he said my employee was"DIRTY"... I gave him a promotion

Just something else said that I really don't. He was dirty.

Everyone, it's Mike Andes. And today we're gonna go back almost a year ago and watch a little bit of this video that I made that has over a million views. It was very controversial and we're gonna break down what's happened to the employee that was featured in this past video. So let me just really quickly set the framework of the story and then we're gonna jump into what happened afterwards because it's been quite a ride. So a year ago, literally a year ago almost this week, we a property and we're mowing the lawn now on this property had to the media team and we were filming so we can make content for landscape business owners around the country so they can learn about business. Now. While we were doing that, a customer came out and no, it wasn't staged. The name of the customer was Dell. He came out and he was unhappy about two previous services where the employees, he said, were disheveled looking. Their beards weren't well kept, they were dirty and they were arrogant. And it was everything in my power I could do just to not get mad at him because I. I really am annoyed when Frontline staff are ridiculed, especially when they're outside working in the blazing heat. Like, this is one of the hottest weeks of the year that we were out mowing and here he was basically casting shade on someone because they were dirty. Like, it's just. It's crazy. So in this video, Caleb was the employee that was originally there and that this specific customer was talking about. So I'm going to give some more information after we watch some of the clips from the previous video. I'm going to give some information about what actually happened to Caleb because Caleb is still working for us and yes, he's been promoted. So let's go ahead and go back, though, and watch this interaction with this customer that came out to complain about some previous services and the employees that were performing those services.

Yeah, it's probably that note, but I can make it clear better notes and that way each time they come, it'll be more consistent.

Just something Mel said that I really don't. He was dirty. I mean, the guy was filthy. He needed to wash his face, needed to do something with his beard and his shirt and his pants were just. He was filthy. Yeah, yeah.

I don't see any filthy on you guys.

These are the video guys.

This guy looks familiar. He's been here before. He was learning how to push more.

And he was going.

Now he's been relegated to the camera now. Now, as a boss would have chewed him out for saying our guys were lazy. Takes everything in my power not to, like, really go after someone when they say that. Oh, yeah, Del and I are friends now, but.

I don't really appreciate when people say that guys are lazy. They're working out in the field, especially because I know our guys are on P4P and they're working their butts off all day.

So if you saw a guy, which.

I'm gonna go back and see who was here and what time they were here, but I can almost guarantee at the end of a day, so they're. They're dirty. We just went through a bunch of rain, so they were probably a bunch. There's a bunch of mud. But to say that people are arrogant and they. I don't like to work. That was, like, the brink of me about. To me, like, oh, actually, I'm the boss, and I'm gonna let you go as a classroom. But we persevered. I don't want to tell them I am the owner, because if I do, next time the guys come, he'll just use my name and say, oh, the last time the boss was here and said, X, Y, and Z. I don't want that happening.

All right, so that was back in the past. Now let's fast forward today, and I'm gonna tell you what happened. But if you look in the comment section of that video, there's a few kind of themes. I want to talk about one of those themes. People said, I lied to the customer by saying that I was not the boss. Now, that is somewhat true. I said I was not the boss. And I kind of swept that on the carpet and said, oh, yeah, I'm not the boss. I'm just. We're just here doing marketing videos and getting some video footage for our marketing. And some people say, you lied to the customer. The bottom line is, if I would have told the truth there and said that I was the owner and just said, yeah, I own this place, he would immediately use that against the next crew and use my name and say, oh, yeah, the boss was here last week. Mike. He was here, and he said that this, this, and this. And I don't want any. The crew to be put in the position where they're like, oh, who do I serve? Like, is the customer right? Is. Well, if the boss said that, like, that just throws them under the bus. Completely disarms them from taking care of the customer and taking ownership of their job. So that's why I did that. And the second thing that people were saying in the comments is that I should have just relented to the customer and just sent a different employee to do the service in the future. And again, I'm not going to do that. Everyone's trained the same way. Everyone has a very efficient route. And for me to say, oh, no, that, that one job in the middle of your route, you can't do that. You've got to skip it because the custom doesn't want you there. It's gonna hurt the performance pay of my employees because they get a cut of all the revenue they make for the business. So by making them skip a job, it's like inefficient for someone else to come driving all the way in and do that customer's property. Everyone's trained the same. Everyone has the same level of quality and the same standards. And the things that he mentioned in the video weren't really complaints. Like he said that the ditch wasn't done. Go back and watch the video. The ditch, I literally was shaving a tiny bit off. So it was kind of crazy, in my opinion. Some of his complaints. And ultimately we ended up firing the customer, letting them go. And some people, you can't fire a customer. You can only fire employees. Well, he wanted us to service his property and we said no. So we fired him. And we said, look, if you're not going to like this one employee coming back, then you're going to have to deal with not taking our services at all and you can find somebody else. And so that's what he did. Other people in the comments were saying that, how dare you blast a customer online? Well, it's funny. It's funny how all of a sudden the customer can blast every single business that they interact with online, say all sorts of negative things, and there's no repercussions. But somehow we as business owners, when people like this that say negative things about our team are demeaning, calling people dirty, that are frontline service workers, somehow we can't get any sort of revenge on them and we can't put them on blast, I don't think that's fair. You can't treat people like this. Whether you're a customer, a business owner, a politician, whether you're rich or you're poor, or you're black or you're white, you can't treat people like this, especially when people are serving you in this service industry. I truly believe you can really tell a lot about a person and Their character by how they treat frontline employees like a waitress and a waiter and people that are gas attendants and people at the gas station, like people who do their oil change. If you cannot respect those individuals that are serving you, I think that's a massive weakness that it shows in your character and a flaw that someone's got to fix. And I don't want customers like that. Now, the big thing everyone wants to know is what happened to Caleb, which was the employee that we actually sent back to the property, talked to, talked to the customer, the whole nine yards. What happened to him? Because a lot of people are saying he deserves a raise, and he's awesome. And I agree. So as of literally just a couple weeks ago, Caleb is now a general manager at a different location. Now, I'm the founder of Augusta Lawn Care. We have a hundred locations around North America, and there was a location about 45 minutes south of the location that was in the video. At this location, we needed a gm, and we literally needed it. Within a couple days, we had a turnover, and we had to immediately get a new general manager. And so I literally called up Caleb on a Saturday morning, and I was like, hey, do you want a general manager position? And for the whole year, whole past year, he's just been working in the field doing the same thing. But I really started to notice leadership tendencies that Caleb was starting to show and really valuing his contributions in team meetings. He started to really take ownership of maintaining the equipment and the mechanics of all the shopping equipment and the tools and really started to own it, like telling people what they should be doing right and wrong and training other people on that task and really just taking ownership of his position. And that's what I'm looking for in a general manager. And so I truly believe that someone like Caleb that cares for the customer, cares about the company, and then takes ownership of their position when the opportunity arises, and it might be a spare of the moment like it happened with him. They're the ones that will be promoted, that will be asked to step up and rise to the occasion because they've been preparing themselves, listening to audible programs and listen to audio books and improving themselves and trying to become a leader and maybe pushing themselves and their personality that might be more introverted, pushing themselves to talk in a team meeting and share with other people and train other people on parts of the business. That is what I'm looking for in a general manager. I'm looking for really just two things. When I look at a general manager and look at promoting Someone number one, can I trust them? And I would trust Caleb with my life. And the second thing is, are they hungry? Are they willing to learn? Are they hungry to learn? Are they trying to constantly improve themselves or they fine with stasis? Are they fine with just being ho hum, kind of, you know, come to work, we show up on time, but we leave. We don't want to work on the weekends. I don't try to push myself to become better. I'm not listening to audio programs and books and I'm trying, I'm not trying to learn more. And that's what I constantly was starting to see in Caleb. And so when the opportunity arose, he was the one that was able to, to take it and literally call him on a Saturday morning. And on Monday morning, he became the general manager at a location. So I wish him all the best at this new endeavor. And I just wanted to make this update video for everyone that was asking about what happened to Caleb. And he has been promoted. He's on a salary with profit sharing. He's a general manager at Augusta Lawn Care. And I'm very excited to see his future with the company, but more importantly, his growth as a manager and a leader. Now he's hiring people and interviewing people and working on routing and dispatching. And literally just a few weeks ago, he was still mowing grass. Maybe you're an employee now. Watching this, you're like, well, what do I do to get ahead? What do I do to get promoted? Do exactly those things. Be consistent. Caleb never showed up late, he never called out. He was always there, dependable. He was there early, getting the office set up, getting the lights, the trucks set up. Everything was ready to go. And he just took ownership of that. And when the time arose, literally over two years, he had already worked for us doing the same thing, but being consistent all the time. That's what led to him one day being able to take opportunity when it arose and become a general manager. So if you're looking to get promoted, look for those areas of the business that you can take ownership, that you can constantly learn and watch YouTube videos, listen to audio programs and then become better, improve your skills. And when the opportunity arises at a company that you might be working for, that's when you can be promoted. That's when you can take advantage. And I wish Caleb all the best. I'm thankful for his service to the company. I'm thankful for all of our team on the front lines. And I hope that the video that has now over a million views is a warning to people that treat Frontline people so horribly. And it's also an indication to business owners that you should not throw your team under the bus by just saying, oh, yeah, I'm the boss and I'm here to fix it. That is the wrong form of leadership, in my opinion. So that's just my two cents. If you want to go watch the original video, check it out here.

I don't get that mentality with, like, customers of, like, a lawn care business. It's like it's dirty work. I know. It's like, well, I was about to be like, well, yeah, he was working hard.