Stop Wasting Time! 5 AI Hacks for Smart Contractors

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ℹ ABOUT THIS EPISODE

AI is like a nail gun: it doesn’t replace skill, it multiplies it. This week, Wade and Stephen share five practical places contractors can use AI immediately. 

This week, let's discuss using AI as an executive assistant to organize email chaos, summarize threads, draft follow-ups, and capture action items. 

AI can help by improving jobsite communication with clearer emails, meeting summaries, and calmer dispute responses; preserving company knowledge by turning spoken processes into SOPs, checklists, flowcharts, and onboarding plans; staying visible through simple marketing like project spotlights, FAQs, newsletters, and social posts; and using AI to think before expensive decisions by prompting better questions about hiring, equipment, cash flow, and customer issues. 

They warn against buying too many tools without mastering one and encourage listeners to share questions and subscribe.

⌚️ Key moments in this episode:

• 00:00 Nail Gun Meets AI
• 00:25 Show Intro And Subscribe
• 02:12 AI As Executive Assistant
• 07:03 Toolbox Talks And Action Items
• 08:52 Better Communication Everywhere
• 11:44 Capture Knowledge With SOPs
• 14:45 Marketing That Stays Visible
• 17:22 AI For Smarter Decisions
• 18:23 Final Takeaways And Wrap

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Wade Carpenter, CPA, CGMA | CarpenterCPAs.com
Stephen Brown, Bonding Expert | SuretyAnswers.com

Transcript

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Wade Carpenter: [00:00:00] You know what a nail gun and AI have in common? Neither one can build a house. A bad carpenter with a nail gun is still a bad carpenter, but a great carpenter with a nail [00:00:10] gun can build a whole lot faster. That's exactly how AI works. It doesn't replace experience, it multiplies it.

Today, I'm gonna show [00:00:20] you the five places every contractor can start multiplying their experience immediately.

This is the Contractor Success Forum. I'm Wade Carpenter with Carpenter Company CPAs, alongside [00:00:30] Stephen Brown with McDaniel-Whitley Bonding & Insurance.

Stephen, I know a lot of our listeners out there want AI to revolutionize their company, [00:00:40] but they don't know how to unbox that nail gun. What do you think?

Stephen Brown: I don't know. The first thing that popped into my head was an older contractor of mine that called a young [00:00:50] fella in his office. His nickname was Nail Gun. He goes, "You young, you just shooting nails in every direction. You need to focus, son. You need to focus."

He was still calling him Nail Gun in his 40s, and I told him, [00:01:00] I was at lunch with him one day, I said, you need to back off that Nail Gun nickname."

He goes "No, no, no, that nickname pisses him off, man. It makes him do what he [00:01:10] needs to do. It makes him focus." I said, "But he focuses more than you do, okay? So you need to let that go."

Anyway, I love the Nail Gun analogy, Wade, and I love [00:01:20] the whole idea of trying to understand people and technology, and that's what we're doing today with AI on our second episode.

Wade Carpenter: Well, Yeah. And that reminds me [00:01:30] of somebody I used to know that was called Microwave, which goes back a ways . But anyway before we get into this, if you're listening to this and you know who contractors said, " [00:01:40] I tried all this AI stuff, and I don't really get this," send them this episode.

That's probably 80% of the people out there in this industry right now, and this is a [00:01:50] conversation that can get them unstuck, I hope.

Anyway, if you haven't already, hit Subscribe wherever you're listening. It's free, it takes two seconds, and it [00:02:00] genuinely how this show gets in front of more contractors, so we appreciate that. 

Stephen Brown: and you can wait and listen to our podcast and push and subscribe afterwards if you like it and subscribe it. But please do [00:02:10] it. It really helps us.

Wade Carpenter: Well, I think we got some good stuff today. The first one I wanted to talk about was number one, making AI your executive assistant.

I know you had some thoughts [00:02:20] on this. You were like organizing emails and stuff like that. Tell us what you were talking about 

Stephen Brown: Yeah, I was like, dang, Wade, help me. When we were talking about this [00:02:30] how you use AI and how I use AI are different, but your influence on AI has definitely pushed me into another level of AI.

Now, the [00:02:40] more you use it, the better you get at using AI and the more productive you can be.

Last episode, we were talking about how to think [00:02:50] and make AI push you. Don't use AI like a Google search engine, and we're talking about using AI right now as an executive assistant.

Wow. I'm embarrassed to [00:03:00] say my emails are a mess. I can find everything, but I want every email to go into a category, and as a primary form of communication, emails [00:03:10] in my industry it's cover your butt, send an email.

But at the same time, so many emails are threads upon threads with multiple people. Some it's important to, [00:03:20] some it's not, but it's I want to cover everybody. I'm going to just blank it to everybody, and then if you want to pitch in, you can pitch in. And I look at that, that makes me crazy because I have to study and go, [00:03:30] "Are they asking me to do something?"

So I got to read the whole thread all the way down. We have a company policy. We're sending out emails. You put a particular subject heading of [00:03:40] exactly what you are answering and the purpose of your email.

So now I've got all these emails in there that I haven't moved over into the right customer [00:03:50] folder, and I have to find them, and usually, the search engine can find them after a while, but I want to find them faster, and I want to be more organized.

And more importantly, I want to be able to say on those [00:04:00] emails, like an executive assistant, "Hey, Stephen, you told so and so you were going to do this. Have you done it yet?" Or, "You need to do this. Have you done it yet?" That's what I'm [00:04:10] obsessed about, and that's what I need help with right now. 

Wade Carpenter: I think a lot of our contractors have the same issue. We did a couple of episodes back, the one on leverage. But you think about all those [00:04:20] little tiny interruptions we all have writing these emails or summarizing a long thread of emails, summarizing meetings.

You got an agenda for your [00:04:30] job meeting or brainstorming ideas. Those kind of things. Believe it or not, things like, we spend time formatting a document so it's ready to go or cleaning up our [00:04:40] notes. Or even just a first draft. There's a lot of things that we think about that take us time, just even if it's just a few seconds.

It's taking our brainpower, it takes [00:04:50] us away. A lot of these business owners, if they're trying to get leverage, they don't realize they're 1,000 paper cuts, it's not one huge thing that is [00:05:00] blowing them off the task. It's like hundreds of tiny ones out there, and all these little tiny moments is where AI shines.

Is that... You're smiling. [00:05:10] I don't know what you think there, but 

Stephen Brown: No, you're exactly right. I'm just thinking about, it just seems like yesterday going paperless was [00:05:20] something you only dreamed about.

Wade Carpenter: Now it's gone. We probably would never go back. And we find things I mean, you know, the whole study's about how much time it would take to find [00:05:30] something on paper. Now that's being multiplied. But, as the contractor, you're still the one that knows how to build the house.

You know, you've gotta stop wasting energy, carrying all the [00:05:40] tools from room to room, basically, I don't know. I just wanted to talk about, and there are ways to have Claude or, ChatGPT or whatever where you can connect it [00:05:50] directly to Microsoft 365 or Gmail, if you use Gmail, whatever it is, and it will train that.

And again, there are ways to also, like say, you can never [00:06:00] delete an email, you can never, respond. Maybe you can create a draft.

Stephen Brown: The new Office 365 does have a AI button. It's not something I subscribe to. I don't even know if [00:06:10] it's private or public. But you're right, those two should tie together to help me be more productive.

Wade Carpenter: They do, and I know we were talking about this before. You said it was a little [00:06:20] confusing and figuring out ways to go there, which I guess the point of that kind of conversation is like, I will screenshot this and I don't know how to do this. this is what I'm trying to do. How do I get there? [00:06:30] And it'll walk you right to that usually.

Sometimes it'll be, out of date, but, example I gave last time, we were talking about dictating notes. You're in your truck and you've got an email you reply [00:06:40] to.

Talk to your phone for 90 seconds. A lot of times rambling, and it can organize your thoughts. 

Stephen Brown: That's scary. That's terrifying

Wade Carpenter: That's... I do that all 

Stephen Brown: the [00:06:50] idea of it recording all my thoughts and analyzing them like I said, anybody that wants to try to figure me out and look at the things that I look at and study on the internet [00:07:00] would say he's just a freak. We don't know where he is." Please go ahead. I'm sorry.

Wade Carpenter: There's just so many things I use it for like for a contractor, let's just say I bid this two [00:07:10] weeks ago and I haven't heard back, and then, you do write a follow-up. Or you got a follow-up meeting and you don't remember the details. If you can capture some of that stuff, like [00:07:20] AI can be your assistant, say, "This is what I want you to do."

And what I've started doing I created a thing where, I was like looking at what I'm doing during the day. If you can [00:07:30] pull out all these action items and you just say who owns it, what due date, is it still unresolved. Those kind of things where it can save you so much [00:07:40] time.

Things like that. Also, like if you have a Monday toolbox talk, whatever you want to call it, we do a team meeting, I say, let's just put it in their context.

Write me a [00:07:50] five-minute safety talk on trenching or something like that. I don't know. Maybe they've heard it before, but maybe say it in a different way.

I don't know. Does that make sense? 

Stephen Brown: No, it's a great [00:08:00] idea. It's toolbox talks that are already all over the internet for any construction safety issue you might come across. You're at a [00:08:10] certain job site, and you've got certain issues going on that day, and you got everybody together. What a great idea to use AI to put that safety, that toolbox [00:08:20] session together for you before the job even starts.

And also helping you organize what you want to get done on that job that day as a project manager.

Wade Carpenter: I guess the point of the [00:08:30] first one is more like, we want AI to revolutionize construction, but it hasn't yet, or we don't know how to get there.

Until you get that leverage we were talking about a [00:08:40] few episodes back, you can't use AI to replace your best work, but you can eliminate a lot of the small distractions if you've learned [00:08:50] how to embrace it.

So that was the point. 

Stephen Brown: Okay. All right

Wade Carpenter: I guess the point number two, we talked about several times over here, but like improving every conversation. As you [00:09:00] were talking about all those emails, it's like construction runs on communication back and forth, whether it's email or text or whatever. The projects don't usually fail [00:09:10] because somebody couldn't...

They didn't know how to swing a hammer. They fail because somebody just assumed something. They didn't know the details. They forgot. They didn't document it. They didn't [00:09:20] follow up. They didn't explain it, whatever.

And AI can go through all those threads of emails and say, AI can help reduce all this friction in [00:09:30] communication. You know, meeting summaries. Somebody missed a meeting that was crucial. We talked about the daily reports or how to phrase a difficult email if you get in disputes [00:09:40] documenting a job site, those kind of things that we've talked about before.

Stephen Brown: And we talked about for example I'm thinking of a Teams meeting that I have this afternoon, and it was set up on an [00:09:50] appointment. So I know that I have in there that Otter AI will record that Teams meeting. And I know that certain team members that I need to be in that meeting [00:10:00] aren't gonna be able to make it, but I want them to know what's going on ' cause a decision's gonna be made with or without them.

So I can synopsize what we discussed and send it to [00:10:10] those team members that weren't there very easily.

Wade Carpenter: Yeah. In construction things happen, and I learned a long time ago, email, people can misconstrue [00:10:20] things. And whether you're taking it one way or another, the rule I always have is like never answer an email if you're mad, you're hot, 

Stephen Brown: oh, yes.

Wade Carpenter: Paste it in AI and just [00:10:30] say, "This is my response." Read it, rewrite this here's the firm answer and here's the facts, but let's not blow up the relationship. So those kind [00:10:40] of things. 

Stephen Brown: Hey, I told you about my assistant 30 years ago that typed everything in CAPs, and I said, "Do you know everybody thinks you're yelling at them, and you need to stop doing that." And she goes I wasn't [00:10:50] really good in school, and I'm not really sure what I need to capitalize or don't capitalize."

And I said, "Fine put everything, uncapitalize everything. Just go with [00:11:00] that. Just don't tick anybody off." And that's what she did

Wade Carpenter: I guess the point of this one is, every unclear message really sometimes creates more work tomorrow. So [00:11:10] communication in construction, and if you can improve your communication, I think whether all the, rework and--

Stephen Brown: Absolutely. No, [00:11:20] Wade, another great point that you've made about this communication is on email threads where everyone's involved in that, and you're following up on [00:11:30] something, and everybody else is involved, and you're telling everyone on that email, has not done what I need them to do." Gotta be very careful with that.

You wanna communicate, but you can make some [00:11:40] enemies that way. Hurt some feelings. Yeah. Go ahead 

Wade Carpenter: I guess moving on to, the next point. If you've got a business that depends on your memory [00:11:50] or the memory of one of your employees, if your best employee left tomorrow, how much knowledge is actually gonna walk out the door? There's thousands of dollars of things wrapped up in [00:12:00] people's heads.

And when they, just like the rework and stuff like that the project manager had all this in their head. If you're coming along behind and having to clean up a mess and you didn't know what was going [00:12:10] on, that mess is gonna co AI can help you capture that, this is the way we do things.

This SOPs, the checklist training. What's the lesson learned? [00:12:20] You have a follow-up meeting, what something went wrong. What's the procedure? Somebody forgot to check the oil in the, stuff like that. What do we need to know about this? And [00:12:30] so something I do all the time, which we were talking about, I'll just sit there and dictate and I'll just ramble all this stuff, and these are my ideas, but how do I explain it [00:12:40] to the team?

I can't explain it to the team if I'm rambling. Okay, this is the way we do it. And I think two, three years ago when We used that example, like I will walk through "Okay, [00:12:50] here's the way we do accounts payable, and this is step one, two, three, four." And I just talk through it. It's gotten even better now.

If you can have it like, okay, here's the steps, [00:13:00] but also if you can say, "Here's a flowchart." Flowcharts help people see that a lot more visually. So I don't know. I mean- We always talk about these [00:13:10] SOPs that never get written. and then some your bookkeeper leaves and somebody else comes behind and changes the whole system.

We don't want that kind of stuff. That new bookkeeper is [00:13:20] starting with a blank page, and AI is removing that blank page from.

Stephen Brown: That's a great point. You got your procedures in place, and then you got AI coming at you in a different direction. How does that fit in [00:13:30] with your existing procedures, and how do you enforce that going forward as effortlessly as possible? Just like you were saying, you've got some ideas you want to focus, [00:13:40] and then you need AI to help you explain, communicate it to your team.

That's part of leadership. That's part of what you do as the head of Carpenter and Company CPAs. [00:13:50] That's your responsibility, and it's the same for a lot of our listeners.

It doesn't have to be stressful, yet something else that stresses that you can use AI to help you with

Wade Carpenter: [00:14:00] And not just dictating this is how we do it, but then letting AI interview you. You want to get down a process and say, "Ask me 20 questions about how we rough in a [00:14:10] bathroom," or something like that. I don't know. I can turn that into a-- " This is our procedure."

I think a lot of times curse of knowledge, we've done this for [00:14:20] years and years, and we don't even think about these little things that somebody, it's just their first time they're walking on the job, they have no idea.

So have AI as like, okay, [00:14:30] ask me all the follow-up questions. What are the little details that I'm leaving out? You walk and talk. I'd do this, just record 15 minutes on your phone, just walking the process.

Stephen Brown: Love [00:14:40] it.

Wade Carpenter: Just build me a first day, first week, first 90-day thing. We got a new labor, somebody that's on payroll, whatever. So a lot of those kind of things.

So [00:14:50] One other thing that I would also throw out there with AI, the next point I guess is a lot of contractors, maybe they just do bid work, but some of them may be [00:15:00] different trades are more out there marketing. And marketing for a lot of contractors is an afterthought.

Marketing is not just advertising, it's like [00:15:10] staying visible. We're not trying to do billboards here, but a lot of times contractors disappear between projects and then they wonder why referrals slow down.

Some of the residential guys may [00:15:20] be out there on Facebook or whether it's LinkedIn or writing an article. Just for a contractor, don't forget that marketing is something it's really good at.

Stephen Brown: so [00:15:30] many of my customers that are complaining about not having any work or work slowing down basically they're getting to back to the point where I'm not doing the same things that brought me here in the first [00:15:40] place.

I'm not out there pounding the pavement, working my network, talking to people, seeing what's going on, i've just been too busy, and AI can help you focus on that. [00:15:50] Yesterday I was talking to one of my customers about marketing, just like you said, and they've been in business since 1948, [00:16:00] and so you can't tell them how to do their business. They've forgotten more about how to do their business than most people could conceive of.

But at the same time, [00:16:10] as they were complaining to me and I said While they were doing that, I was asking AI about their specific industry, "How do you do this?" And I was very specific [00:16:20] to their situation, and it came up with a whole long rambling, and I said, "Condense that. Condense the key points."

It [00:16:30] did. I copied it, put it in an email while we were talking on the phone, and I said, I've been trying to tell you what AI can do to help focus you on what you need, and I just did [00:16:40] this. I hope it helps you. And I'm not trying to tick you off or anything, but you're gonna read through and there'll be something that'll jog a memory of like, yeah, we hadn't been doing that."

Wade Carpenter: Just [00:16:50] contractors that have been around since 1948, the days of throwing an ad in the newspaper are dead, and we gotta think about marketing different.

Wherever your [00:17:00] platform is, whether it's LinkedIn or, Facebook or wherever you're showing... think about things like before and after stories or customer success stories.

Some of the things like [00:17:10] frequently asked question videos, whether you're on YouTube or whatever. A monthly newsletter, a seasonal maintenance tips. A project spotlight.

There's a ton of different ways to get [00:17:20] "Hey, this is our work. We do beautiful work," show some pictures, and it can go a long way.

I know we're getting a little long on this one too, but we've said several of these [00:17:30] things in different ways, but use an AI to think before you act.

That's where AI becomes a multiplier. Not because it knows everything, it doesn't have all the [00:17:40] context but it really does help you slow down and, before you make some kind of expensive decision, whether, it's like, "Okay, should I be hiring another [00:17:50] estimator?"

What question should I ask first or answer first before we hire that estimator? I'm thinking about buying another truck. What does that do to my cash flow? What are the hidden [00:18:00] costs that I'm not thinking about hiring?

Stephen Brown: Okay, but Wade if the AI doesn't know your current financial situation, how can it answer that question?

Wade Carpenter: Yeah. And again, you need to be real careful [00:18:10] about putting financial information in there, but to an extent, yes, you can, if you do it properly, you can lock some of that stuff down. But the idea is, okay I got an [00:18:20] upset customer. What's the best way to preserve a relationship?

So things like that is what I was thinking. 

Stephen Brown: All right

Wade Carpenter: So I guess these were just [00:18:30] more ways that, without getting into things like Claude Code or something, teaching somebody how to code. These are practical tips that a lot of contractors, like they're chasing [00:18:40] something and they don't even know how to start. And so that's one of these little things, getting them off your plate can give you that leverage.

Some of the biggest mistakes I see, we try to buy [00:18:50] every single tool, AI tool or not mastering one, which I know that's probably a sore spot. I've told you about software and then you don't know how to use it.

Have AI [00:19:00] teach you to use it. But you try to automate everything and are not really accomplishing anything. AI does not replace that experience. And so [00:19:10] I guess, I don't know if you had any final thoughts on this. 

Stephen Brown: No I'm thinking back, I don't know, 25, 30 years ago about just the whole idea of time [00:19:20] management and working smarter and not harder. And the very first thing you did was keep a diary of everything you did during that day, and then you kept a diary [00:19:30] long enough that you could go back and you could see how much time is wasted doing this and this.

That's how you see where you're wasting time and where you could do things better. I [00:19:40] think you hit the nail on the head, Wade, with these points. This is what you can use AI for doing, and this is what you should be using AI for doing.

I'd love to hear what our listeners are [00:19:50] using it for and their problems and questions or concern, because we'd love to engage you and talk to you about this 

Wade Carpenter: Yeah. I guess my thoughts, contractors have [00:20:00] always adapted, tried to get tools that make them more productive, whether it's a nailer, power nailer, or a laser level or a drone or something like that.

Whatever the project manager [00:20:10] software that's supposed to revolutionize everything, AI is not saying, "Okay, you still have to keep using a hammer instead of a nail gun." It's just the next tool, but the companies that are gonna [00:20:20] benefit the most are not the ones that are going to have the fanciest technology. They're the ones that consistently remove that friction, improve those [00:20:30] communications, preserve that knowledge, we talked about, and staying visible in marketing to helping them make better decisions.

Stephen Brown: Yeah. Hey, touchdown, Wade. Great points. Thank you 

Wade Carpenter: Okay. [00:20:40] If you're still with us, we certainly appreciate you being here. We do this every single week. If you would, this helped you, share and subscribe to the channel. It always helps us [00:20:50] out. We do this every single week, and we will see you on the next show.