 Hey good afternoon everybody time steward here I'm with Liz Trotter our guest today is Shawn day all things holidays Smart business moves Shawn. How in the heck are you good? Good? Good? Nice to see you two again You too Shawn It's been a while, you know, I I always think of you two as we come up in November coming up on ISSA stuff Well Definitely be there right around the corner right around. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, we got trick-or-treat coming out We've got Thanksgiving all things holidays. Is that what we're doing here? Yeah Yeah, it all in I'm looking forward to Thanksgiving and I'm and you know what you brought up ISSA And I am really happy that this year They didn't overrun Holidays like when they remember when they did it over Halloween always That was terrible. It was we had to be there and people were so upset and this year it and It's the week before Thanksgiving, right? Is that right? Yeah. Yeah 17th ish somewhere in there, I think Yeah, I think it's the 15th through is it the 15th through the 18th November 15th through 18th That sounds right. That's not yes. I believe so You know most a lot of people are traveling on that Sunday the 14th and it wraps up Thursday the 18th Yeah, and it ends kind of early on Thursday the 18th. So people usually are heading out by the 19th So it's a it's an easy easy trip Are you looking forward to anything specific this year? You said easy trip so plada Dad plada my good friend tries to book all this stuff on his Travel credit card points, which basically means Sean will have four layovers for five hours Starved in death because it'll be at midnight and everything's closed. There's no easy travel for me There's just no such thing as easy travel But yeah, I'll be there. I think I think I don't know if we could I think we have our flight now Planned out and I think there's only one layover and it's only for like an hour and a half Custom service manager Denise will be there too. So that'll be good. You're home based at a Cleveland, right Sean? Absolutely. Yeah, so he's got you going from like Cleveland to Atlanta to Miami And you're getting miles for all of that, right? Of course, I am getting miles for him. Of course I am Yeah, I had a Four hour layover in Denver the last time I flew to Vegas, which was just a couple months ago So that's that's a half a day of sitting in an airport And you don't you know, it's one of those where you don't want to leave necessarily I was trying to hook up with a friend that I have there and I couldn't we couldn't connect and it was just like I just I'm I'm always scared to leave the airport no matter what the layover is, you know Yeah Just the cost the hassle of going through security again. Exactly. Exactly. Yeah, and now, you know It's all these years. We've been going to the shows as as You know, not as vendors and now that we're doing this Vendoring thing because of our recruiting services and bookkeeping services We're now traveling trying to figure all that out, which we're not good at vendoring yet Uh, you know, like we'll sit there and people come up to the booth and oh, yeah, yeah Yeah, we'll have to get dinner or a beer later or this or that and they walk away and we Dan and I look at each other Oh, man, I think I think we're supposed to sell something forgot about that part I think we should have got an email or a phone number or something, right? Is that right? But you're there and you know, that's that's important first step, you know, you're making progress But actually I'm so glad that all over the place too. Now, you know, we've got the this beautiful new booth and all this It's just it's crazy. We have a blast though Well, you know, I'm really glad that you brought this up because I have had Dan On my list of people to contact for to get into to do a presentation for my strategic success groups For a couple of months and I haven't done it yet. Can you can you can you reach out to him for me? Absolutely. He'd love to do that. He'd love to do that Ah, I I've been meaning to get him into group to tell everybody about the bookkeeping services, right? Yeah, yeah, that part of the business is just going like crazy. He's got hundreds and hundreds of clients now He's and I think they've got Dan and that team in the bookkeeping probably has 20 bookkeepers That's how much business he's bringing in Wow, that's great. Well, are you telling me that he's too busy for me? I should No, that's that's he's got all these bookkeepers. He hires to do the bookkeeping Along with him, of course, you know, he's the head man there, but He loves to get on the social media stuff. He's got a radio show now He's got a radio show for something with landscaping now Long yeah, so he's got a lot of lawn care clients and he's on this radio show and it's literally specifically for lawn care landscape type of people So, yeah, he just he loves the social media thing. He loves going to the shows all that stuff Yeah All right, cool And you know the whole service of like bookkeeping You don't have many business owners out there that are saying no, no, no, that's my favorite park That's the part that I want to do Yeah, yeah, I I remember I remember my books when I had my cleaning company and cleveland And it was so pitifully bad Like I could not it was so bad. I could it was a mess, you know My my numbers were everywhere. It was a mess, but it got to a point eventually where I would like make I was lying to myself and going this must be part of this So i'm just going to throw it there and oh man, and I don't take while I wasn't supposed to go there But I didn't care I just didn't want it and then I finally got a good bookkeeper and And it was it just changed everything for me everything and um dad's got it, you know I had I had a bookkeeper back then that wasn't specifically for our industry of the cleaning industry where dan is And and owns and has operated cleaning companies So he just knows and he's you know He's a guy that comes from cargill, which is one of the largest privately owned companies in america traveled the world For whatever financial Stuff he was doing for cargill And brought it to the blue collar world and it's uh, you know, he's a blue collar guy with a White collar mind. I guess is a is a good way to put it Oh, that's nice. Yeah. Yeah So but also there's not a heck of a lot of people that are running around Looking having a blast recruiting in the last year and a half or two. I know that yeah Boy, boy, that's an understatement there son. Yeah, are you Are you seeing any changes anything that I mean People i'm talking to things are loosening up a little bit it's getting a little bit easier now Is that the Yeah, we're seeing it loosen up a little bit I would say that there's there's a lot of economic factors that are going into it too I've done a lot of looking up in that regard. So there's a lot of mixing and matching and craziness going on Would the spike sort of in covet over the last couple months that's still a main factor Uh, there was something I read where there are more people taking care of covet Sick people than there has been during this entire pandemic Since since the spike like in July or something like that Um and the July may be somewhere in there. So that is causing some unemployment issues We still have the five hundred dollar or what is it 250 dollar tax credit going on? So people with three or four kids, you know, we're getting a thousand dollars still a month put in their bank account That's still going to go until the end of december. So there's although it's loosening up There's still some things, uh, you know, there's 10 million available jobs out there. I mean, that's a lot of jobs still Um, but there, you know, it has definitely loosened up though to your point. Liz. We're seeing more application flow But we're not out of the woods yet I would say that there's a You know, if if for some reason these child tax credits get extended I don't think they will but if some in some case if that happens that can be a problem And and inflation's really really got me a little bit nervous We're at like a 5.4 percent inflation rate for this year. Uh, that's that's high compared to what we've been Since I can remember that's really really high and inflation Buries the amount of inflation varies, you know across, you know commodities and various things Wages especially on the hourly higher side seems to be Especially hit hard with that. Are you seeing wages going up? We've at blue skies. I know our entire staff has gotten raises everybody That's a conversation I have with a lot of our clients that we recruit for I'll go in and I'll do some homework and research on labor market stuff Um wages is one of them if if if you haven't raised your wages or if you've raised them less than 10 percent That's like not raising them at all. You know, take a look at gas prices right now gas prices are doubled You know in a very short amount of time literally double Um, there's going to be more travel with Thanksgiving right around the corner. So So that 10 percent raise That's not a raise because of cost of living with inflationary pressures. That hasn't given anybody more spending Um, they're just keeping up and that's just fuel, you know, if you if you the other thing that's that's been um that I think it's really Hurt recruiting Is that the savings the cash balances? of americans Is up drastically Because of a lot of the free money from the government these tax credits that are coming in Um, you know, and there's still people that are are able to get cash jobs So we still can make cash, right collect unemployment get child tax credits Um, we're coming up against tax season again Don't don't forget in the beginning of this year. You could as a blue collar What used to be maybe a tender or $12 dollar job? Uh, you had an $8,000 Tax refund at the same time there was about whatever it was $1,000 a month coming in from unemployment or more more than that And then, uh, you know, that's a pretty hefty bank account for somebody making 12 13 bucks an hour And you know a number of people were in situations where they weren't having to pay rent for a period of time. Yeah Yeah, yep, and they you know, there's there were There there's just an enormous amount of money that a Artificial labor force just never had and they and they haven't in their in cash balances Whether it's a savings a checking or whatever it is and then you couple that with daycares closed down and and you know I always said there I'm contrary to this belief that all these lazy people eating corn puffs and doritos and all kinds of cheese Cheese puffs All these things, you know, that's not true. There's there's Absolutely beautiful employees and beautiful workers that have worked really hard most of their lives If not all their lives And they've got kids that don't have daycares to go to that does if my daughter came up to me and said dad You know, it would the with the stuff i'm getting from the government the unemployment I haven't spent a lot of time with the kids because i've been working house with abc house cleaning Eight hours a day and sometimes more because we're so short staffed I haven't seen my kids hardly I wouldn't begrudge my daughter who's worked really hard all her life at 28 years old To maybe sit on the sideline for a couple months and spend some time with her kids over the summer Sure Well, you're not you're not the only one a lot of people with that exact mindset, right? Just like absolutely That's what I honestly think When you know I I honestly believe that I think january is going to be one of the best recruiting months for our industries Then we've seen in quite a while. I really do. I think the trial tax credit stuff is going to end in december So that's extra. You know, i'm getting 500 bucks a month in my bank account for having two children Okay, that ends in december if you have four kids a thousand dollars a month going away Okay, and then some bills coming in With christmas because you're never we never spend just you know of the thousand dollars We still are going to spend more than we have because we're that's what we call this country Um, and then you know, you're going to start to see that money go away people are going to have to go and look for jobs They're they're you know, we we are getting people in a habit of spending more money than what they have Because it's free money that free money is going to dry up I believe at the end of this year and some people are going to have to start to get back to work. That's my feeling I don't know. I can't predict that necessarily, but that's my feeling on it Well, you you should just go ahead go go on the record as predicting that Right we're going to like we're going to be like wow Sean day. He's like no sturdom is If you're wrong, oh well people are always wrong, right? It wouldn't be the first time I'm wrong. So no, yeah, I'll go on the record. Absolutely I didn't say what you're in january. Did I? No, that was showing good point I I think what's happening here in washington is I know a lot of people here things have loosened up because of the Uh vaccination requirement. So a lot of people have left jobs so now they're they're going into these lower wage jobs and They're not as low wage as they used to be right. So yeah Used to be you couldn't really afford to Have one of these jobs if you were coming from, you know, the medical field or something We're seeing a lot of people Applying from the medical field right now LPNs RNs even So yeah, I mean you've got a lot of burned out people too in the health care industry that have just gone through some Crazy hours through this pandemic and continue to so your medical assistance even There's just so many different positions in the health care industry that We're starting to see that too. One of the other things too is that the There's been so much talk about the $15 minimum wage for years now for like But it's really been shouted out loud the last couple years I'm convinced that most employees in the uh blue collar realm that we live in Think that most every state is $15 an hour minimum wage right now I bet if you took a survey most I would I would bet more than we think think it's $15 minimum wage right now and a lot of cities are Not a lot of states are but a lot of cities are I know Minneapolis, Minnesota, for example, their minimum wage is I think $15 an hour and most states are headed that way So when we do job descriptions and we're putting in wages for for clients I always you know, if you're starting at $14 an hour or $13 an hour, which some states you can do that I mean, you know, I suppose but I tell them that's if you're not at 15 or more Everybody thinks $15 is the minimum wage or soon to be so when you're doing 13 bucks an hour, it's insulting to them I mean, you're gonna lose a lot of people out of that circle Based on the based on the work that you're doing. I know that you do recruiting for a whole bunch of different companies Are you seeing anybody having any success if they aren't offering a starting wage of at least 15 an hour? Absolutely without a doubt without a doubt. That's the minimum wage I mean, whatever the federal law is really is irrelevant Practically you you have to start at least 15 if not more Yeah, and there's you know, there's companies out there that do the pay performance the commission whatever you want to call it Uh percentage pay whatever you want to call it. It's all pretty much the same Um that has a minimum wage is sort of that floor and that's fine But I I'm not one to advocate, you know Advertising that it's minimum wage minimum floor You know, I I like to go with what's your what's your weekly average pay for somebody? That's an a employee that might be with you for a couple years We can we can we can mix in there a starting pay if you've got a starting hourly pay um, but You know, if somebody's paying $25 an hour, but they only have 15 hours of a week of work I you know, I want to know what the weekly pay is. That's that's where you know, that's what I think is more important I don't think I try to stay away from hourly Why go with the smaller number if you're putting a job description together go with a weekly number Go with a monthly number something like that You know, that's interesting and I guess You know, there's some people out there though that the amount of money that they're bringing home per week Maybe isn't that is important to them. They are really interested in working a bunch of hours and you know I have I have seen situations where The hourly rate can be important because that's kind of what they talk to their friends about You know, I'm making $22 an hour and they don't really talk about while I'm only getting six hours a week. It really doesn't matter. It's More more bragging rights if nothing else and I and I know both of you know this too is Any type of survey I've read the pay is just part of a huge Pie that these people we call employees want when they wake up every morning to come into work Everybody needs that paycheck, but there's so much That we we talk about that You know, I I've been talking a lot about mindset And perceptions the last year to a lot of small business owners around the country And I'm actually putting together. Um, I don't know what I'm going to call it yet It's going to be basically like an advanced interview something or another about interviewing There's not a week that goes by for the last couple years literally I haven't had business owners ask me about interview stuff So it's been something I've had on this shelf And it's coming down off the shelf finally and we're putting we were able to hire about 20 Cleaning technicians in our Minneapolis, Minnesota office and in two and a half months back in like march and april And we did that because of a mindset that was at a time where everybody was complaining. It was tough to get workers, right? Yeah, you know and in Minneapolis, Minnesota is not an easy place to recruit. It just isn't I've recruited there for a couple years now It's not an easy place to recruit but our mindset was completely different on how we did things and We're gonna I'm gonna talk it off a lot about that And come out with a couple. I don't know if it's going to be like a little live thing or a couple short videos I do know it'll be free and I do know I'm not going to be selling up into anything So it's going to be absolutely free, but it's really going to be cool. I'm having a good time with it Yeah, that sounds exciting. It sounds like it's gonna be fun. A lot of people are going to love that Good timing. Really good timing. I hope so You know, Liz, you're the you're one of the best and there is with culture And culture is just everything and it's sort of like we when I look at culture with businesses because I do when we sign somebody up I do research in their labor market. I look at their website. I want to know what their culture is all about What do they do around the holidays for employees? You know things like that? I mean, it's but Most of the culture I see has a lot to do with We're going to get the best customer this customer that customer this customer this our quality this right? We're we're going to do the best we can for every single customers are going to love us There's nothing with culture to me is more about your employees And and what they have to come to work and do and face and what they what their needs and wants are It's amazing to me the boat that's missed with culture And I'm sure you can speak to that even more in volumes and I can but to me That's part of what I'm going to be talking about in the interview stuff I do think that we're seeing a big shift that I would say in the last six months people are really really really recognizing that the employees Have to be your first concern You know, it's it's always been a little chicken or egg chicken or egg, right? Like employees or clients employees or clients, but I think that people are now recognizing that They they struggled through not having employees and they're like, okay I don't want to fight that fight again. Like I know how to fight that. I can't get enough customer Customers, I know how to do that fight that employee fight. That's too hard. It's bloody I want to I want to make that one work I'll sum up exactly what you're talking about with pain points and here's here. Here's my view on it You've got a several hundred or a few hundred clients as a as a cleaning owner You've got 10 or 11 employees something like that Think of your life if you lose two or three of those clients You're still sleeping fine at night. You're still you're not cancelling your dinner reservations friday Think of the three or four employees you lose in one day You you're looking at the ceiling going I you know, I don't want to get up and call anybody tomorrow I don't you want to show up tomorrow Your wife and you were fighting your husband and you were fighting your your nasty to your kids your life changes Your life changes when you lose three or four employees when I lose three or four clients I hate it don't like it, but I'm not losing sleep You know your typical maid service client if you will I don't know maybe three grand a year in revenue where A technician in today's world is probably going to be knocking down 70 or more So from a dollar and cent standpoint, there's no comparison. Yeah Why is it then that we That some some business owners just don't think through that. I don't know why I think maybe is it we're just so marketing sales and and revenue generated type of mindset I don't know I its habit. It's just the way it's always been I really like what Rohan is saying right here about, you know, that Entrepreneurship is the new culture and that people are right now much more thinking about Why should I work for you? I can do it myself You know, and also the mindset of Wanting to work less. So it's always been the entrepreneurial mindset Of you know, I'm gonna put in all my time. I'm gonna work really hard right now And I'm going to build this business so that I can work less. I mean not for Tom But for most people right that's part of the entrepreneurial mindset is I want to put in this time So that I can work less. But now we're seeing that with employees too I I want to work less. I want to make more money for less time It's not that they want to make, you know, $15 an hour. They want to make whatever it's going to take To be able to work less 40 hours a week Is not normal for this new this new mindset that feels That feels like too much work that that it's not reasonable. That's like old school when You know, so I think it is an employer The the old mindset was well, we're working 40 hours a week money through friday nine to five And if you don't want to do that you go get a job somewhere else That doesn't work in today's world anymore. You know, we have to Be more accommodating to to the wishes of of the labor force or we're not going to have anybody working for us at all Well, it's it's all fundamental to me the the economy drives certain behaviors Okay Different generations because of the way the world is has different expectations um The world with pandemics has different things that Just yeah, it's us to do certain things one of the biggest changes and what we all realize this is working remotely um, you know that The things we're doing now with zoom and interviews and zoom, you know, the things we're doing Today is all because of the way that that the world changed Right that this stuff with telehealth wasn't going to be around for another seven or eight or nine years But because of the pandemic We had to adjust to this world and that's why everybody knows the word zoom In a matter of a year and a half everybody in this country knows what that word means and what it is and so certain but There's certain fundamental things I don't think are going to ever change and those are things like matching capacity and demand I mean that will never change you've got to match capacity and demand the best of your ability Because that's where you make money in our businesses Okay, that's when you make the most money when you have the perfect amount of cleaners for the perfect amount of cleaning customers And that just there's a beautiful world when that happens, right? um So it's it will change again within now It could be 2023 or 24 Inflation is coming around the bond markets in germany not to bore everybody to death are are in positive territory The for the first time in years So not just the united states but other parts of the world are are seeing inflationary pressures Economies are going to change in the next couple years And there's going to be a time where there's going to be that these employees that have us by the tail right now Because there are thousands of jobs that you can go fetch And sit there and go I can get a job tomorrow. What are you paying? What are you doing? What's your benefits sooner or later? There's going to be one job for a hundred employees and those people are going to have to Come down to our reality At that time, of course, we'll be begging for customers then Right It's always the way Yeah, the fundamentals of capacity and demand are are are just never in my view going to change. That's business There's you know, we have to do technologies change Generational things change pandemics make us change But fundamentally, I think there's still things that you have to adhere to Yeah, I like what Asha is saying here too This this feeling of I control my own schedule. You know, we talk a lot about We have talked over the years about maverick meaning measure and we always talked about accountability And when the pandemic hit I switched that a of accountability to autonomy Because that has just become such a big thing In this in these times people want the They want autonomy They want to be able to run their own lives in their own way And in a way that they think is fair and respect respectful And and well fair fair is the big thing right now, right? And I think that's I think we can all do that. We have a lot of us have and the answer is You know, everybody's scratching their head all you've got to do is raise your prices and everything takes care of itself Right, if you want to work less, I'll pay you the same weekly rate if I can charge my customers more And I don't know the can anybody find a company in america today that that is lowering their prices for any for any reason I can't oh That's interesting. I hadn't thought of that at all sean. Um, but I really like that I'm curious if anybody is lowering their prices because I don't know if everybody's raising prices We all expect it. It's it's as expected as Zoom calls are in zoom interviews are and working remote is Raising prices right now is the norm They're, you know, like every now and again I see the facebook posting of how to what kind of letter should I you just raise it Because everything is going up in price gas prices are through the roof, right? And they're going to you know Um, the president of the united states the other day was asked about it And he said that he doesn't see it changing Until maybe we get into 2022. So when we have a president, I don't care on what side of the aisle says that, okay That's what's going to happen chances are we're not going to see gas prices come down Uh, when that happens you got to raise your prices. That's why I don't that's why we ordered couches seven months ago And they still haven't gotten here yet Supplies They're the containers somewhere off the coast of california, right Right. No, all right. Well, let's let's talk a little bit about we're talking about the containers, right off the coast there And that's going to impact the holidays, but how do you see? Uh recruiting being affected through the holidays. Sean. Do you see anything going on here? The regardless from my my experience regardless of the economy and the labor market You'll find that the week before and the week after a major holiday application flow kind of goes away Most people are thinking about Thanksgiving dinners and Going what's I think isn't Thanksgiving the number one travel Time of the year basically. Yeah, that's because we're going to see our friends our family And we're not looking for jobs at that time. Nobody really is There's more competition with retail that's coming up Tom had made that point a little earlier when we were chatting about some things It gets really really aggressive retail wise because people are trying to make a little bit more money. So the labor market Titans up. There's less applications out there. There's going to be an open window for about a week or two after, you know After Thanksgiving, maybe two weeks after Thanksgiving, maybe a week after Thanksgiving where there's going to be some retail Um Job market activity people trying to make extra money retail stores are going to want to pay more, right? You really should protect your employees at that time because retail stores walmart paying reimbursing tuition For their employees walmart that got beat up by unions for paying minimum wage just paying 15 16 17 hours an hour today Okay, so what are they going to pay when they really need somebody around christmas time around the holiday? You know, they're going to be stealing our employees if you're not taking care of your employees So you've got a plan for that you you should have that conversation with your employees Oh, so what does that conversation sound like sean? That's great great advice. I just said exactly what I just said This is typically what happens We're going to um, you know, whatever you need to do whether that's bonuses Whether that's a little bit more pay How about if we give everybody a dollar raise for the month of december and then we're going back to january back down to What we need to go down to And the other part of that is those are temporary jobs and yep, you know, yeah I learned something. I went to a workshop last week. It was in canada and i'm that a lady who Has a software product that she developed software that's kind of on the back end of indeed It's not consumer facing but she sees a lot of data and works with them on that january 8th is The the biggest day of the entire year in terms of people looking for a job Yep, january Yep, january is the best month to recruit we signed up more customers in january of last year because We spent all of november and december harping on that exact same point so, you know, there's going to be a lot of people looking for work in january 8th in particular if you need people be out there and recruiting This is a lot of people looking Yep Get make sure your ad is live on 8th Yeah, and make sure your your your incumbent workforce in december knows that, you know You're going to be recruiting heavily for open positions if they give up their job now to go Work for walmart their job might not be there in january You know and the other thing too when we hired those 20 technicians in our minneapolis office We started recruiting hard in january to hire those people in march and april We were engaging and talking and and getting people to come in for you know If you if you go after it at the beginning of january You figure you'll have interviews set up two weeks after that. So you're mid to end january doing some interviews Get them started mid february That's about the time frame of it if you think about it It takes a month to get somebody hired really and then you got to train them So I you know if the thing about it is if you wait until after january You've got two things that have happened number one your competition is going after it in january So that you're going to lose it to your competition, but number two Those what do we look for smart? A employees to come to work for us Smart a employees are looking for jobs in january Even the ones that are seasonal your exterior cleaning businesses lawn care window cleaning so forth Those people are looking for jobs in the springtime in january and in february. They're smart. They're not going to wait till the last minute Yeah All right, and and we do know that everybody is looking for jobs on january 8th, which this year is a saturday y'all so Gotta be ready gotta be ready It really works out get your ads out there, you know Thursday or friday, and you'll go through the weekend You'll be ready coming monday, and you'll have more leads, and you know what to do with I think so I think so You know, I really like what you said earlier to shon about um You know just be just be trying to think outside the box right now understanding that It is different times right now how things are working is going to be different We don't really know what the seasonal jobs are going to be. We don't know what they're going to be offering I know Everybody here is charging 16 bucks an hour to work at fast food So if that's what you can get at fast food, what's target going to have to offer? What's walmart going to have to offer? So maybe there is a way for us to come up with something that's very temporary that we Decide is going to be through december or whatever and maybe kick it past january 8th Maybe a little bit longer than that. Yeah I think that's I think that's fine to do. I think I think you really need to do something For your employees in december anyway because it's holidays. It's you know all that good stuff But this year particularly I'd be talking loud about it I would you know, there's a lot of companies that get bonuses and they don't You know, they like it to be a surprise maybe and things like that But I'd have a conversation with everybody on staff and somehow or another Let them know that there's going to be some extra money for them in december to keep them around because In the tom's point why it's still good to work for us Not you know, you might be able to go make more temporarily, but that job's not going to be around in january and february I mean you take a look at retail data and I'm not a retail data expert guy But I would be willing to bet my mortgage that That they die in january and february retail Oh, yeah, they do It's um, well you got returns going on. So they're a little bit busy, but You know, I used to work retail back when I had a real job and uh, you know, it's all it's all about the holidays And uh You know, there is one one big problem. Oh, sorry tom. Go ahead. No, you know, you go ahead No, finish your point. I thought you're done. No, no, that's that that's pretty much it. It's um, You know all about all about getting the holiday sales and before uh before the end of the year And then you're processing some returns and by the time you get past january. Let's retailers their quarters their their their fiscal year ends january the end of january So once you get into february, it's uh, it's pretty dead. Yeah All right, so this was what I was going to say is a caution um, if you're planning on telling your employees anything along the lines of Hey, and that's a seasonal job and this is a permanent job and you know that if you're going to use that line You need to be careful because the people right now um, are feeling like The jobs are there I can get a job anywhere at any point in time and I am more valuable than than anybody They're not going to hear the message about temporary not not today not this year They're not going to hear that message because they're they don't have a problem with temporary jobs right now That's what the great recession is all about I'm happy to change out my jobs So that that doesn't have the pull that it had in the past Like we're gonna have a full time permanent job for you 40 hours a week It's like Okay, then thank you for letting me know. I think I better switch jobs now. Why wait? You're gonna try and make me work 40 hours every week right, right But if you think about a lot of these retail jobs though, they're not necessarily awesome either in terms of you know being accommodating It's seven days a week Yes We still have that There's somebody in that store at three o'clock in the morning, you know getting things stocked up ready to go the next day I couldn't imagine working black friday Can you imagine working retail black friday? Who on earth? I guess that's fast-paced man. I just having that many people come running at me. Just isn't my cup of tea not like that I'm gonna remember that when you see me running at you in vegas at Right during convention and you're like what is going on remember this conversation? I'm getting me and all of my friends john So like when people are fighting over that last flat Screen tv are you the one in there? Liz breaking it off? No, I never worked anywhere where it was that kind of violent I'm really in clothing retail And I it wasn't as big of a deal as it is now the deals were not As crazy they you know, it was not like it is today But it was very fast and very busy and I did love that. I really did. Yeah. Yeah What what what changes have you seen with your clients or your business? Liz just out of curiosity with I mean you you seem to have such a Low turnover rate in comparison to others And That's probably changed But I mean in comparison to a lot of other companies in the industry Are you doing anything different for your employees? Yeah, I mean that that holds them tight and keep some in the door Uh, well, I mean like everybody else. I really ran through a hard patch. Um, every one of my employees Uh, except for Mindy had small children when things hit every single one So I was like, oh, that was a really big struggle. Um, we have since brought back a few of those people and Um, I I would say that the same thing that I've always said That there are three main things that keep people at their job that they feel like they matter That they feel like they individually they themselves matter to the company It's hard to leave a job where you feel like you really matter The second job is that there's some type of meaning in the job. They feel good about the work that they do because You know, there's some sort of meaning out there meaning in what they do There's it's not a coincidence that all of these companies are, you know Tom's it gives away free shoes and that all of these companies are jumping on that bandwagon. That's not a coincidence And I don't give away free shoes Yet Maybe I should start The brand is already there, right? That's right. It's ready to go And then also that that measure right that they they know where they stand and there Those are those fundamental things that I talk about that stuff that will never change In my lifetime, I don't think there's just certain to me take care of people that are taking care of you I think that is just a Principle and a fundamental principle that just you know, that's a value that should always be there regardless of the economy The labor market the inflation rate or any of the other external things Those are a lot of the things that I I've been trying to talk about is just that mindset You know, and I give this example. I I remember, you know I was visiting a company of ours and The it happened both on the first day of employment for a new employee and during an in an interview, which is the first Impression that a human being gets was is that first interview, right? And so I just wanted to sit back and take a look And what I saw was this Susie came in I see her driving around like crazy trying to find the place Remember when we used to say hey and people you'd hear other businesses go. I'm not going to give them our address I'm going to make them jump through the hoops of finding our place to work and I sit there and I'm watching this car Going like crazy running on and so Susie jumps out of the car There's three people smoking cigarettes outside of the building complaining about mrs. Jones and being monday That's the first thing she sees smells and hears. She hasn't even walked through the door yet She gets through the door There are 10 employees sitting there with their paperwork and doing things and every one of them turns around and stares at her Like she's got five heads not one of them acknowledges says hello introduces themselves. Nobody does It was probably close to a minute Which if you could picture yourself in the middle of a room being stared at by 10 human beings That's a long time to be sitting there No, finally the manager comes running out like she just got off the stare master breathing hard stressed out Paper's flying out of her hand and says hi. I'm good brother. Come on. We got to get this stuff over with That's I'm sitting there with my veins popping out. I'm choking. I'm thinking about it And I and I and we changed it completely The new vision that we have is Somebody goes out When we know somebody's coming a guest of ours is coming whether that's the first time at work because they just got hired Or it's an interview You're you're to go out there. You're to know their name You're to introduce yourself with a big smile. Hi susie that you must be susie. I've been waiting for you for 20 minutes I couldn't wait. I came in early just to be here for you. I couldn't wait. I couldn't stay home You go out there introduce yourself Anybody that comes near you you are to introduce with a big smile. Everybody shakes hands When you walk through the door, you're to say do you like donuts? Do you want fruit? We've got breakfast. You're having donut. I made I maybe use myself just for you And a big mug of coffee or juice Now that what is that how much did that cost a dollar 50 two dollars? And that is the difference between night and day and a mindset of you know This cracks me up. I talk about that employee And and that client, right? We've you know in time it hit the numbers. It's the numbers, right? It's the math we that that employee brings you in, you know 50 60 70 grand that client brings you maybe three or four grand a year And what do we do? We kiss their butt, right? Think about that. You're the sales When we go after a client think of how excited we get we're kissing their rear end It's a three four thousand dollar sale and we're going and man. We closed that deal. What did we did? Did we make them find our address and jump through hoops? And and and you know, you're gonna have to what's your favorite color and you know all these questions we ask employee When you screen an employee a job candidate properly upfront when you do that properly upfront In my mind that interview is your you've got to go like that's your biggest sale All you all we do in our interview literally is we think of that as a $80,000 or $70,000 sale We want that human being that walks through called a job candidate to show up to an interview And feel like they are queen elizabeth coming in and worse up. This is why we need you to work for us This is what we have to offer you. I'm not asking you to jump through hoops and asking you can you tell me What's how you handled stress and your last job and give me a circumstance? We're what's your favorite color and all these nonsense things? I'm that's an $80,000 sale What do you do for a $3,000 sale? You're still making these people jump through hoops after you if you pre-screen them properly the hoop jumping's gone It's time to make a sale. That's the mindset. I'm talking about So if they answer the color favorite color question wrong, are they no longer a candidate? It's not green It's our blue and blue skies. They're out the door Green i'm sorry. We can't use you. We're done. Sorry We're not dealing with you anymore So audra has a good little idea here too. You can give your new hires a small ticking gift basket token gift basket or something like that Yep, absolutely. There's the the idea here is now what you do Just that you do something that you treat these people like they matter like they're important To your company and that you really want them and you really need them And and it is different now People are expecting to be treated that way when they walk through the door like they matter And if they're not treated that way now Then you're disrespectful and they're not working for you. They have the upper hand right now And I don't see it really Going back and everybody says that it's going to go back But I don't see it going back Hopefully to the level it used to and used to be in the past because hopefully we are going to learn better Hopefully we are going to learn our lesson and we are going to be better And we are going to treat our people better and we're going to have better people And they are going to do better No, absolutely, you know, it's a competitive advantage regardless of where the labor market's going to be in the future I mean it's going to add in flow But if you want to hire the best people you need to be the best employer Yeah I don't think we're going to hear people saying like we have in the past. What more do you want? I I don't think we're going to be hearing a whole heck of a lot more of that, you know for years We we heard that and actually I heard it Maybe six months ago in a facebook group. Why are they expecting all of this? What what do they expect? I'm paying them. That's what they're getting for their job They're expecting more nowadays more than just a paycheck And that is one way that you were talking about the fundamentals That is one way that things have sort of changed a little bit. Um, it's always been the You know the bottom level What's the name of our triangle, Tom? Maslow Yeah, thank you of maslow's hierarchy of need. I call it ours now, right? But the the base level has always been you know to have the safety met and and money but nowadays the problem is We're shooting people right past that everybody's already at safety That's why that money is becoming more of an issue than it ever has been in the past Not because people are motivated by money necessarily same amount of people are motivated by money as have always been motivated by money But because now the expectation is higher that that's what they need to survive That's what it feels like that they need to survive. So I think a great part of um, you know leadership too and and uh, my favorite leadership guru is john maxwell And five levels of leadership and and you know, he talks about Um those five levels and one of the things that we do at blue skies or I don't know if we do it all of our locations or not but the manager the location manager Is cooking breakfast every every monday morning for for the technicians and when your boss is cooking you breakfast and having We're having that servant's heart And serving their employees and cooking them breakfast and having fun doing it and wanting to make breakfast for your employees That goes a long way Our number of employees that showed up on monday's Drastically went through the room Literally when we were cooking breakfast on monday morning just to wake up in the morning and want to come to work Because you've created a job that your employees wants And and and want to come to work. That's huge. That's huge Create that job where somebody wants to wake up in the morning and they want to come to work. That's that's huge Yeah, when that alarm clock goes off on monday morning Knowing that you get a pay you're making so much per hour and you get a paycheck every week Is it really the motivation to get you out of bed? Right And I have a little hint for you shon To make those breakfasts even more impactful Right, so people love breakfast, but the same as everything else once it becomes an expectation It's hard to get around that so cooking breakfast every monday morning Here's how you get out of the expectation piece pancakes at pancakes Thank you All right Have the letters cooking breakfast Ask the next person on the list. What do they like for breakfast and that's what we're cooking next week That's a great idea because then you add the little matter in there This breakfast is not because of me being great I'm not cooking breakfast because I'm a great boss I'm cooking breakfast because shon likes omelets. That's why we're having omelets So if you want to thank someone thank shon Yeah, shon because of shon. We're having omelets today. So that Quests changes. That's that's an that's an amazing thing because it's it's a bit Contrary to what? Entrepreneurs mindsets typically are because we're super egotistical right and we're our brains are always thinking about ourselves Our business our our this our you know our our checking account our bank account our Our vehicles our supplies our equipment, right? It's always on and so that's hard to step out of And it is I've I've done a lot of things over the last couple of years with my mindset and my ego um, and and And if I can stop if I can keep my mind calm Which is not an easy thing for me to do and I know it's not an easy thing for you Liz because I just your personality. It's us Wham, wham, wham, wham, wham, wham, right? So your mind's just going like this But when I can actually calm it down and think of other people outside of myself My gosh, I get creative I can get really creative just like you laid out with that brilliant idea of just Tinkering with something a little bit When I wasn't thinking about myself and how I was having breakfast and I made breakfast for them I when you think of others and you get out of your mind and start to just focus on others Really cool things start to happen in everybody's life Agreed agreed Oh, what's tom gonna pull up here? Hey We are we are quickly approaching the top of the hour. Um wanted to just share with everybody Um, what what you do, uh, what you do with your your day job Sean So, uh, basically we We do recruiting Unlike most other companies though, uh, we We displace your labor. So if you're looking for a full-time recruiting department, that's what we are We we do everything from start to finish The only thing our client does is interview a highly screened human being And set up an interview and hire set up an interview and hire we go through data driven questions That uncover a lot of really important things that you'll want to have in a human being that comes to work for you And those that if you want to if you want a robot, don't call Sean Yeah We've got all kinds of really cool questions that we ask that are pretty industry specific questions Uh, you know a lot of other recruiting companies and platforms and softwares and apps and all that A lot of them have never owned a cleaning company. We have I owned one for 20 some years I'm still a part of them and uh, we we know your pain We know your what you do every single day because we do it too. We're colleagues first and then uh, you know, like I said We we we do a lot of things for free and I love talking shop And if you don't I always say do a demo with me for about 15 minutes And at the end of it still everything I have and do it yourself If you want to pay me a few bucks to do it for you, I'll do it if you want to do it yourself Go ahead. I don't care either way And somehow or another we've got hundreds of clients that are paying us to do it for them so You you have you have always been very very very good About sharing everything Absolutely. You you you walk the talk or yeah, you walk the talk. It's not like you're generous Yes, I mean very generous very giving you you'll you'll give away the playbutt. It's just a matter of you want to do it yourself That's exactly right. Yep. Yeah And I think that's a big part of why you guys are successful that generosity. It's You know, it it speaks to people Thank you. So thank you everybody for being here today I see that we're going a little bit over time here today tom We only have one more day In our everything holiday or all things all things holiday month The next month is convention month So that's going to be a busy month as well But we will be back Wednesday. That's what we will days from now five o'clock east for another another episode of smart business moves Sean as always you make this so much fun I don't know if Sean if you were our guest if you are always our guest we'd be doing this seven days a week, right? I'm probably turning red now now you're getting I always have and I I always remember the dinner we had in vegas and Tom you were kind enough to have me in your home and you're in your family and I always Always thought very highly of both of you and just have learned a lot from both of you and I appreciate our friendship Same here Sean. Thank you so much Sean. Yep. We love you. We love you more trust me It will be and we will be seeing you in Las Vegas here very very soon Absolutely So we're done for today five o'clock eastern on wednesday. We'll be back until then take care. Bye. Bye