Practical guidance for owner-operators
Busy, but not getting ahead? Let’s talk it through.
I help owner-operators in the Arkansas service trades solve the problems that keep their business from working as hard as they do.
HVAC · Plumbing · Electrical · Concrete · Roofing · Painting · Landscaping · Construction
Start with a 30-minute conversation. It’s free, there’s nothing to prepare, and you pick the time.
Phone or Zoom, your choice. No pitch, and if I can’t help, I’ll tell you.
What I hear from owners
Does any of this sound familiar?
That doesn’t mean you’re doing it wrong. Most of the time the business grew faster than the way you keep track of it. That’s fixable, and it starts with a conversation.
What happens in the 30 minutes
The money is where you notice a problem. It’s rarely where the problem starts.
You talk.
Tell me what’s going on in the business, and where you want it to be a few years from now. Start with whatever’s bugging you most.
I ask questions.
How you estimate, how you schedule, how a crew spends a day, how and when you get paid. That’s where the money goes.
We see if it’s a fit.
If there’s something I can help with, I’ll tell you what that looks like. If there isn’t, I’ll say so.
Either way, you’ll leave knowing where I’d look first.
Book your 30 minutes
- Based in
- Benton, Arkansas
- Works with
- Owner-operated service trades across Arkansas
- Who picks up
- Me. No assistant, no call center.
Who you’d be talking to
I’m Isaac. I’m not a salesman.
I spent 20+ years inside large companies running the finance, sales and revenue operations behind the work — building the numbers and systems those businesses run on, and figuring out what to do about what they showed.
Now I do that for owners in the service trades who don’t have anyone to do it for them. I’m local, and I keep my client list small on purpose, so the people I work with get me and not a team.
Why now? Big companies have whole departments to read their numbers. The businesses I grew up around never had that, and they’re the ones where it matters most.
I’m not going to pretend I can do your trade better than you. I can’t. What I can do is figure out what your numbers are telling you, and I’m good at it.
I grew up in Southwest Arkansas, raised by folks who worked with their hands. Today I live in Benton with my wife and kids, and when we’re not at a ball game, we’re at the lake, hunting, or out on the side-by-sides.
“Your CPA tells you what happened to your money. I help you control where it goes next.”
I’m not a CPA, and I don’t do tax, bookkeeping or audit work. If you’ve got a CPA, you keep them — I hand you back to them better organized than I found you.
Background
- Bachelor of Business Administration in Finance; Master of Business Administration
- 20+ years running the numbers, sales and operations behind large companies
Where I look
From the bid to the bank.
How jobs get estimated and priced, how crews get scheduled, how work moves from prospect to paid invoice, and how much of it runs through the owner. I look at how the whole thing connects.
Bid follow-up and sales
What happens to a quote after it goes out. Tracking, follow-up, and knowing your real close rate.
Pricing and estimating
How jobs get priced and quoted, built on your rates and your real costs, so you can bid fast without guessing at the margin.
Scheduling and capacity
What your crew can actually carry, and what a bigger month would cost you in people and in cash.
Change orders
Who on your crew can say yes to extra work, and what gets written up before it starts.
Job costing
Knowing which jobs made money and which ones didn’t, while there’s still time to do something about it.
Cash flow
Where the cash goes between the bid and the bank, and how much the business has to carry before a customer pays.
Weekly numbers
The handful of numbers worth looking at every week, and what to do when one of them moves.
Owner handoff
Written standard operating procedures and tools your people can actually keep using, so it runs without you in the middle and without me.
Numbers find it.Margin, cash, job cost and labor show where the business actually is today.
Operations cause it.How work gets quoted, scheduled, approved and handed off.
Conversation settles it.We talk it through until you can see it yourself.
Every look starts in your numbers, because that’s the only honest way to know where the business is today. But the number is almost never the problem. It’s where the problem shows up.
The cause is almost always in how the work gets done, and so is the fix. That’s why nothing I hand over is meant for a drawer. The written findings come with a plan in priority order, a walkthrough until it makes sense to you, and tools your people can keep using.
The proof shows up back in the numbers: in margin, in cash, and in what you get to keep.
Services
Start where it makes sense.
Most owners start with a diagnostic — a hard look at how the business actually runs, and a written plan for what to fix first. If you already know what’s broken, we can start with a defined project instead. Everything past the diagnostic is scoped and proposed to fit your business, because no two are built the same.
Start here
The Diagnostic
$3,000 one time
A complete review of how your business runs, from the bid to the bank. I follow the money through every stop a job takes: how it’s bid and priced, how it’s scheduled and worked, how changes get approved, and how it’s invoiced and paid. I look at your numbers and at how the work actually gets done, find where money leaks and why, and put a dollar figure on each leak. Then I walk you through it.
It pays for itself, or it’s free.If I can’t show you, in your own numbers, at least $3,000 a year the business is leaving on the table, I’ll refund the full fee. You’re the judge.
Requires the records we agree on at the start, delivered in full. Ask within seven days of the walkthrough call.
Usually 10 to 15 business days, depending on how complete the records are when I get them
How it works
- I start with the records we agree on up front — usually twelve months of profit and loss and job history, plus estimates, invoices and vendor pricing, depending on where the problem looks to be
- I go through all of it — pricing, bid follow-up, job costing, labor, cash timing, how long it takes to get paid
- A 90-minute walkthrough of every finding. If anything still doesn’t make sense after that, we keep at it until it does
- 30 days of email support after the walkthrough
What you keep
- A strategic operating plan in plain English: what’s happening, what’s causing it, and what it’s costing you
- A 90-day plan in priority order. Do this first, then this, then this
- The tools and analysis I built to reach those findings, handed over so you can keep using them
- All of it built on your rates and your jobs, not pulled off a shelf
Most owners take it from here and run it themselves. That’s the point.
If you want backup
Implementation Support
Scoped and proposed · usually after the diagnostic
- You’ve got the plan and you want somebody in your corner while you run it
- Working calls on a set rhythm, usually twice a month
- I keep your key performance indicators current while you get used to reading them
- Email support between calls
- Decisions made against what the business actually shows
Ends when you don’t need it.
Fractional COO
Hands-on help
Scoped and proposed · usually six months or more
- You don’t need a full-time operations person
- Weekly working calls, and a written update every week
- Same-day access when something urgent comes up
- On-site when it matters — job walks, reviewing bids
- Written procedures for how the work gets done, and a structured handoff at the end, so you run it when I’m gone
It isn’t a permanent seat. It runs as long as the work takes to do properly, and it has an end.
Bigger work, a set finish line
Project Work
Scoped and proposed · priced in writing before any work starts
Some problems need more than a plan. They need a system built, the sales side measured, a direction set, or a big decision run all the way through the numbers before you commit. Project work is where I do that with you.
System development and implementation
Build it and put it to work
I design the system, build it on your numbers, and stay with it until your people are running it.
- A recurring revenue program, like maintenance agreements or service plans, priced to pay and built to steady the slow months
- Pricing model and rate card
- Estimating system and bid templates
- Job costing and a weekly numbers report
- Billing, collections and change orders
- Written procedures from sold to paid
- Software and AI tools set up around how you work
Sales and marketing
Know what’s bringing in the work
Where your jobs actually come from, what each source costs you, and what happens to a lead between the first call and a signed job.
- Whether your marketing is paying for itself, source by source
- What it costs you to win a job, by lead source
- Lead tracking from first call to signed job
- Bid follow-up, and win rate by type of work
- A sales process that doesn’t live in your head
Strategic planning
Plan where it’s going
Where the business is today, where you want it in three to five years, and what it takes to get there in dollars, people and equipment.
- A three-year plan with targets you check every month
- Which work to chase and which to walk away from
- Crew, hiring and equipment plan
- A cash plan for slow seasons and for growth
Strategic decision support
Run the big decisions first
Before you sign, buy or hire, we run it through your numbers together, so you know what it does to cash and profit.
- Adding a crew, a truck or a location
- Buying or leasing major equipment
- Raising prices or dropping a service
- Bidding a big contract or a new kind of work
- Hiring a manager or an estimator
How it works
- A project can start without the diagnostic, if you already know what’s broken or what decision is in front of you
- Scope, price and timeline agreed in writing before any work starts
- Built on your rates, your jobs and your records, not pulled off a shelf
- Handed over with written procedures, so it runs without me
If the work turns up a bigger problem, I’ll tell you, and you decide what’s next.
What it costs. The Diagnostic is $3,000, one time, and it pays for itself or it’s free. Project work, implementation support and fractional work are scoped to the business, so you get a written proposal with a fixed price before any work starts. No surprises.
I fix it before you grow it, and I hand you the controls when I’m done. If you still need me in year three, I did the job wrong.
Before you book
A few quick answers.
Is the first conversation really free?
Yes. The first 30-minute conversation is free. No invoice and no catch. If you want to keep working together, I’ll tell you what that costs before you decide anything.
Do I need to prepare?
No. If last year’s profit and loss is handy, bring it. If not, we’ll just talk.
What if you can’t help?
I’ll tell you straight. If I know someone who can, I’ll point you to them.
Will my numbers stay private?
Yes. What you share stays between us. I’ll sign an NDA once we agree to work together. I don’t name clients, and I don’t use your business as an example anywhere without your permission.
What if the diagnostic doesn’t find anything?
Then you don’t pay for it. If I can’t show you, in your own numbers, at least $3,000 a year the business is leaving on the table, I’ll refund the full fee. You’re the judge.
I already use software and AI. Do I need you?
Keep them. They get a lot more useful once your numbers are clean and your process is written down. A tool tells you what happened, not why. I build that foundation, so what you pay for pays you back.
Who this is for: owners who still run the business themselves — in HVAC, plumbing, electrical, concrete, roofing, painting, landscaping or construction — doing real revenue, where jobs get priced on feel and nobody can say which ones made money. Who it isn’t for: anyone looking for growth tricks before the numbers are known, or for someone to run the business for them.
Get started
Pick a time that works.
Thirty minutes, no charge, nothing to get ready.
Book your free 30 minutesNeed an evening or a weekend? I can make that work with some notice. Call, text or email to set it up.
Rather call or text first?
501-303-6105Quick question, or I’ll help you find a time. If I can’t pick up, leave a message and I’ll call you back.
Rather email? isaac@foxbizadvisors.com
- You talk to me. No assistant, no call center.
- Phone or Zoom, whichever you’d rather.
- If it isn’t a fit, I’ll tell you.
Rather I reach out?
Leave your number and I’ll call you within one business day to set up your 30 minutes.
Got it.
I’ll call you within one business day to set up your 30 minutes. If you gave me a time, I’ll aim for it.
In a hurry? Call or text 501-303-6105.
Not ready to talk? Follow along.
I post something useful for owners most weekdays — what a number is telling you, where the money goes between the bid and the bank, and what I’d look at first. Fridays are the numbers to check before the weekend.