The Simple Strategy Dave Uses to Motivate His Team

Summary

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Episode Summary: The Simple Strategy Dave Uses to Motivate His Team

Podcast: The EntreLeadership Podcast
Host: Dave Ramsey (Ramsey Network)
Episode Date: January 19, 2026

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Overview

In this episode, Dave Ramsey delivers actionable leadership and business coaching to real entrepreneurs facing real challenges. Through live call-ins, Dave focuses on how to instill an ownership mindset in teams, navigate the complexities of business partnerships (especially during personal crises like divorce), strategize for profitability amid rising costs, and make effective hires as businesses outgrow solo leadership. Dave’s advice centers on practical wisdom, culture-driven leadership, accountability, and his signature blend of no-nonsense encouragement.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Instilling an Ownership Mindset in Your Team

(Caller: Luke, owner of a dog resort) [00:55–09:01]

• Compensation as Motivation:

  • Dave emphasizes aligning compensation with performance. Sharing profits (even informally) allows team members to “feel the pinch when there’s not [profit]” and the reward when there is.
  • Example: “Hey guys, we had a great month because you did… so I’m gonna give everybody a $100 handshake.” – Dave Ramsey [01:18]

• Culture & Core Values:

  • At Ramsey Solutions, a notable core value is: “We’re all self-employed.” This mindset is actively discussed and reinforced.
  • “We talk about what that means a lot. So one is you do it with compensation. Two is… it’s a core value.” – Dave Ramsey [02:10]

• Hiring and Firing for Ownership:

  • Hiring: Ask candidates about their alignment with the ownership mentality. “Are they gonna act like they’re an owner, or they got a job and they’re going to mail it in, come late, leave early and steal while they’re there?”
  • Firing: If an employee’s attitude doesn’t match the ownership mindset, address it directly and let them go if necessary.
  • Memorable quote: “If you’re just here to collect a check, this place will spit you out.” – Dave Ramsey [03:37]

• The Challenge with Part-Time Staff:

  • Part-timers are harder to instill with this mindset due to higher turnover and less engagement.
  • Dave recommends building a reputation similar to Chick-fil-A: known for training young employees with work ethic and customer focus, so you attract people who want more than a paycheck.

• Patience in Shaping Culture:

  • “You will have to constantly be polishing… over and over and over until you’re sick of saying it. And about that time is when people start hearing it.” – Dave Ramsey [05:42]

2. Business Partnerships and Divorce: Navigating Ownership

(Caller: Manny, HVAC business owner) [11:23–17:28]

• Partnership Pain:

  • Manny is in a business set up for tax advantages, with his wife listed as 98% owner. Now, amidst a divorce, he faces losing his company.
  • Dave cuts to the chase: resolve this in mediation, but if Manny can’t retain the business, dissolve and start over, transferring contracts if possible.

• Avoiding Future Partnership Pitfalls:

  • Manny wonders about making his brother a business partner.
  • Dave: “No, you don’t. You’ve had enough partners, Hunt. Did you not get enough of this already?” [16:07]
    • Dave strongly advises against family partnerships, recommending profit sharing instead of equity.

• Taking Over Business Operations:

  • Manny must learn the accounting and back-office work previously handled by his wife.
  • “You’ll have to learn to run the books, not just run the truck.” – Dave Ramsey [17:46]

3. Managing Tight Margins: Profitability Strategies

(Question from Corey in Fort Lauderdale) [21:44–27:17]

• Revenue Before Cost-Cutting:

  • Dave flips the usual advice: rather than looking at where to cut first, focus on revenue generation—add new lines of business, raise prices in step with rising costs (inflation).
  • “I look for revenue opportunities… because costs are going up, that means you did not raise your prices and everybody else in your business raised their prices.” – Dave Ramsey [21:50]

• Passing Costs to Customers:

  • Companies respond to rising expenses by increasing prices, not by sacrificing quality or cutting crucial team/customer investments.
  • “Increased costs do not cost companies money. They pass it on to the customer in the form of higher prices. That’s basic econ.” – Dave Ramsey [23:43]

• Smart Expense Management:

  • Review P&L for true waste, but, “You can’t cut your way into success, usually.”
  • Dave warns that real waste becomes common in large, bureaucratic companies—not small, scrappy businesses.

4. Hiring for Scale: Virtual vs. In-Person Assistants

(Caller: Steve, child care business owner) [27:17–33:10]

• “Am I Crazy for Prioritizing In-Person Leadership?”:

  • Steve, with 60 employees and $3 million in revenue, wonders whether to hire a virtual assistant or an on-site executive assistant.
  • Dave is unequivocal: “We don’t have any virtual assistants at Ramsey. And you’re big enough that you don’t need one with 60 people. You need your assistant on site.” – Dave Ramsey [28:00]

• Role of an Executive Assistant:

  • This hire is not a “1950s secretary,” but a right-hand with business acumen—potentially someone who’s run a business themselves—to help manage HR, marketing, and finance.
  • “They’re probably going to be worth it though, because… it’s going to increase your profitability.” – Dave Ramsey [31:12]
  • “I would almost like someone that had run their own business in the past… maybe even a little bit older person, you know?” – Dave Ramsey [31:29]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On culture and hiring:

  • “We don’t want any employees, we want team members. And so, if you’re just looking for a place to collect a check, you got the wrong place.” – Dave Ramsey [02:57]

• On firing quickly for cultural mismatch:

  • “This is a condition of further employment. Do you want to plug in and be part of the team here and start caring about this place deeply, or are you just trying to collect a check?” – Dave Ramsey [04:05]

• On leadership and personal breakthroughs:

  • “Your business won’t grow until you do. When you lead better, your people perform better and your business wins bigger.” – Dave Ramsey [10:11]

• On partnership and regret:

  • “You’ve had enough partners, Hunt. Did you not get enough of this already?” – Dave Ramsey [16:07]

• On passing on costs:

  • “Increased tariffs do not cost companies money. Companies raise prices equal to tariffs and so they pass the tariff cost onto the customer.” – Dave Ramsey [23:36]

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Timestamps for Important Segments

• [00:55] – Caller Luke: Instilling ownership mindset
• [01:06–05:35] – Compensation, culture, hiring/firing for ownership
• [06:35–09:01] – Handling growth, part-timers, culture transmission
• [11:23] – Caller Manny: Divorce and business partnerships
• [14:30–17:28] – Handling business split, profit sharing, operational transition
• [21:44] – Question on managing tight margins (Corey)
• [23:43–27:17] – Raising prices, adding business lines, expense review
• [27:17] – Caller Steve: In-person vs. virtual executive assistants
• [30:58–32:41] – Who to hire for executive assistant, compensation

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Tone and Takeaways

Dave’s advice is candid, straightforward, and delivered with both empathy and a practical lens formed from decades of business ownership. He consistently ties business success to personal leadership growth, disciplined culture, and financial intelligence. The episode is rich in real-world, immediately applicable strategies—tempered by Dave’s core belief in the value of character, culture, and courage over shortcuts and easy fixes.

Closing Wisdom:
“Better a weary warrior than a quivering critic. This world needs more high quality leaders, so take courage and lead.” – Dave Ramsey [33:13]

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Transcript

[A]

From the headquarters of Ramsey Solutions, this is Entre Leadership, where I take calls from leaders like you about what it takes to win at any stage of business and leadership. I'm Dave Ramsey, your host with over 30 years of experience leading in the trenches right alongside you. If you've got a question you want to ask on the show, fill out the [e-mail] ask or call and leave us a note and we'll get back to you and get you on the show. Phone number is 844-944-1070. That's 844-944-1090. We're glad you're here. Luke is with us in Alabama. Hi, Luke, how are you? I'm good.

[B]

How are you?

[A]

Better than I deserve. What's up?

[B]

So I'm the owner of a dog resort. We'll do about 1.4 million in revenue this year. And my question is, how do I instill an ownership mindset into my team?

[A]

Wow. Well, there's a lot of things involved in doing that at Ramsey. One thing is compensation. As much as you can, let them be rewarded when there's profit and let them feel the pinch when there's not. So they have incentive to keep expenses down and revenues up. And we talk about that a lot around here because we share. We have a profit sharing program that we developed on something as small as you're doing. You could keep it very informal and say, hey, guys, we had a great month because you did, and give some examples of something that caused revenue to go up or expenses to go down. And so I'm gonna give everybody $100 handshake or whatever. Right. How many team members have you got?

[B]

We have six full time and then about 20 part time.

[A]

Okay. Much harder with the part time because they're more transient and they're not there as much. You don't keep them as long. Turnover's higher and you don't keep them as long. So that's a harder thing, but you just kind of build it in. So one of our core values on the wall is we're all self employed. We have a self employed mentality and we talk about what that means a lot. So one is you do it with compensation. Two is you do it, I mean, with like a manager on the compensation side, if you're one of your senior people, you actually could let them participate in the profits in some way. You could figure out a little formula to do that. But anyway, number one's comp. Number two is we talk about it. A lot. It's a core value. And then the third thing is you hire for it and fire for it. So when you're doing the interview to hire, you say, hey, the people on our team treat this place and our customers like they're one of the owners. We have an ownership mentality, a self employed mentality here. How do you feel about that? Will you fit in with that? That's part of your interview questions and you're trying to solve for that. Are they gonna in and act like they're an owner or they got a job and they're going to mail it in, come late, leave early and steal while they're there? We call those employees, not team members. We don't want any employees, we want team members. And so if you're just looking for a place to collect a check, you got the wrong place. Because we take our business seriously. People love their pets, how their pets are treated, how the customer is treated is indicative of how we're going to treat their puppy. And they care deeply about the whole experience. That's why they pay us ridiculous sums of money in a dog resort, a pet resort, to put their dog up. And so we're going to treat them with ridiculously good care and we're going to smile and we're going to enjoy doing that like we own the place. Do you want to be as part of a team like that and tell me why and tell me what that means to you? And that's part of your interview question scenario where you're getting into the whole thing. This is who we are and you're not going to fit in. If you're just here to collect a check, this place will spit you out. Okay, we talk about that in the hire and that runs off some people because you got people that are just like, how much you pay an hour? You know, it's like, no, I don't. You don't get to work here. We don't talk like that, you know, so no, I mean we do want to tell you what you get paid, but that's your first thing out of your mouth is what you get rather than what you give. No. Then the third thing is we fire for it. And so if we let someone through the hiring process, they get through the screening process and we look up and they're just mailing it in. They got a bad attitude, they don't care, they're not got a self employed mentality. We talk to them about it and say, hey, remember in the interview and remember this thing on the wall that says self employed mentality. And remember, that's how everybody else here acts. Well, you're not acting that way. And a we does that. And if you want to be part of us, you want to be part of we, then you're going to do that. That's a condition of further employment. Do you want to plug in and be part of the team here and start caring about this place deeply, or are you just trying to collect a check? Because if you're trying to collect a check, we made a mistake and you made a mistake and this will be your last day. It doesn't matter to me which one do you want to do? And you can be a little less blunt than that, but that's the essence of a series of difficult conversations with your team member. That depending on how long they've been there as to how much leniency there is on that. But we first, compensate for it, second, we talk about it a lot, reinforce it, and third, we hire for it and fire for it.

[B]

Okay, that makes sense.

[A]

And if you do all of those over time, it'll settle in, but it's not instantaneous. And you will have to constantly be polishing, meaning somebody's going to have to leave and we're going to have to constantly change up our interview script a little and make sure you fit into our culture and our team. And do you want to be. This is how we do it. Do you want to be a we? You know, and you just over and over and over and over until you're sick of saying it. And about that time is when people start hearing it.

[B]

Right, that makes sense.

[A]

Now, how long you had this?

[B]

About a little over three years.

[A]

Wow, you're doing great. Exploded. Didn't.

[B]

Did. A lot of people got dogs during.

[A]

COVID Yeah, that's true. I guess. I hadn't thought about that. There was like a dog shortage. Yeah, there was. You couldn't find one. Yeah. That's funny. Yeah, I love it.

[B]

It's been growing, but seems like the more we grow, the more cracks in the foundation become visible.

[A]

Oh, yeah, that's true with anything. The success magnifies the good and the bad in your organizational processes, Right?

[B]

Absolutely.

[A]

You get really, really strong on some things you were strong on and the things you were weak on. You're like, whoa, we gotta fix that. And my guess is that it's probably a lot harder with all your part timers to get them on board with what we're talking about in this call than it is your full timers.

[B]

Absolutely, absolutely.

[A]

And so what I'm going to start doing is kind of always think about taking a page out of the Chick Fil A book they've become known for. A great place to send your teenager to go work because they'll teach them how to work and teach them how to think about others and train them to say, it's my pleasure. And you know, a teenager that's worked at Chick Fil A had a, has had a good working experience and they're probably not gonna end up working at Chick Fil A after college. Right? But they still send their kid there because they've got a great reputation for that. And so you become a training ground for this issue of self employed mentality when you work over there. If you love animals, Luke loves animals. And Luke's good to those animals and you're gonna be good to those animals and you're gonna care and you're gonna show up and you're gonna work your butt off and he's gonna pay good. But he's also gonna teach you a lot about business and customer service and pet care and whatever else. And you're gonna come away with some knowledge base over there. It's not just, oh, I got a teenage job, it's oh, I got the teenage job because Luke's so good to teenagers, training them, college students, training them, giving them a positive ministry experience where they're working with people and animals and all that. It's all good. So you gotta kinda get that built into the thing from the outside looking in. And then you can start to attract part timers that aren't just looking for a paycheck because they're going to do the least possible work to get the paycheck. If that's all they're there for is look for the paycheck, they're going to care the least they can get away with if they're just there looking for a paycheck. So. Very good question, sir. Sounds like you got a great business going on. I love it, man. I'm proud of you. Keep it up. And thank you so much for the call.

[C]

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[A]

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[B]

How about yourself?

[A]

Better than I deserve. How can I help?

[B]

Well, I have a H Vac business that's growing. We started in 2021. We have a team about three to four with my wife and myself included. And we're actually going through a divorce currently and I'm trying to figure out how to proceed going through this divorce really because the way that the business is set up is she's actually 98% owner of the business and I'm 2% owner. And our CPA told us to set it up this way for tax purposes. She mentioned there's no point of both of us getting taxed when the accounts Being the money going to the same account. Well, now that we are going through this divorce, I'm not sure because there's been very limited communication between us now. And even though she was the 98 owner, I did 98% of the work. And all I want from this business or from this divorce is the business. And I'm letting her know, hey, you can keep everything, the house, the. The bank accounts. I just want the business. And she just keeps telling me, I don't know. So I'm at the point where I'm either going to dissolve the business and start something new, or depending on what she wants to do, depending on our mediation. I don't want to dissolve our business because we already have government contract, several contracts. Government, private, you know, residential. We have a lot of contracts already. So that's my question in a nutshell.

[A]

I'm sorry. So I. I take it she used to work there and she doesn't now?

[B]

Well, she. Yeah, she doesn't. She doesn't do anything she's supposed to, but I haven't seen any activity on her end as far as the government contract.

[A]

How long has this been? How long has she been out of there?

[B]

I would say now about two. Since October. She's been completely, like, off hands of the business.

[A]

What happened to your marriage, honey?

[B]

I didn't prioritize our marriage. I was very selfish, I would say. And I think I prioritized more of the business. Even before starting the business, I always prioritized work. And I felt, yeah, providing and giving, you know, providing a roof, food. I thought that that was enough, but I'm realizing now that's not enough. I needed to pour into my relationship, and I wasn't doing that.

[A]

Okay, so the mediation is called for about a week from now. Yeah. Okay, that works. And. All right, so. Well, at that point, you're going to know what you're going to have to do. Right. She's either going to. She's either going to agree with you, take the business and she takes everything else in the mediation, or you're going to have to go get a job or start your own heating and air business and contact each of the contracts and let them know that the other thing's probably going out of business.

[B]

Correct.

[A]

Do they want to move their contracts over to you?

[B]

Yeah. And that's more than likely that will happen. That's the thing I don't want to do because I'm already established and.

[A]

Well, you won't have a choice, honey, if you can't get this resolved. You're going to have to go do something. You can't just sit with her owning it and you working there.

[B]

Right?

[A]

That's not going to work.

[B]

No, it won't. And I have.

[A]

So she's either going to give you the business or you're going to close it and start another one and move your contracts over, which is a pain in the butt. But that's what divorce is. It's a pain in the butt, right?

[B]

It is. And then. Well, I guess going forward, depending on what happens, either if I do end up getting the business 100% or dissolving, starting something new. I have my brother who is. He works for me. He's. As an employee, but I want to bring him in as a partner.

[A]

No, you don't. You've had enough partners, Hunt. Did you not get enough of this already? No, he's not a partner. He just works for you, Period. No. Good Lord. That's what you're just going through is a breakup of a partnership.

[B]

Right?

[A]

And divorce is nasty, but. No, I mean, this is even nastier. No, you don't need your brother being your partner. If you want to share some of the profits with him as part of his comp plan, that's okay. But there's no need for him to be your partner. You guys don't have anything. It's just two guys in a truck.

[B]

Right?

[A]

We only partnership. You just need to go make some money, go get some deals, which is not a problem.

[B]

I can do that easily.

[A]

Yeah, but that doesn't mean you need a partner.

[B]

Okay. Which is something I already kind of like promised him, and.

[A]

Well, just tell him you made a mistake.

[B]

Okay?

[A]

Sorry, I can't do that. I will share some of the profits with you, but I can't share the ownership with you. I got burned on this divorce thing, and I've got to keep the ownership in my name.

[B]

Okay. Okay. Going. Staying in that page. Which, quite honestly, I feel comfortable with that. I. I guess I feel some keeping in mind on how he will feel. But how would I go with sharing the profits with him? Because I do want to share the profit not only with him, but you.

[A]

Need to do a profit loss statement each month, close the month out, and look at how much profit you made, and you can share some of it with him.

[B]

Okay. Which is something that I definitely need to work on, because that's something that my wife worked on. She. And that was my mistake for not looking at the books. She did all that?

[A]

Yeah. You'll have to learn to run the Books, not just run the truck.

[B]

Right?

[A]

That's your. Yeah, that's part of your stage. Because you're back at the treadmill operator stage. And you know, in order to make your moves through the stages of business, your next thing is to delegate and to get proper books, set up, proper accounting, set up, budget set up. So you know whether what you can pay, how you can pay and what your profits are. Plus that also tells you if you're estimating your jobs properly. So if you got tickets coming in and you're not even making what the ticket costs you to do, you know, we didn't make back parts and labor even. Cause we didn't estimate the job high enough, then you can reset that. You don't know all of that if you're not doing a set of books and closing the books every time. So, yeah, you got a lot of stuff on your plate that's gonna land there that you're gonna have to get a lot better at really quickly. And so you may wanna jump on entreeleadership.com, get one of our coaches in your corner. You through this as you go along. But you know, a week from now, when you get out of that mediation, you will know where you stand with the existing entity. Do you need to go start your own and then contact the customers to move the contracts or is she gonna hand it over to you? It's a pretty simple thing because she's not gonna run it and she's gonna have nothing. Tell the mediator that. Cause I'm not gonna work there and I'm gonna move all the contracts. So tell the mediator she's not gonna get anything. You know, all she's gonna do is put this one entity out of business and the next morning I'll be open. So it's up to her, but it's kind of silly. And if you've got kids and you got child support, she's going to want you profitable so that you can pay the child support and so forth. So that's, you know, that's where we're looking at. So. Hey, Manny, I'm sorry you're going through that. I can hear the pain in your voice. It's a hard time for you and it's confusing and it clouds up everything. You can't get your work done because we don't think about anything else right in the middle of stuff like that. I'm sorry. I love entrepreneurs. Don't forget, guys, I started my company on a card table myself, so I know what it's like to have people counting on you, your team, your family, not to mention your customers. And when you're the one signing the paychecks, you can't afford to fly blind. But I'll be honest. Early on, one thing that nearly sunk us was wasting time with spreadsheets that didn't add up because business units didn't talk to each other. I finally told my team, just fix it. And they did. We got Netsuite. That was years ago and we've never looked back. See, netsuite isn't just for tech giants. It's built for growing businesses like yours. Over 43,000 businesses already run on NetSuite, including a lot that started just like you. And now with built in AI, NetSuite is helping them even more. It's one system connected to every part of your business. For real time Insights, not guesswork, NetSuite AI flags inventory issues, cash flow risks, even supplier delays before they become problems. So you can trust the data, stop wasting time and make the right decisions faster. Take a free product tour [e-mail] Ramsey that's netsuite.com Ramsey Our question of the day comes from Corey in Fort Lauderdale. Dave, I run a small service based business and our margins have been tightening lately with rising costs. I want to stay profitable, but I also don't want to cut in places that hurt my team or our customer experience. When money gets tight, what are the first expenses a business owner should take a hard look at and what should be off limits? Actually, I look at it the other way. I don't look at what expenses there are. I look for revenue opportunities. What other lines of business do I need to add and how do I raise my prices? Because if you're running a service based business and your margins are tightening because costs are going up, that means you did not raise your prices and everybody else in your business raised their prices cause they didn't want their margins tightening. So rising costs generally mean rising prices for the delivery. That's true. So like we're printing a book on the five stages of business, building a business you love. It costs a lot more to print that book now with paper costs than it did 10 years ago. If I'd done that book 10 years ago, it would have cost half what it cost now to produce that book. So what do I do? I raise the price on the book. Hardback books are now $32. They used to be $22 and before that they were $17. And so but that's based on the cost of the production of the book and the soft cost it takes to develop and put out a book. Service based stuff. So same thing. So we raised the price and so did everybody else by the way. So look on Amazon, average hardback book in the self improvement space is about 32 $34. And that's kind of shocking to me because it was 22, 24 forever and before that it was 17 and before that it was 12. So you know, but that's all based on rising costs. And so generally people raise prices when they're cost of production, cost of providing the service goes up. Case in point a hotel to hire maids and to hire servers in the restaurant and to hire front desk people. It costs them a whole lot more than it did before COVID just five years ago. So guess what? Your hotel room costs a lot more. Ta da. And you know what we call that? Inflation. That's what we call it. That's where it comes from. Increased tariffs do not cost companies money. Companies raise prices equal to tariffs and so they pass the tariff cost onto the customer. Increased costs do not cost companies money. They passed it on to the customer in the form of higher prices. That's basic econ and that's what you're gonna need to do first, Corey. Secondly, look at a different way to some other services or other products you can add to your line to create more revenue. And then I don't have to look at what I cut. What is it I cut? Cause you're probably not. I run a small service based business. You probably don't have a lot of fluff. You probably don't have a lot of overhead. That's just miscellaneous stupid stuff. I mean, but go through your P and L every month and go where's every dollar going? Is every dollar an investment? Is every do helping us raise the bar here? Is every dollar what it takes to provide it? Or we got, you know, are we spending $500 to put a green plant in the lobby? Well, I can do away with that maybe, but I mean nobody's ever in the lobby. Hello. So I mean, I don't know what is it for something like that, that's fine, but that's usually not what causes success. Most businesses managing expenses and turning them only into investments causes success, but not cutting expenses. You can't cut your way into success. Usually there's a few times that comes up that that's possible, but most of the time that's not it. So generally speaking it's an increase in revenue from prices going up and extra lines being added and then go through the P and L with a fine tooth comb and see what tangles are in there that you can untangle. But in a small business, I don't run into entrepreneurs that are extremely wasteful. In a small business, waste comes when things get big and it gets bureaucratic and people don't think about what they're spending because they think the company's got plenty of money and they just got. That's when waste happens. But when you're small and scrappy, most of the team is small and scrappy with the expenses. They're not out of control because they know that that means the place stays open, that hired them, and that's a big, big deal there. So. Good question. Cory, we appreciate you joining us from Fort Lauderdale. Every breakthrough in your business starts with a breakthrough in you. That's why you need to come to Entree Leadership Summit. You'll get insights from top thought leaders in the leadership and business space, like Will Guidera, Vanessa Van Edwards, Brian Buffini, and more. And the best part is it all happens at Disney's Coronado Springs Resort in Orlando. To join us May 17 through 20, visit entreeleadership.comsummit or click the link in the show notes. Well, if you like what you're hearing, you can help us out by following the show or subscribing to the show or leaving a nice 5 star review. Those 1 stars are not helpful, you trolls. Okay, sharing it. If you don't like us, just leave, okay? It's okay. We can handle it. Sharing it with a friend, telling people this is a great show. Send a little share button, push all that, all that kind of stuff. Cut out the link and send it to somebody. Go. This is the thing right here, man. Hey, let people know that we're here. You're our best and our only marketing, so let people know that we're here, please. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for doing that. If you want to be part of the show, call me at 844-944-1070. That's 844-944-1090. Steve is with us in Denver. Hey, Steve, what's up?

[B]

Hi, Dave. I'm the owner of a child care business with 60 employees that does about 3 million in revenue. As I enter the trailblazer stage of business, other colleagues in my industry tell me to hire virtual assistants to help with operational efficiency and to help me scale faster. My head sees this as an opportunity, but my heart feels unsure because I can't have the same leadership impact With a virtual assistant. So my question is, am I crazy to value in person leadership impact over operational efficiency when considering a virtual assistant?

[A]

No, we don't have any virtual assistants at Ramsey. And you're big enough that you don't need one with 60 people. You need your assistant on site. The CEO of an organization that size running $3 million, you need. You need somebody on site. That's what I would do anyway. You're asking me now, I'm not against virtual assistants as a concept. We actually endorse a company that does that and they supported us for years. We've supported them for years. But there's a time and place for that and it generally is when you're at the treadmill stage and you can't, you know, you can't afford to have somebody there, you don't have a location even that can hold enough people to, you know, your, your fourth employee is usually not a personal assistant. Right. That kind of thing. But you got 60 people working there and you're running $3 million a year. You said 3 million, right?

[B]

Yeah. And all of my employees are with the children. They're all on operations.

[A]

Yeah, yeah.

[B]

So I'm doing all the marketing, the finance, hr, all of that.

[A]

Yeah. You absolutely need somebody in your corner and they need to be a high level. They don't need to be just a. It's not somebody answering the phone and write letters, just people help you with these actual HR issues. Help somebody help you with the marketing issues. They can implement some of the things you're talking about. They're like your right arm. In other words, rocket fuel. And so, yeah, I think that's even more reason that they need to be in person personally. But you're talking to the guy who doesn't do work from home.

[B]

Right.

[A]

We don't have a single person working from home.

[B]

Would you start with an executive assistant?

[A]

I'm sorry?

[B]

Would you start with an executive assistant?

[A]

I would. In person, yeah. I would not do a virtual. And for all the reasons you outlined when you opened the call, it's the same thing we believe here. Now, again, what I'm trying to say though, is there's. That's not to say just because you don't need one and I don't need one, that there's not a place for some virtual assistants. There is a place for that, but yours is not. You definitely need a high quality executive assistant in there that understands marketing lingo quickly, understands HR lingo quickly. And they're not a glorified secretary. They are Actually helping you run the business almost as if they're an assistant manager, so to speak. That makes sense because you got all these plates you're spinning. You're the only one spinning the operations side. The actual product delivery is the only thing your employees do. You do all the back office by yourself. That's what you said. So that's why we know you need somebody that can help you do all of that, not just answer your correspondence. It's not like a 1950s secretary that brings you coffee and types letters. It's not what I'm talking about. You see what I'm saying?

[B]

Yeah, yeah, that makes a lot of sense.

[A]

This is someone that really has some business acumen and comes in, you're probably going to pay them a little bit more and they're probably going to be worth it though, because you're probably. You probably got enough plates spinning with what you're describing in enough different major areas of the business that you might be dropping some stuff here or there that they pick up and it probably is going to increase your profitability.

[B]

Yeah. So what would you look for in an executive assistant?

[A]

I would like in this case, for someone. I'm just making this up as we're talking. I don't. Haven't put a lot of thought into it, but I would almost like someone that had run their own business in the past.

[B]

Interesting.

[A]

And maybe even a little bit older person, you know, so. Cause, you know, someone just out of college doesn't have the business acumen to help you with these different elements. Right. And if they've run their own business before, they've dealt with some basic marketing things or they've dealt with some. Maybe they ran a little marketing business that failed, you know, and they're just looking for a place to land that's safe and work for a good guy and come in and join a thing and take care of kiddos, you know, and that's a good, that's a good mission for them to come in and bring some of their knowledge base to help you do some of these things. Because I, you know, I'm just thinking somebody has a little bit of marketing knowledge, a little bit of HR knowledge, a little bit of, you know, where they can actually kind of be again, your right arm, not just somebody that fetches coffee.

[B]

Yeah, that would sound really nice.

[A]

And again, I. You be willing to pay 10 or 20 grand more a year and get the right person because they're going to take some of this off of you and it's going to, I think it's going to increase your revenues and decrease your costs because you're going to have another set of eyes looking at the operating the entire business. You're the only one looking at the whole thing right now. And if you get this almost, it's almost an assistant manager's role or a VP role, if you will. I would not advertise it that way, but that's how I'd be thinking about when I'm interviewing and hiring and pushing my way through it. That's how I'd go at it. You're a good man, Steve. It's going to work out. Good for you. Proud to have you in our audience, sir. Very well done. Remember, folks, better a weary warrior than a quivering critic. This world needs more high quality leaders, so take courage and lead. I'm Dave Ramsey, your host. Thanks for joining us on entree leadership.