In today's episode, we're going to help you be prepared for the spring recruiting rush. We're going to answer questions about employee referral bonuses. Are they worth it? Do they work? And what might cause somebody not to refer one of their friends to work at your company despite a referral bonus? We're going to talk about how to reactivate previous applicants. So people, maybe they applied last year and you couldn't hire them, or they went and worked somewhere else. I'm going to share some personal stories about how that's worked for me and how to bring back your seasonal workers, people who may have been laid off for the winter. I'm going to share a story, one of the best stories I've heard about a landscape company that does something to bring people back, and some of the top trends in recruiting for 2024 to be aware of, so you have a great spring.
My name's Jack Jostes, and welcome to The Landscaper's Guide Podcast, where we share sales, marketing, and leadership inspiration to help you grow your snow and landscape company. Hey, before we get into this episode, I want to let you know that you could be eating beef jerky right now. I will send you... Where is it? I found it. A Landscaper's Marketing Toolbox we’ll ship it to you in the mail with the Landscaper's Marketing Field Guide. You can read it. It'll help you figure out which marketing to focus on first and how it relates to recruiting while enjoying a bag of my favorite beef jerky. So tell me where to ship it at landscapersguide.com/toolbox, and see a link in our show notes that you can click on.
Hey, Everyone. Welcome back to The Landscaper's Guide Podcast, where we share sales, marketing, and leadership inspiration to help you grow your snow and landscape company. Today, I'm excited to have a repeat collaborator to The Landscaper's Guide. He's presented at The Landscaper's Summit. He's presented at Win The Spring. We've done numerous collaborations. It's Dave Pacifico. He is the co-founder of Team Engine, which is an incredible software that helps you recruit and retain your employees. Ramblin Jackson is a partner with Team Engine. They're one of the few softwares that I truly recommend to all of my clients because it works. It helps people with recruiting and retention. It's so important. Today, I want to interview Dave. We're heading into spring, and I want you to get some ideas and tactics. Even if you're not using Team Engine, I know that these are going to be things that'll help you fill your staff for the spring. So, Dave, welcome back to the show.
02:44: Welcome Back, Dave Pacifico from Team Engine
Yeah, thanks, Jack. I'm super excited to be here, and I always love our collaboration. We always have interesting conversations, so thanks for having me.
Jack Jostes:
Yeah, I'm glad you're here. So one of the things that I was curious about was for snow and landscape companies, especially ones that are seasonal, meaning maybe they just took, maybe they don't do snow, or maybe they don't retain their whole staff. What are some of the things that our audience can do to get their people back that maybe took the winter off?
03:17: Why Landscapers Should Stay in Contact with Seasonal Staff
Dave Pacifico:
Yeah, I think at times the winter can feel like a time to take a breath. For a lot of landscapers, they work so hard during the busy season and it's a time to take a little bit of a break, but really, because that summertime, and that's the spring all the way through summer and fall, is so intense, you really have to be preparing for it and engaged in it year-round. So we really encourage, if you do have to lay off some of your staff or scale back during the winter, it's really important to stay connected to them. If they have a birthday that falls in the off-season, wish them a happy birthday. Make sure that you set expectations about when you're going to be ramping back up and that you expect to have a job for them on the other side of that off season so that they don't necessarily go off somewhere else, but they're going to be there to rejoin you when you're ready to ramp up again. Really staying connected to them is very important through the off-season.
Jack Jostes:
I agree. Like you said, for many people, it can be a breather. I think not only for landscape company owners, but many employees enjoy taking that wintertime break. Do you know of any companies? I am thinking of a client of mine who had a spring kickoff where she would have a party and she would give her team boots, and that was you'd come to this spring kickoff and when you came they had a return bonus, so they actually paid you a thanks for coming back to work bonus and they gave boots away and they made a fun communal event out of it. Have you heard of any companies doing anything similar?
05:01: How a Return Bonus Incentivizes Staff & Keeps Hiring Costs Low
Dave Pacifico:
Yeah, that's a great example. It's one of the best I've heard actually. It's smart because, if you think about it, how much is it going to cost you to find another person, train that person, and ramp them up? It feels like an expense paying a little bonus, a return bonus, something like that. But it's a heck of a lot cheaper and better for your business than trying to find new people and train them. So we've heard similar things. I think anything you can do, whether it's a party, a giveaway, any kind of gathering like that, the personal aspect of it makes a really big difference. I'm not just looking to fill my staff. I'm excited to have you back. You, as an individual that's worked for me before, I value the work that you do for me, and things like you just mentioned can be a great way to do that.
Jack Jostes:
One of the things that you mentioned there was the cost of acquiring a new employee, and I don't think many people think about this, so can we talk about some of the financials of what should my recruiting budget be? And one of the things before we pressed record that we talked about was literally the daily cost of not having a person in that position.
Dave Pacifico:
Yeah.
06:09: How to Plan Your Recruiting Budget in 2024
Jack Jostes:
So can you talk to me a little bit about some of the financial aspect of recruiting?
Dave Pacifico:
Yeah, I think it's very easy for people to see the cost that they put in, the amount of money that they pay Indeed to promote their job or that they pay an agency to advertise. However, they are spending literal dollars to get applicants or employees in the door. That's the easy thing to see. The harder thing to see is the overtime that you're paying somebody because you're not fully staffed, or you're maybe even turning away business, or you're failing to grow and meet your market demand because you don't have an extra crew that you could have. Oftentimes, the difference there is actually thousands of dollars. So we like to think about the cost of a vacancy on a day-by-day basis. So there's a difference between hiring somebody today or this week versus hiring somebody in a month. You're missing a month of business or you're paying a month of overtime to somebody, and it just adds up really fast and is in the hundreds. It kind of depends on your business and where you are, but it's very easily in the hundreds of dollars a day in most cases.
Jack Jostes:
Yeah, I think that's a really good point. I remember talking with a client who was heavily reliant on H2B Visas, and the one year they didn't get them, they said that they had to turn away $1 million in work.
Dave Pacifico:
Yeah.
07:39: Communication Strategies to Follow Up with Previous Applicants
Jack Jostes:
One of the things that I liked that we've talked about in addition to getting your previous hires, I'm sorry, the people from last year, the seasonal people who left, getting them back. Talk to me a little bit about past applicants and how can we tap into that.
Dave Pacifico:
Yeah, honestly, we think about the hiring process and your employees in general just like you would think about customers. So if you think about the processes that you go through in marketing your business and selling it to new customers, it's very analogous to applicants and employees. So if you have a bunch of leads and they were good leads, they just didn't work out at that time. Maybe they weren't ready to buy or they went with a different company. You don't just forget about them forever. You go back to them in three months and say, "Hey, how's it working out with that new company?" It's the same thing with applicants.
If you go back to last season as you're getting ready to ramp up for this season and you find all the people that maybe they took another job because it paid $1 more, an hour, $2 more an hour, or it just wasn't the right time for them, the timing didn't work out, but they seemed like they were qualified and you'd be happy to talk to them again, that's a great pool of people to start with. Now, you have to be sort of organized enough and have that data in such a way that you can use it, but it's a great way to start rather than just starting from scratch and trying to get applicants in the top of your funnel.
Jack Jostes:
Yeah, I really like that. So reactivating, and I think since you mentioned sales and marketing, you can do this with cold leads that have maybe... And maybe you dropped the ball.
Dave Pacifico:
Right.
Jack Jostes:
Let's be honest, a lot of landscape companies. They get slammed, they get inundated with leads.
Dave Pacifico:
Yep.
Jack Jostes:
The industry is unfortunately notorious for people no showing home visits or not sending the proposal. I think that it can be easy to be too embarrassed to reach back out if you've done that. I know of a lot of people who reactivate business. They just start up a conversation like, "Hey, did you ever finish that patio project?" So I think the same thing is true with recruiting. You can reach back out to the people who didn't. Maybe they fell off, they just fell off in communication on either side, or they took a job, and I wanted to share that this has worked for me personally.
In fact, we just celebrated a three-year, what we call a Ramblerversary for someone. This person applied for a position at my company, did great with the interview, but I could tell that they weren't... It was more that the position that they applied for wasn't the right fit for that person. I let them know that I remember calling them. I'm like, "Hey, I could see you working here, and I don't think this is the right position for you." And then maybe six months later or eight months later something, we had a different position open up that we didn't even have. I called that person, and I was like, "Hey, we talked. You applied in the past." And they accepted the job offer, and they've been here for three years.
Dave Pacifico:
Yeah, that's awesome.
Jack Jostes:
So that was part of what I did in my system. I tag people that I know, or sometimes we end up deciding and we hire somebody, but I have a bunch of really good applicants, and I'll tag them as people that we follow up with. One person actually left the company for a period, and they went and worked somewhere else. Time went by, and a lot had changed, and I just called to check in with them and be like, "Hey, here's what we're doing. Here's what's different. How's it going with what you're doing?" And they're like, "Actually, not that great." And we started working together again. So I really like that strategy of reaching out to past applicants.
Dave Pacifico:
It really just builds up over time. Your employee base has and your applicants have the ability to be your biggest headwind and your biggest challenge, or vice versa. They have the ability to be your biggest tailwind and avenue for growth. So if you're being diligent and following up with people and nurturing the people that you hire and you interact with, then that pays off in a lot of different ways, whether you get that person back or that person knows somebody who needs a job that they think of you as a good employer that they want their friends working for. Maybe they refer somebody. It just snowballs over time.
12:30: How Landscapers Can Prepare For the Spring Recruiting Rush
Jack Jostes:
Yeah, definitely. So what are some things that people can do to get ready for spring? So specific, from an actual tactical standpoint, how are you recommending that people go out and recruit in 2024?
Dave Pacifico:
Yeah, I think I would really start... I'm a numbers person. I think I would really start with, "Okay, what do we expect in terms of the staffing that we're going to need to get the season going and the way that we want, the growth that we want to see?" And then how many people do we have in our pool of people that we had to let go of or scale back from last year, and how many can we recapture potentially, and what's my success outcome and my not so good? And then, can I mine my existence? Basically, go through that. Where am I going to get all these people from? It's not, "Hope is not a strategy." As I like to say. So if I need to hire 50 people in the first few weeks of March or the last couple of weeks of February, I don't want to just assume that I'm going to turn on my Indeed job and pay them a bunch of money, and they're all going to come.
I need to create a diversified strategy of how I'm going to find those people I'm going to use. I'm going to post signs with these QR codes and hope I can get two or three that way, and then I'm going to run this radio ad, and I'm going to do this. So this portfolio need to get 25 new people. I need to recapture 20 people from last season and then break it down into where those people are going to come from, and what are the activities that you or your team are going to go through to try to make that happen? What kind of budget are you going to need to make that happen? And have that lined up ahead of time so that you're not trying to do everything at once.
Jack Jostes:
Do you recommend that? Let's just use that 50 number. Let's pretend that a company... And I have some clients who do need to hire 50 in the spring. I have some that need to hire 2, 4, or 10, but whatever the number is, do you recommend having a budget per head or how do you figure out how much to spend on your recruiting?
Dave Pacifico:
Yeah, it's a great question. Yeah, I think it is going to come down to your margins and profitability too, and what you expect to the business you expect to be able to serve with those people. So I think I would personally think about it from top down in that way. What can we spend to bring on this team if we are then able to execute this amount of business from it? And then, okay, how do I break that down into the different components of my strategy that are going to get me those people? Some are going to be more expensive than others, so it might cost me more to go after this source than this other. So it's going to be cheapest to go recapture people that have worked for you before. So each additional person that you recaptured from last season, there's one fewer person you have to get through Indeed or get through something you have to pay for fresh, so you can kind of work out the strategy that way.
Jack Jostes:
Yeah, I like that. Again, starting with the low hanging fruit, starting with the leads that people that you already have are always going to cost the least to acquire in your marketing cost. I was just hosting our mastermind yesterday, and one of my clients is expanding their commercial maintenance department. We learned that they have a fair amount of commercial holiday lighting clients, and I was like, "Why don't you just go and sell them first?" And they had already thought of that, but I think they were planning to do a lot of other marketing, and I was actually... I think a lot of times the people you're already working with are the most likely, from a customer standpoint, to buy the next service, or employees for sure to work with you. What do you think about recruiting referral bonuses, like if you refer a friend, you get x?
16:18: How to Effectively Use Recruiting Referral Bonuses
Dave Pacifico:
I get this question a lot, and my perspective is that the most, and what we see with our customers is that the people who are most successful at driving referrals and getting employees through referrals are not the ones that necessarily pay the most money for those referrals. They're the ones that build a great culture, and their employees love working there. They know that they're hiring, and they know how to refer somebody. So it's to make it a great place to work and then make it really easy to refer somebody, and what action that employee needs to take to make that referral because people want to work with good people, they want their friends to have good jobs, and they want their family members to have good jobs.
So can a couple of hundred bucks potentially push it over the line? Yeah, in some cases, but I don't think it's the be-all, end-all that a lot of people think that it is, and I definitely think it's a mistake, the companies who say, "We don't have the budget to do a referral incentive, so we're not really going to spend effort pushing for referrals." Because I really think you can be successful in some capacity even without any kind of incentive, just letting people know, "Hey, we're growing. We need your help. We would love to add more great team members to our team."
Jack Jostes:
One of the things that you said was knowing how to refer.
Dave Pacifico:
Yes.
Jack Jostes:
What do you mean by that?
17:36: How Team Engine Makes it Easy for Employees Refer Potential Applicants
Dave Pacifico:
Yeah, so sometimes it's okay, "Hey, we're hiring. We love your referrals." And then companies like, "Do I tell our office person? Do I tell my referral to mention me in the interview? How do I go about doing that?" Then you can get paralyzed and not take any action as a result. So just for example, Team Engine allows you to send a specific link out to each text, a specific link out to each employee that gives them a very simple form that says, "Hey, I'm referring Jack for the foreman job." And it makes that whole connection for you. It just makes it really easy. And so there's no ambiguity about how I go about making that referral.
Jack Jostes:
Literally, instructions for your employees on how to refer is so important. What I like that you said about Team Engine is, it literally texts. Your employees get a text message. So one of the things that I do at Ramblin Jackson is I build out a page on my website for each position, and then when I'm hiring, I even write copy and paste messages that have that link in it, and I tell my team, "Hey, we're hiring for this position. We have this referral bonus. Here's a copy and paste message." And I write it in a casual way that's like, "Hey, in case anyone who might be interested, our company's hiring for this position."
Dave Pacifico:
Yeah.
Jack Jostes:
That's a little different from texting Dave, "Hey, Dave, we're hiring. Do you want to apply?" And of course, if it comes up in conversation then people have it, but I think in any case, having whether you're using Team Engine's program, which I definitely recommend, or you're building the pages, giving your employees clear, literally texting it to them so they can copy and paste it and text it to somebody else's is a great way of making it easy to refer people.
19:42: Why Company Culture is So Important for Recruiting
Jack Jostes:
So you mentioned culture just now, and it's something I think really the gist of it is, you have to first be a good place to work.
Dave Pacifico:
Yes.
Jack Jostes:
You have to, in order for your team to feel good about referring you... Culture is also this nebulous thing. I guess what I'm getting at is, how do we measure? Is it measuring employee engagement? Is it employee Net Promoter Score? How do we as business people get a sense of how is my culture actually doing, and how would I know if it wasn't good?
Dave Pacifico:
Yeah, that's a great question. Certainly, there are some of the more analytical ways of doing it, like employer NPS, and I've seen companies do that. I don't think that's the only way. There's the more... Some of the qualitative approaches. Lots of our customers say, "I can feel it. I walk into the office in the morning and there's just way more energy here." And so I do think there's a little bit of a qualitative aspect to it, but just gathering feedback. It's ironic because a lot of the things that help you measure culture actually contribute to a positive culture as well. So things like consistently giving your employees the opportunity to provide feedback and then acting on that feedback. Gathering, it's going to both help you identify gaps that you have that you need to improve. Then it's also going to reinforce your employees that you actually care about their opinions and care about their feedback. That, in turn, improves the culture and the connectedness.
It often comes through frankly in your customer feedback as well. That's the goal at the end of the day, it comes through in your retention numbers, it comes through in your referral numbers, and comes through in your customer engagement and your customer satisfaction as well. That's the whole point. That's why your employees can be such a strong force for growth for your company, or they can be such a strong barrier to growth for your company, depending on which direction you're heading.
Jack Jostes:
Yeah, I think the feedback opportunity and the conversations that, whether you're tracking Net Promoter Score, I do employee Net Promoter Score, and I find that it often leads to really productive conversations. So is it the score, or is it the conversation that... The score just creates an opportunity in some ways for the conversation, but it's really that conversation that's, I think, important.
Dave Pacifico:
Yeah, I see the score is the potential canary in the coal mine, at least on the negative side or positive reinforcement, "Oh, this trend is negative." This causes me to stop and make sure that I'm understanding the reason for that and then taking action on it. But it's that follow-up that I think really is the most important thing.
Jack Jostes:
Dave, you've shared a lot of knowledge bombs and good ideas today.
Dave Pacifico:
I hope so.
22:42: Dave’s Predictions on the 2024 Recruiting Season
Jack Jostes:
As we wrap up here, I'm curious. What do you think is going to be different in 2024? What are, maybe, some trends that you're sensing as we head into the season?
Dave Pacifico:
Yeah, I think this has been a trend for a number of years now, but the companies that are doing the best are the ones that are really changing their mindset about the balance of work between the employee and the employer. Meaning they're providing much more personalized experiences. They're treating their employees as individuals that have individual career goals and have their own things going on in their life. It matters understanding those things and doing your best to tailor their employee experience based on that understanding. Just with each year, I'd say at least five or more years now where I've seen this trend very clearly, and I think it just accelerates with each passing year.
So the companies that are going to do really well in 2024 are the ones that are going to recognize that and really motivate their employees as individuals. The ones that are going to struggle are the ones that are just going to try to pay their way out of it or just pay a couple dollars more an hour, treat them the same way that we always have thought of these businesses, and then hope that something changes. It's not going to work.
Jack Jostes:
Yeah. Dave, thanks so much for sharing, and it's been a pleasure having you on the show. So hopefully, people listening, I hope you all got some good ideas. Dave, for people who want to network with you, where can we learn more?
23:37: How to Get Started with Team Engine for Employee Recruiting
Dave Pacifico:
Yeah, so you can always send me an email at dave.pacifico@teamengine.io. I would love to hear from you all. Teamengine.io is our website. Jack, I think you have a landing page as well.
Jack Jostes:
Yeah, absolutely. So we are a partner of Team Engine, and you can learn more about that at landscapersguide.com/teamengine. We've partnered with Team Engine. It's built into a recruiting product that we've created where we help people. We help you figure out who is your Hell Yes Employee and what are the three reasons they would want to work for you. We help people with a variety of things, video testimonials, copywriting, job ads, and then we bake it all into Team Engine, which helps you collect responses, manage your recruiting pipeline, text message people, push out your job ads everywhere quickly.
Also, the other thing I like about Team Engine is the ability to keep in touch and have those conversations. So for the people who are listening that have 100 employees, wow, that's a lot of people-
Dave Pacifico:
Really hard.
Jack Jostes:
... to keep track of. Even if you have a really great crew lead or management team, Team Engine allows you to check in with those people via text message, which has just proven to be a very powerful way to communicate, and it has a bilingual component as well. So I think it's really, really cool. So check it out. Anyways, Dave, thanks so much.
Dave Pacifico:
Yeah, thanks. I appreciate that.
Jack Jostes:
I'll put links to that in your email and everything in our show notes. So, Dave, thanks so much again for coming on the show.
Dave Pacifico:
Great. Thanks for having me, Jack. Really appreciate it, always.
Jack Jostes:
I really appreciate the partnership with Team Engine. We've collaborated with many people on our team, including Dave, who has presented at events, lots of great ideas, and overall, the Ramblin Jackson, Team Engine partnership will help you literally get applicants. So I'd love to share more with you about that. So check it out at landscapersguide.com/teamengine. As a reminder, I'd love to send you some beef jerky. So grab your marketing toolbox. See our show notes for a link to landscapersguide.com/toolbox. My name's Jack Jostes, and I look forward to talking with you next week on The Landscaper's Guide.
Show Notes:
Watch the full episode + see the transcript at: https://landscapersguide.com/podcast/
Tell us where to send your beef jerky: https://landscapersguide.com/toolbox
Learn more about Team Engine: https://landscapersguide.com/teamengine
Connect with Team Engine on LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/team-engine/
Email Dave Pacifico: dave.pacifico@teamengine.io