By Greg Allan, tradesman and creator of Data First Coaching
Why do generic business coaches struggle with a surveying business?
Most business coaches work from a template built for a different kind of trade business, usually one with a single crew and a single type of job. A surveying business does not run like that. A boundary survey, a subdivision, a set out for a builder, an as-built or contour survey, and a detail survey behind a title update each carry a different field crew load, a different amount of drafting before a plan or report goes out, and a different turnaround time. A coach who has never priced a GPS unit or a drone against the jobs it is used on, or never managed a field crew around a council deadline, tends to give advice that sounds right for any trade and fits none of them properly.
What goes wrong when a surveyor hires the wrong coach?
Many coaches start every session by asking the owner to explain the business again, which costs time a surveyor rarely has between site visits and lodgements. The advice that follows is often the same worksheet handed to a plumber or an electrician, with “survey” written over the top. When margin is tight on subdivision work but sits fine on boundary surveys, a generic coach can only guess which is dragging the business down, because the coaching never looks at the owner's own job data. The common answer to almost any problem becomes “hire another surveyor,” even when the real issue is how drafting hours are used or how long a title search sits before it gets billed.
What should a good coach for a surveying business do differently?
A coach worth paying starts with your own job and finance data, not with you explaining the business from memory. They should want to see the margin on your boundary surveys, your subdivision work and your set outs for builders held separately, because gross profit margin by job type is the number that tells you where the business is strong and where it is quietly being eaten away, not just the total on last month's invoices.
A good coach will also be able to show you where AI agents, software that carries out an office task the way you would, with your own pricing, wording and rules, can take on the non-billable work that eats a surveyor's week: chasing title information from a council, sending report reminders to a developer, following up a builder about a set out booking. That work still has to be done, it just does not need to be done by you or by a field crew member who should be out with the GPS unit instead.
What should you ask before you sign up?
Ask directly whether the coach has ever run a trade business themselves, and whether they will start from your own job costing and margin by job type rather than asking you to describe the business in a first session. A coach who works data first will want your own numbers before the real conversation, not after it.
Ask how they decide what to fix first, and whether that decision comes from your own field crew and drafting data or from a general checklist. Ask plainly whether their usual answer to a bottleneck is to add a hire, and if so, what in your own numbers told them that was the right fix rather than a guess.
What are the warning signs you should watch for?
Watch for a coach who sounds like a salesperson before they sound like someone who has run a business, who closes fast and leaves the detail until after you have signed. Watch for one who has never managed a field crew, a drafting team, or a set of equipment like drones and GPS units that have to earn their keep against the jobs they are used on.
Watch for advice that would read the same if you swapped in a plumber or a landscaper, and for a coach who never once asks to see margin by job type, whether that is boundary, subdivision, set out or as-built work. If hiring is the answer to every problem they hear, that is usually a sign the advice is not coming from your own data at all.
How does Data First Coaching approach this?
Data First Coaching, built by Greg Allan, starts from the surveying business's own job and finance data through the Trade Business Intelligence, not from the owner's memory of how things are going. It looks at margin across boundary surveys, subdivisions, set outs and as-built work, at how field crew and drafting time is actually spent, and at where the real problem starts before deciding what to fix or where an AI agent might sit in the workflow. The how, the systems and the build, is worked through inside the Academy, with members, because the Trade Business Intelligence is powered by every member for every other member, and that only works with owners who are open minded, innovative and willing to share.
