90: Good to Great by Jim Collins

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1. 00:00:00 So a lot has happened in the last two weeks since we recorded and now maybe the perfect time if there ever was such a time to check in on your action item Joe of paying attention and slowing down.
2. 00:00:14 How's that going?
3. 00:00:15 Not well at all.
4. 00:00:17 Like I have had a lot of people say or ask lately like oh well with everything walking down with the virus going around and such.
5. 00:00:27 Obviously you have more time for things so can you help me with?
6. 00:00:31 No, no in fact not.
7. 00:00:32 I'm working about 60 hours a week right now because in our church what we've done is we've shifted from doing live events you know in person to a media church that needs to produce videos and do live streams online and I'm busy super super busy.
8. 00:00:52 Lots going on.
9. 00:00:53 I definitely understand that I mean our church is not as big as yours we don't have all the technology stuff that you have but also I spent the first week after the everything basically shut down helping to rebuild the church website.
10. 00:01:11 So fun.
11. 00:01:13 So we have a Facebook live which our pastors will use occasionally that's embedded right on the front page and it's all built using Squarespace which was amazing because now someone on staff can maintain it without me having to do everything you know I'll still jump in and help with things.
12. 00:01:29 We created a page where people can submit pre-request it goes to a Google sheet.
13. 00:01:33 Also it's a cool stuff like that that you can do really easily with Squarespace and I can only imagine that on a larger scale with all of the fancy stuff that you guys do because I've seen some of the tools that you use and was pretty impressed with your setup and trying to recreate that virtually I'm sure is quite a challenge.
14. 00:01:55 Well yeah and when the first time we did it they decided that they were going to close our doors at 730 on a Friday night.
15. 00:02:03 So I had one day to build the whole infrastructure for live streaming because we don't live stream on a normal Sunday we have the video equipment to do it but we don't have the actual network side of it nailed down so yes I've been very busy turning all that put together.
16. 00:02:22 But I've told a few folks like well at least I get to learn a new piece of technology in a new world of producing video like that's all whole realm I was somewhat aware of but not in depth and I'm being forced to learn it down to variable bit rate levels.
17. 00:02:42 So here we are.
18. 00:02:44 For real bit rate that sounds complicated.
19. 00:02:50 Messy and causes audio drift.
20. 00:02:54 Alright well I don't know what would she just move on from this action item do you want to try and pay attention slow down now that things are maybe some systems are established or is this just put this on the back burner while we figure out a new normal.
21. 00:03:11 Right now I think it's I need to just get stuff done because I'm not going to be able to slow down at least for a couple more weeks.
22. 00:03:19 I know that and that's primarily because I you know people who have been live streaming for a long time know that the fine details of getting you know everything running smoothly it's not simple so I think I've spent close to 18 hours with just
23. 00:03:40 test live streams up just exploring how to get that to run correctly.
24. 00:03:45 And that's and we still have a long ways to go with it so sure.
25. 00:03:50 Yeah I don't expect me to slow down as much as I would like though I'm being told to slow down by a few folks already because they're realizing how much I'm working so I get it I do but it's one of these scenarios where me pushing myself to this point allows
26. 00:04:09 seemingly around through what is it we can't get somewhere around a thousand people to stay home on a Sunday morning so if I bust my tail I can produce something for a thousand people plus every week.
27. 00:04:24 So that's that's what I'm willing to do right now I know that whenever this is all over I'll be getting some extra paid time off.
28. 00:04:33 So there's there's that side of it as well so the church isn't you know naive in all of this I'm kind of the core person holding a lot of things together there so sure not a thing I'm excited about but my popularity has gone up significantly since all this happened.
29. 00:04:49 Joe's kind of a big deal and I'm not thrilled about it.
30. 00:04:54 What you got to do is you got to grab Becky you got to grab the girls and just get a motorcycle and drive.
31. 00:05:01 Yeah well we on one motorcycle.
32. 00:05:05 This is going to go well.
33. 00:05:08 So as far as the action goes we should probably leave it on.
34. 00:05:12 We'll keep coming back to it I think over the next few weeks but I don't expect at least the next time we record to have much for positive progress on this one Mike.
35. 00:05:21 Alright fair enough you ready to jump into today's book.
36. 00:05:26 Sure.
37. 00:05:27 Alright this is one that has been around for a little while you and I each had multiple copies of it but had not read it yet.
38. 00:05:37 Correct I had to and that is good to great by Jim Collins.
39. 00:05:42 I had heard some of the concepts in this book of cropped up in other books that we've covered over and over again.
40. 00:05:52 I feel like I've there was nothing in here that was completely new when I saw the name of it although I knew it in name only I didn't understand a lot of the concepts as he defined him in here.
41. 00:06:02 It's actually the result of a study that they did with I think 21 different people they said worked on it and they looked at all these companies that made the leap from being just good companies to great companies where they significantly outperformed the markets for a sustainable period of time like 15 years
42. 00:06:22 regardless of what the industry was doing so if the industry was showing those same kind of returns then that company could not be used.
43. 00:06:29 They had to basically outpace the market by an exponential margin and there were 11 companies that they looked at there was Abbott Circuit City, Fannie Mae, Gillette, Kimberly Clark Kroger, New Corps, Philip Morris, Pitney Bose, Walgreens and Wells Fargo which is kind of interesting because this book was written a while ago
44. 00:06:49 and since this book was written there have been maybe some leadership changes in some of these companies and some of these are like Circuit City's not even around anymore which is kind of interesting.
45. 00:06:58 Right, right.
46. 00:06:59 But I think that the results of the studies that they did and the findings that they got from this are still valid and I want to kind of unpack some of this.
47. 00:07:11 Anything else you want to add just about the book in general before we dive into some of the specifics?
48. 00:07:16 I do think it's interesting that they in the midst of going through the studies and looking into these companies.
49. 00:07:24 You're right in that some of these companies have faltered since it was written in 2001.
50. 00:07:31 That's when it was released.
51. 00:07:32 So the study was done from what is that?
52. 00:07:36 1996 to 2000?
53. 00:07:38 No, it would have been 95 to 2000 and then they wrote the book.
54. 00:07:42 So the study looked at these companies but if you look at Wells Fargo or the good one is Circuit City, leadership changes and then they didn't follow through and adapt to the changes of the economy at large.
55. 00:08:00 So they did fall away.
56. 00:08:02 Just because you go through this process of becoming a great company as he spells it out here doesn't mean you're guaranteed to stay there.
57. 00:08:11 I think that's an important point to lay out before we start here.
58. 00:08:14 This isn't a silver bullet that just solves all the problems.
59. 00:08:19 You still have to work at it to stay there.
60. 00:08:22 Don't forget that.
61. 00:08:24 Definitely and I think it would be interesting to hear their perspective if you were to dissect what happened with Circuit City or Wells Fargo.
62. 00:08:34 I'm sure that there are some cases where they did just abandon the principles that they talked about in this book.
63. 00:08:40 But I wonder if there are any exceptions to that.
64. 00:08:43 If there was something that maybe changed over what they presented in this book in 2001.
65. 00:08:52 I didn't do any additional research into this so I can't tell you if Circuit City had a leadership change or if they just tried to hold on to a model that wasn't really sustainable anymore in the future.
66. 00:09:06 They kind of make a point later on about technology and how it really doesn't make or break anything.
67. 00:09:14 It's kind of an accelerator momentum.
68. 00:09:16 It's not a creator.
69. 00:09:17 I wonder if there are exceptions to that.
70. 00:09:19 Sure.
71. 00:09:20 It would be interesting to get Jim Collins' take on that, I think.
72. 00:09:24 For sure.
73. 00:09:25 But we're not going to do that today.
74. 00:09:26 We're just going to talk about the results of the study here and we'll start in chapter one which is good as the enemy of great.
75. 00:09:32 This is kind of an introductory chapter where they lay out the process that they used.
76. 00:09:39 They had four different phases that they went through.
77. 00:09:42 They talked about how they had a staff of people that were working on this.
78. 00:09:46 They identified the 11 good to great cases which I mentioned earlier.
79. 00:09:50 The criteria for being a good to great company and the one thing that really stands out to me from this chapter.
80. 00:09:58 I think it's really important for all Bookworm listeners.
81. 00:10:02 Even if you have no interest in a business book like this is on page 16.
82. 00:10:07 They say that good is the enemy of great is not just a business problem.
83. 00:10:11 It is a human problem.
84. 00:10:13 I agree with that.
85. 00:10:16 I think that is important context for the rest of the book as you consider all of the different things that he talks about in here.
86. 00:10:23 There's a personal application to this as well as a business application.
87. 00:10:27 Yeah, absolutely.
88. 00:10:28 I know at least one of the last stories of the book he talks about a track team that is applying these concepts.
89. 00:10:35 It doesn't have to be in business.
90. 00:10:37 We're going to talk business probably the entire episode here.
91. 00:10:41 It doesn't necessarily have to be that way.
92. 00:10:44 There's a cool diagram that they have in here too where they lay out the rest of the chapters in the method basically that they are going to talk about.
93. 00:10:57 From left to right they talk about level 5 leadership first two then what confront the brutal facts.
94. 00:11:04 That's got a line above it which it says build up and then it kind of angles upward like one of those charts that you might see in an economics class and then it talks about the hedgehog concept, the culture of discipline and the technology accelerators.
95. 00:11:18 That upward arrow pointing is saying breakthrough and then there's this thing behind it which is kind of a circle with arrows indicating that it's turning clockwise and that's the flywheel.
96. 00:11:29 The basic gist of this if I were to try to summarize this entire book into this one diagram which I am describing via audio and you can't actually see.
97. 00:11:38 Well done sir.
98. 00:11:40 You lay the foundation for the successful company and you're not looking at external factors.
99. 00:11:49 You're looking at the internal stuff making sure that you have the right people in the right positions doing the right things and then you get some momentum and kind of like an airplane.
100. 00:11:58 That's when you leave the ground and then you keep doing those things over and over again.
101. 00:12:03 That builds momentum like this flywheel and then once that thing gets going it's easier to keep it turning.
102. 00:12:09 And I think if you look at this first chapter good is the enemy of great.
103. 00:12:16 I think what he's getting at in this section is if you have something he's like oh that's pretty good.
104. 00:12:22 That's often times the thought process that will prevent you from pushing to make it even better because it's good enough.
105. 00:12:31 And I think that's the main takeaway here but I think what you're getting at is this is the whole cycle of how you can do this but it does have the chart and such that I do think it's easy for us to fall into the trap of it's good enough
106. 00:12:48 and then just let it lie. Maybe that's human nature, don't know but a lot of these great companies that they refer to in these studies they were good companies but they were willing to ask some hard questions and make them even better.
107. 00:13:04 That's I think the key takeaway here.
108. 00:13:06 Agreed.
109. 00:13:07 Alright so let's get into the actual content of the book then here which chapter two and this is the first part of this good to great method system.
110. 00:13:17 Whatever.
111. 00:13:18 It's not really a system I don't think because the mechanics of it are going to be very different although maybe you could make that argument because there is kind of like a formula that you follow and there's additional resources by the way with this book that you can download.
112. 00:13:31 Key questions to ask as you would try to apply this to your company if you wanted to do that.
113. 00:13:37 But chapter two level five leadership this talks about the five different levels of a leader as he describes them.
114. 00:13:46 Real briefly level one is a highly capable individual.
115. 00:13:50 Level two is a contributing team member.
116. 00:13:53 Level three is a competent manager.
117. 00:13:55 Level four is an effective leader and level five is a level five executive and the definition here.
118. 00:14:02 They build enduring greatness through a paradoxical blend of personal humility and professional will.
119. 00:14:10 A level five leader they say cares more about the team success than individual success and some of the words that they use to describe level five leaders are words like quiet humble modest reserve shy gracious mild mannered understated.
120. 00:14:24 And they said that this was a common thread in a lot of the actually in all of the good to great companies that they looked at and at first they kind of discounted it because how could this great company be built by one person they kind of wanted to get away from that.
121. 00:14:41 But they saw that the leader of the organization really does have an impact here and they saw some stark differences between the comparison companies and the good to great companies.
122. 00:14:50 In a lot of the comparison companies there's a statistic that they share here which kind of blew my mind many leaders 75% in the comparison companies that they looked at chose weak successors set their successor up for failure or did both.
123. 00:15:06 And that kind of shocked me when I read that because I was thinking who in their right mind would choose to do something like that.
124. 00:15:13 And the point that they're kind of making I think here is that if you are so egotistical if you are a level four leader but you care about yourself getting the accolades and making your name great instead of the organization and pulling everybody up with you then that's the
125. 00:15:35 stark difference there.
126. 00:15:37 I cannot help but think back to corporate days when I look at this section and okay great leaders level five leaders have XY and Z qualities like oh that would have been amazing.
127. 00:15:51 That's always my thought when I go through stuff like this.
128. 00:15:55 That would have been amazing leader to have above me but most cases it's you know I think I've been under maybe a couple of what they would term level four leaders who you know they do a good job but they don't.
129. 00:16:10 They're not quite all the way there maybe they're not humble they're not willing to you know credit someone else for a job well done but I've been under some great leaders but I don't think anyone that's been at this level here.
130. 00:16:26 And I really wish I could have just so I had a little more experience with that because whenever you read the stories of people who and the CEOs and such that we're leaders at this at this scale.
131. 00:16:40 Like it's kind of inspiring like they have a ton of people that show up if they happen to have passed by this point.
132. 00:16:48 So they have a ton of people around them that people love working for them.
133. 00:16:53 You know the list can go on and on all the attributes you would think of when you think of someone who does a great job leading a company or a team.
134. 00:17:01 Describe that to a level five leader basically.
135. 00:17:04 So yes I can see that this is something that I could find very exciting to work under someone like this but I don't feel like there's a lot of people who do.
136. 00:17:17 Is that fair?
137. 00:17:19 I don't know if it's fair or not but I think your situation and your experience with this is probably not uncommon.
138. 00:17:29 When I read this section I tried to think of the different leaders that I have been around or been under and I don't even want to try to guess who was a level five leader and who wasn't.
139. 00:17:44 The takeaway for me when I read this is purely inspirational to become a level five leader myself.
140. 00:17:52 And I don't know if I can do that.
141. 00:17:55 They do make the point later on in this chapter about the two kinds of people.
142. 00:17:59 Those who have a level five leadership seed and can become level five leaders and those who don't.
143. 00:18:05 And I think maybe the difference there is simply the perspective that people have towards themselves and it's probably tied to a growth mindset.
144. 00:18:13 Because I don't think anybody is born a level five leader but you have the ability to become one.
145. 00:18:20 I would argue probably anybody who's listening to bookworm to better themselves because of the types of books that we typically cover here is going to be in that first group where they have that seed and they have the potential to become the level five leaders simply because they kind of want to.
146. 00:18:37 So you can decide at any point, "Yeah, this is really important to me and I want to invest more in this and that probably means that you can achieve it."
147. 00:18:44 But one of the things that a level five leader does is they care fanatically about the organization.
148. 00:18:52 And there's a story in here which really kind of jumped out to me about George Kane in Abbott Laboratories because it was a family business.
149. 00:19:01 I've worked in a family business and they had in this business family members on the board and in executive positions and he basically just cleaned house, fired everybody and sought out the best people that he could for all of those roles.
150. 00:19:20 When I read that story I understood how difficult that would have been.
151. 00:19:27 That really impacted me not saying that that's what all family businesses should do but when you have to make the tough calls about the organization versus your personal relationships, this is why you just in my opinion don't mix those as often as you can avoid mixing those two.
152. 00:19:48 Because then you remove the personal feelings out of a lot of this stuff.
153. 00:19:54 And I know it's not completely true.
154. 00:19:56 You do care about the people that you work with, whether they're family members or not, but if you have to fire your brother or your sister from the family business, that changes Thanksgiving and Christmas considerably.
155. 00:20:10 And David made the comments about that in this book and believing in the good of the company so much that you're willing to deal with that conflict.
156. 00:20:23 I guess that's the thing that kind of speaks to me is I tend to avoid conflict whenever possible.
157. 00:20:29 And just recognizing that this is something that needs to be done is going to bring the conflict but knowing that the end result is going to be worth it, that's gutsy.
158. 00:20:41 Yeah, I could see how if you're in a family business like that gets difficult, but it's also super important to make sure if you're going to lead a company to this level, to becoming a great company that fits into their incredibly challenging
159. 00:20:45 criteria, what was it 11? We're the only ones that they found that met the criteria.
160. 00:20:52 You're forced to make sure you have the right people in that group. You can't just say, you know, let's just run with what's going on.
161. 00:21:02 It'll work out. That's not true. You're going to be forced into finding the right people for those roles.
162. 00:21:09 What was the company where they would find good people and just hire them whether they had a job for them or not?
163. 00:21:28 That's part of the problem with this particular book is there's so many stories. I have no idea what company that was.
164. 00:21:34 I thought that was Wells Fargo at one point in this book.
165. 00:21:37 Maybe. I'll go with Wells. I'm good with that. So, you know, if they found great people, they'd hire them and then find a job for them to do.
166. 00:21:46 They focused on finding the right people and then later on they had scenarios where their competitor Bank of America.
167. 00:21:54 Bank of America was starting to adopt some of that mentality of hiring good people.
168. 00:22:01 They had so many people coming from Wells Fargo over to Bank of America. They had a team that they started to refer to as Wells of America.
169. 00:22:10 So, yeah, it happens. Find good people. Then the rest of it takes care of itself.
170. 00:22:15 Yeah, that story actually is in the next chapter. So, that's a great spot to jump to chapter three. That's okay.
171. 00:22:22 So, chapter three is first two then what? And I was actually thinking that same thing though because the whole point of chapter three is that you first need to get the right people on the bus and then you can decide where to drive it.
172. 00:22:34 And with a family business, the tendencies is say, these are the people that we got can't do anything with them because they're family.
173. 00:22:41 What can we do with this group? Where can we go with this? Yeah. You can do dinner.
174. 00:22:46 And I don't like that approach. I think that there is a possibility that family members could be the right people on the bus.
175. 00:22:56 I want to call that out too. It's not. They're not inherently at odds there.
176. 00:23:01 But you need to make sure that the people that are on the bus are the right people.
177. 00:23:06 And that's where Wells Fargo and Dick Cooley was the CEO. That's where they started talking about injecting an endless stream of talent.
178. 00:23:14 And the model that they were following was the opposite of the Bank of America.
179. 00:23:21 And in the book, they call that weak general strong lieutenants. With the Bank of America model, the generals were the placeholders.
180. 00:23:28 They believed competent lieutenants would replace them over time. But like you shared, it didn't actually happen.
181. 00:23:33 They had to hire strong generals to turn the company around. And they hired them from Wells Fargo because Wells Fargo was trying to pick the very best people that they could.
182. 00:23:41 Getting back to the right people on the bus, though, I like this analogy a lot. And this is one of those things that I've heard people drop in conversations over and over again.
183. 00:23:50 I'm like, oh, yeah, I understand that. No, I don't really understand it. At least I understand it a lot better now.
184. 00:23:56 Because it makes sense when you just hear somebody talk about it. Well, yeah, you got to have the right people to do the right jobs.
185. 00:24:05 But I think understanding that and implementing it are two very different things. And you can say, oh, yeah, that's what we do.
186. 00:24:11 And then you take a closer look at what you do comparing it to what Jim Collins talks about in this book.
187. 00:24:16 And you're like, that's not what we do. We need to fix some things.
188. 00:24:21 The description of what it looks like when you get the right people on the bus, I thought was pretty cool.
189. 00:24:28 He says, if people are on the bus because of the other people on the bus, you can change directions more easily.
190. 00:24:37 Basically, when you have the right people, when you begin with who instead of what you can adapt.
191. 00:24:42 The right people, he says, don't have to be tightly managed with the wrong people.
192. 00:24:48 He also says, it doesn't even matter if you pick the right direction. You still won't have a great company.
193. 00:24:54 Whereas if you just get the right people, they can kind of figure out the right direction to go.
194. 00:25:00 Which is an interesting idea. And one of those things that everybody, like I said, probably agrees with in concept,
195. 00:25:08 but how do you actually walk that out? It's a lot more difficult.
196. 00:25:11 For sure. I think it's an interesting way. This is an interesting chapter to me.
197. 00:25:17 If I contrast what they're doing in these bigger companies with where I work at the church,
198. 00:25:26 because in most nonprofits, you're looking for volunteers. Who will do this job?
199. 00:25:34 And it's rare that you get to say yes or no to those people.
200. 00:25:41 It's about finding bodies that are willing to do the job and that have a passion there,
201. 00:25:48 as opposed to, are you the right person for this?
202. 00:25:52 It's just so different. You can't really do. I shouldn't say you can't do that.
203. 00:25:57 You can, but you're going to end up doing a lot of things on your own, it seems.
204. 00:26:01 And you'll have a lot more on your plate. This is especially true to me right now,
205. 00:26:06 given how much I rely on a small group of people to do a fantastic job every week to put on a,
206. 00:26:15 what is basically a live TV production. That's what we're doing.
207. 00:26:19 So I need some core members who are great at their jobs.
208. 00:26:23 But in most cases, what has happened is these are people that I have been working with for two or three years.
209. 00:26:30 And they are willing to learn and do better at their individual roles.
210. 00:26:36 So it's kind of this weird trying to help people become better so that they become the right person,
211. 00:26:43 as opposed to finding the right person at the beginning.
212. 00:26:46 I don't feel like he addressed that particular topic of what happens if you find someone who has the potential to be the right person,
213. 00:26:56 but then put the time in to build them up into that role,
214. 00:27:00 as opposed to just finding someone who's already there.
215. 00:27:03 So I feel like he just kind of skimmed over that and didn't really cover it, which is fine.
216. 00:27:10 I don't think that was his point. I think his point was that they were willing to find the right people,
217. 00:27:17 but their process that specifically helped them do that, he didn't really explain, I don't think.
218. 00:27:24 Yeah, there's a couple things there. Number one, most businesses do not function like churches where you...
219. 00:27:35 Really?
220. 00:27:36 Interesting.
221. 00:27:37 I shouldn't say that because a church is a business in many ways,
222. 00:27:41 but the whole concept of a lot of churches is that all are welcome here.
223. 00:27:46 So you don't get to say, sorry, there's no room for you on this bus.
224. 00:27:52 At least, generally speaking, but also I think that one thing he talked about in here in the "How to be rigorous" section
225. 00:28:04 with the practical disciplines is that it can take time to know whether someone is in the wrong seat or whether they need to get off the bus.
226. 00:28:10 And if I were to think about how to apply this to a church context, the ministry context, we were working with volunteers,
227. 00:28:18 it would be to say, you don't know who's going to... Like you said, you don't know who's going to grow to the point where they are,
228. 00:28:25 the appropriate person for a specific job. But there are other positions underneath the head of sound and live streaming
229. 00:28:34 that you can put people in and they can kind of test things.
230. 00:28:38 Smaller responsibilities, and you can kind of see who embraces the challenge and who flourishes and who's not ready yet.
231. 00:28:47 You're not going to give them more to do, you're going to give that to people who can actually handle it,
232. 00:28:53 and you can trust that they're going to follow through with it.
233. 00:28:56 And then those are the people who, with their diligence and their excellence, are going to...
234. 00:29:02 I don't want to say I send the ranks, but they're going to be assigned the bigger stuff, they're going to be assigned the more important stuff.
235. 00:29:08 And again, in a church context, not even necessarily that they're being paid for these things yet, because a lot of the stuff, for example,
236. 00:29:14 in my church, people don't get paid for because it's a smaller church. It's primarily volunteers.
237. 00:29:20 But you've got to prove yourself faithful in specific instances.
238. 00:29:23 And I think in a business context, he would probably say, just don't hire anybody who isn't ready,
239. 00:29:30 because you don't want to invest time and resources in trying to get people to the point where they can do the job that you hired them for,
240. 00:29:37 only to find out that 50% of them are never going to cut it and you've got to let them go.
241. 00:29:43 He makes the point in here that good to great companies don't churn more, but they churn better.
242. 00:29:48 In other words, I would argue they churn smarter, and they're going to let go of the people who just aren't a fit at all,
243. 00:29:54 and they're going to totally invest in the people who are a great fit.
244. 00:29:58 And that brings up another point here with the compensation. I thought this was fascinating.
245. 00:30:02 He mentioned that compensation was no predictor of a great company because it's who you pay, not what you pay that really matters.
246. 00:30:09 The right people will do the right things and deliver the best results they're capable of,
247. 00:30:13 regardless of the incentive system he says on page 50.
248. 00:30:16 And the purpose of compensation should not be to get the right behaviors from the wrong people,
249. 00:30:21 but to get the right people on the bus in the first place and to keep them there.
250. 00:30:26 That's an interesting perspective when it comes to compensation, which in a business context typically means how much are you going to pay people,
251. 00:30:33 what sort of bonuses you're going to give, and that sort of thing.
252. 00:30:39 All the extra stuff, you pay for my co-working membership, all that type of stuff.
253. 00:30:44 I think a lot of those things that I see in a lot of startup companies where they'll pay for the gym membership,
254. 00:30:50 and they'll pay for this, that and the other thing, that is naturally attractive to maybe the wrong people.
255. 00:30:57 Those maybe aren't the people that you want on the bus because they're there for the benefits and not because they are completely in a line with the company mission and vision,
256. 00:31:08 which we'll talk about a little bit later. What's your perspective on that?
257. 00:31:13 Yeah, I think there's...
258. 00:31:15 I think you're right. There is a lot of difference between what people are seeing in the business world versus the nonprofit world.
259. 00:31:24 I don't know that I have really anything different to say on that, Mike, but yeah, I think you're right.
260. 00:31:29 There is definitely a different perspective for sure. Is that what you were asking?
261. 00:31:34 I guess what I was asking was, what did you think about the... 'cause you mentioned you were worked corporate,
262. 00:31:42 and I'm sure your corporate position, in addition to maybe paying well, had a bunch of extra stuff with it.
263. 00:31:49 And the compensation structure, as it was set up, do you feel that that helped attract the right people or the wrong people?
264. 00:31:59 'Cause my hypothesis is that maybe those types of things that you hear about, you're like, "Oh, that sounds awesome."
265. 00:32:04 Those actually attract the wrong people.
266. 00:32:07 My sense is that at least the corporations that I've worked around and with, the compensation structure had to continue going up
267. 00:32:18 if you were to switch companies. So if you wanted to attract somebody to a position, you had to improve based on what they had elsewhere.
268. 00:32:28 A good example of this is Sengenna, which was the main corporation that I've worked for in the past.
269. 00:32:34 They would frequently have people leave and go over to DePont Pioneer or Monsanto/Bayer.
270. 00:32:43 And then after two or three years, those people would come back. And then they would go back to DePont Pioneer/Bayer.
271. 00:32:49 And then they would come back. And they would do this back and forth dance. Not everybody, but a fair number of people would do that dance back and forth between companies
272. 00:32:58 because staying with one company didn't provide the same potential pay raises year over year.
273. 00:33:06 But if you swapped companies, they would increase your salary more. If you were being hired, then they would if you stayed.
274. 00:33:15 So I saw that quite a bit. But people didn't really seem to care a whole lot about specifically, like, did you pay me salary in a bonus?
275. 00:33:25 Did you pay me in extra benefits? Like that didn't seem to matter a whole lot. As long as it was a lot.
276. 00:33:31 That's the part that matters. Like pay me a lot. And then I'll stick around for a couple years. And when you don't give me the pay raises, I'll go somewhere else.
277. 00:33:38 That was my perspective.
278. 00:33:40 Yeah, and that's the thing I think is broken because if you're going to have somebody in a spot for only a couple of years and then you know they're going to leave
279. 00:33:48 and they're going to join a different team, a different organization, everything that you've invested in that person to do that job, all of the training, all of the
280. 00:33:56 things that you've been doing. And so I think that's the thing that I think is really important.
281. 00:34:02 Because I'm not going to be able to do that job really well, just instantly goes out the window.
282. 00:34:08 So if you know that these people are there just because I'm paying them a lot and at some point in the future, somebody else is going to pay them more.
283. 00:34:17 That seems like the wrong fit as he's describing it here, like the wrong people on the bus.
284. 00:34:22 So I'm kind of curious what the right method looks like. Maybe it's some sort of profit sharing where you really believe in the mission of the company that you're working for.
285. 00:34:33 And you're so invested in it, you want the company to succeed. So when the company succeeds, you're rewarded, that sort of thing.
286. 00:34:39 I don't really know. I don't think there probably is a formula to like this is the compensation structure that you should use.
287. 00:34:45 But I think that what I have typically seen would foster the wrong kind of behavior as he's describing it in this book.
288. 00:34:54 One thing I want to point out, whenever you're referring to like you've invested a lot in this person, why would you let them leave? That assumes that they're investing in those people.
289. 00:35:03 That is true.
290. 00:35:04 They don't necessarily.
291. 00:35:06 And in a lot of cases, it's more true that there is nothing being put into them.
292. 00:35:12 Whenever I did a contracting gig with Senjana earlier, I guess it's been a little over a year now, on day one, they didn't even have a computer for me.
293. 00:35:21 They let me borrow my boss's computer, set up a different user on it, and asked me to run a couple reports.
294. 00:35:28 I had been there for an hour, and they were asking for reports out of me on day one.
295. 00:35:33 So that's the way that they, I didn't even have access to anything.
296. 00:35:37 I spent my whole day trying to get usernames and passwords.
297. 00:35:40 That mentality of not building into people I think is more common than anything.
298. 00:35:47 So they're really not losing anything other than the person in the seat, and then they just got to replace the person in the seat.
299. 00:35:53 It's a mess.
300. 00:35:55 It's just not, it's not great.
301. 00:35:58 I know you love this, and this kind of gets your blood boiling, I'm sure.
302. 00:36:02 It does.
303. 00:36:03 But that's the way it is.
304. 00:36:06 That's just like.
305. 00:36:07 I am visibly angry if you could see my face right now.
306. 00:36:11 Yeah.
307. 00:36:12 Whenever I have, when I've left, when I've left corporate the couple times now, or I guess it's more than that if you count consulting scenarios, but whenever I leave, it's usually not a big deal.
308. 00:36:28 They're just used to it, it seems.
309. 00:36:31 At least that's been my experience.
310. 00:36:33 It just doesn't matter.
311. 00:36:34 Like, oh, okay.
312. 00:36:35 All right.
313. 00:36:36 Well, how much time do we have?
314. 00:36:37 Two weeks?
315. 00:36:38 Okay.
316. 00:36:39 All right.
317. 00:36:40 Thanks.
318. 00:36:41 Can you get us all your information?
319. 00:36:42 And then they're off to trying to find the next person.
320. 00:36:45 You're disposable.
321. 00:36:47 You just fill a role.
322. 00:36:49 Let us continue working.
323. 00:36:50 If you don't want to do it anymore, we'll find somebody else to do it.
324. 00:36:53 It's that simple.
325. 00:36:55 When you think of non-profit or small business, if somebody leaves, it's a big deal.
326. 00:37:01 Yeah.
327. 00:37:02 It matters a lot.
328. 00:37:05 In corporate scenarios, at least every scenario I've been around, they don't give a rip.
329. 00:37:11 Like, okay.
330. 00:37:12 Do you know somebody that could fill your role?
331. 00:37:14 I've been asked that in exit interviews.
332. 00:37:16 Do you know somebody that could do what you're doing?
333. 00:37:18 So I always say no, because there's usually a reason I'm leaving.
334. 00:37:22 I'm irreplaceable.
335. 00:37:24 Yeah.
336. 00:37:25 Yeah.
337. 00:37:26 We won't talk about my last scenario and how that was actually true.
338. 00:37:30 I had a problem.
339. 00:37:32 All right.
340. 00:37:33 Moving on.
341. 00:37:34 Yep.
342. 00:37:35 Yep.
343. 00:37:36 Okay.
344. 00:37:37 Chapter four is confront the brutal facts yet never lose faith.
345. 00:37:43 I liked this chapter a lot because it talked about not trying to paint a positive picture
346. 00:37:54 about where things could end up, but looking at where things actually are.
347. 00:38:02 And you have to look at the facts and the numbers for what they really are, what they're
348. 00:38:07 really telling you, not what you want them to say in order to make the right decisions.
349. 00:38:11 And he says in this section that breakthrough results come by a series of good decisions,
350. 00:38:16 diligently executed that are accumulated on top of one another.
351. 00:38:20 And good to great companies, they infuse their process with these brutal facts of reality.
352. 00:38:29 And I don't know.
353. 00:38:30 This is pretty simple, but I wonder how many companies actually do this.
354. 00:38:37 I feel like I don't have a ton of experience, but I've seen both sides of this where you
355. 00:38:43 can say you can kind of paint the rosy picture and oh, this is where things could end up.
356. 00:38:49 But if you are consistently not hitting those things consistently don't play out the way
357. 00:38:55 that you envision them, then maybe you're not looking at the picture, looking at the facts
358. 00:39:02 the right way.
359. 00:39:03 I feel like there's a lot of businesses probably that are kind of in denial when it comes to
360. 00:39:10 numbers and facts and they're kind of looking for the next big breakthrough.
361. 00:39:15 So all we got to do is find that one thing and then this thing breaks open.
362. 00:39:21 And Jim Collins would say no, don't do that.
363. 00:39:24 Look at where you are now and if your needs exceed your means, then you've got to dial
364. 00:39:30 things back in a lot of companies.
365. 00:39:31 They'll just refuse to do that.
366. 00:39:33 They'll just continue to try to find that thing that's going to take them to the next
367. 00:39:36 level and eventually maybe they're going to burn out because they don't find it.
368. 00:39:41 There's a lot of value in just recognizing this is where we are.
369. 00:39:45 And what can we control and do about it at this point in time?
370. 00:39:51 So can we do story time with Joe?
371. 00:39:53 I think this will be fun.
372. 00:39:54 At one point, this is not corporate, but I was working for a virtual agricultural marketing
373. 00:40:02 company.
374. 00:40:04 The core of the company was built around making phone calls to farmers, asking them
375. 00:40:13 about their farming operations or providing online, but phone conferences for them to
376. 00:40:21 call into and learn about new products.
377. 00:40:24 So it was two pieces.
378. 00:40:25 One, they would collect information from farmers and two, they would provide these informational
379. 00:40:31 conferences for them to learn about a company or a product.
380. 00:40:36 What we did as part of that was we were learning that phone conferences to learn about products
381. 00:40:43 in the world of agriculture was disappearing quickly because in the world of the internet
382. 00:40:50 and all the information available to you jumping on a phone conference for an hour to listen
383. 00:40:56 about a chemical, no, it's just not going to go very far.
384. 00:41:02 So our company put together an innovation team, as they called them.
385. 00:41:09 And the goal was to collect data.
386. 00:41:12 We were a data company primarily.
387. 00:41:14 It's like, that's how we figured out who to contact for what.
388. 00:41:18 We would take that data and then analyze it in a way to tell us what were farmers wanting,
389. 00:41:26 what were the methods by which they would learn what to do about their fields, like how are
390. 00:41:33 they gathering the information they need to make decisions on their farms.
391. 00:41:37 And when we did that, we ran across point after point after point that the younger farmers
392. 00:41:45 are taking over.
393. 00:41:47 And really what they want is a solid online resource to go to that was unbiased that they
394. 00:41:53 could get information about all the companies and products and then make decisions based
395. 00:41:59 on that and order based on that information.
396. 00:42:02 They wanted all of this in one place, but it had to be unbiased.
397. 00:42:06 That was always the kicker with that.
398. 00:42:09 We had a hard time showing any other result from the data that we were confronting.
399. 00:42:14 However, whenever this was presented to the board of directors and we continued to show
400. 00:42:19 like, this is where we need to go and then we even went as far as here's how we see this
401. 00:42:24 fits inside the vision of our company and how we can improve upon what we're offering
402. 00:42:30 given what we've learned.
403. 00:42:31 Almost every single board of directors shot it down because I learned this after I left
404. 00:42:38 the company, I shouldn't say after I left after they asked me to leave.
405. 00:42:44 They ended up having I think it was two thirds to three fourths of their board within the
406. 00:42:49 next two years retired.
407. 00:42:51 So from what I can gather, they didn't want to go through the process of implementing
408. 00:42:57 that change to adapt to the times until they had cashed in on their retirement and left
409. 00:43:03 because they all had shares in the company and they would collect on those whenever they
410. 00:43:07 retired.
411. 00:43:09 So looking back on it, I'm not upset that we did all of that.
412. 00:43:14 What I am upset about is the fact that I wasn't able to convince them in a positive
413. 00:43:20 way that this was a good move to make.
414. 00:43:23 As best I can tell that company still has not adopted anything new other than phone calls
415. 00:43:29 and conferences.
416. 00:43:30 They still do that exact same process.
417. 00:43:33 So at this point, I'm just kind of waiting for them to die because you know, no one wants
418. 00:43:37 that anymore.
419. 00:43:39 So okay, in story time with Joe.
420. 00:43:42 Thanks, Uncle Joe.
421. 00:43:44 There you go, Malekay.
422. 00:43:49 Another point from this chapter that I wanted to talk about was the Stockdale Paradox.
423. 00:43:55 Do you remember this story?
424. 00:43:57 Yes, but I've been talking too long, so you should tell it.
425. 00:44:02 This was a fascinating story and I want to study this guy and learn more about him.
426. 00:44:07 But the brief version they tell in good to great is that there was a Navy Admiral named
427. 00:44:15 Jim Stockdale that the Stockdale Paradox is based off of.
428. 00:44:19 He was the highest ranking official in a prisoner of war camp during Vietnam.
429. 00:44:24 And he was there for eight years.
430. 00:44:27 He was tortured.
431. 00:44:28 I think they said like 20 different times.
432. 00:44:31 He at one point disfigured himself with like a stool and a razor because he didn't want
433. 00:44:39 any pictures that they would take of him to be used in propaganda saying that they were
434. 00:44:43 treating the prisoners well.
435. 00:44:47 And he basically got on the good side of every other prisoner in there and was revered by
436. 00:44:55 them because he was so steadfast in the face of all of the persecution.
437. 00:45:00 Didn't know when he was going to get out, but didn't matter.
438. 00:45:03 He had a cause and they just absolutely loved him.
439. 00:45:08 Kind of a modern day Victor Frankel.
440. 00:45:11 And I like how Jim Collins got to spend a day with him after he got out.
441. 00:45:20 And they're walking along and he asked, yes, Admiral Stockdale, who are the ones that didn't
442. 00:45:27 get out?
443. 00:45:28 And he said, oh, that's easy.
444. 00:45:30 The people who didn't make it out were the optimists because they were the ones saying,
445. 00:45:34 oh, we're going to get out by Christmas.
446. 00:45:35 We're going to get out by Easter.
447. 00:45:36 We're going to get out by Thanksgiving.
448. 00:45:38 Then we're going to get out by next Christmas.
449. 00:45:40 And eventually like they die because they lose hope and they have a broken heart.
450. 00:45:45 And he says something on page 85, he says, you must never confuse faith that you will
451. 00:45:49 prevail in the end, which you cannot afford to lose with the discipline to confront the
452. 00:45:55 most brutal facts of your current reality, whatever they might be.
453. 00:46:01 And this one section in the book, if this was the only thing that you read, makes the
454. 00:46:07 entire read worth it, even if you have no interest in the business side of it at all,
455. 00:46:12 in my opinion, for sure, because he talks about what separates people is not the absence
456. 00:46:16 of difficulty, but how they deal with the inevitable difficulties of life.
457. 00:46:20 Yes, you can talk about that in a business perspective.
458. 00:46:23 But every single person listening to this at the moment that we are recording it in the
459. 00:46:28 moment that it gets released is in a situation where it is more difficult than normal.
460. 00:46:35 And you may be feeling bad about your current situation and the things that have been taken
461. 00:46:40 away from you.
462. 00:46:42 And what I find so inspiring about these stories is that these people endured some pretty
463. 00:46:49 terrible things.
464. 00:46:51 Not that I want to go through any of that, but I really do believe that you don't know
465. 00:46:56 what you're made of until you're really tested.
466. 00:46:59 And people are being tested right now in ways that they've never been tested.
467. 00:47:03 And it feels uncomfortable in your initial reaction when it feels uncomfortable to say,
468. 00:47:06 "I can't do this.
469. 00:47:07 I just want to quit."
470. 00:47:09 I think I've heard from a lot of people recently about how difficult it is having kids at home
471. 00:47:16 who were normally at school.
472. 00:47:19 My wife has had a lot of people reaching out to her for advice on, "Now everybody's a
473. 00:47:24 homeschooler.
474. 00:47:25 What do you do?"
475. 00:47:26 Right.
476. 00:47:27 So people are having to do this.
477. 00:47:29 And I'm not trying to say that we're better than anybody else.
478. 00:47:34 But we made the choice that this was going to be difficult, but it was worth it.
479. 00:47:38 So we were going to do it a long time ago when we started homeschooling.
480. 00:47:42 And I still believe that to this day.
481. 00:47:45 But it's kind of interesting to me how many people who have put off that sort of decision
482. 00:47:51 to now circumstances have changed where they don't have any other options.
483. 00:47:55 This is what they have to do.
484. 00:47:57 And they're questioning whether they can actually do it.
485. 00:48:02 And I'm telling them, "My wife is amazing.
486. 00:48:05 She is superwoman, but yes, you can do it."
487. 00:48:09 There was a time when this is what everybody did.
488. 00:48:13 And so yes, it's going to be uncomfortable.
489. 00:48:15 Yes, you're going to have to change some things.
490. 00:48:17 But you totally got this.
491. 00:48:20 And I think reading this section on Admiral Stockdale, this is not a one-to-one parallel,
492. 00:48:26 obviously, with the COVID-19 and what everybody's going through right now in self-isolation.
493. 00:48:33 I've seen a lot of stuff going around of like World War I, World War II.
494. 00:48:40 They were really asked to sacrifice.
495. 00:48:42 They were just being asked to sit on the couch.
496. 00:48:44 And there's some truth to that.
497. 00:48:45 We're not being asked to go fight a war.
498. 00:48:48 But in another sense, we are all fighting the same war.
499. 00:48:52 We're all in this together.
500. 00:48:54 And if I can communicate anything in this recording, it would be from this particular
501. 00:48:59 story to say that you don't know what strength you have inside of you and don't be afraid
502. 00:49:08 of the challenge.
503. 00:49:09 Yes, it is going to be challenging.
504. 00:49:11 Yes, you are going to have to make some adjustments.
505. 00:49:14 But you got this.
506. 00:49:15 You were made for this.
507. 00:49:16 Kind of a side note.
508. 00:49:17 Do you have friends who have been debating homeschooling and they're using this as an
509. 00:49:24 experiment to see how it would go?
510. 00:49:26 That's interesting.
511. 00:49:27 I don't know anybody who's told me that specifically, but I could see that.
512. 00:49:31 We have, I think there's three different families that have been asking us a lot of questions
513. 00:49:36 about homeschooling and such for a few months now.
514. 00:49:40 This is not a recent thing.
515. 00:49:42 We've had them over, had lots of conversations gone through curriculum, that sort of thing.
516. 00:49:47 We've done that with a number of folks and it's like, okay, well now you have forced homeschooling
517. 00:49:52 and they're just using it as a trial run.
518. 00:49:54 They're seeing what it would be like.
519. 00:49:56 And I know of one family that is planning to continue to homeschool after all of this
520. 00:50:02 because it's shown them that yes, it would work.
521. 00:50:04 So I have no idea how that applies to good and great, but it's a fun.
522. 00:50:10 Well, I think there is a family application of this.
523. 00:50:15 One of the things that we have discovered in the things changing so suddenly is that
524. 00:50:24 your perspective really matters because you can view it like I said of, oh, I lost all
525. 00:50:29 of these things.
526. 00:50:30 And one of the things that we're dealing with is we didn't, or I did not realize how
527. 00:50:33 much we relied on just like changing context where when you can't take the kids to the
528. 00:50:41 gym or go to the park and let them run off some steam, how that makes everything exponentially
529. 00:50:47 more difficult just because you don't have that break.
530. 00:50:51 But we've been able to navigate it.
531. 00:50:55 And one of the positives that has come out of this is recognizing that we have the opportunity
532. 00:51:01 to reestablish routines and habits that are positive.
533. 00:51:06 One of the things that people always push back with when it comes to creating new habits
534. 00:51:12 is that I just, I don't have time.
535. 00:51:14 Well, now you probably have time unless you're Joe and you're working more now.
536. 00:51:19 Right.
537. 00:51:20 You are trying to live stream services, but I would argue that's the exception, not the
538. 00:51:23 rule.
539. 00:51:24 Yeah.
540. 00:51:25 You have generally more time, but also with that, you have a bunch of additional distractions
541. 00:51:30 and things that can pull you off course.
542. 00:51:32 And that can derail you that can sabotage you, but it doesn't have to.
543. 00:51:38 And so if you're able to put the big rocks in your jar, like Stephen Covey would talk
544. 00:51:44 about, you're able to create some things and spend some time intentionally with families
545. 00:51:49 specifically that you wouldn't have been able to previously.
546. 00:51:53 You know, the saying when life gives you lemons, make lemonade.
547. 00:51:56 Well, there's a whole bunch of lemons laying around right now.
548. 00:52:00 Full show.
549. 00:52:01 But like one of the things we've done is we've started doing every other day.
550. 00:52:06 I've got this men's curriculum at a conference actually right before we got everything got
551. 00:52:12 shut down.
552. 00:52:13 It's this big three ring binder and it's what is a man of God and my kids saw it and
553. 00:52:19 they go, that looks kind of cool.
554. 00:52:20 So we go through, there's 52 lessons in there.
555. 00:52:24 We go through a lesson every other day on what is a man of God, me and my four boys.
556. 00:52:28 So 12, 10, 8 and 6 year old sitting at the table, talk it, we open up the Bible, we read
557. 00:52:33 all the verses together, we fill in the blanks at the end, we talk about, well, what did you
558. 00:52:38 get out of this?
559. 00:52:40 And that was an idea that when I, when I saw it, I'm like, hey, that would be really
560. 00:52:45 cool to do.
561. 00:52:46 And then right after that, it's like, hey, you can't leave your house for who knows how
562. 00:52:49 long.
563. 00:52:50 I guess what you're stuck home.
564. 00:52:51 It's like, well, now is the time.
565. 00:52:53 So we call it, call it man school.
566. 00:52:56 And they love it.
567. 00:52:58 And that is one small example, I would say, of how you can redeem this time that you now
568. 00:53:07 have.
569. 00:53:08 But if you're not intentional about it, you're going to miss the opportunity.
570. 00:53:10 But I really do believe like this is a reset for a lot of people.
571. 00:53:15 And that can be a very good thing.
572. 00:53:16 That can have very long term sustainable, positive impact if you're careful about what
573. 00:53:23 you're doing with this time that you have.
574. 00:53:26 So the moral of the story here is confront the facts, confront the brutal facts that you
575. 00:53:30 cannot leave your house and don't lose faith that we will eventually get through this all.
576. 00:53:36 And do the best with what you've got in the meantime, exactly.
577. 00:53:38 That sounds like a good place to end the episode, but we got four more chapters to go.
578. 00:53:43 Okay.
579. 00:53:44 See you in two weeks.
580. 00:53:45 No, no, we got to talk about chapter five, the hedgehog concept.
581. 00:53:49 This is the one that kind of got me thinking about selecting this book in the first place,
582. 00:53:53 because he talks about the difference between foxes and hedgehogs.
583. 00:53:58 Foxes know many things hedgehogs know one big thing and they do that over and over and
584. 00:54:03 over again.
585. 00:54:04 They perfect it.
586. 00:54:05 They do it really, really well.
587. 00:54:07 And from a business perspective, this means that you find out what is the thing in the
588. 00:54:11 middle of he calls them the three circles.
589. 00:54:13 So they are what can you be the best in the world at?
590. 00:54:16 What drives your economic engine and what are you deeply passionate about?
591. 00:54:19 And then this is the Venn diagram and the thing in the middle, that is your hedgehog
592. 00:54:23 concept.
593. 00:54:25 It is not a plan.
594. 00:54:26 It is not a goal.
595. 00:54:27 It is not trying to be the best, but simply recognizing what you have the ability to be
596. 00:54:34 the best at.
597. 00:54:37 And I think there's obviously business perspective to this, but he also shares how his wife
598. 00:54:42 kind of had this moment of clarity.
599. 00:54:45 She was doing these races and she's like, you know what?
600. 00:54:48 I think I could win the Iron Man.
601. 00:54:50 So she started training and she won the Iron Man.
602. 00:54:53 Good job.
603. 00:54:54 So there's personal application to this as well, I feel.
604. 00:54:57 This is the one area of the book that I actually have an action item from.
605. 00:55:02 I termed it how to apply great thinking to my online business, but really it comes down
606. 00:55:06 to this section with the three circles and where does all of that cross.
607. 00:55:12 I have a good idea of where that is, but I want to formalize it a little bit more.
608. 00:55:18 I don't know that I can share that because of what I'm thinking.
609. 00:55:22 I might be able to, but we can talk about it next time, but I love this concept of find
610. 00:55:28 the one thing, focus on it.
611. 00:55:30 It can have a few different forms that does happen, but stick to the one thing you're
612. 00:55:37 really good at.
613. 00:55:38 Don't be the fox.
614. 00:55:39 Don't be the one coming at it from a whole bunch of different angles, hoping to find
615. 00:55:43 the most cunning and nice way to do it.
616. 00:55:47 But focus on that one.
617. 00:55:50 Be the hedgehog.
618. 00:55:51 Curl up in a ball and throw your spikes everywhere and say good luck.
619. 00:55:54 Exactly.
620. 00:55:56 That is the truth.
621. 00:55:57 And the interesting part about this, I think, is that the hedgehog concept, remember, that's
622. 00:56:03 the thing that you have the ability to be the best in the world at.
623. 00:56:08 Just because you have done something for a very long time does not mean that that thing
624. 00:56:15 is your hedgehog concept and that you can be the best in the world at it.
625. 00:56:20 And I feel like I'm young enough that I don't have the experience and the qualifications
626. 00:56:29 to argue with people who have been in business for a long time.
627. 00:56:34 But I can see how people can get set in their ways and say, well, I've been doing it this
628. 00:56:39 way for 40 years.
629. 00:56:42 And every time I hear that sort of thing, I kind of shrink back a little bit because
630. 00:56:47 I'm like, yeah, you're right, I can't speak against that because I haven't had the same
631. 00:56:51 level of success that you have.
632. 00:56:54 But reading this book also gives me a little bit more boldness and brashness to push back,
633. 00:56:58 I guess, and say that, well, it's not just me anymore.
634. 00:57:02 Jim Collins would agree with me that just because you've been doing it this way for 40
635. 00:57:06 years does not mean that that is the best way or not even the best way.
636. 00:57:11 I feel like that term means that your systems are broken and you're doing things wrong.
637. 00:57:16 You could be doing things right.
638. 00:57:17 You're just not as excellent at that thing as you think maybe you are.
639. 00:57:24 You believe your own press, so to speak.
640. 00:57:29 And I think that can be dangerous.
641. 00:57:31 I don't know what the solution is for somebody who is stuck in that way of thinking.
642. 00:57:35 It's just a warning to me not to fall into that, to always be willing to look at the reality
643. 00:57:43 of the situation and being willing to change course when confronted with the fact that,
644. 00:57:49 yeah, maybe this thing that you tried, this isn't the thing for you, which I think is
645. 00:57:53 important.
646. 00:57:55 I think this kind of lines up with that growth mindset because growth mindset is all about
647. 00:58:01 trying things that you don't know if you can be successful at.
648. 00:58:04 And what do you do when you find something that you're not successful at?
649. 00:58:09 Do you continue to chase that thing?
650. 00:58:11 Do you change course?
651. 00:58:12 You can't just keep changing all the time, but you also can't just get locked into a way
652. 00:58:16 and like, well, this has worked before.
653. 00:58:18 So I'm just going to continue to do this.
654. 00:58:20 There's got to be a balance there before you can land on the thing that really is in
655. 00:58:25 the middle of those three circles, I think.
656. 00:58:27 I don't know what I have a whole lot to say about this outside of.
657. 00:58:30 I like it a lot.
658. 00:58:32 So this whole thing, I'm trying to remember the example I started with.
659. 00:58:37 It was Walgreens, I believe, that was focused on the convenience piece.
660. 00:58:42 Nope, that's later.
661. 00:58:44 That's in the technology thing.
662. 00:58:45 I'll save that one.
663. 00:58:46 All right, Pennant, I'll come back to it.
664. 00:58:48 All right.
665. 00:58:49 ADD took over there.
666. 00:58:50 The last thing I'll add here is that the Hedgehog concept takes a while to find.
667. 00:58:55 He said that it took good to great companies an average of four years to clarify their
668. 00:59:00 Hedgehog concept.
669. 00:59:02 So don't feel bad if it doesn't jump off the page to you right away.
670. 00:59:05 Oh, come on.
671. 00:59:07 I thought this was like a 30 minute practice.
672. 00:59:09 Three simple steps to start saving an hour every day?
673. 00:59:12 No, this book is not.
674. 00:59:13 Hey, do you have that?
675. 00:59:15 No, I don't.
676. 00:59:16 Don't be awesome.
677. 00:59:17 Okay.
678. 00:59:18 Next chapter is chapter six, a culture of discipline.
679. 00:59:22 This one is pretty straightforward.
680. 00:59:25 It is make sure that you are doing the right things and you are avoiding doing the wrong
681. 00:59:29 things.
682. 00:59:31 He's got a two by two grid where he talks about the culture of discipline high and low
683. 00:59:36 on the Y access and then the ethic of entrepreneurship low to high on the X axis.
684. 00:59:42 The great organizations are the ones that have a high ethic of entrepreneurship and a
685. 00:59:48 high culture of discipline.
686. 00:59:51 Those two things aligning are important because the entrepreneurship that's allowing people
687. 00:59:56 to take control of the role that they've been given, not just relying on the boss to
688. 01:00:00 pass orders down, which I think is really important.
689. 01:00:03 And then also the culture of discipline being able to stay in your lane, resist the opportunities
690. 01:00:09 quote unquote that are going to pop up all over the place.
691. 01:00:12 Hey, we should go chase that thing.
692. 01:00:14 Look shiny, you know, squirrel.
693. 01:00:16 That's what I think of when I think of a low culture of discipline is like, Oh, hey,
694. 01:00:20 we could try that.
695. 01:00:23 Maybe sometimes you try some stuff, but just stick with what you're really good at.
696. 01:00:28 That's what he's talking about here.
697. 01:00:29 It takes discipline.
698. 01:00:30 He says to say no to big opportunities.
699. 01:00:33 Figure out what you're good at.
700. 01:00:35 Stay in your lane.
701. 01:00:36 Now my one action item in this book comes from this section, which is start a stop doing
702. 01:00:40 list.
703. 01:00:41 I don't think that's the first time I've had that that action item either, but it's time
704. 01:00:45 to do it again.
705. 01:00:46 Or you've done it before.
706. 01:00:47 You just need to repeat it.
707. 01:00:48 Exactly.
708. 01:00:49 Yep.
709. 01:00:50 I've done it before, but now it's time to do it again.
710. 01:00:51 I think it's timely given again, you know, the current situation, trying to find a new
711. 01:00:56 normal.
712. 01:00:57 Everything is on the chopping block, basically.
713. 01:01:00 So I want to look through what are all the things that I'm doing and what should I cut
714. 01:01:05 out?
715. 01:01:06 It's old Mike this before we started recording, but I haven't done much for updates on Joe's
716. 01:01:11 health, but I'm in pretty good shape.
717. 01:01:13 I'm getting to the very end of my battle.
718. 01:01:17 And as part of that, I've learned that my ADD has become more severe and that it was
719. 01:01:23 being suppressed by some of the health issues, which is kind of a weird thing that's been
720. 01:01:28 going on.
721. 01:01:29 So Joe's ability to be disciplined and stay on task and not chase new and shiny is like
722. 01:01:34 gone.
723. 01:01:35 So I feel like when you're saying, you don't do that and stay focused, stay on the task.
724. 01:01:41 I'm like, how do I do that?
725. 01:01:46 I'm very interested.
726. 01:01:48 Mike has picked a book.
727. 01:01:49 I'm looking at the upcoming books for after his next one and I'm excited to go through
728. 01:01:54 that because I feel like it would help.
729. 01:01:56 But I'm not going to give that away yet.
730. 01:02:00 So yes, Joe's culture of discipline inside his brain is sorely lacking at the moment.
731. 01:02:06 Apologies.
732. 01:02:07 It's interesting.
733. 01:02:09 I think there is a personal application to this culture of discipline like you were talking
734. 01:02:14 about.
735. 01:02:16 And I think if you were going to try and apply this to an online business as a leader, that
736. 01:02:21 culture of discipline, he mentions it begins with disciplined people.
737. 01:02:25 So if you have a disciplined leader, if you are able to establish a discipline for yourself,
738. 01:02:30 then as your online business were to potentially grow, then you have a much better chance of
739. 01:02:34 instilling that in the people who are going to be on your team.
740. 01:02:38 But the thing that I found interesting about this is that I think a lot of companies will
741. 01:02:44 view this culture of discipline as a bunch of bureaucratic rules.
742. 01:02:51 And he makes the point right at the beginning of this chapter that most companies will build
743. 01:02:55 those bureaucratic rules to manage the wrong people being on the bus.
744. 01:03:01 And I think if you are a right person and you see these things, you can sniff this out
745. 01:03:06 from a mile away.
746. 01:03:08 These are very obvious.
747. 01:03:09 It's kind of like, why do we have to do this stupid thing?
748. 01:03:13 And I think I have struggled with this honestly in the past where I haven't been able to see
749. 01:03:19 how certain rules have been put in place because of things that have happened and people that
750. 01:03:28 have been involved in different organizations in the past.
751. 01:03:32 But reading this is kind of like an aha moment as I look back and I'm like, oh, that's probably
752. 01:03:37 why they did that.
753. 01:03:39 But then also the other side of that makes me not want to establish things that way because
754. 01:03:45 he's saying that those things while they are intended to be good to produce and the good
755. 01:03:50 behavior is what they really do is they drive away the right people because the right people
756. 01:03:54 are looking at those bureaucratic rules and they're like, no, I don't want anything to
757. 01:03:58 do with that.
758. 01:03:59 I agree with that 100%.
759. 01:04:02 I'm thinking back to corporate days and some of the red tape and such that we had to go
760. 01:04:07 through to do some very basic things.
761. 01:04:11 And it was painful.
762. 01:04:13 Like I'm thinking of how like if I need to build a website like a one page website or
763. 01:04:19 add a page to a website for a company, it's pretty straightforward.
764. 01:04:24 And it doesn't take much more than design it, you know, give me the right credentials
765. 01:04:28 and we're done.
766. 01:04:30 In my corporate days, I remember trying to build some form of a web platform in order
767. 01:04:36 to accomplish a very, very simple task.
768. 01:04:39 Build out a form and that form will drop the information into a CSV file and we can work
769. 01:04:45 with it from there.
770. 01:04:46 That is all I wanted.
771. 01:04:48 And if I had gone through the correct channels to accomplish said task, it would have taken
772. 01:04:53 me about five months to accomplish that.
773. 01:04:58 When I pulled it off by skirting the whole system, not telling anybody what I was doing
774. 01:05:03 and did it in two days.
775. 01:05:05 Oh, whoops, but then later on it, they, after it was all over, they found out about it
776. 01:05:11 and said, Joe, you should never do that again.
777. 01:05:13 I was like, Oh, okay, sorry.
778. 01:05:14 I didn't know I was supposed to do that.
779. 01:05:17 Easier to ask forgiveness than permission.
780. 01:05:19 Totally 100%.
781. 01:05:22 And you know, that that was actually that type of thing is part of why I left that particular
782. 01:05:28 scenario.
783. 01:05:29 It was not easy to work there.
784. 01:05:32 So yes, bureaucracy can get in the way.
785. 01:05:35 I don't know that I'm a good person for that scenario, but I know that it was very difficult
786. 01:05:39 to work there and it made me angry.
787. 01:05:41 So I left.
788. 01:05:42 There you go.
789. 01:05:43 All right.
790. 01:05:44 Let's move on to the next chapter.
791. 01:05:45 I'm interested in your perspective on this one because you are the tech guy, but chapter
792. 01:05:49 seven is technology accelerators.
793. 01:05:53 And the basic point that they talk about here is that technology is an accelerator,
794. 01:05:58 but not creator of momentum.
795. 01:06:00 Do you agree or disagree?
796. 01:06:02 I would agree with this and it's because he's right.
797. 01:06:07 Even though it was written in 2001.
798. 01:06:10 Yeah, I would still because.
799. 01:06:14 Okay, here's here's an example.
800. 01:06:16 Right now I'm live streaming every week our Sunday services.
801. 01:06:20 Technically, we could record those on Saturday and post it on Sunday.
802. 01:06:25 We have everything we need to do that.
803. 01:06:26 We've been doing that for a long time now, multiple years now.
804. 01:06:30 And we could do that, but we have taken the stance that's watching an event on your phone
805. 01:06:40 or on your TV or wherever instead of going to the building on Sunday, doesn't comply with
806. 01:06:48 our interpretation of scripture.
807. 01:06:51 So we have been against that up to date.
808. 01:06:54 Now we're forced, our hands are forced right now, but what we've chosen to do is we won't
809. 01:06:59 record it and then post it at that time.
810. 01:07:02 We will still have a set time and do the live stream.
811. 01:07:06 The reason for that is because it still creates the assembly time.
812. 01:07:11 Everyone still has to come together at the same time to watch that service or choose to
813. 01:07:15 watch it at a later time, which they could have done previously.
814. 01:07:19 Anyway, now I'm saying all of this because we're choosing to live stream right now and
815. 01:07:24 the question has already come up.
816. 01:07:27 Will we continue to do this after this virus has passed?
817. 01:07:31 And in many conversations, the answer to that is no, we won't.
818. 01:07:36 We'll stop.
819. 01:07:37 Now we will take a lot of what we've learned and produce better recordings.
820. 01:07:42 It's possible we may offer like a private live stream for shut-ins and nursing homes
821. 01:07:47 and such, but the chances of us just offering a blank at live stream, virtually non-existent.
822. 01:07:55 This is, I think, exactly the same thing as what he's referring to here.
823. 01:08:01 Technology can accelerate what the company or the organization is doing.
824. 01:08:07 In our case, part of the reason I'm so busy is because we have made that transition to
825. 01:08:12 doing media, mostly videos and posting those, becoming well-versed in video editing.
826. 01:08:19 And I was decent to begin with, but I don't want to be that good at it.
827. 01:08:24 But here we are.
828. 01:08:25 So what has happened is the fact that the technology exists and that we're able to do
829. 01:08:30 it has drastically increased the speed with which we were able to adjust.
830. 01:08:36 Now our hands are kind of forced in this particular scenario, but that's the exact same thing
831. 01:08:42 that you see in a lot of companies where a new technology comes around.
832. 01:08:47 And because it's possible to do something, they feel like they have to do something with
833. 01:08:53 it.
834. 01:08:54 And it's possible doesn't mean you're required to act on it.
835. 01:08:58 This is the thing I was talking about, ready to talk about earlier with Walgreens, when
836. 01:09:04 what was the, what was it?
837. 01:09:06 Drugstore.com.
838. 01:09:07 Is that what it was?
839. 01:09:08 I forget now.
840. 01:09:09 Yes, I believe so.
841. 01:09:10 It's so old now that it, I never even heard this story, but the drugstore.com became the
842. 01:09:17 first online pharmacy and threatened Walgreens stance there and everybody called Walgreens
843. 01:09:24 a laggard because they weren't adopting the internet to sell prescriptions and such.
844. 01:09:31 And Walgreens took their time.
845. 01:09:34 They slowed down, had the conversation, tried to figure out how it would apply to their
846. 01:09:39 internal, their hedgehog concept.
847. 01:09:43 Once they figured that out, then they adopted it and people were talking about how great
848. 01:09:46 they were at that point at adopting the internet.
849. 01:09:49 When they had just said 12 months earlier, you guys are way behind, you're going to die
850. 01:09:54 because of this.
851. 01:09:56 Well, if you slow down, you can do it the right way.
852. 01:10:00 But just because the technology is around doesn't mean you have to adopt it.
853. 01:10:04 No, I agree.
854. 01:10:06 You said something really important there, I think, where you have to link the technology
855. 01:10:12 to your hedgehog concept and that's what Walgreens did.
856. 01:10:15 Correct.
857. 01:10:16 Because they wanted to, going back a couple of chapters, they defined their hedgehog concept.
858. 01:10:26 Let me see if I can find it.
859. 01:10:28 Profit per customer visit.
860. 01:10:30 And what they eventually ended up with was the ability to order your prescription, even
861. 01:10:36 if you weren't in a, if you're in a different part of the country and visiting a different
862. 01:10:40 Walgreens, be able to drive through and get it quickly.
863. 01:10:44 So that is in alignment with their hedgehog concept.
864. 01:10:51 But when they first started, they didn't just try to jump to the end and say, "Well, we
865. 01:10:56 got to do everything that drugstore.com is doing because they have the ability to do
866. 01:11:01 this, that, and the other thing."
867. 01:11:03 He makes the point in this chapter of how good to great companies go from crawl to walk
868. 01:11:08 to run, not the other way around, which is kind of what drugstore.com did.
869. 01:11:13 And even more broadly, what the whole.com bubble did is they launched this thing like,
870. 01:11:20 "Oh, we're going to revolutionize this industry."
871. 01:11:22 And they came out with a bang and they were trying to run right away.
872. 01:11:27 And those new technologies can be super exciting, but the better way to do this is to figure
873. 01:11:33 out what needs you're going to solve and then do it.
874. 01:11:36 Take the next step and the next step and the next step.
875. 01:11:38 And eventually you'll get to that point where you are fully meeting a need in a way and
876. 01:11:44 that's when things are blowing up.
877. 01:11:46 Kind of interestingly, I saw today a headline that said, "Zoom's overnight success has been
878. 01:11:55 nine years in the making and it's because everybody right now is using Zoom for video
879. 01:11:59 calls."
880. 01:12:00 Right.
881. 01:12:01 I did not take the time to read through the entire article, but I've been using Zoom
882. 01:12:06 for years.
883. 01:12:07 And I think it is a very solid tool.
884. 01:12:10 And I also think that they haven't come out of the gate trying to be like, "Oh, we're
885. 01:12:14 going to replace this, that and the other thing."
886. 01:12:17 There's just a small subset of people who've been using Zoom like me for a long time because
887. 01:12:22 it was the right tool for the job.
888. 01:12:24 And it was in alignment with probably what they would define as their headshot concept.
889. 01:12:27 I know nobody at Zoom.
890. 01:12:28 I know nothing about the inner workings of the Zoom organization, so I can't verify that.
891. 01:12:33 And they've had their snafoos with privacy and stuff like that, but right now, obviously
892. 01:12:38 because everybody's at home and now they're looking for a way to stay connected that they're
893. 01:12:41 the right thing at the right time for a lot of different people.
894. 01:12:44 Our classical conversations group actually is using Zoom to do their school right now,
895. 01:12:49 which is kind of cool.
896. 01:12:52 Obviously not as good as being in the same location.
897. 01:12:56 My kids would definitely like that better, but at least they're able to see their friends
898. 01:12:59 and they're able to do the lessons together and they even do the presentations and things
899. 01:13:06 like that.
900. 01:13:07 My Toastmasters group met last Tuesday using Zoom.
901. 01:13:11 I mean, there's a lot of people who never would have considered it before who are now
902. 01:13:14 going to consider it, but Zoom didn't try to get as big as they could.
903. 01:13:18 It's kind of my point by saying, "Oh, we're going to do this technological thing super
904. 01:13:23 well.
905. 01:13:24 We're going to blow everybody else out of the water."
906. 01:13:26 They just stayed in their lane.
907. 01:13:28 What they did, a lot of people had never heard of it before and now all of a sudden it's
908. 01:13:32 getting big, but it's not because they added something different.
909. 01:13:36 It's because they've stayed in the hedgehog mode for a long time and now it's the thing
910. 01:13:44 that a lot of people need.
911. 01:13:46 That is the way I think that technology can accelerate things.
912. 01:13:51 It's not trying to create necessarily a new disruptive technology, but it's recognizing
913. 01:13:58 when that technology is disrupting the way things currently are.
914. 01:14:04 Video calls, I don't know, those have been around for a long time, but they've been kind
915. 01:14:10 of complicated.
916. 01:14:11 I use Microsoft Teams the other day and it was a pain.
917. 01:14:15 Let me tell you, I couldn't even get it to open on an iPad, even though they have an iOS
918. 01:14:20 app.
919. 01:14:21 It's just getting a lot of use right now though.
920. 01:14:25 My point basically is that Zoom is easier.
921. 01:14:28 A lot of people are using Zoom instead and I think that maybe there was a tipping point
922. 01:14:33 like that with other disruptive technologies like the digital cameras or even beyond that
923. 01:14:38 smartphone cameras over the point and shoot cameras where I was just easier.
924. 01:14:42 This is what I got.
925. 01:14:43 The technology is good enough for me.
926. 01:14:47 I don't think you can ever try to predict that this is going to be the thing that busts
927. 01:14:52 through, but I think a good degree company also is able to recognize when something is
928. 01:14:59 busting through.
929. 01:15:01 At that point, if you have the thing, you just lean into who you really are, but if
930. 01:15:06 that's not who you are, then just let somebody else, let Zoom have their moment in the sun.
931. 01:15:12 You go back to serving the people that you serve to the best of your ability.
932. 01:15:16 Absolutely.
933. 01:15:17 Let's talk about the flywheel.
934. 01:15:20 I like the flywheel.
935. 01:15:21 The flywheel and the doom loop.
936. 01:15:24 And the doom loop because it can go the other way too.
937. 01:15:27 That means you're spinning the flywheel backwards.
938. 01:15:29 I guess.
939. 01:15:30 Yeah.
940. 01:15:31 Actually, if you look at the charts, not charts, diagrams that they have in this chapter, it
941. 01:15:37 is spinning it backwards.
942. 01:15:39 No, I didn't catch that.
943. 01:15:42 Yeah.
944. 01:15:43 Basically, the concept here, we touched on it a little bit at the beginning, so we don't
945. 01:15:47 need to spend a whole lot of time here probably unless you got something that you really want
946. 01:15:52 to dig into.
947. 01:15:53 Nope.
948. 01:15:54 But it takes a while to get the right people on the bus, get them in the right place, doing
949. 01:15:59 the right things, build the systems, the culture discipline, all that.
950. 01:16:04 And then when you have all that in place and you're doing the right things, it can be difficult
951. 01:16:08 to build momentum kind of like trying to turn this enormous flywheel.
952. 01:16:13 But he's basically saying, just keep going because at some point it is going to get easier
953. 01:16:18 and easier and easier and easier.
954. 01:16:20 And because you have all of these proper pieces in place and you're leaning into your
955. 01:16:24 hedgehog concept, that's when massive breakthrough comes.
956. 01:16:29 And massive growth or breakthrough looks very different on the outside than it does on the
957. 01:16:33 inside.
958. 01:16:34 On the outside, things look sudden like revolutionary breakthroughs.
959. 01:16:37 But from the inside, they feel more like an organic development process, which is why
960. 01:16:40 that headline zooms overnight success has taken nine years.
961. 01:16:45 There's a lot of truth to that.
962. 01:16:47 And the flywheel is basically saying it's the positive version of that where you're
963. 01:16:52 going in the right direction and then the company and organization, you've got all these
964. 01:16:55 things set up so it's going to gain this momentum.
965. 01:16:58 But on the flip side of that, number one, if you do the wrong things or you have a different
966. 01:17:04 perspective as a leader, you can halt the flywheel pretty much instantly.
967. 01:17:09 And then if you start getting some disappointing results, that can be the inverse of that.
968. 01:17:14 That is the doom loop.
969. 01:17:15 So this can be positive or it can be negative.
970. 01:17:17 Yes.
971. 01:17:18 I can't say I have a whole lot to say about this other than it just makes sense.
972. 01:17:22 And if you have your hedgehog concept nailed down, you have your culture of discipline.
973. 01:17:28 You're using technology.
974. 01:17:29 You got all the right people.
975. 01:17:31 You're willing to ask the hard questions.
976. 01:17:32 You got a good leader.
977. 01:17:33 Like you have all these things in place.
978. 01:17:36 But you just crank the wheel, like just keep going, like keep working the system.
979. 01:17:42 If you don't have that in place and you keep cranking away, it slowly leads to failure.
980. 01:17:50 But if you have all the right things in place, it can lead to a great company.
981. 01:17:53 So I think that's maybe why he sucks, like pseudo ends with that because it's just kind
982. 01:17:59 of an admonition to just keep swimming.
983. 01:18:03 Like, just keep going.
984. 01:18:05 Yeah.
985. 01:18:06 And he even says that good to great CEOs could not pinpoint a specific key event during their
986. 01:18:11 transition.
987. 01:18:12 There was no name for their transformation or their launch.
988. 01:18:15 There was no miracle moment.
989. 01:18:18 He also mentions that they didn't spend a lot of time thinking about commitment and
990. 01:18:21 alignment, which I thought was interesting because he said it was just transparent to
991. 01:18:26 these leaders and that under the right conditions, alignment and motivation actually took care
992. 01:18:30 of themselves.
993. 01:18:31 All you have to do at that point is turn the flywheel, which is interesting.
994. 01:18:35 Because I really believe in the power of alignment and motivation, I think is a more interesting
995. 01:18:42 concept than willpower a lot of times from a personal perspective.
996. 01:18:46 And he's basically saying, yeah, you don't have to worry about instilling that in your
997. 01:18:50 team so much.
998. 01:18:51 You just got to do the right things and turn that flywheel.
999. 01:18:54 So chapter nine, if you're ready to go there.
1000. 01:18:57 Yep.
1001. 01:18:58 So this is from good to greats to built to last and this is interesting because they,
1002. 01:19:06 when they started the study, they debated having good to great that research study build on
1003. 01:19:13 top of the findings of built to last and they opted to not do that, but rather start from
1004. 01:19:21 the beginning on this study, which I am grateful that they did because what they eventually
1005. 01:19:26 found was that good to great isn't a sequel to built to last, but rather a prequel to
1006. 01:19:32 built to last in that if you go through this and you're able to become a great company,
1007. 01:19:39 you then start to apply the principles in built to last to maintain that enduring greatness
1008. 01:19:46 of a company, which is just kind of an interesting point to make.
1009. 01:19:51 I can't say there was anything groundbreaking in that chapter outside of that point right
1010. 01:19:55 there, but it was interesting nonetheless.
1011. 01:19:59 I don't think we really are qualified to talk about this without having red built to last,
1012. 01:20:05 which I haven't read.
1013. 01:20:06 I haven't built to last.
1014. 01:20:07 You have it.
1015. 01:20:08 I have it.
1016. 01:20:09 I'm looking at it, but I have not read.
1017. 01:20:11 Yeah.
1018. 01:20:12 So I don't think we can really compare those two, but I did find it interesting that he
1019. 01:20:16 says in here that it's easier to become great than it is to remain great and also that for
1020. 01:20:23 good to great companies, profits and cash flow are like blood and water.
1021. 01:20:27 They are essential for life, but they are not the point of it, which I think if you were
1022. 01:20:33 to look at any of the good to great companies that they listed in this book, you can totally
1023. 01:20:38 see how that applies and maybe even have some personal examples of companies that have fit
1024. 01:20:46 that model or maybe on the inverse, they have done the opposite and they have pushed the
1025. 01:20:54 fancy dinners in the corporate, whatever is like all of the fancy stuff for the executives
1026. 01:21:00 instead of just investing in the organization or the company itself and recognizing that
1027. 01:21:08 this is the lifeblood of the company.
1028. 01:21:11 So we're thankful for the profit, we're thankful for the revenue, but this doesn't serve just
1029. 01:21:18 to increase the quality of life and the number of comforts and luxuries that the executives
1030. 01:21:23 have, but it's to further the mission of the company itself.
1031. 01:21:28 Yes, sir.
1032. 01:21:29 Anything else you want to add to the book?
1033. 01:21:31 Should we do action items?
1034. 01:21:33 Let's do action items.
1035. 01:21:35 So I've got one and you've got one.
1036. 01:21:37 Yep.
1037. 01:21:38 I'll mention mine because it's first on the outline here.
1038. 01:21:41 I'm going to, as I mentioned, create a stop doing list.
1039. 01:21:45 It's time for me to kind of evaluate all the things anyways as we pursue a new normal with
1040. 01:21:52 who knows how long this self isolation thing lasts.
1041. 01:21:59 And as I shared, I really do think this is an opportunity to reestablish some positive
1042. 01:22:06 habits and routines, but it'll be easier if I remove this stuff that's just kind of
1043. 01:22:11 in clutter and getting in the way.
1044. 01:22:14 A lot of things have been removed already, but I want to just examine everything and make
1045. 01:22:21 sure that it's all supposed to be there.
1046. 01:22:24 I've been noticing a lot of people out playing with their kids lately.
1047. 01:22:27 Yeah.
1048. 01:22:28 I have one action item applying this great thinking model, primarily the hedgehog concept to what
1049. 01:22:35 I do online.
1050. 01:22:36 I think that would be super helpful.
1051. 01:22:37 I have a tendency to go a whole bunch of different directions.
1052. 01:22:40 I should stop doing that.
1053. 01:22:42 So I'm going to hopefully figure out what I should be doing.
1054. 01:22:46 Maybe I'm doing a stop doing list.
1055. 01:22:48 Maybe that's a byproduct of this.
1056. 01:22:51 It's not my intent, but here we are.
1057. 01:22:54 But yes, I want to figure out my hedgehog concept.
1058. 01:22:57 Cool.
1059. 01:22:58 Fun times.
1060. 01:22:59 How would you rate this, Mike?
1061. 01:23:00 How would I rate this?
1062. 01:23:03 So this is a little bit difficult because I know it's an older book and I feel like some
1063. 01:23:09 things have changed.
1064. 01:23:12 And like I mentioned at the beginning, it would be interesting to take a look at some
1065. 01:23:16 of the companies that have come and gone in terms of the good to great success, like
1066. 01:23:22 the Circuit Cities and Wells Fargo specifically comes to mind because there was a big brew
1067. 01:23:28 ha ha about the unethical practices not too long ago.
1068. 01:23:36 And I don't know what he would say about some of those things because I don't have a team
1069. 01:23:40 of researchers who can unpack this like he did and compare what actually happened since
1070. 01:23:46 2001 with the things that they noticed prior to 2001.
1071. 01:23:51 So I do think that this book does feel a little bit dated.
1072. 01:23:57 I also think that there's some really powerful concepts in here and it was really enjoyable
1073. 01:24:05 for me to read this.
1074. 01:24:07 It did not.
1075. 01:24:09 The writing style, even though there was a team of researchers and this is basically
1076. 01:24:12 a research project, it's not a dry, boring book.
1077. 01:24:17 It's a fairly easy read.
1078. 01:24:18 I think it does a great job of distilling things down even if you don't consider yourself
1079. 01:24:22 a business person.
1080. 01:24:24 There's still a lot of stuff that you could get out of this, the section on Admiral Stockdale,
1081. 01:24:28 like I mentioned, if that was the only section in the book that spoke to you, there's still
1082. 01:24:32 a ton just from that and it would be a worthwhile read.
1083. 01:24:36 It's about 200 pages, which is crazy when you look at the size of all of the research
1084. 01:24:42 and the appendixes that are in this book.
1085. 01:24:45 It feels like you could have easily written 500 or 600 pages on this instead.
1086. 01:24:49 I'm glad that he didn't.
1087. 01:24:50 I'm grateful.
1088. 01:24:51 That's a good spot to stop.
1089. 01:24:56 I don't know.
1090. 01:24:57 I think if I were to pick this up and read it in 2001, it's probably a little bit more
1091. 01:25:02 timely and it's easier to just be like, "Yep, five-star book."
1092. 01:25:06 I think I'm going to discount it just a little bit from that.
1093. 01:25:10 I haven't read anything else by Jim Collins, but I'm guessing that whatever he wrote after
1094. 01:25:14 this is probably more relevant and I would love that book even more.
1095. 01:25:19 This is a really, really good book.
1096. 01:25:20 There's a lot of great stuff in here.
1097. 01:25:23 Really got me thinking about a lot of different things.
1098. 01:25:25 I'm going to read this 4.5.
1099. 01:25:27 Awesome.
1100. 01:25:28 Well, in my case, I am with you in that this is a book that is very easy to read because
1101. 01:25:35 he's got a ton of stories.
1102. 01:25:37 It's story after story after story and then a breakdown of what that means, which is
1103. 01:25:41 awesome.
1104. 01:25:42 It makes for a great book to read.
1105. 01:25:46 There's a spot on in that if they had done what other research teams have done in the
1106. 01:25:52 past with books like this, it's very easy to make this a 400-page book.
1107. 01:25:57 I am thrilled that they did not do that because they can get to be a mess very quickly.
1108. 01:26:04 It becomes one of those books that we are like, "Why are you saying this again?
1109. 01:26:09 Please stop."
1110. 01:26:10 This isn't one of those, so I'm very grateful for that.
1111. 01:26:14 I'm looking around at my shelves right now realizing how many of those I've read.
1112. 01:26:18 Yes.
1113. 01:26:19 Okay.
1114. 01:26:21 With this one, I found that there are a lot of little pieces that you could pick up.
1115. 01:26:26 There's a lot of things that I feel if I hadn't read so many other books in the past, I would
1116. 01:26:31 have a lot more action items than one.
1117. 01:26:34 But because we've been through a lot of books that mention concepts that very likely derived
1118. 01:26:40 from this one because this was written 20 years ago now, almost 20 years ago, because
1119. 01:26:45 of that, we've covered some of this before.
1120. 01:26:50 It's really interesting to see from 19, 20 years ago what the perspective was at that
1121. 01:26:57 time.
1122. 01:26:59 It's very likely that we have some of the perspective of the future of what did those
1123. 01:27:04 companies become.
1124. 01:27:06 We're kind of discounting it a little bit because it didn't fully hold true.
1125. 01:27:09 We did talk about how building a great company is likely easier than maintaining it.
1126. 01:27:17 It's probably not a surprise to Collins and team that some of these companies have fallen
1127. 01:27:22 away from that.
1128. 01:27:23 I don't really see that as an issue with this because things do change, leadership changes,
1129. 01:27:29 and maybe they step away from the principles that led them to that.
1130. 01:27:34 They lose sight of their hedgehog concept and it all goes downhill.
1131. 01:27:38 It's very easy to do, I feel.
1132. 01:27:40 I think in this case, I'll join you at the 4.5.
1133. 01:27:46 It doesn't seem like it's up at that five range, but it is one I'm going to recommend
1134. 01:27:51 to a number of folks who are looking for things like this.
1135. 01:27:55 I'm excited to have read it.
1136. 01:27:57 I'm glad to have gone through it.
1137. 01:27:59 Thanks for picking it, Mike, but I'll put it at 4.5.
1138. 01:28:01 All right.
1139. 01:28:02 Sounds good.
1140. 01:28:03 I'm glad, by the way, that there are a lot of diagrams in this book that make the concepts
1141. 01:28:09 easier to understand.
1142. 01:28:11 There's probably about a dozen pictures in my note file, so I will upload that to the
1143. 01:28:17 club when we're done.
1144. 01:28:18 You can take a look at it if you're a Bookworm Club Premium member, but I feel like that
1145. 01:28:23 really does help you grasp the concepts even if you aren't a business-y type of person.
1146. 01:28:28 Probably not a good one for an audiobook.
1147. 01:28:30 No.
1148. 01:28:32 I would say probably not.
1149. 01:28:33 Yeah.
1150. 01:28:34 I feel like that would be tough.
1151. 01:28:35 Anyway, I'm grateful to have gone through it.
1152. 01:28:38 Glad to put that one on the shelf.
1153. 01:28:40 Hold on to that one forever and always.
1154. 01:28:42 Coming up next, we have My Choice, which is the antidote by Oliver Berkman.
1155. 01:28:49 The tagline on this is, "Happiness for people who can't stand positive thinking."
1156. 01:28:54 Sometimes I think this is one I should have my wife read, because she thinks I'm crazy
1157. 01:28:57 whenever I mention positive thinking stuff.
1158. 01:29:01 I think this will be fun.
1159. 01:29:03 This isn't one that I'm picking to inflict pain on Mike in anyway.
1160. 01:29:07 That does happen every once in a while.
1161. 01:29:09 It does.
1162. 01:29:10 You know, like episode 89.
1163. 01:29:13 All right.
1164. 01:29:15 So, we actually picked quite a few books because just prior to us recording this, Amazon
1165. 01:29:23 was having some significant delays in the shipping of things as they prioritize essentials
1166. 01:29:32 for people.
1167. 01:29:33 I guess they don't consider books essential.
1168. 01:29:36 I think they should.
1169. 01:29:37 I would take issue with that, but yeah.
1170. 01:29:39 Definitely should.
1171. 01:29:40 I agree.
1172. 01:29:41 I understand it though.
1173. 01:29:42 We're going to give you actually a big list here if you want to pick up the books that
1174. 01:29:48 we're going to be going through.
1175. 01:29:50 Joe mentioned the antidote.
1176. 01:29:51 The next one, which I'm picking purely because of where we find ourselves and somewhat inspired
1177. 01:29:57 by Matt Ragland, who is a phenomenal YouTuber.
1178. 01:30:01 I'm not sure if you've ever seen any of his stuff, Joe, but he had a video recently on
1179. 01:30:06 journaling.
1180. 01:30:07 He does a lot of bullet journal stuff, but he had one specifically on journaling during
1181. 01:30:10 uncertain times, which is where we find ourselves.
1182. 01:30:14 But journaling in general, I think right now is a great idea.
1183. 01:30:18 If you've never gotten into the habit, I'm also finding myself, because I'm home all of
1184. 01:30:23 the time wanting to do more and more analog with my fancy pens.
1185. 01:30:28 So it is time, Joe.
1186. 01:30:30 It is time to talk about the bullet journal method by writer Carol.
1187. 01:30:36 I feel like this is overdue.
1188. 01:30:38 Yeah, probably.
1189. 01:30:40 This is probably the book that I feel I should have picked a long time ago, and yet we haven't.
1190. 01:30:46 So now we're going to go through it together.
1191. 01:30:49 And then we've got a couple more just in case you need to get your orders in now.
1192. 01:30:55 So yeah, after that, what are we going through?
1193. 01:30:57 The anecdotes, the bullet journal method, and then nudge by Richard Teller Taylor.
1194. 01:31:02 I don't know how to say it.
1195. 01:31:04 H Teller.
1196. 01:31:05 I'm going to go with taller because it sounds more fun.
1197. 01:31:07 I don't have the tagline on this one in front of me, but yes, following the bullet journal
1198. 01:31:13 method, we'll go through nudge.
1199. 01:31:15 And then you have what?
1200. 01:31:16 And then we will get through my gap book that I have not gotten to for the last couple of
1201. 01:31:22 episodes.
1202. 01:31:23 But I really want to Tiny Habits by BJ Fogg.
1203. 01:31:26 So that is going to be the fourth one on the list.
1204. 01:31:29 So just to reiterate these, the antidote by Oliver Berkman, the bullet journal method
1205. 01:31:33 by writer Carol, nudge by Richard.
1206. 01:31:37 Teller.
1207. 01:31:38 Tiny Habits by BJ Fogg.
1208. 01:31:41 Richard's taller and Tiny Habits follows.
1209. 01:31:45 I love that.
1210. 01:31:46 All right.
1211. 01:31:47 You have any gap books?
1212. 01:31:48 Well, I've had one for a while, but I have not gotten to it.
1213. 01:31:51 So I'm not even going to try this time.
1214. 01:31:55 If I do end up having some extra time to start going through a book, I do have several of
1215. 01:32:00 them just laying here on my list.
1216. 01:32:03 And I will share that when we record the next episode.
1217. 01:32:07 But it's not been working.
1218. 01:32:09 And Tiny Habits being chosen as a bookworm book to force me to go through it.
1219. 01:32:13 There you go.
1220. 01:32:15 Yeah, I do not.
1221. 01:32:15 I was on the verge of not getting good to great done in time.
1222. 01:32:21 I was close.
1223. 01:32:23 I had to get up early this morning to finish things.
1224. 01:32:27 So there we are.
1225. 01:32:29 So yes, I do not have any gap book this time.
1226. 01:32:33 Sorry.
1227. 01:32:34 Maybe next time.
1228. 01:32:35 Don't don't get on it.
1229. 01:32:37 All right.
1230. 01:32:38 Well, thank you to everybody for listening along.
1231. 01:32:42 Thank you to the people who are joining us live as we record this.
1232. 01:32:47 If you want to become a Bookworm Club Premium member, you can join the live recordings.
1233. 01:32:51 You can get access to the extra stuff like the book notes, the MindNote files that I mentioned.
1234. 01:32:56 And you can find more information about that at bookworm.fm/membership.
1235. 01:33:02 And sometimes when you listen live, you get fun tidbits that we don't release in the
1236. 01:33:06 episodes because we do talk for a good five, 10 minutes before we hit the record button.
1237. 01:33:11 And then sometimes that happens afterwards too.
1238. 01:33:14 We won't talk about what happens during those times.
1239. 01:33:16 Usually Joe goes on some rant and says things he probably shouldn't.
1240. 01:33:19 That's what we know.
1241. 01:33:20 I also, by the way, I'm not sure if you've listened to the edited version of Zen in the
1242. 01:33:25 Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.
1243. 01:33:27 I sound a lot nicer in the released episodes than I do in the live ones sometimes.
1244. 01:33:33 Yeah.
1245. 01:33:35 The unedited versions I think are more entertaining, at least for me anyway.
1246. 01:33:41 But Mike likes to make himself sound better.
1247. 01:33:43 I tone things down a little bit sometimes in the edited versions.
1248. 01:33:47 All right.
1249. 01:33:48 Well, if you're reading along with us, pick up the antidote by Oliver Berkman.
1250. 01:33:52 And we'll go through that one with you next time.