Quality control of multiple garden landscape installation teams

These are not abilities that you can make through incentives. The either have the ability or they don’t. If they don’t, it takes years to develop through working with those that do. You don’t have time to develop them, so you either have to find people who have the ability, deal with their lack of ability, or cut back to a manageable size.

This is the same when just dealing with small work crews. Most of the time you can tell them and show them what you need them to do. When you leave and come back, you wonder what got lost in the translation. This is the most limiting factor in growing a company in the landscape installation business.

Managing installations is a very hands on job.

This is also why I left contracting and will never have an employee again.

I think that the best thing you can do is to treat the installers like they have a career too. The best foremen I ever worked with were in the business for multiple decades and prided themselves in the work they did. It was not just a summer gig for them it was their career. They went to the same education sessions I did and were very professional. Maybe the answer is to make the team leads partners in some way. Expect them to have the same continuing ed as your designers(pay for it). Require them to know what is expected on site as they leave. Create standards and hold them accountable, most people with a good work ethic will rise to any standard you set as long as they are rewarded in the end with a thank you, good pay, control on the project, etc.

I know there are some places that everyone gets paid based on outcomes of projects instead of straight salary. So if they get it installed right the first time that saves a trip back to repair a project and saves money that they get a taste of.

I have heard a successful business person tell us not to do profit sharing…just some advice we had passed on to us. They said that anytime you hire a new person or buy a new piece of equipment the other employees see that as taking some of their money, because they don’t understand overhead, etc.

Craig – I’ll just start with the one thing that jumped out at me, please correct me if I’m wrong. It appears that you’re an establish d/b firm, so it seems like the biggest problem is that you’re working 16 hour days and your not able to do the most important thing (besides collecting money) and that’s making sure your crews are delivering the quality that you expect. I could understand if you were just starting out and putting in those kinds of hours, but you can’t go on at that pace forever. As a business guru told me when I was also living at work was that I eventually need to stop working in the business and start working on the business. In other words stop working harder and start working smarter.

I’m guessing you’re probably like most people (me included) who have built a business from the ground up and you probably have your hand in every aspect of your business. As a business matures the owner needs to be less “hands on” and more of an observer. Maybe it’s time to focus on getting your staff better trained to your standards and turning them loose to do their job. Sink or float, if they can’t do the job find someone that can. Give yourself a new job as chief floater and cut the umbilical cord. Your business will be better and you’ll be able to bring a little more balance to your life.

On a side note, your website scared me so much I almost didn’t want to look at your wonderful work. You’ve got some nice stuff.  

Dear Craig,

I’d started reading the whole chain of ping-pong mails and in the long run gave up. The most important thing is in your introduction sentence “I run …”.

After that initial idea you got greedy. You started small, had done a great admirable job, wanted more, had to expand, got more people, more work, more hours, but you forgot to set the tomorrow standard.

Slow down; reconsolidate your targets, and train – something only you can do – your folks. You are the one and only one whose head will be on a block. You had realized that looking at a few pics is not the answer. You know it, you see more, and other things then your guys in the field. It’s not that they don’t want to see it; they simply start getting institutionalized and blinkered. You have to work on them raising their awareness. And this will be an ongoing job. You as a boss are responsible for the quality. It is your ambition, your corporate identity, your future next job. Free advice: tackle it.