From the Owner’s Head to Systems and Processes

Your life as the owner-operator of a landscape business can be hectic without systems and processes. And as you grow, the intensity of the craziness will just continue to increase. 

Then, one of two things will happen:

1. You hit your ceiling and growth stops. You simply can’t firefight another fire.
2. You figure out how to systemize and delegate.

The keys to getting out of the firefighter’s prison in the first point above are in the second point – getting info from the owner’s head and into systems and processes.

Hitting Your Ceiling

I think all of us bump our heads up against the ceiling in some way or another in our journey to grow a business. I usually see landscape owner-operators tap out in the $500k-$2m range. It’s in that range where you simply run out of bandwidth to solve more problems. You can’t take another phone call, you can’t deal with yet another missed order, missed communication, or another callback.

You’re tapped out.

And then, at that moment, you have a choice.

Some of you will choose to just stay right there in the $500k-$2m range long term. You want to continue to be an owner-operator, and would rather focus on being profitable and building a quality life in that revenue range. You personally want to deal with every customer, create every proposal, and be on every job.

And there’s absolutely nothing wrong with that. It all comes down to what you want. If you are passionate about your “boots in the dirt” craft, as opposed to being intent on building a business that can run without you, then this can be an excellent place to settle in for the long haul.

If you do choose this route, you’ll want to focus on

• getting the leads you WANT so you can do the jobs you LIKE
• Say “no” to opportunities that don’t fit the type of jobs you like to do
• Focus on “knowing your numbers” so you can be super profitable, without doing more crews/more production
• Look for ways to save time and streamline things. Being you are the one doing all of it, you want to be as efficient as possible and save time. Work smarter not harder.

Stay Where You Are – No Systems Needed

In this model, it’s all about getting to do the work you love and continuing to do more of it. And having enough leads for the work you love, you have no issue with saying no to the work you DON’T love. Remember, it’s all about the quality of life.

You aren’t looking to grow a ton, not looking to add crews or do more production. Just looking to make more money without adding the complexity of additional crews, service lines, etc.

In this model, you’ll often eke out more production by being an equipment and tool junkie. Cranking out more production with the same amount of guys, by being more efficient and effective with the right equipment.

You also wanna make your life simpler. Save time in dealing with leads, get faster at estimating, having the ability to track jobs without a lot of paperwork. And knowing your numbers to ensure you are meeting your profit/income goals. Your path to achieving your personal income goals is not via adding more crews, it’s in knowing your numbers and making sure you’re making that money on every job you do.

There are always pros and cons though. In this model, if you break a leg, the business stops. You just have to have a contingency plan in place.

A contingency plan could look like having an excellent number 2 team member, that could step into your shoes in a pinch. This is where we get back to the title of the article though – for this to be possible, you need to do an excellent job of documenting your processes, and getting things out of your head and into a system and process. You can’t rely on the fact that “I’ll always be here”.

Pretend you’ll never do this task again, what would the person coming behind you need to know to be able to do the task just as well as you do?

For instance: estimating. Instead of just pulling a number out of your years of experience, get your knowledge and experience into templates and production rates. It’ll not only save you time today but will make it loads easier for anyone else to produce an estimate just like you do.

Systemizing and Delegating

This mode is different, but a lot of the same principles I mentioned above apply, albeit maybe just for different reasons.

This model is usually employed if you started out as an owner-operator, you run into your ceiling, and you want to continue growing.

So you add crews, production, and maybe additional service lines. But now, instead of getting info out of your head and into a system and process being a contingency plan, it is now THE next required step to move forward and grow.

You’ve gotta remove yourself as the bottleneck. You can no longer allow yourself to be the only person in the company that can estimate a job. Or deal with a callback. Or handle a complaint. Or run payroll. Or do invoicing.

In practical terms this means getting off of your notes folder in your phone, quitting eyeballing a job and coming up with a number, no longer running your schedule in your head, you get the idea.

You’ve gotta do the work of taking what you know, and systemizing it.

There’s only one problem.

It is stinking hard.