How to Speak Maintenance: What Good Work Actually Means -Part II

How to Speak Maintenance: What Good Work Actually Means

Guest: Wade Nauman, Greystar

Most teams struggle because no one has clearly defined the standard. This month we're asking the same question about what "good work" actually means but to a property manager. 

What this month hits:

• Why “good job” means something different to everyone
• The danger of unclear expectations
• How inconsistency shows up across techs and teams
• Why standards matter more than speed

The Shift:

 Stop assuming people know what “good” is
 Start defining it clearly and consistently

Practical Takeaway:

• Every task should answer:
  “What does done correctly look like?”
  (Not just “is it done?”)

What really makes a great onsite team? Strong communication and a deep appreciation for maintenance professionals.

Each month, host Jason Fein, SVP of Maintenance at Windsor Communities teams up with TAA Education Foundation’s Becca Ramati to chat with industry guests about the critical role maintenance teams play in our communities. Together, they explore real-world topics that strengthen onsite collaboration, improve communication, and elevate the overall resident experience.

Transcript

SPEAKER_02 0:02

Good afternoon, everybody. Welcome to another episode of How to Speak Maintenance. My name is Jason Fine. I'm the Senior Vice President of Maintenance at Windsor. And uh with me is Becca Romani, who is the Vice President of the Texas Department Association Association Education Foundation. I stumble on that every single time.

SPEAKER_00 0:19

Every time. Hi, Jason.

SPEAKER_02 0:20

Every time I'll get it one of these days. With us today is Wade Nellman with um Graystar. He's a senior community manager. So welcome, Wade.

SPEAKER_03 0:30

Hello. Thank you for having me.

SPEAKER_02 0:32

Would you mind telling us? Yeah, anytime. Would you mind talking to our audience about who you are and what you're working on?

SPEAKER_01 0:38

Yeah, of course. Well, again, my name is Wade Nelman. I'm a senior community manager here with GrayStar in Austin. I've been in industry for right about 10 years now. Um Graystar for five. Currently, right now, I am working on a newly set project in East Austin, so town-owned community, and you know, trying to get that off the ground and get that working. So it's going pretty good.

SPEAKER_02 0:59

That's awesome. It's a leaseup. Is that what you were talking about earlier? Yes. That's great. That's one of the toughest jobs I've ever had was working at a leaseup.

SPEAKER_01 1:09

Yeah, this is my third one. So it's it's it's going pretty good.

SPEAKER_00 1:12

You're a specialist. Can we also ask how you got into the industry?

SPEAKER_01 1:17

Yeah. Yeah, um, like most people in my position, started as leasing. So um took a part-time leasing professional job up in Dallas, and from there just kind of worked my way up and uh moved to Austin back in 2020 and um came over as leasing, moved up to an assistant, came into Graystar assistant, and then shortly after that, about six months later, they promoted me to a community manager and then just gone from property property since then.

SPEAKER_00 1:45

Awesome.

SPEAKER_02 1:46

That's great. Becca, wasn't he didn't he receive an award recently as well?

SPEAKER_00 1:50

He did receive an award. Thank you, Jason. Um Wade was the 2026 TAA Property Manager of the Year, which is no small feat. So congratulations on that, Wade, and thanks for joining us today.

SPEAKER_01 2:03

Yes, thank you for having me. I appreciate it.

SPEAKER_02 2:06

Definitely. So today we wanted to kind of take a conversation from last month's episode about what is what is successful look like, what is good look like, and how uh it might differ from the perspective of a maintenance supervisor to a community manager. So we're really gonna kind of just go through the same questions we asked our CRISPA dual last month, and we're gonna be able to kind of dive in and see from your perspective exactly what successful looks like. So I'll jump right into it. You know, what is good when I say hey, good work, what does that mean to you?

SPEAKER_01 2:42

Doing things right the first time and quality is really my my the first thing that comes to my head.

SPEAKER_02 2:52

Yeah, I mean it'll lease up. Uh you know, speed might actually kind of hurt you, right? You were talking about it'll lease up how you uh if you you speed through it and reputation's everything, and it's all brand new, uh it finishes, you might actually kind of ruin your reputation, correct?

SPEAKER_01 3:09

Yeah, a little bit. So when you know when you go into the lease up, especially our property here, you know, there there's always two different perspectives, right? Obviously, us here in the office, we want to make sure that everything's perfect. We want when these people move into the brand new home, you know, like no one's lived there before, we want to make sure that it's just 100% perfect, no issues whatsoever. But then on the opposite side, you know, we're answering to construction, we're answering to our clients, and obviously they're ready just to get them done and turn on them and get them out of their hands and into ours. And if you rush that process, you know, you may miss some things. And at the end of the day, once we accept those units, you know, they're ours. So if we if we miss a big issue in the department, let's say there's a there's a leak that we didn't find or an issue with the AC, and we accept that from construction, you know, that could be you know financially in us to repair at that point. So um, yeah, most things are covered under warranty to be able to get that covered, but then at that point it's just a process when you know you want to take your time and really ensure that this is something that we're really gonna put our aim on. That's a good point.

SPEAKER_02 4:08

I mean, from a Chris's perspective and other maintenance supervisors' perspective, I mean, there's so much things, there's so many things that are going on on a daily basis between turns and curb appeal and and service requests that you know they might sacrifice quality for speed where, like you're saying, you need that quality because it's lease up. And you know what, even beyond uh just being a lease up, I mean, if it's uh just a stabilized asset, you might you need to make sure quality's uh there as well, correct?

SPEAKER_01 4:38

Yeah, and then too, it's also ensuring that you're priorities you're prioritizing your time to you know maybe the work orders that need that little bit extra time, right? So obviously you're gonna want to spend you know longer time fixing AC to make sure it's done correctly. And that's when I go back earlier saying, you know, do do it right the first time, you know, because if you don't do a great job the first time or you kind of you know cut some corners, it's not gonna be a good experience in the long run because the resident's still gonna have some issues, they're still gonna put on their work order, and then yes, reputation goes down because now they're frustrated. And then, but also too, like I was kind of saying earlier, you know, okay, great. Um, this apartment, right? It just needs a quick touch-up clean. You know, go in, do the floors real quick, mark down the counters, everything is perfect. Our vendors have already been in there, we just want to make sure it's good. But something like that doesn't have to take an hour, you know, it's something you run in, you know, 15-20 minutes just to do a spot check on things. So it's ensuring that you're prioritizing the bigger jobs to ensure that you have the time to get those taken care of to where you can do your best job for that.

SPEAKER_02 5:36

Sure. I mean, do you so do you think you would agree that that's part of our issue is the different competing uh definitions of what good work is?

SPEAKER_01 5:46

From yeah, I mean I I can agree with that, but also too, it's you know, I I did watch the episode from last month, and you know, these guys they come in and they just want to prove themselves. They want to make sure that you know they are doing the best job possible. And when you switch that mindset of like, okay, great, you're service tech switching from a service supervisor, you know, you have to prioritize what's gonna what's gonna matter the most, I guess, right? Or what's going to make the best impact rather than just ensuring that you're spending the same amount of time on every single you know work order. It's just crucial to ensure that you know you're prioritizing the jobs that are you know could cause more issues in the long run, right? It's always preparing for, I wouldn't say preparing for the worst, but you know, trying to be proactive to ensure that there's not going to be a bigger issue in the future.

SPEAKER_02 6:42

Sure. I'll admit it, when I was a maintenance tech on site, I was trying to bust out 20 service requests before lunch. And so speed, I was rewarded for the speed and being able to accomplish a lot of tasks. So uh between you and your community maintenance supervisor, how do you how do you make sure that your maintenance team understands what the expectations are and what you and your community maintenance supervisor would like from the team?

SPEAKER_01 7:07

Yeah. So um every day we have a huddle in the morning. We talk about what we're doing for the day, we set those expectations, we pull the work orders, you know, we also talk about kind of the things that are pending with construction since we are a lease up. Um but previously on stabilized deals as well, like still have those meetings to ensure that we're all on the same page for the day. Um, if we, you know, had some emergency stuff that came through overnight, that that we're those are the very first things that we're addressing if they were not addressed the night before. Um, but I'm very much a goal-oriented person. I will set those expectations from the very beginning, even from my newest maintenance team member that I hired that's probably never been in the industry before, so even my seasoned people, like everyone gets the same amount of time, everyone get understands that hey, these are expectations that were set forth, and that's how we go with it.

SPEAKER_02 7:56

That's good. That's good because you have those meetings. It's important to be able to make sure that you're all level setting. I mean, if you're going into a week where you have 10 move outs and it's you've had three that you're carrying over from the previous week, it can get a little hairy, and that's when people might want to try to sacrifice quality and just get you know speed and quantity up. So yeah.

SPEAKER_01 8:17

And then too, like having those meetings as well is very crucial, especially for the office team, because if we don't know what's going on, we and residents are calling us asking questions, then it it becomes a roadblock, right? Because then we have to stop and ask maintenance at that point, and it doesn't, you know, it's not very fluid. It doesn't show that we are a team or that we that we know what we're doing. So, or not not know what we're doing, but that we're not communicating. So it's crucial that the maintenance team in the morning, you know, lets our staff know, like, hey, this has come up, this is an issue, you know, and even even here on you know the new Lisa, before we turn some units, they were like, okay, well, maybe because you know, everyone's switching to those electronic door locks now, it's like, hey, and these few units, like, y'all can't show these today because the door lock may not be 100% working, so or the batteries are dead, or something like that. So if we don't know that, and let's say we go on a tour and we try to go knock on that or open that door and it doesn't work, then that just doesn't create a good experience for our prospects. So even to the smallest things.

SPEAKER_02 9:12

Do you um let me ask you a question? Do you have KPIs or you do you grade your maintenance teams on uh speed, or let's just work on the service requests? Is it is it speed or is it quality?

SPEAKER_01 9:26

So to be honest, it's so for the KPIs, it's it's typically more about quality because with the KPIs that we measure them on is through Kingsley. So it's the reviews that come through from the residents of a how well the work order went, as well as so when they get a Kingsley review, they get an overall survey, they get you know their work order survey, they get their move-in survey. So those are the things that really grade on, and obviously when those surveys come back, that's when I look at them as like, okay, this what could we have done better? Or hey guys, like y'all did a great job with this one. There was no issues with it. So it's graded graded typically through Kingsley.

SPEAKER_02 9:59

That's good. Because I've seen companies where it's you know, are you completing your service requests within 48 hours? Right. And that's what we're well, I will say that.

SPEAKER_01 10:08

I'm sorry, yes, that is an expectation with Graystar. Yes. If a work order is submitted, it is it is expected to be completed within 48 hours.

SPEAKER_02 10:14

But it's good to have the Kingsley portion in there as well, right?

SPEAKER_01 10:16

So then 100%. Yeah, my mind has been so focused on resident experience these last couple months that it's like, oh yes, okay, Kingsley, let's make sure that's good. But but yeah, expectation is 48 hours with you know, within reason, though, obviously, if we have to order a part or a vendor has to come and actually fix things, or just you know, keeping communication with the resident and to ensure that they understand what's going on with the process. But yeah, 48 hours is typical standard.

SPEAKER_00 10:41

And 48 hours is very different, Jason, than before lunch. So, you know, there's time there.

SPEAKER_01 10:47

Yeah, it is definitely time.

SPEAKER_02 10:50

Definitely. Um, is there any training that you give to your maintenance employees when they first start with the company as a maintenance employee to make sure that that standard is standard is is clearly outlined, or is it um is that just something that's kind of brought up in the in the the meetings, the weekly meetings with your team?

SPEAKER_01 11:10

Um a little bit of both. So uh we're well right now it's a great example. So um we have you know been sending my service tech. We've actually been sending him out to a couple of properties this last couple months to kind of help them, you know, get things together, you know, maybe do some cleaning or help get caught up on service requests because you know we don't have a lot of residents here, so I want to make sure that you know his time is being you know used appropriately. So he actually spent the last two days at another property here in Austin, and he came back today and he's like, Oh my gosh, I just learned so much. And you know, he got to spend time with other service supervisors and other regionals and other community managers that were there helping as well. So there is some really good on-the-job training. Um, but then also too, we do have like our orientations that we take the Gray Star. Um, you know, working very closely with service supervisor here on sites, um, our maintenance supervisor, our regional maintenance supervisor also it's a very, you know, he's also very involved as well. They have their monthly service supervisor meetings, so it's it's it's yes, we we have a lot of different avenues, so it's it's definitely good blends of training for sure.

SPEAKER_02 12:16

Uh definitely. So you talked about your regional maintenance team as well. Do they come in and help support and and meet with their team and give training from time to time?

SPEAKER_01 12:26

Uh yeah, they do. Um, yeah, no, they're very, very supportive. Um, anytime we ever need anything, they're right there to respond to us. Um with Graystar, we do also have like a yearly inspection that they perform on the property, that they just they dive into every aspect of the property from you know Capital X to how the shop's running to you know, balconies, ACs, and everything like that. So no, they're they're very supportive in that aspect. Anytime I've ever reached out to him on an issue, it's a immediate response, it's it's right there, it's giving the support that I need. So we're very blessed to have that for sure.

SPEAKER_02 13:00

That's good. How often do you meet with your supervisor to you know level set? And I know you said you meet with a team as a group and do your huddles. Like, do you have one-on-ones with your supervisor to kind of make sure that you guys are both on the same page?

SPEAKER_01 13:15

Yes, if not, if not once a day, multiple times a day. So he um he he's in he's he's with me uh quite a lot. So um it's me and him basically communicate with construction almost every single day. So yeah, he he's definitely my right-hand man when it comes to the property, so it's nice to have. So um, yeah, we I even after work, we're constantly texting about issues and trying to make sure that we know we have a good game plan going forward. So, because he's very much um he he's definitely one of those guys. He really thinks that his work is what's gonna set him apart from other people. So, and what I like about him though is like yes, he's quick, but also too, he doesn't sacrifice quality. So that was one of the things I you know why I hired him was for that reason. Because that's my mindset as well.

SPEAKER_02 14:04

So do you do you go uh walk vacant apartments with the mate, your maintenance supervisor?

SPEAKER_01 14:10

Yes. A lot. Um, especially like when we're um you know turning units from construction, we go take a look at them. Um about once a week I do pull like a handful of vacants just to I don't I mean, not to be mean to him, but I just pull a couple, like, hey, let's go walk these and see what they look like. So um he he's definitely he definitely stays on his toes a little bit, but no, yeah, we we definitely go and walk them. I try to get out of the office and get on the property to make sure that I one have a good understanding of what's going on.

SPEAKER_02 14:39

Good. Because that I think that's uh vital to the success of the property is the office team getting out and walking vacants or or spending time with the maintenance team to be able to make sure that we're we're seeing the same thing and we're talking the same language. So it's always a good good example. So um, do you uh just personal question do you walk all the the mate the mechanical spaces too? Or is it just you walk vacants in common areas?

SPEAKER_01 15:05

Um I'll go walk the mechanical things, but uh I couldn't really couldn't answer. If you asked me to find something, I'd be like, that's I don't know. So um, but no, yeah, we do as well. Um, I mean, just uh today we were in our pool room trying to make sure all that's good to go. So we're trying to get our pool turned over to us. So um do I know what what pump and what pipe goes to where? I don't, but hey, uh laid eyes on it, I don't see any leaks, and that I hear everything's running, so that that works for me. So as long as he understands that, you know, or he tells me, like, hey, we're great, yeah, I have the faith in him, that we're we're good to go.

SPEAKER_02 15:42

So I think it's a big part of it though, because if you know everything that the maintenance team is working on, you know, you know that there's a morning walk that they have to do in the mechanical spaces, you know they gotta clean up the front of the property, you know all those pieces, then you're you're gonna understand the the pull and the the direction that the maintenance team is gonna have to go in on a regular basis. So it helps to then understand, oh, they have 30 service requests and they have 10 turns that they're working on. So it helps out a lot.

SPEAKER_00 16:11

You know, you talked earlier, Wade, about how you prioritize the time that each job should take, each work order might take. And I'm just curious how you kind of learn that. Because in a way, you're learning how to speak maintenance by doing that over time. I'm sure it's from your supervisor as well, your maintenance supervisor as well, being so close to him. Sort of how did that, how did you come to kind of get a sense of what time these jobs should take?

SPEAKER_01 16:38

I mean, going and cleaning apartments myself. Like, I mean, I know you I use that as an example, but I mean, I've I've picked up a broom in a mop before. Hey, this this clean needs to get done before this move in, so I went and done it myself. But also too, like trying to trial and error, you know, sometimes we we don't get the best employees, and I know y'all talked, you know, with Chris a little bit about that last month, and um it's it's when a service tech takes a workboard's like, well, I'm gonna go do this clean real quick, and I don't see him for two hours. Like, you know, that's it's it's really much trial and error, but also kind of doing the job yourself. Um, you know, one time I didn't have a service tech. I just had a service supervisor at my um one of my properties, and a resident, she clogged her sink and she lost a ring down there. It was a whole mess. And I'm like, you know what, at this point, I've changed I've done it before, I'm gonna go do it. So yeah, no, I I went to the apartment and I, you know, the little pipe that goes down and it goes up and this and that. I just unscrewed it, emptied it out, put it up, and then screwed it all back in and it works. We're great. So I mean it didn't take somebody to go in, you know, it didn't take you know 30 minutes to or an hour to do that. It was a simple just like, hey, let's get this clog undone. So a little bit of trial and error, but also too, yeah, you know, you have honest service supervisors that have conversations with you to like, hey, like this AC is gonna take me about an hour or however long it's gonna take, but hey, this little this clog right here, I'm gonna go in there for five minutes, we'll get it done.

SPEAKER_02 18:03

So like we're talking about, like we're talking about, it's important to make sure that the expectation is clear. You know, it it maintenance tech can go in an apartment and change out one part, and you know, it starts to cool down, and they can say, okay, we're done and move off to the next service request. But to to just take a couple more seconds to wait for a little bit longer just to verify and make sure that that was the true fix. I've had I've had maintenance employees, they they go in an apartment and they fix one thing and they think that that solved the issue and then they run off, and then the resident comes home from work. And like you said, it's a reputation, and now it's it's still broken. So they don't care that we tried to fix one thing.

SPEAKER_01 18:42

Yeah, no, that's a great example too, and that's what I love about Monster Supervisor. I we've we've had a couple of AC things go on here, nothing crazy, but that he says it all the time is like, hey, I I fixed this issue, and then I turned the AC' like super low, and then about an hour later I went in and checked on it again, and hey, the AC is cooling, so I fixed the AC, we're all good to go. So it is about that follow-up. It is making sure that the job, and again, it's doing you know, it's doing things the right way the first time. Because if you do it, you know, and you you don't have to go back every time. Or and then two, some I have seen in the past where people do speed through or they don't do their best job on it, and then you know, a couple days later they're behind on work orders now because the same jobs they did two days before are now back in their bucket and they're having to go back to those apartments. So just taking the time to ensure that the quality is there is going to just save you in the long run.

SPEAKER_02 19:31

Yeah. So good to answer our question, what does good work look like? I think it would you have to utilize your your Kingsley scores, you have to utilize your uh surveys from your residents if they call it and you know, if if you don't have if you're not using Kingsley, if you're a property management company and you rely on emails, right? It's you're you're looking at that response and that communication from the residents saying, hey, everything's fine with my apartment, I really appreciate everything you're doing. That should be the temperature gauge to be able to figure out if your maintenance team is working efficiently and they're doing the right quality work versus just trying to speed through and get things done as quickly as possible.

SPEAKER_01 20:10

Yeah, and it's also following up the residents, you know, here as well, is like when a work order gets closed out, and we try our best to call the residents back, be like, hey, is everything good? Because obviously, again, here in a little bit, they're gonna get that survey when the work order gets closed out. So it's also, you know, putting face to the name, giving them a call, especially on things that are that are major. Like we do have a small league or we do have some AC issues, like it's just keeping in constant communication with the resident to ensure that that they are happy. And I think that's uh also another piece of the the satisfaction puzzle, right? Like, yeah, we're here to do a job, but also too, we want people to love where they live. We want people to stay, we want to retain that retention. And and doing that's gonna be, you know, first off is making sure they love the office team. That's why they sign the lease, but also too, to get them to stay is gonna be your maintenance team. It's gonna be how well they're taken care of. And if you don't set those expectations very early on, then obviously, you know, people are gonna leave. And it's about how they're taken care of after they move in that matters.

SPEAKER_02 21:08

Sure. I've I've walked some offices in the past and seen uh they take surveys, uh good, you know, five-star surveys, and they post, they print them and put them up on a bulletin board. And you know, sometimes maintenance employees, you know, they don't check their emails or they're not, you know, they don't have as much time to spend on digging into Kingsley and seeing what's going on. So I think it's amazing to see when office teams post those things, and we can be able to give the recognition, but also be able to reinforce the behaviors that are gonna make us successful.

SPEAKER_01 21:38

So yeah, for sure. And even like what we do a little cute thing here too. So we get little bags of popcorn and we write on there, like we do do like little printouts, like little survey cards, and it's like, hey, we popped in. Uh how do we how do how do we do? Tell us tell us how everything went. So um even also too making those little efforts, and you know, when that they see their name pop up on something like that, you know, that they they feel good about the job as well.

SPEAKER_02 22:01

So that's great. Becca, I don't know if you uh have any questions or anything came up on our live stream.

SPEAKER_00 22:09

No, but um we will have another episode of How to Speak Maintenance on August 26th of neck of you know the next month, the fourth Wednesday of the month at 1215. So we hope you will join us again then.

SPEAKER_02 22:25

Uh thank you for your time, Wade. I really appreciate you and your insight, and it's gonna really help our listeners to better understand exactly how we can be able to make sure our teams know what good work looks like. So thanks for your time.

SPEAKER_01 22:38

Yeah, of course. Thank you all so much.

SPEAKER_00 22:40

Thanks, everybody. We'll see you next time.