Is EOS the antidote for business stagnation?

Scaling a landscape company requires a structured approach to solving problems, establishing consistency and developing high-performance leaders. Some owners are finding that structure in something known as EOS, or the Entrepreneurial Operating System.

“EOS is a way of harmonizing human energy,” says Adam Frederico, owner and president of Frederico Outdoor Living in Pleasant Grove, Utah. “EOS helps get your team aligned on your company vision, and executing correctly day in and day out.”

Implementing EOS was one of the first things Frederico did after buying his father’s landscaping business in 2020. Like other entrepreneurs, Frederico found himself wresting with countless issues on a regular basis. He was familiar with EOS from his previous career as a business consultant. His most successful clients were utilizing EOS.

“We decided to bring in an EOS implementer to help us go through the process ourselves,” Frederico says. “We needed to get aligned on a vision. We needed an organizational chart. We needed the right data to measure progress. I knew all of that was part of the EOS process. It did such a great thing for our company that I decided to become a Professional EOS Implementer myself.”

As Frederico explains, the EOS Model is derived from a book written by EOS Founder Gino Wickman entitled “Traction.” EOS distills the many issues confronting business owners into six areas:

• company vision
• people
• data
• issues
• process
• traction (i.e. standards and accountability)
  

EOS offers disciplines and tools in each of those six areas. It’s then up to the company to faithfully follow the structure and utilize the tools. That requires a serious commitment — a commitment that can pay off if the company has what it takes.

Everyone interviewed for this article says their businesses have a much steadier pulse as a result of instituting EOS. That said, reaping the benefits requires commitment, hard work and patience.

“EOS is a long-term investment in your culture and processes that takes time,” says Jason Cromley, co-owner and CEO of Hidden Creek Landscaping based in Hilliard, Ohio. “Like any good investment, you’re not going to get your money back in a few months. But in several years, you’ll get your multiplier back. I can personally tell you that since we have implemented EOS, we’ve doubled our company in four years (Hidden Creek now employs roughly 150 people). That growth isn’t 100% because of EOS. But EOS was the basis for how we redefined our company so we could focus and grow.”

Companies must also be prepared to invest. EOS success largely hinges on having a good Professional EOS Implementer helping you work through the process. Once you factor the cost of hiring that implementer, along with all of the unbillable time employees spend in EOS meetings, the tab starts to run up pretty quickly. Frederico says it can cost anywhere from $25,000-$45,000 a year for five sessions, depending on the experience of the implementer.

“It always feels expensive when we’re writing out that check for (the implementer,)” says Justin Crocker, founder and president of EarthTones Design based outside of Dallas. “But after we finish another all-day meeting with (the implementer,) it suddenly feels really good handing him that check because we know the investment is paying off.”

Lining up the right leadership

Cromley launched his company on its EOS journey in 2020. Sales had started to recede after hitting a record in 2019. Cromley felt like he had hit a wall, and he was struggling to find the inspiration to snap out of it. His personal financial advisor told him about EOS.

“It sparked my interest because I felt like I had good people, but not necessarily a leadership team,” Cromley says, adding that one of the key principles of EOS is getting the right people in the right seats. “I realized we couldn’t continue operating this way if it was just me dragging people through the mud.”

Cromley hired a professional EOS implementer to help embed EOS in his company. Having a good implementer has been key, which is why Cromley continues using one four years later.

“Your implementer can make or break the whole experience,” Cromley says. “I was lucky and got a great one. Some friends tried and failed, so be mindful in picking. The first two days are long and exhausting. And you have to really look into the sole of a company you built. You’ll have to recognize your failures and weakness. You have to get raw and honest with yourself. If your implementer is good, they try to make it enlightening but you may feel a little deflated.”

Since implementing EOS in 2020, Cromley says the majority of Hidden Creek’s leadership has changed. It became obvious that important personnel decisions had to be made after utilizing some of the EOS tools within the “people” component. One of those tools is The People Analyzer, which includes a concept known as GWC. A leader has to get it, want it and have the capacity to accomplish it.

“We went through an exercise where we ranked all of our employees,” Cromley says. Doing so helped identify which key employees had what Hidden Creek needed to grow to the next level based on the company’s core values and goals.

“EOS also helps delineate roles,” adds Rico Martinez, chief operating officer at EarthTones Design. “EOS helps keep yourself and your teams accountable for what you’re supposed to be doing. At the same time, it helps keep people from bumping into each other.”

EarthTones Design has been using EOS for more than three years. The journey began when Crocker heard about EOS from a partner in another business. EarthTones was already growing tremendously, but Crocker was looking to bring about more consistency and accountability across departments and branches.

One of Martinez’s favorite EOS tools is the Accountability Chart. It’s essentially an org chart with brief descriptions of what each individual is in charge of. The five to seven core responsibilities assigned to each person are chosen during a separate EOS exercise that helps determine what the company needs to be successful.

“EOS forces a company to live and breathe by its core values,” Martinez says. “It also drives the Accountability Chart. We had some people in our company whom we determined were not the right fit, so we had to part ways. We also found that some people just weren’t in the right seats. A good example is an employee who was struggling in our residential construction division but is now a standout in commercial construction. EOS helped us figure those types of things out.”

Establishing the purpose

As Cromley and Martinez have both touched on, lining up the right leadership is largely tied to a company’s core values and vision. That’s why the Vision/Traction Organizer is one of the first tools a company utilizes when implementing EOS. Frederico found tremendous value in creating this two-page document when taking over his father’s company.

“I quickly realized we had no clear vision,” Frederico says. “I asked 10 employees what our vision was and got 10 different responses. The Vision/Traction Organizer guided us through identifying our core values and core focus. It forced us to define where we stood in the market and where we wanted to be in 10 years. Then, on the second page, you start defining a three-year outlook. Then you start working through questions on day-to-day traction.”

Frederico says his company has grown 4x since he bought it four years ago and implemented EOS (they now have roughly 35 employees). That wouldn’t have been possible if not for tools like the Vision/Traction Organizer. And like Cromley, Martinez and Crocker, Frederico says the leadership transformation brought about by EOS has had a seismic impact.

“We had 100% turnover in our leadership team when I bought the business,” Frederico says. “The Accountability Chart helped solidify who I really needed on the team and what they should be doing. Now I can focus on business strategy because I have really great leaders who are doing other things.”

EOS also brings structure to the strategic planning process.

“EOS forces you to look at not only today, but also toward the future,” Cromley points out, adding that EOS requires the development of one-, three- and 10-year plans. EOS also requires more specific, 90-day goals that help a company achieve its longer-term plans. EOS refers to those as Rocks. At Hidden Creek Landscaping, Rocks are discussed at quarterly companywide meetings, which brings a high level of accountability.

Staff meetings are always a necessary evil for growing companies. Crocker says the meeting structure EOS brings has been one of the things he’s liked most, particularly with respect to the weekly leadership meetings known as Level 10 Meetings.

“The framework keeps our meetings organized,” Crocker says. “The meetings are the same time and place every week. We review each leader’s KPIs as well as our longer-term goals. These meetings help keep everyone accountable.”

One exercise in a Level 10 meeting is called IDS – identify, discuss and solve. The leadership team writes down issues the company is having, and works through them one by one. “We come to a consensus on how to move forward, and then assign to-do’s based on what we’ve decided,” Crocker says. “Then we hold each other accountable by reporting on those to-do’s at the next week’s meeting.”

At EarthTones Design, the Level 10 Meetings have been so valuable to the leadership team that all departments are now having them with their own teams.

“One other benefit of Level 10 Meetings is that everyone in the company is given a voice,” Martinez points out. “Meetings aren’t just a free-for-all. Everyone feels like they can bring up anything. We don’t have any festering elephants anymore.”

Standardizing success

Cromley says EOS is a combination of principles and tools to actually get things done.

“EOS gives you systems and processes that allow things to be repeatable when you have success, and for things to become visible when it isn’t going so well,” Cromley says. “The tools are huge because they are the solutions business owners need.”

“Part of the EOS system is that you spend an entire quarter using their tools and templates to develop written processes,” Martinez points out. “This is a big part of what allowed our company to transform.”

EOS calls this tool the 3-Step Process Documenter. Company leaders go through an exercise where they identify a handful of core processes from each department. Each process is recorded in step-by-step detail and given a name. The leadership team reviews and approves each process before it is cemented as standard work within the company.

So how does a company know if all of the efforts put into EOS are paying off? As the saying goes, “You can’t manage what you don’t measure.” EOS has an entire section devoted to data. Frederico has come to rely on something called the EOS Scorecard. It’s a simple set of leading indicators each company sets for itself. Frederico Outdoor Living likes to track things like payroll, revenue per employee, cash on hand, backlog, social media engagement and other metrics.

“The scorecard is a great one-page tool that we review every week,” Frederico says. “In that one page, you can take the pulse of how well the business is doing.”

The author is a freelance writer based in Wisconsin.