Cleaning and vacuuming taught the mayor of Fletcher, N.C., a small Western North Carolina town near Asheville, what a gavel never could about leadership and how to be a mayor.
Editor’s Note: This column was adapted from its original version and shortened for publication.
When people see me serving as mayor — leading Council meetings, hosting community events, or delivering speeches — I am usually in a suit. But before I was ever elected, I started cleaning buildings at night when the world slept in far different clothes.
My family owns a janitorial business. It is the work I spent countless nights doing with my parents growing up. It is the work I continue to do, and it is the work that has shaped my leadership.
Politics teaches you how to talk. Janitorial work taught me how to listen.
Throughout America, millions of janitors serve our schools, hospitals, offices, and town halls. They stay after hours and make sure facilities are safe and clean for the next day.
But janitors are often overlooked and underpaid, despite their necessity. The median wage is around $17 an hour. This reflects the lack of dignity our country provides janitors, especially if you are trying to support your family.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics asserts there are more than 300,000 janitorial openings each year. Not because this is an expanding industry, but because turnover is incredibly high. It is a job that will burn you out.
This is more than a statistic for me. It is my family’s and my life. My parents founded Quality Janitorial Group, and we have been at it for 35 years. We’ve made a living for ourselves and other community members. Growing up, my evenings and weekends looked different than my peers. I recall being frustrated as a child because I hauled trash and vacuumed carpets while my friends went home.
As an adult, I carry so much pride and ownership as I do this work with my family. We care for clients. We want the floors spotless. Every detail reflects my parents’ reputation and sacrifice.
When you clean after business hours, it is quiet. You notice so much that most people miss. The paperclips that were dropped under the desks. A continuous stream of coffee on the walls next to the trash cans. The evidence that people worked hard throughout their day.
Our work goes unnoticed, especially when tasks are completed correctly. Invisibility teaches you many lessons that politicians need, like humility, consistency, listening, and work ethic. You are not honored for vacuuming a large room. You must find the pride and value in the work for its own sake, not for attention. If you cut corners, eventually the mess shows. When you’re in a still, empty building, you see the details. And when it is your family’s business, you cannot just call out. The work is there daily; the floors get dirty daily. Just as in public service, the problems continue, and so must you.
In America, being blue-collar comes with pride and struggle. Rarely do politicians create policy that returns dignity to blue-collar workers. And when you clean buildings at night, you realize that perhaps the working class does not have the dignity they deserve. Janitors work multiple jobs, stretch paychecks, or work nights while still getting up for their kids in the morning.
That is why Martin Luther King’s Poor People’s Campaign existed. The Memphis Sanitation Strike draws comparisons for working-class people today. The workers proved how much their labor should have been valued and respected.
American politics often forget that fact. However, it has taught me more than any committee meeting ever has.
I am 31 years old. I am Black. I am the mayor of Fletcher, N.C. Additionally, I have cleaned bathrooms for my family business. I want to lean into it, not gloss it over.
Most people in America relate more to cleaning bathrooms than cutting ribbons. We deserve a society where more leaders can come from jobs like these. Our politics would look vastly different. Janitors, bus drivers, warehouse workers, and many other blue-collar workers make everything possible. Without them, the world does not go ‘round as well. Just as those sanitation workers in Memphis proved.
I still work with my family business at Quality Janitorial Services, but I also carry the responsibility of serving as mayor. Both roles are service-oriented and require you to show up with humility, patience, and a willingness to deal with recurring problems, even if you are tired.
I am so proud to bring lessons from janitorial work into the mayor’s office. Whether I am cleaning a bathroom or leading a Council meeting, the goals remain constant: create a safe space where people have dignity and are cared for.
So, each morning when you walk into a clean building, take a moment to take it all in. There was someone there working when nobody was watching. Perhaps that is the purest form of leadership there is.
Preston Blakely is the mayor of Fletcher, North Carolina. Follow him on Instagram.
