Mistakes and Lessons When Working from Home, Growing a Company in a New World Order, Embracing our New Reality
"You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete."
I got a message yesterday morning, what are you guys up to this afternoon? I replied, open at 5:00; do you want to hike? We met Joshua at Meyers Ranch and walked for 2 miles. Joshua is our friend, an Elon Musk type individual with insight from another universe. We walked, he spoke, he asked questions, he is looking for a new journey, it is fun to watch him live.
We shared how our company pivoted, changed, evolved, and some of the new things we were doing. He asked if we would pen a few thoughts on what we did right, but more importantly, what we did wrong. These last 60 days have been a wild ride, but we have learned some valuable lessons. We are confident that we will come out of this stronger than when we entered.
We did underestimate the severity of the situation. In early March, we should have shuttered our offices earlier; hindsight is 20/20. We did have a teammate contract COVID; I blame myself had we shut down earlier; he may have avoided the disease.
I think we did a poor job of communicating with our vendors. We were ahead of the curve with our team and clients sending daily email and a personal video, but I think our vendors were out of our loop, we have made some changes to rectify the error, lesson learned.
I could go on about our mistakes, but I'm more proud of our pivots, our changes that have allowed our company to continue to thrive, and maybe, just maybe, be more efficient. In mid-March, we shuttered our physical locations. Employees were asked to stay home, work using the tools we provided. Each employee is given a laptop and iPhone when hired. We have been telecommuting for a few years, but this was the first time we did not have physical offices in operation.
We had a team call early on, a Zoom call where every employee joined and listened to our game plan. Our instructions were simple. Your workday is no longer from 8:00 to 5:00. We are in a new paradigm, do your work as you see fit, get your job done, but if you need a break, take a break. If you want to work at night, work at night, our new reality was, just get your job done.
We have a policy in our company; if you get an email from a client, you must respond, acknowledge, and set up an expected time frame of action. We asked that they answered their phones, but we were not going to micromanage their work. We hire smart, curious people, we don't need to check if our team is continuously working, we only hire self-starters.
We found that having a weekly Zoom call helps build and keep our culture. The meeting is held every Wednesday at noon Eastern Time, 10:00 Moutain Time. The meeting is lead by our operations manager, he starts, gives a personal update and then he selects another team member, they give their update and pick the next team member. We usually take 45 minutes for our check in's. We may or may not have some agency information; the call is about our team, not about us.
Our operations manager hosted a trivia night. About 2/3'rds of our staff joined us one evening for a cocktail and trivia competition. We did it virtually; it was a blast. I think we will do this again. We began a new offering this week, Bay, our latest hire, now leads our team in a daily 33-minute virtual workout. We don't mandate our team to join, but yesterday we had five join, we even had a client and friend jump in and join our workout.
We realized that we could work effectively from home, not just a few, but all of us. The entire team is a hive using the tools available to get our work done. I've written before, think about 20 employees, all driving an average of 30 minutes to work each day. We just gained 10 hours. Add to that our producers or salespeople were driving two hours a day to appointments; this time has been reclaimed. All our meetings are now virtual, giving our team more time to focus and be more efficient.
We are now meeting with all our vendors every month for 30 minutes. Our team connecting with their team, we have a plan, they have a plan, it's good to put a face with a name, and we keep it light. We have stronger relationships with our partners today than before this event started.
I do not think we will ever return to how we worked before this crisis. In some ways, it was a welcome forced analysis of how inefficient we were working. The time I have saved, I invested in starting another company. I had the building blocks but never had the time or motivation to pull the trigger.
Financially we had our best month ever in April; we continue adding new clients via virtual meetings. We've found people are more open today to review their risk management portfolio. Our team continues to prospect for new opportunities; we have increased our investment in digital marketing and started a new direct mail campaign that might turn a few heads.
Now is a time of innovation and reinvention. As business owners, we can take the old ways and improve upon them. Using the tools and technology available today allows for a service company of any size to work from home. We are forecasting a negative financial impact in 2021, we are planning, we are adjusting our expenses to meet that challenge, but have a long runway to work out our kinks and prepare for the inevitable.
Well, Joshua, I hope I hit the high marks. Thank you for the hike, the insight, the questions, the conversation. We love you and are so fortunate you as our friend and mentor. You inspire and make us better humans; we can't wait to see where your next journey takes you and maybe how you can change and improve our community.
"You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete."