[2007 Leadership Profiles] Harden Blackwell

Situated in the Piedmont area of North Carolina, nestled between the Coastal Plain and the Mountain Region, is the footprint of Harden Blackwell’s Terminix franchise. In this territory, metropolitan areas such as Greensboro, High Point and Winston-Salem combine with rural areas, stretching over 17 counties.

EARLY TERMINIX FRANCHISE

In 1931, five years after Terminix was founded, Robert Burns bought a franchise located in Fayetteville, N.C. Thirty years later, his son-in-law, John R. Detgen, joined the company. Detgen’s daughter Derry married Harden Blackwell in 1968. “I didn’t know the bug business existed in 1968. I had a textile degree from NC State,” Blackwell explains, “and I went to work for a division of Burlington Industries.” After being asked by his father-in-law, Blackwell started at the business in 1971 as a salesman, working in the Greensboro office. At that point, the business operated through four branch offices, with sales of about a half a million dollars per year.

Blackwell concentrated on sales for a few years, then moved to Winston-Salem to manage that branch for more than a year. He then returned to Greensboro, as that branch manager.

Throughout the late 1970s and early ’80s, Blackwell continued to gain responsibilities, eventually becoming general manager. When his father-in-law retired, Blackwell became president, a position he’s held for more than 25 years.

A NEW GENERATION

In 2001, Blackwell’s younger son, Burns, joined the company. John, his older son, chose to go into the insurance business and lives in Wilmington with his wife and three children.

“People are just different,” says Blackwell. “That’s the only way to explain why one son is in the business and the other is not.”

Burns followed a familiar path taken by so many pest control business owners’ children. Throughout high school, he worked as a pest technician and then in the sales department during summers. While attending the College of Charleston, he took a sabbatical from the family business, knowing he would be joining it following graduation.

“In the first year, our goal was to expose me to as many parts of the business as possible,” Burns explains. “So I would spend two to three months in different departments.” Eventually he started traveling to different branches, working for different managers, to gain exposure to various management styles. “I’ve tried to take away the positives and mold them into one,” he adds.
His father still remains his biggest role model, though. Two attributes contribute to Blackwell’s successful management style, according to his son: honesty and a focus on people.

BUSINESS PHILOSOPHY

Blackwell believes there are three basic factors for success in the pest control industry: the battle for employees, the battle for customers, and the battle for profit. “If we can win the battle for employees, employees find the customers and we make the profit,” Blackwell explains. “The hardest part of the equation is recruiting, training and managing people.”

Bob Stewart, the branch manager in Winston-Salem, echoed that statement.

“Like any pest control business, one of the issues we addressed several years ago was turnover.” One step to control this involved learning to put the right people in the right places in the business. Aided by a human resources professional, Blackwell’s company has improved, according to Stewart.

Blackwell knew that turnover could be a by-product of a new work structure introduced about eight years ago for the technicians in the company. Instead of just working their routes and running their tickets, technicians were also being asked to sell.

Chris Fogelman, a technician in the Greensboro office for 15 years, recalls the trepidation he felt. “I was a termite technician. I started at the age of 18. I did the labor, and gave the leads to a salesman,” he says. With the change in approach, he felt scared to talk and worried about all the paperwork. “I had to have a lot of help, but I knew I could make more money. That kind of pumped me up.”

He’s seen technicians leave who couldn’t adapt or meet their goals. But the sales/service technicians, as they are now called, who have embraced this philosophy are sharing in the growth of the company.

“It’s wonderful when they learn what they can do,” says Blackwell, “and you can’t take that away from them.”

This success did not occur by chance. Training, education and mentoring helped the technicians learn the necessary skills. “In my branch, I tried to find an evangelist,” says Kay Boggs, manager of the Greensboro branch. “I picked a person I thought I could make a star. I focused on that person and worked with him to bring him on board. Once he started selling and servicing, the enthusiasm snowballed and spread.”

For any sales/service technician hired now, there is a strict training program. The new recruit is teamed with a mentor, someone who is excelling in sales and service, for 30 days. After that time, the new hire completes four days of technical training along with three days of sales training at the corporate office.
“We stress to them that they can make more in one hour of selling than they can treating homes in eight hours,” explains Blackwell.

Additionally, Blackwell looks for technicians with people skills. “To me, the technical side will never grow the business. You’ve got to kill the bugs, but a customer wants a good employee who is nice, polite and on time.” He may be able to find people with more technical knowledge, but if the customer is not satisfied, Blackwell is not satisfied. “What makes the business grow is satisfied customers.”

EVERYONE SUCCEEDS

This new emphasis on technicians servicing and selling complements a profit-and-loss system developed by industry pioneer Jack Galloway, that Blackwell implemented when he became president. Blackwell credits David Nimocks Sr., from Terminix in Fayetteville, as well as Lex Knox and Tommy Fortson of Terminix Service, Columbia, S.C., for teaching him the system and their willingness to act as “sounding boards.”

Basically, for a branch system to work and grow, the managers receive a part of the profits. “The benefit of this is that managers started operating the business as their own,” explains Blackwell.

“If you try to pay someone less so that you can make more, it never works,” he continues. “You will keep flipping people. What works is when both people are doing well.”

Stewart stresses that Blackwell strikes the perfect balance in dealing with his managers. Blackwell is driven to keep customers and grow the business, so he’s very sales-driven. In fact, all of the computer software used in the company was custom-designed, and managers can access sales figures hourly.
“We have a managers’ meeting every other week that Harden runs. They’re like training classes where he teaches us. I learn something new each time,” adds Boggs.

Burns understands this philosophy also. “He lets every branch manager run each branch like their own business, to an extent,” says Burns. “He’ll step in every once in a while and try to help. He likes to let people make their own decisions — to empower people. He wants people to go out and take risks and grow the business.”

When asked by someone outside of the pest control industry about his success, Blackwell points to this system. “If management succeeds, we all succeed. It’s a chain everybody feeds off. The more they make, the more we make — it’s a direct correlation,” he states. “Everything we do is for managers to grow business and increase profits.”

In fact, by the early 1990s, the company had grown from the half-million mark to five million, enjoying double-digit growth each year. Projected revenue for 2007 is $17 million.

This management philosophy extends to the sales/service technicians also. “We have good benefits, and this is just a great company,” says Fogelman. “There are good people, managers and staff. We are trained well, sent to school and given an opportunity. It’s kind of like running my own business, with my own route.”

TRANSITION TIME

After working in branches, Burns returned to the corporate office and became director of operations in 2005, focusing on aspects such as accounting, the computer system and insurance issues. Blackwell feels Burns understands the business from all sides.

“I’m 61 years old and I still enjoy the business,” Blackwell states, but he looks forward to not being at his desk 40 hours every week. Through the computer system, he can check in from the beach to keep involved. “The greatest satisfaction in running this business, besides Burns joining it, is watching our managers grow and make money. Also watching technicians start to sell and grow and blossom. We’ve made business people out of our managers, ones who didn’t think they were business people. They have done well.”

His appreciation for his employees is radiated back. “Harden is an incredible boss. He’s the fairest boss I’ve ever worked for,” says Boggs. “He really treats all of his people well.”

Stewart shares a similar point of view. “I’ve been in this business for 32 years, and 26 have been here. If it wasn’t a good place to work and the company and the ownership was not good, I wouldn’t be here. It’s as simple as that.”

Pests Cannot Discern Gender

Twenty years ago, a technician quit in the Burlington branch. The manager approached Blackwell with a question — could the manager hire his own wife as a replacement?

“She did a fabulous job,” Blackwell remembers. “In fact, we moved her to a different branch, and promoted her to a supervisory position.”

About 10 years ago, all 12 service technicians in the Greensboro branch were women. One of the technicians was Kay Boggs, who manages the branch today. She believes many factors help foster success for women in the field.

“Most of our customers are women, and they’re very comfortable with other women coming into their homes,” Boggs says. “Women service technicians are more careful inside a customer’s home and more conscientious.”

Additionally, female technicians tend to leave their shoes outside, so they do not track mud into a home, and, generally, are more aware of their surroundings, knowing that the homeowner will be the one cleaning up after an appointment.

Boggs also says that another reason women technicians may be preferable is that customers can feel comfortable in their housecoats during a morning appointment.

The company continues to hire women as technicians, as well as in management positions. “At least half of our managers are women,” Blackwell says. In fact, he laughs that there are so many women managers, they are now hiring men to balance things out.

Through an incentive referral program, Boggs has converted three or four customers into employees. “They see our quality of work, see we enjoy our jobs, and feel our enthusiasm and concern for their home,” she says. The tangible result is that they can work for a company that represents what they themselves value.

The Blackwell File:

Company: Terminix Company

Headquarters: Greensboro, N.C.

Position: President

Career highlights: Graduate of North Carolina State University with a bachelor’s degree in textiles; president of North Carolina Pest Control Association; former member of N.C. Structural Pest Control Committtee;
board member of NCPCA.

Personal: Wife Derry, son John and daughter-in-law Eliza, son Burns, and three grandchildren.