Why Great Employees Should Document Their Job Description

RCS Influencer Anna Anderson says that roofing companies can bridge the generational gap by providing younger workers with thorough training and job descriptions.

Editor’s note: The following consists of a conversation between RCS Multimedia Manager Megan Ellsworth, and Art Unlimited CEO Anna Anderson. 

Megan Ellsworth: Okay. Hello, my name is Megan Ellsworth here at rooferscoffeeshop.com, and I'm here doing a live influencer interview with Anna Anderson at Western States. Hi Anna.

Anna Anderson: Hey, it's so good to be here in person we're recording.

Megan Ellsworth: I know. This is so fun. We've never done anything like this.

Anna Anderson: Right?

Megan Ellsworth: This one's question is all about bridging the generational knowledge gap. So what are you guys at Art Limited doing about bridging that gap?

Anna Anderson: Well, we feel that the knowledge gap is going to be the shortage of the economy, right? Because we're losing that knowledge as people are either aging out or choosing new career paths, especially in the roofing industry. So what we're looking at, and we've been talking about with customers is do they have a learning management system in place? So taking some of those great team members who time and time again bring excellence to the company. Are they pausing and saying, what is it going to take to document what their job role is? How have they delivered excellence? And it might be in video form, it might be in written form, it might be an audio form, who knows why it might be. But dissecting that, creating it into kind of their own curriculum. And then they can easily onboard team members with accuracy. So it's been a conversation with some of our companies that are saying, "Hey, we don't want to just be here today. We want to be here tomorrow." And so creating that LMS learning management system has been a really powerful tool.

Megan Ellsworth: I love that, LMS. Now, is that something you guys created or has that been around?

Anna Anderson: Yeah, so LMS systems have been around for years, but it's-

Megan Ellsworth: Okay. Love that.

Anna Anderson: .... really new to the roofing industry.

Megan Ellsworth: Okay, cool.

Anna Anderson: And not many roofing contractors are looking at an LMS as kind of their path to help bridge the knowledge gap when in reality they can, and it's going to help them propel over that knowledge gap. It might help them with their growth path. There's a lot of different opportunity.

Megan Ellsworth: Cool. And have you guys at Art Limited done this as well with employees that have that knowledge?

Anna Anderson: We have. So we've been able to take and say an onboarding for a specific skillset. If we were to train one-on-one, always shadowing because of the person they might be shadowing, their jobs taking them all over. It might take three months. If we have that new individual walk through the LMS once built out, we've been able to boil that down to a two week timeframe. And the team member's like, "Wow, I know it. I love it. Now I'm ready to shadow and I'm ready to see all the things because I know the foundational things." So an LMS learning management system is really, really powerful. There's great platforms out there. Otherwise, if you have questions about what platform to maybe consider, happy to help with that. But yeah, it personally for our business has helped us be a more profitable company.

Megan Ellsworth: Oh, my gosh. Well that's so smart. I love that. You always bring such great ideas to the table, especially with these questions. And I think that's really great for contractors out there looking to really bridge the knowledge gap in their company. So thank you for sharing that.

Anna Anderson: You bet.

Megan Ellsworth: And we'll be chatting in the months coming and towards the end of the year. So thank you so much.

Anna Anderson: Awesome. Thank you so much, Megan.

Anna Anderson is the CEO of Art Unlimited. See her full bio here.