Podcasts about Peter Drucker

Konumuz siyasi iletişim. Tabii ki, stratejik bir bakış açısıyla… Algılama Yönetimi'nin 11 altın kuralından altıncısı, ‘Ölçmek'tir. Yani iletişim mühendisliği… Peter Drucker, “Ölçmüyorsan yönetemezsin” der, Sir Iain Vallance ise işi daha da ileri götürür, “Ölçmüyorsan yapma” buyurur. Göktürk devletinin başveziri, Türk tarihinin ilk büyük stratejisti, bilge devlet adamı Tonyukuk'un, (M.S. 646-724) bugün hâlâ geçerliliğini koruyan sözünü hatırlayalım:

Every business owner eventually faces this leadership challenge: Is this employee trying to make my company better... or are they simply tearing it down? In this episode, Spencer breaks down the critical difference between employees who bring valuable ideas and employees who constantly challenge every decision without offering solutions. You'll learn how to: Create a culture where great ideas thrive. Know when employee feedback deserves action. Explain the "why" behind company policies. Recognize when healthy disagreement becomes toxic negativity. Protect your company culture before one negative employee drives away your best people. Featuring leadership lessons from Toyota's Kaizen philosophy, Jim Collins, Peter Drucker, Andy Grove, and practical experience from running a growing service business, this episode will help you become a stronger leader and build a healthier team. If you're a business owner, manager, or entrepreneur, this is an episode you won't want to miss.   If you are feeling the love, make sure to subscribe, rate, and review on iTunes, Spotify, YouTube, or wherever you are!! If you'd like to be featured on an episode go to theidahobusinesspodcast.com to APPLY! Apple Podcasts Spotify

Bernie Jaworski holds the Drucker Chair at Claremont's Drucker School and recently wrote “The Soul of Strategy”. Inspired by Peter Drucker's principle that organizations exist to create customers, Bernie critiques traditional strategy frameworks for neglecting customer centricity. He explores how companies lose customer focus as they scale, how AI accelerates insights generation, and why abandoning outdated practices is critical. The conversation also covers the risk of being overly customer-centric and concludes with a rapid-fire round highlighting Drucker's enduring management philosophy.Show notes:Bernie Jaworski - Drucker School of ManagementBook “The Soul of Strategy” by Bernie JaworskiThe “Organic Growth Playbook” by Bernie JaworskiBook “Why we buy” by Paco UnderhillVideo “Shopping cart Design process” by IdeoJoseph Schumpeter in Wikipediasylvainnewton.com/podcast

https://youtu.be/_i6C7OstTEI Courtney Berry, President and Co-founder of Bandits & Friends, is driven by a desire to build an advertising agency where trust, creativity, meaningful relationships, and building energy instead of burnout replace bureaucracy and transactional client engagements. Inspired to create more opportunities for women in executive leadership and eliminate unnecessary bureaucracy, Courtney founded Bandits & Friends to prove there is a better way to build both an agency and lasting client partnerships.  In this conversation, Courtney introduces the Bandits & Friends Growth Flywheel: Choose the Right Opportunity, Create Clarity, Empower Ownership, Protect Your Point of View, and Build Energy Instead of Burnout. She explains why selecting the right clients is the foundation of sustainable growth, how clarity and ownership eliminate friction, and why agencies create the most value when they offer strategic judgment instead of simply executing requests. Courtney also explains how trust creates a self-reinforcing growth flywheel and how Bandits & Friends leverages culture, AI, and fractional talent to scale without sacrificing creativity or client relationships. — Build Energy Instead of Burnout with Courtney Berry  Good day, everyone. Steve Preda here with the Management Blueprint Podcast, and today my guest is Courtney Berry, the President and Co-founder of Bandits & Friends, a full-service creative advertising agency that specializes in stealing attention for brands. Courtney, welcome to the show.  Thank you, Steve. Thanks for having me. It’s good to see you.  Well, you have to tell us first about the choice of the brand—Bandits & Friends. I mean, bandit is not typically something that people would want to start building trust with. But obviously your brand is an award-winning one, so you must be doing something right.  That’s right. Well, we’re in the world of advertising. It’s all about branding, so we had to make sure that we had a good name to back it up. Our name, Bandits & Friends, is as much an operating ethos as it is a name. Bandits—we steal attention on behalf of brands. And Friends, that part of the equation, is how we refer to our clients.Share on X We actually try to never even use the word client in our agency because it creates a certain kind of them-versus-us mentality. And so that’s how we got to the name. We liked that it really infused the way that we operated as much as who we were at the end of the day.  Yeah, I like it. And how do clients react to being called friends? Do they take it at face value, or do you choose clients that you feel could fit—could become friends? How do you do that?  That is a great question. One, when we started, we fully thought the Bandits part of the equation was going to be the thing that potential clients really liked. We thought they would understand that that’s exactly what they’re going to an agency for. But what we have found is that it’s the Friends part of the equation that they have all sparked to so much more. Because sometimes it is a very transactional relationship between clients and agencies.  Sometimes there’s a strong difference of opinion when it comes to certain things, and that can create tension between clients and agencies. So when we talk about friendship, what we really mean is that the basis of all of it is trust. We have to trust each other in terms of the brief being right. We have to trust each other to have really honest conversations with one another to get to the real solution that we’re all trying to reach. Friends don’t waste each other’s money at the end of the day. We don’t want to waste our clients’ money, and we don’t want them to waste ours.  Also, friends are really looking for the best for each other. When we want the best for our clients, and they also want the best for us—because friendship really does go two ways—that's a really important component.Share on X And to your other point, not every client is a friend. Not every client really wants to play in that world of having a back-and-forth relationship, with give and take. If that’s not something they’re interested in, then at the end of the day, they’re probably not the right fit for us and our agency culture. It really resonates with me. I used to be kind of an agency owner. It was an investment banking firm. Whenever we had a friendly relationship with a client who really trusted our judgment, who would let us lead, and who would not be receptive to divide-and-rule tactics from acquirers, then we could get so much more out of the transaction.  Absolutely.  We could negotiate harder because we knew they had our back, and we could really push the envelope to get the best results for them. If we didn’t have that, then it was much harder.  It’s so true. When you don’t have that kind of trusting foundation, there’s an element of fear. There’s an element of fear that they’re not going to do good work for me, or they’re going to overcharge me, or they’re going to do a bait and switch. So yeah, you’re exactly right. It’s the same kind of philosophy and mentality in order to get to better work for them and better outcomes.  Yeah. Yeah, love it. Love it. So let me ask you, what is your personal “why,” and how are you manifesting it in Bandits & Friends?  Yes. I had to think about this question a lot, Steve. Unfortunately, I don’t really have a positive answer for this one. I listened to all of your other podcasts, and I thought, “Oh man, mine’s a little bit of a Debbie Downer.” But I guess it is what it is. I started Bandits & Friends because I was really frustrated by two things. First, when I looked around the industry, there just weren’t many examples of women in real power.  In my last role before starting this agency, there wasn’t a single woman in the C-suite of the holding company that I was working for. Not one. There weren’t women making the biggest decisions. There weren’t many examples of the career path that I was looking for. At some point, I realized I could either wait for someone else to carve out that path or I could be the one to help create it for myself and help create a lot of the opportunities that I wish I had seen. So that’s the first one.  The second one—and I think it really manifests itself in an independent agency culture—is that I was really fed up with the bureaucracy of everything. There was too much energy in our industry being spent on politics, approvals, or process instead of the things that make our work happen: the people, the clients, and the work itself. So I really wanted to build a company that could move faster, trust people more, and focus on the things that actually matter.  What we’re being paid for is to focus our time and energy on our clients’ businesses and on creativity. Removing all the bureaucracy really allows us to focus on that. So I guess, to sum up those two things—and really 343: Build Energy Instead of Burnout with Courtney BerryShare on X  Yeah. I mean, Steve Jobs said there are two functions in business: marketing and innovation. In some ways, those two things are the same because if you don’t keep innovating in marketing, you’re not going to steal anyone’s attention. And you have to remove the bureaucracy to create a culture where people can be creative. That’s right. I love it. That is very interesting.  So tell me about this framework. This is a podcast about frameworks. Maybe it’s a little bit misworded in the description that it’s a shortcut. It doesn’t have to be a shortcut. It’s more of a mental model. It’s a way of looking at and simplifying the world that allows you to do good work or create that Bandits impact. So what’s a framework that you could share with the listeners?  Yeah. To your point, I think it’s more of a mentality and approach versus steps that we take because we don’t work in a very linear business. Often, things are running on parallel paths. The way that I try to approach things—and really what ultimately becomes the culture that we're trying to create at this agency—is removing friction to create momentum.Share on X Because if we’re ever static, we’re wasting our money or we’re wasting our clients’ money. Or, to your earlier point, it means that someone else is going to be able to steal attention before we can on behalf of the brands that we work for.  So, removing friction to create momentum. There are kind of five different components that I’ve thought about for this. The first one, which seems so basic, is that I think a lot of times we get so excited by an opportunity that we forget to stop and ask, “Are we choosing the right opportunity for us and what we can do for the brand?” Because not every opportunity that comes across our desk deserves that momentum. When we first get an RFP or an RFI, or some kind of pitch that’s going to happen, we really ask ourselves two things.  One: Can we make money? Sometimes, in this business, you can’t. The answer is no. The other question that we ask ourselves is, “Can we make great creative?” If neither one of those things is true, we move on, and that helps prevent wasting energy and wasting time. If we can’t answer those questions, then we ask more questions of the prospective client. A lot of times, those clients can’t answer either one of those questions, and in those cases, we also move on. So the first step is really about choosing the right opportunities that we think deserve momentum and deserve the stealing of attention.Share on X  The second point is clarity. I think that, in order to be a great leader, you have to be decisive. You have to be someone who is willing to make decisions when no one else can, or no one else is really tasked with making those decisions. So we’re all about creating clarity because momentum really dies in a world of ambiguity. We’re asking ourselves, “What are we solving for? Who owns this? What does success look like? What is the budget?” Don’t ever leave a meeting without knowing the next steps. I think this is also a step that a lot of people skip, or maybe shortchange, and then you’re going to pay for it later.  Third one is all around ownership. When you’re kind of just starting out, you’re just getting going. At the lowest level, people operate with the mindset of, “I do what is assigned to me.” Right? And then managers get to that managerial level, and they’re all about managing on outcomes. “I’m going to make sure this thing that is my responsibility is going to succeed.” Ultimately, what we’re trying to build are the highest-operating types of people who say, “If I see a gap, I close it.” It might be a gap where no one has assigned the task yet, or no one has even identified that it is a gap.  No one owns the problem, but they see it, they own it, and they move it forward. So we're really trying to create that culture where we don't wait for permission to solve problems, and we don't wait for those problems to even be identified.Share on X And that’s where we can really add value to our clients. We don’t wait for that ownership. We just kind of assume that it’s ours, and we run with it.  Love it.  The fourth piece is protecting our point of view. This is probably one of the most difficult. But as a creative agency, we really don’t exist to execute instructions. We exist to bring judgment to a brief. We talk a lot about partnership, and especially at Bandits & Friends, obviously friendship. But what that really means is that we’re not adding value if we’re simply taking instructions and just executing what’s already known. The best agencies come in to provide perspective and judgment because every single time there’s an opinion in the room, if we surrender our point of view, we’re no longer providing that value.  If you think about it, the Apple “1984” commercial, right? That almost didn’t air because Apple’s board hated it. They wanted to pull it. They didn’t want it to go anywhere. So if they had listened to every stakeholder concern, then arguably one of the best ads that a gazillion people are aware of would’ve never existed. It would’ve never aired. So that is a daily struggle and a daily debate for us. But I can’t even believe I’m going to say this on the record, but in our business, the customer is not always right.  We have to make sure that we can defend why we believe that or why we think that there might be a better path forward for them to consider. And last but not least, honestly, it's about having fun. I think a big part for us is that we have to build energy among both our employees and the clients that we're serving instead of burnout.Share on X Again, it’s not always easy, and it’s not just necessarily a cultural thing. It is very behavioral in terms of the way that we do things, the way that we operate under stress, and the way that we take feedback. But the work itself is hard enough already. I’ve never seen people do their best work in a miserable state or a miserable environment.  Again, that goes for both employees and clients. When we do talk about our clients, we often talk about one of our goals being to try to be the best part of their day, and to be the ones who are actually going to have the best meeting they've had that entire week.Share on X And if we only achieve that 50% of the time, at least it’s 50% more fun than they would’ve had otherwise. So, choosing the right opportunities, bringing clarity to what those opportunities are, empowering ownership, protecting our point of view, and having some fun while we’re doing it.  Wow. You really did a good job. I hope you won’t send me a bill for coming up with that. But I resonate with it. Just to your last point, we’re in the experience economy, right? People don’t just want to buy a service. They want to buy an experience. They want to feel good about the process of why they’re doing this ad or why they believe in this creative.  You want to energize them as well because they ultimately have to sell it. If they don’t believe in it and aren’t excited about it, then it’s not going to work as well. I have the same view with my clients. I typically see them once a quarter, and I know that I have to show up. I have to recharge them so that they come out of the meeting feeling like they want to tear apart the next quarter. Yes. That’s right. Otherwise, what separates you from someone else who can tactically and executionally do the exact same thing that anyone else can?  Or AI, even. I mean…  Oh, 100%. Yeah.  I think the emotional part is our competitive advantage compared to AI. Yes. Love it. So, Courtney, tell me, what drives growth in Bandits & Friends? It’s what I’ve been referring to, I guess, kind of throughout our whole conversation, which is, again, maybe on the surface, a little oversimplified. But for us, the biggest driver of growth is trust. Again, it goes back to our philosophy of treating clients like friends, not just because it's a nice thing to say, but because trusted relationships are where the best work happens.Share on X So that becomes the most scalable asset that we have. When you really think about it, creativity—the business that we’re in—is very vulnerable.  So first, you need trust in order to create great work. Then great work creates more trust with the clients you’re working with. That trust can lead to referrals. It can lead to recommendations, which is where a lot of our new business comes from. Those create more opportunities. We’re in a people business at the end of the day. When referrals create opportunities, we’re attracting more talent.  The talent that we have here wants to stay longer, and they want to give more because they’re working on fun and exciting opportunities, briefs, and brands. Then you have talent that creates better work. So it becomes this flywheel at the end of the day. It’s something that we really feel responsible for every time we’re taking on a new friend at the agency. Do we feel like we have the right kind of chemistry to build trust with them in order to create that flywheel? Our clients don’t necessarily hire us because we’re the cheapest.  They don’t necessarily hire us because we have the biggest team. They hire us because they trust our judgment, and they trust the way that we operate. Once that exists, everything starts to open up. Everything starts to move faster. When you can move faster, get to more work, and get that work out into the world, that continues to open up more opportunities and more growth at the end of the day.Share on X  Yeah, I love that. Do you find that you have to lead with your own trust to get trust?  That is such a great question. Yes. I think that we have to prove that we are trusting that they’re coming to us with all of the information that they can give us. I have to trust that they’re being transparent and truthful about the budget they’re giving us. I have to trust, to be honest, that this is a real opportunity they’re coming to us with, that has been approved by all the necessary parties, and that it’s something that’s actually going to move forward and happen.  It’s really hard to do when you’re picking up a call from somebody you’ve never worked with before. You have to assume good intent. At least starting from that place of positivity, I think can help to then create that path towards the ongoing conversations, us proving that we have trust in everything that they’re telling us, so that then they return that same favor to us. Yeah. I mean, sometimes I get the criticism that I’m too trusting of people. Yeah. But it’s a little bit like optimism. If you don’t have optimism, then you have no positive vision to strive for. If you don’t trust people, you have no chance to earn their trust.  Right.  Maybe it’s vulnerability. It’s something to do with vulnerability. Right. But you’re totally right. You definitely have to have those guardrails around trust to make sure that your trust and your optimism aren’t clouding your judgment at the end of the day. That is one of the hardest things, I think, that we have to do with new opportunities because you’re making a lot of assumptions. Sometimes those assumptions are stated, and sometimes they’re not, and you just have to roll with it. Obviously, you win some, you lose some. But hopefully, the more we do it, the more it becomes that positive net effect.  Yeah. So, Courtney, what is something that you’re actively trying to figure out in your business?  Well, I won’t talk about AI because I feel like everyone’s talking about AI, but that is definitely an obvious answer. Operationally, are we using all of the best tools that are out there? Are we staying compliant with our agency agreements and client agreements when we introduce some of those new AI tools? And then, of course, in the world of creativity, everybody’s really questioning how much we should be using AI in final assets versus the human part of things.  From our perspective right now, we’re interested in exploring. We’re interested in understanding how things can continue to help us remove friction from a process in order to get to those fast-moving flywheels that we want everyone at the agency to be operating on. But also, how do we make sure that we’re continuing to bring craft and fidelity to all of the campaigns that we’re working on? So AI is a very obvious one. I think the other thing we’re really trying to figure out at the agency is scaling. The more we’re trying to grow, the more we’re trying to scale.  The processes and behaviors that you have as a young agency can be quite different from those of a more mature agency with several hundred people. What we’re trying to instill is making sure that the behaviors and processes we’re creating and adopting now are scalable for the future. Sometimes that’s easy to figure out, and other times it’s something we really have to evaluate and take into consideration. For example, time sheets. That’s not something we care to do at an independent agency.  One, we think they’re wildly inaccurate. As somebody who used to work at a bunch of holding companies, my Wi-Fi would be turned off if I didn’t enter my time sheets within a certain amount of time. But I think they’re wildly inaccurate. We’re not lawyers. We’re not accountants. We don’t turn our brains off by the hour. We’re constantly thinking about the briefs that we have. I’ve been challenged multiple times on whether that’s a scalable behavior and process for the future.  When you’re several hundred people, you’re going to want to know exactly how much time so-and-so spent on which project. I just don’t think it’s necessary for us. I think there’s a level of organization that we can bring to the way we operate where something like a time sheet is going to be obsolete in our future. But it really all comes down to how we scale and whether we’re making the right choices every single day to support that scale and that growth. Yeah, this is fascinating. Peter Drucker said, “Culture eats strategy for breakfast.” Some people say that the most enduring professional service businesses build a unique culture, and that becomes their competitive advantage. So they’re scaling the culture rather than the frameworks, the processes, or whatever else they have. That’s an interesting idea.  As an agency co-founder, what would your advice be to other professionals—maybe on Madison Avenue or wherever they are—working in professional services in some kind of leadership position and thinking about breaking out to do their own thing? What’s one thing you would advise them that maybe wasn’t obvious to you when you got started?  I think, first, if people are really thinking about it and weighing the pros and the cons, if you’re not willing to take a bet on yourself, then that’s a larger conceptual, philosophical conversation that you need to have with yourself. I think, at the end of the day, that’s one of the ultimate things that pushed me forward to start this agency. I wanted to take a bet on myself.  I felt like I had proven myself in a number of different opportunities and roles, and that I was ready for it. If it failed, then all right—that’s a problem for another day. Honestly, on a very tactical level, I think today’s world and the way that we operate in a remote and very fractional sense has been one of the most helpful things for us as an agency. I didn’t know about the world of fractional bookkeeping, fractional CFOs, fractional benefits and payroll providers, or fractional HR.  That creates so much back-office power for us. And it’s so important in terms of making sure that, again, we have behaviors and processes that can scale, where we don’t necessarily have to have all of those employees from an overhead standpoint. That has truly been eye-opening for me in terms of the world that exists outside of hiring full-time employees and this ecosystem that’s there that so many people can tap into in order to really have that firepower to show up in a very legitimate and credible way. Wow. Okay. That’s great. You’re running a remote business, you have fractional people, and you’re leveraging AI without hurting the creativity, hopefully. That’s a model for the 2020s—or the 2030s, potentially. Fantastic. So if someone is yearning for the kind of creative juice that your team is bringing, and they have a product or service that they want to steal some attention for, where can they learn more about Bandits & Friends, and where can they connect with you? Sure. Anyone can go to our website at banditsandfriends.com, or they can email us at hifriend@banditsandfriends.com. We’d love to have a conversation with anyone who’s ready to steal attention and operate with that mindset and philosophy of trust and friendship in order to get to the best ideas that are really going to help drive business results. All right. Well, if you want to befriend Courtney and her friends at Bandits & Friends, then reach out to her. So, Courtney Berry, President and Co-founder of Bandits & Friends, thanks for coming and sharing your unique ideas with us. And if you enjoyed listening, stay tuned to our YouTube channel, follow us, and give us a review. Thanks for coming, and thanks for listening. Important Links: Courtney's  LinkedIn Courtney's  website Courtney's email: hifriend@banditsandfriends.com

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Most business owners are chasing more leads while ignoring the biggest opportunity they already have, the customers they've already earned. In this episode Spencer explains why your existing customer list may be your most valuable asset and how adding complementary services can dramatically increase customer lifetime value without spending more on advertising. Learn how businesses like roofers, asphalt contractors, remodelers, retailers, and service companies can create recurring revenue by solving additional problems for the customers they already serve. Spencer also shares practical examples of using a CRM to automate follow-up campaigns, schedule recurring services, and generate new revenue with almost no extra effort. You'll also hear business insights from Alex Hormozi, Peter Drucker, and Jay Abraham on customer retention, increasing purchase frequency, and creating more value for every client. If you've ever wondered how to grow your business without constantly chasing new customers, this episode is for you. In this episode: Why your current customer list is worth more than you think How to identify new services your customers already need Simple examples of recurring revenue opportunities Using automation and CRMs to generate sales on autopilot How increasing customer lifetime value can transform your business Lessons from Alex Hormozi, Peter Drucker, and Jay Abraham Subscribe to the Idaho Business Podcast for practical, no-fluff strategies to help you build a stronger, more profitable business. If you are feeling the love, make sure to subscribe, rate, and review on iTunes, Spotify, YouTube, or wherever you are!! If you'd like to be featured on an episode go to theidahobusinesspodcast.com to APPLY! Apple Podcasts Spotify  

Como chegamos ao atual debate sobre discipulado, pequenos grupos, liderança leiga, plantação de igrejas e revitalização missionária? Neste episódio, percorremos setenta anos de história para compreender como o Movimento de Crescimento de Igrejas influenciou o cristianismo contemporâneo, o adventismo e a forma como muitos líderes enxergam a missão, a liderança e a organização eclesiástica. Partindo de Donald McGavran, passando por C. Peter Wagner, Peter Drucker, Bill Hybels e Rick Warren, chegamos à contribuição singular de Russell Burrill e sua tentativa de recuperar uma visão autenticamente adventista do discipulado, do sacerdócio de todos os crentes e da missão apostólica. Neste episódio você descobrirá: ✅ Como nasceu o Movimento de Crescimento de Igrejas ✅ O que mudou quando a missão passou a ser medida pelo crescimento ✅ A influência de Peter Drucker e das megachurches na liderança cristã ✅ Os limites do modelo consumerista de igreja ✅ O papel de Russell Burrill na revitalização adventista ✅ O que Ellen White ensinou sobre pastores equipadores e membros missionários ✅ Como o sistema representativo adventista se relaciona com a missão ✅ Por que o adventismo não precisa importar uma visão apostólica — mas redescobrir a sua própria identidade Mais do que uma análise histórica, este episódio é um convite à reflexão sobre o futuro da liderança adventista, da missão local e do discipulado no contexto do tempo do fim. Links Instagram http://instagram.com/alexpalmeira7 Podcast Catalisadores http://open.spotify.com/show/6zJyD0vW8MnyRKPYZtk3B5?si=065e95b72bca4b13 X http://x.com/alexpalmeira9 Facebook http://facebook.com/profile.php?id=100069360678042

What gives an organization its spirit?According to Jay Doran, it isn't the logo, the mission statement, or the office. It's the people.In this solo episode, Jay explores one of the deepest leadership conversations of the series: if organizations borrow their spirit from the people inside them, then what responsibility do leaders have in protecting, restoring, and strengthening that spirit? Drawing from philosophy, psychology, business, and decades of experience advising founders and executives, Jay weaves together ideas from thinkers like Heraclitus, Peter Drucker, Warren Buffett, Charlie Munger, Pareto, and Price to examine why thriving cultures are never accidental. They're modeled, reinforced, and lived through leadership. Throughout the episode, he discusses:Why organizations don't possess spirit—people doHow leaders shape culture through words, thoughts, and actionsThe connection between trust, accountability, and organizational healthWhy great companies continually develop people while courageously addressing misalignmentThe hidden cost of complacencyThe relationship between leadership, responsibility, and influenceWhy meaningful work is found in the pursuit of shared purpose rather than the pursuit of happiness aloneJay also challenges listeners to think differently about leadership itself. Leadership is not simply a title or position of authority. It is the daily responsibility of bringing people back to what matters most and creating the conditions where individuals can flourish together. This is a philosophical episode for founders, executives, managers, entrepreneurs, and anyone committed to building organizations that people don't just work for—but genuinely believe in.Because culture isn't something you write on a wall.It's something leaders model every single day. 

Alfredo Ocampo Zamorano es un destacado poeta, científico social e investigador académico colombiano-estadounidense, nacido en Cali en 1930. Su trayectoria abarca la literatura, las ciencias sociales y la docencia universitaria, con una notable presencia tanto en Colombia como en el ámbito internacional. Doctor en Ciencias Jurídicas y Económicas por la Universidad Javeriana (1957). MBA dirigido por Peter Drucker en la Universidad del Valle (1966). Ph.D. en Sociología de la Universidad de Columbia, Nueva York (1972), donde estudió bajo la tutela de reconocidos académicos como Lucien Goldman, Inmanuel Wallerstein y Robert Merton. Ha desempeñado roles como profesor e investigador en diversas instituciones, incluyendo la Universidad del Valle, la Universidad Javeriana y la Tulane University en Nueva Orleans. Además, ha sido consultor para el Banco de la República y ha trabajado en investigaciones sobre líderes de opinión en Colombia. Como poeta bilingüe, Ocampo Zamorano escribe en inglés y español. Entre sus obras más destacadas se encuentran: Poemas Reunidos (1974), que le valió el Primer Premio Nacional de Poesía de Colcultura en 1973. La Savia Sin Nombre (1975). Bitácora, año dos mil (2002). Desde las mil colinas de Ruanda (2008). Farewell: Poems in American-English, 1995–1999. También ha sido galardonado con el Premio Nacional de Poesía en el Año Internacional de la Mujer (1976) y recibió una mención de honor en el Premio Nacional de Poesía Alférez Real (1989). unto a la poeta Guiomar Cuesta Escobar, fundó Apidama Ediciones, una editorial dedicada a promover la poesía afrocolombiana y la literatura escrita por mujeres. Han compilado antologías como ¡Negras Somos! y Poesía colombiana del siglo XX escrita por mujeres, contribuyendo significativamente a la visibilización de voces tradicionalmente marginadas en la literatura colombiana. El 4 de septiembre de 2023, Alfredo Ocampo Zamorano fue nombrado miembro honorario de una academia, destacando su invaluable contribución a la literatura y las ciencias sociales. Su vida y obra reflejan un compromiso profundo con la poesía, la investigación social y la promoción de la diversidad cultural, consolidándolo como una figura influyente en el panorama intelectual colombiano e internacional.

In today's episode, we revisit the work of Peter Drucker, widely considered the father of modern management. Drawing from his book, The Daily Drucker, we share several insights that have profound implications for organization development and human resources. While Drucker is often remembered as a business guru and management consultant, his writings are filled with practical wisdom about people, purpose, effectiveness, and leadership. This is our second visit to Drucker's work because his ideas continue to challenge us to think differently about organizations and what it really means to get the right things done. If you're an OD or HR practitioner looking for timeless principles that still speak powerfully to today's workplace realities, this episode is for you. Some ideas don't age. Drucker's observations from decades ago may be exactly what today's leaders need to hear.

"I'm not here to teach you anything new. I'm here to make you see things that you normally would not see." — Dr. W. Edwards Deming In this episode, Deming educator Balaji Reddie reveals the practices that are hiding in plain sight within most organizations. Practices that feel normal. That get celebrated. And that quietly undermine everything you're building. One example: arbitrary targets. An employee collected 2 million rupees in a single day — four times his target. He told no one and did nothing for four days. Because he knew his manager would just raise the bar. That single moment of silence cost the company a genuine breakthrough. This is what Deming called a "faulty practice." And there are many more where that came from. Host Andrew Stotz and Balaji dig into Chapter 2 of The New Economics — Deming's most overlooked chapter. They cover why ranking employees is built on a mathematical illusion. Why chasing quarterly results destroys long-term value. And why the best leaders, from Steve Jobs to Walt Disney, ignored the pressures that trap most organizations. TRANSCRIPT 0:00:02.4 Andrew Stotz: My name is Andrew Stotz, and I'll be your host as we dive deeper into the teachings of Dr. W. Edwards Deming. Today I'm continuing my discussions with Balaji Reddie. He's an educator and a trainer in the teachings of Dr. Deming and quality management generally. And the topic for today is becoming aware of faulty practices. Take it away, Balaji.   0:00:26.0 Balaji Reddie: Good morning. Thank you, Andrew. So part three of our series, what we're looking at. So last time we met, we spoke about essentially Point number 14, because we outlaid his profound knowledge. And then I always said that he gave us a lot of clues as to what needed to be done. So I started out by reading some of the excerpts from the book, which we tend to ignore. And then he said, "Here's what I expect." So he expected leadership, a critical mass to be created, and then he gave attributes of a leader. So we listed 17 of those points, which we said principles of leadership. And now once you've created that critical mass and there's someone who's taken the lead and there are a bunch of leaders, maybe, so what do we do next? So when you start becoming aware that you are now in a prison, so to say, because that's what he said here, that they feel it's a fixture, and this is the way things are, this is how things always have been. So he says, "No, you need to understand that these things are wrong." Right? And you first need to become aware, and then we need to look at what needs to be done, perhaps. So he's given some suggestions, and you could always adapt and adopt this. So most of this would be taken from the book, The New Economics, chapter two, which he has titled as "The Heavy Losses." Now, remember, when he wrote this book, it was after the other book, Out of the Crisis, where he had listed his 14 Points. Yes, but he also listed diseases and obstacles. And people tend to ignore that.   0:02:18.9 Balaji Reddie: In fact, I remember having a chat with Bill Bellows on this, and I said, "Diseases and obstacles." And he said, "Obstacles?" I said, "Yes, he has listed 16 obstacles in Out of the Crisis." And he said, "Oh, wow." And he took his copy and he said, "Oh, yeah, you're right. There are 16 of them." And so sometimes you see things that you normally would not see. So when he wrote this, initially, I think many people thought that it was just an extension of those Diseases. But when you start looking deeper, you'll find that he became more elaborate in what he listed as the heavy losses. So he says here that these are things that you start observing and you say, "This is not normal." So the language that he's used is pretty, pretty clear. Present practice, so faulty practices. The present practice, and he says these are only reactive. You only need certain skills and not nearly any theory of management. Whereas when you opt to go to a better practice, you need a theory. So let's start with the very first faulty practice. And this stems from his 14 points too. He says, "Lack of constancy of purpose, short-term thinking, and emphasis on immediate results. Think in the present tense, no future tense." And then he becomes more elaborate and says, "Keep up the price of the company's stock and maintain dividends."   0:04:02.0 Balaji Reddie: Which, well, okay, it seems like you should not do that. No. He says here, you fail to optimize through time. Make this quarter look good, ship everything on hand at the end of the month or quarter, never mind its quality, mark it as shipped, show it as accounts receivable, and defer till the next quarter repairs, maintenance, and orders for material. Just a word here, in the new edition of The New Economics, there's been a spelling mistake there. So if anyone's listening, you can just correct it in the next edition that comes out. Instead of "defer till the next quarter," he's written "defer toll the next quarter." So we need to correct that in the next printing. Now he says here, a better practice...   0:04:52.1 Andrew Stotz: And before you go to there, can we just talk about this for a second?   0:04:56.1 Balaji Reddie: Sure.   0:04:57.8 Andrew Stotz: One of the things that, having been a financial analyst all my career, we get quarterly results from companies in the stock market. And in my own business, of course, I look at monthly results because we close the books every month. And it's definitely one... Donald Trump recently came up with the idea of telling companies not to report quarterly results. And I believe the Singapore Stock Exchange also came up with the idea of maybe we'll reduce the amount of reporting to maybe half-yearly, because we do have half-yearly reporting in some countries, right?   0:05:39.6 Balaji Reddie: Right.   0:05:40.9 Andrew Stotz: But having learned the teachings of Dr. Deming many years ago, long before I became a financial analyst, I always thought, I never really got this one because I thought, what an idiot you would be if you're running a company and all you could see was the market's demand for quarterly performance. And I've always admired those people, I think Jeff Bezos was one that really made it very explicit. "If you're here for quarterly performance, you're not gonna get it." And so I always have said to CEOs, having seen analysts and fund managers, I've visited, taken fund managers more than 1,000 times to meet with CEOs, and CEOs ask me, "What's your advice from seeing all that?" And I said, "Don't listen to this too much." Take it on board, what the discussions are about, but you're the CEO. Your job is to optimize the value of this business. And that means, that doesn't mean making quarterly numbers, manipulating things to make quarterly numbers. So part of what I've said to people is, "Get a backbone. Don't come and complain to me, 'Oh, yeah, but the pressure of the market's quarterly.' Come on." You know and I know that the job of a CEO is to maximize the value of the business, not the quarterly result. So anyways, that's my little pet peeve.   0:07:13.6 Balaji Reddie: Yeah. Yeah, that's right. And if you look at even Jobs, Steve Jobs, when he came back as Apple CEO, he had the nerve and the spine, like you said, to tell the board, "Don't judge me on this. It's gonna take time. And believe me," he said, "someday you will see results." Now, unfortunately, he was not there to see what he's created, but I think anyone in Apple can safely say that they're growing because of the foundation that he laid so long back, right? And I think that was one of the major reasons why he did not make Jonathan Ive as the CEO, because he wanted him to focus on the product and the customer rather than the quarterly results. And I don't think Apple ever played it by quarterly results.   0:08:04.9 Andrew Stotz: Yeah. And here's a good book called Competition Demystified by Bruce Greenwald. And there's a passage in here that's interesting because he published the book back in 2005, so it was long before Steve Jobs really made the company profitable. And he had basically gone through and explained the situation at that time as a strategist looking at the company. And what he said, it says, he just said that "Jobs had managed to restore operating margins, but Apple survived, it had hardly prospered, its future does not look bright." And I use this as an example in my strategy class to help people understand that when you're building strategy, you're thinking long term. And the ecosystem that Steve Jobs created, the value of that ecosystem didn't really truly appear until many years after he was working on it. So anyways.   0:09:06.6 Balaji Reddie: Yeah, so that's a classic case here.   0:09:11.1 Andrew Stotz: Let's keep going. You're on a roll.   0:09:14.5 Andrew Stotz: Oh, that's okay. So now better practice, he says, theory of management. Now see what he writes here. He says, "Adopt and publish the constancy of purpose." Now, that's one of the things that he also changed in his 14 points in the 1990 edition, which he never really published in a book but he gave as handouts in his seminars. Earlier on, it was "Create a constancy of purpose," but he says now, "Publish it." And it should be a proper statement, right? And he also said not just for the company, but for other organization. Now, he perhaps was envisioning or he already saw what is happening in the world today, that it's not one company against another, it's a family of companies against another family of companies, if I may say so. And these companies are globally dispersed, so there has to be something that binds them together, and that's the constancy of purpose. And purpose is why we exist, right?   0:10:13.4 Andrew Stotz: And I want to ask about this.   0:10:15.3 Balaji Reddie: Right.   0:10:16.2 Andrew Stotz: Professor, can I ask you about this?   0:10:18.4 Balaji Reddie: Sure. Right.   0:10:21.0 Andrew Stotz: Because if we go to Out of the Crisis, he has his section, and this for me is on page 24, but I don't know what edition I... Maybe I have an old edition, but it's the chapter "Principles for Transformation." He's gonna talk about the 14 Points, and I want to talk about the first point. And the first point is "Create constancy of purpose for improvement of product and service."   0:10:45.8 Balaji Reddie: Yeah. This is the old edition, 24.   0:10:48.6 Andrew Stotz: And the question that I have is that was he saying... Because now you've said in The New Economics he says constancy of purpose. He just states constancy of purpose. He doesn't say "for improvement of product and service." So my question to you is, is he saying that the constancy of purpose should be about improvement of product and service, or is he saying your constancy of purpose could be any purpose, but you just need a long-term purpose?   0:11:22.8 Balaji Reddie: Yeah. And he says that anything that help people to live better and have a market. That's on page 25. So whatever you do, your purpose should be to make life better, right?   0:11:40.2 Andrew Stotz: Right.   0:11:40.7 Balaji Reddie: And the product is just the manifestation of that. It's the outcome, correct? For example, if you talk about Walt Disney and his statement of purpose, he made a very telling statement, right? And how he came to write that down as a very fascinating tale. But he said, "I'll do anything to make a child smile. I'll do anything to make a child smile." So all that you see was aimed at the child, right? Whether it was the merchandise, whether it was the animated films, whether it was the actual non-animated films, if I may say so. And then, of course, coming out with Disneyland and then Disney World. So whatever he did was for the child. And then after he passed away, they lost that. I think they wanted to just sustain what they had attained, but there was nothing new coming out of Disney. And slowly people started encroaching on their turf, so to say. You had someone like a Steven Spielberg who made ET, and that really pulled the rug under their feet. And before they knew it, there was Goonies and Gremlins, and they were really crumbling. And they thought, "Let's join hands with the devil," and so they hired him to make a film. And that did very badly.   0:13:01.9 Balaji Reddie: We also know that Hook, which was supposed to be on Peter Pan, et cetera. And then they were in a crisis and said, "What do we do now?" And most of the top people were just washing their hands of everything. They were the employees who were left, many of them who had worked with Disney, and they said, Sony was very keen to buy them out. And they said, "We need to keep them out, and how do we do that? The only way we can do that is to make a comeback and let's make another film. And we've not been doing anything original, so let's go back to the drawing board." But they said, "We need something to guide us." And that's when they discovered what Walt Disney had written, "I'll do anything to make a child smile." And they said, "What a shame. We forgot the child. We hired the best, but we didn't do anything for the child." And they added one more sentence there. "Anything to make a child smile, and there's a child in every adult." That's how they created Honey, I Shrunk the Kids. Unique idea.   0:14:03.0 Andrew Stotz: Right.   0:14:03.9 Balaji Reddie: You can see it's a statement of purpose that brought them back.   0:14:07.6 Andrew Stotz: Okay. That helps me to understand that what he's talking about, according to what you're saying, is come up with your purpose.   0:14:14.4 Balaji Reddie: That's right.   0:14:15.3 Andrew Stotz: Okay.   0:14:15.6 Balaji Reddie: And he of course also added the word "aim" later on, which is that direction, because he says there, "Where do we wish to be? And then by what method?" So you should know whatever you do should go in the right direction. So that's the first faulty practice, and also giving us a theory of what we need to do. So go back and try to rediscover your purpose if you don't have it, or maybe just come out with something and see what really ignites you, what really drives you forward. And he's given some bullet points here. No number of successes in the short-term problems will ensure long-term. Short-term solutions have long-term effects. So that's that statement where he said cause and effect are not closely related in time and space. Of course, management must work on short-term problems as they turn up, but it's fatal to work exclusively on short-term problems. So he tells us that there has to be some place where you need to stop and start focusing on the big picture. So that's the very first faulty practice. Now the next one is a real, real bucket of water on your face. "Present practice, ranking people, salesmen, divisions. Reward at the top, punishment at the bottom. The so-called merit system." At the top and bottom. It's an artificial creation because no matter what scale of measurement you use, there will be an average measure and there will be 50% above the average and 50% below the average. That's exactly what the word average means. So making these stupid claims that this is an above-average person or a below-average person does not really mean anything.   0:16:07.8 Andrew Stotz: Because what you're really doing is rewarding or punishing common cause variation?   0:16:14.9 Balaji Reddie: Well, that's one. But when you're artificially creating something which doesn't even exist, right? You're saying top half, bottom half. In fact, that funny statement where there's a headlines in England, this happened in England, which said studies have shown, and they spent half a million pounds on carrying out the study, that 50% of the children in England are below average nutrition level. You don't need to spend half a million pounds to figure that one out. That's the law of averages. And using that to judge people is crazy on some arbitrary scale that you've invented. And he goes on to...   0:17:06.7 Andrew Stotz: So the first question I asked was, is this just a frivolous or tampering with common cause variation? Or the other question that... Or is this part of psychology and the idea of demoralizing people through this type of behavior? Where does that fall in from the System of Profound Knowledge, let's say? Is it variation, psychology, or is it both?   0:17:34.5 Balaji Reddie: It's a bit of both.   0:17:36.4 Andrew Stotz: Yeah.   0:17:36.6 Balaji Reddie: Because if you talk about understanding psychology, what he meant, I think I used the word empathy, that we need to be empathetic. When you're talking about employees, what do you mean by empathy there? Well, we need to understand their learning processes. Each one of us has a learning process, but we have a different kind of a learning process. And then when you understand the learning process of a person and then put that person in the right job, you'll have to stop that person from working. That's joy in work. He says that when you... And that takes time. And the ranking system or the merit rating system is an excuse for not having understood or making an effort to understand your employee. You're becoming lazy. You put the onus on them when actually the onus is on you. You have to find out what makes that person tick, if I may use the word resonates. What resonates with that person, right? And then put that person in the right job. He's been saying this from the beginning. It's fascinating that he said this in Japan when he was teaching the control charting there.   0:18:42.3 Balaji Reddie: He said if you draw the control chart for performance of a worker and then it's all within limits for a long period of time, despite all the training and all the lessons that he or she has been given, then he said, "I think it's time to move that person out from that job and give them some other job." Because they've reached statistical control. Any amount of effort put in will not result in a better output. You're gonna get the same thing. And if you want something else, then you need to shift them or maybe give them some better job, whatever it is. So he always had this, that we need to use these in tandem. And in any case, it's a System of Profound Knowledge, so all the four sciences work together, right? And if you want to ask me, when a person understands their purpose, I'm extending the statement of purpose here to the person, when a person understands why they're doing something, they always do the job better. So that statement of purpose needs to come in here too. Instead of ranking them, sit down with them and have a heart-to-heart with each one of them. This is back again to the 17 principles we discussed last time, that you have to spend some time with them.   0:19:57.9 Andrew Stotz: Okay.   0:19:58.3 Balaji Reddie: And understand what makes them tick. So he says "the better practice is to abolish the merit system and manage the company as a system. The function of every component, every division under good management contributes towards optimization of the system. That is, it's not compromise, it's optimize." We don't say either-or, it's and. And he says "differences there will always be, but the question is, what do the differences mean?" So that's where you can use control charting to figure that one out. And I told you how I did this in my company and I got the HR lady to finally say, "I think we need to remove performance appraisal." Performance management, yes, of course you need to have a system in place because I need to know where I am. Even when we later on come to the 14 Points, one of his most, according to me, most misunderstood points is point number three, cease dependence on inspection. But that doesn't mean you stop inspecting.   0:21:02.8 Balaji Reddie: And we will read that when we come to that as to what he meant. So you need to know what is happening, definitely. For that reason, you do need to have some system in place, but you cannot judge a person based on that. And so he says here that "ranking is a farce. Apparent performance is actually attributable mostly to the system." And a simple equation, that's my favorite, that's what we discussed last night too, Tim Higgins, when he said x + (x * y) = 8. And you've gotta solve this equation when you don't even know both. Both are unknowns. Then how can you figure out what is x and what is y? So the other factor, the Pygmalion effect, right? I think for those who are not conversant with the Pygmalion effect, the play by George Bernard Shaw, Pygmalion, which was made into the movie My Fair Lady, where he picks up a lady from the streets who was a flower seller, a flower lady, a flower girl. And he accepts the challenge of teaching her how to speak good English rather than what they call as Cockney English. And then it's like an experiment and a challenge and he starts teaching her. And then to test himself, he takes her to a party. And there she has one drink too many and she gets a little bit tipsy and then goes back to her old way of speaking, which really shocks the guests in the party.   0:22:41.5 Balaji Reddie: And he's very upset when they come back home and he said, "You'll always be a flower girl." And then she makes a statement, "Treat me like a flower girl, I'll behave like a flower girl. Treat me like a lady, I'll behave like a lady." And that's the Pygmalion effect. You start treating people that they're failures and then they have to live up to that reputation, right? So they continue being failures. You treat them well, so the Pygmalion effect comes into play. And of course, he talks about his red beads. That's an excellent experiment in bringing out many of his principles. Though he did not design it originally for this, that came much later. In fact, in Japan when he carried out the red bead experiment, it was purely for sampling. He invented that experiment for sampling. And he said that he broke down barriers and made things so simple for people. I think the lessons of management came much later at Hewlett-Packard where while he was explaining sampling and then when he went to what he was trying to teach them about management, someone jumped up, I forget the name of the person, who said, "But this is... So this is what you're trying to teach us with that sampling experiment." And then he suddenly realized he could use this. And of course, the so-called, and then raises in pay, et cetera. Yeah, whom to raise? Everybody within the system, blah, blah, blah.   0:24:13.4 Balaji Reddie: So I think last time I explained this about the roles, responsibilities and objectives, right? I borrowed this idea from another company in India where I saw this happen. When we removed the performance appraisal system, we came out with something which was quite different. We used to sit down with the people and explain to them what we intend to do as a company for the next four or five years and what their role is and what we expect them to... How do we expect them to contribute? But then came the next question. We turned around to them, "What do you expect from us as a company to help you grow in this direction or anything else?" And so they would give us certain expectations. And so we negotiated, came down and wrote things down. And then came the best part. We said we're gonna meet not once a year, but every month and as often as possible to discuss. That's why I loved it when the Deming Institute came out and were doing it, I'm sure they're doing it even now, in the two and a half day, from "me" to "we". So when we met every month, we used to ask the question, "How are we doing?" Not "What have you done?" "How are we doing?"   0:25:33.0 Balaji Reddie: And so when I heard that, I wanted to tell Bill Bellows I've been doing this since 2004. And when I heard the "me" to "we" thing, which was around 2017, '18, I think I saw that happen and I was, "Wow. All right." So thinking on the same lines. So the faulty practice, all right, when he talks about this, the second one and what needs to be done. Yeah, he gives some other advice also that if you're faced with problems, cut the dividend, cut it out. And that's, of course, when you're having hardships in the company. So he's given us a set of steps there too. And he says finally, if necessary, cut pay, but nobody loses a job. So, of course, those are extreme cases that we need to do, but he gives us advice what needs to be done. Now, the third faulty practice is incentive pay, pay based on performance. And I think that this has a lot to do with the arbitrary numerical targets that are set, right? And then, "If you do this, I'll give you that." So he says that the performance of an individual cannot be measured except maybe on a long term.   0:27:04.7 Balaji Reddie: He said reward for a good performance may be the same as reward to the weatherman for a pleasant day. He's got no control over it. And he says, "Abolish this incentive pay and pay based on performance. Give everyone a chance to take pride." I think you were talking about this last week too when we said about these arbitrary targets that lead to all of this, where somebody made a statement to me that, "The targets were a distraction to me from what my actual job was. My job is this. The target is just distracting me from my job." So very often people feel that way, right? And pay for performance, "I'm supposed to do this," right? And he gives an example. The top salesman may be a heavy loss to the company by overselling, selling to a customer a bigger copying machine than he, the customer, needs, right? And selling a bigger or fancy insurance policy than the customer can handle, promising immediate delivery, promising unauthorized discounts, et cetera, et cetera, right? It's the same thing, when one of my students was doing this, his internship project, he found that there was excessive inventories that were stocked up at an automotive company, at the authorized service stations and the sellers, and they had excessive stocks of components and that's why the sales had dipped over a period of time.   0:28:42.3 Balaji Reddie: Why were they holding so much of stock? Because the previous purchasing guy, or rather sorry, the marketing guy, forced these guys to buy extra, saying that, "I'll give you a discount," and things like that. And so they overstocked themselves to a point where they did not need anything because he had to meet a target. So he pushed it down their throat without really understanding what repercussions this would have. All right? And the problem with that pay for performance, it sounds good. Get what you pay for, pay what you get for. But the funny thing is you'll get only that much. Another case which I can tell you is how this student of mine was... His job during the internship was to collect receivables from the shops that were buying stuff. This was in the appliances, home appliances industry. And after they trained him to do that, how to call up the retail outlets and outstanding statements and then go collect the money, and his target was 500,000 rupees a day. 500,000 rupees a day collection. Now, one day he collected 2 million. My question is, do you think he reported it? Well, he did. And for the next four days he did nothing.   0:30:22.6 Balaji Reddie: Now, there's also a reason why he didn't report it. Because when you don't have Profound Knowledge, if he reported that he collected 2 million, immediately the manager would have said, "From tomorrow, your target is 2.1 million." Now, this is what happens when you don't understand variation. If you drew a control chart and you said that, "Okay, the average is so much, so I'm telling him to collect 500,000," and he's collected 2 million, he's done something special. As a manager, I'd call him and ask him, "Could you please tell me what exactly you did? Because you've not done what I taught you, otherwise you wouldn't have gone to this extent." Sometimes you don't know why you've been successful. The theory comes from the outside, right? So a manager with Profound Knowledge would sit down and have a talk and say, "Okay, you did this right. Now try doing this again." And he goes the next day and collects 2 million again, and then the next day and 2 million again. And then he comes and says, "Okay, boss, I'm ready for a new target. Raise the bar." Now what have you done? You've improved the system.   0:31:24.9 Andrew Stotz: We have new knowledge.   0:31:26.3 Balaji Reddie: We have new knowledge. And that's why, answering the same question what you asked me, it is a bit of both. So you need to understand that it's beyond... And we need to help the people understand why they've been successful. So better practice, here you go, is "abolish incentive pay, give everyone a chance to take pride." So when they start realizing, like this child, this student of mine, why he hit 2 million rupees that day, it would have been great. Instead, he just kept quiet. So see, you've lost an opportunity to really learn, to find a leverage point in a process which can take the process to another level. The next one he talks about is failure to manage the organization as a system. Instead, components are individual profit centers, everybody loses, right? And I think we have these separate business units, and he says here that they don't optimize for the aim of the whole organization. I think this is again, if you look at his Points number 9, 10, and 11, he very clearly mentions these because one thing leads to another, right? Break down the company into silos, each one focuses on what they're doing, and there's no communication, and they don't know their understanding the relationship of their work with the work of others.   0:32:54.9 Balaji Reddie: They don't even talk to each other. And he says here that "enlarge the boundaries of the system," but that comes when you understand your companies much better. And the system must include the future. Definitely, you start with theory. If this is what's happening in the world right now, this is how the world is going to change. Now he says, encourage communication. Now this part, a lot to do with Point number eight, drive out fear, where he says make physical arrangements for informal dialogue between the various components of the company regardless of level of position. That's a very telling statement. Encourage continual learning and advancement. Some companies have formed groups for comradeship in athletics, et cetera, all right, which provided facilitation for study groups. The company can well afford to underwrite the cost of social gatherings in outside locations. I can give you my personal example here. One of my college friends, and this was the time in the '90s when she came to America to do her Master's and then eventually started working in Ford, right? She did her Masters in applied electronics and she joined there as a design engineer. And that time, the world was a different place, and we Indians from India, we tend to be very, very conservative about a lot of things. We don't want to step on people's toes. So when someone says something, we, instead of opposing it, we keep our mouth shut.   0:34:32.6 Balaji Reddie: And so in meetings when they used to discuss and somebody brought up something and she said, "No, I think there's a problem," and they said, "What's the problem?" and she decided not to say anything, but eventually it turned out that she was right. And so the team members had a grouse against her that she doesn't share and she doesn't talk, she doesn't open up. Now what had happened was the HR lady in Ford, when she'd given her resume, when she asked about her hobbies and activities, one of the things she wrote there was dancing. Now she was learning a form of classical dancing here in India and obviously she could not continue pursue that in the United States at that time. So when that lady read dancing, she said, "You know, Ford sponsors ballroom dancing classes. So would you like to go for that?" So she said, "Oh wait, I learned a classical dance form in India. This has nothing to do with this." So she said, "Well, dancing is dancing. Why don't you just go? And we're paying for it, so why don't you go for it?" So she said, "I just enrolled in that class." Now, the first day when she went for the class, I don't know if you've seen the movie Shall We Dance, Andrew, but Richard Gere and Jennifer Lopez, and if you remember the first day, they tell you to hold your partner's hands and you're blindfolded and you follow your partner. It's about trusting the person in front, right? So she said when she went through that and she had to hold a stranger's hands, the whole barrier was broken.   0:36:08.2 Balaji Reddie: And she said, "I don't know, I had a different kind of a feeling when I came back to work." And she started trusting a lot more and it had an impact. Now, who would have dreamt that a ballroom dancing class could have changed my friend like this? That's Point number 13. You just have a theory that this will make that person a better person. You don't really do things to get a return on investment, but it works. So I think this is a beautiful paragraph by Deming where he says that there are ways and means of doing it and give it a shot. You have nothing to lose, right? Now he comes to the next one. Now this one, I think a lot has been spoken about this, MBO. But very clearly, he says "MBO as practiced." He does not blame Peter Drucker at all. In fact, he says Peter Drucker was clear that the objectives are interdependent and they're not mutually exclusive. He says, "Unfortunately, efforts of the various components do not add up. There is interdependence. Thus, the purchasing people may accomplish saving of 10% over the last year and in doing so raise the costs of manufacture and impair quality.   0:37:31.3 Balaji Reddie: They may take advantage of high-volume discount and thus build up inventory, which will hamper flexibility and responsiveness to meet unforeseen changes in the business." Peter Drucker was clear on this point. It's unfortunate that many people do not bother to read his work. In fact, let me just make a note that it was even Juran who said this, that having these kind of disjointed objectives can lead to a lot of problems. He said, of course, you can't be devoid. And that's why I think Deming has been very clear in chapter one of The New Economics where he says there are some things called as facts, right? Facts of life. So giving an arbitrary target is not a fact of life. He says here how he needs to improve that. So setting numerical goals, arbitrary numerical goals, I would say, right? Work on a method for improvement of a process. By what method? I think even Brian Joiner says that when you set this arbitrary goal. And now he goes on to explain that even further where setting a goal beyond the means of the process, they either distort the systems, distort the data, or distort both. Then management by results.   0:38:56.7 Balaji Reddie: Okay. Take immediate action on any fault, defect, complaint, action on the last data point. I think this again brings to the fore the understanding of variation where you need to look and ask questions and where you say, "Okay, I know this normally happens." So understand and improve the processes that produce that. Understand the distinction between common causes and special causes and understand the kind of action to take. So common causes, most of the time you need management to take action. There's a change in system. Yeah, there are some times when it is when a person close to the process can take that decision. Likewise, a special cause can be taken care of by the person closest to the process, but sometimes you need management action too. So that will always be the case, but it's rare, right? And so he talks about Sears, Roebuck, et cetera, and working on improvement of the process. The other one was buying materials and services at the lowest bid, right? Which he goes back to his Point number four, where he says here that it does not take brains to work with the cheapest. It takes brains to choose the best. Right?   0:40:23.4 Balaji Reddie: And estimating the total cost of materials and services, purchase price. Don't go by purchase price alone. And if I know right, Andrew, this was a point he was working on till the end of his life. You see the lady who was actually looking into the publication, the second edition of The New Economics, Elizabeth DiLorenzo. I was in touch with her because in my early days of my introduction to the Deming world, because I was quoting a lot from Out of the Crisis and The New Economics, and she was working for MIT Center for Advanced Engineering Study that used to originally publish his books. And she told me a very funny tale of how she was expecting her twins and at the same time she had to release this book. So the joke at MIT was, "What's gonna come out first, the twins or the book?" And since Deming was no more, she had to release that very quickly. So March '94 is when she released the book, and she said her twins were born some weeks later. So they are as old as this book. Now, she was telling me that till the end, the one aspect of what he was working on was, if you see the notes in the appendix and purchase of supplies and service. So continuing purchase of supplies and services, World 1, World 2, World 3 and World 4. He made this so clear. I think nobody has made it clearer. Okay, World 3, sorry, there's no World 4. So he talks about this and he talks about how practical you need to be about this, right?   0:42:18.7 Andrew Stotz: Yeah, and I underlined something in there from a long time ago that said, "Sudden jump to a single supplier is inadvisable."   0:42:28.8 Balaji Reddie: Right. He says there's a method of doing that.   0:42:32.5 Andrew Stotz: Yep.   0:42:33.2 Balaji Reddie: And I teach that method, by the way, where you start with the product, then go on to the process, and then go on to the system. And that takes time. You just can't get up one fine morning and say, "You're my sole supplier." It doesn't happen that way. It takes a lot of effort and a lot of doing, right? The next faulty practice is delegate quality to someone else or some group. And this is, I remember my interaction with Dr. Juran on this, right? I had just received my certificate for ISO 9000, I became a lead assessor, and I quite liked the new standard that had come out at that time in the year 2000 because it had a lot of Deming flavor to it. Plan-Do-Study-Act had come in and things like that. I was quite happy, the definitions and this. I said, "It's better than what it was." It's not, they had a long way to go, no doubt about it, but I said at least they've broken away from the defense mode where they copied the whole document from, right? And when he asked me the question that, "What's the status of quality in India?" and I said, "Well, earlier on it was a lot of standards-oriented and ISO 9000 played a huge role in that," and he just raised his hand as to tell me to stop and he said, "I am very disappointed with the ISO." And then he made this statement, "The ISO 9000 is a standard for mediocrity splendidly marketed by the ISO." And I just stared at him. I said, "What?" because I had just received my certificate, so obviously I was very touchy about it. And I said, "Dr. Juran, a little harsh." He said, "I've just begun."   0:44:26.4 Andrew Stotz: Yeah. And the problem is, is there's a lot of money to be made from it and it's an ingrained system.   0:44:30.5 Balaji Reddie: Yeah. So I just asked him, why would you say that? They made a lot of changes. He said, "Yes, but two things are missing." And one of them, he said, is something about leadership. Go back and read it. And then I went and read the standard again, and I realized what he was trying to say here. There was a lot of work that they were delegating to a person called the management representative, and he says, "Sorry, you can't delegate this to someone else. It begins at the top." Ed Deming also said that. He said, "It begins at the top. Only they can do this."   0:45:10.5 Andrew Stotz: I have a little story on that.   0:45:13.5 Balaji Reddie: Sure, sure, sure.   0:45:14.8 Andrew Stotz: In my coffee business, maybe 15 or 20 years ago, we got a big, big customer, and overall, they were a very good customer. But they picked us over all of our competitors. And then they told us, "Okay, in a month we're gonna come and inspect your factory, and if you get below 80%, then you're not gonna be our supplier." And so we said, "Well, I study with Deming, and I know quality, and we've never had a problem with quality ever." And my business partner, Dale, is very focused on the principles of quality. So they came, we were quite proud, and then by the end of the day, they had 600 questions they went through. And by the end of the day, we were like, "Yeah, what's our score?" And they said, "65. You're fired." They said, "You have 10 weeks or five weeks to fix these top 10 things." And then at that moment, we had a revelation, which is, oh, to them, paper is quality. And what I've always said, what I learned from that, was that it wasn't a big deal. We did the paperwork that they asked for, and then we got the job. And they were a customer for 16 years and a very good customer. But what we learned, one of the things I say, is that we had the heart of quality. They asked us for the paperwork that they thought represented quality. That's not such a big deal. But could you imagine having been trained that paperwork is quality, and then you have to try to develop the heart of quality? Very difficult.   0:47:01.9 Balaji Reddie: Very difficult. And now I come to this picture that he's drawn on page 37 of The New Economics, the old edition. I think the new one, let me just see what that is. Okay, that's on page 27. So he says here that unique processes that produce figures, all these principles have been applied to just 3%. Now, I have my own version of this particular picture that he's put here. Imagine an X and a Y axis, all right? And on the X axis, you can put down measures that are known. Close to the origin, you can write "known", and then as it goes away from that, "unknown", right? And then you have on the Y axis "measurable", and as you go up, "unmeasurable". So because he said that most of the things are unknown and unknowable, and among the known, you have only some fraction of those which are measurable. So the 3% deal with those factors or those parameters which are known and measurable. There are many parameters, he says 97%, which are unknown and unmeasurable, but you still need to manage them.   0:48:26.5 Balaji Reddie: And that's where he gives us a lot of advice that comes after this. Okay, when after this diagram, beautiful paragraphs in his book. "Beware of common sense," he says. And of course, he gives the example of Gallery Furniture, salary instead of commissions. Also goals, aims, hopes, facts of life, futility of a numerical goal. And a picture may help, where he talks about the goal being beyond the capability of a system. And will the goal be achieved? And he says redefinition of terms and distortion, et cetera. Gives a lot of examples there. And then he goes on to give even more examples. Okay, if you say merit pay, et cetera. Need to manage by results, wrong. And the last bit, the note where he says America 2000 was originally put together in December 1989 at the educational summit between the President and the governors of the 50 states. These goals were published in February 1990 by the White House, later incorporated into America 2000. This job may be an example of an enlargement of a committee. We shall learn in chapter four, he says, that the enlargement of a committee is not a way to acquire profound knowledge. How could they know?   0:49:57.7 Andrew Stotz: Yeah, and so what's happened to education since then in America?   0:50:00.6 Balaji Reddie: Oh, no comments. And we in India are almost going the same way. Of course, in some cases they've gone back to the roots saying that, no, we need to get back to our original way of educating people, right? We had this thing of exposing a child to all the different kinds of subjects, right? Like you have history, geography, languages, mathematics, science, just about everything. But the idea was to very quickly identify which child is resonating with what, because we need these different kind of people to work together. Some people are good at memorizing, some people are good at analyzing, some people are good at imagination. And so you throw all this out and then you cast the net and then you say the job of the teacher is to identify, okay, you're good at this, you're good at this. The problem is when you start saying if you're good at this, you are intelligent, and if you're not good at this, you're not. There are different kinds of intelligence. I would say the problem is more with the teachers and not with the system.   0:51:16.5 Andrew Stotz: We should wrap up at this point.   0:51:18.9 Balaji Reddie: Absolutely.   0:51:19.6 Andrew Stotz: How would you summarize what you want people to take away from this discussion?   0:51:24.0 Balaji Reddie: Sure. Go back and read chapter two in The New Economics. Dr. Deming has very clearly shown us why we need to do what we need to do. You're gonna be seeing things differently. As he used to say towards the end of his life, "I'm not here to teach you anything new. I'm here to make you see things that you normally would not see." And now he's just shown us what we thought was normal in the working of a company is actually detrimental to the running of a company over the long term. So my advice is go back, read this. You could watch some of the videos of the Deming Institute, especially on the 14 Points. We will be covering the 14 points later, but I would say that this is a real elaboration of his Diseases and he's given us what needs to be done. Not just pointing out what was wrong, but he tells us what needs to be done. That's why the heavy losses form an integral part of the preamble to actually what is the next step that you're taking your foot off the brake, so to say, trying to identify things that are pulling your company back.   0:52:37.8 Andrew Stotz: Well, Balaji, I want to thank you for this discussion. And recently I have been reading chapter two and I saw a lot of new stuff. It's funny how you just keep rereading. And then today you've just made me realize I gotta go back and read that chapter two because he does really the way he did the tables. I kind of forgot all about that. When I went back to it about three or four weeks ago, I was like, oh, this is really great. I kind of forgot about it. And now as you go through it, it's the tables was what I was focused on, but now I'm also seeing the text in between that you're highlighting that's valuable. So for everyone out there, grab your book, go to New Economics, go to chapter two. It's just gold. It's gold.   0:53:30.7 Balaji Reddie: It's gold.   0:53:31.0 Andrew Stotz: So, and for listeners out there, remember to go to deming.org and jump into DemingNEXT to continue your journey.   0:53:37.7 Balaji Reddie: Absolutely. Absolutely.   0:53:39.9 Andrew Stotz: Yep. And this is your host, Andrew Stotz, and I'll leave you with one of my favorite quotes from Dr. Deming, and that is, "People are entitled to joy in work."   0:53:52.2 Balaji Reddie: Absolutely.

Flutist Agnes Vass asked Bernhard a question: what if you applied the Fifth Stage of psychological safety to an orchestra?It turns out an orchestra is one of the best models we have for how high-performing teams work.(With thanks to Agnes Was, co-principal flute at the Bremerhaven Philharmonic and founder of the Body Mind Music Lab.)WHY ORCHESTRAS?Peter Drucker used orchestras constantly as a model for organisations. So has Bernhard, given his background.The reason: an orchestra of 70 to 150 musicians creates an outstanding performance in three days—often led by a conductor they have never met before. The analogies for management write themselves.---DUNBAR'S NUMBERBritish anthropologist Robin Dunbar found that humans can maintain around 150 meaningful relationships at once (his average: 148.6).The proof arrived with social media. Remember the early joy of Facebook—reconnecting with old friends? Then somewhere around 150–200, your feed filled with people you didn't really care about. Dunbar's number, demonstrated at scale.Orchestras sit right inside that number. So does W.L. Gore, the company behind Gore-Tex—they cap units at around 200 people and build a new site rather than exceed it. The belief: people at work should genuinely know each other.THE REFRAME: RELATIONAL SAFETY ISN'T FRIENDSHIPAre 140 orchestra members all good friends? No. Some are close. Some can't stand each other. And yet the best orchestras deliver extraordinary performances."The safety a good orchestra has is this: even if I don't like my colleague, I know they are committed to the highest performance, just as much as I am."Relational safety, properly understood, is built on a shared, explicit common goal—the same standard of quality, the same drive, the same dedication to practice. Not affection."If you're a flutist and you haven't practiced, every person in the audience will hear it."FUZZY GOALS vs. MOTIVATIONAL GOALSOrganisations often run on fuzzy goals—"increase turnover by 10%." That's like telling an orchestra to finish five minutes early by playing faster. Nobody is moved by it.Motivational goals are about a meaningful outcome: electrifying the audience, leaving the customer completely wowed. When everyone is committed to it, everything changes.Underneath it: a commitment to practice. Musicians practice. Most managers wing it 80% of the time. That's why Bernhard built RolePlays.ai—a place for leaders to practice the difficult conversations.DIVERSITY: HACKMAN'S ORCHESTRA RESEARCHIn the 1980s, J. Richard Hackman of Harvard studied women in orchestras. At the time, many were all-male—the Vienna Philharmonic didn't admit women until US tour pressure forced the change.What Hackman found:Below 10% women: high turnover, mobbing, sexism. Women leave.Between 10% and 33%: a hard struggle.Around 33%: an equilibrium. Men and women playing together becomes natural. Sexism drops. Performance improves. Women stay. You can even hear it—diversity changes the sound.Not only a values argument: listed companies with diverse boards significantly outperform all-male ones.THE THREE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE GROWTH ZONETo bring a team into the growth zone—where breakthroughs happen—you need three things beyond relational safety: a shared, motivating sense of purpose; a genuine commitment to practice; and space for diversity.True for a 140-person orchestra. Equally true for a team of five.Jon Katzenbach put it well: what separates a high-performing team from a merely good one is that its members are committed to their own learning—and to each other's.REFERENCES:Dunbar, R. How Many Friends Does One Person Need?Hackman, J. R. Leading Teams.Katzenbach, J. R. The Wisdom of Teams.Agnes Was — Body Mind Music Lab (Instagram).LINKS: bernhardkerres.com | roleplays.ai#PsychologicalSafety #Orchestra #Leadership #Teams #Diversity

What jobs will AI replace, and which ones will become more valuable?Matthew Prince, co-founder and CEO of Cloudflare, recently wrote an op-ed in The Wall Street Journal about how he chose which employees to replace with AI. His argument: AI is not coming equally for every role. It's coming first for the people inside organizations who measure, report, analyze, audit, manage, and process information.In this solo episode of The TechEd Podcast, Matt Kirchner responds to Prince's article and examines what it reveals about the future of work. Drawing on Peter Drucker's framework of builders, sellers, and measurers, Matt breaks down why some jobs are likely to be heavily disrupted while others may become even more valuable.The uncomfortable truth: AI may reduce the need for many traditional middle management, finance, operations, and measurement-heavy roles. But it also increases the value of people who create products, build relationships, solve customer problems, lead change, and turn technology into business value.From sales and engineering to marketing, STEM education, data science, and applied AI, this episode explores where human talent still matters most, and what businesses, educators, and professionals need to do now to prepare for the next phase of workforce disruption.5 Big Takeaways from this Episode:1. Businesses need to start their AI journey now. AI is already changing how companies operate, compete, hire, and structure their teams. Organizations that have not assigned someone to understand how AI will disrupt their business, market, or institution are already behind.2. Measurers and mid-level managers will be disrupted the most. Roles centered on reporting, processing, auditing, analyzing, tracking, and managing information are increasingly vulnerable to AI. The opportunity is not to ignore that disruption, but to become the person who knows how to use AI to do that work better, faster, and more strategically.3. Personal relationships become more important in the AI age, not less. AI can automate parts of sales, marketing, and customer engagement, but it cannot earn trust the way people do. Sellers who understand customer needs, build relationships, solve problems, and use data intelligently will remain critical to business growth.4. Creativity and leadership still rule the day. AI gives more people access to the same tools, but it does not replace the ability to see opportunity, connect ideas, build a brand, lead change, or execute a vision. In marketing, business leadership, product strategy, and innovation, creative and decisive people will continue to create value.5. The future belongs to builders. Engineers, skilled tradespeople, manufacturing talent, STEM professionals, automation specialists, and applied AI practitioners are positioned to become even more important. If AI makes builders more productive, companies will need more of them, not fewer, especially in fields tied to physical AI, robotics, smart manufacturing, autonomous systems, drones, and the edge-to-cloud continuumResources in this Episode:Read Matthew Prince's op-ed in the Wall Street Journal: "How I Choose Which Cloudflare Employees to Replace With AI"Episode page: https://techedpodcast.com/cloudflare/We want to hear from you! Send us a text.Instagram - Facebook - YouTube - TikTok - Twitter - LinkedIn

Leadership can look confident on the outside while quietly collapsing under pressure on the inside. We sit down with Rajesh Naji, a CEO mentor and “business physicist,” to get brutally practical about why high-performing founders start to flounder in stressful moments and what actually restores clear thinking. Rajesh uses a model that stuck with me: performance equals potential minus interference. When fear, doubt, anxiety, and sleepless nights pile up, the interference grows and the quality of decisions drops, even for the smartest leaders in the room.From there, we go deeper into what Rajesh means by applying physics to business: the strength of the chain equals the strength of its weakest link. Instead of chasing every tactic, we talk bottlenecks, throughput, and why simplicity often beats complexity. Rajesh also shares the surprising metrics he uses when deciding whether he will work with a CEO, including family meals, time with parents, and showing up for your kids. It's a leadership mindset that ties business performance to real life fulfillment.We also explore resonance as a coaching principle, how listening and reflecting can unlock movement without “fixing” people, and how community and belonging shape culture across countries. Rajesh shares concrete assignments, including a powerful practice to rebuild faith during uncertainty and a simple business exercise that flips your focus from what you want to what your customers want, with a nod to Peter Drucker's view of what business is for.Subscribe for more leadership conversations like this, share this episode with a founder who needs a reset, and leave a review so more people can find the show.Questions? Episode Requests? Send us a message!Ambitious leaders know that real leadership goes far beyond titles—it's about developing the clarity and mindset to guide others with confidence. In this podcast, you'll explore what today's leaders truly need, from navigating everyday problem solving to handling tough moments of workplace conflict with steadiness and respect. Episodes dive into setting healthy workplace boundaries, strengthening workplace collaboration, and building the emotional intelligence and emotional agility that make leadership sustainable. Whether you're managing a growing team or refining your voice as a decision-maker, you'll find insights that help you cultivate a resilient growth mindset and elevate your impact.

Artificial intelligence is changing the workforce, business productivity, and the global economy.In this episode of the Follow the Money podcast, Jerry Robinson explores AI, human value, and the future of work. Drawing on recent comments from Cloudflare CEO Matthew Prince and insights from management legend Peter Drucker, Jerry explains why AI may disrupt “measurers” first while increasing the value of builders, creators, and problem-solvers.Jerry also discusses Pope Leo XIV's recent reflections on artificial intelligence and human dignity and explains why adaptability may become one of the most valuable skills in the modern economy.In this episode:• AI and the future of work• Builders, sellers, and measurers• Why AI literacy matters• The investment implications of AI• Market insights with Jerry• Final thoughts on learning, unlearning, and relearningSubscribe for more investing insights, macro analysis, and financial education.Visit: https://followthemoney.com

90% of dental practice owners are playing checkers. One patient stays one patient, and growth depends on ad spend and PPO contracts. The other 10% are playing chess. Every appointment is engineered to produce the next patient, and the math compounds.In this episode, Dr. Dave borrows a line from Peter Drucker, the father of modern management, to reframe the purpose of every appointment in your practice. He exposes the bribe-for-referral trap that kills practices that should be thriving, and reveals the top-three business number that tells you whether your growth is bought or earned. Dr. Dave learned this surviving brutal ad-spend math in a Colorado mountain town in 2009, and in 2026 the principle matters more, not less. Reviews are gamed. Reels are noise. A referral from a friend is the one signal still cutting through. If you don't know how many new patients came from word of mouth last month, this is the episode to hear before your next team meeting. Press play, then go run the math.

People who don't take risks generally make about two big mistakes a year. People who do take risks generally make about two big mistakes a year. - Peter Drucker Check out John Lee Dumas' award winning Podcast Entrepreneurs on Fire on your favorite podcast directory. For world class free courses and resources to help you on your Entrepreneurial journey visit EOFire.com

Go to www.LearningLeader.com/Becoming for my new book, The Price of Becoming This is brought to you by Insight Global. If you need to hire one person, hire a team of people, or transform your business through Talent or Technical Services, Insight Global's team of 30,000 people around the world has the hustle and grit to deliver. Dr. Henry Cloud is a clinical psychologist, leadership consultant, and New York Times bestselling author whose books have sold nearly 20 million copies worldwide. His titles include Boundaries, Integrity, Necessary Endings, and Trust. For three decades, he has worked with leaders, helping them close the gap between where they are and where they want to be. His newest book is Your Desired Future: The Five Essential Steps That Take You Where You Want to Go. Key Learnings Henry's five-step model for getting from here to there: Vision (clear and compelling) Talent (engaging the right people around you) Strategy and plan (how you'll win) Measurement and accountability (how you'll know) Fix and adapt (course-correcting in real time) At the age of 16, Henry's daughter asked, "Dad, how do people become singer-songwriters?" Henry went out to the garage and brought in his whiteboard. Lucy rolled her eyes. He gave her the five-step model. A couple years later, she published a song called "Crash and Learn" that got bought by CBS, the CW Network, and featured on Spotify and Apple Music. We tend to create departments and businesses in our own image. Of the five components, we're going to be good at two, maybe three. But the others still have to happen. That's where most leaders fail. Only humans can picture a desired future state. Finley is Henry's Doberman. When the FedEx guy comes to the door, she runs to it, and barks every time. Henry has never seen her stop and ask herself: "I wonder if that barking will help me get to where I want to be on Thursday." Most leaders are operating like Finley. Working hard. Doing what they've always done. Never stopping to ask if any of it is getting them where they want to be. You need an observing ego. The worst thing you can do is hit the accelerator harder when you're going down the wrong road and you don't even know where you're going. Tony Blair, while Prime Minister, spent half a day a week sitting by himself next to a pond in reflection. Warren Buffett spends an hour and a half a day at his desk staring out the window.  A revenue number is not a vision. The single worst vision statement Henry ever heard: "We want to be a $50 million company." It provides no clarity of what the company is going to do.   A vision is a compelling picture of a future state that makes people want to sacrifice for it. If your vision wouldn't inspire anyone to get out of bed early, it's a metric, not a vision. Will Guidara created a "dream maker" role at Eleven Madison Park. Their job: listen for clues from guests, then create a personalized, unexpected, memorable experience the guest will never forget and tell everyone about. Trust Fuels Investment. People invest in leaders who feel like they understand them. You're taking your team into a war. They've got to have deep trust with you. The first thing a leader has to do is develop deep, deep trust and let their team know that they understand the pressure they're under. "A vision can die without a plan or without people." Alan Mulally's weekly 7:00 AM Thursday meeting at Ford. Every VP had to give every project a red, yellow, or green status. When Mulally first arrived, the company was hemorrhaging money. Everyone was holding up green. He said: "How can you be holding up green when here's the reality over here? I need some reality in here." When one VP finally held up red, Mulally moved him to sit next to him. The wrong view of accountability is looking back to spank somebody for what they didn't do. The right view of accountability is a tool to make sure we reach our destination. You get what you create or what you allow. Henry was working with a global CEO whose team had cultural problems. Henry kept asking, "Why is that?" After a few rounds, the CEO finally said, "I guess I am ridiculously in charge, aren't I?" If you are the one actually in charge, you are ridiculously in charge. Either you're creating it, or you're allowing it. Accountability answers two questions: Did we do what we said we were going to do? If not, why not? Don't just tell people to "do better." Run a root cause analysis. Maybe they don't have the tools. Maybe you gave them competing goals. Maybe it's a leadership problem. If we executed perfectly, did we get the result we expected? If yes, pour on the gas. If no, go back up the model and adjust your strategy. Most leaders measure goals, not activities. Goals are lagging indicators. You can measure them after it's over. It's too late. Measure activities. Did we do this week what we said we were going to do? Micro drivers matter. Henry worked with a CEO who built multi-billions in valuation from a one-office company who was excellent with micro drivers. It's an atomic compression of the 80/20 rule. He knew the specific activities at each level of the business that actually moved the needle, and he made those objects of extreme awareness, focus, training, and deliberate practice. Peter Drucker said, "Nothing's worse than perfectly executing the wrong things." The number one thing the greatest leaders share: character. Not moral or ethical character. Your makeup as a person. How you're glued together. Integrity comes from the word that means wholeness. The great performers are drivers of tasks and relationships. The highest performers utilize coaching the most. Henry expected the disastrous leaders  to be the ones calling. It was the exact opposite. The ones crushing it are the ones who reach out. The struggling ones rarely do. The greatest leaders reverse the law of entropy: things get worse over time. But entropy only applies to a closed system. Open the system to a new energy source from the outside plus intelligence to organize it, and you can reverse it. That's what coaches, mentors, and advisors do. A leader is a closed system when the only voices they're ever listening to are the ones in their head. The greatest leaders embrace negative realities. They move toward problems. Not to nuke them, but to either resolve them or transform them into something better. Reflection Questions In how many areas of your life are you just barking at the door, working hard at activities without ever stopping to ask if any of it is getting you where you want to go? Is your current vision a metric, or a compelling picture of a future state that would make people want to sacrifice for it? Where in your life are you a closed system? Whose voices outside your head could open you up to new energy and intelligence? More Learning #229 - Dr. Henry Cloud: Be So Good They Can't Ignore You #050 - Dr. Henry Cloud: Integrity is the Wake You Leave Behind #682 - Will Guidara: Adversity is a Terrible Thing to Waste Podcast Chapters 00:00 The Price of Becoming – Pre-Order Now! 01:13 Meet Dr. Henry Cloud 02:40 The Leadership GPS: Where Are You Going? 04:54 Step 2: Building the Right Team Around You 06:09 Steps 3-5: Strategy, Measurement, and Adapt 10:45 Why the Best Leaders Carve Out Time to Think 15:50 Why a Revenue Number Is Not a Vision 18:20 Crafting a Vision People Will Sacrifice For 23:12 The HVAC Story, Joe Girard, and the Dream Maker 27:38 Trust: The First Thing Every Leader Must Build 30:04 Alan Mulally's Red-Yellow-Green Meeting at Ford 32:38 How to Run Status Reviews That Actually Work 34:26 Accountability Should Be an Immune System, Not Autoimmune 38:18 Measure Activities, Not Goals 43:10 Micro Drivers: The Atomic 80/20 Rule 45:14 The Voices Outside Your Head: Peers and Accountability 47:47 The #1 Trait of Sustained Excellence: Character 50:39 The Greatest Leaders Reverse Entropy 56:17 EOPC

In this episode, Jason Li, CTO of Laurel, reveals how the company is turning timesheets into the AI playbook for the entire knowledge-work economy. Jason breaks down why $2,000/hour lawyers still spend Saturdays manually filling out time in six-minute increments, how Laurel's AI platform automatically captures every click, email, and meeting, and why data (not code) is the only real moat left in the age of the SaaSpocalypse. Jason shares how Ernst & Young is using Laurel to identify high-leverage work, why Laurel deliberately integrates with "decades-old" software like Classic Outlook that most startups ignore, and the counter-intuitive reason your best rainmakers should never be forced into cookie-cutter roles again. He also explains why Laurel doesn't train its own LLM, how they run AI feedback loops that self-iterate prompts, and the frameworks leaders can use to actually measure AI ROI instead of just surveying "did it help?" Key Topics Covered: Why "what gets measured gets managed" is the most important rule in AI adoption The Moneyball insight that changed how Jason thinks about metrics How Laurel auto-generates timesheets for lawyers and accountants Why Ernst & Young chose Laurel for their tax group The hidden cost of manual timesheets for $2K/hour professionals How Laurel maps knowledge work to a company's "work ontology" Why decades-old software (Classic Outlook) is a competitive moat, not a liability The SaaSpocalypse: what survives when AI eats applications How to measure if an AI tool actually delivers ROI Why data, not models, is the real defensible asset in AI Episode Timestamps: 00:00 - Intro 00:25 - The Peter Drucker quote that shaped Jason's career 02:49 - A Moneyball analogy for AI adoption 03:25 - What Laurel actually does: the AI platform that maps time to outcomes 07:19 - Why every business (not just law firms) needs time visibility 09:17 - Inside the Ernst & Young deployment 12:27 - Jason's journey to becoming CTO at Laurel 14:21 - Live product demo: Laurel's work ontology engine 17:49 - How AI shifts the line between high and low leverage work 21:15 - What onboarding a 2,000-person firm actually looks like 23:06 - The technical architecture behind Laurel's desktop client 28:35 - Why Laurel doesn't train its own LLM 29:39 - How Laurel handles AI models "getting worse" overnight 33:35 - Capturing time for work that doesn't happen on a computer 37:17 - AI adoption meets employee behavior change 41:54 - The SaaSpocalypse and why Laurel's moat is data, not software 48:00 - Why Jason left Ironclad to join Laurel 51:16 - Jason's answer to The AI Why's signature closing question Jason Li's Socials: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jasonhli/ Laurel: https://www.laurel.ai Partner Links Upgrade your AI toolkit: https://www.theaireport.ai/ai-executive-pass Subscribe to our free newsletter: https://newsletter.theaireport.ai/subscribe Join the community: www.theaireport.ai/leaders-launch-guide Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Are you building a cathedral, or are you simply cutting stones to earn a living?Leadership is not just a shiny title to wear; it is a profound responsibility to bear. In this sizzling, energy-packed episode of Bacon Bits with Master Happiness, host Marty Jalove sits down with a very special guest, his son, Luke! Together, this dynamic father-son duo dives deep into the brilliant mind of Peter Drucker, the visionary who transformed the cold corporate machine into a thriving, human-centric community.What will you pull from this powerful conversation?Discover the true power of the "Knowledge Worker" and why your frontline employees are your absolute greatest asset.Learn how to become the ultimate "gardener" of your team, cultivating rich growth instead of just cutting down weeds.Master the bold art of "Planned Abandonment" to let go of yesterday's comfortable habits and fiercely embrace tomorrow's innovations.We bring it all together by slicing into our signature B.A.C.O.N. framework. You will learn to Build on Strengths, Accept Responsibility, Cultivate Clarity, Optimize for Results, and Nurture Innovation.Are you ready to stop managing tasks and start leading people? Hit that play button! Don't forget to follow Bacon Bits with Master Happiness, share this episode with a fellow leader who needs a spark of inspiration, and leave us a sizzling review to help us spread the happiness!www.MasterHappiness.comwww.WhatsYourBacon.comwww.BaconBitsRadio.com

In this episode, we take the timeless insights of Peter Drucker and ask a simple question: what should HR and OD actually do with them? Drawing from The Daily Drucker, we focus on a few ideas that still hit hard. First, the purpose of any organization is to create a customer—so if HR isn't helping the business win externally, it's missing the point. We also challenge the overused idea that culture “just happens.” Drucker's thinking pushes OD to shape the daily behaviors that drive results—not just talk about them. Then there's accountability. Drucker saw management as a discipline. For HR, that means stepping beyond support roles and helping leaders make better, tougher decisions. And finally, focus. In a world of endless initiatives, Drucker's message is clear: do fewer things that matter—and do them well. This isn't about quoting Drucker. It's about applying him—and pressure-testing where his ideas still hold up, and where they might fall short.

Verandermoeheid is een groot thema in organisaties en in managementland. Daarom neemt Marischka ons in deze aflevering van de DNHS podcast Let's talk Business mee in de hoeveelheid veranderingen die in de organisatie gerealiseerd moeten worden.Want hoe groter de organisatie, hoe meer veranderingen er spelen. Natuurlijk zijn er die veranderingen die vanuit de besturingscyclus komen en die hun vertaling krijgen naar alle functionele gebieden, verantwoordelijkheden en werkzaamheden. We kunnen daar inzicht in krijgen als we de werkwijze van Management by Objectives van Peter Drucker volgen. Maar ook elk functioneel gebied heeft veranderingen vanuit eigen expertise en ontwikkelingen in het vakgebied. En dan hebben we nog de operationele optimalisaties die op elk onderdeel van de organisatie spelen. Samen vormen ze een waterval aan veranderingen waar medewerkers mee moeten dealen.

“What I’m really interested in and fascinated about is that, as AI penetrates and spreads throughout the workplace and gets placed into or integrated into workflows, the first thing that happens is that people in the mix are going to have to learn how to use AI and learn why to use AI when they do.” –Jon Husband About Jon Husband Jon Husband is the Founder and Principal of Wirearchy, a creative research and experimentation laboratory exploring the crossroads of AI and networked workplaces and society. He works as a coach, consultant, speaker and writer, and has co-authored three books, including Wirearchy. Website: wirearchy.com LinkedIn Profile: Jon Husband What you will learn The origins and evolution of wirearchy as a response to traditional organizational hierarchies How AI integration is reshaping knowledge work, workflows, and tacit knowledge within organizations The persistence of Taylorist job evaluation and why traditional work design remains resistant to change The rise of the relational economy and the increasing value of human judgment, trust, and relationships beyond financial exchange New approaches and tools for surfacing and mapping intangible or non-financial value exchanges in organizations The concept of emergence and the need to foster conditions for positive outcomes in complex adaptive systems Challenges and opportunities as organizations shift from rigid, control-based management to adaptive, networked, feedback-driven models Why coaching, facilitation, and skills like listening and allowing for emergence will be critical in navigating AI-augmented workplaces Episode Resources Transcript Ross Dawson: Jon, it is wonderful to have you on the show. Jon: Thank you very much, Ross, it’s good to see you again. Ross Dawson: We’ve known of each other and each other’s work for a very, very long time now from, I suppose, the roots of—yeah, I suppose you can crudely say—the intersection of knowledge and networks. So, as I think many of us who have come from that background, we now are thinking about humans and their relative role to AI. Some people will know of your wirearchy and a lot of your work of the past; others will not. So I’d love to just start off with: what is the concept of wirearchy? And then, how is that morphing or evolving, or are you building on that in how you’re thinking now? We’ll dig in and explore that. Jon: Okay, well, I started paying attention to knowledge work and work in organizations and so on as I changed careers in my early 30s, moving from banking, where I was in management, into management consulting. I ended up working for a large global HR consulting firm that, amongst several others—all the major consulting firms that address organizational issues—have services where they do what’s called job evaluation. What job evaluation does is put a size or a measure or a weight to a job, which then basically places it on the organization chart. I spent quite a few years writing thousands of job descriptions and helping streamline workflows and so on and so forth. So, when the internet came along, I had always been an avid reader, and I suppose a wannabe futurist—a wannabe Ross Dawson, if you will. I was reading all sorts of books back then. Instead of dating, because I was single in my mid-30s, I was spending Friday nights reading books about organizations, like “The Living Company” by Arie de Geus, the Tofflers’ work, “Powershift,” certainly Peter Drucker’s work. There was one day—well, I was reading all of these books, and all of the books were about the coming Information Age. The Information Age had not arrived yet; this was roughly late ’80s, early ’90s. All of a sudden, we hit 1994. I’m sitting in London, and I was just told by my team leader in my consulting firm that I was going to be proposed as one of the next global partners. Three weeks later, I quit my job in the consulting firm because I had begun to feel very uneasy about the work I was doing. If I was made a partner, your job becomes basically selling larger projects to keep the younger consultants employed. I realized that I would be selling methods that I had come to not believe in anymore, and the reason for that is that all of the job evaluation methods sold by all the major consulting companies are all versions of generic Taylorism. They have semantic statements that you pick to figure out a level of a job on a number of different factors. This is one of the things I’ve talked and written quite a bit about in wirearchy: this generic Taylorism is still deeply at the core of most of the work of most organizations. It’s how the work is designed. There has been now, what, 15 or 20 years—how far back does Enterprise 2.0 go?—about collaboration and cooperation and better knowledge management and sharing and transfer of knowledge, and so on and so forth. If you know these semantic statements, which are burned into my brain from this method—the Hay method—you realize that no amount of talking about doing things differently is going to make much difference. It’s not going to change much. And the remuneration—the way people get paid—every single person in every single company, is tied to all of that. It’s tied to your job size, it’s tied to the compensation practice, it’s tied to your performance management, it’s tied to your career plans, if an organization is still doing career planning. Frankly, it has not been touched in 75 years now. Ross Dawson: Used to describe it as a job as a box. Jon: Well, sure, and that’s where that term “think outside the box” comes from. I wrote an article about this at one point in time—oh, I can’t remember the title, so it doesn’t matter—but about the semantic statements essentially becoming semantic straightjackets, because they put limits around what you do. They’re a graded level of permissions, basically, or amounts of influence and authority, and that’s the codified, official organizational chart. So anyway, I was working with this all the time, and I realized if I was going to be made a big-time partner, I’d have to be selling these tools all the time. The internet had come along, so I quit, and I didn’t know what to do after that. I had to move from the UK because I was on a work permit, had to go back to Canada. When I went back to Canada, all the companies I tried to approach to work as an independent consultant didn’t want to engage me, because all of the work I’d been doing in the UK was with really large multinationals, and according to them, too sophisticated for what they were doing in Vancouver. But at the same time, I was still reading all the time—reading Charles Handy’s work, reading Gerard Fairtlough’s work on heterarchy, and so on. I came to believe very strongly that the ongoing sharing of information—which we were starting even 20 years ago to build into constant, incessant flows of information carried via hyperlinks—was going to inevitably begin to affect, I’m going to use the word affect, the traditional top-down power of hierarchy. That comes from the “knowledge is power” by Francis Bacon kind of perspective. Now, that was 25 years ago. What we’ve seen since is, of course, what you know—one umbrella term I could apply to much of what’s going on outside of organizations is the “enshittification” of the web. The same thing applies in a lot of ways, I think, to people doing work, sitting behind screens in organizations. Now, a whole host of things have happened in the past 10 or 15 years: there were armies of developers sitting in office spaces, all of them with their headphones on behind screens coding. There were all sorts of people beginning to understand how to use the internet. There were many failed attempts at effective knowledge management because of the idea that it’s still just good search, find documents, retrieval, without really paying any attention to the connections between people and how they work together, and so on. Ross Dawson: So, the frame there is, I mean, obviously, moving—the wirearchy being an arche of the organization being essentially a network. Obviously, there’s more richness to that as you describe the organization as a network, as opposed to the rigid structures, which are still very much rampant. But fast-forwarding to today, what we’ve overlaid is, whilst the old rigid structure is in place, organizations are effectively a lot more loosened up by Enterprise 2.0 and other types of frames, and essentially more peer communication. Now AI is changing a fundamental role, now being, in many ways, a participant in those workflows, in the creation of value. So where does that take us today, in this humans-plus—essentially wirearchy—pulled into where AI plays a role within those networks? Jon: Well, it’s a fascinating question for which I don’t have an answer. I have some responses, I suppose. The notion of wirearchy came, as you pointed out, out of everybody being wired, everybody being networked—the organization as a network. What I’m really interested in and fascinated about is that, as AI penetrates and spreads throughout the workplace and gets placed into or integrated into workflows, the first thing that happens is that people in the mix are going to have to learn how to use AI and learn why to use AI when they do. Often, it’s very soft at the beginning because it’s reminders, or “did you want to do that,” or “do you want to say that,” and so on. Increasingly, the AI, I think, will have more and more coaching built into it. But what I’m interested in is how, as we learn from the mistakes that are made in integration, and also learn from the successes that are made from integration, is that going to decompose a knowledge worker’s work and eventually capture most of their tacit knowledge and ways of working to reduce the cost of doing that kind of work? Then, on a larger scale, what is the active decomposition of types of work through the influence and integration of AI? How is that going to change the fundamental assumptions about work design? My belief is that the work of Dave Snowden and others with respect to complex adaptive systems is what is going to become—and this is a poorly connected parallel or analogy—but I think something like the Cynefin framework, or a unified approach to complex adaptive systems, will become the Taylorism of the 21st century. In other words, there will come to be forms of patterns and models and actions that help you address certain kinds of conditions, because I think, especially with AI, work and outputs are going to become continuous flows. They are the push and the pull, or the dynamic flow of power and authority that is alluded to in the working definition of wirearchy, the working definition of wirearchy includes knowledge, trust, credibility, and a focus on results, each of which you could write a book about. But as general headings, they are what capture what’s in play, I believe. Ross Dawson: Yeah, no, I think absolutely still relevant today. Now, the point I was going to make was around, in complex adaptive systems, a really central concept is emergence— Jon: Yes. Ross Dawson: —where you are not planning or overlaying or dictating a structure; the structure and the value and how that’s created emerges. And to your point, a lot of the key aspect in that world is, how do you create the conditions for emergence of positive outcomes, as opposed to less positive outcomes? And that’s still, of course, arguably at least as much an art as a science, particularly when you’re looking at complex adaptive systems composed of not just many humans, but also AI, which are stochastic in nature. Jon: Yes, well, it’s a very, very good point. I think it relates to the paper I shared with you a couple of days ago about what the author is calling “weaving the web.” There is an enormous amount of human input and activity, combined with the AI, that doesn’t get measured and is not seen in our currently technocratic, generic Taylorist worldview. That’s not seen, not captured, and it arguably is the kind of human input, work, and knowledge that is going to make this whole new era operate fairly well. That’s this notion of exchanges of value. Once that code is cracked, in terms of how to understand it, surface it, see it, measure it, this is going to lead to more and more of what Nvidia’s Jensen Huang is doing with respect to tokenization. There are some people who say tokenization will become the replacement for money in some cases, or even many cases in another, let’s say, 10 years or so. It’s kind of hard to imagine, but if you come back to the paper that you and I first connected on—Alex Imas’s review of the structural changes to the economy—if you can see the logic of his argument, he says there’s going to be a lot more work, but it’s going to be relational economy work, which ties directly into value exchange and surfacing how that exchange of value operates, say, between two people at work, or a group and a person, or two groups, and so on. This notion of value exchange is going to ground a lot of the conceptual and abstract issues that we talk about when we talk about, you know, why is making effective collaboration so hard? Why is it hard to de-silo an organization? All of those kinds of things are going to, I believe, eventually be washed away in this continuous flow of information. So we have to look for new concepts and new ways to measure what’s being created, the value that’s being created. Ross Dawson: Well, that’s—I mean, this is really interesting. As long as you do not recall, in “Living Networks,” I was actually laying out a quite similar thesis around value creation and network structures, and I did quite a bit of work with Verna Allee on value networks. We ran some workshops together, and we’re essentially—a lot as laid out in the paper you described, and as you’re saying now—a lot of it is saying, how do you look at the non-financial or intangible exchanges of value, which sometimes are apparent and sometimes less apparent? There are all sorts of these structures where, as you say, there is an exchange of value. Sometimes it involves money, oftentimes it doesn’t. To understand the landscape, you do need to understand all of these non-financial structures. But are you suggesting that in this tokenization or other structures, there is a way then of being able to, I suppose, capture some of these non-financial values, which does imply there needs to be some kind of measurement, or at least a mutual agreement or assessment on what that value is? Jon: Yes, the paper that I sent you, and the tool that I’m interested in and think is important, is called VEMapper—Value Exchange Mapper—which has some sophisticated capabilities with respect to AI, mainly by calling the main AI engines into the conversation. There’s a process set out whereby, in a dialogue that’s captured both by recording and by typing, there’s a record of a conversation or a dialogue about value exchange. I’ve carried out a few of them. I recommend trying it, because it’s quite remarkable. You really just tell your story, but it surfaces the tacit knowledge often that you’ve put to work in the creation and exchange of the value. The tool is also quite sophisticated today in terms of its databases and other components. Please forgive me, I’m not a technologist, but it creates a data commons. You, as a participant in a value exchange using this tool, your data, your output, is yours and yours alone. You own it. There’s a notion of data ownership and privacy, and as you carry out more and more of this value exchange, the way it’s captured—and again, I don’t really know about this, but I do know about the structure of the semantic web—it captures triplets: subject, predicate, object, which then makes them readable, makes them discoverable in knowledge graphs and other ways. The tool also has a 3D knowledge graph. If you read that paper, it’s really following the logic, the reasoning, and the innovations that were introduced by Vint Cerf long ago in terms of how knowledge would work, whether there would be things like knowbots, which are agents, and so on. So it stores all of this, and then there’s a process whereby you enter into a dialogue. The AI coach helps you clarify, elaborate, and so on, and then you revisit this process. What this does is it builds and scaffolds trust between people and between groups or whomever is working on a problem. Ross Dawson: Back to a broader frame here. So, what you’re describing—this tool or other tools—has been able to, as you state, capture or make visible value exchange in various guises, with the potential to shift to where we are looking and understanding far beyond the exchanges of financial or overt products and services, and so on. But we’re also relating it to Alex Imas’s thesis that we are moving into a relational economy, where the value—what is scarce—is not AI churning away on reasoning; what is scarce is human relation and judgment. In a whole variety of exchange contexts, including in simple conversations or other knowledge exchange, they’ll be able to apply human expertise to people in situations and organizations. So perhaps, if we just marry those two, what do you see might happen if we move into both a relational economy with the potential to surface more of the nature of how value is exchanged? Jon: Wow, that’s quite a question. I think it’s one of those things where there’s likely to be a very large and durable polarity emerge. I think that the polarity is that there will be some people—probably younger, I’m guessing under 45-ish—that will take to the new environment like ducks to water. They’re already living it in many ways. Their work is much more precarious. They operate in networks that are often networks of support and help, and so on. I think the other end of the polarity is that there will be lots of people who are—I sent you another piece about a week ago called “Artificial Intelligence and Sleeping Humans,” which was about the fact that many of us are, whether we like it or not, not all that much awake when we’re walking around every day, particularly after we’ve been working for 10 or 15 or 20 years, and, you know, kids, busy life, and so on. As AI moves through the workplace, different industries, different natures of work, and brings up issues of relation and so on, I think that relational work will always be AI-aided and supported. I think there’s a significant possibility of something emerging that currently I’m calling AI psychosis. I think that it will disturb a lot of people. They’ll try to build habits or create habits, and they’ll be trained for this with organizations with respect to using AI, but I think it will feel very foreign to them. I think there’s been something—you probably have talked about this before somewhere; I seem to remember reading something from you—but there’s been about 25, 30, 40 years of what I’d call atomization and augmentation in the social fabric. I don’t think that the introduction of AI on a widespread basis throughout work and everything is going to help with that atomization very much. So I think that the longer-term, emergent impacts of AI—I don’t think they’re going to be about productivity and efficiency. They’re going to be up a level or two in terms of the discombobulation and ongoing anxiety that are created. That makes sense? Ross Dawson: Yeah, yes, it does. I think most people can relate to what you’re saying. So, you were just saying before we started the podcast, you’ve, in a way, come back to your work. You’ve been reinvigorated by seeing some interesting shifts in the world. So, what are the next years for you? What do you think we should be thinking about? What should we be focusing on? What should we be creating to enable, as much as possible, all of this to go in a positive direction? Jon: Again, a tough question. It’s so hard because these conditions are all swirling around us. But for me, 10 years—10 years, I’ll be in my early 80s. I don’t like to play golf. I like to swim, so I’ll probably still be swimming. I think we’ll see more and more evidence of the relational economy, with respect to wirearchy and my implication. I’m going, in about a week, to Cambridge to start a creative residency there that involves a number of components. I’ll meet people with the Digital Futures Institute at the University of Bristol, some people at Cambridge. What I’m going to be doing with this creative residency is paying attention to and learning about improvisational facilitation. I think what’s going to happen, what I’m seeing happen everywhere, is shifts in what will be brought to work around the integration of AI. I think the evolution of wirearchy, which implies a different kind of leadership and power, will mean there will just be more and more—how do I want to say it? What I’m noticing is that there’s an enormous amount of talk on LinkedIn and other places where people are wondering about similar things to what we’re talking about. They’re emphasizing the ability to listen, the ability to suspend judgment, the ability to allow the time and the space for emergence—a very, very different mindset than the predict, plan, execute, control, linear types of work. This will be more circular. Many of the elements are already there. We’ve already seen in the last 10 years: develop fast, push versions out fast, fail faster—sort of recursive feedback loops. We’ll all be operating in recursive feedback loops, probably forever more. Ross Dawson: That’s actually very central to my own beliefs. Jon: Yeah, and we just—we have to get used to it. There’s an example I like. It’s not specifically apt for this, but I think you’d probably relate to it. Living in Bondi and in Australia, I presume you’ve gone scuba diving more than once in your life. There’s a kind of dive called a drift dive. Do you know what a drift dive is? Ross Dawson: No. Jon: Okay, I participated in one once, and it was really fascinating. At certain places, there are coral reefs where, I guess because of the topography, the current moves past it quite quickly—more quickly than you can swim against or manage yourself in. So if you go on a drift dive, the dive masters take you out, drop you in somewhere. They know how fast the water is moving, they know how much air you have, they know where you’re going to come up, so they meet you when you come up. But while you’re in the drift dive, what you do is essentially drift along the coral reef, watching the reef vertically because you can’t really swim. I learned about that reading a book a long time ago called “The Horizontal Society” by a Yale Law professor. I can find the title and I’ll email it to you. He described that living in our media-saturated environment—and this was a long time ago—was like living in a drift dive. I think we’re all going to be living in a big drift dive for the next forever—well, certainly for the rest of my life. It’s really interesting to think about things in that way. It relates particularly poignantly to my quitting my job as a management consultant, where I learned all of the method with the generic Taylorism. Because if you go back 20 years ago, the assumption—I know you’ve done a lot of strategic planning with companies and organizations—the assumption was that the next thing, the next time, and we get the strategy right, this thing is going to be stable. This is how it’s going to operate. Ross Dawson: Yes, it’s a common fallacy. Jon: Yeah, exactly. That wasn’t the case 20 years ago, and I started realizing it, and it’s much less the case today than it was 10 years ago. So, you know, I guess it’s like, get used to it. Ross Dawson: Yeah. So where can people go to find out more about your work and what you’re doing, Jon? Jon: At the moment, just LinkedIn. I’m going to put up a new site. I keep—another interesting, fascinating little story. I’ll do it quickly. I was over in England about a month ago, and there’s a guy, a friend of mine, whose claim to fame is, I think he built the first website in the UK in 1994. His name is Felix Velarde, and he’s run a number of agencies and is on the board of directors of a number of digital agencies now, as he’s gotten older. When I visited him a couple days later, I said, “Okay, I want to build a new website. I want to develop a new website, and I have some ideas. But Felix, can you point me to—you know a lot of really talented people—to help me design my next website?” He said—we were on a Zoom like this—he said, “Hang on for a sec.” Started typing into Claude a pretty general statement of, “Give my friend Jon Husband—go scrape his website and blah, blah, blah, and give him an idea of what a good website would look like.” Enter. Wow. Wow, just wow. I started playing with it, and I can do all sorts of interesting things. I can take the wirearchy graphic, I can embed that as a semi-opaque in the back. Anyway, just astonished. I don’t have it up yet, but I will have a new website called wirearchy.com in, I don’t know, about a month or so. I’ll try to put up a couple of my key pieces, but it’s mainly just going to be a landing page. I’ve decided that I don’t have any answers for anything, but I have, you know, 40 years of knowledge about watching organizations morph and change. So I’m going to really just offer half-day and one-day master classes. I respond to all sorts of different situations with different methods, done a lot of facilitation. I think facilitators and coaches are going to be very happy in this new era. Coaching is really interesting. From what I’ve used—Claude, you know, a bit as a personal coach, haven’t tried the others—but I’m really impressed with what they’re going to be able to do, or already can do. Where coaching is going to become critical is at the higher levels, the top of the organization, because all of what we’ve been talking about—sensing, listening, allowing for emergence. The phrase I used to replace “command and control” was “champion and channel”: champion ideas, channel resources. See what happens. Does the node light up? Does the node wither? Does the node connect to other nodes, and so on. This is the world where I think we’re going to be living in, and coaches will be operating at the higher levels to help executives—who have typically been hard-charging and with mindsets they learned 20 or 30 or 40 years ago—helping them adapt, which will be critical. Ross Dawson: Absolutely. There are many people who, for a long time, have been following and applying your insights, Jon, so I’m sure they’ll all be glad to get the update from this podcast and also when your website’s back up. Thank you so much, Jon. Jon: Thank you, Ross. The post Jon Husband on wirearchy, web weaving, the relational economy, and drift diving (AC Ep41) appeared first on Humans + AI.

https://youtu.be/N-og1bznPbs Andy Seeley, CEO of Creatively Disruptive and Ashworth Strategy, is on a mission to become the “8:00 AM call” for small business owners—the trusted partner they can turn to after those sleepless 3:00 AM nights filled with uncertainty. Having experienced the stress and isolation of entrepreneurship firsthand, Andy now helps technician-turned-business-owners (plumbers, gym owners, bakers, and more) build scalable, sustainable businesses with the right systems, strategy, and support. We explore Andy's perspective on success—not as a shortcut, but as a combination of fundamentals: embracing failure, never giving up, and most importantly, building the right team. He shares how most small business owners get stuck because they try to do everything themselves, and why true growth comes from surrounding yourself with smart, hardworking people of strong character. Andy also dives into a critical operational insight: sequencing—doing the right things in the right order—to avoid overwhelming clients (and yourself) while still driving meaningful results. — Help Your Clients Sleep Soundly with Andy Seeley  Good day, dear listeners. Steve Preda here with the Management Blueprint Podcast, and today my guest is Andy Seeley, the CEO of Creatively Disruptive, an agency supporting local, community-based small businesses, and Ashworth Strategy, an e-commerce, multi-channel marketing agency that is creating sustainable growth for beauty, apparel, pets, and kids industry businesses. Andy, welcome to the show.  Thank you. I’m very happy to be here. Nice to see you, Steve.  Yeah, I’m excited to talk to you. It’s a very interesting combination that you have going here, but I’d like to start with my favorite question: what is your personal “why,” and how are you manifesting it in your businesses? I think the personal “why” kind of straddles all the businesses that we deal with. We typically don't work with large corporate brands. We don’t typically deal with, not that we wouldn’t want to, but we typically don’t, and we don’t actually even try to focus on them. Because the main  why”, the founding of our business came from when my partner and I were talking—we weren't very happy with the two different businesses we were operating. We were both working on one project together, but he had his own thing, and I had another thing. We were both there, we’d both gone through some really tough times ourselves and had experiences of feeling very alone, trying to figure things out—sometimes successfully, sometimes very unsuccessfully. And we both talking about our troubles and tribulations, and all of those kind of things. And we were like, wouldn’t it have been nice, wouldn’t it have been good if there was someone there to help us? That “staring at the ceiling at 3:00 AM” in the morning. And the morning is a thing that a lot of entrepreneurs and business owners are very familiar with, right? You wake up at 3:00 AM, staring at the ceiling, thinking, “I've got all these things to do.” Or if it's tough times—how do I make payroll? If there's a legal issue—what am I going to do about that? Whatever it is, there's always something. Even in good times, there's often something. What we thought to ourselves was we are oftentimes, when we were in that situation, we didn’t really have anybody to go to. That 3:00 AM turns into 4:00 AM, then 5:00 AM, and sometimes we were just like, well, I’m just going to get up. And then there are sleepless nights. And we thought if we come from the standpoint, it's a real thing. It's something we're passionate about is that most small business owners are technicians.Share on X Most small business owners are very good at a thing, like they’re a plumber and they start a plumbing company, or a baker who starts a bakery. The E-Myth.  This is the E-Myth concept.  Right. They're a gymnastics coach, so they start a gymnastics gym. Most business owners are technicians, which means they’re very good at a very specific thing, not so good at many other things that you have to be. And we wanted to be that 8:00 AM. We wanted to be their 8:00 AM. And what that means is—staring at the ceiling at 3:00 AM, maybe their mind racing for 30 minutes or so—but then they can say, “You know what, we'll reach out to Andy and Russ at Creatively Disruptive at 8:00 AM. I'll get some sleep. We'll get to the bottom of this idea. We’ll get to the bottom of this problem. We’ll get to the bottom of it. And that was really important to us. And it really was a guiding light. That's why, from a marketing standpoint—you could call us a marketing agency—but I don't think it really is what we are. Because we do consultancy work. We work through exit strategies. We work through financial goals. We work through a whole bunch of stuff that does not include putting an ad up on Facebook, Instagram, or Google, or building websites. We ask—why are you doing all that stuff? I love your first question, because what's the point of it all, right? I had a conversation with a frustrated client yesterday, and at the end of the frustration that the client had, they were not frustrated. And I said to them, “Look, we're talking about a lot of different things, and the reality is what’s going on with you when working with us is there’s some amazing things happening, which you agree with.” But the reality is, you are not talking to us about running a Facebook ad. You didn’t come to us because you desperately want a Facebook ad run, or come to us because you would love your company on Google. That’s not the reason why you came to us. The reason why you came to us is something that those things will change in your life for the better. That's why you're talking to us. There’s a reason why you bought this business. So our “why” is really to help those small business owners—who are often technicians, very specialized people—develop a broader skill set and a team that can help them through their challenges.Share on X The beauty of what we do is—we have 120 clients, all dealing with different issues and different situations. Because we engage with them at a consultative level, we hear it all. We hear, many times many subjects, here’s what not to do—and on those same subjects, here’s what to do. And we actually collate that stuff. As you saw on our Zoom, there was a Zoom link we used—you saw my Read.ai. that read.ai As much as it’s for us to make sure that we have our ducks in order when we’re talking to somebody, it’s also an archive for us to make sure that some things that we spoke about, we learned about that now we can put that in our database to help other clients. And it’s not that we show other clients what we’ve spoken about and give state secrets and so forth.  It’s a repository of company knowledge that you have developed.  Absolutely. Me and you having a conversation like this, Steve, is all well and good. The fact that we are recording it is going to allow loads of other people to understand it. For us internally, it allows my team and us to look at stuff and go, okay, well this is a really good thing, let’s actually turn that into a process. Yeah. Love it. So a very long-winded, long thing. The “why” is, we want to be that 8:00 AM call after you’ve had a 3:00 AM wake up. Love it. I mean, that is the definition of trust. If you are the person that they call at 8:00 AM, then they know that they can sleep well because you’re there.  And the big, burning part of that “why” is that we didn't have it—and it was tough. It was emotionally tough to be so concerned. I had a lot of 3:00 AM wake-up calls during the Great Recession in 2008–2009. It was a very worrying time. There was a market crash. Our house went from being worth $400,000 to being worth $100,000. We owed $300,000 on that house. We had a business that income went from about $500,000 a month. It was a gymnastics gym that my wife ran to making about $200,000 in a two month period, because so many layoffs were happening. My job, which was working for a TV station, we had loads of clients calling in, asking to cancel, trying to figure out how, so there was so much going on. Those 3:00 AMs were very regular thoughts that came up, and I would just sit there not knowing what to do and having no one to talk to. I desperately want to at least be someone that someone can think of, “You know what, we can call Andy. We can call the CD team, and we'll figure this out.” So anyway, there you go.  Okay, so this is a great segue, because you mentioned Read.ai and how you're thinking about about processes—and how to use the 120 clients you have and the challenges you solve. How do you turn that into a process so other clients can easily access to it? So this podcast is really about this kind of stuff. It’s called Management Blueprint, and I’m always looking for shortcuts—business shortcuts, frameworks that entrepreneurs have discovered along the way and that they could share with the listeners and could help other people listening to have a better process. It could be anything—three to five steps—looking at something, seeing something in a different light. So what do you have in mind for us?  So a shortcut to success—I'm always a little bit leery of statements like that. “Shortcuts to success”. It always feels a little bit like a 2:00 AM infomercial—blah, blah, blah—and you get steak knives with it. Because the reality is, oftentimes there's no shortcut. I'm sure you've asked this question a million times, and a lot of people say, “Here are the shortcuts.” But my experience is—the real truth is—there are a couple of fundamentals to success. One is being okay with not having it right? That's a “shortcut,” if you want to call it that. Failure is actually the journey to success. Being okay with failure. There’s a reason why 95% of humanity doesn’t run a business, and it’s because they find failure difficult, and we’ve been trained as humans to not embrace failure.  Failure is the journey to success. It's where you learn. The other part—which is linked to failure—is never giving up.Share on X I don’t know if that’s a shortcut, but you only lose when you give up. Now, some people might say—sunk costs and things like that—at some point, you've got to stop putting into something that's not working. But the reality is, if you believe in what you're doing, there are going to be troubles, there’s going to be failures, there’s going to be difficulties. And as long as you don’t give up, and you learn from each mistake in each thing that happens, you will have success. You only won't have success if you decide to give up. I really, truly believe that. I live that.  I resonate with that, and I wouldn't even say that the 3:00 AM wake-up is a bad thing. It's really a forcing function. It's forcing you, as the entrepreneur, not to give up—to put the energy in and figure the problem out so that you can move forward. Because if you sleep until 7:00 AM, then 8:00 AM the day starts, and you still haven't solved the problem. You're just snowballing it.  But I would say—and those are more operational, ongoing things—so they don't really fit your question of a shortcut to success. To me, that's more the ingredients or material of success, right? But one of the things I would say would be a pattern of success that I’ve seen across hundreds of businesses that I’ve worked with—and that we currently work with—is building a team around you. Almost all of the successful people that I know—and when I say successful, I mean way more successful than I am, with multimillions of income and so forth—and I know a few of these guys… all of them have teams. All of them have people who are experts in certain areas. And almost all of them, to a T, are pretty good at building teams—finding people and putting them together.  And what I would suggest, any business owner, if you are going to think that you are going to become wealthy and do well by doing everything yourself—one, I think you'll fail. I don't know anyone with no team who has achieved strong success. And two, your life’s going to suck. I would say, it’s going to be tough, right? So if I had to choose something—even though I don't like the word “shortcut,” if I’m honest with you, and I know that was a question that was coming up and I did think hard about it, and I kind of feel like I could give you a cheesy one-liner, but that kind of is like nahh. But the reality is, I think our success with our companies is probably my ability to actually find good people. And my philosophy is: hire smart, hardworking people of good character—and then train them.Share on X And if I can find somebody who is smart, hardworking, and of good character, and also has a skill set—that's a bonus. What I'm really looking for are those first three. A smart, hardworking person of character—you can train them, if they have an interest in what they're learning.  So how do you do it? So maybe that's the framework. “Shortcut” is actually—I agree—the wrong word. I meant a business framework.  Okay.  Maybe I shortcutted the expression. So how do you find that smart, hardworking person of character? Do you have specific questions you ask to figure that out?  A lot of what we do is—I'll ask questions around what they've done in past jobs, even past personal lives. I'm not looking for something too narrow—more broad, like: tell me about a situation where you saw something bad happening. What did you do? It’s kind of open-ended, and it’s not telling them the answer. But you know, something bad was happening. Tell me what the bad thing was. And they might say, “Well, it was this kid, and they were drowning in a pool.” Okay—what did you do? Did you run to get someone to help? Did you turn away and walk off? Did you pull out your phone and film it? Or did you jump in and save the kid? What did you do? That gives you an understanding of what kind of person they might be. And then part of it, for me, is I feel I have a decent gauge of whether people are lying to me. Sometimes I don’t get it right, but I feel I have a decent gauge when they’re saying it. In my mind, I'm noting—does this sound like a real story? Does it feel real? Does their face look like they're revisiting that moment that what they’re doing and what they’re telling me? Or does it feel like a story being made up? And then I put that down. And if it’s like, the person said that they jumped into the pool and saved the kid, and I could see the emotion in them and it feels like they revisited, this feels real to me. Check. There would be multiple questions along those lines. It would tell me about a time when maybe you’re ending the day and some things are missing or some things haven’t happened, or blah, blah, blah. What is your thought and what is your plan to address that? And are they going to go back and spend more time working? That might be a good answer—or not. Are they going to note it and handle it first thing in the morning? Or do they say, “Ah, someone else will take care of it”? Getting those kind of answers of how their mind thinks about real world things that they’ve done in the past. Trying to keep it open so it’s not so specific that they say, oh, I’ve never had that experience before gives you an idea of what their character is, right? It also gives you a sense of how hard they work. And I'd say a hard worker should also be balanced with being an organized worker. How organized they are. Are they on top of things? Because I’m okay with you not being such a hard worker, Steve, if you’re very well organized and you get stuff done. You might not be busting your butt, working long hours and saying, Oh my God, I’m working so hard and lots of long hours, but you’re so organized and you’ve got yourself in such good order that you actually outproduce everybody else, because you're more efficient. That, to me, would fall under the hard work category, right? Yeah. Yeah. So a good answer to something wasn’t done that needed to be done, and it’s the end of the day.  A good answer might be, I looked at it and I was like, I can wait until about midday next day. I put it on my list of the first thing that I’m going to do in the morning. Then the next morning I came in, I got it done within 25 minutes, and everything was great. I would look at that and go, okay, that’s not a bad answer. I’m okay with that. As an employer, I care about your work-life-balance. I’m not always looking for somebody who’s prepared to work till midnight every night. That, to me, once in a while is okay. But if I have an employee that’s looking to do that all the time, that’s a problem. Because I know there’s a limitation to that. And then again, when we’re talking about we’re looking at good character, hard work, and smart.  So yes, if they are intelligent, it’s clear. And I'm not going to say, “Hey, here's an algebra test—tell me the answer.” That comes through with the questions, right?  It's common sense. You're looking for common sense—which is not very common. I like it, because essentially you are triggering some signs of authenticity in that person. Are they really showing up? Are they authentic, or are they trying to look like something they're not? And it's a really good filter.  So a lot of times, I think interview questions are like, “Here's a situation—what would you do?” do? Any question like that, especially when you're selecting teammates. And I don’t always have interview with teammates, sometimes the people that I have relationships with and I go and say, I need you to work for my company. I know you well enough. I've experienced you enough—I'm going to bring you in. But during that journey of coming to that conclusion, I'm looking for those qualities. And when you're in an interview and you don't know someone, and you ask a fabricated question—that's a fantasy. They can come back with a fabricated answer—that's also a fantasy.  And most of the time, that's what happens. I’m a pretty good interviewer because my interview, when I’m looking to interview with somebody, not that I’ve done it for a very long time, but let’s say I’m interviewing with something other than work, I dunno what it might be, but maybe something like a school counselor, school for my kid or whatever. And we are interviewing, I’m analyzing what the person who’s asking me the question, I’m trying to figure out what answers they want. And I think anybody with an element of intelligence does the same thing. And you end up giving answers, not necessarily, which are 100% what the interviewer needs to know. The interviewer gets the answer what the interviewee thinks they want to know. And I think when you ask questions that are kind of open-ended, but experiential about what they’ve done in the past, you get a sense of kind of who they truly are. And then the goal is listening to see, to get those cues on.  I always like asking, “Tell me about a time when something bad happened in your life.” Okay—what did you do? That's something you can really work through and get a sense of—are they truthful? Are they emotional? It’s a question I think some people are uncomfortable with, and some interviewers might think, “I don't know about that. What might come up in that interview? I've never had a really terrible answer—like, “I was at the scene of a murder, or blah, blah, blah. I’ve never got that answer. But I've definitely had things like, “I was coaching a team, and one of the players broke their leg.” Okay—what did you do? And they talk me through it, and I'm like, okay, that makes sense. That’s a good answer from a good standpoint. I’ve had stuff like that. So I’m yet to come across a real traumatic story, but what I found is that I can really tell whether or not somebody is telling the truth. And I can get a sense of kind of how they handle really difficult situations.  Okay, Andy, I'd like to switch gears here. What I’m hearing is that you are good at building teams and empowering them. You have a good ability to hire people that have good character—smart and hardworking. What is one thing that you are actively trying to figure out in your business right now?  We've gotten to the point where we have so many moving parts in our business that, sometimes, with our client base, it's overwhelming. There's a lot going on. We've got an AI system with multiple components—it's tremendously useful, a very powerful tool—but it can be overwhelming for a technician, like a baker or a gymnastics coach, who's specialized in something else to suddenly have to take that on. We've got ads, we build websites, we provide consultancy—we've got consultancy, we’ve got all these things that, when tied together, create a really powerful machine. And what we’re trying to do right now is try to figure out how to set expectations and set out how to roll all of the stuff out.  When we first started doing a lot of this in one lump sum, we would almost dump it all on the client within a week of them signing and start working through all these things. And what we found is that it’s quite overwhelming and almost to the point where the client runs away and they don’t actually want to continue. It’s just too much work all at once. So one of the things that we’re working on right now to try to improve our situation is we’ve got a lot of stuff. We’ve built this machine that really helps businesses inside out. But do we have to build every part of that machine in the first three weeks? Clients want things to happen in the first three weeks. We can have things happen in the first three weeks. Do we need everything to happen in the first three weeks? That’s why I said to you, doing everything all the time forever is tough all at once. Right now, we’re actually literally working through a process, talking with the team, working with the team of what’s the order of priority of all these things that we have from the point of view of what’s easy to implement, but maybe not as important, but we can get it implemented within minutes of a client joining. What’s really important, but it takes a long time and trying to prioritize those things. Because all of the smaller things, individually, aren't hugely impactful—but collectively, they are. But we can get them all done in a day. And then some of the things that are singular that have a huge impact, they take a little bit longer. How do we scale this out so we can actually get results very quickly for the client without overwhelming them with all of the stuff? And I think there's a word you've probably heard a lot—sequencing is really important. I think a lot of businesses fall apart because they do things out of sequence. They don’t think about the sequence. They go for the fun, cool thing first, and sometimes that's the worst decision they can make. Right now, we're working through how to properly sequence our onboarding of new clients—to make sure the experience is really positive without overwhelming them. We’re actually getting into a really good place. And some of that is, I mean, most of this is because there is so many things. We have these—like I say—technician business owners, and they come to us and they're amazing at plumbing, but they've got a phone, and that's all they have. So whenever anybody needs to call them to schedule a new job, it rings their phone—and they're under a sink doing work. The phone's ringing. They're like, “Oh, hell,” and they're under the sink. Well, sometimes they don't answer it, or whatever. They've got no system. They’ve got no process to take care of things. And we've got to build all that out, right? And it's so common—and it's totally fine. They’ve been successful in what their technical part of is, but they want more than a job that they own, right? You’ve probably heard that a lot. And they want to start scaling. They want to take vacations without losing income. They want to do all of these things. We can do all that for them—but we can't do it like that. Even though they want it like that, if we do it like that, their brain nukes.  Yeah.  I don’t know if that’s a good answer for you, because that is something that we’re actually working on from a business standpoint of is how to sequence and do things in the right order that allows people to get the best bang for their buck without melting their brains down. Indigestion. Yeah. I don't know who said it—maybe Peter Drucker—but he said most businesses die of indigestion rather than starvation. So that's true. So what drives your business? What is it that helps your business grow? I mean, you mentioned 120 clients. I saw your video—we were talking about 114, 115 clients—so you've been growing since the video.  Yeah.  So what drives your business?  If I’m honest with you, philosophically, what drives us is the failures that we’ve had in the past. My business partner and I—we've had some pretty tough times, going back to that 3:00 AM question. We almost lost our house during the Great Recession. We didn't lose it—we still have it to this day. It's actually a second house now, in Lake Tahoe. We went through times that were quite stressful, difficult, and troublesome for us. I mean, not necessarily nearly as bad as other people have had, probably much tougher times that they’ve had to go through. But I would say what drives us is the fact that we had those tough times. We understand what it’s like to struggle, and we really want to do what we can for a small business owners—mom-and-pop level businesses—avoid those situations. All of our decisions are about how we can make a difference. Again, going to that conversation with that client yesterday that I just mentioned a moment ago, I actually said to them: if you guys decide to leave because of these frustrations that you’ve had, ’cause they had a couple of frustrations, and it was mainly about what I was talking about the everything was getting dumped on them. They were like overwhelmed. There’s lots of stuff happening and they were thinking that it all needed to be happened in one month, but really it was, no, it’s okay if it takes three months for this stuff to get rolled out. And I said to them: if you leave, I'm going to be very disappointed in myself and my team, because of the massive difference we can make in your lives. And that is the driving force for our business—to make a real difference. And the fact that what we've done so far—we're seeing the germination of those really good things. And they agreed. They said, “Yeah, there are some really good things happening. We really like those. We're just frustrated with the amount of stuff going on.” And I'm like, “Well, I think we can spread it out, take the heat off, and make sure things roll out nicely.” That reminded me that the reason our business exists is to help these small businesses be all they can be—to reach for the stars. There are so many very good people who could make a lot of money and do a lot of good things—but their specialty is so focused that they're not rounding out their overall situation.  Especially in gymnastics—we work with a lot of gymnastics coaches. Probably about 60% of our business is kids' activity centers. A lot of kids activity center owners tend to be, they do everything themselves. They put everything on their shoulders, and they don't build out their team—which means they can't scale. So they end up owning a job, not a scalable business. What drives me is: how do we help these small businesses scale, have a better life, reach more people, help more kids, and support their employees? All of that kind of stuff. And people might say, “Oh yeah, sure, Andy—you're like some Mother Teresa figure.” I'm like, no—because my experience is, if we do a really good job of that, the money takes care of itself. A “shortcut,” going back to your earlier question, is: stop thinking about how much money you can make from each customer. Really focus on taking care of that customer. Charge a reasonable rate, and the money will come. If you become well known—if you become a major figure in an industry—that money will come. I'm lucky enough that, in the gymnastics industry and the kids' activity center space, I've become reasonably well known. People I don't know—and I think you become a well-known figure when people you don't know recognize you. You walk into a conference, and people come up and say, “Hi, Andy.” And I'm like, “Oh, okay—I don't know who you are.” I’ve been watching you on this, or I’ve been doing that, I’ve been seeing you talk or speak or blah, blah, blah. I don't think of myself as famous at all, but in some of the niches we work in, I've become well known. And I think that's happened because we care—and we let the money take care of itself.  Andy, our time’s coming to an end, but I'd like to ask—if someone is running an activity-based business, maybe a gym, a swim team, a dance studio, or selling classes—and they want to ramp up their business because everything is on their shoulders and they're a technician—where should they go, and how can they find you? So, like I said, we help plumbers, home service businesses—we've worked with banks, rec centers, kids' activity centers, and all sorts. Where our real specialty is, in a very real way, is pushing the needle for local brick-and-mortar businesses. Obviously, we also have Ashworth Strategy, which we didn't get into—that's our e-commerce brand. But my personal passion is that mom-and-pop business that opens up a storefront. The best way to reach us—regardless of whether you're a plumber or anything else—is to go to creativelydisruptive.com. You might look at it and think, oh, this seems like a whole bunch of kids on here. We do have another brand called highlevelthinkers.com, where we do the same kind of work for home service businesses. So go to creativelydisruptive.com and reach out there. We actually have a little chat square that you can go into and start talking to us and you’ll actually speak to our little AI up here. It knows everything—it's basically like talking to me. It can help you set up a time to speak with one of our team members. We don't have salespeople—we call them business development consultants, because that's really what they do. They'll talk with you and figure out the best way we can help. But basically, in a nutshell, there’s lots of ways to reach out to us. But in my mind, the best and easiest way, just go to creativelydisruptive.com or highlevelthinkers.com, and reach out to us through there using the chat bot, or using the form and just reach out. And we'll help you.  Okay. Well, if you're listening and you're running a local business—whether it's an activity-based business, a mom-and-pop business, or a contracting business—and you'd like to level up, put in systems, and sequence them properly, then reach out to creativelydisruptive.com or highlevelthinkers.com. yep.  And then you can connect with Andy—or the chatbot, if he's sleeping—and it'll get back to you.  The chatbot's probably a much more fun conversation.  It could be. You can listen to the podcast and use the chat at the same time, so you get the best of both worlds. So thank you, Andy, for sharing your experiences and being very vulnerable. And if you, as our audience, enjoyed listening to this, then stay tuned—because every week I have an entrepreneur sharing, not necessarily shortcuts, but good frameworks that can help your business. So thanks for coming, Andy, and thank you for listening.  Thank you. It’s been a pleasure. Important Links: David's LinkedIn David's website https://highlevelthinkers.com/

"What if you train them and they leave?" It's the fear that quietly keeps most healthcare leaders from investing in their people. Matt Staub — CEO of Your Health — wants you to sit with the question his mentor once asked in return: What if you don't train them, and they stay? In this episode, Matt joins Jamie Preston for a conversation about why workforce education isn't a perk at Your Health — it's the culture. From nationally accredited apprenticeships, to a training pipeline built out of a licensing crisis, to the real people behind the success stories, this is a blueprint for leaders who want to grow something that lasts. Key topics covered: The lumberjack story: why sharpening your axe beats swinging harder every time How a shortage of licensed administrators became the catalyst for Your Health's training engine The shift from "education happens on your own time" to "this is how we behave" Real success stories — Olivia, Kristin, Taylor, McKinsey, Rebecca — and what they share Matt's three challenges for anyone ready to grow: show up, find your who, take your shot If you've ever wondered whether developing your people is worth the cost, this episode will change the math. Press play — then look around, and ask yourself who's looking at you.

What gets measured, gets managed. - Peter Drucker Check out John Lee Dumas' award winning Podcast Entrepreneurs on Fire on your favorite podcast directory. For world class free courses and resources to help you on your Entrepreneurial journey visit EOFire.com

AI can write your first draft, research your competitors, and build your workflows overnight. It does all of that faster and cheaper than any one person can. That part is real. But there's one thing it absolutely cannot do — and it's the thing that matters most. I watched a woman cycle through personal trainers for years, renting motivation from the outside. The moment she stopped paying, the drive disappeared. Your experience, your judgment, your way of reading a room — that's the push-up only you can do. AI just helps you do more of them. Featured Story Years ago, I worked with a woman who kept hiring personal trainers. Not the same one — a new one every few months. She'd get results for a while, drift, then start over with somebody new. One day, I asked her about it. She said she just needed someone to push her. She wasn't hiring a trainer. She was renting motivation from the outside. And the moment she stopped paying, the motivation went away. The trainer could design the program and count the reps, but the contraction happened in her muscles, not theirs. I see the same pattern emerging with AI right now — people producing polished output that sounds like nobody. Important Points AI is a multiplier, not a replacement. Bring your experience, and it delivers faster. Bring nothing, it returns nothing. Your judgment from years of living inside problems is pattern recognition; no dataset can replicate on its own. Two columns this week: what only you can do goes in one, everything mechanical goes in the other. Column two is AI. Memorable Quotes "You can't hire somebody to do your push-ups for you. The strength you want only grows through the work you do yourself." "If you don't bring anything specific to AI, it gives you a very polished nothing. That's all you'll get back." "Your particular way of seeing the world exists because you've lived a certain life. AI can't generate that for you." Scott's Three-Step Approach Draw a line down a page and list what only you can do — relationships, judgment, your particular angle on the work. Put everything else in the second column — drafting, formatting, research, repetitive tasks that eat your mornings. Hand column two to AI this week and double down hard on column one. That's where your real strength compounds over time. Chapters 0:02 - Post-Easter confessions and Scott's candy weakness 1:48 - The AI arc continues, and where this is heading 2:33 - You can't hire someone else to do your push-ups 3:47 - The woman who kept renting motivation from trainers 5:34 - AI multiplies what you bring — or polishes your nothing 8:01 - Peter Drucker's knowledge worker and why judgment wins now 11:29 - LinkedIn slop and why sounding like everyone helps no one Connect With Me Search for the Daily Boost on YouTube, Apple Podcasts, and Spotify If you enjoy the Daily Boost, you might like Notes From Scott. A few mornings each week, I send a short note with something I've been thinking about or noticing lately. Sometimes those ideas turn into podcast episodes later. You can sign up at https://notesfromscott.com. Email: support@motivationtomove.com Main Website: https://motivationtomove.com YouTube: https://youtube.com/dailyboostpodcast Instagram: https://instagram.com/heyscottsmith Facebook Page: https://facebook.com/motivationtomove Facebook Group: https://dailyboostpodcast.com/facebook Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What if the key to transforming an entire organization started with the same foundation you learned in kindergarten? Marcia Martin is one of the most prolific influencers in thought leadership over the last 40 years. Renowned as a top transformational trainer and executive coach worldwide, she has provided training for global organizations in over 20 countries. Her clients include Capital One, Warner Bros., InterContinental Hotels, American Cancer Society, Chase Bank, Allianz, McCain Foods, Evian Water, Danone Group, and Hard Rock International. A pioneer of the human potential movement, Marcia served as Vice President and Board Member of Erhard Seminars Training, now known as the Landmark Forum, helping grow its graduate base from inception to millions within a decade. She has consulted for LifeSpring, Robbins Research, Jack Canfield Seminars, Wealth Dynamics, and the Money and You Seminars, and notably organized the film shoot of The Secret: Law of Attraction with Executive Producer Rhonda Byrne. Her memoir, Sex, Power and Transformation, is available now on Amazon.   [00:04:00] At the Birth of the Human Potential Movement Marcia was present at the very beginning of the human potential movement in San Francisco in 1971 Left the University of Washington at 20 for a spiritual quest during the era of the flower children and Haight-Ashbury Apprenticed with her aunt, a clairvoyant healer and esoteric astrologist, who taught her to go inward for answers That training shaped her core belief: answers come from within, not from outside of yourself [00:06:00] Werner Erhard and the EST Years Attended Werner Erhard's very first guest seminar and recognized his message as aligned with what her aunt had taught her Joined the team and became Senior Vice President of EST, helping grow it from 30 people to over 800,000 graduates Was responsible for marketing, sales, training guest seminar leaders, and filling all events Learned both what to do and what not to do by watching how fame and wealth changed people up close [00:11:00] Organizing the Film Shoot for The Secret Co-created the Transformational Leadership Council with Jack Canfield, bringing together top thought leaders and coaches Received a call from Rhonda Byrne, an Australian TV producer, asking to film the group for what became The Secret Ended up organizing the entire film shoot, squeezed into a tiny borrowed office at her country club in Aspen, Colorado Rhonda's skill in editing made the cramped shoot look cinematic [00:19:00] The Night Werner Put Her in Front of 2,500 People Marcia started out speaking to guests on the edge of a bed in a bedroom; groups grew to 20, then 50, then hundreds The day of a major 2,500-person event, Werner told her she would be leading it instead of him She refused, panicked, and was furious; her largest audience to that point had been 150 people His advice: find one person in the crowd, look at them, and remember how much you love them [00:24:00] Empowerment Over Micromanagement Werner's decision to trust Marcia with that event became the defining lesson of her leadership philosophy Most senior executives she works with today are micromanagers who unwittingly signal they don't trust their people Her belief: if a leader is micromanaging, it is not just a lack of trust in others but a lack of trust in themselves True empowerment means giving people room to make mistakes and grow into their potential [00:27:00] The ABCs of Leadership: Her Three-Day Transformation Marcia's flagship offering is a three-day intensive for senior leadership teams of entrepreneurial organizations Covers leadership, championship performance, communication mastery, relationships, confidence, mindset, and causing action Mentored by Buckminster Fuller, Peter Drucker, Jerry Weintraub, and Werner Erhard; she now passes those lessons on   KEY QUOTES "So many human beings look outside of themselves to find answers. We haven't been taught how to go within and connect with our own higher power." - Marcia Martin "Werner was smart enough to give me the room and the empowerment to get it done. He didn't micromanage me, he trusted me and he made a good bet on me." - Marcia Martin "I've figured out the concepts, the fundamentals, the ABCs of leadership and championship performance, and put them together in a way that is fun." - Marcia Martin CONNECT WITH MARCIA MARTIN

Ashok sits down with Ron Baker, co-founder of THRESHOLD and founder of the VeraSage Institute, to explore how mid-market companies must rethink their economic model in the age of AI. Ron began his career at KPMG before pioneering value pricing and leading a decades-long movement away from time-based billing. He is the author of eight books, including Times Up, and has sold more than 80,000 copies worldwide. This conversation digs into how CEOs in traditional industries can move from activity-based thinking to outcome-based economics in an AI-enabled world. In This Episode.. • Why most firms optimize around internal activity rather than measurable customer outcomes • The idea of the Transformation Economy and what it means for traditional industries • Why customer profit is the most overlooked metric in business • A real-world example of a CPA who created 15 million dollars in value but billed only 38,000 • Outcome-based pricing and the concept of a tip clause • How AI increases structural capital and changes firm design • Why smaller, more leveraged firms may outperform larger legacy organizations • The direct primary care model and what it teaches about transformation • Why human capital, structural capital, and social capital matter in the AI era Mentioned in This Episode Ron Baker - https://www.linkedin.com/in/ronaldbaker THRESHOLD - https://thresholdnow.com VeraSage Institute - https://www.verasage.com Times Up by Ron Baker - https://www.amazon.com/Times-Up-Reinventing-Professional-Economy/ The Soul of Enterprise Radio Show - https://www.voiceamerica.com/show/2735/the-soul-of-enterprise-business-in-the-knowledge-economy Fender and Fender Play - https://www.fender.com/play Howard Moran and MD Squared - https://www.mdsquared.com Dr. Paul Thomas - https://www.plumhealthdpc.com/ Palantir Technologies - https://www.palantir.com Peter Drucker - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Drucker Ron's articles on "Earning his mouse ears" from his time at Disney University  https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/20131020050344-38251380-earning-my-mouse-ears-part-i/ https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/20131103175004-38251380-earning-my-mouse-ears-part-ii/ https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/20131117162628-38251380-earning-my-mouse-ears-part-iii/

Junaid Shaikh: How Scrum Masters Can Measure Their Own Impact, Practical Self-Assessment Metrics Junaid's favorite retrospective format? The vanilla: what went well, what could have gone better, what to do better next. He's tried many formats — the Three L's (liked, learned, lacked), the Three Little Pigs, the sailboat — but the core principle is always the same. His practical advice: stick with a consistent format so the team gets better at the process itself rather than constantly adjusting to new concepts. One addition he insists on for any format: an appreciation component. In the rush to analyze processes and outcomes, teams often skip acknowledging how another team member, PO, or Scrum Master helped during the sprint. That appreciation builds trust, respect, and openness that feeds into subsequent sprints. On defining success as a Scrum Master, Junaid starts with a Peter Drucker quote: "You cannot improve something you cannot measure." He proposes several practical self-assessment metrics: First, the Agile Team Maturity Index — a spider graph that shows where the team stands across multiple criteria, making gaps visible and actionable. Second, track retrospective action items. Create tiger teams for specific issues, run small iterative experiments, and measure in the next retrospective whether the trend is improving. Third, watch for shared sprint goals. Junaid once saw a team with nine sprint goals for a two-week sprint — those weren't goals, they were individual tasks. A real sprint goal should be something multiple team members work together to achieve. Fourth, self-organizing teams. If the team falls apart when the Scrum Master is absent for a sprint, there's a problem. Coach teams to self-organize, and their ability to function independently becomes a success metric. Fifth, communication patterns. Too many emails flying around can signal hidden conflicts or trust barriers. If communication happens through the right channels — dailies, direct interactions — you're likely in good shape. Sixth, Scrum event health. If events get canceled too frequently, the team may be reverting to traditional ways of working. [The Scrum Master Toolbox Podcast Recommends]

Marcia Martin is the author of Sex, Power, and Transformation and a pioneering force in the Human Potential Movement, with more than five decades of experience as a renowned speaker, executive trainer, and transformational coach.An international expert in leadership and communication, Marcia has personally trained over 300,000 individuals and consulted for major brand companies, including Hard Rock International, Warner Bros., Capital One, Evian Water, DANONE, and InterContinental Hotels. Marcia's personal mentors include world renowned thought-leaders Buckminster Fuller, Peter Drucker, Jerry Weintraub, Oscar Ichazo, Warren Bennis, and Werner Erhard. Her work bridges corporate leadership, personal development, and human potential.Contact:Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/marcia-martin Website: marciamartin.com Email: marcia@marciamartin.com Phone: +1 (818) 395-5637 Source: https://businessinnovatorsradio.com/marcia-martin-author-mark-stephen-pooler

Casey O'Quinn is the founder of Gravity Digital, a family-owned marketing agency that has served direct-to-consumer family businesses for 25 years. He works alongside multiple family members including his father, wife, sister, cousins, and in-laws across several ventures including the agency, healthcare, and real estate. Casey built his firm on a unique revenue-share model where his team only gets paid when clients grow, challenging the traditional agency retainer approach.SHOW SUMMARYIn this episode, Jonathan Goldhill is joined by Casey O'Quinn, founder of Gravity Digital, a family-owned agency serving family-owned DTC brands for 25 years, about marketing as capital allocation that can drain family wealth and strain relationships when spent on vague retainers without measurable return. Casey contrasts traditional hourly/retainer agency models with Gravity Digital's revenue-share approach, where the agency is paid only on growth above a baseline, aligning incentives and enabling investment in creative, websites, and testing. They discuss protecting “the family farm,” handling generational risk tolerance, patience and education around digital channels, and a “seven-figure blueprint” formula (customers × frequency × average order value) emphasizing ads for scalable acquisition, email/SMS for repeat purchases, and upsells for AOV. Key metrics include new customer acquisition cost, lifetime value, new vs returning customers, and cautious use of ROAS amid attribution limits, plus integrating marketing into EOS scorecards and quarterly testing.KEY TAKEAWAYSFamily before business: Make a commitment to walk away from the business before letting it damage family relationships—this principle forces better conflict resolutionRevenue share model: Align agency incentives with client outcomes by only getting paid when clients grow, rather than fixed retainers that don't ensure resultsMarketing as investment: View marketing spending through the lens of capital allocation and ROI, not just as an expense line itemNAC is critical: Understanding your New Customer Acquisition Cost and being willing to spend MORE than competitors (while staying profitable) is how you win at scaleSimple growth formula: Revenue = Customers × Frequency × Average Order Value. Focus on these three levers systematicallyTest before committing: Start with small tests and let data drive decisions rather than assumptions, especially when navigating generational disagreementsFailure is feedback: Marketing experiments that don't work aren't failures—they're learning opportunities to "fail forward"Patience + transparency: Success in family business marketing requires educating all generations, managing different risk appetites, and showing early wins to build trustQUOTES"We would walk away from the business before we let it come between us." — On family business priorities"He who is willing and able to spend the most to acquire a customer wins." — On competitive advantage in customer acquisition"Good marketing can't fix a bad product." — On fundamental business requirements"The cheapest customer you'll ever get is the one you already have." — On the value of repeat business and frequency"Marketing and innovation produce results. Everything else is just a cost." — Peter Drucker quote on business fundamentals"Protect the family farm—that's the family business." — On preserving generational wealth and avoiding capital drain"Failure is just feedback." — On reframing marketing experiments"Marketing is half art, half science, half left brain, half right brain." — On the dual nature of effective marketingConnect and learn more about Casey O'Quinn.https://www.linkedin.com/in/caseyoquinn/If you enjoyed today's episode, please subscribe, review, and share with a friend who would benefit from the message. If you're interested in picking up a copy of Jonathan Goldhill's book, Disruptive Successor, go to the website at www.DisruptiveSuccessor.com

https://youtu.be/knpxJ7KATsU Joshua McMahon, President of McMahon Custom Homes and a business coach, is driven by a purpose he discovered the hard way: money wasn't his ‘Why.' His real ‘Why' is lifting others—helping people find clarity around their purpose, unlock their potential, and gain traction toward it. We explore Josh's journey from C-suite construction leadership and integrator roles to building his own company as an “evolved visionary.” Josh shares his Satisfaction Pyramid, explaining how customer experience is created upstream through brand awareness, team support, trade partner support, and training, which together produce the outcome every builder (and business) is chasing: customer satisfaction. Along the way, he breaks down why the construction industry struggles with talent, how coaching becomes a competitive advantage, and why McMahon Custom Homes wins through transparency, collaboration, and guiding clients to align budget with what truly matters. — Take 5 Steps to Satisfy Customers with Josh McMahon Good day, dear listeners. Steve Preda here, the Founder of the Summit OS group and the host of Management Blueprint. And my guest today is Joshua McMahon, the president of McMahon Custom Homes and a business coach. Although I don’t know how much time you have for that these days, josh. Welcome to the show.  Yeah, thanks for having me, Steve. We go a long way back, so it’s an honor to be a business owner and now be on your show.  Well, yeah, you are a business owner. In your previous, recent life, you was an integrator, a COO of a business. So you’ve been running construction businesses and have been C-level in other construction businesses, where we also collaborated. So we have been tracking each other’s journey, for sure. So, Josh, let’s start with my favorite question. What is your personal ‘Why’, and how are you manifesting it in your business?  Yeah. I think this is always a great question. And the real truth of this question, Steve, is that I didn’t know what it was for so long. I thought my personal ‘Why’ was just to make more money. And every time I made more money, I was just more miserable. I was never happy. So my ‘Why’ was never money. I really think my ‘Why’ is all about lifting others. And what I mean by that is I have this ability to extract other people's 'Why' and their purpose from them, help them better see that, get clarity around it and then help them get traction to go attack that 'Why'.Share on X And that’s really my ‘Why’, is to help other, lift other people to really achieve their greatness. So I get a lot of energy and joy from boosting others, and watching that untapped potential really take off.  That is fabulous. And I can see that, as a business coach, that's really very appealing to people when you can do that. How does it manifest in your construction business? You have these Custom Homes construction business, how does that help you there?  And this is where it was really born. So in the C-suite and as I grew in my business, the one part that you have to do is you have to know how to recruit. At least, I had to know how to recruit. And in order to recruit, you have to find the right talent at the right price. And what I was really looking for was that potential. I was looking for the right attitude—the right hunger. I was looking for those right pieces that I could make you a construction individual. I could make you a great construction manager, but I couldn’t fix those other things. And so when I could tap into that and take and help somebody see the vision of what I could do and what our company could help you do in your career, that’s where I was able to really take and 10X my recruiting ability, but also to really tap into that untapped talent that’s out there. Because, Steve, we have a hard time finding talent in the construction industry. Well, the talent’s out there. What’s making it hard is that we don’t recognize that talent, and we’re saying, you’ve got to be this perfect candidate. You've got to fit all these marks. You've got to check all the boxes.And I’m saying, no. I just need you to check a few boxes. I'm going to help you see how you can really fit into this organization and how we can help you thrive. So that's where my ability to see that in them, help them see that in themselves, and then help them tie it to our vision as a company. That's where it really gets a lot of fun.Share on X Yeah. It’s so interesting that it’s not just about doing the job, but it’s about being emotionally invested in doing the job. And how do you get your people emotionally invested? You have to find the motivation that they have inherently that you can tap into, and then you have to make your business attractive so that it inspires them, so that they feel excited to work with you there. That’s exactly what you’re trying to do. It’s like you’re not trying to fool anybody on anything, but to think people just get excited to come do work, or just do the job, or just collect the paycheck. If that’s your motivation, that’s the type of candidate you’re going to get. Then what type of culture do you have? So if you flip that and you say, “Hey, we want to help you  transform who you are, transform your career for the better, and it’s going to help us get to our vision. Well, Steve, that sounds like a win-win scenario to me. And that’s a really appealing piece. And that’s a thriving culture.  Yeah, culture eats strategy for breakfast, as Peter Drucker said. And especially in the age of AI, it's probably even more important, isn't it, that you have a great culture, because AI can copy everything, but it won't be able to copy your culture.  No, that's exactly right. I think AI is a great tool. It’s really going to help us magnify and improve our businesses. But if your culture is broken, AI is just going to magnify the brokenness of your culture, and then AI’s going to tell your people how to go find another job. That is probably true. I haven’t thought about that. So you developed this framework, we are a podcast of frameworks. I’m always looking for the framework and and you talked about this Satisfaction Pyramid framework. Yeah. Is this also something that helps create that culture? Tell me a little bit about this pyramid and how did you come up with it and what does it do?  Yeah, it’s an interesting thing, right? So you understand Maslow's hierarchy of needs. These are the things you need for survival and for happiness. And I've said, look, in home building, we've always talked about customer experience and customer satisfaction. We want people to be happy. And I'm saying, well, I don't know what that means. I don't know—if I hit my schedule, if I hit my budget, if I do everything on time, but they're still not happy—so what exactly am I missing? What's the missing link?  And kind of tying the hierarchy of needs to this triangle of customer satisfaction or happiness, I found that there are some really key fundamental pieces that we've got to lock into place to really get to the customer satisfaction and customer experience that we're seeking. For me, I think brand awareness is first. If your brand awareness is out there and it's really strong, people are going to gravitate towards it organically.Share on X That’s going to decrease your SEO spend, you decrease your marketing, decrease your turnover for people, because people want to be part of that. The interesting story on brands — and I don't know how true it is, I meant to look it up before this — but I saw something on social media about Tommy Hilfiger. And before he launched his clothing brand, he didn't have anything, but his brand was so far out in front of himself that people thought this was this great designer, and he hadn't designed anything. And it was all tied to that piece of brand. So if your brand is strong enough, you can do incredible things. So I think brand is super important.  Yeah. Let me just interject here. So probably 20 years ago, I was working with a company, and it was actually in the construction space. It was in the environmental construction space. And this company had an amazing brand. So the founder was a great thought leader, and he was blogging and talking in forums. And I really thought that this company's got to be a $50 million company. I mean, they're so powerful. And then they invited me to their board as a board member. I said, “Wow, this is such an honor.” This big company. And it turned out it was just a $5 million company. But the brand was so powerful that they looked much bigger.  Yeah. And that statement, that’s an appealing thing. So if you think of yourself as a high level achiever, an A-player, and you are gravitating to that brand, that’s what it’s going to do. You're going to bring in the right people, and then if you've got the right culture and the right other pieces, you're going to stick around with that company.Share on X So a $5 million company can look like a $50 million company and be really attractive to people that are interested in that type of world. Yeah. Super important. Love that story. The second thing for me is team support. This is where I really saw in my career as I grew. I can tell you, my first construction job at the construction management level, my VP of construction told me, and this is 20 plus years ago, I haven't forgotten it — he said, “My leadership style is to give you just enough rope to hang yourself.” And to this day, I have no idea what the heck that means. But what he did show me was he wasn’t going to support me. He wasn’t going to encourage me. He wasn’t going to help me grow. He was basically going to let me swim in the deep end. And if I made it, great. And if I didn’t, no problem — there's another guy behind me. And that’s the mentality of the construction industry. And what I said was, we do a great job of spending money for our sales team. Sales team needs training, we’ll spend the money on training. If the executives need training, we’ll spend the money on training.  But who’s training the middle managers? Who’s training the young men and women coming into the industry? Who’s training the people who don’t have the experience? There’s a big myth in that world. So I think from an internal standpoint — and mind you, coaching is a buzzword right now, just as leadership is — not everybody's a coach, and not everybody's a leader, and that's okay. But if you do have somebody who can coach on your team, and you can coach your team up internally, it’s a very big value add. And so for me, my coaching ability has been a real value add for people that I've recruited, for people I've had on my team, and people I've really invested in and helped grow.Share on X And quick story on coaching. I interviewed this young candidate, I mean, really good-looking kid. He had tons of talent, education, everything he needed, but no construction experience. Still, he had all the right soft skills. And it came down between our company and one of the big national builders. And typically, you’d go to the national builders, more money, more upside, more advantages. And he asked me, the last question he asked me, he said, “Why would I come work for you guys versus this other company?” I said, “Because they don't have me.” I said, I’m not saying this is an arrogant thing to say. I’m saying that I’m going to pour everything from me into you and help take you to where you want to go. You won’t get that anywhere else. Because when we’re done after three years, you can go anywhere you want. And that young man is currently making almost as much as I was making as a C-suite employee, and he’s out in the field running projects. And that’s only like a three or five year period. Like that’s incredible growth, but it’s because of the investment we made in him.  Yeah. There's this saying — I think it's Zig Ziglar — that people don't invest in their people, they don't coach their people, because they're afraid that they’re going to go away to the competition. And then Zig Ziglar asks, “Okay, but isn't there a greater risk that you don’t coach them and and they stay?”  Yes. This is always the thing. And I think a lot of people have a scarcity mindset where they’re so afraid of, if I pour into you, you’re going to go and you’re going to take it somewhere else. What I say is, I’m okay with that. Because when you go somewhere else, you're going to say, “Josh McMahon built me up. He gave me the foundation for my career. He put me in the position I’m in today. I have what I have because of my start. You should go there and get the training from him. There’s no sham e in that because, again, we go back to point number one: brand. That’s tight. That’s my brand out in front of our company that adds value to our company.  So I started my career at KPMG, and one of the ideas they had was this pyramid structure — up or out. But the idea was to take care of the people that even when they leave, they become ambassadors for you on the client side. And then they’re going to convince the client to hire KPMG to be their auditor. And I really like this.  It’s so special, right? Because what you, I mean, Steve, you think about this, we worked together two or three years ago. We still stayed in touch. Even though there’s no financial gain, we still help each other where we can because I want the best for you, as you want the best for me. And that’s what you’re really looking for.  Yeah, that’s true. And the thing about coaching is you have the double benefit, because the company benefits because it has motivated employees who are performing at the higher level than when they came in, and at a higher level than where you hired them, frankly. Correct.  And then they are building a career. So they are building a career equity for themselves. And actually that’s why you get a better ROI on these people, because they have more career equity, they have more skill level than what you have to pay them because you are growing them.  That’s exactly right. You’re building into those individuals that generational wealth that most of us are seeking, or think is out of reach. It's there. We just need somebody to believe in us, and that’s really that piece. The third thing for me, especially in construction, it’s the trade partners. And when I think about it, as a general contractor, look—I'm wearing a collared shirt. You're not going to see me on the job site swinging a hammer. I’m out there with the building plans. I’m verifying things. I'm scheduling. I'm doing more management-level work. That means my trade partners are carrying the lion’s share of the work that actually goes into place. And as a construction company, we don’t make money unless work goes in place.  So I have to do the same thing I'm doing with my internal staff with my trade partners. I have to build them up. I have to elevate them. I have to put them in a position to win.Share on X And this is very basic—schedule accurately. Treat them like people. Treat them with respect. When you go on the job, support them. Listen to their feedback. So if they’re sharing something that’s not working, listen to it with an open mind. And maybe we can do something different, or we can explain why we can't do something different, so they have a better understanding of the ‘Why’ behind what we’re doing. Yeah.  So the trade partners is my next big pillar.  And it’s harder to manage trade partners. I mean, I’m not in the construction, but it’s going to be harder because they are part-time with you. They have other commitments that they have to observe. They don’t wear your brand. They are being paid by someone else who may have a different corporate culture than your company has. And you have to bring them in part-time and make them as good as your standard.  Yes. The hard thing is you have to share with them your vision first. This is who we are. This is what we stand for. Share with them your core values. And then build them up and show them that they’re truly a partner in this. Most of us don’t treat them like partners. We treat them like subcontractors. We treat them like they're inferior individuals—less than me. And I think they can work for you part-time and do that. And you’re absolutely right. But if we treat them like people, we build them up, they’ll be there. Because I want to treat them in a way where, hey, you might be a great plumber, but you’re a terrible business person, and I can maybe help you better understand. I say this because I'm working with a young plumber who's bidding things, and he’s just all over the place. And I'm saying, “Hey, how did you come to this number?” “Well, I just know I need to make X dollars.” And I'm like, “Well, how do you know how much money you need to make? What's your break-even number? What's your overhead burden?” Starting to help him better understand how to break down the P&L, how to charge the right margin on the job so that you’re getting work as consistently as you want, but most importantly, so you can grow your business and continue to support my business as it grows too.Share on X Yeah, you want to create stability for them as well. And if you treat subcontractor well, then they’re going to prioritize you, won't they? So they have other customers that may not treat them as well. You’re going to get the most of the energy from them if you treat them well. And that’s also a huge benefit for your business. There’s nothing lost in that, right? Again, you’ve got brand ambassadors out there talking about, one, this guy builds a great house. He treats everybody great. You made the right choice buying with with McMahon Custom Homes. Because, Steve, if you’ve ever been on a job site, the trades will tell people what they feel, whether it’s good or bad. Yeah. So you are getting it no matter what.  Yeah. You go and you look at the construction site and ask around, and then you will get exactly the kind of general contractor you may be dealing with.  Yes. I mean, absolutely. We love to talk, and so you want people talking about good things and talking up your business and what’s happening in the field, and that’s extremely valuable. Okay, so step number one, brand awareness. We talked about that. Then supporting the team. Yes. So that they feel that they are growing and they are recognized as individuals, that you care about them. Yeah. Then the same goes with the trade partners. You support them even though they’re not your employees.  Yes.  What’s step four?  Yeah. Step four is training. Okay. And training, I think of training in terms of systems that you’re putting in place. Constant, never-ending improvement on those systems. Systems are not static, so training is a nonstop thing that we've got to continue investing in and keep helping to grow our team. So constant process improvement. Having KPIs in place, or metrics in place. And the reason for those metrics is simply where do we need to focus our attention? What levers do we need to pull? And then I go back to the training. So then we train up on metrics that maybe aren’t working the way that we want them to, or we’re not getting the result that we want to get out of them. That’s where the training really comes into place. And if we don't have that training in-house, what stuff outside of the company can we get them into? What type of training do they need to level them up? Because as I think about training, Steve, most of us think you’ve got to fit every box, you’ve got to be the perfect candidate. But you and I both know that I’m good at three out of the five things, and you’re good at two out of the five things. So we make a damn good team together. And that’s okay, and we need to better learn how to cross-train each other, level one another up, and then find those right tools.Share on X  Absolutely. Okay, so what’s the final piece of the flywheel?  Yeah. Well, I feel like if you're doing all these things, brand awareness, team support, trade partner support, and the right training, and you're doing this continuous basis, you're going to have customer satisfaction.Share on X That’s exactly what you want. You’re going to create that customer experience because look, at the end of the day, we’re only here because of the customer. If the customer’s not interested in buying my product, I don’t have a business. And so all of these pieces drive that customer experience. That’s what continues driving who I am. One thing I’m really focused on with customer satisfaction and experience is having good specifications written down. I think yes, we’re a custom home builder, but I have minimum standards that I want to achieve.  So I have the minimum standards. Now, if your budget says, “Hey, we can't quite reach that level,” well, we can certainly reduce our standard. And when I say reduce our standard, I don’t mean cut a corner. I mean change from, say, a Kohler faucet down to a Delta faucet. It’s still a great faucet. It’s still a great brand. Maybe just not the same brand that I would use at this level of home. Or we can go the complete opposite direction and elevate that standard. But just having that set in place, so that if I say, “Steve, this home's going to cost you $1.2 million,” and you're like, “Oh, great. Well, the other builder's $1.3 million, so you've got a better price,” okay, great. But what goes into the price? What are you getting for the price? So if I have those minimum standards baked in, I can tell you, This is what you're going to get for $1.2 million. Now we can go in and customize it and make it your home. Having clear expectations. How important are clear expectations even in our coaching business, right? And it’s not just clear expectations from me to you, it’s clear expectations from you to me. I need to understand what your expectations are. I need to know that I can achieve your expectations. And I think that if I believe I can’t, I need to be honest and say, look, I’m not the right builder for you. I’m not the right business for you. But here are..  Or maybe your expectations are not realistic. Sometimes, for the budget you have, you need to make some trade-offs. Maybe you can have this man cave, but you'll have to cut back on the kitchen, and you’ll have to discuss it with your wife. And that’s really key. So the thing that I love about being a custom builder is that my focus is on collaboration.Share on X If you say, “Hey Josh, the budget comes in at $1.2 million, but I really want to be at $1 million,” okay, great Steve. I’m here to collaborate with you and show you ways we can tweak things, pull this down, and future-proof your home. Because I want you to have the home that you want, and in two years you can probably afford that additional $200,000. I don't want to put you in a place where you can easily plug and play that versus oh, now I got to rip out all these walls. I got to redo this. It's not $200,000—it could be $300,000. So that’s where we can collaborate and really find the right pieces to put you in the best position.  That’s very interesting. This whole framework, the culture that you build here. Is this something that connects this whole framework, this idea that you have, how you’re projecting the culture out into the customer service? Is this why you started the McMahon Custom Homes?  It truly is. Well, two parts, Steve. One, I’m an entrepreneur at heart and I have fought this my entire life, and I’ve always thought there was something wrong with me. Why can’t I just get on board? Why can’t I just drink the Kool-Aid? Why can’t I just get in line? And two or three years I go into a company, I do great things, I start rebuilding things, and then I start to get that itch. And then I’m like, okay, I need to go somewhere else. And for a long time I thought it was, well, I’m just moving to a new company to make more money, which was true. I was making more money, but then I wasn’t happy. Again, it was never tied to the money, so it was really just that entrepreneur need. But the second piece was, I've noticed for ten years—a decade—that our industry is in need of a massive transformation. The antiquated way of doing business and how we do things. I think the builder suites and the stuff that we have at our disposal is really good, but it’s not what everybody’s looking for. But I couldn’t tell you, the owner, Hey, we’ve got to scrap this. We need to do this. Because ultimately, even as the integrator, my job is to bring your vision to life. And if this is part of your vision, then I need to bring this to life. And so I started to realize with my entrepreneur spirit and my own ideas, I needed to start developing my own home building business to start bringing some of that to life, to really satisfy who I am and do the things that I wanted.Share on X Yeah, this is so important because, as entrepreneurs, we have this frustration. We are somewhere and things are not going as well as you would like. And we don’t get to tell the boss how to do things because they have their own ideas and their own set ways, and then they just get irritated by all those ideas and they feel like we are just being disgruntled employees, and this frustration eats away at you. And at some point you say, okay, what the heck? I'm just going to rip the Band‑Aid off and try to figure it out, right? It’s very true. I mean, it’s funny now looking back on it because there were so many times where I just didn’t understand. I was like, “What the heck is the matter with me?” But you’re exactly right — you’re going to bang your head against the wall, and not everybody’s cut out to be an entrepreneur, right? I mean, it sounds really great being self-employed, doing your own thing, making your own hours. It sounds great.  But I tell you something, Josh, not everyone is cut out to be an employee either.  No doubt, Steve. So true.  So it’s the other side of the coin. I think many of us become entrepreneurs because we basically eliminate all the viable alternatives.  Yeah. Burn all the boats, right?  Yeah.  I think there’s so much value in this. The second time we really got introduced and got to work together, you introduced me to the book Second in Command by Cameron Herold. I’m a  Cameron Herold fan in the Second in Command book, and I read that book and I said, “Man, this is me. I can do this.” I love being more in the shadows, helping a visionary grow their business, and doing all that stuff. What happened was, I started to really enjoy being out there, networking, putting myself out, and getting in front of people.  And I was like, well, I’m a visionary. I can see what’s going on in the future. And I think I was more of a visionary than the person who said he was a visionary. So it was really like, then we’re clashing heads on which vision are we chasing. And I’m like, I got to get outta here because I’m steering you away from what you want to do, and that’s not fair to you.  I think there are two major types of visionaries. There are the born visionaries, and then there are the evolved visionaries. So you have the born visionary who is a visionary because they are just not able to execute, but they can come up with all the big ideas. And if they find people who can execute for them, they're in luck, and they might build a company. And then you have the evolved visionary who starts out doing the work, grinding, figuring things out, teaching themselves discipline and work ethic. And then they start to manage people because they’re doing it better, so they get more responsibility, and then they become an integrator or operator. And at some point, they want to come out of the cocoon and do it themselves. And maybe you’re that version of it, the evolved visionary.  You summed that up perfectly because that's exactly how this whole thing transpired.  Love it. So tell me about, what makes McMahon Custom Homes unique? Beyond the culture—is it the culture that makes you unique, or is there something else? From the eyes of the customer, what makes you unique?  I don’t know that it’s our culture that makes us unique. I think what really makes us unique is our process—how we do things. We start everything with an initial consultation, just myself meeting with the homebuyers. Typically, it's a virtual meeting where I want to learn more about your project. I’m interested in what you want to build, what your expectations are, what your non-negotiables are, and I just really explore everything under the sun about your project.  Then I'm going to ask the dreaded question: what's your ideal budget? Most—or a lot of—people say, “You know what, I don't want to give the budget. So I'll say, “Okay, what budget number scares you?” Because as a custom home builder, I’m going to help you design the home that you want for the price that you want. But I’m going to also share with you if it’s not possible. If you have a home design that's more than what your budget is, I'm going to share that with you in real time, as soon as I can. So I'm very transparent. And I learned this from working in my past, where we wouldn't share those numbers with clients. We had a client where we were a million dollars over their ideal budget. It was six to eight months of working with them and about $25,000 in actual costs. I don't need to tell you—the homeowner was not pleased, and the homeowner did not pay that bill.  So that was a major lost opportunity in the build, but also the opportunity cost and how much time we spent on it. I learned from that and said, “Hey, I don't want to do that. I don't need every buyer to be a yes. If I'm a good fit for you, and I'm a good builder for you, great—let's go.Share on X I want to build your house. I’m excited about building homes for people. But I don't need to build everybody's house, because for some people, it's just not the right fit. So for me, I'm your guide in this process. And that's what I really pride myself in. You want to build a home, I’m going to guide you through this process, help you with each step of the way. Help you with the county side, the field side. I’m here to guide you through that whole thing. We really work towards your budget, your ideal budget. We build it out. We’re very transparent. A lot of clarity on what we’re doing, where we can collaborate, where we can maybe say, Hey, instead of $80,000 tile package, we can get a $45,000 tile package. Because we’re really looking for what’s your vision for it.  Yeah.  What do you want to see? How do you want to feel? And we can help you pull that together.  Yeah, I think that’s very interesting, because I can see that there is value being created when you have an empathetic CEO who runs the business. You, in that case, who really gets to feel what the lifestyle of the individual is, what their vision is. You help them paint the picture so that you see it as well, and then you measure each element in proportion to their desires. Because maybe they want something like a really flashy countertop in the kitchen, but they really don’t care about what the deck is going to look like. Maybe it’s a stup*d example. And when someone buys, I don’t know, a standard home, then you are going to pay for stuff that you really don’t care about, and you are not going to get the stuff that uniquely is important to you. And with that approach that you’re doing, you are measuring everything to the right degree, and it’s going to be a perfectly balanced meal for the customer. That’s a great way of looking at it. That’s exactly right. And the deck versus man cave or versus this, that’s exactly the right way to look at it. A deck is a great add-on. It can be done anytime in the build. It can be done anytime. It's a minimal barrier to entry. Well, something on the inside of the house, the kitchen, the showstopper kitchen, that’s a different story, right? Because now you're impacting your life. You’re changing things. If we understand that the kitchen is a really prime target, then we want to make sure we commit enough money to that area. We want to make sure we commit enough design hours to that area. And maybe other areas are like, “Hey, minimum standard's great with us.” Perfect. Done.  Yeah. We only sleep in the bedroom, we don’t do anything else.  Exactly. Great point.  Which is a problem in itself. Anyhow, if someone would like to learn more and maybe learn your ideas—maybe they want to be coached by you, or they want to learn about McMahon Custom Homes, what it takes to align with your vision—and particularly if they're in Central Virginia where you work, where should they reach out and where can they find you? Yeah, so several different places. McMahonCustomHomesLLC.com is our website, so you can certainly find us there. We have an active Instagram account, McMahon Custom Homes. I have an active Facebook account, again, McMahon Custom Homes. I do have a LinkedIn account, McMahon Custom Homes, LLC. Also for myself, my wife and I host a bi-monthly podcast. We took a year hiatus, and we just started again in 2026. Our podcast is not on McMahon Custom Homes, but it's really about the construction industry, different things that you experience, and really just giving back and trying to help others learn from maybe stuff that we did or things that we’re experiencing. My wife is a designer. I'm the home builder, so you kind of get a good mixed bag. And that's Feed Me Your Construction Content, if you're ever interested in tuning into that.  Yeah. And if you would like to see what a collaboration between Josh and his wife looks like, then check out his website,  McMahon Custom Homes. You can check out his house, or their house, that they built together. And it’s a beautiful house.  Yeah. Thank you.  It's a good place to start. Josh, loved it. I loved your content. Really interesting how you created the Satisfaction Pyramid in construction. I think that parallel applies to other businesses as well. Obviously, the elements are slightly different, but brand awareness, supporting the team, supporting your partners, training your people, pouring into them, and then creating that customer satisfaction are important in any industry. So thank you. If you enjoyed listening to this show, make sure you follow us on LinkedIn and on YouTube. And stay tuned, because every week I bring an exciting entrepreneur or thought leader on this show. Thank you for coming, Josh, and thanks for listening. Important Links: Josh's LinkedIn McMahon Custom Homes website McMahon Custom Homes LinkedIn

Peter Drucker once said “Until we can manage time, we can manage nothing else”  How is your management of time?  Links: Email Me | Twitter | Fac ebook | Website | Linkedin   The Time-Based Productivity Course    Get Your Copy Of Your Time, Your Way: Time Well Managed, Life Well Lived The Working With… Weekly Newsletter Carl Pullein Learning Centre Carl's YouTube Channel Carl Pullein Coaching Programmes Subscribe to my Substack  The Working With… Podcast Previous episodes page Script | 403 Hello, and welcome to episode 403 of the Your Time, Your Way Podcast. A podcast to answer all your questions about productivity, time management, self-development, and goal planning. My name is Carl Pullein, and I am your host of this show.  Are you in danger of boxing yourself in with too many processes and too much structure?  Now, it's important to stress that having some structure to your day is important. But too much can lead to boxing yourself in and losing flexibility.  Let me give you an example I often come across. Protecting time for doing your focused work. Having this protected on your calendar so the time cannot be stolen by others is important.  If you protected 2 hours and finished in 90 minutes, that doesn't mean you have to continue for another 30 minutes. Take a break. You're done.  But this works the other way, too. If you have two hours protected for a project task but cannot finish it in that time. It's okay. You turned up. You did the work, but you miscalculated how long it would take.  This happens to all of us. Some days we're on fire and can plough through a lot of work. Other days, a lot less so.  The problem is that when you begin your day, you really don't know what kind of day you're going to have. There are too many variables. How you slept, whether you're catching a cold or simply something else is on your mind.  Your life is not measured by what you do in one day; everyone has bad days.  So, with that said, let me hand you over to the Mystery Podcast Voice for this week's question.  This week's question comes from Alex. Alex asks, hi Carl, this year I'm trying to be better at time blocking, but I am really struggling to stay consistent with my blocks. What advice do you have to help stay true to your calendar?  Hi Alex, thank you for your question. Something I have always taught is that of all your productivity tools, one of them needs to be sacred. One of your tools must be the “truth” about what you are going to do that day.  Task managers are generally not good at this because we throw a lot of things into them. That's a good thing. Yet, the issue is that most people never curate what they throw in. This creates overwhelming lists of low-value, ill-thought-out items that will never get done. They just cripple your task manager's effectiveness.  The best tool for acting as your sacred base is your calendar. It's never going to lie to you. It shows you the 24 hours you have each day and where you need to be, with whom, and when.  You cannot overload yourself without it being plainly obvious that you are trying to do too much. And let's be perfectly clear, an agreed appointment with someone will always take priority over an email or proposal you need to write. If not, you cancel the appointment.  I hope, at a basic, civilised human being level, you get that.  I've called off face-to-face meetings in the past if the person I am meeting cannot put their phones down and actually talk to me. It is rude, disrespectful, and no person with an ounce of integrity would ever do that.  One of the striking things I've noticed about the highly successful people I work with is that they never have a phone. Tablet or laptop near them when they are in meetings. A notebook and a pen are all they have.  That's focus, professionalism, and demonstrates to the person you are meeting that you are focused on them in that moment.  When you make your calendar your primary productivity tool, you gain clarity about how much time you have available for the things you want to do.  It's visual, it's staring at you, and there's no escape from reality.  If you work 9 hours a day and today you have 7 hours of meetings, you only have 2 hours to do solo work. That's it.  If you need three hours to get your critical, must-do work done, then you have two choices. You either cancel a meeting or you accept that you will need to work an extra hour.  It's strange how so many people waste so much time trying find other solutions. That's time they could have spent on getting started on the work.  The solution is to time-block slots for doing the work that matters. The best salespeople block time every day to prospect and follow up with their customers. That's why they are the top salespeople. The best CEOs block time every day for working on their top priority task. That's why they are the best at what they do. Best-selling authors block time for writing every day. That's why they sell a lot of books.  Now, as I eluded to at the beginning, there will be some days when things don't go according to plan. You might be sick, had an argument with a loved one or just be distracted for whatever reason.  Or there could be a good old-fashioned emergency that needs your attention.  It happens. That's life.  However, it's not really about what you do or not to do in one day. The purpose of time blocks is to get you to show up and do the work. It's not about volume.  Spending twenty minutes on your actionable email is better than spending zero minutes. It's surprising how much you can get done when the pressure of time is on you. You don't dilly-dally around. (Wow! That's a phrase I haven't used for a long time!)  Ultimately, the measure is how well you did against your plan for the week, not necessarily an individual day.  Let me give you an example.  I have two blog posts, two newsletters, this podcast and a YouTube video to produce each week. They are my measurables. Six pieces of content. I know I need about 12 hours a week to produce that content. I also have 15 hours of coaching appointments. So, in total, I need 27 hours protected before I begin my week to complete my professional work.  It's doable, and based on my completion rates, I complete this work around 87% of the time over 12 months. I'll take that. (I measure it at the end of every year)  I work with one highly successful CEO who writes a LinkedIn Newsletter every week. Her company has over 50,000 employees in six different countries. She protects two hours every week to write that newsletter. One hour for the first draft and one hour later in the week to edit it.  Last year, she didn't miss one newsletter. She had a 100% completion rate. And that was her goal.  How did she do it? She protected her writing time every week. She would protect Monday mornings when in the office, and when travelling, she would take advantage of jet lag and write when she was wide awake in the early morning or late at night.  She time-blocked the time. She knew the only way to achieve a 100% completion rate was to make sure each week she had protected the time to do the work.  However, time blocking only works if you are planning your week. Not planning your week leaves you open to other people hijacking your calendar, and as I am sure you are aware, other people are often very persuasive… or demanding.  When you sit down to plan the week, you first look at what meetings and appointments you have scheduled. How much time does that leave you?  That will tell you what you could realistically get done that week.  If you're away at a conference for three days, you really only have two days to work with. However, one of those days will probably be needed for catching up, so realistically, you've got one solid work day.  But let's look at a typical week when you are at your usual place of work.  How much time do you need to do the work you are employed to do each week? A journalist may be expected to write an article a week. How long does it typically take to write the article, excluding the research and interviews? That would be their starting point.  Doctors I work with often need 2 hours or more after seeing patients to handle paperwork. If they want to get home at 7:00 pm each evening, then that will affect the time they need to stop seeing patients and do paperwork.  Salespeople are focused on seeing clients most of the day, but they also often have paperwork and follow-ups to do. Where can they fit the time they need for paperwork and follow-ups? Knowing what you are expected to do as part of your job and ensuring you have sufficient time to do it each week is what I call protecting time for your core work, and it goes back to the birth of humankind. Our ancestors on the Savannahs knew their core work. To hunt for food. If they'd had a big kill one day, they may have been able to take a day off, but when they started their day, they knew their job was to go out and find food. It was a non-negotiable part of their day.  That's what time blocking does for you. It gives you clarity on what you need to do that day. All you need to do is show up.  One tip I can give you about time-blocking is to keep your time blocks general. For instance, the CEO I mentioned a moment ago calls her newsletter writing time simply “writing time”. That gives her some flexibility.  If she needs to write a report for the board and is up against a tight deadline, then that is what she will write in that time. She will then find another space for the newsletter writing. I do something similar. I have writing time and audio/visual time protected on my calendar. I can then choose what I write or record on the day as part of my daily planning routine.  If you're in sales or a client-facing role, the time you spend working for your clients can be called “client” or “customer” time. I would also highly recommend that you set aside time every day to deal with messages, emails, and admin. These tasks will creep up on you if you're not dealing with them every day. Even if you can only find thirty minutes, take it.  Whenever I am on a business trip, whether domestic or international, I make sure to set aside time during the day to address my actionable messages. The most challenging ones are domestic, as I generally drive to the appointment or event. The easier ones are international as there is a lot of time hanging around in airport lounges.  Another tip I would give is not to go crazy here. Time blocking is not about blocking every minute of the day. It's about protecting time only for the important work you need to do.  When I look at my calendar, there are only three hours a day protected for solo work. On days when I have a lot of meetings, I usually reduce that time to one hour.  So there you go, Alex. I hope that has helped.  You are going to have good and bad days. That's perfectly normal. But, you have complete control of your calendar, so you can move things around, change your blocks if necessary. But, and this is the important but, once you've locked them in for the day, you stick with them. Remember, it's not about how much you do in the time, it's about turning up and doing the work.  And if you want to transform your time management and adopt a sustainable time-based productivity system, my newest course, the Time-Based Productivity course, will do that for you.  It will teach you how to time-block effectively and organise your work so you are doing the right things at the right time. PLUS… by joining the course, you get free access to my recently updated Time Sector System course and my Time Blocking Course.  If I were to recommend one course for 2026, that's the one I would recommend.  Thank you for your question, Alex and thank you to you too for listening. It just remains for me to wish you all a very, very productive week.   

Mark Schaefer is a globally recognized keynote speaker, business consultant, and bestselling author known for his leadership in modern marketing and digital strategy. With over 30 years of experience in sales, PR, and marketing, he leads Schaefer Marketing Solutions and writes the acclaimed blog {grow}, consistently ranked among the world's top marketing blogs. A respected academic and practitioner, Mark holds advanced degrees in marketing and organizational development, teaches in the graduate program at Rutgers University, holds seven patents, and studied under Peter Drucker, the founder of modern management. He is a highly sought-after speaker, presenting at major events worldwide and advising organizations from startups to global brands like Adidas, Pfizer, and the U.S. Air Force. Mark is the bestselling author of ten influential books, including Marketing Rebellion, KNOWN, The Content Code, Belonging to the Brand, and his most recent How AI Changes Your Customers. His work is used as teaching material at universities globally, and he co-hosts The Marketing Companion, a top-ranked marketing podcast with over 1.5 million downloads, while contributing regularly to leading media outlets such as Harvard Business Review, The New York Times, and The Wall Street Journal. During the show we discuss: The most significant ways AI is reshaping organizations, workflows, and decision-making How AI is expected to impact humanity, work, and society over the next decade Why AI is rapidly changing how people learn, process information, and make decisions The rise of AI as a primary source of emotional support and guidance How businesses can make customers feel valued and human in an AI-driven world Why brands must now optimize for AI—not just end users What truly matters (and what no longer does) when communicating in the age of AI Resources: https://businessesgrow.com/

What if your leadership's team's biggest risk isn't bad strategy, but unspoken, outdated assumptions?   In this episode, Bradley Hartmann reveals why even powerful mental models like Dr. Peter Drucker's Theory of the Business often get ignored by executive teams—and what you can do to change that.    Based on the recent outreach of a Construction Leadership Podcast listener, this episode uncovers how you can bridge the gap between strategy and action using a practical new diagnostic tool you can download below.    In this episode you will:   Learn how to frame Drucker's model in a way that actually resonates with your leadership team. Discover the 6 critical assumptions every business needs to challenge—and how to map them. Get a proven tool to document your team's thinking, surface hidden gaps, and lead with clarity.     Listen now to learn how to align your executive team around what really matters—using one simple framework that drives results.    You can download the tool here.   The Construction Leadership Podcast dives into essential leadership topics in construction, including strategy, emotional intelligence, communication skills, confidence, innovation, and effective decision-making. You'll also gain insights into delegation, cultural intelligence, goal setting, team building, employee engagement, and how to overcome common culture problems. Whether you're leading a crew or managing an entire organization, these conversations will equip you with tools to lead smarter and build stronger teams.      This episode is brought to you by The Construction Spanish Toolbox —the most practical way for construction teams to learn jobsite-ready Spanish in just minutes a day over 6 months.   *** If you enjoyed this podcast, please leave a review on Apple Podcasts. Your feedback will help us on our mission to bring the construction community closer together. If you have suggestions for improvements, topics you'd like the show to explore, or have recommendations for future guests, do not hesitate to contact us directly at info@bradleyhartmannandco.com.    

What do a 1970 psychology experiment and the 2008 housing crash have in common? In Episode 6 of Built to Divide, Dimitrius Lynch traces how social identity theory—the instinct to form “us vs. them” groups—became a political weapon that helped sell a bipartisan push for mass homeownership, weaken skepticism, and pave the way for subprime mortgages, mortgage-backed securities (MBS), CDOs, and a crisis engineered by incentives.We move from NAFTA-era globalization and Peter Drucker's “core competencies” mindset, to the dot-com bust, Fed rate cuts, and the explosion of “stated income” lending. The episode spotlights Washington Mutual (WaMu)—from community-friendly bank to shareholder-driven mortgage machine—then follows the collapse, the scapegoating of low-income borrowers, and the rise of institutional investors turning foreclosures into portfolios. A story about housing, finance, and the narratives that keep us divided—even when the math says we share the same stakes.Episode Extras - Photos, videos, sources and links to additional content found during research.Episode Credits:Production in collaboration with Gābl MediaWritten & Executive Produced by Dimitrius LynchAudio Engineering and Sound Design by Jeff Alvarez

What if the future of marketing is a lot more human than we think? Today's guest, Mark Schaefer, has been shaping that future for decades — and he was actually on this show ten years ago. So this is part reunion, part masterclass. Mark's a futurist, bestselling author, Rutgers faculty member, and Drucker-trained strategist whose ideas guide brands from Adidas to the U.S. Air Force. His ten books and his top-ranked show The Marketing Companion have become industry staples. He's also a longtime friend who somehow manages to push your thinking and make you laugh at the same time. What You'll Learn in This Episode Why the future of marketing belongs to the most human companies, not the most automated ones How AI can scale trust, creativity, and teaching without killing the brand When removing friction actually damages customer relationships Why curiosity is becoming the most important career skill in the AI era How marketers must act as brand defenders when technology pushes too far Episode Chapters (00:00) Reunion and why this moment matters (02:00) Why this is the most amazing — and unsettling — time in marketing (04:20) Scaling humanity with AI and the MarkBot experiment (07:30) The most human company wins (and what that really means) (10:40) When AI goes too far and brands lose trust (12:30) Harley-Davidson, friction, and knowing your customer deeply (17:00) Curiosity as a career strategy in an AI world (27:00) The brand that made Mark smile About Mark Schaefer Mark Schaefer is a globally recognized futurist, keynote speaker, educator, and bestselling author. With more than 30 years of experience in marketing, PR, and global sales, he has advised organizations ranging from startups to Adidas and the U.S. Air Force. Mark studied under Peter Drucker, teaches in Rutgers University's graduate program, and holds seven patents. He is the author of ten influential books used at universities worldwide and the host of the top-ranked podcast, The Marketing Companion. Known for blending sharp insight with humanity and humor, Mark's work helps leaders navigate what's next without losing what matters. What Brand Has Made Mark Smile Recently? Mark couldn't stop smiling about Nutter Butter — a once-forgotten cookie brand that decided to go full weird. By embracing surreal, chaotic, almost inexplicable short-form videos, the brand ditched boring category conventions and leaned into creativity with nothing to lose. The result? Tripled sales and a case study in what happens when brands stop playing it safe and start being interesting. Resources & Links Connect with Mark on LinkedIn. Check out his website, BusinessesGrow. Listen & Support the Show Watch or listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, YouTube, Amazon/Audible, TuneIn, and iHeart. Rate and review on Apple Podcasts and Spotify to help others find the show. Share this episode — email a friend or colleague this episode. Sign up for my free Story Strategies newsletter for branding and storytelling tips. On Brand is a part of the Marketing Podcast Network. Until next week, I'll see you on the Internet! Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

What if the biggest risk isn't failure—it's staying down when life knocks you flat? Marshall Goldsmith didn't become the world's #1 executive coach by accident. He sat in the back of Paul Hersey's classroom for months serving coffee for free, studied under Peter Drucker, and learned that credibility must be earned twice: first by doing good work, and second by making sure people know about it.From IU Kelley School of Business to coaching CEOs of Fortune 500 companies, Marshall reveals why happiness and achievement are independent variables, why your good work will never speak for itself, and why the hungry ghost—always eating but never full—is the trap that catches every high achiever.

Tylko 8% dzieci chce przejąć rodzinne firmy! W tym odcinku Maciej Filipkowski wraz z Adrianną Lewandowską (ekspertka ds. sukcesji, Prezes Instytutu Rodzin Biznesowych) wchodzą głęboko w temat, który jest największą zmorą polskich przedsiębiorców: przekazanie władzy i majątku.Adrianna Lewandowska, wywodząca się z 7. pokolenia przedsiębiorców, których majątek odebrał komunizm , pokazuje, że sukcesja nie jest problemem prawnym czy finansowym, ale psychologicznym. Zobacz, dlaczego założyciele niszczą relacje i jak je naprawić, zanim będzie za późno (i co ma do tego japońska sztuka Kintsugi).KIEDY MYŚLEĆ O SUKCESJI?Nie zwlekaj! Peter Drucker powiedział: "Moment, w którym obudzisz się rano i pomyślisz sobie, ale mam fajnie działającą firmę, ona naprawdę ma fajne prognozy wzrostu... to jest moment, w którym pomyśl sobie o sukcesji".Porada dla Rodziców:Poświęć rodzinie tyle samo uwagi i atencji, ile poświęcasz na biznes. Bez miłości i zdrowych relacji trudno zbudować coś na pokolenia._________________PARTNERZY AUDYCJI - WSPÓŁPRACA KOMERCYJNA

"Doing the right thing is more important than doing the thing right." - Peter Drucker   Check out John Lee Dumas' award winning Podcast Entrepreneurs on Fire on your favorite podcast directory. For world class free courses and resources to help you on your Entrepreneurial journey visit EOFire.com

Christopher Lochhead, the renowned “Godfather of Category Design,” recently took the stage at the Constellations Connected Enterprise 2025 conference and delivered a blistering wake-up call to every business leader, entrepreneur, and innovator hoping to surf the current wave of AI disruption. Far from celebrating the AI gold rush, Lochhead warned that almost everyone is about to repeat the same mistakes of the past, chasing after existing markets, adding AI features like “copilots” or assistants, and calling it innovation. Drawing from his decades of expertise and path-breaking research, He then laid out a blueprint for actually leveraging AI for exponential value: it's about category design, not incremental improvement. Here are three powerful takeaways from his masterclass that every forward-thinking leader needs to know. You're listening to Christopher Lochhead: Follow Your Different. We are the real dialogue podcast for people with a different mind. So get your mind in a different place, and hey ho, let's go.   Chasing “Better” Dooms You to Mediocrity Lochhead's central thesis is as provocative as it is true: companies that use AI to make existing products just a little better are doomed to fail. He calls this the "existing market trap." Instead of designing the future, most businesses simply bolt AI onto their old offerings, thinking it will make them competitive. But "if your strategy involves simply bolting on an AI assistant or copilot, you're making a pussy move and you're fucked." Lochhead points out that companies making this mistake are chasing a market that's already been designed by someone else. And in those markets, 76% of all the value goes to the category king (think OpenAI with ChatGPT). The rest fight for scraps, regardless of whether their AI copilot is a little nicer, faster, or more user-friendly.   Winning is About Creating the New, Not Improving the Old The path to massive value in the AI era lies in doing what legends like Sam Altman, Jensen Huang, and Steve Jobs did: creating entirely new categories that didn't exist before. Lochhead illustrates this with both tech giants and quirky startups. He jokes about how Liquid Death became a force in the water business not by making better bottled water, but by launching “canned water”; an entirely new way to experience an old product with legendary branding and a distinct point of view. The same lesson holds for technology: “Different wins, better loses.” Lochhead encourages companies to listen to the language they use; calling your new AI product an “assistant” or “copilot” puts it in the sidecar, not the driver's seat. In contrast, declaring your invention as a new category not only reframes the problem, but magnetizes the future (as when OpenAI refused to call its core product a database, instead introducing the “large language model”).   The Courage to Create: Why Category Design Demands Boldness Lochhead doesn't sugarcoat the difficulty of this path. Category design requires courage: “Grow a set of balls,” he tells the audience when asked how to nurture a creator's mindset. This isn't reckless advice; it's a recognition that in an AI-powered economy, the value of existing knowledge is collapsing toward zero. The knowledge worker, as Peter Drucker defined it, is being replaced by the knowledge contained within AI itself. The only safe (and rewarding) place is at the edge, inventing net new knowledge and value. In other words, creating the future instead of merely extending the present. Lochhead challenges all of us: “Do you really want to spend the last however many years of your career making the status quo incrementally better? Or do you want to spend whatever's left of your work life making a massive material difference?” To hear the full episode from the man himself, download and listen to this episode.    We hope you enjoyed this episode of Christopher Lochhead: Follow Your Different™! Christopher loves hearing from his listeners.

QUOTES from the Episode "Instead of landlines everywhere, give every heat pump a cell phone and let it call home." "We're seeing close to 40% of heat pumps undercharged or leaking—no wonder callbacks are high." "What gets measured gets managed." — often attributed to Peter Drucker (fitting this data-driven shift)   Brendan Hermalyn (CEO/founder, Thalo Labs) traces a zig-zag path from NASA and defense to self-driving cars—then into HVAC. His through-line: high-reliability sensing and prognostics. Thalo's product aims to "give every heat pump a cell phone," using a small, non-invasive module that snaps inside VRFs/splits (and eventually larger plants), measures power and line temps, backhauls via cellular, and flags undercharge/leaks and power-quality issues before they become emergency calls. It's equipment management, not a full BMS—lightweight to install, built for techs, and friendly to API integrations, texts, and weekly roll-ups. Brendan argues the market is ready: most commercial buildings still lack BMS, Wi-Fi is fragile for critical telemetry, and the economics of sensors/cloud have flipped. Thalo avoids tapping the refrigerant loop, prioritizes fast installs (often 10–30 minutes), QR/location tagging, and even a "buzz this unit" feature to find the right rooftop box. Early field data is sobering—he's seeing ~40% of heat pumps undercharged and/or leaking—driving callbacks, compressor failures, and energy waste. The pitch to contractors: turn break-fix chaos into planned maintenance, white-label the savings report, and train new techs faster with data-driven cues. Oh, and the name? "Thalo" like the deep sky blue—an homage to adding tech to make the picture clearer.   Brendan's LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/brendan-hermalyn/ Thalo Labs: https://thalolabs.com/   This episode was recorded in October 2025.  

As we navigate a world increasingly shaped by AI, it's easy to get lost in the technical details of prompts and automation. But what about the human side of the equation? If you're building a business based on your expertise, understanding how AI is rewiring our psychology and our customers' behaviour is critical. It changes how we build relationships, create content, and ultimately, how we monetise our knowledge.In this episode, I speak with Mark Schaefer about his latest book 'How AI Changes Your Customers: The Marketing Guide to Humanity's Next Chapter', which explores the profound psychological impact of AI on humanity and marketing. We moved beyond the usual talk of efficiency and productivity to discuss what it truly means to be human-centric in a world where AI can simulate empathy.Here are three key areas we explored:

Ram Krishnan, a seasoned technology executive with a background in systems engineering from UVA, GE leadership, and several SaaS ventures, joined Valant (valant.io) in 2020 to steer the company through its next growth phase.  His team built a “system of record” that serves as the base operating platform for medical practices—handling everything from patient intake, appointment scheduling, and payment collection to clinical documentation, claim submission, and follow‑up care—essentially automating the entire patient lifecycle and positioning the software as the practice's essential OS. His leadership philosophy is anchored by two recurring nuggets: Peter Drucker's maxim that “culture beats strategy for lunch,” and a relentless focus on the core problem being solved, whether in hiring, process design, or technology investments, echoing lean‑startup principles. Website: www.valant.io LinkedIn: ramkrishnan Check out our CEO Hack Buzz Newsletter–our premium newsletter with hacks and nuggets to level up your organization. Sign up HERE.    I AM CEO Handbook Volume 3 is HERE and it's FREE. Get your copy here: http://cbnation.co/iamceo3. Get the 100+ things that you can learn from 1600 business podcasts we recorded. Hear Gresh's story, learn the 16 business pillars from the podcast, find out about CBNation Architects and why you might be one and so much more. Did we mention it was FREE? Download it today!

In this episode, Kaylee Felio welcomes John Traver of Traver Connect to discuss what “broken” looks like in automotive fixed ops—and more importantly, how leaders and teams can drive sustainable change. John shares frameworks from sports icons, legendary business thinkers like Peter Drucker, and dealership trailblazers such as Ed Roberts to highlight the power of questioning, mission clarity, and process improvement.Tune in for real-world strategies to strengthen your parts and service department—whether it's redefining your mission, zeroing in on your “primary customer,” or getting honest about what's not working. As John puts it, “When you get your mission right, you have an unfair advantage.”This episode is packed with actionable insights for parts managers, service leaders, and anyone passionate about moving the dealership world forward.--------------------------------------------This show is powered by PartsEdge: Your go-to solution for transforming dealership parts inventory into a powerhouse of profitability. Our strategies are proven to amp up parts sales by a whopping 20%, all while cutting down on idle inventory. If you're looking to optimize your parts management, visit

Want to Start or Grow a Successful Business? Schedule a FREE 13-Point Assessment with Clay Clark Today At: www.ThrivetimeShow.com   Join Clay Clark's Thrivetime Show Business Workshop!!! Learn Branding, Marketing, SEO, Sales, Workflow Design, Accounting & More. **Request Tickets & See Testimonials At: www.ThrivetimeShow.com  **Request Tickets Via Text At (918) 851-0102   See the Thousands of Success Stories and Millionaires That Clay Clark Has Helped to Produce HERE: https://www.thrivetimeshow.com/testimonials/ Download A Millionaire's Guide to Become Sustainably Rich: A Step-by-Step Guide to Become a Successful Money-Generating and Time-Freedom Creating Business HERE: www.ThrivetimeShow.com/Millionaire   See Thousands of Case Studies Today HERE: www.thrivetimeshow.com/does-it-work/  

Is your strategy based on assumptions that haven't been tested in years? In this final episode in our mini-series on Dr. Peter Drucker's “Theory of the Business” article, Bradley Hartmann breaks down how the NCAA's outdated assumptions and refusal to adapt destroyed its hold on college football—and what construction leaders must learn to avoid the same fate.    From resistance to change to blind spots in emotional intelligence and decision-making, this real-life case study reveals how ignoring your business environment can kill your team's performance.   In this episode, you will:    Discover how one outdated belief system brought down a billion-dollar institution. Learn how to spot and correct faulty assumptions in your own leadership strategy. Understand how to use Drucker's “Theory of the Business” to guide better decisions and stronger teams.   Hit play to learn how to reinforce your leadership strategy by seeing what the NCAA failed to—and how you can lead with clarity and eliminate confusion.   You can download Drucker's seminal article here.    This episode is brought to you by The Simple Sales Pipeline® —the most efficient way to organize and value any construction sales rep's roster of customers and prospects in under 30 minutes once every 30 days. *** If you enjoyed this podcast, please leave a review on Apple Podcasts. Your feedback will help us on our mission to bring the construction community closer together. If you have suggestions for improvements, topics you'd like the show to explore, or have recommendations for future guests, do not hesitate to contact us directly at info@bradleyhartmannandco.com.