Jason-ology?
HI There - it’s Rebecca and hold on to your hats, because tonight I’m letting Behind the Scenes Jason takeover the blog. He’s been full-time at PJP since March and he’s asked on a daily basis about how it’s going, so here he is to answer all your questions. Enjoy! Rebecca
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Many of you may know me as “Behind-the-Scenes-Tech-Guru-Jason”, but now I’m full-time in the scene. For the past 20+ years, I’ve worked in the corporate world. When I first graduated from college, I was recruited to work at the Federal Reserve, which I enjoyed for several years. Then, on to the financial services industry and most recently I was in human resource leadership at a health care system. Over the years, I most enjoyed the opportunities to learn and grow (a saying that my former colleagues would likely roll their eyes at hearing and I said it a lot). However, this past year, as Peggy Jean’s Pies continued to grow and as our desire to expand it grew, I made the decision to leave the corporate world and join my wife as an entrepreneur. Here’s just a little of what I have learned and overserved in just a few short months…
Department of one. There are no “departments” or “divisions” as a small business owner. I am the finance department, the IT department, the HR department, etc. I can’t just call the purchasing department and explain to them that I ordered (and very much need) the 3x3 ROUND labels for our products. A couple weeks ago, we had placed an order for 3x3 round labels for our pie boxes. As time passed and our supply began to run thin, I contacted our vendor, who then contacted their person responsible for the 3x3 round stickers in their organization…who then told our vendor contact that the labels are on back order and wouldn’t be delivered for several weeks because of COVID. Why did they let us place the order which said 1-2 weeks delivery when it was on back-order? Why did no one give us the heads up, say 3 weeks before we ran out? I reached out to call someone in purchasing as I always do to see what they could do as the purchasing experts when I realized, wait, I am the purchasing office… Argh! So, guess who ran out of stickers and who was not happy about it? Me! This required a quick conversion of all of our product labels and barcode scanning to switch to the square label format. After talking with two leaders in the vendors’ organization, we got a special delivery the day after we ran out. Except… they had shipped the 2x2 round labels instead of the 3x3 round labels. That may not sound like a big deal to many, but a 2x2 label is not big enough to put the ingredient list, barcode, product name and price. GRR……
Lesson Learned: As a small business entrepreneur, there is no department to call, except yourself. I believe entrepreneurs across America are under-valued for the sheer breadth of knowledge and skill that it requires to run a small business. And, apparently, you need to stay on top of your vendors to ensure that supplies are on track, on budget and there is no gap in the supply chain (unless you want to completely re-code all of your product labels).
(Rebecca editing to add: Yep. I will say that this has happened to me 8,000 times in seven years, so I was unfazed by this sticker debacle. But I had full appreciation for his righteous indignation.)
HR has never been more important. This economy has caused steep increases in turnover as well as wage increases. Finding top talent hasn’t been as difficult for us thankfully (because who doesn’t want to work with us?), but the market is much tougher now. One of the things I believe Rebecca was most excited for when I was transitioning to our business was the human resource aspect. Since coming on full-time, I’ve used a lot of my HR skills to make improvements. I’ve also NOT taken a lot of corporate HR practices, such as 300+ pages of policy. I hate policy. Policy is most often an innovation and soul killer. What I can tell you from my 20+ years of experience is there are a few people who absolutely love policy and who believe policy has to outline every .. little .. detail. I’m not one of those. I am much more of person who wants the minimal amount of policy necessary (most of what organizations are trying to do is manage by exception) and I believe in not creating scrolls of text for the one-time exception by that one employee who will always find the loop hole.
Lesson Learned: I do NOT miss all the policy meetings. I felt like I was in a hamster wheel of meetings. If I had one or more hours a day without booked meetings, that would be a good day - I would have time to actually do the work that all the meetings were generating. No more meetings unless they are actually, for real, no kidding, needed. Anyone can come up with a reason why they need a meeting, but .. do they really? I’d say 90%+ of meetings are not necessary. Therefore, guess what PJP isn’t having a lot of .. meetings.
(Rebecca editing to add: I think what I actually said to Jason before he started was that I love my business but the HR issues make me want to burn the store to the ground. Good thing he showed up in time. Ahem.)
Growing a small business is not easy - a new appreciation. Of course I’ve lived the journey of Peggy Jean’s since the beginning. However, there is a difference between “living the journey” with your spouse, and actually LIVING THE JOURNEY. When Rebecca and Jean left me for WEEKS while they were off filming Crime Scene Kitchen (which I could not tell anyone about), I nearly had two or eight breakdowns. I was just beginning to learn what being an entrepreneur meant. I was also handling our household, cooking the meals for our family, leading the PJP team, working with our customers, etc.
Lesson Learned: Entrepreneurship can be overwhelming. I have a WHOLE NEW appreciation for Rebecca. Running and growing a small business IS NOT EASY. I have found myself saying to her, many times, “I had no idea”, or “omg, how do you do this”… I’m so very proud of what she’s done and continues to do, it’s amazing and it is hard.
(Rebecca editing to add: OHHHEMMMGEEE….just between the you, me, and the blog, I TOLD YOU SO.)
Whew. This is just the tip of the iceberg of what I have learned and experienced in my short stint as a small business entrepreneur. I continue to look forward to all the new and exciting things I am learning, the new experiences I have and the continued drive to #WorldPieDomination! (Rebecca editing to add: Overwhelmingly, he is always more positive than I am…which is an excellent quality. I’m excited to see what happens at PJP as well…but I can totally promise you that we will run out of stickers again. Just saying.)
