Her Story
About Shirley
I've been in the pool industry for 20 years, and I'm currently a general manager of two branches. I started at the very bottom as basically a clerk and office manager, taking money and doing billing for distribution centers. Then I went to work for a swimming pool company for a couple years before going back to a different distributor where I worked in outside sales, inside sales, and as an assistant manager. Eventually, I owned my own business doing pretty much the same thing I'm doing now. I grew that business and doubled the size of it before selling the company to the guys I work for now. I've been in this general manager role for about 9-10 years. My main expertise is managing people - I'm very good at reading people, seeing their strong points, and knowing how to shore them up on their shortcomings. A typical day for me involves making sure my managers are doing their job, making sure they're not missing anything, ensuring all the jobs from the previous day have been moved, that repairs are getting done, and dealing with any customer service issues or facilitating those to people who can handle them. We handle about 1,450 pools a week, so there are too many moving parts for me to navigate everything myself. One thing I've learned is I can't do everything myself - I've had to learn to delegate. My biggest achievement would probably be my ability to mentor people under me and share my experience with others.
Her Interview
Ten minutes with Shirley
01What do you attribute your success to?
I grew up kind of rough, so I think I just have a drive in me that makes me want to be better. That internal drive has pushed me throughout my career. I've also had to learn to work with my personality - I have an inherently aggressive personality, I'm a Type A person, and I've had to learn that people don't know how to handle that sometimes. I've had to learn to be a little more gentle and understand that some people don't know how to take people that are brutally honest. If I want to succeed and be able to guide people to be who they can be, the best person that they can be, then I have to really know that personality and that person, and know how to come across to them. My personality is that I just take no shit, and I've had to learn to temper that. That's probably been the biggest challenge, but learning to navigate it has been key to my success.
02What’s the best career advice you’ve ever received?
The best career advice I received was that if someone can do part of what you're doing 80% as good as you can, let them do it and delegate it. You can teach the other 20% up. You can't do everything yourself. It was a hard lesson for me to learn because I'm a control freak and I just want to do everything myself to make sure it gets done right. But at a certain point, you get big enough that if you try to do everything, you're not doing anything well.
03What advice would you give to young women entering your industry?
Have thick skin. Number one, don't take everything personally. As a woman in the industry, you have to understand that a guy walks into a shop and he's given respect, but a woman walks into the shop and she has to take respect. I'm not a big women's lib fan and all that, but I just know what I've learned from my experience. You have to work harder and put your best foot forward at all times. I used to work at Mack Trucks as a warranty manager, and I saw this dynamic firsthand. It's just the reality of being a woman in these industries.
04What are the biggest challenges or opportunities in your field right now?
In the company that I currently work for, there's always opportunities to move up to a higher position, to get into a bigger role. But again, you have to be able to navigate the people around you. I could start my own business again at some point, but I don't foresee that in the near future because it's a lot of work. The biggest challenge I've faced is my personality - I have an inherently aggressive personality, I'm a Type A person, and I've had to learn that people don't know how to handle that sometimes. I've had to learn to be a little more gentle. Sometimes people don't know how to take people that are brutally honest, so if I want to succeed and be able to guide people to be who they can be, the best person that they can be, then I have to really know that personality and that person, and know how to come across to them.
05What values are most important to you in your work and personal life?
I value being very protective over my people. I believe in being honest in all things. I treat my customers how I would want to be treated and treat other people how I want to be treated. For me, an example of that is I'm not a yeller, because I don't like to be yelled at. We can have a conversation about it. We can sit down - maybe it's a hard conversation, but we can have a conversation. Just be honest. That's really important to me in both my work and personal life.
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