Hiring and Staffing Video

How to Stop Losing Cleaners

What You’ll Learn

Inspect using a checklist
Hold short daily meetings with a site supervisor
Call cleaners weekly to ask what they need

Short Summary

There’s no one answer to losing staff, but feedback helps. Cleaners want to know how they’re doing. Use inspections with a checklist to give clear notes. Share results, so the cleaner knows what to fix. A site supervisor can hold a short daily meeting before night work. That meeting can include a quick compliment for good work. Call each cleaner once a week to ask what is missing. Start today with one checklist and one call.

Frequently Asked Questions

How often should inspections happen?

Do inspections often enough to give regular feedback. Follow up using a checklist.

Why does feedback help keep cleaners?

Cleaners are people first. They want to know how they’re doing and feel connected to the company.

Who should run the daily meeting?

A site supervisor can run the daily meeting. Hold it before night work starts.

What should the weekly call cover?

Ask what the cleaner needs. Ask if anything is missing for the work.

Should feedback include praise?

Yes, compliments matter. Cleaners need to hear what is going well.

Full Transcript

Well, hi there. Welcome back. Dan again from CleanGuru.

So, how can I stop losing cleaners? There’s not one answer. That is a really tough question, right? It’s a hard one. But here’s one idea. You may have heard variations of this. It’s not unique; we just maybe need to be reminded of it.

Cleaners are people first. They’re not cleaners first; they’re people first. And people like to know how they’re doing. They want to feel connected to something: to your cleaning business, to you.

So if you can build in ways of giving them feedback, letting them know how they’re doing—an inspection, a checklist—maybe you have a site supervisor there for a short meeting every day. Anything or several things that you can build in so you’re having a regular—we talk about with prospects—touch, touch, touch. It takes a certain amount of touches to build that level of trust. Well, of course, it takes that number of touches to build relationships and trust with cleaners, too. Makes sense.

So when we treat people as individuals, we let them know how they’re doing. Whether it’s following up on a checklist, an inspection, the site supervisor before they start the night work, or a phone call that you make once a week to them, whatever you can do to visit with them: give them constructive criticism, give them compliments about what they’re doing, right?

Give them an opportunity to tell you what things they need or what they’re missing that they might need that you could help with. All those ways are ways of making them feel connected so we don’t lose cleaners quite as often.

Till next time, remember: you can do this. You really can.