1138 – How to Operate More Effectively as a Trade Service Owner with The Garden Continuum’s Monique Allen

In this episode of the Thoughtful Entrepreneur, your host Josh Elledge talks to the founder of The Garden Continuum, Monique Allen. 

The Garden Continuum builds and maintains beautiful landscapes. On their website, The Garden Continuum shares that landscape is more than a “thing” that surrounds a house or business. Your landscape can become a Life‑Scape™; a special, beautiful and functional part of your property. The Garden Continuum strives to enrich the human experience by considering your unique personality, the natural features of your land, and the environmental impacts of design and installation. This is what sets Monique and her company apart. 

Monique shares the different types of providers within the landscaping space. She shares her story about how she fell into this space when she met someone in college who suggested she try her hand at landscaping. She realized for the first time that she felt alive while doing work and she hasn’t steered away from that drive since. 

Josh and Monique explore how this has typically been a male-skewed industry, especially back in the 80s when she started The Garden Continuum. Women tended to only work on the stylistic end of things back then – Monique shares that she wanted to break that mold and do all of the work, including the hard physical labor. The Garden Continuum has more females on their team and the space has seen more women in these roles, she shares. Monique also explains that she is nurturing and compassionate above all else. She’s tough, but she also knows how to get results. She approached the trade without being hard on her team, and this has made all the difference.

Monique and Josh also talk about the evolution of trade-based businesses. Most people are passionate about these trades and start as technicians. As you learn and become more adept, you become a master. That’s when you start asking yourself why you shouldn’t work for yourself. There has been a shift in the space and trade service owners need to understand that their teams are experiencing burnout – enough to put some companies out of business. It’s the job of trade service owners to build the next generation of trade workers. Turnover is higher than ever in the trade services, so providing roles for technicians that encourage good company culture will result in retention. Don’t HUNT for the perfect employee in a trade space; you have to attract them. 

Want to learn more? Check out The Garden Continuum’s website at https://www.thegardencontinuum.com/. 

Check out The Garden Continuum on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/company/the-garden-continuum-inc/. 

Check out Monique Allen on LinkedIn at https://www.linkedin.com/in/moniquetgc/. 

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