Transcription

• Speaker #0

  We're all familiar with the adage, there's two sides to every story, but how does that affect how you lead people and how people view you as a manager? We're going to learn how it affects you today. Welcome to the Key Hire Small Business Podcast, where we cover the issues that help owners scale their small business. I'm Corey Harlock. creator of Key Hire Solutions, and I'll be your host today. We are so fortunate today. We have our first repeat guest, Dr. Bob Johnson. He's the owner of Team Transformation, where they teach owners to stop refereeing and get back to leading. He's got a whole bunch of other taglines. Maybe he'll drop them for us while we're here. In our house, we just call him Dr. Bob. I'm happy to say not only is he an associate, but he's a friend I've known Bob for. a number of years. I met him through my wife and he's, I think, we'll have to check in on this, but I think I met Bob because when my wife worked at a big oil and gas company years ago down when we first moved to Houston, she got to know him because he was working with that leadership team and we went out for dinner and became friends and I'm happy that we did. So Matt, let's bring Bob on. Dr. Bob. Hey,

• Speaker #1

  Corey. Hey, great to be with you.

• Speaker #0

  Is that story accurate? I think you were working with the team where Cluddin used to work. And then she was like, oh, you got to meet this Dr. Bob guy. And we all went out for dinner.

• Speaker #1

  Yeah. Well, no, I think it worked more like this. She met a psychologist, me, at work. And she said, you really need to talk to my husband.

• Speaker #0

  That should be way closer to the truth.

• Speaker #1

  I've been waiting years to tell you this, but that's how it happened. Yeah,

• Speaker #0

  that's how it really happened. Well, I'm sad to say none of it stuck.

• Speaker #1

  That's why I'm back. That's right.

• Speaker #0

  Yeah. This has nothing to do with small businesses and everything to do with me and my relationship. Awesome. So we were having dinner. I want to say it's got to be close to a year ago, maybe a month ago here in Houston. And you were talking about this amazing talk you just gave and all these new concepts you had.

• Speaker #1

  Mm hmm.

• Speaker #0

  And one of them was you are 100 percent right in a 200 percent world. And I'm so happy that's what we're talking about today, because you're so good at teaching leaders how to be better communications, better at communicating and better at leading and better beyond that. How to how to get results. Right. I think that focus is like, hey, how can we get to where we need to go? So I've taken your... tagline. I've thrown it out there. So we always like to start with an explanation. So what does that mean? You're 100% right in a 200% world.

• Speaker #1

  Yeah. So I think that in any organization, you know, probably the most valuable, most value is unlocked when you get different functions working together effectively. Sales and supply chain, product management and customer experience, et cetera. You need your different groups working together. But I think if your experience is anything like many of the clients I work with, that can be some of the hardest relationships to really kind of get going well and staying trust-based and so on. And the reason for that is oftentimes there are problems that come up between functions that are viewed very differently in one function or the other. And I think the problem that most human beings run into is whatever problem we're seeing, we can... come up with a solution for that pretty quickly. That's the 100% right version. But as the old adage goes, there's two sides to every story. The person on the other side is equally convinced they're 100% right. That's how it feels to both parties. So until they can remember that they have to grow into a 200% version of that problem, they're going to keep arm wrestling over solutions and escalating problems to bosses and so on. So that's... where that idea comes from, that oftentimes if we're stuck in these here we go again situations, it's because our understanding of the problem simply isn't big enough to enlist the support and buy in from other people.

• Speaker #0

  And it's different than 50-50 because the delineation is you're 100% right. Your solution is right.

• Speaker #1

  Yeah. Well, I mean, that's...

• Speaker #0

  And the other person is, their solution is right as standalones. But when we bring those together... Now we got to, is the right word compromise or how do you break that down?

• Speaker #1

  Yeah, I don't. I mean, there's nothing wrong with compromise. Our world probably needs more of it, but I'm less interested in compromise and more interested in creativity. Okay. Because I think compromise oftentimes is, okay, you have a set of requirements and let's just try to pick two that'll make you happy and pick two of mine. But I think what my experience tells me is when people step into a larger definition of the problem, a quick example of that, Corey, is between sales and supply chain. Supply chain wants to do things in a process discipline kind of way. We've got a process for that, right? Right. What does sales want? Well, they want options and flexibility. They want to kind of run and gun and make things happen. Right. If they're going to solve problems in ways that work for both, they probably have to solve for both sides of that, right? Good process discipline, good flexibility. I think what happens when we grow into that 200% version of the problem, we start to generate and consider solutions that we would not have generated in. the smaller definition. So I'm okay with compromise, but I really want people to use problems to get creative. And that comes down to how they communicate and how they approach one another.

• Speaker #0

  Well, in the creative process, when they, when they both are able to, I don't know if it's abandoned their initial idea, but, but, but enable or be open to something new and different and you create, that's much more stimulating and exhilarating than saying. well picked to, and then feeling like, right. And the, the, the other side of that is one of my favorite expressions is don't compromise so much that you become compromised.

• Speaker #1

  Right.

• Speaker #0

  Right. And that's the way people are end up feeling like, Oh, I gave you my heart and soul. And I only got 40% of what I wanted, or I only got two of the bullets out of the 10 that I gave you or whatever it is. And you still, it's not a fulfilling energizing solution.

• Speaker #1

  Right. Right. I want people to create possibilities that they couldn't have come up with on their own because they're stepping into a bigger problem definition. Corey, you may remember a conversation we had many months ago where we talked about, you know, how do you how do you build common ground? Right. Situations like this. I've come to believe we have to add real estate to build common ground. Right. That that we have to actually expand. it's not just looking for the overlap. It's like, we've got to expand the problem definition. I've got to take your concerns as seriously as I take mine. Right. And I think if I do that sincerely, that's going to change me because I'm going to start to see the world in a different way. So yeah, it's not just pick two. It's like, let's do something new here.

• Speaker #0

  Yeah. Let's kind of scrap it and rebuild, right? Essentially, maybe. Okay. It's such an interesting concept. My thought was that I know me. So we get irrational about some things or we get very passionate about some things and it's hard to step away and step back. And some people are better at it than others, I guess, situationally as well.

• Speaker #1

  Yes. Yeah. A mentor. This line, I would love to say this line is mine, but it comes from a mentor. The hardest thing about learning, because I think to step into that larger definition of the problem really requires me to learn for you to learn and so on. Right. That you're going to actually teach me something. The hardest thing about learning is that when we are in pain, you know, because you're doing something that makes my life more difficult. When we're in pain, we have to hold our pain and ask for more.

• Speaker #0

  Right.

• Speaker #1

  You're the knucklehead that's making my life more difficult. Yeah. And I got to listen to you. I got to learn from you. That is really hard. But that's where all the necessary and valuable learning is.

• Speaker #0

  And define pain there, Bob, because I think it's not like as tragic as you might think, right? So when you say it's obviously there's a scale or a continuum of what pain could be, it could be. Could it be anything from inconvenience to like, I'm losing sleep over this? What is it?

• Speaker #1

  Well, you know, I think the biggest source of pain in organizations, particularly at more senior levels, is reputational threats, right? That somehow my function or my team is going to look like we're the ones that drop the ball, right? So, you know, I want to prevent that. I want, you know. it's it's hard to admit that maybe we did so i look for reasons why i'm right and maybe it was other people that was wrong and then i think it comes down to the person right how how secure do do I feel in my role? If I'm pretty secure in my role, you know, that's not going to hurt me so much. But if I already feel like my back is against the wall or something, and I feel my reputation is under attack because of some failure in deliverables, I mean, you could imagine that really can be quite consuming for people. People do lose sleep over that.

• Speaker #0

  Yeah, and that's kind of where my brain goes. That person you just described who is kind of in defensive mode. I also, as soon as you're thawing, it's just my thought was like, it's an ego deal, right? Like it's feels like an ego deal. But if I'm overwhelmed at my job, and I know, and this happens a lot with small businesses, right, that the business outgrows the capabilities of some of those leaders that we brought in to help us get off the ground, or we hired someone to take over a role, and they're kind of almost immediately lacking the capacity to push the business forward. And those... are common defense mechanisms of individuals who are feeling overwhelmed. That's my experience. I don't know what your thoughts are on it.

• Speaker #1

  Yeah, I think that's the intersection of our work because it really compounds the problem. If I'm already in over my head and then my reputation is further jeopardized by some issue with that function over there, sales or supply chain or whatever it might be, that's... That's definitely a pain multiplier.

• Speaker #0

  Yeah, the double whammy.

• Speaker #1

  Right, double whammy. Exactly.

• Speaker #0

  I don't need this. I'm already having a hard enough time. I don't need you over there making me look bad.

• Speaker #1

  Right. Well, and what happens? Let me tell you what happens in situations like that and in many others. When there's some challenge that comes up, people default to what I call a win and be right mindset. And win and be right is all about just that. I've got to demonstrate that I'm not the one with the problem. Corey's the one with the problem. I'm the one with the answer.

• Speaker #0

  That's fairly true though,

• Speaker #1

  Bob. Yeah.

• Speaker #0

  I meant it.

• Speaker #1

  I meant it. So people get tripped up by that and they don't even see themselves doing it. Right. That's why I use videotape in my work with clients because in moments like that, and these are high stakes moments. for good reason. There may be a critical deliverable that's on the line or a big new client that's entering the organization, et cetera. So there are some business stakes to these situations. And yeah, people default to this win and be right mindset, which actually blocks learning. It undermines trust and it probably makes it really hard to make decisions that everyone can support. So you get... You get this fragmented commitment to whatever the answer is.

• Speaker #0

  So we always like to kind of define, then we go into the mistakes, and then we will get to the solutions. Because I'm sure there's people out there going, man, this sounds like me. This is all great. How do I fix it? But in there, because let's talk through some now. And I think you've touched on some of them, but maybe we can get deeper in terms of some of the mistakes. if we reference it as you know i'm a business owner 525 million dollars i have my team um maybe we're we're struggling to get business to keep the doors open which is just as stressful as we have too much business coming through the doors and we're struggling to keep up with that demand and i'm worried about sustainability and losing clients and getting going back to zero right and so we have these heightened uh emotional states these business leaders are in. And I always believe business owners are great people. Small business owners are great people trying to do the best job they can, but then circumstances and stress factors, right? They're taking on the responsibility for all their employees that they know have mortgage payments and kids in school and need to put food on the table. They're carrying a lot. And then things don't always go right in the business. sometimes because of them, sometimes not. So what are some of the mistakes that a business owner or a leader in a business where there just happens to be some extra pressure, what are the common mistakes you see them making?

• Speaker #1

  Sure. What I'd like to do first, Corey, is let me talk about what the problem looks like, and then I'll talk about the mistakes that leaders make. Is that fair? Yeah. Because I think the problem, the way this issue shows up in organizations actually compounds what you're describing. And it can take a number of different forms. Here's just one version of it. I want you to imagine, you know, a business critical initiative. Maybe it's, yeah, onboarding a new customer, it's expanding to a new region, it's implementing a new system. But you have this business critical initiative and there's a setback. And you hear your teams saying something like saying things like this. Well, they should have this other team should have given us a heads up or they dropped the ball again. That handoff was a mess. Right. You hear this complaints from peers about peers, maybe even in your leadership team.

• Speaker #0

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• Speaker #1

  So you hear this chirping in the hallway, and at the next meeting, it's just a back-and-forth debate over who's responsible, which is really who's to blame. And everyone's listening to respond instead of listening to understand, and they're focused on fixing the other teams, right? The team maybe agrees to disagree because they can't find common ground, so what do they do? they After the meeting, they each come and talk to you to get support for their version of the story. And what that does is it puts the business owner in the position of having to be the referee leader. Right. Because the team, they're adversarial on the field and the referee's got to step in and make a call in some way. Right. So you've seen this. Right. You can resonate with this.

• Speaker #0

  All sides of that.

• Speaker #1

  Right. That's right. You've been the referee leader. You've been one of those two teams. You've been the new customer. Right. So I see leaders commonly do a couple of different things, each with varying degrees of effectiveness. The probably a very common version is to step in and make the decision. Now, this makes sense because it restores momentum in a stalled situation and who's got time to keep rehashing the past and so on. So the leader steps in and makes the decision. The problem with that is it becomes the leader's decision. So you may be... undermine some of the commitment and buy-in from the team. And probably the leader is going to be favoring, back to this idea of 100% right in a 200% world. If we were to sit down and talk to each member of that team, they would probably, as I like to say, I would bet my paycheck that they would give me a story that is very believable, right? They're each right in their own way, assuming you don't have bad actors. So when a leader steps in and makes the decision, And most likely they're probably not. they're picking one side, right?

• Speaker #0

  It's going to be hard to split the baby, right? Like you're going to, it's not going to be 50-50.

• Speaker #1

  Right. So if it's a question of options and flexibility on the sales side and process discipline on the supply chain side, depending on the leader's background and priorities, they're probably going to say, well, look, we just need to be more flexible. Deal with it, supply chain or something like that. So I think that creates not only problems for buying, it creates problems for the business because businesses need both of those things. You need options and flexibility. You need process discipline, right? So that's the first mistake I see. Another mistake I see is leaders don't get involved in hopes that this just works itself out. Okay. I don't think that happens. I think people typically just stick to their opinions and maybe the conflict goes underground or people live to fight another day, but I don't think the conflict goes away. So that's a problem. Another problem is, look, you guys just need to build your relationship. Will you just set up a meeting and have lunch together and get to know one another better? You know, that'll last for one meeting, two meeting, three meetings, and it fizzles out. It doesn't go anywhere.

• Speaker #0

  Right.

• Speaker #1

  Right. So that doesn't work. Probably the best option that I see is that leaders step in and try to facilitate a resolution to this. Now, what I like about that is that includes the team in trying to resolve the issue. but the problem it still perpetuates is the leader has to get directly involved um Maybe that's possible in that month. Maybe the leader enjoys it. But at a certain point, you have a leadership team, you pay them a lot of money, you hired for the right talent. I mean, shouldn't they be able to work this out on their own?

• Speaker #0

  Right.

• Speaker #1

  So that's really what I'm particularly interested in, helping teams work this out on their own and actually bringing a solution to the owner rather than bringing problems.

• Speaker #0

  Right. Okay.

• Speaker #1

  That's a lot. That was kind of long winded, but that's that's the problem in the common mistakes I see.

• Speaker #0

  OK, very cool. Bob, I had a thought in there as you were talking away. The the mediation piece of it is challenging, though, because if they're slanted on one side, it's it's hard to kind of break that down and find the right. The common ground or the best, I guess it's not common ground, it's the best solution.

• Speaker #1

  Right, right. And, you know, let's face it, most, many entrepreneurs are, you know, they have a bias towards top line revenue, driving growth in the business. So they're going to probably favor the options and flexibility side of that problem.

• Speaker #0

  Right.

• Speaker #1

  Which then causes some challenges on the process discipline side. So it actually undermines their ability to scale over the long run. So. You might win the battle, but you end up losing the war if you're not solving for both sides of that problem.

• Speaker #0

  Here's the question that I forgot that I just remembered. So you talked about, you know, you have the leaders that are, you know, you've hired the right person. When all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail. I deal with capital. So everything to me becomes a talent issue. Right. So if you've hired someone you thought was capable. you're having these run-ins consistently, this person with, they're the consistent player in every one of these situations. Is it possible to level them up or how hard is it to level them up and get them to a point where they're receptive to ideas if they're already feeling overwhelmed? they're out over their skis in terms of their capacity and experience.

• Speaker #1

  Yeah. So like, let's, let's put this into like a concrete example. This is a software firm I've worked with over the years and there's you know, you got the sales team, they want new features. You've got the product team. They want to deliver the roadmap. You've got customer experience. They want to retain customers. All those are kind of aligned, but they can pull in different directions. The product roadmap can be a real flashpoint for the organization because you have folks in product that are trying to, hey, look, we agreed we need these features and these types of products over the coming years. We got to do it. To do that well, oftentimes they kind of have to do this, you know, put their hands over the ears and shut people out and just execute. But that can create all kinds of pain on the sales front and on the customer experience front. So back to your question, you know, what's really going on in that scenario? can that person grow? Is it about that person? I think you have to consider two things. First, yeah, the easy answer is it's that person, but it might be a function of the way the business is operating, right? That everyone's, this person is a flashpoint for a reason that maybe the context isn't set up to support their work. So I think that's something to keep in mind. Okay. But back to your question, you know, how easy is it to level up? The stuff I do is all very teachable skills. I use videotape to wake people up to show them that they probably need to get better and so on. And it's almost like there's a manual for it. It's all very teachable. So what it comes down to is, do people want to grow? Do they want to get better? Do they want to own their side of the problem? If it's someone that's already in over their head in terms of their technical capabilities, then there probably isn't a lot of hope. but if it's someone who has the bandwidth for the role and they're willing to um they're willing to get better to take responsibility for that we can move the needle every time that's okay and so i find what happens a lot in small businesses we get that let's

• Speaker #0

  use production for an easy example you have someone who comes in and they're they're working a machine and they show up every day and they never call in sick They seem to take a little initiative. So we make them a supervisor. And they show up every day. And they get along great with the people. And then we promote them. We make them a manager. Now we give them all this financial responsibility. Now they got to start disciplining people. They got to start hiring. We kind of, we peter them out, right? We raise them up to the level of their own incompetence, and then they start struggling.

• Speaker #1

  Right.

• Speaker #0

  And as a business owner, we say things like, man, they used to be so good. I don't know what happened. And they don't have, they've never led before. And if the business is growing, every day they work in that business is the busiest business they've ever worked in.

• Speaker #1

  Right, right.

• Speaker #0

  And so they're already. have zero leadership experience, they already have zero financial experience, they already have zero human resource experience. We throw them into a role that involves all of that in a business that's growing like a rocket ship and wonder why they're not being successful. And so that's kind of the genesis of the question where people come in and they're overwhelmed and they're struggling and they don't even know why they're struggling. They might think they're doing the best they can. but it's not what the company needs. So that was kind of where I was coming with that question. This episode is brought to you by Key Hire Solutions, where we work exclusively with small business owners who need the right team to scale and grow their business. Are you struggling to find the right talent for your business? As a small business owner, your time is precious and sifting through unqualified candidates can be frustrating and costly. At KeyHire, we can eliminate time-consuming and disruptive DIY hiring by leveraging our market expertise and our proven process to ensure you get a custom hiring solution that fits your culture, your needs, and your budget. We take the hassle out of hiring by delivering the perfect candidate for your business, guaranteed. Let us handle the heavy lifting so you can stay focused on what matters most, growing your business. With KeyHire Solutions, you'll secure the right talent without the stress or guesswork. Stop settling for the best of the worst candidates. It's time to build the team your business deserves. Click the link in the liner notes below to schedule a call and start your journey to success today.

• Speaker #1

  I think what's really quite relevant here is just all the nuance you described, right? There's a lot going on in situations like that. I think the risk that a lot of us face is we want to keep things simple. We want to make up our minds in advance about what's really going on. We need to be right. And then just act on those decisions. But as you point out, oftentimes there's a lot more nuance and complexity than we would think. It would be terrible to make a decision that you later regret that you could have avoided with just some good listening and some good learning first. Right. So I think that's where. It's particularly relevant to the situation you're describing. Yeah.

• Speaker #0

  Compassion might be a word too, right?

• Speaker #1

  Yeah.

• Speaker #0

  Instead of saying, hey, what's going on? How are you doing?

• Speaker #1

  Absolutely. Yeah. And people will listen. People will talk when we listen. The only problem is most of us think we're much better listeners than we really are.

• Speaker #0

  Yeah, that's true. So that brings us into the advice, right? So we've been talking about this super cool concept of... Everyone can be right, but the solution of it all, the intersection of it all could be wrong, I guess,

• Speaker #1

  at the end of the day.

• Speaker #0

  So, and you did a great job at explaining the mistakes that people make when they get into these kinds of situations. So what are the top three to five pieces of it? You could give a small business owner who's recognizing this in their business. Every meeting we have, my leaders are just at each other pointing fingers and everyone says they can't deliver because of... that person, right? What can I as a leader do to start, other than hiring you to come in and educate?

• Speaker #1

  Sure.

• Speaker #0

  Yeah. I mean,

• Speaker #1

  I would love it if they hired me to come in and educate, but what can they do before that? I put together a paper on this. I think there'll be a link in this episode to that on my website. But I think people, okay, so we've talked about the mistakes of the leader, right? The referee leader, stepping in, making decisions. I want to talk about the mistakes that the team makes. Okay. Because that'll tell us what leaders can do. Because ultimately, the way out of this is that teams have to develop that capacity to move beyond 100% right and step into that 200% understanding. Okay. There are three things that get in their way. Number one, they enter into these interactions with their minds made up. They're closed. Okay. Problem number one, you need them to shift to open. I'm going to talk about how they do that. Number two, they get stuck on the problem that they know.

• Speaker #0

  If you're going to grow into a problem you and I agree to, oftentimes I have to add that real estate. I got to really take your problem seriously, too. So I got to move from static to dynamic in my problem definition. And the third mistake teams make is they see the other person as the source of the problem. If we approach them in the right way, they can actually be a partner in solving the problem. So it's those three shifts, which I detail in the white paper. But I think the leader's role. is to coach the team to make those shifts. You've got one of your senior leaders coming to you complaining about the other one. That's when you implement this stuff. Step number one is I want you to listen to that person because until they know you're listening, they're going to keep repeating their complaints. So just listen, let them talk out some of the heat. And then from there, I want you to challenge them with something like, hey, why do you think that... Other side is doing what they're doing and keep coaching them until they get a plausible story that might explain the other side, why the other side is 100 percent right. OK,

• Speaker #1

  because I can imagine their first response is, well, I don't know. Yeah,

• Speaker #0

  they're a bunch of jerks. Right. They don't get it. But it's never that easy. There's always a story on the other side that makes sense.

• Speaker #1

  So you have never changing until they at least start figuring out some reasons.

• Speaker #0

  That's right. That's right. After they come up with something plausible, I want you to ask them, go share that story with that other team and see if you can get them to say, that's exactly right. Right. And if you don't get it right the first time, that's OK. This is just about learning. But have that person keep working that story until the other side says, yeah, hello. That's why we do what we do. OK, so that's that. That is a signal that exactly is a signal that. they've successfully completed the first shift, closed to open. Okay. So the next one is static to dynamic. And for any movie buffs out there, there's a great scene in the movie Moneyball. Have you seen that movie, Corey, Moneyball?

• Speaker #1

  I've seen it a few times, but it's been a minute.

• Speaker #0

  Okay. It's the recruiter scene. Billy Bean, he's the manager of the Oakland A's and he's trying to implement a statistical recruiting system. This is a true story back. from the late 90s, I believe. And it's Billy Bean and the recruiters. They just lost some key players and they are going back and forth and back and forth. The recruiters want to use their old methods. And Billy Bean confronts them. He says, you know, you think you're solving the problem. You're not even looking at the problem. The real problem we have is a budget issue and that's what we need to solve. And unfortunately, the scene closes with the recruiters saying, Billy, you just need to trust us to solve the problem. That's a fail. What we want to do in this scenario, back to the real world here, this example, you want to go from static to dynamic in terms of your problem definition. By getting that exactly, your person now probably has some insight into why the other team is doing what they're doing. And you can start to coach them and ask them like, hey, if you want to get their support for what you're trying to solve, what's the pain point that they need relief from? What kind of outcome would they need to see before they can support what it is you're trying to do here? And you keep coaching your person until they can get to some version of what I call an and problem. The and problem in the sales and supply chain example is, well, how do we get the right level of flexibility for sales while also keeping process discipline? at a healthy level. That's the and problem. You have your person take that and problem back to the other side. And I find that it kind of has a magical effect because when the other side knows that you take their problem seriously, they're going to start to take your problem seriously. And that's where you set up that problem to partnership. I find that if you can get into that same problem definition, and that's really your role as a leader, coach them into that same problem definition, they can come up with solutions on their own. They start to operate as partners once they agree on the problem. So it's those three shifts.

• Speaker #1

  Sounds easy.

• Speaker #0

  It's yes, yes, yes.

• Speaker #1

  Well, this is where your quote that you use, you have to hold your pain and ask for more. That going back to someone who you know. You're frustrated with them, but you have to kind of keep going through this process and letting them talk. Right. And letting them finger point and letting them potentially blame you and getting them to the point, repeating it back to the point where they go, yeah, that's exactly what my problem.

• Speaker #0

  Right. And that word, I think, is the most important word in all this. Exactly. Because that signifies that you've, in the eyes of the other person.

• Speaker #1

  that says exactly you've gone from someone who doesn't get it to someone who gets it right you know what and we we trust people who get it and we listen to people that we trust yeah and it's if you follow that kind of waterfall it works right i remember i i used to work with a another business coach years ago and if as a consultant if you jump to the solution too quickly and People, he used to say, I know you know how to fix the problem, but the problem is if you don't, if they don't think you understand their business, they will think you don't. Or he said, man, how did he say it? But basically he said, like, if you jump to the conclusion so quickly and they don't understand your solution, their conclusion will be you don't understand our business.

• Speaker #0

  Amen.

• Speaker #1

  You had to work through that. He didn't put it wasn't your process, but it was like, yeah, you got to prove to them you understand the business before you can fix it.

• Speaker #0

  Yes, I these here we go again loops are caused and maintained because everyone makes the same mistake. And that mistake is we believe solutions are more valuable than problems. How do I know this? Because people rush to solutions. We want to talk about solutions. But if we don't agree on the problem, my solution at best is hot air. And at worst, it causes you pain. Right. So we've got to get to a place. You need your leadership teams. If you're a business owner, you need your leadership teams to get to a place where they recognize problems are more valuable than solutions because all of the partnership, all of the creativity is in the problem. Right. That makes sense.

• Speaker #1

  Well, and that's the old learning is in the mistakes. You don't learn anything when things are going well. You learn when they're going bad. I mean, it's, it's, you got to learn to love the pain. You got to learn to love the grind. you got to embrace that stuff.

• Speaker #0

  It's true.

• Speaker #1

  Super cool. Any, anything else to add, Bob? This has been so cool.

• Speaker #0

  Yeah. I would say one of the things, uh, one of the things I really enjoy about my work is it teaches me, it teaches me about me and all the mistakes I make. It teaches me that some surprising things over the years. And I think probably the most, the coolest lesson I've drawn from the work that I do is that The lesson is the problem isn't the problem. You know, whether it's a disagreement between sales and supply chain or product and customer experience, etc. The problem isn't the problem. The problem is how we deal with the problem. These here we go again loops. If we can learn to deal these win and be right ways. If we can learn to deal with the problem in a learning way, problems actually become the springboard for building trust and improving performance. I've seen it again and again. So there's so much energy and creativity in the problems because people only complain about the things they care about. So if we can learn to channel that energy in a learning way, that's how you make your business better and build stronger teams.

• Speaker #1

  And I got, yeah, and I got to imagine, especially in the framework of a small business, if you have leaders that are bypassing the owner and just have the ability to sit down and find solutions that benefit the company, not a department, but just like push everything aside and figure out how to do this. So it just, it works in the right way and it works for every department in the right way. And no one feels like they're, they're compromising or giving stuff up. That's gotta be an empowering feeling for a business owner.

• Speaker #0

  Oh man.

• Speaker #1

  They go home at night and, you know, close the door behind them and they're know that, Hey, my business is in good hand.

• Speaker #0

  That's right. That's right. It's how you, I mean, isn't that the dream of most, if not all business owners, that you create something that can outgrow you?

• Speaker #1

  Well, how many business owners feel like I can't take a week or a weekend because I can't, maybe trust is the wrong word. It's probably the right word. But I don't know what's going to happen. And I don't know if the people that are there will. Not do the right thing, but do it like me.

• Speaker #0

  Right. Well, and here's why I got one more comment on this. Yeah,

• Speaker #1

  let's do it.

• Speaker #0

  So if I just go back to this sales supply chain, it's a simple example, right? Sales wants options and flexibility. Supply chain wants process discipline. The CEO knows, the owner knows you actually need both. It's not an either or, it's an and. Right. The problem is most functions, they just want to pick their side and they treat it as either or. a lot of the work I do is about equipping teams to take that and problem and solve it here. Let's treat it as an and problem here, which means if you're a supply chain, I got to take your problem seriously because I want you to take mine seriously. So you're doing executive level work and, you know, organizational level solutions rather than the either or functional solutions. That's where the money is in this kind of work.

• Speaker #1

  For sure. I think it's a great place to leave it too. So thanks, Bob. I appreciate all your insight. I always love chatting with you.

• Speaker #0

  Yeah, yeah, it's great. I'm so happy to be back. And it's really cool to see what you're doing here at KeyHire.

• Speaker #1

  Thank you. Now, if people have been listening and thinking, man, I need to talk to this guy, how can we reach out to you?

• Speaker #0

  Yeah, best place to find me, you can find my website, teamtransformationmethod.com. That's where you'll find the white paper that I talked about, as well as some other stuff. And then you can also find me on LinkedIn. If you just now with a name like Bob Johnson, there it is. With a name like Bob Johnson, it might be hard to find. You are. It's probably the only way to be anonymous these days to have a name like mine. It might be Dr.

• Speaker #1

  Robert Johnson.

• Speaker #0

  Right. Yes. Yes. Right.

• Speaker #1

  I think you might be Dr. Robert Johnson, to be honest with you.

• Speaker #0

  The blues.

• Speaker #1

  Yes.

• Speaker #0

  But yeah, that's the LinkedIn. And I post there pretty regularly about this kind of stuff. I enjoy talking about it.

• Speaker #1

  Awesome, man. Well, thanks so much. I appreciate it, Bob. And we'll chat soon, hopefully.

• Speaker #0

  Yeah. Yeah. Thank you. Thank you so much for having me. And your clients are lucky to have you, Corey.

• Speaker #1

  Anytime. I think you're the front runner for the first third time guest now.

• Speaker #0

  Next week? Should we do it next week?

• Speaker #1

  Yeah. You're the only one who's been on twice. So you got to be the front runner to be on three times.

• Speaker #0

  That's right.

• Speaker #1

  Awesome. Thanks, Bob. All right. There he is. Dr. Bob Johnson, best guy in the world. He's a favorite in our house for sure. I'd like to thank you for tuning into the Key Hire Small Business Podcast. If you got value out of today's episode and you want to keep up to date on our new content, make sure you leave a comment. Let us know what you think of the episode. Let us know if there's any topics you want us to discuss on the show. We're here for the business owner. Make sure you subscribe to the YouTube channel. If you prefer to listen to your podcast, you can find us on Apple, Spotify, or whatever your favorite platform is. Just search up Key Hire Small Business Podcast. Thanks for listening. I'm Corey Harlock. And until next time, stop grinding and start growing.