Life before coaching

When we first started the business, we had no procedures in place.  We were taking on work with no clear direction of where the business was going which meant that business was slow growing although work was coming in.  Work came to us organically, but it was all a little chaotic as we had no systems for setting new clients up and personally, I was overwhelmed, going home from work exhausted after working long hours and trying to do everything myself.  On the cleaning side of the business, I felt was very experienced and good at what we were doing, as we were getting recommendations, but on the business side, I had no normal training or experience and I had to learn and learn fast if I wanted the business to grow.   

Why coaching?

I’ve been looking at coaching for a while and I had read about John online.  I decided to attend a workshop he was running and everything he talked about really resonated with me.  I decided to try a group coaching session to see how I got on and I enjoyed it and felt it would be a great eway to learn and to really bring the business forward.  Coaching has had a big impact on us and as a result of everything I have learned, we are now in our own offices, we have recruitment systems, a payroll system and I wouldn’t have been able to do any of it without John’s coaching. We learn about different areas of business in each coaching session and then find ways to practically apply the learning in our business.  We always come away from group coaching with new ideas and fresh excitement for the business; it helps build you up.  We leave with a clear plan of what we need to be doing over the next week or the next two weeks and this really drives us on as John always holds us to account at the next session. 

Impact of coaching

Coaching has taught us how important is is to ‘know your numbers’.  I now know accurately what the profit levels are and exactly how much stock costs.  This last quarter has been extremely busy and has been by far our best yet and it’s all because we know these numbers.  Before coaching I honestly wouldn’t have had a clue. I wouldn’t have known how much profit we made from one month to the next but now we know the profit for each job which helps us become more accurate with pricing for new jobs.  We were a fairly small team but growing at a steady pace. As a result of coaching, we’ve seen the team grow month on month.  We now have 17 staff -originally it was 6  – and we are still planning on taking on more.

John’s coaching

John has been a great support to the business and the business wouldn’t be where it is today without John’s help.  He’s helped by taking us out of our comfort zone and pushing us – pushing targets, pushing systems, making sure we’ve carried out what we’ve said we were going to do.  Without John it wouldn’t be the business it is today.  Our plans now are to be one of the biggest and best commercial cleaning companies in North Lincolnshire and with John’s help, I know we can do it.  

Jo Wicks – Business Owner, No Worries Cleaning