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- [00:00]
A
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B
Welcome back to DNI Power of One. Back with a business matters podcast. It's been, it's been a minute.
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C
Been four, four months of minutes.
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B
Yeah, four minutes. It's been a, it's been a little bit, but you've been busy. So.
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C
Yeah, I think things have taken a
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B
turn a little bit. Do you want to give the update? You want me to give the update? How do you.
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C
Why don't you give the update?
- [01:42]
B
So, yeah, so very exciting news. After years of talking about BNI and everything else, we've been able to recruit and hire Michael to full time now as our general manager across all seven of our, our franchises now. So we've been keeping him busy behind the scenes and not allowing him to talk on the podcast.
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C
See, the. The only way that they could keep me from not talking.
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B
Right, exactly. Like, you don't have time for this anymore.
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C
Bring me on. I don't have time for podcasts no more. But no, yeah, it's been, it's been exciting. You know, taking all the stuff we've talked about for nine plus years and podcasts and kind of culminating with being actually able to implement it live and in person in your organization has actually been fun.
- [02:29]
B
Yeah, I think it's, it's, it's been a long time, like almost like a work in progress without us, either one of us knowing it. But yeah, I think it is. It highlights a lot of what, like you said, like a lot of what we've been talking about and talk about how this kind of came to fruition, I guess. And then we can talk from your perspective about your thoughts on it and, and why you decided to do it and everything else. But as we've talked about on the podcast before, we were given the opportunity to really expand. So now we have seven official franchises across the U.S. three in the Northeast, four, four in Florida. And so we grew pretty rapidly from that scale. We needed to start scaling obviously the organization in terms of support and hiring, managing directors and market development managers and all these different roles that needed in the field but also additional roles we needed in the back that we didn't have before director training, those kind of things. And I was rereading a couple book. Well I was reading a book that I had never read and by reading I mean somebody was reading it to me in my years audiobook while on vacation. Great book. 10x is easier than 2x which just talks about setting the goals and then like your time and, and you know, hiring and same guy wrote books like who before how and those kind of scaling books which made me start thinking about like okay, how do we really run these organizations and what's my role in it and all that. And then Good to Great, which is a great book, very old but very still pertinent about how good is the evil of great. And most companies will be very comfortable in good. And I realized like that was definitely us in a lot of ways. We were getting a little, we were scaling obviously with the opportunity, but we were, we were good. We were never really great. We were winning a ton of awards. That was awesome. You know we, we've won back to back like franchisee of the year awards and growth awards and all those things but we weren't really great. We weren't doing what we could really be doing. And so when I was reading that book, a lot of self reflection that I was probably, I am, I was the biggest problem in that. Right. This is, you know, been an executive director for 21 years, been in BNI for 25 years. You know, you start getting a little complacent, you get a little, it's like I think anybody can feel this. If you've been in business and doing your business for a long time, you get burnt out on some of the day to day stuff. And I was like, all right, we're going to need to do these types of meetings. We're going to need to do these types of like management meetings. We're going to need to do these types of things. And I just was not going to be passionate enough about those types to give it the full effect. I could do them, I could definitely run those. I can, I've been having management meetings before but I knew like all right, but I'm holding it back because I will be comfortable at good and good enough and how do I get through this type of Stuff, and it wasn't any longer where my Ivan calls it his. The flame. I think you heard him when a conference, I think he talked about, right, like, you're either working in your flame or in your wax. And that was me. Like, if using his analogy, I was definitely deep in the wax with that kind of stuff and. And looking at it like, all right, if we're gonna. We're gonna get this scale opportunity, it's going to only amplify the need of strong leadership and organization and all of that kind of stuff. And if I'm deep in my wax now, I'm just going to get deeper in it, and it's just like, yeah, we'll have these regions, but we'll never reach what we could truly reach. So. So then, yeah, I approached you about the. I didn't approach you about the role at first. I called you about the idea of, like, hey, this is what I'm thinking. Give me your advice. And we talked through it, and it just became very quickly apparent, like, well, you're the guy to do it, if I can trust anybody to do it. And that's, you know, led to that conversation.
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C
That was it. I remember you called me. It was kind of weird. I think it was like a Saturday morning. I'm like, that's an odd time in the winter. Time for Tim to be giving me a call. But then you said, hey, you know, I want to pick your brain on. Like, what should I be looking for? How do I go out and find a person? This is kind of where I'm at. This is what I'm thinking. Yeah. And I think it wasn't long. I think we were talking about it for. About how to approach it for maybe about a week, two weeks, and kind of organically. Suddenly it was like, well, you said. You said to me something like, you've been interviewing for this role for like, 10 years.
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B
Right? Exactly.
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C
And I was just like, yeah. And I was kind of like. And I think I said to you, I. I really enjoy my 52 weeks off a year right now. And. But I think at the end, you know, it was like, hey, you need help? And you were like, yeah. So it just seemed like it was a natural fit and kind of, again, be able to take, you know, all the things we've talked about for so long and kind of put them all together and see if we can make something fun happen and get you kind of rejuvenated and focusing on the business and how to grow and how to create, maintain vision for everybody. And yet not have to worry about the wax part. I actually hadn't heard the flame or the wax before, but it is an interesting way of putting it and very true that, yeah, you can get deep in the wax and as everyone knows, it's thick and gooey and you go slow, but when you're burning, you tend to move quick. Right. So, yeah, I think it was a good segue and I mean, came on board in kind of the beginning of February and it's been a fast and furious pace in a lot of different areas. But I think, you know, what it touched on was, and we've talked about this a lot in the podcast in the past, but like, you know, when you, when you're thinking about your opportunities for your business, what gets often overlooked is your opportunity for people. A lot of people think opportunity lies purely in my marketing strategy and my, this strategy and you know, whatever. But a lot of times it's really about do you have the right people. And I like that, you know who before how that you mentioned, you know that that is something that often gets overlooked and really shouldn't be, particularly for smaller businesses because, you know, there are people that get kind of caught up in the day to day and then their business kind of stagnates, but they just say, well, you know, okay, I'm actually kind of happy where I am. And. But they're really not. They just can't do any more. They can't even see that they can do more. Right. Because they feel like all alone and isolated, like doing all this stuff and they're at their peak capacity. So they don't even have the space or mind share to think about, well, maybe it's time for another person.
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B
Right.
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C
You know, so it's kind of interesting that you were on vacation and listened to some books and suddenly were like, that's where I am.
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B
Yeah, well, it was, I mean, because we, we talked about on the podcast like we didn't even know the opportunity to scale to the size we were, was even coming for long term planning stuff.
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C
Right, right, right.
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B
So it was an awesome opportunity and we're very humbled and thankful for it. But it quickly realized like, okay, you know, I've gotten this to a, to a point, like I've definitely grown this and we've done, you know, my team's done amazing and we've been like I said we were winning awards and all that. But to go and be able to do all the things we should be able to do and want to do. I wasn't going to be the one solely to, to do it. And then I started reflecting on, okay, look who's on the team now. Where are their skill sets? Where, you know, where are their shortcomings? And, or, you know, is, you know, do we have anybody? And it was, the answer was like, not for this. Like we, you know, we've got some people who have been doing a lot of different things and super grateful for all the things that they've been doing, but they weren't even in their flame because we were trying to do too many things. And so it was like, okay, take this opportunity. You know, I mean, being fully transparent, like our business from a member standpoint almost doubled and like everything's being reinvested. Right. Like I haven't increased my pay or take home or everything is exactly the same. For me it was like, now we can invest in. So I think our team's almost tripled in the last three months, which is crazy. In, in awesome.
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C
Yeah, but you know, about the last year. Yeah, yeah, the size triple in about the last year. Yeah.
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B
Oh yeah. I was talking to my parents about it. It was like, you know, our payroll is bigger than the business I bought. Like, when did that happen? You know, but that's fine, that's great.
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C
Happens quick.
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B
Crazy how you drive business. Right? So I think it's good for, you know, hopefully for some people when they're thinking about it. Like I kind of shared the journey. I mean we started very, very small and here we are growing now and these are the kind of conversations you have to have. And you know, it's a, it's a big commitment if you look at it just from the back end, but it's the, what it allows us to do. And like you said, now I can, I can. I was pulling back and not involved in anything in bni like nationally or globally. Now I can do those which helps, you know, us obviously, but and others and getting involved in that stuff. And my passion more is like, where are we going? How do we get there? You know, and then trusting the right people to, to do the day to day tackling of it. So.
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C
And how do we get more people aware of and into, you know, the BNI system? Which, you know, I think is, you know, in my first four months, it's been four and a half months. It's been pretty interesting and eye opening about the opportunities that present themselves. I of course known about BNI for a very, very, very long time, but I didn't really get into the meat of it, you know, even in Our podcast, we. We got into questions and certain business aspects, but it wasn't really being. I focused. It was more on just general questions and. But I do think there's something to it, you know, and I'm having fun.
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B
That's good.
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C
Which is cool, you know, and the work is exciting because there's so much opportunity. And even though the business, like, even in your franchise portfolio, it's grown quite a bit, right? It's doubled in size and tripled in people in the last year, but there's still so much more opportunity for so many more people to get involved, 100%. And I think that's kind of where I like to think about the opportunity. And we're talking about, how do you. How do you scale your business, how to get prepared? Well, got to have the right people on the team, and you got to have the right vision on the team. We've spent a lot of time talking about, on this podcast about setting aside that time. You know, imagine if you hadn't gone on vacation and freed up just enough of your energy to be thinking about it, right to the point where you could pay attention to what you were listening to in your ears. And those audiobooks, a lot of times you put them in and it becomes noise, right? I'll put podcasts on, and then at the end of it, I'm like. Like six hours later, I'm like, oh, there's like three podcasts gone by and I don't remember any of them.
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B
Right.
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C
Because I was caught up in other things. And, you know, so if you hadn't given yourself that time to take a break, you know, you might not have. We might not all be in this situation right now.
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B
Yeah, I mean, it's an interesting looking at, but it's true. We talk about that now. It's like, okay, one of our major investments now is that time, right? By bringing you on, it allows more time to have those thoughts and conversations and. And now thinking like, okay, where's the next opportunity? Internally, externally, whatever for. For the team and for the. So.
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C
And I think one of the things that. That translates well in this and kind of me coming on board, but also how I think, you know, small businesses can think about it is one of the terms I've heard since I've been here. And this is kind of a BNI term, but it would apply to pretty much any business out there that's running with a solopreneur, a very small staff is, they call it bni, busy. Right. So they would come in and they get their referrals and they build up all of this networking and then they get to a point where they stop because the business level that they had envisioned, it's, it's so much bigger than it was before that they feel like, okay, this is it. I got what I need out of it. Now this is, this is my comfort zone and this is where I'm going to be at. And again, good for them. Their business is up, they're happy. But what I think part of the missed opportunity is they're not giving themselves a chance to say, well, it got me to here. Maybe I should be investing in more people to do this added work. And then I can focus on continuing to kind of build the business. Because ultimately a lot of small business people, you know, they have it, they want to pass it on to their kids, which, you know, has. Is largely hit or miss in the end because sometimes the kids don't want to do it, but they build it with that intention. They build it to say, well, I'm going to sell it to fund my retirement or take an annuity out of it, out of it to fund my retirement. But the bigger you can build it while you're actively involved, the more that return on the backside is, or the more that gets passed on to the
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B
next generation, it just gives you more options, really.
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C
Frankly, they don't, they don't necessarily think about it because they get so busy, they're just kind of out of it. I think that's the importance of, you know, taking that step back and, you know, saying, okay, well, what do I really want to pass on? You know, you have to give yourself the time to do it. We've talked a lot about that. Right. You gotta, you gotta set time aside to think, plan a strategy and clear your mind of the day to day so you can focus on what's the big picture. And I think there's opportunity here in our organization to help businesses that get to this point where they're, they're so busy from their referral networking successes that we have to focus on. Here's how you think about adding people. So kind of an educational component. To me, that's an opportunity. I know. And if you do nothing other than listen to our past podcasts, you'll hear all about it. We spent a lot of time talking about, you know, how to plan for that from the people perspective. But I think it's kind of neat because I guess in the end, I'll say it again, this is now putting words into action, like all the stuff We've talked about. And that's what gets me excited about waking up, is that there's great people in this organization, not just our own company organization, but just in bni. Overall, the people are largely just fantastic and excited and it's nice to be around a lot of entrepreneurs and small business owners that are excited about their business. And man, I've been introduced to people and businesses I'd kind of long forgotten about, didn't even know was a thing anymore. But to see their passion about what they do. I went to conference in Orlando and met so many great people. That kind of stuff that kind of. For me, I guess I'd probably say in my life I might have been in my wax and pretty happy prior to joining, but I feel like I got a little bit of that flame going.
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B
Yeah.
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C
So.
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B
Oh, you're deep in the beeswax at that point. That's all it is.
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C
That's pretty. Quite literally, but that's kind of exciting for me. So.
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B
Yeah, I think, I think a lot of people, like you said the B and I busy. It goes two ways. That being I busy part, right, Is one is they get to a point where, like, this is where I'm comfortable. Two is I think a lot of them, they're uncomfortable because the business grew more than they were expecting and they're busier. And then it's like, well, where do I cut the time? And it's interesting it like, you. You understand it, but it's illogical where they go, oh, I gotta cut the time, so I'm gonna cut out the networking. And it's like, I use. I use the gym analogy all the time. It's like, if you were going to the gym all the time and you got in great shape and suddenly you could see your abs and you're like, okay, I can stop going to the gym. Yeah, like, what's gonna happen?
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C
So you're not gonna see your abs down the road?
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B
We see so many of that. That story because a lot of them end up coming back to BNI and it's like, you know. And so, yes, I do think there's a massive opportunity for training on, like, how to, you know, if this is going to scale your business, what does that mean on the other side of the business side of it? And then there's the comfort part. Like I said, I know I could have run these, you know, I mean, I could have kept doing what I was doing. And in theory, I don't make more money, I guess. But I also knew I. Well, I got us here with our team. I wasn't going to get us to the next part doing that same thing. And so that's the conversation you kind of have to have. And it was like, you know, and if I'm just get comfortable, that affects, especially in bni, not just me, but the team and their opportunities and stuff. It affects the membership down, the chapters down. Everybody will feel that pain if we ever get complacent. And so, you know, the fight against that complacency is kind of one of the main things that I think we're, we're really doing. And then there is, I think the other thing that people lose sight of, and I had an interesting conversation with somebody about it, is there's a ton of value of bringing in somebody outside with new perspective and just new lenses on, on everything. So even like back end operation stuff, all that kind of stuff. So somebody was like, you know, are you like, does it aggravate you? Does it bother you? And they come in and they, they find all the, you know, mistakes or things that could be done better. And I'm like, no, I think it's hilarious. It's just like, yeah, we didn't even think about that. Good find. Go do that. You know, I mean, like, and you've done that to a lot of just stuff that people wouldn't even think about. And I was like, you know, some people, I think, get uncomfortable with that idea because it's your baby, you've been working and you could be like, oh, they're coming in and telling me everything I did wrong, where I'm like, dude, just find, find all the warts and cut them off.
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C
You know, one of the things about, I was having this conversation yesterday with somebody about the difference between a goal and a strategy, you know, and it's amazing that, you know, we've talked about it ad nauseam on this podcast that they are not the same.
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B
Right?
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C
But strategy, in a nutshell is not. It's not just about the steps that you want to take to get to your goal. It's also about what you're willing to give up along the way. And you know, I was talking about. And that basically means compromise. And I said to this person, the hardest person to compromise with is yourself. And it's easy, much easier with other people than it is to kind of look yourself in the mirror and say, okay, where are my shortcomings and what am I capable of doing? Where are my strengths? Where are my weaknesses? Right? I think self assessments and just being really honest with yourself is really important for becoming successful. And there's nothing wrong with having a strength in one area and a deficit in another area and then filling in that deficit with someone else and then talking about seeing things with new eyes. I remember I was fortunate enough to be a keynote speaker at the Northeast Florida Conference about seven years ago, and my presentation was about the effects of storytelling on people. Right. So if you're a business, what's your story going to tell? And one of the things I left everybody with at the end was a quote from Marcel Prowse that sometimes it's good to see the world with new eyes, and you can be in the same space, but just take a different vantage point. And maybe it opens up possibilities. And so it is good to kind of get an outside perspective. You know, we've talked a lot on this podcast about the value of having a mentor outside your organization. Yep. As somebody that you can go to, that can really, you know, call out your own BS if needed, but, you know, just ask a series of questions that make you think about, okay, well, what am I doing? What's my role in this? How should I be thinking about it? That's really important to have. I still have mine. And, you know, it's. It's. It's just good to have somebody like that on the outside. So if. Even if you can't bring somebody into your organization, financial reasons, size, whatever. But to be in something like a bni, where you have a whole chapter's worth of mentors that are willing to help you, or if you have some mentor outside, some other way, someone, you know, close friend that, you know, keeps you honest, you know, that's really important to have. I was. I think it was just fortunate I was available and wanted to come in and kind of take a look at things, you know, and help you out. But everybody can go find a mentor.
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B
Yeah. Well, I mean, it's the matter of, like, you know, luck is preparation, meeting, opportunity.
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C
Yeah.
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B
Type of thing. Right. Like, because everybody's like, oh, you're so lucky you had him. I'm like, yeah, true, definitely. But it's not like I just called you out of the blue one day and was like, hey, I've got this B and I thing going on. You know, I mean, we've been talking about it, working towards it, and you've seen the journey. So you come in with it, different perspective, and. And I trust you implicitly, which was a huge piece of it, too. I will tell you, too. And we could. We should, just because of the time now, but we should. Two things. One, we'll do more podcasts, which is great. And I think now that you're in bni, that'll make our conversations expand because you're getting more insight into a lot of what questions might be coming up and that kind of stuff. So we could tie BNI to it, but we should also start talking or can talk about, you know, the investment in it. I think a lot of people, when they look at hiring too, they look at the cost versus the investment in it. And I will tell you, and there's no shock to you either, because we talked about it like it's an investment, not just in immediate returns in terms of like, okay, now I can do this and I can do that and you're doing this and we're getting better here. And all that return, it's also an exit strategy investment. Right. Like by building this layer, our company became more valuable to a potential buyer in the future, whenever that day may come. And so sometimes you gotta look at that too, because you talked about, you know, people are building a small business. It's like, what are you building it for? What is your end goal? Eventually, Even if that's 15 years from now, 20 years from now, 10 years from now, what is it that you want to do? And if it is not just handed off or whatever, then, you know, one of the things I looked at too was, okay, if I were to hire this role, what kind of return on the back end do I get from it? And your role in particular does have that effect because from a potential buyer, right, that's there's better systems in place and management in place and all that. So you got to look at all of those aspects when you're looking at your business. Not just, well, I can't afford the salary or whatever. Right. And there are other ways to compensate too, potentially, and all that kind of stuff.
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C
Yeah, that's a good talk. We could spend a lot of time just talking about that one.
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B
Yeah. And again, this is freed up time for me to learn more. So I think I'm going to be better for everybody because I'm investing now time in my, like, I'm taking this private equity course right now. We're going to do other courses that like, help me learn new ways of looking at our business and, and stuff. So that's all investment of return that comes back around. So I'm excited for it. I think, you know, we'll talk a lot more about it as we continue to do the podcast. Like I said, and probably add value there and perspective there, so.
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C
And we're still chasing that thousand mark. Let's go.
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B
Yeah, yeah. I don't know. We're nine something. We're getting there. We're getting there. All right. As always, I'm excited and we'll have
- [26:36]
C
a lot more coming.
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B
Yeah. As always, if you got questions, topics, that kind of stuff you want to submit for Michael and I. Bipower of1.com, leave it there. You can mention business matters, any topic, any question. For bni, you can go there and leave that. As always, share it, leave a review, all the things. Michael, talk to you in a minute.
- [26:56]
C
Talk to you in a minute.
- [27:11]
A
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