News & Events

Thank you to all our members who supported us at the Jena Dyco Conference. There was an amazing turn-out and SCRIA received a fantastic response to the new Members Benefit Program.

For those who weren’t at the Conference, you will not miss out on these great new benefits that include savings on HR and Employment advice, Insurance, Healthcare, Telecommunications, Fuel discounts, Scholarships, Safety Hotline and much much more! Take a look at the SCRIA Member Benefits Summary, which will outline all the benefits that you will be entitled to as a SCRIA member!

All your benefit information will come in your new Business Resource Kit, a folder packed with great savings, discount, safety templates and technical data sheets.

This will be available from the 1 July to all SCRIA members who have renewed or joined for the 2014 – 2015 financial year. From the 1 July, you will also be sent your own personal login to the SCRIA website which can be accessed at www.scria.org.au. On your exclusive members-only page, you will have all the benefits and templates available via download.

The May 2014  SCRIA Newsletter is now available.

Dear SCRIA members

We are ROLLING OUT THE PACKAGE!

It has been a month now since I was elected to president of SCRIA. I would like thank everyone, especially our families, who have supported the board and me during this busy period of late night phone calls and emails.

Why is that so?  Well, in the last month, we have worked hard to move the association forward, with frequent interactions between the executive board members, our secretariat Annie, and our Member Benefits Project Consultant, Lisa Alexiou. Lisa has been working closely with Annie and the board to get things moving.

We’ve been busy organising some amazing benefits to reward you and give you some great business tools to assist you. Benefits with potential savings of $1000s of dollars. For example, there’s an opportunity to get a complimentary website worth $1500 with any business or personal insurance package. Maybe like me, you would like to save money at the petrol pump. Well we’ve got that covered too, with a really great business fuel card.

These are just a few of the wonderful member benefits we have in store for you. The complete SCRIA Member Benefit Program Launch occurs at the Jena Dyco Conference on May 30th.

Some also may be aware of a small group of SCRIA members who travelled to the USA this month to part take in further training. This was the largest contingent of Australian members ever to travel to the USA for training. I will be highlighting this at the conference too.

So have you booked your conference tickets yet?  I look forward to sharing more about the SCRIA Member Benefit program and the trip to the other side!

On another note, the season of monsoonal weather has passed and for us in North Queensland, it was a bit of a fizzer! Some of our more northern members received some good work resulting from the two cyclones that graced us with their company, but overall the expected workloads were not received. Companies have mentioned that there was wind driven rain and localized flooding, but most of the damage was to infrastructure, sugarcane and banana plantations.

Now comes the cold and the winter storms. Are you geared up for it? Are our leads tested and tagged?   Now is a good time to clean the filters in the front of our dehumidifiers and the side vents in our air movers.

So thank you to all who have contributed so much in the last month and worked so hard. I look forward to seeing all members at the SCRIA stand at the Jena Dyco Conference in May. Please come and say hello to the new board and don’t forget to come to the SCRIA panel discussion. Think about questions you have always wanted to ask about drying or equipment and they will be answered by some great industry leaders.

See you there!

Scott McFadzen
SCRIA President

How are you going to enjoy your privileges?

Most of us like getting value for money. Let’s face it, it makes your membership all that more attractive.

Once you see what you’re entitled to as a SCRIA member you’ll want to keep it a secret, well maybe.

As the independent not-for-profit trade association representing the interests of all professionals involved in the carpet and upholstery cleaning and fire & water damage restoration industry you’ll enjoy a sense of belonging through our programs and events, and the exclusive SCRIA Member Benefits, Rewards and Savings Program.

We think you deserve the very best and we want to give it to you.

The detailed SCRIA Member Benefits, Rewards and Savings Program will be rolled at the Jena Dyco Mould and Restoration Conference 30-31 May, 2014. Registered for the Conference yet? Click here to get on board. And on the 28th you will be treated to pre-Conference drinks proudly sponsored by SCRIA. Click here for more info.

In the mean time keep an eye on your email and Facebook for the latest SCRIA Member Benefits.

SCRIA Member Benefits Program is included in your 2014/15 membership. Not a dollar more. Zero, zip, zilch!

By Paul Buck

Tim Kingston recently asked on the SCRIA Members Facebook Page,

“I am trying to work out how we know staff are efficient and providing quality and also how to let them know their strengths and weaknesses. What KPIs do you use?”

I responded with a few ideas and was then asked to write this article.

In a previous life, whilst working at the Department of Justice in Victoria, I did a lot of work and training on Continuous Improvement in Business and Key Performance Indicators for business and staff. I worked in a small team and trained by the now defunct Australian Quality Council. We were tasked with making a vast cultural change to the Enforcement Management Unit.

Done well, KPI’s will provide focus and incentive for your staff. Done poorly and you have a disaster in the making!

Tim Kingston asked for some examples of KPI’s from the group and whilst this is a great way to get some ideas happening, it is very wrong to think that you can graft someone else’s ideas into your business and make them work.

It is very true to say that each business is unique, and what will work for me in my business may be completely wrong for you in your business.

If you try to develop KPI’s in isolation, you will fail. There are no shortcuts and you will need to do the “hard yards” to get the desired results.

The most common mistake that managers make is to think that they can impose KPI’s on staff. It is very easy to forget that our staff are people too. People sulk, have temper tantrums, pout and do childish things when they’re not happy. As a business owner it’s our job to mentor, nurture and develop our staff and that we should never forget that our staff are essentially paid volunteers who choose to work for us and help us to achieve our goals and aspirations.

There are a number of things that need to be considered before you develop KPI’s and I’ll discuss these further below. But the absolute first thing you need to do is to get your staff involved and provide them with an incentive to accept and work towards the KPI’s.

KPI’s should form part of an employment contract or agreement between you and your staff members and for maximum “buy in” they should be linked to a reward program. It’s very common to link KPI’s with salary or end of year bonuses, but it’s not necessary to go to that extreme. You might consider linking them to a night out, some movie tickets, restaurant vouchers, a team building event, or maybe a desirable training event. The sky is the limit here and your financial position will dictate your budget. Remember KPI’s are designed to ensure you are making money and if you’re making more money then you should be prepared to invest a little back into your staff. You will need to sell the idea to your staff, so addressing the question “what’s in it for me?” right up front will go a long way toward addressing everyone’s natural resistance to change.

When developing KPI’s for staff, your KPI’s need to be both measurable and reflective of your companies mission and values. They can’t just be something that stands out there alone in the wilderness of “boss speak”!

KPI’s need to be relevant and tangible to the staff or you’re wasting your time.

I’d suggest that now, as the winter slow down starts to bite, is a great time to schedule a couple of afternoons with your staff and make use of slack time to invest in the development of your business. (Don’t try to do this in one go. I it can be overwhelming for everyone and you will definitely identify other areas in your business that can be improved upon. So keep focused but allow some time for constructive digression)

In my view, without wanting to make the task bigger than Ben Hur, there are a few things you need to do;

1. Define and write down your, what we called, ‘’Mission, Vision and Values’’; what is it you do, where are you heading and what is culturally important to you, your staff and your business?
   1. Your Mission is what you do. And no, you don’t do floods or clean carpets! You do a lot more than that.
      Glen over at Jumbuck Carpet Cleaning has a Service Guarantee and in that Guarantee are some fantastic statements that, with a little work, could easily become the mission statement for his business. Take a look at http://www.jumbuckcleaning.com.au/our-qualifications-and-guarantee
   2. Your Vision is where you want to go. I’d like to grow my business to a few trucks and six or so staff members, performing a range of services and restoration work, so my vision statement might reflect that. You no doubt will want something different, so your Vision Statement will reflect exactly that. Think in terms of “I’m at Point A now and I’d like to be at Point B. So how can I define Point B in one paragraph?’’.
   3. Your Values are your self-imposed rules, your moral compass, your social compass, and your views on faith. They are the things that define how your business interacts with your customers and society.
      Values are probably the hardest things to get your head around but as far as KPI’s go, they are key to providing the guidelines for your KPI’s. What is the acceptable manner in which my staff are going to go about achieving the desired KPI’s?
      Your Values should reflect your culture (or the culture you want in your business). Here are some key words to get you thinking: Honesty, Integrity, Safety, Professionalism, Courtesy, Environment, Sustainability, Profitability, Consideration, Tolerance, Understanding.
2. Define and write down some very real goals. The big picture! Consider financial targets, cost reduction targets, conversion targets, staff retention targets- everything that is important to your business. If you have a five or ten year plan, pull it apart and find what’s important in it. Your Vision is the holistic statement, and this step fleshes out the nut’s and bolts of that Vision Statement.
3. Define and write down the three to seven most important things and work out how you can measure those things. It’s well and good to say that you want to have more add-on sales or less staff on sick-leave. Now you really need to put some metrics on those things. How many add-on sales do you and your staff think they can achieve? How will you measure that?
4. Once you’ve worked out how to measure them, you need to work out how you are going to achieve them within the parameters of your Mission, Vision and Values. This bit is really important because it’s the rules that you impose to achieve the targets. Think about profitability. If your KPI’s say “make more money” but has no method attached or guidelines, then a staff member who under/over services and overcharges will make more money in the short term but may damage your business in the long term.

So once you’ve worked all that out, you have a frame work to write your KPI’s. When you develop your KPI’s:

• Make them short, meaningful and measurable. Three are just enough but seven is too many.
• Your KPI’s need to be achievable as well as aspirational. If you’re going to this much work, then you need to make sure that there is an improvement in your business model, staff performance and bottom line. As a guideline, your top performers should be able to meet the KPI’s by the last day of your cycle. If they are meeting them by half way through the agreed cycle then you’ve set your metric too low.
• Measure your KPI’s on a regular and ongoing basis. If you plan on only referring to them once or twice a year, then move on. You’ve already wasted enough of your time reading this far.
• Initially, review your KPI’s on a monthly basis and make sure you have got your metrics right. If you need to alter your KPI’s then do it with your staff. Be upfront about it and be honest to yourself and your staff. It’s okay to finesse the KPI’s in the first few months of implementation but once you have a final product then don’t mess with it for another year. At the end of the year, buy your staff a pizza or two and set aside a few hours to “renegotiate” and improve the KPI’s
• Unless you are linking KPI’s to salary then you need to reward regularly, fairly, transparently and with integrity. Don’t make it a competition between staff members. If everyone in the team achieves the KPI’s for the month, then everyone is rewarded. If no one does, then use the opportunity to work out why and fix the problem.

Once you’ve developed your KPI’s, put them proudly up on a wall just under your VMV’s and provide staff monthly feedback on how they are performing.

Done right, KPIs will really bring the team together and give them a focus with a tangible outcome for themselves. You get what you need – the metrics to know what your staff are achieving, an improvement in performance and also, hopefully, in your bank balance.

We want to hear more from our members and the work you’re doing. This month, our very own SCRIA Secretary, Mark Carey from Emergency Property Solutions in Adelaide provided a case-study.

How many of us in Adelaide can forget February’s mini-cyclone followed a week later by the wettest day in 45 years? The team at Emergency Property Solutions (EPS) responded to a significant number of jobs as a result of these events, with many of us working very long hours to help as many of our customers as possible. EPS crews worked till the early hours of the morning to complete as many ‘makes safes’ as possible. This great work allowed our clients and their customers to continue to operate as close to normal as possible.

During the mini-cyclone Loreto College’s Gym had a wall of windows fall out. While SES, MFS and College staff cleaned the initial mess so that school drop off was not disrupted the next morning, they called us at EPS to secure the building and provide make safe repairs. This prevented more damage from occurring and finalized the clean-up. The job needed to be completed out of school hours, as we needed to close the road between Campuses.

As you can see from the photo, we needed to coordinate equipment like the EWP & Light Tower, the required materials and personnel to complete the important task at hand.

The EPS team of Johann, Sean, Russell and Jake having worked all day, then set up and worked through till the very early hours of the morning. They then recommenced next afternoon, and again worked through until the early hours of the morning to finish the job and remove the significant amount of debris that was still on the gym roof. The great assistance of our suppliers; Access Hire (for the EWP) and Kennards, (for the light tower) for mobilizing the required equipment at very short notice is appreciated by both EPS and our customers.

If you have an interesting, unusual, funny case study or simply an on-the-job story you want to share, please send it to us at [email protected] and you might see it in the next SCRIA Screamer!

This month IICRC featured SCRIA member and ex-President, Gary Bourke, in the International Spotlight section of their newsletter!

How long have you been in the industry? Involved with IICRC?
I have been involved in the industry and with the IICRC for 14 years.

What do you do to market your business?
To market my business, I make sure we are listed in our local Yellow Pages, both online and in print. We also have a social media presence and attend networking functions through Business Networking International (BNI) and our local Chamber of Commerce.

To read the full article, please click here

The NSW State meeting was held on the 8th April 2014 at the Restoration Rentals & Equipment premises. We had a good turnout – even Jim Bethel came from sunny Queensland to hear about the innovation and what was happening with ATP in the Restoration Industry. The key presenter was Trevor Warren from Key Diagnostics who gave a comprehensive presentation and hands on demo which had all of us testing the ATP levels on our mobile phones. Terry Kranidis came in at the lowest at 41 and Jim Bethel’s phone came in at 1500 – quite high considering it was a brand new phone! Just goes to show that ‘clean can’t be seen!’ Even Barry Kaye was testing table tops with ATP, then sanitising with colloidal solutions, then testing again – he is a convert to ATP! Thank you to all who shared in the night and we look forward to the next meeting. We are seeking expressions of interest from NSW members who have premises that would be interested in hosting a meeting. Please contact Annie at [email protected] for more information.

As we roll out the calendar of events for meeting this year, we are seeking volunteers who would like the opportunity to host a SCRIA state meeting at their venue!

There are approximately four face-to-face meetings remaining for the Eastern States in 2014. (The alternating months we will be holding webinars to be more inclusive of those members that are unable to travel).

What happens when you host a meeting?

As a host venue you will ideally have a meeting room or provide chairs for attendees in an open space, such as a workshop or an open area.

You will only need to provide the venue and facilities such as bathrooms, tea / coffee. You will also have the option to do a 10-15 demonstration on something that your business specialises in!

You will receive full support from the SCRIA State Representative, who will organise the speaker, catering and make all other arrangements. This is a fantastic chance to become more involved with SCRIA and introduce your business!

If you would like to volunteer your premises to host a meeting, please contact [email protected] and we will send you some more information.

The QLD meeting on Wednesday 18 March went very much according to plan and ran like a well-oiled machine – on time and on budget.

All in all 39 guests turned up for the QLD SCRIA evening.

Thank you very much to Garry Carroll from All Aces for donating his premises, time, food and drink to all existing members, non-members and soon to be members.

Garry’s rug cleaning demonstration was very informative and it was great to up close and personal to a true Rug Master. The question time at the end was very informative, with Gary freely exchanging ideas about one of his areas of expertise.

Unfortunately due to 5 broken ribs and a punctured lung and broken scapula (shoulder bone) our speaker, Jon Mailer from the National College of Business was unable to join us on the night, however in the true spirit of the NCB’s passion and heart for small business they still sent in their $500 voucher to given away as a lucky door prize on the night. We wish him well with his recovery.

Mathew Taylor from Shift Solutions valiantly stood in for Jan and spoke about the Risks in Business from IT perspective, I was especially intrigued to learn that 80% of business that lose data for any one of a myriad of reasons will more than likely not be able to recover and go fail within 5 years. Data can be lost from Malicious Software, lack of backup to external drive and taken off site and failure of hardware.

We held the SCRIA meeting which was very friendly and informal, a genuine exchange of ideas in a relaxed and friendly manner. The executive committee updated the members as to the plans to get Massive Membership Benefits sorted this weekend, more details to follow.

A very special mention to Mr. Gary Bourke from PHJ (whom only last year retired from the National President Position) who not only drove a long way from the Gold Coast, but just last week suffered a stroke (good form Gary) we all wish you well in your recovery.

To finish of the night we drew the lucky door prizes which went off like a frog in a sock with $1500 in prizes being given away on the night with a total of 10 winners, there were some redraws as the condition was you had to be present for the draw.

Special mention goes out to the guys from PowerClean Industries Noosaville who not only drive along way on mass (Wayne and Corallea Edwards, and James Bethel) but also brought along a sack full of goodies to give away. We all loved seeing the Duk Corner Guards in action with, get this, MOVING PARTS!! Plus Controbium Mould products which we all agreed is a tough name to say for a great product that is just as tough on mould!

Was great to have Jenny Boymal from Jena Dyco, not only for her wonderful knowledgeable presence, but also gave away a voucher for $300 to be redeemed against one of their courses.

Toby from Carpet Cleaners Warehouse was there in spirit, but his Flash Extractor Spot Lifter worth $280 was given away about as fast as it lifts spots – Thank you Toby.

Was such a great night and no one wanted to go home, that we had to have security finally kick everyone out at 9.30.

Looking forward to the next event! We are hoping to have an online meeting for the next meeting so that our friends and members from further afield can get to join in on the good times and not have so long between drinks, so stay tuned for more details.