What Not to Do—Lessons Learned from Underperforming Franchisees (Matt Ericksen Pt. 1)

[ 00:00:06 ] All right, welcome everyone to Home Care U. I'm Miriam Allred, Head of Partnerships at Careswitch. It's great to be back with you. I hope everyone's having a great week. We've got a lot to cover today, so we're going to get right after it. I am really excited to welcome our guest today. We've got Matt Ericksen, the Director of Sales and Operations at Griswold Home Care, located up in Pennsylvania. Thanks for being on the show today! Yeah, absolutely. Thanks for having me! Let's uh start with your background. I was just telling you this, I love to do more of like an in-depth background and we've got guests on for two weeks let people get To know you a little bit, learn about you know pre-home care why home care what you're up to now so um why don't you start there and just share kind of some insights on your background a little bit about yourself personally and then we can get into yeah your home care role today.

[ 00:00:53 ] Yeah sure so uh I'd like to say I'm a little bit of an accidental home care person, all right, yeah, I I've never I probably still technically don't know like what career I ever wanted to get into, like it was just kind of like I wanted to enjoy my passions and just have time and ability to you know do my hobbies, right? Um so I'm here literally because I like It just kind of life took me that way, following my passion right, and I started like helping people and coaching people. Um, so that brought me here. But predating that um, and kind of ultimately what got me up to what I love about my position about working with franchise owners and their teams and the coaching, and just it's a million different things every day, so that's wired into my brain.

[ 00:01:36 ] Um, I'm not sure if anybody can see or not but there's a picture of a business guy with a whole bunch of like colors and like just graphics images things just like coming out of his out of his head um behind me on my wall here and that's me that's uh I’m wired uh a little different let's have a high self-awareness I’ve um dyslexia and ADHD and that um manifested very early in my life I had to learn how to read using clay and so I just approached people I’m wired differently and I love it I think it's a superpower and it's really helped me excel um in this role now um but it definitely caused some confusion and um I didn't know what I want to do with my life in my college years and in those formal years when everybody wants to know what they want to do right and they have that they're super clear I’m like I have no clue what's going on and I’m like I don't know what's going On

[ 00:02:25 ] whatsoever, so I went to school forum ultimately for a degree in history, but I only chose it because really, I had to go to school. I went to college so that I could be an athlete, right? I was an athlete for school, so it was this that was that's how I was wired, right? It was you know whatever I could do to keep it and enjoy track and field, I was going to do so. I went to college, got a degree in history because I thought I want to be a teacher, and that ultimately I took one education course and I was like, 'I'm going to have to teach the same thing every week, every month, every year for 20 years then I'm going to retire, and to me that was a death sentence, because I need that variability in my life, and I've had fantastic teachers - nothing against them.

[ 00:03:12 ] Um, my mom's a teacher, but I was like, 'I can't, I can't do the predictable.' Like, I need that variety. Um, but ultimately, that just kind of abandoned the whole education, you know, route. And I just ultimately graduated college in 20 2010 and went to go work at GNCs, um, the supplement stores that you oftentimes see because I was familiar with health, wellness, supplementation from my years as a long jump triple jumper, and I was like, 'I know this; I can do this.' And that's really where um the seed was planted for ultimately where I'm at today, that is. Um, I'm not a sale like a car salesman, right? I'm, I know I'm good at sales, but I'm not a salesman. I'm not a salesman. I'm not a salesman.

[ 00:03:55 ] It's one of my I would say gifts as far as what's given to me by my dyslexic thinking um. But I'm not, I can't just I can't negotiate with you to buy something convince you that you don't want to buy and so at GNC, I was really it really helped me shape my relationship-based sales approach as far as understanding the product, the value of my audience, what they need um, and then obviously having a building a good relationship with them for repeat customer base um. And to build that, and so I was really successful with that for a couple years there, about three and a half years um, I spent as a manager there ultimately um,

[ 00:04:31 ] running one of their flagship stores in central Jersey um, which was really cool, great experience in the industry and, and to learn from a lot of people um, so I have a really random junk drawer of supplementary knowledge that I don't use anymore but um, the skill set as far as working with people um, and working with people of all different types, you come different approaches right so back then I was a bodybuilder and so and so I was a bodybuilder and I was a bodybuilder and so I was a dog, I was part of a Python line, um, um, um. I was a trace to Arg podcasts, um, a dog is about to go; I need to turn inside and get back to work for that. Um, eventually I started to really uh, to focus on that and how to navigate it. Um, and I got all had people who liked the work he did and that made sense. But then I started to you know here what different customers are we talking about?

[ 00:05:22 ] You know, what kind of business that you got? Like I wanted to do that. You know, I wanted to do that. Um, I fell in love with the work that I was doing it because so I'm just miserable behind the counter; I'm like, 'I love what I do here.' I don't like the everything else around that, you know, the retail anyway. That's where retail before knowing that just you know they do it for the same reasons you love that customer interaction that the fast pace that just the excitement buzz I can be in retail, but it's the back end, it's the business management, it's some of the personalities I had my fill of it and uh, so she was like 'you know you're

[ 00:05:54 ] miserable' I know you've talked about getting you into the office space um into a more formal like you know nine to five position where you have some somewhat of a personal life and she was like 'uh, I found this position um it is' it gives you HR recruiting gives you everything you're looking for to be well-rounded because I didn't can't translate that for in a retail situation to into um into a business you know office spot right it's just they're not going to hire you with that so I was like all right it's not my forever job but I need something to kind of give me that that spot and so she

[ 00:06:30 ] was like there's this company called epic health services um they have a they have a client service coordinator role that's going to let you do kind of take what you do and that's how you apply give an interview next week and uh you need to uh go read up on them you go so I did that, showed up for the interview, and got the job. I was like, 'Wow, full circle!' Like what I loved about the teaching and developing, and all that, I found in there is where I could coach, develop, I could help my nurses... um, that for anybody that knows by the way Epic Health Services now is Avion Healthcare, essentially. So, I started off with them, um, back then, and that uh, that job gave me everything I wanted, the well-roundedness it gave me all the kind of structure...

[ 00:07:19 ] talked on sales going out to visit families and clients having to work with uh children that were coming out of the Children's Hospital, so I was working With very, very high acuities children's on trach spends really sad stories unfortunate circumstances um and uh having to you know really have true empathy and understanding of how the difference you can make and I was like this is this is what I was like looking for I had no clue about it all I knew about home care and home health care was the Beata commercials from the 90s right when you had the nurse show up in a thunderstorm and that's literally I zero knowledge and so there's this whole world that opened up to me from that took off and excelled with that role um learned a lot that was not it was not an easy road that was that Was a where I learned all the hard things that I work with franchisee, franchisees, and franchise owners on now about what not to do.

[ 00:08:11 ] A lot of it comes from personal experience of what I did personally wrong myself, whether it was from the wrong decision or just simply not taking action and letting something happen. A lot of that was from those formal years. Um, I did that role in a coordinator role for just under a year, and I took over managing offices for them as a director um in a couple spots in Jersey and Pennsylvania before I ultimately um moved over for the next opportunity to work with in the franchise realm um with a brand. New franchise owner for Bright Star Care, UMH, and help them start their business on the main line here outside of Philadelphia. And, uh, it was a fantastic experience because I'd gone from large to large and I was able to do a lot of the work that I was doing in the home health care, home care space, understanding what does that look like at multi, multi-million dollar volume, um, to you have no clients now you have zero, there is nothing.

[ 00:09:04 ] I was like this is a great, this is what I need, this is that fresh kind of you know, this is that learning opportunity that I always love to chase and apply that knowledge from being a large size now how Do I reverse engineer that into this into making them successful, um, and that was dual-licensed so I've been there for a long time and I've been in the same situation, home health care, home care experience there, um, and that was that was that was like the whole thing that kind of complete, there was a complete picture where, um, applied my knowledge but learned a great deal as far as how to manage with referral sources, build relationships from scratch, you know when it's not given to you on a silver platter essentially right, um, how do you make something out of nothing, um, roll up your sleeves and really get after it, um, that was a fantastic.

[ 00:09:49 ] Learning is still very much of a learning experience, and uh, but great. And I'm glad that I got to do that. And I'm glad I got to do that. And I'm great; it's been a fantastic experience. Fantastic owners, um, and uh. Ultimately, got a message one day on LinkedIn and was like, 'Yeah, you know, hey, there's this position, there's this opportunity.' I'm like, 'I love you know, that's all the hard work and like the difficult situations was all for like this,' and so then joined Griswold uh October 20,20, and uh, it's been it's been a blast ever since then. Just been well, working with such great owners, different opportunities just to learn, grow, help, support, and ultimately You know we see our roles here as franchise business coaches, and mine as aggregators. Take all the years of history, knowledge, and so forth that all these owners have compiled hundreds of hundreds of years of experience in total.

[ 00:10:39 ] And how can I take and give that to like a new owner or owner that's struggling? We're looking for the next level up, so it's all kind of coming full circle now to this, which was amazing! I learned, yeah, some new things about you, I hope people enjoyed that just getting like an inside look at you and what you're doing, what you're doing, and where you're coming from, and how your experience. Has just snowballed to what it is today, and the thing that's coming to mind you said at the beginning, like accidentally got into home care, I think a lot of us can relate. Obviously, there are a lot of people with clinical backgrounds, and that's like a more maybe organic or natural progression.

[ 00:11:09 ] But a lot of us are accidental, and you know the phrase of this podcast is 'nobody went to school to learn how to run a home care agency.' Like, that was just ringing in my ears as you were sharing that because that's so true. Like, nobody went to school to do this, but here we are like trying to figure it out, and that's why we talk to people like you that. you know have just learned over the years and it's like how do we surface all of your knowledge and experience and share it with others so that that was amazing really quick maybe and yeah 69 90 seconds will you just recap kind of your role at Griswold and then give us just like a kind of overview of Griswold like what sets you apart some of the demographics or stats or just what people would want to know about you know who is Griswold sure yeah uh I’ll try to I can be long-winded so that's a history side of me

[ 00:11:53 ] um so director of sales and operations and I lead the support team here at the home office um in bluebell pa um in direct Support of our franchise owners as far as coaching, advising um, on best practices, resources um, overall for their franchise unit success um, and that requires collaboration with all departments here: our marketing, finance um, teams; our learning and development teams, and uh, really being a you know kind of pull-up-A-team together, you know, and be the coordinator um, for the resources and tools, and that requires that means going to franchise field visits, that's hopping on calls any day of the week, and uh, just being available and accessible um, and being a value add most importantly to that interaction with the franchise.

[ 00:12:39 ] Owner, um, and any of those touches that we have, whether verbal or non-verbal, um, and then, um, yeah, as I agree, as Griswold goes, um, where so we are, uh, we are one of the I would say the longest tenured in the home care space, um, having started in the late 80s, um, Gene Griswold, uh, we have a fantastic legacy here which was what was one of the big drivers when we joined it was I just loved the culture, everybody was so nice when I joined, the office, it's like this is this is these are great people, these are good people, and that that you can see that in our franchise owners, I think that's a differentiator in itself, it's just the authenticity.

[ 00:13:15 ] Um, and the true passion behind not only people here in the home office but our brand um and our brand are about, um, you know, just home care and helping people, um, live in the place they love, you know, their home. And that was, um, extremely obvious to me coming out, coming here shortly after Cove started. It's just the importance of the position and helping, um, Griswold, helping individuals and families stay home and where they want to be. And from that, um, you know, we look, we will get involved with the Veterans and the VACCM program, long-term care insurances, um, we try to really kind of coordinate on that non-medical care. For the families, however best we can, and really almost kind of like a care management level of service where we're looking at their needs from a holistic standpoint not just a kind of hay, I need a caregiver for these hours it's how can we impact the community overall awesome.

[ 00:14:12 ] Yeah, thanks for sharing, I think it's great to hear you know like what you're doing day to day, what that role looks like and a little bit more about Griswold. The last thing I'll call out on your background you do have a brand-new little baby at home, you're running on little sleep but you're off to a great start so just keep it up um you know and Thanks for being here, that's great. Um, I want to just yeah let everyone know Matt is a big fan of the show; I would say he's one of our most avid listeners and so I wanted to bring him out of the shadows, per se, and get him in the hot seat.

[ 00:14:40 ] So, um, let's get after the topic I want a couple of disclaimers and kind of expectation setting as we get into this, um, today in this first session with Matt. We're going to talk about what not to do from underperforming franchisees; I put Matt on the spot with this one. The original, you know, objective was just to talk about the most successful franchisees what are they doing? What are they doing right, etc. we thought that would be great and then you know I challenged him and thought like what can we talk about you know the people that aren't performing well what can we learn from them how can we um you know take their mistakes or failures and um you know not bad mouth anybody but just you know expose some of the obstacles the mistakes that are

[ 00:15:22 ] being made so that people can learn from them so that's what we're here to do today um we're going to cover eight areas matt and I have talked through you know some of the trends and areas that he commonly sees so we're going to go through those eight areas we're going to go about knee deep Because we've got, you know, now 45 minutes to go through these eight areas, we're going to go about knee-deep this episode is going to have a lot of stories and examples so it's going to look and feel maybe a little bit different than an episode where we go, you know, 60 minutes deep on one topic um but just kind of setting the stage, you know that's what we're, we're

[ 00:15:52 ] going to get out of today's session, so Matt if you're ready let's get after it and let's go yeah one to eight we're going to go through these um relatively quickly, you know and just kind of talk through stories, examples etc. so um let's start with the first one which Is common mistake you know, number one running your business like you ran your college bank account. You know the phrase that you put was like, 'Is there enough money for pizza?' This sounds horrible, but you and I many people here you know have seen it heard it before, big no-no, big mistake. So, what do you want to share on this this area specifically? Yeah, it's uh, I see it's common and I will say I'll be um the first one I'll throw myself under the bus right as far as what not to do because there's a lot of things that I will talk to and including this.

[ 00:16:38 ] I did I did I did myself as a as the director of a franchise, wasn't the owner but I was the owner, and I was a bit more passive, and I had to handle everything, so I'll throw myself under the bus all day long on this stuff, and give you examples of what I did wrong. Um, or not wrong, but I'll throw myself under the bus all day long on this stuff, and give you examples of what I did wrong, um, or not wrong, but I'll throw myself under the bus all day long on this stuff, and give you examples of what I did wrong, wrong. I hate the word 'wrong', but just, um, you don't know what you don't know, and so, and if nobody shows you that, or educates you on that, that's not truly, you know, don't beat yourself up about it, right? Just learning opportunity. And with this, it's really looking at comfort is a poison in my mind. Um, it's something that um we just get complacent and understanding you know that the business isn't a hobby in a way, right?

[ 00:17:19 ] You can certainly some people would like to buy themselves, you can certainly some people would like to buy themselves, you can certainly some people would like to buy themselves - um, a franchise to you know buy be their own boss, right? But they're not trying to be a five million six-million-dollar business; they just want to keep it um, you know, certain size to reach that comfort level and that autonomy. Um, but even in that world um, the Lack of a formal like accounting platform, um, is really has you know that that, that void if you call it that, it sets the stage really for you know that phrase, 'of really, you're just checking your bank account, you know. Can I cover my bills?

[ 00:17:52 ] Can I cover the question is can I cover payroll this week if I can cover payroll this week, everything else I can kind of figure out on my own like that's the what I’ve seen the approach be um not necessarily kind of like looking at it and being strategic with planning out the um understanding your float understanding um money you know the bills do when and timing of everything. It's Just because it's the biggest, it's just that comfort level with if I can pay payroll, I can figure everything else out and that's that comfort comes you know that's it gives you the comfort, but then the goals don't pull you to be.

[ 00:18:30 ] better than that if you don't have the goals set in place if you don't have, I mean you know you're doing just quarterly monthly goals small ones at that you don't have those set there's no pressure necessarily to break out of that comfort zone you know that you kind of created that complacent culture of just 'I as long as I'm not pissing anybody off by not paying payroll then I'm good, so is that that's really The most frequent mindset, and that's not intentional; I don't think anybody ever says 'how to do that' intentionally, but more so just it's kind of... it's a for whatever reason they arrive at that point, and then it's very, very tough to break out of that because of the comfort level, because of uh you've got a process, you it may not be it's may not be a perfect process but that's your process and it works; able to keep your hours, keep your caregivers happy um but are you happy?

[ 00:19:19 ] Are you happy with the money at the end of the day or are you just an operator of the business and not an owner to where you're actually getting your uh your tank? replenished in a way yeah the most common you know example that I hear is like don't use your business as an atm you know you hear that that's kind of that like horror story that you hear that's all too common any other specific pitfalls that you would advise to watch out for any other just like really common things that you see early franchisee do that you're like you know stop doing that immediately any kind of specific examples yeah I would say the it's um over and especially for your first year owners or your early owners in that you know zero to um 800 000 annual revenue range maybe you have one or two employees I think That size, um, office is the especially for initial ones the over the over what's the word I'm looking

[ 00:20:22 ] for, um, just the so quick to say yes to vendors and vendor solutions that are provided out there and essentially outsourcing core business processes, um, that that all cost money and oftentimes I'm seeing a maybe absolutely extremely useful resources but are underutilized so you're paying a bill for a product that you're only using a fraction of percent of the resource you're not getting the value that you need from it, um, you're mismanaging that that that allocation of funds, it's a waste and you're digging yourself into a deeper hole when can I run leaner and keep my profitability get to profitability sooner um and then implement these things during those stretch periods of growth where the need is higher and the value is greater on the ROI side compared to just saying oh yeah on call service great here I can outsource my recruiting great there but what you're doing is you're also um you're piece mailing out and you're

[ 00:21:22 ] getting coverage there so um and contend during those stretches of development and um again I’m thinking quite deeply about the end goal I’m but it is your point it is your claim we're not we're not going to work with people Who take risks from you, so I see some leads from these group of people who don't take risks from you, don't fall for your beliefs, who don't, you know, you're getting cautiously will aides on being a paid for you. I know I've got no doubt about this right, I do know they're not these people with these issues, but I want to move on. If you want, I'm so sorry. Our next question, um, like you could be wasting a ton of money on tools that you're not using or maximizing and that's, you know, waste early on. I think that's great. And one thing I'll add to that is just it's that first year, especially for newer energy, even if you're not a new owner but you're just a smaller operation, um, what's

[ 00:22:07 ] your identity and if you're if you're outsourcing a lot of your um processes early on your robbing yourself of that ability to create that identity for yourself which is ultimately your differentiator within your market and um, you know I think that's extremely critical for long-term success as far as knowing who you are and what you're good at, um, I knew I was really good at concierge care in my past life and that that was what got done, and then when you have confidence sells, and that's where this is the opportunity to build that for yourself as a new owner, I think. this leads actually really nicely into the second challenge um which is early owners getting too comfortable behind a desk.

[ 00:22:47 ] that's something that you mentioned like maybe an air quotes like too comfortable behind like you're not a physical desk but like the conceptual that's what do you mean by that and what are you seeing so in home care you can it's a really good business to get into to find something to always be busy at so there's always something that's going to get your attention there's never enough time in the day and so it comes down to that what do you choose to make the priority and staying you know getting too Comfortable behind the desk is all right, well technology has enabled me to. I can call that client, say go visit them. I can email that referral source, I can video call that referral source instead of going to visit them, um, and you absolutely can.

[ 00:23:28 ] And it's convenient, and that convenience and that comfort, um, it, it dulls your abilities, you know, to communicate, to have eyes on a situation, um, and to bring just the highest level of care possible, um, or just the greatest value so it's just to those individuals whether it's referral sources, your community, or so forth, and especially forum smaller offices that have um that need to create or looking to create that um presence in your community you're behind your desk there's no amount of um SEO investment that is going to penetrate your market like you being out and involved and engaged with um so at the most and or just maintain

[ 00:24:18 ] the business now if you've reached that number and you're just going to maintain your business you can't be behind the desk you have to do things that are in tentful and in front of people so because this is a trust business where we're vulnerable populations of people whether it's the individual or their family member are asking you to come in the home to solve us and provide a solution that they themselves are not capable of and that's a vulnerability and they have to be able to trust you with that and if you know you're not getting out of the community and you cannot make those connections it's tougher to grow the business as you would like to do you feel like this trend has become more common post-pandemic like is that an obvious assumption or not necessarily you know people have

[ 00:25:01 ] kind of like siloed themselves a little bit and do you feel like that's like the core reasoning behind this or do you feel like there's like more there I think it's always been there; I think it's been there. I mean, I've had the, you know they, I've experienced that, you know, pre-COVID as a coordinator and director, you know, in that let's call it that that old world, in the new world now post-COVID where I was still operating um the bright the bright star in the early days of COVID and I was guilty, I found even just six months in, you know, before I came to Griswold is that it? It's a drug, comfort is a drug, and I was finding that the convenience of technologies that we implemented to help us stay engaged and manage our cases um we were we were letting it trickle down and we were letting it trickle down and we were letting it trickle down.

[ 00:25:46 ] into other areas where we should have been out and we should have been engaged and we should have done that and I think um and I see that um in the industry when I’ve talked to peers when I’m interacting with owners is that um there's that that convenience is still it's still hanging on its digging its claws in and um for one reason or another and it's I think covid that was one of the inadvertent outcomes from all the technology enhancements that we had yeah this is super interesting one of the things that you mentioned that stood out to me was like complacency later on you may get the business to

[ 00:26:25 ] a revenue size a client count that like you wanted to hit and then that comfort level sets in and then there's that level of like I use the word like complacency and that can be like an easy you know trigger to kind of like sit back on your heels you know shoot off that email rather than like driving you know to the referral source so I think there's you know like early on in the industry where you're like oh I’m going to do this it may be just something to avoid and be aware of but then later on you know something also to be aware of when you kind of you know hit that comfort level you get a little bit Complacent, it's easy to want to just like use technology to do everything, but there's a ton of value in you know meeting with the clients, meeting with the families, meeting with the referral sources like having an in-person conversation with the caregiver.

[ 00:27:07 ] Like that stuff is so invaluable and you know just be aware of you know not getting too comfortable behind the behind the desk at various points of time in your business. We've mentioned this in in the context of like a newer owner but then that's managing yourself at the larger volume offices, it's managing your team to this and to really watching and be in touch with Your team to make sure that that's not quietly happening behind the scenes, which is the most common way I've seen this manifest itself. It's not the individual owner; it's that somebody on the team is indulging a little bit too much in the things that can create these solutions for them to stay behind the desk. Yeah, I'm glad you pointed that out.

[ 00:27:44 ] You know, you've got to keep your eye on the team and make sure that you're managing yourself and you’re managing your team and making sure everyone's accountable. And even like you know, in a minute we're going to talk about like measurables, KPIs, making sure you're putting processes Numbers in place to hold people accountable, even to like in-person conversations or visits, etc. So that's great. Um, the third one actually really likes these are snowballing, you know, maybe intentionally or unintentionally, but the third one is um for communication skills with clients and caregivers. What are some specific examples with this trend that come to mind for you? Um, it's the reactive world, so it's the world of um just waiting for the problem to manifest itself and just calling and engaging to solve the pain point to get back to that comfort point to get back to that comfort level, right?

[ 00:28:28 ] So hey there's A call out I got to call this person to take care of it, uh, well they said they were good for the shift, so you know I'm going to take them at their word that they're good for the shift and you call them once I put on the shift or schedule them and then you don't talk to them again until they call out again. Right? On the caregiver side, on the client side, it's a client or a caregiver, it's a client or a caregiver, it's a client or a caregiver, it's a client or a caregiver, it's a client or a caregiver, it's a client; it's your state regulations, you're going to do the minimal to stay compliant with the state regulations, you're Just calling them to give them the news of maybe, uh, you know, of the call-out right there's the um, how did I say it? It's the 'you're only calling when you need something or something for you' and the secondary concern is about them.

[ 00:29:12 ] So the um, that's probably that it’s that reactive mindset compared to the proactive one like 'Hey, I reached out for confirmation that caregiver that caregiver called me back or texted me or emailed to confirm that they're good for that shift even though I scheduled them for the shift last week. I'm doing touch base to make sure that we don't have a failure on this shift so I'm calling. Two days ahead of time to make sure they are you still good for this, I haven't heard back so I'm not just going to assume they're good. I have to continually vet and that proactive communication skill that's just one way on the caregiver side um that's

[ 00:29:48 ] uh that can guard against complacency yeah I find myself using those words all the time reactive and proactive you know home care is often on the defense you know we're both athletes I use the terms like offense defense do you see owners that can get on the on the offensive like you know it's like overtime there can be less fires to be putting out there can be less like reactive Communication, you really can like get out of that and it can be more proactive and more like client or caregiver centric per se. Oh yeah, absolutely there's and that's bite-sized goals, and so understand like you know, there may be, you know, I think any of us can look at and the business where it sits now um, at any level, there's things that you want to fix or you want to be better right, and there's maybe a bunch of those.

[ 00:30:39 ] Then, so prioritizing and choosing one thing at a time and setting really manageable goals for yourself and your team, and that's the biggest I would say the big gap that I personally experienced and had to learn. to grow through but then also I see manifest itself now in many different ways is what the owner wants or the director of the office wants so even if one if the one and two in the office they're on the same page there's a gap between leadership and the coordinators and so forth or the supervisors on um you know what needs to happen and so being able to lead and manage um to that goal and to the goal that you're trying to achieve and to the goal that you're trying

[ 00:31:16 ] to achieve and to the goal of all right we are going to say increase our home care poll scores which is one of the key the experience management and the MPs score is one of the Key things that we look at when let's say doing a franchise field visit, um, evaluating what things we need to influence and impact, and just choosing one or two of those at a time in a fixed time period so we're talking monthly or not, or in a quarter, 90-day window, so that it stays realistic, right? You're not looking at you're not biting off more than you feel that you can chew, it's something that is you know accomplishable, um, and that has helped kind of

[ 00:31:51 ] you know once a foot in front of the other and you look back six months from now and you're like wow all right this is possible this is doable, it's just, you may have all the aspirations to get really aggressive with change the reality is that there's a business to run and there's other things that that's going to pull you in different directions so even on your busiest day can this goal still see progress that's how you need to look at it and that's how you need to look at it and that's how you need to you know maybe it's just a simple weekly call to the families one extra call challenge your team to do that it's like very small manageable things that they

[ 00:32:25 ] can check the box on small but tangible and like quantifiable you know we don't get it and that's the it's if you do this x number of times and you repeat that consistency of it that compounding of engagement is going to help improve that say home care post for, I want to stay on communication for a little bit longer. Um, I'm curious how you're going to be able to do that and I'm curious how you're going to be able to there's not like a blueprint per se, but you know, to your franchisees that you're consulting with um, you know any yeah very specific like how often should you like get face time with your employees or get face time with clients and families or referrals like what would you recommend like how much face time is good, you know because there there's a time and a place for technology like there's a time and a place for automation you know, like digital touch points.

[ 00:33:16 ] obviously the client, you know, the caregivers are very interactive with the clients and that's great but the office, you know, it's very easy to get disconnected um which is harmful for a variety of reasons but how yeah I guess I’m asking you, like, franchisees how when you're consulting how what are how many touch points, you know, with each of the different parties that the office is talking to. so I’ll start with the internal team first because that's where it really starts is setting the example as a leader in The office, whether it's the owner, if you're the owner, if you're the managing director of the office, if you're the manager of the office, if you're the manager of the office, is um having weekly one-on-ones with everybody on your team, having a weekly office meeting where everybody comes together and so you have at least those two things for your team, showing that during those meetings you're driving the value and so you're setting the example.

[ 00:34:00 ] They, the context being that that example, and then by you doing that, coordinators, recruiters, anybody else in the office that reports up to you is going to understand that if they. do this for the caregivers if they do this with the clients what the value is of those in-person meetings relative to the client's value and so that's where I’m going to start with the you just firing an email off to what am I direct report saying hey how you doing this week right drawing that parallel and helping drawing in that that tone there what's the tone for them when they go out to the office out to their teams and first and foremost state regulations so at minimum you need to be compliant with reassessments so forth um at the very least and that varies from state to state um with your depending on how offices are structured I see them differently, so there's I'll try to keep it as concise as possible and I'll try to keep it as concise as possible.

[ 00:34:46 ] Um, office some offices have coordinators assigned to specific clients, some don't. Um, it's you want to be out there. Um, I like to say in a perfect world, monthly if possible, and it doesn't have to be a long visit, not and that's where the context I think a lot of there's a misconception, there's a misunderstanding that you have to sit down for a cup of tea and eat lunch with them no, it's just a quick pop-in once a month at the very least. But looking, teaching the teams to shape their mindset, look for a reason to go visit. them so when they call and maybe there's been a carousel of caregivers through there, you're trying to the weekends have been tough and there's um you know they're just not happy they're not ready to leave but they're just not you don't have them where they used to be well instead of calling them, they give them yet another update.

[ 00:35:34 ] challenge the team should be seeking hey you know what this is a great opportunity for me to go out there and actually just sit down with them and let me talk through you know what we're experiencing in terms of the opening ceremonies you know it has been uh it really was a very wasteful time so I think That's just looking into the Josephine uh um of if there's the opportunity to go out and see them, go see them, uhm suppose if I think I'm more that's key. So really, the coordinator doesn't have to be going out to see every caregiver every quarter. It's, you know, when was the last time that an office person had that interaction in person with a caregiver on the case? So essentially, one person per year to that caregiver ratio, right? You don't have to keep it up.

[ 00:36:33 ] That touches will keep it real for a very isolated role being a caregiver on the field. Yeah, that was awesome. Something that's coming to mind, I shadowed in an office, and it was a big operation. And they had someone in the office, like on the phone, this really like bubbly lady, so awesome, just making phone calls to employees and clients all day long. That was literally her job. And if or when she came across someone, a circumstance, you know, life event, a change or something, you know, noteworthy, then she'd put them on a list. And then that month, they would go out and visit those people. I love it. Yeah, it goes, it goes, it goes such a long way, even a phone call - you know, we're talking about, like, I was pushing for like, in-person visits.

[ 00:37:15 ] How often I frequent? You know, start with the phone calls to just like, build some relationships and rapport. And then if there's something that comes up on the call that warrants, you know, an in-person visit, put them on a list, make it a priority, get to them within the month. So again, like, and make sure everything's scalable. Like, you know, someone hearing this may think like, you know, that's just not possible. We're always on the defensive, we're always putting out fires, how can we like, you know, make phone calls? But it's, it's all part of like, you said, just like small, consistent steps, actions, processes in place. And you will see how much of a difference this makes when you get on the offensive, and are proactive and reaching out to people, you know, the care in the home, the relationships, the outcomes, like it all improves when you're more intentional and consistent.

[ 00:38:02 ] And to give a quick prescription on one for the officers that do that position, make the most of the call and say, 'Just confirming the shift.' Hey, how's your kid's soccer game going? That was one of the things that we that we implemented in my past life of just find out more about them that helped and actually helped teach our coordinators that we hired, how to get to know the people a lot better, because they knew what shift they were working, they also knew their family life and what was going on. And so, when time is, is tough for you, look at that, look at look at the phone calls and find out more about that person beyond what their schedule availability is.

[ 00:38:34 ] And this is probably obvious, but like, you know, jot some notes down, like when you're on a call, you know, take 510 notes, put that in your software, just keep track of that information. So, then everyone's up to date on, you know, who that client is a little bit about them, you can share that information with the caregiver, like, it just makes it all, you know, more personable, and proactive as those conversations are being documented as well. Let's, let's keep going here, you already were kind of like alluding to this, but the fifth, most important, you know, challenge that we're seeing to correct is lack of measurables. It's so easy to get going or be inside the business and just like we're saying, be putting out fires and just trying to like, stay afloat, you know, just trying to like make payroll at the end of the week.

[ 00:39:20 ] But it's really important early on and throughout to put measurables in place and be aware of, you know, what are your KPRs? What are we focused on? How are things trending? So, what do you want to share on, you know, like the lack thereof, like, you know, the obvious, like how, how agencies are lacking measurables? Yeah, I think it's, it can be overwhelming, you know, to the level of data that we have access to, especially for a lot of the, our owners here that started in this business 20, 30 years ago, they're still operating today. It's mind-numbing how much information they have access to. And so, one of the things that we manage everything, you manage nothing.

[ 00:39:56 ] And so what do you have to commit to as a team, as a culture, as a group, what are, you know, pick three to five, and nothing more than that. I, I love less is more in this situation. So, your top three revenue agnostic KPIs, right? And that could be whether you choose like a client caregiver satisfaction. If you're choosing billable shifts, you know, how much their fill rate essentially of the hours that you have available. If it's simply managing your overtime, but we always manage our recommendation was like three to 5% overtime, you know, keep it within that range, grease the wheels, help it kind of help you with your situations and, and to scale the business, but manage to make it digestible.

[ 00:40:41 ] So that you can, even on your busiest day, hey, where are we at with these, with these measurables? That is start there, get that behavior ingrained in you and then build upon it. And so, an office that has to change that behavior of measuring nothing or inconsistently, sometimes we're measuring inconsistently, which is probably the reality more so than anything. It's like, as they have time, they measure, they check in on that KPI. And so that creating that behavior of consistency towards subconscious kind of behavior, almost ultimately. Start small with easy ones, and then just compound from there and empowering your team to do that too. So, it's not on you as the owner of the operating director buy-in from your team's critical for growth and for the overall quality of the outcomes that you're trying to shoot for.

[ 00:41:26 ] So if you challenge your one, say one coordinator, that's really good at recruiting, hey, I'm making you responsible of these two KPIs. I need you to report these to me on Friday afternoons and be able to speak to them on Monday morning staff meetings, right? You are still aware that you're the director, but you don't have to pull that information yourself and your empowering your team's buy-in. So, I think that would be, this is a start. Yeah. I like what you said of like three to five, you know, in this world, like data-driven world, it's so easy to get overwhelmed. Like, what should I be tracking? How should I be tracking, et cetera. But it's like, start small and laser in and get really good at tracking a few really critical things.

[ 00:42:06 ] And you spewed out a couple of great examples: client caregiver satisfaction, overtime, shift coverage, revenue. Like just, just get a couple down and get really good at measuring them, and then scale up from there. Okay. You scale your team. You were just talking about like delegating measurables, you know, just, you know, start small and then scale accordingly, but be really intentional about like what you track and why and when and how. Yeah. And that that's the most important is the consistency across all your growth levels. Right. So, it's, you know, some KPIs are good for a certain phase of the business that you go through that growth. But that requires time to learn that KPI. You have to learn what good is that benchmark is and where that benchmark lives for the industry.

[ 00:42:46 ] So that takes time and investment. So, you want to find the ones that no matter what, they're going to be with you from day one through the day. Ultimately, if you decide to sell the business and exit that you've always managed, you've managed the business to that identity of KPIs. How, how do I word this? Do you see owners struggle with accountability themselves, you know, early on, or, you know, they pass up the responsibility and they're like, I'm going to pass off too much too soon. You know, I'm just thinking about like measurables, KPIs, measuring, like, do you see owners ever, you know, sidestep their own accountability? Does that make sense? I think it's, I think, yeah. And I think it, but I think it's human nature.

[ 00:43:27 ] And I'll speak to it kind of like from my, from my personal experience, you know, in that, in that rule of where if my, my advisor from the franchisor didn't bring it up to me, even though I knew it was good for the business, it didn't, there was another level of importance when somebody else was holding me accountable to it. Right. And there are certain KPIs that were set within our dashboard that they would call and ask me about, they would watch, they would know when, if it felt blind and I would get a call like, Hey, it's below this. Right. And so that level of having an accountability partner was one of the things I put down in my notes is it can't be overstated.

[ 00:44:09 ] The importance of being connected with other franchise owners, and being, and sharing in a simple and really easy practice. I love, I think we need to do more of it in both franchise networks and across the board to share your, share your P&L with another franchise owner you trust and have open conversations and look at them. You know, we like to do that as much with, as we can in our roles with our, our franchise owners. And, but having it with like your peers is another level of accountability where you can talk through things of how to interact with the franchisor, what questions to ask. Right. There's a different dynamic to that. And I think that's really, really important to know, you know, kind of help as far as getting a perspective on how to keep yourself from giving to the temptation of just like, yeah, it's just, I don't want to look at it today.

[ 00:44:55 ] Like it's not, you know, the business is, the business has to operate devoid of emotion. So, you have to be consistent in everything you do. And you're running it on feelings or emotions or just how you, your energy levels at that. Yeah. The outcome is going to be exactly what you bet. It's going to be inconsistent at best. Yeah. I'm glad you kind of ran with that. I wasn't like articulating, but you like kind of took that where I wanted it to go. The phrase that's coming to mind is there's like, it's lonely at the top. There's like some sort of phrase of like, you know, it gets lonely when you're the owner, you know, and you have people reporting to you,

[ 00:45:30 ] but I love what you're saying about like, find an accountability partner that could be franchisee to franchise, or that could be owner to owner, franchisee to franchisee, you know, just find someone that you trust that you can bounce things off of that you can, you know, be accountable to that you can, you know, compare KPIs with, et cetera. I think that's like so invaluable at every single stage, because like we talked about, like, you know, your KPIs that you put in at day one probably won't be the same at like year three. So, you know, as you're learning and growing, you know, have someone that you can talk to bounce ideas off of with, and even, you know, be held accountable to, because like you're saying, it's so easy to run your business off of emotion, or, you know, circumstance, but, you know, to keep people in your room.

[ 00:46:16 ] Yeah, not many people have that. It's not many, but there's just, there's, there's a select few that have an insatiable drive to push themselves regardless of the surroundings. But often the most common, I would say group of all of us is when there's people in you are in front of, there's that pressure to perform a little way, because you want to look the best you possibly can. And when you open up, to somebody you trust and share this information, that's going to be really where you excel. And that's where I think the value of your royalties are. You know, one of the things we'd say is get your royalties worth, right? You pay a percentage to the franchisor. Part of that value is having access to other franchise owners you otherwise maybe wouldn't have as easy access to as an independent.

[ 00:46:57 ] And that ability to just kind of connect with others that have come before you and solve it. Like, that's a, I can’t, that’s an understated value add. That’s an indirect result of joining a franchise network. Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah. Learn best practices from people that have done it before you and be vulnerable. You know, we’re talking about like comfort zone. I think of like, you know, owners may be nervous, like expose themselves. Like here's what we're doing, you know, is it working or not? Or am I doing things wrong? But yeah, be vulnerable and you know, be accountable as an owner. I think that goes a long way. We've got three more to get through in the next 10 minutes. I want to keep going here. Number six is going through the motions.

[ 00:47:32 ] I think this kind of ties into a lot of what we talked about already. But it's really easy for owners to get complacent and to just kind of go through the motions. What do you want to add on this topic? So, this one's a real direct response. I won't be long-winded or long worded with this one. It is set quarterly quality improvement meetings for whether it's just, if you're a one-man show, do a one-man show quarterly meeting. If you have a giant team, same deal, get the leadership together. And you do every 90 days, you do a quarterly review meeting, you know, on your processes, you look at service failures, you look at complaints, bad Google reviews, bad Indeed reviews. You look at your satisfaction reports from home care posts.

[ 00:48:13 ] You take everything, and you look at it, then you look at your processes, what's reported up, bubbling up to the leadership team. What are the processes that are, that are slowly dying out that are not effective anymore? We say anytime that you're seeing quick growth between five to $10,000 in additional weekly revenue, you know, there's going to be a process or two that are going to be tested or those processes are going to expire in effectiveness. And if you're looking every 90 days at there's at your internal systems, your operating processes and communication, as well as the feedback loop from your audience and community, that is going to help to guard against essentially just going through the motions every week. I'm going to come in on Monday and Tuesday.

[ 00:48:54 ] I'm going to process payroll. I'm going to do some recruiting on that day. I'm going to do some scheduling Thursday; I'm going to confirm shifts for the weekend. And on Friday, I'm going to make sure that my weekend of on-call is not going to be held this week. And yeah, that I I've done it. I've lived through it. I've caught myself asleep at the wheel with that for too many times that I want to admit and that, but you need to have that, that pull through. And if you can go to, and if you know, you have a quarterly meeting every 90 days, you're going to have that pull through, even if your goals aren't, you know, you don't have any goals. You just want to look at your processes.

[ 00:49:25 ] That's going to be, that's that break that you need to kind of shake yourself awake and catch yourself so that if you do have accidentally kind of fall into that, just going through the motions process, you have that break pre-established that, you know, like. I love what you called that quarterly quality improvements. Did I get that right? Yeah. Like I just like quarterly. Okay. Every 90 days, quality, like focused on quality and then improvements. I don't know that like is really just like strong, like break that down. Like, that's exactly what you're there to do every 90 days, is like reassess quality and dig up, you know, the bad and the ugly, which are bad reviews. Why did we lose clients? Why did we churn employees?

[ 00:50:07 ] Like, you know, surface the negative in like a controlled environment and then like hash it out and talk it through and start improving. I'm assuming the bad habit here that you've noticed is like owners going longer periods of time. We're talking like maybe once a year, maybe twice a year. And it's sporadic where it's like, you know, something went wrong. Now we need to like have like a quality improvement meeting. But you're saying like every 90 days, you know, it's so easy to fall into this like recurring trap of just, you know, following like the seat at the wheel. I love that example, but it's like, yeah, make it more consistent and be really intentional about what you're going to go over and what you're going to, you know, take away from that meeting.

[ 00:50:49 ] Yeah. That has also auditors' love that. And so, coming from the home health world, when they see like when I had, I have my auditor in my office constantly between the Medicaid and everything that will make your audits go a lot nicer when they see that you have an independent quality improvement process pre-established and actively running, you'll get your auditors out of the office faster. Yeah. That's yeah. And that's like, you know, a quick win is like, you know, get, get, get in gear, you know, and have all these processes in place and it will help, you know, quite literally with like regular checks and things. Let's keep going on these last two here. Number seven resonates probably with me and with a lot of people, just resistance to change.

[ 00:51:31 ] It's you hear business owners, not just in home care, you know, across the board who say, you know, we've always done this. We've always done this. We've always done this. We've done it that way. And we're going to continue to do it that way, et cetera. Like that is such a, you know, an easy pitfall for people to fall into. So, what, what have you seen regarding this? Like translate this to home care. What are some of the, the things that you've heard when it's like, okay, we've always done it this way. We're going to keep doing it this way. Yeah. So, the most common area where this real kind of manifests itself is in the technology space and in the IT world. Because that is simply the fastest changing and evolving consistently year over year.

[ 00:52:07 ] And what can happen is that what, when we see, when we see owners, franchise owners, and I sit and I include myself in this one too, is you get to a certain size using a certain system or two or software strategies. And you, and it proved effective, and it worked, it grew your office. And so that is, that is put in, it's freeze-framed, is cemented in your mind. This system works. It's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's, it's good. It grew my business using this system. And 15, 20 years ago, you know, before the really like, you know, CRMs got really popular and the efficiencies had, you know, running off an Excel file or just a, you know, paper, you know, paper timesheets, right? Like that was an effective process. I grew many offices having an effective time, manual timesheet process.

[ 00:53:00 ] I did those, you know, when I first started, right? Tuesdays, I'm calling caregivers and I'm getting timesheets, let them write, I'm driving to find them, right? It works, but does it make you competitive in today's world? And having to work through that challenge has, I think, that's been key is helping owners understand and that are now risk averse that have grown and have something to lose is try something. You can always go back. It's, you're never forever committed to a software solution if it doesn't work but fail fast is one of my favorite sayings. Try something new. It may take off and give you results that you know, you're not going to get. It's never possibly trained up, but you need to try something new because you know, there's going to be a supplementing feature to your current situation.

[ 00:53:44 ] And that's where we see owners plateauing in the complacency and comfort level is that that fear of failure, that fear of the unknown is self-inflicting pain. If they want to grow that uncomfortableness with changing technologies or changing software solutions or operating platforms, whatever it may be, there's, there's a lot of real tangible pushback on that. There's a lot of changes there simply because it was like, I have something to lose here and that's real. And I respected it for an owner who has invested their retirement. Right. Just because the franchisor said like, 'Hey, we're going to go pivot to this new SEO or this new you know, virus spamware, you know, I get to get a home at the end of the day and you know, it's, I'm just the director of sales and operations here.

[ 00:54:30 ] Right. This is their business, their livelihood. And so, there's a very real risk aversion. You have to work through that and understand, kind of make help understand that there's a way that we can, you're not going to lose. It's just got to try something to elevate the business to a higher level. Am I understanding, right? That this is most common with more tenured owners, you know, owners that have been in business a long time. They like what they like, and they know what they know. I'm assuming those are the people that are more resistant to change in the technology setting specifically. Am I understanding? Yeah. Am I understanding that right? Or is it more like the personality? It's everywhere. So, it's not just technology.

[ 00:55:11 ] I mean, you know, we've seen, you know, it's a behavior, it's a mindset, it's a behavior at its root. And it can be on the recruiting side on the sales and marketing side. But the, on a, on a weekly basis, the technology changing so quickly. So that's it's always popping up there for us. Yeah. It's really just, it's I lost my track there. That's my that's my tire just kicking in real fast. That's okay. We're almost at time here. So, I'll cut you some slack. Yeah. It was just curious, like in the technology, you know, I think just more tenured owners they've been doing it for a long time. And you got something real to lose. Like you, you don't want to well $500,000 behind your goal for the year.

[ 00:55:52 ] Right. Because of this isn't. So yeah, you're happy here. That's real. So yeah. But yeah, there's, there's a lot of variables here and yeah, not to like to generalize. We were kind of focusing in on technology, but. You know, every owner comes to this industry, this business with different skills, traits, background, you know, some are more technology savvy. Some aren't, some have like really strong clinical background. And so, they feel really strongly about like clinical processes. It's, you know, it's just being more fluid and flexible and not getting so set in your ways. I think a great way to like to counteract that is when you bring on new employees, like, you know, just let them come and be a sponge early on and let them like comment.

[ 00:56:36 ] And have feedback on all different processes, even things that they don't touch, like let them just, you know, kind of give like a, an unfiltered view of the office of the processes, et cetera. And that's where you can learn. And don't be quick to say, you know, we've always done it this way. Like, this is how you're going to do it. Like, let it be kind of like an organic conversation where things can evolve in real time. You know, you don't want them like to step into this mindset. Hire to your weaknesses and bring somebody on board that knows more than you are a common trait of the most successful. I've ever worked with this and it's something that I am hiring right now for, you know, in my department, I want to bring on somebody that knows something more than I do, that will help us for success.

[ 00:57:16 ] For sure. We'll call that a teaser for the next episode because that's on the list for next week, which are the top, you know, the things that the most successful franchisees are doing. That's one of them. In our last minute here, I am sorry, I'm not giving you more time on this. You mentioned it early in the conversation, but this is what I want to end with, which is most common, you know, mistake we see is. Franchisees getting disengaged from the franchise or, you know, not leveraging all of the resources available. They're paying royalties, like, you know, putting in the effort to get out of it, what they're putting into it. Just, you know, quickly, what do you want to say on that?

[ 00:57:48 ] You know, why is that happening and how can we encourage owners, you know, to take advantage? Yeah, absolutely. I think first everything starts with trust. You have to have trust on both sides and that's, that's critical. So, we, you have to have the foundation of that and build that, you know, to, before anything else, you know, you have to have the foundation of that and build that, before anything else comes. And then from there, it's slowing down and just having, you know, the franchisor, you know, is, is they want you to succeed ultimately, and they want you to win. And just knowing the best intentions. There's, we're not out to get anybody. I mean, I don't think anybody's out to get either anybody here that everybody wants to win and succeed.

[ 00:58:31 ] And then just taking a step back, like, all right, we have a difficult situation we got to work through here, or we have a question. To work through, you know, or you have a personal challenge with like, you know, your growth, reach out to us and, or get your money's worth, right? It's a line item on your P&L, right? That royalty percentage, right? Are you getting, are you maximizing that for the benefit of the business and engage with the, in any way, shape or form? It's a good conversation, bad conversation. If it's a difficult one, easy one, have that engagement and get what you can from, for what you're spending, you know, just like you would from any vendor or software is how I advocate to our franchisors. And I did myself personally.

[ 00:59:07 ] It's just, that is, you know, there's a resource. You don't have to like everybody, but right. There's a clear value and we can help each other win. Yeah. In a previous conversation, you and I were looking at some of the statistics of, you know, our underperforming franchisees, obviously there's a lot of variables, but our underperforming franchisees less engaged with the franchisor and our higher performing franchisees more engaged with the franchisor. And it wasn't like a very obvious, but it was trending in that direction. You know, you're not just like, I'm going to do this. I'm going to do this. You know, there's more touchpoints with the more engaged franchisees, and they are more successful because, you know, they're taking advantage of the support, the resources, the accountability, the metrics - you know, the franchisor has so much to offer, and those that are taking advantage of it are quite literally winning and succeeding.

[ 00:59:54 ] Exactly. Let's end there. This was awesome, Matt. I know, I know I just like grilled you for a full hour, but you stuck with me, which was awesome. Lots of great insights. I love the teaser, so just so everyone's aware, we're going to bring that back next week. We're going to talk about what to do, eight things the most successful franchisees are doing. So, we're going to talk about those top performers and some trends that we're seeing. So, Matt, thank you so much for being here, and everyone for listening. And we'll look forward to seeing you back next week. Thank you. Take care. Okay. Take care. We'll see you.

[ 01:00:36 ] Bye.