Business Podcasts | How to Hire Quality People On the Planet NOW

Audio Transcription

Steve? Yes? Well, thanks for coming in today. Thank you for having me. Yeah, I appreciate you applying for the job. Always. When’s the earliest you could start, Tyler? Kyler. Mrs. Anderson? You can call me Marlene. Okay, Marlene, we appreciate you applying for the job. Thank you, I appreciate being here. Let’s just dive right in. Boom! Go! What’s your availability like? I’m boycotting Daylight Savings Time, so I’ll either be an hour early or an hour late, depending on the seasons. Tell me a little about yourself. My mom says I have to get a job, so that’s why I’m here, because she wants me to get a job. Why did you leave your last job? Of course, Harry, he was, he was, I just felt like he was looking at me in a particular way. Of course, he was blind, so I don’t know why I felt that. Why did you leave your last job, Steve? Fired. Next question. So what do you think you bring to the table? I can read people’s energies. Let me read your energy real quick. You’re a coyote. Congratulations. I don’t run errands and I don’t answer the phone. You know what I do? I look hot. 24, hot. Whatever you need, I can do it. Janitor, CEO, cook, I can do it all. And I have a lot of money. I have a lot of money. I have a lot of money. I have a lot of money. I have a lot of money. I have a lot of money. I have a lot of money. I have a lot of money. I have a lot of money. I have a lot of money. I have a lot of money. I have a lot of money. I have a lot of money. I have a lot of money. I have done it all and I will do it all. Okay, so you do have experience in all those areas. No, but I just believe I can do it. So availability, you know, that’s kind of a week to week thing for me. You know, I really just kind of like, we’ll see. So what do you consider your weaknesses? candy, snickers, Reese’s Pieces. Becky, I think we’re done here. Do I get the job? Alright, if you’re struggling to find good people, if you’re looking to find good people, then this is the show you want to listen to because a lot of people, a lot of business owners I run into, they tell me I can’t find good people and I have never had a hard time finding good people. So if you’re listening today and you’re going, you know, it’s hard for me to find employees, just know that it’s going to be actually very easy to find employees once you master the systems we’re going to teach on today’s show. Because no matter how great your systems are, nothing will work unless you can find good people to implement those systems. Again, nothing will work unless they will work. So if you’re out there today looking to find good people and you want to know how do you find good people, you know, how did Dr. Zellner and I staff the optometry clinic, a dog training franchise, a haircut franchise, a carpet cleaning franchise. How do we how do we do it? How do we find good people year after year? How do we do it? Well on today’s show we’re gonna break down the specific details of what we do to hire inspire train and retain Great people on today’s edition of the thrive time show here radio podcast down Grab the duct tape and mentally prepare yourself for yet another mind-expanding knowledge bomb from America’s number one business coach, Clay Clark. Recently I’ve had more and more members of the Thrive Nation asking me, Clay, what do you actually say at the group interview? How does the group interview look? Do you really interview all the candidates at the same time? Seriously? Every Wednesday at 6pm you interview everybody at the same time. How do you do it? When do you do it? Where do you do it? Why do you do it? How do you do it? What does it sound like? Well, I do it Wednesday nights at 6. Why do I do it? Because it’s efficient. Interviewing everybody at the same time is efficient. Where do I do it? At our office at 1100 Riverwalk Terrace in Jeeks, Oklahoma. Who attends? A lot of people. We have like 50 people confirmed say they’re going to be at the interview. And usually 10 to 15 show up. And last night we had a great group of people who attended the workshop and we found some really, really great people. So now let me further ado, this is my office and We’re hiring for a myriad of different positions and I’ll open it up for you guys to ask questions. So justice, is that right? I’ll start you so because you’re in the back. So justice What questions do you have? Sure, what position do you did you remember reading about online? Okay, cool. Let’s talk about that one. So marketing assistant Everybody if you’re looking for a product or service you typically search on Make probably What would you how would you find you want to go like you’re in Florida tonight? You’re gonna go to a movie or you’re gonna go What do you typically do to find people? Some people go to third-party vendors. What do you do? To search for what you want. That’s right. 94% of people bring their phones right now use Google for everything. But I think in any room, like 1% of 1% know how Google works. So I grew up crazy poor and I was in a company called DJConnection.com. It still exists. But I grew up really poor. I was 16, my dad was delivering pizzas. I’m 38, and my dad was 38, delivering pizzas. He had a degree from ORU, top of the class. Tom Clark. And my dad just didn’t know how, you know, you have a good business degree, but they don’t teach business. And so my dad, he was just crippled poor. And so my whole thing was like, I had to find a way to not be poor. So I started a DJ company out of my dorm room. Do you know why I started the DJ company in my dorm room? Because it was fun and you enjoyed it. And you were really good at it. It was something that was needed by the band. What do you think, Justice? I think it’s something that you love. Even if you enjoy it, it’s not as good as what you’re getting. And I’ll say I wish that it was that deep. It was like I’m crazy poor and the barrier of interest is pretty low and most DJs are terrible. So I’m like, even if I’m bad, I’m better than them. So I had a service called DJ Connection, this is my pitch, and your name is Barbara. So I’d say, Barbara, I’m gonna DJ for your wedding, your birthday, whatever, and it’s a dollar if you hire me, it’s a quick cost, and then if you’re happy, you can pay me based on your happiness. So if a 10, perfect 10, I’d love to get paid $600 because everybody else charges that. But if I’m terrible, it’s a dollar. And everyone charges four hours, I do unlimited time. And everyone’s like, are you kidding me? I go, nope. And I help you plan your wedding first. So pretty much every bride at every wedding show said yes, every single time. And I just grew it until I sold it. We were doing 4,000 weddings a year. So it was like big, you know, 80 weddings a weekend. And then my wife pointed out to me in 2006 or 5, I was Entrepreneur of the Year for the state of Oklahoma from the Small Business Administration. She’s like, you know, what you do works for other things. You shouldn’t be a DJ. I’m like, why? She’s like, because you’re a grown man. So we have five kids and I built that business and then I started teaching people how to grow their businesses but not in like a, and if you’re in a multi-level I’m not attacking you I’m saying not in a multi-level kind of way not a hundred percent Commission kind of way not in like get rich real estate kind of way but like hey you’re a chiropractor and let’s sell some stuff or hey you’re a homebuilder so now my client we worked with Maurice Canbar who is the founder of sky vodka you know so when he bought a third of downtown Tulsa if you look at my name clay Clark Tulsa world you’ll see the articles. We helped lease. Downtown used to be dead. We helped lease. We helped basically bring tenants downtown. The deals we did was Elote was the first downtown restaurant. Mayo Hotel, we worked with them with the bar and all that. Anyway, that’s what we did. Then people kept reaching out, reaching out, reaching out, reaching out, reaching out. Now we work with 160 clients. That’s the number, 160. 160 clients, most of them are not in Tulsa. And Shaw Homes is the largest home builder in Oklahoma. That’s one of our clients. Total Lending Concepts, that’s one of our clients. Barbie Cookies was one of our clients. Papa Gala’s Pizzeria is a client. Oxyfresh is a client. UPS has been a client. Maytag has been a client. So Ben, come on up here, Ben. Woo, this is Ben. Yeah, let’s hear it for Ben. Ben, yeah. Ben, where were you working at? How long have you been here? I’ve been here eight months. Before that, I was at Lowe’s for eight months. Before that, I was working as a handyman for about ten months. Oh, you shouldn’t have told me that. Oh, yeah. Oh, yeah. That’s great. That’s great. Oh, yeah. Can you do a lot? Is he handy? I’ve done ceiling fans. I can do drywalls and stuff. I hate tiling. No, no tiling. No, no. I just simply thought, my wife’s been like praying for a handyman. I said, here, Jesus, come in handyman. Anyway, so, and then Ben, where did you start? Like, what was your role first? I was on the search engine optimization team, so I write the search engine content, so the content that is going to be going on to the web page for all the clients. Had you ever done this before? I thought I was illiterate. I think I got C’s in high school and college, so I never thought I would ever be writing for my professional career. And what do you do now? I am the SEO, I think I promoted ZAR actually. ZAR, that’s the title. I’m the SEO ZAR. So I manage a team of eight now and they’re writing all day long. This is my job to make sure that the quality of the content is going to be good, make sure that there’s not going to be any duplicates because Google loathes duplicate content with a passion. So I load it with a passion. How much can you get paid per hour right now at your current rate? Current rate, I can do about 25 to 27 an hour. Questions? Yeah. Yes. So you said you’re writing. Are you writing like a literary artist? Or are you talking about programming? So I’m not programming. I don’t know that yet. But HTML? Yeah, so we use, so it’s called a Dragon Diction. So we just like speak it and instead of typing it, that would take forever. Plus I can’t spell. So but then we just talk. I just kind of write that content as in like Two five hundred word articles and let me tell you how this system was created. So you sit I was building DJ connection. I Hired Bruce Clay, which by the way eight grand a month is a lot of money contract twelve months I’m not bitter about it, but it’s expensive. I still pay him now, but it’s like a lot of money So you’re like I’m a DJ. Let me tell you about being a DJ you make a hundred and sixty seven dollars of profit a show If you charge 600. So you’re not making like, you know, you know what I mean? You’re getting like a, after I pay the DJs and the equipment breaks and hiring and sales and marketing, it’s about 150 bucks. Well it’s cool we’re doing 80 a weekend, but it’s still a lot of money, you know what I mean? So I’m going, there’s got to be a better way. There’s just got to, there’s just, oh, just, oh, you know. So I try to make it really affordable and so I used to type the articles and I wrote the best crap ever, man. It was like, oh, and just, you’re gonna love working with our DJs because we have just, I’m using big words like plethora, cornucopia, just, oh, it’s just fabulous. You’re like creative writing style? I was, we’re like working it. I thought that’s what mattered was, I thought having really good words was what it was at. I thought like, and my wife was like, have you ever asked women if they’ve ever read these things? And I’m like, because most people go to the website and call they don’t like a read your 40 page manifesto about DJing and so then I’m like wait a minute so that’s when I came with the dragon diction thing and then that’s kind of anyway so that’s how that worked but that any questions for Ben yes my quick interruption is two weeks hands-on. You’re getting paid the whole time, but two weeks is about how long it took you to… this is my right to… Two weeks, yeah. You’re still getting paid on your on the team right away. Yeah, we saw I think there’s a someone the third day on and so they’re slowly picking up little by little. We had a young lady today who is great and I think her head was gonna explode because it’s like her second day or third day of nice lady. But it’s like, you know, you’ve never done it before. And it’s like riding a bike. And unless you’re a weird person, you don’t mock babies that are learning to walk. Oh, look at the baby. Look at this stupid baby. You know, lazy baby. You just, you kind of coach up, mentor up. You know, you teach. Right. Yeah. So that’s, that’s, that’s the vibe there. So you learn that. And then one day Ben was like, hey, check it out. My wife is smart. And I go, your wife is smart, what is this? Smarter than me. And then, you know, I’m like, well, let’s meet said person. So I’m going to bring up your wife. Is that cool? So you gotta go in now. This was super bad. All right. Now, this is Amelia, and she happens to be married to that guy. And can you explain your path? How long you been here? What you do now? I’ve been here for about six and a half months. I started in Elephant in the Room call center, and then I moved from there to sales. And then from sales, I’m now in coaching, so I’ve got my first three clients this past week, so I’m doing coaching now. Any questions for Amelia? She’s been here a while, but not super long. No? Six and a half-ish. Six and a half months. Oh, good for you. That’s a lot to take over in less than that much. Yeah, no, she’s going through very fast. She’s plowing through it probably the fastest rate of anybody we’ve had so far. So but that’s only because it bends her life coach and just like telling her what to do. Yeah so Clay writes all the pathways that’s like their business plan. You sir what questions you have what is your name? Jacques. How you feeling? Z H A J. Z-H-A-J. Z-H-A-J? Yeah. Zha. Yeah. Is that like a family name? Is this common? Not very common in my culture, but… What does it mean? It means dragon. That’s cool. Can you give him a copy of Dragon Energy? My new book is called Dragon Energy. Oh, yeah? Oh, yeah. Any questions for Amelia about that? Because she’s here. That’s why I have her here. Because she can tell you you ask for anything yeah can you explain who you were calling for though yeah so it’s for a company called security systems they’re a client of ours so they actually contract out their cold calling to us. So I would call their leads, they’re doing 100% of the work. We don’t cold call on behalf of my business, we call on behalf of our clients. Because a lot of our clients are afraid of the phone at first. We actually explain to them, nobody woke up today with a desire to pay you. And they’re like, huh? Nobody cares about your product, you’ve got to go call. And if it’s a retail store, you’ve got to get in front of them you know every business has its own path but it’s but for digi they did the security systems for the gathering place oh it’s you oh you be okay and they get all their accounts by cold call so she’s calling on their behalf that makes sense the other call center would be for elephant in the room so that’s men’s grooming lounge yeah so there no matter which location you’re going to, the calls all come in to us. And if you move to Denver, the company I’ve worked with for a long time up there, Denver, my partner that I, he and I have an elephant in the room together. The other business though is called Oxifresh and there’s 406 locations, carpet cleaning, and there’s a major call center that books like 8,000 carpets a day. A lot of carpets. So that’s, yeah. But inbound calls for elephant room, basically. Any other questions? You feeling good? Okay. And it’s Zha. Am I saying that right? Yeah, that’s right. Okay, sure. And what is your culture, by the way? You said your culture. What’s your culture? Monk? Monk? Monk. And where, how, were you born here in this country? Yeah. Okay. I grew up in the dark, so my excuse is monk. Are your parents first-generation immigrants? Uh, I’m not too sure. Okay. Maybe my grandparents are. Okay, cool. Awesome. Excited. John, okay. So, Jacques. Jacques. You had a question? Yeah, I’m just curious if I did get the job, how long would I have to get everything in order to move up here. I don’t live in Oklahoma. And what’s your name? Roy. And you drove here from where Roy? Just south of Houston. Really? For this interview? Yes. How did you hear about us? Online. I saw something that said, it was about graphic design. And I looked into what the company was and did a little research and it looked really great. We have about half a million people listen to our podcast. I don’t think the workshops you were at but Sean were you the one we had people from Guam here? Yeah, two of them. So we have people from Guam and Canada and Australia. I’m always amazed though because you never know with the podcast where it’s going to reach. We hit number one on iTunes six times so we get different people that find it. How far did you drive? Nine hours. That’s impressive. What are you doing now? Where do you go to college? I’m super impressed. Okay, and you’re a graphic design guy? Got it. To answer your question, what we do is we have a thing called a shadow process. Is it Carol? Is that right? Barbara, why would I say Carol? I’m not… Boo! Okay, so Barbara. So what we do is we have you guys shadow. So if it was like, we go through all the resumes and I want to meet you because I go through them and I kind of want to like put a face with the resume and figure all that. And then we’ll call you guys tomorrow like by 9 if it’s something I want to move forward I’d like to get your aura and we have a lot of people I’m the one always meets everybody but then we’d have a shadow where you guys you we’re gonna shadow like for an hour or two I thought they’ll just plan on like from 9 to 12 but you don’t have to do the whole time necessarily and I’m just want you to meet everybody who would work here to see if you’d get along and that kind of thing you know and then Barbara what Barbara, what questions do you have? How did you hear about this place? Oh, my mother-in-law. Cool. Yeah. Yeah. What are you, what questions do you have? Yeah. Well, I have, I will basically the search engine optimization role the marketing assistant that role is open today tonight it’s very dynamic though because there’s always growing so there’s a lot of people coming up like Google it was hiring but then you have the sales thing I think I don’t think we have a position open to that time right yeah but we do have, I think, three spots we’re looking for currently tonight. So, but any other questions you have about what we do up here? So, Mike, do you have a family name that describes that name? Do you have something with an author? Yes, I do. My attorney represents TD Jakes and Joe Loestein and Craig Rochelle, and somehow he got stuck with me. And we handle all the marketing for them too. And they are looking for somebody who’s really, really sharp to fill a long-term position. It’s benefits, it’s, but they want people who’ve been on the planet a longer period of time, because if you were born yesterday, one might think that, oh, this person has the best of intentions. And if you’re working for a law firm, there’s always kind of squirreliness. So they want people that are mature and kind of dress sharp. That’s just what they’re looking for. People are detailed. And yes, and so that position just came open yesterday. So I know about that. I can be able to talk to you more about that. Any questions you have? What skills do you need to be on a big old kid? Skills? Just be crazy coachable, like off the charts coachable. And then try to go like years without yawning. Because it’s like a, it’s a, it goes fast in here. And so we’re meeting here after everyone’s gone home. But Monday through Thursday from 7 a.m. to 3 p.m. it’s like a sprint. And it’s just if you like energy and go you’d like it. But if you’re like I don’t like this. Now what is your name? My name is Terry. Terry. And what questions do you have Ms. Terry? Well I want… first of all I came here to make sure it wasn’t just a sales position. Because, like, I have two degrees in AAS and graphic communications and MBA in graphic design. Okay. And the reason why I feel like it’s sufficient to bring it up is because I’ve been looking for something like in the advertising world. Yeah. You know, now I have, I live in Fort Gibson because me and my husband own a ranch. Oh, cool. Okay. Yeah. And so I do all the ranching and stuff like that with him, and plus I do industrial design and stuff like that. But I’ve had a lot of ad agencies looking at me, but I didn’t want to relocate. Got it. You see what I’m saying? You don’t want to move. No. You want to stay where they’re gonna get the farm, the ranch, the husband, the whole thing? Yes. Okay, cool. Right, and he’s a literary artist. We were all in the, my daughter’s an artist. She’s in the Air Force on top of it. She also did her swans and the white bird and stuff like that. But I saw this on Indy. And I was like, this is probably an opportunity for me, but I wasn’t sure because all the positions that I looked like were graphic design positions. I want to grow, first of all. Well, there’s different kinds of, and I’ll just tell you this, and I’m not trying to be negative, my buddy owns a firm called Hampton that might suit what you want to do because it’s very artistic, very creative, and they do really cool stuff. I don’t view them as a competitor, but they are like… He wears a flower in his shirt. He’s very, I don’t know, fabulous. They have huge accounts, and that’s what he does. I’m all about helping people get un-poor real fast. I’m all about, that’s cool, we could spend seven weeks talking about the logo, but instead, I’m gonna just get you to the top of Google and make a bunch of money right now. And by the way, when you shoot your YouTube video today and make a performa and fire that guy and do this, and then they’re like, I’m more of like, you ever seen that show, The Prophet? Yes. I’m like, kinda like that. It’s like, no soup for you. It’s like a high energy, fast pace. It’s like, people are like, are you like a, what is your deal? I’m like a bowling ball. I just go, you know, just go. But the graphic design, typically more like, the high design, I would say Hampton and Cubic are probably the best in town for that. I’m probably more like low design, but fast design, and then make money for clients. Does that make sense? I mean, I count winning as like the client making more money than they’re paying me as soon as possible. That’s how I do it. Skills, but just super coachable. Being able to… Ben can talk to you more about that, but Ben you were at Lowe’s. I mean were you typing like a boss at Lowe’s? I was not. I was a moving lumber actually. And I have no discernible skills. I took algebra three times, ACT three times, my wife rejected me multiple times when I proposed. Crazy, it’s crazy how she said yes. Blindness, she’s got blindness, you can’t see. But all I’m saying is like that’s a, you don’t need a whole lot of skills, you need to have that grind, if that makes sense. Your name is? Alex. Alex, where are you from dude? Tulsa. Okay, okay. Any questions you have, sir? And what’s your name again? John. John, okay. John, any questions you have? Yep, true. Yep, graphic design and the marketing assistant will be SEO search engine. And those would be the two spots tonight. Two, they’re open for search engine tonight. Shaw Holmes is looking to hire somebody. Steve Curren is looking to hire somebody. I believe Nathan’s hiring somebody for the carpet side. Do you need one technician tonight? One or two? Yeah. And what does that pay approximately? Depending on the person that you make, $35, $40, $50, $100. Yeah, so I’m kind of a matchmaker. I try to find the right fit for the right people. So there’s a couple different spots there. And ma’am, your name? Lily. Lily, okay, Lily. And Lily, what questions do you have? You’re good? Okay, I respect that. And your name again, sir? Austin. Austin. What questions do you have? I’m just wanting to know more about the graphic design position. Okay, well what I’m going to do, I’m going to bring up Daisy here real quick. Amelia, I’m going to let you get back to being awesome over there. Hey, let’s hear it for Daisy. Thank you. Yeah, Daisy! Woo! How long have you been here? Two years. Okay, what were you doing before you were here? So, before I was here, I did a, I was in education, which is surprisingly soul-sucking. Oh. But no, I love the kids. The politics and the bureaucracy of it all, I just got… Did you do administration? Yeah, I became kind of cynical with it. Before that, I managed a donut shop, two locations. I’ve done banking, I’ve done a myriad of different things, but none of them as great as your. And you are not white. Last time I checked. And you’re Buddhist? Yes. How does that impact our daily interaction? It doesn’t. You know that I’m a Christian. I’m always trying to convert you. Yeah. And you know that Ben’s a Mormon and he’s always trying to convert me. He never mentions it, but I know what he’s doing. I know what he’s doing. No, he is. Let me tell you about Ben. He’s sneaky. He’s like, I’m not going to talk about it. I’m just going to live it. And then if you want to ask me about it. See, that’s what he does. He just like sets this, he doesn’t talk about it. I made it very sneaky. His wife’s the same sneaky. They’re both like this guy the other day, we had barbecue. We’re serving barbecue for a person. It was like a celebrating somebody. And we’re like, Ben, do you want barbecue? Tempting him. He’s like, no, I’ll wait for a million. Doesn’t know where she is. Says it’s sneaky though. Most people are like, this dude’s not gonna have barbecue while he’s waiting for you. He has no idea where she is in the building. He’s a good guy. So all I’m saying is, but we have different faiths in here. It doesn’t have to be like you’re pro, but capitalism is probably the religion that we all have, you know. So what questions do you have for Daisy? Because she started off on the phones and now she manages the call center. And she’s a great lady and has a great kid named Atticus who says that I’m old. You’re old. Yes. You’re gonna get paid to do like you’re gonna be like doing it like day one. Yeah what you do is you’re gonna work in a 90-day tour of duties, I would call it. I’m just asking you mentally to commit to work here for 90 days. Because I shouldn’t do it, and my wife is kind of helping me through this, but like, I don’t know, you know my mother-in-law, but she really cares about facials. And I’m like, can we let it go? No, no, no. Because she like wants to deliver a great experience. She’s into that. And I can’t explain to you why, but she is. That’s just her love language. She’s into it. I think clients of hers experience that, you know? And for me, I kind of view every employee as kind of like the personification of my dad, where I’m like, I don’t know why my dad is so poor at the age of 30. I don’t understand that, but I think it’s because he wasn’t taught certain skills. Because he had a degree, he was at the top of his class. He literally was at the very top of his class at ORU. And I’m like, I have to believe that if somebody would have pointed out to him Tom don’t do this and do this I have I believe he would have done it he always worked hard but because he worked at quick shift from the night shift and he worked at Domino’s I started as a kid I got made fun of I couldn’t talk to us 13 years old I got made fun of all the freaking time and my parents couldn’t afford a speech pathologist and I have to believe they would have hired one if they could have and so I just kind of like I want to teach you the skills needed to pay the bill. I’m just all about like do this boom and then if you want to be here for five years or six years and become a partner in one of the businesses like a law firm, great. If you want to be on the podcast with me every day and that’s your goal, great. If you want to become a real estate agent, great. If you want to become a supermom, great. I don’t care. Super dad, great. I just say I want to help you get where you want to go and I view it as a tour of duty, not like a wage cage. So upward mobility is my game. So every 90 days, we kind of reevaluate. Can you speak to that a little bit? Yeah, yeah, so I started off in the call center as a call center rep, and I came in through the group interview, and I was like, I literally don’t care what I have to do. I need to be here, so what do you have? And at the time, Vanessa was like, well, we need somebody in our call center. And I was like, okay. So, you know, I really want to work with Rive, but if it means being here in this environment, I will do whatever I need to do. And so I started off in the call center and within the first 90 days, they’re like, we want to promote you to call center manager. I was like, okay, cool. And I’ve been doing that ever since. And she was the worst manager of all time, in my opinion, and the best salesperson at the same time. Cause when she’s good, like she’s good at her job, but then managing people, that’s like where you’re going like, hey hey hey hey hey hey hey, quit vaping. Yeah and she like absorbed it though, you know I mean? And so I’d be like, hey don’t argue with her, just tell her what to do. Because we had one co-worker, he used to like go out there and do the hula hoop, remember? In the middle of the day, she would just go out there and she’d be like, just hula hooping, I’m like, what? You know what I mean? And then she would like get into a debate with them. Now she’s great at it. Then she messed up and said she wanted to become a speaker lady. Yeah. Now she speaks at the conferences. We have a conference in here every two months for our clients. About 120 people are here every time. Any other questions for Daisy about being here? No? When you first got here, when I first came in, I was like, this is so great. You know, because the way it’s set up. And I was like, oh, that’s for the workstations. This area right here was like a photo shoot. You know, the backdrop of a photo shoot and everything like that. And then I was going over there and I was like, oh, this is where some of the graphic design comes in. Every picture on every wall has been put there specifically. And then all the writing is my handwriting. So I’m always… My dad died, there he is, ripped Tom Clark, Tom Bomb, it’s Tom Bomb, so I put that there because I felt like I needed to have it, I see it all the time when I’m speaking, so I’m at conferences, I’m always thinking of my dad. So and then like victory, I think that’s a big word, it’s important. But anyway, so we, it’s a different place, it’s a fun place, but I would like for you to meet the teammates before you kind of decide A or B. What I want to do is I had questions for Justice and Jaw and for Barbara, I had some questions for you guys based upon your resume and I would like for Amelia to give a tour of you so you can see everything. Okay, so if you guys here, you three, can go with Amelia, that’d be great. And then if you three can go with Daisy and Ben on a little tour, let’s give them a tour. Is that cool? And then I have some questions for you guys. And then do you have your printed resumes tonight? Okay, I have a few questions and then those of you who are interested in graphic design. Have you all emailed in your portfolios? Okay, those are all been emailed Okay, so before you go today, I would like Yeah, so before anyway graphic design comes down to me I have to like obsess and look at your portfolios Because we’ve got so many talented people applying and I like to personally look at that. So before you leave, if you have access to a mobile device or something, if you could please, I want you to verify they do it, send it to founder at thrive15.com. That is how we do it. And now, without any further ado, 3, 2, 1, boom! You have questions? America’s number one business coach has answers. It’s your broda from Minnesota Here’s another edition of ask clay anything on the thrive time business coach radio show Welcome back to another exciting edition of ask us anything and on today’s show we are talking about the difference between merit-based pay employees and flat pay employees, salaried employees. Again, easy for me to say. Merit-based pay employees versus salaried employees. They’re employees who can’t make any more money no matter how hard they work. So before we get into the data and the research, before we get too deep into the weeds here. Marshall, why does a job for you not appeal at all if it is a flat salary? It doesn’t appeal because my ceiling is capped. I know that I’m going to make so much, and no matter whether I perform well or don’t perform well, I’m not going to be able to make more money. And so I love to be able to go eat what I kill. I love to be able to know that because I am busier, because I am performing more effectively, because I am producing more results, I am going to get paid more. And that’s why I love the merit-based pay versus the flat salary. All right, Clay Stairs, you are a former school teacher. Talk to me about the kinds of behavior that you would see from your fellow colleagues who are all on a flat salary. No, seriously, because a lot of people have never been a school teacher or have never worked for the government. But what kind of work ethic or lack thereof would you see from your colleagues who all made a flat salaried wage in any public school system? Oh, let’s see. I’m really tired today. I think we’ll watch videos in the classroom today. I think that’ll be a good thing. I think I’ll wear my sweats today. I think that’s a good move for me. I get 10 sick days a year. I’m taking every dad gum one of them. I get another six personal days. I’m going to take those as well every single year. I had a friend of mine that was a very, he was a teacher who taught in the public school system for over 30 years and he got this thing called tenure. I’m not sure how many years you have to work before you earn the tenure. Is it three? Three. And so basically, unless he sexually or physically assaulted a kid, he’s good to go. And they had this thing called personal days. I’m not sure if you’re familiar with that. But it’s where you could call in and your employer was not allowed to ask why. Yes. I remember this. And he would just call in. At that point, Clay, I loved it because I was the C player in those days. So let me just tee up what he would do. He DJ’d for us on the weekends, on a Saturday usually. So what happened is, he would tell me, he’s like, dude, here’s the deal. Because we were merit-based pay and the job he had during the day was not merit-based pay. Because I was merit-based pay, he would tell me, just so you know, I am not going to be at work on Saturday or Sunday. I’m just telling you in advance I’ll be out of town. I’m like, okay. But as I got to know this person, he started telling me, I’m calling in my workplace and I’ve put you as like a backup employer or my second employer or whatever, and I took a paid personal or whatever, this personal day, so I’m going to call in last minute on Thursday and Friday. I’m going to call in last minute on Thursday and Friday. I’m telling you in advance, though, I’m going to be gone Saturday and Sunday. I also have a call in last minute on Monday so I can string together a long weekend because I’m going to Florida.” And I’m like, so you’re going to go to Florida on Wednesday knowing for sure you won’t be at work on Thursday, but you’re going to call them Thursday morning with a personal issue. He goes, oh, exactly. It’s a system. He said, all the teachers do it, man. And I’m going, are you serious? Have you seen that scenario unfold, Clay Stairs? Oh, completely. I have, unfortunately. Again, unfortunately, yes. And again, it’s not just teachers. I mean, it’s just in that salaried world of whether I’m awesome or whether I suck, it doesn’t matter. I’m going to get paid the same, so I might as well just be marginal. So again, as we’re talking today about flat salaries or just salaries where you’re capped versus a merit-based pay system, the level of performance of the average employee is just dramatic, Marshall. I mean, people who are chasing a carrot, they are just sincerely and much more motivated than the average person who, no matter how hard they work, they make the same amount of money. And there’s a book called The Service Profit Chain that’s written about this concept. The service profit chain essentially establishes relationships between profitability, customer loyalty, employee satisfaction, loyalty, and productivity. But Marshall, you’ve read the book, you’ve broken down the service profit chain. Why does merit-based pay dramatically impact the performance of the average employee? Okay, so merit-based pay is so crucial because at the service profit chain core, that’s what drives it. So they find, OK, we understand that we need to increase customer loyalty. Well, what drives customer loyalty? What they found in the Harvard Business Review is that customer satisfaction, that’s what drives it. So they’re like, OK, how do we drive customer satisfaction? Well, what they found is employee satisfaction. And at the core of employee satisfaction are things like merit-based pay. They know I can make more if I produce more and my employer is going to engage with me. They’re going to train me. They’re going to help me become better and therefore help me make more money. That’s really cool and so that’s why merit-based pay in the Harvard Business Review, this is one of my favorite topics. If it’s okay, I would like to just tee up some ample examples and we’ll go to Quick Trip first. The convenience store industry, the gas stations. For those of you listening in different parts of the country where you cannot find a Quick Trip convenience store, there are billions and billions of dollars generated every year by Quick Trip. They are a very successful company. Just Google search Quick Trip convenience stores to learn more. Marshall, contrast your experience as a customer going into a Shell gas station versus a quick trip gas station. Going into a quick trip, merit-based pay culture versus a shell, flat rate, salary-based culture. Talk to me about the difference between merit-based pay, quick trip, versus, ah, salary, let’s pay as little as possible, shell. I have a confession to make, and it was one of the loathsome moments of my life. No. But last week, I was like, I’m looking around for a quick trip to pull over, maybe use the restroom, get some gas, get something to drink on the way to the show or something. I just pulled over in a local gas station. I’m like, it can’t possibly be bad. I assure you, there’s open standing water back there. There’s gas tanks. I’m like, oh my gosh! They’re giving me a key to the restroom with a car carburetor attached to it or something like that. It is wild, but you walk into Quick Trip, it’s always clean, everything’s always stocked, there’s checklists on the door showing the last time it was cleaned and who it was cleaned by. As a customer, I wouldn’t want to go anywhere else. I would go out of my way in order to go to Quick Trip. Okay, Clay Stairs, you travel a lot. You’re a paid speaker. You travel now all around the world. People in San Diego love you. People in New York love you. People in Florida love you. You speak all around the world at different events. And you and Lisa, your wife, incredible wife, have a great time, a great opportunity to travel together. Yes, love it. And to speak. It’s neat. I just, in the future, as you’re adding more and more speaking events, it’s exciting to see you guys do that. But you, I’m sure, have flown on many different airlines. Could you please contrast Southwest Airlines and their merit-based pay culture versus that of pretty much everyone? Oh my gosh. It’s night and day. There’s been several times where flying out of Tulsa can be tough with your choices, but But man, if I can get on Southwest, it’s the only way to go. The friendliness, the ease in getting onto the plane is so much easier. Clay was actually literally on a plane one time, and it was on not Southwest, and I just asked the stewardess, or the flight attendant, pardon me, could I have some snacks, some peanuts or something like that, she literally looked at me with angst in her eyes and said, this isn’t Southwest. She literally said that. Okay, now I want to be, Marshall, I want to be united in this idea. I want to be united in this idea because as great Americans, we’re not here to name specific American airlines that suck. We need to be united in this idea. We don’t want to name specific American airlines that suck. We don’t want to do that. We’re not the kind of people that would name specific… Right? Are we united in this idea? That’s right. We’re not going to name specific American Airlines that suck. Exactly. Right. Exactly. So, but, talk to me, Marshall. Your experience. You’re a tall guy. You’re a tall man. How tall are you? I’m 6’7″. You have flown on many different airlines. Yes. Talk to me about the courtesy, or lack thereof, of Southwest Airlines versus other airlines when it comes to just accommodating you and other people. I would say on other airlines, it has been disastrous when the flight is empty, I kid you not, there’s an economy class and then there’s economy plus with a little extra leg room. And when the flight is empty, I might like to, you know, go up a little extra couple rows and sit in the economy plus because there’s five people on the plane, and I’m promptly asking, sir, you didn’t pay for an economy plus. Can you please move back to the economy seating? There’s literally nobody else on the plane. You know, a little fun factoid for you. This is a little fun factoid for some of the listeners out there. A lot of our listeners like to tune in for the fun factoids. Oh, Marshall, I think I might’ve hit the wrong button. I’ll just kind of make a sound effect. Okay. Okay, so Marshall, I’m not sure if you’re aware of this, but Delta is actually the fourth letter of the Greek alphabet. That’s right. Completely unrelated to this conversation. That’s correct. Because we are united in our decision to not speak specifically, antagonistically, about any other American airline. That’s correct. Have you ever flown on another airline outside of Southwest Airlines that was a positive experience? Because if you have, you want to keep it fair and balanced. People have said good things about Virgin. People have said good things about JetBlue, which was started by a former Southwest employee. Have you ever had, Marshall, an experience that was positive with another airline outside of Southwest Airlines? No. Clay Stairs, we want to be united in our non-attack of American Airlines. Fun factoid, the fourth letter of the alphabet here in the Greek language is Delta. Just a fun factoid. Have you ever had a positive experience with another airline that’s not Southwest Airlines? No, I have not. Six hours. Six hours on the tarmac. Starbucks. Starbucks. Merit-based pay. So what happens is, I actually met a lady who’s the regional manager for the Starbucks stores in this area a few years back and she was sharing with me at the end of the month she makes a percentage of the stores profitability. She personally gets to keep a percentage of the stores profitability. Sounds to me a lot like merit-based pay. The better they perform the more she makes. So have you ever been into a Starbucks Marshall? Yes. Clay Stairs, have you ever been into a non-starbucks? Yes I definitely have. Have you noticed the difference between a local donut slash coffee shop with the white ambiguous styrofoam cups versus a Starbucks, Marshall? Yeah, it’s vastly different in that I could go to a Starbucks in the Northeast or down south or here in Tulsa and I know that I’m going to get the exact same experience across the board. It seems to me in these first few examples that merit-based pay versus salaried pay there might be something to this whole idea that you pay people based upon what they do versus what they say they’re gonna do. Do you guys agree at this point? Are we? I agree. I’m over with you. Okay so Disney World versus the average amusement park. Have you ever been clay stairs to a Bell’s amusement park in Tulsa, Oklahoma? Yes. Do you remember Bell’s? I remember Bell’s. Marshall, do you remember Bell’s? Fantasmagoria. Oh, thank you very much. Do you guys remember you could actually bring a Pepsi can and you could get in for like five dollars? That’s right. Your admission to Bell’s Amusement Park in Tulsa, Oklahoma was only five dollars if you brought in a Pepsi can. That’s right. And do you remember how that was too much. Yeah, you’re like I mean it was like you’re going into It was like you went into like an airport I could like an airport store You know the airport store has a store called like news or something new CBS News Right CNBC News something like you’re looking for like a tuna fish sandwich from the CNBC airport store It’s weird and you’re looking for a tuna fish sandwich and you’re thinking, well, you know, in a typical American economy, 2018, I’d probably spend $6, $5 on that. At the airport, it’s like $26.17. It’s like $26.17. Or you go into the airport and you’re looking for a yogurt, like a yogurt parfait. Yogurt parfait is typically what, guys? $2 at Whole Foods, $3 at Whole Foods, Sprouts, maybe $3, whatever. You go in the airport, Marshall, how much could you expect to pay for a yogurt parfait at a typical airport? It’d be like $17.50. Do you remember how that felt when you went into Bell’s, you brought in a Pepsi can, you did your duty to help recycle, you go in there, and it was normally like $30. And they said, you know, did you bring a Pepsi can? You said, yeah. They said, well, it’s $5. Do you remember the feeling of like, this is probably too much? You’re like, I could use this $5 for so many other things. I’d be engouged here. Yes. And do you remember how no matter how your shoes were going into Bells, you would always leave with gum? They were different. On your shoes going out? Shoes were different. What about Bells Amusement Park was terrible? Their culture of salaries, of paying people as little as possible, and then let’s contrast that to Disney World. Okay, so let’s go with Disney World versus Bells. So Clay Stairs, you’re on the team Bells. Tell us what was terrible about Bells. And then Marshall, one-up him with team Disney. So let’s go with you, Clay Stairs, first. Well, just the cleanliness at Bells. Like you were saying, your shoes change while you’re there. They’re like offering tetanus shots when you get out of the bathroom. And another one, well, I’ll take that one, and then Marshall will go to you with Disney World. When we were interviewing the former Executive Vice President of Walt Disney World Resort, a partner, a friend, a frequent guest on the Thrived Time Show, Lee Cockrell, we were there in Walt Disney World, and we watched different cast members, not team members, but cast members, walk around the park and pick up trash and we never saw trash down on the ground for longer than I don’t know 10-15 seconds we just somebody’s coming by and picking it up because that was how important that was they assign a specific area and they walk up and down all day picking up trash and greeting guests that’s what Disney World does it was impressive it bells people almost walk around like avoiding the trash yeah like oh there’s trying not to see you try not to see it. I want salary. I make a flat rate here. I can’t get promoted. No matter how hard I work, I can’t make any more. I’m out. Yeah, Bell’s had that culture of carnies, too. They were always just a little sketch. Could you, for the listeners out there, we have a lot of listeners who are in Florida, California, Canada, Australia. We have a lot of high class listeners that cannot relate to the term carny. Could you please explain what a carny is, Mr. Kleystert. They’re carnival people. They’re vagabonds. They are travelers. They are bohemians. They’re moving with the truck. They usually talk, they kind of have their own thing where it’s like, well I’ll tell you what, you want to play here today to win a chance to win that big old stuffed animal, I respect that because you want to step right up or are you a weenie? And you’re like, does the man just call me a weenie? You just ask somebody, how much does it cost to play this game? Well, I’ll tell you what, you a weenie or are you going to play the game there? And they do a lot of like, well, I’ll tell you what, my God. And they do a lot of, it’s like a, they’re into doodling. One of the redneck games. It’s an interesting breed of people, the carnies. Marshall, contrast the carny culture of Bells versus that of, by the way, the bankrupt Bells, Bells now out of business, versus that of the consistently profitable Walt Disney World Resorts. So Marshall, talk to me, Kearney’s versus, what kind of people can you find at Walt Disney World Resorts? Well, first of all, we’re talking about cast members. So they’re not employees, they’re not team members, they’re cast members, and that’s exactly how they acted. They’re actually always on showtime. They call it showtime there at Disney World. Well, I put on my pants this morning and it became showtime right away. And so you’ll see all of these cast members in their character. They’re acting as Cinderella. They’re acting as Goofy. Goofy is another one. I’m dressing up like I’m Mario and Druscia. Marshall, I didn’t brush my teeth, but do we know if Mario and Drew should brush their teeth? No we don’t. And so you’ll see that regardless of what’s going on in whatever the cast members life how they feel they’re acting the entire time that they’re out in front of their guests because this is supposed to be the happiest place in the world. And barrels were often brown-toothed technology. No, you can’t have that. That’s not a thing. That’s not a move. I want to make sure you get this. Those of you who have not been to Bells, it was unbelievable how low the quality standard was. And for years, Tulsa was forced to go to Bells as its only entertainment option. Now we go to Chick-fil-A. Clay Stairs. Have you ever been to a Chick-fil-A? Yesterday. Marshall, have you ever been to a Popeyes? Oh, yeah. Have you been to a Chick-fil-A, Clay Stairs? I have been to a Chick-fil-A. Have you been to a Popeyes, Marshall? Yes, I have. So please contrast. Now, Clay Stairs, you can be the good guy now. Oh, yeah. Talk to me about the merit-based pay culture of Chick-fil-A, where they pay people based based upon results and not based upon intentions versus that of Popeyes. No offense to Popeyes, we’re just talking about facts. When I say with all due respect and no offense, henceforth I can say whatever I want. So Clay Stairs, Chick-fil-A, why do people line up and form a line around the building for Chick-fil-A? Well, number one, I’ll go first here, Marshall. Number one, my pleasure. Just the courtesy and the kindness of the people behind the counters. And they’re like 16, 17, 18 years old. Nice people. Nice people. And look nice. I feel like I’m going to like a Mormon missions trip. Thank you very much. To Chick-fil-A. Nice people. Filled with homeschoolers. Now we go here to Popeyes. Marshall, have you been to Popeyes? Yeah. Objectively, do you like the chicken? I don’t like it more than Chick-fil-A. Have you been into a Popeyes? Yeah, I’ve been into a Popeyes. What’s the difference between the people at a Chick-fil-A versus the people of Popeyes? Well, you’ll just stand at that counter with the register, and you can almost see the eyes from back behind the grill, and they’re like looking, does he see us? They’re like shocked. We have a customer coming in today. What do we do? I wasn’t prepared. I wasn’t prepared for what is going on. But that’s how it feels. With Chick-fil-A, when you walk in, they’re greeting you and acknowledging your presence immediately. But at Popeyes, you’re like, I’m here. You almost want to yell, shout through the store. Guys, I’m here. I mean, seriously, when you walk into Popeyes, you want to freak a Popeyes employee out, just go there. They’ve never seen a customer. Show up. Show up. It’s amazing how it still exists. Seriously. Okay, now Chick-fil-A. Another good attribute, Clay Stairs, of Chick-fil-A. Think about Chick-fil-A. What makes Chick-fil-A so spectacular in your mind? Okay, I’m doing two here. Clean, all right? Clean and the music. I’m going there. Clean and the music. Marshall, contrast that to Popeyes. The fluorescent light bulbs that are out, or worse than that, they’re not out, but they’re just kind of flickering. So you feel like you’re in an industrial park inside the Popeyes, and you’re like, oh gosh. And it’s eerily quiet. Later in the night. And so you’re like, can I just get my chicken and get out of here? Or they got the TV going. They got the TV going. So you got some kind of rando drama going on. Now again, Chick-fil-A really does accommodate. As a parent, they accommodate the kids. They always have balloons for the kids, slides for the kids, a nice environment for the kids. My kids want to go there. My kids, you know, kids when they’re like 12, when they’re 13, they start to develop a filter, but 9, 8, 7, 6, 5, my kids will just say, no filter. They’ll say, Dad, we don’t want to go to Popeye’s. It’s terrible. Now as an adult, you go, this podcast host is mean. He’s slanderous. This is a mean person. He’s mentioning a company by name and talking about how terrible it is. Yes, because everybody out there knows it. You just don’t want to say it. Marshall, talk to me about how Popeyes accommodates kids. Talk to me about the slides, the balloons for the kids. Talk to me about the Popeyes aura they bring to the table on a daily basis. Okay, I’m not a parent. Clay Stairs, you help me out with this. I’ve never been to Popeyes. But you help me out with this. Okay, I’m with you. You’re going to Popeyes. You’re bringing your kids when your kids are little. Kids don’t touch anything. If they’re headed towards the playground, the thought crosses your mind, what did the other kids touch before they touched it? Do we need to wipe this town? But at Chick-fil-A, it’s always clean. Everything is spotless. If you’re out there today and you’re going, I don’t really see the difference between merit-based pay and flat pay, salary pay. Marshall, could you read the notable quotable from Jack Welch? Jack Welch, he says, if you pick the right people and give them the opportunity to spread their wings and put compensation as a carrier behind it, you almost don’t have to manage them. And Clay, I want to one-up you with another quote from my main man, Steve Jobs. In my face. Okay, so this is what Steve Jobs talks about A players, okay? He said, I noticed that the dynamic range between what an average person could accomplish and what the best person could accomplish was 50 or 100 to one, given that you’re well advised to go after the cream of the cream. A small team of A plus players can run circles around a giant team of B and C players. What does this mean? This means if you’re gonna hire people, hire the A plus players. And what are A plus players looking for? They’re looking for merit-based pay. Set it up. If you are out there today and you’re fighting this idea, I want to just give you an example we can all relate to. Everybody knows about this. Marshall, are you aware, you watch a lot of NFL. Yeah. Who’s your favorite team? The Cleveland Browns, baby. Okay. Lee-foo! No, and I will tell you, the Cleveland Browns, objectively, these guys are really turning their organization around. But I want to make sure that we get an example of merit-based pay. The NFL stands for not for long if you don’t produce. That’s right. Why? Why, Marshall? Why does it stand for not for long if you don’t produce? Because they’re in the business to win games and sell tickets. Okay, so think about this. The average career length of NFL players is what? I would say maybe six years, eight years. Three, four. Really? I’m going three or four. 3.3. Boom! Really? Yeah, 3.3. Now I want to tell you an example from my favorite team, the New England Patriots. I just want to give you an example about why the Patriots can win year after year. They create a team where the vast majority of the income for players can be made via incentives. So, as an example, Rob Gronkowski, who is an all-pro future Hall of Fame tight end for the New England Patriots, he has a contract that’s very nice, but the guy can earn up to $4 million a year of additional income based upon incentives. And those are like making the Pro Bowl, per game he plays. So he has an incentive to play hurt. He has an incentive to play at his best. It’s based upon getting to the playoffs, number of catches. There’s a lot of incentives, and we’ll put a link to Rob Gronkowski’s 2018 Patriots incentives. But at the NFL level, and I’m just ripping on myself right now, I definitely do not have the talent and or skill or the will to play in the NFL. I couldn’t do it, even if I wanted to. But if let’s just say that we were all 6’8″, and we were very athletic, Marshall, would you want to play in the NFL if you couldn’t earn millions of dollars per year? No, I probably wouldn’t. Playstairs, I mean, if you were offered an opportunity to play in the NFL, knowing that there’s concussions, injuries, a lot of times life-altering. Like I heard an interview the other day with Jerome Bettis, the former running back for the Hill Hall of Fame, running back for the Steelers. And they were asking him about what it’s like getting up every day. You know, how are you dealing with retirement? Every morning is, again I’m paraphrasing, he says, every morning is a living hell. Wow. He’s like, I just have so much pain, arthritis. It’s just, it takes me until about noon just to kind of get my mind right, you know, kind of get, and there’s a lot of people in the NFL that have a similar, if you look up, Marshall put it on the show notes, Michael Strahan’s hands. Clay Starrs, have you seen Michael Strahan’s hands? I don’t think I have. Okay, I’m going to pull it up so you can see it on the screen here. It’ll blow your mind. This is Michael Strahan, and this is what an NFL career does to you. Look at his fingers. Oh my. Look at those fingers. Whoa, that’s not right. But I’m just saying, how many people out there, Marshall, you included, would want to play any sport at all if your fingers were going to be in continual arthritic pain for the rest of your life if you could not earn millions of dollars as a reward? Nobody’s going to do it. Would you do it, Clisters? I would do one play, but not two. Okay, so a lot of people, though, would say, I’m not going to play in the NFL, but if there wasn’t that kind of merit-based pay. Now let’s dial it down a little bit. How many listeners out there, Mr. Listener, Mrs. Listener listening out there today, I ask you this, would you be willing to care about the profitability of a billion-dollar company like Starbucks if you did not earn a bonus based upon the profitability? I mean, Clay Sears, if you were the district manager, regional manager for a Starbucks, would you care at all about the profitability if you couldn’t make more by essentially living at Starbucks to make it more profitable? No. Marshall, Disney World. You’re a manager of Disney World. Would you at all care about the profitability of Disney World if you could not make more money as a result of the success of the team? I wouldn’t care. Okay. Chick-fil-A. Clay Stairs, if you owned a Chick-fil-A, no matter how bad or good it did, you made the same amount of money per year, would you care? No, would not. I can say this, if I ran a Quick Trip or Southwest Airlines, I wouldn’t care. And maybe you’re listening today and you say, we’re bad people. I think we’re honest people. Well, Clay, that goes back again to me as a school teacher, flat pay, and the only way for me to make more money was to teach another year. And I got like a 2.5% increase. There’s just no reason to want to do a great job. I think if you’re out there and you’re honest with yourself, you’re going to probably not be super motivated to do something unless you can make more money. That’s why you started the company. That is why you started the company. You started the company because you wanted to make money based upon the value that you add to the hour and not get paid based upon the hours that you work. So why would you not share the wealth and create a merit-based pay program for your team? Marshall, what’s the biggest struggle that clients have, that entrepreneurs have, that business owners have when it comes to implementing merit-based pay? Where do you get the pushback? I don’t know how to implement it. I don’t know what it should be. I don’t know like metrics wise what it should be. Clay Sears, where do you get the most pushback on how to introduce and implement a merit based pay program? Oh, yeah. Most of the people that when I bring up the topic with our clients, Clay, they just they don’t have any idea what it is. And they they think immediately they go to paying employees more money. No, I can’t afford that. I can’t afford that. That’s the pushback that I’ve had. So if you’re out there today and you are struggling with implementing merit-based pay or any other best practice that we teach on Thrive Time Show, I would encourage you today, book your tickets to our next in-person Thrive Time Show workshop because, Marshall, when people have a specific question about how to implement merit-based pay for their specific company, home builders, doctors, dentists, lawyers, chiropractors. What do we do in between the breaks? Well, we have a 45-minute sprint where we’re teaching a principal. And then the 15-minute break, we’re actually breaking out into small different groups and answering any questions that you have. And then we actually have boards that we’ll have up there so that you can write down your questions. And we’ll answer all of the questions that you have before you leave. Clay stares. If somebody has a question at the workshop, you’ve seen this, they’re going, I just don’t know how to implement the merit-based pay. I have a question. What do you see us do? Do we just disregard the question or how do we handle it? Oh no, we address it right there. We address it right there. We do. We answer it to the satisfaction of the person that answered the question. We even stay during lunch. We stay after the workshop. We’ve met people before the workshop. That’s why we cap the workshop at 150 people or so. So if you’re out there today and you’re going, gosh, I want to take my business or life to the next level, I would encourage you to book your tickets to our next in-person Thrive Time Show Workshop today. It is irrefutably the world’s highest and best, it’s the world’s best and most reviewed workshop, the world’s best and most reviewed business workshop. It’s called the Thrive Time Show Workshop. You can book your tickets online today by going to ThriveTimeShow.com. That’s ThriveTimeShow.com And now without any further ado, 3, 2, 1, Boom! The number of new customers that we’ve had is up 411 percent over last year. We are Jared and Jennifer Johnson. We own Platinum Pest and Lawn and are located in Owasso, Oklahoma. And 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 dollar companies. They both have two to three thousand pages of content attached to their website. So to basically go from virtually nonexistent 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 pest and lawn 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 percent over last year. Wait, say that again. How much are we up? 411 percent. 11% we’re up 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%. 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 before we worked with Thrive. So again, we booked more deals last week than the first five months of last year. And 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 when 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 Jared had mentioned, that has really, really contributed to our success. But that, 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, and we didn’t know. Oh, sorry. 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. You know, they implemented those systems, and 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 going to take in order to really succeed. So, I just want to 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 pediatric dentist. 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 40-42% 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, graduated in 1983 and then I did my pediatric dental residency at Baylor 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 and Clay’s done a great job of helping us navigate anything that has to do with 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 Lee Crocker, the head of Disney with the 40,000 cast members. He’s friends with 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, and 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 six to eight weeks. He’s doing reawaken America tours every six to eight 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 startups go from startup 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 it 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 is like he 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 the 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 impressive thing was 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. Anyway, just an amazing man. He’s impacted me a lot. He’s helped navigate. Anytime 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, because our clubs were all closed for. 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 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 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 Thrivetime Show, two-day 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. When 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, but 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 gonna be the best business workshop ever, and we’re gonna give you your money back if you don’t love it. We built this facility for you, and we’re excited to see you. Hey, I’m Ryan Wimpey with Tip Top K9, and I’m the founder. I’m Rachel Wimpey, and I am a co-founder. So we’ve been running Tip Top for about the last 14 years, franchising for the last three, four years. So someone that’d be a good fit for Tip Top loves dogs, they’re high energy, they wanna be able to own their own job, but they don’t wanna worry about, you know, the high failure rate. They wanna do that like bowling with bumper lanes. So you give us a call, reach out to us, and we’ll call you, and then we’ll send you an FDD, look over that, read it, follow through, it’s very boring, and then we’ll book a discovery day, and you come and you can spend a day or two with us, make sure that you actually like it, make sure that training dogs is something that you wanna do. So an FDD is a franchise disclosure document. It’s a federally regulated document that goes into all the nitty gritty details of what the franchise agreement entails. So who would be a good fit to buy a 6UP K9 would be somebody who loves dogs, who wants to work with dogs all day as their profession. You’ll make a lot of money, you’ll have a lot of fun, it’s very rewarding. And who would not be a good fit is a cat person. So the upfront cost for Tip Top is $43,000. And a lot of people say they’re generating doctor money, but on our disclosure, the numbers are anywhere from over a million dollars a year in dog training, what our Oklahoma City location did last year, to $25,000, $35,000 a month. To train and get trained by us for Tip Top K9, to run your own Tip Top K9, you would be with us for six weeks here in Tulsa, Oklahoma. So we’ve been married for seven years. Eight years. Eight years. So if you’re watching this video, you’re like, hey, maybe I want to be a dog trainer, hey, that one sounds super amazing. Go to our website, tiptopk9.com, click on the yellow franchising tab, fill out the form and Rachel and I will give you a call. Our Oklahoma City location last year, they did over a million dollars. He’s been running that shop for three years before he was a youth packer with zero sales experience, zero dog training experience before he ever met with us. So just call us, come spend a day with us, spend a couple days with us, make sure you like training dogs and own your own business. Well the biggest reason to buy a Tip Top K9 is so you own your own job and you own your own future and you don’t hate your life. You get an enjoyable job that brings a lot of income but is really rewarding. My name is Seth Flint and I had originally heard about Tip Top K9 through my old pastors who I worked for. They trained their great Pyrenees with Ryan and Tip Top K9. They did a phenomenal job and became really good friends with Ryan and Rachel. I was working at a local church and it was a great experience. I ended up leaving there and working with Ryan and Tip Top K9. The biggest thing that I really, really enjoy about being self-employed is that I can create my own schedule. I have the ability to spend more time with my family, my wife and my daughter. So my very favorite thing about training dogs with Tip Top K9 is that I get to work with the people. Obviously, I love working with dogs, but it’s just so rewarding to be able to train a dog that had serious issues whether it’s behavioral or you know whatever and seeing the transformation taking that dog home and mom and dad are literally in tears because of how happy they are with the training. If somebody is interested I’d say don’t hesitate. Make sure you like dogs. Make sure that you enjoy working with people because we’re not just dog trainers. We are customer service people that help dogs. Definitely, definitely don’t hesitate. Just just come in and ask questions. Ask all the questions you have.