Splashing success

Nation's Business, Sept, 1997 by Roberta Maynard

Gene Kijowski's annual endurance test is nearly over for another year. It's the end of the swimming-pool season, that steamy, sticky stretch from Memorial Day weekend through Labor Day when Kijowski faces the ultimate customer-service challenge: 101 days in which to make customers happy with clean pools, competent management, and, most important, no serious injuries.

His passion to meet that challenge has led to a thriving business for Kijowski, a Baltimore native who 31 years ago gave up notions of teaching school to take a job as a pool cleaner and lifeguard. Now his 24-year-old businesses in Kensington, Md., operate 287 pools in the Washington, D.C., area. Century Pool Management, Inc., staffs and manages pools, and Century Pool Service, Inc., handles the technical aspects of pool operation and repair.

But as area children put away their swimsuits and head for school, Kijowski's 24 full-time employees barely pause to take a breather. They will turn to contract renewals, hiring, training, and scrutinizing Century's systems in search of ways to work smarter and better next season.

Working smarter and better is Kijowski's creed. During the six years he worked for other pool companies, he saw that many had inefficient systems and were poorly organized, and that there was little supervision and minimal training. He remembers once having to use a rusty nail to adjust equipment because the company hadn't provided the necessary Allen wrench -- and the inspector was due in 15 minutes. Crisis management was not his style, he decided. Better to be a step ahead, especially in a business where people's lives are at stake.

In 1974, he put those lessons into practice by starting his own business. The firm managed 54 pools its first season, nearly twice as many the next. "The reason for our accomplishments was simple," recalls Kijowski. "Our overarching core values demanded that we provide the best and safest pool service available and deal honestly with our clients and employees.

Until 1990, most of what we did was survive," he says. "Our real success has taken place over the last six years when we recreated Century into a learning organization."

Pool safety had been paramount for Kijowski since he rescued a fellow lifeguard during his first season. Then it came into sharper focus. He began improving on the infrastructure he had created to provide training to his young workers, offering voluntary classes in CPR, safe handling of chemicals, and related topics.

"By far the biggest challenge of the pool-management business is conveying to young people aged 16 to 25 the seriousness of the job," he says. To underscore his point, Kijowski has brought in quadriplegics to talk to new hires. He sends observers posing as guests to check out pools, and he gives pizzas to guards who get good ratings. Convinced that good communication and strong management presence are essential to safe pool operation, he plans to spend tens of thousands of dollars on cellular phones, pagers, and other devices.

To increase productivity, Kijowski and his partner, Hank Lavery, have invested about $250,000 to automate Century's operating systems. This year they installed an automated call-in system that eliminates timecards for Century's 1,000 lifeguards. "The only reason we've prospered these last few years is we've really embraced change," says Kijowski.

Most important, he says, change must include the company's leadership. "I understand now why so many companies fail. Leaders don't realize that they also have to evolve. It's not OK just to have the leader be [financially] successful. I can't expect my people to grow if I don't."

The philosophy has served him well. His pool companies have grown about 11 percent a year for the past five years and have a contract-renewal rate of about 85 percent. Together, they will generate revenues of $7 million this year.

But it's not money that drives him. "I have always believed and still believe that if I personally -- and we as a company -- do the right thing, real success will continue to come."