70 – ABC-FEC’s Word of the Year: Grit

In the first episode of 2026, Peter and Sonny discuss how, based on a study of college students in Southern California that found they are unable to perform basic math, we have decided that grit will become ABC-FEC’s word of the year. To keep our relentless progress moving forward, we are instilling grit in our staff to persevere and grit in everything we do.

The Merriam-Webster Dictionary defines grit as: “firmness of mind or spirit, unyielding courage in the face of hardship or danger.

To find the Allysia Finley story in The Wall Street Journal mentioned in this episode, click here.

The full audiovisual version of this episode is available on YouTube: https://youtu.be/vqzl3mYuprg 

“The Obvious Podcast” is a production of ABC Florida East Coast Chapter. Unless otherwise stated, all content reflects the opinions of the guests and hosts.

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Transcript

Sonny Maken 0:09

Welcome to the Obvious Podcast episode number 70. My name is Sonny Maken.

Peter Dyga 0:14

And I'm Peter Dyga, president and CEO at Associated Builders and Contractors Florida East Coast chapter.

Sonny Maken 0:20

You are listening to the very first episode of the podcast in 2026. Happy New Year. Happy New Year. Before just reminding you, Very important.

Peter Dyga 0:30

All opinions are our own, right? That's uh unless we say otherwise. Unless we say otherwise. So which we rarely do. Yeah, because it's just our anyway. Love the show. We ask you to subscribe on any major podcast platform or watch us in action on YouTube. Follow the Obvious Podcast on Instagram, X, and True Social, and now on TikTok. All the links you need are in the show notes. Reach out to us anytime at the Obvious@ abceastflorida.com. And if you're enjoying the ride, help others find us by leaving a review wherever you listen. All right, help us uh achieve new heights in 2026. Happy New Year, happy Friday.

Sonny Maken 1:05

Happy New Year, happy Friday. So I'm very glad to be here. As you know, tomorrow I'm flying out to uh Arizona for IOM. So very exciting. It's uh a course for association management put on by the chamber, U.S. Chamber of Commerce Institute for Organizational Management. Organizational Management. Four-year program. Year two for me this year, so excited about that. Uh, I also want to today's January 2nd. I also want to wish my parents a very happy and my mom's gonna be so mad at this 51st wedding anniversary.

Peter Dyga 1:36

Wow. Congratulations, Manny and Pam. Pam. That's my mom. Yep. Love you, mom and dad. So that's awesome. So well, happy new year 2026. Um what are we gonna talk about today, Sonny? Word of the year, Peter. We're gonna keep to our format of talking about bland spring, yes, you know, inside baseball related stuff.

Sonny Maken 1:58

Exactly. So uh what are we gonna do about the cost of concrete, right?

Peter Dyga 2:03

Yes, let's talk about aggregate and the different We love our supplier members.

Sonny Maken 2:10

Dave, if you're listening, we're a big fan of you. So um so and I know Dave listened. So thanks, Dave.

Peter Dyga 2:17

And we probably should have you on to talk about that. So we should. Yeah, we'll take we'll take live calls. Yeah people asking about the supply of their so anyway.

Sonny Maken 2:27

Um you know, speaking of which, I want to do an episode with Mike uh Bruner as well, uh sort of about his experience in the 80s and 90s.

Peter Dyga 2:34

Yeah, that would be great.

Sonny Maken 2:35

You know, he's got some great stories to tell.

Peter Dyga 2:37

I agree. That would be great. And our big theme this year. We're gonna be ha actually having uh, I think our first life member of ABC uh inducted into uh ABC at their uh Utah Salt Lake City Conference. Salt Lake City, yeah. Uh is that in March? March. March. Um so any event, we'd invite you to come on out. If you've never been to that conference, that's the one where we have the this uh this construction management uh and students chapter organizations uh compete. We also have our craft uh Olympics or sorry, I guess we got a cease and desist order at one point in history, but um our craft championships, you know, for our electricians and our plumbers and our you know all the different trades that ABC uh trains in and ABC members train in. So it's a great, it's a spectacular convention in addition to our national board meeting, which we will be inducting our first ever lifetime member, which is Richard Wass. Yeah. Uh who is uh chairman of our board here and one of the longest standing uh members. Yep. One of our longest standing ABC members going back to the charter uh of the chapter, I think in 1968. So uh he too, the reason it made me think of him was you know, the people who have been around long enough that have the stories of um how construction, at least in Florida, has changed, not everywhere necessarily. There's still these challenges and and violence and opposition and project labor agreements and you know discrimination and speaking of the Olympics.

Sonny Maken 4:02

Have you ever watched the Special Olympics?

Peter Dyga 4:04

Mm-hmm.

Sonny Maken 4:04

I have nothing, nothing makes you feel more inadequate than watching these guys. You know, I got a guy with like one leg going on a mountain at like three miles an hour, and you're just like, Right, man, I couldn't even do that with two legs.

Peter Dyga 4:15

Run out of breath walking up the stairs, you know.

Sonny Maken 4:19

You know, there's a guy playing basketball better than I ever have, like on a wheelchair, and you're just like, man.

Peter Dyga 4:24

Yeah.

Sonny Maken 4:25

So, but kudos to those guys because it's unbelievable what they're able to accomplish, you know? And um, but you had a topic you want to talk about, which you know just kind of related to Special Olympics, because I think I don't think you're gonna be ever ever successful at that, um, unless you have what, you know, our award of the year at ABC is grit. Right?

Peter Dyga 4:43

Yeah.

Sonny Maken 4:43

I feel like that's the that's the big sort of I've read a lot of social sciences on this, like in terms of what is the one sort of thing that successful people have in common, right? And it is the ability, and by the way, it's totally connected to sort of meritocracy and American freedom. Because it's if you don't have grit, right?

Peter Dyga 5:01

We're gonna we're gonna start to institute, we'll ask our producer to do a little bell every time we do anything that's kind of uh related in some way or another to the mission, vision or values.

Sonny Maken 5:09

Mission, vision, and values. There you go. A little bell in the background, you know, it'll be kind of fun, I think. Uh I'm pretty sure the San Diego chapter has that trademarked. It's a cowbell. That's a cowbell, that's right. I do like cowbells.

Peter Dyga 5:22

Um but's um the uh inspiration for this topic or today's uh podcast, that article on math. So which was last year.

Sonny Maken 5:33

That's a weird thing last year.

Peter Dyga 5:35

I read this article in just to say you'd be writing in the last year's year on your all your checks, but nobody writes writing checks anymore. I write one check a month for my HOA, so I still I still write the check. But your HOA doesn't do ACH or electronics.

Sonny Maken 5:49

It was such a pain in the ass to sign up for it. I was like, you know what? Screw you, you're gonna get a check. I carry stamps in an envelope just for them. Stam and pennies. It was it was the most arduous sign-up process.

Peter Dyga 6:03

And I'm like, bro, you need that anymore, by the way. You know, we did away with pennies, I think. Although it'll take a few years, probably, for them to work their way out of it. That's right. I can't even pay nicely. But the merchants will be charging you an increments of five right away. I gotta hear that. I gotta pay nickels now.

Sonny Maken 6:16

So all you need is my routing number and the account number. Like it's not that complicated, but they were so difficult with the whole thing. I was like, forget it, you're getting checks. So to this day, they've been getting checks from me. Okay. Um anyway, I just got I had a new order printed from Costco. By the way, just to pay your HP in my HO. The only check I I write. Uh it makes me so angry because I'm like, you know, by the way, my bank wanted 40 bucks for 80 checks. I was like, are you insane? So I went to Costco. That's like 50 cents a check. 50 cents a check at that math. You did that math very well.

Peter Dyga 6:55

So this article is insane. Okay. So it was uh it so A, it was not just the general population. This was UC San Diego. University of California, San Diego students that were that were um not just surveyed, but uh given these tests. They were given these tests, yeah. So and if I recall correctly, night only 19 percent of college students could perform in an eighth-grade level math problem. Uh yeah. Which I you and I were talking about this earlier. I was trying to recall. I mean, basically in eighth grade or middle school, you were doing you were doing fractions. You know, I mean, you weren't even really into this or anything like that in eighth grade. So, I mean, you're you're fractions. 19%. I mean, it should scare the hell out of the world. It was so bad.

Sonny Maken 7:41

It was so bad. They started um a class, literally a remedial math class for their students in college.

Peter Dyga 7:48

Wow. So that got me insufficient, you know. Right?

Sonny Maken 7:51

That got me thinking, okay. Um, and you know how much I hate DEI and college admissions, but that's a whole different conversation. That got me thinking on um why are you reminds me?

Peter Dyga 8:04

Can I interrupt you for a second? Yeah, yeah. Do we have a functioning like search searchable if somebody were to go into our podcast and search for DEI, you know, or is that something that we would have to work on or something that's a good idea? Oh, I don't know. That's a good question, Mr. Producer. Because we're getting to the point, you know, with uh episode 70. Yeah. You know, you're gonna we're gonna need something. So I don't think he knows if that's searchable. Doable, you know. We probably have to tag you know each of the episodes with certain keywords or something and then have so in our blog. The blog, maybe?

Sonny Maken 8:38

In the blog. All right, all right. Well you can go on. Yeah, we'll talk about that in a different episode.

Peter Dyga 8:43

So this got you thinking about grit, you know. Grit how uh college students in California.

Sonny Maken 8:48

Because there's this presumption, right? Like we just are like, Asians are naturally good at math, we aren't. And that's the end of the story. And like it's sort of an absurd if you really think about it, it's an absurd view to have, because it's not like Asians have some like genetic advantage when it comes to mathematics, right? It's just you get your ass beaten by your parents if you don't do the work.

Peter Dyga 9:08

Yeah, or you study and you learn it.

Sonny Maken 9:09

Or you study and you learn it.

Peter Dyga 9:11

Or there's an expectation.

Sonny Maken 9:13

Yeah.

Peter Dyga 9:14

Or if it's not being presented at all, which probably is a problem in many cases.

Sonny Maken 9:19

So then, oh you know what this was an interesting fact I wanted to share with you from this article. I I actually pulled up the article here. Most of these students who were in these remedial math classes had taken uh advanced math course in high school. Advanced math. Advanced math course, and had gotten an average and A minus in it.

Peter Dyga 9:40

I I'm sorry, that just doesn't compute in my mind. How did this tie how did this the theme of grit for you?

Sonny Maken 9:49

So for me, this is how it ties into grit. I think Asians are better at math because they have more grit. In general? In general. Well, not in general. I think parents have like fed it into them and families have fed it into them, right? So the idea that you have to kind of fight and learn and fight and learn, and that's why they're so successful in small businesses, right? Like and now I can tell you this in most kind of countries around the world, if you fail at business, broadly speaking, you're done, right? America is one of the few societies and few cultures where like, yeah, you fail, you try again. You file for bankruptcy, you try again.

Peter Dyga 10:24

Right.

Sonny Maken 10:25

Right? Your business collapses, you try again. Like you get out of jail, you try again. I know I know a guy. You get into government. You know, I know a guy personally. I went to grad school with him, right? Served time in prison for drug um sales. That's not the right term, but you know what it is. He was a dealer. He was a dealer, thank you. He was a drug dealer. And served time in prison, got his GED in prison, and then ended up going to Brown for undergrad, Yale for law school, and then he went to um graduate with me, you know, and just turned his life completely around and is one of the most successful people I know. Right. And so there's a there's an amount of grit that leads to success that I think most certainly most immigrants understand that, and a lot of people who are very successful, immigrants or not, get it. And I think this idea okay, so I'm gonna tell you like I see this all the time on social media, right? Especially young people, like, oh, I need to protect my peace. Or I had a I had a friend tell me that his son told him he needed a mental health day, right? And this idea that I gotta protect my peace or I gotta take a mental health, like in in most cultures, that's absurd, right? You get up and you fight because you have to succeed. And failure is not an option. Like nobody in in uh nobody who's successful ever sits there and says, you know, I I I just don't feel like fighting today. I'm gonna sit there, I'm gonna stay at home and and do this, right? Absolutely. And I'm not talking about like burning both hands at a candle. You obviously you need vacations and time with your family. You're right, like I'm not talking about that. But this idea that I am owed, I am entitled to success without having to put work in, I think has really caught up to American students where universities now have to set up. So by the way, if you want to look up this article, the article was by a journalist named Alicia Finley, F-I-N L E Y. It's in the Wall Street Journal. The college students who cannot who can't do elementary math. That's the the title of the article. So you can easily find it. So for at ABC, one of the things we've been talking about with our staff and our team here is hey, 2026. Like you have to persevere and you gotta show grit in everything you do, right? And there will be problems, you know, there will be events that don't sell out the way you think they're gonna sell out. There's gonna be members who don't want to renew, there's gonna be problems that come up. And you get you have to be the one who has within yourself the ability to kind of fight on and to and to succeed, because that's how um you're gonna have success. Because it if you don't have grit and you give up and you quit, right? I mean, you think about you think about the greatest sort of example of grit, and I'm gonna I'm gonna ask Mr. Producer to drop in a little clip, is when Rocky is getting his ass kicked. You know, and that's by every metric. I mean, the whole movie's about grit. Like you instead of giving up, you just get up and you fight again, you fight again, and you fight again. Sure. And I know you have a great example of that.

Peter Dyga 13:27

So yeah. Well, when you told me you were gonna be talking about this and with a theme of grit, uh, you know, I I I told you I was gonna ran a little bit because I'm gonna start off the year with talking about such an we're we're in the middle of retention. Yeah. Very important period for us. We can't do what we do, uh, couldn't do any of it without our members and their support. Uh with retention? And retention is you know, the number of members that renew, you know, each year, you know, that uh you see uh the value in ABC. Uh hopefully you're engaged and you know you come out to events. That's uh you know probably one of the most important ways you can uh that indicates whether you're gonna uh uh renew your pay or dues again each year after year. But for many members um in the association or nonprofit business, uh you know, there's uh an old phrase, uh, mailbox members. There are a lot of people that understand the mission and value of the organization that support it and that support the things they do, whether you know they come to the events or not. So there's certainly a fair number of those. But I was gonna rant a little bit because I think uh a thing that most people don't appreciate about ABC, and I want them to. I want you, our listeners, especially those that are members, and maybe you're thinking about whether to send that renewal check in, is um you know nobody is doing more to talk about and impose this idea of grit. Yeah. You know, and and it's a you if we're a nation that loses that, we got a lot at risk. You know, and some would argue that we have lost it, you know, or we got to reclaim it or rekindle, you know, that fire. So, you know, and when I when you talked about the grit, the first thing that came to mind was a book that this chapter bought a thousand copies of this book. It's a children's book, and we've given away almost a thousand copies of it, and we'll be ordering some more. We give it away at our apprenticeship graduation or touch a truck event. And if you if you don't have one and would like one, email us at the obvious at abc isflorida.com. We'd love to get one to you.

Sonny Maken 15:17

For free.

Peter Dyga 15:18

So, but there's a kind of construct the the name of the book is Grit Leads to Greatness. And the subtitle is An Epic Quest Built to Change the World. And the heroes in this are construction workers, electricians, and different things. And then again, it's a kid's book, it's meant to be read by kids, but it's we're trying to instill uh those values that we're talking about here. And I think about it's not just getting a thousand copies of this book, which by the way has an ABC connection. I think one of the authors, you know, is an ABC member and uh an actual contractor himself, and uh one of the illustrators of the book actually went to college at uh Flagler, I think, up in St. Augustine. Anyway, there's some really good connections to ABC in our community. Um but the point is we're trying at every level. You know, a lot of people know about ABC being the largest apprenticeship provider in the state of Florida. Yep. And I I've told the story many times. I think the first conversation I had 27 years ago now, uh, when I came to work for ABC, and we have it almost every day in this industry. And if you ask anybody what the biggest problems you face, you're almost almost always going to hear uh some workforce development, um, you know, labor, yeah, labor trade uh related issues. You know, so you you have to appreciate the amount of money, the amount of effort, the amount of thinking, the amount of strategic planning that this chapter alone puts into developing that workforce all the way to the young age where your grandparents are reading you know books to try to instill the ideas of uh grit leading to greatness because we believe it. You know, and so we just want we couldn't, again, we couldn't do this without our membership. So um, I want to turn this into a little bit of a retention, you know, please um you know help us continue to do great work like this. But when you talked about, we were gonna talk about you know uh college students not being able to do simple fractions. This is a problem. This is a problem for our industry, it's a problem for our society, it's a problem for everything. You know, so um we certainly, and there are certainly some families and some ethnicities that I think have a more uh connection still to this grit, this need for grit. So have you ever seen a cashier in a little bit of a way, in a humble kind of way.

Sonny Maken 17:34

Oh, that's great. Have you ever seen a cashier when um your bill is 1405 and you give him 20 and a nickel? Just the confusion that that creates.

Peter Dyga 17:45

Oh, that's nothing. I mean it's 1405 and you give them a 20 and a nickel, that's easy. I'm the kind of person that if it's uh, you know, I don't know, uh I'm wanting quarters back, I'll give them like enough pennies to make it so that I get quarters back instead of but of course, most machines nowadays you can just enter what you're given and it'll tell you what you get back.

Sonny Maken 18:03

But if they don't have one of those machines or they don't know to use it, it's it's the panic on their face.

Peter Dyga 18:07

Yeah. So if you've experienced that, this story, it's not gonna really surprise you much.

Sonny Maken 18:11

Yeah.

Peter Dyga 18:12

But you know, what do we have to do to turn it around? You know, and again, that was my point is that, you know, um, and again, we ask Mr. Producer, you know, ring that little bell every time, you know. And when we talk about the fact that what we're doing of everything from young kids and the kind of books they read, a lot of pre-apprentip programs we do, the partnerships in the community, the apprenticeship, the pre-apprentip, the craft trainee programs, the you know uh who who else is doing more to try to reinst reinstate the grit that we need, nobody I'm aware of.

Sonny Maken 18:49

So but let me ask you a question. What system that takes away the need for its people to have grit?

Peter Dyga 18:58

Um let's see. I don't know, to each according to his own.

Sonny Maken 19:02

Right. But if you're uh if you're growing up in socialism, right? I mean that that's the first thing to try to kill.

Peter Dyga 19:08

Sure.

Sonny Maken 19:09

Absolutely. And that's that's because grid to me is profoundly it's the same coin that's and one side is grid, the other side is freedom. Right? Because and the whole idea whenever you see these these socialist policies or communist policies, or you know, you look at that um guy who got elected mayor in New York City Hey, we know you haven't succeeded, but you deserve this, so we'll get it to you for free, right? And what is the first thing that that thing does is it kills your grid, your your grid, your desire.

Peter Dyga 19:41

Your determination.

Sonny Maken 19:41

Your determination, your ambition. It kills it.

Peter Dyga 19:44

Absolutely. That's a great point. It's a great point.

Sonny Maken 19:46

People are people are creatures of incentives. And if you take away any incentive for them to like go out and achieve, they won't achieve that.

Peter Dyga 19:51

Right, right. So the bottom line is for me, it's a new year. It's a new year 26. We have high ambitions at ABC, in large part guided and directed, you know, by our our leadership, our volunteer leadership, our strategic goals and planning. Okay. Um, and some of the great irons that we have in the fire that we're shaping and hammering away the the metal uh as we speak. We're also going to do the basics well and everything we do. Absolutely. From membership to networking and business development and education and developing that workforce or competencies. Or competencies. And we invite you, we thank you as our members and future members. You know, if you're listening to this and you're not a member, uh, you don't have to be a construction company. You know, we'd love to have your membership if you just believe. Um, I mean, we are in essence, you know, that nonprofit, that that I don't want to say chamber, but that that organization, that business organization, yes, we focus around construction. Um, but if you believe in grit and you believe in merit autocracy and you believe in freedom, this is the place to be. So welcome to the new year.

Sonny Maken 21:01

That's right. So and if you're struggling with anything, anything, just keep fighting. Because the minute you stop fighting, you lose.

Peter Dyga 21:08

So all right. I'm looking forward to another year of the obvious podcast. That's right. And great achievements and accomplishments at ABC and having you all along for the ride.

Sonny Maken 21:18

So all right, so sometime in July we're gonna hit our our hundredth episode.

Peter Dyga 21:22

So wow. All right. So hope to see you then. All right, until next time. Ciao.