Bob Wilkins, ISL vice president of operations and owner of Wilkins Mechanical Service in Bedford, N.H., helped kick off the three-day meeting by hosting an all-day HVAC Business Management class (one of several designed for personnel from all job classifications). Wilkins told attendees that he was going to keep the instructions simple and "break business basics down to the most common denominator."

The core of his presentation was Key Performance Indicators (KPI), which allows a business to grow through the daily tracking of benchmark figures. Wilkins said these figures provide a platform for understanding where the business is financially on a daily basis. "They also allow you to understand where the company is headed in the short term," he added.