Oh my, I could write a book on this subject
the last person I employed was Squeaky and I ended out selling him just about all of the domestic work I had left!
At one point I had 4 guys working for me and over an 17 year period I must have had 70 or 80 people at least make a start.
The frustration of finding someone reliable drives you round the bend, and if they last more than a day or 2 it takes about 3 months before you have them properly trained up and able to do a consistantly good job at a reasonable speed.
At the very beginning you will find yourself cleaning all of the upstairs, most of the downstairs and then going over the couple of windows they have managed to clean picking up their mistakes.
You have to show them just how to use a squeegee properly, I have even held the hand of a new operative and guided them around the pane of glass
Once upon a time I had pairs working for me, or sometimes 3 of them, I soon learned the most efficient way of getting work out of them.
Separate them and have them working by themselves.
Even if you have just the one working for you, once you have spent all that time nursemaiding them and getting them up to speed, drop them off on clusters of houses (if they don't drive (and sometimes even if they do!)) with ladders, bucket and scrims, give them a target and leve them too it.
For a while you are still spending half your time going back to check on the work they have done, if you find a mistake or a sill unwiped then you send them back to do it again, or even the whole house .
You will rarely do as much work as you used to do because you have to check up on them to make sure standards are being kept, also you will have to be picking them up and dropping them off.
If they stay long enough, eventually you will be paying them petrol money to use their own car, buying them a ladder rack and just giving them their work list at the start of the day.
If you are doing lots of large(ish) commercial stuff then you will be supplying them with a van and sending them out fully equipped, you will be employing them properly, minimum wage (almost certainly somewhat above the legal minimum too), bonus schemes (essential for incentive), paying out for expensive Employers liability insurance and so on and so on.
2 people working together will NEVER do the same amount of work as 2 people working separately.
Over the years I put an awful lot of effort into time and motion studies, there are times when the job calls for more than one person, and when 2 are working together, getting the most out of them is an art in itself.
And of course if they last a year or two they will eventually realise that they can work for themselves and keep ALL of the money
At least 6 of my 'ex' employees are still going strong with their own window cleaning business.
After Squeaks I gave up
Not bothering to employ now...though I have a feeling I will be employing a son later this year...sigh...just as I'm starting to earn good money by myself, have a round filled up with just the right amount of work I am going to have to emerse myself back into a huge drive to pick up double the work I now have.
Which will mean paying out loads of wonga to equip son with WFP...a damn sight more expensive than a ladder, a BOAB, pouches, applicator, squeegee and a couple of scrims
Ian
