From 8-Year Apprentice to Superintendent: Lessons on Leadership with Ben Rhymers, Part 1

the way they tested you out was rough like that. And you nailed it. If you didn't quit, then they said, okay let's invest in him a little bit. We'll think he'll make it. But they challenged you. They ran you through the ringer quite a bit. They probably sent you for the sky hook and the pipe stretcher, all of that crap. And what's amazing is you went through that, but that's not how you treat people now.

No, it's not. There's a reason for that. And it goes back to, I told you, I wound up going into the industrial field and I was working at the refineries. The foreman that was there we were working on day shift. He wanted to, Move tonight, but he couldn't do that without having a foreman to take his place. Yeah. And he said that I was the best candidate. He wanted me to move over. And I was like, okay yeah cool. And I asked him why did you pick me? And he's you obviously know what you're doing when it comes to work.

Now you can't tell me that you've never had that experience. That my good friend, Mr. Ben Reimers is describing words like. Hey, you're up. Promotion and all the feelings that that brings. Anyhow. You're going to get to meet Mr. Ben through this conversation. And I've just, I'm just going to say it. I'm going to make you jealous. I have been able to work side by side with this man. And he is one of those transformational type leaders. Um, he may not be fully aware of it or ready to embrace it, but it is 100% clear to me. And through this conversation, I believe that's going to make it apparent. Now reminder, this is part one of two. And in this piece, what you'll hear is. This dude put in work, like he took the long disciplined path to building his career. I. I mean, there was some setbacks that. I probably wouldn't have taken myself so kudos to him for that. And he also talks about his code for effective leadership. Which, like I said, In person when I see him interacting with people. Uh, and, and the comradery that he elicits. There's no doubt in my mind that it works. It just baffles me who, why the rest of us ain't doing that yet. And yes, I'm super fortunate in that I get to hang out with like super duper amazing ballers. And like my buddy, Bruce gumball says ballers ball. It's a one L and M family member. That is absolutely amazing that I want to recognize, for, for doing a little post and sharing her perspective is miss Yesenia Garcia. You're saying it says I purchased the book, becoming the promise. You are intended to be. And as she was reading halfway through it, you realize that there is an audible version and yes, there is an audio version of the book. Uh, she's never been a typical reader. In fact, she grew up reading cliff notes to get through the books, which I feel you girl. As well, what she's found is listening to audio books is a great way to accumulate and expand her knowledge. And she goes on to say this book was so much more than I expected. And many stories really resonated with me. The one that stuck out the most was story number 20. Why can't I see what they see. That's the title of the story. And it's a really heartfelt story that, that I actually lived through. Uh, she goes on to say, thank you for writing this book and sharing your stories with the world because we all need to be seen. Absolutely girl. I see you. I feel seen by you rest of the L and M family. Thank you for supporting me. And here we go on to the conversation with Mr. Ban. what is going on? L and M family. I have a super special guest here. Mr. Ben Reimers. What's hometown for you, bro. So

I do consider Castroville hometown, but it's 10 minutes outside of San Antonio. If I go anywhere. In the country, and they ask me where I'm from, I say San Antonio, because nobody else outside knows where Castroville is at, they know where San Antonio is at, right?

That's a good point, I didn't even think about that, like who else knows about Castroville? The L and M family doesn't know this, it's interesting. I was just thinking about this before we jumped on. A lot of the folks that I've interviewed, I met them through the internet, through LinkedIn and whatever. You're like one of the very few that I've actually met in person and known before interviewing. But folks out there. I know Ben he's been in the construction industry for I'm not sure exactly how many years he's going to tell us, but one thing that really stands out to me is. Yeah, thanks. The way he leads and the way he demonstrates appreciation for people. Is exactly what our industry needs and lacks. So he is a rarity. I'm a bet money that as you hear him share his story, you're going to say, man, that dude's a little different and he's different in a good way. Not different. Like me.

I behave,

exactly. So Ben, what should the L and M family know about you, my man? I would

say. The biggest part is where I come from, right? So I'll just start off here. I've been in the construction industry for about 23 years now, right? I got married young, I had my kids young heck, by the time I was 19, I was married with my first kid, right? Everybody knows it's oh, man, what do I gotta do now? I gotta get a job, right? I gotta get a job. And my first job my brother got me onto as an electrician. With the company and man, like the first day I was like, Oh, I don't even want to do this. Like I had blisters all over my hands because they put a sledge hammer in my hands and it's okay, put these T posts down and I just had blisters all over my hands, right? So I've been in the industry for a while, and that's where I started. I started from the very bottom and just coming into it. It was like, sucks. It's hard work. Fortunately, I was young and, I could do it back then, right? I can do all the hard work. So moving on into my career. It started off with wiring up houses and then I believe I get it from my dad, right? But I always had a drive of continuously improving myself, right? Continuously improving myself and it was just I always wanted to learn more, right? I always wanted to learn more, so I learned how to wire houses and then next step for me then was I went through an apprenticeship and I wound up going into the commercial side, and I used to always tell everybody, dude, you're going to work for me one day. You're going to work for me one day. I was competed like that, but I did have an attitude back then. And then once I was in commercial I had another kid and at this time, it's four years into my career and I wanted a raise. Back then I was making like, I don't know, 8. 50 an hour and I needed a raise, right? And I asked my boss for a raise. He's nah, we just. Can't give you one, right? I wound up reaching out to the union here in San Antonio and I already did three years of apprenticeship, right? And it was yeah, to reach my journeyman's license. And the union tells me yeah, classes are starting up. We need apprentices, but you're going to start back at a first year. Yeah, I was like, dude, that's three years wasted. And they said, look that's what we got going on right now. You either take it or leave it. That's your option. Yeah, that was it. And that baby wasn't waiting on anybody. So that happens to be my beautiful daughter. But yeah, so I said, fine, I'll take it. They told me what they were going to give me and it was. Like I think at that time, 10, 15 an hour which was the raise I needed. I went ahead and I took it. And so I wound up doing a whole the apprenticeship there was like a five year apprenticeship. So it was a total of eight years. As an apprentice. Yeah, I know. It's like the longest apprenticeship ever. Anyway I wound up getting my journeyman's, but I gotta say I worked with a lot of influential people. And when I say that there's different types of influential people. There's people that teach you how not to do things by their actions, and you just think, I don't want to be like that, right? But there's people that take the time to invest in you, because they understand that it's going to help them out, right? They took the time, they taught me how to do my trade. And I really do appreciate them. If anyone's on the call right now and you're one of them, you know who I am, I really appreciate you. But yeah, so I became a journeyman, went into the industrial field. Working in in refineries. I worked in the oil field moving further down. Traveling all around Texas, in the country just working. Everywhere I went just chasing the dollar, putting in overtime as much as I can. I remember putting in 90 hours a week, sometimes even more, just to make that money. There was sacrifices there though. One of the sacrifices was actually watching my kids grow up and away from the family. But we made it through, and then I wound up becoming a city inspector for, yeah, I wound up being a combination inspector. It brought me home, but. I'll say this, okay? And here's something I learned the hard way. I loved working for the city of San Antonio, but if you're young and you are still wanting to make money I don't recommend working for this city. The pay is not that great if I ever retire and I want to get back into it, that's when I recommend going and becoming an inspector. After that once I was an inspector for probably about a year, I got a call to head up to Dallas and do some QAQC work with an electrical company. And becoming the QAQC regional manager for the Dallas Fort Worth area for, And it was great. I got to work with some great people. One of the guys that taught me in the company was an Old timer and, he was rough. He was teaching me how to energize equipment. This story's can be a little bit rough when I think about it sometimes. Cause he had no filter. This guy. Yeah, he's one of those But one of the things that he did teach me what stuck out was when we were energizing equipment and when I had to inspect it before we energize, he said a couple of things and it was like, Hey just remember who is going to be turning on this piece of equipment, which was myself. And I said, yeah, it's going to be me. He's okay you're the one inspecting it. Make sure you inspect this equipment like your life's on the line because it is, right? A couple of things about electricity is you can't see it, you can't smell it, and you can't hear it. Unless you have the proper tools, that's how you know it's on, is with the right tools. Before you put your hands in there, make sure that there is no foreign debris or anything like that's gonna blow up in your face, right? Yeah, man, I just gotta say that stuck with me like that stuck with me and that hit me hard because you know I got my wife my three kids and it just hit me in a different way and I think I carried that on when I went to Dallas and I taught that to the People that I was teaching over there on how to energize equipment, I always spread that message to them and I want to feel like it hit them a certain way to and then after that I wound up getting a good opportunity over here back in San Antonio working for GC and I've just been enjoying it ever since, right? I really enjoy this career change in my

life. Yeah. So you started out 19. they put a damn sledgehammer in your hand. Yeah. Got the blisters. How much grief did your people give you because of the blisters? Like calling you soft.

Oh man. Great question. A lot. So when I asked. I was like, Hey, can I get some gloves here? Can I get some gloves? What do you need gloves for? I was like first of all, you look at my hands. Like every finger and all right here on both hands blistered up. And they just. Threw some electrical tape at me and they said, here, tape it up I was like, oh, okay but I thought that was the norm because I wasn't trained any other way. That was the beginning of my training. That was the beginning of it. It was always like hazing the new guy. I think the way they put it best and is. Let's treat this guy like crap, and see if he's gonna last, right? Yeah. And if he lasts, then he's worth keeping I had no choice but to make it last, right? Stuck family. I stuck in it, man. But it developed me for sure. It developed me in a different way.

What's amazing, Ben is you went through that. And so the hazing that we went through back in that day, and it wasn't even that long ago, but maybe it was right. 20, 25 years ago, whatever that was, maybe 30, who knows? Like the way they tested you out was rough like that. And you nailed it. If you didn't quit, then they said, okay let's invest in him a little bit. We'll think he'll make it. But they challenged you. They ran you through the ringer quite a bit. They probably sent you for the sky hook and the pipe stretcher, all of that crap. And what's amazing is you went through that, but that's not how you treat people now.

No, it's not. There's a reason for that. And it goes back to, I told you, I wound up going into the industrial field and I was working at the refineries. The foreman that was there we were working on day shift. He wanted to, Move tonight, but he couldn't do that without having a foreman to take his place. Yeah. And he said that I was the best candidate. He wanted me to move over. And I was like, okay yeah cool. And I asked him why did you pick me? And he's you obviously know what you're doing when it comes to work. And you seem to have a good attitude. It's like, all right. One of the things that I told him was because he wasn't like any of the other foremen either. He had a really calm, a really mellow attitude. And when you talk to him, he talked to you directly. If he was upset, he didn't yell. And I was like, you don't yell. Like the other form and yell, right?. Here's what he said to me. And this is this stuff and he's Ben, if you have to yell at somebody to do their job, then you need to take a step back and assess yourself to see if you are doing your job correctly. Oh, that hit me on so many different levels. That's another good lesson that I carried. Along with me and we all lose our temper, right? We all get upset but I try my best, I try my best to talk to people, to talk it out, right? To not yell at them. And for the most part, I think that's helped me out a lot, cause it's all about how you treat people, right? It makes sense, if I go and yell at somebody. Like how much longer are they going to want to work for me, or how much good hard work are they going to put in for me if you're a leader, and you're just constantly getting down on somebody, making fun of them or just treating them the wrong way. How much of that do you think they're going to take before they say, F you, dude, I'm not going to put up with this,

right? Yes, some people still subscribe to that method, right? That's how they lead air quotes. Yeah. Is they push, they scream, they threaten, they yell. And they might get results in the moment, but it's a short term situation, long term you're just wearing

people out. When you have that mentality, you're basically forcing people to work for you out of fear. That's how I see that. Do you really want that? Did someone really want to be working in fear every day. We're asking these people to work. They're coming and it's hard work. It's not easy. Yeah. On top of the hard work. They want to put up with that attitude. And we're asking them to work 60 hours a week at minimum.

Yes. Yes. Dude. So I just started demoing my house. Yeah. And demoing out just the sheetrock. Just the interior. I'm soft, bro. Like my plan was, I got the dumpster on. Wednesday, I'm going to be there, meet the dumpster of demo out two rooms loaded in the dumpster. Thursday, I'll demo out the other two rooms, load the dumpster Friday, I'll finish. I've worked about an hour and a half on the day one, soaking in sweat, felt like my heart was going to explode and I'm in the shade I'm inside the house. And I'm like, dude I didn't bring enough water with me. I got to go home and closet. And my thought was like, okay, is it going to take longer than I expected? A B the men and women out there in the trades do that all day, every single day. And to your point, like instead of demonstrating appreciation for them. We're going to go and jump down their throat and scream and yell and nitpick. That's just not the way, man. And nowadays there's so many ways for people to earn a living like online and et cetera. Why would you put up with that crap? There's no reason to and I'll add one of the reasons I'm really excited about speaking with you. Like I said, at the top of the conversation is because of the way you treat people, you have an appreciation for what it is to be human. And I 100% believe I'm betting my future on this. All the leaders out there that demonstrate appreciation for the people on their job sites that put things in place to show that they care and want to make things better for their people. They are going to smoke the composition of the doubt.

They're going to get better production. They're going to have a better work environment. It's just. All around good vibes, right? Again, just because of the hard work that they're putting in for You got to remember and this is something that I told one of my foremen whenever I was a journeyman Cause he coming down on me and telling me all sorts of stuff and I was like, Hey man, don't forget who the person is that's making you look good. That's me. That's the hard worker right here. That's not you. You're not the one up here doing all this work or in the trenches doing all this work. You may be leading me, telling me where to go, what to do, but I know how to do the work and I'm the one that's installing this and making you look good. Just remember that. Oh, can I say something? I want to say something else, right? One of the foreman, he was actually a superintendent that I used to work with and this guy was as rough as they came. I really appreciate him. Cause he also helped me develop into a good superintendent as well. But he told me something he was going on a rant and I just happened to be at the right place, wrong time, and he's you think I give an F about any of these people in here? He's talking about his engineers. His project managers or any office people, he's all I want you to learn something right now. I don't give an F about any of these people that are in here. Cause when it comes down to it, if all these people are gone, I could still get the work done the workers that are out there. If they leave, I can't get nothing done. So he just looks at me and he tells me when it comes down to taking care of the people out in the field, that's who you take care of first. Don't take care of the people in the office because they're the ones that are working their butt off to make you look good. It's like a lot of quotes that people said throughout my life that really stuck to me. But it helped shape me.

Yeah. For me, that lands is like a core value, right? Value. The people that are doing the work, like yes, we need everybody like behind the scenes, But the reality like that is a super true statement. Oh yeah. If I'm sucking up to all the fancy boots, all the carpet dwellers and undermining or undervaluing the people out in the field and the people in the field, leave the job, that job ain't getting done. Like

there's, I guarantee you, there's not an engineer or a project manager that is going to go out there and strap on a tool belt and start working, no offense to you, project managers and engineers that are here, let's think about

that for a second, right? Yeah, there 100% all the apps in the world. Still can't build a building, right? Like we need people, we need human beings to make that out. Another thing that really stood out to me, Ben, is you went through three years of apprenticeship, open shop, and then you said, man, I need to make some more money. I got a family now went to union apprenticeship and they said, yeah, we'll take you, but you got to start back from year one. Yeah. And so you had the grand eight year like PhD in apprenticeship, which is awesome. But the way that lands with me is number one, humility and number two, playing the long game. So what would you recommend to a young adult out there that is thinking man, four years of apprenticeship since you've done double that. What's the frame of thinking that you would advise them to use when considering where they're going to invest their time to earn a living or build a career off of,

I would say where do you really want to see yourself? And is the juice worth the squeeze? For me, I didn't have a choice in that matter. Like I needed to have more money. I needed to do this, to provide for my family. For someone who's like that who is going to invest five years, it was a five year apprenticeship with the union. That's the path. I would say if you want to take that path you got to have to want it, right? You got to have to want it. If you truly don't want it, then don't waste your time. Don't waste the instructor's time. If you do decide to go down that route, make sure you're putting in the effort because if not, it's just a waste, right? And commit to it. As a person, you know where you want to be in five years. And, are you making the sacrifices to put forth that effort to get to where you want to be in five years? I knew where I wanted to be. I wanted to be a journeyman electrician. And I wanted to do it in four, but because of my situation I sacrificed it and I got it done in eight,

commitment. That's it, bro. That's nothing but commitment there. Cause hell I know me, it was me. I'm too damn proud. I said, piss on you. I'll do something else. I ain't worry. Do you know who I am?

Yeah. Yeah. I tell my son nowadays. Are you working towards your goal in life? If your goal is to be I don't care video game designer. Are you working right now in an area that is promoting your goal? If you're not, if you're working at a restaurant. And your goal is to be a video game designer, then you're wasting time. Yeah. You're wasting time. It's a bad example for me, cause I don't know where else to go from there, but you should be working somewhere that would lead you to your goal. And that's what I tell my kids is you should be working somewhere that'll lead to your goal. I say kids, they're all 21, 20, they're grown already, but I would say that every person needs to take that to heart a little bit. Cause I do for myself, I try to practice what I preach to. But if I'm working somewhere and my goal is to be a general superintendent, in the next five years I'm going to make the sacrifices and I'm going to accept the disciplines that I need to accept to get me to my

goal. Yeah, man, that's it. Not straight up. To use the video game designer example. There's so many resources for us to learn whatever the hell it is. We want to learn, Sean Moran, that weirdo. The other day he was like, I don't even know how, all this stuff about the internet. You're like a totally different person. And I was like, whoa. That was a funny comment. And I was thinking about yeah, like the stuff that I do online, like behind my desk now, I never did that I never would have imagined myself doing it, but the way I learned, youTube university, baby, like for real, man. It's okay. How do I design an offer for my website? Okay. And I just offer design type that in and when I'm running or working around the house or whatever, I'm listening to the way they do that. And then I pick a way that let me try that. Click. Oh, that works. How do you do affiliate marketing? Let me listen to some of that. Yeah. The information is out there for whatever anyone wants to do. You want to be a general superintendent? Guess what? That's a whole hell of a lot of leadership and there's tons and tons of content on leadership. Actual leaders that are alive right now and leaders. Great leaders from centuries ago their lessons are available. You just gotta go soak'em up. Oh,

See what I mean, Ben is just like ultra cool. And, you know, the way he just kind of put this idea out there about, are you working on your goal? Got. Gave me a little tinge of conviction. Like, oh man, I need to check myself. And as I checked myself, I'm going to ask you. How are you working on your goal? Come back next week for the second half of Ben's interview. in the rest of the conversation, he shares about his learning and misstep. Which is a powerful one. And it's one of those learnings that you can apply in your life. As you continue on your path to becoming the promise you are intended to be, be cool. And we'll talk at your next time.