By Greg Allan, tradesman and creator of Data First Coaching
Why do most business coaches not work for a tiling business?
Most generic business coaches hand a tiler the same worksheet they would give a plumber, a landscaper or a shopfitter, because they are selling a course, not working from the tiler's own numbers. A tiling business has its own rhythm: square metre quoting against day rate jobs, waterproofing warranty exposure, and long stretches waiting on other trades before a tiler can even start.
A coach who has never run a trade, or never dealt with subcontracting to builders and renovators, often cannot tell the difference between a bathroom strip-out quoted wrong and a crew that spent two extra days waiting for screed to cure. The first session is usually the owner explaining the whole business, which takes time and is out of date within weeks, because new jobs have been quoted and more tile has already been ordered by the time any advice lands.
Why does coaching advice often treat the symptom instead of the problem for a tiler?
A tiling business with tight cash flow is often told to raise prices or chase debtors, but for many tilers the real issue sits further back: crew idle waiting on other trades, breakage and wastage eating into margin on square metre jobs, or waterproofing comebacks being absorbed unpaid under warranty. Treating cash flow as the problem, instead of asking what is causing it, fixes nothing for long.
Without looking at a tiler's own job costing, a coach cannot see which jobs are actually profitable: large format floor tiling for a builder, a wet area fit out for a renovator, or small bathroom jobs booked direct. Generic advice to quote higher gets repeated, because the number that would show where the margin actually disappears was never found.
What should a tiler look for in a business coach?
You want someone who has run a trade business themselves, understands how subcontracting to builders and renovators changes the way a tiling business gets paid, and starts from your own data rather than a template built for every trade. A good coach looks at your job costing, your square metre versus day rate performance, and your waterproofing warranty exposure before giving you any advice at all.
A good coach also fixes root causes with systems, not worksheets, and does not answer every problem with "hire someone". If the answer to a quoting problem, a waterproofing comeback, or slow progress claims from a builder is always the same regardless of what your numbers actually show, that is a sign the advice was written before your business was ever looked at.
What should you ask before signing up?
Ask whether the coach has run a trade business, and whether they have worked with a tiler whose jobs are mostly subcontracted to builders rather than quoted direct to homeowners. Ask what they will look at first in your numbers, and whether they will build something around your own job costing and quoting, or send you the same material every other trade gets.
A coach taking a data first approach will want to see your actual jobs and your actual margins before they tell you anything about your business. If a coach wants your card details before they have asked a single question about how your tiling business runs, that tells you how the relationship will go.
What are the warning signs of the wrong coach for your tiling business?
Watch for a salesperson first and a coach second, someone who has never run a trade business, and advice that would read exactly the same whether you are a sole tiler doing bathroom fit outs or running a crew on commercial floor tiling for builders. If waterproofing warranty risk, square metre pricing and waiting on other trades never come up, the advice is not built for a tiler.
Also watch for a coach whose answer to every bottleneck is to hire more people. Sometimes the real fix is a system that stops a job moving forward until the information it needs is actually there, not another wage to carry through a slow season.
How can AI agents change the office side of a tiling business?
An AI agent is software that does a job the way you would, with your prices, your wording and your rules, so the office work that is not billable gets handled without taking a tradesperson off the tools. Picture a tiler who spends evenings chasing supplier accounts for tile and adhesive, and sending waterproofing certificates to a builder before a progress claim can be released.
AI agents can take on that kind of work, built around your own prices and your own paperwork, so the person running the crew is not also the one staying back to do admin. That does not replace a coach, but it changes what coaching has time to fix once the non-billable work stops eating the week.
How does Data First Coaching approach this?
Greg Allan's Data First Coaching starts from your own job and finance data through the Trade Business Intelligence, not from you explaining your tiling business from memory. It looks at where margin is actually leaking, whether that is square metre pricing, waterproofing warranty exposure, or time lost waiting on other trades, and works back to where the problem really starts rather than treating the symptom again next quote.
The how, the systems built from that, is worked through inside the Academy with other members. It is built for owners who are open minded, innovative and willing to share, because the Trade Business Intelligence is powered by every member, for every member.
Looking for a business coach who starts from your numbers? Tiler Business Coach or every answer for tilers.
