Own Your Mistakes

A tech finishes a living room, rolls up the hose and heads to the next job. Twenty minutes later, the customer calls the office. A black scuff marks her freshly painted hallway wall.

At that moment, the tech has two choices. He can say, “It was like that when I got there.” He can also say, “That might have been me. I’m sorry. We can fix that.”

One answer costs a little paint. The other costs the customer, along with any neighbors who hear her version of the story.

Nobody gets a perfect score

No one in a cleaning or restoration company is perfect. That includes the newest tech, the office manager and the owner.

This work is physical, and it happens inside somebody else’s home. A wand scrapes a baseboard. The office books the wrong Tuesday. A drying crew leaves an air mover where the homeowner trips over it. The owner quotes a job from memory and misses it by $50.

Mistakes come with the territory. What turns a small one into a big one is the cover-up. A scuff is a 10-minute touch-up. A scuff the customer finds on her own, after being told everything went fine, becomes a question about everything else the company did in her home.

The wrong plate

Think about the last time a restaurant got your order wrong. If the server sighed, blamed the kitchen and left you waiting 20 minutes while the rest of your party picked at their food because they weren’t sure if they should eat or wait … you probably haven’t been back. At the very least, that restaurant didn’t get the good review it was counting on.

Now picture a server who says, “I am so sorry. I wrote it down wrong.” The right plate shows up fast, maybe with a free dessert. Chances are you tipped more than you planned.

The mistake is identical. The ending is completely different. Customers of cleaning and restoration companies work the same way. They don’t expect perfection. They expect the truth and a fix.

What owning it looks like

Owning a mistake on the job comes down to a handful of habits.

Speak up first. Tell the customer before she finds it. News that comes from the company sounds like honesty. News she discovers on her own sounds like hiding.

Drop the excuses. “The stairs were tight” sounds like the tech is blaming the customer’s house. “I scuffed your wall, and I’m sorry” is plenty.

Bring the fix with you. Explain what happens next and when it will happen, then follow through.

Check back afterward. A quick call a few days later to make sure the customer is happy with the repair often leaves a stronger impression than a job that went perfectly.

Honesty starts with the owner

Owners set the tone here, whether they mean to or not. If a team watches the owner blame the supplier or the customer every time something goes sideways, they’ll learn to do the same.

Fear makes it worse. A tech who’s afraid of getting blamed for a stain that won’t come out might push a couch over the spot and hope nobody rearranges the furniture any time soon. The owner ends up hearing about it from a one-star review instead of from the crew.

When the crew hears the owner say, “I priced that job wrong. That’s on me,” they learn it’s safe to be honest. Repeat problems still need coaching. An honest slip, reported right away, deserves a thank-you.

Go first at the next meeting

One simple way to build that culture is for the owner to go first at the next team meeting. Sharing one mistake from the past year, along with how it was handled, makes it clear nobody is expected to be flawless.

From there, ask the crew a direct question: “If you mess up on a job, what do you need from me, so you’ll tell me right away?” Write down the answers and hold yourself to them.

A customer will forgive a scuffed wall. What she won’t forgive is finding out the company knew and said nothing.

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