As a whole, the industry is focusing on education, which is the most important thing in my opinion that will help us stay at the top of our game. In the past, this hasn’t been the case, but with all the changes in our world recently, I think we have realized that education and training have taken a back burner to profits and getting the work, when in reality education and training is why we get the work and have such great profit margins.

Too many times, I hear restoration professionals bad-mouthing the insurance industry as a whole and vilifying them as the bad guy that is out to get us. This couldn’t be further from the truth in my opinion. At the end of the day, insurance companies are a business just like us that is trying to make a profit. Are there some bad or even rotten apples out there? Sure, just like there are in the restoration industry. But as a whole, they are not different from us as businesses wanting to make as much profit as we can. Our job is to figure out how to work with them, as they are ultimately the ones paying us, while maintaining profits and getting the job done the way it should be.

My goal is, and always has been, to bring an awareness to contents processing and how important it is to be well systemized, technically trained and ready to provide help in our communities when dealing with a fire loss. I believe more and more companies are getting on board with this, and creating something amazing for client experience that will be at the forefront of our industry in the upcoming year.

Being commoditized is one of the biggest obstacles I feel our industry faces. It’s why I love contents so much, because insurance companies have figured out how to box in and control water and reconstruction, but contents – well that’s a very different animal. How do you commoditize someone’s feelings, emotions and memories? You can’t, and that’s why contents scare insurance companies. It’s also why processing contents in our restoration company can help us stay out of the commodity trap.