Reducing Phone Tag from Your Crew

Phone tag

Do you ever feel like your phone just rings constantly? Are you wishing that you could reduce phone tag from your crew?

Well, it’s that time of year. Landscape companies are kicking back into gear in full force, crews are rolling out loaded up for jobs, and… your phone just might be ringing incessantly. 🥴

Your hard-working and well-meaning crew is blowing up your phone all day with questions about the job. When are the materials showing up? How much stone do I need to order? The client asked this or that, and on and on it goes.

So how do you go about reducing phone tag from your crew?

What are the causes of phone tag?

There could be a couple of causes.

In many cases, the crew simply doesn’t have the info they need to do the work or answer the question themselves. The only option they have is to call you to get the info. You as the owner feel like you’re babysitting. The crew feels frustrated that they are making you babysit them. They just want to know what they need to know so they can get the work done.

Or it could also be that you have provided the info they need, they just aren’t using it.

That’s another matter entirely. Now it’s a leadership issue.

How?

Well, what you tolerate you promote.

If you tolerate them calling you asking for info that you know they have in their job folder, then…. that’s on you.

What do you think they’ll do the next time they have a question?

Yep. Call you. 😅

I’m not discouraging communication. Communication is extremely important and healthy.

I’m promoting having the needed info at everyone’s fingertips to reduce unnecessary phone tag. Unnecessary interruptions.

I’m discouraging undisciplined processes and reactionary thinking.

I’m encouraging working together as a team to define good processes, and then as a team, follow those processes.

And then, if you as the owner fail to hold everyone accountable for those processes, that’s where “what you tolerate you promote” becomes true.

A better way

Scenario #1:

Let’s imagine you and your team have a meeting to discuss what information should be in every job folder so that the crew has the info they need to work as autonomously as possible.

You decide that every job folder should have:

• client names
• job site address
• before photos
• design photos
• copy of the scope of work or proposal
• materials list
• equipment list
• notes and instructions from the salesperson
• manhours estimated to do the job

Now, let’s say a few weeks later, you kick off the job.

Your phone rings and it’s your foreman asking how many tons of stone to order for the patio.

The correct response from you would be: “Did you check the job folder?”

If not, then ask him or her to check the job folder and call you back if they still have any questions.

If you straight up answer the question, and never mention the job folder, what do you think will happen next time they have a question?

Yep, they’ll call you. 😉

Scenario #2:

However, let’s play out another scenario.

Let’s say your foreman is kicking off the job.

They go check the job folder to get an answer to how much stone they need to order.

And the info is not there…

Oooooohh…….. That’s a bad look.

You as the owner or the salesperson did not follow the very process you helped create as the leader.

Not good.

What do you think will happen the next time they have a question?

Well, “The job folder is not reliable, so skip that!” thinks your crew…

It’s a team sport.

It takes a team to win at this.

When you define a process, all parties need to follow it. Leaders included.

If leaders don’t follow the process, what message does that send to the rest of the team?

That’s not the type of culture any A player is going to want in any company they work for…

A players want to be A players, and work with other A players. Operate at the top of their game.

What’s the point?

What’s my point in this whole article?

A lot of teams in the construction and contracting industry have inefficient communication.

Phone tag is a constant thing.

My point is that good efficient processes can dramatically cut down the need for that phone tag to happen.

My next point is then just “Follow the plan, Stan!”

You as the leader are the barometer for how the rest of the team performs.

If you yourself don’t follow the plan, that you helped create…. well, then just expect the things like undisciplined phone tag to continue.

And don’t blame your crew.

Unless of course you have followed the plan, and they simply forgot to follow the process.

I was on a landscaping crew for 15 years, and let me tell you, we all hated to be babysat more than the owner hated babysitting.

When it comes to defining this process and getting info to the crew’s fingertips, well, let’s just say that pursuit in Tussey Landscaping is what ended up producing the SynkedUP mobile app.

We built the mobile app for this

We built that mobile app to solve this problem!

That whole bullet list of info I threw up there that every job folder should have?

Yep, the SynkedUP mobile app has it all and then some.

Live. In real time.

Anything changes? It gets updated immediately.

Left the job folder in the other truck?

No worries, pull it up on your phone.

Wondering how many actual manhours you’ve consumed so far on the job?

Easy peasy, check the estimated vs actual progress bar to see how many manhours you have left to get the job done.

Then high five each other when you pull of the job site, happy customer, 5 star review, beautiful images of the completed job uploaded to the job folder, and you came in under hours.

That smile on your face, the satisfaction of a job well done, belongs there.

You can check out a quick video of how this Digital Job Folder works and looks in this On Demand Demo video I made. You can watch it right here.

Skip to the 8:40 minute mark on the video timeline to skip straight to the part about the Digital Job Folder.

In the meantime, good luck on building out your processes, pursue 1% better every day, and go crush it this season!

Cheers!

Weston