Your franchise is only as strong as its culture. A thriving business isn’t just about processes and profits—it’s about creating an environment where employees are motivated, customers feel valued, and your brand reputation soars. In today’s episode, we’ll dive into why culture matters, the biggest mistakes franchise owners make, and how to cultivate a strong, positive culture that fuels success.
Culture is like the air in your business—you don’t always see it, but you feel it. And when it’s bad, everyone suffers. Here are the biggest culture-killers:
Imagine walking into your franchise and seeing employees who are actually happy to be there. Customers notice the difference, and your business thrives. Here’s what a great culture can do:
A great franchise culture isn’t accidental—it’s built on these foundational principles:
Culture isn’t just words on a mission statement—it’s built through daily actions. Here’s how you can create a culture that sticks:
You’re ready to build a strong franchise culture! Here’s your action plan:
So I have a question. How are small business owners like us who are spending sixty plus hours a week working in our businesses and are still struggling to make ends meet? We have no time to spend with family, friends, or the things we value most in life. We feel trapped inside of our businesses, and it is consuming our lives. How do we get the freedom to be able to work on our businesses and not in them?
That is the question this podcast will give you the answer. My name is John Nichols, and this is expansion code radio. What's up, everyone? Welcome to today's podcast. Let's talk about something that can make or break your franchise, your company culture.
You can have the best location, the best product, the best business model, but if your culture stinks, your business will suffer. Your employees won't be engaged, your customers will notice, and turnover will be through the roof. So today, we're gonna dig into what it's like to build a franchise culture that drives success. Let's get started. So why franchise cultures fail?
This is a really big thing. I mean a really big thing. Culture is like air in your business. You don't always see it, but you feel it. And when it's bad, everyone suffers.
Here are the biggest culture killers. Number one, negative or toxic work environment. Employees dread coming to work, leading to low morale and poor customer service. Number two, lack of clear values and mission. If your team doesn't know what your business stands for, they won't feel connected to it.
Number three, employee turnover, and I mean high employee turnover. Bad culture leads to constant hiring, training, and drains time, money, and energy. As a franchise owner, that there is crazy true. And number four, disconnection between leadership and employees. When your owners or managers don't engage with their teams, it creates the them versus us mentality in your franchise.
So let's just let's just kinda dig deep into this. I got a really great story about a negative work environment, And this was probably be about eight years ago at my UPS store in Lenoir City, Tennessee. I had this employee, and she was the most negative person I ever met in my entire life. I'm not sure one of the manager even hired her, but she would come into work and you could just feel the negativity come in and it would drain everybody of whatever was going on. And she just brought this I don't know.
I don't even know how to explain it. It is just it dropped the tempo. It dropped everybody's attitude. It dropped everything inside the store when she came in, And everybody felt it. The customers felt it.
Customers didn't wanna be, waited on by her. Other employees didn't wanna even interact with her. She was just so negative. And so whenever you have people like this in your business, my best suggestion is this, turn them into a customer. And that means, promote them to customer, which means fire them.
Because the thing is, is that one person is like a one bad apple in a whole barrel full of apples. It's gonna make everything else go bad. The days that she worked, I had employees call out because they didn't wanna work with her. Her and the manager got into, verbal arguments all the time. I mean, I'm talking about, like, knock down, drag out arguments that were just horrible.
And I'm telling you right now, nobody wants to work in that kind of environment to where someone is just this nasty and mean. So get rid of this person in your organization. If you have that person, they need to find another job, something that they are not facing the public. They need to find a job that suits them, and your franchise is not where they belong. But here's the good news.
When you build a strong positive culture, everything changes. Let's talk about the possibilities. So the power of a strong franchise culture. Imagine walking into your franchise, seeing employees who are actually happy to be there. Customers noting the noticing the difference.
Your business thrives. Here's what great culture can do. Number one, increase employee retention and engagement. People stick around when they feel valued and supported. Number two.
Better customer experience. Employees with positive energy creates a welcoming atmosphere that keeps customers coming back. Number three. Higher productivity and teamwork. When people enjoy working together, efficiency skyrockets.
And number four. Brand reputation. A great culture attracts top talent and loyal customers, making your franchise a go to destination. And so let's go back to that same story I was talking about when I had this one employee and she was just bringing everybody down. So I remember the day when my manager called me and told me that she quit, and everybody in this location was celebrating.
It was the craziest thing I've ever seen. I've never seen so many employees be so happy over one person leaving, quitting. And I didn't really understand why my manager did not fire her, but I let her make that decision. I remember going back into the store a few days later and watching everybody's attitude. Everybody was upbeat.
We and my manager said, hey, John. Whenever I hire the next person, can I get my employees input on this? And I said, yeah. That's a really great idea. And what happened was the next employee that they hired, she let her team help make the decision.
And we used to have people come in and do what's called a working interview, where they would come in and work a few hours and interact with the customers, do a little bit of the job. We train them a little bit on on the front end of, like, how to enter a drop off package. And they would get a chance to interact with the other employees too. And this made a huge difference because we did a working interview on three different people and only one person made the cut because they either started saying negative stuff to the other employees or they wasn't stepping up trying to wait on the customer. And so it really was eye opening to see what was going on when you do a working interview.
So I highly recommend this to really kind of vet people out and really get them to a place to where your employees can have a decision on who is part of their team. Now, I know all this sounds great. Right? So let's break it down into core principles behind strong franchise culture. A great franchise culture isn't accidental.
It is built on these foundational principles. So number one, lead by example. Culture starts at the top. If you're not embodying the values, you wanna see, your team won't either. Number two, open and honest communication.
Employees feel safe sharing feedback and without the fear of having backlash. Number three, recognition and appreciation. A simple thank you or a shout out can do wonders for morale. Number four, consistency and integrity. Say what you mean, mean what you say, follow through with commitments, and treat everyone with respect.
And these are really four really great things that we that you need to have in your franchise. One of the big things was that we did is that we figured out how people really needed to feel appreciation. And there's a book, and I've talked about this in my other podcast. I'm gonna keep talking about this, but it's, written by the guy who written who wrote the four love languages, and it's called Appreciation at Work. The four, the the five the four languages of Appreciation at Work.
It leaves out touch because you don't need that. That that's just harassment and a lawsuit wouldn't happen, but it's the other four that you need. And I really do encourage you to look this up. But we figured out how our employees appreciated or felt appreciation at work, and it makes a big difference in how they perform. So some people like words of affirmation, but here's the dual edged sword of words of affirmation.
Some people want words of affirmation publicly as low in front of the entire team, or some people want words of affirmation privately. You have to know which way an employee wants to receive that. Because if you got somebody that is a little more shy and they don't want to be, you know, have words of affirmation in front of everybody, Whenever you do that, it does just the opposite. They don't feel appreciated. They feel like you've targeted them.
So you really need to figure these things out. It's a it's a really kind of minute little thing, but when you really dig into your employees and you start down this pathway, it will really help things out on you figuring out exactly how that they wanna receive appreciation. Now that we've talked about the principles, let's talk about how to actually build a strong culture in your franchise. Let's talk about the strategies. Culture isn't just words on a mission statement.
It's built through daily actions. And here's how you can create a culture that sticks. Number one. Hire for attitude. Train for skills.
Skills can be taught, but the right mindset and attitude, it is priceless, folks. Number two. Create team rituals and traditions. Weekly team meetings, fun incentives, or special celebrations builds a sense of community. Number three.
Encourage employees growth. Offer training, mentorship, opportunities for advancement to show you invest in your people. Number four. Foster fun and supportive workplace. People perform better when they enjoy their work.
Create a culture where fun and professionalism coexist. So I really wanna touch on a couple couple of these things. Hire for attitude and train for skills, that there's a big one. That's part of the reason why that we do a working interview because one of the tasks that we do during a working interview is this, we ask the potential new employee to take a small trash can and empty it into another trash can in the back of the building. And what this does is that it lets us see the attitude of doing this simple task, And it's emptying a trash can.
And the thing is is that not everybody thinks that cleaning or emptying the trash is part of their daily duties at one of my UPS stores, but it is. It's clearly stated inside of our employee handbook. And it's stating that when we watch an employee and see how they do that protect that task, it's not them performing the task, it's the attitude they have around doing it. And it speaks volume to what kind of employee that they are gonna be. And the other thing that we do is that we really try to promote from with inside of our organization.
Anytime we have a manager's position that comes open, we try to promote from our existing staff, and we put this out there. Before we go even try to find somebody outside of our organization, we normally put this out there and say, hey. If anybody wants to apply for the manager's position at this particular location, please get in touch with our director of business. And what will happen was is that they'll go through an interview process, and then we may or may not hire them depending upon whether they're a good fit for the job or not. And these are some really great strategies on really building from within and really depending upon your current employees to be better employees.
Strategies are great, but to make them work, you need clear action plan. So let's wrap this up with some next steps. You're ready to build a strong franchise culture? Here's some action plans. Number one, assess your current culture.
Get honest feedback from your employees and customers about the current working environment. Number two, define your core values. Make sure your team understands what your franchise stands for and how it makes an impact on their daily lives. Number three, implement small changes this week. Pick one strategy, recognition, communication, fun traditions, something that we've talked about, and start using it today.
Number four, hold yourself and your leadership accountable. Culture starts at the top, so commit to leading by example and staying consistent. I'm gonna go into this just a little bit today. The thing is, is that you really don't know what kind of culture you have until you really take a good look at it. And sometimes we, as franchise owners, we're behind the counter working all the time.
And sometimes it's hard for us to take a good, hard look at what's going on inside of our franchise. Then what I'd suggest doing is take off a few days, and then come into your franchise from the front door, stop and just kinda watch and see what's going on. Start from the very front of how how the customer enters, and what this will do is it will give you the customer's viewpoint of when they come into your business. And also do it. So if you have a uniform or anything that you wear like that, don't wear it when you first get there.
When you first come in, act like you're a customer and just kind of view and see what's going on. This right here will definitely see what your current culture is like and where there is deficiencies too. You can also have a friend of yours come in and do the same thing, and this is a great way to get some feedback from someone that doesn't really have any skin in the game. I normally get one of my friends to go into my UPS stores at least a couple times a year just to see what the company culture is like and what where my deficiencies are at. Another thing we do is that in our bathroom, we put up what our core values are.
So that every time and we put it right next to the mirror where our employees wash their hands after using the restroom. And we also put another copy of it on the door when they open the door as they're walking out. They see it there too. I know that seems a little redundant, but the thing is, it's when we first hire somebody, we'd like, come on, I need I need to show you something in the bathroom. And they're like, what's going on?
And I show them some of our core values and there people always ask, why do you put it in the bathroom? I said, because you at least come in here two or three times a day or more, and when you do, you're able to see our company values whenever you come in and whenever you leave both. And it's really important that or those documents are there so that you're able to really show them what your core values are. That is one of the things that that we that we really do. And the last thing I wanna touch base on is holding yourself and your leadership accountable.
This is a really big thing. I always get my managers to critique me, and I always critique my managers too in all my locations. And this is vitally important to make sure that we are leading from the front, with that everything comes down from us down. And if we're not leading by example, then we can't truly ask our employees to do something that we wouldn't do. So we have to do these things.
I've told this story about whenever I go visit one of my locations, I'll go in and clean the bathroom. And I'll take fifteen minutes and just clean it really good and stuff. And then I'll tell the employees, hey. By the way, I just cleaned y'all's bathroom for you today so that they understand that I'm not above cleaning the bathroom. And this also tells them that I expect them to also clean the bathroom.
In doing these small things, it took fifteen minutes out of my day when I go visit with these locations, does a huge morale boost for your employees. It lets them know that you're not better than them, and that whatever you can do, they can do too. So in closing this out today, I just wanted everybody to know that culture is the foundation of a successful franchise. When you invest in your people, they invest in your business. Take these steps, create a positive work environment, and watch how your franchise transforms.
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