Matthew Belcher: [00:00:00] My advice is really to get on a path early, so as many as cool as everything’s been. That I’ve gone from carpentry and when, I know so many aspects of construction because I’ve done them and gone to school for them. But I think getting on a solid path early, having a good mentor a good apprenticeship and there’s so many things like if you want to be a lifelong learner.

You’re in mechanically, you’re in the right, you’re in the right field because technology’s always changing. Equipment’s always changing. So being a lifelong learner, I think falling into the mechanical and the HVAC and the plumbing side of things really worked out for me. But I think the earlier you can get on a path, get a mentor work for a company that has strong leadership is key. The sooner you can do that, the better.

Jonathan Hughes: Hi everyone and welcome to the [00:01:00] MEFA Podcast. My name is Jonathan Hughes and that was our guest on the show today, Matthew Belcher. And I’m just going to tell you upfront, this is honestly one of the best shows we’ve ever done. I didn’t realize it until I was watching it again to edit it, and it’s so good, and here’s why.

This show is for students who want to go to college, and also for students who want to enter the workforce right away. It’s for someone who is interested in community college and also someone who’s interested in a four year private college. It’s also for someone who’s interested in being a teacher. An apprentice, a blue collar entrepreneur, all in one show, all in one guest.

I say this in the show my guest has done so much and we talk about so many things that I had a hard time deciding what the focus of the show should be [00:02:00] until he hit the nail right in the head. And that is lifetime learning how to adapt. How to constantly learn and sharpen your skills and pivot to new opportunities when the need arises.

Now, you don’t do all of that carpentry, HVAC, plumbing, construction, teaching, owning your own business without gaining a lot of wisdom, and you’re going to get to hear a lot of it. Without further delay, let’s start the show.

Matthew Belcher: My name’s Matt Belcher. I live in Bridgewater. We- I have a HVAC plumbing and HVAC company. Oh, and that we’ve been running for just over six years now.

Jonathan Hughes: And that, that’s a leading question that I asked you, right? Because Yeah. Part of the reason that we wanted to have you on is there’s two reasons. First. One is we like to highlight different career pathways and things like that.

But the second is you’ve done a lot. Throughout your career through now, right? So you you’ve worn a lot of hats and I had a hard time kind of isolating just [00:03:00] one aspect of your career and your education because you, like I said it really encompasses a lot to focus on. We met a couple of weeks ago now and talked can you give folks listening just a kind of high level overview of what you did after you left high school, really?

Matthew Belcher: Yeah, I guess just like a lot of kids coming out of high school, you don’t know what direction you want to go in. I wanted to go to college. Wasn’t really working for me, but I kept going nights fell into construction. My family had always been in construction.

So I did, I was a carpenter for a good nine. About nine years recession hit, changed careers again. Just, you just got to keep moving, try to get work. Fell into plumbing and heating the whole time. Still going to college, chipping away nights residential to commercial and, and it just, I’ve been staying in construction, but just keep shifting and then, eventually, starting my own company.

Jonathan Hughes: Yeah. So let’s go back to your college experience.

Matthew Belcher: Yeah. I guess I, I [00:04:00] had to go to a community college. It was just the way things worked out for me, but I realized real quick that, that just going full-time wasn’t going to work for me. But I also knew that I needed something to try to further myself because I knew maybe I’d change how I wanted to be in construction later on. I went to the community college, we chipped away at classes.

Jonathan Hughes: And what was your, I’m sorry. What was your thought that you wanted to like. What degree did you want to earn? What field did you want to go into?

Matthew Belcher: Yeah, so I just, yeah, so I just did the liberal arts because like I said, I didn’t know I didn’t really have a, at that time I didn’t have a whole lot of information. The guidance counselors in school didn’t really prep you for what kind of jobs were in construction other than manual labor.

And so I was just like, I knew at some point, what if I get hurt? Or because it, it happens, or just, anything. But I just knew that in order for me to leave options on the table, I had to keep going and at least chip away. And I’d rather if I decided, Hey, listen, I really want to do this.

I didn’t want to be looking [00:05:00] at like, all right. Being older and trying to cram in a full career. Yeah. A full co working in college, which plenty of people do. But chipping away with the community college really helped. And then when that whole, the whole recession there, 2000 7, 08, 09 hit I was faced with, with looking at what am I going to do?

So that’s when I actually found out that I didn’t even know really that, that they had all these, construction related degrees. So that’s how I ended up at I ended up at Wentworth. Going nights, which was incredible. Can’t say enough good things about that program.

Jonathan Hughes: So yeah, tell me about that. What was, so did you finish the two year community college program or no?

Matthew Belcher: So I didn’t I was about halfway through it. And we it’s, yeah, it was about halfway through it, I’d say. And I, and then when I went to Wentworth even at that point, was they took so many of the credits, they took so many of the credits and more than I, I expected them to.

Jonathan Hughes: So it was really a huge help financially, and you were working [00:06:00] construction after that and you found out about the program at Wentworth?

Matthew Belcher: Yeah, exactly because I was looking at because we ended up getting laid off is what happened. The company I was working for that they we weren’t a construction company, we were just a construction division.

They eliminated it when there was no construction jobs, right? So I was like, all right, what’s my next move? And that’s when I started searching and I found out that Wentworth actually had a whole night program for this professional studies. And so when construction management but then coming to the end of that, they.

Things still hadn’t rebounded yet. So I ended up stopping at the two year degree with intent to get my bachelor’s, but we ended up stopping at the two year. There just weren’t any jobs at the time. But yeah, I can’t say enough good things about that program. It was it was really good.

Jonathan Hughes: Yeah. What was the program like? Tell me about it.

Matthew Belcher: If just, it’s like anytime you go to night school, it’s the professionals during the, you have some day teachers and stuff like that, but you have the people who work in the field, during the day. So they’re really they’re not removed.

And it’s not oh, we used to do that, [00:07:00] 20 years ago and now I teach. It’s like these guys are there, they left their day job and, wherever, whatever they were doing, project management, construction management, engineering, whatever it is they were doing, and then come and teach you. They teach you the book stuff, part of their curriculum, but then they have their real world experience. It was really good.

Jonathan Hughes: And what is construction management?

Matthew Belcher: I mean it’s similar to project management, right? The construction management degree was really focused on, kind of being like site supervising. So they, there were two programs. You had project management, construction project management, and then you just had construction management and the two classes overlapped. So I was, I was in a lot of the same classes with the project management guys. But it just seems, it seemed to be more or field oriented.

Jonathan Hughes: And what do you remember from the process of getting your credits over and did you file financial aid forms and paying for college and all that stuff? Was that, what was that process like?

Matthew Belcher: So [00:08:00] that process was I mean it was fairly easy.

The. It was really just a matter of getting my transcript from the community college, bring it over and they told me what they accepted and didn’t, and they actually accepted almost all of it. So that was great. And then the financial aid, already being in my, mid to late twenties and there was no financial aid, so you’re paying out of pocket, but it still wasn’t, it was. It was reasonable, but that was, that was still over 10 years ago.

Jonathan Hughes: So let me see if I have the timeline straight in my head.

Matthew Belcher: Yeah.

Jonathan Hughes: So high school, a lot of high school, went to community college, studied liberal arts, went to work in construction. Worked at construction. And then was it during the sort of 2008, 2009 great recession that you went back to Wentworth?

Matthew Belcher: Yeah exactly. Yep.

Jonathan Hughes: And now I understand though, that you were in carpentry.

Matthew Belcher: So that was that whole construction period from high school till that whole recession. Like I said, that was, seven, eight years, somewhere in there. 7, 8 years, somewhere in there. But and what we did was I worked for a convenience store chain. So we were [00:09:00] doing commercial build outs and remodels and sometimes maintenance. So you had to wear all the hats. But at there, there is where I took over.

I took over doing millwork in finish work for, it was commercial stuff, but I took over the carpenter shop. And then that sparked an interest to really get into some higher end stuff and I had access to the shop, so it was great. And. With searching for courses. That’s where, and if you’re segueing into this that’s what I is the is the North Bennett Street School.

Jonathan Hughes: yeah. I was going to get to that because we did a show at North Bennett Street, and I know you went to North so when was that?

Matthew Belcher: So that was like, just before that whole, I got laid off in recessions. That was just before Wentworth. And I used to use my vacation time to take to take workshops.

They, at the time they did have a good weekend, one, I took that. But after that, if they hadn’t during the week, I took I, I use my vacation. And take a week and go do it.

Jonathan Hughes: That’s pretty dedicated using your vacation time to work essentially, or to learn Yeah.

How to [00:10:00] do things. So what was it that drew you to that? What were you trying to to learn that you could do differently or better in your job before that happened?

Matthew Belcher: When you’re in the commercial world, you got a whole bunch of different levels and of finish that they, they require and most of them aren’t that high depending on what you’re doing, but we’re working for a convenience store, so the fi the level wasn’t that high, but I’ve always had that desire to do better to learn more techniques.

And when I I took a tour of that of the school and. I was like, oh I would love to go here, but there’s no way I could make a full-time program work. So I was so pumped when they had so when they had the workshops and it was it was just really just, it was the next step to elevate, to really get myself especially not working in that industry.

So I guess if I had added an apprenticeship with a higher end millwork company or something like that, maybe it wouldn’t have been as necessary, but I don’t know. I just, I like getting it from the source. I like getting fundamentals. I like not picking up other people’s bad habits.

It’s a lot of that, especially apprenticeships are great, but your apprenticeships only as [00:11:00] good as the guy you’re working under, that’s, so that’s what kind of drove me to. Jump on those courses and those workshops.

Jonathan Hughes: We’re going to talk about apprenticeships too, because you were in, in an apprenticeship as well, right?

Matthew Belcher: Yeah. Oh yeah. Yep.

Jonathan Hughes: But before I get to that, I wanted to ask you, because you also, I’m telling you, it checks a lot of boxes here because you were also teaching

Matthew Belcher: Yes. Yeah. Comes full circle, right?

Jonathan Hughes: Yeah.

Matthew Belcher: Yeah. It so I guess it’s, so in me taking all my courses for the trades and like you said the apprenticeship when I got into plumbing I was taking a course at the Peterson School.

Which is where I did a lot of I did a lot of my HVAC training there, but I was taking a refrigeration course over there in, in me talking with one of the instructors he had had mentioned that they were looking for an oil teacher, which is, I worked for an oil company and I was like yeah, I don’t know.

I never really thought much about teaching and we were taking the course over the summer and then the summer ended and they were like, okay, so you’re starting. What do you mean? I’m I am. Oh, [00:12:00] okay. I guess I’m, I guess I am. And it was it was great actually. I loved it. I did it for nine years, teaching part-time nights.

Yeah. Just a couple nights a week and it was, it was awesome. Yeah, it was a great experience. I’d still be doing it if I wasn’t, running my own company. So it was there.

Jonathan Hughes: And so if I can, again, just, I want to go back to the timeline that I have in my head and make sure I have this, so high school community college construction, then recession hits back to Wentworth, and then. I say back to Wentworth and back to school at Wentworth. When did HVAC and plumbing come into it then?

Matthew Belcher: So that, that came out. So that came in right after, so like when that whole recession hit and I got laid off and I went back to Wentworth, I couldn’t find a job in construction.

And I was hoping that even me just being in. Just me being enrolled in the program would get me somewhere. And it just, at that time it didn’t. So that’s when I went to go work for my buddy was working for an oil company and he was like, I was like I [00:13:00] do construction. So learning another aspect of it wouldn’t be bad, not thinking I was ever going to stay.

And so I was going to Wentworth at night while I was working for the oil company. And then once I graduated, I just kept going. It just never, I don’t think I’ve ever stopped going to school since I graduated high school. It just, there’s always either a training or a certificate or a license or something that, that we keep moving forward with.

Jonathan Hughes: But yeah, that’s and how difficult was it to learn a new trade basically at that point? What were some of the big differences between construction and HVAC and plumbing?

Matthew Belcher: It wasn’t, I won’t say it was really difficult. You already have the knowledge of working with tools, which is a huge help.

You you know how now doing construction, you know how things are built which really helps. So it was really just the mechanical side. It’s not like it, coming in from construction, it’s not like you’re coming in as, an 18-year-old kid from high school who, doesn’t know what end of the hammer to use.

So that, that side of it’s good. But it’s still is, it’s it is a whole [00:14:00] other aspect. Like it’s not even remotely the same, knowledge wise.

Jonathan Hughes: And is this when you were an apprentice then?

Matthew Belcher: Yeah. Yeah. So when I was apprentice, yeah. So it took, it takes a while. It takes a while even going to school and being an apprentice.

Jonathan Hughes: And what is. Involved in being an apprentice? You said going to school is part of it, or, how long did that take? Were there costs associated? What was that whole process of being an apprentice?

Matthew Belcher: Like yeah. So the apprenticeship was five years.

Jonathan Hughes: Wow.

Matthew Belcher: For the, yeah, for the plumbing.

Jonathan Hughes: That’s longer than I expected for some reason. I didn’t know how long I expected, but five years is-

Matthew Belcher: Yeah, it was five years and five years of school and, I paid for it all out of pocket. And you’d think I would, I’d remember that, but I don’t remember how much it was. I just remember it being reasonable.

It was something like, it was like $1,400 a year or something like that. It wasn’t anything ridiculous, although the company I worked for did offer to pay for it. But then you had to sign a contract to stay working with them for. Three years after you got your license. And although I did stay with them, I just didn’t want to be held down to it, so paid for it [00:15:00] myself.

I did have them pay for other trainings, other HVAC trainings and stuff like that. Took advantage of that.

Jonathan Hughes: Where were the classes?

Matthew Belcher: All of my HVAC stuff I took at the Peterson School, which is, like I said, how I ended up teaching there. But the plumbing was actually another great, I could have taken the plumbing at the PhD school. They offered it there too, but I was already enrolled in another school, which was Master’s Plumbing and Gas School. I think he’s all online now at the time. He had a physical location, but that was it’s actually a lot of guys like the online platform now. I’m just an in-class kind of guy, but-

Jonathan Hughes: Yeah, me too. And that was five years of apprenticeships and then. You started teaching there, had taught for nine years. Was that beginning after your apprenticeship or after your beginning there?

Matthew Belcher: So it was it was halfway through.

So at one point in time I was going to school two nights a week for plumbing, teaching oil burners, two nights a week. Luckily this was all before I had kids but yeah, so there was a few semesters where it was a little rough. This was all after graduating, so at least college wasn’t in the [00:16:00] wasn’t in the mix anymore, but yeah, so I, I was teaching the oil burners and then going to school for to finish up my plumbing my plumbing, schooling hours.

Jonathan Hughes: And then, finally, like the last major topic that we’re going to discuss that you again, exemplify is entrepreneurship, right? Because you started, you mentioned before you started your own business. And I think that’s something that a lot of people would like to do, but it’s scary to do that.

If you, to the extent that you want to, can you tell me how you made that decision to start your own business and what did you learn from doing that and-

Matthew Belcher: Yeah.

Jonathan Hughes: What do you need to do to be successful in that?

Matthew Belcher: I guess first of all, you’d have to define what success is, right?

If you want to say what you do, because success is different for everybody even in entrepreneurship, right? Is success to be doing 20, $30 million a year or is success to make sure you’re home for all your, your kids. You kids sporting events and putting food on the table in, a little something in retirement and stuff like that.

It’s, I think it [00:17:00] all, you need to define success first of all. And then the other side of that is, is, you just got to do it. If you think that’s something that’s for you, I go, I think I was always going to do it right. I was already set up to do it. I came unexpectedly.

I departed from the company I was working for. And on my way it was on a Friday and on my way home. I got three calls. I, before I even before I even pulled back in my driveway, I got three calls for job offers from other companies that had already heard word that I wasn’t working there anymore.

And I was like, you know what? I guess I wouldn’t recommend anyone do it this way, but I was like, I guess this is it, because what’s the worst that happens? I just, I go back, I do what everybody else does every day. I just, I go back. There’s no. There’s no shortage of jobs for guys who are willing to work and know what they’re doing.

So I think that’s one of the things I, if I could give any advice if someone’s afraid to do it that the worst case scenario you go back to doing what you were already [00:18:00] doing. It’s but I don’t necessarily recommend anyone do it that way, but-

Jonathan Hughes: And how long have you been doing this at your own company?

Matthew Belcher: Six years. We just, yeah, we just hit six years this this month. We got over that five year hump. Things are started moving in the right direction, it’s been it’s been interesting, the highs and lows and, everything in between.

Jonathan Hughes: It seems as somebody who I don’t think I would ever do it myself because I just don’t think I have that in me. Just the, ultimately maybe the desire, but it seems exciting to take that leap. Was it?

Matthew Belcher: I guess it was, it was exciting, but, I don’t know. I think you have to be a certain kind of person and not even just in the business sense, in the go-getter.

I think it’s certain you have to I’m trying to think of how to put this. It’s, you certain things can’t matter. And I would say if you don’t want to get super stressed out. And because you’re going to anyways, but if you don’t want to get burnt out or stressed out or even fail right? For that matter is that [00:19:00] I don’t see.

I think you got to stop seeing you, you start seeing money as just numbers on paper, right? So you actually start to learn, you start to see money. That’s one of the biggest changes. You start to see money differently. It doesn’t you see your money. The same like stuff in my money. Sure. My money is still the same.

Yeah. But business money looks totally different. And you can’t I think that’s got to be the last reason why you do it. I, that’s interesting. Yeah, I think money can’t be, it’s definitely shows you it’s a metric, right? So money is a metric, right? It’s going to tell you what you’re doing right, what you’re doing wrong.

But if you are in it solely for the money I don’t think you’re going to be in there. You’re going to be in it long because money comes and goes right? When things get hard, it’s, you, yeah, I got to stop and sit there and go, why am I doing this? And that better, that reason better be bigger than money because the money’s not there, I think that’s some of the advice I would give guys if you’re going into it for the money there’s plenty of ways to make money. There’s plenty of ways to make more money. There’s plenty of ways to make money. I don’t think I would go into business for myself if money [00:20:00] was the driving force.

Jonathan Hughes: What is the driving force then, for you?

Matthew Belcher: I think it’s almost I think it’s almost like why do people climb mountains? Why do people do, why do people do anything that where they’re not getting money back in return? Why do anything that’s hard? And I think it’s, one is to challenge myself because I do get bored.

See as far as, I keep changing, not changing stuff, but where I keep taking classes and stuff like that, you get bored at some point. So there’s definitely no matter how like mundane things will become in the business, there’s always something that’s going to challenge you or keep you on your toes or, something will come out of left field and you have to react to it.

So there’s the challenge. There’s the challenge aspect. It definitely always, I always have to learn something new all the time.

Jonathan Hughes: Yeah. I’m getting that impression, I, yeah I was saying before that I had a hard time sort of isolating the main theme because you’ve done so much of this, but yeah, then I came to it.

It’s that you have, you are a sort of lifetime learner, right? That you [00:21:00] do Yeah.

Get bored or want to try something else. In, in, in looking at it, in that light, what was hard about that? And I think it was that’s who you are. So I was going to ask what was right for you but it’s clear.

Yeah. Yeah. I guess what I would say is if there’s anybody listening here and they’re like you and that, what would your advice be to them? In general.

Matthew Belcher: My advice is really to get on a path early. So as many as cool as everything’s been that I’ve gone from carpentry and when, I know so many aspects of construction because I’ve done ’em and gone to school for them.

But I think getting on a solid path early, having a good mentor a good apprenticeship, and there’s so many things, like if you want to be a lifelong learner, there’s you’re in mechanically, you’re in the right, you’re in the right field because, technology’s always changing.

Equipment’s always changing. So being a lifelong learner, I think falling into the mechanical and the HVAC and the plumbing side of things really worked out for me. But I think the earlier you can get on a path, get a mentor work for a [00:22:00] company that has strong leadership is key.

The sooner you can do that, the better. I. Who knows where, how much farther along I’d be if those things happened earlier for me. But again, the path I took was cool too. Yeah.

Jonathan Hughes: And you mentioned your kids

Matthew Belcher: Yeah.

Jonathan Hughes: Earlier. How old are your kids and do they seem like they might be similar to you in that way?

Matthew Belcher: So yeah, like a, anyone who has kids, right? They’re all different. But yeah, so I got three boys which would be good if they want to work, but we got we got my oldest is 10. And then they go seven, and my guess is five. And my middle guy he’s got an engineer kind of mind.

And he’s the, I call him the foreman because he’s, anytime I do something around the house, he wants to know why did I stop? Why did I take a drink? What do you, he’s always right there. What are we doing? Okay, let’s keep going. Dad. My, my oldest has really no interest in working with his hands.

But I was sitting at the, I was just sitting at the table one [00:23:00] night with a set of plans out and he was like, oh, you know what are you doing? And I’m like there’s more to what I do than just swinging wrenches, right? He’s no, I didn’t. And, so I sat down and explained to him like, all the other jobs, like nobody did for me, right?

All the other jobs, whether it’s, it’s CAD or it’s estimating or it’s sales, and you started going through that whole thing with him, like all these jobs that are there, and he’s oh. That sounds pretty cool. I’m like, alright, that’s good. Yeah.

Jonathan Hughes: And you mentioned this before too, I think times have changed a little bit where if you went to your counselor, hopefully they would, have a little bit more for you yeah.

Regarding trades and constructions and thing and construction and things like that. Is that your sense from there’s a lot, from what I can tell, a lot of renewed focus on some of the things that you did and some of the things that you studied. Is that something that you see as well?

Matthew Belcher: Yeah I do see that, and I do think it’s great, there, there’s enough studies to show that we’re short on skilled labor and trades and all that.

That [00:24:00] this is a controversial topic when I talk to people about it, but one of the things I do see a lot is I see people who have never been in the trades pushing their kids into trades. And they’re like glorifying it, like oh, this is where you make all the money and blue collars the new millionaires.

And there is some truth to that, but I think you got to give some reality to it is that, it’s dirty. It’s dirty work, it’s not in HVAC if I’m in somebody’s house, it’s because they don’t have, they don’t have AC if I’m in there in the winter, they don’t have heat.

If I’m in there doing plumbing, they don’t have running water. It’s all it’s not, I love it. I wouldn’t do it any other way. So I wouldn’t tell someone not to do it, but I think there’s a lot of people not in the trades trying to convince people to go into the trades versus, I think what you really need is the voice of the guys in the trades telling you, Hey, this is what it is.

Choose your heart. It’s, there’s a million different jobs you can do in the trades. Pick one you like or pick one you don’t hate. How about that? Pick one that you wake up in the morning and you go to work. And you don’t dread the ride in.

Jonathan Hughes: Yeah.

Matthew Belcher: So I, again, I would definitely encourage guys to get into it, it, or women, girls, women, everybody, I, everybody to get into, we, [00:25:00] we have that shortage. It’s true, but I, we need to show the reality of, the job hazards and that, what you’re actually getting into.

I feel like that was very clear to me. Even though we didn’t have counselors telling you that, but my family was in construction. I think all. The good, bad and the ugly was made very clear early on and it was just it’s that, or sit in an office all day. And like I said, you choose.

Jonathan Hughes: Yeah.

Matthew Belcher: You make an informed decision.

Jonathan Hughes: So is, before we go, is there anything else that you’d like to say that you haven’t said?

Matthew Belcher: Oh, oh, I’m sure when I get teaching, you get up on these. You have the opportunity to to try to shape the industry when you teach.

And I, you, the guys, any guys who’ve taken a class from me know that, be I’ll get up on my soapbox and talk about I a million things about, my, my opinions and the way things should be in the standard of, of the way the, the industry should be. But so yeah, I go, I could talk to you for, I’d go on for hours.

Jonathan Hughes: Okay. If you want to do that, we can do that at another time.

Matthew Belcher: Yeah. Sounds great.

Jonathan Hughes: This is great. Thank you so much. I really enjoyed it.

Matthew Belcher: No, thank you. I appreciate it.[00:26:00]

Jonathan Hughes: Good. So big thank you to Matthew Belcher. I certainly appreciate you taking the time out of your day to come and talk to us. I learned a lot and I’m sure everyone else hearing this did too. And if you liked what you heard in the show today and you want to hear more from us on planning, saving, and paying for college and career readiness you can follow the show and you can do that wherever you’re watching or listening to us now.

And please remember to leave us a good review helps us to keep doing what we’re doing. I’d like to thank our producer, Shaun Connolly. I’d like to thank Lauren Danz, Lisa Rooney, AJ Yee, Meredith Clement and Christina Davidson for their assistance in posting the show. Once again, my name is Jonathan Hughes and this has been the MEFA Podcast. Thank [00:27:00] you.