Dashboard: Why Gene Marks Hates Employees, Part 492

[Music] welcome to another 21 hats dashboard I'm Lauren Feldman I'm here with Gan marks to talk about the stories and issues we think business owners should be following this week welcome Jean hello Lauren how are you I'm doing great how are you good got up early played squash ready for action glad to hear it very early um as usual you've been writing and uh talking about issues that matter to business owners let's uh Dive Right In you wrote an interesting piece um that you you just published about a Mid-Atlantic convenience store that I know very well uh a chain called Wawa um that sounds weird to two-thirds of the country but we know it well uh you were taken with the chains business model and you you actually write that it's a model for how you run your own business can you explain that you know I'll tell you why it Wawa inspires so first of all for those of you guys listening that are not familiar with Wawa uh it is a very popular convenience store chain in the on the East Coast uh there are like 900 locations from Pennsylvania all the way down to Florida their biggest competitor is a company called sheets you can't even compare them to 7-Eleven 7-Eleven totally sucks Wawa is like clean and beautiful and the food is edible and not only edible but really good and I tell you what inspired me I mentioned when we were first stared like I played squash like I I play when I go down the Jersey Shore I play Squash really early in the morning like like 5:00 in the morning and I finish like around 6:15 6:30 and every time when I'm driving back to my house I always stop at the local Wawa for a cup of coffee and it's always you know bumping you know um and it goes in shifts you know like you get the contractors that are in there at 6:00 in the morning and then the school teachers come in after that and then like the office professionals after that but it's always popular it's always been good it's always you know it's such a well-run pop place no one complains about WWA and I started thinking like what what is with this compan like why are they so good and have been so consistently good over so many years and you know they really have sort of like these three pillars of success and that's what I wrote about on entrepreneur I mean for starters their prices are very competitive which is very very important I mean you know if you're running a business we all know that I think I have to say too much about you got to be in the range of competitive pric and they are it's like a buck 29 for like a 12 oce coffee which is certainly a lot better than what you would pay for a similar coffee at Starbucks which is nowhere near as good as wah wa coffee I'm sure you'll agree right um but then there's two other pillars that that I also like there there's choice and there's control like I'm just using coffee as an example but my God Lauren when you get coffee at a WWA there's like all sorts of different you know mocha and keap and Colombian and regular and you know all sorts of and then you have all these condiments that you can that you can choose from as well the honey and the cinnamon and the cocoa all that stuff that you see at a you know at a you at a Starbucks but it's not just the coffees if you go for sandwiches if you go for snacks if you go for refrigerator there's a lot of choice at a w Wawa which is really really good um and then the third place is price there's Choice and then there's just control which means that you know you they give all the control to their customers you know you choose how much coffee you want because you feel it yourself and how much sugar you want in there but more importantly when you place orders they have self-service kios you can really customize what you're getting um so like when you're really when you go into huawe you just feel like it's like a self-service place with really good quality at a competitive price with a lot of options that to me is like that's what what a business should be all about but your business is very different your business is a business that helps uh small businesses with their technology needs um how how do you relate the two it's a totally different industry but you know I I you know I I don't sell coffee of course but you're right we sell technology and financial services but you know we work very hard to keep our rates competitive so you know that that solves the price issue I mean we're right there in the Middle with our rates so I work hard to keep our overhead what it is and to keep our rates competitive we offer lots of different types of services um for our clients they can get you know you know fixed price you Services we have all sorts of things like you know training and customization and development like if you need help with this product and we sell this product there's a whole bunch of different ways that we can help you and finally um we give our clients control as to how they want to spend their money they can hire us by the hour they can pay a fixed price they can buy just a block of time to control the amount of time that we have so like I don't know like just with unconsciously I kind of run my business a little bit the way wa runs its business this and that makes me kind of proud because they're awesome so there it is do you know why it's called Wawa I used to know that you must know you you're Googling it right now to tell uh I had a friend who wrote a story about them years ago and I could be remembering this incorrectly but I don't think so I think they grew out of a town in Pennsylvania called yeah there is a town called Wawa Pennsylvania that's that's that's where they started um I think it's a a name of Native American derivation um I the one funny thing I wouldn't swear to this but if I remember correctly I think the correct pronunciation originally was waah not waah I'm not sure I would suggest that you ask the typical Philadelphian uh where the nearest waah is waah is yeah you'll be punched in the face probably just just for for for you know you disrespecting Wawa it is bizarrely popular you are definitely right about that I'm not sure I yeah I mean it's fine I I don't quite understand the popularity but but but you're right it exists yeah well I tried to explain it in that article and I think you know and I I like I said if you're running a business or you're thinking of starting a business if you take a trip to a few wwas you'll see the consistency among them and you'll learn like this is you know if I keep my price and give my customer options and and give them control over their services or products they're getting from me you'll um there's are three really good places to start when you're when you're running a business all right next topic uh on Friday the latest jobs report came out and uh this is one strange recession we're having um it the report was that more than half a million jobs were created in the month of July which is a bang up month you know at any time um and way more than the economists were predicting um thoughts yeah I have two big thoughts on that so for starters um I wrote a piece in the guardian which appeared yesterday Sunday um which addresses the recession and and my point is if people are asking if we in a recession they're asking the wrong question uh I mean the real question is is is who's having a Slowdown and who's not because you know Lauren if that jobs report shows us anything it shows us that we are not in a recession as a country I mean we are in a Big Country right now there are parts of the of the economy that are slow and are struggling I mean construction and real estate is a perfect example and uh technology industry is another example even manufacturing um has been reporting across the board slower slower results but gez travel industry is like you know they're kicking some ass you know they have they've almost recovered to pre-pandemic levels and even retail and restaurants I mean man I'm you know when I'm down the shore I go to Ocean City new Jersey they're bumping down there and same thing when I walk around the streets of Philly and when I talk to different people that are in the retail and restaurant industry I mean they're they're recovering pretty strong so like you can't just be like oh man are we in a recession or not I mean it's like well that's just not the question to ask I mean they their jobs being generated all over the place and there are some industries that are just doing better than others that's my first point and then my second point is I think this jobs growth number is understated I think you know yeah I think people and I'm going to write about this as well because I think we need to have a real real reconciliation a real what's the word for it like um when we have to really look come to Jesus moment with our numbers that we're getting from the government because they keep all these Bureau of Labor Statistics numbers are about employees employees employees learn you know and you and I both know over the past two years like 10 million new businesses were startup and you and I both also know that those new businesses are mostly Freelancers and independent contractors right people selling stuff on Etsy or you know working from home and you know Uber drivers whatnot those are those people are gainfully employed I mean I have a dozen contractors that work for me for my company that I give anywhere from you know 10 to 30 hours a week of work and they're getting work from else they're not employee they're not on the books like nobody the Department of Labor is not reporting on them these and in fact when people are like oh labor participation actually went down that's what the Republicans are saying like oh it's not all good news well they're not counting all these people that are out of the workforce because they have their own businesses that they're doing or they're only working part-time yeah the labor participation thing is an issue when there aren't enough jobs and people just give up looking for a job that's not what's happening right now that is not What's happen there's still 10 million open jobs right now and I just and I and and it's all jobs jobs jobs and employees employees employees and I just think the government is not paying attention to all of Freelancers and independent contractors that are out there that are working and you know that people are saying like well you know we're still you know behind you know in labor you know from pre pandemic in the sense that there's still less you know you know you know workers out there you know to available for jobs I'm like well that's because a lot of them are probably making money on their own with their own side businesses I'm not sure that's even true anymore I think we caught up with this jobs report I think we well the number of employees caught up but I thought lab we just said labor participation I think the number you might be right I don't know I think it's I think there are more people out there working than even the government is reporting and I think we and you know it's funny all of this labor conversation about employees the unemployment rate it's like we're using the same methodology and the same statistics that have been used for the past God knows how many decades and the world has changed we've got a lot of side gig people and a lot of entrepreneurs and contractors and whatnot 1099 workers that I think these calculations need to start including these people because I think we're understating the number of people that are actually working in this country because they're not officially called an employee that's really interesting I mean there is a category for self-employed uh but I guess that doesn't catch everybody depending doesn't catch no it does not and and again these are surveys as well so it's like you know I don't even know if they're Gathering the right amount of information that they need well the other thing these these numbers are always subject to change they they and they do change yes sometimes significantly yeah but getting back to I mean I just you know again you know President Biden gets a lot of grief I mean I guess he deserves some for just you know you know some the way he be you know acts you know like an old man but yeah the economy is and then you're like two two you know quarters of of negative GDP defines a recession okay but you know it's our political leaders job to get jobs for people it's all about jobs and like man that's their job how can you not say he is like crushing it um when you've got so many people working in so you know such a low unemployment rate let me ask you this um you know for quite some time now whenever I talk to business owners and I talk to a lot too perhaps not many as you but I I ask people you know how's it going are you seeing any indication of a softening that kind of thing and you know most of the people I talk to say no they're they're they're not feeling it yet the one exception actually was you not for your business but you told me quite some time ago fairly early on that your clients were telling you that they were seeing a softening um are they still saying that or yeah yeah they are you know it's funny first of all this whole conversation is so unscientific and completely anecdotal you know but um when I talk to my client which are mostly B2B companies and family-owned businesses you know that kind of stuff they're they're they and this is up until this week because I mean I'm still you know I talk to my clients about this all the time they still say that that demand is is softening and um you know it's it's but nobody's panicking um and they still have open jobs I mean it's not like they're like I'm not going to hire that great person when I find them um because they they know that it's it's likely you know it's just cyclical I saw a term in a I think a Wall Street Journal maybe it was Bloomberg I don't know remember where I saw a term last week that I hadn't seen before called Labor hoarding uh about businesses where their business is softening but they don't want to give up any employees cuz it was so hard to hire them in the first place they don't want to take a chance and you know it's funny the a lot of times people pay attention to these um you know the the the open jobs the jolts numbers you know the unfilled you know jobs and um I actually think that number needs to be Revisited as well because I have a lot of clients that do have open positions for jobs um but they're they're really not filling them in a lot of cases they're not they're not actively trying to fill them it's open but you know if somebody they stumble on somebody who like knocks them out yeah they would consider doing it you know what I mean but other than that they're still kind of riding along um but they're they're always looking people are always hunting for good talent at least my best clients are always hunting for good talent um because they know you know if they find somebody really good they don't give a [ __ ] out of the economy is going they'll find a way to pay for that person because you know position themselves to the Future all right well we'll continue to keep an eye on the recession this this weird weird the weird recession with the lowest unemployment rate you in the past 50 years all right last topic for today I want to talk to you about uh another uh piece you wrote that is uh yet another in your ongoing series on why you hate employees at least as I view it I got another one coming up by the way AB I have just interrupt you we have we've been sending out myself and a few people in my company we've been sending out um like you know email you know messages uh like you know campaigns to like a lot of corporations that we deal with and employees there whatever I we are compiling I've got dozens of out of office messages and I don't mean out of office is like I'll be back on Monday like we're coming back I'm I'm off until September 15th from like some of the largest Brands around there and I'm like oh my God this is unbelievable how much time people are taking off right now um anyway I'm going to write about that too mainly as I'm going to complain about it but I'm also going to but I'm also going to say that maybe we're becoming more European which I think is a good thing you know maybe America's finally waking up but anyway we want to talk about Co let's talk about Co they are related and I'm glad you mentioned that I will definitely be watching for that piece but yes I want to talk about Co because uh as you disclos in this piece first of all you had it recently uh you indicated that it was a mild case you're doing okay yeah I I mean I had I've this the first time I got I tested positive for covid mainly cuz I never tested myself for all I know I've had it six times already um I'm traveling I'm all over the place I'm doing my thing you know and um when I got it this time I tested it because we had a family event coming up so my wife forced me to test and it was and I had like you know the snipples and uh a cough like a dry cough and uh and then I tested positive you know so you know the reason why I've been and I'm not you know yeah I'm a dick I I admit it but the re but but I'm not trying to be a you are such a nice guy in person and such a hard ass when you write are you aware of that well let me tell you something I mean the let me you know it does intermingle with each other because you know the when I talk to my clients and this has been for years I remember one client I had a lunch with my client this is probably 15 years ago and he was complaining about employees that call out sick and that by the way is the topic of your column we have we we should say that that's exactly it's calling out sick and and he's like when would I I mean he goes I would have to be like riddled with bullets I would have to be like on my back to call out sick because I run a [ __ ] business I have employees and customers and vendors and suppliers that rely on me to you to do what I got to do so I gotta you know I got to come to work unless I am really like in you know incapacitated and it's been the same thing with co co has been like the the the greatest get out of work for free card ever invented there is a bank and I'm not going to name them but there is a bank because we know some of the employees there and one of the employees told me that if they test positive for covid and they show proof that they tested positive for covid the bank gives them two weeks paid off because they tested positive for Co two weeks because the bank is terrified of like not having a generous Co policy because somebody's going to get on Twitter and complain about the bank or maybe they don't want other employees infected and they're concerned about keeping staffed but what I mean paid time off not even working from home Lauren you know and I had another guy I know who works for a large organization again not to be named who tell told me tested positive and is uh you know and was very mild symptoms but um you know he'd be out for a week so you know call him next week or email next week I'm thinking to myself what the [ __ ] like you I can't call you you're not working from you have mild symptoms I mean you what business owner would do that if you know I had mild sympt I know certainly I knew a few people that had Ser you know your worse symptoms like a bad cold or the flu and they were out for a day or two and then and they're back to work as well in other words like Jesus you know if you get you you test positive for covid you know okay yeah you try to take precautions to stay away from people but you know for goodness sake I mean you stop all work you don't even work from home you just it's just like hey I'm going to just sit and watch Netflix now for a week because I tested positive for Co and I have the snipples and don't even tell me that I'm like alone in this because I I I can dozens of business owners that I talk to who voice the same frustration with these employees but they can't do anything about it because it's 3% unemployment right now and you know it's it the employees control the market so they got to they got to behave but they Grumble but do you expect employees to have the the same attitude as business owners yeah I do I absolutely do you work for a company it's your job I mean do you not have any self-respect do you not take responsibility for what you need to do you're being paid to do a job you're not paid to sit on your ass just because you have the sniffles and I understand if you don't want to come into work and spread it you know there there's those which by the way I'm not a scientist but there's that's a whole other argument about you know if you're you're obviously if you're vaccinated and you're whatever like really what the effects is it's like coming to work with a cold now but okay I don't want to go there because again you went there I I can say but you know you can't work from home nowadays you can't you know I mean or the minute you know you got to take two full weeks off I mean you know you can't just as soon as you test negative come back to work is this happening at your company I'm just curious why you're no we we're a virtual company right and my employees I it's like don't ask don't tell I don't know they don't know I don't know if people have had covid or not I just expect them to get their jobs done I don't ask them you know what I mean so it's just it's just getting their jobs done yeah they're getting their jobs done I haven't had any people so why are you writing a piece that implies that you know most workers are looking at CO as a you know winning the lottery I'm not talking about my company but I am talking about just dozens and dozens of clients and other companies not that I personally know but then that I also read about because I read all the reports and others I talk to all the time um where they you they are using this Co excuse to just you know not all covid uh cases are as mild as perhaps yours was I agree just like not all cold cases or flu cases are as mild as well and again without you know getting into the science of it I mean we have 0.001% of people dying from covid the cases that we're seeing right now are so under reported because a lot of people are getting Co like me and not even reporting it so that makes the percentage of people that are hospitalized or dying just even that much more minute although up since May I think with the latest variant I you know I think 400 people or something like that are dying in this country every day it's it's it's not nothing yeah out of a country of 350 million people and then when you start digging into the 400 people you find out they have all sorts of other you know health issues or they're old or they're unvaccinated and I think to myself all right well you know if if you're super old or you know Health compromised or whatever you know I get it uh there are a lot of people saying oh I don't want to bring it you know CU my fifth cousin on my mother's side uh you know I don't want to give that person infected you know what I mean so well that can be a legitimate concern look neither as you suggested neither one of us is an epidemiologist I'm not interested in the the giving healthc care advice here uh but but you are a legitimate expert on small businesses you run one you uh you see the internal operations of hundreds of clients you're a trained accountant you you know technology inside and out and you know I'm interested in your apparent sense of just how widespread this is I mean to some extent this this issue has always existed I mean there have always been employees that abused this trust um what what should be done about it what should business owners do yeah you know there's there there there's no answers to that that a business owner is going to like because covid is you know the narrative is is that if you get it uh you know you or somebody else could die uh or contract monkey pox now so therefore um if somebody in your contract monkey pox from Co I know I know I'm just kidding I'm just kidding but if you if you have you know if you I can tell you what my my clients are doing when their employees say they have covid uh the know the employers you know they roll their eyes and they say to the employees okay I understand stay home do whatever you need to do until you feel comfortable coming in and leaving it up to the employees discretion when you work at a small business you do have more of a personal relationship with your employees you get to see them and interact with them a lot more and I found that most the employees don't really want to you know they they do take responsibility for their jobs because they do know how important they are to the operations of a small business they don't want to let their bu you know their their bosses down so they will tend to come back to work when when they can so I think if you take that attitude as a small business owner I think that in the end you'll be okay there will always be a few employees that will take unnecessary advantages in my experience pretty few um and that's kind of what I hear from the owners I talk to I mean that's kind of where you started you were talking about us maybe moving in the direction of Europe I mean there have been a lot of study that indicate that if anything Americans work way too much and way too hard and don't take vacations well that's that's a different topic I mean you know here we're talking about just skirting work and using covid as your as your Shield to do that it's related the vacation issue is a whole other it's just a whole other attitude and you know that is something that I think I mean listen I think this whole the whole pandemic and the change in the workforce the low unemployment the labor shortage that we have right now I think it's having profound you know work Place changes for the better long term and I know some people are going to argue that you oh we're going to turn into a social State like Europe is I don't think the US will ever be that what changes are ref are you referring to for the better well when I say for the better I mean more time off for people but not you know not time off for you know oh I tested positive for Co I take two weeks off I mean more time off like I'm accepting this new job and it comes with 30 days of vacation you know one of the examples you gave I just have to point out I think you mentioned I think it was a bank you said it was the bank that said you have to stay home for 2 weeks and clearly they were doing that because they didn't want people to be infected I you kind of categorize it as being part of a narrative like they're doing something politically correct but I I think they felt that rightly or wrongly they thought they were operating in their own interest and it wasn't the employee that was shering Duty uh Lauren how it's so sweet how naive you are it's so sweet sometimes you are you're adorable you are adorable please explain the banks for doing this um they trust me when I tell you they want their employees to come to work so they can get you know they can get work done um and I think anybody working at you know senior levels at a bank if you were to talk to them over a beer with doors closed they would tell you that this whole thing is ridiculous too but they can't tell out to their employees and they are desperately trying to find good employees and the minute that word gets out on social media or whatnot that you know our bank is Harsh when it comes to covid and that's that's indicative of how they care for their employees that's going to it's going to have an impact on them so what they do is they say y you have a CO oh that's so sad okay you know our policy is you can take two weeks off fully paid because we love and care for you but trust me when I tell you when the when the doors are shut the same executives are like you know you're you're rolling their eyes so I guess my last question for you is I mean it sounds like you don't really think you have this problem at your business um why not what have you done right that this isn't an issue for you oh I I think and I think I'm not different from a lot of small business owners in that I have a good relationship with my employees and our contractors too by the way um and I I trust them you know and have the respect for them to take care of their [ __ ] do you know what I mean so you know if you've got covid if you you've been shot which there's probability of that we do live in Philadelphia you know or if you've got whatever other issues you've got going on um you know I you you've got your responsibilities to take care of so I'm just I'm going to assume you're going to take care of them unless you tell me otherwise and I think the people that work for me and I've had very low turnover um over the I have lots of most of my employees have been with me for more than a decade I think they would tell you that like I treat them with respect and adults and they you know they take care of their stuff and I find out after the fact like like months later oh yeah I I had Co back in April you know what I mean I'm like oh geez how you feeling now I'm fine okay good what you just described is what I hear from a lot of business owners who who treat their employees with respect as well and aren't having the the problem that you described yeah it's as a small business owner if you treat your employees with respect then you the co issue shouldn't be as big an issue but it's just the larger corporations and the problem is is that you know our employees do see and read about the banks that are offering the two weeks of time off for Co or whatever that doesn't help you know what I mean I mean in the end we've got good relationships with our employees and it's okay but but it really doesn't help you know like we're then suddenly like hey what kind of a jerk are you that I'm working for I should have worked for this Bank you know so that's all I'm saying all right well let me just say in real life Gene Marx is not the hard ass he sometimes Sounds here and and I'd like to think I'm not as naive as Jean thinks I sound here but I'll let someone else pick that determination Gan marks is a CPA who writes weekly on small businesses for the guardian the hill the Philadelphia inquir the Washington Times Forbes an entrepreneur you can also hear him on ABC radio's eye on the world with John B Bachelor Jean hosts two small business podcasts with paychecks Corporation and the Hartford thank you Jean thank you Lauren we both to you soon always a pleasure have a great week everyone