“It’s Never Crowded Along the Extra Mile”: Leadership Insights from Shane Humble

00:00
Robert Murray
Hi, everyone, and welcome to the IM Landscape Growth podcast, where entrepreneurs help entrepreneurs grow faster, better and stronger in the green industry. From leadership to sales to recruiting and operational excellence, we cover the topics holding entrepreneurs back and share how to get past those bottlenecks with the best in the industry. I’m your host, Rob Murray, co-founder and CEO of Intrigue, a digital marketing company focused on helping landscape companies grow. So sit back and enjoy the show. Hey, everybody. Welcome back to another episode of the I Am Landscape Growth podcast. Today, I have our guest, Mr. Shane Humble, from Complete Property Maintenance. Shane, thank you so much for doing this. I appreciate you coming to the show.

00:46
Shane Humble
Yeah. Morning, Rob. Thank you. Glad to be here. I appreciate you asking me to step in with you today.

00:53
Robert Murray
Give the crowd a quick summary and overview of how you got into this industry and what’s. Where are you today? What’s the focus of your company?

01:01
Shane Humble
Sure. Kind of a funny story. I was sold drilling rigs for earth stabilization. These drilling rigs were manufactured in Europe. Euro came into effect, and all of the rigs I sold went up 30 to 40%. No longer competitive. The company closed its doors six months later, and I needed to find something quick. I had a baby on the way, and my wife jokingly said to me, you need to find something recession-proof. And I’m like, yeah, like that exists. She’s like, no, like something like, you know, like, you can’t stop grass from growing, like, things like that. And I just said I’m gonna cut grass. And she’s like, wait, you’re 30, you’re gonna cut grass? Like, how’s that gonna go over with your parents?

01:41
Robert Murray
It was your idea.

01:43
Shane Humble
I thought I got a pass, right? So that’s how it started. And I already knew Strada with soil with the drilling rigs. Kind of understood the ecology of how that all played in and bought a truck, lawnmower, and a trailer and started cutting grass.

01:59
Robert Murray
Amazing. And now, what’s the business? Where are you at? What’s the size? What’s the focus of the company?

02:04
Shane Humble
Yeah. So right now, we are a. And back then, I did individual residences, just onesie twosies here and there. Now, we are solely an HOA landscape maintenance contractor. We’ve got 530 employees and five branches, and I absolutely love what I do. It’s been. It’s been just a whirlwind of ups and downs, but, you know, a lot of fun along the way.

02:27
Robert Murray
How many employees did you say? Okay. I want to make sure that people hear that because how do you get so many people? We’ll get to that in a minute. So the primary theme of the podcast, as we’re just talking about, is, you know, what’s the primary growth constraint holding entrepreneurs back in the green industry? You had a pretty unique perspective on this. So why don’t we just get right into it? Like, what do you think? What do you see as the bottleneck holding people back from growing?

02:53
Shane Humble
Sure. So, you know, I’m in a market that has really changed over the last couple of years. You know, let’s kind of bring it to the COVID you know, era. There were, on average, a thousand people moving into Florida every day. So, you know, that Translated to that 18 months of, like, you know, over a half million people moving into South Florida. Construction was going crazy, with lots of growth opportunities. And you know, we all know that in this marketplace, our labour pool kind of fluctuates between construction and landscape, depending on season and the fluctuation of growth. So, we share the same labour pool, and at the same time, landscape and company values seem to be going up. We were almost, you know, considered like garbage men at one point. And that’s not a put down to the garbage men because they’re hard-working.

03:45
Shane Humble
But as a company, we’re guys that cut grass, you know, where it’s not, you know what I say, rockets, you know, scientists, you know, we’re not physicists. What I was like was that I didn’t even want to downplay it because there is a lot more to it than that. But all of a sudden, there seemed to be this real interest in recurring revenue that maintenance contractors provided. It’s like Netflix, I guess. So our biggest kind of constraint that we found was that these, you know, equity firms were coming in, buying up our competitors and needed to grow quickly. The challenge became that they were buying work, getting the work, and then, in turn, finding they needed to buy the labour because they didn’t, you know, we don’t carry excess employees around with our business model.

04:39
Robert Murray
No, of course not.

04:40
Shane Humble
So we can’t afford it. We’re working off of small margins in large volume. So, you know, the labor rate got falsely kind of puffed up. And it was that was creating an issue down here in our marketplace.

04:55
Robert Murray
And so then you see, you know, essentially like, you know, private equity or venture capital at some level coming in and buying up companies, consolidating, then cash hungry. So they need to fulfill the work to their grabbing employees, maybe paying more than they need to because they’re under the gun to get the work done. They have to deliver, or they’re not going to generate cash at all. And then that’s not good for anybody from a shareholder perspective. So then, how do you respond to that?

05:24
Shane Humble
So, you know, you focus on, you know, the 8020 rule. You try to make sure you’re taking care of your existing customer base. That also gives you know, I don’t say the guaranteed extra revenue with your mulch or flowers or landscape enhancements, but that’s really where you need to then shift your focus to growth is going to happen. And I strongly believe that. It’s like a construction company building a high rise. They don’t know that the people are going to look to move into this building. So it’s the theory of, like, empty space. If you create an empty space, avoid something that’s going to fill it. And that’s kind of how we are. That’s kind of. We have the intention to create the opportunity to find the right labour; it is also going to come with it. So we just focus on.

06:15
Shane Humble
On the positive aspect of intention.

06:18
Robert Murray
Okay, well, I mean, that’s amazing. And I mean, it says a lot about mindset, which I’m going to circle back to in a minute. However, you did say something that’s kind of interesting because a lot of people we talk to when it comes to growth, they kind of correlate that with new business, and you kind of just went a little bit of a different direction. You said, hey, when things got a little bit rough, and the market was a little bit volatile or just difficult, rough waters, we just stumbled down and looked into our core business, taking care of our core customers. So, first of all, why is that the perspective? And second of all, what did you do specifically to do that?

06:51
Shane Humble
Sure. So, we found that our HOAs weren’t holding meetings. They were, you know, so new into the COVID era that we, you know, they weren’t having the meetings or they were exploring Zoom. And, you know, there. There weren’t these approvals taking place for these large projects. However, they were still doing the basic enhancements. They were still putting flowers at the entrance. They were still mulching the common areas. You know, they were. They were doing the basics that potentially may have gotten bid out before, but there wasn’t this movement toward getting multiple bids. It was more of, hey, you know, we. We don’t want to bring new people into our communities. There was this fear. So we said, you know, we’ve got to really just focus on those that we already have within our base, not that we have not done that before.

07:40
Shane Humble
Our average tenure with our clients is somewhere around 12 years. So that’s big. Yeah, it’s huge. And you know, and that’s with our employee base as well. I mean, just in my office, our admin staff share, I think it’s 77 years amongst the five, you know, our office staff here. So we’re big on that. So, yeah, doubling down on that. And, you know, we’re always going to have fluctuation boards change, property management, companies change, and it can literally be a vote that determines whether or not we stay or go. So we’ve got to make everyone happy versus just, you know, even the complainer we want to flip because one day they may be on the board, and we have to appreciate that.

08:19
Robert Murray
Oh, cool perspective. Right. Because it’s like a resident. Nothing to do with decision-making today but tomorrow. Oh, very much it could. Yeah. Yeah. Well, that’s like a crazy part of the whole HOA business model. So, then, what did you do as a team to go take care of these folks and really double down on that relationship that then leads to a 12-year average lifetime value for a customer?

08:43
Shane Humble
Presence, presence on the site. A lot of time, you know, during that period, people were remote, but not us. You know, were considered essential. So they were allowed to stay on the properties. And there was such an efficiency gained because we were focused on those particular properties that the managers have that weren’t out driving around, going to pick up material, going. Because there wasn’t a lot of that happening. So we just found ourselves focused, staying on site, boots on the ground, being in front of the customer more. The customer was now home, and their offices had been shut down.

09:21
Robert Murray
Sure, yeah. You’re on a zoom call, watching somebody mow, mulch, whatever outside your window. Right, Yep.

09:26
Shane Humble
And you know, and suddenly also we did on the same, you know, opposite end, Rob, we gained, you know, I don’t know, 20,000 landscape experts who are now stuck looking out of their window that didn’t care if the shrub was 2 inches higher or not, but now they did. So it’s it created more opportunities to talk to the residents.

09:45
Robert Murray
And then. So was there any, like, because of the increase of visibility and presence and then the interactions I would think of customers, like, did you do any training, that kind of stuff about how to talk to people, how to listen, like, how did that go with people that are talking to more customers more times?

10:02
Shane Humble
Yeah, you know, I don’t think there was, I don’t recall a, you know, a meeting specific about, you know, do we approach differently, how do we do it was already something within our account managers. They’ve done this on a daily basis. They just found themselves having more time to do it just because they were dialed into those, you know, the accounts that they had at the time.

10:24
Robert Murray
So then you take this, you know, Covid era, which we could say we’re at the end of. How has the tide changed in the last 612 months from your perspective?

10:37
Shane Humble
Yeah, there’s, you know, along with the construction, we found there has been a definite opening of opportunities. And you know, we’ve only got, I think currently, I think we have like 68 to 80 clients, something like that. So it’s a small base, but they’re larger HOAs anywhere from, you know, 50 homes up to 1800. So yeah, we’ve done so we’ve kind of dialled in our customer base, and we’re not chasing the accounts just to pay into the overhead. And we’re more looking at who’s going to be a great fit for us. It’s almost like we’ve started interviewing the customers versus the other way around because we know now really dialled in what we’re looking for.

11:22
Robert Murray
And so then what was that journey like going from being interviewed to then interviewing? How did you flip that, and how is it working? Because I mean, you go from, you know, mowing a couple of lawns to 530 staff, you’re doing something right.

11:36
Shane Humble
You know, I think it’s just asking the right questions. You know, you want to find out what your turnaround time is on a board decision. You know, do you find then. Because that’ll tell you if there’s discourse within the board. If there’s a seven-person board and these votes aren’t, you know, kind of moving quickly, you realize there’s some animosity amongst those board members, and it’s not cohesive. So, you know, you just start looking at those avenues to know if it’s the right fitness.

12:03
Robert Murray
Well, and that’s interesting, right, because then I guess if there’s not cohesion, then if it, if a vote does get passed, you come in, there’s probably going to be somebody sitting there trying to get someone out because they’re not happy with the decision that was made. That’s got nothing to do with the company. But then you’re in this kind of weird, volatile relationship that maybe you don’t want to be part of. Is that kind of the idea?

12:21
Shane Humble
Exactly. And you can’t take it personally because why would you invalidate somebody’s relationship that they may have with another landscape owner? Sure. And, you know, we’re pulling from the same labour force; we’re using the same equipment. You know, typically, we’re providing a very similar service. It comes down to understanding the needs, meeting the expectations, and describing the expectations right up front because that’s what kills you. You know, if you tell them you’re going to do everything and you’re telling them you’re going to do it 100% right, you’re letting yourself down. I usually start off by telling them the first 60 or 90 days are nothing like a honeymoon. I’m going to hit your fence; I’m going to tear your screen. I’m realizing the nuances of your property.

13:00
Shane Humble
So you set it up right from the start and say, I’m only going to get better after six months. It doesn’t tail off. This is when we actually get good.

13:08
Robert Murray
Yeah, it’s more like dancing. Right. You’re going to step on some toes to start with, and eventually, you’re going to start fighting the groove, Right?

13:13
Shane Humble
Exactly.

13:14
Robert Murray
And then being honest about it. A lot of people necessarily want to be vulnerable to their mistakes up front, right?

13:20
Shane Humble
Well, you know, it’s like, you know, we talk about immigration, and it’s one of those topics that’s like, you know, very. Like you don’t want to approach it, but you do. They’ll ask me. They’ll ask me that question right off-cent. Oh, you know, do you? How many of your employees speak English? Or is my supervisor going to speak English? And, you know, so I’m in this board meeting, or I’m in a town hall, and I’ll say them like, oh, you know, hey, how many of you guys have kids? And 90% of the time, they raise their hands; oh, I have kids. Yeah, I have kids. I said, oh, great. I’m like, how many of you have kids that you have encouraged to go into the landscape industry or cut grass? Every one of them drops their hands.

13:56
Shane Humble
I’ve never had one person doing this for 20-plus years. Tell me. Oh, I did. I told my son or daughter to go into landscaping. And I’m like, so who’s doing this work? I’m like, if you’re not pushing your kids into it, you represent 90% of people with kids. So, the whole topic of speaking English goes away. You just have to.

14:15
Robert Murray
What a beautiful way, though. It’s like judo, right? It’s Their energy, bringing it up, and you’re just bringing it back to them. I think that’s brilliant.

14:22
Shane Humble
Correct.

14:23
Robert Murray
So there’s something that you’ve woven into everything that you’re doing and this mindset thing that you talked a little bit about and being intentional. What do you mean by that, and how can you describe what that has done for you and others listening?

14:35
Shane Humble
Sure. I think if you approach life with positivity and you put your mind to that place as opposed to, you know, I don’t want to say, I’ll say marinating. I would prefer to marinate in the positive outcome as opposed to the negative. So if you put your intention, talking of all the things that can go wrong, they’re going to happen. But if you talk about and think about all the things that can go right, that also is going to happen. So, you know, we feel as if we do the right thing on a daily basis, and we approach it with that mindset that that will be our outcome. And the team that I have around me is fantastic. I mean, they are my branch managers to account managers to the guy care, and the rake is integral to this, and they are all working.

15:23
Shane Humble
And if you don’t let them know that and treat them with that, they will feel it’ll work its way back up. And you know, I think all of the guys and you know, I just, the three branch managers that I have now are all ten plus years here. So they’ve got it, and I can be a dad, which is, you know, delegating and disappearing. They just tell them I’m their dad, I said it, and I hope that then they run with the decision because I know what I don’t. That’s what I think is stronger than knowing what I know.

15:55
Robert Murray
I mean, I believe there’s a lot, I mean, the idea too of focusing on the positive. It’s like that saying: where attention goes, energy flows, and it’s so easy to get wrapped up in the negative because we talk about this idea even here about you. There’s a tendency if someone were to post a YouTube video as an example, and there are a thousand thumbs up and one thumb down; the producer of said content would look at the thumb down. What do they say? You know, it’s so easy to focus on the negative, and it needs to be, I think, a choice. I think it’s just also a bit of human nature. What’s wrong? And we’re all worried creatures, and I think there’s a little bit of evolution.

16:32
Robert Murray
Because if you’re not worried, you probably got eaten by a tiger at some point in the evolutionary history. So I think that making that decision, though, to make an intention to focus on positivity is pretty amazing. And then it might sound a little fun to somebody listening to this now, but then if you hear underlying messages of Shane, what you’ve been saying is that my admin has a combined 77 years. My branch manager has been me for 10 years. I hear time and time again the growth constraint is getting and keeping great staff. Can you tell us a little bit about what you’re doing with your team outside? Like you take this positivity focus, how does that come to life for folks and then turn into this outcome for tenured staff?

17:15
Shane Humble
Sure. So I think the involvement of asking for their decision and getting them involved in the decision is kind of, like you said, commonplace. I think that we, you know, might be one of those, you know, 101. Let’s make sure the staff feels involved. But I have a perfect example. Just recently, you know, we have somebody involved in special project implementation, Jimmy, who, you know, goes out and he looks, and you know, just recently attended the elevate, and his mission was to find software. We don’t use landscape management software. So he goes out into the world; he’s trying to find XYZ what works for us. So, one of those initiatives recently was okay. We’re tracking our vehicles, and we’re rewarding drivers for their scores on, you know, heartbreaking hard. So we thought, you know what, this was a great fit.

18:04
Shane Humble
The next evolution of that was, okay, we’re going to add forward and rear-facing cameras in the dash. And we just kind of maybe didn’t give our branch managers enough input, and we said, we’re going to do this, we’re going to roll this out for everybody. Even myself is going to do it. They got this major pushback, and they thought of things that we had never thought of. And I went, you know what? This was one of those times. I didn’t ask for their input because we just thought it was everyone who was going to feel safer knowing that they were being monitored. You know, there’s a voice in there saying, hey, your eyes aren’t focused on the steering wheel, you know, you’re looking at your phone, whatever it may be. But we took out the personal interaction with them, and they gave us a major kickback.

18:46
Shane Humble
So, we Halted the program. And, it was like one of those, this is what happens when you get off focus like we didn’t do that. Right. And now we’re rolling it out with their kind of INP thought it was a good reason or a bad reason. And I think it’s going to be more successful. So it’s getting that involvement, I think, that helps keep our key players in place.

19:09
Robert Murray
That’s cool. I was talking to somebody just on Tuesday or Wednesday and the whole theme around if you want buy in, you got to get weigh in.

19:18
Shane Humble
Yeah.

19:19
Robert Murray
And I think that’s a really cool perspective because, you know, it’s a good program.

19:23
Shane Humble
Yep.

19:24
Robert Murray
And it needs to happen at some level, and you’re rolling it back out, but with more success because you had some folks weigh in with some perspective.

19:30
Shane Humble
Yeah, absolutely. And, you know, we thought the justification was, you’re going to be safer. Listen, we’re spending X amount of our, you know, dollars here towards this program. How how can it be selfish? Like, we’ve got this big outlay every year. Like why would you think it? And they explained to us perfectly why it didn’t work for them. And, and we, we got it. So, you know, it’s just not undervaluing your staff’s opinions on every decision you make, to be honest.

19:58
Robert Murray
That’s super cool. And I think this. You know, there were a lot of years where I would hear leaders talk about slowing down to speed up. And I was like, what do you mean slowing down to speed up? That makes no sense. But then I realized over time that if I were to make a decision without anybody’s perspective, it often went very poorly. And taking the time to get people together is kind of like that slingshot. You’re just tightening it up so you can go farther, faster. I think you just described a really great use case of how that comes to life. Shane, you said something a couple of minutes ago about delegating and disappearing. You know, some folks, when learning to delegate, and me included, have done things like here you go, bye, and didn’t necessarily provide context.

20:51
Robert Murray
So I think that was the biggest piece of feedback I had for a year or two about I need to bring more context into decision making and what’s going on.

20:59
Shane Humble
Sure.

21:00
Robert Murray
How does delegating disappear work?

21:02
Shane Humble
Sure. So if you know that you have, if it’s a repetitive kind of idea or, you know, we’re taking on a new account, and you can provide the framework, the basis of the specifications for the contract, and they’ve done this time and time again. The last thing I want to do is micromanage them on how we’re going to transition it, how we’re bringing it on, and what to do. It becomes more successful the more involvement they have on their own. And it’s not to say that I wouldn’t do that on a task like, oh, hey, you know what? We’re bringing on ADP for payroll and you know, there’s a lengthy process for the mobile app in order to get set up. Here’s your phone. Here’s the app. Good luck.

21:48
Shane Humble
Not one of those, you know, that, you know, that’s 40 phone calls and 40, you know, sessions sitting in with the ADP rep. But so not, definitely not in that regards. But I get it. Yeah. I hope I didn’t make it sound like I’m just give an order and then leave, you know.

22:05
Robert Murray
No, no. I got the impression that it’s not just that, but I find a lot of people, when trying to learn how to delegate, don’t necessarily give people all the information they need. And it seems like when if you’ve got staff sitting around for this long at leadership levels and mid-management levels, you’re delegating well. And so I was just curious from your experience if there’s something that you could share with the audience about how to maybe speed up the learning curve on how to delegate. Well, what would you say to somebody from what you’ve been through?

22:35
Shane Humble
Yes. Set the expectations, set the level of confidence that you have in them because that’s the biggest thing, you know. And I’ll tie this into, you know when I first started, I had a, you know, I was, myself, and three employees. There were a lot of small landscape companies before hurricanes hit down here. My wife and I thought we’re gonna move out of state. We’re not, we’re not doing this hurricane thing. I put my business, yeah. I put my business for sale, and I had an immediate full-price offer from a Canadian-based franchise. And I’m like, this is great. Everything’s falling into place. I had the intention because I already picked out a house. So I thought I was going to sell the business, and it’s happening.

23:18
Shane Humble
We went to sign the contract on the house, and it was like 37 degrees, and my wife went, wait, it gets that cold in Georgia. Like we can’t do this. So I had to run back to Florida, you know, tail between my legs and tell this franchise that I can’t sell. And it was one of those where the broker said, well, you had full price commission, you’re gonna have to pay me my full fee. So I went back to the franchise; it was Clintar; it’s a Canadian-based, you know, franchise. And I said, listen, I can’t sell. And you know, they’re like, well, why don’t you stay on and buy back in? So that’s what I did. I stayed; I bought back in.

23:55
Shane Humble
And it was one of those situations where, like, you know, every turn gives you a new challenge, and if you can talk through, work through what the problems are, there’s typically a solution. And that, that delegate is kind of the same mentality. You provided a problem; you found the solution. And it typically emerges through many hours of discussion. And it’s kind of, I think, how we work here; it’s an open-door policy. My door is never shut. It is shut now for this podcast, but otherwise, it’s wide open. And you know, everyone just comes in, and we figure it out.

24:37
Robert Murray
So you go from four folks to how many when the Clintar group got involved?

24:42
Shane Humble
So that’s where the confidence comes in. So, you know, I would say that you know, I had a positive mindset, but confidence is always something that’s in the back of your mind. Can you do this? Can you know if you are doing it right? And you know, Klindar didn’t have any exposure here at all in the United States. We were the first US franchise, and my partner was a guy by the name of, who had a best friend from Brampton who had a Clintar franchise. And you know, Simon wanted to bring that down here. So we partnered up and painted and decal all of our trucks this bright Clintar green. And for whatever reason, it gave us this confidence boost that we’re part of something bigger. But weren’t, weren’t pushing any snow, you know.

25:27
Robert Murray
Right, right. Yeah, it’s a different business.

25:30
Shane Humble
Yeah, it’s a different business. We didn’t have the Home Depot contract, so. But we found ourselves within a matter, I think it was, we were the fastest growing Clintar branch in their history, and we got it up to 100 employees, and I think it was like seven years.

25:45
Robert Murray
So then can you speak a little bit to some of the breaking points that you might have experienced going from 4 to 100 and like how you needed to evolve as a leader in order to like have that kind of a group working with you?

26:00
Shane Humble
You know, I was still pulling weeds. No matter. Like, you know, I’d go onto a property and pull weeds, and people would now come up to me and say, boss, you can’t do that. Stop. And I’m like, no, this is what I do. And I struggled to move from labour to the. I still don’t even like saying boss. I prefer a head gardener. Like I, I, you know, that was a struggle for me. That was a problem that I faced was learning how to become somebody who wasn’t the one doing the work, but finding the work, pricing work, bidding the work, and then allowing those that were in that I’ve hired to do that role, actually do the role. So that was a challenge. And, financially, you know, we didn’t have backing.

26:48
Shane Humble
We were, you know, paying royalties and those, you know, that the margin here in South Florida is slim. So, paying a royalty made it even more challenging to compete. So financially, it was difficult and probably our toughest gross because the equipment was all around then. You know, that wasn’t a problem to find. Labour was plentiful then. So yeah, I think it was really just changing the mindset of what I was supposed to do on a daily basis.

27:19
Robert Murray
I mean, I heard a title of a book in what you just said, from labour to Leader. I don’t know, I don’t know if you’ve got it on your plan to maybe share your experience through writing, but I know that’s a lot of, that’s a lot of people struggle with this thing. From going from the tools to the office to being like a CEO who is really helping cast the vision and getting people aligned. So you go from 4 to 100 to 530. What is your main focus in the organization today at that level?

28:01
Shane Humble
I think it’s really just focusing on the right work. We don’t provide landscape installation to builders or to. And we won’t, at least while I’m here. I think you need to just fully understand what it is you do well, focus on it, and not try to dilute your labour force into doing things that you may not be able to explain properly. Or. So I think for us, it’s to focus on what we do the best we can at a fair price. We’re never the low bidder. We’re typically not the high bidder. We typically fall in the middle. And I think it’s because we’ve understood that we provide all of the products and services that are included in the contract. And the end. The end result shows what we do. And that, I think, needs to remain the focus here.

28:58
Robert Murray
You know, it’s interesting; there are a couple of ideas that come from that. One is around the idea of what you say no to, which is almost more strategic than what you say yes to. And when you simplify what you focus on, people get really good at it. So, did you try other things earlier on, and it didn’t go so well? Then maybe backed out of it and said, hey, we got a core double down on our core focus? Or how did you get that kind of laser focus on what you’re up to today?

29:27
Shane Humble
Yeah, you know, more recently, within the last few years, there’s been this major push to put synthetic turf in backyards of these HOAs. Right. For the residents. And we’re missing the boat because we’re focused on maintenance. But we’re seeing these synthetic truck companies parked on all the streets that we’re cutting the grass out up front, you know, where we’re doing the hedges, we’re fertilizing, we’re doing the pest control, the irrigation. And we’re missing a piece that’s becoming extremely popular. So we did; we brought somebody on to kind of head that up.

30:00
Shane Humble
And it, you know, it didn’t get the traction that we would have liked because what we found is if we had a Monday where, you know, three people, four people didn’t show up at a branch, the one thing we’re going to pull from was that area to make sure we continued to do what we’re good at, which was the maintenance. So we were constantly robbing from this in, you know, synthetic turf division to take care of what we were contractually obligated to. And it just, it. So it didn’t work. It has not worked where it’s, you know, I don’t know that we’re going to try to rekindle that. You know, I’ve got a son who’s currently in college, and he told me he would love to do landscape lighting. And, you know, he’s a couple of years away from graduating.

30:40
Shane Humble
So I thought, you know what, okay, we’re not going to push on that now, but maybe if he still wants to do that two years from now, that could be an avenue that we pursue. And it’s a, you know, it’s a one or two or three person, you know, kind of role until it grows. So it could work.

30:54
Robert Murray
Yeah, that’s Cool. It’s also interesting because you just implied that you need a leader to start something new instead of just diverting focus from what you’re doing now and then trying to do more. So that kind of implied what you said because you brought in somebody for synthetic. You’re thinking about lighting, and you have to have a leader who’s going to come in and drive it. What’s that perspective about?

31:16
Shane Humble
I think we’re in an industry where it’s very easy. You know, people are nervous about training somebody to the point or level where they can leave you to start their own. But if you know, it’s like, do I hire just well enough that they’re going to stay and not too good that they’re going to go? But that shouldn’t be it. It should just be that, oh, if they leave, that means they’re leaving for a better opportunity. And ultimately, what do you want for your employees? The best opportunity they can have. So we’ve lost many people because they’re so good that they can go do this on their own. So great. We encourage it, we push it. So why not bring a leader who can, you know, have that same? And if they take ago elsewhere, okay.

31:58
Shane Humble
You know, there’s so much work here in South Florida that it’s not necessarily a concern. And I’ve given actual jobs to these employees who have left that are maybe too small for us but in their niche or their niche. And it comes around. It all comes around.

32:12
Robert Murray
So, yo, I love it. And the idea, too, that, like, I think some people just think they can do more all the time, and eventually you end up getting stretched too thin. So if you don’t have somebody coming to lead the charge on a new initiative, it could just fizzle, you know, even if it’s a good fit. And the idea, though, like, I mean, it’s through and through. In the 40 minutes, we’ve been talking about positivity and mindset around abundance and what’s possible. You know, you hear so many people griping about how someone was there as a right hand for six or seven years, and they start their own thing, and I’m competing with my direct competitor, and you’re sitting there being like, no, let’s just grow people, help people, have better lives, be their best self.

32:54
Robert Murray
If they go and do their own thing, that’s almost like a win because you’ve grown somebody to the point where they have the confidence to step out on their own. I think there’s a lot People can learn from that approach because you went from 4 to 530 with the mindset of helping people grow. So I just think it’s. That’s beautiful. Really?

33:12
Shane Humble
Yeah. Parents definitely instill that very positive people.

33:15
Robert Murray
Awesome. So resource, an author, a speaker, somebody that kind of hits you over the head. Parents. But maybe somebody outside of that, the one that you draw inspiration from, would want to share it with people. What would you say?

33:29
Shane Humble
Yeah, my parents. So, my dad is an author. He’s passed away. My mom, I have a biological dad in England. My mom is here. My mom is just the center of positivity and meditates. You know, a great all-around leader. And then, you know, my dad was an author and wrote self-help books. You know, I’ve got one of his quotes on my back, which says, “It’s never crowded along the extra mile.” You know, you just work hard, just put it in and do what you say you’re going to do. Show up when you say you’re going to show up. And things fall in place. So, you know, I would definitely just say that’s kind of the mantra for here: just go that extra mile.

34:12
Robert Murray
“It’s never crowded on the extra mile.”

34:14
Shane Humble
“Never crowded along the extra mile.”

34:16
Robert Murray
Oh man, that’s so good. I’m writing that down because I gotta use that for when we share this. Shane, thank you so much for doing this, man. This is just a great 45 minutes, man.

34:30
Shane Humble
Appreciate you. Yeah, thank you, Rob. Appreciate it.

34:32
Robert Murray
And thanks for everybody listening to another episode of the IM Landscape Growth podcast.