Change Is About Trying Things

Change is inevitable, so developing a positive mindset towards change can really help a business thrive. Whether that’s in marketing, staff retention or handing over the family business.

Today we hear from a second generation business owner who has leveraged change and connection to continue his father’s legacy in the home improvements industry. We hear how his passion for clear and simple communication has helped the company retain both staff and customers at an incredibly high level and about the mentors that inspired his management mindset.

Although originally reluctant to step into the family business, our guest now believes it’s a privilege. He is Managing Director of Global Home Improvements, Barry Shevlin. Visit https://globalhomeimprovements.ie/

Transcription

For your convenience, we include an automated AI transcription

Barry Shevlin  00:01

That’s one of the big changes I’ve developed in the last five years. I’ve trusted my gut more in everything, and I think that has made a significant difference to the business and also to myself.

VO  00:13

No unicorns, no brands, just hard working people who built their business from the brand up sharing their experience so others can learn. Presented by Larissa Feeney from Kinore. This is Real Business Conversations.

Larissa Feeney  00:32

Hello. My name is Larissa Feeney. I am CEO and founder at Kinore Finance and Business Services. Today we have the fascinating story of a second generation family business which is still growing after nearly 50 years. We’ll be chatting about the dynamics of a family business, tips they have learned about dealing with customers and staff which has helped their success, and some insights into staff turnover and other common issues. So let’s get straight in with a very warm welcome to the Managing Director of Global Home Improvements, Barry Shevlin.

Barry Shevlin  01:02

Thank you very much, Larissa, for having me on.

Larissa Feeney  01:09

Barry, can you maybe start by telling us how Global Home Improvements began?

Barry Shevlin  01:14

Wow. Okay, so how long do you have? So essentially, you’re right. It’s a family business. My father started this 44 years ago. We’re actually 45 years next year, 2025 so I remember he worked with a window company, and then I came home from school, so I was in primary school, I’m not going to give too much away there. And I came home from school, and I lived in a box bedroom, and I came home when there was a big desk sitting in my bedroom, and that was the start of global windows. So you lost your bedroom. Well, now I had to sleep in the bedroom, but I lost whatever space I had, and that was his office during the day, and when I went to school, and he started it then, 44 years ago, and essentially he built a manufacturing so where we are today in glass Nevin A is our manufacturing plant. And that’s, that’s, that was there probably four we were around the corner 44 years ago, and that’s where we are still, to this day, manufacturing windows and doors and various other different products as well. Okay,

Larissa Feeney  02:19

that’s, that’s amazing 44 years ago. And how many is on the team today?

Barry Shevlin  02:23

I think we’re roughly around 50. I think so so nice. It goes either side of it, but 50 is is, is our, is our, is our current staff numbers? Yeah, so good. Great team, great

Larissa Feeney  02:35

team. And so that grew from your father, and he managed it for the first 20 or so years, is that right? And then you took over.

Barry Shevlin  02:43

I joined the company in 99 I vowed never to join the family business. I left and said, I’m not, not a chance. I just was totally No, don’t want to do it. But I went working then for a developer called Lean Carroll of Zoe Developments. So he built half of a lot of all the apartment building in the 90s, and I absolutely loved that, but I then just grew because of, probably because I didn’t have an engineering background or so forth architecture, and I couldn’t go. I was getting a little bit bored with it, and then I was asked, then to join. So I joined in 99 but my dad’s remained in it right up to probably about five years ago. But obviously his role was diminished. I think was, I was managing director in probably 1012, I think I remember exactly

Larissa Feeney  03:28

So did your dad at that time specifically ask you to come into the business? And you must have had reservations?

Barry Shevlin  03:35

Yeah, I think, I think we it’s a bit of an urban myth at this stage. We think my mother was involved a little bit, brokering the deal. So I said I didn’t want to go in. He said, You know, I was doing my own thing. So it’s up for debate. Yeah,

Larissa Feeney  03:49

okay, okay, okay, so I suppose depend on who you ask, yeah. But look, it

Barry Shevlin  03:53

was one of the, it’s definitely one of the best decisions I ever made. Working in a family business is very challenging, because it’s family. And as we all know, families, as much as we all love them, can be challenging as a family, but in a business, it’s an entirely different set of you know, completely different. But I always can look back and say that I had the opportunity, and not everyone gets the opportunity to work beside their father and see exactly how what they are outside of the home, you know. And that, to me, is a privilege, you know, and one that I always hold. And I learned from him as well. I was

Larissa Feeney  04:29

just going to ask that question, what can you think of a couple of things that you did learn from him? Because, I mean, you know, as you say, working with him is very different than growing up with him, although you grew up effectively in the business, you were sleeping in the office. So what did what type of leadership style did he have, and how does that compare with your leadership style? We

Barry Shevlin  04:49

probably have different leadership styles. We’ve often spoken about this, but essentially what I saw him and observed, even though he said I wasn’t you know as Father Son and. It. I wasn’t open to feedback, because I’m going to call it that, but ultimately I was watching and observing, but also what I saw was his absolute love for the customer. I really, really, really, just that that was just that just soaked into my DNA. I just saw how customer centric he was with with everything that then just went down into into staff as well, and how we treated staff. So I did that was the culture, that it was a customer centric culture, but also that it was, it was a staff centric culture, and it wasn’t like staff as regards, you know, pizzas on Friday. It was just basic human connection and respect. And I think that’s, that’s ultimately what I learned often,

Larissa Feeney  05:44

and that must, I mean, that’s typical, isn’t it, of a long standing business, putting the customer and their people at the center of everything they do. And that has obviously stood to you, because a large proportion of your customers would be returning customers. Yeah,

Barry Shevlin  06:00

huge amount like we’ve, I think we’ve transformed and proved by 25,000 customers, homes, you know, even 30,000 and I think, yes, we, they keep on coming back. And, you know, the model then we built on was that homeowners are asking us, would you not do other products, like kitchens, bathrooms and so forth? So we added on to the business, and, you know, that’s, that’s our model. But definitely, if you’re customer centric, if you want to provide the best customer service out there, you know you have to, if you don’t look after your staff or treat them, well, they’re not going to give you, they’re not going to do that part of it for you. And I think the two have to go together, very important. And

Larissa Feeney  06:39

we hear a lot about, you know, putting the customer first, and the customer is always right. And can you give us some examples of like, what does great customer service mean to you and to your team?

Barry Shevlin  06:52

The first thing about customer service that is just so important, I think it’s really, really simple, but yes, it’s so hard sometimes to implement, but I think if it depends on the attitude of companies as well. But what we tell the to all our staff, so if someone comes into our company, we’d have certain we induct them as regards what we require. But it’s very, very simple, call a customer back within a really prompt time, update the mistress issues, and put your hand up if you’ve effed up, you know, you’ve made a mess of it. Okay? And I think simply, if they are followed, them three cornerstones, as we call it, if they are followed, that’s customer service. That’s really, really good customer service. And it’s so simple concept, but yet, as individuals and companies, we all make them mistakes.

Larissa Feeney  07:43

I love that, because you’re absolutely right. It is making sure that we do the simple things, the basic things right, because we can get caught up in the newest bit of software, or the newest CRM system, or, you know, whatever. But actually, if we can’t pick up the phone, or we can’t respond to our customers or respond adequately to our customers, then, you know, we’re not we have no chance of anything else working.

Barry Shevlin  08:09

No. And I think I’m very much of a, you know, a simple mindset. And if I don’t, if someone is explaining something to me and I don’t understand it, and I will say, Well, if I don’t understand this, our customers are not going to understand that. Our staff are not going to understand it, and I will be of average intelligence. So a simplicity is so hard to do, but I think it’s so important. And I think as businesses, as people, individuals, our lives have got so complicated. And it’s, it’s just, it’s an overload, I think presently, on a lot of people. But number one, you always have to understand that our customers are getting overloaded in everything. As people, individuals, we’re all busy. We’re, you know, there’s two people working in households. There’s so much information coming. So you have, I think as as businesses, we have to understand that our customers really are getting overloaded, and we have to just, we have to communicate concisely and promptly to them. And not enough phone calls. There’s not enough we

Larissa Feeney  09:13

1. You know what? I’m smiling because we had this issue just this week in Kenora where this, this conversation came up about, you know, the lack of phone calls. It’s, it’s amazing, isn’t it, how much we’ve moved to email and how we do, maybe this is my age, but we do need to get back to picking up the phone, to creating those connections, because emails are great, and, you know, online is great, but you’re we miss the connection.

Barry Shevlin  09:40

We do. We do. And I think, I think some people do like to operate digitally and an email and so forth. You have to have that channel open. But then there’s a huge amount of people that just want to pick up the phone and say, What, what’s the story with this? Or when am I getting that, or the issue? And that should, that should be really easy for them. Know, there should not be all the hoops and loops and everything and people, you know, oh, it should just be simple. And then, God, I rang them. They rang me straight back, or they sorted out there. And then that’s customer service. It’s so simple, you know? So

Larissa Feeney  10:15

Barry, how do you get your you get new customers. And I know you have a huge amount of return on customers, so that’s a big element of it. But how do you how do you market to your customers?

Barry Shevlin  10:26

We market, yeah, like, marketing is a big part of our company. It’s like, for every company, you know, we’ve invested a huge amount of money and time into our brand, like 44 years of branding. We’ve invested millions in it over that that period of time. So various. So obviously, digital is a massive thing. Social media, and we be on the radio. We do. We’re in the Irish Times. So various. So we use all various different kind of modes, but ultimately, we keep on trying. You know, our strongest revenue is our repeat business so that to us, is making sure we do everything right for the customer and just very have a very, very high customer satisfaction rate that’s massive. That’s so important to us. You know, because word of mouth is so strong, do you

Larissa Feeney  11:15

measure that customer satisfaction rate at all? Do you? Do you have any way of measuring it, or do you just do it through word of mouth and reviews, that type of thing.

Barry Shevlin  11:22

No, we measure it at two different stages, I think. So we measure it. We measure it throughout. So I would be very much of you know, like, if you go out for a meal that the waiter comes up, someone comes up to your journey with me and says, everything going okay with your meal. So I say to the team that that we have to do the exact same thing. We need to find a problem very quickly, if it’s happening, and be able to deal with it. So we would measure it that way. But we also do an NPS score. I

Larissa Feeney  11:50

don’t know if you’ve heard of that stands for net promotion score

Barry Shevlin  11:53

yet. Yeah. So we do that at the end of every installation, every customer experience. So that’s done at the end of every customer experience where they’re asked that one question, and we then ranked that then, and we would get a report through every week on what our MPs is. And I think currently it’s 78 as far as I

Larissa Feeney  12:13

know, brilliant. And that’s an amazing MPs. It’s very, very

Barry Shevlin  12:16

good. We our goal is, it’s, like, it’s, it’s, it’s up there with the best but our goal is to get to 90. That’s our goal. The goal, yeah, we’re never happy, and we’re, I think, as a business, if you say you’re happy with everything, do you know what? We’re great. We’re doing brilliant. We don’t need to change anything super like good luck. Yeah,

Larissa Feeney  12:34

yeah. No, I know. I know. I know you always have to keep improving. Can I switch then from customers over to your team? Because you talked about customers been at the center of everything you do, and building a team in order to serve those customers. So there’s about 50 on the team at the moment. Do you have Is there a leadership team or a management team? Barry, there is,

12:54

there is, yeah.

Larissa Feeney  12:55

And can you talk to us about how you recruit? Do you find it difficult at the moment to hire. I know there’s a lot in the media at the moment about how we’re in full employment, and employers are finding it difficult. Are you experiencing that?

Barry Shevlin  13:09

We are no one, to be honest, we don’t. We’re not recruiting. We don’t recruit a lot often. Thankfully, we’ve kind of a low turnover rate, but we did, but when out of covid, like covid, we came out of covid really, really busy with a really our order book increased massively, and with a lot of kind of like Polish and various different people working for us, they all went back after covid, and the country seemed to empty days. So that was our, definitely our toughest time for recruitment. And I would echo everything else it was, it was really, really hard, but equally, it’s, it’s a little bit, I think it is easier at the moment. We recruited recently there for a role, and we just found that the quality was with better, but you have to work harder at it to get it definitely than, let’s say, five years ago, no question.

Larissa Feeney  13:57

But if you have a low turnover of staff, then you’re obviously doing something really well. There an employee today can leave and go somewhere else and get another job relatively easily. So how do you maintain that morale? How do you keep motivation high? You must have a very good culture.

Barry Shevlin  14:16

Yeah, I think, I think there’s always been a good culture, like from day one, when I came into the company in 99 I just felt that there was a just, there was it was a really nice place to work, and I looked forward to coming in. As I say to my team, I spend more time with all the E than I do with my kids and my and my good wife. So I have to really enjoy that to come in, you know. So it’s so important, and if I dread that, then there’s something wrong. So. But ultimately, I think it’s like the 8020 you know the 8020 rule, where 80% of the ski should love or enjoy 80% of what you do in your role, and there’s always going to be a 10 20% that’s you could lose it if you if someone gave you the choice. So I kind of see it as a little bit like that. In that there’s some companies, I hear people saying, right, we have to focus on our culture. Now this year is our culture, and those ideas thrown around, let’s get more pizzas on a Friday, and we’ll do this, and we’ll do that. That’s great, but I think that’s the 20% but you have to be operating on the 80% which is, you have to be treating people with respect. You have to have an open door policy. You have to be just giving them feedback. You have to be literally just having a nice place to work and just respecting each other. And ultimately, that is the thing. If you don’t do that, and then you try to do the 20% well, then the 20%

Larissa Feeney  15:38

won’t work. That’s really great advice. That’s really great advice. And none of your guys work remotely, do they?

Barry Shevlin  15:43

I think we’ve one or two people that work remotely, and it’s fine, but the majority of people work in the office, yeah,

Larissa Feeney  15:50

yeah. And that works well for you. It

Barry Shevlin  15:53

does now we have got more flexible, like I’m working from home today, and I work from home probably one to two days a week, and I definitely found, and I would have been in the office before that all the time, but I think that’s one of the good things of covid. It is after giving flexible working to people, and it’s after reducing the kind of the rigidity around it. And if we go in on a Friday, sometimes it can be or some days, some people work from home. So we do, we do offer flexibility? Yeah, we do. You have to, I think,

Larissa Feeney  16:24

can I ask you, Barry, about yourself, because you were, you were in a very challenging position, starting to work in the family business and then transitioning to take over the family business from your father. And I know from speaking to clients over the years that that can be really, really difficult. No navigating that change can be difficult, both for the senior and for the person coming in. How did you guys work that out?

Barry Shevlin  16:53

Yeah, that’s a really difficult transition, and it I suppose I was a pain in the ass to my dad. In other words, I was just like, I want, I just wanted. I want this I want to go this way. I want to go that way. So I was a huge ambition. So we were very, very alike. And I think when you’ve got two people very, very alike, that that’s when issues can happen and clashing. So he wasn’t the type of person that wanted to just retire and go out onto the golf course and just have a, you know, just tour the world or whatever. He really enjoyed work as well. And he loved, he loved work and business. It’s just in our DNA. But it was, we navigated it. And yeah, we had tough moments. And it was, it was tricky. But I think we always, we always kind of made a rule that that if we had, if we had a row or had some issue, that we’d never and we, we do this with the kids as well, that we, we don’t sleep on it, we’d all, we’d always ring that night or whatever and say, look, okay, we had a crap day today that didn’t go well. I think both. I don’t know who’s wrong, but let’s, you know,

Larissa Feeney  17:58

let’s move on.

Barry Shevlin  17:59

Yeah, let’s move on. And I think that’s kind of key, but it’s very it’s very difficult when you’re in it but, but I think that’s key.

Larissa Feeney  18:06

Yeah, no, absolutely, you’re absolutely right. Did you sit down with your dad and say, Okay, on this date, you’re going to exit and I’m going to take over, or was it like a general stepping back for him, or gradual stepping back for him.

Barry Shevlin  18:21

I think it was a gradual stepping back. And I suppose, no, we did agree about where I take over as Managing Director, and that that happened. And then he, you know, part of that was he still wanted some role in the business. And we absolutely, we maintained that. But also, you know, I wanted to he, you know, he’s, he’s a, he’s a brilliant business person and an amazing mind. So, you know, massive asset to the company as well. So, so I wasn’t just going to just write my turn now you out. So I think that’s really important to use the experience and and the knowledge and the advice. I think it’s, you know. I think as business owners, you know, you all, we all need to get, seek advice from from others, and it’s their expertise, because it’s so important. Because sometimes you can be blind, you can be blindsided, you know. And it’s just, it’s really, really important to talk to others in every shape, you know. And

Larissa Feeney  19:20

final question on this part, did you get anybody external in to help you navigate that time? Or did you guys manage to do it yourselves?

Barry Shevlin  19:30

We did, yeah, like we will be a big believer always in if we have any sort of an issue, or any or any sort of an area of getting the best advice, you know. So we, we always are a big believer, to go to go to someone good and get really good advice for X, Y and Z. So we, yeah, we had a consultant that came in to manage it. We said, right. We went first. My daddy said, right, we want to do succession planning here. And he started doing that really early. He. Thinking way down the line on it, and, in fairness, doing great foresight in it, but at various different times. Or if we feel we have a weakness, we will always go to a third party to see, right, how can we do that better? And that’s always the way. That’s

Larissa Feeney  20:17

great. That’s great to hear because, and I think that’s the best way to do it, because otherwise it’s very difficult. It’s very difficult to navigate emotions. And, you know, once emotions get involved in in business, it’s difficult. And with families, as you’ve already mentioned, it can be even more so. So no thank you for that. I think everybody would benefit from hearing that. Can I turn then to yourself and your own development Barry, because you had to, you know, pick up the business and take the business over from your dad, and go on to grow the business and grow the team. And you’ve done that really well. How have you developed yourself? I know in that journey, what does that look like for you?

Barry Shevlin  20:54

Yeah, I suppose, yeah, that’s an interesting question. There is, yeah, I books. Books would have been now, I’m not a great reader, but I do, but I definitely I’m probably reading less books because just life is just busy. Probably listen to more podcasts, to be honest with you. Yeah, books would have been played a big part of it. So I read all, lot of business books, autobiographies, especially autobiographies, I love getting insight into into actual, real people that have done it and hearing their all their stories, they’re the good, the part, and all the different things. I just found them exceptionally helpful. Then I would I again, have used, you know, mentors and coaches over the years. Then I’ve certain organizations, if I joined them recently as well, and just to share with other entrepreneurs. You know, all that type of stuff is really, really helpful. You know,

Larissa Feeney  21:45

I agree with you on the on the books, you know, I’m a greater I’m great reader of autobiographies. I listen to them, um, rather than read them. But what I find is that I listen to people who have done it, if the author hasn’t actually done it, but telling me how to do it, I get I don’t, I don’t get it. So it’s much better whenever you hear about somebody who’s grown a business, who’s gone through the challenges, and then you can take clear actions from those stories, you know, absolutely.

Barry Shevlin  22:10

And I think, you know, it’s no disrespect to people out there, and sometimes people who weren’t just great football managers, who never played football, you know. And so I definitely like to listen to real stories exactly like that. And I think it’s, it’s, it’s just more intro. I just find them interesting, I suppose, often, often, when you’re in these positions of leadership, you get the imposter syndrome, and you get all, you know, just, God, is this? What am I doing wrong? But when you hear someone else who’s who, you had up with a pedestal going, Oh, and it’s you kind of go, okay, that’s, that’s cool. They’ve exactly the same issues as I have, or whatever. You know exactly,

Larissa Feeney  22:50

exactly, just selling different products or services, yeah, exactly. What about networking? Would you do a lot of networking? No, Hate it.

Barry Shevlin  22:57

Hate it. Just, yeah, it’s not me, yeah, I don’t do it. No, I’ll be honest with you, I am in one organization, entrepreneurs, organization, Ireland. But it does not networking. It’s that’s, it’s we meet once a month, and literally, we share our issues, our problems and challenges and ideas on how to be better and but it’s not networking and there’s no judgment or anything like that. So, but no, I’m not a networking person. I don’t, don’t enjoy it at all.

Larissa Feeney  23:29

And what about and that’s great to hear as well, by the way, because then everybody is a networking person. So it just goes to show you that you don’t have to be what about difficulties? Or did you have any difficulties as the as you were growing, as the team was growing around delegation, you know, delegating those tasks? Or were, you know, were you naturally good at it? Or did you have to learn how to do it? I

Barry Shevlin  23:51

don’t think I was naturally good at it. If I mean, honest, I think, I think I learned how to do it, and I improved, and I’m still, still not amazing at it. I don’t think I’m top, top, top of it, but I’m still improving, like I constantly, like when I was younger, before he moved into my office, I would change my bedroom around. I changed my bed from the left hand side to the right hand side, but just the top of that change. Used to draw. I used to love it, you know, it’s just a big change, but I constantly change things, and it’s probably, probably the team will probably say to you, it could be frustrating at times, possibly because my god is after changing, but I’m constantly changing, and I want to improve, improve, improve. So it can be frustrating. I’d say when you’re on the other end of it, but it’s Yeah, delegation, I think is just some, some people really, really good at it. I definitely, I am good at it, but I definitely learned over the years, and I’ve got a lot better. Even the last two years, I got really, much better, of much better. I

Larissa Feeney  24:54

think there comes a time, doesn’t there, that you you have to become good at delegating. Otherwise. Eyes. Well, the company can’t grow because you only have so much time. And that change that you mentioned, I think that’s a good thing. I think I understand exactly what you mean. I think my team will probably see the same that, you know, she’s always changing things, but that change is important to to move forward. Now, every change doesn’t necessarily move you forward, but it’s good to have a culture of of change. I suppose I’ve been happy with change.

Barry Shevlin  25:23

I think so. And, you know, and change is about trying things. So you have to try things. And of course, they’re not, they’re not going to work all of them. And that’s but, but you don’t know until you try it. It’s like you learn from your failures that that old, you know, and quite true, uh, reasoning is that you really have to try things. And so that’s why we’re changing all the time. But if something is not really broken, it’s very successful part of your business, you probably won’t change that too much. But it’s normally the areas that are not working that you have to change, that I find and then eventually go, okay, that’s look what’s after happening. And I even had a call with, with, with our marketing manager there just earlier, and we just, we’ve done a few changes, and it was amazing what it we said right now that we know that was working, because as a result of this, it’s not working. So I think you have to, you just have to, I do, you have to have that mindset, you know? And, yeah, it can be frustrating for people at the time, but certain people just like to know exactly what way they’re doing every day, and they’re great. And I think you have to try. You have to try and balance that as well, and kind of be able to judge that and not throw people upside down either, as well. You have to be able to see certain people can adapt to it better than others.

Larissa Feeney  26:39

That’s a good point, because you have to, and I suppose in a team of 50 you have this, you have to have a good balance of those two types of people, you know, those who embrace change and want to see change, and those who, as you say, would prefer to know exactly what they’re doing in the day or the week. And both are equally valuable to the company and and we need both types of people on the team Exactly.

Barry Shevlin  27:00

And I think if, if you are bringing in change, you know, you have to be, you know, aware of certain people, and you might have to talk to them a little bit more about the change than someone else, and kind of sit them down, go through it and just, just explain it, and the reasons, the the reason why we’re changing. And often, when you do that, it’s fine, but if you introduce something and then you don’t inform people that are a little bit more sensitive about change, well then that’s when, that’s when it goes wrong. And I think that’s ultimately, you know, informing and keeping just like we treat our staff like customers, keep them updated, you know, keep them informed. Go back to the move to got an issue. It’s the same thing. So it’s, it’s all about communication, really, at the end of the day,

Larissa Feeney  27:46

it is, isn’t it? And what do you do? Because you have a large team of 50 people, how does, what does that look like in terms of communication to the team? Do you do it regularly, on a formal basis, or is it quite informal?

Barry Shevlin  28:00

It’s a bit a mixture of both. We don’t, you know, I wouldn’t be in favor of having meetings just for the sake of having meetings. I think, you know, I think we’re all very, very busy and but we do, of course, we have our regular meetings that are required, but if there’s we’re trying to reduce our email, because email is just becoming just, oh, it’s just for me. I hate it. It’s just just so much of it. So we’re kind of going into teams now, which we’re finding quite useful. So it’s, yeah, but essentially it’s, it’s having conversations. And so like we’ve one or two, we’re planning for next year now for 2025, so we’re probably having more teams meetings a couple of times this week, just to kind of work, just tossing it around, you know, and it needs that intensity, and then we might decide, right? We all know what we’re doing, and we’ll meet back in three weeks time, or whatever. So I think we’d be informal, but at the same time communicating. So it’s, it’s, yeah, yeah,

Larissa Feeney  28:56

yeah. And I think, because you’re in person, you know, whenever you work with the team face to face, that communication is a lot easier than if you were apart from them. It

Barry Shevlin  29:06

is, it is, and you know, like, if you’re grabbing a cup of coffee and you’re passing by someone’s door or their desk, you know, you can just that five minute interaction there is so powerful. And I think that that’s as a company, we’re always trying to figure out which way is best and all that. So we’re just No, we don’t have a template. Yeah,

Larissa Feeney  29:26

yeah, no, that’s brilliant. Let’s look to the future then. Barry, so what are your plans for future growth, for, you know, future innovation within the company? Do you have any, do you have any strategic plans?

Barry Shevlin  29:39

We do. We do and like the future, that’s we’re always looking to the future. So the next five years is crucial for us. We do feel that we’re in a very, very good position in the market with our brand, our level of service, and what we do for the homeowner there is 2030 which is the deadline for the you know, the glow. With admissions have to be reduced by a certain level. So that’s in 2030 which is practically about five, five years away. So what we’re doing, we’ve, we’ve various different initiatives and products coming, coming down the line that we’re working on. At the moment, it takes us a long time to launch a product, because we just, we just can’t pick up a product and launch it. We have to, like, we guarantee most of our products for anywhere between 15 to 20 years, no charges within them time frame. So it’s a massive investment and commitment. So we have to research a product and just ensure that it really, really stands to the test of time and won’t fail us or our customers. So that’s really important. So but we have a focus on energy efficiency. It’s going to be a massive part of our business going forward, because we do feel it’s especially Ireland, the world, everyone leaves things to the last minute. And we just feel in 2030, 2028, and onwards, there’s going to be huge amount of grants, pressure on home orders, business owners to bring their homes up, to upgrade their homes to a sustainable and energy efficient standard, and we feel we’re going to, we want to be right in the middle of that, to make sure that we can help their foundation. So

Larissa Feeney  31:13

you’re looking, I mean, you’re looking five years out, which isn’t, you know, it’s, it’s not unusual in many ways, a lot of businesses do look five years later. They have, you know, a five year plan as such, but yours is a lot more detail from what you said. You must have resources dedicated to that development and that innovations. Now

Barry Shevlin  31:31

we do, like, with people internally looking at it and researching and, you know, creating propositions and products and how are we going to sell it and so forth. So absolutely and it does take a lot of time to do it. It’s not something you can just we can’t just pick something off the shelf and go with it. It takes us a long time to launch a product because, unfortunately, we’re very attention to detail. And how we do it when there’s a fixing that goes into your window there, Larissa, you would never see it, will never affect. You never see it. But we could spend, we could spend two weeks talking about that, fixing, you know, and how it would affect, will it last, and we want to see all the test reports, everything. So that’s the attention the detail, or an absolute nightmare to our suppliers, because we break their hearts. So it’s, it’s because it just wants all the details. No one else asked for this. We want it. That’s the way we do it. So we put a huge amount of effort into that. But what happens is, when we put the effort in and get it right in the beginning, it normally, and it does, it works out afterwards, you know.

Larissa Feeney  32:34

So there must be a really strong culture of innovation within the company then, because you’re you’re always looking to do things better, as you said, but also you’re looking quite far in the future, and you’re almost well, you’re using your knowledge and your skill and what’s happening in the world to make an educated guess on where you think it’s going to be in five years time. But that’s still a risk, isn’t it? You know that’s possible that it might something might happen and might go the other way. So you are investing in something that may not turn out the way you you think is going to turn

Barry Shevlin  33:04

out? Yeah, absolutely. And we don’t. We all don’t know what’s going around the corner. So it’s and anything could happen. And the last, the last five years, have told us that you know, and I think which what you have to just, you have to, you have to, okay, you do your analysis, you do whatever, but you also have, I’m a firm believer in your gut. You know, I’m a really firm believer. You also have to, you have your stats, have your analysis, have all your reports, but essentially, you have to use your gut as well. And that’s one of the big changes I’ve developed in the last five years. I’ve trusted my gut more in everything, and I think that has made a significant difference to the business and also to myself.

Larissa Feeney  33:49

And what changed over the last five years that allowed you to trust your gut.

Barry Shevlin  33:55

I think Larissa probably did. Covid was a massive, massive thing. I like, I worked all during covid. So when, when the shutters went down, essentially, we kind of, we rewrote the blueprint for the company in many respects. So we kind of got right when are we going to have three four months where we where we don’t have customers talking to us, where we have to operate the business? So let’s use this three or four months to figure out what’s wrong, how we can improve, where we can improve, and write a new blueprint. Now we didn’t turn thing upside down, but we put significant things in, but it was kind of very much nothing to lose, nothing to lose. And I think just give it a go and go for it. And I think that just it just makes a big difference when you do that. So I think definitely trusting your gut is important. Now it can be wrong, of course, but the amount of times where I didn’t do it, and so that means you have to increase your risk as well. So you have to increase your risk, getting back to your original question. So yeah, yeah, you have to increase your risk. You do. You

Larissa Feeney  34:58

have to increase your risk. And. It is the difference between a growth mindset and a scarcity mindset, because you need to have that growth mindset to be open to risk and to be comfortable with with possible failure, because it’s it comes with the territory. And if you wanted to be a success and you’re not willing to compromise, you’re not willing to take the risk, then you’re limiting the chance of that success in the first place. First place. Exactly,

35:23

exactly. Yeah,

Larissa Feeney  35:24

no, that’s that’s really, really interesting. Can I ask you what the most important lesson is that you’ve learned as a business owner over the years? Oh, God, best putting you on the spot now. Yeah,

Barry Shevlin  35:35

you are the most important. I think probably, I know it’s so simple, but response to your staff and your customers, I think that is ultimately it.

Larissa Feeney  35:49

So that communication thing, again, it is,

Barry Shevlin  35:51

I think I remember when I worked for Liam Carroll. He was an amazing, amazing man. He was, you know, he developed half a Dublin, and he, he’s passed on now, unfortunately, but I remember used to see him where he, he, he’d drive in to the site, big Master Site, that’d be 200 300 people working on it, and, you know, we’d hand out the wages, but then people would come up and say, I have a query on my wage from this last week. I think I got missed overtime, or missed this, or whatever he had about, I think 500 people working for him, but he made it as business to make sure that every one of them wage inquiries was dealt with straight away, absolutely straight away. No messing whatever you do, you just deal with them and get back to that person find out, because that was the most important thing in that person’s life at that point in time. And if you ignore that, then you just, they won’t, they won’t do anything for you. So that was and then my father had the same thing with customers and our staff. I know it’s really simple and it’s but getting back, that’s one of the most important things I’ve learned off in my time. And if you operate that everywhere, you know it’s it’s good, yeah, you know it’s really

Larissa Feeney  37:02

good. That’s great advice. Like he had empathy. He had empathy for his staff. He knew, as you say, that that was the most important thing in their world, and he could fix it for them, and that was causing them a lot of anxiety, and he could take that away. And I was going to ask you as a final question, what is the one piece of advice that you’d give to business owners starting today,

Barry Shevlin  37:21

don’t be worried about, you know, like you see all these companies with their pizzas, like we do things, we’ve had to get better at it, but our, 80% of our time has just been you and beans to each other and being nice and just Communicating and just just being, just be normal and and I think if you do that with your staff, I think that is so important. And then if you have unhappy or pissed off staff, they’re not going to do it with the customer. They’re going to give it back the customer a bad experience. So I think, and even just for your own mindset, for your own health and for everyone’s health, going into a positive atmosphere every day is good for you. And if you go into some toxic or negative the other one, the other, actually, the other important bit of advice is, if there is, if there is a toxic element in the business, I would definitely say, if you’re feeling it in your gut that this that this person or this company or whoever you’re dealing with is is not helping the business in any way. I would say that that would be actually advice to business owners, deal with it very, very quickly.

Larissa Feeney  38:27

Just cut it straight away. Deal with it. Have the difficult conversation. And that’s really hard, actually. That’s a really interesting point you raise. That’s really hard. You know, if, if they’re a team member, if they’re a customer, if they’re an important customer, that can be a really difficult decision, but I do completely agree with you, yeah,

Barry Shevlin  38:45

and they could be Larissa, they could be actually a top and often they could be a top performer in your business, you know, they could, they could be really, really good at doing this and, and that’s, it’s a very, very difficult situation, but Ultimately, this is, this is from experience is that possibly you can sit on it too long, and the damage it does then, ultimately, is because No, no business, every, every business, can survive without anybody, including me. You know, you can’t have any god like creatures in your business.

Larissa Feeney  39:18

I really don’t know, ego, egos. There’s no room for egos in business. No, no, no. That’s really great advice. I think the most business owners struggle with that. I think it’s fair to say, I know I certainly do. It’s a hard one, difficult one. Yeah, it’s a difficult one. And that, you know, that’s that saying, that cliche, you know, higher, slow fire, fast. Well, it’s a cliche, because it’s true, isn’t it?

Barry Shevlin  39:41

It is, it is, and it’s, I think it is probably one of the biggest things we’ve all struggled. I definitely struggle with it, and it’s such a tough area, and you’re blinded by so many different things. I mean, look back, oh my god. Why didn’t I do it earlier? And I think that is fun, and that. That links into the gut. Your gut was probably telling you, but then you had all this kind of science, kind of other results are brilliant, but ultimately, no, you know. So it’s, it’s a really, it’s, there’s no easy answer to it, you know. But I think any new business owner, I think you know, you’d have to say, be aware of that. Be aware of because it can catch you,

Larissa Feeney  40:21

it can and just to bring you back to the point you made earlier, because you mentioned bringing in professionals to help you navigate the transition from one generation to the next, the same applies for this type of situation, you know, to bring in objective advisors to, you know, to tell you or to help you understand if you’re thinking the right way and if you’re going to make the right decision, and how to make that decision is an important

Barry Shevlin  40:44

100% and always, when you bring in someone from the outside, they’re a helicopter view. They’re not involved in the business. There’s no emotion in the business. So they’re looking at the helicopter view. But they’ve seen this countless times everywhere else. So it is important to listen to outside people in that and sometimes you don’t want to listen to them, and you shut your your mind. No, they’re wrong, they’re wrong, they’re wrong, and you don’t want to listen. But I think it is important to go, Well, why are they telling me this? And then my gut is also niggling at me as well, so you kind of have to, yeah, I think in combination of outside with listening to your internal self as well, and others, and I think is really, you’ve kind of, you have to go at a different loads of different kind of things to come up with a decision. But definitely outside, outside is really, really important in them situations, so important. Yeah, yeah.

Larissa Feeney  41:35

No, fascinating Barry, I could talk to you all day. Thank you. Thank you very much for sharing all of that insight into the growth of Global Home Improvements. We really appreciate your time, and I know that everybody will really enjoy listening to your story. Thank you.

Barry Shevlin  41:50

Thank you very much, Larissa, thank you.

VO  41:52

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