Episodes
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A few weeks ago, I took my 7-year old son to the Colorado Avalanche game and though we've been there before, this was for a school function so they weren't the best seats in town although frankly, I don't think there are bad seats at an Avalanche game especially if you're a student at a game where you could sit up high and see how things develop. We were up high but it changes your perspective. As we were sitting up there, little Ryan was asking about things in the sky and as I looked up, he pointed to the jerseys in the ceiling and asked these questions:
What are they doing there? Are they special? How come there are hockey and basketball ones? How come there are some with no names on but say Champions?
As I sat there and asked those questions, it just dawned on me how significant and how much work went into those banners and what they signify. As a former athlete, I worked my tail off to get my name on the rafters. I don't think there's a kid that played sports that didn't dream about playing on the Super Bowl or on the NBA Championships or winning a home run or getting your name on the rafter. It's all about winning championships.
So I explained to my son that those were the leaders and champions who were fortunate enough to get their name raised and be recognized because of their hardwork. They were recognized that they were the best of the best.
My son sat there a little puzzled and further asked what the best of the best means. I didn't have a good 7-year-old-answer to him except for this:
When you play basketball and there's 20 different teams and you know who the best guys are on that team. Then you take those best guys and stick them on another team and then you take those best guys and you stick them on another team and then you get to the very end where there's nothing left but guys that are the BEST. They're the best of those guys or girls. Those are the ones who get their names on the rafters.
What does it take to get up there?
Work hard.
Have fun.
Do your best.
I thought about this relating to business and questioned myself if this what I'm doing and the things I go after. Am I working so hard to get to the rafters where I want to be the best?
I played sports and I fell short of it as a lot of people do too. But it's the journey that matters. And as I questioned that, it became so surreal to me.
Then my son asked me this question I knew it was coming, "Dad, are you retired and in the rafters like them?" I told him I was on the Hall of Fame in high school although nothing like these guys.
Lessons to be Learned:
We all aspire to work as hard as we could to get our names in the rafter and to be a champion or to get our team in the rafters and retire. But you won't get there if you don't work like a champion, if you don't have fun, or if you don't lead. You will get close and you will earn legacy status if you do those things even if you don't get into the rafters.
There's a lot of great people in business and in the sports world that are not in the rafters but still live epic lives.
Are you working hard to get into the rafters? Or are you just going with the flow and drifting? Are you fulfilling your destiny and using your God-given skills to better yourself and the world, to better your family, to better your life, and to better your circumstances? Are you getting up everyday letting your feet up the ground, getting fired up to be the best you can be?
Books, People, & Resources:I'm researching former professional athletes and how they transition from being an athlete or a new lead athlete into the "real world." I'm interested in hearing about their struggles, their challenges, roadblocks, successes, and everything in between. Sports has always been a big part of my life. I love them. I have a special interest in athletes and specifically the ones that have competed at the highest levels. Do you know anyone like that? If so, I'd love to hear from them or maybe it's even you. Shoot me an email at [email protected].
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My guest today is Cameron Herold, the mastermind behind the exponential growth of hundreds of companies. Cameron built a dynamic consultancy and his current clients include a Big Four wireless carrier and a monarchy. His clients say what they like the most about him is that he isn't a "theory" guy. And this is what I like the most about him as well. He speaks from experience. He's actually done the things he talks about doing.
He has a reputation for growing businesses and he's the guru behind them in doubling their profit and doubling their revenue in just three years or less.
Topics We Discuss:
Major challenges of organizations: Vision & Alignment and Quality level of people
Cameron's concept of the Vivid Vision: A 5-paged written document that describes your company in vivid detail three years from today
The challenge to get A players and working hard at getting rid of the wrong people
Is business difficult?
Hiring for greatness: Finding people who have done it before + Reference checks
The power of having a daily accountability partner
Focusing on the critical few things versus the important many
Hiring A players: Giving them a better place to work + Core values
Stop making excuses, fix your excuses!
Metrics for success: Net promoter score + SWOT Analysis
Factors for profitability: Employees first, customers second
How to grow your business from zero to 60: Customer satisfaction
Balancing systems: Family first, personal stuff second, then work
The importance of unplugging yourself from work
Building fun activities and building your business around thatBooks, People, & Resources:
Double Double by Cameron Herold
The Miracle Morning for Entrepreneurs by Cameron Herold
Good to Great by Jim Collins
The One Minute Manager by Ken Blanchard
Endurance by Alfred Lansing
Toronto Sport and Social Club -
Missing episodes?
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Today's show is a bit of a rift but this seems appropriate to dive into. The topic is called Unconscious Bias.
Here are a couple of definitions to set the stage as well as some of the narrative around it before I dive into what my beef is with it.
Bias versus IntuitionBias is defined as an inclination of temperament or outlook, especially a person, and sometimes unreasoned judgment.
The flip side of it is something I consider one of the most powerful things that business people or anyone for that matter have, which is their intuition. For me, I've found that when I do some of my worst work is when I don't follow my intuition.
Intuition is defined as the ability to understand something immediately without the need for conscious reason. So it sounds an awful lot like a bias.
However, a bias is obviously with negative connotation. You look down on something or somebody or have some type of prejudice.
Unconscious Bias
You may have heard of this term and there is a massive narrative going on with this. I see it extensively in large organizations and on media outlets, especially the Fortune 500 companies I'm in or around.
With training, communications, meetings, forced training, forced action, and questioning - basically everything you do is some form of unconscious bias.
It's a question of the people you work with, with their race, gender, sex, nationality, etc., the people you hire and fire - it's all being shaped or molded by this concept of unconscious bias.
A Mask on Discrimination, Stripping Away Intuition
To me, this is a new mask put on the word, discrimination. (This might make your feathers ruffle a bit) Instead of focusing on the people or the circumstances that are discriminatory, the narrative is that you have to question every decision you make about any person, any situation, any organization and vetted against some sort of bias. Therein lies the problem.
I believe this strips us away of some of our natural intuition and the biases we have in our life are the things that have built our intuition. Especially for those people that are intuitive (which I consider myself), it strips away your power.
For example, if you have walked by a house that has type of dog that's ferocious and vicious (pitbull for instance) and it bites you, maybe you'll be scared of dogs. However, if you walk by five houses and this dog is ferocious and vicious and it bites you, you're going to establish an intuition about that type of dog. So when you run across that dog in the future, you will now have this natural thought process about that type of dog. That's normal and natural. That's what you call a defense mechanism. That's what you call experience.
People that are experienced in the field see things, feel things, hear things, and sense things. That's what makes them awesome at their job. This unconscious bias strips that away. So when you run across another pitbull and you automatically associate it as dangerous, you could be wrong but you could also be right. And you could be right far more times than you are wrong for that one bias that you have.
This is the challenge in the business world, in corporate America, or in your small business. What does that unconscious bias look like?
It’s About Being Smart
There is a fine line between a bias that's on the negative side and intuition. Let's face it, this is where people may not agree with but your intuition is not only for good things but also for the bad things. If it's going to be labeled as a bias that your intuition tells you to stay away from a certain person or business profile that's treated you wrong, if those are the things you stay away from because you've learned from them in the past, then I don't consider you a racist or that you're discriminatory. Instead, I consider you smart that you're taking action.
Labeling Based on Perceived Unconscious Bias
I am not naive, in the slightest, to believe that there is no discrimination out there. My wife's family is from Mexico and my kids are half-Mexican. I am a mentor of underprivileged youth so I am very aware of the discrimination for race, gender, sexuality, nationality, etc.
But the narrative of not putting people in a box and then later put them in a box because they're part of the box or that you hire or fire them because they're not in the box is the same thing with what they're trying to teach about not having unconscious bias.
When I was a kid, we had a mixture of nationalities - Hispanics, African-American, Asian kids. I really didn't know the difference between races or what that meant. In fact, one of my best friends at that time was Jewish. I had no idea he was different than anyone else because he really was not. They just had a different holiday celebration but that was it. They're the same people. Unfortunately, we've lost some of that. My intuition now is that we lose some of that by labeling and forcing actions based on this perceived unconscious bias.
I was talking with my business coach, Mark Silverman, and brought up this concept of unconscious bias to him and how it charred me a bit. He brought up a good point though that people do have unconscious bias. I get that.. I wouldn't even call it an unconscious bias. I think some people are just flat out discriminatory. I don't even consider it unconscious.
Intuition versus RealityYou have to have a level of awareness inside of you to acknowledge what your intuition tells you versus reality. People that are aware of that can handle it.
So if I see a pit bull and it comes up nice and wagging its tail and excited to see me, I should be aware enough to change my perception about that. And you can apply this methodology to whatever business scenario you want.
I’d Love to Know Your OpinionUnconscious bias is a hot topic right now and I'd love to know your take on this. It's a massive hot topic in the Fortune 500 companies.
As a side note, anything that becomes a massive hot topic in the Fortune 500 space is because they're afraid of getting sued. They don't do anything without some type of consequence so they're doing risk mediation.
Like I said, I consider unconscious bias as just another painted picture for discrimination and the things that come with it. This is a disturbing topic for me because it strips away intuition and again, for me, intuition is built through experiences and experiences create really good professionals and really good business people. Stripping that away and throwing a wet rag over that does the business person and the employee a bit of a disservice.
Some hard core examples from a business standpoint:Facial or neck tattoos
When somebody comes in and I'm interviewing them and they have facial or neck tattoos or piercings, you can bet that I have some intuition about whether this person is a good fit for my company. And I may be wrong and they may be the best person in town. But they don't fit what I'm looking for and I know that. They will have impact on my customer base if they're doing physical interactions with them that I don't want. Call that bias. Call that intuition. Call that experience. But if you've got a neck tattoo, you can't be helping me sell or deliver high quality services and it's just how it is.
Communication
I think that scenario happens all the time. And sometimes it is wrong. You hear it all the time in the development or programming space. Like you don't want an Indian person answering the phone because you can't understand them. And I find that to be crap. That said, if their communication is not good, regardless if they're Indian, Chinese, Mexican, American, etc, if they can't communicate well then that's the problem. It has nothing to do with them being Indian.
What are you trying to accomplish and what are you trying to solve? How does your intuition work? Mine doesn't work in "Wow! They're Indians so they automatically don't speak good English." But, "I wonder how well they communicate." I'm obviously going to wonder if they have a thick Indian accent that would be hard for people to understand. Of course, that has to go through your thought process and has nothing to do with being racist or bias because they're Indians but it has to do with whether they're communicating well. And you need to vet that out.
Books, People, & Resources:I'm researching former professional athletes and how they transition from being an athlete or a new lead athlete into the "real world." I'm interested in hearing about their struggles, their challenges, roadblocks, successes, and everything in between. Sports has always been a big part of my life. I love them. I have a special interest in athletes and specifically the ones that have competed at the highest levels. Do you know anyone like that? If so, I'd love to hear from them or maybe it's even you. Shoot me an email at [email protected].
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Guest Name:
Coach DayneGuest Intro:
Today's guest is the distinguished and honorable Coach Dayne. He's a former professional athlete turned mental performance coach. He's focused on elevating our belief, what we're capable of, and achieving and aligning our mindset with those new expectations.I've been following Dayne for some time and I love his style. I love his message. He's an athlete and I'm a big fan of athletes being a former athlete myself. I love his "no excuse, no BS" kind of way.
Topics We Discuss:
Coach Dayne's background growing up in a family of athletes
A missing piece in what people or trainers are teaching: Mental performance
His struggles and how he got into mental performance coaching
The other side of struggle: Greatness
Aligning your mentality as an athlete with your business or career
How to harness your greatness when you keep on making excuses: Going from macro to micro
The power of visualization: Having a mental picture of what you're working toward
Goal versus vision: How do you differentiate them?
The secret sauce: Get committed to your belief!
Hiring for greatness: Identifying the barriers that are holding you back
Redefining failure as a success: Failure is your trampoline where you will be launched to new levels.
Failure isn't just inevitable, it's mandatory.
Putting yourself in situations where you can fail to train you for greatness
How do you know you're on the path: An inextinguishable passion
Coach Dayne's vision of making an impact and how he defines it
Reshaping your expectations and raising them to insanity
Monitoring progress: Journal entries and progress report on video
The power of taking risks: Stop playing it safe!
Books, People, & Resources:
Learn more about Coach Dayne on www.coachdayne.com and connect with him.
Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill
The Book of Joy by Dalai Lama and Desmond Tutu -
Do you have any certificates? OR What awards do you have? OR What certifications do you have in your arsenal of skills?
Let's break down what this actually means.
An External Validation
It's really a validation. They're asking for external validation, which is some form of insurance of who you are or what you are. This is an indication that you haven't served them.Over the last 25 years, I've worked for companies like Microsoft, Ford, Dell, Sports Illustrated, and with small businesses (hundreds of them at this point in time). And when someone that you've already worked with ask you for these types of things, you haven't served them initially right out of gate. Or they're looking for some form of "insurance" about who they're talking to. They also use that as a quick way to discard organizations or people they're working with. And they make decisions based on other people's perceptions. So it's an external validation.
Are you certified? Do you go for awards?
I'm a lifelong IT person and I've been in all sorts of positions from the very bottom to the very top in an IT organization. Along the way, I've held all sorts of certifications which have got me jobs and have got me in the door. I've learned a lot of "booksmarts" trying to obtain these certifications. Some employers or people really value them. They will love them. And they do sound good.I was one of the very first people to get my Microsoft certification back in 1999 and back then, I was a big deal. Nowadays? Who gives a squat? It doesn't really matter in that realm.
But back then, it was a big deal and I used it to my advantage. I actually had my company pay for me to go to a bootcamp where I spent 13 days just hammering, learning, and taking test to get the certification. And the company tried to pin me into their organization because they paid for this $5,000 bootcamp where I went and got certified. They wanted to make me a prisoner of their organization because they paid for it. I had other job offers because I now had the certification which really meant a lot back then and they were going to pay me a lot more.
So I basically paid my company their money and for the certifications, I paid for myself and went on. That was a great decision for me. But it's a good example of how the certificate benefited me. It made a lot of sense since I also learned a lot. Plus, I met someone who later turned into my future boss twice that brought me into great organizations.
Do I still pursue certifications and/or awards?
No.
As a business owner and an employer, I would actually even put college degrees in this bucket now as well. I really don't care that someone has a certificate in web design to work in my company or care for business coaches that only have to have a business certification from some place. I've worked with some that have certifications who are fantastic but I've also worked with many that don't have certifications and they're just as fantastic. So for me, this is something I don't make decisions on.
I believe the best employees, producers, companies are the people that are just actually doing great stuff. I want to see real results. I don't care about scholastic achievements or awards. It's not always the best who wins the award. So you have to look no further than our pool of presidential candidates. That doesn't mean they're the best in the country or at anything to run it.
If you work your butt off, produce great results, and get an award, that's awesome! You should be proud that you did something so powerful that other people noticed. Your goal should always be to win, to be productive, and to serve your customer.
Getting a certificate or a certification
This may ruffle a few feathers but this reminds me of the movie, Tommy Boy, about guarantees. I'm not certified in a lot of the things I do but I don't care. I'm not guaranteeing something that I have. I would throw caution at the wind that there are a lot of people that use a certification as their business model. So instead of building a business, they go and get a certification and use that as a way to attract business even when they're not really qualified to deliver their product/service. And that's scary!Getting a certification is not like walking in and spending two weeks at a bootcamp You have to be up for it. Tradesmen and apprentices don't just follow a plumber around for two weeks and become a full-blown licensed, professional plumber and expected to do good work. Especially with doctors and lawyers, it takes time to gain that skill in your craft.
Winning an award
If your goal is to win an award just so that you can attract prospects, it may work. But it's going to catch up with you sooner or later. Your business model isn't going to work.
The Products of Running a Great Business
Wrapping up, there's nothing wrong with awards, certifications, and certificates. Many are well-received and very valuable, and most of them are great learning experiences. But as a consumer, I'm always aware that these certificates or awards just don't mean much to me.As a business owner, certifications and awards are benefits of running a great business. If you win an award because you're recognized in your industry or community, that's awesome. But that's a product of you doing a great job.
If your people who work for you want to get certified because they want to pursue it to deepen their knowledge and you're able to provide that for them so they can get certified, then that’s awesome. But those are products of running a great business. They are not business plans to get certified and get a job or business after that. So you don't want to be the guy or gal who sold a guaranteed piece of crap just because you have a fancy certificate or won an award. It won't work.
Books, People, & Resources:
I'm researching former professional athletes and how they transition from being an athlete or a new lead athlete into the "real world." I'm interested in hearing about their struggles, their challenges, roadblocks, successes, and everything in between. Sports has always been a big part of my life. I love them. I have a special interest in athletes and specifically the ones that have competed at the highest levels. Do you know anyone like that? If so, I'd love to hear from them or maybe it's even you. Shoot me an email at [email protected]. -
Guest Name:
Philip Cooke - Radically Simple ConsultingGuest Intro:
My guest today is Philip Cooke whose lifelong passions are process improvement and helping people achieve their deepest passions in life. His engineering firm helps businesses who can't keep up with their demand for their product or service. They streamline their workflow to get more done with what they have.
Topics We Discuss:
The challenges and successes Philip commonly sees in organizations
The impact Philip provides to their clients: Finding the bottleneck is key
How to tap into people who need help but don't understand the value
The importance of knowing your pain points
When to know your operation is growing in an unsustainable way
Balancing between improving operations and new projects: Getting things ironed out before adding people
The difference between automation and building a process: Make sure you're NOT automating a broken process!
Attributes of great leaders: Daily plan + Execution
Dealing with decisions and tasks performed at a wrong level
What makes a bottleneck?
Find the bottleneck and start finding ways to shift around
Freeing your mind to take things off the plate
Metrics and monitoring the health of an organization:
Scoreboards with 2-3 Key Performance Indicators (KPIs)
Cycle Time
First Time Right
Making sure there's a good market for what you do
The way to build relationships: Providing VALUE
The importance of simplifying your operations: Whiteboards + simple systems
Books, People, & Resources:
Radically Simple Consulting
The Go-Giver by Bob Burg and John David Mann
The Goal by Eliyahu Goldratt
The ONE Thing by Gary Keller and Jay Papasan -
Show Summary:
Today's show is about making the big leap. This is for all of you that has a side hustle, a day job, and would want to make a big leap.Just like every show, this is strictly my opinion but there's a big narrative out there of “going all in” and “burning the bridges.” This is dangerous for older people or those with responsibilities. And it gets glazed over too much. I think that's dangerous.
I'm not suggesting it shouldn't be done because I'm a big fan of going all in. And I'm a big fan of going all in when it's calculated and not just because you're sick of your job or you think you have the next best thing.
I'm going to talk about what my mental process is or would be if I were to make a big leap.
How much money do you make?How much money are you making right now? How much money are you making in your side hustle? You have to be really diligent about this. You've got to add in back in things like your healthcare, cellphone, retirement, stock options, home, mileage, or any other perks that your company pays for. You've got to account for all that stuff because it does add up.
Healthcare is a huge one. If you have healthcare and you're on your own, maybe you can swing it but if you have a husband/wife or kids, you can't play with that. You've got to have that all mapped out. At least be aware of it. You don't have to do anything but if you're already living okay and you have a side hustle and you've been making money, and you're probably doing financially okay, then you need to figure out what that level is for you.
How much money do you really need to make to live and survive? Then add 20% because things could go wrong and there are always problems. Kids will always get sick. Things in your house are going to break. Your cars are going to need repairs. So make sure you know how much money you have to make and don't undercut that number.
How much money do you save?How much money have you saved? If you've had a full time job and you've had a side-hustle and you don't have any money stashed away, here are three possible reasons:
Not as good side hustle as you thought
You have a spending problem.
You have a cash flow problem.
Any of these will turn into big problems once you start running your business on your own. Cash flow is a really important thing to have. You have to have cash to run a business. You have to have cash to pay your bills. Managing your cash is critical.
The Profit First ModelThis means that if your side hustle is making money, that money goes into profit before you do anything with it. Put it in a separate account that you can set aside. How much money do you have stocked up? This is both personal cash and business cash.
If you're going to make a leap, sales are not always going to happen or things are not going to go the way they normally do so you have to have a number of months of cash set aside so you're safe and not in panic mode right out of the gate.
How would you handle slow months?Of course, it goes back to much money you have saved up but more importantly, could you survive? Could you pay your bills? Could you find auxiliary work? Do you have ways that you could work harder to make more money? How are you going to account for slow months? Because, guaranteed, it will happen (lost deals, economic downturn, holidays, high interest rates, snowstorms, etc.) You have to be prepared for it by having a plan in place.
Have you talked with your significant other?Talk about your husband/wife/partner what's going to happen when there's a slow month, what you need to do, and what you need them to be aware of. More importantly, ask for their understanding and support. This is very important. It's your responsibility to have this conversation with them. Get them fully on board with what you're doing. It's not going to make the situation any easier but your significant other has to be on board with you.
What sacrifices are you willing to make?How long are you willing to stick it out for? Are you willing to live off of credit cards? Are you willing to cut your cable bill or sell your car to have cash? Are you willing work weekends or when your kids are playing sports or on holidays? What sacrifices are you going to make?
You have to define this and hopefully, you won't have to compromise on them. You need to account for these but at the same time, you need to be very self-aware and really understand the sacrifices you're willing to make. For example, you can't trade three months into working 7-12 hour days and seeing your family less because you're in the basement or office. It doesn't make sense.
Are you ready to make that big leap?If you're really going to do this, please talk to your significant other. Please understand what you're getting yourself into. And please seek advice from others that have done it.
With all this being said, I love people who burn the ships and people that go all in. Personally, I am far more motivated, efficient, and determined when my back is in the corner but it's hard to do that when you're in the comfort zone. So I think you're crazy if you have other responsibilities and you've risked it to the extreme if you have not answered these questions because you're jeopardizing your family's well-being.
Maybe you don't need all the things that you have to live now but you certainly don't need to eat ramen noodles with your family or not have healthcare for a couple of months because you're wanted to go chase your dream. Maybe that's what would come out of it, but it's different than not planning for it and not being aware of it ahead of time.
Make an educated decision.
Again, the narrative of going all in and burning the bridges is dangerous, crazy, and exciting for some people. But you need to take a step back. Take a deep breath. Consult with some people. Map it out. Answer the questions mentioned above. And make an educated decision. The decision may be bad down the road. But at least it wasn't blind on going all in. You don't see professional poker players, going all in with their chips, blind. You have to have data and information and be educated. And this is no different.
Books, People, & Resources:
I'm researching former professional athletes and how they transition from being an athlete or a new lead athlete into the "real world." I'm interested in hearing about their struggles, their challenges, roadblocks, successes, and everything in between. Sports has always been a big part of my life. I love them. I have a special interest in athletes and specifically the ones that have competed at the highest levels. Do you know anyone like that? If so, I'd love to hear from them or maybe it's even you. Shoot me an email at [email protected].
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Show Summary:
Today's show is about if you’ll need to rent your pallbearers and the core of that question is pretty obvious. When you die, are you going to have relationships? Do you have friends and people that care about you so much so that they'll be at your funeral and carry you down in the casket? The root of this is...How are you making your money as a business owner?
Are you in alignment with your integrity?
Will you do anything for a buck?
Or are you spending quality time with the ones you love?
Are you working to do things that allow you to spend time with the ones you love?
This all comes down to your mission.
What is your mission in life?
What are you trying to accomplish? If you're making a crap ton of money, you've got no friends, and you're doing anything to make a buck and taking advantage of people (or whatever that looks like), if that's your mission then live it. That's up to you. That's between you and your maker and how you sleep at night. Just remember to save some of that money to rent your pallbearers.
However, it will work out better when you align your mission with something more powerful and bigger than just how much money you're making. The irony here is that when you align your mission or what you do with something that's not related to money and materialistic things, oftentimes you end up doing better anyway.
I suspect there are a few people out there that are money-hungry but those ones fizzle out quickly. If you burn enough people, you'll get called out and eventually, it's not going to work anymore or you could end up in jail.
To wrap up the show today, I’ve got two questions for you:
What are you doing to make sure that the people you have in your life will be your pallbearers?
Are you spending your time on the right things?
I'm actually wearing a silicone bracelet to remind me of what's important in life. I get wrapped up in success, business, Focus53, doing a good job, and working hard enough but it all boils down to these three things, which I call my 3F's:Faith
Family
Fitness
I know that if I'm taking care of these three things, all of the other things will take care of themselves specifically for me.Books, People, & Resources:
I'm researching former professional athletes and how they transition from being an athlete or a new lead athlete into the "real world." I'm interested in hearing about their struggles, their challenges, roadblocks, successes, and everything in between. Sports has always been a big part of my life. I love them. I have a special interest in athletes and specifically the ones that have competed at the highest levels. Do you know anyone like that? If so, I'd love to hear from them or maybe it's even you. Shoot me an email at [email protected].
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Guest Name:
Joe Shafer - Joe Shafer - Joe Shafer Fly FishingGuest Intro:
Today, my guest is Joe Shafer. We've been friends for 25 years and he's actually my oldest friend that I've interviewed for this show. He is someone I respect a lot. Joe is in the law enforcement but that's not why he is on the show but because he owns a company called Joe Shafer Fly Fishing. He's my client and partner and we've worked together on his website and his strategy.I'm excited to have him on because he's going to bring a different element to the show. The fly fishing business is really cool and very detailed where you have to know your stuff, and it's a service-based business to the core. The better service you provide, the more clients like you, the better tips they lay down, the more they come back and see you.
Topics We Discuss:
How Joe got into the fly fishing business
The benefits of fly fishing
Building the brand: Promoting his fly fishing guide
Using the website as a teaching tool for people
The importance of translating your knowledge into something people can use and digest
Processes/systems he used: Developing a good game plan
The power of feedback
Joe's biggest struggle of breaking down website content that is easily digestible
Learning new processes regularly to make him better and to put out the best product possible
Having the right mindset, overcoming fears, and building confidence
Monitoring success for business: Utilizing social media as a tracking mechanism and looking for growth areas
Knowing you're competent but you're scared: What do you do?
Books, People, & Resources:
Find out more about Joe Shafer on www.joeshaferflyfishing.com
Connect with Joe on Twitter, Facebook, and LinkedIn.
Colorado Guide Flies by Pat Dorsey -
Today's show is about something I work on with my clients all the time and something I'm always working on. And you can substitute "working on" for "struggling" sometimes and sometimes it's something I'm really good at. It's a form of personal balance - how to know how much time to spend on your craft, product, or service versus the other "stuff" you do in your business, which can be accounting, admin work, marketing, sales, hiring/firing, business development, reporting, etc.
How much of your time are you doing that versus the actual product creation or product development (if you're a “products” person) or services and services delivery (if you're in service business)?
You'd like to think this was an easy answer but we all know we have a limited amount of time to deal with during the day. But I've found it personally as well as with the people I'm working with that being able to put a container around this helps keep you from working 16-hour days and looking back not knowing what the heck have you got done in the day.
Here are some principles I've used to govern how to know what to spend time on.
Bootstrapping
If you don't have money and you're bootstrapping it, suck it up. The exercise here is to only do the important things. Do you really need to work on a social media campaign if that's a stretch for you and that's not important to your business right now? Is that the best use of your time? If you're bootstrapping and can't hire people to do it then you're going to have to do these things.
Setting priorities
Have a great priority identified and set up that you can go through and review to make sure that if you're doing all these things, at least you're doing them in order of priority. Sales and business development should always be at the top of this list. Sales will make up for a lot of wrongs in your other business certainly in the short term so cash flow can account for some of these stuff. Business development is something you can do yourself especially when your business is small.
Hiring
Let's say you do have some money but you still find yourself stuck in the minutia of your business. You should hire out to very specific tactical functions inside of your organization like:Accounting
There is no reason you should be doing this. Go hire someone. Pay a couple hundred bucks a month. Ask your friends or other people in business who they use and get a referral to get this off your plate.First of all, your books need to be clean. Your accounting needs to be done well. That has all sorts of downstream ramifications from both being able to sell your company and identifying issues in your business. Get it done right by having an expert do it. It's an easy thing to segregate from your business and have someone else do it.
Hiring/Firing
If you don't have an HR person inside the organization, this is something you need to do. If you have someone in your organization that you think needs to be let go of, let go of them TODAY. I say this pretty sternly because everyone knows there are people inside of the organization that you need to let go but they just drag on.I saw an interesting stat at this one conference I was at that really resonated with me, which is that:
"A bad employee costs 15x more than their salary."
This seems like a bit of an exaggeration but you can very easily see how it does between bad potential customer service and the loss of additional customers or bad morale or environment for your other employees. And it sets the bar.
Stop making excuses!
When you're running a larger company and have a bit of money but you still find yourself stuck in the minutia and there's not enough time to hand off things or you don't know what to hand off and how to get it to someone else or that you don't want to hire someone. These are just excuses and in fact, this is the biggest pull of people I work with and the environment I'm in.
The reality is, you're lying to yourself. You know exactly what to do. You know exactly how to do it. You just need to do it. And by "do it," I mean getting it off your plate. Either find someone else to do it or delegate it to someone who's already in your organization, hire somebody, or don't do it at all.
This is the giant paradox and what I want to tie this back to is that I work with a ton of people that are working so hard and in the grind and they're complaining about their job and what they're doing. They're working 16 hours a day and doing part of the assembly of their product because they don't have the stones to hire someone for $8 an hour to do the manual labor for them so they can be off doing their own business.
Your Call-to-Action:
If you're really unsure how much time to spend on your craft, product, and service versus other stuff in your business, I encourage you to sit back and reflect on these questions:
Am I happy with everything I'm doing to my business right now?
Am I providing service to my business the best that I can be?
Are you happy? Or are you just working your ass off to get by and that's just all you've done?
Sit back. Take a deep breath. Think about all the things you're doing. And think about whether these really fit into the things you're really good at that you should be doing for your organization.For solopreneurs out there and you work by yourself and you augment everything with contractors, same thing. If you're the one doing all your Facebook posts and if you have the opportunity to outsource it for $100 a month, think about it.
Books, People, & Resources:
I'm researching former professional athletes and how they transition from being an athlete or a new lead athlete into the "real world." I'm interested in hearing about their struggles, their challenges, roadblocks, successes, and everything in between. Sports has always been a big part of my life. I love them. I have a special interest in athletes and specifically the ones that have competed at the highest levels. Do you know anyone like that? If so, I'd love to hear from them or maybe it's even you. Shoot me an email at [email protected].
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Show Summary:
Today's show is about a question I received from my business coach. Mark Silverman. He's a great guy and I love him to death. He really knows his stuff so please go check him out. And the question is...
What area/areas do you feel you haven't been doing your best?
This is a pretty deep one. It makes you reflect on yourself and what you are doing versus your expectations. And if you're okay with it, sitting with it for a minute, and really processing it - the goal here is to be brutally honest with yourself.
I'm going to give you what mine were and I hope this resonates with you and will get you to sit down and think where haven't you been your best. Everyone knows, giving your best is important but only giving your best for the right things are important. So this implies which areas should you be giving your best that maybe you are not.
Making good food choices and working outThis is a big one for me and it always is and always has been a struggle in my life. Eating like crap translates into feeling not as good and then this spirals down. So the two big dominoes for me are making good food choices and getting a workout in every single day.
I brought this up on the show a number of times now but the year I trained for Ironman (which was just over a year ago) that I competed in was my best business and financial year (so far) of my life.
A coincidence?
I don't think so. Because it becomes part of your life. You become laser-focused on the time that you're not working out because you're working out so much and you're working out only on the things that are important to you.
The Domino EffectSo this is a massive domino for me and I believe it is a massive domino for everyone. If I am working out, if I am competing for something, it makes me feel better and it brings up the energy, and then I also make good food choices because I don't want to be running with what it feels like a bag of concrete in my gut. I don't want to be swimming with that and I don't want to feel crappy. So these are the two things that I haven't been doing my best at and I know that.
AskingI am very much a Type A person and I have this weird and crappy belief that I'm working on that I don't ask for help. It's a very prideful thing. I don't ask my best friends for help. I don't ask my family for help. I don't ask much of anyone for anything really. And while that may seem like a good and a prideful thing, the people that love me the most, that can help me out the most, that would love to help me out the most, I don't ask them for anything. So I'm working on this
It's not asking in a way that I'm asking for money, but things like, asking for introductions or if they know anyone that would be a good fit for my business. I've been telling myself this lie to my closest friends and to myself for the better part of 15 years that they can't help me in my professional life.
The reality is they know people that need the services I do and I just haven't asked. And this is just a big, big, black spot that I need to address, which is an area I haven't been doing my best in.
Being bold
This is an interesting one because if you ask my friends, who are stable and conservative and have day in and day out jobs, they think that I'm the boldest guy they know. I have multiple businesses. I travel. I am not afraid to go to conferences or talk to people. And they consider that being bold.
The truth is...
I don't feel like I'm being bold. I feel like I'm playing half-ass a lot of times. Being bold is relative to the person but for me, I haven't been playing my best. I have not been bold. I have been conservative and laid back and that's a focus area for me.
Playing safe
Every week, it changes potentially but these are constant themes I see as I go through. I use the 100 Day Journal as something that my business coach, Mark, gave me for some of my journaling goals and my business goals and this is a common theme I see.
This is a culmination of all of the above areas I've mentioned. Playing safe for me is really this mindset of putting limits on the things that I can do.
From Ironman to now...
I know that when I didn't play safe, I put a date on the calendar and signed up for Ironman when I hadn't trained and when I hadn't run more than 5 miles in my entire life. That's not playing safe. That's being bold. That's going after what I want and I did that! And it feels really good to do that. It feels like you get a new lease of life that you've proven to yourself that you can do something great.
And I haven't been doing that ever since the Ironman. I have been playing it safe on many levels - on a professional level and on a fitness level. This is something I need to work on and this is where I haven't been my best. And I'm looking to change that.
What about you? Where haven't you been you're best?I encourage you to go deep with yourself and be honest with yourself. Really sit with yourself and stew on this because the places where we aren't being our best and the areas that we want to be our best are massive opportunities for growth and success. And this is very different than, "I'm not being my best at watching Game of Thrones." Being the best at that isn't going to move your life forward.
Where I am definitely doing my best at: Commitment to my family and my faithWhat you don't see on this list which I'm very proud of are my family and my faith. I am committed to both of these and I am extremely committed to being there for my family, probably a little too much on the family side. Because if I have to travel for any reason, I get a little frustrated because I want to be with my family. It's probably healthy for me to be gone. But what you don't see on this list of where I haven't been giving my best is with my family. I feel like I'm doing a really good job at that and there's a lit of things that I do feel good at.
But for me to grow, I have to really focus on what I haven't been my best in and these are the things for me right now and I'm working every single day to change that whether behavior changes, daily practice changes, or habits. I'm a big habit guy. So if I change my habits, then I'll change these things natively. And the biggest domino of all of these is getting workout in so that's what I'm focusing on.
Books, People, & Resources:
I'm researching former professional athletes and how they transition from being an athlete or a new lead athlete into the "real world." I'm interested in hearing about their struggles, their challenges, roadblocks, successes, and everything in between. Sports has always been a big part of my life. I love them. I have a special interest in athletes and specifically the ones that have competed at the highest levels. Do you know anyone like that? If so, I'd love to hear from them or maybe it's even you. Shoot me an email at [email protected].
eye9design - A boutique web design and WordPress agency that just celebrated 10 years in business (an eternity in the web design space). They built hundreds of websites for businesses of all sizes. Finding a web design company is hard. There are lots of options, lots of good ones but lots of bad ones. Let the team at eye9design take care of you. If you need a great website for a great price, visit www.focus53.com/eye9. Mention this ad and get 10%.
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Guest Name:
Kelly ChildressGuest Intro:
My guest today is Kelly Childress. She is a dispute resolution practitioner, a certified coaching consultant, and a board certified chaplain with over 15 years of experience in healthcare. Kelly has vast experience working with people who have been blown away by a difficult event, a death, a terminal diagnosis, a tragedy, or some type of crisis. She loves to help build bridges and gaps between what was and what can be. She also have three amazing nieces who light up her world. As a side note, she is one of the sweetest and most genuine people I've ever met.
Topics We Discuss:
What Kelly does as an Ombuds/Mediator in healthcare institution
The importance of self-care
Balancing transparency versus self-incrimination: Being an internal neutral to advocate for a fair process
Erring on the side of truth: Paying high value in transparency and truth
Factors for playing the blame game: Culture + Discomfort
Practicing a just culture: Taking the story from everyone's perspective and creating positive changes to grow
The power of effective communication: Understanding one's culture and listening
The attributes of a good medical practitioner: Technical excellence + emotional intelligence + communication expertise + open heart
The value of compassion: Treating people as human beings + smiling can be healing
Who do you really want to be in this world?
Dealing with stressful circumstances: The medical institution as a world unto itself
How to be more receptive to care: Willingness to share, listening, participating in creating the right conditions to get well
How to cultivate effective communication: Being an expert in your field.
Being open to being coached: Listen to what's being reflected back to you
Never underestimate the impact you have on people
Planting seeds of compassion, kindness, and forgiveness
Books, People, & Resources:
Furiously Happy by Jenny Lawson
The Code of the Extraordinary Mind by Vishen Lakhiani -
Show Summary:
Today's show is a quick, ad hoc one. I just had a conversation with people about sales quotas and sales goals. I wanted to dissect this a little bit and talk about them. It really depends on your perspective, what organization you're in and how your company is set up and what you're trying to do but I'll offer some words that may ruffle some people's feathers and that's okay.
Does Your Drive Compromise Your Morals?Follow what you want but when someone sets up a sales quota or sales goals, goals are fine. Quotas when they're tied to compensation elicit drive in people that, in my opinion, allows them to compromise what's right for the customer.
Let's talk about the sales quota and say you have to sell $100,000 worth of widgets and you have three different types of widgets. But when you talk to a customer, they don't need the widgets. They don't need your widgets. But you're okay selling them with these widgets.
The same thing in the service-based business. You really know they don't need your website. You really know they don't need your technical services, your writing services, your auto services, whatever that looks like, and you still sell it to them because you're driving to feed you family. You're driving to make a sales quota.
I know why companies put them in place because of this very reason. It drives people and motivates them where I have a big, big, big set of conflicting struggles since these people will compromise their morals to sell someone something that they don't need. The excuses I hear are: "They're big boys and big girls. If they don't really need it, they should say so." That doesn't work for me. If you tell them they don't need it and they still bought it, then that's maybe a different conversation
But if they're buying something that you know they don't necessarily need or they don't get the best value out of, or there is a better alternative and you're just selling it because you make a higher margin on that product, that is wrong!
I get why companies and organizations do that since that's the only way to drive a lot of people and motivate them. At the end of the day, that's what it's about, especially publicly traded companies. What's the topline? Money coming in.
Take a step back...
Sales Goals and Extra Bonus
Sales goals - They are 100% valid, accurate, and needed. You have to have goals to know where you're going to. You have to have a target you're shooting for. Are they tied to compensation? Maybe.
To me, I like the bonus model where if you get to this, we'll give you an extra bonus. Hopefully, that takes some of the angst and desire to sell someone something they don't necessarily need.
Playing the Long Game
At the end of the day, I want to play the long game. I want to build relationships. I want to have the customer or the client know, like, and trust me. If I had signed some of the deals knowing that it wasn't the right deal, the number of clients or websites I've turned down because I didn't think it was the right fit or because I didn't think they needed my services, it's just not right.
Is your company in it for the short term or the long term? That's the question.
Are you looking just to make a quick sell, to meet some sales quota, to move onto the next thing? Or are you really trying to build a long term relationship with your client?
It's real simple. I want a long term relationship. I want to do the best for them. And I believe from the bottom of my heart, that ends up the best for myself, for my organization, and for the customer. The people that have an immediate need of fix make bad decisions.
Books, People, & Resources:
I'm researching former professional athletes and how they transition from being an athlete or a new lead athlete into the "real world." I'm interested in hearing about their struggles, their challenges, roadblocks, successes, and everything in between. Sports has always been a big part of my life. I love them. I have a special interest in athletes and specifically the ones that have competed at the highest levels. Do you know anyone like that? If so, I'd love to hear from them or maybe it's even you. Shoot me an email at [email protected].
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Guest Name:
Alla BarovaGuest Intro:
Born and raised in Russia, Alla worked as a registered nurse for 13 years in Russia. But guess what? She came to America in 2003 and she brought her son and her mom a year later with her. She's a little different than most people I've had on this type of podcast but I'm excited because it has a big parallel to what business and life is about and we'll talk about that. Ala and I have have been been able to spend some time together in the past and we'll talk about what that means. She is currently a real estate broker and also, a student at Quantum University of Honolulu, going for a PhD in Integrative Medicine.I have more admiration for the things she has done in her life, moving from a place that she didn't like to live and came to the U.S. That's why I wanted to have her on and how that parallels to the business. She set a goal and a destination and a journey and she didn't stop until she made it there no matter how hard the trials were between where she started and where she ended. She set out a really, really big goal that probably most, if not all people listening to the podcast right now have not done. There is a ton of admiration coming from me and a bunch of other people for the journey that she made.
Topics We Discuss:
What her life in Russia was like: Born in a family of teachers and dealing with money struggles
Her biggest driving force to move to America: Wanting to give her son more than she had and not wanting her son to be drafted to the army which was mandatory
Coming to America with literally nothing and not speaking the language
Being able to bring her son and mom within a year and dealing with immigration stuff to apply for political asylum
How she assessed her priorities every single day: Clarity, Focus, and Freedom
Making the most money in the fastest way to be able to buy a car and to save money for her son
She recounts her story of flying to the America and escaping from the hands of slavery just in the nick of time
Surrounding herself with the right people through trial and error
Being 100% in what you do: Love it and make others love it through you.
Trusting the GPS in your body: Do what feels good to you because your heart will never lie.
Books, People, & Resources:
Alla's book recommendation: The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle -
Today's show is about the "Expert's Dilemma" - a phrase I've been using. I don't even know if it's out there or someone else has coined it but I'm going with it.
I see it all the time. I see it in myself. And I see it all around the business world as well as with solopreneurs (a lot!), people that run their own one-man businesses and I also see it with small businesses.
What is an expert's dilemma?Somebody got into business to do whatever they're gifted at or their zone of genius for their craft, for their trade, for their product. However, they grow their business and the next thing you know, they spend more of their time doing the things that they are not their expertise or their zone of genius. In more times, they do things that they hate - accounting, marketing, HR, hiring, firing, etc.
This then starts to erode them. Their business starts to erode and they start hating the thing that they really love and the reason they got into business in the first place. And it causes all sorts of problems.
A gradual shiftThis doesn't happen overnight. It's a gradual shift. Right when you get into business, say you are a plumber and you love plumbing. You're the best plumber in the whole land. You then start doing it, doing great work, and making good money. You spend 90% of your time doing plumbing. But over months, quarters, and years, that 90% of plumbing and 10% of business administration and the other side of the business shifts. The next thing you know, you're doing 50% of the plumbing and 50% of running the business. Then you start hiring people, dealing with issues, marketing taxes, accounts payable, accounts receivable,books, etc. Eventually, you're no longer doing the thing you love the most since most of your time will be spent dealing with issues on your business.
Does this sound familiar to anyone?
It's seen in big and small business alike.
The sad thing is I see this at big Fortune 100 companies. People get into a specific role. It's their zone of genius, they may get promoted or they move to somewhere the grass is greener and they spend all their time doing things that isn't their zone of genius.
I see it in small businesses. A business owner may be doing well. They've hired their staff, they're set up and rocking well. The next thing you know, this business owner is in the weeds doing things that are not business owner-type tasks.
My personal experienceThis is the expert's dilemma. You are basically spending more time on things out of your expertise or zone of genius. I have done this. I do this and when I do, I notice that I become frustrated with what I'm doing. I become angry at the type of work I'm doing and I become resentful for the type of work I'm doing.
One of the things that I do outside my zone of genius is general marketing. So I literally stopped doing any type of marketing (social, blog posts). The only thing I really do is this podcast. And the reason I stopped is because it's literally outside my zone of genius. I don't like it. I'm not good at it. I have an atrocious looking face so when I shoot a video and look at myself, I'd go, "My goodness. Who is going to watch this guy?" And so I stopped.
I found myself sinking back into it every now and then but it's really about the FOCUS.
What's the fix?Surround yourself around people that are going to call you out on this. Be aware that you have an issue. Acknowledge the fact that you are not working in your zone of genius and it's not making you happy. I've heard so many times that that's the cost of business. Well, that's not the cost of business. Yeah, there are some things you need to do as a business owner that you don't necessarily like but that doesn't mean you should hate it. It also doesn't mean you should go out and hire a platoon of people to take over every little thing you don't like.
The real fix - AwarenessAre you aware of what you're working on? Of what you should be working on? Of what's the best use of your time? And of the tasks and the things you focus on during the day? Do they align with your zone of genius?
Your challengeGo look at work or tasks you've done last week. See how those align to what you think you are and what you think you aren't. I guarantee it will surprise you and that includes your zone of genius at work, the things that you hate and the things that you do to kill time. Go look back one week, 7 days and take a look at what you did. I bet it doesn't align with what you want. It doesn't align with your zone of genius. It doesn't align with the things that you would say "this is who I am or who I want to be."
If I plagiarized anyone else's term with this expert's dilemma concept, I apologize. But we all get in it and it's really powerful when we're in it. We do some of the great work. It feels like it's the easiest thing in the world. And on the flip side, when we're outside of it and doing things we're not good at or continue to be uncomfortable at, it's not fun. It turns our businesses into work and that's not what we want.
Books, People, & Resources:
I'm researching former professional athletes and how they transition from being an athlete or a new lead athlete into the "real world." I'm interested in hearing about their struggles, their challenges, roadblocks, successes, and everything in between. Sports has always been a big part of my life. I love them. I have a special interest in athletes and specifically the ones that have competed at the highest levels. Do you know anyone like that? If so, I'd love to hear from them or maybe it's even you. Shoot me an email at [email protected].eye9design - A boutique web design and WordPress agency that just celebrated 10 years in business (an eternity in the web design space). They built hundreds of websites for businesses of all sizes. Finding a web design company is hard. There are lots of options, lots of good ones but lots of bad ones. Let the team at eye9design take care of you. If you need a great website for a great price, visit www.focus53.com/eye9. Mention this ad and get 10%.
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Show Summary:
Today's show is about what should a solopreneur or a small business focus on first. I often don't talk about startups and this doesn't necessarily apply to that but I think it's something really important for a startup or a solopreneur. A solopreneur is basically a one-man wrecking crew.
Focus on CASHSo the first thing to focus on is cash. I don't run into too many businesses that are in trouble and have a healthy cash flow. However, that's not to say that you're running a good business if you have a healthy cash flow. These two are not mutually exclusive but they cash could be an indication that you're doing something right, that your products or services are received in the market, you're making money, and you don't have really thin margins.
1. Save cash.
For startups or existing businesses, you have to save cash. I know this is really hard for a lot of people because they want to pour every single dollar back into the business but I believe in the Profit First model.The Profit First Model
In its simplest form, it means that when $100 comes in, you automatically set aside a certain percentage of it that goes to a savings account so you save cash for your business. Then have another account for your business taxes. Therefore, your $100 gets sliced up immediately.
The Advantages of a Profit First Model:
It allows you to see how much cash you have and you will always have cash on hand to weather any storm such as if you lose a big contract or if business is slow for month. Whatever that looks like, you know you're able to handle that from cash.Obviously, driving more sales is another way to top into that. But what that looks like for you and your business is a whole another topic specific to your business.
2. Manage your expenses.
This is important because expenses literally take away your cash. You may not think your extra $25 a month cellphone bill is a big deal but when you add that up over a year and you're diligent with your money and have it in your savings account, that is cash in the bank.Cash Is King
Hands down, cash is the number one thing to focus on. During a recent networking event, someone asked me about what I'm doing and who I'm working with as well as some of the big struggles I see. And they asked me what to focus on first.
So if you're generating cash for your business, you are doing something right. You should be excited and you should be proud of yourself. However, you have to be aware that it may dry up so you need to have things in place to account for slower times. But whatever you're doing to generate that cash, pour a little fuel on that fire and generate more.
Cash is king.
It will always be king. It is going to be king if you need to ever get financing or if you ever need to get an investor or when the customer you thought had went south and there are problems.
Be honest with yourself and look at your account, personal or business. If there's cash in there, then it just reduces a level of anxiety just by seeing it in there and knowing you have it. It allows you to not be needy.
Books, People, & Resources:I'm researching former professional athletes and how they transition from being an athlete or a new lead athlete into the "real world." I'm interested in hearing about their struggles, their challenges, roadblocks, successes, and everything in between. Sports has always been a big part of my life. I love them. I have a special interest in athletes and specifically the ones that have competed at the highest levels. Do you know anyone like that? If so, I'd love to hear from them or maybe it's even you. Shoot me an email at [email protected].
eye9design - A boutique web design and WordPress agency that just celebrated 10 years in business (an eternity in the web design space). They built hundreds of websites for businesses of all sizes. Finding a web design company is hard. There are lots of options, lots of good ones but lots of bad ones. Let the team at eye9design take care of you. If you need a great website for a great price, visit www.focus53.com/eye9. Mention this ad and get 10%.
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Today's show is about focusing on results only and not the path and the journey. I see this a lot and it basically comes down to people being so enamored with this one goal they set for themselves, which is typically a pretty powerful goal, and they compromise everything along the way to get it.
I'm going to use two analogies here:
Building a business - I will use my coaching and consulting side of what I do as a business example.
Baking cookies with your kids
And as we go through this, hopefully, it shows the challenge that we face when we try to apply a single metric, goal, and focus to our business.1. There is value in learning from your failures.
If you're so enamored with the final result or goal that you don't learn from your failures along the way, then you're missing out on some tremendous knowledge and experience.
The same with cooking with your kids. If they don't learn to measure using the right measuring utensil or learn to measure with the right numbers then they just don't learn and experience the value of learning from their failures.
2. There are so many other benefits besides the single result you're looking for.
If I'd just look at my business, where I'm at today versus where I was at 6 months ago, and if I were to only focus on top line sales and I ignored all these other benefits...
... of all the great relationships I've had and set up,
... of all the business opportunities that came to me,
... of all the great people I've met,
... of all the great conferences I've been to,
All these things have been just blessings in my life. Had I only been focused on driving sales, I would have missed those and that would be really bad. That would just be really bad for my business and it's just really bad as a person and a human being. I wouldn't have been able to offer or serve other people along the way, had I been only focused on that.
Same thing with baking cookies and you're only worried about that you have the most perfect cookie. And you're not rocking the benefits with your kids along the way. You're not enjoying being with them. They're not having fun with you. You're not engaged. You're not giggling. You're not appreciating your time with them. You're not appreciating what that time together is about. Who gives a crap about what the cookies come out like really? The value is spending time, cooking cookies, and being together.
Sure, you want good cookies. Who doesn't? But if you take that same approach and apply it to your business, I wonder if we really dive in on a single goal or focus too much at the expense of other things as we're going along the path.
3. You are blindly attacking this desired result so hard that you compromise everywhere else.
This is one that probably will sting a little bit for many people. This maybe hard for you to hear (and sometimes for me too) but you worked so hard to close these deals that you basically have no pipeline after you hit your magic result.
I see this all the time in the corporate world as well as with small businesses. They're driving for sales number. They get it. Lord knows what kind of carnage is left behind of what they did. They hit their number and they're happy for 20 minutes then they realize the next quarter, the next month, or the next 6 months, they have a sales goal or they have business that they need to bring in. And guess what? They have no pipeline. They have no people left to service because they just burned through everyone trying to hit this goal.
This is equivalent to baking cookies at 700 degrees in your oven with every single ingredient in your house and then at the end of it, maybe you have some cookies that cook fast and they're good. But at the end of it, you certainly can't bake anymore.
So the pipeline is crushed and you just blindly attacked it. Head down. No holds barred until you get to this goal and result without really appreciating the process.
What is the solution?
To me, it's having a clear understanding on a few key metrics for your business that allow you to achieve your goal without compromising the important things in and around your business or life.Metrics for cooking cookies:
Is my child having fun?
Are they learning?
Have I taken the time to really sit back for just a couple of minutes and just look at them and enjoy our time together and what they're doing?
Are they engaged?Metrics for my business
How many people am I serving?
How many people am I actively coaching and consulting with?
What are my conversations like and how do I feel about them?
Am I continually learning?
Am I serving in the most powerful way possible?These are metrics that I literally keep track of and that I diagnose, look at, and reflect on. So as I continue to grow my business, those are what are important to me.
It is critical to have goals. I think everybody knows that. But it's also brutally painful if all you do is focus on that goal and not the process to get there.
If you look at where you're at today, no matter where it is, no matter how successful you are, stop and look back and think to yourself,
"If I only wanted to get to where I'm at today and I didn't learn or experience all the things behind me that had gotten me here today and I didn't get the value out of that, think about how difficult it would be to go forward."
The moral of the story:
Absorb, soak in, and appreciate the things along the path because those are the things that are going to take you to the next level for your business.Books, People, & Resources:
I'm researching former professional athletes and how they transition from being an athlete or a new lead athlete into the "real world." I'm interested in hearing about their struggles, their challenges, roadblocks, successes, and everything in between. Sports has always been a big part of my life. I love them. I have a special interest in athletes and specifically the ones that have competed at the highest levels. Do you know anyone like that? If so, I'd love to hear from them or maybe it's even you. Shoot me an email at [email protected].
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Guest Name:
Randy Williams - Talley & Twine Watch CompanyGuest Intro:
Randy Williams is an entrepreneur, author, and speaker based in Hampton Roads, Virginia. His most recent venture, Talley & Twine Watch Company has been featured in Black Enterprise, The Network Journal, and Inside Business. Randy is passionate about inspiring other entrepreneurs to take a leap into business ownership and believes that service is at the heart of everything we can do. As a side note, he has a beautiful, young daughter. He's a new dad so he and I like to talk about that.Topics We Discuss:
Talley & Twine's business model: A direct consumer watch company that cultivates lifelong relationships with customers
What influenced his drive to build relationships with customers: Seeing it as a strategic advantage
Systems and processes in place: Social media presence and looking at customer service emails so they can speak directly and sending out personalized video emails
Biggest challenges with running the business: Inventory management/Cash flow
Learning what to do: Maximizing what little amount of cash he has and selling a few watches at a time; choosing to spend money on the things that have the best return
Assessing new projects versus existing projects: Using information from the emails received from clients to determine what products they should create or offer to clients at the right time
The power of market research: Do an Amazon search for their top selling items, look at the things that are already selling, see how you can improve upon that, and create an even better product.
Key metrics that drive his business: Monitoring your daily financials or run rate (number of products you have to sell per day) and cash flow (seeing how much money is in the bank vs. expenses)
Vanity metrics: Are you sure you're turning them into customers?
Focus on your actual business versus your vanity metrics
Hiring for greatness: A heart that cares and recognizes the value of delivering the gift on time and connecting to the human element of it
Books, People, & Resources:
Talley & Twine Watch CompanyRandy has a special gift for Focus53 listeners. Just go to the Talley & Twine Watch Company website. Enter in Focus53 upon checkout and receive $10 any timepiece.
Randy's tool recommendation: Shopify
Randy's book recommendation: The War of Art: Break Through the Blocks and Win Your Inner Creative Battles by Steven Pressfield
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Show Summary:
Today's show is about FEARS. I'm going to try to keep this in the business context but as you can imagine this bleeds all over the place.Fear, for me, as I work on myself, on my business, and my mental, spiritual, and personal sides of the house, I've noticed that fear dictates and controls a lot of what I do, and more specifically, what I don't do.
There are all types of fears and I'm going to cover a few of them here.
Fear of failure
We don't appreciate how much this controls us. I see this with a lot of business owners, individuals, and businesses I work with.One of the ways I see fear of failure happening is you will work with anyone that comes to your business. Your fear of not making money takes over so you'll just work with anybody and that will kill you in the long run.
In a more traditional sense, it's the fear of doing something because you're afraid you're going to fail, of what you'd look like if you failed, and of how that would feel to you.
Fear of success
People do have the fear of success for some things. You project yourself in your head that you're having a certain level of success but that success comes with other things like making more money than your friends or you're making enough that your family is going to ask you for money or you have to pay more taxes - any of these other things that come with success. More pressure is another thing. In the corporate world, success often equates to more responsibility, more travel, more hours, etc.Fear of rejection
This would come in the form of whether you’re being rejected by your peers for not being a thought leader, or being rejected by the common audience for not pleasing them, or for saying something to somebody and afraid that they'll reject you so you instead say what they want to hear. This fear of rejection is what keeps you from being your true and genuine self. You're not going to hear yes every time.Honestly, this is a big one for me as I am a people-pleaser at my core. As I continue to coach, consult or work with people, I find that the more genuine I am to myself and the more I serve somebody with no fear of them rejecting what I'm doing or saying, the better I produce for them, the more genuine I am, and the better results they have. They may reject a thought or an idea but I don't visualize it as thinking that I'm a bad person, which is often the case.
Fear of missing out
This comes all the time in the business world. You might call it the shiny object syndrome or the new project syndrome or the "I can't keep my shit together and focus on a project" syndrome.There's a new project, a new idea, a thought, a new customer, etc, and if you don't go do it or spend time on it, you're afraid that you're missing out on something.
This is the biggest problem. You're not focused. You're afraid of missing out that you spend all this mental energy on what could have been or what you've missed out on while you're missing a really good opportunity with the business you already have.
Fear of what others may think
You have this sense of fear that what you say, do, accomplish, or don't accomplish will not be good enough for them. They may think down upon you. This is a combination of all the fears put together. Probably 9 out of 10, this is your own fear in your own head and doesn't truly reflect what you think.For example, if I started a business and it went south, it's not that I was afraid of failure, but I was afraid my best friend or my wife would think that I am a loser. The reality is, they won't. Because that's just not how they are. They don't view a single failure in the sense that you are a failure. These are two very different things.
I still care about what my wife or best friend or other people think but I don't have fear that my actions done in the best of interest, with the best of mindsets, are going to be something that persuades them to dislike me. They may not have liked my actions or business ideas, but I no longer have any fear that they may think I'm a bad guy because a business didn't go well. This may manifest with you in a lot of different ways and I see it manifest in business and business owners I've worked with.
Having the Athlete's Mindset
You seldom see this kind of fear in the sports arena, specifically on the field. You don't think about what the person next to you thinks about you in the heat of the battle. This is the mindset that you want to get into.
Now, once you go out of the field and back to the locker room to watch films, that's when fear begins to hit you as you're sitting there being peer-reviewed. Your fear of what others think comes into play when you slow things down and you begin to think a little irrationally. The funny thing is you're sitting there in fear of what the other person sitting next to you would think while he's also thinking what you are thinking. The reality is... no one really gives a crap.
The same analogy applies to business. At the end of the day, the more fear you can let go of, the more fears that you can identify, the more you're able to sense their true meaning in your life and not let them control what you do, the better off you are.
This is a big focus for me to work on the fears, the things that guide my thoughts, and more importantly, the things that prevent me from taking action where a lot of them are fear-based.
There are more different types of fear and different ways they're being manifested inside a business and life in general. Hit me up if you want to know more about them.
Books, People, & Resources:
I'm researching former professional athletes and how they transition from being an athlete or a new lead athlete into the "real world." I'm interested in hearing about their struggles, their challenges, roadblocks, successes, and everything in between. Sports has always been a big part of my life. I love them. I have a special interest in athletes and specifically the ones that have competed at the highest levels. Do you know anyone like that? If so, I'd love to hear from them or maybe it's even you. Shoot me an email at [email protected].
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Guest Name:
Chris Blair - Blair Financial Planning and Rocky Mountain Business ForumGuest Intro:
Today's guest is Chris Blair. Chris is the President of Blair Financial Planning as well as the Executive Producer at Rocky Mountain Business Forum. Chris and I shared a cup of tea, a cup of coffee, had some great conversations about service, business, giving back, and much more on a deep business level. We see eye-to-eye on a lot of things.His value proposition conveys why I've really enjoyed my time with Chris and why I wanted to have him on the show. His value proposition says this:
Our Value Proposition is Simple – We help you…
Align your Financial Choices with your most important goals & most deeply held values
Get your entire financial house in order & keep it that way forever
Have confidence that no matter what happens in the markets, the economy or the world, we will strive to help you achieve your goals
Topics We Discuss:
The two greatest gifts Chris could give to his two kids
Product versus performance: Service-based proposition
The music conductor analogy: Working as a financial conductor
Getting the clarity as to where clients stand relative to where they want to be
Process and systems in place: Working with teams + 3-meeting process with clients
A walk-through of their goals conversation with clients: values, specific goals, timeline, numbers, a picture of their ideal life
Hiring for greatness: customer service, hyper-organization, creativity, attention to detail
Challenges they face: Messaging that resonates with people and overcoming customer objections
Knowing how to stay retired without any stress: Making the right decisions
Who are not a good fit to their company
The model of vetting clients: Finding if it's a good fit
Developing a process around networking
The value of recording your meetings
Books, People, & Resources:
GoToMeeting
Blair Financial Planning
Rocky Mountain Business ForumSend Chris an email at [email protected]
Chris' book recommendation: Traction by Gino Wickman
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