Sharing My Heart to My Team (Vision of Augusta Lawn Care)

Mike Andes tells his Augusta Lawn Care team that 25 franchisees is not the goal, changing the industry is. He warns them to ignore both criticism and praise, stay focused on the work, and never compare themselves to other companies or people.
Chapters
A couple things I wanted to go over real quick and it kind of has to do with the fact that, like, we're getting a lot of franchisees, we're starting to get some traction right now. I want everyone to remember this, and this is that we are not anywhere close to where we want to be at and we're not getting content at 25 franchisees. We're not even starting. And like, especially if you've been here for a while and you know, like, hey, this is always the goal. And now we're a year into this and, like, we're getting somewhere, we're not anywhere close. The goal is to change the industry, it's not to get 25 franchisees. And so the reason I say that is because especially if you come to conference, especially if you're around here, you're like, hey, we're winning. I'm very aware that we're winning the game right now. And what we've been working on for a long time is starting to come to fruition.
And I know that there's a certain part of, hey, we gotta step back and realize we're doing a great job. And we are, and I appreciate that. And I probably won't say that enough to all of us who work so hard, but on the flip side, we are nowhere close to where we want to be at. And so when we go to conference and things, you're going to get a lot of praise. You're going to get people like, oh, you guys are doing so amazing, that's fine. But like, if we're gonna be. If we're gonna be deaf to all of the criticisms which we've played with for the past five years of having this massive goal and people like, oh, it's never possible, you'll never get landscapers to change, whatever, whatever. And now we're starting to get some traction. If we're gonna be deaf to all the criticism, we have to be deaf to all the praise, alright? And so, like, if you come to the conference and you see, especially between sessions, you'll see guys come up to me and they're like, just heaping on the praise. And you'll notice I'm quiet and I say thank you and stuff like that, but in this is, we're not done, we're not done. You gotta keep telling yourself that because otherwise you'll just be like, oh, yeah, we're doing good, like, time for a victory lap. Like, this is great, we've won the game and we're not even close. And this is like, why college athletes, they do so good, they get the Heisman Trophy or whatever and then they go into the pro sports and they just fall flat in their face is because they've been told they're great their whole, whole career, right? Oh, you guys, you're so talented. You're so amazing. They get to the college and they can't put in the work, they can't put in the extra effort. Austin's laughing.
And then who is it? Johnny Manziel? Like, those guys just flop. And it's because they have so.
But a lot of it is like, they're so talented, they're told their whole life that they're amazing. And then it comes to like the professional, like, they don't know how to like, work ethic, they don't know how to push themselves and we don't want to get there. And so I just encourage you, whether it be in business or here or whatever is like you want to be deaf to the criticisms and the praises of others and know why you're doing something and just stick to it and realize where you're at in the process. Process of getting there, right? Like early in the process, you're gonna have a lot of resistance. You're gonna have people saying you can't do it. They're gonna say, oh, you're only gonna ever be able to make dollars per hour. You're never gonna be able to your own business, you're never gonna be able to be anything great. And your parents, your grandparents, you've never had an education, they're gonna throw all that junk at you and then you're gonna flip at some point in your life and you're gonna have to switch to where now you tune out all the praise. Alright? And so I've dealt with the five past years of the criticism and now we're switching to the praise part. But the.
And like not comparing ourselves to other people. Like when we drive down the street, we're not comparing ourselves to any of these other companies. Like as an employee, as a business owner. Like, nothing. Like, if you see other guys, like slacking up, we're not comparing ourselves to them. Like, we're not even trying. We're not trying to. Their goals are not ours. Like, why would we compare? Like, oh, we're so much better. It's like, who cares? I don't compare myself, like, in terms of money or like, how many employees or trucks or anything like that know why we're doing what we're doing and we're striving towards that, and we're just deaf to everyone else's opinions about that. So I just encourage you, like, don't compare yourself to anyone else. If you're like, oh, I'm a great worker here. Okay, well, we have a small sample step here. Go be great. Forget about this group of people or me. Supersede what I've done. Give to other people, your family. You can do better than that. Stop comparing yourself. It limits what you can do in life. I think it's really, really damaging to compare yourself up or down the ladder. In other words, when I say down the ladder, I mean, oh, look at me, I'm so great, all those people down there. But it's also very toxic to look up the ladder and compare to all these great people and be like, oh, I'll never be that. Like, just lock into what you're doing in life and know why you're doing it. Show up every single day to kick butt. Like, stop trying to think about what people above you are doing. Like, oh, they're so amazing. Like, I'll never be able to attain that. Or looking down like, oh, I'm so much better than all these people. Like, you're just always going to go towards the average. Because if you look at the great and you're like, oh, they're so. I can't. You're gonna come down below them. If you're looking down, you're like, oh, I'm so much better. It'll prevent you from reaching your full potential. So, like, that was my sermon for day that I thought of for the weekend while I was running. Just don't compare it, like, whether it be here in your personal life, whatever. Don't compare yourself to other people. And it's like, get deaf to their opinions. And then you'll wake up one day like, oh, I accomplished something. And, like, I've got to where I want to go, but you got to be patient, you know? And we're not anywhere close to where we want to be. So that's my $0.02 today. Anything anyone want to add to that?
I saw a quote that's like, it says along those lines, it says, like, don't compare your planting season to someone else's harvest season. So, like, you can't judge. Look at someone else's results they're getting right now and not realize where you are at, your process of the grind. And then be like, man, they're doing so much better. But you don't see when they're in that exact same phase as you before. And so you just can't compare. Yeah, like Mike was saying.
Cool. I noticed, Josh, you were so diligent about your mask, and now you don't have a mask on.
Okay, thanks, everyone. Have a great day. Appreciate.










