Mike Minutes Mastermind 11/13/2023

Let me just get this YouTube thing figured out.

Oh, my audio needs to be fixed and we are in shambles here on a Monday morning. Okay, there we go. All right. YouTube put this in the playlist. Mike minutes there. Copy save Facebook.

They've added another step. Nice. There it is. Paste. Okay, we got two questions it looks like. And then I do have a couple things I want to muse about. Some cool stuff I thought about about yellow slips and improving the business, etc. So let's just knock out the questions and then we'll jump into.

Some thoughts I had about yellow slopes.

What do we got today? We got two. Let's go. Kyle Tarver, Oklahoma. I've noticed Liz may be an intrapreneur. She has a business for self also works really well within your organization. In my opinion, these type of people actually benefit the business in the long term as they tend to be drivers of innovation, implementation and growth. I've had, I have. I have a guy like this and to be honest, I don't want to lose him if he decides he wants to do his own thing. Not that I would stop him. I'm just thinking how we can best position in the company to where he can scratch that entrepreneurial itch without him feeling like he has to leave. Few questions. How do you foster the intrapreneur spirit in her to want to challenge herself within the organization but not push too hard to achieve, Just want to leave and do her own thing. I would say a few things. One is you give people kind of like marching orders slash like here's the goal. But you don't necessarily tell them how to get there. So you give them directive like hey, this must be done. Like this is the goal. Here's the goal posts. I'm not going to necessarily how to tell you how to get it done because they don't want to just follow step one, step two, step three, like checklists. If they did that, they'd like to. They'd love to be out in the field or a frontline team member. Typically, like that's also a very valuable role in the organization. But for someone that wants to come up with creative ideas and like figure out the plan and the solution and the strategy, great. They're just not gonna. If there's. If they're self introspective enough, they realize they're not as great at creating the goal post or like the end goal and. Or that might be more limited for them. So they, they feel like, hey, if I can just work with someone who creates that really Definitively and it's like bigger, better than I could do myself. But. But they give me the freedom to like create the strategy and the plan to get there. Then that's good. So like the directive I've given Liz is like I want to kick spraying rash in the teeth and you have a blank checkbook and I want you to do whatever it takes to get there. So I don't really give like the definitive like how many people needs to be hired, systems and procedures that need to be changed. I don't really give that. And so. And then you just back them up 110%. All glory goes them and then anything goes bad is your fault. If you can, if you're willing to do that, usually they'll stick with you. That's what I found.

2. Is there some sort of framework you use when working with people who are more entrepreneurial minded? Yeah, like you just, you just got to be. You got to realize that they don't want to draw inside the line. So don't give them any lines, just tell them what you want them to draw. I'm planning on emailing her as well and getting her take. Just curious what you think. I don't think you necessarily need to email her. You actually I guess you could unless you make a video about her channel or something like that. But I would, I would say that's, that's the framework. Also realize that most people aren't self aware enough to realize they're an entrepreneur and they think they're an entrepreneur, especially because entrepreneur has been glamorized. It does take a lot of self reflection for someone to realize like that they are better off sticking with underneath an entrepreneur and being in the operator and being someone inside the business who operates it like they own it and that person's valuable. And so if they're willing to hold their breath a little bit with you as the business grows, then you're good. So Liz at the very beginning was very.

Kind enough to realize that like the company didn't have money and she did not take a lot from the company and she never asked for a raise and she never asked for more money and you know, now she makes good. But it's like it's a matter of years of holding their breath. If they're willing and able to do that, then I value them a lot. And so most people unfortunately that are quote unquote entrepreneurial don't have the ability to hold their breath. They, they're immediately like, oh, I want to get more money, I want to get more position. And so eventually they kind of grow outside of the company. They're like, okay, hey that's excellent, but you'll have to move on because we can't provide that here. But again, if, if they are realizing that sticking with you is going to be better in the next 10 years versus doing their own thing, that takes a lot of self reflection and I really admire people that do that. I think it's under underrated and it gets no media attention or anything like that. Like someone who realized if I stay with this company and work inside of it for 10 years, I'll be better off than if I try to do something on my own. Takes a lot of humility. And so in, in exchange for that humility, I try to give them as few guidelines and strategies and plans and tactics and just say, hey, here's the goal, run for it. And typically you'll get the best work from people. If you do that, you're also going to get people that go outside of what you want and they will mess up and they will make mistakes and that's just part of life. And the risk of wanting to micromanage in those moments when they might do something that you necessarily don't want is appealing. Oh, sick. I just realized I didn't share my screen. All right, so just in case anyone's wondering, this was Kyle Tarvin's question. There it is.

The risk you have in not giving people defined guidelines is that people will fail. They'll mess up all the things you don't want the risk to giving them too many guidelines and tactics and telling them exactly what to do, micromanaging them, is that they will leave. So I tend to believe that the greater good is found when giving people less restrictions as they move up the company, but giving them clear defined goal posts. So I've been doing what we call internal mic minutes for our team at Command Center Copilot Command, Augusta Media. Like all the stuff we do, the general managers etc, and just trying to tell them here are the goal posts and here's how you win inside this organization. And like here's like the framework and then it's up to you, like figure out the strategy and the plan and the tactic to get there if we, if you, that's what you want. But trying to make that as defined as possible as the organization grows, I found to be helpful and honestly not your goal posts. My goal post might not be necessarily the right ones or the correct or the best ones, but it makes it clear to everyone in the organization how to win. And then the people who are more entrepreneurial will figure out usually the best and most creative ways of getting to the goal in the most efficient manner because they want to win.

All right, number two from blank. Mr. Anonymous. We need to have a name for this. I should make up a name. Mr. Anonymous is good for now, but there's gotta be a better one. I was watching landscape business course and saw your section about a team scoreboard. Is this something you still recommend doing? The team scoreboard, in my opinion, has now been replaced by the PPP app to be able to see the top three people.

We're working also on having the ability to do scoreboards that are more based upon not the whole month, but like daily or weekly. And having also when you integrate with copilot, having like where live on the app, they're able to see who's the most efficient for that day and who's making the most money.

Excuse me.

So I would say that's probably been replaced and is most beneficial the P4P1, because, like dollars and cents. It doesn't just like give random scores of the whole team. It gives like, who is the most efficient. But I would we will add. Be adding to that down the road and making it more tangible in terms of daily and weekly instead of just monthly like it is now on the P4P app. Okay. I had some notes I wrote down. It was really simple. We've already talked about it. Oh, here. Here's a more tangible one. And I'll give the other one. Okay. More tangible. So we're buying a few new trucks for the Bellingham shop. We'll probably buy three and then next year buy another 10 or something like that. Here's what I found. Currently in the truck market, new trucks still very high demand, in part because of the uaw United Auto Workers, the strike thing that went on so long, it really has made production slow too much. Like they can't get trucks, and therefore prices are still pretty high. Like, you're looking at $40,000 at least for a baseline work truck, which is a little high. Usually. Like back in the day, you get 30, obviously with COVID everything. But now this whole thing, other thing, it's like still being inflated. So you're really looking at 40,000 enemies. That's if you can find them. However, you can also find trucks that are one to two years old. So here's the thing. Other. Other vehicles are like 10 to 15,000 are getting. Are still very high, especially trucks. So if you look at a lot of reports right now, car prices are coming down, electric vehicle prices are coming down. But trucks have maintained their value a lot, mostly because you can produce with them. So all that being said, the lower end price value price vehicles have really retained their value. What's really coming down a lot in value is like 70, 80, 90, $100,000 vehicles, those are coming down. And then also trucks, trucks that are kind of in the middle between like what I've seen, like between 20,000 and 40,000. So what we're buying right now, we're going to buy three of them over the next couple weeks is trucks that are one to two years old and have less than 20,000 miles. They're a good deal in comparison to the new and the trucks that are 20,000 and 15,000. Because like, it's crazy for, for $20,000 you're looking at a 10 year old truck that has a hundred thousand plus miles on it. For what I'm purchasing is 25 to $26,000 and they are one year old, they are 14 to 16,000 miles on them and it's been really good. So I still think that's a lot of money to spend a truck. I don't recommend everyone do that from day one. I'm in part doing this to make sure from a tax perspective and the year I can clear some stuff out, but also because I know the Bellingham shops can be business for 10 years. So I want to get newer trucks. If you know you're going to be in business for 15, 20 years, it's a really good idea to get newer trucks. You get warranties, you got the full track record of the truck, Nothing unexpected like rust starts happening. It hasn't been abused. The reason I don't publicly talk about buying new trucks for lawn care and landscapers is because the average landscaping company lasts less than four years. And so if you're going to buy something in the next two or three years, it's not a good idea to buy a truck for the, for the masses. It is not a good idea to buy a brand new truck, however, if you're going to be in business for 20 years and that truck you're going to keep for the next 15 and run it from 0 miles to, to 180,000 and sell it for scrap. That sounds like a really good deal to me because in terms of maintain, maintenance, fixing, repairs, et cetera, downtime, it makes a lot of sense. The reason I talk about so publicly about buying used vehicles is because most people don't use their trucks for 10 to 15 years. And most people don't even stay in business for 10 to 15 years. So if you have a. And so that's why typically you'll see some of our larger operators inside of Augustine. They're buying newer trucks and newer stuff. They know they're going to keep you staying in business. They've developed systems, they have management in place. Space like this thing is staying open. Even if I'm not around, this business will keep operating. So it's a good idea for me to keep get a truck that over the course of the lifespan per mile, I'm paying less because if I'm paying $15,000, $16,000 for a truck that has 150000 miles I. E probably only 60 to 70000 miles of useful life left versus spending twice as much, but getting five times as many miles out of it, that starts to make more sense. So that's why buying new is in like newer is sometimes actually beneficial. As you've grown the business and become more successful, you have cash. And then also from a tax perspective, it can really help because now you're in a high enough tax bracket where you are saving 30, 40% on the truck. If you're not making a lot of money and you're just getting started and you're starting your lawn care business the first year or two, you're not making any money. And so like it's not section 179 doesn't help you as much as if you just wait a few five, six years, become really profitable. And then when you take to section 179, it's actually saving you 30, 40%. People buying these brand new trucks on their first year, it's like it doesn't do anything for you.

In terms of taxes, especially in the immediate because you don't have any profits to save from taxes. So and. And if you're less profitable, you might be only saving 15 or 20% versus 30 or 40% because you make more money in higher tax bracket. So things to think about. Second thing was something I allude to a few weeks ago, but I just want to emphasize again, that is the fact that yellow slips are the. Are the place you should be looking to, to to improve your business. If you want to know what to improve in your business, simply take all of your yellow slips and fix them. Here's something the Bellingham shop we've talked about a lot and I was like, we know that initial mows and weeding is literally probably 60, 70, 80% of the yellow slips that we get, if you want to make the business better financially, operationally, making it simpler, etc. Fix the yellow slips because you'll increase retention. You won't have to get as many new customers because you'll lose less customers. And for every one yellow slip, you probably have five other people that are experiencing the same problems with your service, and they need to be addressed. And so.

Yellow slips are literally as much as you're like, man, I hate getting yellow slips or callbacks. There's. You should be looking at those as an opportunity, and they are literally the recipe for you to make your business better. That's how we look at it at copilot. It really helped us the past few months in terms of attrition, like how we just treated bugs. It's how we look at the command center. And I was like, yellow slips are horrible. We hate yellow slips. We hate making mistakes. But they are the recipe for making command center better because you find the bug, you find the issue, and then you're able to create a system around making sure it doesn't happen again, whether it be retraining, whether it be firing somebody, et cetera. And so in your business, the same thing should be true. Like, yellow slips should be the. Like, you're like, I need coaching. Like, no, you need to look at yellow slips and solve those problems. And most of us, if you just look at the yellow slips, you would know how to solve the problem of X, y and z happening, whether it be retraining somebody, letting somebody go, having a checklist, having better job notes, having a better video, having better communication in the morning, around the team huddle. These are the type of things that can be done. And you fix the yellow slopes, you will absolutely make your business significantly better.

I'm guessing this is Lee to Kyle's question. Corey and I are listening to the book Good Authority. Fantastic book for managing expectation of team members. Team members and facilitating crew buy in based on their personalities and yours as the owner manager. Good authority. Let me check this out. Let me just go ahead and make a note. I need to listen to this book.

Add task book. Good Authority.

Done. Thank you, Lee, for the book recommendation.

All right, that is it for today. Happy Monday, everyone. Have hope you have a fantastic day. If you did not get a chance.

Thursday, Friday and Saturday. Last week we did a free public conference. Cutting edge conference. I think it'd be helpful to listen to.

Let me break them down really fast so you know what to listen to. Number one, Thursday we talk about upsells at the very end I talk about feature that we're talking we're going to be releasing at we have released at co pilot but the actual keynote very important to listen to.

Second thing Friday price matrices and job costing. If you really like the math and numbers of figuring out exactly what you should be pricing per hour to break even etc, also very helpful. We're going to be instituting that in the next few weeks in co pilot. In terms of the feature, the third one though, if you like marketing getting new customers, probably a good idea to listen to it. It'll give you a really good idea of how to do your offers for your ads, especially Facebook ads. So definitely recommend listening to that. And if you have questions I would be happy to answer them because I did not go into as much depth as I could have on Saturday. Specifically about like the fact that you need to change up the offer, you got to change the creative, you got to change the title. Like all these other things I could have gone into. But I think it's a good way to generate ideas. Probably that Saturday lecture if you're able to listen to it. So with that being said, have a fantastic day and we'll see you tomorrow. Take care.