Welcome Mark and Laura Thompson to the Sr. Management staff at Environmental Cleaning Services. Prior to joining the ECS team, Mark Served in the United States Army as a Team Leader and SGT. in an airborne infantry Battalion. Also served two years in Alaska as an airborne contingency response force for the Pacific Rim. Mark spent 2012 conducting combat operations in Eastern Afghanistan. Laura is our Office Manager and head of HR department and Mark is our Operations Manager. Mark and Laura are a tremendous asset to our expanding Leadership Team.
Category Archives: corporate trainng
ECS- Sr.Management Team
ECS – Attracts High Quality in their Management Team!
We would like to highlight our regional manager for our Wilmington area! Josh Ober! 
After graduating high school in 2008, Josh decided to pursue his passion and join the military. He spent five years in the active duty United States Marine Corps. In his time in the Marines he served on three different deployments. Josh promoted fast through the ranks of Marines and in just over 3 years time, he earned his meritorious promotion to the rank of Sergeant. After making the hard decision to honorably discharge from the Marine Corps, Josh began working for Environmental Cleaning Solutions Inc. as a full time employee at the Harrisburg Mall. His hard work, diligence, and attention to detail in his time at the Harrisburg Mall paid off as he is now our Divisional Manager for the Philadelphia, PA / Wilmington, DE regional area where he now lives with his wife Amanda.
Creating Culture!
Creating culture in business is something that must be completely intentional. It doesn’t just happen.
It’s been a very long time since writing my last post. I kind of feel like the famous Bible story about David the shepherd, not seen very much, but on the back side of the mountain, tending and protecting his sheep, learning, growing and being tested. That’s how my last calendar year was. I haven’t always been victorious, sometimes I lost, but I always learned great life lessons.
In 2014, Environmental Cleaning Solutions, Inc. grew over 300%. Expansion was fast and furious. Many factors went into this large and fast growth. Life changed for all of us. One of the many factors that enabled us to experience this kind of growth was the LIFE Leadership development company. Improving my people skills, learning to work ‘on’ my business and not ‘in’ my business, learning to look at our employees as teammates, and partners and building relationships with many of them, instead of looking at them as a ‘means to an end’, being real, finding purpose, and many more factors…
Changing and growing yourself is a journey, not a destination.
In 2014 we started a monthly corporate leadership training program (LIFE Leadership) with all of our managers. Starting anything new, requires intentional effort, is at times awkward, and you must know why, or you’ll quit. However, the changes in growth have and continue to be phenomenal.
In studying many other companies, there seems to be some common threads of success. Some of those common threads are:
– Purpose, Vision, Values, and Focus
– Personal & Leadership Development
– Focus on Mentorship
– Overcome yourself: if too cocky, sand off the rough edges; if lack of confidence, build it.
– Be Teachable
– Learn to Delegate, duplicate yourself
– Trust Others, believe in your employees, expect excellence
– Lead by Example
I’ve been self-employed for over 26 years. With many successes and failures, you must re-visit the ‘why’ often to keep growing and not become stale.
As a Leadership Team, we are re-visiting every aspect of our business. From company vision to how we hire, we are asking the tough questions. We hired consultants and are even entertaining the thought of re-branding our company with a new logo. Input from our teammates is extremely important.
We love our Teammates, our Leaders, and our customers! We are humbled to be a growing company in some difficult economic times. We have offices in Harrisburg, PA; Reading, PA; and Wilmington, DE, with our Headquarters in Lebanon, PA.
Stay tuned!
Sincerely,
David A Ober
daveober.team@gmail.com
Education think outside the box!
Read excellent article by-Chris VanDevere earned a degree in a course of classical liberal education known as the Program of Liberal Studies at the University of Notre Dame. He returned to Notre Dame to complete a joint Law and M.B.A. program.
The challenge of traditional thought is understanding that what always was does not have to be what always will be! LIFE
(think of travel,communication,economics etc.) Be careful of the assumptions you make and keep!
http://claude-hamilton.com/life-old-fashioned-primer-on-education/
Life education changing life’s! Testimony over titles!
Here’s the kicker… There were 12 (TWELVE) other applicants who interviewed. They ALL had Bachelors degrees, and 6 (SIX) of them had Masters Degrees!!! I was the ONLY ONE who did NOT have a degree, but rather had a leadership education from the LIFE/Team community and I’m the one who got the job making a mid-range teachers salary. WOW! http://orrinwoodwardblog.com/2013/01/14/larry-stacey-allswede-testimonies-over-titles/
THE IMPORTANCE OF AUTHENTIC RELATIONSHIPS IN TODAY’S WORLD!
March 14, 2012
by CBS News.com
(MoneyWatch) COMMENTARY Now more than ever, there never seems to be enough time to get things done. Why that is, I don’t know. But I do know that, in an era of social networking, telecommuting and virtual meetings, when it comes to work, the one thing that gets sacrificed is relationships.
Big mistake.
If you want to get somewhere in your career, in management, in business, the worst thing you can do is just focus on work, work, work. Success is all about relationships. Relationships with your management, boss, peers, employees, customers — everyone in your immediate work ecosystem, if you know what I mean.
And I’m not just talking about working relationships; I’m talking about your personal relationships with these people, where you break through the workplace persona people use for whatever reason and actually connect with the human being beneath.
Just to be clear, this isn’t about wasting people’s time. That’s a bad idea because, as I said before, that’s the one precious commodity that nobody has enough of these days. But if you do it right — if you’re genuine, open and sensitive to people’s boundaries — you’ll do fine.
Here are seven reasons why your success depends far more on those all-important interpersonal work relationships than you realize:
Any CEO, VC, or entrepreneur will tell you that their network is their biggest asset. It’s where opportunities come from. And when it comes to networking, doing it old school is a major distinguishing factor versus social networking. When you have a personal relationship with someone, that creates a level of trust that sets you apart from the virtual hordes.
Strong relationships make it easier to get information and information is power. It could be about a major project, a key customer, budget cuts or an upcoming promotion opportunity. When it comes to important stuff, you have to give to get, and you’re not going to get anything valuable from somebody who doesn’t trust you.
Relationships get people through tough times. Long ago I learned that, all things being equal, a personal relationship will help you keep your job, win the business, whatever it is you need, it can make the difference when times are hard. It also means you have someone to lean on. Try leaning on someone you hardly know. Bad idea.
The higher up the corporate ladder you climb, the higher the stakes, the bigger the deals, the more important everything becomes. And that means people have to look you in the eye and feel confident that they know who they’re looking at, that you’ll do what you say you’re going to do, get the job done, whatever. And vice versa.
These days, companies have to be lean and mean, and that means having fewer, stronger relationships. No kidding. It’s the same reason why manufacturers minimize their number of vendors, suppliers and components. Because it’s more cost effective that way. Also, there’s a cost associated with bad business because you didn’t know the person as well as you should have and he failed to meet a commitment, for example.
It may be easier than ever to work and communicate virtually, but all that does is level the playing field, meaning there’s nothing that distinguishes your relationship with an individual. There’s no real connection, no real bond, and when push comes to shove, you can’t expect that person to do anything special or go the extra mile for you.
Personal relationships are more important in just about every nation on the planet than they are in the U.S. Why that is, I can’t say. But I’ve done business in dozens of countries on five continents and just about every culture devotes more time and energy to personal relationships than Americans do. And the more global our markets become, the more important it is to get with the majority program.
LIFE!
What if there was a company that could teach you how to have successful relationships in a community setting ( not theory only) but then would also compensate you as you all learn and grow together in growth groups all across the country!
This is why the LIFE business is going to be the next Walmart,Microsoft,apple etc. but instead of creating another billionaire it will create many millionaires and financially free families! www.the-life-business.com Life # 61235149 www.daveoberleadership.comThe business of the information age our product is information! Welcome to the future!
Living on Purpose
Are you living your life on purpose or by accident? Are you living your priorities or your obligations? Are you living life or is life living you? Charles Perkerst said, “Purpose is what gives life meaning.” What gives your life meaning? What is it that inspires you, wakes you up in the morning, drives who you are and what you do? Fulfilling this dream is what gives purpose and meaning to life.
I believe many, at some point in their journey, get to the point that you ask yourself, “Is there something more to life?” With the ever-increasing amount of pressure placed on our lives today, this question is being asked more and more. People are searching for something more!
Victor Frankl, a man captured and tortured in the Nazi concentration camps, lost everything, including his family, stripped even from his clothing, left for dead many times, still had the will to live. In his book, Man’s Search for Meaning, said “Many mental and emotional illnesses are really symptoms of an underlying sense of meaninglessness or emptiness.” Frankl had a reason to live strong enough to overcome the struggle to push through. Frankl has said that in the concentration camps, when people would lose there will to live, they would be dead by morning.
In life, if you reject that you’ve been created than purpose is meaningless. God is the only one who can give true meaning and purpose to your life. As we detect our purpose, one man likened this process to discovering and unearthing an important archeological artifact. This is a time-consuming process that as small layers of soil are removed, the artifact becomes more and more visible until it is totally unearthed and displayed to the world. Individually, our purposes in life are a lot like that. We may feel for years as though we are digging for it. This can be a slow and painstaking process. But sticking to the search, we eventually start to uncover small bits and pieces of what God has built and equipped us to do. Continued exploration, our purpose becomes clearer, than enthusiastically embraced. As General Douglas MacArthur said, “Every man should be embarrassed to die until he accomplishes something great in this world.” Many times doing something great in this world may mean that you have done your personal best and are faithful wherever God has placed you. It doesn’t have to be loud and noticed by the world.
Through many successes and failures in my life, God has revealed His purpose. It has been very slow and painstaking, but in the midst of the storms of life there has always been that underlying sense of purpose. As my mother always told me, “God has a very special purpose for you.” Among others, Charles ‘T’ Jones and Orrin Woodward are two men in my life that have been great examples and mentors to help detect my purpose.
My wife and I are so grateful that God brought TEAM/LIFE at a very critical time into our lives. TEAM/LIFE is a community of like-minded people on a journey together. The individuals, couples, and families that my wife and I have had the privilege to help through the TEAM/LIFE system has been incredible.
If your purpose is to be the best house-wife, father, mother, child, doctor, lawyer, pastor, teacher, ditch digger, accountant, janitor, physical therapist, manager, supervisor, etc. the TEAM/LIFE system will help you in all areas of your life.
This is exactly what Orrin Woodward, Chris Brady and the Policy Counsel have created. They detected their purpose and now thousands, soon hundreds of thousands, and then millions of people will buy into this purpose of making a difference in people’s lives through the TEAM/LIFE system. Not only are people buying into this vision, Orrin and the Policy Counsel are mentoring and duplicating themselves into other leaders who will in-turn develop other leaders. And in that, TEAM/LIFE is creating a new industry. Just as McDonald’s and Ray Kroc; Wal-Mart and Sam Walton; Microsoft and Bill Gates; Facebook and Mark Zuckerberg created new industries. Within 5 years of 11-01-11 LIFE and Orrin Woodward will become a household name. Because Orrin Woodward detected his purpose. There is no question in my mind, God has his divine hand on TEAM/LIFE business for this moment in our history.
Andy Stanley, author of The Next Generation Leader, says, “To become a leader worth following you must give time and attention to the inner man. To leave a legacy that goes beyond accomplishment alone, a leader must devote himself to matters of the heart.” Abraham Lincoln said, “Nearly all men can handle adversity, but if you really want to test a man’s character – give him power.” Orrin’s example, by the life he lives, has earned the right to go down in history as one of the most influential leaders of our time.
I would like to recognize and thank my wife, Beth; the CD, LLR 497, Living on Purpose by Orrin Woodward; the Books, Launching A Leadership Revolution, by Orrin Woodward and Chris Brady; and Man’s Search For Meaning, by Viktor Frankl; for aiding in this blog. Sincerely, Dave Ober
Dave Ober Leadership 