Lawn & Landscape Leadership Winners 2001: Bill Hoopes

No one is born with leadership skills in tow. The thought of an infant exiting the womb with the inborn guarantee of leadership ability is inconceivable. Most skills are learned – leadership among them.

Bill Hoopes – a man who preaches daily about leadership as director of training, development and regulatory affairs for Scotts LawnServices, Marysville, Ohio – should know.

“George Patton was not born with two pearl-handled pistols on his side,” announces Hoopes, continuing with an authentic fervor. “Leadership is a style you develop. People may be born with the basic potential to become effective leaders, but they aren’t born with the skill itself.”

People – this is Hoopes’ hot button. As a question pertaining to the proper training and management of lawn care operators, and you’ve started an unstoppable whirlwind. The man is passionate about helping people develop communication skills.

“You only win with people,” stresses Hoopes, who while growing up watching the weekly antics of Wayne Woodrow “Woody” Hayes, The Ohio State University head football coach from 1951 to 1978, learned this valuable lesson. Spend an hour talking to Hoopes and suddenly figuring out a new boss’s attitude or coworker’s motive seems simple. There’s a basic premise to understanding people that runs through his veins. He gets it, and he wants to teach it to the rest of us. “People tend to be insecure and defensive,” Hoopes explains. “They fear they are not good at expressing themselves, so they become introverted. They naturally relate to things better than they relate to other people.”

Herein lies the very essence of a Bill Hoopes’ lecture. Enter only if you’ve shouldered a positive attitude and are willing to walk away, lesson learned.

HOOPES’ LESSON NO. 1: Be prepared to work hard. Comparable to a teacher studying students’ faces for that first sign of understanding, Hoopes says the willingness to make a difference in people’s communication skills starts with observation. Since the moment he stepped out on stage as the fifth grade play lead and received the grand applause of a pleased, packed house, Hoopes says he knew he wanted to be a communicator. “When the lights hit you after you get the chance to do your thing and you can see it was something of value to them and they accept it or like it – some people run from that,” Hoopes explains. “I couldn’t get enough of it.”

Growing up in Marysville, Ohio, Hoopes learned inspiring lessons from his grandfather, mainly that “hard work and proper values are the critical foundation of a productive life,” he says. Consequently, by the time he was 14, Hoopes was mowing lawns for the Scotts Co. “I had an affinity for the grass business at an early age.”

Hoopes, a 20-year-old without a definite career plan who came from a musical family, experienced his first communication challenges when he spent three years playing guitar with some friends as part of a folk band. “They were like the Kingston Trio or the Eagles,” quips friend and past coworker Terry Kurth, director of development, Weed Man, Middleton, Wis., who in August 1976 was hired by Hoopes as an instructor for Scotts Co.’s Professional Turf Institute, a golf course superintendent training division. “Bill wanted to hit the road with he band, but a couple of them didn’t want to make the commitment. How Bill tells it is that they would have been the biggest thing to hit America, but then the Beatles happened, sot hey had to change their career paths.”

While Hoopes had an obvious talent for entertaining people and has never been nervous in front of a crowd, he still didn’t know what type of work would suit him best. After graduating from Ohio Wesleyan University, Delaware, Ohio, with an economics degree, he got a job selling industrial aluminum mill products. Four years later, he left to join the Scotts Co., as an account executive in the retail division.

As a part of his Scotts’ orientation, Hoopes attended a training class. Watching the instructor motivate the newcomers sparked a charge in Hoopes that forever changed his direction. “As I sat there and watched the trainer, I said, ‘That is precisely the job that I want to do,’” he explains. “So I got up out of the orientation class and went to my vice president of sales at the time and told him, ‘I have the right company but the wrong job.’”

Since there weren’t any openings in Scotts’ training division, Hoopes was told to go into the field anyway and get experience and that he would be moved the first time there was an opportunity. “I tried to go the straight and narrow sales path, but the second I saw that guy up there training, I knew that was me,” Hoopes reveals, explaining that he saw the job as a combination of his entertainment and communication skills and his willingness to not just motivate others, but to teach them something of value.

HOOPES’ LESSON NO. 2: Believe in yourself and follow your dreams, regardless of the advice others give you. Hoopes patience paid of and, in 1971, he joined Scotts’ Training Institute. By 1973, he became the training manager. The right job fit like a tailored suit and gave Hoopes the confidence to tackle new, appealing opportunities. ‘Training is interesting for me,” he says. “I don’t care what the topic is as long as it involves helping people build skills.”

Hoopes managed Scotts’ Professional Turf Institute and trained golf course superintendents from 1976 to 1983. Then he directed turf and golf course training until 1985, before leaving Scotts to head Barefoot Grass’s training division. He remained there until 1997 when Barefoot was sold to TruGreen ChemLawn, Memphis, Tenn.

In November 1997, Mark Long, who worked with Hoopes at Barefoot Grass was searching for people to help him launch Scotts LawnService, the professional lawn care division of Scotts Co., and he says Hoopes was a perfect fit. “When I started thinking about all the people and things I needed to launch a lawn care business, it dawned on me that I needed to have an ambassador – someone who was willing and passionate,” Long explains. “So, it was a no-brainer that I thought of Hoopes. He was the natural choice for the position.”

Long says Hoopes’ ardent enthusiasm for the industry and training its troops was evident not just to him but to others he worked with. “The thing is with Bill – if he gets excited about an idea, he’s tenacious,” Kurth says. “He’s one of those guys we often talk about wanting to go to war with. If you need him to carry his portion through, he’s the type of guy who will get his part done on time or ahead of schedule.”

At Scotts LawnService, Bill heads the Management Operations Training School, where instead of training technicians he trains managers. The job demands organization, particularly since Scotts LawnService plans to employ more than 2,000 individuals by 2004. “I can’t function any other way,” Hoopes says, admitting that he takes five minutes to prioritize his to-do list at the start of each day. “I spend time organizing and prioritizing so I get the most out of my time. Managers do things right, but leaders do the right things effectively. So, I have to practice what I preach.”

The importance of organization was something Hoopes learned early on and then taught his employees. “He always told me to hope for the best, but plan for the worst,” says Kurth, remembering his days working with Hoopes. “If the plan looked good and everything looked in place, he’d still call ahead just to double, triple check – he is very organized that way.

“He was like an older brother to me at work,” Kurth continues. “He would always encourage me to learn from his mistakes. But he never suppressed me. Instead, he’d treat me like a jewel in the rough that just needed a little buffing. You work with Bill – you never work for him.”

Kurth also recalls a particular incident in his personal life where Hoopes’ advice and training came in handy. “I was sitting downstairs with my older son who just finished his freshman year of college,” he explains. “He had an adolescent dilemma and I was giving him some advice on how to handle the situation without trying to sounds like I was telling him what to do. After I finished, my son thanked me for the information and said, ‘Dad, I understand. You are very good at expressing yourself.’

“See, Bill is a great public speaker and he spent time teaching me how to communicate, Kurth says. “Since I can’t pay Bill back for all he’s taught me, I paid it forward. Hopefully, I’m teaching my son some of those same lessons.”

Like Kurth’s son, Hoopes also was given some invaluable advice that he has employed throughout his life. “All my life choices have been influenced by a comment my father, a small-town lawyer, made when I asked him what it took to win in front of a jury,” he remembers. “He told me, ‘If you want to be able to look yourself in the mirror and feel good about the person looking back, then you simply have to be true to yourself.’”

To Hoopes, this translated to: “Ultimately, you cannot be a phony and last – people will see through it and see through you,” he says. “If you’re true, you’ll be effective no matter what you’re communicating.”

HOOPES’ LESSON NO. 3: Do not underestimate what you can do. You will surprise yourself if you give yourself half a chance. Hoopes says his single biggest accomplishment is that he has never played on a losing team. “In any aspect of my life – work, business – I’ve never been part of a losing team,” he says. “In my show business days, I was selling songs and I didn’t fail – I just stopped doing it. At Barefoot Grass, I helped build the second largest lawn care service company in the country. I’ve been able to surround myself with winning people.”

A few of the people that keep Hoopes motivated daily are Debby, his wife of 23 years, and his children Bill and Carrie, who both live in San Diego. “They expect me to be good – as good as I can be – and that reallykeeps me going,” Hoopes explained.

While Hoopes’ family serves him a daily dose of encouragement, Debby says Hoopes also provides inspiration. “What I can tell you about Bill is that he is one of the most honest – maybe to a fault at times – reliable and dependable best friends anyone could ever have in his life,” she says. “And I’m very fortunate and lucky to have him in mine.”

This extra support helps Hoopes through his everyday challenges. In addition to his work with Scotts LawnService, Hoopes is now president of the Professional Lawn Care Association of America. After eight years of committee and board work with the organization, Hoopes says this is the “icing on the cake,” providing him with a vehicle through which to maximize the effectiveness of the association’s member communication and government agencies that directly impact lawn care operators’ abilities to build and manage profitable businesses.

In addition to increasing the number and quality of PLCAA educational tools and networking opportunities, Hoopes has one other goal as president: “I want to highlight more winners,” he says. “I think too many of us see the negative before the positive, so I want to shine the spotlight on the people out there who are succeeding.”

While aiming for these targets, Hoopes also strives daily to reach his highest priority: breaking down people’s barriers to effective communication. He is constantly searching for a mechanism to improve communication, and since he has limited time with people, he must do this efficiently. “In every class, I have to break down the bad and build up the good and find ways to get people to look at themselves, see the plusses and minuses and then accentuate the positive. And I have to catch these people when they are ready to do that.”

To achieve this daily tasks, Hoopes must always be charged with enthusiasm. Using his personality, he has to impact the behavior of others. This means that once he walks into that classroom, he must be “on” the entire time, setting a good example for even the most skeptical members of the group. “You only become an effective leader when you impact others – and the strongest tool you have is your personality,” he emphasizes. “You have to be involved on a level of honest and fairness and show them you care. This business is all about people, not fertilizer. You have to balance your concern for the goal with your concern for the person and you have to ignore the pressure that pushes you toward the goal and the numbers.

The author, Nicole Wisniewski, is Managing Editor of Lawn & Landscape magazine.