KickStart: “TIME is the only resource you can’t buy more of.” Sam Walton
“Make MORE profit by doing FEWER jobs? You’re an idiot, Steve!” You might think I’ve lost a few screws, but “Patience, Grasshopper”! Stick with me here…
Want to skyrocket your profits?👏🏼 Give your onsite employees a step-by-step Service System that will create an ecstatic “Cheerleader” (and 5-star reviews!) out of each residential client. (I call this “Service Engineering”.) Remember…
KickStart: I’m a slow walker, but I never walk backwards. Abraham Lincoln
As Home Service Business owners we’re often our own worst enemy. I call these “Displacement Activities” “Entrepreneurial Attention Deficit Disorder”!🤪 (Most business owners are blessed [cursed?] with a frenetic, almost manic energy/curiosity!)
Me? I would have driven good, old Honest Abe nuts! (As I did my long-suffering wife Sioux!) Both in business and personally I ran (not just walked) forward, backwards, and much of the time in meandering energy and time-wasting detours!😥
KickStart: “If everyone is moving forward together, then success takes care of itself.” – Henry Ford
If only for the sake of your aching back (not to mention your own Personal Freedom) I sincerely hope your Home Services Business (HSB) is more than a “group of one”! If so, you need to meditate on Mr. Ford’s sage observation above!
By far the biggest challenge you will ever face as a residential services entrepreneur will be recruiting, hiring, onboarding, training, motivating and managing employees. Am I “preaching to the choir” here?🤔 However…
KickStart: “Success breeds complacency. Complacency breeds failure…” Andrew Grove, CEO of Intel
During his eleven years(1987-1998) as CEO at Intel, Andy Grove used his absolute hatred of “business complacency” to rocket Intel’s value by 4,500%! (From $4 billion to $197 billion!) But now let’s talk about you and your residential services business…
KickStart: “I have just one day, today, and I’m going to be happy in it.” Groucho Marx
So, have you found your “Happy Place” as a Home Services business? (And life?) Your biggest “Happy Place Choice” in our residential services industry is…
KickStart: “Any time a customer comes into contact with any aspect of a business, however remote, is an opportunity to form an impression with a Moment of Truth.” Jan Carlzon, Moments of Truth (1985)
Way back in the 1980’s this “Moment of Truth”(MOT) concept transformed my life! (Thanks, Jan!) Click HERE to review why MOT’s are so very important in our Home Services industry.
Of course, it’s easy to say: “Great idea, Steve!”👍 And then go back to putting out fires and/or planning your next trip to Disney World!😲 Instead, I urge you to…
KickStart: Examine building a Critical Mass Business to bring you the elusive ‘Personal Freedom’!
We’ve recently discussed the why and how of creating a work atmosphere that is 1) safe, 2) sane, and 3) stable. (More important than ever in these CRAZY TIMES!) However…
While happy, engaged and committed workers are incredibly important they shouldn’t be the Primary Purpose of your business. NOTE: Please don’t focus ONLY on ‘getting big’. After all, I’ve consulted with Home Service entrepreneurs who have 100’s of employees and are totally enslaved by their business!
Of course, I (of all people) am a big fan of money! After all, I tell every class, “All things being equal… it is better to have more money than no money!” Why? Because financial success is a tool- to help others and bring you (and your family) freedom! (More on this in a bit.) But first, a warning…
KickStart: Get your entire company focused on their ‘Triple A’s’ (Appearance, Actions and Attitude) and profits will soar!
I admit it. I truly love inventing acronyms for routine daily activities. (This drives Sioux nuts!)🙄 But my staff used abbreviations in my residential services business all the time. For example…
We invented and implemented a PDS (Production Day Sheet), IQC (Immediate Quality Check calls) and an EEB (Employee Efficiency Bonus program), etc. You get the idea, right?
KickStart: BEFORE you diversify into a new service STOP🛑 and ponder on Steve’s ‘8 Introspective Questions’!
di·ver·si·fy: “enlarge or vary the range of services or products of a business.”
Hmmmm… does diversifying sound good? Maybe. As with so many undecided business questions, “It all depends.” Above all else one not-so-simple question…
KickStart: When you honestly don’t know what to do… WAIT!
Motivational speakers constantly exhort you to “git ‘er done” and “get moving”! But since Steve Toburen isn’t a ‘goo-roo’ I’ll remind you that sometimes ‘Procrastination Pays’! Say what, Steve?😲
Yep, when I’m honestly perplexed on what to do going forward I’ll engage in what I call…
‘Creative Procrastination’: Waiting on events (or just plain ‘serendipity’) to show you the next step.
Let me be clear on what Creative Procrastination (CP) is NOT! CP doesn’t mean slacking off and then complaining that a) the economy is bad, b) competition is too fierce or c) there are too many ‘Price Shoppers’ out there! (Our industry is full of excuses like these and so many more!)