Okay so i need some honest feedback from you lovely lot on here.
My first full time employee has been working with me for just over a year. It's been a bit of a learning curve but overall i would say he is a good employee. He works hard and long hours, never turns up late, has a good attitude and a great work ethic and is fully understanding of how i need to run my business and he is totally honest which above all else is very important to me. There has been a few issues in the past where his technique was not up to standard, and he was occasionally missing simple things that can often make a difference, this was more in the early days the first 2-3 months of him working. He has improved alot and as of July this year he has been going out in my main van by himself.
I was reluctant to send him out alone because i am a control freak and i was terrified that somehow he would crash the van or upset customers and do a bad job! Generally speaking none of those things have happened and actually i am quite happy with the general arrangement we have going.
The problems though have started in the last 3-4 months. We have had a total of 8 complaints. Lost atleast 3 if not 4 customers out of those complaints, the others have generally been resolved. My first problem is how do you validate complaints when you are no longer out doing the job? I need to listen to what the customer has to say, and then find out from my employee whats happened. Ive had complaints in the past personally which were not valid. I.e customer complaining about quality, but it turned out there inside windows were dirty, or they had perished rubber seals around glass or window units where blown etc.
How can i validate complaints to the best of my ability before passing judgement that my employee has infact done a sub par job?
Some of these complaints where we lost the customer, i validated the complaints personally and could tell that the customer was extremely picky, however other complaints it was obvious that my employee had done a sub par job. Most complaints where either, the odd window had runs or streaks (kitchen or living room most common) or the odd sill was missed and still had bits on it.
The problem i have is that 95% of my customers to the best of my ability are very happy with my employee. I regularly get texts or phone calls praising my employee saying they think he does a great job. Even today had several customers say how happy they always are with the service by my employee.
So the inconsistency is confusing me. Alot of customers praising my employee whilst out of a customer base of around 500 customers we are averaging 2-3 complaints a month in last 3-4 months.
I told my employee that as he was working alone by himself he would naturally have to speed things up. I need my employee to bring in around £250 a day in my eyes to make it worthwhile having him out in the van by himself. I am wondering if some of these complaints are because he is slightly rushing around to make sure these targets are hit every day and because of this quality sometimes dips, and in most cases 90%+ of customers dont care as they are not extremely picky. Its the picky ones who are complaining generally.
Now i am worried, if i tell my employee he needs to slow down a bit and be extra careful this will result in him doing about 20-25% less work per day. Quality will increase but then he will only be doing £200 of work per day, as opposed to £250.
So one part of me is thinking right all that matters is that we are offering a service of perfection, but in doing so we will be doing alot less work per day, and another part of me is saying, i am running a business here i need to make money above all else or everything is pointless, if we have to sacrifice a small minor part of quality in order to make more money, there is a part of me that is okay with that.
I know a few windies that do £200 a day solo and do a perfect job, absolutely 100%. However i know a few windies that are doing £300-£350 a day, and they are not perfect, they are a wee bit splash and dash, but 90% of customers dont even notice or seem to care. I even know a guy who does £350 a day 4 days a week based in north wales where this is very hard to achieve all domestic. He gets complaints atleast 4 or 5 a month. But he does not care, because he brings in new customers faster than ones he loses, so he is happy to sacrifice quality in order to have more money from his business and provide for his family more. Thoughts?
So what is the best way to be? I can't decide.
As i am trying to grow my business though with employees i need to make sure there is some quality control, really could do with some advice. I dont want to be getting a bad name from complaints ofcourse.
I haven't sat down with my employee yet and had a proper heart to heart as i dont know what the best way to resolve this is. I want to sit down before christmas and sort this out, so we can have a clean start for January 2019 firm in our resolve.
throw your thoughts at me guys, i am especially interested from those who have employees who can understand what i am going through.
Thanks
