Blunt business lessons for the trades.
The Tradesman Experience treats the trades as serious businesses, not just hard work with invoices attached. Josh and recurring guests talk through pricing, delegation, cash flow, conduct, and the habits that keep growing companies from collapsing under their own momentum.
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The Tradesman Experience is a business and leadership show shaped around the realities of running a trade company. It speaks to people who know the work but are learning the company behind the work. Josh’s recurring focus is ownership: the financial, cultural, operational, and personal responsibility that comes with taking jobs, hiring people, setting prices, and carrying risk. The show is blunt. It does not romanticize entrepreneurship. Episodes challenge the idea that starting a company is an escape from accountability, and they repeatedly frame business ownership as harder, less forgiving, and more complex than many first-time owners expect. Pricing comes up as a survival issue, not a spreadsheet exercise. Job costing, overhead, market rates, supplier debt, payroll float, and cash timing are treated as fundamentals every owner needs to understand. Leadership gets the same direct treatment. The show argues that teams mirror what leaders tolerate, not what leaders say they intend. Delegation is presented as more than handing out tasks; it is a test of trust, clarity, standards, and development. Culture is not a poster on the wall. It is built in the repeated behavior of the person setting the tone. The show also spends real time on professional conduct, from organization and communication to attitude, performance, skill mastery, and tool competency. Personal discipline is not separated from business discipline. If someone is disorganized in one part of life, the show suggests that pattern will show up elsewhere. Guest conversations widen the frame, especially around financial planning, household money habits, debt, insurance, and risk. Teaching series such as the bottlenecks, breakdowns, blind spots, and pitfalls episodes give the catalog a structured coaching feel. The language can be raw, but the function is practical rather than performative. The Tradesman Experience is best for listeners who want hard-earned business fundamentals delivered without corporate polish. Its central promise is not inspiration. It is fewer avoidable mistakes.
Made for: The show is for tradespeople, contractors, and trade business owners who want to understand the company they are building, not only the craft they perform. It also suits employees considering ownership who need a sober view of pricing, leadership, cash flow, and responsibility.
What sets it apart: The Tradesman Experience stands out by turning common trade-business problems into concrete operating lessons: job costing, supplier pressure, delegation, culture, and owner conduct. Its tone is direct, field-tested, and more concerned with avoidable failure than motivational gloss.
A show built for Tradesmen, by Tradesmen. We dive into all aspects of business including leadership, team building and adding value to the marketplace. Join us as we share stories, strategies and tactics along with interviews and real life experiences as a Tradesman.
Based on 6 episodes we listened to · September 2026
Candid trades-business conversations connect leadership habits, job costing and cash-flow decisions to the daily consequences of ownership.
The Tradesman Experience turns the mechanics of running a trades business into frank working conversations. Josh, often joined by Greg Giroux, moves readily between delegation, team communication and financial discipline, keeping the discussion tied to decisions an owner can…
A new truck meets an unpaid tax bill, and your business-owner optimism gets a reality check.
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Short reviews from the PlayNext desk, based on the episodes we processed.
Josh and Michael discuss shared money basics, credit card debt, and planning for household risks.
Josh and financial planner Michael Mamino discuss how different upbringings can affect the way spouses talk about money. Michael thinks both people should know the basics of managing it, even if one handles most of the work.
Josh and Greg Giroux make the case for knowing business costs before treating a full schedule as profit.
A full schedule can hide a thin margin. Josh and Greg Giroux put numbers to it with a $600 job: if a competitor finishes in two hours and an owner takes four, charging roughly the same price may leave little profit. The exchange makes job costing feel immediate.
Josh puts attitude first while making room for skill, organization and the humility to keep learning.
Josh puts personal conduct at the center of professionalism in the trades, particularly when work or life gets hard. In judging people, he ranks attitude ahead of performance, then skill set. He still expects professionals to master their skills and know their tools.
Josh and Greg discuss planning for taxes and company growth before spending on a hard-earned reward.
After a hard year, a business owner may feel a vacation or a new truck is deserved. Josh and Greg understand the impulse, but they ask what happens when the vacation comes before the tax bill.
Josh and Greg Giroux discuss how crews understand job pricing when owners share the numbers.
Josh and Greg Giroux start with a question any crew can understand: how do people know whether they are winning if they cannot see the score? They bring that question into business planning and job pricing.
Josh discusses communication and feedback across generations in the trades.
The conversation starts with a preview of a one-day business event, then turns to a question for people leading trades teams: how do they keep in touch with workers whose expectations differ from their own? Josh favors a steady feedback loop.
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Josh opens The Tradesman Experience with Michael Mamino, a wealth strategist and financial planning expert who has worked in the field since 1999 and serves federal employees.
Josh discusses culture bottlenecks in leadership, emphasizing that being the sole decision-maker throttles growth and teaches delegation as a key solution.
Josh continues discussing bottlenecks, breakdowns, blind spots, and pitfalls in business, focusing on cultural blind spots and how a leader's behavior sets the standard for their team.
Josh introduces a deep dive into pitfalls, bottlenecks, breakdowns, and blind spots in business, covering finances, culture, and operations.
Josh shares 12 disciplines to implement in 12 days to transform how you operate, based on his experience as a tradesman.
Josh challenges the negative mindset of 'screw the man' and contrasts entrepreneurship with intrapreneurship, arguing that starting a business from a place of rebellion is a recipe for failure.
Josh and Greg frame The Tradesman Experience around what "you need to know before you start a business," with Greg Giroux and Josh saying the lesson applies to owners at any stage.
Josh uses The Tradesman Experience to argue that “personal conduct” and “financial discipline” matter as much as tool skill in the skilled trades.
The Tradesman Experience episode "How Most Owners Kill A Business" argues that the owner, not the market or the employees, is the biggest threat to a trades company.
Josh and Greg Giroux discuss business planning for 2026, including OCS's 16-page plan, True Pros' request for financial projections, and the lesson to measure specifics while managing averages.
The Tradesman Experience episode centers on the Strategic Growth Accelerator panel in Houston on August 22, 2025, with Josh Hewitt, Steve Rosenberg, and Joni Wolfswinkel trading practical advice for trades business owners.
Coach Bob Turner discusses his journey from remodeling business owner to coach and podcaster, focusing on helping others and selling his business.
A tradesman podcast host interviews a gym acquaintance about the intersection of physical fitness and mental health.
Trenton Wisecup discusses the art of sales in the roofing industry, emphasizing relationship-building and value creation.