Could you leave your business for 30 days and not check-in at all? Why or maybe why not? Let’s talk about that today. Happy Monday friends, Thomas Joyner with Business on Purpose here.

The litmus test for our coaching roadmap is always what we call the 30 day test. Could you leave your business for 30 days and not answer email, voicemails…whatever. What would happen to the business?

Would it be able to survive? Would it limp along with quality control issues and employees aimlessly getting through each day? Would people even know what to do and would they get it done?

If you’re anything like most of our clients when we talk to them…the answer is always, no way. That’s impossible!

But it’s not. I was sitting with one of our former clients last week and he was saying how freeing it was for him to actually try it. He had finished recording all of his systems and processes. He had delegated all of his responsibilities and the day to day operations of his business…and he took off. Loaded up the family for an RV trip out west for 31 days…because why not go a day longer just to prove the system works!

No email, no phone calls…just let the team figure it out. And they crushed it! Years of preparation for that 30 day trip and yet the business seemed to thrive as it leaned into each system that had been built along the way.

So, if you were to answer no way to the question…what holds you back? Are you the main source of revenue generation? Ok, no problem, how can you begin to share that with someone and delegate?

Are you the key person who puts out all of the fires? Great! Start training someone and bringing them into these decisions to get that responsibility off of your shoulders. 

But seriously, if you had to hone in on what was holding you back, what’s keeping you from starting to offload that? Think the business can never get there? Well change your thinking, work on an ORG chart and a Vision that would allow you to offload it and then go to work achieving it.

Because here’s the thing. If the answer to this question is no, if you can’t take off 30 days and the business survives…it actually means you have a job not a business. That’s a harsh truth, but you really just have a job that you have to show up to versus an active business that you are running to work without you.

That’s a BIG DIFFERENCE!!!

Now, hear me clearly…if 30 days off isn’t what you want, that is fine. But what is the target? It’s a business that COULD work without you if you needed it to. 

I have had incident after incident of clients telling me they don’t need to work towards that in their business and yet we push them to get it there.

And the unthinkable happens. Father comes down with cancer and they need to go home to spend time with him and help through treatment. Daughter gets in a car accident and has to have surgery at a hospital an hour away. Kid does better in a baseball tournament during the summer and gets invited to play in a tournament 4 states away to showcase their talent in front of college coaches and asks you to be there. 

These are real situations, where had they just thrown up their hands and said, no we don’t need to build systems and processes, they would have missed all of them or at best been rushed and distracted instead of present where they needed to be. 

That’s why we always say it’s not just about being liberated from chaos, but it’s so that you can make time for what matters most. That’s the end goal! 

And for any one of our clients who have had something that truly matters staring them in the face and had the freedom to go with no questions asked, knowing their business would be fine without them, gah that is what we want. 

That’s why we push and ask the question. So, today, go back to that question and ask what needs to change so I could take 30 days off in my business. Do it today! You’ll be glad you did.

Thanks so much for joining today, hope you have a great week!

It is the first day for your new employee.  

Yet most new employees for small businesses walk into their first day staring at what feels more like a rusty, duct taped operation instead of a well-oiled machine.

The very first impression that a business makes on a new employee takes place during the hiring process when the business team is simply telling the then-candidate about the wonders of their business.

Day one is usually the day where the new employee walks in and comes face to face with reality, “what I see feels different from what I was told.”

This story has played out too many times in our coaching calls where an owner will tell us they just hired a new employee and when that person walked in on day one, not only did the owner forget they were to start that day, they also began scrambling to find busy-work that would occupy the new employees time.

The owner then justified that haphazard training by saying “it’s just better if we throw you to the wolves”.

No.  

It is not better to simply be thrown to the wolves without initial training on how to handle wolves.  

Imagine any professional sports coach simply throwing a new star player to the wolves without training and practice…it’s silly.

Yet in business that tends to be the strategy of choice.  We hide behind excuses like, “we just hire smart people and they can figure it out”, or “if she can’t handle the heat then we don’t need her”.

There is a better way, a more human way to onboard that massively valuable new team member.

One element of that better way is to have a new employee kit or packet ready to physically hand them on day one.

That packet can consist of five elements to give your new employee a much higher chance of success.

First, each new employee starter pack should include an opening letter from the owner.  

This is a letter that is standardized for the new employee starter pack and allows the new employee to hear directly from the visionary of the business.

The letter should start out with a simple welcome followed by the mission of the business letting the new employee know that the primary reason they were hired is to help achieve the already-defined mission.

After the mission, the letter should include a simple outline of the unique core values of the business letting them know, “these are the filters we use to make decisions every day.”

The letter can be rounded out with an overview of the rest of the new employee starter pack.

Second, each new employee starter pack should include the outline of their initial training.

What technical skills will you be teaching them?  How?  When?

What will the timeline of that training look like?

What professional soft skills will you be having them commit to?

What is the scorecard for a successful startup in this role?

Third, each new employee starter pack should include a printed guide with training notes or slides they will be learning from so they have a note-taking mechanism.

Actively having your new employee physically write down notes, thoughts, and questions will help them to engage and retain the information that must be shared. 

In her helpful book The Power Of Writing It Down, Allison Fallon reminds us that “writing gives us space to work through our biggest questions.” 

Fallon goes on to remind us that “writing helps us gain confidence in ourselves, our ideas, and how we move through the world” while giving us a chance to know the sound of (our) own voice.”

Giving your new employee space to write gives you the space to answer their biggest questions, thus new content for updating your training as you hire future employees.

Your greatest opportunity for feedback on your business are the fresh, new eyes of a new employee.

Fourth, each new employee starter pack should include startup swag and quick start support tools for the role they are assuming.  

If you are hiring a salesperson, what are the selling tools they will need to stack away in preparation for that first sales call?

If you are hiring a field operations person, what are the “cheat sheets” or checklists that would be helpful in the startup phase?

Think of these tools as the “Quick Start” guide you see when you open the box to a new appliance or power tool.  Identify the five things (or four, or seven) that will get this person “started” in this new role knowing that a more advanced understanding of the job will come with further time and intentional training that you have mapped out above.

Finally, every new employee start kit should include some sort of engaging handbook that employees can refer to answering the most basic questions like contact lists, and overall employee related questions (payroll cycles, vacation, dress, conduct, etc.)

Regardless of the specific elements in your new employee starter kit, just having something built and delivered that shows forethought and intentionality in line with the mission of the business takes you miles down the road towards a successful startup with your new team member.

This summer, we have had multiple business owner clients physically leave the location of their business for an extended period of time (anywhere from two to four weeks).  

Most of these are physical location businesses, and no, this is not a fantasy…it is real life.

For the most part, these owners are not spending the time away from their business simply sipping bubbly and eating bon bons.  Most are staying active through the duration of their time away, and in many cases working on their own business, or learning about the inner workings of another business they are visiting.

One owner traveled north for five hours and worked three days a week at another business that is in the same industry.  He simply called the owner up and asked to come work as an employee so he could watch and learn. 

The perspectives and takeaways were endless.  He would spend a few minutes each evening creating audio notes from his time each day.  No conference could equip him in the same way he was able to see it for himself. 

How did he create the margin to physically leave his business?  You can read and listen to the majority of our content to learn that.  The bigger question is, why?

Why did he leave his business and not spend every second of the time away just resting and relaxing?

Most business owners are drivers, and most drivers rarely find replenishment from “doing nothing”... their mind never stops.

Instead, owners are now making a decision to leave their physical location for extended periods of time, and making a plan beforehand with how they will allocate their time in a rhythm of rest, intentionality, learning, and work.

While away, many of these business owners would still check in on elements of their business, but only during pre-determined times.

But why?

First, when you are physically taking a break from the all-in, day-to-day grind of your business, then you are forcing yourself to see things from a different perspective.

I have also been physically away from the central location of our business for three weeks.  Two of those weeks were committed to working both in (some) and on (some) of the business, and one of those weeks was committed to absolutely zero communication around our business.

While hiking trails in the morning, or biking town streets in the evenings that are unfamiliar to me, it is forcing my mind to bend differently around many of the same issues that I was only able to see from one angle.

The second reason you should make time to take a break from the day-in-day-out grind of your business is what it does for your small team.

You have team members that are silently looking for an opportunity to grow, to lead, and to develop.  Contrary to the bitter generational sentiment, there are many young professionals, leaders, and line workers who are waiting to be asked… to be invited into greater responsibility. 

They cannot (err will not) step up if they believe they will be stepping on your toes.  No matter how non-intimidating you think you are; your team will usually have great internal respect for your role, and you will not see them “step up” until you are willing to step out for a small period of time.  

Finally, you should plan to take a break from your business for a defined period of time because it will force you to prepare for that time away.  In order for your team to assume responsibility in your distance, they will need to embrace the vision, mission, and values of the business.  They will need to be equipped w/ the systems, processes, and methods to bake that cake, stack that crate, pack that bait, or quote that rate.  

When others are working IN the business, it allows you to leverage your narrow brilliance, that part of the business you truly enjoy while the team runs the day to day.

You will never fully know if your team is ready to own the day-to-day, if you are unwilling to leave the day-to-day… if only for a few days, a few weeks, or a few months.  

Start preparing now, set a date, communicate, prepare… and go see your world from a different trail.

I’ve sat down with a few businesses recently for introductions and after chatting for 30 min or so, they have each said something along the lines of, “man this sounds awesome! I’d love to get through this busy summer and start up with y’all in the fall.” That’s great, so what’s going to be different in the fall? If you can’t make the time right now, what happens in the fall where things magically slow down?

So, this raises the question…”When is the right time to work on your business?”

That conversation has probably happened 25 times. And I’m being more direct than I probably would be with them, but the truth is right there. Nothing changes in the future. Life doesn’t magically slow down and give you this green light to finally work on your business.

At least not with any of the businesses we work with. It’s fought for and scheduled and followed religiously until it becomes ingrained into the fabric of your business. You know, just like I do, that your business doesn’t care if you have a vacation planned or were hoping for a date night with your spouse. Nope…it slings chaos at you just as frequently as the sun rises in the east every morning. 

So…how do we find the time to make all this work? Because what we ask Business on Purpose clients to work through is DEFINITELY work! In fact, we ask for 2-3 hours a week of “work on your business time” every single week.

There are ones that limp along for a bit, and then there’s one where it looks like they are in the fast and the furious movies as they just fly through our roadmap and see change in just a few short months. So what’s the difference between the two?

Well, we asked our clients that question. And here were their top 3 answers.

1. Schedule time every week and don’t allow anything to invade that time.

I know it seems overly simple, but putting it on your schedule every week, letting your team know that you’re diving into work that ONLY you, the business owner, can do, is a game changer. Then shutting out email, texts, calls, interruptions of any kind so that you protect that time and can do valuable deep work! That’s what moves the needle.

2. Stop making excuses for why you can’t find the time. 

This may come across as harsh and it’s not meant to. I’m guilty of this, too, as we all love excuses! I’m too tired, we were gone all weekend, my kids are too young, my kids are about to leave the nest and we don’t have much time left with them, I have too much work right now, I don’t have enough work right now, we have the wrong employees, we just aren’t ready yet…trust me we’ve heard them all! 

What we heard from our clients is that the day we stop making excuses is the first step towards freedom from the chaos. Because you take charge of owning your business and start moving the right direction. There’s no way to get rid of legitimate excuses, but you can stop them from preventing you from moving forward.

3. Follow the plan.

Early on in coaching, most people fight certain things we tell them. Whether it’s team meetings that they’ve tried and failed at before, or opening up multiple bank accounts, or delegating responsibility for things to employees that you don’t know quite how it will turn out. And yet we have taken hundreds of businesses through our Roadmap and everyone that has committed to all of it. Not a la carte pieces of it, but the system as a whole has come out the other side free from the chaos. 

But it takes trust and commitment. Each of them, looking back, wished they had stopped fighting it and gone with it, trusting the plan. Now, hindsight is 20/20. We all look back and wish we had done things differently, but once people commit to the plan and gain momentum there’s no looking back.

So…what changes for you this fall, or in 2023? What’s holding you back from working on your business this week, today…shoot right now!?! If you ever expect anything to change you have to schedule the time, stop making excuses, and follow the plan.

And as always, we’re here to help! It’s what we do best…liberating business owner’s from chaos. A plan to walk alongside you the whole way!

If you’d like to see how your business stacks up on the things that we value, take a few minutes to take our healthy business owner assessment at boproadmap.com/healthy.

Hope we can touch base soon!

Today I want to talk about something that holds businesses back more than anything else. Continual learning and implementation.

Thanks so much for listening in today, Thomas Joyner with Business on Purpose here.

One of our core values here at BOP is learn and implement. We want every conversation with business owners, every coaching meeting, and shoot every time we show up to work to be a learning experience. Relentless and never-ending. We never just want to step back and look at our content, our roadmap, and think…man it’s perfect!

Because the business world is always changing. It morphs and moves and the climate it operates in changes. We have to be willing to learn and adapt and change with it. Now, we don’t want to change the core of who we are, but operationally and strategically we can be out in front as we respond to all of that change.

But here’s the thing, we don’t just want to learn. We want to adapt and implement that learning into our every day. It’s next step that so many businesses fail to do today. And that, specifically, is what I want to talk about today.

When we see businesses stall, or plateau…9 times out of 10 it’s because this thought has entered their mind and not been kicked out like a kid acting out in class. They will think… well, that’s just the way it is and I don’t ever see it changing. They have waved the white flag on whatever their problem with and growth cannot happen in that vacuum.

You see it’s that fixed mindset, we seem to have talked about that a million times, that holds business owners and their teams back.

I was working with someone the other day and here’s what they said…that schedule has always been chaos. And we don’t see that changing anytime soon. We’ve done this for 30+ years and it’s always chaos.

So here’s where I pushed back. If you believe it’s going to be chaos, then you’ve already given your consent to your team that it SHOULD be chaotic…and that’s a problem. What part of the process do we have control over?

Well, a lot of it. The business owner said.

Great! Let’s start there and work backwards.

So we built out a 12-week plan to get better at the things they control. We wrote out every step of their process with dates that corresponded. Even invited several of their team members into the process to make sure that the next time they walk through this…it may still have some components of chaos, but at least they will own the parts they can control.

That’s game-changing business ownership. Understanding what you control, and even if 100 times over you fail, taking what you’ve learned, growing from it, and implementing it into a new process that can lead your team to a more efficient and enjoyable experience. 

It’s why we get out of bed every morning at BoP…to liberate you from that chaos!

So…where have you thrown your hands up in your business and just said, it will never change? Where have you just gotten so frustrated and stopped learning, have made the choice to crack the door and make chaos normal. You cannot tolerate it or it will spread every which way in your business and hold you back from growth.

So today, take the time to think through it. Then, do something about it! Put a plan in place. Figure out who needs to be in the room, discuss what you can control in the process, and become experts at the things you control. Shoot, maybe it’s inviting other businesses who are a part of it too, and ironing out a process together. 

Because newsflash, eliminating chaos helps them too!!! I can promise you if you can take a step back to provide yourself with some margin, it is never the wrong thing to do. It will help in all areas of your business!

And here’s the last thing…if we can help, please reach out. It’s our specialty! Walking along business owner’s to figure this stuff out. Because it helps you make time for what matters most in your life. Not just putting out fires, but family and building your team and not having a heart attack! And maybe finally running your business instead of your business running you.

Hope that makes sense today! Have a great one.

It’s mid-July…back to school is beginning to rumble in the not too distant future, employees are restless and it’s time to begin preparing for another season of structure as the fall rapidly approaches. Hey everyone, Thomas Joyner with Business on Purpose here. So, what do you need to be doing to get ready for that? How can you truly kick it off with a bang and get your team operating at full capacity again? 

Well, I’ve got 3 things you can do TODAY to prepare for the fall.

I don’t want to waste any time, so let’s dive straight in.

1. Take an inventory of where your team is at?

When was the last time you scheduled a meeting with yourself to do a self-audit? Are you struggling with motivation? With lack of training? Do you have the right people in the wrong seats on the bus or the wrong people on the bus entirely? Are there glaring holes or areas where your process is severely lacking? 

I wouldn’t blame you no matter what the answer. But you can’t figure out a plan to get where you want to go without having a sobering conversation of the state of your business. Here’s what I’ll tell you. Be brutally honest. Not negative and debby downer, but honest. Those are two very different things. Negativity keeps you from seeing hope and solutions, while honesty shows your flaws and leaves room for solutions! Lean in on honesty

Walk through your Vision, your mission, your job roles and org chart, your core values. Look at your schedule to see if any changes need to be made. Look at vendor relations and any headaches with team members that have been consistent…hopefully, you’ve kept good notes in your employee check-ins! Take a quick pulse check on your culture…what are you known for internally and externally?

Once you have a great idea of the things that need fixing it’s time for step 2.

2. Build out a team day for early fall and get it on the calendar

What problems came back time and time again. Do you need to walk through processes by department and retrain on all of them? Does your team need more structure and accountability? Do they just need to laugh and play together and enjoy some good food together after a long summer of grinding it out? Do you need to redraw job roles and share lines of responsibility? Are there new people on the team that need to hear you read through your vision story and your mission statement to explain where you’re going and why you’re going there? Do you need to remind them of your core values and what truly separates you and the standard the team will be held to?

Maybe it’s just a time to thank them and celebrate and truly build a culture of gratitude…I don’t know. But so often we try to address all of this stuff in an hour meeting when the phone is ringing and to-do lists are out of control. But everyone’s attention is on their job and not on the meeting…so get your team away. It doesn’t have to be at a resort. It can be at a bowling alley, at a putt-putt course, one of your homes, anywhere! But create a time to refresh your team and address anything that came up in your self-audit.

It all starts with building it out and putting it on the calendar!

That brings us to our last thing to do today…

3. Build in structure of accountability

So often this stuff fades quickly because we never revisit it. We have to build new systems to support these areas that need help. If it’s something like Core Values, start talking about it every week at team meetings. Where did we see someone live out our core values? And have a small prize like a gift card or silly award. If it’s new processes, set up a follow-up meeting once a month to talk through any hiccups or areas to improve it. If it’s moving job roles around, have check-ins once a week to offer support and make sure the team is living in the new roles effectively and not drowning!

We want to take the easy way out and just act like by us leaving work for a few hours, playing together, and discussing things that matter is really going to create lasting change, but it’s only the starting point. If we don’t revisit and create repetition and a predictable system to live within, our team just goes back to their same old habits and nothing changes.

Address it, coach it, provide the system to live within, and then watch it come to action.

So, if you’re like almost every business we work with, your team is tired and dragging trying to finish the summer. It’s time for a reset.

Schedule some time for a self-audit today, build a team day around the things that are found out in your self-audit and then build in structure and accountability to keep things moving the right direction.

You can’t solve every problem today, but you can start building the framework to fix a handful of them this fall. Hope that makes sense and hope you truly will schedule the time for this work this week. Have a great day!