Building a Thriving Culture with Chris Sweet

Have you ever wondered how a welder turned entrepreneur could transform a humble moving company into a thriving business? Join us today as we uncover success secrets with Chris Sweet, owner of Swamp Rabbit Moving. Discover how his love for fishing, pickleball, and business growth have influenced his journey and company culture. Get inspired by his infectious enthusiasm and sharp business instincts.

Delve into the intricacies of business management with us. Discover how tough conversations and calculated risks can unlock success. Chris shares his experiences, stressing the need for a yin and yang dynamic with your operations team and a resilient attitude. Plus, he highlights the power of a positive, empowering culture in facilitating these crucial discussions.

Exploring work-life balance and a positive business culture, Chris opens up about his personal and business challenges. Learn about his team-building approach, nurturing leadership, and valuing every team member. Gain fresh insights on business, leadership, and success by focusing on internal talent and fostering a growth culture. Join us to discover how you can cultivate a successful business culture while keeping your personal life in balance.

NOTABLE QUOTES
"I love seeing what happens to a business when you put a lot of effort and determination, and watching it grow. That’s really my passion in life." – Chris
"I just realized one day that I was meant for more." – Chris
"Always humble, always grateful, but never satisfied." – Chris
"A lot of people fail to realize that there’s so much value in delegation." – Chris
"All my friends I have now, I met through networking." – Chris
"I’m not scared to throw some money on the line or put myself on the front line and try something new out and see what happens. Because I know if I don’t get an ROI on it, I’ll get an ROI on my knowledge about it." – Chris
“Business is business. We need to have those hard conversations and then outside of work, we can be friends, cordial, and go about life as we should." – Chris
"I think that’s where a lot of people fall short in entrepreneurial roles—they want perfection before execution." – Chris
"We’re in an instant gratification world now where I needed it as I thought about it before I even put it into order. We have to realize it’s not instantaneous especially when you’re dealing with humans." – Philip
"I wholeheartedly believe why many people leave businesses is one, because of the manager and two, because of the culture." – Philip
"When it comes to business, your best investment is your people." – Chris
"When I started my thing, I was going to really invest in people and be huge in the second chance." – Chris
"I’m always down to roll my sleeves up and offer a helping hand. I think that’s where I get a lot of respect from the guys." – Chris
"We’re not going to ask anybody to do what we wouldn’t do." – Chris
"You got to know what you can and can’t." – Philip

RESOURCES
Chris
Website: https://www.swamprabbitmoving.com 
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/swamprabbitmoving
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/chris-sweet-555650208/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/chris.sweet.7967/ 

Philip
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/iamphilipsessions/?hl=en
TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@philipsessions
Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/philip-sessions-b2986563/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/therealphilipsessions

Transcript

Philip Sessions: 0:15

What's going on, guys? Welcome back to another episode of the Speaking Sessions podcast. I've got Chris Sweet here with Swamp Private Moving. He's always hopping to it literally with the name of the business. I know it's a slogan there and everything, but this guy is somebody that I've seen over the last couple of years just really grow tremendously, not only in his business or in the local area, but for himself as well, and it's definitely somebody I wanted to bring on the podcast to not necessarily talk from a speaking perspective which is usually what we do, but we'll get into that within the podcast but really just to talk about how he has pushed his own personal limits and the limits, what most people probably set on him, and how he's been able to push past that. So, chris, glad to have you on, tell us a little bit more about yourself, man, I'm glad to be on.

Chris Sweet: 1:09

Thank you for having me. So my name is Chris. I got three beautiful daughters. I got a beautiful wife, two dogs that are crazy. Well, one's crazy, one's pretty lazy. I love fishing, I love pickleball and I love business. I love growing a business. I love seeing what happens to a business when you just put a little forth, a lot of effort and determination, and watching it grow. That's really my passions in life man.

Philip Sessions: 1:32

So give us this backstory, because I know everybody probably in Greenville, south Carolina, knows who Chris Sweet is, but there's definitely people that are not in Greenville and don't know you yet, because you definitely are expanding the business like crazy right now and so we'll see what we get into with that. But tell us, like, your background, because obviously you weren't at where you're at today and it was not that long ago that you worked at BMW, being one of those jobs that you had before starting the business and everything. So kind of tell us this story of where you started to where you're at now. Just an overview.

Chris Sweet: 2:07

Yeah, absolutely so. I started, you know, born and raised in Greenville, south Carolina, kind of hopped around all around the upstate anywhere from Rind Eastside, the Riverside, to, you know, all over pretty much the upstate. I've probably been to every school in the upstate I can imagine, grew up, had a loving mother, had a loving father too, but he just had some personal issues and later in life my mom kind of fell down that rabbit hole and got into a little bit of mess and obviously you know they say that it's hard to break that chain cycle. So inevitably I kind of fell in that cycle as well for a little while Until, you know, I just realized one day that I was meant for more.

Chris Sweet: 2:44

I started out my professional career as a specialized welder, went to Greenville Tech, welded for probably five, six, seven years somewhere around there, just got burned out, was making good money, but just was working seven days a week, 12 hours a day. And I had a buddy that I met through the recovery world. His name was Kyle Nawiki. He actually owns a movement company now as well, but he was working at another local movement company in the upstate area. I was like, hey, man, you should come try this out. It's awesome environment. You get to hang out with the bros all day essentially, and get to see new houses and get tips and get paid kind of well too as well.

Chris Sweet: 3:20

I was like sure whatever started there and I just fell in love with the movement and I love going into like these super nice houses that I've just never even seen in my life and I love the satisfaction of doing a great job for a client and getting a nice tip and return.

Chris Sweet: 3:33

And it was. It was a lot of fun and I just found a passion for moving at that company. Like I said, it was a great company but I saw a few things that I could tweak. I saw the bridge between the management and the field staff was not there, like the culture wasn't there. It was kind of like a point fingers kind of game Instead of just work together as a team and come up with solutions. And I knew if I could bridge that gap that I would have something really special. And it actually just take a few steps back while I worked at Tiger move and I had gotten to a little bit of trouble and I was actually driving a moped from Spartanburg, south Carolina, all the way to Lawrence Road, greenville, south Carolina, every day for four and a half straight years.

Philip Sessions: 4:12

And it's like a 45 minute drive right.

Chris Sweet: 4:14

An hour and a half.

Chris Sweet: 4:15

Yeah one way, and it didn't matter me, I had a rain suit. If it was rain, I just threw my rain suit on and take off. I'll always keep my head down too, because at that time I was a little embarrassed. I was like man, I hope none of my friends see me. Obviously, everybody at work knew, but you know, I was just just kept my head down and hopped on my moped and got to work. And so the reason why I brought that up is because I had formulated a game plan during that time how I was going to start moving company as soon as I got my license back. And the week I got my license back, I bought my first truck and was doing side jobs for about a month and then after that, I made it official, and that's where Swamp Rabbit Moving came from. It was actually October 13th, or three year anniversary is coming up. It's October 13th 2020.

Chris Sweet: 5:02

It was eight days before my third daughter was born, and, man, what a wild ride it's been. I've been super blessed, always humble, always grateful, but never satisfied. It's kind of like my motto. Well, my first truck.

Chris Sweet: 5:17

For probably the first three to four months, we added three more trucks and I was kind of in that mindset like I need to do everything right, like I think every entrepreneur struggles with that they're like I have to be over everything, I have to micromanage everything. So I was like moving furniture while I was on the phone, booking jobs, sending crews out that I wasn't a part of, and then finally I had a coach and he's like Chris, you got to start delegating. And as soon as I started delegating, that's when it really spread like wildfire. I mean, we went from three or four trucks to, it seems like, 10 trucks overnight. And then we continue to grow. And I think that's where a lot of people fail to realize that there's so much value in delegation. Right, because now, instead of one mind working on all the solutions, you got multiple minds coming up with multiple solutions to find the best solution, right yeah?

Philip Sessions: 6:08

Yeah, Delegation is such an important thing, but it's such a hard thing to do and I'm glad you brought this out. So let's go ahead and take a pause here on the story. I know there's still a lot more to go, but with delegation how obviously, like you said, you struggled with that at the beginning and most entrepreneurs struggle with that it's built to get rid of a little piece of their baby and it feels like, oh well, I got to control it, I'm the one that can do it best and maybe in the moment you can. But once you actually delegate it, you find out that you really weren't that great at it.

Philip Sessions: 6:38

So what did that look like and how are you able to delegate so? Probably easier now than you were at the beginning.

Chris Sweet: 6:46

Yeah. So I think my biggest thing with delegation was it was a multiple things right. It was, you know, I thought I could do it best. And then also that scary thought of bringing in a nonproductive role or non-income producing role and having to pay that person in the very early stage of a business was also very scary. But, like I said, once we did it was crazy.

Chris Sweet: 7:07

And now it's really cool because now I mean we're just so top heavy on staff. I wouldn't say top heavy, but we got enough people for anything right. And it's cool because now I get to play on the vision stuff. Now I get to, instead of working on driving leads or filling up. We just got a new vertical with warehouse storage. Instead of trying to fill that up, now I get to think about. My job. Today is like, what are we going to do when our warehouse gets full right? Like I'm thinking 2024 problems, 2025 problems, instead of working on today's solutions. And I think that's just so quintessential to grow in a business, especially once you get to a certain point right, like you don't have to do it right away. But I think when you get to a certain point in business, delegation is there's no way to scale, yeah, without it.

Philip Sessions: 7:54

Yeah, for sure, and I know you've been doing that on a lot of different fronts, and especially right now you obviously were doing a ton of networking events or maybe not obvious to everybody in the audience, but you were doing all these networking events. So tell us about that real quick and then we're gonna kind of dive into that also a little bit within delegation. But networking events, there's a ton around. You start going all of them. Yeah, what made you decide to do networking events. Yeah.

Chris Sweet: 8:19

No for sure. The first year I mean any networking event in Griebel. I was probably there, you know. So we would, we would, I would move furniture all day and then anything I could find that evening after I was done To go meet new people. And really it was to learn about business too, right, like I just wanted to get around some people that new business or that was doing something that I could really like look at and Mentor and get a mentorship from.

Chris Sweet: 8:44

Because I didn't know nothing about business, right, like I didn't graduate high school. I went to trade school, you know, business just was not my forte. I had never, to be honest, I'm like not the smartest person in the world, but I knew if I could get around the cultivator skills they had and mirror that, that I would be able to learn pretty fast. And that's exactly what I did and Through that I was able to build some really good relationships and meet pretty much all my friends I have. Now I met through networking. Right, because I don't really hang out with too many people that don't, that don't own a business or does doesn't have some kind of dreams or passion behind it, because they say, you know the five closest people or who you're gonna turn out to be right. So I tried to always be the small fish, a small fish in a big pond, and then that way I can grab that inspiration and learn new things from them.

Philip Sessions: 9:30

Yeah, yeah, and you're definitely great about that. I know our first like real, true interaction was actually when I asked you to sponsor an event that I was doing. So it was. It was a marketing based event but a lot of realtors and stuff like that. We're gonna be there, so it was a great fit for you.

Philip Sessions: 9:46

And then, on a personal perspective, I never told you this but I was like dude actually, I think I did say a little bit like I hate to be that guy. That's like coming right into your DM and the first thing I say is like hey, I want to ask you for money. But John, our mutual friend, was like age, talk to Chris. I made sure to preface that dude, this is the last thing I want to do. Like hey, by the way, you want to sponsor this? I know we never talked before, but you're cool about it and you've been great about investing into Marketing, into your company, everything, which I think is another unique thing.

Philip Sessions: 10:18

There's definitely a lot of unique things about you, but that's another unique thing. And so, within networking, investing that way your time, but you're also investing money. How I mean, how has that been? Because I feel like a lot of business owners. They're ready to start taking money in and I don't know where your financially You're taking money in versus putting it out or investing it back into the business. But yeah, how has that been as far as from a mindset, and how does that help develop you and your business?

Chris Sweet: 10:46

I think a spending market of dollars is huge, right, like it. And spending marketing dollars when it gets hard is even bigger. Right, so like. What I mean by that is is easy to Delicate of a percentage of your revenue to marketing when you're cranking in a lot of money. But what happens when you slow down? Right, a lot of people, they make the mistake. When you know business starts getting slow, revenue slows down, coming in, is that they first thing they cut is is marketing and that is like the biggest number one. No, no, that I think you could do in a business. Right Like, they're in tough times and during hard times and money is tight, that's when you need to be spending the most marketing dollars, I believe and I like I said.

Chris Sweet: 11:23

I mean, there's, like you said, to like there's a lot of good things that I've learned to do, and once you stack those on top of each other and that's where you really get scale. So like delegation, marketing, branding, community impact, like just being a good person, integrity in your business, like doing the right thing, I think you stack a bunch of little things up and that's what equals scale at a large size.

Philip Sessions: 11:48

Hmm. And so what got you in this mindset in the first place? Because I mean, people think about okay, I probably should network, I probably should do marketing, I probably should be some kind of local influence, but they only think about it. They never actually do it. So what got you first of all, to think about doing it and then, secondly, to actually take that action and do it?

Chris Sweet: 12:09

a lot Of it, I think, comes to like, you know, I've had a coach throughout, probably a month after I've started. I've had a coach throughout the whole process. I've say I've cycled out about growing some, which that is a good thing, right, like if you have a good coach and they're doing a good job, eventually you probably should outgrow them and the good ones understand that. But I think, yeah. So when I first got my first coach, you know he we started talking about all this and I was very hesitant, like it took me a long time to Get over that hump to where I was actually doing it. But then once I did do it and I saw the results, you know, I kind of built a thicker skin to like, even as we scale now and our op-ex is a lot higher now, like I know that where I want to go and my mission statement for the company, what I I have to do to do it. So that just makes it so much easier Once you've done it, once you have that mindset and also I kind of have a I would say it's a pro, but a lot of people say it's a con.

Chris Sweet: 13:00

I have a very impulsive like business sense. So if I think something, no matter what it costs or no matter what it does or whatever, I'm going to do it regardless and I'm going to figure out. And I've lost a lot of money that way, but in those losses I've learned a lot of lessons, right. So I think it's invaluable to kind of have that impulse reaction when it comes to business, like I'm not scared to throw some money on the line or put myself on the front line and try something new out and see what happens, because I know if I don't get a ROI on it, I'll get a ROI on my knowledge about it, right? So either way, it's a valuable lesson.

Philip Sessions: 13:39

Yeah, for sure, and I really don't know which way. If you could say one way or the other is better, I would almost feel like from the, the visionary of the business yeah, you want to have that person that is going to go out there and risk it and that's where you have that operations person, that integrator that comes in. Let's really back in here, let's make sure we stay within some guidelines and everything If so for sure, you need to have that person.

Philip Sessions: 14:03

That's the yin to your yang, so to speak. For sure, but I think that's my way now.

Chris Sweet: 14:08

I do, yeah, I have like a plan. Now my operations guy, I mean he's looking, we're going in our P&L means we're talking, and you know he has to hold me back sometimes because my vision outweighs reality sometimes, yeah, and so how is that conversation?

Philip Sessions: 14:26

I bet that's a pretty tough conversation from both sides to be able to have. But how does that conversation look? I'm guessing it's not fist fights.

Chris Sweet: 14:34

How does that?

Philip Sessions: 14:35

conversation, feel at the end of it when you, when you both, have to go back and forth and kind of fight for your side, if you will.

Chris Sweet: 14:42

It's definitely involved, right Like our conversations now don't look anywhere like our conversations did before. But now it's just more like we just come with data points, like you know, have an idea, and he'll he'll map it out and say, well, I really don't think it's going to work out like you think it is. And this is why, and if it's a logical answer, why then you know, maybe we'll pivot our decision and maybe try something new. Or, you know, maybe sometimes I still kind of override it and and try it anyways, and usually I get burned and then he'll look at me and say I told you so. Oh, man.

Philip Sessions: 16:05

Yeah, that's definitely a tough spot to be in, but that's good that, like he's willing to put that out there and really shows your leadership as well, that you know he's going to tell you what to do and then, yeah, and then if you decide not to listen to it, obviously you're kind of the boss at the end of the day. So for sure you know you can't fire yourself and it's not like he can fire you, but still it's cool that y'all have that relationship, that you can go back and he can kind of see I told you so, yeah, who prove you that he was right and everything.

Chris Sweet: 16:34

Absolutely. It's very joking manner. I think it's super important that you empower your people to like really be able to have hard conversations. That's what it's all about. So being able to have those hard conversations whether it's with the leadership team or staff member, or vice versa, them having hard conversations with you, you know, I think that open communication is crucial, yeah, and so how do you think you've been able to have these tough conversations?

Philip Sessions: 16:58

Because there's so many companies around here, more so as they get bigger and bigger. But even with the small companies, it's tough to have those tough conversations. Or even in your personal life, having those tough conversations is very difficult. So how have you been able to nurture that kind of culture to be able to have those tough conversations?

Chris Sweet: 17:18

I have not always been great at it, you know. That's something like my biggest thing that I'm working on this year is not being passive, aggressive, right. I'd like having those hard conversations. So it's something I've probably really just recently evolved into and the way I did it was just practice, right. Like you know, you just start doing it and you know they're a little weird at first and they don't. The message is not conveyed like it's supposed to at first, but you go back and relive that moment a little later on and figure out where you could have went a little bit better and then you shoot for better next time, right.

Chris Sweet: 17:51

But my coach has really been working with me this year how to really step into that leadership role and have those really hard conversations. Honestly, it's tough for me because I have a lot of people that are on my leadership team that I have close relationships or outside personal connections with, like my operations guys, my kids stepped down. So, like, imagine those hard conversations. Those are really hard, yeah, but we have them and it's really cool. It's cool that we can like know that we can have those and still, you know, outside of work, be good friends, right, like we go out to eat together. I mean, we spend a lot of time together, but we know that business is business and here we need to have those hard conversations and then outside of work, you know, we can be friends and cordial and go about life like as we should.

Philip Sessions: 18:37

Yeah, and you, being an entrepreneur and a business owner, it's obviously very hard to turn off that business conversation and thinking and talking about the business and now you're working with people that you go share a meal with, that you go do things on a personal level. How are you able to keep that separate? Because that's such an important thing for all of us to learn.

Chris Sweet: 18:59

Yeah, that's another good thing I've been working on. I mean, I still not perfect at. Like my mind is always swamp, rather than, like me and you If you saw me at a networking event, I'm probably staring into space thinking about what I could do with swamp, rather than I'm thinking about the next vertical, I'm thinking about how to improve a process. So it's something I'm really not that great at and, honestly, like I don't really care to have too many conversations that aren't business related outside of work. I'm just being 100% honest.

Chris Sweet: 19:30

Like I like to be around friends where we can talk about growth and strategy and how we're going to scale and like what's your thoughts on this? Like those are the conversations I like to have, whether it's in business or outside of work. So nine times out of 10 when I'm talking to somebody we're talking about you know where they're at, how they're growing, or where I'm at or how I'm growing. I haven't mastered the shut off switch yet. Maybe with my kids I do, like I'll take them fishing and I can shut off there, or pickle ball. Like the only time I really shut off my mind is when I'm involved in a hobby that I enjoy very much or I'm spending time with my family.

Philip Sessions: 20:05

Okay, okay, I was going to ask that question, as I guess, with your wife because she works in the business, right, or does she not? I forget she came.

Chris Sweet: 20:13

Yeah, when we had our daughter, she took some time off from what she was doing prior, and then this year she came to work as an HR and so on.

Philip Sessions: 20:24

Oh man, so she's the one that can actually fire you then.

Chris Sweet: 20:28

She definitely can fire me and she can kick my butt, yeah.

Philip Sessions: 20:34

So how is that dynamic? Because most entrepreneurs are going to struggle when their wife is not in the business. But then your wife is in the business and maybe it makes it easier, maybe it doesn't. But how are y'all able to have a quote, unquote, normal relationship, where it's not business talk, and then also have, like that, business relationship as well?

Chris Sweet: 20:57

Yeah, so again, that's another thing. That was just practice makes perfect, right? Like I think that's where a lot of people fall short as well in entrepreneurial roles that they won't perfection before execution. That's never the case, right? You're never going to be perfect in anything you do right out the gate. It's always just about practice. So it's just trying to figure out her boundaries and she tries to figure out my boundaries and then just try to come to a happy medium in between.

Philip Sessions: 21:23

Yeah, I like that. Perfection before execution that's what most people think and you have to have that execution for sure before you can get into anywhere remotely like perfection. That's for real yeah.

Chris Sweet: 21:37

But let's go back to go ahead.

Philip Sessions: 21:38

What were you going?

Chris Sweet: 21:39

to say, oh no, you're okay. I think you got to have some kind of data to back up your decisions, right, but I think that if you think you're going to be perfect in the situation, you're just that wrong.

Philip Sessions: 21:49

Oh, definitely, definitely. But we're in an instant gratification world now, where I needed it like that, or I needed it as I thought about it before I even put it into order, like it should have been on its way, so we definitely have to realize it's not instantaneous like that, especially when you're dealing with humans.

Philip Sessions: 22:07

For sure, yeah, but let's go back to culture. So I know we've been kind of dabbling around all of this, but I would say you probably have one of the best cultures, at least in the upstate, and that's such an important thing. And I wholeheartedly believe why many people leave businesses is one because of the manager and two because of the culture there. People will stay at a business for a certain culture or if it's basically they need something, it's either the job itself needs to become such a pain that they decide to leave, even if they don't like it, or the culture needs to be so well that they just can't leave because they're never going to get it somewhere else. So I need to basically see that the grass is greener on the other side in order for them to take that leap.

Philip Sessions: 22:53

So how have you went about developing this culture? Because I know you've had the massive growth. So, through this massive growth over almost three years, and you've had a location change, you've added an additional office that's like three and a half hours away. Now you're not only doing moving, you're doing storage, so you're adding verticals within your business as well, but you've been able to maintain this culture. What do you think that success is?

Chris Sweet: 23:22

Yeah, I think so. When it comes to culture, maintain is a tough word because culture, no matter how good it is, there's going to be little epsom flows, there's going to be little dips and valleys and there's going to be huge hills and that could be anywhere from. You. Just get one bad employee in and it spreads like wildfire. They got a negative attitude that showed up to work negative. Somehow. They weaseled their way through the interview process. But as long as you catch it fast, it's very easy to get culture back up top.

Chris Sweet: 23:52

One of the recent things that we did which I'm super excited about is we added a CHO, a chief happiness officer. It has a mental health benefit to our guys. She is here to motivate, to grow, whether they grow within the business or we're growing them to further their career elsewhere. That's okay. It's such a cool thing to watch because I was one of those guys that were super tough and timid to like emotions or growth or develop. All that's all sissy stuff. Keep delighting, be where I'm at now, where I'm like heavily involved in that, and see where they're at and seeing them slowly chip away at their hard shell exterior and really get like excited and juice stuff about coming and learning about work, about showing up to optional late night leadership meetings, taking time away from their family where they're not getting paid is optional. It's really cool thing to see.

Chris Sweet: 24:46

I think, when it comes to business, your best investment is your people, right? I think? You know, without investing in your people and making them feel loved and appreciated and feel like no matter what, like even at we don't have a gender, but even when we had a gender, he's just as important as me, right? Because everybody plays a crucial role in our success, I think we're baying that message is super important and show an appreciation like, hey, you know, you might be a mover and Dustin might be the operations manager, but you're just as important as him and we appreciate you just as much as we do him because you're just as much as a part of our success as he is. Right, I think that's huge yeah.

Philip Sessions: 25:32

Yeah, go ahead.

Chris Sweet: 25:34

I know you're fine.

Philip Sessions: 25:35

Yeah, well, I was going to say you often see these operators, if you will, the movers in your case where they're the ones that are kind of overlooked while they're doing the day to day stuff. They're the ones that are paid hourly. We can't focus on them. We need to work on leadership and because they're on salary, we can then go put them in trainings and help them develop and grow, both from a business perspective but then also a personal perspective. But we leave these operators out of the picture. But they're the ones, unfortunately. They're doing the hard work. I mean, they're the ones that are literally making things happen. Yes, you need people that are the operations manager, that are the HR person, but at the end of the day they're not literally bringing in the money. If you didn't have those guys moving, you wouldn't have a moving business. You could do it without the operations manager, hr person or even really the salesperson. That's a little bit different there. But still these other people. But we train them so much, but we don't train the operators.

Philip Sessions: 26:32

That is a really cool thing that you do.

Chris Sweet: 26:34

Absolutely. And I think that you know, like you said, the operators. They have the most space time with the customer. Why not pour into them, why not train them and pour into them the swamp rabbit way, and then that way the customer gets the most swamp rabbit experience possible, right.

Philip Sessions: 26:51

Yeah, exactly. And then, not to mention, if these guys want to stay within the company, well, if you haven't been training them when they were the mover, the operator, and they move up into a management or office position, well, now you've got to go try and train them now and everybody's already been through this training and let's take disc assessments, if I can say that right.

Philip Sessions: 27:12

For example everybody's done disc in the office, but nobody out in the warehouse has done that. Well, when they come in the office, like, oh, what you know? What are you? What do you mean? What am I? Well, on disc, are you DIS or C? I'm like what do you mean? Oh, oh, yes, sorry, we're had to get that for you Now. They're completely confused. Now they feel they already felt awkward and out of place because they were always in the warehouse and now they're in the office.

Philip Sessions: 27:37

But now, you're just continuing like almost pouring fuel on the floor and they're still on the flame of the awkwardness.

Chris Sweet: 27:43

Absolutely.

Philip Sessions: 27:44

And so getting them all trained up, I think, is an awesome thing that you're doing there, so I definitely want to commend you on that. Thanks, matt, and did you just start because I know this is all kind of new to you as well and Chief Happiness Officer, that's pretty cool thing as well, very unique, and all this has kind of started. It's a little bit newer and I know it started with you doing your own personal development. How did you go about kind of rolling this out, if you will, from being like you and your, foreign to you and making sure the business grew to then passing it down to others in the company?

Chris Sweet: 28:17

Yeah, I think I think, first and foremost, you know, if you have that leader's elast mentality, then you have to work on yourself first and then that way you can figure out how to be a leader and then you can train other people to be a leader right, and motivate them and push them, because you've already walked that path and you know how to kind of guide them. And then I just, like I said, from past experience with the other moving company, I just knew what. At first they had a great culture and then the culture kind of went down and I knew the flip and I kind of saw where it flipped and I just made my mind up right then and there that when I started my thing, that I was going to really invest in people and we're huge in the second chance. It's like we love giving second chances to people because, you know, coming from my past, I've got hundreds of chances that I probably didn't deserve sometimes.

Chris Sweet: 29:06

And look at me now. Now I'm able to, you know, do all kinds of things that are beyond my wildest dreams, right Like I'm. We're able to, you know, dedicate a portion of revenue to a non-profit, no matter what, whether we lose or make money, we're able to do quarterly meetups where we go back and give to the community. I'm able to invest mornings during the week going to mentor and guide. So I just think it's a good thing to be able to pour into your team and I think it's super crucial.

Philip Sessions: 29:36

Yeah, yeah. And then one other thing I've kind of got to hear, because I know you've been going to networking events and you're at this point in in. You see this more in big corporations, but even in small companies. You see the owner where they're going out and doing all this stuff or they're going to these events and it seems like they're just not working. You know, I know when you're at networking events you're building up relationships so that business does flow back in. How do you navigate that? I know there's a lot of people that haven't seen your come up, if you will, from where you started to where you're at now. Even from the outside they're seeing like well, dude, chris is always going on fishing trips, chris is always going to this mastermind and doing that thing. Like when does he ever work? Like must be nice kind of thing going on there, yeah, yeah.

Chris Sweet: 30:22

So, how do you?

Philip Sessions: 30:22

navigate it, those conversations internally, because I mean who cares about? External they're going to say what they want to say but internally, keeping that culture alive.

Chris Sweet: 30:30

Internally, I think, because I have a lot of guys that started with me right Internally. They know where I was at, they know how much work I put into this. I mean when I first started I would work four or five jobs a day just to build in revenue so I could buy another truck, right. Like I would work from seven in the morning until eight o'clock at night and then I'd go to a networking thing or whatever the case may be. And a lot of those guys seen that and really you know I just I kind of explained to my guys like this is my role, like my role looks a little different and I'm not afraid to get back out there and move.

Chris Sweet: 31:04

I've done it here recently. Like I'm always down to roll my sleeves up and offer a help in hand, and I think that's where I get a lot of respect from the guys and I do a lot for my team. Like you know, somebody might have an issue or whatever, and even though you know they didn't work the hours or what, I'll help them out. Like you know, I'll give them some cash or Whatever. I'm just I think they realized that where I'm at is where I'm supposed to be and this is where it's best Benefitted for me to be in the business and they know in return that I'm gonna be here to you know, help them out if they need or be family or they're like their hours depend on me getting out there and networking and driving these relationships, and a lot of times when I'm fishing I'm networking as well. I just make a hobby with with work, yeah.

Chris Sweet: 31:53

I haven't really had that issue come up too much, to be honest, and I think it's just because I keep my finger on the pole so much and, yeah, it looks like I go fishing all the time. But you know, social media doesn't tell you everything. It's not showing you Me here at night or early in the morning doing what I need to do. And, like you said, all those external people I could care, to be honest, I could get two shits about them.

Chris Sweet: 32:15

Really I'm gonna do me, you do you and and I'll, I'll work you, no matter how many fishing trips. I think.

Philip Sessions: 32:26

Exactly, man. But no, that's awesome to see that you're still willing to roll up those sleeves, so to speak, and everything, and get out there, which says a lot about your leadership. It says a lot about the company. Culture is like guarantee there's other people, if not everybody, in the office that's willing to get out there and do something. Maybe they can't do everything because they just don't know how to, but they're willing to get out there and do something and not just sit in the office because well, hey, I'm an office worker, I don't do that stuff. They're willing to get out there and help out.

Chris Sweet: 32:54

Yeah for sure. I mean, before I even jumped on this podcast, we had a storage inbound job that went a little late last night. We told the guys just to leave the truck loaded and right before I jumped on me my operations manager out there Unloading the truck and the storage pods. Like We'll do whatever we've been there. I've been a mover for Four and a half years before I started swamp rabbit moving. I'm not afraid to get out there and move, and neither is he.

Chris Sweet: 33:16

Just because, like, we're not gonna ask anybody to do what we wouldn't do or what we happened on. You know. I think that just goes a long way.

Philip Sessions: 33:24

That's important, and so then I'm just curious from this perspective. I see companies do this differently. Do you only hire from the ground floor, so to speak, and then up, or do you also kind of hire people at the different levels that need to be there?

Chris Sweet: 33:38

when I first started, we would only you, we only can promote it with them. But as we got a little bit bigger, we noticed that you know some position. We always open the. If we have a new position, come up in a higher role, we open it up to the whole team. But we also open it up to the public now because we know if we're gonna drop to our mission statement and we're gonna do what's best for the company emotions aside, then we need to also sometimes bring in outside talent as well. Um, a big instance is our sales reps. Like sales reps before, prior to a year and a half ago, we're only the movers that had moved up. And now, you know, we kind of brought in some people that are experiencing sales, but doesn't mean that we still don't promote with them like we're really big and to Cultivate a leader and I'm watching them grow inside the company if they choose to yeah, yeah, that's great.

Philip Sessions: 34:29

I think that's that's important to do that. But there's obviously some roles that you just can't like, for instance, you know, I know, you know him, but he's talked about this before how they only promote from within, unless it's a super specialized position, like the T guy he's like.

Philip Sessions: 34:45

I didn't have anybody I could bring into an IT role now Maybe once he had somebody in place he could if somebody was interested. But it's hard to Especially, for your example, bring a mover into an IT role unless they went to school for that. So you gotta know what you can and can't. So that's really cool that you do that though, because I've noticed companies have better cultures that will kind of promote from within and trying to bring people into those positions Versus oh, we've got this new like high salary position. We're just gonna bring somebody from outside has no clue about us culture and just do it. There are times where you have to feel it from somebody from outside. But yeah, I give that opportunity internal first and let everybody say, if no, that's not for me, I don't want to do that, and then you go outside. It's like, hey, we gave you the opportunity, but nobody bit for sure or anything.

Chris Sweet: 35:36

It depends on, like, like you said, like you know, you have to have the talent to fill the role. Yeah, you have to be close enough to where I can guide you to fill that role. So we find it's good to have like a mix, a mix of people that are well experienced and a mix of people that we brought up and then that way they can feed off each other, like, especially in the sales world. You know our guys that have been movers, that are selling now. They know how to quote a job, they know how long the job is gonna take. All the people that we brought in from outside they know how to sell. Really well, we put those two people in the same room and guess what? You just got dynamite.

Philip Sessions: 36:11

Yeah, man, that is awesome it's. It's been awesome talking about, like your company culture, how you've developed that. I know it's been really good value for people. But I do want to get to our last question here and we'll go to that. Actually, let me ask what's next for swamp rabbit, because we talked about this massive growth over only three years. But what's next that you want to let us know about?

Chris Sweet: 36:35

So I am actually Up, switch my mentality and swamp rabbit is actually just gonna be like a legacy piece now and I'm gonna leave swamp rabbit where it's at and grow it to its full extent Mm-hmm. But I'm also jumping into the acquisition world where I'm starting to purchase Existent moving companies that are already profitable, already having brand recognition, and then just pump our systems and processes into it and watch them grow. So I'm super excited about that and where that takes me. So just stay tuned and see, see what happens with it.

Philip Sessions: 37:08

Nice, I mean swamp rabbit national, or if you're gonna kind of keep the same name, but then put your systems in there.

Chris Sweet: 37:15

Yeah, I'll leave them branded as it as is, because they'll already be. You know, my box is they have to be doing at least one to five or in between one to five million, and at that point you know they've already built that brand recognition. So I would just leave them branded as is, because I think the only well, there's multiple reasons why people rebrand, but I think the biggest one why people rebrand it and already thriving company is just an ego thing, right, like I don't have to have swamp rabbit on it to know that I'm gonna do great things with it. Um, I'd rather just leave it how it is and then put my processes and systems into it.

Philip Sessions: 37:48

Nice. That's incredible. I'm looking forward to seeing that growth there as well, as you do that, and that's cool. No-transcript the names swamp rabbit being everywhere, although that would be cool as well to see that.

Chris Sweet: 38:00

That would be cool. And you never know. I'm like I said, I'm a visionary and in my dischange all the time. So you talk to me tomorrow and I might be like, yeah, we're going to have a hundred swamp rabbit locations. You never know, but that's part of the journey, that's what kind of All right, I was going to put that like.

Philip Sessions: 38:14

So we asked them on this date. So if you hear two weeks from now, it's changed because it was, and everything but dude, that's, that's awesome. But let's get to our last question here, and that question is if you only had one message to share for the rest of your life, what would that message be?

Chris Sweet: 38:31

Yeah, and when we, when you brought that up, I've got it word for word now. So my favorite quote of all time is the man in the arena. So I'll read it really quick if I have time.

Philip Sessions: 38:42

Yeah.

Chris Sweet: 38:43

It is not the credit who counts, not the man who points out how the strong man's doubles or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is mirrored with dust and sweat and blood, who strives valiantly, who ears, who comes short again and again because there is no effort without ear and shortcoming, but who does actually strive to do the deed, who knows great enthusiasm, the great devotions, who spends himself in a worthy cause, who, at the best, knows in the end the Trump of high achievement and who, at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat. Deodore Roosevelt.

Chris Sweet: 39:34

Man every time I read it, it just gives me chills.

Philip Sessions: 39:37

Yeah yeah, same here, man. I just think about that and how I'm trying to apply that to my life, or working to apply that to my life as well right now. It's just awesome. I can definitely see how you're living that out. For sure, definitely a message that you need to put in your own words at some point.

Chris Sweet: 39:52

Absolutely.

Philip Sessions: 39:53

For sure, and I know you will. I know you will. I mean, that's how you are. You're just visionary. Chris, this has been awesome getting to talk with you and interview you real quick and kind of getting a little bit more behind the scenes on who you are and what you've done with Swamp Rabbit. If people want to get to know you more, follow the rabbit or yourself. Where's the best place for them to go?

Chris Sweet: 40:13

Yeah, so you can connect with me on Facebook. I have LinkedIn and Instagram profiles, but I'm an old soul so I stick to Facebook. So you just look me up, chris. Sweep, shoot me a friend request, add me, send me a message. I'd love to connect with you. Or you can shoot me an email, chris, at SwampRabbitmovincom. Awesome.

Philip Sessions: 40:29

Well, Chris, thanks so much for coming on and sharing all this awesome value. Sounds good.

Chris Sweet: 40:34

Thank you for having me on my friend.