rely on our training, rely on the fact that we plan for this. We know what this is going to look like.
23:24
Speaker 2
Yeah. Think of a formula one pitrew or a emergency command center. Problem hits and there's typically, you know, 10, a dozen things we know are going to happen. Some we're going to have a material issue, we're going to have a budget issue, you know, supply chain issue, maybe a safety issue, maybe a site condition issue, we know those are going to happen. So by planning ahead of time, creating a playbook, creating roles, you know, here's the triage team for this problem now that takes all the stress out, depersonalizes it and allows you to work the problem, not work the person over. And, and I've seen that work tremendously. And you come every day knowing that it's okay for me to bring a problem together because I'm not going to get thrown under the bus. We have hide it.
24:27
Speaker 1
We agreed up front that these problems would exist. Like we knew this was going to happen. Surprise though.
24:33
Speaker 2
They're a surprise. Yeah.
24:35
Speaker 1
Yeah. That's wonderful. So, so another, another thing that I, you know, I guess when we look at some of the more acute issues that have really been, you know, stemmed probably originally from COVID and then inflation and then, you know, hyper demand and all kinds of interesting combinations of things, we have an acute opportunity and notice I say that right, not a problem, but I think an acute opportunity to, you know, address what's happening right now in a slightly different way. And you. The term that really stuck out to me in our most recent conversation, Rex, was transparency with the owner, this idea. So talk about that. How can, how can we work through our current acute stressors in the industry through transparency?
25:28
Speaker 2
Yeah, well, I'm an owner right now and I've got construction going on and we've had some problems and I went to one of the suppliers and said, hey, look, I can deal with knowing in advance I'm going to have a problem. What I can't deal with is that you make a promise, you don't keep it and I get hit blindsided. We're in this condition where there's so much unknown, there's so much unpredictable things going on and the best thing we can do is bring the owner who's going through their learning curve with this as well. You know, they've made commitments to their board or they've made commitments, capital project commitments, and they're getting pummeled. The best thing we can do is, you know, forewarned is forearmed. We can help going through and giving them sight line down.
26:22
Speaker 2
Here's what we're running into with our supply partners. Do you want us to change supply partners? Do you want us to do whatever? My contractors are calling me every day. We can't get this here. Do we get our refund, go someplace else? What do we do? Do we do a different product so we, it. We couldn't get what we're doing done without daily adjustments, pivots all the time. Just imagine, you know, a 700 room bed tower or something like that and all the things going on there. That line of communication with the owner is the most vital thing we can begin part of its education. You know, they, well, they don't get into the weeds all the time.
27:07
Speaker 1
It's, you know, contractors, God bless them. And I understand it, I really do. You have a deep sense of personal responsibility and you know, I, I find very frequently it's you and I do the very you. We do the same work, you know, from a collaboration and, you know, team development standpoint. And when I'm in the trenches with a project team, I'll find frequently that the contractor, through no desire to be, you know, to hide anything, they've just kept all the problems to themselves, right? They just kept thinking they're doing the.
27:38
Speaker 2
Owner a favor and trying, you know, they're like ducks where they look calm on the outside, but they're paddling fast underwater to try to come up with a solution, hoping they can pull rabbit out of the hat. And then there's no time to react if they can't.
27:54
Speaker 1
And it's a very lonely place to be, right when you're, when you feel like you're dealing with all the problems all by yourself. And, and if the owner of the organization is feeling that way, then it's highly likely that the foreman are feeling that way. And if the foreman are feeling that way, it's highly likely that the crew is feeling that way. And, and this is where we start to get those sad statistics. And, and you know, people, you know, leaving their companies, leaving the industry not performing at their very best, you know, dealing with addiction issues and you know, fill in the blank because it's just not a happy place. Place to be. So. Okay, I gotta bring Stacy in. I, I feel like we should have budgeted an hour and a half, but we're like up on time. So.
28:38
Speaker 2
Yeah, I'm seeing lots of good questions too.
28:40
Speaker 1
Me too. Yeah, I'm bringing Stacy in. She'll steer those questions to us here and, and make sure that we get a chance to cover it.
28:47
Speaker 2
And by the way, I do want to review the six disciplines for post traumatic growth resilience that every project team, I take them through these and so I want to make sure we leave that with the folks and. All right, and those are in that PDF that you downloaded. They're in there as well.
29:09
Speaker 1
And we will make sure to share that on this LinkedIn post to share that out to the audience as a result of this. So, but yes, let's commit to covering that before we finish. Stacy, let's try to get to three questions. And Rex, let's do our best to try to keep our answers inside a 10 minute period because I will go over, but I don't like going over by more than 10.
29:30
Speaker 3
Sure. So Tom Hughes had a really good comment here. He said he has about 85 people in his group and he's had open conversations with exactly two of those people regarding mental health issues. And he's like, he likes to think of himself as someone who people can talk to, but a lot of times you know that you don't have that person to talk to. And I know in the notes you had said something along the lines of like creating some peer to peer support or how do you address, you know, the tough guy stigma on trying to have these conversations more frequently for people who, you know, keep everything to themselves.
30:19
Speaker 2
So on the website there are some free downloads to some templates. So one of the things we've done is we've borrowed a tool that cognitive behavior therapists, clinical psychologists use with groups that go through trauma and it's storytelling. So we've created a template that allows you to everybody to fill it out. So we call it low risk, high value because everybody fills out the same thing and it's just a fill in the blank and you read it and it's a progressive way of going into.
30:55
Speaker 2
So during some of the times when our companies were experiencing, you know, what is work from home like and the pressure there was a template around my work from home experience, my return to office experience when the George Floyd event happened and it was really uncomfortable for people to talk about and we can help create and we'll do it at no cost if there's a topic you want to address in a construction area. And there's tremendous power of everybody sharing their story and they can disclose as much as they want or as little, but knowing that you're not alone, having a model to go about, and that takes a lot of pressure off the manager because Gallup says that only 18% of managers are wired to be that listening, coaching voice. Most managers are task oriented.
31:50
Speaker 2
Here's what you do, here's how you get it done. And their soft skills are not soft.
31:58
Speaker 3
Yeah, all great. George Nash had also mentioned when you were talking about addressing the low bid design build procurement process, do you believe that variations of alternative procurement allow for the collaborative environment in which there needs to be a high level of trust that allows for a successful project for all team members?
32:21
Speaker 2
Yeah. So the ideal situation is that the owner would tell either the architect or the contractor, you put your team together and you come and show me how you're going to solve some of my big challenges and problems. You know, Patrick Bruner with GSA did that with the Edith Green, Wendell Wyatt. He brought teams into a room not to present their wonderful stuff, but to solve a problem. And what he wanted to see is that team dynamic. He was watching for the team dynamic and he threw them off. He brought them in a room with no table. They brought their, you know, their projectors in and their laptops and they were given a stressful situation to begin with and then given some problems that were unsolvable. He was pretty ingenious.
33:17
Speaker 2
He had blueprints that were unsolvable and he wanted to see how the team behaved. He was more interested in the dynamic of the team, not the price. Now the price is important. They had a budget, but then the team worked to bring it in at that budget and make business case. That's the ideal that I would say. And he didn't use PD process. He used a CMC6. So you can basically create collaborative structures with any of the delivery models. You just have to write and build it in. And the big thing is let people come as teams, not as isolated individuals, because you're only as good as the weakest link. If you were assigned the shotgun wedding approach, you're only as good as your weakest link.
34:07
Speaker 3
Yeah, Great answers. Dennis and Ethan also had kind of a similar question. They were talking about the use of cell phones 24, 7 and you never feel like you're off the job and unrealistic expectations of responding immediately. Like, I just feel like we can definitely all relate to that. So I don't know if you had any advice on how to handle that and manage those pressures.
34:36
Speaker 2
Well, we have a digital sunset in our house. And a digital sunset is that at 8 o'. Clock. Cell phones are off. Everything's off. Your brain needs about two hours of no screens at all. Screens. Project blue light. Blue light is noon. It's telling your body peak cortisol. It takes about two hours for that cortisol to. To get out of your system for the melatonin to get in. So we need to practice one of my clients on Friday at 5, all emails are shut off, no cell contact over the weekend. Now, you may not be able to do that for projects, but some boundaries, some rules, some ways to escape and make it a habit or practice. The average person checks their cell phone 150 times a day, and you need 20 minutes of focus work. We're operating in the shallows.
35:38
Speaker 2
Our brains never get into that deep work mode that's really healthy. And being in the shallows is stressful all day. It's cortisol all day. It drains you all day. And you feel it at the end of the day. And that's when you reach for comfort, food, alcohol, some medication to sleep. You binge watch Netflix. So the cell phone is public enemy number one. It's designed to make you addicted to it.
36:09
Speaker 1
Yeah. I've found myself in lots of conversations, quasi debates about productivity. And, you know, people talk about being busier than they ever have been. And I would, I don't know, I think I challenge that a little bit and say, I think you're feeling busier than you've ever felt. I don't know that you are actually, you know, any more productive, you know?
36:38
Speaker 3
Yeah.
36:38
Speaker 2
Disney and productive are two different things. Yeah, right.
36:42
Speaker 1
Yeah. So this has been fantastic. I want to make sure that we bring it to a close with those six disciplines. Walk us through that, Rex. And then walk us through, you know, where that comes from.
36:54
Speaker 2
Well, we're familiar with post traumatic stress syndrome and the research really picked up after the gulf wars. And Dr. Martin Seligman the University of Pennsylvania led the research and he found some attributes we've added to that. But the very first attribute to build resilience and what we're talking about is you come back stronger. The setback, the impact on you doesn't, you know, there's robust, where you just kind of withstand it. Resilience is bouncing back. Post traumatic growth is coming back stronger. And the first one is resilient mindset. And the resilient mindset Revolves around three things. Growth, mindset, grit, persistence, which most of us have, and gratitude. This morning I. Every morning I. I do my gratitude journal. Then the next one is playing to your strengths. We use the cliftonstrengths. There are other assessments, but those release positive chemicals. Dopamine, serotonin, endorphins, oxytocin.
38:06
Speaker 2
But more importantly, they're satisfying in and of themselves. And everybody has a set of unique strengths. Knowing what they are playing to them is healthy in and of itself. The third is your circle of five. Five key relationships that are essential that keep you buoyant. These are people that lift you up, that will kick you in the rear end if you need to. We'll be there, we'll check on you. And we need five. Most people, I'm surprised at how many people say and come back, to me, that was the most insightful thing they got. And to me it's. It seems to be natural, but it's not. For most people. We have this loneliness epidemic. The third piece is energy. Having peak energy. You can't be mentally strong if you're physically tired.
38:57
Speaker 2
So sleep is my number one sleep, health, habit, movement and then eating, getting as much sugar out of your system as you can. That's carbohydrates, breads, pastas, all of that. That keeps you in a chronically fatigued condition. Then meaning and purpose. Having something greater than you that you're working for or aiming for, and especially on construction projects. How many people work a project but really don't know who it's benefiting, who they're serving, why it's important they do what they do? And the best story I've heard is Stuart Ekblatt's story at the UCSF Children's Hospital, where they brought the project team together with the patients and the doctors for a day, and he came back later with a drywall sub who was vacuuming out the studs. Before he closed it off. He spoke English as a second language. Nobody told him to do that. Why?
39:59
Speaker 2
Because he knew that dust would compromise somebody with cancer. That's meaning and purpose. And then the final one is keeping score of leading indicators. Having a process and protocol that you go through and working the process and letting success come as a result. You go to the All Blacks, the most successful rugby team in the world. You go to John Wooden. It's all about the process, getting the disciplines, getting the things right. We focus so much on the lagging indicators, the budget, and all these things that come after the fact that we miss the point. So Those are the six disciplines.
40:38
Speaker 3
Those are super helpful. Yeah.
40:40
Speaker 1
What, what a great note to end on. So, Rex, what. What email or, I'm sorry, what website would you steer people toward to learn more?
40:48
Speaker 2
Yeah, inspired by RexMiller.com LinkedIn is where I do most of my posting, so connect with me on LinkedIn. If you're interested in any of the free material, let me know. I know you're going to put some links there and, you know, and come down to the ranch. Thanks.
41:11
Speaker 3
Rags will be ready in April, you said, Right.
41:16
Speaker 2
Well, the Ranch is ready now for small groups of eight to 10. In July, it'll be ready for groups of 30.
41:24
Speaker 3
Nice.
41:26
Speaker 1
Nice. Hey, thank you so much for being here. This was a lot of fun.
41:31
Speaker 2
Thank you.
41:32
Speaker 1
Yeah, it really means a lot. So, Stacy, let's talk a little bit about what's coming up from here. Let's talk about season three.
41:42
Speaker 2
Yep.
41:44
Speaker 1
Sorry, I froze there for a minute as I was thinking about the work.
41:49
Speaker 3
So.
41:49
Speaker 1
So it's going to be great to take a little bit of time to reset and per usual, like, you know, just like we did in the last off season, I guarantee we're going to have a handful of things that we do to make this better. I don't think we're changing the time. I don't think we're changing the day. We'll be back in September. And so far, you know, we're looking really good in terms of a fantastic series of guests that are going to bring a lot of value and continue types of conversations that we've had. But I'll say what we always say, which is that, you know, if you or someone that you know has an important story to tell about creating positive change in the building industry, please contact us.
42:30
Speaker 1
We, we do have a handful of open slots for season three and obviously we'll be loading for season four, which is going to be, you know, in 2023. So, you know, please reach out and let us know about that. As always, email us to be added to our weekly mailing list. Stacy, what am I forgetting?
42:50
Speaker 3
I think you got everything. We'll do a recap of today's episode and then me and Chad are going to meet to kind of lock down our season three date sometime in September. So I hope everyone enjoys their summer, gets some vacation in and we'll catch up with you in September, right?
43:09
Speaker 1
That's right. Take care of yourselves, folks. Do and make sure that you focus on that mental health. I love the, you know, the advice we got from Rex today and you know, was taking furious notes myself because I've got a couple of ideas that I need to focus on in my own. Thanks so much, and have a good one. See you, Stacy.
43:27
Speaker 3
See ya.
