Step into the world of innovation and excellence with “Industry Champions”! Join us as we celebrate the trailblazers who are redefining success across diverse industries, sharing their journeys, strategies, and secrets to thriving in competitive landscapes. Today our host, Chris Budihas speaks with Ricky Lewis of Home Builders Institute
The Daily News Network, Buzz Tv News, and DAILYBIZBRIEF highlight business professionals, nonprofits, veterans and community leaders on over 40 TV Segments including The Horse’s Mouth, Legacy of Leaders TV, Veterans Buzz TV, Finding Your Frequency, and Buzzworthy Businesses.
Teal, The Agency, powered by Client Focused Media, offers marketing agencies a full-service white-label solution to scale their services without the cost or complexity of building large in-house teams. Tailored for small and medium-sized agencies, Teal specializes in relationship-driven lead generation, advanced CRM workflows for personalized client engagement, and end-to-end project fulfillment. With powerful integrations like HighLevel, Stripe, and Zapier, Teal simplifies your operations while optimizing efficiency—saving you valuable time and resources. While other tools on the market like Vendasta, RocketDriver, and DashClicks, may require contracts, Teal provides flexible, no-contract pricing, giving you the freedom to grow on your terms. Ready to elevate your agency’s impact and efficiency? Explore how Teal can help you deliver exceptional results and better serve your clients. Apply on BeTeal.com today to start your journey toward becoming a marketing powerhouse by understanding digital marketing strategies for agencies, SEO best practices for marketing agencies and scaling a marketing agency.
Chris
Welcome to Industry Champions I’m your host, Chris Budihas, and I have Ricky with Home Builders Institute. Ricky, sir, how are you doing?
Ricky
I am doing fine today. Chris, thank you so much for inviting me here.
Chris
Yes, sir. Yeah. When I when I talked to some folks and I found out last year what Home Builders Institute was, they pointed me towards you and I said, well, I need to get him on the show. So before we get into what HPI is a little bit background, you where you were from, what you do in the military.
Ricky
Well, as you can tell by the the language I have, my language is from a native of North Carolina, but I joined the military in 1985 and did a little over 21 years in the military. That brought me to Jacksonville. So, I was in the military, in the Navy as a gunner’s make it, and doing my time in the military, I learned that, you know, it’s not just about leadership.
It’s also about giving back 100%.
Chris
And I appreciate what you’re doing. So for the audience today, as a know what Home Builders Institute or HPI is, what is HPI?
Ricky
So the home builders Institute is a nonprofit organization. We’ve been around over 50 years. And believe it or not, we’ve been doing trades training for we just celebrated our 50 year anniversary, and we’re located throughout the whole United States nation, and a total about 58 states.
Chris
Wow. That’s amazing. And so what do you guys do at HB? I can kind of unpack that. You know what? What kind of trades are you doing? What does that look like?
Ricky
Sure, sure. So so what we have is what’s a prove? Friendship certificate training is a call. We call it a pack. And then we also provide, you know, trades training in the corporate world as well as the electrical world, Hvac, plumbing, anything that stands around trades in our, you know, a market of construction industry. So we are just so proud about giving these training to these students and, underprivileged students, as well as transition service members.
Chris
Yeah. And so let’s talk about that. So I know in Jacksonville, when I, when I talk to the the local chapter here, can we kind of center that conversation on veterans specifically. But this is really for anybody. How does anybody how do folks that are interested, they hear this interview or they hear about in their community about Home Builders Institute.
Chris
How do they find out more information and then how do they get plugged in? Is it do they just go on the website? Do they go to some specific location to, you know, some other request? Okay.
Ricky
Yes. So so Chris, I would tell you so many, many years ago before we even started the military segue way of, of inserting, military training and veteran training in Hvi. We started with small grants, but then years ago, the Home Depot Foundation actually, was interested in us. And then we started by, having a conversation around what can we do to build momentum for these trades, training within, the military community.
Ricky
And we put in the a memorandum of understanding with D.O.D. and we were able to get a, a successful proved to be a, one of the, one of the skill bridge program that transits you. Servicemember can actually come to our program when they’re within 180 days out of, of get in transition out of the military as well as veterans and their dependents go.
Ricky
We invested in yeah, we’re locked in about ten major installations nationwide. That provides this training.
Chris
Thanks for thanks for that. Specifically that shout out to our veterans and their families, by.
Ricky
The way, and then families.
Chris
And the skill bridge program, too. I’ve met some folks here locally that went through the program. Who are they? Did something, you know, they were, you know, more technical in the Navy, and they’re like, hey, I want to do, you know, something a little bit different. I want to go into carpentry. I want to be an Hvac.
Chris
I want to get in, you know, the in the electrical side of things. So they they took advantage of the opportunity to get that education. Not just the education but the certification. And then, as you’ve seen, I like to ask you, what’s the demand for these folks coming out of these courses? I mean, I got imagine there’s jobs on the back end that they can they can, let’s say walk into.
Chris
But, you know, there’s folks that need them to come and work for them.
Ricky
Yeah. I’m happy to say that, you know, here they yeah. You know, I dedication. It’s just you, the blueprint is for for forward. You know, we’re sitting at, over a 90% placement rate as we are sitting here today. So, the demand is there and the unique thing about bringing transition service member and veterans to our program is their skill set of thinking.
Ricky
You know, they come to the military with a lot of discipline, accountability as well as, you know, they had to learn some sort of, you know, job that they gained in the military. So they already come in with a a strong sense of I want to learn. So, it really impacts them. And, you know, of course, our program, you know, you might get into the part about how long a program is in a minute, but yeah, it’s 12 weeks.
Ricky
Wow. Yeah. 12 weeks. We at a 90% placement rate. And they are coming out with high paying jobs because of their background from the military as well as in the job industry.
Chris
No, I appreciate I get to tell folks, you know, you know, you and I were in the military like the profession always has a barred entry. There’s an education piece and there’s an experience piece. And the fact and I know I’ve talked to some of your teammates down here in Jacksonville is 12 weeks, but is it is a intensive 12 weeks because you come out ready to work?
Chris
I mean, day one shovel ready to do the work. And I think that matters because I know there’s folks out there. You’re like, now I’ll just show up, I’ll get a job at, you know, X company and they’ll they will train me. Well, you can one be a better, you know, a better employee. But you’ll be a more informed, experienced employee through the process.
Chris
Relatively short amount of time, though intensive. And then you’re more employable and you have options, by the way, you can, you know, you go where you want to work with the people you want to work with. So that’s huge.
Ricky
Yes.
Chris
Yeah.
Ricky
Yeah. But it’s different. Like when a, when a transition service member skill bridge offers so many different skill bridge opportunities. That’s the most important part is where we are, we’re able to go to these transition assistance program tap when they’re trained in and out, and discuss what we can provide to them at no cost. We don’t bother the GI Bill.
Ricky
So yes, it’s definitely a benefit to them for one. And then we also have our coordinators focus on the first day of class is when we start looking for a job for you. So the whole 12 weeks, by the end, you should have something that says you can obtain employment by x, y, z of number of days.
Chris
Well, thank you sir. As we wrap up, how can folks find the Home Builders Institute and how can they find you?
Ricky
So what they can do is go to WW, HBA, the org. When you go to that website it actually has different programs you can apply to. We have our community corrections side. We have a military size job Corps side as well as academies. But they can also pick any program, whether it’s for themselves or they’re dependent. But we’re here, we’re nonprofit and is free of calls, and we’re happy to step in because we do want to, kind of work on the the shortage in the industry.
Ricky
And that’s our job here to focus on, make sure the America is back where they supposed to be.
Chris
Yes, sir. I appreciate that. I mean, literally, I mean, you think about it, you know, you’re changing trajectory of many people’s lives, right? You’re you’re putting them in want a career? They want to be in and to as we know, if anyone is paying attention in the trades, is a well-paying, great opportunity to not only do some constructive and something you enjoy, but also make a living that’s appropriate to your commiserate, you know, with with your level effort as you’re doing.
Chris
So I appreciate you coming on today on industry champions. I’m going to have you back on Buzz on Veterans, and we’ll talk a little bit more. But thanks for taking the time to talk about HPI. I highly encourage folks to reach out to you and I on LinkedIn there. Any questions. And, you know, take a look at the website and not one personal interest, but two, if they got other people in our community kind of spread the word.
Chris
So there’s other benefit for this conversation.
Ricky
So, so yes, I call it a little better build, but
Chris
Well, number one, you know, thank you for your service. And obviously you didn’t do that. We can’t do this here today. And thanks for your doing your post Military Journey to make our world just a little bit better.
Ricky
Awesome. Thank you so much, Chris.
Chris
Yes, sir.
Ricky
Thank you.
Chris
All right folks, take a look at Home Builders Institute. Take a look at Ricky. And I would love to connect on LinkedIn. We’ll see you next segment live.
