In this interview, Regina Gulbinas shares valuable insights into her approach to guiding businesses toward success. Through her experiences working with clients, Regina emphasizes the importance of breaking free from industry norms, fostering effective communication, and prioritizing long-term profitability. She discusses strategies for overcoming mindset barriers, identifying and prioritizing business goals, and building strong relationships. With a focus on clear expectations, dignity in conversations, and earning trust, Regina demonstrates how these fundamental principles can lead to improved margins, sustainable growth, and tangible results for businesses in various industries.
Can you provide a specific example of a successful outcome resulting from your work?
Certainly! Let me share an example from my experience working with a commercial construction company. One of the common challenges in this industry is maintaining profit margins. Many CEOs believe that increasing margins per job is impossible and settle for lower profits as the industry norm. However, I educate my clients on breaking free from this mindset and show them alternative approaches.
In this case, the company specialized in framing, a service offered by many other construction firms. Our goal was to differentiate them from the competition. We focused on key areas to stand out. Firstly, we prioritized client experience by delivering projects on time, contrary to the belief that construction companies often miss deadlines. We also emphasized the behavior and professionalism of our employees on job sites, ensuring a clean and efficient working environment.
By providing an enhanced client experience, we built trust in our product and service, resulting in customers being willing to pay a premium. This concept applies to any industry—people value and invest more in a superior quality of experience when they trust the provider and feel confident that they won’t need to constantly supervise the job.
Increasing margins is just one aspect of our work. Another consideration is reducing waste within companies. Often, organizations mistakenly believe they need more staff or resources when it may not be necessary. Instead, we emphasize having a highly qualified and efficient team. More people working on a task doesn’t automatically translate to increased productivity and effectiveness.
We guide CEOs in bidding on jobs differently and help them understand that not every high-paying job guarantees higher profitability. It’s crucial to consider the long-term perspective and evaluate where the company can truly make more money. For instance, a single $3,000,000 job may seem appealing, but it might be less profitable than multiple jobs priced at $300,000 each. We encourage CEOs to thoroughly analyze the time versus money factor. How long does it take to earn the same amount of money from a $3,000,000 job compared to several $300,000 jobs? The latter option often requires fewer staff members, less insurance coverage, reduced expenses, and less room for error during production.
To facilitate this understanding, we engage in conversations with CEOs, exploring all angles and assessing what truly generates more profit while considering the time investment. It’s crucial to distribute resources effectively, balancing manpower across multiple projects rather than focusing all efforts on a single job. We extend our teachings to the entire team, including the administration department. Time versus money is a constant consideration. We emphasize the importance of having the right personnel in each role, and understanding their unique contributions.
Our approach involves teaching CEOs and their teams to comprehensively understand the inner workings of the company. This process includes analyzing profitability, optimizing resource allocation, and instilling a culture that prioritizes client experience and efficient operations collaboration.
What strategies do you use to help clients overcome mindset barriers and unlock their full potential?
One of my key strategies is addressing the interplay between emotional and logical decision-making processes that often influence business owners, especially when facing cash flow challenges. I emphasize the importance of making long-term, logical, and profitable decisions instead of succumbing to short-term emotional impulses. To effectively convey this message, I provide clients with examples demonstrating how their previous decision-making approaches may have fallen short of their desired outcomes. It’s essential for them to recognize that their current mindset may not align with their goals. Tangible proof of how their current approach limits their success often captures their attention and opens the door for me to assist in transforming their mindset.
Our decisions ultimately reflect our mindset and belief system. By analyzing the numbers, we can uncover what we truly believe is possible for ourselves. Therefore, I take into account clients’ historical decision-making patterns, which are influenced by their mindset and beliefs. Working together, I guide clients toward making different, high-quality decisions from an alternative perspective and mindset. While some individuals readily embrace and implement these changes, others may require tangible evidence along the way. Starting with small decisions, we gradually build a solid foundation for a transformed mindset.
