Phoenix Build Expo 2026 | Keynotes & Seminars

Your P&L says you made money last year. Your bank account says something different. That gap — between what you earned on paper and what actually sits in the bank — is the single most common problem in construction, and it has nothing to do with how hard you're working or how many jobs you're closing. Using real, live examples from real contracting businesses, this keynote lays out exactly why profitable companies run out of cash, and the specific playbook to fix it — without buying another piece of software, without raising your prices, and without taking on debt to bridge the gap. This isn't theory. It's the exact framework being used inside contracting businesses right now to turn "profitable on paper" into cash you can actually see.

Learning Objectives:

1. Identify the specific point in your business where profit is quietly leaking out between the job and the bank account.

2. Learn the account structure that separates true profit from operating cash — so you always know what's actually yours to spend.

3. See a live, real-numbers example of a contractor who fixed this exact problem without raising a single price.

4. Leave with the first two moves to make this week to start closing your own cash flow gap.

Most businesses approach government contracting by searching for posted solicitations and responding to bids. However, successful government contractors understand that the procurement process begins long before an opportunity is publicly released. Agency missions, budgets, market research, acquisition strategies, and stakeholder collaboration all influence purchasing decisions well in advance of a Request for Proposal.

This session provides a practical framework for understanding the government acquisition process from the agency's perspective. Attendees will learn how requirements are developed, who influences buying decisions, why market research and early engagement matter, and how to identify opportunities before they reach the bidding stage. The presentation also explores the growing role of artificial intelligence in market research, opportunity identification, and proposal development, while emphasizing the continued importance of relationships, trust, and strategic positioning.

Whether you're a contractor, architect, engineer, manufacturer, construction professional, or business owner looking to expand into the public sector, you'll leave with a clearer understanding of how government agencies make purchasing decisions and practical strategies to position your business for long-term success in the government marketplace.

Customers often focus on the lowest bid they receive. Contractors spend more time getting as low a number as possible as opposed to making a good profit on projects. Contractors are capable of winning work but struggle in securing a reasonable profit on their projects. The result is focusing on bidding and quoting as opposed to full customer engagement to drive higher profits. There are very effective methods to increase margins within a solid sales effort. These methods will be presented and examples of their success related. Contractors and suppliers alike will benefit from this detailed information.

You already earn enough revenue. The problem was never how much money comes in — it's how much of it you actually get to keep. This keynote is built for the contractor owner who is tired of living deposit to deposit, tired of watching real revenue disappear before it ever becomes real profit. Using live, real-world examples, we'll show you exactly how cash-rich contractors are built — not through bigger jobs or higher prices, but through a small number of specific shifts to how revenue is captured, protected, and kept inside the business. You'll leave knowing exactly what separates a contractor who's always chasing the next check from one who never has to again.

Learning Objectives:

1. Understand the difference between revenue and Real Revenue — and why that distinction is the root of the deposit-to-deposit cycle.
2. See a live example of a contracting business that ended its own cash cycle without changing pricing or volume.
3. Learn the specific account structure that protects revenue the moment it comes in, before it can leak out.
4. Leave with a clear, personal definition of what "cash-rich" actually looks like for your business — and the first shift to make toward it.

In this class we will layout how to determine what associations to join, how to work them and get business from your involvement. The single greatest way to find grouped customers and network contacts is right in your backyard association! Work them to the fullest and you'll never make a cold call again!

https://www.tomwoodcocksealthedeal.com

What if design could help you win a construction project before your prospective client ever asks for a bid?

Most contractors think of design as something that happens after a project has been secured. But design can also be a powerful marketing tool for generating interest, demonstrating expertise, building relationships, and getting in front of prospective clients.

In this session, Michael shares how he used conceptual design and visual communication to develop relationships and win projects through his own design-build business, as well as case studies of other companies applying this method, barriers, and opportunities.

Attendees will learn practical ways to identify opportunities, approach potential clients with ideas, and use design to build trust before a project goes out to bid.

Course Outline:

1. Rethinking Design as Marketing: Why design can be more effective than traditional advertising for generating interest and building trust.

2. Finding Projects Before They Become Bids: How to identify opportunities and reach property owners, facility managers, developers, and other decision-makers earlier.

3. Using Conceptual Design to Start Conversations: How preliminary sketches, visualizations, and project concepts can communicate value and create interest.

4. Turning Design Into Relationships: How to use design ideas to demonstrate expertise, educate prospective clients, and establish trust without giving away full design services.

5. Converting Interest Into Work: Moving from initial conversations to paid planning, proposals, and secured construction projects.

Discover how to use ChatGPT effectively to reduce marketing costs and generate better leads. Learn the prompts that improve AI visibility, strengthen your website’s credibility, eliminate ineffective marketing messages, and identify hidden opportunities using Search Console. Leave with practical strategies you can implement immediately to attract more qualified customers.

Course Outline

• Why most companies collect data but never use it
 • Turning business data into actionable insights
 • Using AI to improve accountability and performance
 • Coaching technicians and teams with real time feedback
 • Building dashboards that drive action
 • Creating a data driven culture

Learning Outcomes

Attendees will learn how AI can help leaders make faster, better decisions while improving team performance.

This class will provide contractors with a practical understanding of how insurance companies assess construction firms, determine pricing, and evaluate risk. Attendees will learn how underwriters view:

Claims frequency and severity

Safety culture and operational discipline

Financial stability and growth trends

Management quality and leadership

Subcontractor risk transfer

Fleet and driver exposures

Jobsite controls and documentation

Contract language and insurance requirements

The session will also cover practical steps contractors can take to improve their insurance profile, strengthen carrier relationships, reduce long-term insurance costs, and position their companies for growth.

Designed specifically for general contractors and specialty trades, this presentation translates the insurance

Cost estimating is one of the most important tasks for any contractor, as these estimates represent a prediction of a future occurrence with so many uncertainties. Being too conservative will reduce the chance of winning a contract, while being too liberal will reduce profitability and may even lead to a loss. Failing to pay attention to certain items can make a big difference in the estimate accuracy.

While no one is perfect, the contractor can follow a few tips to optimize the estimate; minimizing risks and uncertainties and maximizing profit. This seminar takes a chronological tour from project inception to completion, providing valuable tips that tend to reduce risks and uncertainties and draw the contractor’s attention to issues that optimize the estimate and maximize profit.

How to use federal programs to fast-track your revenue and legally bypass the bidding wars

Want to stop fighting over low-margin local bids and break into high-paying federal construction contracts? The U.S. Federal Government is the world's largest buyer of construction services, and by law, billions of dollars are locked away exclusively for firms utilizing specific federal programs.

If you aren’t aggressively leveraging certifications like 8(a), HUBZone, WOSB, and VOSB, you are leaving massive, guaranteed revenue on the table for your competitors. Even better—programs like Joint Ventures and the SBA Mentor-Protégé agreement allow you to team up with larger contractors to win massive federal projects you couldn't qualify for alone.

In this high-impact session, we strip away the complex government bureaucracy and give you the exact roadmap to position your construction firm for elite federal status.

What you will learn:

• The Big Three Catalysts: How to get positioned on the GSA Schedule, capture emergency FEMA funding, and leverage the 8(a) program for sole-source (no-bid) contracts.
• The Teaming Secret Weapon: How to legally use Joint Ventures and the Mentor-Protégé program to bid on massive federal projects using a larger partner's past performance.
• The Target Demographics: How to stack HUBZone, Veteran-Owned (VOSB), and Women-Owned (WOSB) status to eliminate 95% of your competition.
• The Fatal Compliance Trap: The #1 reason construction firms lose their federal certifications mid-project—and how to bulletproof your business against audit failures.

Stop guessing at government paperwork. Come learn the step-by-step framework to unlock a steady stream of highly profitable, recession-proof federal work.

Everyone wants to LEAD. Few understand the secret: powerful leaders know when to speak—and when to stay silent. In this dynamic class, Dr. Jacob Hawk reveals how saying less can strengthen your influence, sharpen your impact, and elevate your leadership. Discover the art of leading more by saying less.

It is paramount that contractors realize that the most important aspect of their business is sales. Without them you have nothing. Yet, the amount of attention given to sales by most contractors is minimal. This results in low profits and the ups and downs of revenue. It doesn’t matter how good your marketing is or how efficiently you run your business if you’re not closing deals. We’ll get you closing more projects at higher profits.

 You don't need to be technical. You don't need another piece of software you'll abandon in a month. What you need is something that acts like a second brain — a built-in assistant that takes the repeatable, energy-draining work off your plate so you can get back to running the business instead of being buried inside it. In this live, hands-on workshop, we'll build a real AI-powered delegation system in front of you — no scripts, no fluff, just a working tool you can start using the moment you walk out the door. This isn't about chasing every new AI trend. It's about turning AI into the one thing most contractor owners have never had: a system that remembers, reminds, and executes so you don't have to carry it all in your head.

Learning Objectives:

1. Identify the three categories of repeatable owner-level tasks in your business that are safe to delegate to an AI assistant today — and the ones that are not.
2. Build a working AI delegation prompt live in the room, using your own business as the example, that you can put to use the same day.
3. Learn the difference between an AI tool and an AI system — and why only one of them actually gives you hours back.
4. Leave with a specific, written plan for the first 8 hours per week you will reclaim, and what you will do with that time instead.

Contractors are often told financing can help close more projects, but the wrong option can leave homeowners with higher costs, smaller projects or a process that makes them walk away. Learn what to look for in financing and how to choose options that help you win more of the right projects.

How to put AI to work in your business this week. The mindset shift (treat it like an employee, not a search bar), how to set up a workspace with roles and your real company docs, a simple prompt framework, and two starter plays: reviewing sub bids in 90 seconds and drafting a scope of work in two minutes. Everyone leaves with something they can run Monday.

Course outline:

1. Mapping the end-to-end customer journey to eliminate bottlenecks

2. Implementing standardized digital workflows for scheduling, budgeting, and change orders

3. Turning project data into marketing assets that generate referrals and new leads

4. Action-ready tools and templates attendees can deploy immediately

Everyone wants to be the best in their field, but becoming the GOAT requires more than technical skill. The difference-maker? Skills most companies don’t know how to hire for. In this class, Dr. Jacob Hawk reveals how to stand out, rise above the competition, and become unforgettable in any industry.

Building and sustaining a safety culture is a practical, leadership-focused session designed for business owners, executives, and safety professionals who want measurable results, not just policies on paper. This course breaks down the core elements of an effective safety culture, including leadership accountability, employee engagement, hazard recognition systems, behavioral reinforcement, and regulatory alignment. Attendees will learn how to move from reactive compliance to proactive risk management, reduce incidents rates, strengthen morale, and protect their organization from operational and legal exposure. This session includes real world examples and actionable strategies participants can implement immediately.

Learn how to fix the two biggest marketing leaks costing contractors revenue: poor website engagement and slow lead follow-up. Discover how AI can improve website performance, automate personalized responses, re-engage lost prospects, and increase close rates. Build a smarter marketing system that converts more leads without increasing your advertising budget.

• Why most contractors lose 80% of potential reviews
 • The hidden connection between reviews and revenue growth
 • How to capture reviews while the technician is still on site
 • Building a referral engine from every completed job
 • Measuring ROI from reviews and reputation management
 • Creating a repeatable system that scales across every technician

Learning Outcomes

Attendees will leave with a framework to increase review volume, improve online reputation, generate more referrals, and reduce reliance on paid advertising.

An introductory class explaining "no-bid" pathways in federal contracting, with definitions, eligibility, where they appear, and compliance basics. Participants will learn how relationships and market research factor in, and where to find authoritative rules and examples to capture government contracts.

In this energizing speech, leadership expert and author Janet Polach, Ph.D. reveals how leaders can break free from the trap of constant busy-ness and lead with a strategic mindset as well as greater clarity, focus, and trust.Leveraging her proven strategic leadership model, Janet introduces the seven essential mindsets of expert leaders and the habits that drive sustainable results. The audience will gain practical tools they can use immediately to sharpen decision-making, foster trust with their teams, and shift from reactive execution to strategic impact — transforming overload into alignment and performance that lasts.

Learn how to build a marketing system that consistently generates qualified leads. Discover the five channels every contractor should understand—Google Ads, Meta, retargeting, SEO, and AI search optimization—and how each supports business growth. Gain practical strategies for allocating your marketing budget, improving ROI, and creating a predictable pipeline of new opportunities.

The next level. How to set up AI agents that run on their own every morning (overnight bid intake, job-cost rollups), and the big one — building a single, always-current cost catalog from the invoices and bids you already have. This is where AI stops being a novelty and starts protecting margin.

Getting a product specified often begins long before a contractor requests a quote. Architects, interior designers, and other design professionals regularly influence which products and manufacturers are included in construction projects.

For building product suppliers, one of the most effective ways to develop these relationships is through education.

But a successful lunch-and-learn is much more than a product presentation. It's an opportunity to become a trusted resource, understand upcoming projects, and make it easier for designers to confidently specify your products.

Drawing on his experience as both a specifier and product sales representative, Michael explains how suppliers can use lunch-and-learns and other educational approaches to build lasting relationships with design professionals that may lead to specifications in drawings.

Attendees will learn how to identify the right firms, create presentations that designers want to attend, and develop a follow-up process that generates specification opportunities and new sales.

Course Outline:

1. Understanding How Products Get Specified: How architects, designers, and other project stakeholders influence product selection and why relationships matter.

2. Finding the Right Design Firms: How to identify architects and specifiers working on projects where your products are relevant.

3. Getting Invited to Present: Practical ways to approach firms, introduce educational topics, and secure lunch-and-learn opportunities.

4. Creating Lunch-and-Learns That Build Trust: How to provide useful education rather than a sales pitch, while establishing your company as a valuable technical resource.

5. Making Your Products Easier to Specify: Providing drawings, three-part specifications, product data, and other resources that help designers confidently incorporate your products.

6. Turning Education Into Specification Opportunities: How to follow up, support active projects, build recurring relationships, and measure results.

A candid, practitioner-led panel on real-world AI in construction and government contracting: what's changing in workflows, compliance, bidding, and client expectations. Leaders share wins, stumbles, and practical guardrails so small and midsized firms can evaluate where AI fits-today and in the next 12 months.

Good marketing is meaningless if you don’t know how to close leads. Contractors spend significant dollars on marketing to produce leads. It’s necessary to use all the vehicles in regard to social media, A.I., web and e-newsletter marketing to gain leads. We’ll teach you how to raise your close rate and improve your ROI on that marketing investment. Marketing is NOT sales but can effectively lead to sales if leads are worked properly. Find out how.

Contractor schedules shape project planning, cash flow, procurement, and resource management—but CPM schedules often rely on assumptions that can create risk. This session offers practical tips for building and maintaining accurate, optimized schedules from day one through execution. Learn how to strengthen forecasting, improve reliability, and use your schedule as a powerful tool for project control and performance.

Every contractor owner is being told they're falling behind if they're not "using AI." Much of it is not true, and most of it is a distraction from the real problem. In this live workshop, we cut through the hype and show you the truth: most contracting businesses don't have an AI problem — they have a system problem, and AI without a system just makes chaos move faster. Using a live demo, we'll show you exactly where AI does and doesn't belong in a contracting business, and how to build the system underneath it first, so that when you do use AI, it actually works.

Learning Objectives:

1. Identify the difference between a business problem AI can solve and a business problem only a system can solve.
2. See a live demo of AI layered on top of an existing business system — and understand why it fails without that system in place.
3. Learn the specific, narrow list of tasks where AI creates real time savings for a contractor owner today.
4. Leave with a one-page plan for what to build first — system or AI tool — based on where your business actually stands.

This class will provide insight into how safety is more than compliance.  It is a strategic business investment that directly impacts an organization’s performance, profitability, and long-term success.  This class explores how effective safety leadership creates a measurable value by reducing risk, preventing costly incidents, improving employee engagement, and strengthening operation excellence.

 Participants will learn how safety professionals contribute to the bottom line by identifying hazards before they become losses, using data decision-making, improving workplace culture, and partnerships with leadership to achieve business objectives.  The course will examine true costs of workplace incidents, the financial impact of proactive safety programs, and how organization can demonstrate the return on investment (ROI) of safety initiatives.

The class is designed for business leaders, operations managers, HR professionals, and safety practitioners.  This session provides practical strategies for transforming safety from a perceived expense into a competitive advantage.

Contractors are often told financing can help close more projects, but the wrong option can leave homeowners with higher costs, smaller projects or a process that makes them walk away. Learn what to look for in financing and how to choose options that help you win more of the right projects.