< Previous10 MAY 2019HIGH-PERFORMANCE HVAC TODAYHIGH-PERFORMANCE PRODUCTSSERVICETITAN PRICEBOOK PROServiceTitan recently released its new premium price book, Pricebook Pro, a proprietary solution that integrates seamlessly into the platform in as little as two hours.ServiceTitan Pricebook Pro integrates with ServiceTitan’s technician-specific toolkit, providing pre-populated imag-es to enhance estimates and generate higher sales. According to a press release, this turnkey information helps drive top-line sales and protect margins while improving estimate accuracy and tech-nician efficiency.With preloaded services, images, and price calculators, it’s easy to get Pricebook Pro up and running. Features include the ability to: zBrowse and select content z Use in-app tools to make customiza-tions z Plug in material markups, billable rate, and surcharges to generate your prices.For more information on the Service Titan Pricebook, go to ncilink.com/ STPriceBook.COMFORTMAXX AIR™ CLOUD-BASED TESTING TOOLThis subscription-based, easy-to-use, cloud-based testing tool from National Comfort Institute, Inc. (NCI) allows you to record and calculate System Airflow information based on static pressure measurements. Subscribers must be NCI-certified in order to use any of the ComfortMaxx programs.ComfortMaxx will help speed up and simplify your testing process and helps hold your technicians accountable. As a result, you can generate high-quality leads and wow customers with profes-sional and easy-to-understand reports about their comfort systems. This helps differentiate your company as a Perfor-mance-based leader in your marketplace.ComfortMaxx Air allows you to: zTest static pressure and airflow z Track customer information (for sin-gle or multiple locations) zSeparate heating and cooling tests z Create customer reports based on lo-cation type: residential or commercial zAnd so much more.Full toll-free support is available and you can enroll up to four additional users on the application itself. For more information, contact Nation-al Comfort Institute at 800-633-7058.RHVAC is available in both desktop and web-based versions. The desktop has a one-time fee and works on all Win-dows-based computers. The online ver-sion is subscription-based.Both calculate peak heating and cool-ing loads (block and room-by-room) for residential buildings and some light commercial applications in accordance with ACCA Manual J, D, and S. Both include a complete ACCA Manual D duct sizing capability and a complete Manual S equipment selection. You can enter data manually or au-tomatically import it from a floor plan drawn with the optional Drawing Board program (available only within desktop RHVAC). The Heat Transfer Multipliers (HTM val-ues) for all the walls, windows, doors, and roofs listed in Manual J are automat-ically looked up by the software as need-ed. Additional construction materials are easily added as well.Among its many features, RHVAC has design weather data for over 2,000 cities built into the software. Users can revise the existing weather data and add more data as desired. Learn more by visiting the Elite Soft-ware website at ncilink.com/RHVAC.This included examing key perfor-mance indicators, how to face chal-lenges, and the importance of tweak-ing processes for a huge, positive impact on the business.GUEST ORIENTATION AND NEW MEMBERSThe 2019 Summit had its larg-est group of first-time attendees who were welcomed to the event during an orientation meeting to help acclimate them to the program and events. New NCI members also attended. The first timers then joined all oth-er attendees for the annual Welcome Reception, hosted by Goodman Man-ufacturing, which set the stage for the rest of the week.LET THE LEARNING BEGINAnother first for Summit was hold-ing all general sessions in the same room with the preferred partner trade show. This kicked off Tuesday morn-ing, April 16th, as all attendees gath-ered and were treated to a rousing multimedia introduction, followed by an interactive game show called “Reach for the Summit.”The learning began when two ran-dom contractors from the audi-ence were selected to answer multi-ple-choice questions from real world installation and service scenarios. The audience then had the opportunity to vote, via a mobile app, for which an-swer they thought was correct. The contractors earned points for correct answers with the winner taking home a new NSI 3000 Low-Level CO Monitor. Each question was followed up with commentary by David Holt and David Richardson, who discussed the merits of each answer and which way they felt the audience would vote.The winner was Frank Copeland of Copeland and Son AC and Heating Ser-vice, Nashville, TN. Coming in second place was Jose Montes of Kennihan Plumbing and Heating, Valencia, PA.FIVE PERFORMANCE WORKSHOPSWorkshops immedately followed the game show with attendees spending the day in groups moving from room to room so they could attend every class.The 2019 Workshops included: zGenerate High Quality Leads with Performance Testing – pre-sented by Michael Hartman of Thom-as E. Clark, Inc. and David Richardson of NCI zTurn High-Performance Leads into Appointments – presented by Nancy McKeraghan of Canco Climate Care and David Holt of NCI zPerformance-Based Selling in Known as the theme park of the world, Orlando, FL was headquarters for National Comfort Institute’s (NCI) 16th Annual High-Performance HVAC Summit last month. No, the theme was not Disney oriented: it was centered on the High-Performance Sales and Delivery Cycle.From April 15 to 18, Perfor-mance-Based Contractors gathered from across the country to learn about this cycle, network, and discover op-portunities to enhance their approach to HVAC contracting.For the second year, Summit was open to the entire industry, including the thousands of HVAC companies that have been trained and certified by NCI. In accordance to the theme, all the workshops concentrated on one of the key elements of the process: Lead Generation, Lead Turnover and Set-ting The Appointment, The Sales Pro-cess, Hand-off to Your Installation Team, and Selling High-Performance Service Agreements.GETTING THINGS STARTEDSummit Week began on Monday, April 15th with pre-conference train-ing sponsored and conducted by both Goodman Manufacturing and Amana Heating and Air ConditioningCalled the Business Planning Bootcamp, the all-day session helped contractor attendees dissect their businesses and create a roadmap to a higher quality of life. SUMMIT SPOTLIGHTBy Mike WeilThe High-Performance Summit Takes the HVAC Industry by StormMAY 2019 13HVACTODAY.COMthe audience to answer key custom-er-facing topics, including sales, mar-keting, and customer service.The coaches on the panel included: zDrew Cameron, President, HVAC Sellutions, Inc. zBrigham Dickinson, Trainer and Coach, Power Selling Pros zDavid Holt, Director of Busi-ness Training and Coaching, National Comfort Institute zDennis Mondul, consultant, HVAC Contractor Solutions zTom Piscitelli, Sales Coach, TRUST® Training and Consulting.PARTNER TRADESHOWJust under 30 exhibitors managed their table-top displays all around the general session ballroom, so contrac-tors had the opportunity to talk with them during breaks and regularly scheduled tradeshow hours.Exhibitors also participated in NCI’s annual Preferred Partner Prize Drawing where attendees received “game cards” that had to be stickered by each exhibitor, then turned in to be eligible for the drawing.STATE OF THE HIGH- PERFORMANCE HVAC INDUSTRYTuesday, April 17, the morning gen-eral session was headlined by NCI CEO Dominick Guarino who discussed the state of the High-Performance HVAC Industy and NCI’s role in it. In fact, Guarino told the group that he sees an increase in the number of Performance-Based Contracting™ firms across North America as well as “an increasing awareness among consumers that there is a better way.”Guarino says this is just the begin-ning and feels there are some positive steps to take to make true performance more than a niche in the overall HVAC Industry.“For starters, we need to recognize this is not an add-on service or prod-uct,” he said. “It must be integrated in your company culture. Furthermore, we have to educate consumers every chance we get. Testing needs to be in-tegrated into every maintenance visit and service call.“In other words, success will follow behavior. If we build these habits in our businesses, they become who we are – and I can point to many of you out there who are living it and expe-riencing the benefits of it every day!”THE CLOSINGIn NCI President Rob Falke’s closing remarks, he contin-ued with the theme of ‘teaching.’Falke’s comments focused on the pow-erful influence the Performance-Based HVAC technican can have if they approach their jobs and customers in the role of teachers.“That role is to teach customers about their HVAC and air distribution systems and show them how to make the best decsions in their specific cir-12 Steps, from Test to Proposal – presented by Michael Hyde of Hyde’s Air Conditioning and Rob Falke of NCI zThe Handoff Can Make All the Difference – presented by Dawn Vickers-Mroczek of GV’s Heating and Cooling and John Puryear of NCI zSell High-Performance Main-tenance Agreements, presented by Jim Ball, Ball Heating and Air Condi-tioning and Tom Johnson of NCI.THE IDEA MEETINGOnce again NCI hosted the Annual Idea Meeting where all contractor at-tendees chip in an entry fee and gather behind closed doors to share ideas on two major aspects of the High-Perfor-mance Sales and Delivery Cycle: Lead Generation and Sales.Moderating the event was David Squires of Vincent’s Heating and Plumbing and Mike Weil of NCI. This hour-long meeting was divided into two sessions: one dedicated to High-Performance Lead Generation, the other to Sales.Attendees presented their ideas on each topic and then voted for those they felt were the best.The winning ideas were from: zJim Betlam, John Betlam Heat-ing and Cooling zCorrie Johnson, TM Johnson Bros., Inc.ASK THE COACHESImmediately following the Idea Meeting, NCI hosted a new event called Ask the Coaches. This pan-el of five HVAC Industry coaches – moderated by NCI’s CEO Dominick Guarino – worked interactively with 14 MAY 2019HIGH-PERFORMANCE HVAC TODAYEach year, NCI presents three Con-tractor of the Year Awards based on company size – Small (less than $2 million in volume), Medium ($2 to 6 million), and Large (more than $6 million). NCI Contractors of the Year must have implemented or are in the process of implementing performance-based testing in their companies. Furthermore, their organizations must have a Performance-Based cul-ture that includes training – technical and non-technical – for its field teams as well as office staff. Their companies must have a strong service depart-ment that is service agreement-based and must regularly offer system reno-vations in their sales proposals.During the banquet, Dominick Guarino and Rob Falke recognized the following winners: z2019 Small Contractor of the Year: Punbar LLC, Houston, Texas. Accepting the award was owner Ron Amaya z2019 Medium Contractor of the Year: GV’s Heating and Cool-ing, Inc., Glenview, IL. Accepting the award was Greg Vickers, president z2019 Large Contractor of the Year: Control Point Mechanical, Shrewsbury, MA. General manager Nick Lupo accepted the award.In addition, contractors are recog-nized with the following awards:John Garofalo Implementation Excellence Award – This recogni-tion requires the contractor to regu-larly deliver measured performance in every aspect of their business. They keep their employees informed with visual benchmarking and/or scorecards with up-to-date perfor-mance results. This year’s John Garofolo Imple-mentation Excellence Award recipi-ent was Jim Ball, Ball Heating and Air Conditioning, Biloxi, MSDavid Debien Technical Excel-lence Award – This award is for an individual who has demonstrated hav-ing strong technical skills, especially in Air-Side and Combustion Testing. This person regularly performs di-agnostic testing on service/installa-tion projects. The recipient is a con-stant learner – always seeking to improve their knowledge – and par-ticipates in sharing that knowledge by cumstances,” Falke said.He came up with a name for the techs who take this approach – ‘Teachnicians.’“The secret to influencing your cus-tomer’s purchase decisions is to teach them the prinicples about their prob-lem until the knowledge you give them confirms your recommendations are true,” he said.“Once they have trust and confi-dence in you, they will respond by buying the products and services they need and want as a result of what they learned.”He concluded by saying that “Teach-ing closes more sales than selling,” and that is ultimately the theme of the Summit 2019 event.RECEPTION AND AWARD BANQUETThe highlight of every Summit is the presentation of National Comfort Institute’s annual awards to deserv-ing High-Performance contractors from around the country. This is the 13th year that NCI recognizes excel-lence in the Performance-Based Con-tracting™ industry.SUMMIT SPOTLIGHT2019 Small Contractor of the Year: Punbar LLC2019 Medium Contractor of the Year: GV’s Heating & Cooling LLC2019 Large Contractor of the Year: Control Point MechanicalMAY 2019 15HVACTODAY.COM zThe recipient is a strong supporter of NCI and its shared mission zThis person implements all aspects of NCI’s methods in service, sales, and installation zHe or she is an excellent sounding board for NCI’s leadership zHe or she is a great contributor of ideas, energy, and their time to NCI and its membership.The 2019 Chairman’s Award winner was Ron Getzschman, Getzschman Heating LLC, Fre-mont, NE.MARK YOUR CALENDARSMissed Summit this year? Don’t let that happen again. Mark your calen-dars today: the 2020 NCI Summit will be in Scottsdale, AZ at the We-Ko-Pa Resort the week of April 6th. sales skills who performs diagnostic testing on sales calls. This person also sells a high percentage of air upgrades and duct renovations. NCI recognized Corey Osborn of Getzschman Heating LLC, Fre-mont, NE with this award.In addition, NCI presented its Pre-ferred Partner Award to Good-man Manufacturing. NCI presents this award to one preferred partner each year who demonstrates strong support of the NCI membership with special pric-ing, discounts, or rebates. Accepting the award was Goodman’s President, Satoru Akama.The pinnacle of the evening was the presentation of the highest honor NCI bestows: the Chairman’s Award.The criteria for this recognition is as follows:teaching others in his company. This year’s David Debien Techni-cal Excellence Award winner was Michael Greany, All Pro Plumb-ing, Heating, Air and Electrical, Ontario, CA.Scott Johnson Training Excel-lence Award – This is also an indi-vidual award targeted to contractors who make training a key component of their company culture. They are willing and do share their training with other NCI members.This year, NCI presented the Scott Johnson Training Excellence Award to Michael Davis, Davis Services, Inc., Spartanburg, SC. The award was accepted by Michael’s son, Nick Davis.High-Performance Sales Excel-lence Award – This award recogniz-es an individual with strong technical 2019 High-Performance Sales Excellence Award Winner: Corey Osborn, Getzschman Htg.2019 Preferred Partner Award: Goodman Manufacturing2019 Chairman’s Award: Ron Getzschman, Getzschman Heating2019 John Garofalo Implementation Award Winner: Jim Ball, Ball Heating and Air Conditioning2019 David Debien Technical Excellent Award Winner: Michael Greany, All Pro Plumbing and Heating2019 Scott Johnson Training Excellence Award Winner: Nick Davis for his father Mike, Davis Services16 MAY 2019HIGH-PERFORMANCE HVAC TODAYfront, so everyone aims at the same bullseye. Controlling the test procedures and readings taken helps reduce callbacks, excuses, and miss-ing information. It helps you hold your guys to a higher level of accountability and removes the temptation to stop measuring performance traits, like static pressure, when you get busy. Consider this scenario: A newer technician is dispatched to a cooling call where the indoor coil is freezing up. The technician arrives and pro-ceeds to “gauge up” to the system. He scratches his head and decides to add four pounds of refrig-erant to the system and call it good. The next day, the same customer calls back to let you know the indoor coil is still freezing up. You decide to send a more experienced techni-cian out to see what is going on. They have no readings from the day before because the newer technician forgot to write them on the service in-voice. Ouch!A difficult task that faces many Perfor-mance-Based contractors is getting their service team on the same page. If you’ve ever had a technician who seems to consistently leave out that one important piece of information or misdiagnose an obvious system problem, you know what I’m referring to. How can you assure that your technicians are consistently gathering the right information and correctly diagnosing systems? Let’s look at ways well-built software can help you with the incon-sistency challenge and improve your perfor-mance-testing results.CONSISTENT DATA COLLECTION Software lets you predetermine the informa-tion your technicians must gather before they can close out a call. They know what’s expected of them on each visit before they step out of their van. Their measurement targets are defined up-Use HVAC Software to Improve PerformanceBy David RichardsonMANAGEMENTMAY 2019 17HVACTODAY.COMrors that come from them.Procedures are predefined allow-ing testing to go faster since the tech-nician doesn’t have to rack their brain to remember all the possible tests that can be performed. The tests are clear and diagnostic accuracy increases be-cause of it. Improved diagnostics help techni-cians match appropriate repairs based on the measurements they input into the software, instead of guessing.Your technicians can all sing from the same sheet of music since they get their information from a central source. This prevents the unintentional throwing of one tech under the bus by another due to misdiagnosis.Here’s another scenario to consider: A technician learning to measure total external static pressure (TESP) is dis-patched to a poor cooling complaint. The indoor unit is an upflow gas fur-nace with an external coil and filter rack on the side. The tech is excited to measure per-formance but decides to go off mem-ory. He installs test ports in the sup-ply plenum, after the coil and in return drop, before the filter. Unfortunately, this technician chose the wrong locations – the coil and filter should be included in these measurements. This results in readings that are incorrect and much lower than they truly are. However, he knows from his training that something isn’t right, his TESP is too low. He decides to call a more experienced tech-nician who helps him discover the error. New measurements are tak-en in the correct locations and the problem is identi-The experienced technician arrives and does a visual inspection of the blower to assure it’s clean and checks the blower speed. Next, they measure static pressure and discover indoor coil pressure drop is high. They pull the coil door off and see the fins are extremely dirty. After a thorough coil cleaning and second pressure drop test to verify improvement, he recov-ers four pounds of refrigerant from the system because it is now over-charged.Consistent data collection and test-ing procedures in software could have helped prevent this. The newer technician would have predetermined checks to perform be-fore gauging up and probably would have caught the issue or known to call for help if he couldn’t fig-ure it out. If the experienced technician was needed, he would have a clear picture of what he was walking into since all the new-er technician’s information is stored for easy access.PROPER CALCULATIONS AND IMPROVED DIAGNOSTICSTechnicians who test performance will encoun-ter situations that cause readings to look better or worse than they real-ly are. They are often the result of improper calcu-lations and can cause a technician to misdiag-nose a system. Software can help prevent these miscal-culations and the er-Using HVAC diagnostic software like ComfortMaxx™ can help technicians get accurate readings because procedures are predefined.“WITHOUT DATA, YOU’RE JUST ANOTHER PERSON WITH AN OPINION.” – W. EDWARDS DEMING 18 MAY 2019HIGH-PERFORMANCE HVAC TODAYMANAGEMENTGARBAGE IN = GARBAGE OUTSoftware isn’t a sil-ver bullet and it can’t take the place of prop-er training and the skills required to suc-cessfully implement it. If your techs are poorly trained and don’t have the skill set to success-fully test performance, no software can over-come that. Software should com-plement what you’re al-ready doing and make your life easier. If you currently use software, take inventory of your needs and see how it stacks up. Some companies stick with what they have been using for decades be-cause it’s comfortable, even though it doesn’t fit their current needs. If you don’t use software, consider the suggestions above as you search for options to use at your company. Above all else, software must be sim-ple to use. If your techs have a hard time using it, don’t be surprised if they’re unwill-ing to change. data, you’re just another person with an opinion.” Unless you have test measurements, you don’t have any data. The reason so many get beat up on price is because they only provide their customers with opinions instead of facts. Good software enables your cus-tomers to make informed decisions from a credible third-party source. You have a partner saying the same thing as you.Have you ever encountered a cus-tomer’s distant relative’s opinion which bears more weight on their de-cisions than yours? Unless you have data that’s easy to understand, you look like another guy with an opinion.Software can also help your cus-tomer understand what is going on with their system and translate your test results in a simple manner. Visu-al graphics and charts often tell a sto-ry to a customer far better than we can express. fied as a supply duct re-striction that is causing low airflow. Proper calculations and improved diagnos-tics available from soft-ware would help avoid this issue. The appro-priate fields are shown which reveal correct test locations for neces-sary measurements, so the correct readings are gathered each time. Correct readings are essential for accurate diagnostics and deter-mining needed repairs.SERVICE HISTORY Think about how your medical re-cords are handled – all relevant infor-mation is in one location that’s quick and easy to search for. In the examples above, service history was an import-ant piece in solving the problem and tracking it.Your technicians can use service his-tory to review performance measure-ments from start-up to each mainte-nance visit. This helps them determine if components are getting dirty, worn down, or unexpected changes occurred. Many software platforms have doc-ument storage that you can tie to a customer or building so the neces-sary documents are available when needed. Manufacturer’s performance data, fan tables, wiring diagrams, and charging charts are commonly stored documents. THIRD PARTY CREDIBILITY Quality improvement guru W. Ed-wards Deming once said; “Without David Richardson is a curriculum developer and trainer for National Comfort Institute, Inc. (NCI). NCI specializes in training that focuses on improving, mea-suring, and verifying HVAC and Building Performance. If you’re an HVAC contractor or technician interested in learning more about software that can help you improve performance, contact David at davidr@ncihvac.com or call 800-633-7058. Next >