[Mac]

Ive tried to make my company, which is predominately built upon maintenance work, very systematized with standard processes for most common tasks. However, there are always exceptions to the rules - whether its for a single property with special requests or practices that change a little bit based on the time of the year/season, etc.

What do you find in these situations? Do your employees fall back on the systems and say "well I am supposed to do it this way" when the task/property asks for a slight deviation? If you are like me and find this, how did you or do you overcome this? I do not want them to ditch the systems entirely because they are partly what makes my company what it is, but at the same time I do want to allow some leeway for rational thought and sound reasoning/judgement (does that still exist today?). Your input is appreciated!

[Stonehenge]

I think it can be a matter of degrees - give them too much latitude and your systems go out the window, too little and they ignore an obvious issue because it falls outside of their training parameters. I've heard of some organizations allowing employees a specified amount of freedom to exercise their own judgement (tended to be more in a retail environment), up to a certain dollar amount. I don't know if this would work for your scenario or not.

For us, since every job is different (paver patio one day, lawn seeding the next, water feature the next) and every job is custom, tight parameters are hard for me to set up, so I rely more on trying to teach them what my judgement/values are, so that they can use those same values when faced with a decision when on their own.

I don't know if that helps at all, but that's where we're at.

[Fine Edge]

There should be certain assumed responsibilities ( which you will have to teach ) on every job.
For instance, with you being a maintenance company, it's easy to teach beds edged, driveways edged, debris cleaned up, all hard surfaces blown. But what happens when the client wants an annual bed installed and 3 shrubs?
Your employees have to understand the importance of carrying over that same quality when it comes to a finished product. Is my annual bed defined properly? Is there mulch all over the grass areas? Are my shrubs planted properly?
Whatever you do, you need to nicely remind them ( probably every job, at least for awhile ) that the quality needs to be consistent in whatever they do.
Your customers are looking at you and your company to give them the look that they desire, no matter what you do on their property.
It seems like an easy thing to communicate but believe me, getting your employees to stand back for 10 seconds and look at what they just finished is harder than it sounds.
Most of the time, if they would just take a tiny bit of extra time to go back over their project, maintenance contract, etc.. at make sure everything is clean, spaced accordingly, neat then you would have fewer headaches.
Even simple things like planting annuals in some simple rows can be an enormous mental challenge for some people.
I know because I just had to re-plant 35 Wave Petunias that were supposed to be evenly spaced and it looked like they threw them in the air and planted them where they landed.

[Mac]

FE, you just said exactly what I am thinking. Im too tired to say more - maybe later.