053- Business Structure with Doug
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Summary:
What does business structure mean for your business and how do you know what will work best for you? Doug Keeling, owner of Bad to the Bone Pet Care, joins us to discuss the importance of “finding your why” and what it looks like to hire amazing staff.
Topics on this episode:
Find your WHY
Setting priorities
Business structure examples
Bad to the Bone’s current structure
Hiring awesome staff
The importance of planning
Building robust policies and SOPs
Main take away? Your business structure needs to reflect your values and goals.
About our guest:
Over the past six years, Doug Keeling has built an award winning team of in-home pet care professionals across Northeast and Central Florida. Bad to the Bone Pet Care is currently a team of 30 pet sitters and dog walkers offering fully customizable personable care and is constantly growing. It is Doug's goal to show the pet care community, and the world, that through compassion and love we can truly make a difference. Be sure to follow him on Facebook, Instagram, and his blog to follow his teams progress as we continue to expand. Feel free to email him any questions you may have about starting and growing a pet care business.
Links:
https://badtothebonepetcare.com/
https://www.facebook.com/BadtotheBonePetCare/
Instagram: @badtothebonepetcare & @thewanderingpetsitter
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Email us at: feedback@petsitterconfessional.com
A VERY ROUGH TRANSCRIPT OF THE EPISODE
Provided by otter.ai
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
clients, business, pet sitter, people, pet, structure, policies, pack, leader, hire, flexible schedule, sitters, dog park, burnout, interview, dog, services, day, grow, plan
SPEAKERS
Collin, Doug
00:17
I'm calling and I'm Megan. And this is pet sitter confessional, an open and
00:22
honest discussion about life as a pet sitter brought to you by time to pet.
Collin 00:31
How is your business structured? Think about it for a moment, who reports to who? What does the flow of information and personnel look like on a day to day basis? If you're solo still, how is your business structured? More importantly, then who reports to who does your business allow you to do the things that you actually want to be doing? Today we have Doug Keeling owner of back To the bone Petcare back on the show to discuss all things business structure, he breaks out why they are so important in mission critical to your business. And we end this episode with a great discussion about hiring employees. Now, the last time Doug was with us was way back on episode 18. I can't believe it's been that long. And we're so happy that he's back on that episode, he gave an introduction to his story of starting and growing his business. You haven't listened to that episode yet. I really encourage you to do so. Now. Let's get started.
Doug 01:32
Thanks so much, Colin. I'm so excited to be back. I had so much fun recording the last episode. You know, in that episode, I gave a brief introduction of myself my history in the business. To tell you a little bit more again. I started pet sitting back in 2014 and I have been a professional pet sitter for over six years now. I have built an award winning team of pet sitters and dog walkers, covering six counties in Florida, mainly in the Jacksonville, Tampa, Lakeland and Plant City regions. We currently have 30 pet sitters and dog walkers and are always growing and hope to have pet sitters in every corner of Florida by the end of 2020. That's kind of what leads me into what I wanted to talk about today is really the importance of structuring your business and and planning for the future so that you, you don't have panic phases or anything, anything like that. To give you a little bit more of my backstory, you know, I started as a solo pet sitter six years ago and kind of added people on to help me with request as I needed. And, you know, now now I'm really trying to grow the business to two by the end of this year cover all the Florida like I said, but eventually have centers all over the country. And so as
Collin 02:59
you're growing One of the things that you you talk about and you recommend is right when you're starting out, people kind of need to make some very early and fundamental decisions about their business, kind of where do you recommend people start? as they start thinking about building a business structure that will last?
Doug 03:19
Yeah, yeah, you know, this is such an important topic, and it's something that I think a lot of people overlook. And it's not just important for pet care businesses, but for all small businesses, you know, you really need to just sit down and have a heart to heart conversation with yourself and figure out what your why really is. And you know, you can read a million different books and there's podcasts and YouTube series all about finding your why. But at the end of the day, you know, you need to tap into yourself, do whatever you need to do to do that. You know, I enjoy hiking with the dog. So I go out on hikes and that's when I really plan for the future of my business and decide about these structural changes and everything. And I base it all around Why? Why am I in business? Why am I pet setting? What do I want my future to look like? And, you know, really try to figure out what you value most internally and intrinsically, you know, a lot of business schools and and people will tell you, it's all about the money and the profit margins and all of that kind of stuff. But what I've found for myself and for my business over the past few years is that I truly value knowing that I'm making a difference and being able to have a flexible schedule, and things like that more than the profit margin and by structuring my my business and our policies and Everything that we do and the way that we go about it around what I truly value it, it limits the possibility of me or any of my team ever getting burnt out. And that is so crucial in our industry, you know, for all entrepreneurs, burnout is very prevalent, but especially in the pet care industry, and pet sitters and dog walkers in particular. It's so easy to allow yourself to stay up all night replying to clients, text messages and Facebook comments and then you're out walking dogs all day and then before you know it, you're you're burnt out and then you can't you can't make the difference in these clients lives and in their pets lives they you really want to make
Collin 05:55
right and i think you really touched on there as to why it's so crucial. is if you don't sit down and set out your priorities, to then design a business structure around that burnout gets hard and fast, regardless of what else you try and do in the interim, because if you don't know your why you'll never understand when and why you should say no versus yes to new things that come on your plate. And so those priorities really take precedence first and foremost. And, you know, you can revisit them periodically make sure that they're still in check. And that's what part of that being flexible and being adaptive style comes into play.
Doug 06:40
Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. You know, my entire business structure and what I have truly valued the most, both for my own personal life and for the business have changed multiple times since I started my business and I've had to kind of steer the ship you know, to go with Those changes. So it's it's totally okay to reevaluate. And I, I would suggest reevaluating periodically, but so many people just forego this whole step at the beginning and just want to jump right in and take every client that they can get and do everything for everyone. And that's just not going to be good for you mentally or emotionally, let alone financially down the line.
Collin 07:34
And this this part can be kind of scary because it takes some introspection of who you are as an individual, what you value. And so, you know, I know there's maybe some very analytically minded people out there, what are some options when it comes to setting priorities because that that kind of word might be foreign to some people. What what are some of the things on the spectrum of options that someone may think of when they're designing or setting out their priorities for their business?
Doug 08:06
Yeah, yeah, you know, again, I would say just have that heart to heart conversation with yourself and really figure out what you value most. And, you know, a few years ago, when I started my business, what I valued most was being able to touch and help as many families in my area as I could. So therefore, I structured my business, all the way down to how I hired when I hired where I marketed, how I marketed, what services we offered, and and the prices were all based around, being able to help as many families in our area as we could. As time has progressed, you know, I've really value now, the ability to have a flexible schedule and know that While it's great to be able to help all these families, I need to be able to help myself and my own family also. So I've I have changed some of our policies and even gotten rid of some of our services and added different services to kind of meet those new goals as as time has gone on. We started 2019 with five pet sitters five full time, pet sitters, and we ended the year with a team of 30. And so there was lots of change happening every single day and I was having to reevaluate all of this stuff. I mean, almost weekly, if not monthly, to to go along with the change and make sure that the we were always being steered in the correct direction. And what came along with that was I had to create the operation manager role and hire someone for that role to ensure that I was still able to keep my flexible schedule and travel when I wanted to and, and do these other things, these other priorities that I did not have a few years ago when I started my business,
Collin 10:12
we've thrown out the term a couple times already, as far as the business structures to somebody who's not familiar with that, what even the options are, could you give some examples of possible structures and how they may relate to different priorities someone would have,
Doug 10:31
you know, a lot of people that start out pet sitting or dog walking will start out just as a solo pet sitters. So they're, they're managing themselves and and all of their their marketing their clients information, they're doing everything themselves I I see that a lot, especially in our local community here in Florida. So that's one way to start out and then as you grow you kind of you need to know whether or not you're going to hire from the beginning. And that goes back to that heart to heart conversation that you have with yourself when you're deciding how to structure your business and what kind of policies to have is, you need to ask yourself, you know, do I enjoy hiring people? Is that something that I'm good at? Am I going to want to manage these people? Or is that something that I really don't want to have to deal with? So that goes into your business structure? You know, are you going to be a solo pet sitter? Are you going to have a team? And if if you're okay with hiring people, or even if you're not okay with hiring people, but you know, you want to be able to delegate some of the work. What I would say is find someone that is good at hiring people, and then hire them. So you only have to make one hire and they can do the rest for you. That was one of my biggest struggles when I started bad to the bone a few years ago was that I had no experience interviewing people. And it made me very uncomfortable that I wouldn't know what I was doing and that I wouldn't be able to structure the business correctly around it. So what I did is I went out and found someone that was really great at hiring people. That's what she had done for another company for a long time. I just hired her and said, Hey, I need you to go hire pet sitters for me. And yeah, it worked out beautifully. Just to loop that back in with business structure, you know, when you start to when you make the decision, if you're going to hire or not. If you decide to then you need to know, you know, how are you going to manage these people? Are you going to manage them yourself? Are you going to have someone else manage them? And are they going to be manageable at all? Because labor laws are different in every state, you know, and I can't speak to them. But I know that in Florida, how you can treat a independent contractor is extremely different than how you can treat an employee. And there's different guidelines and stipulations, you know, that that will vary from area to area. But you know, if if you decide that you want to build a team under you, and you are a control freak, you need to have employees, not independent contractors. But if you're okay with being a little bit more trusting and a little bit more hands off, you might be okay with independent contractors instead of employees. And then there's different ways to structure these different teams. You know, I know of a couple different businesses in our area that have independent contractors and it is truly a collection of independent contractors by definition these couple companies They go out and find these existing solo pet sitters, and they hire them under them. And these pet sitters, even though they're operating under this one company's name, and they're getting client referrals and insurance and bonding and everything from this parent company, they are still out there setting their own policies, their own prices, and all of that, just between the sitter and the client. That is really how a independent contractor environment is supposed to work, you know, they are supposed to just offer you their services and without any kind of management. But on the opposite end of that, you know, people that work for rover or wag or some of these larger big box companies, they're also independent contractors, but the the platform's the companies themselves, kind of say, Hey, you know, these are our list of criteria and our policies and as long as you agree that you will provide your services under these stipulations, we'll agree to send you clients. And then as soon as you don't agree to these policies and we won't send you clients, so those are kind of two different ways to structure a team of independent contractors from from the get go. And then as you grow as your team gets bigger, again, you'll have to ask yourself, are you going to be managing these people? Are you gonna have administrative help all of that kind of stuff? For me, personally, you know, I really, I got into pet care because I love hanging out with animals. I don't want to sit in front of a computer or in an office all day. You know, so, I as the businesses grown, I found ways to kind of delegate as much of the administrative work as I possibly can. That way, I get to stay outside with the dogs all day. I mean, that's why I got into this in the first place.
Collin 16:09
Yeah, which is I think the reason a lot of us are most of us get into providing pet care is we love being with the animals and serving them and helping families in the area. And then when you start growing all of a sudden, like, oh, I've got all this admin what to do, and Oh, do I need to be managing now and oh, my goodness, and all this stuff starts being piled on your plate. And I like how you're presenting that of just, you know, making that decision of, you know, at admin. I don't want to be behind my desk all day. How can I make that go away, is bringing somebody on to take care of those tasks so I can focus on what I really want to be investing in. And that gets back to understanding your why and to help prevent the burnout. And the fatigue and those things that go along with it. As as you make these decisions, you can start taking some of these other burdens off of your plate so you can focus on what you really want to be doing sometimes.
Doug 17:11
Yeah, exactly, exactly. It all goes back to having that heart to heart conversation with yourself and finding that why absolutely, it may mean that you give up some of your profit ability to be able to have someone to help you with your admin side or it may mean that you even offer different services or different type of services. So a lot of people just jump in and say I'm going to be a pet sitter and dog walker. But what does that mean at the end of the day, are you doing midday dog walks in in high rises downtown or are you doing overnight farm care out on the outskirts or anything in between? right the the options are
Collin 17:58
broad and vast and as niche as you want to make them that, again, take some understanding of the market and what options are out there and making some of those decisions as you grow, what do you what services do you add? What services do you take away,
Doug 18:15
I cannot stress the importance enough of really thinking ahead. And it doesn't have to be an exact plan. You know, you don't have to say, on June 13 2023, I'm going to be doing this and I my team is going to look like this. You know, just get out a napkin and a pen and jot down the first things that come to your mind of what you want your life to look like and what you truly value. And then just kind of build everything around that and have a loose plan that you can kind of follow so that you know when you hit let's say $10,000 a month in revenue that you will want administrative help or that you will want to get a system like time to pet that you can process through invoices and scheduling through, you know, having just a general idea of what you are going to be doing in the future, it will help you so, so, so much, so much and just absolutely preventing that burnout. All of this just comes back to preventing any possible burnout.
Collin 19:27
So you walk through solo sitter collection of independent contractors, what are some of the other structures that look like kind of on the larger end of that spectrum?
Doug 19:38
Yeah, you know, as your business grows it, you will have to ask yourself, again, you know it what you want help with and what you will want to delegate and not delegate. And as you make these hires and make these decisions, your business will kind of take form. You shouldn't You shouldn't let it just take form, you need to plan ahead of what you want it to look like, for example, I have a spreadsheet breaking down what exact hires I will be making and how I will be delegating certain things all the way up till five times the business size that we're currently at. Wow. Right. And it and I'm not saying you don't have to be that detailed, you know, I just I love playing with spreadsheets. So I do that kind of stuff. But, you know, just start on a napkin, start on in a loose leaf notebook, you know, and start jotting these things down. For for me, you know, we have pack leaders that do some things and then we have one operations manager that kind of manages all of the pack leaders and catches all the admin stuff that kind of falls through that way. So it's kind of taking more and more of that. Corporate style structure as we grow, and you know, the my next hire will be some marketing help down the line. So it's it's really starting to look like more of a corporate company. Of course without the feel, you know, I would never want to a corporate stealing company.
Collin 21:22
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. I don't Yeah, I don't think anybody does. And as you mentioned earlier, you know, you don't want to just let things happen because that's how that culture changes. If it just let if you just let it happen. It's easy there is intentionality in this and making sure that structure is reflecting your personal priorities, to maintain that the culture that you want, and not have that corporate it, you know, big business kind of feel you've talked about before, about, you know, in the midst of all of this the importance of making sure that you are registered and as an actual business, but to not Don't get bogged down in some of that paperwork and some of that process, what kinds of pitfalls do people fall into? And why should they go through that long process?
Doug 22:10
You know, I talked to a lot of just solo pet sitters and people that are on rover or, you know, different, different options. And I've, I've had many of them tell me, I love what I do. But I want to start my own business, but I have no idea where to start. And it's so easy to let that hold you back and to let it seem so much bigger and more complicated than it really is. You know, I have to tell you, when I when I started bad to the bone, I had no idea what I was doing. I said, I said in the last podcast that like I filed my my paperwork with the state to register as a business without even ever thinking about the fact that I was registering the startup It sounds crazy to say that but you know, don't let these things feel so overwhelming break them down just piece by piece. You know, say you have this big goal of of having this amazing pet sitting and dog walking business and all of these things that you want to do with it. It all starts with this just the getting filed with the state, getting the proper insurance getting bonded, you know, all of that kind of stuff. You You cannot be a real player in our field without those types of things. And, you know, there's so many attorneys and different people out there that are that will charge an arm and a leg to walk you through this kind of stuff. And I can tell you, if I could figure out this paperwork without even knowing what I was doing. Anybody can figure it out. And I taught myself how to do it just by watching YouTube videos I got on YouTube and I typed in how to register as a business how to sign up as for business insurance, and I watched a few videos I think I read like a wiki how article and I figured it out and I just broke it down step by step day by day, and I didn't let it overwhelming. And I think that's the most important advice I can give people starting out is it seems overwhelming, you know, planning this business, filing the paperwork, doing all these things feels and looks huge, but when you break it down, bite, bite bite, you know, it's, it's not huge. It is something that you can do and do very well.
Collin 24:49
Absolutely. It can really look like a mountain when you're just starting off, but one step at a time, one chunk at a time, and it does happen pretty quickly. Especially as you you know Reach out to friends that are doing it or other businesses in the area. How do they do it? Or especially, you know, YouTube and wikis out there just really break it down so simple these days.
Doug 25:10
Oh, yeah, definitely, definitely. You know, and if I could go back and give myself any advice to when I was going through this processes, I wish I just would have taken better notes. And because I'm all about data, you know, the more data that you can have about your full business and everything that you're doing will help you better determine your future policies and your future direction for your business. Again, going back to that, why, and it's, you know, to keep records as you're going through this process. I didn't, I didn't, and I really wish I had. Now you know, I'm all about having Google Analytics and facebook pixel and I have spreadsheets, you know, tracking every different thing and you You can hook you can use systems like Zapier to connect a spreadsheet to the the contact form that you have on your website. That way you're able to keep track of all of your clients information really easily that way and just having this this data, this information will help you so much down the line.
Collin 26:21
You've mentioned your personal priority of flexibility, you really value that walk us through the current structure of bad to the bone and how that reflects that priority.
Doug 26:33
Currently I am doing traveling pet sitting full time I'm just doing traveling pet sitting gigs, kind of bouncing around between California, Oregon and Washington. And I love doing this. You know it's I love it. I love traveling. I love having a flexible schedule. I love being able to be outdoors and hiking and being with the dogs and like I said not Not getting just drowned in the the admin side of things. So because of that, what I've done is with our team of pet sitters, I all of our policies, every every single thing that we do is so that I can be across the country in a different time zone and not have to worry about the little day to day things that that might happen. I think a lot of people that are starting out here that holy crap, you know that that's crazy. How How could you do that? It's, it's easy. It's, it's, it's way easier than you think it would be when you break it down step by step, like I said, and when you have a set plan, and when you know what kind of structure you want to go with everything. So our team everyone goes through a pretty rigorous interview. process so that we know that we won't have any issues with the pet sitters. Everyone starts as a as a pet sitter and a dog walker. And, you know, a lot of people will opt to just stay as a pet sitter dog walker, but after they have been on the team a few months and have really proven themselves to really go above and beyond and be amazing for their clients, and they've gotten five star reviews and, and all of those key things that you want to see. I give them the option to then be a what I call a pack leader. And our pack leaders essentially operate as a like a local area supervisor, they are able to hire and manage pet sitters underneath them, and they act as those pet sitters emergency backup, and they manage those sitters, schedules and invoices. thing and all of that kind of stuff via time depends. So by by structuring it this way that means, you know, if a pet sitter were to have an accident or get sick or you know, knock on wood Something happened, I know that there is a pack leader to fall back on they can swoop in their cover the visit and which allows me to go travel, you know, and again, it I, I give up some of the profit ability to be able to have that peace of mind, but I would rather give up that that money in exchange for the flex flexibility that it allows me. Yeah, so our team now is it's 30 pet sitters and we have I believe six pack leaders currently and We have one operations manager and our operations manager, she kind of monitors everything that's going on with the pack leaders and the pet sitters, and just really ensures that nothing ever falls through the cracks. And she is there in Florida again. So, you know, let's say just knock on wood. A pet sitter gets into a car accident, they can't show up to the visit. And then the pack leader is also sick, you know, then there's another layer of protection that I know I can depend on. And it allows me to, again, have a flexible, flexible schedule and and not worry so much about the administrative side of things.
Collin 30:46
Yeah. And I think that the key takeaway from from that entire structure is the peace of mind it gives you in that entire process is that that structure bringing on the right people And I want to talk about this in a little bit as far as that that rigorous hiring process allows you to have the right people around around you. So that it is a well oiled operating business. And that peace of mind is is the major takeaway from that? Is that yes, as you mentioned, you're there is you are giving up some profitability there. But the peace of mind to you is so much more valuable than that, in the long run.
Doug 31:27
It's interesting clients will kind of pick up on this, you know, they, they see that you have so many different layers of protection. They see that you you, if their pet sitter doesn't show up, there's a pack leader, and then there's an operations manager and there's all these different layers to it and they love that clients eat that stuff up and they will pay extra for right because they're, they're paying for a service and the structure that you have is basically a guarantee that it will happen right? Whether It's the pet sitter, if that falls through the pack leader, if you don't, there's there's that there's that backup of a backup that's going on there. But it really all does go down to having the best people, you know, it's, it's what we do is so incredibly personable, you know, we, we are in these clients homes with their babies, and you know, it becomes so personable and you can become friends with these clients and and create these long lasting relationships. And none of that would be possible if you had the wrong people on your team. So we have a really set hiring process that I have our pack leaders go through when they're ready to bring someone on, and then we pay our pack leaders actually a percentage of the jobs that their pet sitters do that way. You know if their pet sitters aren't doing well And they aren't doing well. But if they are doing really well then the pack leader is is making more money and they're doing well. So it all kind of feeds off of each other which again just really hones in on the good hiring practices and making sure that we're making the right decisions in those terms and I tell our pack leaders you know, on a regular basis that you know, if you can't find the right pet sitter refer the client to it to a different reputable company, because I would rather lose the business entirely, then risk sending them the wrong person. Yeah, I don't know. I don't know very many business owners that think that way. But again, it comes down to to really knowing yourself and knowing your why and to me, it is so, so important that these families you know they are they're willing to trust you with the keys to their home, with the keys to their for baby's heart, you know, and that is something that we cannot just look past that is so incredibly huge on so many different levels. And, you know, so if we don't have the exact Perfect Fit pet sitter for a family, I will absolutely refer them to a quote unquote competing company, you know, rather than send them the wrong person.
Collin 34:34
Have you heard about time to pet krisann from raining cats and dogs as this decided
34:39
becoming a time to pet client has been a game changer for us. We can give our pet services clients real time cloud based information they never imagined they'd be interested in. And most importantly to me personally, I can better manage my company and look forward to more and not a small thing. Time to pet is responsive to my request. For new features and modifications to existing one,
Collin 35:03
if you are looking for new pet sitting software for your business, give time to pet a try. listeners of pet sir confessionals get 50% off their first three months when they sign up at time to pet.com slash confessional. That's that level of dedication to the care and the the seriousness for each individual job that not only you are bringing, but you are instilling in each of your employees. And so in that process, you know, you mentioned it's incredibly personal and it is I could not agree more. How do you screen for or look for those kind of qualities in a potential hire.
Doug 35:50
Like I said earlier? I'll start by saying if you're not good at hiring or the it just makes you uncomfortable or something You know, find someone that is good at it and create a list of the either way, whether you're doing the hiring or whether you're having someone else do it, you should create a list of the exact things that really matter to you, and matter to your clients and your future clients. And that list is going to be a little bit different for everyone. We have a list of criteria that all of the incoming applicants have to meet. And then we have a list of questions for each stage of the interview process. And we really do put a lot of thought and work into this entire process on our list of things to really watch out for we have if they asked to reschedule the interview. Whether we do a phone interview first after we receive their application. And then we do an in person interview, usually at a coffee shop or somewhere Sit down. And then we do actually another interview after that usually at a dog park, so that we can see the potential sitter interact with new dogs that they aren't familiar with. And I can see them strike up conversations with with strangers at the park also. But if anywhere in that process they ever asked to reschedule, they're an automatic no on our list. Because if they think that they can reschedule an interview for a job, then why wouldn't they think they can enter, reschedule, let's say a drop in visit, or a meet and greet with a client. And that is just in my opinion, that's not a good look for your team to be asking to reschedule things. For phone interviews. I have the potential sitter call us I will say, you know, hey, I'm available for this phone interview your nine to five, Monday through Friday, on this week, call me anytime, in that in that time span. And if they take, you know, if I send them that message on a Monday and if they take until Friday to get back to me, they're an automatic No, you know is our our clients expect very expedient responses. They don't want to have to wait a couple days to know but if their request has been booked or not. So I need to be hearing back from the applicants immediately from from day one.
Collin 38:36
And these are these are all just little key things you know, that you can pick up on throughout your interactions without even getting into the questioning in the interviews and things of that nature. Because what's really important here is that the interview is going on before the interview starts, is what I'm hearing here is how you process that you know, for that person is even in front of you Or on the phone or in the coffee shop, they are sending out, sometimes unintentionally cues of how serious they take it of the importance that it is on their schedule of where their values are. And that's an immediate as you've as you've laid out here, cue as to how they're going to operate. Moving forward, you know, these little, these little habits of Oh, they didn't call me till Friday, you know, and I've sent it on Monday. If you don't pick up on that immediately, you know, who knows how they'll be communicating four months into the actual job.
Doug 39:35
Right? Exactly, exactly. And it all starts before the actual interview. Even in our application, we have a few different questions and in our pet sitter application that says, you know, hey, here's the situation. Here's the details of a situation. Tell us exactly what you would say to the client work. for work, and I have a lot of pet sitters that will submit the application and say, Well, if this then this, you know, and I might tell the client this yada, yada, yada, but that shows you right from the beginning that they weren't reading and following the exact instructions, you know, we asked for the exact message or the exact phone call that they would be placing to the client, not a,
Collin 40:29
well, if this then this scenario, and if they can't follow those really basic simple written instructions from the get go in their job application, then why would they follow the simple instructions in the clients note saying to give Gus his medicine at exactly 8am because of his diabetes, or you know, whatever the situation is, those really minute Details can tell you so much right from the get go. Because I think a lot of times when people go to hire, they say, Oh, I want someone who has a good attention to detail, but they don't really know how to screen for that. And so this example of giving explicit instructions as part of the interview or questionnaire, and then seeing how they respond to that is an immediate way to see is this person detail oriented? Well, I gave them I asked for detail. They gave me no detail. They're not detail oriented. So over the years, what's been one of the biggest things that you've learned about hiring people?
Doug 41:37
Oh, wow. You know, the, the biggest lesson that really stands out to me is, trust your instincts. follow your gut. If you have any inkling whatsoever, for whatever reason, even if you can't quite put your finger on it. Something just feels off. Don't do it. Do not hire them, it will always come back to bite you. Really, this this business is your baby, you value it more than anyone else, you know, your clients, you know, your services, you know, even if you can't put a finger on it if it just feels off, don't do it.
Collin 42:22
I'm interested in a little bit more of this hiring process. You said, you know, you have a few situational kind of questions, if you don't mind. What are some other kinds of questions that you'd like to ask either in that packet or when you're out in the dog park or anywhere long process?
Doug 42:40
Yeah, yeah, you know, the the situational type questions in the application are really my favorite and that's well I really look at more than anything and we have a our most common question on the application that I think is the most telling for applicants is let's say, you're you're doing a series of drop in visits, three drop in visits a day for a client. And you notice in the evening visit that the the dogs pop hat is slightly red and slightly swollen, but doesn't seem to really be bothering the dog. What exactly would you say to the client, if you would say anything? And then the next question after that is, okay, now you've showed up for the next visit, and it is extremely irritated, very red and swollen, and you can tell it is bothering the dog. However, the client has not responded to your last message informing them because they're out of the country with no cell service.
43:53
What do you do?
Doug 43:56
These two questions can be so so So telling, I would say 50% of applicants that we get would say that they wouldn't tell the client anything at the first visit, they would just make a mental note of it and move on. And I mean, if that's not a huge red flag, I don't know what is
Collin 44:17
right.
Doug 44:19
The people that say that they would you know, it contact the client, and then they've moved on to the next question and everything. It's, it's crazy the amount of people that would say that, they would just wait to hear back from the client knowing that the animal is in pain, and that can be so so telling. And again, that kind of goes back to having your the correct policies and procedures and stuff because we do have some applicants that will actually read our policies and procedures before submitting their application and then they will quote those in the These two questions and they'll say, Well, I did instruct the client at the first visit, because that was what I was supposed to do. It was the right thing to do. This is what I said to them. And then at the next morning, you know, even though the client hadn't gotten back to me, I did have their vet information on file with instructions on what I could do with the vet and not do with the vet, per hour client contract. And this is how I would proceed with the vet. What
Collin 45:31
that's really showing is, you know, for those people who are applying, and they've already read your policies like that, that just goes above and beyond some of those initial expectations is, is wow, this person really took the time even just take a cursory look at what our policies are, that goes a long way to telling how they're going to act in the future, versus somebody who just goes, I may take a picture of it just to document it. So if they yell at me, I can just To them or something like that, like a kind of nonchalant cavalier attitude
46:06
that that's giving me heartburn just thinking about that.
46:10
You know,
Doug 46:12
oh, man, you should see some of the applications we get. I mean, it's, some of them are truly cringe worthy. It's amazing. It blows my mind. Sure. But
Collin 46:23
that's why you have those in place is so that those people, however well intentioned, don't end up on the front lines, interacting with people in their pets, because that's, that's the level of service and quality that you and the clients expect from them.
Doug 46:41
Right, exactly. Exactly. And you know, and then going outside of just these questions on the application, when you're actually interviewing them, it's just really paying attention to all of those personal cues. Again, what we do is so personable and These pet pet sitters are going to have to kind of sell themselves to their future clients in their meet and greets. And if they can't sell themselves to you in an interview, then they'll never be able to sell themselves to a potential client in a meet and greet. And that really comes down to did they come showered and clean clothes? And you would be amazed.
Collin 47:26
You'll be amazed. Sure,
Doug 47:29
yeah. Yeah. And did they make eye contact? Did they shake your hand right away? Those types of details. I think a lot of the time will show even more than what they actually say in the interview.
Collin 47:42
Yeah, that mindset of these are as much as they are pet care providers. They're also, as you mentioned, salesmen for the services and customer service, interaction with the clients and so all of those nonverbal cues are huge and play a huge role in, in meeting expectations and bringing on new clients.
Doug 48:06
And that's one of my favorite reasons to take them to a dog park, you know, because then you are surrounded by complete strangers and their pets and, you know, dog parks are kind of known for being very communal. And it's, it's easy to just walk up and start a conversation with them about their dog. And if you take a potential pet sitter to a dog park, and they just stand there with their arms crossed, not talking to any of these people at the dog park, you know, that's a, that's a big red flag, you know, you want to see them running in there playing with the dogs in a in a, you know, good man. Right? And, and striking up, you know, really healthy conversations with these people. And even then working the business into those conversations, not in a salesy way but just saying, you know, hey, oh, I am a pet sitter, if you're ever in, you know,
Collin 49:03
yada, yada, yada, right? So, after someone's been been a pet sitter and dog walker for a while, how do you know when it's time to start moving them into a pack leader position? What are some of those qualities that you look for for that move?
Doug 49:21
Yeah, well, I always make sure that pet sitters know from day one that there is opportunity to move up, you know that if they do really well that they could become a pack leader down the road, as they go through clients. over their first few months on our team, I really watch for how they communicate with clients more than anything. It's It's not easy always to communicate with people that you don't really know that well and you're in their house and it's like, do I say this? Do I not say this? How do I word it and some people just have a knack for that. You know, they are just really excellent at communicating the good things and the bad things because it all has to be communicated. And they, they take really, really great photos and they always show up to their visits on time, they're going to their meet and greets five minutes early, you know, those kinds of things, when I'm seeing all of that, and especially when they're bringing in some of their own clients through their connections that they may have at their other job or with friends or neighbors or whatever, then I kind of start pushing them towards that pack leader role. When I when I see those things happening, but again, I really leave it up to them and I to design the pack leader role to to meet their own personality. So we have a list of criteria and tasks that each pack leader must meet, but it's up to them to decide. Do they want to be a pack leader? Have the entire city of Jacksonville and have, you know, 15 pet sitters working underneath them? Or do they only want to be the pack leader of their little neighborhood and just have their next door neighbor, help them with just a handful of clients? You know, I leave that up to the individual pack leader to really ensure that everyone is happy and really that it just goes back to finding your why and helping them find their own why so that they can then avoid burnout right?
Collin 51:31
Yeah, that's so important is to you know, while Yes, you are, you know, they are employed by you know that the role that I see going on here is really kind of this this mentorship and really investing back into them to keep them going so that they don't burn out and that they can continue to maintain that high quality of service and get a lot out of the job and not just make it a drudge. So that next step, you know from from a pack leader, how what qualities do you see The differentiate a pack leader versus the your operations manager as far as ization or communication or those kind of things.
Doug 52:08
So our operations manager, she was a pack leader for a long time and her team kept growing and growing and growing. And she was excellent at everything. And I kept thinking to myself as our team grew, man, she's, she's gonna burn out, eventually, something's gonna happen. And nothing ever did. You know, she was always on top of it. And she actually came to me and said, Hey, you know, the business is growing. I think this should be the next step. What if I helped with this position and these tasks that need to be done and Wow, it just, I can't say enough that I just got so lucky. I just got so lucky, you know, to have such a wonderful team and have people that That whole some of the same values that I hold and understand how important all of these things are, it's, it's truly amazing
Collin 53:08
I can really see how those those qualities of somebody who is able to to manage themselves and and has those not necessarily coping mechanisms but these these healthy ways of dealing with stress and is not burning out how that would really set apart that Operations Manager level because everything that that person is now dealing with
Doug 53:30
being able to unplug yourself, you know, as the operations manager and being able to help your pack leaders and the pet sitters underneath them, you know, set working hours for yourself that you you will reply to clients during these hours and you don't through these other hours because otherwise you'll get burnt out you know setting. setting that example from from the top down is so important. Not only setting that example as far as avoiding burnout, but just having the the skill and the wherewithal to be able to delegate some some tasks and to be just a leadership figure without being too pushy, you know, those are really, I don't know if that kind of stuff can be taught or not. But I've gotten extremely lucky to just have people that know that intrinsically, you know?
Collin 54:31
Yeah, and, and how much things are, are taught versus taught in those scenarios and being able to work one on one with some really amazing people, I'm sure definitely helps in that process that allows them to grow in knowing that that you and others are continuing to invest back in and are, you know, concerned for people's well being you know, that that goes a long way to helping those people flourish in those kind of positions. One of the things I've heard you talk about before, and you've mentioned Our action plans are a plan of action that you can sit down and you can kind of design those on a monthly and weekly basis. Could you give a little bit of detail about those and why you think they're important to keep the business moving forward?
Doug 55:18
Oh, yeah, absolutely. You know, I personally, I create a yearly plan at each December I will create a broad general yearly plan of you know, this is approximately how many clients we want to bring on this is approximately how much we want to grow, where we want to grow, how we're going to do that. And then at the end of each month, I really take this broad plan and say, Okay, these are the big tasks for the next month. And then each week, each Sunday I sit down and I say, Okay, these are the monthly tasks, what needs to be done This week and I break it down day by day. And again, like I said, with the filing your business paperwork, you know, creating a business plan like this does not have to be a big overwhelming thing, break it down, bite by bite. And it doesn't have to be perfect. It doesn't have to be this big 17 page business plan perfectly formatted. Like Business School, you know, you can do this in an in a notebook with just pen and paper and and jot down what your yearly goals are. And then break those down into monthly goals and then break the monthly goals down into weekly goals. And then, you know, I have daily checklists for myself and for our operations manager to make sure that we're meeting all of these different goals and tasks and if you don't have something like that in place, using this slow season time, that to work on those and to start planning for the coming year, or next slow season and so that you can be in a better place. But at that point, the most important thing is just to never let your business go stagnant. I see that with a lot of local pet care businesses where, you know, they've been at it for so many years. And you know, they have so much going on that they kind of forget that, even though even though they don't want to grow any larger, they're not doing anything to keep the business active and moving and changing and it just kind of goes dormant and clients pick up on that, you know, if you are never updating any of your policies and procedures, if you're never updating your website, if you're just kind of doing the exact same thing day in and day out, year in and year out. clients will kind of start to step back and go well, I might be better served somewhere else. You know that that speaks volumes to how much you're investing back into the business and how much you are trying to, you know, maybe learn from mistakes or learn new things new, learn new ways of doing things and continually being adaptive to the the ever changing environment around you. You've talked about your, your policies and your slps and they seem pretty systematized at this point. Why is having such exact policies and slps in place important for you and your business? They say if you don't stand for something, you'll fall for anything. So I say stand for your business stand for the health and the growth and the well being of your business and your own mental psyche. And if you don't have these set, policies and systems and procedures in place, you will fall for anything and you will not be standing up Or the strength of your business? And it goes back to finding your why and having that conversation with yourself from day one, you know, do you want to when it comes down to your systems and your policies, you know, do you want to use choke chains? Or not? Do you want to be only positive reinforcement? Do you want to only offer visits during certain hours of the day? Are you willing to operate 24? Seven, there's so many different day to day decisions like this, that if you if you don't figure those out, and if you don't have them written in your systems and your policies, your business will just end up running you instead of you running your business, right? It can just, quote unquote, just happen and you can look up 510 years from now going, Yeah,
Collin 59:53
this isn't what I wanted. None of this is actually making me happy. I didn't want to be doing all of these services. They're kind of a waste of time. You know, so taking that time to step back, pen to paper and and really think about your why, what you value and and what you want to offer to yourself into your community. And if you have employees or want to have employees, what you want to be able to offer them, it's this really big pitch stepping back and looking at that big picture. So that when you're down there in the nitty gritty, you know, that there's, there's, there's things above you that are helping guide and control as things move around.
Doug 60:32
Right, right. And again, just don't think that you have to have everything figured out from day one, and that you have to have this 50 page plan with every little system and policy written out. You know, it's just don't don't think that way. Take it one day at a time one step at a time. The only person putting pressure on you
Collin 60:56
is yourself. Yeah, I'm curious if you've ever gone back and looked at some Have your early drafts or maybe some of your policies from a year or two or three years ago and kind of what you think of those?
Doug 61:06
Oh, yeah, yeah. So I carry around a, like 100 page spiral notebook with me all the time. And I go through about one of these notebooks every three to six months. So I have a stack of these notebooks all labeled with their timeframe. Every now and then I'll look back at like, my notebooks of my notes and ideas and stuff from like, 2016 2017 even into 2018. I'm like, Oh, no, oh, no.
Collin 61:42
Yeah. And I'll probably you know, in 2025
Doug 61:44
I'll probably look back to my notebook now and say the same thing, but that's like, right, that's life and just don't let that stuff hold you back. You know, it's all a learning experience and just make the best of it.
Collin 61:56
Yeah, absolutely. I dug I'm, again, so thankful and grateful that you have you've come back on, you've talked about all of these things that that are out there and are big decisions that people need to be thinking about. And as you mentioned, it's not just a, you know, get it all figured out right now, as we just talked about this is going to and should change over time as you learn. But I know there are a ton of other things that are out there that we didn't even touch on. So how can people get in contact with you ask additional questions and follow along with what your you've got going on these days?
Doug 62:36
Yeah, absolutely. You can check out our website. It's bad to the bone pet care.com We're also on Facebook. It's facebook.com slash bad to the bone pet care. We're on Instagram at bad to the bone pet care. And you can shoot me an email at bad to the bone pet care@gmail.com. That's all spelled out all one word. all lowercase. And you can follow my personal travels with my traveling pet sitting that I mentioned at the wandering pet sitter on Instagram as well. I, anybody that has any questions or would like to follow up with me, you know, please shoot me an email DM me on Instagram, shoot me a Facebook message. I'm happy to talk with anyone that has any questions. And I have recently started offering some business consulting services. So if anyone is interested in that, please again, just shoot me an email and we'll set up a meeting.
Collin 63:35
Well, again, thank you so much, Doug. It's been a real pleasure and hope to bring you on again soon.
63:41
Awesome. Well, thank you so much.
Collin 63:43
So what do you want your life to look like? What do you value? If you've never done this before? Maybe it's been a while. Take some of the time that we have right now. before things get crazy crazy again, to think about those things and plan for the future. Are you standing for your business? What are your guiding principles? As Doug said, if you're not standing for your business, who is and what will be done to safeguard it for the future, now really is a good time to think about exactly what we want our businesses to look like moving forward. Last week, we talked with Amber about rebranding, and now this week with Doug and just the whole business structure. If you've thought about this, use this time to start implementing some of those plans and reaching out for help if you need it. We'd like to again, thank our friend of the show time to pet for bringing this week's show to you. Check out our website, pet sitter confessional.com for all of the links and extensive Show Notes for this episode, and every single other one. We'll talk to you guys again soon.
