Welcome to the all-new International Roofing Expo Business Update enewsletter! Twice a month, we’ll be bringing you the latest trends, news and pro tips to help grow your team, business and leadership skills — all essential to business success. 

Charlotte Jones Executive Vice President and Chief Brand Officer of the Dallas Cowboys — a world-renowned franchise worth a jaw-dropping $5.5 billion — is arguably the most powerful woman in sports. And she'll be making history on Feb. 4 at 9:30 a.m at the IRE as the first-ever female keynote speaker.

The roofing industry is constantly evolving, and as roofing contractors, manufacturers and distributors look for ways to grow their businesses, they also need to find ways for their workers to grow. Labor shortages and worker retention continue to be a struggle in the roofing industry, and NRCA is helping to address this issue through its national worker certification program,  NRCA ProCertification.

Contractors continually ask, “What’s the very best employee incentive program?”  How do roofers get their employees to do the right things at the right time? How do they improve employees’ abilities and willingness to think like owners? We think we've stumbled onto the best employee incentive plan, and so we want to share this intelligence. 

Everything is bigger in Texas, and this year’s International Roofing Expo in Dallas was no exception. As of press time, final numbers were still being tabulated. But show organizers said there was no question that the 2020 show broke records in attendance and size.

Decision making in many family and closely-held companies is broken. Many family and closely-held businesses refuse to make decisions! In 30 years of working with contractors, I could probably count on one hand the times that NOT making a decision was in the best interest of the company. Why?

For many roofers, the labor shortage isn’t just frustrating, it’s choking growth. But even in the midst of these difficult circumstances, some creative roofers are finding ways to recruit the workers they need to meet the demand.

Now more than ever – for reasons like a potentially softening economy, accelerating technological changes, increasing regulation, and ever-intensifying competition – contractors need to plan, renew, and reinvent.