Time flies when you’re busy executing work. Yet it’s essential to pause and review if you are on track to reach your goals before the end of the year.
Ideally, you should be checking on your company’s performance at least on a quarterly basis, if not monthly or weekly. However, a mid-year check-in specifically can serve as halftime for your team to regroup and attack the remaining year with concentrated focus.
“It is wise to review as frequently as is reasonable so adjustments can be made,” says Brian Mark, partner and president of Chris Mark and Sons, Inc., based in Pocasset, Massachusetts. “We always take a deep dive at mid-year and make some ‘halftime’ adjustments.”
Mark adds mid-year check-ins allow you to make corrections to avoid the regret of year-end review and realizing you are missing key metrics you could have adjusted.
Some of the key metrics to review include your profit margins, revenue growth and if your overhead is tracking to budget. Brodey Mann, vice president of Blue Marble Landscape, based in Mesa, Arizona, says they have set profit margin goals for each of their divisions.
“If you don’t have a specific and an attainable goal for each one of your divisions, then you’re really leaving way too much to chance just hoping that it works out for the best,” Mann says.
Responding to Common Challenges
Gilly Artigues, president of Pleasant Places, Inc., based in Charleston, South Carolina, says in the past they’ve had times where they were underperforming expectations after six months.
“When that happens, it’s important to understand why you’re behind and how to learn from the mistakes made in the first half of the year,” Artigues says.
Artigues says when this occurs, they will bring in their management and regroup.
“Usually, it’s a matter of resource allocation,” Artigues says. “Do we need to adjust crew size? Move resources from a division that might be a little slow to a division that is overperforming? Is it an issue with our price point? Is our overhead too fat? It’s a team effort.”
Mann says a couple years ago they had a situation where their post-emergent chemical prices were growing far beyond their expectations.
“That really woke us up because we were probably trending towards 200% past budget,” Mann says. “So, we looked at what we were doing, how we were doing it, just re-educating everybody on best practices on that to mitigate the use of chemicals.”
Mark says this year they’ve noticed a revenue shortfall and are adjusting. Also, in the past when production was lagging in their maintenance division, they made some routing and scheduling changes that resulted in a remarkable turnaround. He says the key is creating counter measures depending on the issue.
“If it is revenue, we push marketing and referrals,” Mark says. “If the issue is production or efficiency, we assess and implement counter measures. Sometimes direct costs go up unexpectedly and then we discuss whether we ride it out or ask for a price increase of our clients. If overhead is getting out of budget, we trim and cut to make sure things are kept in line.”
Course Correcting For the Second Half
Even in these instances where they realized they were behind their target, these companies do not change their goal.
“The goal is the goal,” Artigues says.
Mark says only when there is a black swan event like COVID have they had to adjust their budget goals. Mann says you should only recalibrate a goal if it was overly ambitious, but first always review if there are any missed opportunities in the pipeline that would help you reach your goal.
“It’s like we’re going to fall 5% of our goal here in arbor,” Mann says. “Can we upsell? Can we find some new opportunities in chemical to make up that 5%? You don’t have to just say that 5% isn’t going to happen. Can we get 2%, 2%, and 2%, from three other divisions? That’s our approach.”
Mann recommends making sure you are setting SMART goals so you are less likely to need to change them halfway through the year.
Mark says they’ve found sprint efforts can help refocus the team.
“The focus can be geared towards safety, attendance, efficiency, revenue, or other items,” Mark says. “It does help refocus the team. Sometimes we incentivize these short-term sprints for the group.”
Artigues adds that being able to quickly reach a goal can feel good when you’re coming up short on your overall target.
“When the team sees that the short-term goals are attainable, it makes the long-term goals seem easier,” Artigues says.
Mann personally isn’t a fan of sprint efforts because they can narrow your focus too much.
“If we say, ‘We need tree work. We need tree work.’ and we get out there and we get a million dollars in tree work and then say, ‘Okay, well, congratulations guys. We’re not going to be able to get this done until the second month of ‘26 with our manpower,’” Mann says. “‘So call your clients and let them know. Thanks for approving this, but we’re not going to get to them for four months.’ I think sprints can be kind of dangerous.”
Artigues says as long as everyone understands the goals clearly and can see the KPIs and other reports in black and white, it’s usually not difficult to come to a consensus on how they need to attack the 3rd and 4th quarters.
“When you set a growth target, you have to give the team the resources necessary to hit that target,” Artigues says. “If it doesn’t look like we’re going to hit the growth goal, we have to decide whether or not these resources are being utilized effectively and whether or not they should be repurposed in a direction that is working better than what we’ve been doing.”
