Last week I had the opportunity to attend a conference for my carpet cleaning business. As part of the conference, I was able to go to a Franklin Covey leadership training, and though it was very fast, it was very insightful. One of the first questions that I was asked to think about was what is one of the biggest stumbling blocks you are running into in your business. After thinking for a few minutes, I wrote down “Toilet Paper Rolls.”
Now, I’ve had several funny looks when I tell this story, and I wouldn’t blame you if you were taken aback by that statement, too. It sounds kind of funny, that toilet paper rolls are holding my business back. And you’re right, toilet paper rolls aren’t really holding anything back, but they are a symptom of a much bigger problem.
You see, my staff has a hard time changing the toilet paper rolls in the bathroom. I don’t know why, it isn’t a particularly hard toilet roll holder to change, and though I’ve threatened to ration tp, we have plenty of it in the bathroom. The bathroom is really small, too, so there isn’t any problem reaching the toilet paper when it is needed. So why is it so hard to change? I still don’t know. But when it does get changed, the next challenge is to throw the empty roll away. At one point, we had a tower of about 15 empty rolls going! All the effort that went into building that architectural masterpiece, yet no one is able to throw them away…
So what is the bigger problem, the thing the tp represents? I believe it is a lack of caring about each other, about our space, about our equipment, and ultimately, about our customers. We see other symptoms: trash left in the vans, trash left on the floor, equipment not being put away properly, equipment being broken or lost. Doing a half-assed job cleaning a customer’s home, not trying to go the extra mile. Not helping the other members of our team out.
None of these things is a really big thing, but it is the accumulation of all these little things that makes for a really big mess. Don’t get me wrong, I think my team does a fantastic job, and we work hard to serve our customers, but I think there is a lot of room for improvement.
For example, I happened to look out my living room window yesterday, and I saw one of my vans a few houses away from me. Thinking that was pretty cool, I walked down to take a look and see what was going on. As I approached, I started ticking off these little things in my head. First, the van was parked 4 feet into the street. Not the best placement when legally we need to be within 12 inches of the curb… I did notice the rear doors were closed, the hood was open, and the a/c was off, all good things. I took a look inside the garage, which is how my tech had entered into the home to clean, and I noticed a fan, and a few corner guards. Good, at least those made it into the house. But the van sounded a little funny, and so I took a closer look. The vacuum was on its low setting, and the water pressure wasn’t high enough, and the temperature control was all the way down.
Well, I turned the water off, knowing that would get my tech’s attention. Sure enough, he came outside to see what was going on. We went over the various things I was looking at, and fixed them. As he was heading back in, I challenged him to sell protector to the customer. He immediately told me “she’s on social security,” as if that was the final thing to say. I looked at him, and told him to sell her protector anyway. “Well, she’s on a fixed budget.” “She doesn’t want to pay for stain removal.””She doesn’t want to buy anything else, the carpet cleaning is too much already.” I told him to quit making excuses and sell protector, and no, I wasn’t nice about it.
He went in, and I walked home. My wife told me to go help him out, and after grumbling a little, I did. And I think it was a good thing that I did, as it helped me see several “toilet paper rolls” that needed to be fixed. Now before I go further, I want to be clear that any mistake my tech made, any thing he did wrong, is my fault for not teaching him the right way to do things. This is a list more of my faults than of his, and it is my attempt to start to address and fix each of these problems.
I went into the house, and introduced myself to the customer, my neighbor. I spent some time getting to know her, and observing how my tech was cleaning. The first thing I noticed was that he hadn’t hit the transition area well enough- it still showed soiling, and needed a bit more work. I helped him with that, even showing him how to go at it from a different direction to get a better clean. We then proceeded to work on a few stains that were in the carpet. These were not typical stains, and there was some nuance to them, but they cleaned up really pretty well. I brought the customer into the room and showed her what was going on. While I was on my knees, I began to do a little bit of stain removal and talked to her about her last carpet cleaning. I asked if she had had the carpets protected, and she didn’t remember.
Even though the stain removal kit was almost out of product, we were able to get the stains out of the carpet. That was another lesson- get the stuff ready before you leave the shop. Check it, and if it is empty, refill it!
I then showed my tech how to properly spray. He was kind of haphazardly spraying the carpet, not at all being deliberate about what he was doing. After explaining that this is probably the single most important thing he could do when cleaning, I showed him how to get a good, even coverage with the pre-spray. Next, I showed how to wand. Without going into too many specifics, let’s just say his technique needed some work.
The next thing I did was explain to Lexi, our customer, that she should consider re-protecting the carpet next time. I told her I knew it wasn’t in her budget this time, but next time it would be a really good thing for her to do. Well, that was the kicker, and she asked how much it would be. I let her know, and she said she wanted to do it right now. It was a little above her budget, but within the margin of error, so to speak, and so we re-protected her carpet.
In my discussion with my tech afterward, I ran down a bunch of these little things that would have made his work better, and far more effective and efficient.
First, he should have parked closer to the curb. Next, he should have taken 2 fans and the corner guards to the front door when he went to knock on it. That would have saved him 3 trips to the van, compared to how he did it. Next, during the walk through, instead of telling the customer she needed to pay extra for the stain removal, he should have said “let me test that spot. If it comes out with the normal clean, great! If not, we will see what we need to do to get it out.” I suppose this is the real first- he should have checked his stain kit to make sure that he had everything he needed for the day BEFORE he left the shop, not during the last job of the day. Next, he should have used the van the way it was meant to be used, with proper heat, pressure, and vacuum.
Once he got started with the cleaning, using proper pre-spray technique and proper cleaning technique, and then being more thorough with the cleaning would have ensured that he didn’t need to go back and re-clean some of the areas after he had moved on. Next, testing the spot and then doing a little bit of stain removal went a long way in helping the customer to feel like we were really trying to take care of her, which we were. Having the fans inside the house already would have also made him use them faster, helping the carpet to dry faster. I also took a long time to talk to her about protector, starting out on my knees, and then coming back and saying that next time would be a great time to protect things.
Now, I’m not perfect, but I know that job would have been a lot smoother had he “done it my way” from the beginning. But it was really good for me to see in what ways I need to step up my training efforts. As we talked afterwards, my tech told me he’s afraid to sell things to customers because he’s afraid to get behind in his schedule, and that he didn’t want to appear pushy. I asked him if he thought my approach was pushy, and he said no, but that he doesn’t have the time to chit chat with the customer because he’s afraid of getting behind. I replied that he a) has plenty of time, there is no hurry, and b) he doesn’t need to chit chat a whole lot, and c) if he had been more efficient in getting things set up, he’d have more time to chit chat, if he wanted.
This was another lesson: that the most important job of the day, the most important customer of the day, is the one you’re at right now. Nothing else matters at that moment.
The big take away for me is that we have lots of little things, lots of these toilet paper rolls, that get in the way of us doing what we need to be doing. And instead of just ignoring them, we need to get down and confront them to make them better. Cleaning them up takes just a few seconds, and it makes a world of difference. Not because one toilet paper roll makes a huge difference, but because the accumulation of them does. It’s all the little things that hold us back or move us forward, not any really big thing. Just the little ones. Done right, over and over again. Until the job is done.
DaveGrigsby.com 