Interview Series: What Would Happen If Someone Else Ran Your Company ?

Episode #180: What would happen if you let another landscaping company owner run your company? We launched this new part of our ACE Peer Group Program earlier this year with the ownership of Coastal Greenery switching places with ownership of Malone's Landscaping. In this episode, the group that swapped places talks about what they learned from getting fresh eyes on their company and also spending a week running another landscaping company. They talk about all the hot button issues: managing teams, technology, branding, overhead costs, and much more.

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Guests:

Jim Cali - Founding Principal at McFarlin Stanford, ACE Peer Group Facilitator, Grow Group Strategic Partner
Jeffrey Johns - Owner, Coastal Greenery (Brunswick, GA)
Jacob Johns - Controller, Coastal Greenery
Jim Malone - Founder, Malone's (Seattle, WA)
Ryan Malone - President, Malone's
Jake Malone - Branch Manager, Malone's

Resources Mentioned:

Key Learnings

You Cannot See Your Own Business Clearly From Inside Your Own Business: No matter how sharp you are, you walk past things every day. An outside set of eyes will see in 15 minutes what you have missed for years.

Peer-to-Peer Learning Beats Zoom Every Time: The value of the CEO Swap wasn't in the ideas exchanged, it was in the one-on-one meetings with each other's team members. There's no hiding, no deferring, and no shortcut when you're on site.

Sense of Urgency Is Often the Missing Ingredient: Coastal Greenery already knew about their account manager churn issue. The Malones pointed it out and drove accountability, which turned a slow-burn problem into four new hires and two internal promotions.

Compensation Plans Have to Match Ambitions: If you want to be the destination workplace in your region, your comp plan for critical roles like account management has to be the best. People are the biggest line on the P&L. Treat it as an investment, not an expense.

The Best Talent Already Has a Job: They're not looking. If you want to recruit them, you have to build a business worth switching to. Nice comp is table stakes.

Small Standards Reveal the Real Standards: If not everyone is wearing branded uniforms, you don't have a uniform standard. If your safety rules aren't enforced, you don't have safety standards. Standards you don't uphold become suggestions.

Clear Career Paths Change Culture: Coastal Greenery has a physical board with every team member's photo, their current position, and the next role they're working toward. When people know exactly what "next" looks like, engagement changes.

Tech Spaghetti Slows You Down: Every growing business ends up with a stack of software plugins bolted together. Simplify. The best software is the one your team actually uses. Switching won't fix a usage problem.

Good Managers Make Good Decisions With Good Information: If you don't have dashboards, KPIs, and metrics that show what's working, you're guessing. Every property, every project, every dollar of fertilizer should be trackable.

Celebrate the Team Constantly: Malone's has built a culture of celebration that Coastal Greenery is now copying. Coastal Greenery has built a level of detail and standards that Malone's is now copying. Both companies got better because both were willing to steal what worked.

Vulnerability Is What Makes Feedback Land: Jeffrey Johns didn't tell Malone's team what to do. He told them what he had messed up and what he learned. That's why people listened.

The Value Isn't the Visit, It's the Execution: A great idea list doesn't improve a company. Doing something about it does. What separates ACE members from everyone else is action.

Reflection Questions

Who has permission to tell you something you don't want to hear about your business? When was the last time you actually let them?
What standards in your company are being enforced, and which ones have quietly become suggestions?
If another owner spent three days inside your operation, what are the three things they would call out that you already know but haven't acted on?

Additional Resources:

Virtual Sales Bootcamp

Grunder Landscaping Field Trips

The Grow Group

Grunder Landscaping

Marty Grunder LinkedIn