05/12/2026
Spent an hour with Grant Fuellenbach on Beyond the Bid this week breaking down something I haven't seen many trade companies talk about. We're losing knowledge two ways and most of us don't see either one.
The daily leak: Every clocked-in hour from every job sits in timesheets and never feeds back into the next bid. So we keep estimating labor on a gut feeling. I went back four years through my own company's data, layered 30,000+ NECA labor units on top, and now Claude pings me when an estimator quotes x amount of hours but our crew, based on our own historical data says otherwise.
The permanent leak: My close friend who is a 46-year energy efficiency expert. The kind of guy who walks any building and reads it cold. When that guy retires, decades of margin-protecting knowledge walks out with him. I've been working with him to capture all of it before that day comes.
We also got into reverse prompting, the digital twin I built to pressure-test every decision, and what's coming next with Ion Labs.
If you're a trade owner trying to figure out where AI actually fits in your business, this one's worth your time.
www.ionelectricalllc.com
Most trade businesses bleed margin two ways — labor estimates that never learn and tribal knowledge that walks out the door. Edward Rivera plugged both with one AI system.
