Ryan Englin on Behind the Tools: Hiring for Fit Over Skill in the Trades

I went on Behind the Tools with Tradify to talk about how home service contractors can hire the right people and stop gambling on warm bodies.

Michael Steckler asked me about the state of the trades hiring market, and I gave it to him straight. 2020 was a banner year for home service contractors. Everyone went home, toilets got more use, AC units broke down, and suddenly every contractor was booked out for weeks. The problem wasn't leads. The problem was empty trucks sitting in the lot with no one to drive them. That's exactly what pushed me to pivot my business six years before this conversation. An HVAC contractor in Phoenix was booking three weeks out in July. 120-degree heat. People weren't sticking around. I told them, let's fix the real problem.

The real problem is never what people think it is. It's not a lack of applicants. It's a lack of clarity on who you actually want to hire.

I walked through this on the show. Most contractors have never built a Core Fit Profile. They say they want "a guy who can work on AC units" or "someone who can crawl under crawl spaces." That's a skill list, not a person. What they actually want is someone who gets out of bed on time, takes care of the customer like the owner would, and fits the culture of the team.

I told a story about an electrical contractor client. They had no idea they were doing this, but every successful long-term hire had visible tattoos. Every person without tattoos washed out. When we called it out, they didn't run from it. They doubled down. They got clear on the behaviors, traits, and interests that people with tattoos on their team shared. Then they started attracting people who actually aligned with their culture. Hire for the things you can't or won't train. Then train for the rest.

Michael asked about red flags. The first one is a candidate obsessed with pay. If someone leaves their current employer for money, they will leave you for money. There's always somebody more desperate, willing to go bankrupt faster than you. The second red flag is someone who won't invest in your hiring process. If they won't show up on time for the interview, they won't follow your processes on the job. The way somebody does one thing is the way they do everything.

We talked about why most contractors skip the interview altogether. One client had a 100-point system. Ninety points for showing up. Ten points for catching the keys to the truck. That was the whole bar. Show up and catch the keys. That's the fog-the-mirror test, and it creates every retention problem they complain about later.

I told Michael that the fix starts with time. The more time you spend getting to know someone before you hand them the keys, the easier it is to turn them loose with your customers and your reputation. A structured interview process isn't lost revenue. It's insurance against the catastrophic cost of a bad hire.

We also got into the apprenticeship and reputation problem in the trades. People know these jobs exist. They don't want them because the industry has done a terrible job of marketing itself. It's not cool to Instagram that you're tearing off roofs in 110-degree heat. It's cooler to post about your remote gig at Amazon. That narrative won't change at the industry level. It changes one company at a time when contractors start putting as much effort into recruiting as marketing as they put into advertising for leads.

I shared the example of a local HVAC contractor running radio ads that sound like customer ads but are actually recruiting ads. Clean techs, trained techs, invested-in techs. The message to homeowners is "we send great people to your door." The message to job seekers is "we invest in our people." Same ad. Two audiences.

My parting advice on the show was simple. Get clear on what you value. Not words on a wall. Behaviors you see and reward every day. Then interview for those things. Everything else follows.

If you liked this conversation, I go deeper on building a hiring system that actually works on Titans of the Trades.