 Hey guys, good afternoon. Tom Stewart here, and I'm with a plethora of people all Foundations alumni. This is the foundations alumni st. Patrick's day Celebration Yeah, got Laura Smith here Joe wash Trisha, is that Derek behind the Mask there. Yeah, I'm in an airport. So it's my hero academia. It's anime. Yeah, and We've got a whole bunch of people that's supposed to be here over the next next hour and we're just gonna be sharing stories from foundations over the years past Got Katie Trish Matt's with us and you guys know Laura. She's I mean Heather. Yeah, Heather Liz Liz is here all the time Right now, I know it does feel like that right so so Liz explain Liz, what are we going to be doing today? a few things that we're going to do so first I just want to say service coming and And There is going to be a contest around to the end and Whoever is the most blinged up and gets or best blinged up and gets the most boats is going to win Everybody look at Tom. He really wants to win. I Don't have a green hat. So I think I lose you guys all look green It looks like a green as Derek's shirt does that he was trying to fall off it. It's all We have a prize whoever gets voted on so how you will vote on who you want to win Prize is you'll go to chat and you will just type in bling and whoever you want to win So you might type bling Tom bling have it. Don't do Tom. I can't win even so Bling have a bling Laura whatever and that's how we're going to count up a vote. Hey Amy turn on your microphone Are you doing dishes? Oh Whoops. No Oh Joe I would have thought you would have had your Whole attire going on here or you it wasn't ready for today Don't you have you have some genetic obligation to do this, don't you? Well, technically my genes are not very Irish. Oh, okay I just spent a year and a half living there and my last name is Irish, but okay Don't you have to wear? What's the deal if you're Irish? Are you supposed to wear orange? Oh really, I don't know Think it's green judgment or do you live I think You can Guinness and having corned beef dinner tonight Right there. There's a celebration going on right there All right, and then Additionally what we want to do today is hey there a case era. Don't turn on your little pictures We would just like to hear about What we've been doing since Foundation I have a few different questions that I'd like to hear Hey, Liz before we get too deep into this Matt has another commitment But he was gonna like drop him right at the beginning and we have a piece of the exciting news. We want to share I don't know ever since cove is started about once a month Matt would call me up with some Entrepreneurial idea, you know, it's like a start a paint company. Let's be one of the buyer restaurant Tia, you know, there's a list of things and I almost did buy a restaurant I had an offer on one so it could have been my life could have been very drastically different and I had to walk him off the edge on each one of those and We started talking a couple weeks ago about how may central's got to the point where I really need somebody knows what they're doing from a marketing and sales standpoint and Matt's joining us joining our team as the chief marketing officer for for for made central so He's going to be basically taking over that side and freeing up Resources for us to provide more support and build more cool tools and just make it a better platform Yeah, I see it as I see the you know beyond the marketing and just the sales at first It's helping the users be successful. So people that are on board I mean, I wasn't the first but I was the first to commit I got other people actually started before me but I was the first to to commit to come on to made central and so I feel like I have a lot of institutional knowledge and I know We're a lot of the software There's pieces that people aren't using that we they're good that we can improve upon and But I really I really am excited about getting more people on board to increase the awareness of the software and I Feel like we're at a tipping point where we just got out. We've got to grow We've got to get more people on so the software can keep getting better and better So I know a lot of you on the collar are on the software and you know just the more you use it the deeper you use each feature I feel like You know, that's that's you know, that's part of your implementation But it's part of you know marketing and sales too of just getting people to really use the software to their to their full Stability, so I'm excited. I think it's going to be a really great year And we're all going to benefit from more power users coming on more smart people in the community I feel like that's the biggest advantage of main central is just the network that we have with one another I mean just I mean me and Joe talk all the time off channel me and Tom talk off all the time off channel and You build your network of people and how do you do this? How do you do this? And I want to build that community. That's that's my biggest piece that excites me So we just wanted to take we wanted to take this opportunity to let Matt share that before he had to go do other things But if you guys have any quick questions, I can take those but otherwise I'm gonna bounce in about two or three minutes I've got another call That's a little congratulations on your new adventure Matt Yeah, that's a great setting. I'm excited for everybody because I know how much you contribute to the main central and Having this new role I can only imagine what you're gonna be doing. I'm so excited Yeah, Tom formalizes my my work, you know that I'm doing behind the scenes anyway So it's it's a little bit of a formalization of something Annie gets a little bit a few extra hours out of me So it's a it's a win-win for all of us. So I Appreciate Everyone that's on the software now if you're not on it yet, you know, it's maybe not related to you yet But I think y'all will be on it next year So New people coming on every day, I know we talked about that almost every day We're talking about something about main central the MMA groups And I can't even remember a day that we didn't bring up something, right? Don't you think Heather? So what's our format going to be today Liz you've got some questions for us Everybody Any questions that they want to talk about or any problems I saw that Sarah did An issue that she would love I hear it that she would love to see us chat about So and then we will do our contest in that that'll be it. So let's see It's a little bit after two and for right now. I just have a couple of questions my first question I'd love to hear from everybody I It's a little bit difficult because this New window takes a full all of the screen and I'm not used to working Just think how easy would be if you had two monitors Just think how easy would be if you were dressed like a green care bear Hey now Where are we sharing it right now? We are streaming on About six Facebook pages and a couple of YouTube channels Okay, so you'll have to let us know if there's comments that we don't see on stuff Yeah, we'll see we got Sam's here with us watching us on Facebook Denit's with us. Hey, Denit Linda Somewhere so they could join us. Hey y'all if you go to Maybe you could just drop it where you normally drop the comment. They can join us here for the Yeah, I can do that Okay, guys You're getting invited to the live so what I would like to start with is and maybe you can start before you go as Which foundation did you go to if you remember the number like that's 11 or 4 Well, no, I get I got one minute. So I think it was 2017. I was there with Who if anybody's here now? I mean Derek was obviously there Nina was there. I don't see Nina today Wasn't it or was that I was it was definitely 17. I'm just supposed to pick today. Yeah 2017 with Warren and Regina Ben and Ryan Ryan and then the jump. Yeah, the gentleman that started there is working with He's built they're kind of building their own franchise model I Linman Brian Brian Brian Wagers. So it was a good group. So really enjoyable, but I do have to jump guys. I've got another 415 I wish I could say through this. See you guys All right So just curious what what foundations class the rest of you were in and also if you could tell us and Also, if you could tell us one Takeaway one like one of your better takeaways or I don't want to say best I know that's so difficult, but one of your better takeaways from that foundations class So once we go Go ahead in foundation six, I think I Don't remember them. I'm pretty sure I was in six Joe because you taught at at some too Maybe I was in four and then taught at six and seven I can't remember You know, I can think of a Takeaway, I mean there were there were many but I think it was really getting a handle on the numbers of the business in terms of Performance performance indicators and how to measure Success in this business. So that was that was pretty big for me Joe, I remember we had like a workshop afterwards in Dallas one year and You were like just I mean We were all kind of working on stuff But like you got into the numbers and and you kind of just zoned out to like another world And nobody could keep up with you and you got a tremendous amount of work done in Dallas Kind of picking up on the work that we'd started earlier Yeah, I remember that I remember sitting in a hotel conference room with you Tom for like a couple of hours and pouring over financials and One of the big takeaways I got from foundations was how important it was to control your cost of goods sold Which is basically your labor costs and that was really huge and that kind of changed how I looked at the business Well, thanks Joe, Sarah. I think did you Did you say yes, yeah, so what but that you wanted to say what class you were in and oh, yeah Sorry, I have bad lighting. I'm driving. I'm looking at the road though. I was in 2018 and then I did the 2019 alumni I think my biggest takeaway was I have been in business about Six seven years before foundations and I didn't know what a KPI was. I never knew anything about that So I actually cried when we were learning it So so for how we did I was I didn't know everyone was talking about and I believe I had been business that long And I didn't know how to track my numbers or how to measure anything So that was definitely a big moment for me and it's really cool to get the spreadsheets where I can track things and See my future predictions and all of that I'm not the only one crying at least one more person on this call today was also crying. I won't call anybody out KPIs is traumatizing for a lot of people but a lot of times people also are crying over release Hey at the end. They're like Finally So I do love that Heather, I think you had your hand raised So I went to nine and ten I went to foundations nine and had no idea of anything of this Calibri existed in the industry and I went to ten and I also did the alumni So I was fortunate to stay with them for two full weeks, which was insane So many big things to take away Can't even narrow it down to one, but I have to I'm going to say the biggest takeaway was me How I could control the narrative How how I took responsibility for everything that went right and for what went wrong And that was a really hard one took a long time to really understand that but I think that was probably my biggest one That was a good one. I remember my legs were sore from walking you up and down the beach Well about about that whole thing. So that was good. That was big. That was big Big breakthrough. Yeah, really really was I'm just gonna go down the line here. Hey, how about you Trisha? Oh, yeah Hey Chris So I was in I hit like people I say with yours and I'm like, how do you remember that? So I don't remember years like that, but I was in 2018 and 2019 then so nine and ten. I believe that is And I Yeah, I learned so much like When we had already hit the one million dollar mark when I had went to foundations the first time And I thought I just kind of moved everything And then I went to foundations and I was like It wasn't even at foundations yet Just doing the pre homework and I was like Holy crap. I don't know anything And that was the part that like I was I was kind of overwhelmed by that But excited at the same time. And so then when I went into foundations like I really I was amazed at what I didn't know, you know, like I had created a successful company in my opinion But the whole time I had created it. I was just winning it I was You know, like everything would just work out perfectly, you know and profit and margins. Everything else was fine But ultimately I didn't know why I didn't know what I was doing, right? Or what I was doing wrong with anything And you know, that's just not scalable when it comes I want to be able to continue on, you know, and so um Just kind of seeing all the actual inner workings of of a company It really helped me to understand. Okay. So like I Luckily have been doing things really good. I didn't realize I was but now I go down this route And so forth and that pushed my company to be able to to be even better My other one is I think there's so many of them so so many of them But one that I can tell you like impacts me today is touring tom's facility Because I was so Amazed not with the one location But I was amazed that he had He was able to be able to have like this This system and this call center type facility Working with working at other, you know his other locations and I was like I had never once thought of to do that and um, you know, I thought about opening up more locations But I didn't know how to and so when I seen his It really like clicked something in my head, you know, and so then the following year, you know, I after I started really thinking about it and I was like I can totally open up a second location Like and we just streamed like everything and then now we have our third location And it's all still ran out of one office in Fargo nice sweet Tom what do you call that you talk about it a lot when people sort of luck their way into Yeah You can be successful and have it be an accident and that's awesome as long as it's working But when market conditions change things like You know wages go up and demand shifts and you know the the legal landscape changes If you don't understand why you're being successful You won't be able to adapt to that and plus you won't see the opportunities to grow your business The story that Trisha just shared after understanding why she was having the success she was having She understood how to leverage that and and take it to another level Then I was able to drill down and hit those areas hard Knowing what I was doing, right? And you know we used to be teams of three as an example And after foundations we started going to teams of two teams of one like everything to start making sense in my head That how it works together, you know to where um Yeah, we just we just winked before and it just happened to work But but now once I started diving into those things I started understanding things much differently You're making decisions with confidence rather than just doing it and keeping your fingers crossed Yeah Well, I remember you saying you didn't know what anything you were especially good at after meeting with you one on one I'm like teach these people what you do with facebook because you just did it so naturally. You didn't know that was special Yeah I had a lot of stuff like that actually take quite a few things like that I'm sad that we had the miss sherry. She had to run Her biggest takeaway besides friendships, and I think uh, everybody would probably agree that the friendships is a few keys Absolutely For me and kpi's to watch that's huge for some people Um, how about you laura and you can't say that garrick was your biggest takeaway? I he was bad He was joking me and chat that I was supposed to take away Um Now I think it was a couple of things um when I went to foundations I was already doing over two million dollars And um, I can't remember which one of you guys told me but one of you guys told me that I filled out my my like home More thoroughly than like almost anybody ever had. Um, so this was a little cocky when I got there, I guess um But two things that were really big for me one was I had hit a point where I didn't really know where I was going Or what I was going to do anymore And tom really took the time to walk me through the idea of buying them building Um, which was huge huge for me. Um having my own space Not only is huge for my company. It's going to be huge for my retirement Um, it's just it's a huge part of my plan that I honestly don't think I would have thought thought of if I had not gone there Um, but obviously the biggest piece for me is as most people know my daughter was diagnosed with cancer 16 months ago Um, and I had to basically quit. I called my general manager from the airport Um, when I got the call I was kind of to try I just landed in Detroit and I got a call of my daughter Was in the airport being diagnosed with cancer and I called my general manager. I was like I quit see him a couple years Don't know what to tell you And I feel like having gone foundations a year and a half before that was huge And getting us to a place where I could just walk away like that Um, because even though I was good at a lot of things and I had built a large company Um foundations is just so thorough. They go through every possible aspect of your business that it's It's just a really good way to start poking holes in Where are your weak points and I mean I have to give My general manager azure the majority of the credit for you know, getting us through the way she has I think that the work we did post foundations on poking at our weak spots Identifying what those were trying to strengthen those. I think that that made that possible Um, so I haven't been into work in 16 months now And we're still doing just fine and I think that foundations was a big part of that And then also I know that I I think you're doing a mma bonus for Foundations Is this 11 or 12? Okay. Um, so also that was another I think that's that's an incredible bonus because After I had to step out completely. I needed support from my general manager And so I actually put her in mma which is intended for owners But I mean it's been huge. It's been huge on her Having a community to get answers from a community really smart people to get answers from Um, you know when she runs into things that she doesn't know what to do with to just have that support um It's just been it's been Priceless, so you love having her too Of course, we love having her I think anybody at any size that can benefit from going through their business with fine cheese come on to do foundations Everybody's got stuff to work on Yeah, I totally agree. There's no no company that doesn't have stuff Um, Amy your situation is a little bit different. Tell us about it. Tell us about what you're up to well, um Like everybody else, I don't know if any of you guys are seeing your your facebook memories while the ocean shots and everything But I'm really loving those this week. Um, but uh, What foundations showed me and it was a great time and I learned so much and I was one of the friars. Oh my god But when it showed me and my kpis and my numbers was that My business was on life support and I had full club That's basically it Um, and it was hard But it was a super huge relief to me because I was just miserable and I couldn't make it work What I did and I just didn't have any other funding Thing to do with it. I just was like, yeah, you know, and then when covid happened, we'd had a really hard winter A lot of snow days So we lost a lot of business with that and then there was some stupid mistake on my ppp application and they Clined it and I was just like, oh, I give up Then, you know, it was it was like the universe was going, okay, do you believe me now? So I really love that though, Amy because I don't think people really Understand what we mean when we say that like the course is individualized for you It's based on your company your needs Your situation It doesn't seem like that could really be the case. So you got all these people and in this one round Nations was the best money I ever spent even though I closed and maybe some people don't see it that way but you know like Sarah was saying that she just winged it and Trisha said she just winged it and I winged it for 12 years and All I was doing was throwing money into a bonfire Really and I didn't have to know how and I didn't have money to hire anybody to see me out of it You know, of course, there's a bunch of other things That just contributed to all of that but so I Always thought the cleaning would be my I don't know a lot of ticket And while it isn't in running a company and thank god, um, I'm not I can't tell you all how really they have to be out of it I'm I'm starting a cleaning course Some training stuff. So I'm trying to work on that and I'm also blogging and writing. So if you guys need a blogger Yeah, we're gonna talk about where what the next steps are that everybody's doing too So, um, keep get some contact info for us. I mean, all right. Um, let's see Derek. You're going to f11, right? Uh, whatever Whatever the one we're going to next year or the year after or some year I'm going to the next one. It's october Derek. So, you know, october. Yeah Yes And you are registered to go so Putting on your calendar Yeah, yeah, I've been registered for like a year and a half Thanks for digging it in there I'm looking forward to it. I got to come down and see, um, like a like, uh, was it a one day thing we did in south carolina? um What two summers ago What was that Tom was it? Um, was it behind was it behind the scenes? Something like that. It was like a one day crash thing that we and Diana came down for a weekend or something like that I remember exactly which table you guys were sitting at. I remember I I think it might have been behind the scenes Tom I was thinking somewhere Yeah, so that was my first I think uh, I guess vision for what I could see us growing into or Getting access to people that have done Um, amazing things in the industry. So I was like, I gotta I gotta learn more. I'm gonna get around these people. So I'm I've always I'm I guess in the industry. I'm fairly young. Um Still even though I don't feel to be young, but um, I've always valued getting around people that know more than I do And have accomplished more than I do. Um, I've failed out of three colleges. And so traditional Um Education is not really my strong suit, but I do I do like to follow successful patterns that people have done and Um, a lot of the details of running a business are not what my strong suit is. So um, I'm hoping to to really Learn a lot from it. I'm already a part of the MMA group. So I'm learning a lot from that obviously and Um, hopefully it'll just add on to it when I actually go to the the week long event I promise Um, I can see very tough to Joe Linda. You're in the MMA group, but I don't think you are alumni Are you know, but you're in the MMA group have been for about a year now. Is that right? September I started last September. Oh that seems so much longer. I know I file for you for all your growth. I'm so proud of you. You're a really really great job Um, all right, so chris Uh, what what class were you in and what's what? I'm a trisha. I don't remember what year that was But um, I think he was the last one didn't you I think that was You guys drank a lot and that's why you don't remember It was nine It was nine. No specifically remember you guys saying that we didn't drink very much Oh, really? Okay, that could be true now We were the ones that ate all the junk food because the last people on the first were the health nuts Don't all the groups drink a lot need a lot of junk food I think I did really pass out on the couch. Um, next to john during class one day Yeah, there was there was a lot of productivity for the record Oh man, I was so stressed. I was like, I think we lost my whole staff while I was out there Yeah I remember that and you were like sitting in the corner with smiling. I'm like, why are you smiling still you're like I don't know. I'll just It's fine. It's fine Yeah, that was um You know what I really took away though is yeah, I'm meeting everybody. I mean Laura how many times did you let me come? Poke around your business. That was huge. Um And really planning is the one thing that I took away when we had to fill out a one-year plan I was like you could plan for a year I didn't even know that Like a whole year out you can go even further like it's that he does that Would you actually do it? I'm at a quarter now. So we're a quarter out So you are in the anime group you are setting at least your annual goals and you you started to think in terms like that But you're breaking it down into quarters still We're I'm getting there right and it's it's it's gonna be a process and it took me a year to plan at all Right, I think like the whole year after it took a long time to sink in And that whole year after foundations I was still scattered and then trying everything that I possibly could and I think a year after we started planning At least a quarter and you're right. We're we're at a year Now and and still improving it. So that that was my huge thing Yeah, that's good All right. Well, thanks you guys for sharing that I was going to um I have to keep switching over and I keep switching thing Because I get interested in listening and then I Forget to go do my job Sound familiar Ah It's the it's the monitor thing I know it is the monitor thing. I'm thinking that I really do. Do we have any comments or anything? Any questions? No one here Pam says she loves hearing out everyone's success stories and experiences So it is fun to hear how other people are doing and so You know, we really wanted to have a chance to talk to you guys because we don't get a chance to talk to you about how things have gone Um, and I'm glad other people are interested. I know I love to listen to what other successful people are doing What has worked and you know, how they're taking advantage of different Another thing that I would love to have you guys talk about Is how you are feeling about your 2021 prospects? So what do you what do you got planned for this year because there's The time now, right? I think we are different. So I'm just curious what Y'all have going on. Anybody want to share that? I can sir. Um, so We're just excited to be hitting hard. So um COVID hurt us bad Bad bad we Our sales dropped to like, I think 30 or 40 percent multiple months. Um student staffing issues um, and so We now have a year to make up for because if anybody knows me knows I'm very competitive with myself and anyone in That was a mild radius And so I'm competing against myself on where I should have been so last year We should have hit the over the two million dollar mark and we didn't Oh, we actually dropped sales from the year before which was like a heart crusher for me And so now this year we're on point. Um, we just talked about our senior management team this morning Our goal is to be over the 2.5 is our goal this year Yeah, so we opened up our third location. Um, this September we did and that's going phenomenal. Um, we have a really great group of staff up there and um And we're growing really great. Um So yeah, we're excited here. Hey, that's awesome. Yeah Uh, laura, I saw you were ready to share. Thank you. Um, I am so excited about 2021 I feel like 2020 it was it was hard for us. I mean, I think it was hard for everybody Um, I was really surprised how well we did through COVID though We were completely shut down for about five or six weeks when we very first to open back up I think we only had about 65 of our clients come back initially Um, but we were able to kind of backfill with A lot of new people. Um It just it it changed people's it changed the conversation around cleaning You know, some people were afraid to have people in their homes Whereas other people felt like cleaning was so much more important than they never thought about before Um, so we actually did pretty well through 2020 Um, surprisingly, especially concerns there the entire time. Um, we were down just a little bit from the previous year but not by much Um, but we were still consistently. I mean, we had a lot of down months because we track You know month by month. Um, we did have a lot of down months. Um But we used as an opportunity to regroup we switched from teams to solas Which has been much more profitable for us. We went through all of our clients. Um, thanks to me and central We were able to go through all our clients one by one and Um adjust prices and we wouldn't take anybody back who was under price Um, so it was like kind of our year to fix everything Well, things were a little Different and slower and people were already by the idea of massive change Um, and so now we're just feeling like we're going into this year so strong We have been blowing up for the last three months I think when I was there the last time I went off was I think was like march Fourth and we were already plus 30 points for the month. Um for anybody who used the points system. So, I mean, it's just been wild start to the year and um, you know, I think we're turning the corner of covid I think things are beginning more normal by summer and I just I'm really actually kind of thankful for 2020 And that we had the time to tear apart and put it back together like that. I'm I'm super excited for this year Yeah, that is exciting Um, who else wants to show what they're doing this year? Are you going on? What heather heathers got a lot of fun stuff that's here What am I what am I going on all your cool accounts you got? Um, well, I will have to say that um from foundations was another big takeaway was my relationships We had I think 20 people attend foundations that first year and I was able to bit a job It was a very large job and who do I call up to get um the sound coaching from is this uh, Trisha Lake over here And she helped me secure that a job I think was like 200 3000 and then we landed another one. So now we're like 385 thousand dollar gigs per year Off of that bid. So that was huge. Had I never kind of foundations I would never have known um, how to do it And I think I won it because he was impressed with how I knew my numbers like I would ask him so many questions about his numbers He wouldn't even give him any answers So knowing your numbers was huge huge. Um, what are we doing? I mean same thing right on with with what Laura said You know, we got hit hard like I didn't know if you were gonna have an office I knew we would still survive How it would look did we have cars to get to go solo as we had no idea But we were able to do a lot of fast moving around money and securing things that we were able to just kind of power through And when we saw a lot of our competition, they didn't survive um I don't know what we're doing We're just growing like crazy down here people just want to have their houses clean Then even though we're masked up people are still going about and living their lives And you know, I'm gonna ride this wave for as long as I can My ops manager left us. We're doing about 1.5. I think right now and I'm doing without an ops manager. So I'm really working in the trenches with my people And hopefully it'll change soon, but you know, it's it's on red and I really can't complain that you know We're still in this pandemic and we're we're kicking ass and taking names Oh, yeah Look at who just joined CC He sees in the house The house mom, I don't think she can hear us. She would at least smile at once Um All right, how about uh, joe, what do you what do you got going on? What are you working on right now? Well, I can echo a lot of what uh others have said here. I mean like trisha. We were We were poised to hit We would have hit like almost two and a half million last year If it weren't for covid we were right on track to do that. I'm confident we would have so Uh, it's so we took a big hit because of covid and really what it had to do with was staffing We closed for six weeks like a lot of other people. Um, you know We're closed. Um, I think I was one of the first ones to close. Amy and I closed early Before others did But you know, anyway, um, we just Staffing has been a huge issue. I'm in a really competitive market staffing wise and that we really haven't been able to recover In fact, um, the mid eights franchise and our market actually closed and went out of business because of staffing They couldn't plow up So I'm actually happy that we're still here and we're starting to be able to recruit people again Um And so what we're focusing on this year is just kind of trying to get us back to where we were At the end of 2019 which when you say it that way Like discouraging but really we're doing great and honestly Um, we changed a lot of things like a lot of other people. We went to all solos We were teams before teams or two and three we went to all solos Which is more profitable and we've changed our scheduling protocol Which is like stabilize the business and I'm looking forward to Returning to focusing on some kpis that I've been focusing on before the pandemic kit which was to focus on employee turnover and unplanned absence rate And in some safety kpis because the unplanned absence rate and the employee turnover Were really where there was a lot of values that we could a lot more value than you know the business if we got those metrics right So we're we're getting back to that um and getting back to focusing on that So actually this week for the first time since the pandemic our unplanned absence rate is below 4 And for you know someone who's been following that metric for a long time 4 below 4 your life as um as an owner is much different Everything's a lot more stable and you're not scrambling around trying to cover cleaning So I'm looking forward to getting everybody vaccinated and getting back to focusing on stability so I love that. I think that that is a kpi that a lot of people don't look at too. So that's I like that you illustrated something that We we experience a lot in foundations is And a lot of people have said it here today I thought I knew it all There comes somebody and they're like what you did what And it's just this whole new shift and being able to get a deep dive into why that's important What this person's doing that right? I love that Well, I you know, I should also say that I've been having a lot of fun focusing on Bottom line and profitability rather than necessarily top line and just growth I had been in growth mode for a long time including when I went through foundations and after and My business did more than double in size at the foundations I think I was around just under a million when I went into foundations and I topped out at a annualized run rate of around two and a half million So, you know, we grew a lot After but then, you know, I've been having a lot of fun focusing on the the bottom line and there was a lot of value to extract there and The other thing that's always been important to me for those of you that don't Don't know me as well as quality of life And I really look at my ability to not be at the business and to Not have to work 12 hour days and and things like that. So I've made vast improvement in that as well. So that's also been really great Yeah, we really get it at I mean maintaining your focus and deciding what you were going to go after and protecting that sarah Sarah does the same thing. It's really good at protecting that Time puts a lot of focus there. What are what are you working on for 2021 sarah? Well, we ended up growing through 2020 so it was a little bit different I think our location really helped Arizona as it really was a really good place to be So we ended up growing 20 in 2020 Um, and this year we're just like on fire. We're up like We're up 20 just from February to March. So we're trying to just um Add to our teams and train and figure out how to maintain our quality as we're in this massive growth mode Um, and then I also am really big on the work life balance because I have young kids I prefer to spend time with instead of in my business I'd rather pay people to work on my business than pay people watch my kids. So Um, it's been going pretty good I feel a lot less stress than in previous years where I couldn't find the balance and we seem to be just growing naturally and um So this year we'll cross the the million dollar mark, which I've been chasing after for a long time. Um And I'm hopefully opening a second location. I'm working on the details of that. So um, that's what I've got going on Super and I'm glad that you're finally growing again sarah because you had that one month I was plateaued for two months and I was like in tears because I thought it was just so horrible that we were plateaued And then we then the next month We're up 16,000 the next month. So I think we're We we have a question pan clad has a question that uh, I'm sure that somebody here can help her with She wants to know how you run things when you're gone for the week for foundations She's got seven cleaners and one professional organizer doesn't really have an office manager and just wants to know How you guys keep the business running when you're at foundations for a week and that's not I think uh, it's about that size when I went I remember emailing you guys and saying Hey, uh, what was that pre upfront coaching on how to leave your business for this for this four-day trip and you guys emailed me back What are you talking about? It's a it's an eight-day trip Even worse, right Man, I just put somebody in charge I think I ran it for myself on to be honest with you. I didn't have anything in the office Um, and we just didn't we need to do during breaks or call people back or whatever Yeah, I will say I mean by the time I went to foundations. I had you know, bunch of people in my office. So Um, that wasn't a concern but back when I was still smaller enough that I only had one person in my office with me And I used to take the conventions and stuff with me all the time. So there was nobody there with the phones and my sister Who also was in the same foundations class as me? Um has not had an office person a really long time She handles everything and she goes to like I mean before my daughter was diagnosed We're gonna like rush in and handle on and all over the place Um, and she just I mean Sometimes you have to balance whether what you're getting is worth what you might lose Which is really not a lot. We just we would change the voicemail Staying, you know, we're out of office at the moment calls will be returned um, put on an email responder and then just You know first thing in the morning. I got lunch break at the end of the day Go through return what has to be returned. It's You're really going to be surprised if if you've gone for a week You're cleaning up most half of your clients at most once So even if you somehow miss a whole bunch of them, they're probably not going to fire you for it So the trade-off is worth it Do what you gotta do Okay, no team that I'll go ahead let's Oh, I'm sorry. I was just saying it's a good perspective because when you're in that when you're in it and it you're like Yeah, but I can't yeah on the other side of it. It's like I don't know what the big deal was It's not like such a huge deal. But afterwards I think afterwards too. I was able to leave for like now. I don't I don't have that stress anymore, right? Is that that one week did it? Hey, I think I think what we did is we did a test We haven't gone to foundations yet for the week But we've done a test where we went to like the qds conference for like two days And saw how our team did and we took a vacation like a You know two-day vacation during the middle of the week instead of on weekends And put people in charge and kind of saw how things went and then we also didn't put any complicated Cleaning on those days that could potentially be fires to put out Just try to make them all recurring indigaling cleaning I want to second what Derek's saying. That's what I would do And that's what I used to do when I used to go to the arcsi conferences when in fact when I had, you know Four five six seven eight people and I didn't really have anyone helping me in the office Um, I did just what Derek did. That's a great great advice Test do test runs before you go and start with one day Then try two days then try three days And you know what actually you might even enjoy yourself. You might even get Surprise yeah Yeah, we weren't able to take our first like week-long vacation about uh months ago We actually went out to colorado. I went through your business floor. I don't know if you knew it or not But um, I met up with azha Katie did a quick tour But we went on a ski trip and for the days I was like, we're not available. We're on the ski slopes You're not gonna go reach us. So be sure to help We want the people want to step up though, too I think that if you have people that you know, they want to show you that they can do a good job We're not around And giving them that power to be able to do that the freedom It's a great way to test your staff In general, it's that One one mindset that I used to always have is that if I'm not doing it It's not going to be done correctly And that truthfully is just so wrong and I was so obsessed with like me being the one to do it all Then I slowed myself down. I slowed my growth down massively and when I started to kind of start giving off those You know those duties and those tests and stuff like that I was actually really amazed with my staff or something's better than me at a lot of different areas Because they're not juggling a thousand things like I was trying to do all the time So in order for you to get past that point to where you can take those vacations and tend to take that time You need to pause and With like eating oak or week. You might lose some clients. You might have some failure to happen or whatever But once you go past foundation's class, you're gonna have all the knowledge and information To actually get you off that hump to whether it's not going to be your main focus Like you can leave for a month of time two months at a time if you want to But if I don't know I think that if you if you're scared to leave your business for one week How are you what happens? Let's say something happens to your kiddo or something like that. What are you gonna do? You know, and so while you're small Take that advantage of that and just simply just do it You know, don't think about just do it jump into it and then reap all the little words after you've learned out of knowledge Yeah I just wanted to pay back on what Trisha said though and say like I never in a million years Would have thought that what happened to my family would have happened my family I think no one ever thinks that that's going to happen and I think God for all star every day because if it hadn't been in the position where it was where I could just Leave to take care of my kid. We would have lost everything And so many people do, you know, your husband has a heart attack your kid gets sick You, you know have something major spring up and people lose everything. And so I think that Laying that foundation to be able to be gone Well, nothing is going on is the difference between I mean, I haven't been to work in 16 months now and I'm still getting paid and like I'm so thankful for that I I could have lost everything Um, so I think that's the most important thing that business owners need to realize is whether it feels like you can leave or not You need to start leaving you need to figure that out Make that happen. I don't know. Cece. Can you hear us yet? Maybe not I'm driving so it's It's okay. We just wanted to say hi forever Foundations, how much do you do for us, right? Like door mom exactly For for for those of you who don't know Cece was uh, very important part of our team like figuring out what foundations was going to be and helping us put the program together and the logistics of of you know, doing this this program over the years We honestly we probably wouldn't be sitting here having this discussion or talking about foundations if it wasn't for Cece and I was messaging her, you know, when we started and she's stuck on 95 somewhere I guess between dc and fredexburg. I'm glad you were able to uh to join us here She did all the grocery shopping too, didn't she? I thought that was brilliant Yeah, every day, right and you guys always give her a new list every day Like spoiled kids That's part of the fun of it too, right? So we did have um a couple things. Amy, stick in chat your contact information Anybody that's looking for like blogs or um, if you're wanting to talk about training, maybe you might be somebody to talk about Talk to about that. Um, we're Quickly running out of time Tom, uh, can you also please put the link for people who want to find out more about foundations and they want to read about it um, you can send them over to that page and then I'm really picky Sarah had a problem that she would love for us to address um And you're just hiding So before we get to Sarah's question is I want you guys to also vote for the winner of the bling contest And there's not a whole lot of people in here. There's lora. There's heather. There's linda. I guess Derek With his fake green over there um One of those three people just put type in the chat Celebrating properly And the prize is going to be there are three presentations that you will receive Um, okay, uh, so let's hit sarah's question real quick Go ahead Hit us real quick. Okay. I'll come back Okay, well, I was just throwing stuff out there because you guys were asking for information So, um, I was wondering if any of you guys, especially the bigger businesses have any advice On how to grow and scale with your training and hiring when You grow really fast like we weren't expecting such fast growth We have about a hundred more jobs this month than last month, which is a lot for us and I don't want to turn people away But I don't want to start losing our quality either because we can't hire and train fast enough So I don't know if there's a secret sauce, but if you got it, let me know I would love to touch on this if I can Please Trisha So, um, I am so excited that we hired an HR manager. So if you want to rework his manager The very end of 2020 I think now and he's amazing He has a master's in business And a certification in shrm like the whole thing But um having somebody dedicated to employees only was such a game changer for a company Like his job is to nurture them His job is to like take care of every problem every red flag like hiring acquiring like onboarding like all of it working with benefits like 401k is like all of our stuff um That was such an awesome part for us to be able to do and so I understand if they're your company might not be to the point where you could have an HR manager But you could certainly still have someone like that that's in charge of those things um, you know and uh Like their whole goal is to make you grow and we know that how how we make those is grow right We grow by advertising and we grow by increasing our employee numbers Well, it's increasing employee numbers are super important because you have all these leads coming in Having somebody that's dedicated to higher higher higher is going to be really what takes you to the next level That's great advice trisha. Thank you But he also has something how about training because that's always a big thing for sarah. Yeah, go ahead Yeah, I would just like to second what trish just said. I couldn't agree more We I actually groomed my own HR person from within which I think is a pretty Difficult to do so I might hire from the outside but that like an HR person is like Changed my life and really it's not an uncommon combo either to have someone who's HR and an admin So like they do They sort of like can do accounts receivable accounts payable That sort of stuff do the payroll and do HR that is a combination that is you can just hire from the labor market For that and there are a lot of great people out there who can help with that And it's the the onboarding and and all of that stuff and in our business We're in the business of selling labor. So that is a really critical position If I had it to do old way again, I would have hired an HR admin person when I was your size sarah Yeah, me too. That that would Allow us to have grown a lot faster And I don't think I think it can they can also help with training too, but You know in terms of training It probably would have been something I would have focused on with a good operations manager or a field supervisor That might have been something I would have focused on with them There are whoever you have for your trainers. Is it possible for them to be promoted up to that HR position and be an exclusive trainer? Possibly I'll have to I'll have to think on this because I do have two Managers in my office and once more sales once more like Scheduling all things operation, but I might be able to shape her into more of a HR position But you're you're wanting the actual training so that the cleaning that's actually being done is good, right? Yeah Okay, I might be able to help you out with that. Um, call my number. Let's chat. Okay. Awesome Okay, I can basically Laura. Yeah, go ahead. Um, so we did a couple of things. We had sort of the same problem. Um A lot of people remember ocean 13 we fired 13 people one day. We had a re staff on a lot of people at once Um, so that was when we really started figuring out doing bulk hiring and training. Um, so the things that we do that I think Um, work the best for us is we have a field manager who is very similar to our HR person She's the point person for all of the field staff. Um, and she's the Person who is in charge of our quality assurance person Um, so the field manager holds regular trainer meetings So it gets them all in the same place and reviews things with them. We also have a trainer only Um channel and slack that we talk a lot and we kind of seek those conversations so that everybody is on the same page with things Um, and then our qa person goes out and if we graduate out of training She'll go out and start checking them and be the field manager is the one who's doing the onboarding So she does all the orientation everything and so she tells everybody right up front all the trainers will tell them too You're gonna get to know brandy really well when you first get out training She's not coming to see what you're doing wrong. She's coming to help and make sure that you're comfortable with everything. Um So I think it's a combination of getting because we have a four or five trainer And so getting them all on the same page through those regular meetings regular You know communication that they're all involved in they all see and then having um, my field manager's assistant Go do the checks on the people who've graduated and she's a flex position. So sometimes she's full time Doing quality checks. Sometimes she's full-time cleaning. It just depends on how many people we have coming out So awesome. Thanks And we do the exact same as laura, um where we have the trainers to see the video chat So we have all that stuff. So we do quarterly meetings um So from like it's like a six hour meeting actually So like every quarter we have a train train the trainers class And in order for them to continue to be a trainer or company, they have to attend every single one of those So every three months what we tend to find is that when we're renewing and re-uploading that sort of that sort of It with us They're re-engaging themselves into our company. But what we notice is that we don't do it every three months They fall off the bandwagon Like and it really re-engages them when we continue to do it every three months Um, and then in foundations foundations actually gives us a train the trainers program Um, right list. Yep. We know that's where I got mine. And so what we did is we um, We took that annual and then we kind of reinvented it a little bit to make it work with our company And things that were really important for us, but it sets all the found all the ground things and um We have we have five trainers and they're phenomenal. So like once our training program really got like awesome um, and and having someone to charge our hr like We can we can hire 10 people in a week and be fine. Wow, that's amazing Well, we are a little past the top of the hour This is a lot of fun and really awesome and appreciate everybody's help here Today, Liz, do we have a winner for our contest? We do it looks like it's Heather So thanks everybody for um coming It was really good to see everybody hear what everybody's doing I'm super excited to hear that everybody's doing well Any thanks for sharing your information and how people can contact you Sarah, if you didn't have a chance yet to look at the chat, please check out Joe's information Because It's very similar to what Trisha said as well that if you could instead of hiring from within However from without gets me that is a professional on their own right a lot of people would do that They have to go over again. Yeah All right And the other thing too with that is that when you're hiring within They already know your staff and already friends with your staff and so if somebody that's um not on that friend With them is really important as well Okay Okay, guys. Well take care. Liz. We're going to be back here tomorrow. We're doing something fun, right? Tomorrow, I'm doing a presentation Tom. Oh, that's right. That it's not going to be it's not going to be fun Liz is doing a presentation. It will be fun We'll be talking about training tomorrow Oh We have Take care