Episode 51: Do You Hold Your Cleaning Technicians Accountable For Their Performance?

As a cleaning business owner it's your job and your supervisors' job to hold your cleaning technicians accountable for their performance. But that's easier said than done. Here are some tips for making sure you're holding up your end of the bargain.

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Episode #51 - Video Transcription

Are you holding your cleaning technicians accountable for their performance? It seems like a fairly easy concept if you think about it. You hire an employee, explain what the job is and what the rules are, and expect that they'll do what they're supposed to do! Unfortunately, it doesn't usually work out the way we hoped, and it's our job and our supervisors' jobs to hold our cleaning technicians accountable for their job performance. But here's the problem.

Usually what happens is, a small performance issue arises, like the employee takes too long of a break. So you may or may not say anything because you figure it's part of the employee's learning curve. Then something else happens, like being late for work and not calling to let you know.

It's not really related to the first problem, so you let it slide. Then a third thing happens that you DO address with the employee, but it doesn't really get fixed. And finally, the first problem comes up again and you start to realize that pattern may be forming. So you decide to wait a little longer to see if it's a serious pattern, or just a few small things that you're making too big a deal out of.

If this sounds at all familiar, chances are, you're not doing as much as you could to hold your cleaning technicians accountable for their performance. It's your job to hold your employees accountable, even for the minor issues. The longer you wait to let your employees know there's a problem, the larger the problem becomes when we finally do address it with them.

How many times will you allow an employee to be late for work before you finally say something? How many times will you allow an employee to be rude to a coworker before you intervene? How many times will you allow an employee to make personal phone calls while working before you tell them that this is unacceptable behavior? The more you let your employees bend the rules without saying anything, the more they think it's okay to do this.

A lot of cleaning business owners would rather role model the expected behavior in hopes that the employee will follow suit. And that's great, you should be a role model for the expected behavior. But that isn't always enough. Sometimes the employees just don't get the nonverbal messages you're trying to send.

So what's an owner to do? First, don't wait to address the problem. Talk to the employee as soon as it occurs. If you wait until several things happen, well then you've got a laundry list of things to address with the employee and they'll feel like you're ganging up up on them with all these different issues.

Second, set the stage for accountability with new employees. Let them know that your style is to give feedback as it occurs. Tell them that your goal is to give positive feedback because you want them to succeed in their job, so you're going to let them know how to accomplish this. And if they need coaching, you're going to point out the problem area and help them solve it. If they realize that you're holding them accountable up front, it will be a more positive experience for everyone involved.

Now this probably isn't going to work for everyone because there's always that person that really doesn't care, and all the coaching in the world isn't going to turn this person around. If this is the case, it may be time to let that person go. Just make sure you've done your due diligence by documenting the unacceptable behavior.

So what I want you to do now is rate yourself on a scale of 1 to 10; 1 being low and 10 being high; on how effectively you hold your people accountable for their job performance. If you're not happy with your rating, then it's time to make some changes in your own behavior when it comes to holding your employees accountable.

Check out our Customer Service Training Program for Cleaning Technicians if you'd like to start training your employees on how to provide exceptional customer service.