Smart Cleaning School

Hosted by Ken Carfagno

Business Careers Education

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Episodes

500

Latest episode

Aug 2025

Language

EN-US

About the show

The Smart Cleaning School Podcast helps cleaning business owners from start-up to the struggling solo to the striving seven-figure get SMARTER in their businesses, reshape their mindset, increase productivity, clear the overwhelm, and get clarity through SMART goal-setting & personal accountability. Ken Carfagno is a lifetime learner and teacher. His mission is to help visionaries make the impact they were meant to make.

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60 recent

August 18, 2025Episode 50015 min

Smart Cleaning School Season 1 Finale

I started this podcast on October 10th, 2019. I never imagined that cleaners would listen to me talk. Listen to these stats for the Smart Cleaning School Podcast:20 years of cleaning experience and 8 years of coaching accessedDownloaded in all 50 states and 150 countries.500 total episodes3 individual episodes with over 1,000 downloads175,000 total downloads1,000 hours of my life invested into training solo cleanersI am so proud of this work. It has been meaningful and transformational for thousands of listeners. Many have told me that this podcast has literally helped them start and grow a successful cleaning business. That thrills me.As great as these last 6 years have been, I realized that it was time to make a major shift. I encourage you to listen to the last two episodes entitled, “Patience Vs. Prudence” and “Celebrating 20 Years in the C3 Experience”. I need to take my own advice and exercise prudence. This podcast and my 1,000 hours needs to end, so that I can re-invest that vital time into the C3 Experience.I also started a podcast in 2024 for my local chamber to interview top business leaders. It’s called the “Leadership Lens” and allows me to utilize my podcasting skills to enhance the local community. That excites me!This was a difficult decision to reach, but I know it’s the right one. Who knows, I am purposely leaving a door open by only closing down Season 1 of the podcast. I will likely release stand alone episodes and interviews when I’m so moved to do so.Now to the most important person in the Smart Cleaning School Podcast… YOU! What happens to you and your training? Let me be very direct. I have given you 500 episodes of the best business owner mindset you can get to grow your cleaning company. How much did it cost you? Nothing!Here’s what you do next.Listen to as many of these free episodes as you want.Apply what you learn! Nothing happens until you take ACTION!Schedule a free Strategy Session with me to discuss immediate issues in your business.Subscribe to Private Coaching with me to take your solo cleaning business to the next level!It’s that simple. I am not going anywhere. I am still coaching solo cleaners to optimize, so they can decide to STAY, SCALE, OR SELL. I hope to hear from you soon.Thank you all so much for being a part of Season 1 of the Smart Cleaning School Podcast.

August 11, 2025Episode 49921 min

Celebrating 20 Years in the C3 Experience

“Introducing the C3 Experience” released on October 14th, 2021. I had just given our family cleaning company a major brand change from the solo residential business to a commercial cleaning company with a team. Our family had “A New Freedom Vision” to live in Florida for the full month of February 2022. The company model would have to change. Over the next 8 months, we poured ourselves into this company to create the C3 Experience.We wanted to attract new customers and employees to our company core values of Excellence, Ownership, and Safety. We wanted to grow through these core values to accomplish our mission statement to our community. “1,000 smiling faces every Monday morning in the professional, financial, and medical office spaces we clean in the Indian Valley.”We wanted to serve our Lord Jesus through the company vision he gave us. “C3 is a Ten-Talent Company (Matthew 25:14-30).”The company had to completely transform. Those 8 months were so difficult, but we achieved our goal and enjoyed a full month on the Gulf Coast of Florida in February 2022. It was a trip of lifetime for our family of 7. They will never forget, nor will Teresa and I. We were so grateful.For the next 12 months, I poured myself into the community and serving my local chamber however I could. I joined the Membership Committee and called on other members to survey them. I participated in the chamber’s 5 year strategy meetings. I attended multiple networking events and even spoke at a few. We were rewarded with new customers. Our reputation grew and high-caliber employees were finding us.2023 was a breakthrough year! We loved Florida so much in February 2022 that we hit the goal to do it again in February 2023. C3 was selected for the Cornerstone Award for Small Business of the Year in our chamber in March 2023. Our reputation grew more. More importantly, we really felt like we were making an impact in our community and living out our mission, vision, and values.I joined a coaching group with other growing commercial cleaners in April 2024 and started implementing better systems in 2024. This allowed C3 to take on our first two 5-night per week clients. This was a huge step. C3 was now serving every night of the week. We updated our mission statement in early 2025. “5,000 smiling faces every morning in the professional, financial, and medical office spaces we clean in the Indian Valley.”A few weeks ago, C3 reached a significant milestone. On July 25th, 2025, C3 celebrated 20 years in business. It’s hard to believe that 20 years ago, Teresa went to our county clerk to open Carfagno Cleaning so she could clean apartments part-time. It’s been an incredible journey. We’ve poured ourselves out in this company through sacrifice, commitment, and excellence. It has not been easy. Most days didn’t go as we had hoped. Nevertheless, we kept our faith in what God was doing through us. We remained patient when other well-wishers around us told us to quit. We invested time and money into a business that looked like a loser.Yet, here we are. I am thrilled to announce that our family has decided to celebrate this 20-year anniversary in a big way. We are knocking one more bucket list trip off the list. The Carfagnos are traveling through 11 states in a month from the Dakotas westward with a focus on Montana, Idaho, and Wyoming. This is the trip of a lifetime. The kids are so excited. Our team is excited for us. Friends in my chamber are cheering us on.Read the rest of this article at the Smart Cleaning School website

August 4, 2025Episode 49821 min

Patience Vs. Prudence

I purposely re-released “Excellence Vs. Perfection” last week. Many solo cleaners struggle with perfectionism. They are under a belief that ‘good enough’ is when the perfectionist is finally happy… and they are never happy. Over-cleaning is problematic for multiple reasons. It costs the solo cleaner time and money because they are at each house or office a lot longer. It also dissolves trust with the customer because they don’t want you in their house for 6 hours!Do you know what customers want? It’s pretty simple. They want their house or office cleaned well. They want to be happy when they come home or enter their office. They want to get the cleaning at a great value. This is where excellence comes in. The solo cleaner needs to shift their mindset to ‘good enough’ is when the customer is happy. Trust me. It takes a lot less to make the customer happy than a perfectionist solo cleaner.There is a balance. The solo cleaner does need to have a way to measure their quality and relate that measurement to customer happiness. In C3, that measurement is a quality score of 8.0 out of 10.0. Excellence is anything over an 8.0. Perfection is 10.0. If the cleaner doesn’t have this measurement system, they may not clean well enough and the customer is not happy. That is also problematic. There is a balance between Excellence and Perfection. I’m not a solo cleaner anymore. We have a team of 10 solo cleaners at C3. I am having a blast finding and training great people to clean at the company. I have a problem though. I’m a bit of a perfectionist when it comes to following the rules. It’s in my personality type. Therefore, I struggle with employees failing a quality inspection or not following company protocols or not being responsive or a customer late on payment. It strikes my ‘that’s not fair’ gene. My gut in each of these cases is to act and penalize the employee, acting swiftly to follow the protocol.That approach does not work! My coach, Josh Melton, has taught me that we need to be relationship-first with team members and customers. He doesn’t jump to conclusions. Maybe the customer is having issues with the parent company or the computer system crashed and they can’t make payment yet. Maybe the team member is dealing with something in their health or family and they didn’t have the time to follow the protocol. Maybe they couldn’t concentrate on hitting the required quality level. There are all kinds of maybe’s. Josh taught me to be patient with people. Assume the best and give them a chance to explain themself before you execute a verdict!Recently, I had an interesting scenario play out. I found a high-quality prospect in my hiring pipeline and offered her a job. Then I waited. She seemed to have a lot going on in her life and I wasn’t impressed with her responsiveness. I was patient like Josh taught me, prodding her along from step to step of the onboarding process. Here was the problem though. I needed to fill that position for the benefit of the company by a certain date. I also need to know that every C3 hire is responsive. This candidate was not checking the boxes.Ultimately, I decided to be bold and direct. I was kind. “Responsiveness is vital to your success and our success at C3. You are not as responsive as other new team members we’ve had success with in the past. It doesn’t seem to us that you truly want this job.” She replied and confirmed my suspicion. Her life was too busy and this second job was a bit too ambitious. She thanked me for being honest and turned down the job. I was able to move on to the next candidate and fill the position in a more prudent manner.Read the rest of this article at the Smart Cleaning School website

July 28, 2025Episode 49716 min

Best Of - Excellence vs Perfection

Perfectionism is a big problem in the cleaning industry. It took me over 15 minutes to say it in the podcast. It's really not that complex. Perfection is working hard to make YOU as happy as possible and you may never get there. Excellence is working hard to make THE CUSTOMER as happy as possible and you absolutely can get there.How do you know if you've made them as happy as possible? You ask them how you've done. I consult with cleaning company owners all over the country and so many struggle with perfectionism. It cost them time, which equals money and profit. I believe that Perfectionism and Excellence are on opposite sides of the same spectrum. You've got to work to the best that you can. but doing it with excellence is different than doing it with perfection. Your customer will feel the difference and so will your bank account!

July 22, 2025Episode 49621 min

Roadmap to Freedom

There are too many overwhelmed, overworked, underpaid, and underappreciated solo cleaners. They want more than showing up to clean every day. They want to get traction with their businesses. Optimizing accomplishes this.You want more margin, more choices, more balance, and more freedom in your life. Why else would you be running your own business in the first place? Optimizing accomplishes this.I share a third straight Solo Elite clip in this episode. The first two addressed these two points I just made. This one is meant to build the dream and show you that freedom has many levels. You can and will get to each level if you set goals, stay in accountability, follow the ISO Model System, and persevere to completion.We’ve personally done this. That’s why I can teach it. It’s also why we are taking our next freedom family trip in a few weeks. I’ll tell you all about that in the next episode.Are you interested in private coaching with me? Check out www.smartcleaningschool.com and book a free strategy call.

July 14, 2025Episode 49514 min

3 Steps of Optimizing

We are getting closer to the end of season 1 of the Smart Cleaning School Podcast. We are in the middle of a series on the 3 S’s, which stands for Stay, Scale, or Sell and represent FREEDOM for the solo cleaner. In the last episode, I shared a clip from a Solo Elite Membership Call from late 2024 focusing on creating margin.Margin is vital. We need margin to make more choices. We need more choices to have more balance and freedom. This episode shares another clip from Solo Elite. This one shows you what to do once you’ve created margin. You optimize!Optimizing gives you the balance you want. There are 3 steps to optimizing.Get Faster at Cleaning - As you implement the Optimizer Tools of the ISO Model, you get faster at each house or office. This allows you clean more in less time.Charge More Over Time - As you clean longer and develop your systems, trust, and expertise, you will increase the perceived value of your “product”. Charge more over time.Increase Profitability of the Business - You especially need to know your numbers for this one. Print out your Profit & Loss (P&L) and study it. Solo cleaners range in profitability from 60-95%. Optimizers are over 85%. In the next episode, I’ll pull it all together with the big picture roadmap from an overwhelmed solo to an optimized one.

July 7, 2025Episode 49415 min

Create Margin and Earn Freedom

In this episode, I share a short clip of a Public Service Announcement I made last November in the Solo Elite Membership. It’s a PSA for all struggling, overwhelmed solo cleaners. First, let me say a few things.You are the one that overscheduled yourself by never saying ‘No’. Take ownership of that.You are the one that priced as little as you did. Take ownership of that.You are the one that didn’t know your numbers and acted without any strategy. Take ownership of that.Great, you took ownership. It’s time to give you hope and show you how to optimize your solo company and earn freedom. This first message is about creating time margin first. That is vital.No margin equals no choice. Margin means choices. In the next episode, I’ll share another clip of the 3 steps to optimizing. Enjoy.

July 3, 2025Episode 49314 min

I've Done Everything I Teach

I have an announcement to make. This is episode 493 of the Smart Cleaning School Podcast. I will be ending season 1 at episode 500. Why? What does that mean? All these questions will be answered in these final 8 episodes, where I’m focusing you on the end of the solo optimization rainbow. It’s called the 3 S’s.That’s the series that season 1 will end with. What do you do when you get to the top as a solo cleaner? In the past 2 episodes, I’ve discussed the 3 S’s or Stay, Scale, or Sell and when a solo should scale. I’ve talked about this a lot throughout this podcast.This episode is different. I want you to trust who you’ve been listening to. You should only follow coaches who have DONE what they TEACH. I have. You should only listen to those that have the fruit on the tree that you want. I do. I’m qualified to teach you because I’ve done what I teach.In this episode, I share a short clip of a monologue I had on a late 2024 Solo Elite Membership Call where I share my successes as we approach 20 years in business. I hope you enjoy it.

June 23, 2025Episode 49218 min

Best Of - When a Solo Should Scale

I am excited to share this clip from the Solo Elite Membership! A few weeks ago, I ran my first Zoom call for the members to meet each other, dive into a topic, and ask questions. It was a great call. Afterwards, I pondered the idea of sharing a portion of the call with my podcast audience.It's a 16 minute clip from a 90 minute call, where I shared my journey openly on scaling with employees. Many ask me when can I hire and scale. I firmly believe that you need time and money margin to properly scale a cleaning company. You can do this right away if you have time and money. Or you can do it the way I teach. Here you go! Enjoy!You can optimize your solo cleaning business to earn full time income through part time cleaning without the drama of employees! When the time is right, you can scale with employees like me and they won't be as much drama! Get access to this game-changing training for only $57 per month or $597 per year in the Solo Elite Membership atsmartcleaningschool.com/elite. Members get access to the full ISO Model Course to optimize your solo business, plus access to the Solo Elite Community, bonus podcast content, access to private coaching and additional courses at 50% off! You can also sample the membership with our brand new "Backstage Pass", which is found at smartcleaningschool.com.

June 16, 2025Episode 49135 min

Best Of - Stay, Scale, or Sell

The summer is finally here! This is both literal and figurative. We just celebrated Memorial Day as the weather is heating up. Just like the 4 seasons of nature, my business is entering a new season. After selling my 1st solo business in 2018, we moved to our hometown and stayed indoors. I tried everything in my power to build my coaching and consulting business in 2018 and early 2019. I stayed indoors as much as possible as I didn't want to clean. This was winter. Ultimately, I needed to get outside again and start planting seeds. I started this podcast and my aggressive networking plan in late 2019. This was the start of Spring. By the beginning of 2021, our new business was cranking and I was able to work on my consulting business again. My cleaning business was optimized and it was comfortable outside. Spring was coming to an end. But with anything, being comfortable is not a good place to be. I needed to get my hunger back and stretch myself. I need to put on my shorts, get outside and enjoy the weather. A New Freedom Vision was placed in my heart and we needed to enjoy this summer in the winter by spending a month in Florida in February. This would require me to scale my business beyond the comfort of Spring into the dog days of Summer. This will pay off because Fall represents the harvest of all seeds sown in the Spring. I am so excited to reach that season and earn my family's financial freedom! Now that you've got the seasonal perspective of my new Philly cleaning business, I'd like to announce a segment change to the podcast. I've been sharing weekly updates on my Carfagno Cleaning business since inception in October 2019. However, I've been adding more and more value-packed influencer interviews and snippets from expert calls within my paid groups, that I don't have the space to continue them. For this Summer season of Carfagno Cleaning, I will shift from weekly to monthly updates on my cleaning business. I will not share every detail as I have been. I will share relevant wins, struggles, and lessons that I feel will best support your own business growth. Most importantly, I will keep you updated on the progress of my efforts to scale my business so this long-time solo cleaner can get out of the field and live a life of time, money, and location freedom.Read the rest of this article at the Smart Cleaning School website