The Courage Advantage: Lessons Learned from 1,300 EOS Sessions | Jill Young

What happens when a visionary founder lacks the courage to be disciplined, or even the courage to lighten up?

In this episode of The Scalability Code, Matt Haney sits down with Jill Young, an expert EOS implementer who has facilitated over 1,300 sessions and author of The Courage Advantage. Jill shares her journey from growing up in a Utah family business to navigating corporate America, only to realize that true innovation and spirit live with scrappy entrepreneurs.

Jill unpacks her best strategies for scaling a business and building healthy teams. She reveals why having the courage to "lighten up" actually broadens your strategic perspective, why company structures shouldn't be changed just to avoid hard conversations, and how to capture wild ideas safely using a "Hallucination Journal".

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Transcript

Jill Young 0:00

Jill, we're entrepreneurial. We disrupt shit. We're not gonna follow an agenda." And I said, "You do not want to disrupt yourselves. That is, you know, you're acting like a child." Like no. Yes, dis- yes, disrupt your competitor, disrupt the industry. Don't disrupt yourselves. That's ridiculous.

Speaker 0:23

Welcome to The Scalability Code, the podcast that helps you get out of the sh*t show and start growing your business. And now for your host, Matt Haney.

Matt Haney 0:32

Here we are, folks, another episode of "The Scalability Code." Today, I'm joined by Jill Young. Jill, I've followed you. I've seen you on the internet. Um, I know you have an incredible following, and I love that you're in the great state of Texas. So Jill, thanks for joining us, uh, today on "The Scalability Code."

Jill Young 0:48

Well, thank you for having me, Matt. Maybe you've seen me blowing bubbles or dancing or something like that. That's usually when people...

Matt Haney 0:56

I have seen, your personality in action and, uh, your, your energy is, is infectious, so that's awesome. Well, we start the same way. Uh, every episode we start off the same way with kind of a two-part question. Uh, one is like, tell, tell us about your entrepreneurial journey, um, a- and kind of how you got to where you are today. And, and this is really a chance for you to go back and sort of relive and rethink some of the ways and things that you may not have talked about or think or... 'Cause those, those tidbits are helpful. So that's the first part. And then the second part is, talk about someone that influenced you as an entrepreneur. Someone that, you know, that got you that bug going, got that fire going, and maybe that person leads you into your journey.

Jill Young 1:40

This one is easy for me, Matt. It's at the, it's just right at the forefront of my brain. My entrepreneurial influencer was my dad. I grew up in an entrepreneurial family. Dad had several different businesses. Th-the term serial entrepreneur was not around back then, but he was, and, uh, it, it was all throughout our family. My, um, grandparents on both sides were builders, entrepreneurs, um, top salespeople, if you will, which is, you know, one of the greatest skills of an entrepreneur. And so I don't even know what it feels like to catch the bug because it is installed in me. Uh, m-my, uh, dad had... He was a master electrician, and he had, um, he had an electrical contracting company. And the day I was born, he was over on a job in Ogden, Utah, on the Dee Event Center. He was wiring the Dee Event Center and the hospitals across the street. So he's like, "I'm just gonna go check on a job real fast."

Matt Haney 2:47

Yeah. That's awesome.

Jill Young 2:48

and then here I am

Matt Haney 2:49

was like, "What?"

Jill Young 2:51

Yeah, exactly. "I'm gonna check on a job real fast." And he comes over and You know, here, those were the days where the father could not be in the room, and then it's like, "Ta-da, here's your baby girl." And we were-- I was attached to him from that very moment. I have many memories of going with him to um, his, his CPA and his attorney for all of, you know, the different businesses, and just so grateful to him because every time I would go with him or, um, be inside the business with him, I asked questions, questions, questions, questions, and he always paused to answer, or he would ask the professional to answer, uh, and, and talk to this little girl who was, um, who was growing. And where in those days, you know, little girls, little children, period, could just be ignored, and he didn't. He didn't. So that was my, that was my bug.

Matt Haney 3:51

That's awesome. Did you grow up in Utah?

Jill Young 3:53

I did, yep.

Matt Haney 3:54

a huge Utah fan. I lived there for four years, met my wife there, got married there, anniversary all the time. So beautiful place, wonderful people.

Jill Young 4:02

Absolutely gorgeous. Whenever I fly back, 'cause I have a lot of family there, I will say, "There are my mountains. Hello, mountains. Did you miss me? I missed you."

Matt Haney 4:11

Salt Lake is, is-- Salt Lake Valley is a, is a special, special place.

Jill Young 4:15

Just gorgeous.

Matt Haney 4:17

that's awesome. So you've been around entrepreneurship your whole life, which is amazing. You'd be surprised how many times I hear that, and I also hear the opposite, which is, "Oh, I didn't grow up with entrepreneurs. I didn't know I was going to become one. My parents did this, my parents did that, and then I met this person, and it transformed my career or their career." So I love, I love hearing all the, the different places of that. Um, and I love that your dad was your mentor and the person that you followed and that, uh, sounds like an incredible man and role model, um, to, to, to follow along. Well, tell me about your entrepreneurial journey. Obviously, your dad was impactful, uh, and those around you, but how did you sort of progress to where you are today in terms of entrepreneurship?

Jill Young 5:00

this is a lovely story also because I was also... Can I swear on this podcast?

Matt Haney 5:05

and ten percent.

Jill Young 5:06

Awesome. Because I was also just a little bit of a shit, you know? Just a little shit. So, uh, I, uh, I grew up in the family business. I, you know, here I am a teenager, and I'm looking around going, "You guys don't know what the heck you're doing

Matt Haney 5:21

Yeah. What was the business?

Jill Young 5:23

The business that I was in mostly was childcare centers, and, uh, but we also had a wedding center, the electrical contracting company. Um, my dad was also an inventor. So whenever I get the chance, I like to say he's the patent holder on the electronic trailer hitch locator and ball cover. I mean, think of what a really cool name there is.

Matt Haney 5:44

nobody can say that. That's amazing.

Jill Young 5:48

We still hold the patent, baby. He-- There's f- there's probably 30 patents on things that he's invented. And so childcare was the industry, and I was, I just... You know, like a lot of teenagers, you look at things in a simple way and go, "Well, why are we doing that? That's dumb. We should do that." Um, over the years, I convinced my parents to let me run the schools, and I did, and I still was irritated that we didn't know how to do it right. Uh, so I left the family business, and I went to work for big companies. Big companies where I thought, "Ah, this is where, this is where you- we will know what to do." I got into the big companies, and I had kind of the same attitude of like, "No, that is not right. Why are we doing that? That's ridiculous." Now, all of that has served me. I ho- hopefully I'm not a little shit anymore. But it served

Matt Haney 6:45

a big shit. You're just like a bigger version. Yeah.

Jill Young 6:49

Thanks, Matt. That's funny. That's funny. I like it. Uh, sometimes my clients will say, "Gosh, Jill, you're being an ass today." And I'm like, "Well,

Matt Haney 6:59

welcome.

Jill Young 7:00

think, yes, you did not hire a half-assed coach. You hired the whole ass." Like, I am gonna, I'm gonna help you with this. Now I, I have a style where I do it with lightheartedness and love and funny and... But it still gets the job done. So I left this entrepreneurial world to go out and find out how we really do it, how business really works. I got an MBA, I worked for some big companies, and then I'm like, "Oh, actually, we did know what we were doing back in, in the family business." As it turns out, we knew, uh, we knew what we were doing. We didn't have words for it. We clearly didn't have a system that we were running on. And the first time I read the book Traction, um, I cried. Uh, and, and it wasn't because it was so beautiful, and like all laid out so perfectly. Um, now I do have some nerdy friends who cried because it was written so beautifully. But I cried for, "Oh my gosh, if we would've had this in the family business." And Matt, this is the same stuff that you talk about, is the founder-led companies. And Dad was the founder, but he... My mom was an indentured servant, essentially. And it was like, uh, she's dabbling in this and dabbling in that, and then all the kids, right? All the kids are working there. And I- I'm, I don't mean any disrespect because we all had, we clearly had choices. But also when there was a big decision to be made, Dad wasn't working in the company, but Dad would say yes or no. But he didn't, you know, he, he

Matt Haney 8:41

buck stops somewhere.

Jill Young 8:42

Yeah, genius in the middle. Um, the genius with 1,000 helpers. Um, that, that's, that's how

Matt Haney 8:50

mentioned something I wanna, I wanna tag onto, and I have been an entrepreneur pretty much my entire career, and one of my clients, my EOS clients that I worked with in, in 2024, um, and through last year was acquired by Accenture. So, um, I got, and am still running a, an integration of in- integrating that company into Accenture. It's been fascinating. Jill, they have 700,000 employees at Accenture. There are people on top of people on top of people. And you said something about your experience in big business that made you realize, turns out the entrepreneur, you know, the shit show they live in, they still get it done, right? I talk to my clients about being dysfunctionally functional. I'm like, "Let's not forget the fact that we are functional. Yes, there's a little bit of dysfunction, but we are, we are functioning, and there's a little bit of dysfunction in all of it." But I tell you that because I got to see behind the scenes now in a big... one of the biggest com- companies in the world, they're still figuring it out. They're literally, like, still figuring it out every day. The difference between our clients is entrepreneurs can turn the steering wheel and see a somewhat immediate reaction. In these bigger businesses, you, you make a turn, it may be six, 12, 18, 24, 36 months before you know if the strategy you implemented is actually being effective, and that's tough. That's tough. It-- for me, when I'm used to working with entrepreneurs, they're like, "We're gonna go left. We're going left," and, and then you go with it. But did you see that in these big businesses? Is that maybe what brought you back to entrepreneurship, was the bureaucracy or, or any of the, you know... I don't know. What, what made you say, "I don't wanna go work. I got an MBA. I'm in big business now, and I wanna go backwards," quote-unquote?

Jill Young 10:39

There's, there's something that's coming to me. Uh, I, I love the phrase that until a question is asked, the answer doesn't exist.

Matt Haney 10:47

Hmm.

Jill Young 10:48

So I don't know if anyone has ever asked me that before, and now here's the answer that I'm like, "Oh my gosh, I see it now." So thank you for asking 'cause now I get to see my own story. Um, it really was the spirit of entrepreneurialism that was missing.

Matt Haney 11:04

Wow. So well said.

Jill Young 11:06

the ownership, the, the, the pride, the excitement, the if we don't get this done, our customer will be so sad. Like ooh. And you just feel it. Uh, ironically, I work with some really big businesses right now, publicly traded businesses, um, and we're running on EOS

Matt Haney 11:28

Yeah.

Jill Young 11:28

And if we don't-- Uh, it's not like, you know, it's not like we're shouting it from the rooftops, but because there is this entrepreneurial human in the center that wants all this stuff to happen, even inside big businesses, there's some really good shit happening, and it's flowing, and it's flowing fast, and we can see the change because there is that energy there. So I'm wondering right now, I'm like, I'm wondering if we have that entrepreneurial energy in those businesses, can we keep everything we love about entrepreneurial companies, that spirit, the, the culture, the connection, um, the innovation, and still have some discipline that comes with the bigger b- the bigger company?

Matt Haney 12:16

That's so well said. I love it, I love it, I love it. Well, um, couple things. Obviously, you are a very successful EOS implementer, which I love. Um, I have a question that I ask, um, all the EOS implementers I bring on, which is, um, can you, can you give me some tips, tricks or, or knowledge around how, uh, you get EOS to stick one or two levels down below the leadership team? I, as a fractional integrator, uh, deal with that a lot and some of, you know, getting it down to the bottom is very difficult. Um, so I'd love to hear if you have any, any experience or opinions on that.

Jill Young 12:52

Hmm, for sure. Well, first of all, big shout out for my friends Beth and Marissa. Beth Fahey, Marissa Smith. They just released a book called "Roll Out." I know you're aware of that. So read the book because it's really, really great. Uh, uh, so here's a couple of things that come to me as I, I think I've done 1,300 sessions, 100 implementations. So just, you know, uh, it's still anecdotal evidence, but there you go. Uh, one of them is it is imperative that the leadership team is all fully committed to getting it rolled out throughout the company. And one of the, one of the phrases that I use to help with that is, it, it, it's kind of funny and people laugh, but every company runs on a system. Every department, every team, every work team, every shift, you run on a system. Everyone. It's just that do we want that to be an intentional system where everything is flowing, or do we want it to be chaotic and disjointed? 'Cause like you said, are, are we functionally dysfunctional? What did you say? Dysfunctionally, but we're still functioning

Matt Haney 14:09

There's, there's...

Jill Young 14:10

Oh, yeah. That-- So we, we want to be intentional with this system that we're running on. I was just on the phone this morning with an integrator, and he's saying, "Hey, what I'm finding is they have 12 locations and they're all running the same scorecard at each location." It's just so simple like that. He goes, "Some, some locations are starting to call these numbers different things." He goes, "I think that's really dangerous." And I'm like, "Yes, you're right. Nice work. You see it. It's dangerous." We've all got to speak the same language. But if he wasn't dedicated to that, if he's n- 'cause he's the integrator, he's-- if he's not looking for that, he's gonna, he's gonna go, "Well, now I, I want him to have some autonomy over there," and, "Oh, that's not a, that's not a big deal. That's a little deal." But it's the little deals that are the big deals. So the leadership team has to be absolutely committed to this.

Matt Haney 15:02

Yes. Pull that one string on the sweater and all of a sudden everything starts to unravel. You let that one metric become, uh, vague or not descript, all of a sudden you

Jill Young 15:13

about it. Mm-hmm.

Matt Haney 15:14

you give autonomy and, and creative liberty to things that aren't supposed to be autonomous or creative. They're supposed to be defined and known.

Jill Young 15:22

right. I had a, a visionary the other day that, um, he got a, he got a, a, a Jill youn- a Coach Jill talking to, you know? He got a Coach Jill talking to, 'cause he, he had three rocks, and he completed one out of three rocks, and he had said, "No, I wanna do this. I'm gonna do it. It's, it's great. I'm, uh..." And then he was laughing in the session, and we're light-hearted. He goes, "It's not a big, it's not a big deal. One of three rocks. It's not these two things, these two rocks. I'm gonna get it. They're gonna be done in a couple of days. They're gon-" You know, and he started to do this. And I'm like, "The reason it's a big deal is because you just set the bar for the rest of the company. You just said to the whole entire company, starting with your leadership team, that 33% completion on our highest priorities that we've agreed to is your bar. So that's where the problem is." And he wa- you know, he was like, "Oh."

Matt Haney 16:22

did you get to have that conversation in session or

Jill Young 16:25

Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. Right in front of everybody. Yeah.

Matt Haney 16:28

And it's a great-- I mean, I have it all the time and, and I always feel like as the integrator, um, the m- the expectations on me are higher than everyone else because they are... I mean, I feel like if I don't set my milestones accordingly, if I'm not very intentional about what smart looks like for myself, how can I even begin to do that for the people that I work or that, that work with us? Because they're looking at me not as an opportunity to judge, but certainly as the person who's supposed to have their shit together and know exactly how to do it. And if you're not leading by example, then guess what? We are not leading by example, and it's perfectly obvious to everyone else in the room when that doesn't happen. That's awesome. I love that. what do you think the hardest part about managing people and/or a team? Like, where do you see the hardest challenge around managing people?

Jill Young 17:20

Well, the, the hardest challenge is inside the human. The, the tools, we've got, we've got tons of simple tools. The tools will just, like, they just say, "This is the thing, and that is the thing." I mean, they're so simple that the information, the data is right there in front of your face. We even have two checklists, a leadership checklist and a management checklist that says, "If you're doing these five things, you're good." Um, but the hardest part is inside. Um, our in- our own inner work as a human to, to say the truth to other human beings.

Matt Haney 18:00

Hmm. So

Jill Young 18:02

share what we are seeing, to share what we are feeling to another human being. That's the hardest thing.

Matt Haney 18:09

being candid, being direct, being honest, is that what you're saying is hard?

Jill Young 18:13

Or, um, sharing some praise or some encouragement or asking a question. "Was I clear when I made that request of you?" Um, "Matt, are you happy in this role?" I mean, uh, the-- it's, it's our, it's our fear, um, it's our fear of connection.

Matt Haney 18:34

Right.

Jill Young 18:35

of connection. Now, there's this, there's this, um, epidemic of loneliness, isolation, uh, 'cause there's some kind of fear right here that we do not want to really open up and connect. And if you can really open up and connect, then it's easier for you to be a manager. Uh, and there's a difference. There's, there's a difference between someone who is just very jovial and excited and social. Uh, I'm not saying, you know, they always make the best types of managers, but the, it's the best types of managers are people who really do wanna connect, and they care about their people. And, and it's hard. It's hard for people to open up and feel safe.

Matt Haney 19:20

It's fascinating you say that. Literally this week I'm helping a leadership team and two people below the leaders, one specific leader and his team break down that barrier because there's a little bit of distrust amongst the team, and I'm kind of getting triangulated around. As the integrator, I'm stepping in, helping the leader of the department navigate these interpersonal challenges that he's having with his team. And, you know, I, I, I said just what you said to him, which is, "Hey, you need to be honest and open with these people. If you're feeling a lack of trust, they're certainly feeling it. And if they're not, we need to have a conversation around that." But to your point, being vulnerable and honest and humble and, and one of the, the, um, core values of this company is lead with positive intention. Meaning be a leader that's saying, "I'm doing this for the reason of being positive, not to be critical and judgmental." And our visionary pulled out that core value during an L10 and it was like, "Whoa!"

Jill Young 20:21

Great. That's

Matt Haney 20:22

it came up and I was-- And it was so well-timed. So well-timed. But, um, it goes back to what you're saying about, about sharing those feelings and being honest, um, which is really special when you can get there and when you're not there first, for me, it's really obvious. So I want to ask you, you spend a lot of your time coaching coaches, right? You spend time with people teaching them to be better leaders. How-- I mean, it, it, it sounds like that's a core value of yours, which is, is being honest and open or, or something along those lines. Tell me how you weave that into, you know, your coaching practice when you're teaching others.

Jill Young 20:58

the open and honest when you're one-on-one, which is a lot of the work that I do now, um, with leaders, coaches. Um, young leaders are really fun to coach, right? Young, high-potential leaders. Uh, when you're coaching one-on-one, it's a lot easier for people to be vulnerable, open, and honest. So a lot of what I do is listening. Listening, um, asking questions. Um, the accountability piece. I have a definition that I love of accountability. It's, uh, reminding someone of what they've already agreed to. Mm-hmm. Reminding someone of what they've already agreed to. So one-on-one vulnerability, open and honest, that's, that's the whole thing. That's why people hire me. A lot of times they don't feel like they can be entirely open and honest anywhere else in their life. Coaches, you know, we can hold that space where someone can say things, even be honest with themselves while I'm, while I'm listening to them. The tricky part for open and honest comes in when you get a team environment. 'Cause if we think about it, Matt, if you are-- if here you are and you're walking through the forest and, uh, you know, five people are coming at you, if we just think about our hindbrain or our lizard brain, you don't know how you need to protect yourself. So clearly, you're gonna put up all of your defenses and really make sure you're safe before you take those down. That's why team d- team functionality, team health, um, especially me- my work as an EOS implementer, is so much different than one-on-one work. Uh, this is where we really have to work to br- take down those defenses to get open and honest, and it takes some skill and some time and some willingness. Yep. But it's, uh, yeah, it's, it's different in the one-on-one coaching than it is in the team coaching, for

matt-haney_2_02-06-2025_192447 23:03

You are listening to the Scalability Code. I'm your host, Matt Haney, founder of Sinclair Ventures, and we help visionary entrepreneurs like you get out of the shit show and focus on growing your business. We offer fractional COO and leadership coaching services that free up that brain of yours to focus on what's next. Learn more about us at SinclairVentures. com. Now back to it.

Matt Haney 23:24

I know you've written a book around courage And it sounds like what you're saying, uh, the courage mindset over fear is, is to your point you were just saying, you know, being courageous to, to, to say that and, and, and find out what the answer is. Uh, you talk about that in the book. Um, you mentioned there's three principles. Tell us the three principles in the book.

Jill Young 23:48

Um, so I wrote this book, um, back in, I think it was 2018, so it was a while ago. And, uh, you know, my, my EOS practice was, um, full. I'd, I'd done 500 sessions at that time. At this point, at the recording of this podcast, I've done 1,300. That's kinda crazy. Wow. Uh, like, where does life, where, where does,

Matt Haney 24:12

Where do we go? Yeah.

Jill Young 24:14

Where did we go? So 500 sessions is a lot. In fact, in EOS, once you've hit 500 sessions, you're an expert EOS implementer. This was before there was even a designation like that. So I had done 500 sessions, and I had a, got a phone call from somebody that was a referral, and he said, "Jill, listen, my whole industry uses EOS. It's awesome. It's incredible. We're gonna use it. But can you tell me why it won't work?"

Matt Haney 24:41

Ah.

Jill Young 24:42

"Wow." And that question just stayed with me for a few months. It would not leave me. 'Cause I had clearly had some implementations that didn't work. So I started asking the other implementers, doing my own research, and over the course of a year, I wrote this book in answer to that question. It's called "The Courage Advantage," and it's why it doesn't work. So here's the three things. Um, uh, companies that fail to implement a system, I will even just kinda expand it to any system is, we have, um, we don't have the courage to be disciplined To be disciplined. I was working with a more of a startup kind of, you know, kinda fast and flashy company just, uh, just a few months ago, and they just were not running good level 10 meetings. They were, you know, just level 10 meetings start to feel like, oh, they're just too structured. And one of the guys goes, "Jill, we're entrepreneurial. We disrupt shit. We're not gonna follow an agenda." And I said, "You do not want to disrupt yourselves. That is, you know, you're acting like a child." Like no. Yes, dis- yes, disrupt your competitor, disrupt the industry. Don't disrupt yourselves. That's ridiculous. Anyway, so it's the courage to be disciplined and encourage to stay in your seat, courage to not say anything, and write it down and save it for the issues list. Courage to b- be disciplined, but not just with your time, um, but also with your thoughts. Disciplined with your thoughts.

Matt Haney 26:27

And I think I'm gonna s- I'm gonna jump in because the next one is my favorite. And I think, um, you and I both love being fun and not taking ourselves too seriously, and lighten up is one of them. Have-- That's one of-- Which, by the way, everyone that says, "Oh, EOS is so corporate," that is such horseshit. I can promise you that EOS is not that, and the structure and discipline does not have to be rigid and, and, you know, just tightened down. You can have fun. Tell us.

Jill Young 27:00

It's, um, it's actually mandatory. If you come to my session room, it's one of our objectives for the whole day is that we're gonna have fun. If I feel like you're not having fun, you have to talk to this mechanical hot dog who makes fun of you. I mean, it's really a lot of fun. Now, I, I clearly like to have fun in my life, but that's not why we're doing it. The courage to lighten up comes from this principle in our brain that if, if we have a white-knuckle grip, just absolutely stressed out about everything, we can only see... This, this comes from science, not just from Jill. We, uh, you can't even see into your peripheral. Your whole body rearranges itself for fear and anxiety and danger, and you can only see what's in front of you. Your brain is being conservative. When I help my teams lighten up, which is what I found in the book, we don't take ourselves so seriously We lighten up a little bit, your brain starts to widen up and you can get curious. And you can say, "What if we do that? And what if we do that?" And when there's a mistake made, I have a team that calls it a Bob Ross event. They're like, "We're just gonna Bob Ross that." 'Cause what did Bob Ross do in his paintings? When he made a mistake, he's like, "Oh, I'm just-- That's a happy little accident. What can we do to

Matt Haney 28:19

What can we do?

Jill Young 28:20

we Bob Rossed it. So lighten up your language, lighten up your reflections.

Matt Haney 28:25

It's such a good thing to teach, to teach visionaries because I know from my experience that most of, a lot of them feel this need to be all-knowing and, and they, they have this, "Well, I'm the visionary. It's my company. I started it. Everyone looks for me to have the answer." And it, it ties into sort of vulnerability and humility and lightening up and not having to feel like you have to have the answer. That's why you have a leadership team. That's why you have people around you. You know, some of the best leaders I've ever worked around and under say, "I don't know the answer. Let's all of us figure it out. Stop looking at me to have all the answers. You're here to help us. We're all part of it." Um, and to that point of lightening up, you have to be willing to be in that vulnerable space to say Okay, I don't know. Because that's, that's hard. It's really hard to not take yourself too seriously and to lighten up around the people that you've brought in to help grow your business or that you lead.

Jill Young 29:26

Yeah. Yeah. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Yeah. And, uh, um, uh, these, these entrepreneurs that we serve and that we are, right? Like I am an entrepreneur, so are you. Uh, a lot of us have, uh, um, I think, uh, the book "Drive" talks about it. Beckman, Doug, Douglas, Douglas Beckman. Oh,

Matt Haney 29:46

Okay. We'll go with it. We'll go

Jill Young 29:48

Yeah, "Drive." Uh, they talk about a gene in there, a, a D2 gene that we have for just drive. And along with that often comes this irrational weight of responsibility, um, this tendency to isolate. Um, uh, we d- we don't take criticism very, very kindly, um, as it, as it will help us. Uh, and I found that a lot of leaders that I coach, a lot of visionaries that I coach, when they do some inner work in here, they find that some of these more heavy, um, or kind of a darker energy elements to this drive, to this gene, this entrepreneurial gene can be lightened up when they do a little bit of their inner work. Journaling, meditation, therapy, a coach, uh, uh, a peer group. Oh, a peer group is so nice. So it's this operation stuff that we're talking about. Absolutely, yes. And if, if our, if you and me included, beautiful visionary entrepreneurs will do a little bit of our own inner work, think life can lighten up just

Matt Haney 31:07

it's so

Jill Young 31:07

the extent where we can really enjoy it.

Matt Haney 31:09

Yes, so true. I, I, uh, I always famously tell everyone that I've been in therapy, couples therapy with my wife. We've been married almost 20-- We've been married 20 years, together for 25 years. And some of the best, you know, life lessons have come from that session of just communication and, and, and, and doing that inner work and working on yourself so that you can be a better spouse and a better leader and a better parent and so and so. And I'm a big proponent of, of that, that inner work and that self-work because, uh, it, it just simply makes you happier. Um, and I definitely know it makes you be a better leader.

Jill Young 31:44

Yeah. A, a lot of times we do talk about it like that. Therapy or coaching helps you be a better, and then you list off all of your roles. You just did it, right? Husband, father, te- teacher, coach, coach Aus. So you're like, "Ooh, I'm gonna invest in that so I can be better for everybody else." But also, number one, better for yourself. Like, live with yourself. There, there are things I've been doing for the last 10 years that I thought were self-care, and it was, I was actually punishing myself. Like, what? But 'cause, just 'cause I ju- I just didn't really think about it. I wasn't aware. So yeah, that, that awareness of who I am

Matt Haney 32:20

Oh, I think it-- awareness and, and, and humility are two of the best skills that I think any visionary, any leader, any person can, can embrace, and it just-- it, it makes a huge, huge difference. Okay, I want you to think back to your last session, could have been this week, um, or last couple sessions, where you saw an interaction between a visionary and an integrator that wasn't working, wasn't healthy, or something that you felt like, wow, I'm gonna have to address this either in person or outside of the session with these two because it's affecting the rest of the team.

Jill Young 32:58

Yeah. Well, this one, this one's easy. Um, it's a newer team, and I have not taught this team the same page meeting. So when they came in, uh, the visionary and integrator starting to go back and forth are, uh, healthy discussion and debate, which is lovely, but I got to watch this little tennis match from the leadership team like you da, da, da, da, da, da, da. And it's just a, it's a, it's a waste of time. Um, they're not bringing a clear vision in. They're-- we're using our session to, for them to get on the same page. So that one was easy. I'm like, "Oh, so I get to teach you guys the same page meeting thing right now." So we've got a little Zoom call scheduled for tomorrow.

Matt Haney 33:41

Oh, that's great, and, and that's-- what an opportunity for them. I mean, uh, I mean, seriously, if you-- if you're not having that conversation, um, you're, you're not-- you're not living the-- you're not living the best way you could as a leader. And I also think that same page meeting, what I tell folks is it, it, it allows you to have a disarming conversation about things that need to happen. I know it's on my calendar, you know it's on yours. We know the intent of that is for us to literally get on the same page. What an opportunity to write those things down. P- I always say share your screen, get it out there, let's go through it. Because if you write it down and you know it needs to happen and you share your screen, you're more likely to get it out and not say, "Oh, I'm not gonna talk about this one 'cause this one's hard, so we're just gonna, we're just gonna leave that down here." Share your screen, get it out there, say what needs to be said, and, and continue to move forward. What a great opportunity to, to teach them something that's gonna impact them.

Jill Young 34:40

Anytime I, uh, an integrator will call me or a visionary will call me, and they're like, "I'm, we're having a hard time in this partnership," my very first question is, "When was your last same page meeting?" And 100% of the time, okay, 1,300 sessions in, 100 companies in, 100% of the time it was either canceled, they forgot about it. They, they were like, "Well, we did... We didn't have any. We talk every day. You know, ho, ho, ho, we talk every day." Yeah, that's it. So just have your same page meetings. It fixes 90% of the issues.

Matt Haney 35:16

cool. All right, last question around EOS, one of my favorites, um, around tools. Everyone knows the tools, not everyone, but those of us in the EOS world know the tools. So I, I, I want you to think about either one, one of the tools that you deliver really well, that you feel like, "I, Jill, am very good at teaching this tool." Could be same page meeting, but I'm not gonna let you use that

Jill Young 35:37

No. No.

Matt Haney 35:39

and then also, um, maybe the hardest one to, to, to move across the line in terms of just getting it to be effective with a team. So the one you're best at and maybe the one that is the hardest.

Jill Young 35:52

So, uh, this is interesting. I've never been asked the tool I'm best at, 'cause I ha- I haven't ever l- really thought about what is the best

Matt Haney 36:00

I'll give you an example. I was in a session the other day, and I saw someone deliver the cash flow drivers in a way that I'd never seen it before. Obviously, the way that they were able to bring it together and tie it together, for me, I was like, "That's really special. Really special."

Jill Young 36:15

Yep. So, uh, I think I really love teaching the how we discover core values. That's a really fun one to do, and it really opens people's eyes. I think at the beginning, even though my clients are prepared when they come to the sessions, I think at the beginning they really do feel like core values are just gonna be for the back of the T-shirts, you know, and the coffee mug and the website.

Matt Haney 36:41

on the-- Just fills a block.

Jill Young 36:44

the website. This is how we get clients. Uh, so that's really fun to, um, to walk them through some mindsets of why these core values are at the center of everything we're gonna do. And when they see the big picture like that, I really like the aha moments.

Matt Haney 37:02

That's so great. I've never heard someone say that. I mean, obviously, I've been in session and seen it and know the impact of it, but I haven't heard an EOS implementer say that's a... I mean, it's like a duh. I'm saying it out loud. Of course, that would be impactful. But the fact that you're able to pull

Jill Young 37:17

And it's really fun, it's really fun to teach. Now, the facilitation of this is hard and you, like, it-- This is, you know, why you don't hire a half-assed

Matt Haney 37:27

That's exactly right.

Jill Young 37:28

can get really tricky, and the energy of the room can get so positive. See, okay? Now, I'm a positive coach. The energy of the room can get so positive that the exercise can g- run away with the positivity, and then we're not carrying the weight of what we're really going to do with these. So, uh, that's, that's another thing that I'm like, "Hmm, I guess I'm pretty... Yeah, I'm pretty good at that," is bringing it back to, "Now, you do know we're gonna fire people if they are not these things." And then they have to have a really hard conversation with themselves like, "Will we fire people around it?" Yeah.

Matt Haney 38:08

Yes, we absolutely will. I, I did it last year with a client, a high performer in the company, and multiple times we kept coming back to the fact that they were, you know, not leading with the best of intentions, and it was a very clear one. Very clear one. That's awesome. Okay, which is the hardest? What do you think one of the most challenging tools to get down or, or where you feel like people may struggle? Maybe it's not hardest for you to teach it, but it's one that comes up as a sticky point.

Jill Young 38:34

The, the struggling one is the accountability chart. Clients will consistently struggle with that if w- if me, as the coach, if I'm not on top of it all the time. A couple of things that they, uh, that they do that are squirrely is they will find someone that they really like and they wanna hire them and then create the seat for them. Or they c- wanna create... They're like, "Oh, Matt says he's ready for a promotion, so we gotta create a seat for him." And I'm like, "Eh. Eh." Um, so that's, that's one that I just gotta stay on top of all the time.

Matt Haney 39:12

also feel like people love to change the accountability chart. It kinda goes off of what you're saying. It's like-- And this is a question, and, and everyone has a, I think, a different answer, but how often should, should we be, like, changing it? Because I think there are people that can leave an accountability chart in place for too long, and then there's certainly people that can change the accountability chart when the changing of the winds.

Jill Young 39:34

Mm-hmm. Yeah. Well, it need, it sh- it shifts as often as it needs to, but if we're looking at our five leadership abilities, one of those is structure. So we want to make sure we have the right structure. If the structure is not working, you gotta change it. Here's what I will say also with that, though. Some teams are structure happy, and they'll go, "Oh, let's change the structure. That will fix our issues," when really they're just not having hard conversations with people. They're, uh... So structure is sometimes a tool that I see my teams go, "Oh, maybe we'll just add a seat." Okay. That's add a seat 'cause this guy doesn't wanna do his stuff, so we just add a seat.

Matt Haney 40:17

move it around.

Jill Young 40:18

Have a hard conversation with this guy. Um, or let's, let's restructure. Let's move this pres- person under here. So sometimes when I see them wanting to use the accountability chart tool to not be courageous, then I'll go, "Timeout. Is it process? Is, do we have the right people in the right seat? Have we been really great managers to, you know, this event?" Um, and then that sometimes will slow down the structure, changes that sometimes happen too fast. And then there's teams who do not want to change their structure, and then

Matt Haney 40:56

all. And don't-- And then we're not changing it. We're not changing it at

Jill Young 41:00

Yep. And then I'm like, "Ooh, look, it's a leadership ability." I have the five leadership abilities across the top of my whiteboard. I'm like, "It's one of the leadership abilities. It might be time. We may have outgrown this structure. Where we were at $5 million is not where we're gonna get to at 50 million." I know you're a big, a big fan of that. Okay.

Matt Haney 41:22

And it should be a profound moment. It should be something that sticks out to you. Um, you know, there's people we come across that give and, and sound advice, and I'm curious if you can pull out some sound advice that you were given either in a good time or a bad time or something that stuck out to you that said, "Hey, this is really good advice, um, I've received from somebody." And, and how-- And do you pass that on, on a regular basis?

Jill Young 41:47

Hmm. Mm. Yes. Uh, this is great. When I was, um, when-- Just before I was an EOS implementer, I was president of a CPA firm.

Matt Haney 41:56

Oh, wow. Okay.

Jill Young 41:57

We were growing and growing and growing, but also hitting the ceiling. And my next-door neighbor, on a particularly hard day for me, my business next-door neighbor came outside and he sat next to me. I was sitting on the curb, 'cause it was one of those days where you just walk out and sit down on the curb. And he, he said to me, you know, as I was throwing him my pity party of how life isn't fair and... I said, "I'm not very good at this, running a business. I guess I'm just not very good at this." And he said to me, this is the best advice. He said, "Jill, there is nothing wrong with you. There is something wrong with your system." And I love to share that, especially, you know, if visionaries are listening to this podcast. Visionaries, there is nothing wrong with you. Uh, sometimes EOS is known or there's some, there's some strains of EOS where people will do visionary shaming. Like, "Ooh, you don't know how to run a company. I have to run it for you." And I, and I feel it. I feel it. My visionaries feel it. And it's like, "No, pause. There is nothing wrong with you. There's everything right with you. There's just something wrong with your system." You, visionary, are brilliant and amazing and capable, and we would-- none of us would be here without you taking a risk and, uh, and being en-enthused about this product or service we're taking to the world for good. None of you visionaries wake up and go, "Ooh, I hope to be a hard ass today, and I hope to be,

Matt Haney 43:42

Incredibly difficult to be around. No, no one says that.

Jill Young 43:45

No. No. You're amazing. So that first line of advice, there's nothing wrong with you. And maybe there's something wrong with your system if you're not flourishing, if your life isn't flourishing.

Matt Haney 43:56

That's awesome. That's awesome. Very well said. And, you know, we all have our uniquenesses, but I do love what you said about visionaries. I talk about it all the time, which is this person's doing their job coming up with 100 ideas. That's what they're supposed to. It's our job to create a system to-- that we can see those and implement those and push the ones that aren't so great to the, you know, to the back and get the ones that are good to the front. That's their job. That's what makes them unique and special. There's nothing wrong with them. We just need to create a system and, and around them, which is

Jill Young 44:27

That's right. That's right. I have a fun tool that I hand out to my visionaries, and I invented it. I'm an artist and a creator myself. So here's the tool. It's called the Hallucination Journal. Yep, it's the best. In EOS, we say vision is at the top of the model, traction is at the bottom of the model, and it's by design because vision without traction is just hallucination. And then I wait for people to laugh because it's really fun, but sometimes saying that gives hallucination a bad rap.

Matt Haney 44:58

Right.

Jill Young 44:59

hand it... We need to hallucinate.

Matt Haney 45:02

Yeah. Yep.

Jill Young 45:03

out these hallucination journals to the visionaries, and the rule is you're only allowed to hallucinate, like put all of your crazy ideas in here, all of your amazing, wonderful, life-changing ideas in this journal, but you can't execute on any of them. And what this journal does then is it keeps this hallucination journal is safe. I can go in there and think about a hotdog stand, a new version of purple paint, anything I want to, and it's actually a creative exercise to keep visionaries

Matt Haney 45:36

It's a

Jill Young 45:36

Now, in the event-

Matt Haney 45:38

a safe space to put all your crazy-ass thoughts. Um, and I'm, I'm quick to not shut those thoughts down. I think I see some people like they-- that, that hallucinization, hallucination comes out and people are like, "Meh." I'm like, I try to be very intentional about my body language, about my response, about the way I'm delivering it, because I don't wanna create a scenario where, uh, people are encouraged to not do that. It's quite the opposite. Like somebody that had a quote unquote terrible idea, turns out, guess what? It was a really badass idea. We just needed to get it forward, and they thought it was a terrible one. I'm glad they brought it up. We never would've been here.

Jill Young 46:11

That's right. That's right. And then if you do have an idea that ends up into your hallucination journal that you're like, "This is really good," you have to ceremoniously rip the pages out of the journal and put them somewhere else.

Matt Haney 46:23

That's cool.

Jill Young 46:24

you always do- It's really fun. It's, it's a lot of fun, for sure.

Matt Haney 46:28

Jill, I, I have thoroughly enjoyed this. Um, I loved having you. I love your energy, um, I love your wisdom, and I love that you're, uh, the badass you are, 'cause it's fun to watch. It's fun to be around. And, um, you're, you're a, a great human and a great role model to a lot of us. So Thank you for being so, uh, so fun and, and lighthearted.

Jill Young 46:50

You're welcome for being so much fun. That's, that's awesome. I'll, I'll

Matt Haney 46:54

I look forward to seeing you next time I'm up in Dallas, either at one of the EOS events or just up seeing folks. But, um, wanted to thank you for joining us today on The Scalability Code.

Jill Young 47:04

Perfect. Thank you for having me, Matt.

47:07

Thank you for listening to The Scalability Code. If you made it this far, please follow the show on Apple, Spotify, YouTube, or wherever you get your podcasts. Let's get out of the sh*t show together. We'll see you next time on The Scalability Code.