I Don't Need Help - Part I

In the last episode, we talked about how to implement follow up systems in our businesses.

Today I wanted to go a little different direction and talk about a subject that I think most of us are guilty of at one time or another - getting tunnel vision in our businesses.

I mentioned in a previous episode that I had a great business partner for many years in building our company, SalesDouble. There is definitely a synergy you get from being able to bounce ideas off of a partner or partners in business. Unfortunately, most partnerships don’t last and sometimes end in a pretty nasty divorce, so there are definitely pro’s and cons for partnerships.

The model of how we would deal with employees for the next 15 years or so - was to figure out what needed to be done from our perspective, and give orders. It was very much a military style top down management with almost no input from the people doing a lot of the day to day work.

My business partner and I would meet 3-4 times a week, work on strategy and planning and come up with our directives for the employees. You hear a lot in business circles and with leadership training, you should delegate, delegate, delegate. However, what they are talking about is delegating work tasks that you shouldn’t be doing, and it’s a one way relationship, meaning, you have an activity you need someone to do, and you tell them what to do, and that’s the end of that. Of course, good leaders are open to and invite feedback, but it’s easy to just tell someone what to do and get it out of your mind so you can focus on other things.

We ran our company this way for many years, until I was forced to change. Sometimes in life, it’s the moments when things appear to be falling apart or you face incredible challenges that you come up with your best solutions and ideas.

The day after the 4th of July in 2017, I came to work in the morning as usual and my business partner didn’t show up. I later found him at home where he had suffered a fatal heart issue. Obviously, this was a major shock personally and for the business. In one day, after almost 2 decades in business, I was solely responsible for our business. 

After struggling for several months trying to figure out what to do and what direction to go in, I realized that I couldn’t grow the business myself based on my ideas alone. I started searching for some kind of guidance on how to get help. In my search, I realized that I had a goldmine of perspective right in front of me - my staff. 

For those of you who already take advantage of the feedback and wisdom of your team, kudos to you. Whatever you are doing, keep doing it, and find ways to get even better information from your team.

I rectified this situation by starting with one meeting of the staff, which for my company is a pretty small group. During this time, I attended Tony Robbins Business Mastery weeklong seminar, and he challenged us to have at least one 90 minute meeting with our team every week and talk to them about ideas focused on growing the business, not day to day operation stuff.

So we started doing a weekly meeting starting at the beginning with the real basics asking questions like why are we in business. As I humbled myself and realized I didn’t have all the answers, a flood of fresh ideas and strategies I had never thought of came from the employees in these meetings. 

A lot of things really surprised me and I found I had uncovered a fountain of information I was lacking about my own business. 

I won’t lie and say this didn’t give my ego a little dent. After all, I had been in sales for over 20 years and thought what could this 20 year old teach me. But, as a phone sales training guy I followed in the 90s, “money is better than ego, every day of the week.” If you struggle with this like I did, think about the old, would you rather be right, or rich. I’ll take the latter.

I can say with 100% certainty that this o