Podcasts about excellence lessons

Charles J. Read is a Certified Public Accountant (CPA), U.S. Tax Court Practitioner (USTCP), Vietnam veteran, and former member of the Internal Revenue Service Advisory Council (IRSAC). He's also the founder of GetPayroll, a full-service payroll and payroll tax company serving businesses nationwide since 1991.With over 50 years of financial leadership experience across multiple industries, Charles is a seasoned executive, entrepreneur, and author of four books. His latest, The Payroll Book: A Guide for Small Businesses and Startups, is currently ranked in the top 25 in Amazon's Small Business Books category.Charles' Links:Website: https://getpayroll.com/Facebook: http://facebook.com/getpayrollInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/getpayroll/LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/10964861/Freebies: https://thepayrollbook.com/resources/Book Recs:The E-Myth Revisited: Why Most Small Businesses Don't Work and What to Do About It: https://amzn.to/46z9tFzIn Search of Excellence: Lessons from America's Best-Run Companies: https://amzn.to/46FqaikThe Payroll Book: A Guide for Small Businesses and Startups: https://amzn.to/3WDUs0lThe Impatient Entrepreneur's links:Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TheImpatientEntrepreneurPod⁠LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/theimpatiententrepreneurpod/⁠Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theimpatiententrepreneurpod/YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@TheImpatientEntrepreneurPod⁠Online: https://www.theimpatiententrepreneurpod.comConnect with us⁠⁠: https://www.theimpatiententrepreneurpod.com/contact⁠Kwedar & Co.'s links:Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/kwedarco⁠LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/kwedarco⁠Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/kwedarco⁠YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@KwedarCo⁠Online: www.kwedarco.comConnect with us: https://www.kwedarco.com/book-consultation

In this episode of Training Unleashed, host Evan Hackel sits down with Chris Tripoli, a 45-year hospitality veteran and training expert, to explore what businesses can learn from the hospitality industry's approach to training and development. Chris shares insights on the importance of structured, ongoing training, the role of leadership in fostering a strong learning culture, and key strategies that restaurant and hospitality businesses use to ensure top-tier performance. Tune in to discover how these best practices can be applied to any industry to improve employee engagement, retention, and operational success. Key Topics Discussed: The Power of Continuous Training – Why training isn't a one-time event but an ongoing process for success. Lessons from Hospitality – How top restaurants and hotels implement training that drives performance. Leadership's Role in Training – How effective leaders create a culture of learning and development. Employee Engagement & Retention – Strategies to keep employees motivated and reduce turnover. Applying Hospitality Best Practices to Any Industry – What businesses outside hospitality can learn from its training models. Stay inspired and keep learning! Please like, share, and rate our podcast to help us reach more professionals like you. For more episodes visit us at trainingunleashed.net Watch the episode: https://youtu.be/x_44sIgMpeU Connect with us: https://learning.net/ https://www.facebook.com/thelearningnetwork https://www.instagram.com/tln_solutions/ https://twitter.com/TLN_Solutions https://www.linkedin.com/company/283736 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

I'm excited to kick off season 3 with Rob Markey! It's his third time on the show, and I think you will see why I'm so excited about the insights he shares. Rob is a Senior Lecturer at Harvard Business School and an Advisory Partner at Bain and Company. He's widely known for his work on customer loyalty and the development of the Net Promoter Score and System.

What's the real cost of maintaining high standards in leadership? When my former high school classmate - now a successful Google executive - shared that his leadership style was polarizing his team, it sparked a crucial realization about excellence. Half thought he was too demanding, while the other half wished his high standards were the norm. In this candid episode, I share why leadership isn't a popularity contest and what I've learned about maintaining standards from working with Olympic champions and building companies. Drawing from my experience with eight-time Olympic medalist Veronica Campbell Brown and insights from scaling organizations, I reveal why letting your standards slip might be the biggest mistake you can make as a leader. Learn: Why maintaining high standards often means being unpopular Why your organization's values must have teeth The critical mistake that causes leaders to unknowingly dilute their culture Get my weekly newsletter - Adaptation Book Erik for your next event Start AIM7 for Free Want to work with Pratik? Apply here Quotable moments: "Leadership isn't a popularity contest. It actually comes with a cost." - Dr. Erik Korem "If A-minus quality is okay, you'll get B-minus." - Dr. Erik Korem "You're either trained or you're untrained. That includes the physical, psychological, technical, and tactical." - Dr. Erik Korem ABOUT THE BLUEPRINT PODCAST: The BluePrint Podcast is for busy professionals and Household CEOs who care deeply about their families, career, and health. Host Dr. Erik Korem distills cutting edge-science, leadership, and life skills into simple tactics optimized for your busy lifestyle and goals.   Dr. Korem interviews scientists, coaches, elite athletes, entrepreneurs, entertainers, and exceptional people to discuss science and practical skills you can implement to become the most healthy, resilient, and impactful version of yourself. On a mission to equip people to pursue audacious goals, thrive in uncertainty, and live a healthy and fulfilled life, Dr. Erik Korem is a High-Performance pioneer. He introduced sports science and athlete-tracking technologies to collegiate and professional (NFL) football over a decade ago. He has worked with the National Football League, Power-5 NCAA programs, gold-medal Olympians, Nike, and the United States Department of Defense. Erik is an expert in sleep and stress resilience. He is the Founder and CEO of AIM7, the #1 pickleball health and performance app that helps pickleball players win more, recovery faster, and prevent pain and injury. SUPPORT & CONNECT Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/erikkorem/ Twitter - https://twitter.com/ErikKorem LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/erik-korem-phd-19991734/ Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/erikkorem Website - https://www.erikkorem.com/ Newsletter - https://adaptation.beehiiv.com/subscribeSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

The following article of the tech industry is: “Achieving Sales Team Excellence: Lessons from ‘Inside Out 2'” by Brenda Zetina, Regional Director Latam North at Datadog

"When that trust level increases in leadership, then it looks like magic. All kinds of other good things start happening." - Dr. Toby Travis, Executive Consultant at Global School Consulting Group "The school rises and falls on leadership..." - Rick Calloway, Head of School at Metrolina Christian Academy

How do hidden dynamics fuel successful e-commerce strategies?In this episode of the Greenbook Podcast, host Karen Lynch engages with Rasika Mathur, Head of Consumer Insights at Snapdeal. Rasika delves into her extensive career, highlighting her expertise in understanding consumer behavior and her journey in the industry. She shares her passion for fostering a customer-obsessed culture and explains how understanding consumer emotions can bridge the gap between intention and action, driving business growth and customer loyalty. Rasika offers practical insights into the nuances of e-commerce, from leveraging emotional intelligence in personalization to maintaining authenticity in digital interactions. Join us for a compelling conversation packed with actionable strategies and heartfelt anecdotes that underscore the power of consumer insights in shaping successful businesses.Read Rasika's interview here.You can reach out to Rasika on LinkedIn. Many thanks to Rasika for being our guest. Thanks also to our producer, Natalie Pusch; and our editor, Big Bad Audio.

In this podcast episode, Ken Segel, the CEO of Value Capture, meets with Mayor Ed Gainey, City of Pittsburgh, to discuss the city's journey toward habitual excellence and Mayor Gainey's leadership learnings.  We will explore the principles of habitual excellence as exemplified by Mayor Ed Gainey of Pittsburgh. The episode delves into Gainey's leadership style, focusing on his commitment to continuous improvement and excellence in public service. It highlights Gainey's background and how his experiences have shaped his approach to leadership. Additionally, the post discusses specific initiatives and strategies implemented by Gainey to foster positive change and improvement within the Pittsburgh community. Through anecdotes and insights, the episode provides valuable lessons and inspiration for individuals and organizations striving for excellence in their respective fields.

In this episode of CXOTalk, host Michael Krigsman talks with Taylor Wolsey from GardaWorld about the company's journey to align customer experience and operational excellence through digital transformation. GardaWorld, a leading security services provider, has grown rapidly through acquisitions, presenting challenges in delivering a consistent, high-quality customer experience across multiple brands, languages, and regions.Wolsey shares valuable insights into how GardaWorld:

A few years ago, we had the privilege of talking with Mike Hamilton, the former University of Tennessee athletic director. He was a very well-respected administrator and leader. More importantly, he was a person of great integrity. Unfortunately, Mike passed away on November 10, 2023 while awaiting a liver transplant. He will be greatly missed. We are extremely thankful for all that he did to make a difference in the world. He left quite a legacy and impacted many people (not just in athletics). Today's episode is a replay of his popular episode from 2017. He told some great stories from the SEC and provided us with great leadership insights. It's well worth your time to listen. ORIGINAL SHOW NOTES... Mike Hamilton is the Executive Director of Show Hope, a position that he has held since December 2014. Show Hope is an orphan care and adoption ministry started by Christian music entertainer Steven Curtis Chapman and his wife Mary Beth. A man of deep faith, Mike has extensive experience in leadership and development, serving 26 years in intercollegiate athletics at Clemson University, and Wake Forest University. Most notably, he was the athletic director at the University of Tennessee and their $105 million budget.  Mike also served on the board for Show Hope, as well as other local, regional, and national nonprofits. Mike is also the CEO and Founder of Winfred-Henry Partners, LLC, which provides athletic consulting. Mike and his wife, Beth, live in the Nashville area and have five children through adoption. In today's episode, we discuss: The environment and pressures of big-time SEC athletics Job search advice, including why many coaches get hired or fired Ways that Show Hope is impacting lives and making a difference in the world The interesting story of Bruce Pearl getting hired at the University of Tennessee   Books, Resources, and Links Mentioned in the Podcast Mike's Twitter: @MikeHamilton63 Mike's Email: MikeHamilton63@gmail.com Show Hope Twitter: @ShowHope Show Hope Website: www.ShowHope.org Show Hope Facebook: www.facebook.com/ShowHope Winfred-Henry Partners Twitter: @WinfredHenry1 Click here to listen to Mike's podcasts as he interviews athletic directors In Search of Excellence: Lessons from America's Best-Run Companies by Tom Peters Red Teaming: How Your Business Can Conquer the Competition by Challenging Everything by Bryce G. Hoffman Quench Your Own Thirst  by Jim Koch The Rooster Bar by John Grisham - - - -  Each week, the SUCCESS IS A CHOICE podcasting network brings you leadership expert Jamy Bechler and guest experts who provide valuable insights, tips, and guidance on how to maximize your potential, build a stronger culture, develop good leadership, create a healthy vision, optimize results, and inspire those around you. - - - - The Success is a Choice podcast network is made possible by TheLeadershipPlaybook.com. Great teams have great teammates and everyone can be a person of influence. Whether you're a coach, athletic director, or athlete, you can benefit from this program and now you can get 25% off the price when you use the coupon code CHOICE at checkout. Build a stronger culture today with better teammates and more positive leaders. If you like motivational quotes, excerpts, or thoughts, then you'll want to check out Jamy Bechler's book "The Coach's Bulletin Board" as it has more than 1,000 positive insights to help you (and those around you) get motivated and inspired. Visit JamyBechler.com/BulletinBoardBook. - - - - Please consider rating the podcast with 5 stars and leaving a quick review on Apple podcasts. Ratings and reviews are the lifeblood of a podcast. This helps tremendously in bringing the podcast to the attention of others. Thanks again for listening and remember that “Success is a choice. What choice will you make today?” - - - - Jamy Bechler is the author of five books including "The Captain" and "The Bus Trip", host of the "Success is a Choice Podcast", professional speaker, and trains organizations on creating championship cultures. He previously spent 20 years as a college basketball coach and administrator.  TheLeadershipPlaybook.com is Bechler's online program that helps athletes become better teammates and more positive leaders while strengthening a team's culture. As a certified John Maxwell leadership coach, Bechler has worked with businesses and teams, including the NBA. Follow him on Twitter at @CoachBechler. To connect with him via email or find out about his services, please contact speaking@CoachBechler.com. You can also subscribe to his insights on success and leadership by visiting JamyBechler.com/newsletter.

STRONG Life Podcast ep 400!!! Brought to you by: http://ZachStrength.com - BEST FREE Strength Training Courses In this episode I share lessons learned & thoughts from my recent trip to Ithaca where I worked with Cornell Wrestling, Spartan Combat RTC (The Wrestlers Prepping for World / Olympic Wrestling) and my buddy Joe DeSena.  This episode truly embodies the STRONG Life Philosophy where we are attacking Training & Life and living for the Relentless Pursuit of Excellence.  Recommended Resources: http://ZachStrength.com - BEST FREE STRENGTH COURSES    http://SSPCoach.com - SSPC (Strength & Sports Performance Coach) CERTIFICATION    https://zacheven-esh.com/store/ - STORE / PRODUCTS    https://UndergroundStrengthCoach.com - The Underground Strength Academy for Strength & Sport Coaches   AMAZON Books - https://amazon.com/author/zach    IRON JOURNEYS BOOK - https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0C91CBJ4N?ref_=pe_3052080_397514860    Business Consulting: https://zacheven-esh.com/coach/     UNDERGROUND STRENGTH COACH CERTIFICATION -  http://UndergroundStrengthCert.com    STRENGTH & SPORTS PERFORMANCE COACH CERTIFICATION -  http://SSPCoach.com    7 Days FREE ONLINE COACHING with Zach - GLADIATOR STRONG   https://marketplace.trainheroic.com/workout-plan/team/garagegymgladiators?attrib=1266-yt    TRAIN AT THE UNDERGROUND STRENGTH GYM:    https://UndergroundStrengthClub.com in Manasquan, NJ    Manasquan Gym / Manasquan Strength & Conditioning    STRONG Life Podcast:  https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-zach-even-esh-strong-life-podcast/id740235285?mt=2   https://zacheven-esh.com/category/podcasts/     ZACH'S INSTAGRAM - https://instagram.com/ZEvenEsh    Official Underground Strength Gym Instagram -   https://www.instagram.com/UndergroundStrengthGym/    ALL Training & Business Courses Here:  https://zacheven-esh.com/store/    Wrestling Strength & Conditioning Course: https://coachtube.com/course/wrestling/underground-strength-system-for-wrestlers-combat-athletes/17548914    Kettlebell Training for Combat Athletes:   https://coachtube.com/course/health-fitness/kettlebell-training-for-combat-athletes/17503546    https://zacheven-esh.com/wrestling-workouts-that-win/ - WRESTLING STRENGTH WORKOUTS   https://nhssca.us/ - National High School Strength Coaches Association    #UndergroundStrengthGym #UndergroundStrengthCoach #SSPCoach 

#121: Pat Williams is the co-founder of the Orlando Magic and a member of the Basketball Hall of Fame. He has also been the former GM of the Chicago Bulls, Atlanta Hawks, Orlando Magic, and the Philadelphia 76ers, where he helped lead to the NBA title in1983. He has drafted players like Shaquille O'Neil, Charles Barkley, & Penny Hardaway and built rosters with players like Julis Erving, Maurice cheeks, and many many others. Pat is also a top inspirational speakers and is a best selling author of over 100 books! He has many, but one of my favorite books is Your Formula For Success, which I  would highly encourage you all to check it out. It is a great tool focused on helping you find the place where your talent and passion meet. And even with the long list of accolades, Pat is not slowing down. With his newest venture he shares what it takes to start a new MLB franchise from the ground up in Orlando, Florida.He has a unique perspective of being an executive in professional baseball and basketball, building a championship team, and building something from the ground up.Pat and his wife have 19 children, including 14 who are adopted. On the show he shares his perspective on the importance of faith and family. For more info on Pat, the Orlando Dreamers, and his newsies book on Aging check out patwilliams.com Enjoy the show!

Welcome to the "Secrets of #Fail," a new pod storm series hosted by Matt Brown. In this series of 2023, Matt dives deep into the world of failures and lessons learned along the way from high-net-worth individuals.  Join Matt as he dives into the world of failures and lessons.Series: Secret of #FailRobert Stevenson understands what it takes to succeed. He is a man who knows how to deal with the risks, competition, and the ever-changing business arena. His ability to connect with an audience is amazing; be it a strategic planning session for a Fortune 500 company to 20,000 salespeople, he excels at blending humor, facts, inspiration, conviction and audience participation. Robert delivers high-energy programs that can help any company or person achieve higher levels of excellence. Today, he travels around the world, sharing powerful ideas for achieving excellence.Get an interview on the Matt Brown Show: www.mattbrownshow.comSupport the show

Tim Attinger is Co-founder and President of OvationCXM, with nearly 30 years of executive management experience in financial services, financial technology and digital transformation. Prior to Co-founding OvationCXM, Tim held executive roles in digital transformation and growth with successful exits at Monitise, a global mobile money platform acquired by Fiserv and Blackhawk Network, which went public in 2013. Before this, Tim had an extensive career with Visa. He managed a $1 Billion plus global portfolio of digital businesses, led product innovation development, and was part of the executive team that took Visa Inc. public in 2008. Preceding roles including building and managing strategic growth initiatives for First Data (now Fiserv) and managing client engagements for a host of Fortune 100 companies with Windermere, a McKinsey-spinoff boutique strategy consultancy.   Questions   • Could share in your own words, even though we did read your formal bio, in terms of your background, a little bit of your journey, how you got to where you are today, in your own words, and why you do what you do? • Can you share with us a little bit about why it's so important that organizations should have customer experience as a priority for their business. What can businesses do to differentiate themselves and set themselves apart? • There's a lot of digital or digitization that's happening across different industries, and because of the digitization, and also artificial intelligence, people are losing their jobs. It is as a result of increase artificial intelligence and they're increasing efficiency, but they're also reducing the level of human input that they're utilizing What are your views on that? • What are some of the key things that we need to think about in the customer journey? • Could you share with us what's the one online resource, tool, website, or app that you absolutely can't live without in your business? • Could you also share with us maybe one or two books that have had the biggest impact on you? It could be a book that you read recently, or even one that you read a very long time ago, but it still has left an indelible mark on your life. • Could you also share with us what's one thing that's going on in your life right now that you're really excited about - either something you're working on to develop yourself or your people? • Where can listeners find you online? • Do you have a quote or saying that during times of adversity or challenge, you will tend to revert to this quote, it kind of helps to keep you on track or get you back on track if for any reason you get derailed? Do you have one of those?   Highlights  Tim's Journey When asked about his journey, Tim shared that the funny thing about it is, it wasn't as though what you just read off was something he sat out to do consciously from the outset. And it was a bit of opportunistic starting in a consultancy, then it basically offered a role with a former client to help drive strategy and then recruited from there by some friends to go to yet another company.   So, he's spent most of his time in a particular industry and a particular kind of role. But it almost feels as though that was a happenstance rather than sort of a conscious thing that he was driving, which he guess means in retrospect, his career is a fascinating thing for him to see, because it's been highly varied, and at the same time, not necessarily overtly managed, if that makes sense.   The Importance of Prioritizing Customer Experience and What Businesses Can do to Set Themselves Apart in the Financial Sector Space Me: Well, thank you so much for sharing. We're in a very unique environment globally, as it relates to customer experience. And so, I'd like for you to share with us a little bit about why it's so important that organizations should have customer experience as a priority for their business. I know most of your experience is in the financial sector, so it'd be good to hear from your perspective, especially seeing that that space is a competitive space. What can businesses do to differentiate themselves and set themselves apart?    Tim shared that he thinks part of the challenge that enterprises find themselves in today, in particularly with respect to sort of customer experience, and how that intersects with digital transformation is that a lot of organizations are looking at customer experience as a way to optimize sort of touch points or channels of communication with customers, as opposed to sort of the way that we look at it, which is thinking about holistically the customers journey with an enterprise.   So, the customer's journey with a business, which is more than just an interaction, but it's a series of engagements as the customer tries to accomplish something in their lives or in their own business.   And so, he thinks part of the challenge that businesses have seen today is that they're thinking about touchpoints as opposed to customer journeys, which creates a challenge in how you solve for delivering great customer experience. And he thinks the reason why customer experience is increasingly important is, it's a fairly simple thing, but it bears repeating with most enterprises, that all of your revenue as an enterprise comes from paying customers.   So, the most important source of growth for your business is your customer base, frankly, the lowest cost position you can possibly have in any marketplace is to have a satisfied customer base that continues to do business with you.   So, he thinks customer experience is increasingly important in the marketplace because recruiting and then retaining and growing a customer relationship is increasingly challenging in competitive spaces. And those organizations that focus on doing it right, and particularly in orchestrating great customer journeys, which we can talk about in a little more detail. But sort of orchestrating great customer journeys will have a competitive advantage relative to organizations that are looking at the sort of either optimizing touchpoints or trying to re architect their entire sort of back-end business from a technology standpoint, as opposed to focusing from the customer back into their business.   Digitization and Artificial Intelligence – Reducing the Level of Human Input Me: Brilliant. So, you spoke about customer journey which I do want to talk about. But before we get onto the customer journey, what I wanted to find out also, especially seeing that this space is competitive. And there's a lot of digital or digitization that's happening across different industries, especially in the financial sector, for sure. And so, as a result of the digitization, and also artificial intelligence, people are losing their jobs. I'm here in Kingston, Jamaica, and over the weekend, I read an article in our local newspaper, stating that 100 persons in the BPO sector are going to be laid off. And I imagine that it is as a result of increased artificial intelligence and they're increasing efficiency, but they're also reducing the level of human input that they're utilizing What are your views on that?    Tim shared that it's unfortunate to hear that news, because the best kind of deployment for artificial intelligence, for machine learning, for automation, is not as a replacement for people, but as a compliment to them.   So, a large part of sort of the platform capabilities and again, just taking from context in sort of his company, OvationCXM, and how they think about it, but a large part of the deployment capability that they put in place is, is essentially helping people be better at the live interaction, and the live engagement and the direct engagement with a customer.   And he thinks about the sort of the analogy of the airline industry, when you think about sort of the check in process, if you've got a fairly straightforward, I just need my boarding pass, I don't have any bags to check, and I'm on my way to the gate, right. That's, something that absolutely, because it's always the same, it's never complicated. Automating that stuff is great, because what it does is it frees up the humans who are there to deal with the family of 5 who just had their flight cancelled, they've got a connection, the luggage is already on the way.   So, when you look at sort of AI and digitization, a lot of the initial investment has been in exactly what you're describing sort of these point solutions where I'm just going to try to automate conversations, and digitize a particular channel, but still I'm not looking at what is the overall customer experience of trying to navigate my entire enterprise? And who are the people, the people who are going to help me do that, the Sherpas who helped him sort of climb this hill that is getting himself live with a product or opening a business and having a financial institution helped him do that.   So, he thinks over the long term, the pendulum will swing back to equilibrium and organizations will realize that conversational automation is great for certain things. But having intelligence inside of systems to help deliver the right answers to the right people in the right moment in the context of what the customer is trying to accomplish and then having humans engaged with that customer is really he thinks where the industry is going to go.   Key Points to Think About in the Customer Journey Me: So, let's go back to the customer journey. So, the journey of the customer, for our listeners that I mean, I've had episodes in the past where we have guests that talk about customer journey. But because I want to get a little bit more granular, let's talk about the customer journey, let's say for example, in a financial institution, if you are, let's say, getting a product, like a credit card, for example, when you look at the journey that the customer will take from application until however long they use that card for, what are some of the key things that we need to think about in the journey? And is a journey just giving the customer the card? Because now we have new business, now we have a new loan that we've booked, or is it more so the maintenance of having that person on board.   Like in Jamaica, for example, one of my greatest pet peeves is, if you pay really well on your credit card, you automatically get an increase annually. I think a telephone call should be given to the customer to find out, “We see that you're a great customer in terms of payments, and we'd like to offer you an additional increase, is this something you'd be open to?” Versus just getting your statement and seeing that you've been given an additional X thousands of dollars on the card. But what are your views on that?   Tim shared that to back it up into sort of where his firm spends most of their time, which is in sort of business relationships. So, banks to take the analogy Yanique just had, imagine a bank helping a business owner who's opening a new business apply for a line of credit so that they can fund equipment and site improvements and setting up a payroll service so that they can sort of disperse funds to employees. And if you think about sort of journeys in 3 basic increments, they're sort of the discovery and buying journey, where he sort of figure out what it is he need, and who has it, and from whom he'd like to buy it.   And then once you finally committed to buying it from someone, what is one of the most challenging things they've seen in financial services is getting a customer from, “Hey, I'd like this solution from you, Mr. Bank, all the way through to it's working for me today and I'm finally live with it.” And in business banking, that process can be fairly complicated with multiple steps. Imagine what it's like as a small business owner applying for a lending relationship, you've got paperwork you fill out, there are forms you have to send in, there are credit checks that the bank does, there's an entire internal process of reviewing your risk and underwriting requirements that you don't even have any visibility into. And then somewhere out the other end of it, you find out whether or not you qualify.   And then on the tail end of the sort of what they call the Go Live journey, there's also the ongoing relationship, which is quite frankly, where most of the experience of a financial institution comes from, which is what's it like every single day for me to use this and solve problems? And what are some of the most important things in sort of thinking about, let's just take that Go Live journey as an example, most businesses are blind to what's happening.   I bought something from you and then it kind of disappears into a black hole, I don't hear from you for 3 or 4 weeks, except every couple of maybe twice you asked me for things completely out of the blue, I have no idea why and then. And then another couple of weeks go by and I get some kind of decision. It's sort of like one of the most opaque things that you can possibly imagine, as opposed to you think about the experience of that business owner, as a consumer when they take advantage of something like a food delivery product, or, God forbid, they just buy something from an online merchant, like an Amazon.   There are really clear steps that are communicated to you, here's where you are, here's where you're going, here's how many steps there are from here to there and step 4, we're going to ask you for something. It's as simple as saying, make it really clear to the customer, what are sort of the stops along the way on the journey that you're about to undertake with them, make them aware of where they are. And even internally in organizations that are trying to deliver to that customer, you quite often have departments that don't talk to each other. So, everybody internally is kind of like, who's got the ball? Who's got next? What am I supposed to be doing now? When does this get done?   And so, he thinks a large part of making experiences go well, it's just connecting all of those humans and systems and teams into a fabric that makes everybody aware of what everyone else is doing. Where are we in this process and communicating that in simple terms to the customer, so they know where they are.   When you think about it a large part of customer experience is just visibility. And, frankly, one of the best ways to disappoint someone is to not meet the expectations that they have. And so, a big part of having a journey go well is just setting expectation upfront, here are the 5 steps that we're going to go through, here's how long it's going to take, here's what we'll need where and when. And here's who you can talk to on this stage, right?   Me: Agreed, agreed, managing expectations and communication is so important.   Tim stated and invisibility, just simply where am I? Who's got this now? And what do they need so that I can make sure it's moving forward, because at the end of the day, the customer is just trying to accomplish something and the journey through your enterprise is just a means to an end, think about that small business owner, I'm just trying to open a business and start selling pizzas. I really don't want to be an expert in underwriting. I just want to know when it is that that process is done, what do you need from me to make it go as quickly as possible?   Me: Indeed. Because at the end of the day, they also have their customers that they're trying to get to serve, but they can't do that if you don't do your part.   Tim agreed that's exactly right. And so, one of the interesting things, you sort of brought up credit cards, one of the most important things that a financial institution can do for a small business owner, is give them a way to accept payment, right?   That sort of what they call accounts receivable, right, which is essentially managing your revenue from your own customers and making that something that's easy to do, that works every time that gets that money from your customers into your bank account on a regular basis. You can make payroll, you can buy supplies, all of that.   The role that banks play in helping small businesses survive and thrive, really is it's critical in those kinds of activities. So, if something goes bump in the night, or there's a hiccup in that process, being on top of it, and giving the customer an expectation when it's going to get solved is super important, particularly for businesses that basically need that cash flow to operate.   App, Website or Tool that Tim Absolutely Can't Live Without in His Business When asked about an online resource that he cannot live without in his business, Tim shared that what's super, super, super critical for them, they use their platform and then a combination of that, and then an online tool set called Miro, which is almost like it's a group whiteboard capability. They use that with their bank clients in the way that you do these things today, because everybody's all over the place, you get on an hour, or two Zoom call and they actually facilitate discussions with their clients on what exactly is it like from a customer's point of view to try to accomplish something inside of your bank.   What is it like from a customer's standpoint, and particularly, not just your bank, but also increasingly, I know, you've seen this, financial institutions are partnering with other companies and external providers and financial technology providers to deliver solutions to businesses. So, increasingly, it's not just, how are you doing things internally, but also, what does it like for the customer to get bounced between you and some other company they've never heard of that you happen to be sourcing a solution from.   So, that capability and the ability to map all of that out in real time with their clients and then so that they can see what that looks like today and then start working to make it better, has become a critical component of sort of how they help those banks improve their business.   Books that Have Had the Biggest Impact on Tim When asked about books that have had an impact, Tim stated that absolutely that's an easy one. In the interest of full disclosure, again, back to he didn't consciously set out in this path to be in financial services. He was originally studying to be a Literature Professor.   Me: You like to read.   Tim stated that he decided he liked it so much, he didn't want to have to do it for a living. So, after he finished his master's degree, as he was thinking about maybe do I or do I not want to go get a doctorate and become a professor. On a lark, moved out to the Bay Area in San Francisco and just backed into a job at a management consulting firm. And the founding partner of that firm encouraged him to read a book by a couple of his McKinsey colleagues called In Search of Excellence: Lessons from America's Best-Run Companies by Thomas J. Peters.   And because he had almost no business education whatsoever, he eagerly dove into it. And the interesting thing about that book is that it's a fairly straightforward analysis of how have companies across a number of different industries been successful. And almost all of the stories come back to a fairly simple premise, that if you build your business from the marketplace back, you start with the customer, you start with a customer group, or a portfolio or a type of customer you want to serve, and then you design everything else about your business around being really great at meeting that need for that customer.   You think about sort of what the typical airline experience was before Southwest came on the scene, or what the typical shopping experience looked like before somebody like an Amazon came on the scene. It's like I'm going to rethink what it is a customer is trying to accomplish, what needs they're trying to fill, and then focus really intently on doing that very well, and strip away everything else that doesn't absolutely serve that need. And so, that was a real revelation for him, sort of as a newbie in the business world.   And that's continued to be a touchstone for every career stop he's had and particularly in the role that he has now, which is basically helping a host of different enterprise companies of various stripes, mainly in financial services now, but also in a number of other industries, get to that realization, focus intently on what is the experience of the customer in trying to accomplish something in their lives and how does he design what he's doing around meeting that really well. So, it's kind of come full circle for him from that sort first introduction to how good businesses operate.    What Tim is Really Excited About Now! When asked about something exciting that's going on right now, Tim shared what's really exciting for him, sort of as he's gone through his career, he's made a study of how businesses create ecosystems, sort of how networks of organizations come together around a common delivery to a customer or to a segment or to create a product, or solution and you think about the companies he's worked in Visa, Blackhawk, sort of which are network business models where you've got sort of, you build a platform, and then you have companies onto that platform and do business with each other through the capability you're delivering.   And they're finding in the business today, OvationCXM, which is their audio sort of customer experience management software platform, that they're starting to see the same kind of ecosystem dynamics that they have in sort of major enterprise banks and insurance companies and healthcare organizations. Partnered with a host of providers of services and solutions, whether that's financial technology, health tech, what have you and their customer experience management platform is becoming a way for them to collaborate and interact as an ecosystem in delivering great experiences to their customers.   And it's fascinating to see that sort of network effect begin to take off. Even something as simple as their customer experience management delivery platform in this industry, it's just fascinating to see network effects start to materialize in the software business, which is it's really exciting for him because he's spent a lot of his days helping to manage and grow network effect businesses, and they're starting to see that in theirs today. So, it's super exciting, at least for him, maybe geeky for most folks, but for him, it's fun to watch.   Me: Okay, it's like you're forming your own community.    Tim agreed yes, exactly. And that's the funny thing about it is that in the same way that communities are super important to our lives as individuals, right, and families, businesses are actually not that different, the immunities of companies that are delivering capabilities or delivering on something tend to be stronger, more resilient. And, frankly, more adaptive.   Where Can We Find Tim Online  Website – www.ovationcxm.com    Quote or Saying that During Times of Adversity Tim Uses When asked about a quote or saying that he tends to revert to, Tim shared that he does and it's from a longer poem by Rudyard Kipling and the entirety of which he doesn't remember off the top of his head, but one line in particular, which is about sort of one of the most important things you can do in times of duress is “Be the person who's keeping his head while everyone else around you is losing theirs.” And he thinks that has helped in a number of ways, in particular stressful situations, it is just to step outside of the challenge that you're currently in and realize that the only way to respond to and solve the challenges is to not let it cloud your mind. And he thinks that that quote has helped immensely in difficult times professionally.   IF ~ BY RUDYARD KIPLING (‘Brother Square-Toes'—Rewards and Fairies) If you can keep your head when all about you        Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,    If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,     But make allowance for their doubting too;    If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,     Or being lied about, don't deal in lies, Or being hated, don't give way to hating,     And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise:   If you can dream—and not make dreams your master;        If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;    If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster     And treat those two impostors just the same;    If you can bear to hear the truth you've spoken     Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools, Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,     And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools:   If you can make one heap of all your winnings     And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss, And lose, and start again at your beginnings     And never breathe a word about your loss; If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew     To serve your turn long after they are gone,    And so hold on when there is nothing in you     Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!'   If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,        Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch, If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,     If all men count with you, but none too much; If you can fill the unforgiving minute     With sixty seconds' worth of distance run,    Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,        And—which is more—you'll be a Man, my son!    Please connect with us on Twitter @navigatingcx and also join our Private Facebook Community – Navigating the Customer Experience and listen to our FB Lives weekly with a new guest   Links ·  In Search of Excellence: Lessons from America's Best-Run Companies by Thomas J. Peters   Grab the Freebie on Our Website – TOP 10 Online Business Resources for Small Business Owners  Do you want to pivot your online customer experience and build loyalty - get a copy of “The ABC's of a Fantastic Customer Experience.” The ABC's of a Fantastic Customer Experience provides 26 easy to follow steps and techniques that helps your business to achieve success and build brand loyalty. This Guide to Limitless, Happy and Loyal Customers will help you to strengthen your service delivery, enhance your knowledge and appreciation of the customer experience and provide tips and practical strategies that you can start implementing immediately! This book will develop your customer service skills and sharpen your attention to detail when serving others. Master your customer experience and develop those knock your socks off techniques that will lead to lifetime customers. Your customers will only want to work with your business and it will be your brand differentiator. It will lead to recruiters to seek you out by providing practical examples on how to deliver a winning customer service experience!

Host Chaz Wolfe welcomes John Kearns, CEO of PARTAS. In this episode, John shares his insights on social enterprise, serial entrepreneurship, and the difference between being an entrepreneur and a businessman.In addition to his insights on entrepreneurship and networking, John also shares his perspectives on aging and wisdom. He challenges the notion that people necessarily get wiser as they get older and instead argues that wisdom comes from learning and growth.He also discusses the biggest asset anyone can have in his opinion, which is confidence.So don't miss out on this inspiring episode! Tune in to hear John's thoughts on the entrepreneurial mindset, building relationships, and the value of confidence. You can connect with John on his LinkedIn profile and follow him on Twitter.Remember, real entrepreneurs thrive on face-to-face interactions and authenticity. Let's take action and make things happen!During this episode, you will learn about;[01:43] Introduction to John and his business[08:24] Serial Entrepreneurship[06:06] The difference between an entrepreneur and a businessman[15:05] Do you really get wiser as you get older?[32:38] At the end of the day, it's all about sales[34:34] False Networking[38:21] How John goes all in with business and family[42:40] The biggest asset anyone can have in Johns opinion[44:44] How to connect with John[45:44] Information on Gathering The Kings Mastermind Roundtable Mastermind Notable Quotes“Entrepreneurs are great at multitasking which is probably why they're not good business people.” - John Kearns“Old entrepreneurs never die.” - John Kearns“Learning to get outta the way gracefully and encouraging the next ones up is a key role.” - John Kearns“For real entrepreneurs, the things they're good at is actually face-to-face.” - John Kearns “At the end of the day, whether you're in business, in your personal life, in your political life, in any life that you're in, it's all about sales, which is a relationship business with people.” - John Kearns “I think there's a lot of false networking. It needs to be authentic networking.” - John Kearns“I think the biggest thing anybody can have is confidence.” - John KearnsBooks and Resources Recommended:In Search of Excellence: Lessons from America's Best-Run Companies by Thomas J. Peters & Robert H. Waterman Jr.:https://www.amazon.com/Search-Excellence-Americas-Best-Run-Companies/dp/0060548789Let's Connect!John Kearns:Email: jkearns@partas.ie LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jkearns/Twitter: https://twitter.com/john_kearnsChaz Wolfe (Host): Website: www.gatheringthekings.comFacebook: https://www.facebook.com/chazwolfe/Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/gatheringthekings/LinkedIn:

Welcome to season 3! In this episode, M.O.N.K. describes the pursuit of consistency in excellence and what he has learned after 2 years of hosting G.L.A.W.R.Y. Podcast. Topics Covered: 1. Preparation is an art. Preparation as an art. 2. Consistent excellent in one pursuit will lead to other opportunities. 3. Consistency breeds confidence. 4. Excellence requires accountability. 5. Pursuing excellence in one arena will lead to the development of other skills. *** Pick up the Book: Reclaiming the Man. You can connect with everything going on in the Glawry Universe by clicking here! Instagram: @_glawry_ or @xxmonkxx Twitter: @_glawry_

On this week's episode, I'm excited to bring on Charles Read as a guest.Charles J Read is a Certified Public Accountant (CPA), U.S Tax Court Practitioner ( USTCP), member of Internal Revenue Service Advisory Council (IRSAC) and the Founder of GetPayroll.Mr. Read's companies have provided full-service payroll services, payroll tax services, and other payroll-related services since 1991.Charles is an accomplished senior executive and entrepreneur with more than fifty years of financial leadership experience in a broad range of industries and author of four books, the latest one being The Payroll Book: A Guide For Small Businesses and Startups.Check out Charles' book here: The Payroll Book: A Guide for Small Businesses and StartupsRecommend book 1: In Search of Excellence: Lessons from America's Best-Run CompaniesRecommend book 2: The E-Myth Revisited: Why Most Small Businesses Don't Work and What to Do About ItConnect with Charles: GetPayroll - Payroll, Timekeeping, HR experts for Small Businesses---Connect with Vijay on Instagram: @RealVijayKailashConnect with Vijay on LinkedIn: Vijay Kailash, CFA | LinkedIn--A quick message from our show's sponsor:Do you invest in index funds? This simple strategy (when used with your index funds) can lower risk, produce income, and help you retire early.This conservative strategy has outperformed SPY for over a decade. And the best part? This strategy takes just 5 minutes a week to execute.Click here now to learn this simple strategy for FREE: https://www.optionsellingsecrets.comRequired Disclosures: Options involve risk and are not suitable for all investors. Past performance is not indicative of future performance. Achieving a 7-figure investment portfolio nor retiring early are guaranteed. All opinions shared are each individual's opinions and are not the opinions of The Vijay Kailash Show, Option Selling Secrets, or other companies that may be mentioned in this show.

Show Notes zur Sendung 129 "Management-Moden" Für Kleidungsmoden gibt es drei Theorien[3]: die trickle-down theory:[4] untere soziale Klassen imitierten die Gebräuche der höheren was jene zwingt, sich laufend anders zu kleiden um Differenzierung unten/oben und damit die bestehende soziale Distanz aufrecht zu erhalten. die collective selection theory:[5] Auswahlmöglichkeiten werden durch Kosten oder Verfügbarkeit reduziert und gewähren wenigstens für einen absehbaren Zeitraum Stabilität. die marionette theory[6] erklärt Moden als das natürliche Ergebnis des Kapitalismus, als die Manipulation des Konsumenten durch Massenmedien, Werbung und Hersteller weil alle Teilnehmer von immer neuen Modewellen profitieren. Moden funktioniert also so lange, wie alle Teilnehmenden einer in-group davon Nutzen haben. Die Aufmerksamkeit der Arena wandert weiter, sobald eine nächste Methode noch mehr Differenzierung, Effizienz oder Zeitgeist verspricht.   3 Schnierer, Thomas. 1995. Modewandel und Gesellschaft: die Dynamik von „in“ und „out“. Opladen: Leske + Budrich. 4 McCracken, Grant. 1985. „The Trickle-Down-Theory Rehabilitated“. In The Psychology of fashion, 39–54. The Advances in retailing series. Lexington, Mass: Lexington Books. 5 Blumer, 1969 - auf S. 283 wird Zeitgeist erwähnt, Blumer war deutschstämmig und lehrte in Berkeley. Eine Kernaussage ist ‘fashion performs in a moving society a function which custom performs in a settled society' (S. 289). Blumer, Herbert. 1969. „Fashion: From Class Differentiation to Collective Selection“. The Sociological Quarterly 10 (3): 275–91. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1533-8525.1969.tb01292.x. 6 Berger, Arthur Asa. 1992. Reading matter: multidisciplinary perspectives on material culture. New Brunswick, U.S.A: Transaction Publishers.   Seit mehr als dreissig Jahren ist ausgeforscht, welche Zutaten ein Management-Blockbuster braucht:[17]     Ein blinder Fleck und bislang ignorierter Umstand.     Sofortiges Handeln: eine drohende Krise ist so furchterregend, dass ohne Verzug gehandelt werden muss.     Geteilte Werte stehen auf dem Spiel, präsentiert als cleverer Mix aus Einfachheit und Mehrdeutigkeit[18]     Entdeckt in der Praxis von herausragenden Führungspersönlichkeiten, eine Prise Wissenschaft hilft der Glaubwürdigkeit.     Umsetzung nur mit Experten zügig möglich: wäre es einfach, könnte es jeder. Das Ansinnen muss einfach und verständlich formuliert sein. Kurze Sätze und keinesfalls akademischer Jargon. Der Autor kommt aus der Praxis und formuliert für seine peer group, verwendet aus Sitzungen und Seminaren vertraute Formate und Charts. Wesentlich: das Timing muss passen, der Nerv des Zeitgeist will getroffen werden.[19] Diese Eigenschaften decken sich mit den Bedürfnissen der Teilnehmer der Arena. 'Blinder Fleck' und 'sofortiges Handeln' erlauben emotionalisierten Alarmismus und lose Forderungen in die Weite des sozialen Diskursraumes. 'Geteilte Werte' koppeln und gestatten jedem Teilnehmenden Anschluss, Teilhabe, das Mitreden oder wenigstens das Signalisieren flüchtiger Zustimmung. 'Herkunft aus der Praxis' stiftet Vertrauen, die Referenz zu 'Studien' adelt den praktischen Handwerker. Die Nennung von 'Experten' wiederum öffnet die Tür für kommerzielle Dienstleistungen beliebiger Qualität. In der Manege freuen sich alle Teilnehmer: jede/r bekommt, was benötigt wird. 17 Abrahamson, Eric. 1996. „Management Fashion“. The Academy of Management Review 21 (1): 254. https://doi.org/10.2307/258636. siehe auch Eccles, Robert G., Nitin Nohria, und James D. Berkley. 1992. Beyond the hype: rediscovering the essence of management. Boston, MA: Harvard Business School Press. 18 Clark und Salaman, 1996 - zitiert nach Kieser, Alfred. 2020. „Kann man Managementprobleme im Prinzip so diagnostizieren und ‚heilen‘ wie die Probleme von Patienten? Zur Kritik des Evidenzbasierten Managements“. BFuP - Betriebswirtschaftliche Forschung und Praxis 2020 (06): 601–22. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/348834976_Kann_man_Managementprobleme_im_Prinzip_so_diagnostizieren_und_heilen_wie_die_Probleme_von_Patien-_ten_Zur_Kritik_des_Evidenzbasierten_Managements. 19 Roberts, Joanne. 2005. „The Ritzerization of Knowledge“. Critical Perspectives on International Business 1 (1): 56–63. https://doi.org/10.1108/17422040510577906. sowie Peters, Thomas J., und Robert H. Waterman. 1983:488. In Search of Excellence: Lessons from America's Best-Run Companies. London]: Profile Books.   kne:buster - ein Podcast-Satelliten-Experiment mit Stefan Knecht und Alex Jungwirth Expedition Arbeit, das heißt auch: Immer wieder Experimente, mal fast unmerkliche Veränderungen in der Community, mal gewagte Neuheiten, manchmal einfach das kreative Stochern im Nebel oder das lustvolle Ausprobieren dessen, was Spaß und Spannung verspricht.  Stochern, Spaß und Spannung, das wird es bis auf Weiteres donnerstags geben, im Kurz-Podcast-Gesprächs-Format  “kne:buster”. Der Titel enthält den Namen des Gastgebers, Stefan Knecht und die Funktion des “busting”, was irgendetwas zwischen “auf den Arm nehmen”, “Pleite gehen” und “sprengen” bedeutet. Im Kern geht es um die Aufdeckung von Mythen, einem Hobby, dem Stefan Knecht schon seit geraumer Zeit krawallfrei aber messerscharf und wissenschaftlich fundiert auf seiner Seite digitalien.org betreibt. Seit nun schon langer Zeit regelmäßig dabei ist ein weiterer “pragmatischer Skeptiker” namens Alexander Jungwirth. Alex ist den Hörerinnen und Hörern des Mitglieder Radios aus seiner Audio-Kolumne “Linzer Worte” bestens bekannt und fungiert im Duo Jungwirth & Knecht tendenziell als der Fragesteller an den Viel- und Intensiv-Leser Knecht.  Wer beim lustvollen Dekonstruieren lauschen will, ist herzlich eingeladen.     MITGLIED WERDEN Expedition Arbeit wünscht sich viele, neue Mitglieder: Denn dann können wir gemeinsam mehr bewirken, außerdem schaffen wir nur ab einer gewissen Größe die gewünschten Netzwerk- und Matching-Effekte. Vor allem aber glauben wir, dass wir nur mit ganz vielen auch ganz viel in Sachen sinnstiftender, selbstbestimmter und wirksamer Arbeit erreichen können.  Mitglied werden ist einfach. Kündigen übrigens auch. Weil es eben kein Abo ist, sondern eine Mitgliedschaft. Alles dazu findet Ihr auf unserer Website oder direkt auf der Crowdfunding-Plattform Steady: https://steadyhq.com/de/expeditionarbeit/about Kommt an Bord, seid dabei, lasst uns etwas bewegen!   ALLGEMEINE LINKS zu Expedition Arbeit Ideen, Anregungen und Kritisches an die Redaktion: florian@expedition-arbeit.de  Expedition Arbeit-Mitglied werden   Mitglied bei Expedition Arbeit werden   Du willst in der Community mitmachen? Dann melde dich bei Der öffentliche Expedition Arbeit-Newsletter   Unsere halböffentliche LinkedIn-Gruppe   Unsere öffentliche LinkedIn-Seite   Expedition Arbeit bei Twitter   Expedition Arbeit, Event-Kalender   Community Management und Host Community Radio: Florian Städtler bei LinkedIn   Redaktionsleitung: Wolfgang Pfeifer   Sprecherin Zwischenmoderationen: Stefanie Mrachacz   Schnitt und Mix: Yannik Mattes   Die Musik und SFX (Sound-Effekte) in allen Sendungen stammen von der Plattform bzw. von Florian Städtler      

In this episode of Quah (Q & A), Sal, Adam & Justin coach four Pump Heads via Zoom. Mind Pump Fit Tip: Are you having trouble burning body fat? STOP drinking water while you eat! (6:05) Would you give the Government the ultimate control over your money? (12:23) Talk about work “benefits.” (21:26) How Neanderthals and modern humans fought. (24:39) Blinkist is a great way to get the gist of a book. (29:51) Ned's Sleep product has been reformulated. (34:40) Joe De Sena on the desired outcome for his new show ‘No Retreat: Business Bootcamp'. (35:53) #ListenerLive question #1 - What are the steps to get back into training after a concussion? (49:20) #ListenerLive question #2 - Can you provide some mobility training advice for gymnasts? (1:03:27) #ListenerLive question #3 - How would you recommend building consistency and adjusting your workouts while on TRT? (1:12:46) #ListenerLive question #4 - Any advice on how to train to shrink down my legs? (1:23:26) Related Links/Products Mentioned Ask a question to Mind Pump, live! Email: live@mindpumpmedia.com March Promotion: Limited Time Power Bundle! MAPS Strong and MAPS Powerlift for the low price of $79.99 Here's what's in Biden's executive order on crypto Company gives employees 30-minute paid masturbation breaks in special VR ‘w**k pods' Neanderthals And Humans Were at War For Over 100,000 Years, Evidence Shows Visit Blinkist for an exclusive offer for Mind Pump listeners! Visit NED for an exclusive offer for Mind Pump listeners! No Retreat: Business Bootcamp In Search of Excellence: Lessons from America's Best-Run Companies Visit MASSZYMES by biOptimizers for an exclusive offer for Mind Pump listeners! **Promo code “MINDPUMP10” at checkout** MAPS Prime Pro Webinar MAPS Prime Webinar Visit Four Sigmatic for an exclusive offer for Mind Pump listeners! **Code “mindpump” at checkout FIX Bad Posture With HANGING (NO MORE FORWARD HEAD) - Mind Pump TV How to Build Ripped 6-Pack Abs (No BS Exercise Series: Video 2 of 6) - Mind Pump TV Day 6: Mobility Exercises - 30 Days of Training (MIND PUMP) How to do a Jefferson Curl  MAPS Fitness Anabolic No BS 6-Pack Abs | MAPS Fitness Products MAPS Fitness Performance Build Your Hamstrings- How to Properly do Good Mornings – Mind Pump TV The ONLY Way You Should Be Doing Lunges! (Build GREAT Legs) - Mind Pump TV Mind Pump Podcast – YouTube Mind Pump Free Resources People Mentioned Joe De Sena (@realjoedesena)  Instagram  

Debbie talks to legendary business author and speaker Tom Peters.  And if you're wondering why she's interviewing a business management guru, it's because Tom exemplifies the new name of the podcast: [B]OLDER. I.e. getting bolder as you grow older. Tom is the co-author of In Search of Excellence, which was published 40 years ago and is considered one of the most influential business books ever written. The book makes the argument that excellent companies treat their employees with respect. They put people first. That was a more unusual perspective four decades ago than it is now.Tom is known for his brash delivery and has been happily haranguing audiences and readers for decades with his philosophy of people first.  In 2017 he received the Thinkers50 Lifetime Achievement Award. He also coined the term Personal Branding.And he's not stopping, even as he turns 80.In this conversation, he reflects on excellence and teamwork; passion, outrage and why they are the most important quality in a good speaker; his love for research and data and the concept of compassionomics. He also gets personal, opening up about his childhood and his mother's influence and reiterating why he is not done yet.He's as fanatical as ever and you'll hear Debbie occasionally interrupting or trying to interrupt him in this conversation. Not something Debbie normally does but Tom's Director of Programs, Shelley Dolley, encouraged her to do so. His most recent book, Excellence Now: Extreme Humanism,  is more relevant now than ever with its emphasis on creating a humane workplace. It's his eighteenth book and it may be his last, he tells Debbie. Much of his written and speech material is available—free to download—at tompeters.com and excellencenow.com.Enjoy a spirited and wide-ranging conversation with a legendary thinker.  Mentioned in this episode or useful:TomPeters.comTom Peters on TwitterIn Search of Excellence: Lessons from America's Best-Run Companies by Tom Peters and Bob Waterman (​​Harper Business; Reprint edition 2006)Excellence Now: Extreme Humanism by Tom Peters (Networlding Publishing, March 2021)Complete listing of Tom's booksThe Brand Called You by Tom Peters (Fast Company, August 31 1997)Tom Peters remembers Bob Waterman (who died Jan. 2, 2022)Debbie's Cool Friends interview with Tom Peters (2008)Susan Sargent (married to Tom Peters)Rebecca Eaton - Masterpiece TheaterMcKinsey & CoThe Firm: The Story of McKinsey and Its Secret Influence on American Business by Duff McDonald (​​Simon & Schuster; Reprint edition 2014)The Golden Passport: Harvard Business School, the Limits of Capitalism, and the Moral Failure of the MBA Elite by Duff McDonald (Harper Business; Reprint edition 2017)Tickled: A Commonsense Guide to the Present Moment by Duff McDonald (Harper; 2021)Dopesick (TV Mini Series 2021)Empire of Pain: The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty by Patrick Radden Keefe (Doubleday; 2021)Should Women Rule? (The Atlantic, November 2008)Compassionomics - The WebsiteCompassionomics: The Revolutionary Scientific Evidence that Caring Makes a Difference by Stephen Trzeciack and Anthony Mazzarelli (Studer Group; 2019)Amazon.com: The Social Psychology of Organizing by Karl E. Weick (McGraw-Hill Humanities/Social Sciences/Languages; 1979)Thomas Keneally, the Australian writer Tom has been enjoying recently Note from DebbieIf you've been enjoying the podcast, please consider leaving a short review on Apple Podcasts. It takes less than two minutes and it really makes a difference. It makes me feel loved and it also attracts new listeners.Subscribe to my newsletter and get my free writing guide: https://bitly.com/debbie-free-guide.Connect with me:Twitter: @debbieweilInstagram: @debbieweilFacebook: @debbieweilLinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/debbieweilBlog: Gap Year After SixtyEmail: thegapyearpodcast@gmail.com- DebbieWe Are Looking For a SponsorIf you are interested in reaching a smart and thoughtful audience of midlife, and older, listeners, contact Debbie Weil.Media PartnersNext For MeEncore.orgMEASupport this podcast:Leave a review on Apple Podcasts: it will help us find a sponsor! If you are interested, contact Debbie WeilSubscribe via Apple Podcasts, Google Podcasts, Stitcher or SpotifyCredits:Host: Debbie WeilProducer: Far Out MediaPodcast websiteMusic: Lakeside Path by Duck Lake

Imagine what could be possible if we learned to listen first? Better flow, understanding and win-win solutions that transcend cultures, beliefs, and languages. Leaders can learn how to provide a safe space and trust for a challenging conversation, which allows for a more dynamic interaction among team members, empowering them to seek solutions themselves and become proactive rather than reactive.   Colin Smith, also known as The Listener, shares stories and gives practical tips as to how to listen with deep impact. He has an innate ability to listen to people deeply and hold space which enables people to open up and share their concerns, feelings, ideas, etc. His varied background, view of the world, and inquisitive and curious mind enable him to share unusual, thought-provoking, yet grounded observations and alternative approaches to business, people, systems, and change.    In this episode, Colin shows the many facets of how people are literally “dying” to be heard, and he shares how we can manifest a listen first attitude in many ways and with every opportunity we have. This approach is how we get people to also listen to us.    Listen first, listen always, all ways. All the different ways you can listen, always do that. Because we're all dying to be heard."  - Colin Smith Listen IN Notes:   00:40 - The moment he noticed the power of listening: The idea of disruptive dialogue is you sit with someone for two or three hours, you have a deeper, meaningful conversation, you ask lots of good questions. And it really gets them thinking because it's an unusual conversation.    05:36 - What made people notice he had a gift for listening: It's not about DOING listening. It's about BEING a listener. It's about how you arrive, how you show up, your presence, your intention underneath all of that.   09:52 - Sharing his deep thoughts about disruptive dialogue and how it shifts the environment into something that opens doors for interactions and flow of ideas.   14:21 - What happens when a leader gets genuinely interested in what others have to say in a meeting?   17:15 - How do you make people listen to you?   20:25 - What does it take to have that clarity of communication?   24:43 - One beautiful moment about listening that he didn't really expect    27:05 - Transforming the word 'conflict' in a different perspective that makes sense   28:48 - Creating trust and safety around difficult conversations   34:45 - What Colin wants leaders to learn about listening.   38:51 - Differentiating hearing from listening   40:51 - What he wants listeners to take away from listening versus hearing: Don't try and fix the problems. Let them come up with something that they think.   42:23 - The best thing about being the listener: “When I listen first, at the end of it, they can actually go away from a conversation thanking me for such a great time and telling other people what a great time they had. Actually, I say, all I did was listen. And that's because it is so unusual. It's seen as special.”   44:15 - What Colin discovers about himself in this conversation with Raquel: I appreciate your listening because you've enabled me to think better and come up with some new ways of expressing what I express.    46:33 - Is there a rule to follow when you listen first? Key Takeaways:   "If we all learn that idea of listening first, then we start listening without judgment, with curiosity, with interest, with equality, with ease. Then everything flows much better." - Colin Smith   "When you're listening, the most important thing is to BE a listener. And that's really different. It's about how you arrive, how you show up, your presence, your intention." - Colin Smith   "When we take the time to be interested and genuinely interested in the other, we might get a surprise." - Colin Smith   "Just because I have an answer doesn't mean it's the right answer. Let me ask you what you think first." - Colin Smith   "Sometimes I just need to be able to vocalize what I'm saying." - Colin Smith   "Do we care about someone to enable us to listen? Or could we listen fully, and as a result, we'd end up caring about them." - Colin Smith   "How much could be listened to from someone? And what we really get from the conversation is often a very different message." - Colin Smith   "There are no rules. We know if we instinctively are present with someone, we will know what to do. We'll know what to say. We'll know when to add in our bit. Because it feels right. And it will feel congruent to the person who's speaking." - Colin Smith Notes/Mentions:   10 Ways to Have a Better Conversation by Celeste Headlee: https://www.ted.com/talks/celeste_headlee_10_ways_to_have_a_better_conversation In Search of Excellence: Lessons from America's Best-Run Companies by Thomas J. Peters: https://www.amazon.in/Search-Excellence-Americas-Companies-Essentials/dp/0060548789 Brenee Brown: https://brenebrown.com/ Jane Adshead-Grant: https://listeningalchemy.com/2021/02/15/the-transformativepower-of-generativelistening-with-jane-adshead-grant/ Connect with Colin Smith:   dexteritysolutions.co.uk LinkedIn Connect with Raquel Ark: www.listeningalchemy.com Mobile: + 491732340722 contact@listeningalchemy.com LinkedIn

We've discussed Mike's Respect-based Performance Coaching method in previous episodes. Here's another insight from Mike's new book--one that can change your life:   You can't order excellence. More insights from the book can be found in these previous episodes: How do you coach? Three things you need for your coaching to succeed: Trustworthiness  Care Commitment  We would love your questions and comments for future episodes: Email Mike and Mark. 

Shep Hyken is a Customer Service and Experience Expert and the Chief Amazement Officer of Shepherd Presentations. He is a New York Times bestselling author and has been inducted into the National Speakers Association Hall of Fame for a lifetime achievement in the speaking profession. Shep works with companies and organizations who want to build loyal relationships with their customers and employees. His articles have been read in hundreds of publications, and he is the author of five books. He is also the creator of The Customer Focus™, a customer service training program which helps clients develop a customer service culture and loyalty mindset.   Questions   Your new book is called I'll Be Back: How to Get Customers to Come Back Again & Again. And so, could you share a little bit about the book, what inspired you to write this book? How can this book help organizations? What are the core pillars or themes that the book is built on? Just give us in your own words what it's all about? You mentioned in the book, the concept of being nice. The behavior or personality of a customer service employee versus the technical side, I wanted you to expand on that for us on what is the importance of that? And what does it really mean to be nice? In the book you also mentioned to create real customer loyalty, we first need to understand the difference between loyalty programs and marketing programs. Can you explain to our audience what you mean by that? A lot of organizations clearly having to pivot over the last year and a half since the pandemic, trying to look at their customer journey, trying to incorporate digital even more, even those organizations that didn't have a digital as part of their whole process. What are your thoughts on organizations looking to do all those things, but still create that amazing experience? Can you share with us what's the one online resource, tool, website or app that you absolutely cannot live without in your business? Could you also share with us maybe one or two books that have had the biggest impact on you? Can you also share with us what's the one thing that's going on in your life right now that you're really excited about either something you're working on to develop yourself or your people? Where can listeners find you online? Do you have a quote or a saying that during times of adversity or challenge, you'll tend to revert to this quote it kind of helps to get you back on track or get you refocused?   Highlights   Shep's Journey   Me: So, I'm going to piggyback off of your last statement, “It's great to be back” because your new book is called “I'll be back.” And so, could you share a little bit about the book, what inspired you to write this book? How can this book help organizations? What are the core pillars or themes that the book is built on? Just give us in your own words what it's all about?   Shep shared that the full title is, I'll Be Back: How to Get Customers to Come Back Again & Again. And he joked about the accent, but whenever people say I'll be back, they kind of tried to do that Terminator, Arnold Schwarzengger impression.   And originally, when he started writing the book, he hadn't even thought about that, the tie into the Terminator movie and then about three hours in the starting his outline, he's going “Yeah, I'll be back. I bet I can play off of that.” So, while it really doesn't have anything to do with the Terminator, he does mention it a few times and the goal is to get your customers to say, I'll be back and you want them to not only say it, you want them to actually do it.   So, there's all kinds of tips, tactics, ideas, and strategies just for the idea of getting your customers to come back and understanding the difference between repeat customers, loyal customers, how to create a more customer focused culture that delivers that experience that gets customers to come back, so it's really about that. And the really cool thing is, he believes, even with this crazy COVID variant going around, the Delta, he gets the feeling that a lot of the world is starting to feel like they're coming back. So, there's a double message in there that he didn't even anticipate was going to happen.   The Concept of Being Nice: The Behavior or Personality of a Customer Service Employee Versus the Technical Side   Me: Now you mentioned in the book, the concept of being nice. The behaviour or personality of a customer service employee versus the technical side, I wanted you to expand on that for us on what is the importance of that? And what does it really mean to be nice?   Shep stated that being nice is a foundational concept and there's a story behind it that's pretty funny. The idea behind it was, he was asked to do a speech and he was the closing keynote speaker, the last speaker of the day, he had to end exactly on time, because these people had to go to another event and they were all being picked up by buses. So, his client said, no matter what happens, you finish on time.   And ultimately, the speakers ahead of him went longer and longer and longer, and by the time it was his time to speak, there was two minutes left, not the 40 minutes that he was supposed to do. So, he said to the client, “Don't worry, I've got this.” And he gave him this weird look but he walked on stage and the first thing he said was, “Thank you for that wonderful round of applause. I realized that we have to be out of here in less than two minutes. And I promised everybody, the client especially that that would happen. So, we're going to start over and I'm going to give you the shortest customer service speech in the world.”   So, he's introduced quickly, the applause is here, he's now standing center stage. Are you ready? Here it goes. Be nice. Then he started to walk off stage and the audience, he stopped halfway through and he goes, “I know it's pretty easy, isn't it.” But think about it for just a moment, he's still got about a minute or so left.   So let me tell you about being nice. Being nice is foundational, it's fundamental. If you're in a restaurant and they have great food, but the server is so mean to you, you're never coming back, it's that simple. But I want you to realize that being nice isn't always easy, it's simple, but it's not easy.   And you need to think about it because there's going to be times that you're going to be distracted that you're going to be busy that a customer or an internal customer, one of your own team members is going to come and talk to you and you're going to be interrupted, and you're going to be a little snappy, you can't do that.   Foundationally, you must be nice. Now, nothing's changed. He always joked about nothing's changed in customer service and they talked about that in the book. But really, that's a fundamental, people don't want to be treated the wrong way, they want to feel appreciated, they want to feel like it's a place that wants to do business with them.And if you aren't at least nice, well, think about you don't want to put yourself behind just because you weren't doing something as simple as being friendly and nice.   And by the way, they surveyed over 1000 consumers, and one of the most important top three qualities they want in dealing with somebody related to the areas of customer service, sales, whatever, is that they want somebody number one that's knowledgeable and number two, that's nice.   Me: So nice is like, good morning. Nice is, how are you doing today? Nice is the softer side of your personality.   Shep agreed and stated that it's just a soft skill and it is exactly that it is a skill. And sometimes you need to work on that skill, you need to be remembered, and it's a little bit of a smile, it's a little bit of a friendly attitude. And when you combine those together, that's what your customers want and expect from you. Doesn't that sound so simple. And by the way, they don't spend a lot of time on this in the book, but it's important, he talked about foundation and really what is the underpinning of all the experience you want your customers to have. And even if you're in the business of an eCommerce company that it's almost all automated, you still have to create this feeling that you're friendly, it's the images, it's the simplicity of how the website works and if they ever do, in fact, call you, if the customer ever does call you, it's how they're treated. In a B2B environment, maybe business to business, they say is different than B2C and the reality of it is, it's not much different today, because your B2B customers are comparing you to the best service experiences they've ever had. And that could include a retail store, it could include Amazon, it could include a restaurant, it doesn't matter, it's the best service they've had and that's what they expect from everybody.   Me: What if you have an organization where it's just not in the character of the person that's interfacing with the customers to be nice. Generally speaking, in their own personal lives, they're just not nice people, they have a very unpleasant countenance, they're not very welcoming, or approachable, and you feel very uncomfortable around them because of their demeanour and your facial expressions. How do you get that person to be nice?   Shep stated that first of all, he wouldn't have hired that person. So, part of creating a culture that's customer focus is making sure the right people are on the bus and that means you've got to hire right. Now, there are some people, they can still be nice, but they're not cut out for being on the front line, great. Put them in another job somewhere else in the organization, they still have to be nice. But again, being introverted may be awkward for somebody, and we don't want to put anybody in that situation.   But he'll also add that if you've got somebody in the warehouse and their job is to pack boxes with product based on what the customer orders, and by the way, this is a little bit off of the concept of being nice, but that person has a great responsibility to the customer. Because if they receive that box, and it wasn't packed properly and the items inside are broken, or whatever, that's going to reflect on the entire company.   Now back to this employee that never sees the customer in the warehouse, in the accounting department, whatever. If you are going to create a culture that's focused on the customer, there has to be a personality to that culture and the people who are hired have to be in alignment with that personality.   Now, again, being nice means friendly, it doesn't mean overly friendly or overly gregarious, it is really about the fundamental concept of just being friendly and nice to your colleagues and your customers, not overly so that's why even behind the scenes, they still have to have a little bit of something going on there, they just don't have to be quite as dedicated to it as perhaps somebody on the true front line.   The Difference Between Loyalty Programs and Marketing Programs   Me: Now in the book you also mentioned to create real customer loyalty, we first need to understand the difference between loyalty programs and marketing programs. Can you explain to our audience what you mean by that?   Shep stated that let's just take frequent flyer miles for a moment, they call that a loyalty program, the airlines do and the reality is it's a miles program, it's a points program. In other words, it's a marketing program. In a sense, it's kind of a discount, you buy enough airline tickets, and you fly in the airline long enough, you get a free flight, just like if you go to a restaurant and they punch your card five times, the sixth sandwich might be free. So, his question is, and he doesn't know if Yanique fly a lot or not, but I talked to people all the time he goes, if the entire airline industry were to take away the miles program, would you still fly on the same airline that you're currently spending most of your time on? Because most people will try to accumulate miles on one particular airline and he's surprised it's split. He hasn't done a formal survey, but he's going to say it's approximately 50/50 from the people that say, “Oh, I'd stay here.” or “You know what, I'd fly a different airline.” And it's that simple. The reason they're staying on the airline is because of the points, not because of the airline itself, take that away, and it's gone.   Now, the other thing they talked a little bit about related to repeat business versus loyal business, is that sometimes-repeat business is due to maybe it's a better price.   “Why do you love doing business with them? They have the lowest prices?”   “What if you found somebody with a lower price? Well, then I'd go do business with them.”   So, the customers loyal to the price, not the company. And the same thing with convenience.   “Why do you go to them? Well, they're the closest one.”   “What happens if a competitor moves closer? Well, I'll probably do business with them.”   So, what you need to do in those situations, if price is how you're competing, or convenience is how you're competing, make sure you deliver a level of service. And when given the opportunity, try to connect with that customer on some kind of an emotional level, make them want to not only do business with you, because of whatever reason they have in their mind, but also make them like doing business with you.   Me: Yeah, I totally agree. So, you're saying then that most loyalty programs or that they dub as loyalty programs are actually marketing programs. So, what really makes a customer loyal, as you said, is that emotional connection.    Shep shared that it often is, he will add that there are certain programs, like Nike has a loyalty program, it's actually a membership program, it has really nothing to do with points, it has to do with, “Hey, you're a customer and we're going to give you great information about what you're interested in.” So, if he just bought some golf shoes from Nike, and he's never bought golf shoes from them and since that time, he's received a couple of really interesting emails, not just about product, but about how he can improve his golf game, and what the new technology and the shoes are. And so, he learned about these things and he thinks to himself, they know who he is. But what they don't send him is they don't send him information on soccer shoes or football as you might call it in other parts of the world, because they know that's not something he's ever bought from them and he's never indicated in the interest. So, he considers that type of program more focused on gaining the customer in other ways than just giving them true incentives to buy. So, he thinks that's an important delineation between membership programs and marketing. Now, one other thought before we jump off of this is that some people refer to the Amazon Prime program as a loyalty program and he even thinks Amazon refers to it as the Prime membership program, not a loyalty program and if they do, it's okay. But here's what happens when you're willing to spend $120 a year and it might be $129 a year, you want to get your money's worth out of it so you're going to try to use them as often as possible. That's the idea is give them, the customer, a reason to come back and that's because you spent money with them and you want to make sure you get good value for that.   Organizations Looking to Incorporate Digital Even More But Still Create An Amazing Experience   Me: Now, the book also mentions, it piggybacks a little bit on some of your principles from your previous book, The Convenience Revolution, that was such an awesome book. And it talks about self-service, technology, subscription delivery, access and reducing friction. And I've seen a lot of organizations clearly having to pivot over the last year and a half since the pandemic, trying to look at their customer journey, trying to incorporate digital even more, even those organizations that didn't have digital as part of their whole process. And sometimes in doing that, it actually creates a lot of confusion and friction for the customer because there are so many steps that you have to take, and you're so frustrated and a lot of times you'd want to serve yourself but you can't, you have to end up reaching out to somebody either through their contact center, or even physically visiting their location. What are your thoughts on organizations looking to do all those things, but still create that amazing experience?   Shep shared that there's a lot going on there, he wrote an entire book on the concept of convenience and there's no way he couldn't reference this in the new book, because this is what drives repeat business is frictionless, easy, the company that's often easiest to do business with is the one that wins that means it makes price a little less relevant, so that may not be as important to the customer when they say, it's so easy, it's worth paying for.   And he'll give a quick example of this. Prior to the pandemic, when he wrote the book, by the way, The Convenience Revolution, in his mind it was somewhat of a breakthrough in the thought process, nobody had ever written a book about this. There was an author, actually two authors together wrote a book titled The Effortless Experience, but it was all about the getting customer support and making that easy. This is about everything related to your business, now back then it was breakthrough, then it became trendy and now it's become an expectation, especially with COVID.   So, he's thinking, well, that's the big change that's happened in this, so we've got to be more convenient. He doesn't spend a ton of time on it, he has two short chapters on number one, the self-service route, because that's what you're talking about is going digital and getting your customers to think digital first. How can I get the information that I need to have without having to talk to somebody, without having to wait on hold? And for the company, it's how can I make sure that our people are handling customer issues that are of a higher level rather than dealing with things that are so simple like, can you check on my order? Can you see if it was shipped? Can you see if the payment went through?   Insurance companies and banks, financial institutions are really making it easy for you to check balances and make claims and that type of thing. So by going digital first, if you do it right, you create this great, easy frictionless experience and when there's a problem, you need to make it seamless for the customer to transition to the human to human connection to get their help. And that's where a lot of companies fail, they actually fail in two areas.   Number one, they create a process that's not always intuitive to the customer and the good news is the design, the user experience, or the UX as they call it today. And that design is getting better and better and people are recognizing how easy it is.   Think about when you go on Netflix once you register and you're in how easy it is for you to find the different movies genres that you want okay. When you go to Amazon, the entire buying process, you have total control over and they make it so easy. So, they become like the poster children of what convenience and easy is about. And so, when you do that the right way, you create really a little bit more distance between you and your competition but he digress.   Back to what happened in the pandemic and why people are willing to pay for it. If you think about it, delivery is a great convenience. He used to have his food delivered from different restaurants, they never charge for it, once we got into the pandemic, they started charging. And he's not saying we're completely out of it, but we're out of it enough that everybody's back to somewhat business is normal like it used to be. And guess what, they're still charging, and nobody is complaining, they're willing to pay for convenience.   Last year, they did a study and they looked at over 1000 consumers and they found that, he believes it was 60%, this year was just a titch different, but it was around 60% of people were willing to pay more, they want a great service experience but they'll pay even more for convenience. And that number goes up to almost 90% when delivery is actually part of that convenience.   Me: I think a big part of it also, well at least for me personally is safety, with the pandemic and people are so concerned about being exposed, especially as we're clearly going through another wave a lot of countries are going to another wave now, people want to be safe. So if that means I can stay in the convenience of my home and place an order and it can be delivered and the only exposure I'm having is to physically come to the door and just exchange money or if I paid through the app and it's just to get the bag from the delivery person, then I'll definitely rate you higher because I feel safer and I think safety has been definitely something that customers look for that is included in the whole convenience, all because of the pandemic, at least I view it as important. If I don't feel safe in an environment, it's highly unlikely that I'm going to return to the business unless I absolutely have no choice.   Shep shared that 100% safety is of the utmost concern of some people, and you know what it's like, “I'm going to order it, set it at the front door and leave. I'll pick it up when they're gone and they're not there anymore.” But you're right and the digital experience that companies are creating that are making customers feel better about doing business with them, he thinks is a really important piece of building that trust and creating a connection. He might have been doing business the old way with somebody and they knock on the door, and they'd say, “Hello” but if the new way requires or his desire is to have that door stay closed, yet they create a system that allows him to still get everything done easily, he's still going to be appreciative that that company took the effort to make that happen.   Now, long term, you can't automate or digitize a personal relationship, you still need to create some type of connection. Just before they came on together and they're recording this, he got a call, he won't tell you the name of the airlines, but their initials are American Airlines, AA. And you know what they were doing, they were just calling to number one, say, “We saw that you flew last week and you've been flying a little bit more regular, we just want to thank you for that.” Every one of his flights is booked online, he put his boarding pass on his mobile phone. And other than dealing with flight attendants and people at the gate, he doesn't ever talk to anybody from American, they're losing that connection with him. So, what did they do? They picked up the phone and they made an outbound call just to check and say thanks for business, that's how you humanize the automated relationship.   Me: Amazing. And I'm happy you touched on that because that was actually a question I was going to ask because I get asked that question quite often, with technology and automation and artificial intelligence and chatbots and all of these things that companies are doing to enhance the customer experience. Do you feel that the human interaction is going to fade away?   And I always think, no, I think at the end of the day, human beings like to deal with human beings because at some point, that robot or automation can't answer your question. I've had the personal experience myself, it's like they're automated, they ask you a question, you log on, and they say, what's your name, and you put in your name, you put in your account number, and you tell him the issue that you're having and it seems like the robot is just regurgitating the same information to the point where I have to say, “I would like to speak with a representative.” Then it says, “I don't understand what you are saying.” then I change up how I say it, I say, “I would like to have an Agent.” And then it gets what I'm saying.   Shep shared that he gets it. And that's so frustrating and it should seamlessly take you there, there should be an easy way to get there. But that to your point, it's very difficult if all you are is a digital last company, you're not going to be able to compete with the people to figure out how to create the balance. And the magic happens in the balance and it's different from one industry to the next. And even from one company to the next but they figure it out.   App, Website or Tool that Shep Absolutely Can't Live Without in Him Business   When asked about an online resource that he cannot live without in his business, Shep shared that that is a great question. He loves his travel apps, he travels so much, so it's very difficult. So, he's looking at his phone going, what is it that he can't live without? He loves the communication apps, he's on WhatsApp a lot and they do a Zoom. How about LastPass. LastPass, which is so important, he has a virtual workforce, and they all have access to different websites, yet they have no idea what his password is, he loves that.   Books That Have Had the Greatest Impact on Shep   When asked about books that have had the biggest impact, Shep shared that one of the books that is probably his favorite aside from I'll Be Back: How to Get Customers to Come Back Again & Again by Shep Hyken and other books that he's written. He loves The Experience Economy: Work Is Theater & Every Business a Stage by Joe Pine and James Gilmore, it's one of the greatest books written on customer experience. And even though it was written over 20 years ago, and they did come out with an updated version, he believes that it is as relevant today as it ever was. So, love that book. He loves the Tom Peters book from the 1980s In Search of Excellence: Lessons from America's Best-Run Companies. And even though many of those companies aren't around, which is by the way is one of the reasons he likes it, it shows how the most excellent companies, some of them are out of business, some of them were bought out, you cannot ever rest on your laurels but he loves the lessons that it teaches. That's a great book. So, he loves The Experience Economy, probably number one business book in his choice.    What Shep is Really Excited About Now!   Shep stated that he knows he sounds like a broken record but the book just came out, I'll Be Back. So very excited about that. But you know what else? He has a report, it's called the 2021 ACA Report Achieving Customer Amazement.   He did the 2020 last year. So, the 2021 he was going to put out earlier this year, but he felt they were still so deep in the COVID dealings that he thought you know what? He wanted to wait. So, he waited until June to do the research and they just came out with the report. So, just go to his website, www.hyken.com and you'll see the link to get the report.   Me: Awesome. I will definitely be accessing that. I thought the content that you put out last year from the 2020 report and I shared it with a few of my clients, I thought it was really, really great. So, I'm happy that you have an updated one this year.   Shep shared that his favorite stat is, again, by the way, he mentioned a couple of these stats before where they interviewed the consumers. They asked, “Would you rather go to the dentist or call customer support?” 48% of the people said, “I'd rather go to the dentist.” So, it's a great report, it's free. And he thinks there's a lot of great information that would compel a company or an individual to say, you know what, if I don't deliver service, I'm going to lose my customers. This is a reason that I need to keep at the top of my game.   Where Can We Find Shep Online   Me: So, our guests, our listeners would have tapped into this episode when it's released and they are super pumped about your book, I'll Be Back. How to get customers to come back again and again, because I think that's what every business wants, not just to do a one-time sale, but to actually have their customers come back over and over again for their lifetime of that product or service that they're using. And so where can they find you online, they want to download this report, they want to tap into the book, they want to tap into your journey, see what you're up to? And just really be in touch with you. Where can they find you online?   Website – www.hyken.com YouTube – ShepTV   Quote or Saying that During Times of Adversity Shep Uses   When asked about a quote that he tends to revert to, Shep shared that this is one that he have come up with on his own. And he doesn't know if he's ever shared this but “Bad days only last 24 hours.” And here's what happened. He took a daily pocket planner where you write out like what your plans are, it's a calendar. And instead of planning, he reflected at the end of each day, what happened today that was good, and on a weekday, it was business and personal and the weekend, it was pretty much just personal because he tries not to do too much business on the weekends. And he found that within a very short period of time, he realized that even on the worst days, good things happen. So, it was very, very motivational, inspirational, if you will. But it was really inspiring to realize that as bad as the bad day is, it's really not all that bad.   Me: True, very true. I do something very similar as well. But it's more like a gratitude journal, it's digital actually. I just like have a note, I use the Notes app on my devices a lot, it's so amazing. And you can lock the note if you don't want other people to access it if they're on your phone. But I'll type out 10 things that I'm grateful for that happened in that day. And sometimes I have more than 10, I'll end up writing like 15 or 18, or 20. But then there are other times that I really have to like dig deep and things that I think are simple, I really have to give thanks for and it makes me just realize that, as you said, even if things didn't go your way, or you didn't get the contract you were looking for, maybe you weren't feeling well, or you weren't able to accomplish certain goals that you had set for yourself, there are other things that happened that makes you feel good, especially when you give thanks for them, or show gratitude for them because it really goes a very far away.   Shep agreed and stated that he likes that. It's an attitude of gratitude and that's part of what his little journaling does and you've experienced that same thing.   Please connect with us on Twitter @navigatingcx and also join our Private Facebook Community – Navigating the Customer Experience and listen to our FB Lives weekly with a new guest   Grab the Freebie on Our Website – TOP 10 Online Business Resources for Small Business Owners    Links   I'll Be Back: How to Get Customers to Come Back Again & Again by Shep Hyken The Experience Economy: Work Is Theater & Every Business a Stage by Joseph Pine II and James Gilmore In Search of Excellence: Lessons from America's Best-Run Companies by Tom Peters 2021 Achieving Customer Amazement Survey Report by Shep Hyken   The ABC's of a Fantastic Customer Experience   Do you want to pivot your online customer experience and build loyalty - get a copy of “The ABC's of a Fantastic Customer Experience.”   The ABC's of a Fantastic Customer Experience provides 26 easy to follow steps and techniques that helps your business to achieve success and build brand loyalty. This Guide to Limitless, Happy and Loyal Customers will help you to strengthen your service delivery, enhance your knowledge and appreciation of the customer experience and provide tips and practical strategies that you can start implementing immediately! This book will develop your customer service skills and sharpen your attention to detail when serving others. Master your customer experience and develop those knock your socks off techniques that will lead to lifetime customers. Your customers will only want to work with your business and it will be your brand differentiator. It will lead to recruiters to seek you out by providing practical examples on how to deliver a winning customer service experience!

As practitioners, we are all ultimately working towards perfecting our craft & our skills. Being focused on the present, understanding your strengths, acknowledging your weaknesses, and most importantly, the willingness to admit them are some of the lessons that make us who we are. The pathway to success is a journey where we learn from ourselves & others. In this episode, Naren invites Dr. Jason D. Bloom, a pioneer in the industry & a specialist in Facial Plastic Surgery, to share with us what he learned early on in his career that led him on to a pathway to achieving excellence!

There are several great investors out there who are effectively offering free lessons through their positions, letters, and interviews. What’s surprising is that while many people listen to them, hardly anyone puts those lessons into practice. Today’s guest, Mohnish Pabrai, is not one to miss such opportunities and he attributes much of his success to his hunger to learn, improve, and adjust. Mohnish is an author and the Founder and CEO of Pabrai Investment Fund, which he started in 1999 at the peak of the tech bubble. In 1983 he moved to the United States from India, to study computer engineering at South Carolina's Clemson University. After working in research and development, Mohnish launched his own successful IT consulting firm, TransTech, in 1991. One of the most original investors out there, Mohnish arrived relatively late in his professional career to the world of investing but he has made such an impact ever since. Through Pabrai Investments, Mohnish has built one of those records that is the stuff of legends. On this episode, Mohnish and I discuss how his early years alongside his entrepreneurial father have shaped him as an investor, why he decided to make the switch to a career in investing, how he was introduced to the world of value investing through the works of Peter Lynch, his growth as an investor since starting Pabrai Investments as a hobby investor, how you can use cloning to your advantage, and so much more!   Key Topics: The meaning behind the title of Mohnish’s book “The Dhandho Investor” (3:02) What Mohnish learned from his father’s entrepreneurial ventures (4:20) Mohnish’s invaluable hands-on business experience as a teenager (8:05) How an engineering background offers an advantage as an investor (10:40) Mohnish’s decision to remain in the US after university (11:51) The importance of looking at the big picture (13:03) Moving from computer engineering to international marketing (14:36) How Mohnish’s father changed the path of his career (15:41) Why Mohnish decided to start his own company (18:17) The early days of TransTech (20:14) An introduction to Peter Lynch and Warren Buffet (22:22) Testing out the Buffet approach to investing (23:48) Transitioning into asset management (27:35) The 1999 start of Pabrai Funds as a hobby (30:04) Starting out as a traditional value investor (32:46) Our aversion to cloning (34:17) The significant competitive advantage you can gain by cloning (36:24) Understanding the patterns of different investors (39:10) Mohnish’s approach to idea selection (40:51) Reaching clarity before making investment decisions (44:10) Examining Fiat Chrysler as a case study for Mohnish’s investment process (47:31) How Mohnish utilizes guardrails (50:59) A value investor’s approach to risk management (52:46) Finding 50 cent dollar bills (54:29) Focusing on compounders (56:55) What we can learn from NICE Holdings (59:37) What you need to know about “spawning” (1:01:43) Why investors need to think like entrepreneurs (1:05:06) Why this is an interesting time for value investing (1:07:23) How Mohnish thinks about the future of value investing (1:09:41) And much more!   Mentioned in this Episode: Mohnish Pabrai’s Books: Mosaic: Perspectives on Investing The Dhandho Investor: The Low-Risk Value Method to High Returns Peter Lynch’s Book | One Up On Wall Street: How To Use What You Already Know To Make Money In The Market Young Presidents' Organization (YPO) Tom Peters’ Book | In Search of Excellence: Lessons from America's Best-Run Companies   Thanks for Listening! Be sure to subscribe on Apple, Google, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. And feel free to drop us a line at valueinvesting@gsb.columbia.edu. Follow the Heilbrunn Center on social media on Instagram, LinkedIn, and more!

On Episode 99 of The Edge of Innovation, we're talking with Pastor Mark Dever of Capitol Hill Baptist Church in Washington D.C. about whether or not a church is the place for innovation. Subscribe To Our YouTube Channel Here: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCYBVK2Zko_sZruK_9QgR5FQ Read the Blog Posts Here: https://saviorlabs.com/is-church-the-place-for-innovation/ https://paulparisi.com/2019/09/03/is-church-the-place-for-innovation/ Show Notes: Capitol Hill Baptist Church's Website: https://www.capitolhillbaptist.org About Capitol Hill Baptist Church: https://www.capitolhillbaptist.org/about-us About Mark Dever: https://www.capitolhillbaptist.org/about-us/leadership-staff/member/1267131 Contact Capitol Hill Baptist Church: https://www.capitolhillbaptist.org/contact-us Find Capitol Hill Baptist Church on Twitter: https://twitter.com/chbcdc Find Capitol Hill Baptist Church on FaceBook: https://www.facebook.com/capitolhillbaptist Listen to Mark Dever's Sermons at Capitol Hill Baptist Church, here! https://www.capitolhillbaptist.org/resources/sermons Find Mark Dever on Twitter: https://twitter.com/MarkDever 9Marks - Mark Dever's Organization for Equipping Biblical Churches: https://www.9marks.org Find 9Marks on Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/9Marks Find 9Marks on Twitter: https://twitter.com/9Marks: “In Search of Excellence: Lessons from America's Best-Run Companies" by Thomas Peters: https://www.amazon.com/Search-Excellence-Americas-Best-Run-Companies/dp/0060548789 "Mere Christianity" by C. S. Lewis: https://www.amazon.com/Mere-Christianity-C-S-Lewis/dp/0060652926 “Who Is Jesus" by Greg Gilbert: https://www.amazon.com/Who-Jesus-9Marks-Greg-Gilbert/dp/1433543508 The Gospel of Mark in the Bible: https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Mark+1&version=ESV Link To Savior Labs Assessment: http://bit.ly/2K9OGhW Many Thanks Our Sponsor - SaviorLabs – offering Managed IT Services, Application Development and Website Design and Marketing. Call them today at 978-223-2959 or visit https://www.saviorlabs.com

Todd Tresidder is the author of seven personal finance books with an eighth coming out shortly. He created a course on strategic wealth planning and is the founder of FinancialMentor.com, a popular personal finance site. He is a self-made millionaire and was financially independent at age 35, which was more than two decades ago. Since then he’s been coaching clients on how to do the same giving him an unusual depth of experience. Todd has maintained his wealth by remaining an active investor and utilizing statistical and mathematical risk-management systems for investing. Through FinancialMentor.com he teaches advanced investing and advanced retirement planning principles. Take the next step beyond conventional financial advice and discover what works, what doesn’t, and why, based on years of proven experience.   “So he had all kinds of great stories about how this company was going to the moon and he didn’t understand the setback but this company was going to fly and I was a stupid kid and I bought it hook line and sinker and I put even more money into it. So I made this stupid mistake of averaging down on a loss you know chasing good money after bad and eventually went to zero, and I lost everything.” Todd Tresidder     Support our sponsor   Today’s episode is sponsored by the Women Building Wealth membership group, the complete proven step-by-step course to guide women from novice to competent investor. To learn more, visit: WomenBuildingWealth.net.       Worst investment ever Graduate joins HP, friend in credit department offers hot stock tip Todd made his first and worst investment when he fresh out of college. Holding a fine résumé for a new graduate, he had been the business manager for campus businesses. It was the mid-1990s and he had read the book In Search of Excellence, by Tom Peters. He went straight from college to work for HP, one of the top companies employers at the time, and had a friend in the credit department. One day during a lunch-time chat, his friend told him about a new company they were working with that was buying HP mainframes, and they were listed in the pink sheets on the Nasdaq. Todd’s friend had put his money in the company’s stock after doing financial analysis on the company and all this. ‘Inside scoop’ meant he put in all funds he had saved for his MBA course So Todd felt this was a “cool insider scoop” on this “amazing emerging company”. The company had an algorithm that was dominating how mail was going to be sent. Todd said “it sounds so absurd now, but it sounded cool at the time”. He had been busily saving for tuition fees to study for an MBA after paying his own way through school, and was still trying to pay off his college costs. He was also saving some money but chose instead to stick his savings into the pink sheet stock. Initially, it went up. But he neither knew anything about how new stock issues work or about how this business worked. So he also had no idea that it was standard protocol for new issues to promote them in an over-the-top way to get people excited about the stock, that it was “going to the moon”, in order to create demand. Todd was in early enough to see an initial rise in the stock, and he kept pumping more money into it. The more he had, the more he would invest, thinking this investment was going to pay for his further study. Stock price turned and broker talked him out of selling He then watched his investment fall to zero Then suddenly it turned and started going down. Magically, the stockbroker called Todd (as though he could read Todd’s mind) and “had all kinds of great stories about how this company was going to the moon. And that he didn’t understand this setback, but this company was going to fly and I was a stupid kid”. Todd bought the broker’s story and put more money in. He made “this stupid mistake” of averaging down on a loss, chasing good money after bad and eventually it went to zero, leaving him with nothing of his original investment. That was Todd’s first and worst investment ever. So for his very first investment I lost everything. But it did set him on a course to learn everything about how to stop it happening again.   “It was only in hindsight, as I started to learn (about finance and investing), that I realized the depth and the level of all the different mistakes I was making.” Todd Tresidder     Lessons learned Don’t buy on hot stock tips Don’t risk money you can’t afford to lose Don’t buy a story If you think about it, you are actually buying a business, so if you are going to buy based on any sort of fundamentals, it better be business fundamentals. You must must must have a risk management plan in place This must include an exit strategy Don’t play a game that you don’t fully understand. Todd was in the new-issue market, which is a very specialized game. There are rules by which that game is played by and he admits violating them all “with pure stupidity”, because he did not know the game. Don’t confuse brains with a bull market Which is he says is what many people are doing right now. Don’t ever buy based on news Don’t send good money after bad by averaging down Don’t let a win turn into a loss       Andrew’s takeaways Collated from the My Worst Investment Ever series, the six main categories of mistakes made by Andrew’s interviewees, starting from the most common, are: Failed to do their own research Failed to properly assess and manage risk Were driven by emotion or flawed thinking Misplaced trust Failed to monitor their investment Invested in a start-up company Andrew says Todd’s case features Mistake No.2 “Failed to properly assess and manage risk” When we get excited about the returns and the opportunity, we often ignore the risks Part of managing risk it to assess the risk of that particular company but the other part of it is managing all the other risks, and that is about the position, size, how much money you put into it, and things like that. Have some kind of exit strategy for every single investment you have The hardest thing for an analyst and for any investor is the decision of what to do when the stock goes down. When we talk about emotion in investing, the emotion involved when our stock is starting to fail is intense. Nobel Prize research highlights that the pain of loss is two-and-a-half times the excitement you feel when you’re winning. When that emotion is involved, that really is the time to have a risk management system in place. It could be a stop loss, or something else. You must learn the game before you play That’s a critical lesson.   “(Risk management) It’s the first consideration in investing. I always think in terms of what can I lose and only secondarily do I consider what can I win? My focus is entirely on controlling losses.” Todd Tresidder   Actionable advice Focus on risk management, first and foremost. The reason for that is you can make all the other mistakes, but if you have a risk management strategy, you can still win in the long term.   “If you don’t have risk management any one mistake can bury you.” Todd Tresidder     No. 1 goal for next the 12 months Todd is finishing off his wealth planning course at FinancialMentor.com and he has one final module to create to complete that project. Then is will be time to build all the sales funnels and all the systems to support the site.   Parting words “It’s really not painful to talk about your losers.” Todd said, no one is born a smart investor. As a matter of fact, we are hardwired in our DNA that opposes what we should be doing as a smart investor. That’s one of the reasons he uses quantitative disciplines to overcome the natural human emotions. Recalling mistakes and how they are made is just part of learning how to invest.       You can also check out Andrew’s books How to Start Building Your Wealth Investing in the Stock Market My Worst Investment Ever 9 Valuation Mistakes and How to Avoid Them Transform Your Business with Dr. Deming’s 14 Points Learn with Andrew Valuation Master Class - Take this course to advance your career and become a better investor Connect with Todd Tresidder LinkedIn Twitter Website Full bio Course Books Connect with Andrew Stotz astotz.com LinkedIn Facebook Instagram Twitter YouTube My Worst Investment Ever Podcast Further reading mentioned Thomas (Tom) Peters and Robert Waterman (1982) In Search of Excellence: Lessons from America’s Best-Run Companies  

A lot of companies are good, but what makes them great? In episode 11 of “The Richard Blackaby Leadership Podcast,” Richard discusses the bestselling book “Good to Great” by leadership expert Jim Collins. This episode is the first installment of the monthly book review series. Be sure to check out next month's pick: “Execution: The Discipline of Getting Things Done” by Larry Bossidy & Ram Charan. Buy it here. Follow Richard on Twitter: https://bit.ly/2GDXNDM Follow Richard on Facebook: https://bit.ly/2kcjqlL Resources referenced in this episode: “Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap and Others Don't” by Jim Collins. Buy it here. “Built to Last: Successful Habits of Visionary Companies” by Jim Collins & Jerry Porras. Buy it here.  “In Search of Excellence: Lessons from America's Best-Run Companies” by Robert H. Waterman Jr. & Thomas J. Peters. Buy it here  “The Halo Effect…and the Eight Other Business Delusions that Deceive Managers” by Phil Rosenzweig. Buy it here. “How the Mighty Fall: And Why Some Companies Never Give In” by Jim Collins. Find it here. NOTE: BMI will be hosting a Spiritual Leadership Coaching Workshop on Oct. 24-26, 2018. Register soon to receive the early bird rate! For more info or to register, click here.

Rebekah had no idea that choosing to fetch water not just for Abraham's servant, but also for his 10 camels, meant for her future.  She did not live a life of just doing the minimum; she lived a life of excellence...and it led to her marrying into great wealth, as well as the bloodline of Christ...You never know who's noticing...this message is a call to living a life of excellence, that's Kingdom!

Tom Peters is known for many things, including being one of today's greatest business minds. His first book, In Search of Excellence: Lessons from America's Best-Run Companies (with Robert Waterman) was published in 1982 and may be considered the beginning of business books. Today he joins Kevin to share stories from his journey over the past 36 years and how we can use that information today. Further, he discusses his latest book, The Excellence Dividend: Meeting the Tech Tide with Work That Wows and Jobs That Last. AI is everywhere and Tom suggests that nothing will beat a dedicated workforce and a commitment to high-quality service or products. In this episode, Tom shares his thoughts about 1. The tech tsunami. 2. Relationships. Additional Leadership Resources Book Recommendations: The Score Takes Care of Itself: My Philosophy of Leadership by Bill Walsh with Steve Jamison and Craig Walsh War in 140 Characters: How Social Media Is Reshaping Conflict in the Twenty-First Century by David Patrikarakos Learn more about Tom Peters. Learn more about The Excellence Dividend. Get our free report: The Secrets of Becoming a Remarkable Leader Sign up for our free video training series, 13 Days to Remarkable Leadership. Get your free copy of my inspiring e-book, 101 Ways to Unleash Your Potential.  

Mike Hamilton is the Executive Director of Show Hope, a position that he has held since December 2014. Show Hope is an orphan care and adoption ministry started by Christian music entertainer Steven Curtis Chapman and his wife Mary Beth. A man of deep faith, Mike has extensive experience in leadership and development, serving 26 years in intercollegiate athletics at Clemson University, Wake Forest University. Most notably, he was the athletic director at the University of Tennessee and their $105 million budget.  Mike also served on the board for Show Hope, as well as other local, regional, and national nonprofits. Mike is also the CEO and Founder of Winfred-Henry Partners, LLC, which provides athletic consulting. Mike and his wife, Beth, live in the Nashville area and have five children through adoption. In today’s episode, we discuss: The environment and pressures of big-time SEC athletics Job search advise, including why many coaches get hired or fired Ways that Show Hope is impacting lives and making a difference in the world The interesting story of Bruce Pearl getting hired at the University of Tennessee Mike's Twitter: @MikeHamilton63 Mike's Email: MikeHamilton63@gmail.com Show Hope Twitter: @ShowHope Show Hope Website: www.ShowHope.org Show Hope Facebook: www.facebook.com/ShowHope Winfred-Henry Partners Twitter: @WinfredHenry1 Click here to listen to Mike's podcasts as he interviews athletic directors In Search of Excellence: Lessons from America's Best-Run Companies by Tom Peters Red Teaming: How Your Business Can Conquer the Competition by Challenging Everything by Bryce G. Hoffman Quench Your Own Thirst  by Jim Koch The Rooster Bar by John Grisham Today's podcast is brought to you by audible - get a FREE audiobook download and 30-day free trial (new subscribers only) at www.audibletrial.com/SuccessIsAChoice. Over 180,000 titles to choose from for your iPhone, Android, Kindle or mp3 player.  Get a free audio book download from one of our previous podcast guests such as Kevin Harrington, Micheal Burt, Kelly Roach, Jeremie Kubicek, Lolly Daskal, or Pat Williams.

Shep Hyken Show Notes  Shep Hyken is a Customer Service and Experience expert and Cheap Amazement Officer of Shepard Presentations. He is the New York Times best selling author and has been inducted in the National Speakers Association Hall of Fame for Lifetime Achievement in the speaking profession. Shep works with companies and organizations who wants to build loyal relationships with their customers and employees. His articles has been read in hundreds of publications and he is the author of 5 books, he is also the creator of The Customer Focus, a customer service training programme which helps clients develop a customer service culture and loyalty mind set. Question Tell us a little bit about yourself and your journey What is your view of customer service and customer experience, what do you think is the number 1 reason why it’s not consistent across all industries both private and public sector? If you could describe the most amazing customer experience that you’ve ever had, what would that be and why? How do you stay motivated every day? What is the one online resource, website, tool or app that you absolutely cannot live without in your business? What are some of the books that have had the biggest impact on you? What is one thing in your life right now that you are really excited about – something that you are working on to develop yourself or people? Where can our listeners find your information online? What is one quote or saying that you live by or that inspires you in times of adversity?   Highlights   Shepard Hyken stated that his first education on customer service and experience was when he was 12 years old. He was doing magic shows for parties and he came home and his mom said, “Make sure you write a “Thank You” note.” He thought that was a great idea but little did he know that that was customer service. His dad said, “Follow up a week later and thank them again with a phone call and also ask what they liked about the magic show and find out what was their favorite tricks and how they felt about the show.” And that was also a sales tactic because soon as they said, “Hey you were great” and he would ask why and say, “I notice that little Johnny had a sister, does she need a magic show too?” That was all helpful but what he was learning was: 1 – Show appreciation to customers, 2 – Ask for feedback. His dad actually told him that,“When they tell what tricks they like, if they aren’t mentioning certain tricks as you go and do more and more shows, see if the parents aren’t mentioning the same tricks or are mentioning the same tricks and then you’ll know what tricks you might want to pull out and replace to try and make better because nobody is talking about them.” And he goes, that’s great feedback and isn’t that what we do in business today and that’s why he jokingly say but it’s really no joke that his customer service experience started with common sense that was taught to him by his parents and that’s really where a lot of customer service falls in the world of common sense. There he was age 12 doing that and he worked in Gas Stations when he was a kid and he was in a self serving station when he was in college at a gas station where you pump your own gas but it was a cold day and an elderly woman came, jumped out of her car to pump gas and he said, “Mam, get back into the car, I’ll pump your gas, it’s too cold.” And he pumped her gas and the manager at the gas station as he was a low-level employee, got upset with him for pumping her gas and he said, “This is the right thing to do, the woman could slip, she could break a hip.” She had to be 80 may 90 years old and he thought it was the right thing to do, once again common sense. He believes in all of that and he eventually in that retail organization was a region manager for the convenient stores and gas stations that they had and eventually the station’s operations manager and when they sold their company, he didn’t have a job and he decided to get into the world of professional speaking and he had a little entertaining background and he had some business background, plus he had gone to college, got his degree and he felt he could write a speech and within a very short time, all the research that he was doing and his favorite topic was in that world of customer service, so that’s what he gravitated toward right away and that was over 30 years ago. He was hired back in the early 1980’s by companies like IBM and General Motors and Enterprise Rent a Car, these were his first clients and he’ll never forget because to him IBM was one of the greatest companies and is still a great company but back then they were the ones that really bring customer service on the map, “We want to be so good at what we do that price doesn’t matter.” And of course price always matters at some point but when it becomes less and less relevant, it’s because of the value that you offer and many times that value is because we have a reliable product, we have unbelievable response time, that’s customer experience.   Shepard Hyken stated that what amazes him, he read that customer service they spend about 1/10th of what they spend on marketing and at the end of the day, customer service is the best marketing you can have because if you do a great job, people go out and talk about you. Customer service used to be where the value was and then it slowly shifted to something they call customer experience and experience for a long time was just another word for service. Steve Jobs figured it out and he use him as an example of the Apple products he has, obviously you walk into an Apple store great service, you call their support line, you get great service but really what he figured out is the experience is more important than just the service, although service is a big part of it, when you get your new Iphone or Ipad or your Mac computer, the way it’s packaged alone is a great experience. So all these different touch points the customer has with you and it’s not just people to people touch point, it’s what you experience. He stated that he always quote Jan Carlzon, when he’s doing a speech, he talks about this concept called a “Moments of Truth” and he came up with it and primarily he focus on the people to people experience but he called the “Moments of Truth” in business whenever a customer came into contact with any aspect of the business, they form an impression. Jan Carlzon ran Scandinavian Airlines so his customers were passengers, so there were main impressions that were formed when a customer call to make a reservation, today we go online and do it but back in the early 1980’s when he was running Scandinavian Airlines, you pick up the phone and you made the call, you check your bags at the curb, you make check in at the ticket counter, all of these are major touch points but if you think about it, you sit down in the plane and is the seat comfortable? And he used to joke that if the tray table doesn’t work, the passenger might worry that the landing gear might not work. So it’s like, “They can’t keep the tray table from falling down.” But what is the user experience in addition to the customer service experience, so you combine thoseand that’s the total experience. All of his work for the first three quarters of his career was based on customer service, now a chunk of his work that they do, he is brought in to talk about what is the experience going to be? What can we do to enhance that? Which he emphasize that customer service is a big part of that.   Shep stated that he talks about a cab driver in many of his speeches and it seem to be like a normal cab but when he got in it was spotlessly clean, it had 2 newspapers to chose from waiting for him, he gave him a soda and this was back before bottled water. He had a dish of candy, he asked if he needed to use his phone, he was great and he send him a thank you note because he asked him for his business card because he said he collected them from people he drove. He sent him a thank you note after a ride; think about that, that’s amazing. Every time he goes to Dallas he calls him but he’s retired now. The interesting thing was that has he got to know Frank, he would tell him things like he used to wait at the airport like every other cab driver 2-3 hours in the long line and now he just goes and parks the car and walks and waits 10 minutes for his next customer and he’s managed to make back in the day more than USD $100,000.00 a year as a cab driver because he figured it out, he figured out the average cab drivers making 3 or 4 decent trips a day that are making them money and he’s making 15 or more because he’s not waiting in line, he’s waiting for his customers and he figured it out because it’s customer service and the lesson is there is a big difference between satisfied customers and loyal customers. There is statistics and facts that will prove that satisfied customers don’t always go back to places that satisfy them because the moment they have a chance to do business with somebody a little bit better, a little more convenient, they will do that and that’s the difference and the loyal customer’s a mind set, it’s an emotion, you feel connected, so he felt truly connected with Frank, when he sent him that thank you note, that was it. It was like in that movie with Tom Cruise where he plays a sports agent, Jerry McGuire, “You had me at with the thank you note, you owned me at that point.” Shep stated that he has a lot of stories like that but he really loved that one because of the ordinariness of the job of being a cab driver and taking it to a whole level of being extraordinary and anybody can do that if a cab driver can figure it out, we can do it virtually in any business.   Shep shared how he stay motivated, he stated that he is an optimistic guy and sometimes you’re just born with the luck of thinking that way, some of it has to do with the way you are brought up by your parents. He stated that he has this optimistic outlook, at a very young age he surrounded himself with the right people and even as a teenager, he had great mentors and these people drove him to be more successful because maybe they made him feel good, maybe telling him he’s doing a good job like a coach telling you, “Go out there, you can do it, you did it, that’s great” pat you on the back but he over came fears, he did the magic shows and you would think a kid at age 12 doesn’t have fear, he was scared to death of those little kids staring at him. Even in his mid 20s, he started his speaking business and if the audience was under 100 people, he felt comfortable but as soon as it got bigger than that, he was scared, when he got in front of an audience of 1000 or 10,000 so he’s still nervous but he gets over it because mostly anxiousness than, “I’m scared to get out there.” How do you get motivated? You have to over come things and feel really good about what you do so that drives you. He reads a tremendous amount of good things, one of the things he doesn’t do anymore, he doesn’t watch local news and even the national news, national news keeps you inform of many things but local news, they are showing car accidents, crime scenes and other than the weather and sports, he doesn’t need that negativity in his life, he needs to know the big picture things. He also works out quite a bit and he has fun. He shares that he has a really good balance, he works very hard but he has a really good time, he takes advantage of things when they are in front of him, he has a great wife, great kids. If he’s going to a sporting event, he soaks it all in and he just loves having fun. He works a tremendous amount of hours but when it’s time to have fun, he knows how to do it.   Shep stated that one of the apps that cannot live without in his business is Outlook, he also mention that he loves a good travel app because he travels so much and he’s using TripIt but it feeds into Flight Update Pro and so that way he can track flights coming into his gate, if they are going to be late many times he knows before the gate agent, so because he travels a lot and that’s great. He stated that for email, he just signed up for Sanebox so if you want to check out Sanebox you can put his email address or his name and you can get a free month. What Sanebox is doing is everything that’s coming into his inbox, it recognize when he’s getting a newsletter and puts it in the newsletter box that he can get to it later on. It is actually learning his routine, it is putting his best emails in his inbox and putting everything else in another box and it’s unbelievable accurate, they say it will essentially save you up to 12 hours a month. There is a feature on it called the Saneblack hole, if somebody subscribe you or you start getting on somebody’s promotional email list of a company and you don’t know how you got on the list, you just put it in the black hole and you’ll never see it again. They give you a trail period to play around so that’s a cool app for a reasonable price. He just got a Slingbox at home so now he can watch TV on his phone and where that counts is when he’s traveling on the other side of the world and his favorite sports teams are playing in the USA and he wants to watch them, so that’s a cool app. Another app is BombBomb, if he wants to take a short video that say, “Hey thank you for having me on your show” and then send it to you, he can do it with the phone but what happens is that attaches the video to the email and if the video is too big, it may get block by your email system, so what BombBomb does is allows you to create a cool template that’s custom to you and then you shoot your video and then you send the email and the person just pushes the button and actually plays if they are connected to the internet, it’s a very cool thing and that’s the most basic use. You could have a list of people and you want to send everybody a video message.   Shep shared that he mentioned Jan Carlzon book, Moments of Truth was written mid 1980’s and the first time he ran across Jan Carlzon was in an article but he eventually went on to write the book about Moments of Truth and it’s a thin little book that would take an hour to read. Shep stated that to him one of the greatest customer service books of all time. However, his favorite book is called The Experience Economy by James Gilmore and Joe Pine, what a great concept and they used Starbucks and that book has been out for maybe 10 or 20 years and for a company like Starbucks to maintain its relevancy in the experience base is really cool. He stated that Thomas Peters co-author a book back in the 1980’s called In Search of Excellence and he believes he had 50 companies that he considered most excellent companies in the world and if you look at it 25 years later he doesn’t know if half of them made that list anymore. For Starbucks to stay relevant and he predicts that Starbucks will stay relevant, their module is all about the customer not just about coffee and that’s why Amazon has been so successful and when Jeff Bezos says, “We are trying to stay a step up ahead of our competition, we’re trying to stay ahead of the customer” meaning what are we giving the customer more than what they thought they were going to get, get them something they didn’t know and that’s what Steve Jobs did too with Apple, give them something they didn’t know they needed and create this need or discover the need the customer didn’t realize they needed then deliver on it. To put another book, in the latter part of the 1980’s a guy name Harvey Mackay wrote a book called Swim With the Sharks Without Being Eaten Alive: Outsell, Outmanage, Outmotivate, and Outnegotiate Your Competition, we have anyone out there with entrepreneurial type businesses or anybody that’s in a business to build a relationship with your customer, this book is unbelievable, it’s filled with so much great information, common sense information from a guy that was really doing it at the time.   Shep shared that there are 2 or 3 things, number 1 is they have an amazing online group of courses based on the work he has put into his books and what they do with their training programmes and speaking programmes in person, so he’s very excited about how over the years it has been revolving into a major part of their business. He is just finishing up a book called Be Amazing or Go Home, so that’s kind of fun, you got a choice in life, if you want to come to work, be amazing otherwise why show up for work. The other book that’s coming out next year is a book all about creating convenience, they talked a little bit about that’s a part of the experience, how convenient and easy can you make it for a customer because today you walk into a business, you expect a certain level of customer service and that’s table stake and for the last 30 years he has been talking about the table stakes and now he thinks it’s becoming common when companies get it and understand it, whether they execute on it is another thing, so what’s the next level of delivering amazing service and that is be more convenient than your competition.   Shep shared that listeners can find him at - Shep Hyken Twitter www.hyken.com   Shep shared some of the quotes that inspire him in times of adversity. He loves Jiminy Cricket who said, “Let your conscience by your guide.” In business when he’s up against somebody who is upset about pricing or maybe he’s upset that something is a little more expensive than he thought it was going to be and he always remember Aldo Gucci said, “Quality is remembered long after price is forgotten.” so when he thinks about business in general, it’s not just the quality product, it’s the quality service and experience and even though he didn’t write it, he thinks it’s a mantra we should all subscribe to, we deliver the best part of the quality, an experience, everything does what it’s supposed to do, great people, people aren’t going to be so concern about the price.  Links Moments of Truth by Jan Carlzon The Experience Economy by Joseph Pine II and James Gilmore In Search of Excellence: Lessons from America’s Best Running Companies by Thomas Peters Swim with the Sharks Without Being Eaten Alive: Outsell, Outmanage, Outmotivate, and Outnegotiate Your Competition by Harvey Mackay

Download the action plan from this episode here: http://jimharshawjr.com/action/ Today I bring you a solo episode. I had the privilege of touring some of the most exclusive wineries in Napa-- experiences that money simply can’t buy-- because of the friendships of a well-connected colleague. If you’re a wine connoisseur then Harlan Estate means something to you. The level of uncompromised excellence-- which happens to be the slogan for the University of Virginia Athletics-- was beyond what I’d ever witnessed. The experience changed me. I saw first-hand the result of world-class vision, hard work, and patience. In this episode, I share with you six lessons I learned that you can use in your business, life, and family. If you don’t have time to listen to the entire episode or if you hear something that you like but don’t have time to write it down, be sure to grab your free copy of the Action Plan from this episode-- as well as get access to action plans from EVERY episode-- at JimHarshawJr.com/Action. Let's connect: Website | Facebook | Twitter About Your Host Jim Harshaw My name is Jim Harshaw. And I know where you’re at. You’re working hard and qualified for what you do but you aren’t getting what you want. You have plans on getting to the C-suite or launching a business but ultimate success seems as far away today as ever. You’re at the right place because you can get there from here.  And I can help.  Who I Am I’m a speaker, coach, and former Division I All-American wrestler that helps motivated former athletes reach their full potential by getting clarity on what they really want and taking aggressive action to lead their ideal life not just despite their prior failures but because of them. I’m a husband and father of four. And I’m a serial entrepreneur. I’ve launched multiple successful businesses as well as the obligatory failed one. I’ve been the executive director of a non-profit and have raised millions of dollars. I’ve worked in sales. I’ve even been a Division I head coach. While I was born in a blue-collar home I have spent my life surrounded by Olympians, CEO’s and millionaires. Jim Rohn said, “You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with.” I’ve been lucky. I’ve learned the habits of successful people and guess what. You’re just like them. I know because I know your type. You’re programmed for hard work, which is a prerequisite for success, but you’ve never been shown how to use what you know to create the life you want with the tools you have. I will show you how. Why You are Here You've worked hard to achieve greatness. You’ve set goals and maybe even set records. You’ve definitely failed and you’ve at some point found yourself questioning if you were on the right track. You need to understand this: You are far more prepared to succeed than those who’ve not tried, competed, struggled and overcome like you have. That’s the value of your education as someone who aims high. You are prepared to be as successful as your wildest dreams will allow. Here I will teach you, with the help of brilliant minds that have been shaped by failure, struggle, and adversity, to be who you want to be. I sense that you want this because you have read this far. To take the next step today, click here. FOLLOW JIM Website | Facebook | Twitter

Ken Marlin. He’s the founder and managing partner of Marlin and Associates – an award winning mergers and acquisition business focused on investment banking. They are headquartered in New York city with offices in San Francisco, Washington DC and Toronto. Ken is also the author of The Marine Corps Way to Win on Wall Street: 11 Key Plans From Battlefield to Boardroom which was published in September. From 1971-1981, Ken rose in rank becoming a Marine Captain and Infantry Commander. He’s applied his Marine Corps principles to leading successful businesses. Famous Five: Favorite Book? –  In Search of Excellence: Lessons from America’s Best-run Companies What CEO do you follow? –   Fred Wilson Favorite online tool? — LinkedIn, Salesforce and Morning Star Do you get 8 hours of sleep?— No If you could let your 20-year old self, know one thing, what would it be? – Pursue your passion and you’ll do well—play to your strengths and not your weaknesses   Time Stamped Show Notes: 01:42 – Nathan introduces Ken Marlin to the show 03:00 – Ken is not doing it for the money 03:13 – Marlin and Associates tries hard to be the trusted advisor to people who want to buy or sell middle-market, technology companies 03:26 – Buyers and sellers pay Marlin and Associates retainers 03:55 – “The bigger the deal, the smaller the percentage” 04:20 – Ken shares their success in 2016 04:42 – Marlin and Associates gets 8-10 clients a year 04:58 – Marlin and Associates is service-oriented 05:45 – Marlin and Associates negotiate with all phases of the transaction 05:54 – Marlin and Associates help buyers understand the strengths and weaknesses of the companies they’re planning to buy 06:21 – “We always try to play the role of the honest broker” 07:09 – There are no risk-free transactions, so the question that should be asked is how much risk is there? 07:38 – The average amount of transactions 08:27 – The types of seller and buyers 09:05 – The #1 reason a deal blows up 09:31 – From a seller’s perspective, transactions are made from trust 10:00 – It’s important that they have a set of financial projections they’re going to meet 11:25 – “Perfection is to give people a set of forecasts that you’re going to meet and to meet it” 11:52 – Key principle from Ken’s book is “take the long view” 13:12 – There are people who buy companies without a clear understanding of how that acquisition helps advance them towards a strategic goal 14:30 – Ken talks about the acquisition of LinkedIn by Microsoft 16:41 – The Famous Five   3 Key Points: There are no such things as risk-free transactions—the question that should be asked is how much risk is there? Give your client a set of financial projections that you’re going to meet—and, meet it! Work around your strengths, not your weaknesses.   Resources Mentioned: Acuity Scheduling – Nathan uses Acuity to schedule his podcast interviews and appointments Drip – Nathan uses Drip’s email automation platform and visual campaign builder to build his sales funnel Toptal – Nathan found his development team using Toptal for his new business Send Later. He was able to keep 100% equity and didn’t have to hire a co-founder due to the quality of Toptal Host Gator – The site Nathan uses to buy his domain names and hosting for the cheapest price possible. Audible – Nathan uses Audible when he’s driving from Austin to San Antonio (1.5-hour drive) to listen to audio books. The Top Inbox  – The site Nathan uses to schedule emails to be sent later, set reminders in inbox, track opens, and follow-up with email sequences Jamf – Jamf helped Nathan keep his Macbook Air 11” secure even when he left it in the airplane’s back seat pocket Freshbooks – Nathan doesn’t waste time so he uses Freshbooks to send out invoices and collect his money. Get your free month NOW Show Notes provided by Mallard Creatives

I recently had the pleasure of chatting with Claire Ferrara, the powerhouse President of Standard Heating and Air Conditioning up there in the Twin Cities.We dove into the nitty-gritty of the Home Services industry, explored leadership strategies, and got real about the challenges businesses face, especially in today's market rollercoaster, and how to prepare for an unpredictable 2024.Claire kicked things off by dropping some serious wisdom bombs on operational excellence. She stressed the need to know your numbers inside out, have a team that understands their roles, and keep a close eye on the cash flow – daily.One golden nugget she shared – never, and I mean never, cut back on branding and awareness efforts. She delved into the importance of understanding your existing customer base and aligning marketing strategies with the preferences of the younger demographic.The takeaway? Stay agile, know where you stand financially, and be ready to roll with the punches, whether it's a booming economy or a bit of a rough patch.We then shifted gears to leadership training – a topic near and dear to my heart. We talked about the importance of ongoing training, covering everything from technical skills to soft skills, problem-solving, and processes.As the Home Services industry continues to navigate uncertainties, Claire's lessons on adaptability, forward-thinking, and a people-centric approach are valuable for businesses aspiring to thrive in any economic landscape. Don't miss out—navigate the 2024 market with confidence!This episode was sponsored by:- Smart AC: https://smartac.com/Key TakeawaysIntro (00:00)The rich history of Standard Heating and Air Conditioning (06:47)How Claire got into the trades (14:09)Women leadership in the trades (19:15)The operational focus for home services businesses in 2024 (23:16)Workforce management in 2024 (29:31)Taking feedback as a gift (31:51)Simple strategies to win in 2024 (32:45)Marketing strategies for a harder market (38:04)Various calls to action that work (41:01)Critical lessons to navigate a difficult market (47:16)Additional Resources ➡️ Schedule a FREE consultation here: https://rynoss.com/contact-us/Get in Touch with Claire Ferrara:Website: https://www.standardheating.com/Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/StandardHeatingTwitter: https://twitter.com/StandardHeatingYouTube: https://www.youtube.com/user/StandardHeatingTo The Point Home Services Podcast is a home services podcast that gets to the point! Focused on helping HVAC, plumbing, electrical, roofing, and many other HS companies grow exponentially.