In our opinion, whether you’ve just started your cleaning career, or you have decades in, your reputation is crucial. Now, some readers in the business will argue with that. Some will note that knowledge, technical skills and their position are key. We would agree that all of those are important. We also believe that none of those are attainable WITHOUT a good reputation. In this podcast we discuss how good service and recommendations created an opportunity years later.

 

Your Reputation on First Hires

Cleaners are hired based on a screening. And they keep that beginning, front line cleaner based on how they perform their duties. A big contributing factor is how they manage themselves. Attitude, timeliness and problem-solving display how a front-line cleaner performs. These become a reputation.

 

Your Reputation as a Supervisor

Taking direction well can mean you have capacity to lead well. As weeks become months and years, the reputation forged becomes how people know you. Accepting the challenge of gaining knowledge and solving cleaning client problems speaks volumes.

 

Your Reputation After Decades

After investing (not spending), years in a field, you’ve gained a lot of useful knowledge. If you’ve chosen to accept leadership roles, you know why most employees don’t. Providing leadership is hard. Technical problems come out of “nowhere”. Clients change and make choices that can seem arbitrary. Your team is very likely a collection of people who may or may not care how well they do their jobs today. Everything is in a state of flux. Good leadership remains steady. That’s why it’s of such high value.

 

Your Good Reputation Pays

When we discuss the topic of reputation inside DOC’S, sometimes its tongue-in-cheek. There will be times in the course of your cleaning business, when taking a “moral short cut” can be tempting. Doing the right thing may not make you popular. Professionally confronting an angry team member can be very hard.  Taking time to train someone again, may be frustrating. Delivering the best recommendations to your clients or prospects might not get you hired, right away. But these steps of growth become how people know you. These become your reputation.

 

How Much?

We’ve seen cleaning employees come and go. We’ve seen poorly structured businesses with cheap service come and go. As DOC’s remains in business, we’ve seen how consistency and honest service matter to our clients. Operating any business is challenging. That’s why DOC’s Facilities Consulting works with cleaning company owners and environmental team leaders. Those positions need help to build and operate their services. They also need help to train their team members. If that’s you, contact us here to determine what will make you and your cleaning team a success.

 

 

Ray

Joel, we’re back. We’re talking about an interesting topic here. When was the last time you spoke to a purchasing agent?

 

Joel

The bean counter?

 

Ray

The bean counter. Fill me in here because I got to think when an owner walks in, you get, store owner, business owner, manager, or call back later.

 

Joel

Or you would think that there would be equal respect between business

 

Ray

Well, it’s a lovely thought, but I made those calls, too, but There’s not.

 

Joel

Yeah, I’m a president in my cleaning company, but I have to talk to an admin or a facilities manager or an office manager.

 

Ray

So how did you jump the gate to purchasing agent?

 

Joel

That is a great question! I love your questions! How did that happen? Well, jeez, we’ve talked about networking and how important it is while also holding a contract with somebody because sometimes our contacts move from job to job. How I ended up speaking to the purchasing agent at this other location was this A former facility manager I dealt with, a very large client that we do have, moved to another location. He’s now a CEO in another firm. They want to make a change in cleaning. Because of the size of the contract, they have to get three competitive quotes. They asked the CEO, who do you know? Because they knew he came from a facility’s background. He gave him one name, mine. So, this purchasing agent asked the CEO, we need three because of the size of the contract. And the CEO said, “This is the only person I want to use because I made a mistake years ago. We had to cut costs, and we decided to cut costs where we shouldn’t have cut costs.”

 

Ray

This is the CEO, talking?

 

 

Joel

Correct. “And We replaced the company that Joel owned, and we had nothing but headaches after that. He gave us the right price for the right level of service that we needed. Were there problems? Every once in a while. But now we had 30, 40, 50 problems a day after we replaced them because the other company that came in cleaned the building seven hours per day as opposed to the 21 hours a day. Joel’s company was providing level of service for seven days a week.” So, the purchasing agent was trying to find companies that they could qualify, but they called me and wanted to know what made me different than everybody else. So, purchasing agents usually look at a bottom line and they don’t care what anything says.

 

Ray

Well, there’s a reason we call them bean counters.

 

Joel

Correct. Usually, it goes to low price when you’re talking contract janitorial where it’s going out to bid. It’s just like I tell people all the time when you go to get gasoline, gas stations on all four corners. And when you pulled up to the corner, you looked at all four and you went to the one that had the lowest price. There was no differentiation factor. So, this purchasing agent wanted to know what made me different. Why is the CEO so emphatic about this person and their company getting the work? All right, yeah. Reputation. I’ve talked about that before. That’s important. I’ve talked about networking and how important it is to build and mine relationships with your clients even after they become clients. You don’t be an absent owner. Now this person goes, obviously this purchasing agent realizes that there’s some value here. Well, where’s the value? They interviewed me over the phone for well over an hour. My background, my education, my certifications. Why do I use the products that I use? Why do I use the technology that I use? Why do I use them- (Seriously, they went that deep.)

They went that deep to find out what made us different. They were so impressed. They said, It still somewhat comes down to price, but we also see that with the way that you guys are structured with your training in the higher quality equipment, materials, the supplies that you use, that there’s a value to that. I told them, Absolutely. You buy a car, it’s transportation. For those of us that can remember a Yugo, it was a two-year car. It was marketed to college students. And in the northeast, with the salt that we had- Two years. It had two years. It was all you were get out of. It was like, bargain basement, cheap price. It was a gas pedal and a break. Or you can buy something like an Austin Martin or a Tesla in today’s day, much higher, considered slick, much prouder to be driving than a Yugo. But What are you willing to pay for it?

 

Ray

By continually being who you say you are, you got the CEO’s attention. They went to bat for you. Actually, they demanded it, and that’s what got you there. Yes?

 

Joel

Correct. It is. It’s not just being lip service. A lot of companies I know, perform lip service or they got great marketing. But you have to live up to that marketing. You have to live up to that lip service because your reputation is everything. If you can’t provide or perform, you’re going to be in trouble.

 

Ray

For our listener, there’s a previous podcast. I’m going to put the link in the description below about finding your differentiator, whether your differentiator is low cost, fastest response time, best-looking crew, or cleaning for health the way it is for DOCS. If you really want to learn how to use contact Joel. Joel, thank you.

 

Joel

Thank you, and you’re welcome.

 

Finding your Differentiator https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=av0b2SXWR3E&t=2s Approx. 3:00 minute-mark