Eric Blevins

When Eric Blevins gets to the office, the first thing he does is “hop out of the truck and go greet all the team members,” says the owner of Evolve Landscaping. “I shake hands or fist bump with everyone and call them by name. If I’m high-fiving guys and laughing with them, it puts everyone in a good mood,” he says.

Blevins says this is a great opportunity to manufacture energy for the day, and it also allows him to gauge the morale of the crews.

“If someone seems to be ‘off their game,’ I can pull them aside and talk about what may be going on, or at least follow up with their manager to discuss,” he says.

Here’s Blevins’ average day:

I get up each morning around 5:45 a.m. to be at the shop before 7 a.m. This doesn’t give me time to do many things other than get ready, with the exception of making coffee. I roast and grind my own coffee beans, so this is a pre-work routine that I enjoy each morning. It gives me time to start thinking about my day while I wait.

My drive into the office is only about 15 or 20 minutes, so typically I just use this time to snack on a protein bar, think about my schedule and plan for the day. If there’s nothing in particular coming up, sometimes I put on sports talk or Pandora and jam out.

Additionally, by walking around in the mornings, I have the opportunity to observe how crews and equipment are looking. Are uniforms being worn and in good shape? How are the trucks loaded? Does everyone have everything they need to be successful? I can also observe if trucks roll out on time. If not, this gives me a chance to follow up with our management team on our morning process.

Once crews are out, I grab my gear from the truck and head into the office. This is my opportunity to touch base with my mid-level managers. We talk about anything that I saw during morning roll-out, how things went the previous day, what we have lined up for the following day(s), etc. This also gives me a chance to see if they need me to help out with anything they have coming up or take something off of their plate if I can.

On Monday mornings we run payroll, so I go in and approve the crew’s hours for the prior week. I always go in to make sure that time is coded correctly to the appropriate jobs and work tickets and review hours to budget. This gives me the ability to have follow up conversations with our managers about making sure that guys are entering time and materials correctly, and that we are looking for opportunities to streamline routing and cut down on non-productive time.

Wednesday is our meeting day. I schedule our staff meeting and any individual, sales or production meetings all on Wednesday. This way, we can all be out with our crews and customers the other days of the week, and I can spend time being out of the office and overseeing quality and customer service.

If I’m not in the office, I try to stop by the gym 2-3 days per week and get in a workout. I always feel better when I’m in the gym on a regular basis.

Since I get to the shop early in the morning, I’m often heading home by 3:30 or 4 p.m. Most afternoons I still get on the computer for another hour or so, catching up on emails, designs, proposals, etc. Typically, I’m following up with my operations manager about his day to help me start planning for tomorrow.

My wife and I love to travel, and we often head out on Fridays for the weekend. However, both of us usually still get in computer work on Saturday and Sunday. This is a great time for me to catch up on social media posts, put together financial reviews for my team and catch up on administrative tasks. We also have a motorcycle and spend a lot of time on it during the summer. We have found that we really enjoy using this time together to strategize, brainstorm ideas for both of our businesses or put our heads together to problem-solve things that may come up from time to time.