By any standard, Heads Up Landscape Contractors, Inc., in Albuquerque, New Mexico, is a success. Celebrating its 30th year in business in 2004, this full-service landscape management company has grown from a college student’s dream into a multimillion-dollar operation that employs upwards of 150 people. For partners Gary Mallory and David Daniell, CLP, success did not come overnight, nor did it evolve without a fair share of “learning experiences.”

Growth and success have come through an understanding of where the owners wanted to take the company and a concerted effort to set and reach goals. Sounds easy, but anyone who has ever tried to implement the strategic-planning process understands that words and ideas do not always translate into desired results.

Heads Up’s history begins in 1974, when Mallory and couple of college friends launched an irrigation installation and repair business. The three friends built their business primarily by subcontracting to local landscape companies, one of which was owned by David Daniell. In 1983, Mallory asked Daniell to join Heads Up and run a newly formed installation division. Early on, the division targeted both residential and commercial customers, but gradually it carved a niche in the commercial sector.

For the next 14 years, the company grew in spurts, riding the ups and downs of the local economy and experimenting with adding new services. In 1989, it added a maintenance division, only to sell it four years later. As Mallory recalls, selling the maintenance division (the company later formed a new one after the noncompete agreement ran out) was a foreshadowing of things to come. “We could not agree on how to grow the division, and still, four years after it was sold and the company was generating $5 million in annual sales, not everyone shared the same vision.”

The lack of focus disappeared when Mallory and Daniell bought out their partners in 1997. Since then, company growth has been spearheaded by two owners who carry the same vision and share a penchant for setting goals and making plans. “Going through the strategic-planning process has been huge for us,” relates Daniell. “After the buyout, Gary and I set some business and personal five-year goals, and we have been resetting those goals every year since. In addition to yearly two-day strategic-planning sessions, we hold off-campus monthly planning meetings with our executive team.” These one-day sessions, he adds, are complimented by weekly updates.

Both Mallory and Daniell credit much of their planning expertise to industry consultants Frank Ross and Kevin Kehoe, the latter of whom facilitates the company’s annual strategic-planning session. “It is not just enough to set goals; companies have to establish a system to implement plans to achieve them,” notes Mallory. Ross and Kehoe have been particularly instrumental in helping us find ways to reach our goals.”

Over the last seven years, Heads Up’s goal-setting sessions have further defined customers, determined the direction of recruiting, and mapped out financial strategies. Driving the overall plan was an organizational chart and, by necessity, the owners had put their names in several of the chart’s boxes. Now, seven years later, their names appear only in couple of boxes, and the company continues to grow and take advantage of new opportunities.

“One of the keys to our recent success has been recruiting and retaining talented and motivated individuals and sharing our goals with them,” Mallory emphasizes. “For a company to be truly successful, everyone has to be pulling in the same direction. From past experience, we know that sharing like goals and visions is fundamental to growth.”

The planning process has worked. According to the partners, every one of the company’s last five-year goals has been met, and new ones have been established. “In addition to specific growth goals, we have identified three areas where we want to focus our attention,” says Daniell. “One area is dealing with the drought here. We want to find ways to reduce its negative impact on our business and turn it into an opportunity. To do that, we are looking at new products and services, including developing cisterns to facilitate irrigation and helping customers replace water-intensive landscaping with xeriscaping alternatives, drought tolerant plants, and different soil amendments.”

He continues, “We are also focusing our attention on ways to streamline internal processes by integrating our computer system, and we have made it a goal of ours to continue to improve recruiting and hiring practices.”

Throughout, Mallory and Daniell are also continually resetting their personal goals. “Both of us are at a stage in life where we want to spend more time with our families,” Mallory explains. “I have children in school who participate in sports and play afternoon games. I want to see those games when I can, and that becomes an important personal goal.”  

Daniell adds, “Being able to do things like spend more time with our families does not materialize without some upfront planning. I think everyone in business has to think carefully about where and how they want their businesses to grow. The alternative is to work hard every year and never truly make any headway.” Successful planning requires commitment, he emphasizes. “We set goals, develop action plans, and assign names and accountability to those plans. Then, we use our weekly and monthly meetings to assess progress and make sure we stay on target.”

For the Heads Up partners, it all starts at the beginning. The action plans work toward meeting strategic goals that, in turn, are driven by long-term goals. Everyone wants something a little different out of life, and that is one reason why no two companies look alike. Successful owners, though, share common traits. They are visionaries and planners, and they operate companies that reflect their business and personal aspirations.

2/04

By Rod Dickens, ALCA Contributing Writer