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Innovative Group × Monte Power & Electric
Working portal · Prepared for Abraham

You built the crew. Let's build the business around it.

Monte Power & Electric does work people call back for. The trade is not the problem. What is missing is the side of the company that decides what a job should cost, when the money lands, who gets hired next, and which doors are worth knocking on. This is how we would run that with you.

Prepared for
Abraham, Monte Power & Electric
From
Chris, Andy & Michael
Subject
Running the business side
Status
Draft for discussion
Meeting notes

Every session, written down.

So nobody has to remember what was said or dig through a recording. Newest at the top, updated within a day of every meeting.

Meeting 01 · August 21, 2026 In person

The framing session. Owner stays owner.

Duration
About 66 minutes
Format
In person, recorded
Purpose
How an advisory relationship would work
Next session
Once the numbers are in

Who was there

Monte Power & Electric

Abraham, Andrea, and family

Innovative Group

Chris Salazar, Andy Seo, Michael Sykora, Blanca Garcia

What we agreed

  • Abraham stays 100% owner, and stays CEO. No equity to IG. Equity is the one thing that cannot be undone, and it is too early for it to be fair. If IG earns it later, Abraham raises it then, not the other way round.
  • The role that is actually missing is an operations manager, reporting to Abraham, growing into a COO as the company does. Not a CEO. The title stays with the founder.
  • IG comes in as advisors, on time, not for a share of the business. Outside the building IG is part of Monte's team, not a vendor. In front of Comcast or PG&E, that is how it gets presented.
  • Foundation before scale. Every decision routes through Abraham today because there is no system to route it through. Build the system first, then he chooses what he spends the day on.
  • The tools are included. Job costing models, ROI calculators, receipt and invoice automation, the integrations. Monte pays for IG's time, not the tooling.
  • Abraham's own target is $120,000 a month, which is roughly $4,000 to $6,000 a day. That is the number the quoting system is built to serve.

The priority list, in order

  • Quoting. Systemize it so a price is not a judgment call in the moment, and so someone else can quote without Abraham in the room.
  • Job costing. Margin per job and per job type, so it is clear which work is worth taking.
  • Cash. A forecast covering payroll, materials, insurance, and vehicles against what is actually coming in.
  • Collections and invoice disputes. Clear the rejected codes and stop chasing money at night.
  • Hiring. A plan for the next five, plus healthcare, workers comp, and the vehicles under the company.
  • FiberTel. Build the data and the proposal now, ahead of the renewal.

On FiberTel, specifically

  • The thousand-plus pole transfers that sat for two or three years and are now getting cleared are what put Monte in a position to ask for more. Documented and priced before the renewal conversation, not during it.
  • Payment terms go in writing. A verbal promise should not be what decides when Monte gets paid.
  • Longer arc: a bigger share of the FiberTel rate, then direct with Comcast, then PG&E. Boring and Route 20 work are the routes in, and both get scenario-planned rather than guessed at.
  • Legal counsel on retainer at some point. In the meantime IG works the code book and escalates the genuinely contested items.

Action items

Send the profit and loss, and a balance sheet if one exists. Easiest route is giving Jessica the access she asked for, so QuickBooks produces both automatically.
Owner: Abraham
Pull together where the invoices stand. What is out, what is disputed, what is past thirty days.
Owner: Abraham
Confirm project volume. Roughly 100 in flight, and 40 to 50 completed but not yet billed.
Owner: Abraham
Drop receipt photos into a shared Google Drive folder. IG runs them into a spreadsheet automatically from there.
Owner: Abraham
Text Jessica so she knows to loop IG in once she has access, so Abraham hands things over once rather than twice.
Owner: Chris
Review the numbers and come back with the plan, the order of work, and what it costs. Two to three days once the financials land.
Owner: Innovative Group
Secure a yard or parking for the vehicles and equipment, needed inside two months, plus a second bucket truck.
Owner: Abraham
Bring the laptop to the next session.
Owner: Abraham
Recording
Watch the session
About 66 minutes. Plays in the browser.
What we see

The work is coming in. The business is running on your evenings.

You are the licensed electrician, the estimator, the salesman, the collections department, and the hiring manager. Four of those five jobs happen after the trucks are parked. That is not a discipline problem. It is one person holding five seats.

TODAY WITH US On the tools, on site The part you trained for Quoting and estimating, at night Chasing invoices, at night Hiring, payroll, paperwork On the tools, and running the crew More hours here, not fewer. This is where the money is actually made. YOURS. AND THE LICENSE STAYS YOURS. Quoting · collections · hiring · payroll RUN BY OUR TEAM You approve. You stop doing it at 9pm.
Figure 1 · The point is not fewer hours. It is the right hours.
The three things in the way

Good companies in your trade rarely die from lack of work. They die from these.

01 · The money arrives after the bills do

You offer Net 30 and Net 60 on the bigger commercial jobs, because that is what wins them. Materials get paid up front. The crew gets paid every two weeks. The customer pays in two months. Every large job you win opens that gap wider, and the faster you grow, the wider it gets.

MONEY OUT MONEY IN Materials Day 0 Payroll Day 14 Payroll Day 28 Payroll Day 42 Customer pays Day 60 THE GAP YOU FUND YOURSELF
Figure 2 · Four paydays before one payment. That is the whole problem, drawn.
The rule of thumb

Contractors generally need to keep about a tenth of a year's revenue sitting in cash just to operate. Grow the company and that number grows with it, before a single extra dollar of profit shows up. This is the single most common way a busy, well-run, genuinely profitable shop in your trade ends up in trouble.

02 · Four licensed electricians is a ceiling

Two journeymen and two masters is a real crew, and it is also a hard limit on how much work can be delivered in a year. More demand does not become more revenue on its own. It becomes longer lead times, rushed jobs, and turned-down calls. The way through is hiring, and hiring in California is a compliance job as much as a recruiting one: workers comp classifications, overtime rules, break rules, and the safety record that follows the company around.

03 · The big doors are locked from the inside

Work like a corporate campus does not get won on a handshake and good reviews. It gets won by passing a vendor screen before anyone reads your bid. Right now we do not know whether Monte would pass, and that is worth finding out before a meeting, not after.

Safety record 3 years of history Written safety plan And someone who owns it More insurance Above your $2M Bonding capacity A number, verified FOUR LOCKS. ALL OF THEM OPENABLE. NONE OF THEM FAST.
Figure 3 · The vendor screen most large buyers run before they read a bid.
Worth saying plainly

Winning a large job on 60 day terms without the cash arranged to carry it is worse than not winning it. We would rather help you open these locks in the right order than walk you into a job that strains the company.

Where it goes

What good looks like, in plain terms.

Not a revenue target on a slide. Things you would actually notice.

In 6 months

You know your numbers

Every job has a cost and a margin you can see. You know which kinds of work make money and which quietly do not. Invoices go out the day work finishes and someone other than you chases them.

In 12 months

The crew has grown, on purpose

You hired against a plan, not a panic. Pay bands exist, so raises are a conversation about a framework instead of a favor. The safety record and the paperwork open the doors that were locked.

In 24 to 36 months

The business runs without your evenings

Monte holds standing agreements with property managers and campuses rather than chasing one job at a time. You take a real vacation and the phone still gets answered. The company is worth something to someone else, whether or not you ever sell it.

The honest end state

A company your size should eventually employ its own operator rather than rent one. We would rather build toward handing this seat to a full-time person you own than be here forever. Saying that up front is the point.

Who runs what

Two lanes. Nobody crosses into yours.

This is the part worth reading twice. You are the licensed contractor. The state expects the license holder to actually supervise the work, and no arrangement we make changes that. So the split is clean.

Stays with you

Abraham
  • The C-10 license, and the responsibility that comes with it
  • Every technical call on every job
  • Quality, and what "code clean" means here
  • The crew, and who is right for it
  • The customers who call because it is you
  • Final say on price, scope, and any job we take

We pick up

Innovative Group
  • Job costing, so margin is visible per job
  • Cash forecasting and collections
  • Estimating discipline and price structure
  • Hiring plan, pay bands, payroll compliance
  • The vendor screens and the bigger relationships
  • Software, permits workflow, and the paperwork trail
On the license, specifically

You remain the qualifying individual. We are not applying to be the licensed contractor, and we would tell you if any part of this required that. If anyone from our side ever becomes an officer of the company, the state requires a filing and fingerprints first, and we would handle that in the open with you.

How we run it

Not one hire. A panel of seats, each with a specialist in it.

You would not put one breaker on a whole building. The business side of Monte is the same: it is four different jobs, and the person who is great at cash is rarely the person who is great at hiring. So we run it the way we run our fractional executive work: a small team, each holding the seat they have actually sat in, on one weekly rhythm with you.

MONTE POWER · BUSINESS PANEL MAIN Abraham · owner and license holder EVERYTHING BELOW ANSWERS TO THIS Money Job costing, cash forecast, collections, pricing IG seat People Hiring plan, pay bands, payroll compliance, raises IG seat Growth Vendor screens, standing agreements, the bigger doors IG seat Systems Software, dispatch, permits, the paperwork trail IG seat
Figure 4 · One main, four circuits. You are still the main.
Why a team rather than one person

This is how our fractional executive practice already works. A seat is held by someone who has run that function, not by a generalist covering four. It also means the engagement does not collapse if one person is on vacation, and you are not betting the company on a single hire being the right fit.

The split, activity by activity

What we would do. What stays with you.

The bar under each item shows roughly how much of the work sits with us versus with Monte. Some things only work if they come from you.

Innovative Group Monte Power
Build job costing and see real marginIG 90% · Monte 10%

We set it up so every job carries its labor, materials, and overhead, then report margin by job type. You tell us how the work actually flows so the model matches reality.

Cash forecast and collectionsIG 85% · Monte 15%

A rolling view of what is coming in and going out, and someone other than you making the follow-up calls. You stay the relationship when a customer needs to hear it from you.

Pricing and estimating structureIG 60% · Monte 40%

We build the structure and the markup logic. The trade knowledge behind an estimate is yours and always will be.

Hiring plan, pay bands, payroll complianceIG 80% · Monte 20%

We build the plan, the bands, and the compliance side. You decide who is right for the crew, because you are the one who has to work next to them.

Vendor screens and prequalificationIG 90% · Monte 10%

The safety plan, the insurance review, the bonding conversation, and the forms. This is paperwork, and it is ours.

The bigger relationships and standing agreementsIG 55% · Monte 45%

We open doors, prepare the material, and sit in the room. You close them. A facilities director wants to look the licensed contractor in the eye, not the consultant.

Quality, code, and every technical decisionMonte 100%

Not ours, not ever. We would not know where to start and it would be wrong if we tried.

The team

Who would actually be in the room.

These are the people on this engagement, not a roster you never meet. The team that wins the work stays through the work.

Lead · money and growth
Chris Salazar
Co-Founder, Innovative Group

Led marketing at VMware, Netgear, and Hitachi before building IG into six specialty teams with a venture arm. Three IPO runs. Holds the CMO chair in our fractional executive practice.

Local business lead
Andy Seo
Specialty Team Leader

Runs IG's local business practice. Built and ships the work behind Monte's site today, plus restaurant and service-business clients across the Bay Area. Your day to day contact.

Growth and pursuit
Michael Sykora
Growth Officer

Growth strategy and the commercial pursuit side. Would own the vendor screens, the prequalification work, and preparing Monte for the larger buyers.

Compliance and risk
Blanca Garcia
Co-Founder

Compliance and legal operations. Payroll rules, licensing filings, insurance and the paperwork that has to be right before it matters, not after.

The bench behind them

Monte would not be buying four people. Six specialty teams sit behind this engagement, and we pull in whoever the problem needs.

David Garcia · Experience and AI Mark Willson · Strategy and accounts Norm deSilva · Operating and strategy Steve Wymer · Executive Partner Viraj Damani · Advisory Council Gray Zhou · Advisory Council Ashlesha Khond · Delivery and project management Andy Mark · Growth strategy Sean Van Tyne · Education and enablement Chris Heuer · Professional services RJ Naugle · Operations and systems

Founded 2021. Six operating companies acquired and integrated. Work delivered across 25 countries. Clients from AWS and SprintRay down to the shop on the corner, which is the range that makes us useful to you.

How it starts

Three steps. The first one is small on purpose.

01

Look under the hood

Four to six weeks. We get the real numbers, build the first job costing view and cash forecast, review how you price, sketch the hiring plan, and check Monte against the vendor screens. You get a plain-language operating plan at the end, and an honest answer about what this should cost and whether it is worth doing at all. If the answer is not yet, we will say so.

02

Run it with you

Our team takes the four seats and works to a weekly rhythm with you. Named targets, reviewed every month: margin per job type, how fast money comes in, revenue per electrician, and progress on the locks. You keep final say on everything that touches the trade.

03

Hand it over

When the numbers support a full-time person in the seat, we run the search, hire them, train them into the systems we built, and step back to a lighter advisory role. The systems stay yours either way.

On cost

We are not putting a number on this page. Quoting a monthly fee before we have seen your books would be guessing, and you would be right not to trust it. Step one is fixed price, small, and gives us both the information to have that conversation properly.

What we would need from you to start

If some of that does not exist in a form you can hand over, that is not a problem and it is not unusual. It is most of the reason this conversation is worth having.

You are already good at the hard part.

The trade takes years to learn. The business side takes a system, and we have built it before. Let's sit down and look at the numbers together.

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