Entrepreneur | Part 1 – Determining Winnable Keyword Phrases

Audio Transcription

Get ready to enter the Thrivetime Show! We started from the bottom, now we’re here. We started from the bottom and we’ll show you how to get here. We started from the bottom, now we’re here. We started from the bottom, now we’re here. We started from the bottom, now we’re on the top. Teaching you the systems to get what we got. Cullen Dixon’s on the hooks, I’ve written the books. He’s bringing some wisdom and the good looks. As the father of five, that’s where I’mma dive. So if you see my wife and kids, please tell them hi. It’s C and Z up on your radio. And now, three, two, one, here we go. We started from the bottom, now we’re here. We started from the bottom, and that’s what we’ve gotta do. You said so much there, and I’m going to try to unpack this, because it’s just, I’m going to try to duct tape my head back together and put the knowledge back in. But you talked about organizational DNA. You talked about the mission, the vision, the values and beliefs. And I see what you’re saying in the great companies. We have had a pleasure to work, I’m doing a speaking event for UPS this month, and when you see UPS, they just get things delivered on time. And you see the difference between that, and let’s just say some other large postal company, you see the difference in where they have to operate, and you see it in small business, where you’ll see a small business that’s thriving and quickly growing, and you see another one that’s stuck. And it really comes down to that organizational DNA there. So talk to me about, if I’m watching this and I’m going, oh boy, I don’t have a mission. I don’t think I have a vision. I don’t know that I have any values or beliefs. I’ve always just told my people, do that. Do that, yeah. Do the checklist. For me, management’s not about inspiration. It’s about just do the thing. The process, yeah. Would you recommend that somebody deep dives into, A, one of your books, or would you recommend that they need to get to a workshop? What does somebody, if they don’t have mission, vision, values, or beliefs, what do you recommend they need to do here? I think the first thing they need to do is just write the question, why should we open our doors again tomorrow? Aside from needing money or wanting to establish ourselves as being the coolest person on the block, why, from a customer’s point of view, should we bother opening our doors tomorrow? And when you can answer that well, then you’re on the path. If you can’t answer it well, get some other people you trust, people who care about what you’re doing, and have them help you come up with an actual statement that says, this is why we exist. Okay. You know like a person says well we make we make fruit that looks so real you could almost eat it. I tried to eat it earlier. Yeah I noticed the tooth marks but yeah it really is well well done artificial fruit. Okay. What possible meaning could you have from artificial fruit? Well first off that’s good for the environment. Hmm. I’m not putting a bunch of apples out here for decor and Having the problem of constantly replacing the ones that have gone bad, right? You know, these are I could have flowers there and I’d be replacing those all the time once this is made. It’s permanent Yeah, and as long as I keep this clean, then it’s going to serve as a decoration for you know, indefinite time frame so that’s one reason another reason is that you’ve set a standard for other people. Because this looks real. Yeah, it does. Other people are then inspired to make their decor also look as real. And so you kind of lift, you know, one person doing better lifts the standard for everybody else. I’m starting to feel bad about trying to eat these. The reason I picked that is because that’s something you wouldn’t typically think of as having any meaning. There’s people though who are watching this and I’m just trying to attack it right now, because I know somebody’s watching this right now who’s going, well that’s a bunch of bunk. I mean I’m just focused on profits. I’m focused on just making some money. And then if I go to your office and no one’s motivated, this is the stuff that motivates. This is the motive. Yeah, it makes the action This is huge. If you don’t have this is the heart. Yeah, right. I mean without this mission vision values and beliefs It’s like a business who has a body but no soul No, and your vision is what you see coming, you know in the future What what your dream is like creating the happiest place on earth was the vision? Yeah And the mission of Disneyland was to create a theme park, which would allow that to be done. And they did that in an Orange Grove area in Southern California and then grew from there. I think people, when you reference Disney, I don’t think a lot of people realize, I think we know about it, but I don’t think we realize that what Disney was at the very foundation, when he got it going with his brother Roy and it started taking off, it was a bunch of men and women who were drawing the same thing different by what 1% over and over and over and over so you can flip it yeah fast enough to make so I think to make like a animated cartoon a second of animation took however many drawings I mean it was an insane and if you weren’t motivated if you didn’t know the motive you wouldn’t have done that he couldn’t find well it a good way to use that analogy is the story drove the motion. So if I’m drawing a mouse and I have to have the mouse’s hand go like this, I’ve got to know why. Because that’s got to fit into the storyline that’s going to advance this cartoon feature to get to wherever I want it to go. It’s unbelievable to me when you’re talking about this because there’s so many people watching this right now who go, well, I just heard this the other day and it’s speaking to me. It blew my mind. I was listening to people talk and one manager says, you just can’t manage millennials. You just can’t. I can’t do it. It was a print shop. You just can’t do it. They don’t care. All they want to do is get their little tattoos and eat their granola and recycle stuff and I’ve got to get them to work. And then you hear another guy talking about how you can’t manage baby boomers. These are people that are already set in their ways. You can’t teach them anything. You hear these different camps. But if you think about it, Disney taught artists. Artists couldn’t be, I mean, if you’re watching this and you’re artistic, you know what I’m talking about. Motive matters for artists. And he had a huge facility filled with artists who were diligently drawing the same image slightly different all day. And not computer generated. It was all by hand. But I mean, if you didn’t have a motive there, Disney’s not possible. Right. So I think a lot of people, if we’re being honest, if we were giving the keys to Disney, if Disney says, here you go, you can take over, we might not have been able to do it without the understanding of motive. I mean, it would just completely fall apart. Well, let’s use something more down to earth for most people, and that is an auto repair shop. One of my clients is the Automatic Transmission Rebuilders Association. So I work with people who own transmission rebuilding facilities, shops. And you know, you might, if you were one of them, say, well, how does this relate to me? I fix transmissions. No, you don’t. I mean, that’s a function you perform. But what you do as a transmission rebuilder is you get people back to where their transportation works and they can rely on it without fear. Right. And they don’t have to worry and have backup plans for getting across the state to another city because they’re not sure whether their transmission would make it. So it’s not about fixing a transmission, it’s about getting that person back to mobility with that vehicle at an affordable level in a short period of time. It’s about satisfying needs. Everybody watching this right now, that’s something we can all do. We can say, why should we open our doors tomorrow? Why should we do it? We really want to find that motive. And then the vision is you’re saying, you’re casting a vision saying, this is where we want to be in the future. This is how we’re going to get here. Well, I want to get into this because I want the thrivers to know you can’t manage high velocity people. You can’t manage moderate velocity people. You can’t manage any kind of person for a sustainable time. You can’t do it if you don’t have your organizational DNA together. You just can’t because people are going to go find another job where they find their why and they find that. Well, yeah, look at the surveys that have been done about job satisfaction. There’s an enormous percentage of the population that are finding their jobs meaningless. They do it because they got to have a job, got to work somewhere, you know, got to do it. And that was me years ago. You know, I’ve been in that position. And what’s interesting about America, without getting on off a huge rabbit trail on this, but about America, a lot of the reasons why we did things before is that we wanted to, we’re like, well, I’m thankful for any job because I have to find a way to pay my bills. And now people have found other ways to pay their bills. And so now I’d rather go work as a barista, as an entry-level job, than work in a factory as an entry-level job, because maybe I have more meaning in connecting with people as a barista. And all these studies are showing that the younger demographic, the millennials, really do want to know why. It really does matter. It’s a huge thing. I had more fun working in a drive-in movie back when they still had drive-in movies everywhere in the concession stand than I did when I worked in a factory one summer. Hated the factory work. Really? Loved the work at the drive-in movie because of the customer interaction and the variety of activities. Well, you talk now, the next couple of things you mentioned was standards and systems. Can you dive into standards, what you’re talking about? Well, standards, we will do this at this quality level. So if you’re producing neckties, then you want to make sure that all the neckties fit an exact size range, color, pattern, texture, that you’re always using the same kind of fabrics for the same kind of things, and that they’re sewn in exactly the same way, not approximately, unless you’re doing handmade and that’s your unique thing, you know. Then you say, this is made by Mott on Tuesday, the 5th of July, you know, then that’s fine. But the standards you set are like the quality that you have committed to sustain. At the Four Seasons Hotel, their standards are very high. At, say, Holiday Inn, they have high standards, but nothing like Four Seasons. There’s a noticeable gap between the two. I have to talk about this for a second. There’s one Thriver named Andy. Andy, if you’re watching, we stayed at his La Quinta in Rochester, Minnesota. Now, I’m not dogging Minnesota. If you’re watching this and you live in Minnesota, that’s great. I actually grew up in west of Minneapolis, a town called Cocado with 2,038 people, right by the world’s largest ball of twine, which I’m sure you’ve been to for vacation. No, but I’ve seen a photograph of it with a motorcycle touring guy standing next to it. It’s something. Well, this guy, Andy, though, we get to the La Quinta. Now, a La Quinta, I’m not disrespecting the brand. I’m just saying I have stayed in four seasons and I have stayed in a La Quinta. So my expectation level when I pulled in was a certain expectation. And it’s set by the company’s own standards. There you go. Because they’re not going to build a marble foyer for a La Quinta when they can do fine with granite. Here’s what wrecked my mind. This is what happened. I’m there and I walk in and it is like a Disneyland fused with his La Quinta and this guy owns a La Quinta and he decided he bought a franchise and he decided to take all of the elements that Lee Cockerell, one of our Thrive mentors, he used to manage Walt Disney World, he took all of these Thrive nuggets on management and customer service and he implemented it. So I checked in, my name is printed on a insert there on this glass thing it says Mr. Clay Clark and then Mr. Thompson, all these different people and they’re, are you Mr. Clark? They knew when I was flying in because of my air flight. When I got there they knew when my plane was landing, they knew who I was, they had a little note on my little pillow with the note. I mean just unbelievable. And I just thought… And things that didn’t cost a lot on their part, it just took raising their own standards and agreeing to do things more fully than others do. And I get motion sickness. And so the lady, she says, I understand you get motion sickness. I said, sure. She says, do you want something to eat? Which is, you know, boom, all of a sudden, I didn’t have to pay for it. She just gave me something from the little concession area. I just was so amazed. Well, then I get to the speaking event and there is probably a dozen people that are talking about how great his La Quinta is. They’re going, would you believe that La Quinta? And it was just inspiring. And so just like that one speaker helped inspire you and change your direction, I thought it was great to see how Andy was applying these principles that anyone can do. But it’s just setting a standard that is higher than. So if you’re watching this right now, an action item is just ratchet up those standards. Get it out there. It doesn’t hurt anybody to offer a little more value and a little more service. And staying in Minnesota, I’ve heard, I haven’t personally been there to the events, but I’ve heard that the baseball games of the St. Paul Saints are packed and always great fun no matter what the game is like. This is true. Now this next thing is systems. Let’s talk about the systems, because if I have a mission, and I have a vision, I’ve got my values, I’ve got my beliefs, I’ve got these great standards, but I don’t have any systems. I’m just going, hey, you know, put that over there and try to do this. And hey, do you have a checklist? No. No. And what happens in a business without a system? Well, the same thing that happens to a pilot who doesn’t have a checklist. You know, when you’re getting in that plane, it’s life or death if you mess it up, right? So you need a system that you commit to. Every time I get in this plane, I’m going to go down this checklist. And I’m not going to just do it to get an A in checklist. I’m going to do it to make sure the flaps work, that this works, that works, that works, that works, that works, and I’m going to actually look and see every single time I fly the plane. And I’m going to do a walk around and I’m not going to just do it so other people see me do it. I’m going to do it to see if this plane’s ready to carry human life to another location through weather. Right? So that’s the whole point. Systems are the tools we use to get our intentions into reality. Can you say that one more time? Systems are the tools we use to get our intentions into reality. Here’s another way to think about it. Systems are to an organization as habits are to an individual. So a system is an organizational habit pattern. And it takes a while to develop a habit. There’s a book called the Checklist Manifesto and that book, you’d love this book, but they study major commercial builders. They study John Hopkins University, the hospital there. They study all these different organizations and they found that by studying hospitals all around the world that fully one-third of all of the infections and all of the things they had were caused by a doctor who was not required to use a checklist. And it was simple stuff washing your hands. So they began… And it’s the level of washing your hands. I was trained as an army medic and a hospital corpsman. And so I learned how to scrub and how to go for sterile. And then I worked after high school, I worked in a hospital as an autoclave orderly. I ran a machine that sterilized surgical equipment. And thinking back, nobody ever told me how important my job was. They just told me how to do it. But if I were managing me in that role today, I would say, Jim, the reason this matters is after these instruments come out of this autoclave and go upstairs to the surgery, third floor, someone’s gonna use these to perform surgery on another individual. And if infection is allowed to stay in there and get carried through that instrument, that person could potentially die or be disabled as a result of this surgery. All of a sudden it matters. What you do, Jim, is a life or death action in this food chain. There is a friend of mine who owns a Chick-fil-A, is one of our Thrive mentors. And they have a video that Chick-fil-A has produced. And what it does is it shows the customers walking in. And it shows you their inner dialogue. So you see a customer, but you can see their inner dialogue. Well, they show it. It’s unbelievable, but it shows one person. This is a person who just got divorced, and they’re with their kid, and the divorce just happened. There’s another person who has been diagnosed with a terminal illness, somebody else who just got married, somebody else who just bought a house, someone who’s looking to buy a house, someone who has to get to work, somebody who… And you hear their inner dialogue. It talks about how every person that you’re serving matters, because you don’t know how that interaction could impact somebody. Someone might come into the Chick-fil-A upset because they just had a divorce or they just got diagnosed, but you can lift them up. And what’s interesting is Arthur, with that mindset of why it matters, a young family came in there and they have a boy who has nonverbal cerebral palsy. His name is Keith, so he can’t talk. He actually uses his eyes to look into a machine, and he looks at it, and it reads his eyes, and it allows him to type the letters. And he can talk. His name’s Keith Boyd. If you get a chance to look it up, he was written about in the Huffington Post, the Thrive team sent him out. But Arthur met this family, and he knows that every customer matters. So he pulls him aside and says, how are you guys? And where are you from? And what’s going on? Can I get you a drink? Well, long story short, he finds out that this kid, Keith, wants to raise, I don’t remember the exact number, I think it was $200,000 for the Little Lighthouse, the organization that gave him the machine that allows him to now communicate using his eyes. And so Arthur took the time to connect. The next thing you know, it ignited this whole movement in Tulsa. And in Tulsa, in one summer, they raised almost $200,000 for the Little Lighthouse. And now Keith’s lemonade, you can buy it and I think a hundred different stores all across the country now. Outstanding, I’ll look for it. Yeah, you have to do it. What a great cause to support and notice I didn’t say I want lemonade, I love lemonade, I’ll probably buy some of that lemonade because I’ve heard it’s so good. The reason I would buy that lemonade is support the cause. In other words, the why we should go back to work tomorrow. And this is why we should open our doors today? This is why I want to harp on this because we study high velocity and we study medium velocity and then we go into moderate velocity and then we say, I don’t have a mission, vision, values, belief, standards, or systems. What if I’m a low velocity type? Then it’s not going to work. And so you might, a whole homework, I encourage everybody to time out, get this done, get this organizational DNA, get it in there, get the heart pumping, get the energy moving, and now let’s talk about, assuming we have that, assuming we have that, now let’s talk about managing these low velocity folks. Now low velocity people, from your book, I’m just going to read the description, because it’s magical. It says, you are driven primarily by immediate needs or by others. You find work generally demotivating. You prefer to work as a team player rather than be a solo performer or leader of the team. You prefer that someone else take the lead. You seldom set big goals. You have mild aspirations, not lofty ones. You really don’t like competition, avoiding it if possible. You use your energy to take things as they come. You’re casual about your leisure time, which you use to pursue personal or social interests, you enjoy occasional inactivity and appreciate your downtime. How do we manage these people? Well, the first thing, they’ve got to see that what they’re doing matters enough for them to engage in it. So you’ve got to start with why it matters, and then show them how you want things done. In other words, what are the standards and the systems that have grown from those standards? And then allow them to work at their pace, which is going to be a more unimpressive pace, you know, just like a routine in a factory or in a production line or something like that. You can find, have you ever gone in a coffee shop and you’ve seen a barista who is taking 20 orders a second it seems like and at the and double latte, mocha, decaf, you know, whatever. Grande. With room for cream. Yeah. And another thing right next to it, and just, you know, Yeah, I’ve seen that, it’s amazing. high velocity types. And then you see the one that says, good morning, your name’s Clay, isn’t it? Nice to see you again. What would you like today? And you say, well, I’m kind of in a hurry. I’d like a, you know, a double decaf with a shot of vanilla flavor and give me a croissant. And they say, OK, I’ll be right back with you. And they go over and they start. And you’re thinking, could you hurry up? And they’re just going at a normal pace that wouldn’t bother anybody except someone who’s in a hurry. There’s a place in Tulsa that serves unbelievable coffee. But what the guy does is he like hand makes the, you know what I mean, if you ask for like an espresso or something, this is a nice bean. Let’s see if that’s what he’s doing. He’s grinding the deal. He’s pulverizing the deal. He’s doing the thing. And I just think so. Let me just say if I own it, if we go back to that cosmetic surgeon example, 10 employees, what percentage or how many of those 10 are probably low velocity out of 10 typically? Oh, that’s probably going to be a couple of them out of that. So maybe 20 percent of 20 percent. Yeah. And so there’s 20 percent. They’re like, hey, what’s going on boss? How you doing? Okay, and they show up for work. They you know, is it fine? But they’re not gonna be all wait if they start at 8 o’clock. They’re not always gonna be there at 8 o’clock Okay, because low velocity person says well, you know 8 o’clock’s when we start so, you know, I’ll leave home 755 So let me ask you this how they get there at 8 o 5 and they think well Why is he so concerned because I was here. How do you see? There wasn’t any fire. Well here’s kind of the problem you have is most of the time if you get promoted in a job you’ve probably have been a moderate or high velocity person to get promoted. Yeah. Usually the boss, the guy who owns it, in this case let’s say this cosmetic surgeon, he owns the place. He’s bringing high velocity every day. He’s let’s go. Yeah. He probably just finished listening to one of your self-help audio books or he just finished reading the acorn, you know, principal, he is pumped, he is ready to go. He’s got the latest medical journal things in his ear. He’s ready to go. He’s walking down the hallway. And then he runs in and he encounters the low velocity. Yeah. How should he manage this person? How, why would he, how should he not? How should he not do it? Well, he should not expect that person to be able to turn up the volume and be higher velocity while they’re on the job. Because that’s the thing, when you’re higher velocity you tend to Well, actually when you’re in any of these groups you tend to project Your preferred style on to them. They should be like me. Yeah, they should be my way you know, it’s like I remember when Paula and I first married her velocity is lower than mine and And she would say why why are you always so? intense. You know, why? Why? You’re greedy. I said, greedy? She said, well, not greedy, but you know, you want a lot. I said, well, that’s ambition. Yeah. Yeah. Why are you so ambitious? Why are you so ambitious? Yeah, because I’m, I don’t know. But that’s what makes my life feel good, you know, and she just didn’t understand it at first. And she’s obviously gotten to know me over the years and we’ve got a wonderful relationship. We’ve been married 45 years this summer. Congratulations. Thank you. Yeah. And so you don’t have to marry a person with the same velocity. In fact, if you do, there’s a little bit of danger to that because low velocity marries low velocity and neither one of them does nearly as much. And there’s very little initiative taken and they’re waiting to defer to the other person. Well, I thought you were going to do that. Oh, well, I was waiting, you know, cause I thought you’d want to. Or, you know, no one said anything. So I didn’t think it mattered that much. That’s the whole point. A low velocity person, main thing to think about, they need an activator. They need an activator. You, the manager. So I had a person working for me, a woman, this was in San Diego years ago, and she was a delight to work with. Low velocity, but an absolute delight. She was my personal assistant. So she was the one that did my correspondence, handled my phone calls, you know. Yeah, made you look good. Had a very important job in my company. Yeah. And I dealt with her every day, off and on all day long. But there was one factor in her, or one feature, I guess, in her behavior pattern that just drove me nuts. When she would finish a task, she would go into neutral. It was like the car just ran out of gas. Just done. Yeah. And so she’d sit there and, you know, she might pick up something and read, or she might diddle around in the computer on one of those little games that, you know, that you can play that’s built into the computer when you buy it. And I would go up to her and say, what are you doing? I was done with that project a while ago. Yeah, but it’s not done. There are lots of other projects. Oh, what would you like me to do? So she’s perfectly willing to engage, but she needed an activator, me, to initiate that next one. So I had to constantly assure that she saw the list of the things that needed her attention. You had to stay ahead of it. Yeah, so it takes a little more effort on your part to manage a low-velocity person. That’s why you’ve got to be careful with any person, what position you put them into, and what kind of management process you use for that person, because you do not manage cats the way you manage dogs. Mmm. Well, you know, that’s why my cat won’t sit. I’m always like, just sit. Correct. And the cat looks at you like, what? I’m gonna stop trying to train my cat and stop trying to eat that fruit after today’s lesson. If you’re watching this, you’re high-velocity. You, as soon as you’re done with your job, you’re now looking for something else to do for psychological reasons. You just emotionally have to do stuff. That’s why vacations make me crazy. But I have to just go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go, go. And then the low velocity is like, all right, cool. Let’s lay out on the beach. And I’m like, let’s big deal. Let’s excavate the beach. Let’s build something on the beach. So you have these different personality types. I think one word that I think is dangerous for an organization, and I want to have you unpack this, is when you see two different velocity groups get annoyed with the other. And I see this a lot where you see, and we’re going to go with this cosmetic surgeon example, but he’s a high velocity guy and he’s now annoyed with the low velocity. Once that happens, once you cross that line of kind of the respect starts to erode, talk to me about the danger of instead of working with all these three different groups, if you start to get annoyed or you said judgmental. Well, that’s the judgment because judgment pollutes the relationship. Okay. And you’ve got to remove it in order to get on with the relationship. So you can’t feign a lack of judgment like if If I believe that my co-worker is Low velocity and shouldn’t be yeah, they should fix themselves get out the taser. That’s just the wrong way to be then Like this woman that worked with me in San Diego There was no way I was going to change her velocity, but I could change her performance on the job. By identifying the standards and the systems, getting her to agree to it, and by supervising her more, then I would supervise someone who was self-starting. So you’re not going to change the person, but you can change the quality of the work they produce through those standards. But if you believe, you know, because they’re not coming up with new ideas. Slow in the mind. Yeah, you know, that’s just… They’re just slow in the mind. And that’s not a fact. That’s your judgment of them because their pattern is different from you. Right. If you do that, then you’re never going to activate them because, first off, they don’t… they realize you don’t respect them. They don’t see any reason to care about you or the work that they’re doing for you. Okay. Because if you don’t care about them, to heck with you. And oh, by the way, I don’t feel very well. I’m calling in sick. Oh, yeah. And they’re not sick, but they’re not at work. So they’re better. Yeah. I remember having a job years ago that I was miserable in the job. It was a bill collector job at a bank. And I hated that every call I made was a call that was adversarial. Yeah. And I would take longer than necessary breaks just to get the stress level down. You’re in the restroom for like three hours. Are you okay, Jim? Actually, I would go to the restroom and stand there and look out the window at the traffic. Instead, it was on the ninth floor, so I’d watch the traffic down below. And I’d stand there. I had no reason to use the restroom except as an escape. And I’m standing there watching traffic for five or 10 minutes, whatever I think I can get away with. And then I go back to work. And I did my work, but I hated my work. I remember at Target. Oh, and it’s even worse. I didn’t respect my boss because I had had to collect off him at a previous company. Oh, really? He was a personal bad debt guy, and yet had gotten a job as the manager of a bill collection department in a bank and I was working there. Yeah. Yeah I just remember when I worked at Target we had pretzel gate where a lot of us we didn’t like the manager and we didn’t want we didn’t want to do our job. Yeah. So we would he’d say you cannot eat pretzels during shifts. Like absolutely. And then all of us would go up there and just like you know that guy who ate all the pretzel. We don’t know you know we just it was a way like therapeutically We didn’t the manager. We didn’t he didn’t motivate us We were annoyed by him there wasn’t and this is just this right here no matter what your ideas matter What kind of business you have you have to be able to manage people of all different velocities and you can’t let me interrupt Yeah, sure The military I was in the army During the Vietnam era I didn’t go to Vietnam. I served in the National Guard and the Army Reserve and went to officers’ candidate school and became an infantry training officer. But I was initially trained as a combat medic and hospital corpsman. And I remember, you know, that platoon or company that I was in and the platoon that I was individually assigned to was a mix of every kind of velocity you can imagine. And we had people that would never do more than it was absolutely necessary Right and people that would always be the first one. They’re trying to you know lead the world. Yeah If our sergeant Hadn’t reminded us constantly that what you’re doing will be a life-or-death Skill or habit when you get across the pond to Vietnam. If they hadn’t reminded us of that, many of the things we went through we would have done for compliance only. OK, this is the move you wanted with the bayonet. This is the thing you want me to do. OK, what’s the least slow I can run in order to complete it? Yeah. Yeah. Man, that’s the whole point. You’ve got to constantly remind people of why what they’re doing matters. I would say this, if you’re watching this and you’re a leader or manager, why do you have to keep talking about why? Because this is the heartbeat of your business. And so some action items I want to encourage everybody watching this to do, I have a whole bunch of them here for you, but one is I encourage you to look at your staff and try to figure out the velocity of these people. It might be something you develop over a few months or you might have observed them enough to already know, but figure out the velocity types of all your employees. Make sure you do that so you know where they’re at. But kind of figure out who these folks are. Go ahead and put it on paper so you get an idea of who they are and what kind of personality types. The next thing we need to do is we need to get our organizational DNA together. And I bet you, if you’re being honest, I bet you nine out of 10 of us watching this right now, we do not have our mission statement written down. We do not have a vision written down. We do not have our values written down, and we don’t have our beliefs written down. We need to write down all of those things. We need to do that, and it’s going to take some time. So figure out when are you going to do it. When are you going to schedule it? And every one of those should be the drivers for the systems you create. So the system should always grow from the vision, the mission, vision, and values and beliefs, instead of coming up with a system because it’s efficient. Don’t screw this up. Don’t do the standards and systems first. You want to get your vision, your values and beliefs. Then we want to work on our standards and systems. Once you have that and you know who your people are, you’re going to begin to experience so much more growth in the organization. You’re going to start to see more prosperity, more profits. You’re going to see a happier work environment. Things are all going to change. People are going to start bringing a lot more initiative and a lot more contribution to their work. They’ll be engaged because they care. Well, you know, and in closing, I just want to make sure everybody’s hearing this. We’re talking about today is it requires a lot of sweat equity, a lot of time, but we didn’t say go buy this thing because I’m telling you, I work with you guys, small business owners all over the world. I know where you live. And a lot of times, it’s we want to buy the new thing. We’re like, if I can just get everybody up on this new software, then we’re going to start, or if I can just buy everyone new desks. Hey, there’s an app for that. There you go. So I just encourage you to go ahead and take these action items. We’re going to transform your organization. And Jim, I can’t tell you, thank you enough for letting us come into your home. You are a living legend, and you’ve won this Golden Gavel Award that, again, I’m amazed. Walter Cronkite has won this award. You’ve got Robert Shuler has won this award. I mean you are in a… Earl Nightingale has won this award. I mean you’re in rare air my friend. So thank you for just taking the time out of your schedule to allow us to be here with you today. Oh, it’s a treat. I love this conversation. Thank you. Alright JT, so hypothetically, in your mind, what is the purpose of having a business? To get you to your goals. So it’s a vehicle to get you to your destination. And would you need profits to get there? I mean, when you have a business that’s successful and you’re in your mind and your expert opinion, would you need profits to get you to your goals? Yeah, because if you have a $15 million business, but you have $15 million of expenses, it’s kind of pointless. Holy crap. All right, so the question I would have here for you if you can take like 10 minutes or less and see if you could save 3,000 bucks a year by reducing your credit card fees. Would you do it? Yes, absolutely Why would somebody out there who’s listening right now who has a sane mind why would they not Go to thrive timeshare.com forward slash credit dash card thrive timeshare.com forward slash credit dash card to schedule a 10 minute consultation to see if they can reduce their credit card fees by at least $3,000 a year. Why would they not do it? Yeah, why would they not do it? Maybe because they don’t understand how you set the website. This tree is a symbol of the spirit of the Griswold family Christmas. No, that’s clear. Okay, so that could be true. So I would encourage everybody to check out Thrivetimeshow.com forward slash credit dash card Thrivetimeshow.com forward slash credit dash card Thrivetimeshow.com forward slash credit dash card. What would be another reason why someone would not be willing to take 10 minutes to compare rates to see if they can save $3,000 or more on credit card fees? Maybe they think it is a waste of time and then it won’t. It’s not possible. There’s somebody out there that’s making more than $3,000 every 10 minutes and they’re like nah, that’s not worth my time. We gettin’ that rap money, we gettin’ that rap money The big goal, in my opinion, of building a business is to create time, freedom and financial freedom. And in order to do that, you have to maximize your profits. Holy crap! Now, one way to maximize your profits is to increase your revenue. Another way to do it is to decrease your expenses. It’s a profit deal! Takes the pressure off. JT, is there any other reason why somebody would not be willing to take 10 minutes It takes the pressure off. JT, is there any other reason why somebody would not be willing to take 10 minutes to compare rates to see if they could save a total of $3,000 a year on average? I am at a loss. I cannot think of any other. Shampoo is better. I go on first and clean the hair. Conditioner is better. I leave the hair silky and smooth. Oh, really, fool? Really? Uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh. Stop looking at me, swan. Well, let me tell you a good story here real quick. I actually, years ago, compared rates with this company here called IPS. It’s Integrated Payment Services. And I scheduled a consultation. I don’t know if I was skeptical, I just thought, whatever, I’ll take 10 minutes, I’ll compare rates. I can’t tell. You can tell me I’m a doctor. No, I mean, I’m just not sure. Why can’t you take a guess? Well, not for another two hours. You can’t take a guess for another two hours? And in my case, in my case, my particular case, I save over $20,000 a year. Holy crap. Wow. which is like groceries when my wife goes to the organic stores. Find everything you need today? Yeah. Great. Oh God. Everything okay ma’am? It’s just that you’ve only scanned a few items and it’s already 60 bucks. I’m so scared. Okay, I’m a trained professional ma’am. I’ve scanned a lot of groceries. I need you to stay with me. It’s just that my in-laws are in town and they want a charcuterie board. This isn’t going to be easy, so I need you to be brave, alright? What’s your name? Patricia. Patricia, alright. I need you to take a deep breath. We’re about to do the cheese. You know, that’s the difference between eating organic and not organic. So because my wife eats organic, I had to take the 10 minutes needed to compare rates to save the $20,000 a year on credit card fees just for one of my companies. One question, what’s the brand name of the clock? The brand name of the clock, Rod. Brand name of the clock. It’s an elegant from Ridgway. It’s from Ridgway. Ridgway. Ridgway. Ridgway. Let’s buy. Buy the clock. And sell the fireplace. I encourage everybody out there, go to thrivetimeshow.com forward slash credit dash card. You schedule a free consultation, request information. A member of our team will call you. They’ll schedule a free consultation. It should take you 10 minutes or less And they’re gonna compare rates and see if they can’t save you more than $3,000 a year Off of your credit card processing you were hoping what I wouldn’t know you money Oh, you don’t owe us money because at the end of the day at the end of the day The goal of the business is to create time freedom and financial freedom in order to do it in order to do that You need to create additional profits The number of new customers that we’ve had is up 411% over last year. We are Jared and Jennifer Johnson. We own Platinum Pest and Lawn and are located in Owasso, Oklahoma. We have been working with Thrive for business coaching for almost a year now. Yeah, so what we want to do is we want to share some wins with you guys that we’ve had by working with Thrive. First of all, we’re on the top page of Google now, okay? I just want to let you know what type of accomplishment this is. Our competition, Orkin, Terminex, they’re both $1.3 billion companies. They both have 2,000 to 3,000 pages of content attached to their website. So to basically go from virtually non-existent on Google to up on the top page is really saying something. But it’s come by being diligent to the systems that Thrive has, by being consistent and diligent on doing podcasts and staying on top of those podcasts to really help with getting up on what they’re listing and ranking there with Google. And also we’ve been trying to get Google reviews, you know, asking our customers for reviews. And now we’re the highest rated and most reviewed Pesce Monde company in the Tulsa area. And that’s really helped with our conversion rate. And the number of new customers that we’ve had is up 411% over last year. How much are we up? 411%. So 411% we’re up with, with our new customers. Amazing. Right. So not only do we have more customers calling in, we’re able to close those deals at a much higher rate than we were before. Right now, our closing rate is about 85 percent, and that’s largely due to, first of all, like our Google reviews that we’ve gotten. People really see that our customers are happy, but also we have a script that we follow. And so when customers call in, they get all the information that they need. That script has been refined time and time again. It wasn’t a one and done deal. It was a system that we followed with Thrive in the refining process and that has obviously the 411% shows that that system works. Yeah, so here’s a big one for you. So last week alone, our booking percentage was 91%. We actually booked more deals, more new customers last year than we did the first five months, or I’m sorry, we booked more deals last week than we did the first five months of last year from before we worked with Thrive. So again, we booked more deals last week than the first five months of last year. It’s incredible, but the reason why we have that success is by implementing the systems that Thrive has taught us and helped us out with. Some of those systems that we’ve implemented are group interviews. That way we’ve really been able to come up with a really great team. We’ve created and implemented checklists, that way everything gets done and it gets done right. It creates accountability, we’re able to make sure that everything gets done properly, both out in the field and also in our office. And also doing the podcast, like I said, the diligence and consistency in doing those in that system has really, really been a big blessing in our lives, and also, you know, it’s really shown that we’ve gotten a success from following those systems. So before working with Thrive, we were basically stuck. Really no new growth with our business, and we were in a rut. The last three years, our customer base had pretty much stayed the same. We weren’t shrinking, but we weren’t really growing either. Yeah, and so we didn’t really know where to go, what to do, how to get out of this rut that we’re in. But Thrive helped us with that. They implemented those systems, that they taught us those systems, they taught us the knowledge that we needed in order to succeed. Now it’s been a grind, absolutely, it’s been a grind this last year. But we’re getting those fruits from that hard work and the diligent effort that we’re able to put into it. So again, we were in a rut, Thrive helped us get out of that rut, and if you’re thinking about working with Thrive, quit thinking about it and just do it. Do the action, and you’ll get the results. It will take hard work and discipline, but that’s what it’s gonna take in order to really succeed. So, and we just wanna give a big shout out to Thrive, a big thank you out there to Thrive. We wouldn’t be where we’re at now without their help. Hi, I’m Dr. Mark Moore. I’m a pediatrician. Through our new digital marketing plan, we have seen a marked increase in the number of new patients that we’re seeing every month, year over year. One month, for example, we went from 110 new patients the previous year to over 180 new patients in the same month. And overall, our average is running about 40 to 42% increase month over month, year over year. The group of people required to implement our new digital marketing plan is immense, starting with a business coach, videographers, photographers, web designers. Back when I graduated dental school in 1985, nobody advertised. The only marketing that was ethically allowed in everybody’s eyes was mouth-to-mouth marketing. By choosing to use the services, you’re choosing to use a proof-and-turn-key marketing and coaching system that will grow your practice and get you the results that you’re looking for. I went to the University of Oklahoma College of Dentistry from 1983 to 1985. Hello, my name is Charles Colaw with Colaw Fitness. Today I want to tell you a little bit about Clay Clark and how I know Clay Clark. Clay Clark has been my business coach since 2017. He’s helped us grow from two locations to now six locations. We’re planning to do seven locations in seven years and then franchise. Clay’s done a great job of helping us navigate anything that has to do with like running the business, building the systems, the checklists, the workflows, the audits, how to navigate lease agreements, how to buy property, how to work with brokers and builders. This guy is just amazing. This kind of guy has worked in every single industry. He’s written books with like Lee Crockerill, head of Disney, with the 40,000 cast members. He’s friends with like Mike Lindell. He does Reawaken America tours where he does these tours all across the country where 10,000 or more people show up to some of these tours. On the day-to-day he does anywhere from about 160 companies. He’s at the top. He has a team of business coaches, videographers, and graphic designers, and web developers. They run 160 companies every single week. So think of this guy with a team of business coaches running 160 companies. So in the weekly, he’s running 160 companies. Every 6-8 weeks he’s doing Reawaken America tours. Every 6-8 weeks he’s also doing business conferences where 200 people show up and he teaches people a 13 step proven system that he’s done and worked with billionaires helping them grow their companies. I’ve seen guys from start-ups go from start-up to being multi-millionaires, teaching people how to get time freedom and financial freedom through the system. Critical thinking, document creation, organizing everything in their head to building into a franchisable, scalable business. One of his businesses has like 500 franchises. That’s just one of the companies or brands that he works with. Amazing guy, Elon Musk, kind of like smart guy. He kind of comes off sometimes as socially awkward, but he’s so brilliant and he’s taught me so much. When I say that, Clay doesn’t care what people think when you’re talking to him. He cares about where you’re going in your life and where he can get you to go. That’s what I like him most about him. He’s like a good coach. A coach isn’t just making you feel good all the time. A coach is actually helping you get to the best you. Clay has been an amazing business coach. Through the course of that we became friends. My most impressed with him is when I was shadowing him one time. We went into a business deal and listened to it. I got to shadow and listen to it. When we walked out I knew that he could make millions on the deal and they were super excited about working with him. He told me, he’s like, I’m not going to touch it. I’m going to turn it down because he knew it was going to harm the common good of people in the long run. The guy’s integrity just really wowed me. It brought tears to my eyes to see that this guy, his highest desire was to do what’s right and anyways, just an amazing man. So anyways, impacted me a lot. He’s helped navigate any time I’ve gotten nervous or worried about how to run the company or navigating competition and an economy that’s like, I remember, we got closed down for three months. He helped us navigate on how to stay open, how to get back open, how to just survive through all the COVID shutdowns, lockdowns. I’m Rachel with Tip Top K9, and we just want to give a huge thank you to Clay and Vanessa Clark. Hey guys, I’m Ryan with Tip Top K9. Just want to say a big thank you to Thrive 15. Thank you to Make Your Life Epic. We love you guys, we appreciate you, and really just appreciate how far you’ve taken us. This is our old house, right? This is where we used to live years ago. This is our old neighborhood. See? It’s nice, right? So this is my old van and our old school marketing and this is our old team and by team I mean it’s me and another guy. This is our new house with our new neighborhood. This is our new van with our new marketing and this is our new team. We went from four to 14 and I took this beautiful photo. We worked with several different business coaches in the past and they were all about helping Ryan sell better and just teaching sales, which is awesome, but Ryan is a really great salesman, so we didn’t need that We needed somebody to help us get everything that was in his head out Into systems into manuals and scripts and actually build a team so now that we have systems in place We’ve gone from one to ten locations in only a year in October 2016. We’ve grossed 13 grand for the whole month Right now it’s 2018 the month of October. It’s only the 22nd We’ve already grossed a little over 50 grand for the whole month and we still have time to go We’re just thankful for you thankful for thrive and your mentorship And we’re really thankful that you guys have helped us to grow a business that we run now instead of the business running us Just thank you. Thank you. Thank you times a thousand The thrive time show today interactive business workshops are the highest and most reviewed business workshops on the planet. You can learn the proven 13 point business system that Dr. Zellner and I have used over and over to start and grow successful companies. We get into the specifics, the specific steps on what you need to do to optimize your website. We’re going to teach you how to fix your conversion rate. We’re going to teach you how to do a social media marketing campaign that works. How do you raise capital? How do you get a small business loan? We teach you everything you need to know here during a two-day, 15-hour workshop. It’s all here for you. You work every day in your business, but for two days you can escape and work on your business and build these proven systems so now you can have a successful company that will produce both the time freedom and the financial freedom that you deserve. You’re going to leave energized, motivated, but you’re also going to leave empowered. The reason why I built these workshops is because, as an entrepreneur, I always wish that I had this. And because there wasn’t anything like this, I would go to these motivational seminars, no money down, real estate, Ponzi scheme, get motivated seminars, and they would never teach me anything. It was like you went there and you paid for the big chocolate Easter bunny, but inside of it, it was a hollow nothingness. And I wanted the knowledge, and they’re like, oh, but we’ll teach you the knowledge after our next workshop. And the great thing is we have nothing to upsell. At every workshop, we teach you what you need to know. There’s no one in the back of the room trying to sell you some next big, get rich quick, walk on hot coals product. It’s literally, we teach you the brass tacks, the specific stuff that you need to know to learn how to start and grow a business. I encourage you to not believe what I’m saying and I want you to Google the Z66 auto auction. I want you to Google elephant in the room. Look at Robert Zellner and Associates. Look them up and say are they successful because they’re geniuses or are they successful because they have a proven system? When you do that research you will discover that the same systems that we use in our own business can be used in your business. Come to Tulsa, book a ticket, and I guarantee you it’s going to be the best business workshop ever and we’re going to give you your money back if you don’t love it. We’ve built this facility for you and we’re excited to see you. If we go back eight years ago, think about the number of clients you had back then versus the number of clients you have now. As a percentage, what has been the growth over the past eight years, do you think? We’ve got to inspire somebody out there who just doesn’t have the time to listen to their calls. Well, okay, so Clay, it’s like I would go up and down from about $10,000 a month up to about $40,000, but it’s up and down roller coaster. And so now we’ve got it to where we’re in excess of 100 clients. That’s awesome. And so I would have anywhere from 5 clients to 20 clients on my own with networking, but I had no control over it. I didn’t, without the systems, you’re going to be victimized by your own business. For somebody out there who struggles with math, if you would say that your average number of clients was 30 and you go to 100, as a percentage, what is that? I have doubled every year since working with you. So I’ve doubled in clients, I’ve doubled in revenue every year. That’s 100% growth every year I’ve worked with. So I’m looking, we’ve been good friends 7, 8 years and I’ve got doubled 5 times. Which is just incredible. I mean the first time you do it, that’s one thing, but when you do it repeatedly, I mean that’s unbelievable. We’re working our blessed assurance off this year to double. We’re planning on doubling again. We’re incorporating some new things in there to really help us do it, but we are going to double again this year. I started coaching, but it would go up and down, Clay. That’s when I came to you, as I was going up and down, and I wanted to go up and up instead of up and down. So that’s when it needed a system. So creating a system is you have nailed down specific steps that you’re going to take no matter how you feel, no matter the results, you lean into them and you do them regardless of what’s happening. You lean into them and it will give you X number of leads. You follow up with those leads, it turns into sales. Well, I tell you, if you don’t have a script and you don’t have a system, then every day is a whole new creation. You’re creating a lot of energy just to figure out what are you going to do. The best executives, Peter Drucker is a father of modern management, he said, the most effective executives make one decision a year. What you do is you make a decision, what is your system? And then you work like the Dickens to make sure you follow that system And so that that’s really what it’s all about. So with a script here I you know, I we have a brand new gal that just can’t came in working for us She nailed down the script and she’s been nailing down appointments Usually we try to get one appointment for every hundred calls We make 200 to 300 calls a day per rep. And she’s been nailing down 5 and 8 appointments a day on that script. So she’s making how many calls a day? She’s making between 200 and 300 calls a day. And our relationship is weird in that we do… If someone were to buy an Apple computer today, or let’s say you buy a personal computer, a PC. The computer is made by, let’s say, Dell, but then the software in the computer would be Microsoft, let’s say, or Adobe or whatever that is. So I basically make the systems and you’re like the computer and I’m like the software. That’s kind of how I would describe our relationship. Tim, I want to ask you this. You and I reconnected, I think it was in the year 2000 and what was it, maybe 2010? Is that right? 2011 maybe? Or maybe further down the road, maybe 2013? 2012. Okay, so 2012, and at that time I was five years removed from the DJ business. And you were how many years removed from tax and accounting software? It was about 10, 11 years. We met, how did we meet? What was the first interaction? There was some interaction where you and I first connected. I just remember that somehow you and I went to Hideaway Pizza. But do you remember when we first reconnected? Yeah, well we had that speaking thing that… Oh there it was! So it’s Victory Christian Center. I was speaking there. My name is Robert Redman. I actually first met Clay almost three years ago to the day. I don’t know if he remembers it or not, but I wasn’t working with him at the time. I asked to see him and just ask him some questions to help, you know, direct my life to get some mentorship. But I’ve been working with Clay for now just over a year. The role I play here is a business coach, business consultant. I work with different businesses implementing best practice processes and systems that I have learned here by working with Clay. The experience working here has, to put it real plainly, has been just life-changing. I have not only learned new things and have gained new knowledge, but I have gained a whole new mindset that I believe, wherever I end up, will serve me well throughout the rest of my life. Since working with Clay, I have learned so much. I mean, I would like to say it was everything about business in terms of the different categories. I don’t learn it all, but I’ve learned all about marketing. I’ve learned about advertising. I’ve learned about branding. I’ve learned how to create a sales process for organizations in any industry. I’ve learned how to sell. I’ve learned how to create repeatable systems and processes and hold people accountable. You know how to hire people. It’s almost like every aspect of a business you can learn. I have learned a lot in those different categories. And then again, the the mindset that I’ve gained here has been huge. You know working here you can’t you can’t be a mediocre person. You are a call to a higher standard of excellence, and then as you’re called to that standard here, you begin to see those outcomes in every area of your life, that standard of excellence that you want to implement no matter what you’re involved in. I would like to describe the other people that work with Clay are people that are going somewhere with their life. Marshall, in the group interview, talks about how the best fits for this organization are the people that are goal-oriented. So they’re on their own trajectory, and we’re on our own trajectory. And the best fits are those people where there can be a mutually beneficial relationship, that as we pursue our goals, and we help the business pursue those goals, the business helps us pursue our goals as well. And so I would say people that are driven, people that want to make something of their lives, people that are goal-oriented, they’re focused, and they’re committed to overcoming any adversity that may come their way. Clay’s passion for helping business owners grow their businesses is, it’s unique in that I don’t know if there’s anyone else’s that can be as passionate. You know whenever a business starts working with Clay it’s almost as like Clay is running that business in the sense that he has something at stake. You know he’s just serving them they’re there’s one of his clients but it’s as if he is actively involved in the business. Whenever they have a win, he’s posting it all over his social media. He’s shouting it across the room here at Thrive. He’s sending people encouraging messages. He can be that life coach and business coach in terms of being that motivator and that champion for people’s businesses. It’s again unique because there’s no one else I’ve seen get so excited about and passionate about other people’s businesses. The kind of people that wouldn’t like working with Clay are people that are satisfied with with mediocrity, people that want to get through life by just doing enough, by just getting by, people who are not looking to develop themselves, people who are not coachable, people who think that they know it all and they’re unwilling to change. I would say those are the type of people. And in short, anyone that’s content with mediocrity would not like working with Clay. So if you’re meeting Clay for the first time, the advice I’d give you is definitely come ready to take tons of notes. Every time Clay speaks, he gives you a wealth of knowledge that you don’t want to miss. I remember the first time that I met Clay. I literally carried a notebook with me all around. I was looking at this notebook the other day actually. I carried a notebook with me all around and I just took tons of notes. I filled the entire notebook in about three or four months just from being around Clay, following him and learning from him. And then I would say come coachable. Be open to learning something new, be open to challenging yourself, be open to learning and adjusting parts about you be open to learning and adjusting parts about you that need to be adjusted.