Taking your team to the next level: Create Ultimate Culture

“Leading people is the most challenging and, therefore, the most gratifying undertaking of all human endeavours. 

There are no bad teams, only bad leaders.  The leader’s attitude sets the tone for the entire team.  The leader drives performance—or doesn’t.” 

Jocko Willink

You get a text at 5-o’clock on Monday morning.

Sorry, can’t make it in today. Not feeling the best. 

It’s going to set you back, but that’s alright.

You arrive at the office, hoping to hype up the team, but a couple of the boys are running late. 

Typical for a Monday morning. 

One guy’s rocked up with bloodshot eyes and a massive tear up the side of his uniform like it’s a fashion statement.

You read him the riot act, chuck him a fresh shirt. Then you start setting yourself up for the day.

But you can’t locate your battery charger. You look through every bit of mess, under every pile. It’s nowhere to be seen.

One of the boys must’ve left it on-site. 

Fuck. 

Now your phone’s ringing. You answer. Someone’s screaming in your ear.

Friday’s switchboard upgrade left the gelato store without power. Now the owner’s blasting you in broken English because his containers are overflowing with sticky cream. 

You do a bit of digging, and find out the boys didn’t test their work properly. 

Now you’ve got a call-back to deal with.

They’re not on time. They don’t take pride in their work. They’re not professional. They don’t even try to sell upgrades. 

And guess what?

It ALL reflects back on YOU. Your company, your bottom line, and most importantly, your leadership. 

Even though you may have a breakout star or two in the pack, they won’t carry your team the same way Thurston carried the Cowboys.                  

Team performance and attitude is a very common pain point for trade business owners, and business leaders in general. 

But here’s the truth bomb we’ve helped so many trade business owners realise;

A solid team of tradies who work hard, and care about the quality of their work, is NOT a pipe dream.

It’s within reach if you’re willing to take ownership, marshal your troops, and create the right systems to incentivise high-level performance. 

This article breaks down some of the key tools and techniques we’ve taught in the Academy to help business owners take the performance of their teams to the next level, and in turn, skyrocket their businesses. 

Even small, simple changes can have a massive impact on staff motivation. 

But the first thing we need to talk about is communication.

How can I get through to these dickheads?

Not by being a dickhead yourself, unfortunately.

To guide your staff effectively, you need to get on board with the adult learning theory.

What this theory puts forward is really simple; you can’t teach adults things the same way you’d teach kids. Kids will eat anything up, but adults have lived experience which they’ll refer to if you try to teach them something new.

For example, if you’re showing a staff member the right way to install a switchboard - and he’s done it successfully hundreds of times a different way, under a previous boss - he’ll question why he needs to do things YOUR way. 

As you would.

There are six elements of adult learning theory which we’re going to run through, using part of the scenario above - how to smoothly handle the headache of someone leaving the battery charger on site. 

What you don’t want to say to your team is;

Oi, dickheads, why did you leave shit on site?

This will tune out the guys who had nothing to do with the incident, and will make the culprit resent you. You want to get your message across to the entire team. 

So what’s the better way to approach this situation?

Here are the SIX STAGES of adult learning theory.

1. Tell the story

Paint the story so that it applies to everyone, not just the culprit. 

Hey guys, an unfortunate error crept into our game. We left behind some equipment that we needed. We got busy, we were packing up, and we were in a rush. Because we were in a rush, we didn’t do a proper walkthrough and missed the battery charger that was plugged into the hallway. 

2. Explain why it’s important

Paint a disaster scenario so your team understands WHY it’s important.

Those battery chargers are critical for us to be able to do the work. If we don’t have it, we’re unable to complete the work on time. The customer loses confidence, and there’s a chance we lose the customer. That ripples down and affects the whole business.

It’s always useful to tie the disaster scenario back to losing business. 

3. What’s the solution we’re trying to get them to realise?

Think about what might solve the problem, and pitch it. 

I think implementing a checklist is the best way forward. You guys can tick it off after each job.

4. What’s the outcome if we get this right?

Drive home the positive impact.

If we don’t leave tools behind, we make sure all our customers get top quality service on all their jobs. This means they’ll recommend us to their family and friends and will help us develop as a business.

5. Identify where things can go wrong

No system is perfect. Define the likeliest flaw.

The weakness in this process is that I can’t make sure you do the checklist on every job - So I need you to commit to doing it every time.

6. Inspire

Make the task seem easy - get your team to verbally confirm their commitment to getting it right. 

Guys, do you think this is easy enough for us to implement moving forward?

You’re all going to benefit from this, because now no one’s going to be left in the lurch. We’ll start implementing it tomorrow.

They’re your communication basics - but that’s just the tip of the iceberg for good leadership and an inspired team.

There are other super-important things to get right as the leader. 

1. Team Meetings

Don’t just berate everyone for 60 minutes a week. 

Make sure your meetings have a purpose. 

We recommend two meetings a week over zoom - the guys can be on site and sitting in their vans. This will optimise your efficiency, and the efficiency of your team. 

You can plan your meeting any number of ways as long as they’re largely positive and uplifting for the team. 

One great technique is to get your team sharing their wins, and their challenges; this gives you valuable information on how to help them, and encourages a healthy team dynamic. 

2. A shared online community

Building a shared digital community is powerful on so many levels.

It’s an awesome way of automating some of your training, development and onboarding processes, as well as building good team connectivity. 

We recommend using a platform like growth space - It’s like your company's own private Facebook. 

You can start by posting your tip of the week, and encouraging the team to do the same. 

You can also add screen recordings to explain how processes work within the company - for example, how to enter something into the job management system. Or ten things you need to do prior to every job. 

What you’ll eventually have is a MASSIVE LIBRARY of content for new and existing staff to learn from or refer to. 

This will enable them to replicate what you do well through your staff. 

3. Sales Script

If you’re already hiring staff and building a team, you must have a killer sales script ready to pass on to your staff, so they’re able to leverage your expertise in this area.  

Remember, they’ve largely learnt technical skills throughout their apprenticeships - Not communication-based and sales skills. 

You want to make sure they feel comfortable and hit the ground running in this department, because they might not even realise how important it is to develop this skills. 

Equip your staff with all the tools required to be great sales people and use your experience to develop a sales script that YOU know works for your target clients.

4. Develop Your Staff

How are you developing your staff?

You want the quality of the person who has been working for you for six months to be MUCH BETTER than the person you’ve hired on day one.

This will be a reflection of how you're developing your staff.

Why is this important?

Good processes will enable you to have lower quality staff.

Good processes deliver consistent results.

Good processes ensure better outcomes for customers.

How effectively you develop your staff will ultimately come down to your leadership, and the systems in place. 

5. Performance tracking and incentives

Start tracking the three main KPIs. These are;

• Billable hours

• Call backs

• Value added (upgrades, upsells etc)

Employees won’t naturally perform to their best potential if the culture doesn’t promote high performance and a learning and growth mindset.

Striving towards financial incentives will motivate your team to take their work to the next level. 

Upgrades and upsells are SO VALUABLE to your electrical business - So provide your staff with the skills and the incentive to knock it out of the park.

There it is guys. 

Sharpen up your communication. 

Make it easy for the guys to form a community and leverage your expertise.

Incentivise high-level performance.

There are always curveballs and unexpected situations when you’re dealing with people, but the rewards will revamp your team culture and in turn explode your business if you can get this right.

Ask yourself right now; are you the best leader you can be?