[00:00:01] Speaker A: Welcome to the Grow show brought to you by Marty Grunder's Grow Group where we specialize in helping landscaping companies to clarify their platform, grow their people, build their processes and realize profits. Everything we teach is grounded in real experience. Our team is actively involved in the day to day operations of Southwest Ohio's Grunder Landscaping Company.
New episodes are released weekly on Wednesdays and are made possible with the support of Bob Yard. Remember to subscribe so you never miss an episode. Now here's your host, Marty Grunder.
[00:00:27] Speaker B: Well, good morning, good afternoon, good evening wherever the case may be. This is Marty Grunder from Grunder Landscaping Co. And the Grow Group. Thanks for downloading the Grow Show. Today we're going to talk about a critical focus of every landscaping company around retaining team members. But first, a reminder. You can get the latest edition of the Grow show delivered to your phone, tablet or computer by subscribing wherever you get your podcasts or Watch us on YouTube for an enhanced learning experience.
The Grow show is the Greatest Thing since Golf with My Son and Son in Laws in honor of golf with my son and son in laws, this shirt from Augusta is one that my son in law got me for my birthday. I've got it on today. I've never been to Augusta as I don't like crowds.
You know, I didn't start playing golf Till I was 51 years old. I'm 58 now, so it's been a struggle. I have finally consistently broke 90 which has been fun.
I wish I would have taken up the sport when I was young folks. I digress. It is so much fun to be out in beautiful landscaping with my son and son in laws playing golf. We all have about the same talent. Well my one son in law, the one that got me the shirt, he kicks our tails. But the rest of us, all on the very same level. We laugh once in a while, we have an adult beverage on the course and we really enjoy each other's companies.
We have played all over the country and I look forward to playing more in the years to come.
Now about my challenges in those sand traps. And one more thing, even though I don't like crowds, if my son and son in laws, maybe they're listening, get me tickets to go to Augusta or any golf tournament for that matter. With them, I'm gone. Love those men.
Now on to the Grow Show.
You know ladies and gentlemen, everyone always asks me about recruiting, but very few people ask me about retention. It's kind of odd. And here's what I've learned In the last 42 years of running Grunder Landscaping Co. The easiest employee to hire is the one you never lose. Let me say that again. The easiest employee to hire is the one you never lose. Okay, so today I want to share with you what we've learned at Grunder Landscaping company about keeping great people. I got five points. Point number one, retention starts with culture.
Don't start with wages. Don't start with benefits. Start with culture. C U L T U R E. Ask, would I want my son or daughter to work here? Ask yourself. Would you want to work for you? One of my favorite questions to ask the owner of a landscaping company. Would you want to work for you? At Grunder Landscaping company, We have tried to create a safe workplace, both safe physically and mentally. We've tried to create an environment where there's clean trucks, equipment and facilities, paid training, opportunities for advancement, and leaders who care about people.
People stay where they feel respected, folks. And here's one of my favorite lines. Culture isn't what you write on the wall. Culture is how people feel on Sunday night before they come into work Monday morning. All right? If your workplace isn't safe, safe from a safety perspective is the rubber on your truck tires, safety guards in place on your mowers, PPE safety training and an incredible focus on safety, why would someone think you care about them? I cannot believe how many trucks of landscaping companies in the Dayton and Cincinnati area that I see with their team in them, and they don't have their seatbelts on. If you ever see a Grunder Landscaping truck with anyone without their seatbelt on, let me know. We mention it every morning. Believe it or not, we care about our team. We want them to know they got to be safe. We have clean trucks. We have a clean facility. Maybe most importantly, we have clean bathrooms. Do you send me in a dirty bathroom, folks? Really? Are you investing in me? Did you send me to grow or a field trip? Here at Grunder Landscaping, did you let your team partake in some of our virtual learning events or did you do anything with them? Did you send a state association? Did you send to some local training? Whatever it is? What about opportunities for advancement? We're going to talk a little bit more about that in a minute. But are there opportunities or is your place stagnant, not growing? There's no place for anybody to go.
Culture at the end of the day, folks, is not a set it and forget it deal. It's something we all need to work on constantly. You never, ever let up on it. It's rooted in Your core values. Our four core values are quality, leadership, teamwork, and profitability. They've been around here almost 30 years. Believe it or not, we hired them and we fired them. And as the late, great Peter Drucker often said, culture eats strategy for breakfast. Meaning that no matter what your goals are, what your plans are, your culture, what's going on when you're not around all the rules and the unwritten things in the organization, the culture will ultimately dictate your success, despite whatever your plan might be.
Amen to that. Get that culture right. Landscape Pros after culture. Point number two.
I think point number two is every manager owns retention, and I mean owns it. One of my favorite concepts for HR training is that HR is part of every manager's job. Too many owners think, oh, well, HR will handle it. No, people quit. Managers. Managers create engagement. Managers create frustration.
Managers create growth opportunities. At Grunder Landscaping company, we believe every leader should be able to coach, mentor, train, and maybe most importantly, maybe most importantly, address conflict. That's not the human resource department's job. That's leadership. HR is not a department, folks. It's a mindset. And let me throw something in very important.
I'm not talking about loose ownership when I say own it. I'm talking about true ownership. The buck stops with you.
And that means that your team needs training. Your managers, they need your support. They need you to check in with them. They learn the most by watching you. So how do you treat people? How do you lead? Do you just keep kicking the cans down the road or do you truly address issues?
There is not enough time here in this episode of the Grow show to cover everything.
But let me just say three things that comprise what I mean by owning it and how you own it. Chastise in private, praise in public, and do it swiftly. If we have an issue with someone that's in private and we handle it quickly, if something good happened, we praise in public with great specificity and we do it in front of everyone and we do it swiftly. Number two, in the words of the great Jean Sean Wright, the person who you should be working with on your hr, we're going to put her contact info in the show notes.
She has taught our entire team. She's taught me, she said it for over 25 years. If it's not written down, it didn't happen.
So aside from chastising in private and praising in public, you got to document all these conversations, the things, the conflicts that come up. You may need that for legal reasons, but it's also Needed so you can see trends and so that the ownership of the business and the leadership team can inspect what they expect. If we're truly going to have other managers in the organization owning these relationships, they have to document conflict. They have to document episodes, little things that happen. Okay? And then finally, attitude is everything.
Get the bad apples out of your company, and when they're removed, debrief so you can learn. You can't always see what you missed in hiring a person that didn't work out. I understand that. You interview them, they're never going to look better, smell better, appear better. You have great needs, and you hire them. And then, gosh, after that day, it's like, that's not even the same person that was in the interview. I know it happens, but I don't think you just say, oh, well, they're not here anymore. Let's go. Somebody's got to slow down and look at it. Okay, Listen, I have 146 or so team members at Grunder Landscaping Company right now, and I love 143 of them.
All right, I make you chuckle.
I'm exaggerating a little bit for effect. Okay? But I think what tends to happen is we worry about the three instead of the 143 of the 146. They're actually doing it right. And bad apples, the longer they stay, the more time they take and the more other aspects of your business they wreck. Get them out of there. Park a truck if you got to, but get them out of there.
All right, and now how about we hear from one of the trusted partners we work with at Grunder Landscaping Company.
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[00:09:51] Speaker B: All right, so we're talking about not making HR a department.
What we definitely do not want is an us versus them in place. All right? Have it a we're in it together place. Okay.
One of my clients mentioned to me a couple years ago.
He said, I'm very excited. I'm hiring a HR manager. We finally have someone to advocate for the Employees.
And I said, charles, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. Stop.
What do you mean? I'm not following you. So you have to hire an HR manager to advocate for the employees. What you're telling me is if that person's not there, we're all just going to run over the employees and not do anything that's to their benefit?
Now he realized what I was saying. He chose the wrong word to say to me. You're not hiring an HR manager to advocate. You're hiring an HR manager to teach your team how to handle conflict, to manage, to handle the things that you have to do for compliance from an HR perspective. But we're not hiring somebody to come in here and create division. We're hiring someone to come in here and create unity. So HR is not a department. It's a mindset, folks. And we need to hire slow and we need to fire fast. And we need to understand that every hire is either impressing or depressing. And you know what you need? You need people that impress, not depress.
So get the culture right. Teach your people how to lead. Equip them to handle conflict and manage. Now on to number three.
Give people a future.
The best people want more, ladies and gentlemen. They want more responsibility, more opportunities, more growth. And if you don't provide it, somebody else will. And we're talking about career paths. We're talking about goal setting reviews. We're talking about promotions. We're talking about training. One of the best things that I have taught for years is something I learned from my mentor and friend, Mike Rory. He said to me, the best reason to grow your company is because you want to create opportunities for ambitious people. When talented people can see a future, they see greatness. There's three kinds of workplaces, ladies and gentlemen. All right, there is the raging river, which is the out of control workplace. Okay? There is the stagnant pond, which means nobody's coming and going and nobody wants to be there. And then there's the ideal place, which is the Lazy river. And that's where I'd like you to be. Okay? We don't want a raging river. Whitewater rafting trip every day, all day, seven days a week. That's exhausting. We also don't want a stagnant pond where you go in there, but there's no place to go. That's what Grunter Landscaping have become. We want the Lazy river, where there's movement. Okay? We've got a couple examples here I want to talk to you about.
We've got Bill Roselle, Bill Roselle started out here working on the crew. Now he runs our production operations.
We've got Brian Davis. Brian Davis, believe it or not, started out here watering plants.
He was passed over for promotion by a manager that I had here that I still don't understand what he was doing. He left the company for a couple months. We brought him back. He's now our director of administration. He's a homegrown all star. Amanda Collis, internship with us from Michigan State University.
She succeeded on the crew. We had her in sales. Then we moved her into procurement. She's a silent all star here in terms of procurement. Kim Hurley started out answering our phones. Our administrative assistant is now our accounting assistant. Another success story. Homegrown. And then last but certainly not least, someone I'm very fond of, Gaston Ramirez. Gaston's been here 12 years. Came here on the H2B program, worked on a crew, ran a crew. He's now a permanent res. As you scan through all those five people from my company, folks, these are all awesome people that started out one place, and because of the growth, we had had an opportunity to go someplace else and by way, come meet those five awesome team members and the rest of the team at a field trip here at Grunder Landscaping Company. The next one is August 5th and 6th. They all sell out, folks, so don't dilly dally around. Sign up for one of them August 5th and 6th. Then in September, October, and December, it's an incredible learning experience.
You get to see what I've screwed up, and I've screwed up more than any other landscaper in America, folks. But you're also going to see what I've learned, and we share it all. It's all very transparent. Come see me. You'll be glad you did.
So I ask you here, how is your culture? It's never too late to fix it, folks. It starts with you and the example you set and what you spend your time and money on. Do you have a stagnant pond or raging river? Get that lazy river with all sorts of organized and controlled growth where people are moving but not so fast like a raging river that they don't know what's going on and can't catch their breath? So we talked about culture. Are you thinking about what you can do starting tomorrow to make yours all it can be? Hr, remember, is not a department. Learn how to lead. And does your place have opportunities for your team to grow? Remember, if they grow, you grow. They make more money. You should, too. Okay. All right, now on to point four and I think this is really important. Appreciation still matters, and it doesn't have to be expensive. There's such a fallacy there. At Grunder Landscaping Company, we do team events. We spent $600 three weeks ago to cook burgers for everyone. It's a simple thing. I cook. My wife usually comes out and helps me. Do you recognize your team? Do they get bonuses? Do you sing to them on their birthday? Are you paying them for referring folks to your company that you're employing?
Do you do safety shout outs? Is there pictures of their jobs and their work on Facebook?
The real point is simple, folks. People want to know that they've done a good job.
And I know that this stuff matters. Maybe it's you passing out the first paycheck to a new hire or greeting a new hire, having their locker ready with their name on it. I don't know what it is, but I think what matters the most is for you as an owner and your leadership team to show up on the mornings that I am at Grunder Landscaping, which is most days out of the year, other than some traveling for consulting and speaking, I'm out in the circle in either Cincinnati or our Dayton location. Here's a video right now of our stretch and flex. You can see what we're doing. I'm out there with them, taking my old body and stretching it. I know their names. I even sing Happy birthday to them if I'm there on their birthday. I give a darn. I show them that. And you know what? I'm going to share something with you. I'm going to show some vulnerability.
I don't hear. I think enough that I've done a good job by my team. All right, now, I don't cry. I don't feel sorry for myself. But I'm just saying, like, do you know how you feel when one of your team members has a genuine thanks to you? I love to hear it. You would, too. It's not that hard, folks. It's more about being intentional and organized and seeing things, having a vision. Why would your people want to give a darn about their work if you don't give a darn about the work they're doing for you? So I'm going to ask you again. Would you want to work for you? And let's go one more time. How's your culture? HR is not a department, folks. Learn how to lead. Teach your team how to handle things. You weren't very good at this handling conflict years ago, either.
Create opportunities for your team to grow. Show them that you care. Show them that you love them. Yes. Love them. Love them. And then finally, and I truly think this last thing is an overarching theme that has to permeate your organization.
And if you're watching on the YouTube version for the enhanced learning experience you're seeing on your screen right now, Dwyer Wy W D.
What does that mean?
Do what you said you would do.
There are so many folks here in point five that they just don't do this. If you promise training, then do it. If you promised a raise for getting certified, then do it. And, yeah, maybe you need to be more careful about what you're talking about. Watch what you're doing.
I used to talk freely about all kinds of stuff. And I had this environment here where I didn't do what I said I would do. I couldn't remember what I said in the heat of the moment. I'm very careful about what I see. If you promised opportunities for advancement, you've got to deliver them. If you promised a review, you got to do it. Do it.
One simple, broken promise, ladies and gentlemen, can undo months of goodwill.
At the heart of it all, this doing what you said you would do is all about retention. It's built on trust. Okay, now, I know some of you are listening and you're thinking, marty, this all sounds great, but I'm overwhelmed, and I have no idea how to actually implement it. Well, that's exactly why we host our field trip, folks. Come to our Dayton, Ohio, our original branch, and you'll see morning meetings. You'll see leadership systems. You'll see career paths, training processes, safety programs. You'll see firsthand the culture that we have. You'll see how we communicate with our team, how we work to retain great people. You'll see the real thing. Not a dim the lights pour on a PowerPoint presentation. Good Lord, who would ever want to do that? The fall field trips is where you should be. All of that's enclosed in the show notes. The next one is August 5th and 6th. Come see me. And here, as we wrap this up, I'm going to end with this.
The number one way to recruit great people is to make your place a great place to work.
What I'm implying you do here, I'm begging you to do this week on the Grow show, is to stop focusing so much on the people you need to hire and start paying attention to the people you've already got. They are your greatest asset. They deserve your best leadership. Well, that's going to do it for this week's edition of the Grow Show. Folks, I truly hope you can tell how much I love doing these episodes. I am grateful that you drop by each week if you haven't done so already. Subscribe to the Grow show and if you can, give it a rating or share a comment that helps more success minded landscape professionals find us. And if you really want to help us, share this link right now on your phone. Share the YouTube link, get it to a friend, a fellow landscape pro and tell them what you're doing. It would help us a lot. Thanks for joining us on the Grow show this week. We'll talk to you next week.
[00:20:41] Speaker A: Join Marty and the Grow Group team at Grunder Landscaping Co. This year we host GLC Field Trip events at our living laboratory, Grunder Landscaping Company where we show you how we operate and how you can too. This event features small groups so you get the one on one attention you need and features a full 27 hours on site at GLC where we dive deep into everything from operations to sales to administration.
Find more information and sign
[email protected] and do it quickly. These events sell out every year.
