Ep 6 - Part 2 Why Would Anyone Want To Work For You

July 27, 2021

Here is the 2nd part to our series on attracting and retaining great people. Let’s take a look at the benefits that we are providing our employees. Let’s explore additional ways we can provide for our teams and help support a healthy work environment. There are lots of cost effective ways for us to enhance how attractive our organization is in the eyes of a prospective employee.

The universal pain point for most organizations is filling the seats with A+ players. Are we taking an honest review of our company, the culture we have established and the actual benefits that we are providing our employees? It’s critical that we look at our organization through the eyes of our prospects and existing employees. What’s in it for them? So often we ask that question and only look at it through our own eyes. We forget that the things that seem the most valuable to us may not be as valuable to those we are trying to hire.

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Episode Transcript

[00:00:02.680] - Chris
Welcome back to another episode of the MRM podcast.

[00:00:05.590] - Brandon
I'm Chris

[00:00:06.370] - Brandon
and I'm Brandon join us as we discuss business, life and legacy.

[00:00:11.380] - Chris
It's business time.

[00:00:13.810] - Brandon
Hey brother

[00:00:14.520] - Chris
Hey

[00:00:15.910] - Brandon
how are you? Ready to jam one out?

[00:00:18.650] - Brandon
I'm talking about a podcast episode. Ready to jam a podcast episode. Yes. Where we're going today?

[00:00:24.280] - Chris
I love how you just can't stop with the double entendres.

[00:00:29.680] - Brandon
Oh, well, you lost me on the second word. I had kind of an idea where you're going and then you used really.... I think that would have been a million dollar word.

[00:00:37.450] - Chris
That's so funny. OK, all right.

[00:00:40.480] - Brandon
Back on track. focus lets act your age.

[00:00:43.840] - Chris
yeah. So we decided to do a multipart series on this topic of recruiting. And last time we we really dove deep on the idea of onboarding. Having a defined process that makes people feel good, makes people feel important, gets them connected to the team in the process as soon as possible. Right. Really treats the experience as an important one, which it is.

[00:01:10.600] - Chris
Yeah. And I think one of the things we said was. It's possible that that new person that starting that day is the most important thing that's happening that day.

[00:01:21.480] - Brandon
Yeah, absolutely.

[00:01:22.850] - Chris
Yeah, yeah. So today or two, I want to dove deep on why would anybody want to work on your company? Work with your company? Yeah, that question is provocative. Yeah. There's a little bit of a salty flair to it. Right. Like why would anybody want to work for your company. Well, because we're awesome, you know, and we family owned company and.

[00:01:41.630] - Brandon
All right.

[00:01:42.420] - Chris
So let's dig into that. I think it's a worthwhile exercise. I think I even wrote a blog on this a while back. It just routinely as a business owner, taking time to reflect on like to zoom out to like that. Thirty thousand of view take your emotion out of it and really look at your business and say, why would anyone want to work here?

[00:02:04.790] - Brandon
Yeah, I think the question is asked fairly often, but not with the intentionality of getting down to the nitty gritty, like getting into the details. Right. I think we're all having these kind of on the on the run conversations in our own head about like, why do people want to work here? I think this is the part that we kind of have to hammer on a little bit is that most of the time, owner operators, entrepreneurs, key leaders.

[00:02:31.610] - Brandon
I think a lot of times they're looking at that question and the answers from a far too pragmatic perspective, a utilitarian perspective. Well, why would someone want to work for your business? And you say things like, well, it's fairly competitive pay. We're a family business. We have a family feeling business. Well, they're getting full time work right here. Like these are a response.

[00:02:55.010] - Chris
We offer medical.

[00:02:55.970] - Brandon
Yeah, we get some medical benefits and some of these stand out.

[00:02:59.090] - Brandon
But the reality of it is a lot of times when we're asking ourselves this question, we're asking it too much from this perspective of, oh, gosh, what more do you want? Right. Well, you're getting full time work. We're paying you for your time. Like, what else do you really need? And I know that people aren't necessarily having that specific conversation in their head. But if we're honest with ourselves, how often are we answering that question?

[00:03:23.660] - Brandon
From what else do you want? Like what exactly you need?

[00:03:27.290] - Chris
Yeah, you're exactly right. If we're honest with ourselves. Yeah. Because self-deception is a real thing. Oh, man. And it's possible that as owners and leaders, sometimes we can be the most self deceived because of our egos. Yeah, right. And I think the attitude at times we're honest with ourself is these people that work for me should be grateful. Yeah. They should be more grateful for what I'm doing for them. And and I think we can also fall into the trap because it's real.

[00:03:55.430] - Chris
They don't even understand we're paying them 18 bucks an hour. They don't understand that our real cost is whatever, twenty, twenty five dollars an hour. So they want more money. They don't realize that bumping them to twenty five bucks an hour bumps our cost of thirty two. Right. Right. And then we raise them to twenty five bucks an hour. Well what does that mean for the rest of our workforce in terms of what we have to bring their wages up to?

[00:04:18.320] - Chris
Like I think we can get really mean at the end of the day, it's we really dismiss our people, like they just don't know how all this works. And the end of the day, they should just be grateful for the job I'm giving them. I'm providing them a livelihood.

[00:04:32.300] - Brandon
You bring up a good point. And I think part of it is just remembering who it is that you're selling this idea to. So staying in track of what we're talking about right now and I think maybe kind of where both of us are going in a different fashion is when we're asking ourself this question. We're going to have some time to really, I think, dove into some of the answers that people commonly get and really, I think, unpack whether or not this is something of value or not.

[00:04:56.930] - Brandon
But I think we always approach this from this perspective of we're asking ourselves the question and we're trying to answer that question from our perspective, from our vantage point. And if you're a business owner, right.

[00:05:10.730] - Brandon
Not everyone can be a business owner because there's a lot of responsibilities and very black and white topics that you're wrestling with, you have to make decisions on. And so as business owners, we're looking at our business and we're looking at the cost efficiencies we're looking at. How does that relate to the thirty thousand foot view like what you're talking about? But at the end of the day, part of the element here, I think the juice that we have to tap into is, is your candidate thinking about the business from your perspective?

[00:05:40.400] - Chris
Oh, yeah. The answer is most definitely no.

[00:05:43.820] - Brandon
They're not even kind of seeing what's in it for me? What's in it for them.

[00:05:48.260] - Brandon
And I think all of us kind of get in this position right. Like, I think we've even been in these positions with clients where we have this in-depth understanding of our industry. We understand the ins and outs. And so when we go to solve a problem or interact with our client, we're coming preloaded with all this vetted experience instead of trying to approach the topic from our clients eyes because. Right, wrong or indifferent. It's their perception and their perception is their reality.

[00:06:17.630] - Brandon
And so all of us get not all of us, most of us have tried to get better at seeing the world through our client's eyes. But how often are we answering this question from the eyes of those who we may be trying to recruit or our employees in general? Right. This is part of that larger culture conversation. It's not just the exercise of asking the question. It's then saying, OK, when I answer is the who gives a shit part of that answer?

[00:06:45.170] - Brandon
Is it relevant to this person I'm potentially hiring?

[00:06:48.290] - Chris
That's right. That's the filter. That's the lens we want to put on. Yeah. Yeah. Is really just asking ourselves is and sometimes I think we're not going to be able to perfectly relate to it for many of us as owners especially. And again, it's that we talked about this a little bit in the last episode of we are just inherently biased by our success, like our success, what it tells us, what it tells our ego when we have any form of success.

[00:07:13.820] - Chris
So, again, for some people, that's they got to where now they're drawing one hundred thousand dollars salary for themselves like that success. Other people would say it's five hundred thousand or it's 50 or everybody has a different success definition. But I think once we start to tap into success, the tendency is to assume that it's a product of what we're doing. Sure. You know what I mean? That we just made all the right choices. So we're successful because of everything that we're doing.

[00:07:44.000] - Chris
And it prevents us from seeing the things that could be done better, could actually be making us more money, could actually aid in lowering our turnover and extending our retention of our people, could actually help us recruit more mission critical roles like how much more could we grow, right. If we had the technicians staff to be able to respond more quickly to all of the leads and calls that we're exposed to. Right. Right. So but I think success gets in the way.

[00:08:17.090] - Chris
And so, yeah, what we're talking about is all about us putting on that lens of what is this actually like for a potential employee? How did they experience our business? So let's let's talk about some of the things that commonly because you and I've been in that leadership seat where we're making decisions about benefits and how we're going to take care of our employees and what demands and expectations we're going to put on them and stuff. What are the common things that we value as an employer and that we tout with our recruiting? Health insurance benefits

[00:08:50.060] - Brandon
which many of us out there aren't able to provide?

[00:08:53.300] - Brandon
Yeah, I remember from us crossing that threshold, 20 employees.

[00:08:59.520] - Brandon
Oh, no. We I think that at that point we were probably in the thirty, thirty five range. But this was the scariest thing about making that decision. And for a lot of the people listening right now, they may be in the seat right now was there was no way to guarantee what that cost looked like.

[00:09:14.000] - Chris
Oh, that

[00:09:15.530] - Brandon
So I think for the first three years post us crossing that threshold and committing to providing a medical benefit option, I think almost immediately the following three years we had somewhere between twenty and thirty five percent rate increases every single year.

[00:09:31.940] - Chris
It was brutal

[00:09:32.480] - Brandon
that were not part of the use variable.

[00:09:37.370] - Brandon
That was just market conditions, essentially changing what carriers were charging

[00:09:43.790] - Chris
then our claims just blew us out of the water right off the fourth year or something.

[00:09:49.970] - Brandon
Right. So it's like, OK, we added this benefits package with the intent that our our people could use it. Right. That's the point of medical insurance. And then so they use it. And then we essentially there was penalties, cost penalties. That is a scary thing to add to your overhead. Right. But it is one of those go to benefits. Like once you cross this threshold, you're a legitimate company in quotation marks. But I just remember that being a scary thing to add and how it was painful for three or four years as we continued to grow.

[00:10:22.580] - Chris
And and it doesn't matter how much you communicate the cost and how big of an investment this is for the company and how much of an opportunity, cost or sacrifice it is like we did some education for the team. We were educating them on look, this is a minimum this is a brand new like one hundred thousand dollar expense or whatever it was. Do employees ever care about that?

[00:10:45.440] - Brandon
It's hard for them to place

[00:10:46.790] - Chris
it's hard for them to even have a context for which I think is a big...

[00:10:50.150] - Brandon
Because who are they taking care of? It's their own families?

[00:10:53.450] - Chris
Yeah. And I think naturally there is a feeling of entitlement that every employee is going to feel like because they all have friends somewhere that get health insurance with their job. And I think there is some feeling of expectation which is really hard as an owner or a leader.

[00:11:08.030] - Chris
Yeah, anybody who's in charge of the PNL, that is responsible for that. It's hard that people aren't grateful for those really expensive things that you do. Right? I remember us having like addressing that many times as a leadership team, even though we weren't ultimately writing that check. Like, we still felt the full weight of that responsibility. And it's like, man, people just don't understand, like, what other things could we do with that? Two hundred.

[00:11:33.150] - Chris
And so at one point that one hundred and fifty or two hundred k spending, like all the things that could be spent on elsewhere, not the least of which is bonuses and compensation and all that stuff. Right. Like it connected with us, but it never did fully with the employees and that was hard. Yeah.

[00:11:50.340] - Brandon
And I think that goes back to what we started with here is just this idea of as owners, owner operators, key leaders, you guys are looking at the PNL and you understand the financial commitment and impact of providing this medical benefit. But again, we understand that leaders, we understand the position you're in. However, we got to play good enough to beat the ref. And really, in order for us to do that, we have to look at this from the average employees or the average prospect's eyes.

[00:12:21.030] - Brandon
And honestly, I hate to say this, this is a check the box item. Most people are going to anticipate that a company is providing, at least for the employee themselves, some portion of that A medical coverage is available and B, some portion of it is covered by the company. Like, again, and we understand for those listening, you guys vary in size from small single owner operators to very large, robust organizations. And the reality of it is, is this is one of those benefits that quickly falls into the expectation category.

[00:12:57.900] - Brandon
And so let's keep going. Let's identify a couple other ones.

[00:13:00.480] - Chris
But yeah, I guess I would just to close the loop on this health insurance thing, is it a benefit? Is it a perceived benefit for the employee? Because we tout this a lot. We offer we pay 50 percent of the employees things or even one hundred percent of the employees and maybe some of you maybe there is an outlier out there that covers employee and spouse. Pretty rare. I don't hear about that much anymore. Companies are able to cover that, especially in our industry.

[00:13:26.680] - Chris
But but the answer is it's really not a benefit to your average employee. It's seen as an expectation. And in a lot of markets, your competitors are already offering or doing the same thing. So why would somebody come on work at your company? It's not because of the health insurance.

[00:13:44.410] - Chris
Yeah, let's just be honest.

[00:13:46.080] - Brandon
It's in most cases it's just not.

[00:13:46.980] - Chris
most cases, most cases.

[00:13:48.630] - Chris
And that's for you to, like, look at because maybe it is in your market. Maybe that's not customary. And that is an edge. Great document that. consider that. OK, that is a legitimate benefit. Great. But for a lot of you, it's not OK. So, yeah. What else what other things do we tout as our workplace?

[00:14:06.840] - Brandon
Well, I think the meeting, the minimum standards with vacation sick time. OK, right. I think in general there's some bare minimums. Right. That as operators we have to hit the mark on in regards to some form of PTO or sick time or family leave. Right. There's some minimum standards that you're hitting or or when folks list out the holidays that they provide paid time off for. Right. Again, I think there's an opportunity eventually we're going to kind of circle in what are some ideas of some things to add to the roster that are low cost or cost effective.

[00:14:42.720] - Brandon
I think we just have to consider with the time off with the PTO packages.... When we're meeting bare minimums, we're probably not really standing out in any way. And again, like all of this is coming from the perspective, we understand the real life financial impact of us making these kinds of commitments to our workforce. We just what we're trying to do with this conversation is just be very clear about looking at it from a prospect's perspective.

[00:15:11.050] - Chris
Yeah. And where we're going to go with this conversation is we want to explore what are the way in 2021 when we have all the challenges of recruiting that we do it quote "is what it is." Yeah. We have this reality we're dealing with. Yeah. What can we do to win? Right. In this reality. Right.

[00:15:30.960] - Brandon
Stand out, be different.

[00:15:31.590] - Chris
What we do to be a company that people want to stay at and want to come to. Yeah. What can we legitimately. That's an actual differentiator. That's where we're headed with this conversation. Yeah. Yeah. Like paid time off. And let's talk about that a little bit because I think the reality with with vacation time in our industry, it's hard,

[00:15:52.740] - Brandon
it's hard to take it.

[00:15:53.370] - Chris
Especially those of you, those of you that work in smaller companies.

[00:15:58.020] - Chris
Maybe you've got three techs mitigation manager, you've got an office manager, an estimate or and a couple trade technicians. You got a team of eight or ten.

[00:16:09.210] - Chris
How hard is it to actually take vacation for any of you? Yeah, how does that feel? all right, you get the right systems in place, you get the right procedures and training. And so it's absolutely doable, but it's the nature of the industry. It's difficult to take time off. And for your other key leaders, sometimes it can feel not worth it.

[00:16:31.640] - Brandon
yay i see where you are going with this.

[00:16:31.640] - Chris
All of us are in that conversation where as a mitigation manager or as an estimator or especially in these smaller companies where there's only eight or ten of you.

[00:16:41.500] - Brandon
Yeah.

[00:16:42.050] - Chris
There's nobody to just pass that workload off to.

[00:16:45.020] - Brandon
Honestly, nine times out of ten, we were fielding questions and managing conversations around employees, just trying to cash out. So, again, it's like we're not trying to break break anybody down on these hard earned, hard paid for benefits that we're attempting to provide to our place. But again, does this make you stand out?

[00:17:05.240] - Chris
Not at all.

[00:17:06.056] - Brandon
really not really

[00:17:06.830] - Chris
Because most companies are going to have some version of this. And oh by the way, it's just a really tricky industry to even take advantage of some of these benefits that we tout. Yeah, what what else?

[00:17:19.100] - Brandon
I think the pay range thing, this is kind of like the go to competitive marker. And I think you and I, this may have even actually come up in this in the previous episode on that onboarding piece. And we were talking about job postings and the fact that you can right now jump on indeed and review a job posting in a market or all the job postings in a market. And you're going to see that really at the end of the day, you've got to meet the pay window just to even show up on the radar.

[00:17:47.510] - Brandon
So even our competitive pay in quotation marks, again, we understand how hard it is to provide a real competitive wage in the market right now. But again, does that stand out? Is it any different than anybody else? And there 15 listings on indeed right now? And the answer is unfortunately, no. It's a minimum marker. Like if you're not willing to be competitive with your pay, you're not hiring anybody.

[00:18:14.300] - Chris
Yeah. From a practical standpoint, one of the things that we've been consulting clients to do is you need to match the range of what's happened in your market. There's no benefit to you if you're posting a job from 14 to 19 bucks an hour and you've got a competitor that's that's posting a range on a mitigation tech of eighteen to twenty two bucks an hour.

[00:18:33.230] - Chris
There is nothing in it for you to say to hunker down in that 14 and you need to up your range. This is just the nature of the world right now. It is. It is. Yeah. There's other like some people do, health savings account contributions. There's all these other versions of the things we've been talking about. But let's I think we got the message across, which is, hey, all these things that you thought were a benefit are likely not perceived as a benefit.

[00:18:59.570] - Chris
It's just a minimum like your anteing in to just this. You pay to play. Yeah, we pay to play in this industry. And if you're lucky enough, I don't even know if I'd say lucky enough, but you happen to be one of those markets where your competitors aren't doing anything for their employees. Well, lucky you. Yeah, but there's going to come a time...

[00:19:15.930] - Brandon
it's not likely.

[00:19:16.430] - Chris
And here's the other reality we're facing. You may have a bunch of small operators or whatever that aren't doing these benefits, but undoubtedly you have other companies in the service sector that are also going after your technician estimator admin employees.

[00:19:32.690] - Chris
They want that talent just as much as your competitors do, and they may have those things in place. So it's a pay to play a part of our business. So how do we differentiate?

[00:19:44.000] - Brandon
So I think before we tap into this full fledged, I think one of the things to remember here is that because some of the things that you and I are going to talk about right now are very internal, meaning it's hard for a prospect on the outside to see these things happening. So with that in mind, part of what we alluded to in a previous episode was this idea that your best recruiters are actually going to be your own team members. Because what's happening is we look at job posting markets, we look at LinkedIn profiles, we can look at all these things and it's noise.

[00:20:14.150] - Brandon
It's noise across the board. We've already talked about wage comparisons and all those things, like if you're not meeting the pack, you're not even looked at. So the differentiator is going to come from someone within your ranks, being so diehard and so bought into your team, your culture, your brand, your family, whatever you want to call it, that they want to attract other people in their sphere of influence, family, friends, people at the counter, at Home Depot or whatever.

[00:20:43.160] - Chris
And how does that message get out?

[00:20:45.680] - Chris
this is this is new and emerging. And I've done a little bit of poking around on our clients and just in the industry and actually. Right. I've looked at companies. When you search for a company like before I went to go work for Belfor a recent career position, I looked at their Glassdoor profile.

[00:21:04.010] - Brandon
Exactly.

[00:21:04.730] - Chris
And many of the applicants that you're trying to get their attention.

[00:21:09.210] - Chris
Now they're Googling your company, and glass door is one of the things is coming up.

[00:21:15.810] - Brandon
And remember SCO and all those things, not only is it coming up, but it's coming up all the time and it's right at the top.

[00:21:22.440] - Chris
Right at the top of the list,

[00:21:23.620] - Brandon
top of the list.

[00:21:25.350] - Chris
But that's something you have a certain measure of control over. Even if you don't pay to do the whole premium thing on Glassdoor, you can certainly encourage your happy employees to go post about their experience on Glassdoor. And you should if you haven't done that, you need to take a really proactive stance with with things like Glassdoor.

[00:21:45.120] - Brandon
And just for the sake of connecting the dots. Right. We're pretty aggressive about that. So let me just kind of map out a little bit where we're going right now.

[00:21:52.380] - Brandon
So remember this this perspective, guys, we are talking about the fact that those benefit check the box benefits that we're all working very hard to provide, understand they're not setting the tone for difference or differentiation. So what we're talking about here is actions, attitudes, behaviors, some actual formal type benefits of sorts that you can add to the roster to create a differentiation between you and your competitor. So what we're talking about right now with this whole Glassdoor thing and our behavior and how we manage it and we proactively engage it, well, this would be the point where one of the teachers stamps their foot.

[00:22:30.210] - Brandon
This is one of the items that we're saying this can help create a differentiation between you and your competitors.

[00:22:36.270] - Chris
An awesome looking glass door profile

[00:22:38.430] - Brandon
man, it can make all the difference. And my gut says because we were in this position multiple times, my gut says either half of you or more don't understand what Glassdoor is. And you have not given it any level of prioritization whatsoever. And remember, it matters. It doesn't matter if you're one hundred person company, if you're a five person company, Glassdoor cares. They are going to come up when people are searching for company names and your prospects are more sophisticated now and have more tools available to them for their choice making than ever in our history.

[00:23:13.440] - Chris
Don't fall in the trap of well, not my employees, the technician people don't look at this. You're fooling yourself. Yeah, like everybody's been forced to get more savvy with that stuff and so are your applicants.

[00:23:25.920] - Brandon
And I would go as far as saying, you know, the applicants you want are savvy enough.

[00:23:30.990] - Brandon
So so if if you're not worried about it because the people you're going after aren't smart enough to look at something like that or be that proactive, well, you're going to get exactly what you're looking for unfortunately.

[00:23:41.850] - Chris
We're going to dive into some ideas. Some of them are going to be practical things that you spend money on that you choose to offer that are different from what the rest of the market's doing. But a big part of the opportunity in front of us as restoration leaders and owners is really being mindful of and strategic about how we make people feel.

[00:24:02.290] - Brandon
Man.

[00:24:02.790] - Chris
And we talk a lot about that. And that's what we talk about a lot about the fact that in the delivery of our services are nuts and bolts services.

[00:24:09.600] - Chris
The most important attribute to the service experience we're providing is how we're managing, how that customer feels, how the adjuster feels in the process of working with us, how our subs feel in conjunction. And if we go back to Danny Meyer, which we talked about on our last episode, he talks about this virtuous cycle of enlightened hospitality that it must begin with us extending that enlightened hospitality, that customized experience, the way we make our employees feel because we're modeling for them how we want them to treat our clients.

[00:24:47.010] - Chris
And I would venture to say in the service sector, particularly in the trades construction, this is not something we talk about enough. OK, so how we make people feel....

[00:24:57.540] - Brandon
It's massive.

[00:24:58.170] - Chris
I think one of just the random ideas that we've talked about and we've implemented at previous companies is this idea of family meal, eating together. And it's tricky in our industry right. It's time on the clock. It's payroll expense. Right. And not only that, it's the opportunity cost, just pulling people out of the field, finding time, making time to eat together is hard to prioritize.

[00:25:26.580] - Chris
We get it. Like we've talked about this in running companies. It's hard to make that choice. But boy, does it have an impact. This idea. So what we did is once a quarter, the leadership team, we would do a pancake breakfast, eggs, bacon, pancakes, BISQUICK. Yeah, easy peasy. We'd bring the hot plates, we plug it in, we'd set up

[00:25:49.980] - Brandon
Coleman stoves

[00:25:50.940] - Chris
four-five L shaped four or five tables and all of us would get aprons on and we'd show up to the shop at five thirty six a.m. and we as a team we'd start prepping the meal and then as employees they knew from seven thirty a.m. until Loadout or 7:00 a.m. till Loadout, we would be serving breakfast. We'd have music on, and it was so fun. It was fun. I mean, I remember being fun as a team. We had a lot of fun together putting it on. Yeah, but I think it was one of those things that employees look forward to.

[00:26:23.960] - Brandon
And from a cost perspective, it's nothing. And honestly, I think I think we were working our way towards more of a once a month kind of gig. And I know like for large teams, man, we're talking about some serious payroll every half hour. You're definitely seeing the till ring a bit. But in general, guys, this is a low cost way to treat your employees. But it's about what you do with the time is really the kicker.

[00:26:50.960] - Brandon
So if you check the box with this, if you show up haphazardly, you barely give it any attention. You throw the food down everybody's throat and everybody jumps in a truck and moves on for the day.

[00:27:01.550] - Brandon
I would tell you, you probably could have not done it and it would have the same impact. In fact, it may be better because as soon as we do something with this pencil whip, check the box kind of mentality, everyone's experience matches that. They see it, they feel it, they comprehend it, and it does nothing to benefit the team.

[00:27:20.810] - Chris
We OK, so this this is an area where you and I, over the years, we've wrestled a little bit on how big do we go with this stuff? Yeah. How special do we make it? Because my tendency is how we complement one another. And a lot of ways. I can tend to get too spun out on the details and the experience to where you can optimize it to the nth degree for the experience.

[00:27:45.740] - Brandon
You just keep going.

[00:27:47.120] - Chris
It's like, OK, we're not doing Bisquick crappy pancakes like everybody else.

[00:27:52.560] - Chris
No, we're going to like we're going to make it from scratch.

[00:27:54.890] - Chris
Like you. You can take things too far.

[00:27:57.170] - Chris
But I think something that is important is, yeah, when you just whip it together and with little thought you may think...... Again, it comes from this mindset of they should be grateful.

[00:28:09.800] - Brandon
Yes!

[00:28:11.240] - Chris
We can get into that mode of they should be grateful. We're giving them free breakfast. Yeah. It's like, OK, hold on. Yeah.

[00:28:19.190] - Chris
What are we trying to model....

[00:28:21.950] - Brandon
There we go

[00:28:22.730] - Chris
for our people? Right. And that level of detail and introspection is really important if you're trying to create something special. Yeah. If you're really trying to actually stand out from your competition in terms of the service you provide clients, if you're serious about that, then you have to be serious about it. There's that that one saying, I don't know if it's like a Buddhist saying or something, but it's "how you do one thing, is how you do everything."

[00:28:47.840] - Chris
Yeah. And I think we just we underestimate how much our employees notice the little things. Yeah.

[00:28:54.230] - Brandon
For sure.

[00:28:55.200] - Brandon
Yeah. So let's OK, so let's use this example. It's a simple tactic. It's a look call it family meal. I love that description of that.

[00:29:02.090] - Chris
And there's a bunch of ways to do it. Right. It could be a barbecue, gets a lot links

[00:29:05.360] - Brandon
totally . Smoke something on the barbecue, whatever the case may be. Here's the point. The point is to suck it up, be OK with the fact that you're going to have some folks on payroll that aren't producing something for you in that moment and that's OK. For small shops, small outfits, where it's really maybe the owner, maybe owner/spouse, owner/partner is the ones putting on the breakfast. So it's only you that you have to be prepared to do this well. Get engaged. Smile. Talk to your people. Be enthusiastic,.Ask them non-work related questions. Poke at them. Jar at them. Right. Have fun with this. Yeah.

[00:29:43.220] - Brandon
Do your homework.

[00:29:44.720] - Brandon
Like when that employee walks in the door, be prepared to say something, recognize something about them that's different from everybody else. And if you're a big shop and you have lots of employees, then take the time to prepare your leadership to share that burden with you. Right. So there's not anyone better than to have specific things to say about their team, then let's say you're mitigation manager. So proactively sit down and prepare the activity with your MIT manager and talk about the fact that, hey, this is what I'm looking for here.

[00:30:19.580] - Brandon
Right. We're here to serve our employees. We're here to make them feel special and stand out. Can you prepare for your five technicians? Will you make sure you have at least one thing that's specific to each one of them that you share as they walk in the door? Right. Make them feel as if it's the first time you've seen them in six months and you're more excited to see them than anyone else that's ever walked through that door.

[00:30:45.050] - Chris
You're dude, you're hitting on a really critical behavior that I think we executed well on together.

[00:30:52.850] - Chris
Certainly could have executed even harder and better. But we this was part of our culture was that specific, personal, input and feedback. you were great at it. A lot of the people on our leadership team, it was a priority in our business

[00:31:08.450] - Brandon
it was.

[00:31:08.450] - Chris
but I think there's there's like a whole nother level there that you're talking about, which is preplanning interactions with our team.

[00:31:15.530] - Brandon
Completely

[00:31:16.340] - Chris
and I think it can feel like a lot because we have so many things tugging at our sleeve, right?

[00:31:22.010] - Chris
Yeah, but this simple behavior of before and all company meeting before, even in some cases morning stand-to. The night before checking in with our leaders as an owner or a general manager and saying, "hey, I'm going to be dropping by the morning, stand to tomorrow, and I really want to be able to encourage your team, give me some nuggets on each person, on your team. Give me something that I can comment about." Oh, so-and-so just got their water cert?

[00:31:49.880] - Chris
Awesome. OK, so-and-so just got had a client refer another job right after they did stabilization for another customer.

[00:31:58.760] - Brandon
Throw it on the board.

[00:31:59.640] - Chris
That's awesome.

[00:32:00.830] - Chris
OK, in doing some of that pre work. Because man, and we often underestimate the power that we have as an owner, a general manager, mitigation manager and it just goes down through the ranks. Right. Because as a mitigation manager, maybe you have maybe your big enough to where it's not just you and your techs, you've got a lead tech or you've got a supervisor that goes out and is kind of helping manage the team. Every single time we take the care to do that pre work and then show up and affirm our people, we're modeling. We're modeling to them what they're going to do when they become the leader.

[00:32:42.320] - Brandon
That's huge. Yeah

[00:32:43.940] - Chris
this is a long term strategy that has short term, big results.

[00:32:48.290] - Brandon
Big time. It's you're creating the opportunity to perpetuate the foundation that you're putting into place. The actions that you're teaching these team members now is the same stuff that they will carry on into the future and then teach their down lines once they become more responsible or maybe that resposability increases.

[00:33:05.150] - Chris
And I learned this and maybe you saw this model by leaders in the military or other companies that you worked for. But I first saw this in Cutco when I was selling knives as a 19, 20 year old. I saw that those little conversations in the back of the room between our vice president and the general manager of that territory, I saw them preparing each other and then I'd see them branch out and then they'd go talk to one of their sales reps.

[00:33:31.310] - Chris
Hey, you know, I was talking with with JP and he said that you were top dog in the office last week. Wow. Nice job. We hear that from Bruce Goodman, the guy who oversees ten thousand sales reps on the West Coast. That feels really good. Wait, Bruce is talking to me?

[00:33:48.980] - Brandon
Right

[00:33:49.610] - Chris
jP my manager was talking to Bruce about me.

[00:33:53.480] - Brandon
Right. That's the differentiator. Oh, right. This is what we're talking about that now for a lot of us, we don't categorize this as benefit. And what your employee doesn't put it into the black and white benefit category, but they're perceiving the difference. And this is what we're talking about when we say the things that you can be doing to differentiating yourself, you guys, it may not be anything that falls in the benefit column, but your employee, your internal client is benefiting from the way that you're taking care of them and treating them.

[00:34:23.120] - Brandon
And these are the differentiator makers. These are the ones that make people stick around when you like them. And this also makes people come to you because your internal team's going, you have to work here. This is the place. They're getting sick and tired of hearing their friend bitch and complain about their employer. And so they're recruiting them.

[00:34:38.990] - Chris
By the way, the only way this strategy or this tactic or behavior works is when it's done consistently. It's like everything else. Consistency is the culture maker, right. So like so many of these things work so good then you stop doing them. But if you build it in your system. So here's an example of how do you build that kind of affirmation in this kind of feelings in your system? Well, we talk a lot about battle rhythms with our clients, right

[00:35:05.490] - Chris
Yeah. And it could be one of the most important things we implement with our clients.

[00:35:10.070] - Brandon
Yeah. So what does this look like if we're following the same train of thought or this example is it needs to be defined on your calendar, your entire team, if you're small, all one of you, if you're a big team, all your key leaders need to understand this is coming. Which means they need to protect their employees schedule. Your client does not know what you're doing on Friday morning with your team. All they know is you'll be at their residence at 9:00 a.m. as scheduled.

[00:35:34.520] - Brandon
Yeah, right.

[00:35:35.780] - Brandon
So the other thing that I'm hearing people say already in the back of their minds is how am I going to get everybody out of the field at the same time?

[00:35:42.230] - Brandon
You do it early in the morning, right? Or you do it late afternoon, whatever. Your clients do not know what's happening behind the scenes.

[00:35:49.850] - Chris
They don't know if your team is heading to another job. or heading back to the office.

[00:35:53.180] - Brandon
But will that what they will know is they'll know that they've got the right team showing up at their job. When your employees are mirroring how well you take care of them by how well they take care of your client.

[00:36:04.340] - Chris
It's so true. It's so true. So let's get down. This is something that people listening can implement right tomorrow. Morning stand-to. So we don't need to get in the full nuts and bolts of what takes place in the morning stand-to ,but this is the time where you are holding the standard .Right.Your reviewing, in addition to reviewing the jobs and making assignments, who's going where, all that kind of stuff. We're inspecting vehicles. We're making sure that vehicles are properly ready for the day, et cetera, et cetera.

[00:36:30.770] - Chris
But one of the things we can also incorporate in that stand-to are these affirmations. Yeah. This is the primary role of the mitigation manager. It's not like, again, it comes back to how we make people feel. It's mission critical to dole out the assignments for the day to get clear on what's our work? What are we trying to accomplish in terms of the nuts and bolts tasks? But the most important role is that that mitigation manager comes to that meeting with an affirmative statement for every single person on that team, ideally.

[00:37:06.470] - Chris
now do we miss it here and there? Of course. But how hard is it for us to just sit at the end of our day and be like, all right, what good happened? What are the challenging things that I need to train around? What are the learning opportunities and training opportunities I need to log and follow up with my team? And what were the good things that happened? Where were people following our process successfully? Where were people going above and beyond?

[00:37:30.350] - Chris
What are the stories that came out of yesterday of people really caring for a client?

[00:37:35.660] - Brandon
And sometimes it can be the team?

[00:37:38.180] - Chris
And caring for the team?

[00:37:39.350] - Brandon
Yeah, I mean, and sometimes maybe the thing that we're noting or affirming is a team's behavior in general. Just be specific about what you noted.

[00:37:48.070] - Chris
It has to be specific or it doesn't matter. And the thing is, as a standard, if you're giving somebody an atta-boy or atta-girl and it's not specific, like, oh, you're a really great part of this team, OK, why? What who cares?no.

[00:38:03.770] - Chris
you're an important part of this team because of your attention to detail. Like, I can always count on you of checking every box. You are somebody that doesn't cut corners. And I appreciate that about you. Like you set the standard for our team in following the process. It's obvious you understand why we do this stuff, because you do it every time . that's an atta-boy.

[00:38:27.890] - Brandon
That's severe and

[00:38:30.770] - Chris
clear and severe

[00:38:31.740] - Brandon
clear and severe.

[00:38:32.540] - Brandon
Dude I got to add something to that? And it's this is that..... You and I and I can't remember what book or what speaker.

[00:38:39.020] - Brandon
Right. We're kind of over the top with a lot of the stuff is, is that we caught on to this idea that you could actually speak into place, speak into reality, someone's ability or strength. And this sounds totally hocus pocus, but hear me out. I have had many experiences where an employee... I heard them out loud make a comment a couple times about "I'm just horrible at the details or I'm I'm just horrible at paying attention or follow through or whatever."

[00:39:10.490] - Brandon
Right. Whatever the thing is. Right.

[00:39:12.200] - Chris
I'm bad at this.

[00:39:13.010] - Brandon
I'm bad at this. And when what I started experimenting with was actually giving these individuals specific feedback where I noted that they actually did that thing really well. And here's what I didn't do. You know, you always say blah, blah, blah. Well, I don't believe you.

[00:39:30.260] - Brandon
What I think is.... That's not what I did.

[00:39:32.720] - Brandon
Total blindside. It would just be I took mental note of this individual putting themselves down in whatever way. And what I did actually is when I had this conversation with that individual, I would note specifically and give an example of how where they did that thing really well.

[00:39:49.910] - Chris
find the evidence.

[00:39:50.990] - Brandon
totally found evidence. And then I made the comment "man, I have just noticed how you are consistently really good with this." Dude, I'm telling you, and this is not B.S. I have a handful of times notice an immediate change in that individual's behavior.

[00:40:07.520] - Brandon
And from that moment on, they actually were really good and consistent at the thing I drew out.

[00:40:13.220] - Chris
And here's the mindset it gets in the way of that, that we as leaders and owners can easily fall into. They're supposed to do that thing anyways. I'm paying them to do that. Good thing. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's the attitude that keeps us from recognizing good behavior. But the recognition of right behavior is what all of us get off on. Who cares if you expect it or not? Call out the good behavior and so we can get caught up in looking for the really cool thing to comment on.

[00:40:45.170] - Chris
Yeah. And I think what you and I have learned over the years is comment on all of the positive things.

[00:40:50.840] - Brandon
Attitudes, behaviors.

[00:40:52.670] - Chris
Your rig looks really, your rigs really organized.

[00:40:56.000] - Chris
Yeah, it's supposed to be. And it is. Yeah. Call out every positive thing because that is that is a hang up for a lot of mitigation managers or any leaders. Is I don't know what to call out?

[00:41:08.120] - Brandon
Or leaders saying I'm no good at this thing.

[00:41:10.550] - Chris
Yeah. I'm no good at giving compliments and all that kind of stuff

[00:41:12.850] - Brandon
and I'd say part of where we're going with this, I think series of episodes is less about what items you put in the column, whether it's this benefit or that benefit.

[00:41:24.460] - Brandon
What we're trying to say is that the true differentiating factors are the leaders who stop making excuses for being poor at appreciating their people, and they start dialing in whatever is required to get good at it, because if you don't, your company is going to die on the vine. Because the companies that get really good at showing people they appreciate them will keep them. They will get them and you won't. So stop giving yourself an excuse that you're no good at doing this or that you're old school.

[00:41:56.800] - Brandon
You're you're part of the old school group that just wanted to work hard because they're principled. Will cool.

[00:42:03.010] - Brandon
Yeah, but are you trying to attract yourself? Because I think you're already on the team. What are you doing to attract the talent that's in the market right now looking for work and you have to get good at this. This is a non-negotiable, non-negotiable.

[00:42:17.260] - Chris
And I would also just call bullshit. You know, it's funny. We all like to think, well, I don't need a pat on the back. I don't need any of that. And I've had clients have told me I'm like, bullshit your lying. Yeah, you'de function better if you got some encouragement and affirmation. Yeah. A little more often. Yeah. And I don't care. You try and tell me you don't want encouragement, affirmation from your spouse

[00:42:38.080] - Brandon
or your kids.

[00:42:39.130] - Chris
Yeah.

[00:42:39.280] - Chris
Your lying to me, your lying. You've learned to make do. Yeah. Maybe without that. Right. You've learned to function without that. OK, well that's not the same. Your people and everybody else on the planet functions better when they're appreciated. Period. end of story.

[00:42:52.330] - Brandon
And you notice them.

[00:42:54.280] - Chris
Yes. Right. So, so again. But it's so important. Right. That's why we incorporate that into the morning stand-to, because it's like clockwork. It's like religion. We go to church every Sunday morning. We'll just in the morning stand-to

[00:43:07.450] - Brandon
this is what you do.

[00:43:07.450] - Chris
People grow to expect that shot in the arm, that positive injection before they head out into all the crappy jobs that we do.

[00:43:16.060] - Brandon
And here's the other thing, and were kind of probably beating a dead horse, but here's the other thing. I see more leaders trying to focus their attention on...." You know what? This week I'm going to draw a hard line. I'm going to be more disciplined in how I hold my team accountable." All those things are great. Those are I am not saying it's you don't do that. But please understand, this is not an either or equation. This is a both and.

[00:43:38.290] - Brandon
So, yes, you are going to get better at developing systems that you follow. Yes. You should get better at identifying your KPIs and holding your team accountable. Yes. You should draw more clear lines in the sand and you should get really good at noticing your people and affirming them when they do the right things. But here's the bottom line piece with this or the this is why it's valuable to you,besides the obvious.

[00:44:01.750] - Brandon
People are more likely to hear you compliment someone else's attitude and behavior, take note of it and mirror it because they want the same affirmation from you. There's more contagion built around that concept than there ever is of five people watching you chew someone's ass for something that they shouldn't have done. Right. It's your return from your time spent from that is so much more contagious. You will get so many more legs from that versus chewing on someone in public, which, by the way, that's another topic....But you should use that extremely sparingly. And for the most part, there may be brief moments in time where a team actually needs a collective ass chewing.

[00:44:47.170] - Brandon
But in general, you praise in public and you discipline in private.

[00:44:51.910] - Brandon
Like I just those of you out there can push back on that if you want. I'm just going to tell you, for nearly two decades of leading people, actually more than two and a half decade...

[00:45:00.530] - Chris
Who's done their fair bit of public ass chewing of public ass chewing.

[00:45:02.800] - Brandon
Oh,

[00:45:03.490] - Chris
at times

[00:45:04.060] - Brandon
I was really rad at it, actually. And my military days may be really good at it anyways.

[00:45:10.900] - Brandon
We're kind of.

[00:45:11.410] - Chris
No, this is good. This is important.

[00:45:13.450] - Chris
This is really we could talk we will talk a lot more about this, because what you're also referencing is the holding people accountable in providing clear and severe feedback is also a gift that employees appreciate. But this isn't something we talk about a lot, is that employees deserve to know where they stand and we all function better when we know where we stand. When we're looking over our shoulder, where the drama comes in our business... Is when people don't know where they stand.

[00:45:42.130] - Chris
They don't know inside whether they're doing well or not or what people, what their manager, the boss or the owner thinks of them. Whenever there's question marks on that side of things too. Like, tell me how I'm doing? If I'm doing crappy, people want to know. They want to hear it. And when they know they're not doing their best or when they know that they're screwing up a lot right now and nobody's saying it in the moment,it scares the shit out of them.

[00:46:09.790] - Chris
So people are showing up to work on pins and needles. So there is actually an employee benefit. Like you and I've seen this and we sure as hell have felt it as employees in other roles. Is that, the best the healthiest environments that people want to be in is where they know where they stand. They can enjoy their successes and they can also they also are in an environment where they feel like they're growing and they're making progress. Because when they're screwing things up, somebody tells them about it and gives them the feedback so that they can recalibrate and change.

[00:46:42.840] - Chris
Like that's a healthy environment and people want to be in healthy environments.

[00:46:46.150] - Brandon
And again, with that, it's clear, we're being clear and we're being specific. It's not you is your identity. It's not you as a person. It's this thing is a weakness. Let's get better at this thing specifically. It's funny that kind of the direction that you're going, because these all kind of build on each other. But, guys, for all of you out there kind of listening, maybe some of you are still waiting to hear the benefit, the specific benefit that we're going to unleash on you and it's going to save you.

[00:47:13.170] - Brandon
The point is this, guys, it's the way that we're treating our people. It's the it's the nuance. It's the way that we're communicating. These are the benefits. These don't cost you a ton more money. These are not some rocket science methods that you're adding to the roster guys. These actually are the benefits. This is the work environment types, the work environment contributors that are going to make you have more success in your recruitment and retention.

[00:47:41.040] - Brandon
This is what we're talking about. These are the bullets. And you talking about ensuring that employees know where they stand. Let's add a little bit of meat on the bone there. So, again, it's the clear and severe thing. I love when you coin that. I love that clear and severe. But here's some other elements of this. One of the things that we've seen, our clients have just an absolute ton of success and not just in their training methodology, which we talked about in a previous episode, but it's the intake and the behavior of the employee when a clear training map or when a clear performance map is developed and given to them is they get the keys .Right.

[00:48:19.060] - Chris
They get control

[00:48:19.860] - Brandon
they know. It's not a cryptic formula that only the leaders understand and and they get to deploy it kind of heavy handed over here and sometimes not so heavy handed. The point is, is that if a new employee or someone on your team knows my career path, a tech 1 has to have these things done. A tech 2 has to have these certifications and accomplishments. a tech 3 needs to have these competencies. You see what I'm saying. When we map for our employees what a career path can look like and then we give them the form, the keys, the map, and they can see, oh, I need to be really proactive in bringing my containment game up and getting a signature on containment.

[00:49:02.400] - Brandon
I need to be really diligent next week on gear, whatever. Right. You can go through all the variables. The point is, employees that are on teams where they know what actions they can take and the behaviors that they can mirror that will help them get pay increases, move up in job and title and scope. Have a clear career path within your organization. These are the kinds of things that people want. These are the benefits people want to experience.

[00:49:30.340] - Chris
Yeah, nothings hidden

[00:49:30.960] - Brandon
it's not hidden.

[00:49:33.080] - Chris
this is also how you avoid the whole ivory tower thing.

[00:49:36.270] - Brandon
man

[00:49:36.270] - Chris
as you grow and we struggle with this at times. as we we're growing. We had these periods of time where there is a lot of questioning of what the leadership is doing? Why are we making this decision? Why are we... And that is usually a product of we just don't have an open.....There's secretiveness the developes. Right.

[00:49:54.480] - Chris
Let's have a little fun time talking about some other fun ideas. Sure. OK, because I think ultimately we're going to we're going to come back to this other thing. what are some other things that we can do that are actually value added? And some of these will make more sense for those of you that have maybe a larger business, some of these will make more sense for those of you really just starting out and you're trying to get creative and bootstrapin'.

[00:50:18.390] - Chris
Right.

[00:50:18.720] - Brandon
Yeah

[00:50:19.770] - Chris
I think one of the ideas that we've heard tossed around in circles that were fans of and actually we were taking some steps at previous companies to be able to implement something like this. We didn't quite get there but, student loan forgiveness. Yeah. Is something that is really picking up steam and a lot of other industries. Yeah. And I think our industry is really ripe for that. Right. There's an opportunity to to create a timeline for that kind of benefit that ties people into the company.

[00:50:49.140] - Chris
It gives them something to work for.

[00:50:50.688] - Brandon
yep

[00:50:51.210] - Chris
Right.Where maybe there's instead of a sign on bonus, which is coming really popular too. You have a debt forgiveness program where once somebody's been with you for a year, the company will forgive up-to so much of your student loans and pay off student loans for you. Right. So that's becoming a really common benefit.

[00:51:13.770] - Brandon
And we're going to run the gambit here, everything from expensive to dirt cheap.

[00:51:17.800] - Brandon
So we're justpitching ideas

[00:51:18.870] - Chris
but that's something that yeah. And I think one of the reasons why debt forgiveness, this is not just a restoration industry thing. I just don't hear a lot of restoration companies talking about that. But one of the things that companies like about that benefit is that you can decide how much it's not saying we're going to pay off one hundred thousand dollars in student. No, but based on the size of your company, based on your PNL, you can decide. And the cool thing is you can always grow it over time. As the scale your company, grows your profitability gets where you want it, you can increase the benefit. As you find it to be a great retention tool, recruiting tool, you can grow it, whatever.

[00:51:57.570] - Brandon
I think another one is different types of non industry training. So for instance and again, this is all over the board, but one of the things that we saw was just kind of ....Every company's front line employees, not every the majority of them are struggling a lot or Friday to Friday. Not necessarily because of their wage. A lot of them are Friday to Friday because of behaviors, because of a lack of knowledge and experience and a lack of training.

[00:52:28.860] - Brandon
And so things like a basic home finance class. How difficult would it be for you to find an online or maybe a local market company that could partner with you and provide? Maybe it's a one hour, a couple evenings in the week or for a week or whatever the case may be. Either you're purchasing this prepackage, you're working with someone to deliver it and you're giving your team members access to a home finance class.

[00:52:57.420] - Chris
My wife and I, years ago, a friend introduced us to a Dave Ramsey certified financial planner, and we paid like one hundred ninety nine dollars to have a few meetings with them. And they taught us how to kind of refine our budget and gave us strategies and stuff for how to get out of debt. Right. It was super helpful, right. We actually ended up getting out of all of our personal debt through that process. And man, is there a better feeling, right?

[00:53:24.740] - Brandon
Oh, man.

[00:53:25.270] - Chris
And how many of our front line how many of all of our employees are just buried in debt? Yeah. How many times do we process draws against their paychecks? Because they're just like their life is in financial chaos perpetually. Right. So, yeah. Can we provide them those resources?

[00:53:46.020] - Brandon
I mean, the win-win for you and your team is that, you know, people think the answer is to make another dollar an hour. When the foundation is what's cracked and leaking. Right like that extra dollar an hour is not doing a whole lot to actually build up water. It's just leaking right through the dam. And so, again, there's long term winds from this, not just getting more from your people because they're more present and less stressed out about their financial situation.

[00:54:11.730] - Brandon
But these are life changing pieces of information and just healthier in general, right?

[00:54:17.220] - Chris
Yeah. And again, we talked about this last time, and it's so gratifying. It taps into this legacy thing, right. Of helping take, and it's not just our doing right. It's they're doing. Like they have to buy into this stuff in order for it to have value. But it's in taking our people from where they are coming into the company and helping them move to an entirely different place. I mean, I as I say those words, all of these faces pop up in my head, just all of them.

[00:54:45.990] - Chris
And it is so gratifying. I get this rush of dopamine come up for me. Right. Even just thinking about those people. You got to talk about that leadership academy that you did.

[00:54:57.000] - Brandon
yeah, so that was it was an exciting experience.So, so cool.

[00:55:03.360] - Brandon
You know, I kind of nerd out on this stuff and so part of it's in my wheelhouse. So it was pretty exciting. But we were fortunate to have access to friends and vendors and people that influenced our company in our lives that we could tap into to for information.

[00:55:16.080] - Brandon
But basically, our team decided it would be really important for us to establish an internal leadership academy. And so this was a basic this particular version that we put on was we deemed it kind of leadership basics. And the idea here was to raise the bar for our downline personnel in preparation for them being more equipped to move up the ranks within our organization and take on additional levels of responsibility. And really what we saw with this was this idea that honestly, it just kind of raised their own expectations on themselves.

[00:55:52.230] - Brandon
And so even if they weren't immediately moving in to some mid-teir leadership role, they just led their peers better. They led themselves better. They did a better job being integrated into the mission and vision that we had for the company. And I've had multiple people that have walked through that course work with us, note it as one of the things that really had a long term impact on their ability to grow as an individual. Kind of beside the point.

[00:56:16.860] - Brandon
But that's part of the reward of it, right, if you take this on. But from a real cost perspective, guys, this was a volunteer basis. We did it after hours off the clock. It was time commitment on my part as a leader is really what this boils down to. But we did formalize it. There was handouts, there was books, there was homework. There was certificate's.

[00:56:38.700] - Chris
what time was it? Five until six or seven.

[00:56:40.410] - Brandon
Yeah, we did about six o'clock in the evening.

[00:56:42.450] - Brandon
That gave us the highest chance that our teams would be back out from the field and they might be able to throw a burger in their neck or something like that before we we met. We did bring food, but it wasn't a full meal. It was kind of some snacks and supplement kind of thing. But yeah, we did this multiple nights a week. It was a couple hours at a time. And if I remember right, it was about 12 weeks.

[00:57:03.730] - Brandon
So it was a pretty significant commitment. But again, this was volunteer basis. So people had access to it. It was not forced on them. It was not mandatory. And so their participation was awesome because when they chose to prioritize it and participate, it was on their own free will. They wanted to do it. Again, this was a very cost effective way. And for those of you that don't feel strong enough to do that or to create that curriculum on your own, again, reach out to your local market because there's vendors and partners that want to help spend money.

[00:57:35.770] - Brandon
Right. Who's your local equipment dealer or your local consumables dealer? See if they're willing to sponsor your guys coursework? Or your class? Or whatever the case may be. There are very cost effective ways to partner with local folks that want time in front of your people.

[00:57:53.500] - Chris
And I think too, you're really good at putting that stuff together. You're really good at mapping it out. Not everybody is. Yeah. Pick a John Maxwell book, totally and break down the chapters. Go back to your high school or college days and outline the chapter and pull out the highlight. Just make a simple curriculum, buy a box of those books. That's your textbook for the thing, right? We don't have to be fancy.

[00:58:20.200] - Brandon
Yeah, we're not it's not a college degree.

[00:58:22.960] - Chris
you don't have to be Brandon to pull that off. No, I mean, really. I mean, you like you built a curriculum for that twelve week thing. It was super intentional. But I think for it to be high value, it doesn't have to be that customized. It's all about the pre-planning. Being intentional. Having a plan. Having it feel really thought out. Yeah, you're giving them a book, you're giving some materials. And a lot there's a lot of like John Maxwell's example.

[00:58:52.030] - Chris
Right. A lot of times there's an activity book, like a companion thing you could use as part of the text part of the curriculum.

[00:58:58.120] - Brandon
Absolutely. This is kind of an off the wall one, but just a breakfast bar.

[00:59:02.890] - Brandon
OK, now, again, this is

[00:59:05.110] - Chris
we did that, too.

[00:59:05.800] - Brandon
We did it. You got to have different stomach levels, right, for what you want to spend. But again, we're trying to look at all these things from the perspective of our prospects and our employees. And the reality of this is guys is that I will tell you my years of experience in the trades and these kinds of companies, what I saw a lot was Red Bull, rock star and a pack of cigarets. And the reality of it is, is that people they're not great at managing their mornings or their schedules or their timelines.

[00:59:33.490] - Brandon
And we can talk about, well, if they had any level of responsibility they'd wake up earlier, they'd do this, they'd do that. But again, we're playing the game good enough to beat the ref. So if the stats say most of your people aren't awesome about their morning routine, stop acting like you're going to expect them to be and put something into place to help them be right.

[00:59:53.590] - Brandon
Here's the benefit. Have a breakfast bar at your shop. Right. Have it stocked with some breakfast burritos, some good fruit, whatever the case may be, this is not a mission impossible. But, man, it's one of these things where, you know, your teammates are coming in. They're at least getting a good start to their day. They're throwing something in their gut along with their redbull.

[01:00:14.530] - Chris
Get a couple of boxes of a decent protein bars.

[01:00:18.880] - Brandon
And don't get mad when you see someone stuff two of them in their pocket on the way out the door. In fact, get really motivated because now, you know, your customer is not going to get a hangry-ass employee. They're actually going to be ready to go.

[01:00:30.070] - Brandon
And it may totally change your customers experience. But again, really, in all intents and purposes, this is a very cost effective way for you to value and take care of your customer, your internal customer. Here's another thing, owners. You know what's rad, accidentally be down by the breakfast bar, grabbing a burrito when one of your technicians rolls up and take three minutes to make eye contact, shake their hand, say, man, I've been hearing a lot of good things about you.

[01:00:57.790] - Brandon
What's been going on with you? How's the kids? How's your family?

[01:01:00.490] - Chris
I've gotta stop you though. I've heard a lot of good things? bahaha, I heard X, I heard Y about you. Yeah, that's funny.

[01:01:08.080] - Brandon
Yeah. Like, tell me what's going down with X, Y, Z.

[01:01:10.990] - Brandon
Again, these are not hugely expensive things, but they're game changers. And again, I think a lot of the things that we're talking about, Chris, are mutually beneficial. These are win-win-wins. Right.

[01:01:22.620] - Chris
it feels good to do this stuff.

[01:01:22.620] - Brandon
If our client has a better experience, it feels good to do it. You're taking care of your people. Your people feel cared for and important. And some of us, you guys, the reality of it is you can't out-give a taker.

[01:01:35.350] - Brandon
There's going to be people on your team that keep taking and keep taking. They don't they're never thankful. They're a bottomless pit. Chances are they're not going to be on the team forever.

[01:01:45.460] - Brandon
We're not talking about that.

[01:01:47.110] - Brandon
We're talking about the other 90 percent of your employees that will see the benefit to this and appreciate you and the team for providing it. Right. What else you got?

[01:01:55.820] - Chris
Well, you know, I thought it was one of the fun things that we did. So goodie bags. I mean, we did that. And a lot of times, we didn't do that on the regular, we would just spontaneously do that and periodically kind of surprise folks. I think the other thing we did was really fun was remember when we created like a little slush fund where people, peers, could catch each other doing something cool for a customer or somebody else on the team and they could, like, write their name on a sheet and then that person would win like a Starbucks card or something.

[01:02:30.040] - Brandon
Yeah, we had a goodie basket.

[01:02:32.080] - Brandon
Yeah.They could go to they would get a token or a card. And it was basically like an atta-boy card or an atta-girl card. Yeah.

[01:02:38.950] - Chris
And then that would entitle them to go get something out of the fun basket. Right. It was a five dollar Starbucks card or movie tickets. or a jumbo thing off of now and laters or candy or something like that.

[01:02:51.740] - Brandon
Yeah, right. And those were awesome too because peer it was peer to peer. Yeah. Right. Again guys, what kind of environment are we setting when peers now are going out of their way to affirm one another, to be a participant in the feel good of the day? Guys, this is the stuff that once it gets momentum, once it gets legs, you don't have to be the single person masterminding the entire corporate culture of your company.

[01:03:19.480] - Brandon
This is people then begin to perpetuate it on their own. And again, we're talking five bucks here, ten bucks there. It's not huge. Yeah, it was the I can't remember what we called it, but it was basically the goody bag they could draw from.

[01:03:31.180] - Chris
So let's go back to this idea of managers, leaders coming prepared with specific bits of affirmation, because this is the strategy that you just can't possibly invest too much in. Right. The term that I use for that is preceding interactions with your employees. One of the ways you can do that is by is not just with your leaders, but going straight to your front line staff. So here's an example. We had an all company meeting once a month.

[01:04:03.280] - Chris
It was usually toward the end. It was like the last Friday of the month. We'd bring everybody in and we had a whole routine. We'd probably talk about that at some point, how we leverage those. But one of the things that I like to do, and I think several of our leaders on the team did this. Is when I had a Downline employee over the course that month that did something really great.

[01:04:23.200] - Chris
Or what I would do is and it happened at kind of a team level, like not many people knew about it. We wanted to shine a light on that stuff during those opportunities. And I would go to that front line employee, hey, listen, that thing that you and Sally did the other day for the Johnson job. Listen, I'd love for you to share about that at our all company meeting this next Friday. Would you be willing to do that?

[01:04:48.820] - Chris
Can I coach you a little bit on here's the highlights. Like, I think if you talked about this, it's going to make the team feel really good. It'd be really encouraging for the team. Would you be willing to do that? Awesome. Here's how it's going to work, right. We're going to have our announcements. We're going to get through our stuff, and then we're going to have this segment where we talk about wins. And I'm not going to call on you.

[01:05:09.850] - Chris
I just want you to raise your hand. You cool with that? All right. Sure. It's your moment, right. And you're teaching your people how to call out the wins.

[01:05:21.310] - Brandon
yeahI love it.

[01:05:21.820] - Chris
And it's so much more meaningful when you get those frontline people raising their hand on their own accord on their own volition. Right. We prepped it. We kind of manipulated it. It's the best kind of minipulation.

[01:05:33.060] - Brandon
It's like you manipulate one or two and then you see the popcorn.

[01:05:36.550] - Chris
And ultimately what we're teaching is we're teaching our frontline people how to someday run a company. man. Yeah, you do that one hundred times with somebody over the course of two or three years, they're ready to become your GM or your mitigation manager because they've watched all of your tactics and tricks. They know how to build people up.

[01:05:56.990] - Brandon
They know how to build and affirm.

[01:05:58.070] - Chris
they know how to build culture. They know how to build this positive working environment where people know where they stand and they know how to call out the good people are doing. And they also know how to be clear and severe when they see stuff that doesn't align because they've watched it, they've heard it. They felt it so many times.

[01:06:14.420] - Brandon
I love it. I love it.

[01:06:16.010] - Brandon
I think I have one more actual little tactical type idea that we could practice and maybe we should look at the finish line.

[01:06:24.530] - Chris
Probably.

[01:06:26.330] - Brandon
OK, so the idea of a and this is very common, just how it's executed.

[01:06:32.300] - Brandon
I love the employee of the month and or employee of the quarter, depending on company size. If you're a big organization, you got lots of employees,employee of the Month is probably great. For smaller teams, you do that three times and you've gone through your roster. Right. So here's here's something to think about with the employee of the quarter. And it might be something that ties in to some of these other things that we've mentioned is when we affirm and see these types of behaviors, actions, focus's peer accountability that we love, like we love it.

[01:07:04.820] - Brandon
Right.

[01:07:05.570] - Brandon
Let's get our teammates, our leadership team, tokens, coins, tickets, whatever the case may be that we hand to that employee. Again, we're clear and severe. Hey, I saw you do X, Y, Z. Man, that was monster. I love it.

[01:07:21.290] - Brandon
Here's a token. Your name is going in the hat. And what we would do is we would go out and buy a big screen TV and a PS5 OK, or a traeger barbecue, whatever.

[01:07:31.880] - Brandon
And this thing sits in the company office out in the shop and all the eyeballs are on it for one month to month, three months. As the teams walking around doing their business and they're getting these coins and names are going into the hat. Right. And then, boom, it's that particular end of the quarter. All company meeting or whatever that we do are drawing from all those that earned their name in the hat. And someone's walking out of the building that day

[01:07:59.330] - Chris
with the fifty inch TV

[01:08:00.320] - Brandon
dude, with something rad.

[01:08:02.540] - Brandon
Right. And here's what I really love about that, is this is the kind of stuff that for those who like resources are not unlimited right. And the idea that a dad or a mom, OK, for the most part might be living Friday to friday .Has a couple of kids at home. Imagine what it feels like..... I get kinda choked up thinking about it. Imagine what it feels like to equip one of your employees to walk home with a big screen TV and a PS5 for their two kids.

[01:08:33.770] - Brandon
Wow. Right. It's like, again, we're just talking about things that perpetuate these wins across multiple fronts within your organization. But it's like you did just a little something to promote this consistent following of behaviors and tactics that you want to see within your organization. You equipped people to recognize eachother and put their name in the hat. And then you equipped one of your employees to walk home with a freakin awesome surprise that they, under normal conditions, may very well not have had the financial resources to provide.

[01:09:08.270] - Brandon
And then they look like a superhero.

[01:09:11.450] - Brandon
Yeah, right. Like that parent, that dad that mom coming home with this amazing gift and sharing that with their kids. They're the hero. Yeah, they're the hero. And that's part of the point of this. so, again, asking yourself this question, I'm trying to attract good employees to my team. I'm trying to hire good people. When you're equipping your employees to go home and be superheroes in front of their kids, do you not think that that's creating a level of commitment and loyalty to you and your brand that goes far beyond you checked the box that you provided some medical benefits? Like this is the kind of stuff we're talking about here. And guys, OK, Costco right now for a 50 inch TV is what? It's a few hundred bucks. You're not doing this every day.

[01:10:02.390] - Brandon
Right.

[01:10:02.660] - Brandon
But these are super impactful things.

[01:10:05.480] - Brandon
If we're intentional, if we're proactive and if we're consistent with what we're doing with these things. But, man, we've we've had a lot of fun with scenarios like that. A lot of fun. Yeah.

[01:10:18.530] - Chris
And it's the stuff that we think about now, like years later. Yeah. It's like I can I can still remember the look on people's faces when they realize they had one and it's like, oh my God, this is so amazing.

[01:10:30.110] - Brandon
Yeah. And it is sometimes it was fun to watch four people try to carry someone's prize out to their car and figure out how they're going to stuff it into the back seat. Right. Like it's all rad.

[01:10:40.260] - Brandon
It all creates wins.

[01:10:42.440] - Chris
Well, lets uh.

[01:10:44.050] - Brandon
are we going to wrap it?

[01:10:44.720] - Chris
give us the summary

[01:10:45.370] - Brandon
this one, this one's all over the place, but here's here's where I'm taken from this. Current climate, it's rough. We got lots of things affecting our ability to recruit and keep good people. We need to do a better job of asking ourselves the question, why our company? Why would someone want to work for me? Work for us? Wear this shirt? And we have to get over this mine block of well, they're getting good hours.

[01:11:16.480] - Brandon
They're getting decent pay. Well, this is what they're paid to do. Stop fooling yourself. Take the time and do yourself and your organization the service it requires and say, if I was answering this question from my employees perspective ...And you're looking for a win through their eyes, not yours. And we're not discounting your background, your experience or the realities of running and owning a business, but you're not recruiting yourself. You're already there.

[01:11:43.180] - Brandon
So really asking ourselves this question and understanding that the check the box stuff that does cost us a lot of money that's hard to provide is not necessarily the differentiator. So what are you going to do? What are the kinds of things that you can do within your organization? What are the steps that you can take? What are the things that you can prioritize to not only get people on the team, but to keep them there? Right.

[01:12:08.170] - Brandon
And those things can be creative.

[01:12:10.330] - Brandon
It's like I don't need to re-list these ideas, but be creative, have fun with it. And remember when you were 15, 18, 25, 30 dollars an hour person, what would you have enjoyed? Right. Take stock of your people. These are often folks Friday to Friday. What do they need? What could they use? What makes them happy? What makes them look awesome to their families, their friends, their peers? And then really lastly and the most important is that it's not the thing.

[01:12:38.620] - Brandon
The point is, how do you make your people feel working for you? Yeah. How do you make the people on your team feel? Do they feel trusted, valued, wanted? Do they feel like they're participating in the journey? Because those people want other people to come experience what they're experiencing!

[01:13:04.810] - Chris
I know we try not to do this summary and then jump back into podcasts, but I have this I have this thought, the screaming in my head, that I feel like it's really relevant to this that is maybe OK for us to kind of end on. One of the things that our employees are looking to us for is safety.

[01:13:22.090] - Brandon
man.

[01:13:22.570] - Chris
They want to be protected. Yeah, the good ones, our best employees, they want to be protected from the drama and bullshit that comes up in our business.

[01:13:32.470] - Brandon
Man.

[01:13:33.130] - Chris
And one of the things that I know we've been guilty of at times and we've seen the fallout from it. When we as leaders make a decision to keep a toxic person on our team because they're filling an essential role...

[01:13:47.650] - Brandon
Boo

[01:13:48.730] - Chris
we're harming the rest of our team.Period. And we're creating an unsafe place that our best people just have to deal with. We're also sending a really clear message, certainly one that we probably don't intend to, but we're sending a really clear message about how much we really value our people and our culture and the customer experience we give.

[01:14:11.380] - Chris
Because when we decide to keep somebody who's toxic either to fellow employees, or to customer relationship. What we're saying is that ultimately the money is more important. keeping these jobs flowing and keeping those invoices coming in. That's ultimately more important than all the rest of the awesome people that just have to put up with that toxic person that's making everybody's life miserable. So I just feel like this conversation would be remiss if we didn't address that, because it's a common, common occurrence in our business.

[01:14:47.260] - Brandon
It's in anybody's business.

[01:14:48.670] - Chris
In anybody's business. Right. We put up with that rotten mitigation tech or that AR person that all they do is complain and gossip and whatever the situation is. Yeah. If we are not dealing with that and keeping the rest of our employees safe. Yeah. It's going to be really difficult for us to win their trust and really win them over.

[01:15:11.230] - Brandon
Love it.

[01:15:12.820] - Chris
ok

[01:15:12.820] - Brandon
That's a wrap, man. Goodbye.

[01:15:16.930] - Brandon
All right, everybody. Hey, thanks for joining us for another episode of the MRM podcast.

[01:15:21.520] - Chris
And if you got something out of it, share it with a friend. Hit subscribe. Hit follow. Leave us five star review.

[01:15:27.190] - Chris
Thanks a lot.

Ep 6 - Part 2 Why Would Anyone Want To Work For You

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