A Review Of 2023: CRASH CEO SCHOOL

Happy New Year and welcome back to episode 30 of Baktari MD! In this episode, we take a look back at 2023 and all of the advice we gave this year. Need a quick review? Check out the full episode below for all of the tips and trick you need are right here! Find out all of this and more in the full episode! 

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    Jonathan Baktari MD is the CEO of eNational Testing, e7 Health, & US Drug Test Centers. Jonathan Baktari MD brings over 20 years of clinical, administrative, and entrepreneurial experience. He has been a triple board-certified physician specializing in internal medicine, pulmonary, and critical care medicine.
    Jonathan Baktari MD is a preeminent, national business thought leader interviewed in The Washington Post, USA Today, Forbes, Barron’s, and many other national publications. He is also an opinion writer for The Hill and the Toronto Star.
    He is the host of a highly-rated podcast Baktari MD as well as a guest on over 50 podcasts. Jonathan Baktari MD was formerly the Medical Director of The Valley Health Systems, Anthem Blue Cross Blue Shield and Culinary Health Fund. He also served as clinical faculty for several medical schools, including the University of Nevada and Touro University.
   Jonathan Baktari MD is also the author of the highly-rated course High Converting Call Class where he shares his secrets of increasing revenue through incoming phone calls.

Transcript

00:00:07:52 - 00:00:16:59
Unknown
Make sure the business is scalable without you. So this kind of feeds on, you know, don't create yourself a job, you know.

00:00:17:04 - 00:00:47:22
Unknown
Yes. Initially the business is going to need you. It's going to need you the for the first year or two years, three years. But really, if the business is dependent on you doing the work, you can't really grow the business or work on the business. So if you're the one cleaning the pools, if you're the one that's, you know, running the front counter, if you're going to be the main chef at the restaurant, it's not ideal because it's not scalable.

00:00:47:31 - 00:01:19:18
Unknown
There is only so many restaurants you can open and right from the beginning you need to find something that's scalable, theoretical, everything scalable. But certain businesses are much more scalable than others without you. So yes, I mean, you could run around all day long, but the goal of it is for you, it's not, you know, below you to work in your business, but I'm going to make the argument that it's better for you to work on your business than work in your business.

00:01:19:23 - 00:01:43:26
Unknown
Maybe the first year. Yes, You you work in the business because when you hire other people and train other people, you need to know the business as though you're an employee and you've worked there. So initially, yes, you most businesses, you are going to have to do everything, but you try to look at the business model and say, if this grew, what I need to be there.

00:01:43:33 - 00:02:13:39
Unknown
And at the end of the day, the most scalable businesses are the ones that can scale without you because it's on the one you. And that cannot be the rate limiting. Plus, as the business grows, your ability to focus on higher level issues will have a much bigger impact on the business than your ability to like literally get in the weeds and solve problems.

00:02:13:44 - 00:02:49:57
Unknown
And that we will have other talks about how to hire people and how to create an organization. All of that will hopefully be in future episodes. But for now, we just want to let you know, if you look at a business and the business is going to involve you being there in perpetuity, you may want to look somewhere else because especially if you already have a job and you're trying to get to the point where you could be more creative, you can let your your, you know, entrepreneurial side run wild and think outside the box.

00:02:49:57 - 00:03:18:28
Unknown
And you know, solve problems and, you know, disrupt things and create innovations. You're not going to be able to do that very well if you're in the grind, you know, behind the counter or wherever you're going to want to be, more focus on that. So to leave you with that, find a business that scalable eventually without you. Again, the caveat I would say the first year or two that probably doesn't apply, but at some point can grow without you.

00:03:22:07 - 00:03:57:03
Unknown
You know, as long as talking about the description. Do you think unbalanced it's better to overshoot the importance of the position than undershoot it? Because I sometimes I see ads for like administrative clerk, you know, like how many people are waking up saying, I want to be administrative clerk, but is and I think we have learned that, you know, where you don't call it administrative clerk, you can say assistant director to you or assistant to the director or you know, because often that is what it really is.

00:03:57:08 - 00:04:24:37
Unknown
But we just call it literally like what they're be doing, but not how important they are. And tell us about like that job title versus, you know, it's a great topic because I look at the job descriptions and we've been guilty of it ourselves. You know, if it's a basic title job description, we're like, how do we jazz data, you know, So if it's even if it's production worker, people understand what a production worker is.

00:04:24:42 - 00:04:45:02
Unknown
It doesn't need to be like assistant to a lead in production. You know, or something of that. We're trying to like sass it up a little bit, know, be as honest as possible. One of my pet peeves I will say this and not just mine. I think a lot of people is is you think you have to keep some type of secret within the job description like, well, let's let's get folks to look at it and look at it.

00:04:45:02 - 00:05:00:31
Unknown
If we don't put a pay rate on, they're wrong. They're not looking. If you don't put at least a range. Right, depending on what it is. But if there's there's no stick and carrot game, you know, because as an employer, you're the one like what is the actual position that you're doing?

00:05:03:23 - 00:05:25:49
Unknown
So how do you build culture? The first thing you have to understand in building culture in any organization is to see who you already have in an organization. Now we divide up most people in our organization as two types of people, people who are amazing people, but they're clocking in and out versus people who are owners who really feel like this is their company.

00:05:26:01 - 00:05:54:19
Unknown
We'll have other podcasts about how to convert people in your organization to owners. But first, let's just talk about what happens when you have predominantly people who are clocking in and out and versus organizations where you have predominantly people who are owners. If you're an organization where 80, 60, 70, 90% of people are clocking in and out, any person you bring into the organization is going to feel the pressure to conform.

00:05:54:24 - 00:06:22:25
Unknown
The majority of people who are clocking in and out and by the way, they may be doing a great job, but they're still clocking in and out. The flip side of it is if you have an organization that the majority of people are owners and you bring in someone who wants to clock in and out or who comes with that background or expectation, they're going to feel tremendous amount of pressure to conform and either become an owner or leave the organization.

00:06:22:30 - 00:06:43:38
Unknown
So what happens in these kind of things where 80, 90% of the people are predominantly renters, as we call them, versus owners, any new person coming into the organization will feel like a renter. And same thing in the other rooms where predominantly everyone's an owner and somebody comes in, they're going to feel a lot of pressure to be an owner or leave.

00:06:43:39 - 00:06:53:07
Unknown
These are how these organizations actually perpetuate itself by having a predominant ownership versus renter mentality.

00:06:55:59 - 00:07:08:36
Unknown
and that is SEO. Why is that important? Well, most companies, on some level, especially small to medium, can make or break their company, depending on how well their website is.

00:07:08:36 - 00:07:39:51
Unknown
Of course, depends what industry you're in. And if you don't fully understand what drives people to your website and how you can make your website grow, leaving it up to someone else is literally like, you know, leaving up the fate of your company to other people. So on some level, you have to get involved. I know when I was starting out I was very frustrated because as a regular, you know, business and medical person is not something I knew about how to drive people to a website or how to make our website work.

00:07:39:56 - 00:07:59:39
Unknown
And I was really frustrated. I was very frustrated because I would talk to people and I'd hear all this jargon about SEO. I didn't know what it meant, and so I didn't know who to trust. I didn't know what was the right thing to do. And it's a pretty nebulous field to begin with, right? So for someone who is not in that space, it's even worse.

00:07:59:44 - 00:08:18:29
Unknown
I actually did something really crazy. I actually started to go to SEO conferences for SEO people just so I could see what they were talking about. Of course, that was a big investment of time. But you know, the companies we were involved in, you know, we were living and dying by our website traffic. So for me it kind of made sense.

00:08:18:34 - 00:08:41:18
Unknown
But going to those conferences, I learned what I at least need to know what the lingo is and what kind of questions to ask and what the pitfalls are. And I'm going to talk about that SEO industry because it's I don't want to say is on par with used car sales, but it's pretty close, especially if you just randomly get involved with SEO with some random people.

00:08:41:18 - 00:09:03:16
Unknown
It's not for the faint of heart. It can be very treacherous. And and there's a lot of people out there who are just making money on it, but not providing a whole lot of value. So if you as the SEO don't at least have a handle on it, I can tell you, you know, in terms of your website and traffic and growth, you're probably going to pay a price.

00:09:03:16 - 00:09:15:23
Unknown
So is it worth for you to learn a little bit so you can manage the people who are doing your SEO and ask the right questions and make sure you're not wasting money and make sure you're not hurting your website.

00:09:18:15 - 00:09:21:42
Unknown
you know, is there truly an upside for ownership?

00:09:21:45 - 00:09:53:32
Unknown
And this is really tricky because I've met a lot of people who've kind of have given that commitment just for whatever reason, and done it for ten years, and it has gone unnoticed maybe or after ten years, basically, you know, the company either folded, it closed or, you know, they got laid off. So I think there is a danger sometimes where people say, look, if I even give this, is anyone going to recognize it and will I have an upside?

00:09:53:37 - 00:10:39:33
Unknown
And this is where your mentoring comes into place, right? Because you have to then say, look, this company does recognize that we really do. We look for it. We validated, we promote it, and then we compensate appropriately. So if a certain person is responsible for you know, increasing the revenues of your company or growing your base or your clients, they need to maybe not the next day or the next week, but at some point, you know, if they're responsible for part of the reason, you know, why your company is growing, I think it's it's incumbent on you to compensate them not only financially but professionally in terms of promotion, status, title, financial.

00:10:39:33 - 00:11:02:50
Unknown
But I think there has to be at some point a correlation between if they're taken care of and their sense of ownership. Because if you really think about it, that's what ownership really is, right? I mean, if you if you're the owner of a pizzeria and, you know, this year you sold 10,000 pizzas and next year you sold 30,000 pizzas, what's going to happen to your bottom line?

00:11:02:51 - 00:11:31:39
Unknown
I mean, assuming everything else is equal, I mean, it's going to improve so owners get that positive feedback when they're successful. So my argument will be that staff that act like owners and cause the company to grow actually need that positive feedback just the same way as an owner. What's interesting is owners often don't get the feedback right away.

00:11:31:54 - 00:11:54:06
Unknown
You can imagine an owner who let's go back to the pizzeria, you know, sells 30,000 pizzas next year but decides to take all that money reinvested into better equipment, open up a new location. So, again, this idea of ownership, you know, is not sort of meant to be a a direct 1 to 1 correlation. But over the long term, it has to correlate.

00:11:54:16 - 00:12:14:02
Unknown
In fact, I would be very weary and skeptical of people who come and say, look, I've been here for a year. You know, our revenues have grown 20% and you should talk to me about compensating me more. That's actually a red flag. What's interesting is the ones that are owners. I just it's kind of not what you would think.

00:12:14:06 - 00:12:40:56
Unknown
Rarely our focus on their own compensation to that direct, you know, correlation. The ones that have it really tied down are probably the ones that are sort of pretending to care and pretending to be owners because the the people who genuinely own a business understand unexplained expenses come up, we're going to reinvest the money and they're in it for the long haul.

00:12:40:56 - 00:12:59:55
Unknown
Owners are in it for the long haul versus, you know, people who are not owners who, you know, want this immediate, you know, feedback correlation between the effort they're putting in. And I try to mentor a lot of young people because I get this where, you know, I've talked to people who say, you know what, I killed it for the company.

00:12:59:55 - 00:13:20:05
Unknown
So this year I'm going to go into my annual meeting and I'm going to like really, you know, put, you know, draw a line in the sand that I need to be compensated. And I really you know, I really argue against that necessarily, unless they're really in a company that long term is not going to acknowledge it, which then raises another issue.

00:13:20:17 - 00:13:33:41
Unknown
But this sort of 1 to 1 correlation, because owners don't get 1 to 1 correlation. But but here the flip side is but over the long term, there should be a definite correlation.

00:13:36:33 - 00:13:57:30
Unknown
People only become owners if the people on the other side of the equation appreciate that and are grateful for that and reward that. Right? Because at the end of the day, what's in it if you are going to give of yourself and then really see nothing in as a result of it.

00:13:57:45 - 00:14:21:43
Unknown
In other words, not even a tit for tat. But if you go into an organization and really give of yourself above and beyond the call of duty, not necessarily working more than 40 hours a week, but having a sense that you're going to put out the same product as you would as if you owned the company, which is a pretty high bar and which is what I've already described in the previous episode, which by the way, I'll provide a link for.

00:14:21:43 - 00:14:51:42
Unknown
So you can if you haven't seen that. And also in the description about, you know, why should you become an owner, why should you give of yourself if your organization doesn't necessarily value it is not grateful for it doesn't necessarily want it, especially your direct boss or the main leader of the organization. If that's not where their mindset is, it's hard to imagine a scenario where people say, Yeah, I'm going to, you know, give that extra mile when it doesn't even get noticed or acknowledged.

00:14:51:47 - 00:15:11:29
Unknown
It's interesting, though, the people who do give that extra mile aren't necessarily saying, I need a tit for tat Every time I do something, I need a raise. Any acknowledgment. But broadly speaking, over the course of time, if those kind of efforts are not acknowledge, if you're not grateful for it, if you don't appreciate it, long term is just simply not going to work.

00:15:14:21 - 00:15:23:40
Unknown
But starting off with my number one and number two rule, my number one rule in negotiation is always negotiate in good faith.

00:15:23:45 - 00:15:49:54
Unknown
And that's a really tough one to put into a few words. But basically you want to be a legitimate partner in the negotiation. So if you really are not serious or don't have the capacity to deliver on what you're saying, you know, probably behooves you not to negotiate. This idea that someone's negotiating in good faith means that they really are at the table.

00:15:50:05 - 00:16:18:35
Unknown
They really want to cut a deal and they want a win win. Now, what's interesting is when you are when you come across someone across the table who is not negotiating in good faith, you know, that's often very easy to recognize and leaves a really bad taste in people's mouth where you just say this, this party just doesn't really want to do a deal or is wasting my time or, you know, it's just a bottom feeder who just wants everything to be their way.

00:16:18:49 - 00:16:39:09
Unknown
So if you're not prepared to do a win win deal where both sides come out ahead, you're probably not going to be negotiating in good faith. So be cognizant of that, you know, before entering any of these situations. And just ask yourself, is this a deal I want to do? You know, can I afford this deal? Can I deliver what I'm going to promise?

00:16:39:13 - 00:16:45:44
Unknown
And can I set up an arrangement that's win win? So negotiating in good faith is a key point,

00:16:45:44 - 00:17:09:03
Unknown
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00:17:09:08 - 00:17:19:16
Unknown
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00:17:22:08 - 00:17:43:24
Unknown
The third strategy to use when you don't have leverage is try to reverse engineer what a win would look like for this other company or person. Right. So be in their shoes Now that you know how their business works, what's what's important to them. Often you need to have a better understanding.

00:17:43:25 - 00:18:07:44
Unknown
This should direct your if you're doing a PowerPoint presentation, for example, some companies, a win for them is if they are able to get more market share. So volume might be important to them. Other companies, it's important that they have higher margins, so margins might be important. Some other companies is the type of business, we tend to do more, you know, casual clothing rather than formal.

00:18:07:48 - 00:18:29:36
Unknown
Every business has a sweet spot that they'd rather be in, and you need to understand that other companies only want to work with companies that are rapidly growing versus have already plateaued and are stable company. They want to roll the dice with more start ups. Other companies want to work with companies that are low maintenance. You know, once they get them as a client, they don't have to hold their hands.

00:18:29:41 - 00:18:53:48
Unknown
Sometimes it's the reverse. Sometimes they want companies who they have to hold their hands because they can charge more for that. So again, your reverse engineering for what a win looks like for them, right? Sometimes people want, you know, they're willing to do business with a company that can make a quick decision. Yeah. Like, my gosh, you know, every everybody we meet with is a 12, 14 week process.

00:18:53:53 - 00:19:15:01
Unknown
But so their sweet spot is to find clients that, you know, maybe not ideal on other points, but they're ready to make a deal that day. So conveying that in this sort of reverse engineering can can make a difference. Some people like to work with companies who are tech savvy versus people who aren't. Again, I'm randomly picking things.

00:19:15:06 - 00:19:37:54
Unknown
Some companies are willing to work with companies that are flexible, that are not rigid and can make decisions. The decision makers are in the room and and they can if they need to tweak the arrangements, someone can say yes. So there's more. And a lot of these are abstract, but as you create your PowerPoint, you know, on some level you have to pretend you're them.

00:19:37:59 - 00:19:48:14
Unknown
And what? And you want to highlight the points that is in their sweet spot and of course, minimize the points. That is not going to be a win.

00:19:51:06 - 00:20:07:45
Unknown
You know what's interesting, when I try to distill this, the one thing I always tell people is if you're looking to figure out what kind of product you should put out as you join an organization, the best way to really do this is reverse engineer it, right?

00:20:07:55 - 00:20:40:45
Unknown
Because one day you're going to be the boss, right? Why not? So when you become the boss, who are you going to surround yourself with? Right. If you can answer that question, it makes putting out the product that we're talking about a lot easier. Because if you're not prepared to put out the product right that you would want if you were the boss, then there's something wrong because, you're saying, Well, if I was the boss, this is this is what I would want from, you know, everybody around me.

00:20:40:45 - 00:21:20:57
Unknown
But when I'm not the boss, I'm going to, you know, maybe tone that down a little bit or give something other than that, right? Maybe I'll just do the bare minimum that will keep my boss off my back, or I'll do the bare minimum that gets the job done. And I think this often, you know, you see, especially with what happened the last few years, when people are working remotely, of course, some people do a great job working remotely, but then some people basically do enough that they can say they've done their job and I think you often see this where people create a checklist, Well, if you're working remotely, you know, if you can

00:21:20:57 - 00:21:42:13
Unknown
accomplish these tasks, then we consider that you're working efficiently or adequately. So not to pick on remote work for for now, that's a whole separate topic. But I think a lot of people, when they think about the product that they want to put out, you want to put out the product that you would expect when you're the boss.

00:21:42:13 - 00:21:42:50
Unknown
Okay?

00:21:45:42 - 00:22:01:34
Unknown
now let's talk about how do you go about it? Well, the way you go about is you go on Google or Bing or any of the other ones and you set up an account and you have to get familiar with their cloud based software and how to set up your ads.

00:22:01:48 - 00:22:29:26
Unknown
To be truthful, this is probably the most daunting aspect of Google ads. It's not complicated, but it will require you to spend a lot of time to become familiar with the software. I would liken it to Photoshop If you know nothing about Photoshop and you want that to go on there and start editing pictures, or if you want to start doing videos, the learning you would have to spend some time to get the learning curve.

00:22:29:30 - 00:22:59:20
Unknown
You need to learn Google ads. So you either have to learn Google ads or someone in your team. Again, this talk is meant for SEOs. So as you're thinking about whether you want to approach Google ads, you have to think, Do I have someone in house or someone in the leadership that understand Google ads, understands the software, could navigate the software and and get us the results that we want.

00:22:59:24 - 00:23:25:53
Unknown
It is very, very difficult to learn all the aspects of Google ad software in a short couple of weeks. It takes months and sometimes even longer to become so proficient. Now, if you don't learn Google ads and don't become proficient data and you just take a stab at it, more than likely you're going to be squandering a lot of money.

00:23:25:57 - 00:23:38:23
Unknown
So whatever your budget will be, you're going to wind up spending a portion of it on wasteful stuff. If you haven't set up your ad campaigns keywords, negative keywords correctly. So I'm going to talk about that.

00:23:41:07 - 00:24:01:46
Unknown
So we're going to talk about the three C's of Know Your Client and those three C's are convey alignment, convey confidence and convey value. So when do you start the process of getting to know your client? I would argue you should start it within 1015 seconds of starting that interaction.

00:24:01:46 - 00:24:23:28
Unknown
If they're calling, if they're in front of you, then know your client phase begins right away. And I think the most common mistake people make in the know your client phase is they answer the first questions. Usually in any sales situation, somebody walks into your store or somebody calls you and immediately asks about your services. And of course, they'll be in the form of a question.

00:24:23:33 - 00:24:45:10
Unknown
But I would argue that not answering their first question, not as a sales tactic, but actually by understanding them better, will get you further. For example, you wouldn't walk into a bank and say, Could you please help me with the rate for mortgages? Right. Because they're going to ask you. Well, before we do, is this for our house?

00:24:45:15 - 00:25:08:18
Unknown
Is this for a condo, is this for primary residence is for an investment property. So people understand that real professionals often don't answer their first question and they actually interpret that question as meaning, give me more information. So when someone calls and says, what is your mortgage rates, they don't really expect you not knowing their credit score, not knowing how much they're putting down to give you a rate.

00:25:08:22 - 00:25:16:52
Unknown
I think that's just a way that people use. Like, please explain to me how your company moves forward and gives out mortgages. Explain the process to me.

00:25:19:44 - 00:25:30:32
Unknown
number one SEO skill that I want to talk about today is actually not a skill but a strategy, which is when you're first starting out to seek a mentor or mentor.

00:25:30:32 - 00:25:53:49
Unknown
Cause I find that a lot of people think being a CEO or being a leader is a soft skill, that if people just like you, if people respect you, if you're likable and get along with people, you will naturally be a good CEO. That's almost like saying, you know, we put you in a 747 at 30,000 feet in the cockpit.

00:25:53:54 - 00:26:21:35
Unknown
You're going to be able to land that plane because people like you and you're well respected. It's not true. Obviously, you're going to need some skills to land the 747. And as long as people think being a leader is just a soft skill and as it's just a matter of being liked or respected or having a way of talking with people, even if you're charming and have a magnetic personality, there are skill sets.

00:26:21:35 - 00:26:24:49
Unknown
You still need to be an effective CEO

00:26:27:41 - 00:26:50:02
Unknown
So the first challenge that I think very few people will talk about, and I think you're probably going to hear it in this channel for the first time, is your first year or maybe longer is a period that's unique and how it's unique is that often the people you bring on board in that first year will have no redundancy.

00:26:50:02 - 00:27:08:01
Unknown
And there's something I mean, very specific. Often in the first year of life of a business, the positions that are created. There is no redundancy. You know, if you go to a business that's been around for ten or 15 years, you go to the marketing department, there's ten people in the marketing department, there's 20 people in the h.R.

00:27:08:01 - 00:27:41:22
Unknown
Department. There's, you know, and so if anything happens to any one person, there's resiliency, there's redundancy. But almost by definition, the first year of a business, you often don't have much redundancy in the positions and then the roles. And that is going to be really different for you because often that first year you're trying to build culture, you're trying to build a standard, and sometimes if you don't really understand it, it becomes challenging to create culture to, you know, right?

00:27:41:22 - 00:28:04:41
Unknown
Run the business the way you want to when most of the positions that you have in your small organization, there is no redundancy. And the best example I can give of that is imagine you had, you know, 20 accountants in your accounting department and there was this one accountant who was coming to work every day late. The quality of work wasn't up to snuff.

00:28:04:46 - 00:28:26:53
Unknown
Blah, blah, blah. Well, you decide to have a conversation. You know, you want to maybe coach this person, mentor them and and what have you. Well, that conversation that you're going to have with the 20th accountant in your accounting department is not going to be the exact conversation you're going to have if that person was the only accountant in your accounting department.

00:28:26:54 - 00:28:48:37
Unknown
Some people might argue, well, that's not true, but on some level it can't always be the same. When you have one person, your organization, which is running all the marketing or you have one person, but they're not doing it the way you want. Can you be frank with them? Can you coach them? Can you mentor them in the same way as if you had 20 people in the marketing department?

00:28:48:41 - 00:29:17:50
Unknown
And you know, some people will give me blowback. Yeah. So yeah, I'm the same way. But you got to think about it. When someone is your only person that first year in the marketing department, you just can't talk to them the same way. I'm not saying don't be professional, don't be direct. But still, you know, you have to calibrate and calculate, you know, what happens if even if I said professionally and nicely, maybe I'm right on all the points, maybe they're not going to like what I have to say, and maybe they'll just pick up and leave it.

00:29:17:51 - 00:29:39:27
Unknown
And potentially, if if literally if there is no way to duplicate what they're doing with other people unless, of course, it's you. But for now, just just the more it can't be you or the more, yes, it'll be you, but it'll be so much brain damage to do it. You, you, it will alter how you serve up this information.

00:29:42:19 - 00:30:19:15
Unknown
know, one of the examples I can give you is, for example, let's take an attorney. You may have the world's best attorney. He may able to win every case. He may be able to, you know, understand the nuances of any, you know, legal issue within a certain field of law. But if the person answering the phone comes off as someone who is not someone who is heavily involved in that industry, can answer the most basic questions about, you know, what kind of what are the breadth of services that you offer within that industry.

00:30:19:17 - 00:30:41:47
Unknown
You may lose a client because basically they're judging you whether your firm or company are subject matter experts, not by the actual people. Let's say on the back end who are going to be doing the work. So you may go to an IT company and they may have the best I.T. persons that really are top notch and the best in the industry.

00:30:42:02 - 00:31:09:37
Unknown
But if the person answering the phone is able to convey that, you know, they've called the right place and you are the subject matter expert. You can only imagine what would happen. Right. So always, you know, sometimes having the best staff, having the best talent, if that's not conveyed somehow in that initial touch, it almost doesn't really matter.

00:31:09:38 - 00:31:31:24
Unknown
Right. It doesn't matter how good these people are. If the person who answers the phone is unable to take them through a process that conveys not only that they've called the right place, but that you've also asked them enough questions to understand their needs and wants to show what a professional you are and how good your company really is.

00:31:34:16 - 00:31:55:42
Unknown
right. So let's talk about the first rule, which I mentioned already, which is never, never, never, never, never answer the first question. And the reason for that is, I don't know if you can give the proper answer unless you have more clarity. You know, somebody calls you up and says, are you open on Saturdays? You think, well, that a question I should answer.

00:31:55:47 - 00:32:18:41
Unknown
And let's just say you decide to answer, No, we're not open on Saturdays. Well, that may not be true. Maybe you have not been open on, you know, every Saturday for the last ten years. But let me ask you a question. What happens if the guy calls and says, hey, are you open on Saturday? B, And you say, no, they hang up versus are you on Saturday?

00:32:18:44 - 00:32:46:26
Unknown
Open on Saturday? Well, let me ask you, what are you trying to do? Well, we want to put $1,000,000 order, but it needs to come in this Saturday. Well, guess what? Are you still not open on Saturday? I don't know. Maybe. Yes, maybe no. But if the guy just said he wants to do $1,000,000 worth of business and are you open on Saturday or you open on Sunday or are you open on Thanksgiving?

00:32:46:30 - 00:33:00:18
Unknown
I don't know. So even when you're tempted to answer the first question, like, are you open on Sunday, Are you open on Thanksgiving? I don't know if somebody wants to put $100 million order. Are you really close on Thanksgiving?

00:33:03:10 - 00:33:12:29
Unknown
Next one is a tough one because I think it could be a video unto itself and that is admitting when you're wrong.

00:33:12:33 - 00:33:37:15
Unknown
I think a lot of people who are in leadership view to admitting when they're wrong is a sign of weakness, that they're not a great leader. But nothing could be further from the truth. So I want you to practice this next line, okay? Just just practice it at home. You got to be able to say to the other person in your mind, you were right.

00:33:37:20 - 00:34:00:57
Unknown
I was wrong. You were right. I was wrong. You almost have to say that. Okay? And believe me, nothing is worse than a boss who is wrong but still wants to hold on to part of it. Yes, I was wrong. But you don't understand. You're given the facts at the time. You know it does it. Who cares? You know, come clean and I don't.

00:34:00:57 - 00:34:23:08
Unknown
In fact, you will get more respect and not less. But I think there is this thinking saying that if I show that I'm having second thoughts about my thinking, let's say you went to the marketing meeting and say, I think we need to push in this direction. And you made a big push and the data came back and nothing could be further from the truth.

00:34:23:12 - 00:34:48:14
Unknown
It helps to own that, to say, you know, I just I do remember that meeting two months ago. I remember I pushed for this and yeah, I'm here to tell you, boy, was I wrong. This idea that people will think less of you, if anything, you'll. You'll be elevated in the minds of many people because they realize that you just have the best interests of the company.

00:34:48:19 - 00:35:08:03
Unknown
And just like them, if they made a mistake, you'd probably want to see that in them. But you have to set the example for, you know, that it being a culture where someone can, you know, admit they could have gone in a different direction and they didn't. And being wrong is not 100%. Sometimes you're just a little bit wrong.

00:35:08:12 - 00:35:34:23
Unknown
But even taking ownership of, you know, yeah, I think I was on the same train with that. And it turned out to be wrong. And so I own that too. This concept that you were right, I was wrong or I own that, that you know, that's 100% on me. Sometimes are things you have to learn to say. If you are the head of an organization and you have never said, I own that mistake, you know, I got that one that's on me.

00:35:34:27 - 00:35:55:28
Unknown
Yeah. Or say, or when someone had a conflicting view saying, Hey, you know what, you are spot on on that. And I missed that on that one. Okay I totally missed that. I own that. This is the culture you need to be cultivating because if you're talking like that, what does that do? It gives people permission for them to talk like that.

00:35:55:33 - 00:36:21:37
Unknown
But if you're always deflecting, minimizing, you know, saying, well, yeah, okay, yeah, that might have been. But, you know, I had five excuses for that. What's up upside for mentioning your excuses, Whatever it was, who cares? You know, just take it anyway, right? Even if you in your mind thinking, there is some rationale that I wasn't totally wrong, what's the upside of that at that point?

00:36:21:37 - 00:36:31:33
Unknown
Just just say, you know what, I own that. I got it mine. Let me digest that to make sure I incorporate that into my decision making moving forward. Okay.

00:36:34:25 - 00:36:45:22
Unknown
in one sense, you do want to have checks and balances on your decision making, on your thinking, because sometimes you can sometimes you don't have all the information when you're trying to make the decision.

00:36:45:27 - 00:37:02:16
Unknown
But the flip side of it is when you have made the decision, when you've taken everything in and you want to move in a certain direction, you know, you don't want to have to get 15 people to sign off that, hey, we're going to be offering this new service or we're going to be canceling that product or whatever.

00:37:02:17 - 00:37:23:08
Unknown
So if done properly, if calibrated properly on the things that you're very certain that's the direction you want to go after getting all the information that you should be able to do that easily. The flip side of that is if you're about to send the company off a cliff, there should be a way for people to communicate that.

00:37:23:08 - 00:37:32:41
Unknown
Back to you. So this is the fine balance and it's almost as much of an art as it is a science to to do that.

00:37:35:33 - 00:37:49:02
Unknown
what you really want to do is create a company that after a lot of thought, is going to be the kind of company that if you do everything right, you know, makes your competitions irrelevant.

00:37:49:07 - 00:38:17:07
Unknown
You're not struggling for margins and you're not in a blue ocean, you're not in a red ocean where you're stealing clients from one company to your company. I think I talked about in my previous videos that that great book called Blue Ocean Strategies, where you want to create a company where really your competitors are irrelevant. And I think that's really the filter someone should use in creating a company.

00:38:17:12 - 00:38:54:04
Unknown
So if you're going to be the 10th accounting firm in a small to medium sized company, by definition you're going to be in a red ocean where you're, for the most part going to be, you know, stealing clients from one accounting firm to another, which is fine. And you can make a living on it, but it just doesn't have that endless potential if you come up with an idea or a company that is in many ways has doesn't really have competition, whether it's because of technology, because you've created the space, because you have some insight track on something.

00:38:56:56 - 00:39:16:02
Unknown
And really when it comes to pricing, instead of calling it pricing for a product or service, and it doesn't matter what what you are, if you're, you know, doing tax prep or doing, you know, insurance, whatever, pricing is not simply pricing and pricing is really value.

00:39:16:09 - 00:39:42:30
Unknown
And I think when people hear value, they think about, the value you're going to give the customers, which is very important. But more importantly, I like to turn the whole thing on its head and talk about the value in terms of what it brings to your company, meaning when you select the price, there's a value to the customer, you're selling it and hopefully you're selling on value, but there's also a value of what that is worth to you.

00:39:42:35 - 00:39:58:23
Unknown
Not only in dollars and cents, but but over the things I'm going to go over. So let's talk about what goes into pricing slash of value and how these factors should help to help you determine your pricing model.

00:40:01:15 - 00:40:14:58
Unknown
next. Number three, the reason to get a partner is to diversify the talents. you know, you often hear partners talking about I'm no good with the books. I'm no good with, you know, front facing customers.

00:40:14:58 - 00:40:43:48
Unknown
I'm no good with operational stuff. And so what you can really do with a partnership is to focus on your strengths. And if done right, your weaknesses can be covered by someone who, for whatever reason, is stronger in that department than you. So diversify talent pool, even before you hire your first employee, is a huge, huge advantage, right?

00:40:46:40 - 00:40:57:32
Unknown
Today's topic is very interesting because it's not really talked about a lot and that is business integrity and how it can impact your business and specifically how it can impact your bottom line.

00:40:57:39 - 00:41:21:07
Unknown
What I want to talk about and what I've learned in my travels is that business integrity is fundamental for any company that's really going to have sustaining power and really grow, because at the end of the day, people figure this out, whether your business has integrity. And I've mentioned in my earlier videos, but personal integrity often is the precursor for business integrity.

00:41:21:07 - 00:42:02:57
Unknown
So what you often see in organizations where the leaders in their own personal lives or personally may have some issues, often that sets the tone and impacts business integrity in ways that sometimes are subtle and sometimes are not so subtle. So I think when we talk about business integrity, the first question is what does it mean? And of course, it is kind of fluid, it's kind of vague, but I think we all know when we run into a business and certainly people that have integrity, meaning they mean what they say, they're really looking out for themselves as well as you, as well as their staff.

00:42:03:01 - 00:42:35:04
Unknown
And they are going to be honest and truthful in their dealings with everybody, including clients, customers, the partners, vendors and the customers downstream from them. They're going to treat them the way they would want to be treated. They're going to convey the truth while still obviously marketing things, but convey the essence of their products or services in a way that a reasonable person would say, yes, they're being forthright.

00:42:35:09 - 00:42:42:36
Unknown
So let's talk about the three ways that integrity can impact people in your business.

00:42:45:28 - 00:43:21:10
Unknown
Once you find this no limit person, then that's your cue to invest time and energy in them much more than you probably can comprehend. Because we're not talking about just a phone call here or there. We're talking about initially, maybe hours a week, one on one. And what I think that involves is not simply them doing their work, but you spending quality time with them and going over things that may be not directly related to their job description and just training them for their job is not going to be enough.

00:43:21:15 - 00:43:29:46
Unknown
What you need, like I said, is for them to see you and have experiences other than their traditional job functions alone.

00:43:32:38 - 00:43:58:23
Unknown
The second thing that is really important is reliance and dependability. If people can't rely on you, if you're not dependable, one day you say one thing and the next day you say another, or you're late, or you have excuses for this and that. I think what happens is that even though you may be ultra competent, if they can't count on you, right?

00:43:58:23 - 00:44:24:15
Unknown
I mean, if LeBron James would show up late to a third of all his basketball games, it wouldn't really matter how good he is. He probably wouldn't be in the NBA. And that's an exaggeration. But you see that if you don't have reliability and dependency, that it will jeopardize even your competence. So you need competence. But then let's add the other missing ingredients, which is, number one, reliability and dependance.

00:44:27:08 - 00:44:38:15
Unknown
Being an entrepreneur means, of course, some downside, and the main downside is the financial risk, right? Because when you have a job, for the most part, your financial risks are mitigated by that position.

00:44:38:19 - 00:45:08:54
Unknown
But if you are an entrepreneur, really, there is no theoretical limit to how much financial burden you may have to take on and financial risk. And with that financial risk comes with comes also with the fact that you may often be the last person to get paid, especially when you're starting out. And if there's a financial crunch, you will be the last person to get paid and potentially not get paid at all and not paid for a long stretch of stress of time.

00:45:08:54 - 00:45:34:49
Unknown
In addition, you know, when you are the entrepreneur and this is your own gig at 5:00 or 6:00, the stress doesn't necessarily stop or the thinking or the effort. Often when you have a career, you know, at 5:00 when you're driving home, boom, all you're thinking about is, Hey, are we having a lasagna or are we having, you know, Chinese food tonight?

00:45:34:49 - 00:46:05:06
Unknown
And that's your biggest concern driving home often when you're in charge and that's your deal, you're not thinking about whether you're having Chinese food or pasta that night. You're thinking about, I never returned that email or I got to call that guy back tomorrow. So your evenings, weekends, holidays, vacations are sometimes not your own because you're always thinking and you're always on essentially, especially in the early to mid stages of of trying to start an endeavor.

00:46:07:58 - 00:46:26:31
Unknown
So if you really want success in your organization, what you really need to mentor for, what you really need to teach is you need to teach people how to grow. Other people. So what I tell my senior leaders is spend a good part of the day not killing it yourself, which is of course important, but investing in others.

00:46:26:31 - 00:46:41:56
Unknown
Right. Have them sit in on your meetings and your strategy, soak in your culture, and also have them understand that it's not good enough for them just to kill it. But they're going to have to have or acquire the skills to pass it on to other people.

00:46:44:48 - 00:47:01:58
Unknown
What I would propose to anyone who's starting a company or has has a moderate size company is you have to ask yourself, if my business doubled tomorrow or if my business tripled tomorrow with my current staff, would I be able to handle it?

00:47:02:09 - 00:47:32:24
Unknown
Now, certain businesses, you know, where if you're running a restaurant, obviously the capacity is going to be we're going to need more space, more chefs, more whatever. But for most companies who there isn't that direct correlation, it is possible often to double, triple, quadruple your business with the bandwidth you currently have. If you've leveraged technology. And I think that's really one high level way of viewing technology For a lot of businesses.

00:47:32:24 - 00:47:56:42
Unknown
This doesn't apply to all businesses, but for a lot of businesses, you have to ask yourself, you know, if our business quadrupled, let's say by some miracle, whatever one of our competitors goes out of business, we land on TV and all of a sudden our phones are ringing off the hook. What would happen? So really, what often happens when people's business grows, they have two choices.

00:47:56:42 - 00:48:14:38
Unknown
They can hire more staff, more people, or they would have already invested in technology sometimes, which then can handle the extra work. Right. It's not always that clear, but that often is is the choices. Right.

00:48:16:51 - 00:48:41:09
Unknown
So the argument I want to make is, is that it's not clear cut, that if you just get a 9 to 5 job and don't really try to get ahead because it's going to infringe on your personal life or whatever it may actually be, potentially hurting that personal life down the road, maybe in a decade, maybe in two decades, maybe three decades.

00:48:41:14 - 00:49:16:44
Unknown
There may be things that, you know, later on you can't do for your children or your family or your spouse or your community because of the resources that you have or, you know, maybe you're going to be tied to that 9 to 5 job for the next 40 years. So in terms of travel, freedom, time, freedom, if you invest in creating something for yourself, whether it's inside of a company or outside of a company, in many ways you can't rule out that that actually is the optimal thing for work life balance.