From Binders to Bytes

Melissa Hastings remembers when restoration training meant thick 4-inch binders with typewritten Times New Roman font and VHS tapes.

“You would sit there and you would watch the people on the tapes do carpet cleaning or stretching or carpet dyeing,” she recalled. “And then you would just go out and ride along with somebody in a truck and let them show you how to do what you saw in the video.”

That system worked for decades because workers arrived with foundational skills. They’d grown up around tool sheds, worked on farms, and cranked wrenches with relatives. Training just filled gaps in restoration-specific techniques, not fundamental hands-on skills.

But most restoration companies still use that same system while hiring from a workforce where many have never held a wrench.

In a recent Cleanfax + KnowHow webinar, Hastings joined Leighton Healey and Travis Martin of KnowHow to discuss why this mismatch is killing employee retention, and what smart companies are doing about it.

The ‘unhandy’ generation

Leighton Healey, CEO of KnowHow, who’s built and scaled multiple people-powered companies, has watched the workforce shift dramatically. He jokingly called the incoming generation “the unhandy generation.”

“Not a lot of young people growing up today [have] parents with tool sheds, or head out to the farm or go work or crank wrenches with Uncle Nick,” he explained. “That’s becoming more and more uncommon.”

These aren’t inferior workers. They’re digital natives whose brains are wired differently based on the technology they grew up using. Generation X learned through step-by-step instructional videos, so they prefer structured, sequential content. Millennials came of age Googling everything—they think in keywords and search terms.

Generation Z grew up with Siri and ChatGPT. “They don’t think in keywords. They think in questions because they’re used to talking to artificial intelligence,” noted Travis Martin, vice president at KnowHow.

Try to train a Gen Z brain with Gen X methods, and the training fails. Not because the worker is lazy, but because the delivery method doesn’t match how their mind processes information.

The accelerating technology disconnect

This mismatch is getting worse, not better. Tech companies are spending trillions on AI infrastructure that will further reshape how young people interact with information. “What used to come every five to six years, a significant transition, the pace is going to be so accelerated that there will be a game-changing technology introduced probably quarterly if not at least biannually,” Healey warned.

Young workers will regularly ask about new tools and technologies, and companies that can’t adapt will lose talent to those that can.

Training as a recruitment tool

College enrollment has dropped significantly over the last 15 years. Smart people are choosing skilled trades because the economics make sense—better pay, less debt, tangible skills that can’t be outsourced.

But these workers evaluate opportunities differently from previous generations.

“People are coming into the job interview or they’re searching job postings to see what type of education, continuing education, professional development, and even personal development is available,” Hastings observed. “They need to know that they are going to receive something in exchange for their time and their effort.”

Your training program has become your primary recruiting weapon. Companies with strong development systems attract higher-caliber candidates. Those relying on outdated methods get whoever shows up.

This creates a vicious cycle: poor training attracts weaker candidates, who struggle more with inadequate systems, reinforcing the belief that “workers today just aren’t as good.

The personal cost of poor training

Poor training doesn’t just hurt recruitment; it also traps you in your business. “What is downstream of not having a sufficient training program?” Healey asked. A business that is highly dependent on a small number of people. Your health, your marriage, your family, all of them are experiencing the strain of businesses that are too dependent on you, he said.

When you can’t develop workers who execute consistently without constant oversight, you become the bottleneck. Every vacation gets interrupted. Every evening includes work calls.

Effective training creates independence—workers who can handle standard situations without escalation and systems that function when you’re not there.

The nicrolearning solution

The answer isn’t fighting modern brains. Instead, it’s designing training that works with them.

“Don’t stick them in a room with a TV or a computer all day and have them watch videos for eight hours,” Hastings warned. “They’re not going to learn anything.”

Her solution? Create short, focused content that can be absorbed quickly. “Keep your videos small. Keep your learnings short. Have little knowledge checks in between, but change it up because nobody has good attention spans these days.”

Start by documenting what you know now that you didn’t know when you started. Ask current crews what they struggled with in their first 30 days. Mix delivery methods throughout each day: Hands-on practice, team discussions, brief online modules, and written materials.

Most importantly, build clear advancement paths. Show new hires examples of people who started where they are and where those people went over 18 months.

What hasn’t changed

The core services remain the same. Restorers still deliver service through people’s expertise and effort. Customer service still matters. The equipment functions the same way.

What’s changed is how people expect to learn and develop. Companies that adapt their training to match how today’s workers actually process information will build workforce advantages their competitors can’t match.

The choice is clear: Evolve your training systems to work with modern brains, or keep losing workers to companies that do.

Hastings’ VHS tapes worked for that generation. The question is: What will work for today’s worker?