November 2021 Freedom Report with Coach Josh

I recorded "A New Freedom Vision" in May, just 6 months ago. It was a bold proclamation. I could not go to Florida for a month, while scheduled to clean 2 days per week. I had to grow a team. I interviewed Josh Melton for my podcast in June ("The Cleaning Road to Nineveh with Josh Melton") and immediately asked him to coach me. I was ready for the challenge and I was ready to show you all that I could do it. Let me cut right to it. It's 6 months later and we have 0 new clients and 0 new employees. In fact, we have at least $1,000 per month less in cash flow because our expenses went up as we've been building to scale. There are 3 topics to discuss on this episode and unfortunately, I don't have a clip from Coach Josh. His best stuff was on the final coaching call before Thanksgiving and it wasn't recorded. His call-out was tough and I'll share that first.

Josh's Call Out!
I have set out from the beginning of this journey in 2021 to grow my commercial cleaning company in the niche and model I choose. I want weekly, small office clients that I can stack up and complete on weekends. I don't want office cleaning to think about during the week. This preference has held me back from going after bigger revenue accounts or recommending to offices a multi-day pricing option of two. This fully surfaced when Josh was helping me with a quote for a 10,000 square foot showroom with offices. They have a cleaner twice per week that they want to replace. It has 6 restrooms and I'm positioning the price options to sell the weekly option to fit into the perfect schedule I want. Josh hit me hard with this. "Ken, what do you want? Your dream of Florida or your preferred business model? Make it work. Get the revenue. Clean however it comes. Weekly, twice weekly, 5x per week. More people want to work weeknights over weekends. Get up the job ads. Get to work and be scrappy. Make it happen. Just because you choose this now, it doesn’t mean you need to keep it this way.  Don’t choose your preferred business model over your dream. You need revenue. Your preferred business model is weekly offices on weekends. You don’t want to work or operate your business on weeknights. I get that. I was like that too. I realized that more nights per week equals more revenue. I'd rather have less clients and more revenue. You're playing too small all in the name of keeping your preferred business model." This is so true that it stung big time. It's me trying to optimize my business when I'm still an initializer. Why do I keep doing this. I just need to get revenue and team members in the door. This conversation convinced me to offer one of my recent proposals 2 out of 3 options as twice weekly.  By the way, I never answered the question. I choose my dream! I told my wife and she agreed.

My Dream of Florida
Speaking of my dream of Florida, let's discuss that as the second topic. We wanted to go to Florida for a month with our family in the winter, so we rented the house and spent the money. We had plenty of time to get it done in June, but now that December is looming and we are no closer to getting the cash flow needed or the team to do the work, what do we do? I was working like crazy and stepping out of my comfort zone a ton in November and we got a big goose egg out of it. My wife saw that I was stressed and came over to me at my desk and started praying over me. She said something in the prayer that caused me to pause big-time. We never asked our greatest advisor if booking a house in Florida was the right thing to do. We always petition the Lord with our big decisions and every time He is faithful. I've shared on podcast interviews where I was the guest that I write out petitions to God on a regular basis. Then I hold them up as I pray and ask God for answers. Every question has been answered since I began in August 2016. Yet, I didn't do this with this trip to Florida. I didn't realize it at the time, but I was not giving God the opportunity to receive all the glory. If I make the proclamation and I get it done, then I give myself the credit. On the other hand, if I ask God to bless this decision and He does. Then I give Him the credit for us being in Florida. Teresa and I asked God to forgive us for not including Him in our big family decision. I was talking to my friend Billy about this and he said. "You got ahead of God and hoped he'd follow. By asking forgiveness, you slowed down to walk with Him." I loved this answer. Billy warned me not to let this become an easy excuse for why Florida didn't work out. I can blame it on God. I confessed and prayed with Billy. I would humble myself and ask God to bless our decision, then help us get there. I now want to publicly proclaim that whatever happens, I give all the honor and praise to my Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. I will not slow down. I'll treat the next 2 months like a traffic light. If God throws up a red light, we will pull the plug on our trip and lose money to be obedient. But I won't stop hustling. If God gives a green light, I'll hustle. If God gives me a warning or yellow light to proceed with caution... I'll hustle.

My Hustle
The past month has been a whirlwind. I've made initial contact to over 240 local offices. I 've made personal phone calls to at least 75 companies, personal visits to 15, and emailts to the rest. This has resulted in 7 interested in quotes, 4 proposals so far, and no new clients. I continue to make uncomfortable calls every day as my hustle is to contact every single office on my list and even grow it to 300. I want more than just initial contact. I want to personally speak to each office and find out if they are happy with their current cleaning setup. This leads me to the low-hanging fruit that Josh promises me is out there. I am already seeing it. I have also been unafraid to get job posts out there and have recieved close to 20 applicants. Josh showed me a screening process to filter most out. It's amazing how lazy these candidates are. Most want the easiest path to a part time job. I don't want those people. I want action-takers. I want accountable, self-starters. I want professionals. I will keep hustling to find team members, train them, and contact potential customers every day. Florida will merely take an increase of $2,000 in monthly cash flow. I can do this. I will work like it's up to me and pray like it's up to God. That's what I call a yellow light.