Duraclean Journal of Marketing, Management and Technical Topics

Understanding today’s increased business regulations and still being able to respond to a changing business climate were the motivating factors in creating a Duraclean “Peer Management Group.” The idea was to invite Duraclean Franchises with similar business infrastructure; being defined as having a business location, technical as well as administrative employees in addition to people with marketing responsibilities.

Once the criteria of who would be invited to the first round was established, a meaningful agenda was next on the item to be accomplished. We wanted this to be a free exchange of dialog by the attendees, sharing both successes and failures and we understood this type of networking groups already exist within our industry so we looked to make it more.

Personal invitations to the attendees were made in November, 2009. Invitation criteria was based on Duraclean restoration and remediation businesses that have an office facility away from their home, with both inside employees and outside technicians, more than one service truck and have exhibited the desire to grow their business.

As part of the meeting preparations for exhibits and related discussion a “Pre-Meeting Worksheet” was sent to the attendees asking them to bring various examples of what they utilize in their business including administrative forms, handbooks, business procedures, paperwork uniforms, etc.

In addition to the obvious benefit of an open discussion we added a professional consultant to the meeting both as a facilitator and a trainer. As you will read below our first get together dealt with a core business model, so the consultant was a human resources expert. Our next meeting planned for April is on business expansion through marketing; therefore, a representative of the Dale Carnegie Institute will be our consultant to teach us to evaluate what is really happening in the market place.

We held the first Duraclean “Peer Management Group” session on January 28 and 29 at Duraclean Central. It was attended by the following franchisees: Randy Roe, Rick and Tim Criss, Todd Wearsch, Tim Shoup, Al and Tammy Jankowski, Joe Bartz and Jason Sauers. Bradey and Larry Parks who purchased Lane and Shirley Rainwater's Macon, GA franchise were also there as an extension of their Success Institute training.

The session was led by Duraclean President Vince Caffarello and Mary Lynn Fayoumi the President and CEO of the Management Association of Illinois who functioned as the professional business consultant. Attendees at the 2008 Annual Meeting in Las Vegas will remember Mary Lynn’s excellent general session presentation on “Human Resources Best Practices.”

The meeting was a full two days of activities. Vince started by laying out the direction the group was going in for the next two days.

The first session of the day began with filling out the organizational chart which included job descriptions of their various employees, standards of performances, pay grades and benefits and eligibility issues. Mary Lynn was an integral part in leading this part of the presentation.

Later in the afternoon new HR rules and regulations, employee handbooks, job application forms and job interview procedures were covered. Employee training and testing related topics followed. The day concluded with administration topics regarding the handling of incoming calls, scheduling, financial operations and training.

The second day began with marketing and sales of old customers, how to generate add-on sales and considerations in hiring a marketing person. The morning concluded with two concurrently held breakout groups. Rick Criss was the leader of the first group.

Rick's group discussed company image in relation to professional dress; specific uniform considerations for technicians; invoice paperwork components; technician compensation in regard to hourly rates and bonuses for certain types of work; route sheets; expected productivity in carpet cleaning, mold remediation and fire damage restoration; and check-in procedures.

The other group was led by Tammy Jankowski. Their mission was to concentrate on employee training ideas.

Training was broken down into three employee categories including administration, sales and marketing and technicians. For all three an important consideration was the employee’s orientation and introduction to the business. Ideas such as management, marketing and sales seminar attendance, role playing, association memberships, certifications and training and field experience were also debated as they related to each applicable employee group(s).

After lunch everyone got back together and each breakout group reported on their activities. The remainder of the session dealt with producing the work in the field which expanded upon many of the topics discussed by Rick’s group.

After the upcoming April meeting, this fall the participants will visit one of the member’s facilities to evaluate the discussions regarding a working environment. In the future visitations are planned for one or two per year until all of the participants have been through everyone’s business environment.