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I hope everyone had a great weekend!  Hopefully these quotes will help get your Monday started with the right frame of mind. — Luke

“Winning is not a sometime thing; it’s an all time thing.  You don’t win once in a while, you don’t do things right once in a while, you do them right all the time.  Winning is a habit.  Unfortunately, so is losing.”  Vince Lombardi

“The first one gets the oyster, the second gets the shell.”  Andrew Carnegie

“People are definitely a company’s greatest asset.  It doesn’t make any difference whether the product is cars or cosmetics.  A company is only as good as the people it keeps.”  Mary Kay Ash

“If you work just for money, you’ll never make it, but if you love what you are doing and you always put the customer first, success will be yours.”  Ray Kroc

“The trick is in what one emphasizes.  We either make ourselves miserable, or we make ourselves strong.  The amount of work is the same.”  Carlos Castaneda

“If you did not look after today’s business then you might as well forget about tomorrow.”  Isaac Mophatlane

I’ve had a topic in my mind for the past week or so that I thought would be good to blog about but everything changed when I sat down in front of my computer and looked at the date my next blog was supposed to be on – September 11.  Almost everyone has a story about 9/11.  I remember it like it was yesterday.  I had graduated from college the year before and was on my way to work.  As I rounded the corner of the building, my cell phone rang.  It was my boyfriend calling to ask me if I had heard the news.  I had not heard anything so I rushed inside only to find a small crowd already gathered around the small television in the partner’s office.  We all stayed there for most of the morning glued to the TV…in complete and total shock.  Little did I know that the next decade of my life would be shaped by that single day.  My boyfriend (and now husband) decided to go to officer training school with the US Air Force not long after September 11 so I have seen firsthand the sacrifices that men and women make on an everyday basis.  Just as we should honor the incredible sacrifice that many made on that tragic day, please don’t forget the service of our men and women who continue to be deployed overseas and those families who wait for them at home.

Rachel

Luke, Shane, and I will be traveling to Chicago this afternoon to meet with our consulting group, Leedom, for our buy here pay here car lots.  These meetings always come with a certain amount of  nervous anxiousness.  We will spend all day Saturday and Sunday reviewing numbers and sharing ideas with about 20 other dealers from around the country.  I look forward to seeing how our numbers compare against the other dealers and most of all look forward to finding out what areas we can improve.  I hope everyone has a good Friday and a great weekend.

Louis

I hope everyone enjoyed their extended Labor Day weekend.  I had a great one but am glad to be back within the labor force today.

The other night I watched one of the few reality TV shows that I enjoy, Bar Rescue.  Bar Rescue consist of an industry professional, Jon Taffer, who goes around visiting failing bars and pubs across the country.  He works with the owners and employees to diagnose and fix their problems and give them advice on how to get their given businesses moving in the right direction. 

As I was watching the latest episode of Bar Rescue, Jon Taffer had just completed his initial walk through of the latest pub he was assigned to help turn around.  Even to the untrained eye it was obvious that this bar had problems.  Filthy grease buildup in the kitchen, holes in the wall and unkempt and rude waitstaff seemed to be the norm in this particular pub.  However, each time Jon Taffer pointed out any of the aforementioned problems the owner was quick with an excuse for both his and his staffs’ performance.  Kitchen not cleaned? Well, we clean as often as time will allow. The waitresses lack of grooming and adequate dress? We have a very casual dress code. Why is your staff so rude? We haven’t had much professional training. And on and on and on. 

After about three rapid fire excuses Taffer told the owner that there was no helping him and appeared ready to move on to his next show.  Startled, the owner pleaded with him to stay and wanted to know what had offended Taffer.  Taffer quickly pointed out to the owner that he had “excused himself to fail”. 

I really liked the way Jon Taffer put it.  In what years we have been in business I have noticed that the very best employees never make excuses.  Sure they make mistakes but they never make excuses.  Actually, most of the great employees we have been fortunate to employ have gone out of their way to accept blame for problems within their particular area of the company.  When I hear someone make an excuse I immediately think to myself that they will probably repeat that same mistake in short order because they see no fault of their own.  However, when I hear an employee say something such as “I really have no excuse for not getting that done” or “I really messed that up and I am sorry”, well. . . I think that sounds like a good employee who is getting even better.  It is obvious they are learning from their mistakes which is an integral part of being a star employee. 

Let’s all work to “bite our tongue” as we catch ourselves making excuses for our mistakes.  It takes practice but, with effort, can become a way of life.

Have a great rest of the week! — Luke

“He that is good for making excuses is rarely good for anything else.”  Benjamin Franklin

My 5 year-old daughter, Holly, used to watch a show called “The Wonder Pets.”  If you have never seen the Wonder Pets, you are not missing anything.  However, I think it does have a recurring theme that applies to our day-to-day work environment.  In every episode, Lenny, Tuck and Ming Ming get a call on their tin can phone from an animal in distress.  Then, they fly away in their fly boat to be the heroes and save the day. At the beginning of each rescue, one of the three will try to save the animal all by themselves.   In the end, they always find out that they have to work together to save the day.  Holly is a “growing-up” now (as she says) so she no longer watches the Wonder Pets but I don’t think I will ever forget the end of the show’s theme song:  What’s going to work? Teamwork!  What’s going to work? Team—-work!  In a two to three person office, teamwork is essential.  If two or three employees in each office can’t work together as a team, achieving goals will almost be impossible.  To put it another way, there is a direct link between teamwork and the success of our company.  Remember there is no “I” in teamwork so let’s all work together and save the day!

TEAM = Together Everyone Achieves More

Rachel

We recently began phase one of our name change by changing out the signs at the Fulton and and Macon offices.  We have about three offices to go to complete the first phase and the rest of the offices will be completed after three to four more phases.  We have already had many compliments on the new logo from friends and customers here in Fulton.  Once we get all the offices under the new name and logo it should help with marketing and branding tremendously.

“A business with no sign is a sign of no business.”  Sign Salesman

  Yesterday, Louis, Shane, the Area Managers and I had lunch with the graduating class of our most recent Montgomery Enterprises Leadership Skills Course for new hires.  After lunch we enjoyed getting to hear what all they were able to take away from the class and also to see the projects they had been working on for the past few weeks.  Rubye Del, the class facilitator, does a great job in bringing out the best in the class participants and this class was certainly no exception.  Congratulations ladies! 

Claire Darty, Amy Alexander, Alise Dill, Elisha Hopkins, Juanita Smith, Rebecca Davis, Tiffany Walker