This is how you win the race.
Welcome to builder nuggets hosted by Dwayne Johns and Dave young. Hey, our mission is simple, build freedom. We are a couple of entrepreneurs turned business coaches who have dedicated ourselves to helping our builder remodeler clients create the most rewarding businesses in the industry. My co-host Dwayne has been a successful builder and remodeler for over 30 years. He's seen the highs and the lows. From the beginning though, Dwayne has been on a quest to find a better way to run a contracting business. In 2016, he found that better way. That's how I met Dave, a lifelong entrepreneur and visionary who measures his success by the success of those around him. He reached out one day with a formula on how to transform my business and the rest is history. Since then, we've teamed up to help hundreds of contractors like you build better businesses and better lives. Now we've decided to open up our network and share our secrets so we can start moving the needle with you. It's collaboration over competition. Each week, we bring together industry peers and experts who share their stories so that we can all build freedom together.
(01:06): Nobody ever builds a successful contracting business, all on their own. It takes a team, but before you can add value to others, you need to come to grips with your own strengths and weaknesses. Having the right mindset can help you discover your unique abilities that will empower you to build freedom for you and your team.
(01:20): Today, we brought in a world thought leader on team success. Who's going to help you unlock your individual talents and those of your team so that your company can deliver a signature experience in your market. What may surprise you is how simple some of this stuff is.
(01:35): Our expert is an accomplished author. Award-Winning Colby certified consultant sought after speaker and a key decision maker at strategic coach, where she has dedicated 30 years to helping entrepreneurs build more rewarding businesses from Toronto, Canada. We welcome Shannon Waller to build their nuggets. Welcome Shannon.
(01:53): Yeah, last month we came up Shannon with probably about six different ideas for episodes and content. You know, lots of stuff for shows here, but ultimately we decided on tying three or four key principles together here, and that's what we're going to dive into. And the first one is your unique ability. You know, we refer to this on builder nuggets as your highest and best use. You know, what you're truly meant to do leadership. So borrowing from one of our favorite books, who not, how, why you are a great who for others, which is really how you apply your unique ability, and then how you take this unique ability. And you put it together in the form of unique ability teamwork, which is how you combine the talents of your team to create a unique and recognizable experience in your market. And you've got some just really simple four simple habits that will help kick people off on this as well. But before we dig into all that, tell us how you got connected with Dan Sullivan at strategic coach and your, and your background. Oh my gosh.
(02:59): Story short, first of all, I met them 30 plus years ago now, and I was working for another company again, small launch rail company, but whose major client was general motors of Canada. Anyway, they rented seminar room space from the company I was part of. And they approached a friend of mine to come work with them. And when he told me what they wanted, I was like, Hmm, I could do that. So basically he was coming to a presentation that Dan Sullivan was putting on and like, see if I can come to, so we kind of snuck out of the office for a couple of hours. I don't know what we said. I met the team and I met Dan and I sat in this room with some quote-unquote suits at the back of the room. And then I came out and I was back in the office for maybe 45 minutes.
(03:39): And the key sales person, then their only sales person called me up. And she said, what did you think of the presentation? And I said, it was incredible disparate things I'd known, but I'd never put together before. And then she asked me a brilliant question. She said, are you happy with what you're doing? And out of my mouth pot, no, I'm bored. And five weeks later I had joined strategic coach, not knowing what I was doing. I calculated how much I needed to make, but I forgot about taxes. I mean, I was so naive and so green, but I started off selling a program and then eventually morphed to evolved actually to coaching and started the team programs in 1995. So talking about team success is like our entrepreneurial team success in particular is my favorite thing to do so thank you very much for having me on to to share what I've learned.
(04:26): Well, and you've literally written the book on it too. So that's pretty cool. We feel privileged to have some time with you today. That's for sure. One of the hallmarks of the strategic coach program is the concept of unique ability. What does that mean, Shannon and how does somebody apply it to their
(04:44): Great question? So uniqueability is really, if you think about all of us as human beings, all of us as business people, there are a number of activities that we have all tr attempted, tried to do and have had a greater or lesser degree of success with them. So, you know, in, in our model, we have everything from uniqueability at the center, all the way out to excellent out, to competent, out to incompetent activities. Most people don't like to talk about their incompetent activities until they first realized, realized they've got a few very unique things that they were really put on the planet to do. Will you talk about your highest and best use? So your unique ability activities are those few things. It's not 30, it's more like two or three that you both have superior skill at them. You are better at them than those than most people.
(05:30): And that's not your ego talking. That's other people saying you're amazing, but you also love it. You bring a passion to it. You bring excitement. And it's interesting. There's a couple of other characteristics of unique too. So you love it. You have superior skill. Also it it's, it gives you energy. Like at the end of the day, you might be physically tired, but you're kind of alive that way because it feels you, this is like, this was fun. Can I, how do I get to do more of it? And you feel like you're really making a difference. And then the part that kind of bends people out of shape a little bit is how even as much as you love and, and as good as you are, you can always see room for improvement. And that's where people get a little bit tricked in the sense that they think, oh, if I can get better, I mustn't be very good. People can't get better unless they actually have that passion. And they ha I mean, they could theoretically get better, but they know they're never going to cause that just don't have what it takes.
(06:26): That's sort of prep. Procrastination comes in, you know, Dan calls it wisdom. You know, it's a form of enlightenment where it's like, I'm procrastinating. This clearly is not something that's in my unique ability, wheelhouse and a really good sign. That probably something you should get off your plate. So aside from others telling you, this is what you're meant to do, what are some of the ways that somebody discovers what their unique abilities are?
(06:52): It's interesting for a lot of people, unique ability is often something that you take for granted because you think, well, if I can do it so easily, other people can too, right? No, that's actually one of the first clues. So one is, it comes really, really easily to you. It could be. I w I was talking with someone this morning, who's just incredibly talented at relationships and just can walk in a room and know whether or not there's any discord, any disharmony. They're just so tuned to it. Others of us walk in and we have no idea. So they're very skilled at that area. Some others have are unique at just determining physical quality or gaging. You know, it shows up in so many different types of ways in terms of how we deal with learning and how we deal with people and how we deal with taking action.
(07:35): There's more, it evolves into something really interesting at this core. So it comes really easily to us, but it's very different than other people. And other people say really great things when you do it for them, right. It could be how you organize something. It could be how you just make a decision and how you could be how you handle a difficult conversation. And people are like, wow, that was amazing. And you're like, it was really so it's, again, it's something so simple for you that is really appreciated by your audience, where you can be a hero is another way that Dan talks about it. So it's making a really big impact and it feels easy and fun. And as it, as bottom line is really energizing for you probably don't use this word a lot in business, but it feeds your soul, right? Is this like, you're like, oh my gosh, if I could do more of this, it doesn't even feel like work. But sometimes we have these mental precepts. Like it should be hard. It should feel like work. It's painful. If it's not painful, it's not, I'm not doing it well enough. You kind of have to disabuse your skills of those notions to tap into unique ability.
(08:36): There's a real mindset around that. That's prevalent in the, in the contracting business as well. It's, it's portrayed to be this rough and tumble type business where, you know, what, if you're not good at something, you better learn how to be good at it. You have to lead by example. You have to get down in the trenches. And that may be the furthest thing from the truth. Sometimes that's required from a leadership standpoint to show that you're willing to do those things, but does your team really want you working on the stuff that you're crappy at or focusing on the things that you create opportunity around and how do you feel when you're doing it? Do you feel like you're adding value or are you doing it as a, as a, maybe it's fun to go dig holes, but you know, for a morning of exercise, that's about it. You're not adding value to the company.
(09:19): I really like what you said about creating opportunity for others, right? Because I think that actually is a really powerful way to describe your unique ability and your team really doesn't. I I've worked with teams since 1995, and I can tell you, they really don't want you doing those things because guess what? They have to go and redo your work. Right? So it makes no sense. Again, you can show up as a leader, you know, from a leadership standpoint, show up early, do all those things. But in terms of you doing work, that you are absolutely not suited, no. And you don't want to be paying anyone else to do that either. Would you pay someone to do what they're actually not very good at? That is just not a good business decision, but we have to include ourselves in that thinking
(09:55): Team is very cognizant of that. You know, they can tell if you're comfortable doing something, you know, the term of, well, you made that look easy. Well, when you're doing your highest and best work, you do, you make it look easy. Whereas that might be a struggle for someone else. And that's the kind of things that I think that a team is going to gravitate towards. If they see you as a leader, doing those things, doing them, doing it well, making it look easy, elevating others around you. That's powerful stuff. But when they see you doing the stuff, you're not good at you're frustrated, the expletives are flying. It's not fun for anybody. Yeah. And that is not empowering.
(10:27): You're wearing all the hats and we talk about it off and you're wearing all the hats and nobody looks good in 10 hats. No, in your team. Interesting. I cannot, I import politics of any, well, almost of any kind. And, but within a company, just such a waste and it can happen on the building site, right. When it's like, when, when you know, person a is talking person being like, oh man, dude, why is he doing that again? You know what a waste, you know, so all of the extra chatter comes in when someone's not doing what they're meant to be doing. It is a complete distraction from that person actually focusing on their task at hand and doing a really brilliant job at it. So you just save so much time and mental energy and people looking sideways, frankly, when you have everyone doing what they're, especially you doing what they're best at, it just eliminates friction and drag. And therefore it speeds up results. This is a productivity strategy actually, to have everyone doing them. What they're unique at, it's not just a nice to have. It actually pays off in dollars and cents
(11:29): To know thyself first, before you can lay any of this, any of this out and yeah, Shannon, you're an award winning Colby expert here. So introduce the builder nuggets community to what we need to know for self-diagnosing.
(11:45): Well, first of all, know, thyself is a little bit of my byline. So thank you for saying that. I love it. And, and I guess that our profiles and indexes tools, same as you would have really great quality tools on the building site. These are tools to help you build the scaffolding of really understanding the framework of who you are. And it's just, it's a shortcut and not one, that's a bad one. It's a good one because we were not, it's tough to analyze ourselves from the inside because like looking at your skin from the inside, can't do it unless you take it off. That's very uncomfortable. So what you want to do is you want to have these indexes with they're validated, proven, reliable in test retest situations. And Colby is my favorite because it measures how you take action and how you problem solve.
(12:29): And if anyone's wondering how to spell it, it's K O L B E. So it's not, it's not like the cheese. It's K O L B e.com. And there's both a personal and a business site. You can go to, obviously, if you're going to do more than just yourself definitely go to the business one and set it for free everywhere with all accounts, but it's powerful because it measures how you strive. And since we're all at work striving to accomplish a result, you want to know how different people take action. The neat thing is you've already seen this. You've really, you've watched the detail person. Who's really great at the finishing work. You know, the person who's really good at looking at the flow chart and the process and the way in which things should happen. You really, you also know who's really good at innovating a solution at the last minute when you're in a jam and you're stuck.
(13:14): And you also know the person who's just fanatical about the physical quality and making sure that everyone is safe and protected. Well, what I just went through were four of the different modes of Colby. So it's fact-finder, which is your mental energy for details and specifics follow through is your instinct for, and it's driving instincts by the way. It's not, not anything else, not personality, not intelligence. None of those things fall through is how you arrange and design. Whatever you're working with quick start is how you handle risks and uncertainty and implementer is how you handle space and tangibles. So very relevant, especially in the building in the, for builders in the building trade, because you want to know who's super handy, whose should be, who should be working on the, on the spreadsheets. Make sure that that's kind of spread out, not just say someone can or can't do something that's very much, that's your brain. Whether or not someone wants to, has to do with, you know, their heart, their preferences, that kind of thing. But this is your will. This is what you are, you know, will, you will, won't are willing to take on. And that is really only accurately measured by the Colby profile. There's something we hate doing. If there's something we don't enjoy doing something where you, we procrastinate until the end of the day, thinking numbers as you're invoicing, those sorts of things.
(14:33): But guess what? There are people on the planet probably close to you that, you know, that actually love doing that. And when you're not doing it, it causes them pain. They're like, they just, they're just itching to get their hands on stuff. And they see you putting it off and then they get worried, but they, whatever, because of the roles that we all ourselves in, they think, you know, you think you're supposed to be doing it. They don't think they're supposed to speak up. And it, and everyone stays in pain makes no sense, but we're boxed into these roles. And when we can break them out instead, and focus on unique abilities and base in talents and how people's mental energy plays out, that's what Colby measures your mental energy. It's nothing to do with whether or not you can run a spreadsheet or what have you.
(15:15): It's like, do you have the mental energy to do it? Some of us tap out after three minutes, some people can do it for five hours. Find your partners, find your other people who actually, and it may be someone unexpected just saying who actually has a talent and a skill if you're looking for it. And then all of a sudden you get relieved from that thing that you didn't like doing. And they get to contribute in a whole new way. That totally suits them. It's I want, I want you to say, I want to use the word magical. It's not.
(15:42): Yeah, it's freeing. And it's, you know, you're able to shed yourself of the guilt of the stereotype that comes with passing the buck, because that's not what this is about. And we've talked about it on a previous show is when you can get your head around the fact that you're actually creating opportunities. As we mentioned before, somebody else you're getting out of their way for them to take it, they're actually good at it. And they like it. So just because you think it sucks and you hate doing it, giving it away makes you feel like a lot of the times you're like, well, I got to get this off my plate. I hate doing it. But you want to dig in and say, well, I can't just burden that on somebody. Don't look at it as a burden. Look at it as an opportunity. I look at the direction where we want to go with something on our team. And then I have Dwayne to help me translate that to some other team members. And we've got Kate on our team and Whitney and Mike who take the ball and they each have their own lane and they go and kick butt with their, you know, with their particular or all. And nobody wants me doing that stuff. I can tell you it was falling apart when I was trying to do it.
(16:44): Well, there's two things about that that you said that I want to emphasize. One is there's a mindset that goes along with this. If you're going to pursue the know thyself highest and best use path, you really need to pay attention to yourself and understand how you're unique, where you're special, where you're really not. So it takes that honest look and not from a judgmental good or bad, just from a here's where I'm useful. Here's where I'm not standpoint. And also being willing to do that with other people and recognize that we're not all the same. If you put everyone into the same box, this conversation will not be useful for you. But if you're willing to recognize that you're unique, and if you're unique, then all, if there's in some few ways, and there's lots of ways where each of us is not, but other people are unique too, then you start to invite that in and then you start to go, oh, this is an activity that is crappy for me, but I bet you there's someone else who thinks it would be incredible.
(17:37): So I wonder who that is and some, and here's the, here's the corollary to that. Something that they think is crappy, you think is like, oh my gosh, that is so fun. Let me add it. What is the, what's the expression one man's treasure is another man's trash or vice versa, same deal. So if we can just appreciate that our viewpoint is our own, the biggest difficulty for a lot of people is that handoff. Cause they're like, oh, if I hate it, other people must hate it too untrue. Yeah. Just critical to recognize that other people love to do the stuff we don't thank goodness. And, and you'd love to do things that other people don't. So,
(18:09): And that was big on our team. You know, we we've taken the Colby index, others on our team have, and I love the know thyself. That's huge. But then also when you see others, you get to understand really quickly. You can say, wow, now I see why that person has struggled with that. Or, you know, I've given things, I've given those things to that person in the past. And now it's very clear why they haven't been able to do it the way I think they should, because it's something they shouldn't be doing, doing this as a team.
(18:34): It was benefits. Yeah. It's not just what you delegate. It's what you stopped. Delegating. W we've talked about this before. It's with EOS, it's delegate and elevate, and we've kind of flipped it in our, in our business to elevate somebody first and then delegate to them. Start looking for people's sweet spots, start looking for, Hey, you're good at that. You seem to like want to keep doing that. My job as the leader of the company is to go out and find you more of that so that you can get better at it. And then ideally delegate some aspects of that to a team that you can build and grow your leadership. So, you know, you're constantly looking to elevate and probably one of the hallmarks of a, of a great leader. And one of the things that we've discovered so succinctly from who not how, which you guys have heard us talk about this a million times, but you know, we're going to bring it up again with Shannon because she works directly with one of the, one of the writers, Dan Dan Sullivan.
(19:32): And this book really is a simple way to explain how you working on your highest and best use things, creates opportunities for others. And you no longer have to go and figure out how to solve as a leader. Your job is to figure out who should solve and who should work on these things. And you surround yourself with that. And soon enough you recognize when you see it come together, all the value that you're bringing to them. So probably a good spot to turn it over to you, Shannon and share with us how being the, who to your team really is one of the best leadership steps that you can take.
(20:11): Yes, yes. And yes, yes. It is a leadership move and it actually ties into what you're just saying about elevate the whole, who not how concept is essentially, first of all, let me just back up. So who not, how is, as soon as you think of something that you've got this big aspiration, that's our model, it's a big star that you're excited about accomplishing, and then you think then you think, well, how do I do that? And then you get completely de-energized because you don't know how to do that. And you have to go to the bottom of learning curve and you're like, Ugh, not again. Right? And that could even stop you from embarking on this bigger goal. But then if, instead, if you can figure out, ask the question, well, not how I can do it, but who do I know? Who knows how to do it?
(20:51): Then you're like, that's when the light bulbs start popping. And it really is looking for the who, who is an elevated talent. They are better at it than you are right now, probably ever would be in the future. Sometimes you need to know a little bit about what you really get really clear on what you want. That's kind of the secret to the success on the secret sauce on this one is be very clear in your intentionality and have a way to communicate that. But when the right who will take it farther and better than you would. So it is absolutely an elevation. Delegation is a four letter word. It's a dirty word to most people. And not even a fun one to say it doesn't even have some satisfaction. Delegate is not something like most people, most entrepreneurs avoid it. Like the plague. When you're talking about who yourself up is become a code word.
(21:38): A coach now is a code word for, for yourself up when you who yourself up and you have the right talent, all of a sudden the whole whole thing got bigger. The whole thing, the whole picture got better. And your job is simply to be a great person to work with. And one of the benefits when you surround yourself with great who's new, provide them the type of opportunities that you were talking about Dave, is that if you're creating opportunity for people, they're going to stay with you. You have longevity, you don't have to go and find new ones. You get to help them grow. They help you grow, you know, retention. I mean, I don't hiring right now is such a challenge everywhere. So if you can attract and keep great who's oh my gosh, this is you. You, you again have another secret ingredient to your success. So this mindset, again, pays off in multiple ways.
(22:25): Well, and, and think of how that person feels valued and appreciated in this, in this process as well, because you go from being a commodity and we're seeing it right now. We're watching project managers get poached. It's all about money. Nobody's saying, come over and join me for more freedom or more opportunity. They're leading with money because that's all they have. That's the story that's been told over and over again. And they're, and they're willing to, you know, you're working long, hard hours, but what are you working towards? You're just being used up. It's it's like, you're a finite resource, instead of all right, how do we put this person into a spot where they are loving what they're doing? And then those people don't leave. And you know what? You surround happy people with other happy people. It's not that they don't want to leave the role, make it so they don't want to leave each other. That's the other piece is you can pay more. There will always be somebody who's willing to pay more or give a different opportunity. But if you've layered all of this together, and you've got the culture and you're surrounded by positive people who are happy, they will not leave each other because they know what they have works. And to go and try and do that on a different team, that could be a disaster. That's why you see people leave for the money and then come right back for the culture because they realize it's not worth.
(23:43): We're getting a fair rate of hiring at coach right now. And I just hired someone we can half ago, she starts in two weeks. Cannot wait, actually less than that. Now 10 days. And it's ingest, she's leaving because of what she wants is a positive culture. She wants that well, positivity. She wants to be able to be successful. She wants to strive. I can't wait to get her talents working on me. Cause she's my total opposite. She's very complimentary to like what she loves to do his stuff. I really don't and vice versa. You know, our, like what we need to do in a day will be completely different, but there'll be in support of one another. And that's just so fun. So I know what to look for. I know what to look for from a personality standpoint, I know what to look for from a Colby profile standpoint, I can be spoke astute about who I'm, who I'm looking for and set up the conditions for them to win. And so I know that when I hire someone it's not a six month or 12 month or even a three-year gig, I know it's going to be longer. And that gives a massive advantage in the marketplace who does not love that. And I bet it's a hard job that she's doing too. It's a far important job.
(24:49): There you go. But where I was going with that is when we look at work in the construction industry, project managers are the most important piece of these companies. They're the ones who are interacting with the clients the most. And in the ideal scenario, they're overseeing things with race. They have a lot of pressure. They have systems and tools and you know, the companies we work with provide a lot of support for their project managers, but it's, it's hard. But when you, when they have the support, when they have the tools, when they have the vision and people are bringing them the opportunities. So opportunities to a project manager probably looks like one exciting projects to work on, okay. That is fulfilling for a project manager, more important than that is great clients. You know what you've screened your clients really well because they're a valued part of your team as well.
(25:39): You need to understand your, your client, you know, you need to have a very good trade professional trade base that you're, you're working with your trade partners. You know, and if you've worked on that now think about what the building experience is like for that project manager supported like that. And if there is additional growth opportunities, whether it's to move up, to be elevated to a general manager or with a lot of the companies that we work with, we're seeing project managers become part owners, equity owners, and, or go on to different roles within the organization.
(26:09): So the leadership aspect, you know, I think that's where the leader steps in and really you've got to start driving your culture. You know, the culture part is so huge. I I've thought about it a lot. When you think about traditional hiring and the resume, you know, really getting to know the person, understanding the person, how do they fit into your culture? Colby indexes, things like that to understand who they are is way more powerful than the resume, which is basically the, how they got to where they are in life.
(26:36): So well-put Dwayne. I love them. Yeah. And helping it's not on, you know them, but they actually get to learn to know themselves. Very few people will come, never having done a Colby profile. So them understanding themselves, they should be able to look back and go, oh, that explains a few things. Right. That's what's so,
(26:52): And I think that's something that some people take, you know, they see a resume and maybe they see all the things that someone's done and it, and it fits the boxes for that role or that person I think they hire, but they haven't taken the time to think about the who, you know, that, that person, what are their innate skills? What are they really best at doing? And then they struggle with that person, you know, well, we hired, well, they checked all the boxes, but you didn't take the time to find out if the role you're actually putting them in is, is where they're supposed to.
(27:18): It's fine. If they're a box checker. I mean, that's literally, I despise most job descriptions because it's just like a laundry list of, they all look like work, like so unfulfilling from the outside look, man, you know, most of them and to describe what a project manager has to do, like their parts therapist, marriage, counselor, union representative, when you're dealing with multiple trades, like there's so many skills that these men and women need to have. And you know, it's our job if we're to lead them and to get to go off on a tangent here, but investing in them, we were at a, I was in Manitoba to meeting and one of the project managers, you know, we were recognizing one of the project managers for all of the above and beyond things that he had done and were like, man, you have invested so much of yourself into this company.
(28:13): How, what made you do that? You said, well, it was really easy. This team all invested in me first. So when you start to look at your people as an investment and as the leader, you're like, I'm, I need to find opportunity for these people. I need to work on them, not like a project, but with this, with the same focus that I work on, building a house or building my business, I need to work on building my people and what do they need? Individuals treat them as individuals and set of commodities. And I don't think enough owners are sitting down and looking at what is your career path? What are you happy about? What are you doing? A Colby index, making sure that they have what they need to be fulfilled in their job and so that they can so that they can thrive.
(28:58): Well, we were talking about mindset a little bit ago and you just brought up another point that I just remembered, which is if you have the, there's an investment versus cost mindset in terms of team members. So if you treat, if you think of team members as costs, which is where they show up on the PNL, it's a problem because we do, what do we, what should we all do with costs in our business? Exactly. Do you want to be minimized or cut as a human being with your talents? No, you do not. And this, any human being can relate to that, but what do we do with investments? Well, last time I checked, we all want to grow our investment. So if we treat our team members as investments, not costs, regardless of how they show up in the financials, it's a totally different way of looking at a human being.
(29:44): Now there are good investments and bad investments. Your job is to nix the bad investments as quickly as possible. And one of the ways you can stack the odds in your favor is by profiles like Colby. So that, you know, because I was thinking, when you were talking about checking the boxes, my resume before I started at coach had been administrative. Now here's the thing. If you know my Colby profile, you know that it's the worst idea of life. That's probably why I had the highest billable hours because it took me so long to do those things. But I could S I would, you could have, I could have, if I was less aware, less self-aware of what I wanted to do. And when I liked and didn't like, or what I thought I had to do, I could have sold you on hiring me for an administrative role. I had the history, I had highest billable hours, and I'm a really good sales person. Want to level up, connect with us to share your stories, ideas, challenges, and successes.
(30:37): The builder nuggets community is built on your experiences. It takes less than a minute to connect with us@buildingnuggets.com, Facebook or Instagram,Access to the resources that can take you and your team to the next level. One call could change everything.
(30:53): Likability. If people like you, you're positive, they're willing to spend time with you. You feel they're getting value from you are willing to pay it. If it takes you a little bit longer, it's okay. It was still worth it to them,
(31:03): But that would have been the worst decision of life for other of us. We both would've been unhappy. So we, we have, we just because we're unaware of the other parts of the mind, cause there's the cognitive that's called the effect of the heart. And then there's the cognitive, which is your will that stuff we're talking about with, with your Cobian stinks. But you know, we're, we're, we're trained to people have had the experience and it shows up on a resume and it checks the boxes that we're kind of assuming they're suited for that. Maybe, maybe not. Maybe they're just really smart and can fake it for a while. You know, you want to have some other checks and balances in your system to be able to have that person know themselves so you can know them so you can help grow them, you know, and you can get feed them opportunities. Project managers in our business are precious. We have to, you know, one of them, you probably know Kathy Davis and, and not what she wants is amazing new projects, working with things that make a difference and control. If she can have the power that she needs to do, what she needs to do, she rocks our world.
(32:03): Autonomy. Autonomy is key. They need to be able to have the freedom, to put their own personal stamp on it. And as the owner, it's like, you know, trust, but verify, you know, meet and be there to support them, ask them what they need, but let them go and, and do it. And don't try and take it over. We see this all the time. Dwayne project managers is being usurped by owners who want to swoop in and solve something. And they don't have all the details there. You just end up tripping over each other. Most of the time, no, the project manager does not get the power and the authority that they need in the first place, the
(32:39): Business isn't set up for it. It's not structured the systems and processes aren't in place now, but when it does happen, it's pretty special to see because you know, we talked about leadership. We talked about finding the unique ability and, you know, I think the next point is, is huge. When you, when you do start to put that together and you've defined the unique abilities for, for all the different people on your team. And then you pull that together for that, you know, the unique abilities from a team concept, maybe touch on that a little bit, Shannon around what that looks like in the power of that. Once you have a team full of people, doing all the things they love to do, and they're really good at,
(33:15): Yeah, it's the classic dream team. I will say that. And one other comment about the entrepreneur or the owner swooping in, if the owner's not clear on their unique ability, often they feel the need to exert control and it's kind of their ego in the way. But if someone's grounded in what their highest and best use is, what, how they can make the best contribution to the business, it creates enormous space for other people to show up. So to your point, Dwayne, if any of us are going to be freed up to do what we do, what we'd love to do and do best other people, we immediately need other people we need other who's right. There's no way that I'm going to be freedom to do the stuff I love unless I've got a big team around me, quitting ones that helped organize today, right? And to have to be able to support those activities. So if I just want to be able to show up and do what I do best, I need other people. So that makes me very appreciative, very good at noticing and observing and supporting their talents and their contributions. And then also incredibly grateful because that, you know them doing what they do best leads me up to do what I do best. What is positive.
(34:21): That's a great point. I actually posted a blog on our website this morning and it was around. I'll just do it myself. It's one of the things, especially in this industry, people default back to that really fast. They delegate something. It doesn't go well, they get frustrated with it. Just do it myself. And then they do it more and more because the more they try to delegate stuff and it doesn't get done, they get more frustrated. And that just it's, it's constricting to the point where they, they don't want to grow. They don't want to add these different people. And so much of it is because of what we're talking about right here. They haven't taken the time to identify their own, you know, unique abilities and then realize the unique abilities of others. Because that's the power of delegating. As Dave says, elevate and delegate is if you're going to hand something off, it can't just be a, get it off your plate action. It's gotta be, you know, something that's set up for success.
(35:09): Yeah. So one of the models I have is we call it, we have a great tool in strategic coach called unique method. What it is is simply the, the flowchart. If you imagine 12 boxes in a horseshoe shape, and it's the handoff, it's all the different unique abilities needed in a particular process, no magic to 12 steps. It just happened, happened to me that way, north no correlation, but one of the most important things. And I I've nicknamed it, the uniqueability relay race. Now, if you're running a relay race and I'm not an athlete in any way, shape or form, but I do know that there are two important things to be being successful in a relay race and think of the Olympics. We just, we had the summer, you know, so number one is have the right runner in the right place in the race.
(35:51): You've got your starter, you've got two middle people. You've got your finisher. What's the other rule. Don't drop the Baton. And if anyone can picture me right now, I'm holding a red Baton in my hand. And so, and that's key. So have a really good handoff. But to what, the point that you were talking about that sometimes the person goes to hand it off and then they don't let go. We call this the delegation desk grip. It has a name just so you know, you know, or, or they're passing it to the wrong person. Someone who's either incompetent or confident, but not excellent or unique at the role. So they don't do a good job. And the person has just too much scar tissue built up and then they take it and run the whole race by themselves. But when you have, you know, really talented, capable people, if the term uniqueability feels a little overwhelming, like this aspirational unicorn, you're trying to find, you know, it really is someone who simply is really, really good at it and enjoys doing it.
(36:46): Just think of it in those terms. But when you pass it to that person, they grab it and they run probably faster than you would, which is amazing. And then they get to the end of their part and then they pass it to the next person and don't drop the Baton. And if you can imagine you have a race where there's a combination of talents, some people are incompetent, some people are competent, some people are excellent. Some people are unique. We actually have a little fun diagram. It's kinda like running around a lake. You know, half the time someone's off in the woods, they're falling in the water. It's, you know, they're not winning anything. And then you substitute those players who are in the wrong place. Either you move them to the right place or you replace them. And all of a sudden, every single person around the race is the right, right human. And they are all running like the wind. This is how you win the race, right? When you have the right people in the right place. And you've got good handoffs communication is still key. You can't just assume it's magically going to happen. Cause it doesn't when you've got good handoffs, you will win. This is a very, it's a productivity and a profitability advantage to have people doing what they love to do and do best that it hits your top and bottom line in the best way as possible.
(37:57): One of the other things that has to resolve from this is an incredible experience. So the team that you create that is built on their unique abilities is going to be unique in itself. And we are in a custom building environment where all of us are striving to be able to produce a known, a unique level of quality and service and everything to the clients. We all want to be known for that. Every builder would love to be known for building a high quality product. And most of the time it's the product that's thought of first and most of the time, that's where the focus is going. And the owner like, Hey, this thing has got to be good. This has got my name on it. And the experience suffers. And I think a lot of the time, the experience suffers because of the experience of the people delivering it are suffering in trying to meet these objectives, objectives, and objections sometimes as well.
(38:53): But think about the business, how your business would run. If you took the team, you were all working on your, with your unique strengths, plugged in. And like you said, Shannon, you know, running your leg of the relay race, like to perfection on stride every time it's not going to be perfect, let's go back. It won't be perfect every time, but you're really going to be flying and think about what that feels like for everybody else that is connected to the experience your team is delivering. And that is the trade partners, the client, the architect, whose vision, it was for this project who, who, who are dying to see how it turns out and who has their reputation and their status resting on your ability to do that. And they may have referred the client to you and they want to hear good things back as well. But that's what you're able to do when you have everybody working on that, you're able to go from a product-based business to an experience-based business that just happens to produce an unbelievable product because you've got unbelievable people doing stuff they're great at. So how, how does somebody get started with this? Do you have any like, well, I know you have four simple things too, you know, that that help with some of this, but how does somebody get started? If there's a business owner sitting out there going, how do you get started?
(40:13): Okay. I listed a few things actually, including the four things that we're talking about. So one of the first of all is do your own Colby profile. So, and then cool thing is, is you can't fail. There's no wrong answer. Perfect score foreshadowing. Right there.
(40:29): There you go. And by the way, one of the most owners of one of the very most successful owners, he was building a first-time homes for people on the Colby profile, in terms of actual building on the implementer score. He was a one out of 10, a one, there are no zeros just saying most successful company ever. So that was kind of like, please don't have a preconceived notion of how you should end up just answer if free to be myself. So that'd be number one. Then I would look at some of your key players. Cause as soon as you do your own profile, you really are going to want to know everyone else. I've profiled my entire family, my kids, since they were small, I profiled my husband before I married him. That was, we've been married for 25 years. So I have to recommend that as this strategy, but I also have every single person.
(41:18): We, we profile every single person before they work at strategic coach. And if someone has a great resume, but they don't have the right Colby for the role, we do not hire them because someone can kind of cover up the cracks for the first three months. And after that, they start to show. So we're really, really strong on that. And you will take your hiring percentage from about a 50 to an 80% success rate that's to put some numbers to that. So doing Colby's any other profiles you'd like to in terms of personality, if that's important to you, disc is a favorite. Myers-Briggs some people like Clifton strengths is great. Although you should do that after you hire. So get to know people with whatever index is kind of connect with you. So that would be one thing, but take yourself seriously and take, take those responses seriously and try and start to ask people, what do you love to do?
(42:05): If there's one thing could get off your plate and not do or give to someone else, what would it be? Then trade tasks. I literally have had people do it with post-it notes on the wall. And literally someone, every, every person takes everything that someone did not want to do ends up in someone else's hands. You end up with some interesting job descriptions, but they work because they're tailored to the people that are there. So those are some just basic things to get to know how to reorient things. If any, the thing I want to everyone should think about is, are you thinking about it as you're listening to this? Is it anyone in your, in your business, in the office, on the field on site is doing something they're incompetent at you're losing money. This is not contributing to the great experience that you talked about.
(42:48): It's not producing, bridging right. Product is not producing a great service, nothing. So get rid of like, if you can protect people and the project from anything, when people are incompetent and competent, please do that and get everyone into what we call excellent and unique. So that's one, but then there's some other things that we call referrability habits. They're also credibility habits, relationship habits, but we started off calling them referrability habits. So no matter how talented you are, if you don't do these four things, it will kind of sink you. You will not be referrable as a person or as a company. So number one is show up on time. Now some of us are a little optimistic about what we can pull. We can pull off so that you may have to set extra reminders or timers, but still we're all responsible for getting ourselves to where we said we were going to be on time. So show up on time. Number two is do what you say. So if you committed to something, write it down, remember like putting it into your iPhone, do something so you can actually do what you say. Number three is finished. What you start, Dave, I'm looking at you. You and I are really good at finishing things at the last minute. Other people are really good at finishing things shortly.
(43:56): Dwayne is grinning because what we do when we do like writing for episodes, it's like a week before and I'll say, okay, make sure you get those notes up there. And it's like the day before I will be running in sometimes the morning before it will be like, that's going to be, he'll text me like 10, 15 minutes before we get ready to record an episode. Did you check out the show notes and prep time? He likes, he likes to have it all in front of them and think about it and absorb it. And that's how he works. And for me it's like, if I looked at this stuff a week advance and be gone by the time I needed it,
(44:33): Or you change it, you wouldn't like it. So no, and this is, what's so great about Colby and other profiles. It's because you two know your Colby profiles. It's, you know, Dwayne, you're not taking, Dave's doing it last minute personally. And you're not thinking he should do it exactly. Like you do it. And Dave, you're the same. You're like, okay, that's great for you. You get started a week in advance. I'll promise to have it in 20 minutes before the show starts or whatever it is. And you know that he'll meet that deadline initially just in a very different way of getting it done. The end result is there. Let's be clear. We're all responsible for finishing what we started and delivering the results. If we just get there very differently and knowing someone allows you to not take it personally and not assume everyone else is just like you, because we know what assume means from grade four.
(45:23): So that's key. And so we've got show up on time. Do we say finish what you start? And the last one is less about doing and more about appreciation. It's basically saying please, and thank you. So not taking other people for granted being respectful and asking, being appreciative and saying thank you in a very genuine way. So as I was coaching this one time to, to some team members and their entrepreneurs or the team members said, oh, my entrepreneur says, writes P and T Y on the bottom of everything standing for please. And thank you. I'm like I said, that's not really coming across well, is it? And the person said, no, it's really not. You have to express it. You have to let the person know specifically treat them as individuals you said earlier, you know, you have to let them know specifically what you are asking them for and bring appreciative again, specifically with detail about the difference that it made, that they did that when you do those things, you'll be both a fabulous human being incredibly referrable, you'll be a great leader. You will attract and keep really great people. And if you have that as a byline for your company, you will absolutely win in the marketplace because a lot of industries that say it's a game changer, but I have to say, Dave, you and I were talking about this in our pre-conversation. I have to say in some trades, not so much. So I think it's really important to, if you adopt these four for ability habits, it's amazing how differentiated you'll be.
(46:50): Yeah. The, and these four are very similar. There's a book out there called the four agreements. Don't take things personally as the one that I always, Yeah, very similar to these, but number four here, you know, saying please, and thank you something, something for me many years ago that was actually might even been done through through a Myers-Briggs or some other type of personality profile. But I think the power of going through that and doing it with your team, this is the perfect example of, there were several folks in my office that once we went through this, we realized that something that just brightens their day and elevates them is a very direct, good morning. Happy to see you kind of thing the morning. Whereas that is so far from me. It's not, and it's not, not that I don't want to do it. It's not that I'm uncomfortable. It's just not something that I need. I don't need someone to run right up to me and tell me good morning, great to see you, but just understanding people, you know, and how they react. It's so powerful so that, you know, you know how to interface with people, how to communicate better with them. And I think that's something that's really important and will help you with number four, you know, everybody's a little different and it's just the way you communicate can change all of it,
(48:00): Such a great point. And to me, it really is about treating everyone as individuals. Dave, that's also what you said earlier. And when you really take a moment and stop and appreciate your unique talents and contributions and unhook yourself from some of those sheds and expectations, that's part of the next book that, that the big book that's coming out very shortly is the gap and the gain and people when you can, should, would, could, are all good signs of putting yourself into what we call the gap, which is measuring yourself against an ideal that just isn't realistic we can set goals and aspire towards them, but those ideals, not so much when, when we can actually just really deeply appreciate who we are, what we have to contribute, what we, what we, don't, what we should, we're not put on the planet to do.
(48:42): And then how we can surround ourselves with other people who in fact are uniquely suited, passionate, and highly skilled at those things that we're not all of a sudden, this, this freedom emerges free from some of those preconceived notions that we've had. And you can end up with a much happier, much more successful company. That's a lot more fun than, than the alternative. So that's why I think this is such an incredible, I would call it a maximizer strategy and taking what could be a hard part of doing business and making it a wonderful experience as you both were talking about.
(49:14): Well, we, we talk a lot about building freedom. That's the whole mission of this show is to help people build freedom. And sometimes people get the wrong impression even from, from that, because they think, okay, it's a business owner creating freedom for themselves, but you're really creating freedom for your team as well because they're, they have the ability to work on meaningful things that are important to them. If you're aligned in the clients and the, and the trade partners and the team members that you're working with, then you have, you know, the freedom of, you know, valuable relationships that you can work on instead of just being, having a master and servant type relationship with that ultimately will come financial freedom as well, because you will be more successful. You will generate more opportunity for yourself as an employee and you're, and the rising tide floats all boats here.
(50:07): It's really exciting to be on strategic coach has taught me so many amazing things. Maybe take a second and talk about, for anybody interests out there about learning more about what strategic coaching is. We've got like 30 year plus expert with the company. I can share that for me. There's been important things in my business, strategic coach is really about how you think the way about your own mindset and what you need to be able to deliver that experience, how you need to think in order to create opportunity for others. This second is, you know, you've got your thinking, then you've got how your business is going to operate. And EOS has really helped us with that. That's the language and the structure for operation strategic coach has the language for how do you communicate your eye and tools for how you communicate your ideas. EOS is for how you actually operate and implement those ideas. And then as you build your unique company, then you need the systems and processes for how you perform. So those are the three key buckets. When I, when I think about it, as it's thinking operation and performance. So we've got a top program there. If I look at those letters, but walk us through coach and why somebody should look at how to learn, how to think using what strategic coach brings to the team,
(51:36): Ah, such a great summary day, well done. It's hard to put all of those things together succinctly, but you've done that. So it really is a thinking program. You're absolutely right. It's, it's thinking about your thinking program and it's all about mindset and it's Dan initially created a coach to really help free people up from the, the absolute ceiling of complexity that you saw entrepreneurs hitting all the time and how to think about things differently, these incredible simplifiers. So you'll take so much of the complexity of everyone's business and get it down to its essence about what you need to be doing, what your team needs to be doing, how you spend your time, you know, with whom you spend your time. And it's all elements that you're really familiar with, but it's getting it down to the essential and uncluttering. You know, Dan has this great expression.
(52:22): He said, I just know that if I can help an entrepreneur uncluttered their mind, they're thinking they have all the answers. So that's why, you know, whether or not you can direct classic program, which is in person when it can be and spend one day every quarter, or if we have our new virtual workshop, which is incredible, which is four hours, every eight weeks, roughly, it's really a chance to step back out from the business and work on it, as opposed to in it and think about how you're going to approach things. And it gets you out of the doing into the thinking about it in a little bit more into the being, if you want to think of it that way, and to really just free yourself up from some of those preconceived notions. And it's, it's fabulous because in a community of other, as we'd like to say, ambitious, creative and cooperative entrepreneurs, that's really who you're with. So you're not alone. One-To-One coaching is great, especially for accountability, but in terms of learning and elevating you and your business, that's really what cope is all about. And we have, you know, EOS has fabulous strategic coach runs in EOS. It was created by a strategic coach, which is really fun.
(53:28): I know they actually are. And we have, it's like EOS loves it when they're entrepreneurs, they're visionaries. Are we in coach? Because there's so much clearer about what they want. We really love it when someone runs on EOS cause they're, they actually implement those ideas just as you talked about, coach has phenomenal thinking tools to implement so many of the symptoms, the, the, pardon me. So many of the systems that EOS supports you with. So now one of the terms is IDs identify, discuss, and solve impact filters, strategy, circle, experience, transformer, pretty brilliant tools for that. So they really do operate hand in glove, which is really fun. So, and as I said, we run on it as well. So coaches for someone who has, it's hitting a ceiling of complexity, either of scarcity or abundance to a little of something like time, too much complexity, for example, or too much opportunity, sometimes it wants to break through and wants to do it in a community of other ambitious and creative and cooperative entrepreneurs.
(54:26): It is phenomenal. It's a term that really struck me that I'm taking away from this is invest in your seat, your example that you gave Dave about that person investing in themselves. I mean, that's why I've been here for 30 plus years at this point is because, and why I've invested so much of myself in it because I get to see that freedom. I get to see that expansion. I get to see people just experience life to the point where they don't actually want to stop. Most people retire from businesses or sell because they're like, they're just burnt. They just get really fried. And when you get constantly rejuvenated, you're doing what you love to do. You're making a positive impact. You're creating opportunity for other people. Why stop? What are you excited about working on these days? Oh my God. So many things. I've bet a million projects.
(55:12): I'm really excited about working with my new who. So I have a fabulous who I've worked with for over eight years, who, who manages me. So I never knew when starting her. Name's Katrina, she's starting shortly. So I'm very excited about that. I'm also, there's one of our clients who is also a hero to what we would call strategic assistance. And we were talking the other day about possibly doing something together, just because it's people we are both passionate about. I know how much they leverage entrepreneurs. It's one of the missing pieces for a lot of entrepreneurs, because if you don't have a strategic assistant, you are one, some people are way too highly paid for the quality of work being delivered myself included, just saying. So anyway, I'm kind of excited about just some new ideas that were percolating totally in the baby infancy stage.
(55:57): But anyway, that's kind of a fun collaboration that comes to mind and I've written two books, but I'm excited about also working on my third, which is, has to do with a shooting assistant and what we call a project manager, which is an innovation manager, which a lot of entrepreneurs actually need for themselves, not just for their businesses, because they have so many ideas. They need someone who's going to, they're going to make it up. They need to make it real person before it goes to the person who's going to make it recur. Get your first two books. What's the right spot to get them
(56:25): Strategic coach.com story. But if you want to check out my website too, there's some cool free downloads to facilitate teamwork. That's your team, success.com I a team success podcast I do. And the first two books are the team success handbook, which is how your team can have an entree attitude. And the second one is interesting. It's multiplication by subtraction, how to gracefully exit, wrong fit team members. And in that book, there's a great cheat sheet for how to nose symptoms and results of those. If it's not working and also a right fit team members, scorecard. So lots of fun, practical resources, if someone wants to take this further.
(57:01): Yeah. And I, and I can say from firsthand experience, there are lots of resources on the strategic coach site members of my team have downloaded some of it. They're starting to use it. They're starting to speak Dave or understand Dave a little bit better. So it's, it's helpful, particularly the impact filter, but there's so many resources there that the strategic coach team is very generous in sharing. And if you're not ready to make, if you're only interested in not ready to make a giant commitment to something like this, it's a great way to start learning a little bit at a time until you are ready
(57:33): About expanding entrepreneurial success, freedom and happiness. That's our reason for being. So if we can help that, do that through our books, through our downloads, through our podcasts, all the things we want to do that in eventually, you know, the right ambitious, creative cooperative people will show up in our workshops and we continue to make that as easy as possible. Thank you, Shannon. This was some great stuff. We're big fans of all of it. Appreciate the time you put in. And my pleasure. Thank you so much, Duane. Thank you so much, Dave. Real pleasure. Love this conversation and I hope it helps.
Hey, thanks for listening. Dwayne and I love hearing from you. Your stories are inspiring and your challenges can be overcome. Got a cool tip? Idea for a show? Problem that you haven't been able to solve or maybe just struggling to figure out what you need next and where to get it. We can help. Hit us up at BuilderNuggets.com and start building freedom.
