CFC Hits the Road

May 17, 2022 | From Joe, Management

Don’t worry, we’re not packing up the business and moving away. It’s almost summertime and many of our team members are planning for a well-earned summer vacation. We decided to make vacation time the theme of our late spring/summer marketing with a campaign called “CFC Hits the Road”.

Here at Country Fried Creative, we believe it’s important for everyone, clients and team members alike, to have time away from work.

We do not believe it’s healthy for anyone to always be “on the clock”. Growth occurs during rest and everyone needs time to recharge and refresh. Even as I type this, one of our key leaders is planning for a well-deserved vacation next week.

We’ve been very deliberate about building systems and processes for business continuity when people are out of the office. When we were a smaller company, clients would contact me directly with requests and we would just handle them. We’ve been able to grow our business over the years because of the support from great clients like many of you reading this. Along with that growth has been an increase in the number of clients we have, the number of staff we employ, and the wider variety of services we offer.

Maintaining our personal touch with all of our clients is important to us, but we also need some structure to ensure high-quality service. We’ve set up programs like our help desk ticketing system (powered by ZenDesk.com) and our online project management portal (powered by Basecamp.com). Having systems like those allow our team to track requests, make assignments, and ensure that things get done. In addition, those systems allow us to keep our prices lower than industry norms as we leverage technology to help people (team members and clients). Having those systems also allows us to be better positioned to keep things going when team members take a vacation. Does your organization have a system in place to keep things going when key people are out? If not, let me know – we may be able to help.

VACATION! WE ALL NEED TIME OFF.

I know many of you reading this feel like you don’t have time to take a vacation. I’d like to challenge that thinking. Here are some benefits of taking time off from work to hit the road.

Perspective – a road trip, preferably to somewhere you’ve never been before, allows you to gain perspective away from your computer and telephone. Typically you’re focused on basic things like travel, food, recreation, and lodging – not accounting, HR, sales, or project management.
Experience – a road trip enables you the opportunity to experience things in real-time, not through a digital lens such as a YouTube video, website, or social media post. Seeing a sunrise in person is much different than viewing a picture of one on social media. You can feel a breeze in person, but you can’t “see” a breeze on a TikTok video.
Inspiration – a road trip has the potential to inspire. Seeing natural wonders, experiencing special events, tasting exotic food, and enjoying good company can help be a catalyst to new thoughts & dreams. I often have my best business ideas while on the road.
Letting go – taking a road trip forces one to let go of task lists and deadlines. Doing so helps get one “off the front lines” and it also allows your co-workers to shine while they cover for you at work.
Connections – getting out of the office and out on the road allows for the making of new connections with people, places, and things. Sitting in an office (home or otherwise) tends to limit one’s ability to make new connections.
Re-charge – one of the best benefits of a road trip is the ability to recharge – attitude, thinking, perspective, and gratitude. Sitting on a beach or standing atop a mountain is a wonderful way to re-charge.

So, this summer CFC is hitting the road. We’re going to do that in two ways.

First, we’re going to make an effort to visit every single client we have. We’ll be hitting the road here in the community to check in with everyone. We want to make sure we have the proper perspective and re-establish our connections with each of you.

Secondly, We’re all going to take a vacation – not all at once, but we all will take time off at least once. To help inspire you to take a vacation, we will be sharing some of our vacation pictures online via social media with the hashtag #CFCHitsTheRoad. We encourage you to do the same. Tag us in your vacation pictures and we’ll share them.