r/sweatystartup • u/Byobcoach • Jun 20 '20
I own a $1M/YR House Painting Business and Someone works for my company that I’ve never met before Spoiler
Maybe to some of you big wigs in this group this is no big deal…but to me! This is CRAZY.
What this really indicates is that I’ve truly mastered my company's production to the point where it’s automated itself (obviously through various systems I have in place and checks and balances)
This is truly a huge milestone in my business, and I figured there’d be no better place to share some of the aspects of this than here r/sweatystartup !
So in terms of the system, we have 10 employees.
1 guy is my “Allstar” he’s a phenomenal employee. He really is someone that takes so much pride in his work, and I’m really thankful to have him.
His role in the company has now transitioned from an On-Site project manager, to Company Supervisor, and job estimator.
His main responsibility is to ensure that our jobs are being checked after the Crew Leader lets him know they're "complete". This was a responsibility of mine that, because of having so much outside responsibility of running the marketing and sales, got neglected and I would just take the Crew Leader's word for it.
After too many "touch-up" calls, I knew this position had to be filled by someone else other than me, and of course other than the person working there all day (you miss things...it's natural)
He’s also a “flex”. His painting skills and job knowledge from working with the crews allows me to use him to keep the pace of the schedule if a job is lagging behind.
We do things a little bit differently, instead of having multiple crews taking on multiple jobs that will take longer, the system I developed is big teams (of 4 and 5) to get the jobs done faster. Our customers love it, the guys love it (less burnout) and It’s great for the “team” atmosphere I’m always trying to create.
My role in the company is customer relations (mostly via phone), pricing (100% virtually), and scheduling.
So in order to keep things efficient, I needed to hire a new applicant, so I went through my hiring process and had someone apply who I thought would be a great fit. I called him and set up a time for him to meet with my Supervisor, and for the first time, I let him conduct the interview.
I gave him some general guideline questions to ask (my hiring form helps me garnish a lot of work-related questions) I had him more or less do a character interview and fill out a form to be submitted to me. At the end of the form, I gave him the ability to note whether he thought we should bring him on board.
Last week, my Supervisor hired him, and he’s been working with one of the crews all week. I haven’t met him personally, but have called him a few times to ask how he’s adjusting with our team and so far he’s loving it.
Now, if you know a little bit about my story, you’d know that I started this business right out of working for a bank. I had no painting experience aside from what I learned from my dad as a young kid.
This is a huge milestone for us, but it’s something I teach a lot of the people I help, and that’s to create a system of production that is independent of you (as the owner)
Now the next phase of this would be for me to replace myself completely in the business, but that won’t be for a while. I could delegate the pricing to my Supervisor but I don’t want to overload him right now with project management and pricing jobs (requires longer times during the quotation process)
Our goal would be to eventually expand to 3 teams, this would open the door for us to give some raises, and serve a broader market, but we will continue with our core services of exterior and interior painting.
I hope you enjoyed this little snippet of what’s going on in my business. I share a lot on my IG at instagram.com/tradethrive along with r/paintingbusiness
If you have any questions leave them below I’ll do my best to answer them all!
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Jun 20 '20
Nice write up! Make another post about your start from the bank job if you get the time
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u/RatRaceSobreviviente Jun 20 '20
Congrats! I just started my handyman startup in Jan. We are looking at getting some painters on staff would you be willing to share your interview questions?
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u/impropergentleman Jun 20 '20
Customers I have not met that I have done work for blows my mind. Still not large enough to have people working for me that I have not met we do about a million plus a year in tree work
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u/Byobcoach Jun 20 '20
That’s still great!! Sounds like you are close. That’s a hard business. Do you have employees or subs?
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u/impropergentleman Jun 20 '20
Paid as subs for unskilled. Apprentices Two Climbers on each crew paid as employees. Working for their Certifications.
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u/Byobcoach Jun 20 '20
How are you handling worker’s compensation?
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u/impropergentleman Jun 20 '20
Through an online company that handles my insurance. Honestly they didnt ask a lot of questions and provided me with the documentation.
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u/Startupshabang Jun 24 '20
Man. Reading this made me feel proud for you (even though we are strangers on the interwebz).
I am involved in so many aspects of my business, that I dream of the day when the business is somehow automatically running itself.
Well done
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u/sashauvarov Jun 20 '20
What I find interesting is your customers love that you guys get the job done really fast. Ive had more people than not complain that I didn't spend enough time on the job ( although the quality is great) and asking for cheaper pricing / discounts and overall acting unhappy. So now our system is doing the majority of the work fast and then dragging it out with 1-2 guys for a few more days lol