Are Leaders Born or Trained? – Ron Reich

Alan and Chris interviewed Ron Reich who brought his deep background in large company leadership and culture training to the pod! We talked about an early boss that had seen more in Ron than Ron saw in himself, and that belief propelled him to achieve more. The leadership set by a company should be set from Emotional Intelligence, Disc Profile to understand everyone's communication method, to effective delegation, listening and coaching. We need to be human beings and not always human doings. Did you know our amazing voices can go beyond just the microphone? Yes, we have video! Subscribe to our YouTube channel here!

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Ron’s Links:

•  LinkedIn | @ronreich

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GOLD NUGGETS:

(10:12) - Consulting Business Success and Marketing Strategies

(16:31) - Sales, Leadership, and DISC Profiles

(21:14) - Culture and Leadership Weaknesses

(28:32) - Workshop Happiness and Recognition

(35:49) - Book Recommendations

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Books Mentioned

• Leadership Gold - John C. Maxwell

• The Advantage - Patrick Lencioni

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Previous guests on The Small Business Safari include Amy Lyle, Ben Alexander, Joseph Sission, Jonathan Ellis, Brad Dell, Chris Hanks, C.T. Emerson, Chad Brown, Tracy Moore, Wayne Sherger, David Raymond, Paul Redman, Gabby Meteor, Ryan Dement, Barbara Heil Sonneck, Bryan John, Tom Defore, Rusty Clifton, Duane Johns, Beth Miller, Jason Sleeman, Andy Suggs, Chris Michel, Jon Ostenson, Tommy Breedlove, Rocky Lalvani, Amanda Griffey, Spencer Powell, Joe Perrone, David Lupberger, Duane C. Barney, Dave Moerman, Jim Ryerson, Al Mishkoff, Scott Specker, Mike Claudio and more!

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If you loved this episode try these!

• Growing Small Business E-Commerce Brands | Tyler Jefcoat

• Adults Need Stickers Too: Leadership Lessons with Brian Gottlieb

• Home Remodel Struggles and Million-Dollar Nightmares with Andy Apter

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Find our newsletter here! Or at chrislalomia.com

Transcript

Alan Wyatt: 0:00

little disk trivia. You know what else the founder of the disk profile invented? No Light detector test and Wonder Woman.

Chris Lalomia: 0:10

Wonder Woman yeah, look it up. I'm more excited about that, I'm actually.

Alan Wyatt: 0:14

I'm he's writing it down. What color brand are you using for?

Chris Lalomia: 0:17

Wonder Woman, she gets up.

Ron Reich: 0:19

She gets to write that down too.

Chris Lalomia: 0:24

I love it. Welcome to the small business safari where I hope guide you to avoid those traps, pitfalls and dangers that lurk when navigating the wild world of small business ownership. I'll share those gold nuggets of information and invite guests to help accelerate your ascent to that mountaintop of success. It's a jungle out there and I want to help you traverse through the levels of owning your own business that can get you bogged down and distract you from hitting your own personal and professional goals. So strap in adventure team and let's take a ride through the safari and get you to the mountaintop.

Chris Lalomia: 1:00

Welcome back to the small business safari. Let's go make it happen. Once again, everybody, we're going to go make it happen. But if you're listening, go out there and give us a follow. And if you're not following, maybe go have your friends follow, your dad follow, your mom follow, your kids follow. You know, even get your dog to follow. I mean somebody just follow me. Man, we follow us. We're doing some great things. Get follow us on YouTube. We've got a great YouTube channel out there. The thing is popping, by the way on. It is crazy.

Alan Wyatt: 1:24

Is. It is a top 5%, like like everything else.

Chris Lalomia: 1:27

No, it's not type for 5% yet, but we're on our way, we're having fun. Guys, ladies and gentlemen, we are ready to rock and roll. We're going to talk to a great guest today, dense some research on Ron Reich, and he is going to come on and talk to us a lot about leadership, culture and. But he's got a lot of stuff he wants to talk about culture and leadership and development. But before we do that, what he doesn't know is I got to ask questions because he started out as a sales trainer and I want to hear more about his sales training experience because I think for a lot of us there are three schools. Okay, there is a, a, that's Carnegie, the Carnegie sales method to and to the Sandler sales method. And then there's C me, winging it, baby. That's how I sell my business and trust it to a box and winging it. So, no, we actually use, we have implemented the Sandler sales tactics at our company. But I'm interested to hear how you did sales training and what you did. What method did you teach?

Ron Reich: 2:31

When I, when I first started, I was a believer in spin selling and I liked it. It made sense to me at the time. It still does and as I went through, as I, as I got more and more experience, I went through the best sales training course ever. And it was and again I'm sorry, chris, I'm not going to remember the name of the course itself. The book was called let's, let's, let's play or let's, let's not play at all. It was something along those lines let's get real.

Ron Reich: 3:13

Let's get real, that's it. That's what they do.

Chris Lalomia: 3:15

I actually, I actually had to read that book at Accenture back in the day for.

Ron Reich: 3:19

B2B sellers. It was uh, let's not play at all by Mohan Kalsa, that's it.

Chris Lalomia: 3:25

That is.

Alan Wyatt: 3:25

I don't want to throw a curveball in already, but for those of us who are unedicated like you guys, give us a little bit of it. What are the nuances between Carnegie and Sandler and this one?

Chris Lalomia: 3:36

Well, I'm going to let Ron do it, because he did training of sales for a lot longer than I have, because I was winging it Fricking witted dish.

Alan Wyatt: 3:43

Throw it all the way through your name dropping and you don't know what it is.

Ron Reich: 3:47

Yeah.

Alan Wyatt: 3:47

I can't.

Ron Reich: 3:48

Guys, it's interesting because I, you know, I, I, I use this method in my consulting now and I mean what I love about it so much is that it is just all about questions, questions, questions, questions, questions. And I'm not. And again, I, I still remember the facilitator of this session, david Markham, said over and over and over you are not permitted to say one word about your company, your product or yourself until you know everything about your client, because otherwise, how do you know what you're saying is an important that's.

Chris Lalomia: 4:35

That's a great line, and I remember that same sale place all coming back to me now because we use a lot of that even in the home services sales. That we do is that we have to live sometimes in that world of you don't know, what you don't know, and what you don't know is what their biggest pain point is right.

Ron Reich: 4:49

Well, and, and, and you know what, and again, chris, you're reminding me of this stuff. It's just the way my mind works. Instantly, I mean, that's exactly right. And if I don't find out what's important to the client, I'm going to talk to you about what I like and what's important to me, which is not the point. And I mean, you know, you know, with the toolbox and so forth, many, many years ago, after my, after my wife's aunt died, we were responsible for selling the home and for some bizarre reason, we tried to do it on our own. And I know this was many, many years ago. That's the point I'm trying to make.

Ron Reich: 5:30

What you don't know is that Ellen is a commercial real estate Later the point I'm making now is that my wife's cousin was there too, and as people were coming to the open house, she was just saying to them and I remembered it instantly, I remember it to this day Let me take you into the bedrooms, let me show you the kitchen, and now I want to show you. And I was like let's ask them what's important in a house First.

Alan Wyatt: 6:01

Might have been the backyard.

Ron Reich: 6:03

Take them to exactly.

Alan Wyatt: 6:05

Yeah.

Ron Reich: 6:05

Exactly.

Alan Wyatt: 6:07

I learned that one the hard way, chris. I'm sure I told you this story once. But back in my enterprise corporate days and I think I just got my first big promotion to area manager, had my first company car and I all sudden I see this insurance agent's office I'd never seen before and I'm like, well, I'm going to go tell him what's what about enterprise. And I went in and I launched into my best sales pitch I've ever given to this day in anything. I mean I could tell I was on my A game and it turns out he didn't ensure automobiles had nothing. All right, that's great. And I just ensure boats and I mean, and I'd given him 15 minutes of just like my, just the best gold I'd ever delivered. That's awesome. So never did that again. I like questions. Now, ron, questions are good.

Ron Reich: 6:55

Well, and guys, again going back, you know I am also a voracious reader. I love to read and one of my favorite quotes relative to leadership and really what we're talking about here is that leaders don't give the best answers. Leaders ask the best questions.

Alan Wyatt: 7:15

Gold nugget. There it is there. It is there. It is From.

Chris Lalomia: 7:17

Ron From Ron. Ron dropped one already. Ask great questions, get better answers.

Alan Wyatt: 7:23

Right, but no, but I'll do it. As a leader, I ask great questions and I only get better answers.

Chris Lalomia: 7:29

Whoops, sorry, ron's going to coach me later, all right.

Chris Lalomia: 7:34

You really shouldn't use crayons when you're taking notes, Chris you know, it's the only way I know how to write, alan, but there's 64 great colors in that body. Do you have the sharpener in the back? Of course I do. All right. Right, let's talk a little bit more. So you, in your career, you obviously did a lot of sales, training, helping people, and then it morphed into culture and leadership development. Was that based on experience? Did you decide to leave the corporate world and start into your consulting practice? Talk to us a little bit about how you started that.

Ron Reich: 8:05

You know it was interesting because, guys, what I'd like to do, if you don't mind, I'll take you all the way back because it's an interesting story. I started all those years ago in human resources and, you know, went through and then worked for a bank and you know some good stuff going on. The banking industry all those years ago had so many mergers that a number of there were five of us that left and opened our own consulting firm, an HR consulting firm. We did well for a number of different reasons. After about six, seven years we decided to close the doors.

Ron Reich: 8:40

At the time I was going through an uncomfortable divorce. Things were not going well in any area. I moved back in with my mom and dad because I had nowhere to go, trying to think to myself what do I want to do? You know I'm 33, where do I want to go? And I had always had in the back of my mind I love training, you know. I mean I've done a little bit of it, I enjoy it and so forth. Out of nowhere, I get a telephone call from a recruiter in Dallas, texas, who tracked me down in New Jersey at my parents' home. I've got a job with Toshiba. It is the exact opposite of what you are. They're looking for somebody who has a lot of training and some HR. You have a lot of HR and some training. I will get you in front of them. Your job, ron, is to get them to flip their competencies. I talk to them. They flip the competencies. I got into sales training and I've never looked back for the last 30 years.

Alan Wyatt: 9:45

So, Ron, I got to ask a question. Ron, when you're, Did your mom answer the phone and did you tell her to?

Chris Lalomia: 9:52

Mom meet Lof.

Ron Reich: 9:53

Meet Lof mom, yeah, that's like I did say that to my parents when I was there. It was like, will you please let me answer the phone.

Chris Lalomia: 10:03

Right, If the answer phone goes, just say HR Saltly Headquarters, Rod's office. I'll help you.

Ron Reich: 10:10

And you know I will pull the story through. Though and this is something of which I'm very proud is that I, first of all, I did not know at the time how unbelievably high the bar was at Toshiba. These people were so good, and I mean just so good. Tony Codiani, who's gone now, was unbelievable, the best boss I've ever had in my career. Barbara Fulmer was my boss. They saw, you know, the sales training was where I was. They saw something in me that I didn't see in myself and helped me to grow and just saying, hey, would you like to get into sales management training? And you know the course that we offer.

Ron Reich: 10:55

And it evolved from there and ultimately, what ended up happening years later, I was working for a pharmaceutical company, got laid off and just started to think about you know what I don't know how many certifications I have now. This a lot 15, 16, 17, whatever it is and I was like I can take this out on my own and I can make a big difference and I know, I know it's cliche and I say this to people all the time is that, ron, you know what is it you want to do and I want to make a difference. I love that that is so important to me, and I mean it brings me incredible satisfaction and I do make a difference, which is wonderful.

Alan Wyatt: 11:47

That's great, I heard the dog barked in the background and threw me off. Dog is affirming.

Chris Lalomia: 11:52

Ron. He was affirming, ron, I love that the dog saying came out, get a whoop whoop.

Chris Lalomia: 11:56

All right, thank you, ron. All right, so you started out on your own to do this consulting work. For a lot of us who the Left Corporate America, either we wanted to or didn't want to. But off we go and we start a business. You know, a lot of times we don't have a chance to plan for it. Did you come out into your consulting business with clients in hand? Did you have to go knock on doors? And let's get real and let's not play.

Ron Reich: 12:21

No clients in hand and it took a while in order to get going and about. I mean, the first year was tough, the second year was better and after that it just took off. I mean it really, really just took off. And I mean pre-pandemic, I was at a point where I was as busy as I wanted to be.

Alan Wyatt: 12:47

And again I was having a lot of fun.

Ron Reich: 12:49

Things were going well. Pandemic hit and you know, the rug got pulled out from underneath me and, for a number of different reasons, I was not interested in doing the Zoom training or the online, again, for a number of different reasons. That's not who I am and there's some other stuff we don't need to get into. None of it's sorted, I promise.

Chris Lalomia: 13:11

All right. Yeah, I was going to say wait a minute. This is a no, I'm kidding, it's not a family podcast because I swear too much, but keep going yeah.

Ron Reich: 13:18

And I mean, and again. My point is, though, things are picking up again and I mean I'm getting busy again and it's just a joy. I mean I was with a client yesterday where you know a very small manufacturing firm here in New Jersey, and I did it essentially, if you will, a keynote address for them, where we spent the day together and we went through emotional intelligence and I took them through the dispense from oh yeah, all of them at the end is like run.

Ron Reich: 13:54

This was just a fabulous day, thank you. And I mean you know, and where I go with this too, is that my sweet spot tends to be the smaller, midsize firms, because number one I'm by myself and number two I'm able to establish those strong relationships with people. And it's also been my direct experience, as it was yesterday and with some other current clients as well, is that they're not aware of the kind of training and information that's out there that can make such a difference.

Alan Wyatt: 14:32

I was just going to say the smaller companies don't have the internal training and you know educational models and things like that that they can work with their people. So to bring you in, it's just all like, oh wow, it's like a caveman with fire, probably, right.

Chris Lalomia: 14:48

Yeah, I'm sure it's like that. Well, on the business side of this, though, I'm interested in how do you get your name out to these folks, because, I mean, is it CEOs and COOs who are actively looking for this, or is this something you're out there pushing? Obviously, you're on the podcast today. We're talking to you getting that information, but, as a business owner, how are you finding those leads and getting this work?

Ron Reich: 15:07

I have been, I've been on a lot of podcasts and that's been a lot of fun and you know, and again, really getting back into the leadership piece of it, you know I realized as the pandemic ended and I say this proudly, first of all, I am very good at what I do, I have a lot of fun with it, I'm good at it and I'm proud of that.

Ron Reich: 15:31

One of the things good leaders need to know, too, are the things at which they're not as good, and I realize I don't know how to market myself that well. And so I've hired a marketing coach and I've been working with Elaine for a while now and she's been extraordinarily helpful for me, you know. I mean I, you know she's, I've known her for many years and she's a friend and she's also just a wonderful coach. She's helped me with the podcasting, she's helped me with getting newsletters out there and really learning more about how to use LinkedIn and just everything else. So again, turning to people who know more than I do about a particular subject and with marketing, I need some help, yeah.

Chris Lalomia: 16:19

No, that's, that's excellent. I think that's a great cool nugget right there too. Know what you're good at, know what you're not good at. Hire for your weaknesses and strength and just play on your strengths and develop that and double down on that right.

Alan Wyatt: 16:31

What do you have most to call for Sales training, leadership training or management training? And I notice I differentiated between those last two.

Ron Reich: 16:39

It is Tread lightly here, ron. The only work that I'm doing is in leadership. I haven't done any straight sales training in a lot of years now, although I still consider it. You know, even the leadership training is sales training, you know. I mean you are trying to influence people, you're trying to get things done through other people. I mean you know we need to sell the culture, we need to sell the new venture, we need to sell. You know just all of these different things. So I mean there are tie-ins everywhere.

Alan Wyatt: 18:32

So Ron, Chris and I actually before you came on we were having a little bit at. We were on a different side of this topic, because I kind of think that you're either a leader or you're not. And if you're a natural leader, you can be trained to be a great leader. If you're not a leader, you can be taught leadership skills, but you may not be a leader. And Chris, on the other side of things, he says no, I think you can be taught to be a leader. What do you say to that? Let's say you run, Settle this argument, Chris is wrong, right? Well, no, hang on, Let me run and talk, I know.

Ron Reich: 19:07

I think everyone has some, In different levels, of innate leadership skills. I do believe that I also believe extraordinary, as strongly as I can that these skills are. You know they're, they're learnable, they're teachable. If they weren't, I wouldn't be in business.

Ron Reich: 19:27

That's the point you know, I think you, you, you can teach people to be a leader. I think a lot of it too is instinctual and you know in in interesting ways. You know you can teach people to be a leader and you can teach your best. I think it's a. It's a very interesting way. I'll go back. I was I was talking to. It was not the client yesterday, it was someone the week before, I believe, whatever John Maxwell. I've read quite a bit of his of his work in his book Leadership Gold. I read the foreword and very, very rarely do I read the forwards in the books. Learn too much from this book. And I was like, huh, that's odd. Continued. What I'm hoping is that you are already doing what I talk about in the book instinctually. My goal for the book is to put a framework around what you're doing, so you can call it something that makes sense to me.

Chris Lalomia: 20:33

I like that. Yeah, that's a great. That is a great forward. And you're right, I do the same thing forwards. They get in my way.

Alan Wyatt: 20:40

It's too forward for me. I have to keep going.

Chris Lalomia: 20:41

All right, that's what. So obviously you definitely a big reader and we've hit so many topics. I'm trying to figure out which one I want to dive into, but I'm gonna go pick the disc profile. So how do you use the disc profile in your training to help teams understand themselves better?

Ron Reich: 20:57

Well, first of all, my opinion and I have shared this with people over the years I think the disc is the best instrument on the market. I really do for the following reasons, and this is how it helps to build teams. Number one it is steeped in research, it is phenomenally accurate, phenomenally. It is easy to use, it's easy to understand and it is incredibly useful. And I mean I think you know, for for me, the key, the key comment that I just heard it if you want, if you want to be the best leader, possibly you want to be the best person possible, let's keep it the leadership. What I always say to people get to know yourself extraordinarily well, because the better you know yourself, the more effectively you will work with other people. And the disc is a tremendous instrument to start that process on a deep level, on a very deep level, and you know it goes back to what we were just saying before. It helps people understand. These are the things I do well. I'm detail oriented, I'm factual or I'm, you know, I'm more people oriented and I'm fast-paced. I need to be around people again, whatever it might be, and it helps you to know yourself, allowing you then to work more effectively with others in.

Ron Reich: 22:30

In fact, what was what was so interesting? I'll give you an example. Yesterday we were actually we were actually talking about strengths and limitations of our profiles, and I was talking with one of the participants and he said to me I was like so what, you know what's one of your limitations work was? And he was like oh, he said I am, I am just so, I'm very, very detail oriented, which is good. He said I hate Taking those details and then having to present them. It drives me crazy. I get so nervous and I get it's awful. I was like okay, this is how you, if you and I were to work together, we could collaborate beautifully. You do the research, I'll do the presentation, right, oh, and he was like hey, that's really good.

Chris Lalomia: 23:21

I love that. Yeah, no, I agree, I'm a big believer in disc. All my people in my company abuse disc and I use it for Communication. I use that to develop my leaders.

Chris Lalomia: 23:32

I want your managers, because you can know they lead, okay, but no, I'm kidding. But it's been very helpful for me and I agree with you a hundred percent it's. It's easy to use, Simple to understand. There's a lot in it, so you can pick off as much or as little as you want, but it, directionally, gets you much better in understanding how to best communicate with people. And then that's what I have found over the years as well.

Alan Wyatt: 23:54

Little disc trivia. You know what else the, the founder of the disc profile, invented? No, I did take her test. And Wonder Woman.

Chris Lalomia: 24:05

Wonder Woman. Yeah, look it up. I'm more excited about that. I know I'm actually.

Alan Wyatt: 24:10

Writing it down. What are you using for?

Chris Lalomia: 24:12

wonder woman. She gets up, she gets. One of the things I know you're passionate about it is culture, and so let's talk about that, because that's a big one for me. I, you know, I'm a big believer that you have a culture in your company, whether intended or unintended, and you need to understand the culture as a Leader in your company, to understand what the best do. So talk to us a little bit about what makes a good culture, what makes a toxic culture, what the different? What it? Why do you measure?

Ron Reich: 24:45

I think you got, I think you can, you can, you can measure that for me based on the engagement of your, of your team and and just of your organization. And this is where, again, you need you need, from my perspective, if you really want to get the best information, bring an outside consultant in, let the consultant talk to the people at the organization, find out what they're thinking about, how they feel about things, because you know, it's so often we, you know we had those different, we did those different views of things. And again, I am working with a company right now on on building an intentional culture. Yeah, a family owned business and and actually, guys, you know what, what's interesting here? Let me, let me take it back because I had, I had spoken with them. I was, I was referred to them by a friend saying, oh, they need, they need leadership training or they, you know, they need management training. It's like, okay, fine. So I got on a zoom call with the, with the COO and one of the vice presidents, and they're talking about Well, this is, this is what the staff needs and this is what's going on here. And it was very clear to me and I was like, guys, you know what time out, time out. I Can tell already they need training they do.

Ron Reich: 26:12

Before we do anything, we need to sit down because you and the senior leaders need some training. We need to talk about culture. Family owned business. It's been around for years and years and years and they said to me things have become lax. You know, people are just sort of doing their own thing. We've grown and it's just. It's just a doesn't know what B is doing and C is doing his own thing, and and just all of that. And Over and over the past month or so, we've met on a number of different occasions.

Ron Reich: 26:50

We have come up with what's called a culture statement for the organization. We have four values that we came up with, defined as the company sees it, not the classic definition defined as the company sees it and and what we need to do next, and this is, and this is where the commitment needs to be. You need to have the commitment from the senior leaders, because what I'm going to do is take the senior leaders through the actual training itself. I'm going to take them through emotional intelligence, the disc instrument, delegating effectively, how to give feedback, how to listen, all of these different things. Once they've gone through it. It's at that point. Then we bring it down to the rest of the organization. I mean it's a big commitment and it's well worth the time.

Alan Wyatt: 27:48

The culture I mean. To change culture is brutal because, whether you like it or not, there's a culture. It just may not be a good one, and so you can decide, you can committee all you want on what you want your culture to be, but it may not roll downhill.

Ron Reich: 28:05

Sure, here are our values.

Alan Wyatt: 28:07

Lift them.

Ron Reich: 28:08

Okay, now let's.

Chris Lalomia: 28:09

Right. One of our values is honest and open communication. Now shut up and get back to work. That's exactly right.

Ron Reich: 28:16

Exactly.

Alan Wyatt: 28:17

I'm not saying that I might have said that today. It seems like that came pretty natural.

Chris Lalomia: 28:24

Culture statement on that one very interesting. You hit on something that I wanted to ask you about as well, and that is as leaders, a lot of times we're unfocused and sometimes we can mislead people. Where do you find that are some of the bigger weaknesses of leaders, as you've been working with other companies?

Ron Reich: 28:45

Sometimes I think my experience has been they don't treat their people as human beings, is that they see them as cogs rather than humans. I mean, an old boss of mine said to me one time he said never, never, never use the word subordinate, because no one is subordinate to you and no one is subordinate to me. They are your colleagues, they are your coworkers. And it was interesting because, going back to that organization where we're working with the culture, one of the employees kept using the word superiors. I go to my superiors with this and my superiors tell me and I was like Tiffany, is there a reason you keep using that word? Because it's coming up over and over and again.

Ron Reich: 29:48

My point is simply that we all need to work together. Yeah, there are people at different levels, and I get that and there's no doubt. Come on, let's be honest with each other here. There's hierarchy and there's power involved and again, at certain points in time, there's nothing wrong with that, except you know one of the big. Actually, let me ask you guys, you know I'll throw a question to you if I may what do you think the biggest reasons are? People become unhappy at work.

Chris Lalomia: 30:18

Oh, boss holes, Was I too quick?

Alan Wyatt: 30:21

I don't know.

Chris Lalomia: 30:23

You know the fact that Chris wants to be called.

Alan Wyatt: 30:27

Lord of all I survey. I mean, is that is not bad?

Chris Lalomia: 30:31

We do have a. We do have a moment of silence. Every time I come into the office, I ask everybody please bow down Rose. I have begun the day. Thank you everybody. Please, you are now allowed to go back to your little work that you are doing at your little computers and you go work in your little spreadsheets and I will go off to my throne and I will start to eat grapes and talk to everybody.

Alan Wyatt: 30:54

Now I think people, people need a sense of purpose, ron. I think they need to be valued purpose. You know, I used to sum it up very simply. You know, to be happy in your job, you either need to be making a lot of money or having a lot of fun. But I like to have a lot of fun making a lot of money.

Ron Reich: 31:11

That's a good one For me here, guys I agree. The number one reason people become unhappy, based on the research of which I'm aware, is their relationship with their boss.

Alan Wyatt: 31:26

People don't quit their company, they quit their boss.

Ron Reich: 31:28

There's no doubt about that. People leave companies. Number two their relationship with their coworkers. Third lack of recognition, lack of respect. The key point, though, is there's no separation between those three. In other words, people become unhappy with their boss because he or she is not providing enough recognition to his or her direct reports or not enough respect. It's the same thing with coworkers. It's something I try to emphasize to people and, candidly, I get frustrated sometimes because people buy the concept they do. I can tell.

Alan Wyatt: 32:14

He said oh yeah this is really important.

Ron Reich: 32:15

I can tell, and then you talk about it months later. You go visit months later and it's not happening. When I say recognition, it's the simple, simple stuff. Chris, thank you for staying late last night and finishing the presentation. I really appreciate that. We're going to get you more involved in some leadership training because I know that's of interest to you. We're going to design your job so that you can leave on time, because I know you have a new baby at home.

Ron Reich: 32:50

You know, whatever it might be, and again, one of the key things here it's so, so simple Is that, because everybody is so different, I always say to them and say how do you know that when you're recognizing somebody, it's important to them? How do you know?

Alan Wyatt: 33:09

It's back to the questions thing.

Ron Reich: 33:10

Everybody likes, you know. Just ask them. Just ask them what's important to you, and it changes over time, so you need to continue to ask.

Alan Wyatt: 33:22

So hypothetical situation, Ron if you're just on vacation all the time, like in Cabo or Tahoe, how do you provide that kind of recognition, virtually or from a long distance? Let's just say, for example, if your name rhymes with Chris.

Ron Reich: 33:37

All right?

Chris Lalomia: 33:40

How about this? So I, just because I asked the question is, one of my handyman said I need a week off for paternity leave and I went paternity leave. Is that the right question? Or should I said I highly respect the fact that you're being more incredulous.

Chris Lalomia: 33:53

I did, I did. I let him. You're right, younger people, especially in a, put in this all in the old category, ron, you hit on it. Sometimes it's not more money, in fact, a lot of times it's not more money, it's it's more recognition and more understanding of what they want. And so one of my younger handyman said I like to stay home for a week and I have paternity leave. And I ended up, I gave it to him in the handyman Well, this is construction blue collar work. And I did it. And this guy has now been with me for two years.

Alan Wyatt: 34:24

Nice.

Chris Lalomia: 34:25

Yeah, so I get it. I mean, you're right, is, I think, one of the best lines? I've been dying to put this one out there. We just learned this one earlier this year. We have to not be human doings, we have to be human beings like that.

Alan Wyatt: 34:40

I have to think about that for a minute. I just so do like it did.

Chris Lalomia: 34:42

It resonated with me because he's right. I mean, I'm in there, you know, wheeling and dealing, running a business or or going to those hypothetical places that somebody might have mentioned earlier. But we're busy and sometimes when we're busy we forget to recognize people. So one thing that all those people in my company will appreciate is that the fact that I took an hour out of my day to talk to Ron today is I'm going to go in there and think a little bit more tomorrow.

Ron Reich: 35:07

And you know some. Sometimes it can be as simple as just chatting with people.

Alan Wyatt: 35:14

I get it.

Ron Reich: 35:15

I remember a pharmaceutical company and I was fairly new. I had been on board very new actually, maybe, you know six weeks, whatever and it was right around this time of year because the US Open was taking place and I knew my boss was a big tennis fan and I am too, not as much as I used to be in it, and that's not the point I want. It was very early in the morning, we both used to get in early. I walked by his office and just said to us like hey, joe, did you see the match last night? He looked at me and with with just like it's not fair to say fire in his eyes. Still I'm busy. I was just like you got to be kidding.

Chris Lalomia: 35:58

Right.

Ron Reich: 35:59

Got to be kidding. I mean as simple. Did you see the match last night? It's 730. Nobody's here and I mean you know, maybe you weren't busy, maybe you're working on something to not even be able to just acknowledge. I'm talking about it to this day. So clearly it made an impact on me negatively.

Chris Lalomia: 36:19

Yeah, I did. There you go, and just one action leaves a big negative impact. What was his name? Again, he's a tool.

Ron Reich: 36:26

Yeah, I believe that one.

Chris Lalomia: 36:28

Yeah, you'll get the name out. You're in Jersey. Hey, we know some people in Jersey. Last things, la La Mia here. You know what I'm saying. I don't know. I got some things to say. Okay, no, ron, we've enjoyed this conversation, but before we go into our famous four questions, how can everybody get ahold of you to learn more about how to help themselves in their culture? Small to medium businesses? Go check this guy out. I checked him out on LinkedIn, but how can we all find you?

Ron Reich: 36:54

The best way to do it is through LinkedIn. Just you know, ron Reich, r-e-i-c-h, r-l-b, training and development, and yeah, check the site out. And again, gentlemen, sincerely, as I say I mean it sincerely anybody wants to contact me. I welcome a conversation and I come up on it guys.

Chris Lalomia: 37:18

Hit them up on LinkedIn. You know what I say, that all the time you guys have listened to me and it happens. I just got another email yesterday saying hey, thanks again, can you spare 30 minutes with me to talk to me about my business? And Ron, you can tell he's sincere as well. And so hit him up, man, talk to him a little bit. You know no sales pitch, he's just going to talk to you for a little bit.

Chris Lalomia: 37:37

The man knows what he's talking about too. You can definitely. He's picked on some a lot of great stuff here so far. All right, ron, we're coming to the end and we've got to get our four questions and we'll do them rapid fire. But we're going to get him going because I know you've got like a million books you've read. But what is a favorite book that you would recommend to somebody that you've recently read?

Alan Wyatt: 37:56

Change it up a little bit.

Chris Lalomia: 37:57

You did change it up your favorite book ever.

Alan Wyatt: 37:59

that I was going to say a book you'd recommend to somebody who's thinking about starting a business or is new in business.

Ron Reich: 38:10

You know what. You know what. I'm going to link it into what we've been talking about relative to culture. The best, the best book I have read about that is called the Advantage, written by Patrick Lynch. He's a man. He talks in the book so much about culture, what it is, what it isn't, and he says and I believe him too, I'm not, not, not my believe him, I like it. He said every organization in this country is smart. Everybody, everybody, every company has smart people. The problem is most of these organizations are unhealthy and they're unhealthy because of politics, toxic cultures and those sorts of things. I won't get into all the details he talks a lot about. The one gets wonderful suggestions and tools about how to go about addressing and building a solid culture. I love the book.

Chris Lalomia: 39:09

That's a great recommendation, man. You've hit so many of my favorite authors Maxwell and Cione, the Mahan Kalsa book that's great too, but now we have to talk about houses, because I love houses and that's why I'm in this business that I do. What is the favorite feature of your home?

Ron Reich: 39:26

You will. You, I'm certain. I hope you will love this, because about five months ago, whatever it is we finished a enormous kitchen renovation and house renovation and the favorite feature that I have within the kitchen is the big is the big window in the back, Because what it allows us to do is to see our entire backyard, where we couldn't see that before. And what I link that into as well, again from a leadership perspective the balcony view is that I can see the entire backyard and see the big picture. I can see the trees, I can see the bushes.

Alan Wyatt: 40:10

It's a metaphor.

Ron Reich: 40:11

And I apologize for the barking. We can see her running around and chasing squirrels out there and that kind of stuff, so it's a fabulous feature.

Chris Lalomia: 40:21

Awesome. What kind of cook range did you put in your kitchen? Are you guys cooks?

Ron Reich: 40:25

What yeah? Oh, my wife's a wonderful cook, all right.

Chris Lalomia: 40:28

What kind of range, what kind of cook top did you guys put in Gas?

Ron Reich: 40:32

Yeah, oh, it's gas yeah.

Chris Lalomia: 40:33

Yeah, name brand, I'm not pushing it. Oh nice, nice. Oh yeah, ellen and I are both big cooks, so I love hearing about that. When anybody brings up a kitchen, but I love that. You're right when you open up the back of the house.

Ron Reich: 40:47

I have to say I'm not allowed to use the stove.

Chris Lalomia: 40:52

Good job. You know your strengths and we just figured out who the leader in your home is, so we're going to keep that going. The wife is a high D. Yes, I think we just figured that out.

Ron Reich: 41:04

Yeah, exactly right, who knows?

Chris Lalomia: 41:08

my friend. That was good. Well done, ellen. All right, we are big into customer service. Because we are customer service freaks, let's go. What is a customer service pet peeve of yours when you're out there and you are the customer?

Ron Reich: 41:24

You know I was thinking about this, and for me, I think it's inconsistency that drives me crazy, and what I mean by that, too, is that if you make me a promise, I expect you to keep it. You say, hey, I will be there. You know the classic thing by four o'clock Okay, fine, be here by four o'clock. My mom it'll be three years. I'm going to be there by four o'clock on Saturday, saturday to be three years. She died when she was in the hospital. We needed some help and I needed to talk to the social worker and I was on the phone with her internally within the hospital. Ron, I'll be there within an hour to talk to you. First thing I do, guys, I promise you, I look at my watch. I expect you here in an hour. She didn't show up for an hour and 40 minutes and I was like what's going on? You promised me I've got other things to do here. You know my mom is so sick. I need you to keep your commitments to me, and that drives me insane on any level.

Chris Lalomia: 42:35

Yeah, the inconsistency is it's a hard work Even if you do something really well and you come back behind, do it bad and then come back and do it again. Well, people don't like it. You gotta have the same.

Alan Wyatt: 42:45

It's the old over promising and under delivering, or telling people what they wanna hear rather than what they need to know.

Chris Lalomia: 42:51

I mean it's yeah, very, very good one. All right, you're fresh off the kitchen renovation, and so now I gotta ask my last question, and that is give us a DIY nightmare story.

Ron Reich: 43:03

I'm not gonna give you a D to do it yourself, if you don't mind. I have a contractor nightmare and it does tie into what we've been talking about. We hired these guys to read not to redo our basement to do a lot of work on the basement. They needed some refurbishing and some other things. Fine, they came in and said, hey, you know what we can do some other things, we can do some painting for you, and then just again, just some other things. And after they started we realized these guys don't know what they're doing. They just don't know what they're doing. And we talked to them about it. We tried to go down the nice route with them. It didn't work out well. Attorneys got involved and it was ugly.

Ron Reich: 43:51

It was ugly and again it just yeah. I don't need to get into the details.

Chris Lalomia: 43:59

Well, on that note. So, on that note, talking to a contractor who's sitting there going. Is he doing his job? How do you feel about attorneys, chris? Oh, we don't want to talk about attorneys, especially not in construction. No, all right, ron, this has been amazing. Thank you so much for coming on sharing your knowledge with a small business safari. Guys, if you didn't learn something today, that's on you, not on us. Man, this has been fun. We've learned a lot of stuff. We've learned a lot about how culture can make a big difference. As they say in the biz, man culture eats strategy for lunch. So let's go make it happen, get up that mountain top and make it successful. We're out of here. Cheers everybody. Thanks, ron.