Jana is our Office Administrator and is the “hub” of All Elements. Most of what we do passes by her at some time. As office Administrator Jana has a unique perspective of All Elements. We affectionately refer to her as designated company Mother, the Gate Keeper or “Roz” from the movie Monsters Inc., imagine the line, “Mike Wazowski, where’s your paperwork?”. She’s quick with a smile, a smart remark or to hound you for a missing receipt.
1. What is one thing you would like building owners to know about (making repairs to) their roof?
Don’t do less of a repair because of the initial cost, if you do the minimum repair it usually ends up costing more in the long run. We see buildings where we continue to make small repairs around the building where a larger repair or a replacement would make the leak issues go away.
2. What are the most common problems you see?
I’m not allowed to go on roofs, but I see every repair photo and every photo of every installation. Deteriorating materials on roofs due to weathering and the age of the roof. Most of the roofs we look at are beyond their expected lifespan.
3. What are the worst things to put off repairing?
Small leaks left unattended usually turn into bigger problems and become more costly. When we see small or occasional leaks addressed, it saves the building owner from a larger project in the future. Removing and replacing insulation, roof decking or framing is much more costly than a repair.
4. How long have you been in roofing?
I will be with All Elements 3 years in August. Now while I’m out driving around, I have caught myself observing all the different roofs on buildings instead of the building itself.
5. What is the thing you’ve done at All Elements that has made you feel the best about doing it?
Assisting with implementing our new repair software to make repairs go more smoothly, make things more efficient for our customers, and opening communication with our technicians and our customers. In May 2017 we installed a cloud based App, imported all of our customers, entered material and labor costs, trained our Service department, the Foremen, Production manager and Estimators.
We operate a paperless service department. This allows a service request to go from the point of contact to dispatched in minutes. On the other end it allows a closed service request to be invoiced or warrantied in minutes. The Service Tech knows all the details of the request right away. This has made our service department much more efficient and the response time for customers much shorter. It caused some tense days in May of last year, but now we all think it was worth it.
6. What’s one roof “hack” you want to share?
As I said, I’m not allowed to go to the roofs so I don’t have one.
7. What project is the one you will always remember?
The projects at both Grand Casino Mille Lacs and Hinckley. For all of 2017 and 2018 we have multiple projects in progress for multiple General Contractors and the Mille Lacs Band of Ojibwe. Keeping the contracts, change orders, labor and job costs going to the correct project can be challenging.
8. What’s one piece of safety advise?
Always know your surroundings.
9. What’s your favorite lunch spot you’ve discovered?
Bluestone Grill
10. What’s your favorite song on the radio right now?
I Lived It by Blake Shelton or maybe Humble and Kind by Tim McGraw