How hiring an executive coach in a downtime lays the groundwork for a rebound

Jeremy Hittle, president, Hittle Landscaping Inc.

When Hittle Landscaping Inc. lost 30 percent of its revenue during the recent housing market crash, President Jeremy Hittle had some difficult decisions to make. The first one was how to bring the $10.4 million family-owned company out of the funk. That took teamwork and some painful choices.
But equally as tough was to decide whether or not to hire a pricey leadership coach who could teach the Hittle management team the skills needed for long-term prosperity.
“It was expensive and it was difficult to spend the money in times like those, but it had to be done,” Hittle says.
“When the housing market crashed, we had to react to it quickly. Getting the upper management team together to fight the fight was a lot better than me just fighting it myself.”
The decision to hire an executive coach often requires considerable discussion. A business must tie it to an analysis of expenses, how to increase revenue and how to increase efficiency.
“You need to discuss what’s a better way to manage your business, manage your people, manage your customers,” Hittle says. “The lists will get very long and very hard to manage. How can you ask the employees to work harder? You can, but what’s that going to get you? So better leadership skills are a great way to improve efficiency, morale and communications. That’s where efficiencies come from. Efficiencies don’t just come from working harder.”
Hittle asked consultants to suggest a coach, and he hired one who had also written a book on leadership. Weekly and biweekly sessions helped the management team set goals and provided different ways to think about situations.
“It really makes a difference,” Hittle says. “There is a lot of frustration today in leadership. Frustration just doesn’t help. It’s kind of like carrying around baggage when you’re trying to be a leader.”
The personal leadership development benefits can be significant.
“It’s been great. It’s fascinating when a person does decide to consider his own leadership style, develop upon that and grow on what he’s found,” Hittle says. “I know it’s been huge for me, and I have had several employees step back and say, ‘Wow, I better understand my job now. It’s not just to tell people what to do. It’s about being supportive. It’s about accepting better who you’re managing.’”
The term “supportive” is a key operative word that is stressed in the leadership sessions.
“Employees need to know how valuable they are to the organization,” Hittle says. “You don’t want them to feel like they are employees ― you want them to feel like business owners. They all should feel like they have their own small business that they run beneath them. They feel like those beneath them are the employees that they employ, that they support, encourage and direct.”
That support helped the company reclaim 60 to 70 percent of the revenues that were lost and racked up near-record profitability for 2010.
Compassion is another focal point of leadership training.
“Listening, understanding what they want, and giving it to them,” Hittle says. “It’s not being a leader by directive. That’s not what to shoot for. Shoot for trying to nourish their needs, and your needs become their needs.
“A lot of leaders don’t quite understand it because they just want to have the first and the last say-so, and they expect it to be done that way. I don’t believe that works very well.
“Usually people that excel to a leadership position are firm-minded thinkers,” Hittle says. “They don’t realize that you have to open up, be a little vulnerable, and ask for some help and do some self development ― to try to pass along the message that we can all be better.”
How to reach: Hittle Landscaping Inc., (317) 896-5697 or www.hittlelandscape.com
Trimming and pruning
With a significant portion of its business tied to the housing industry, when the market hit bottom in 2009, Jeremy Hittle and his management team had their plates full learning how to be better leaders while they trimmed and pruned Hittle Landscaping’s operations to weather the storm.
“It was my job to not give direction but to convey a message,” says Hittle, president of the 140-employee company.
“The message was that we are in trouble, and we need everybody’s help. I spent a lot of time in 2009 making sure that nobody thought otherwise. I tried to make sure that they knew that the company’s challenges were their challenges ― that we were all in it together.”
The solution was plain and simple: Everyone needed to be in concert and do some brainstorming.
“The only possible way to get out of a downturn like that was to come up with 50 ways that would help,” Hittle says.
“Obviously we had to lay off some employees, and we changed things around,” Hittle says. “Nobody worked any overtime. We worked four days a week instead of five. We saved on travel.”
Steps taken to recover from the downturn are lessons that likely will be retained.
“We are constantly working on reorganization. Even today, it’s about how we are going to change today to deal with tomorrow, just like we did back in 2009.”
How to reach: Hittle Landscaping Inc., (317) 896-5697 or www.hittlelandscape.com