Episode Transcript
[00:00:04] Speaker A: If you want more time, money, freedom, and have a business that's not reliant on you, then you're in the right place. Each week, Mark Creedon, along with some of the very best business minds in the world, will take you through simple, practical steps you can take to create the business you always wanted. From his own practical experience, Mark will show you how to work less, make more, and get the business you always wanted, the one that you deserve.
Now, here's your host, one of Australia's most sought after business coaches, Mark Creedney.
[00:00:53] Speaker B: Welcome to the latest edition of the Mastermind for Business podcast. I'm Mark Creedney, host.
What I want to talk about is how do you get your team on board? Because it's one of the questions that I get asked so often is I've got all these great plans and I've got a great team, but I just can't get them aligned with me. I can't get them to see things the way that I do. So I'm going to share with you in this session five ways that you can get your team on board. Five things that you absolutely should be doing.
All right, let's talk about five things. But before we do that, let's say g'day to Nick.
Morning, mate. Nice to see you back with us. So thank you, Nick. I want to talk about today is we often hear this concept. Know I've got a really good team around me and I've got really good plans for the business, but I can't sort of get my team on board.
I can't seem to get them to buy in is often the term that's used and I think there's a number of reasons for it. So let's work through what I think are the five ways that you can get your team on board. And what I'd really like our listeners to do is, as we work through each of these five ways, I'd like you to think about how are you performing on each of these. In other words, if you were to give yourself a know a score one to five, for example, how would you score yourself on each of these as we go? All right, let's look at number one.
I think this is a massive one. Nick, you're going to groan because you've heard me say this so many times, but it's about sharing the destination. You've actually got to share the destination. In other words, where the business is.
Right. And the analogy I use, and this is where you will grown. But the analogy I use is this, if I pulled up outside your house in a car and said, jump in.
What would be hopefully one of the very first questions you'd ask me.
Where are we going? Yeah, 100% right. But what we do is we invite our team into our car, which is our business, on a daily basis. The doors open, whether it's a bricks and mortar business, whether it's online, we still invite them into our business on a daily basis without necessarily telling them where we're going. You've actually got to share the destination. You've got to let people know if you want them to get on board, they've got to know where they're going.
[00:03:32] Speaker C: Yeah, 100%.
[00:03:34] Speaker B: Have you ever worked in a place where you sort of got. I got no idea where this thing's going?
[00:03:38] Speaker C: Oh, definitely. You know what, to be honest, I've also worked in a place where I've been told the end game, I've been told where the finish line is, where they're intending on going, but I haven't been shown a clear picture of how they intend to get there either. So I think you're right. You're 100% right. The destination is key, and bringing them into that, into the fold on that is key. But I think also mapping it out and planning it out and actually communicating the entire process and the steps to get there is just as important.
[00:04:07] Speaker B: Yeah. So, nice segue to point number two, which is about.
[00:04:12] Speaker C: I'm good at that.
[00:04:13] Speaker B: Yeah, you are fantastic. And I didn't even share the five points with you beforehand, so you've done exceptionally well. Number one is sharing the destination. You got to tell them where we're going. Right.
If you want them to be a part of it and you want them to be excited about it and you want your team to be on board and stand alongside you, you actually have to know what's going on. They need to know where they're getting to. But what you just said was a nice segue to point number two, which is sharing the journey.
[00:04:43] Speaker C: Yeah, 100%.
I think you're right. If I think about it in, like, a sport term, if you were to go out there for 26 rounds or something and play a game of footy without knowing that there was a grand final or a premiership trophy to lift at the end of it, then why would you put in the effort every week?
[00:04:58] Speaker B: That's right.
[00:04:59] Speaker C: Why would you go to that extra length?
[00:05:01] Speaker B: Yeah, that's right.
[00:05:01] Speaker C: So, yeah, I think it's vital.
[00:05:03] Speaker B: You've got to know where this thing is going. And you often hear, in terms of business, that there's an analogy drawn between a business and a ship, and people go, it's a big ship to turn, but the reality is no one's going to get on a ship without knowing where the thing's going. You've actually got to let them know. But the other thing, just mapping out the journey, otherwise what happens is people get a little bit, or they can get a little bit put off by twists and turns.
So you imagine you're sitting in the backseat of the car and you're lying down on the backseat of the car and you can't see anything. That's everything's sort of blacked out or whatever. Almost sounds like you've been kidnapped and thrown in a van or something, and all you can feel is a whole bunch of twists and turns, and it doesn't feel like it's a straight road. You'd sort of start to worry, well, what's going on? Why are we twisting and turning so much? But if you knew that we were actually going up to the top of a mountain where there's going to be this amazing mountaintop picnic, and you're going to have a whole lot of fun and all your mates are going to be there or whatever, then it would be a different situation. So as your business goes through twists and turns, and everybody listening to this right now will have gone through a bucket load of twists and turns, I'm sure. But if you want your team to come on board, it's not just sharing the destination with them, but it's also sharing those journeys, those twists and turns. So they're not surprised by them.
[00:06:33] Speaker C: Yeah, 100%.
[00:06:35] Speaker B: So they need to know that the twists and turns are perfectly okay. It's part of the journey. And also the other thing, too, I think, is if you're sharing both the destination and the journey with them, the other two things that will happen is they'll be less surprised when there's a variation.
Suddenly you might not pivot, but you might just slightly vary the course.
But I think, Nick, the other thing that happens is they start looking for opportunities to vary the course to improve the journey.
[00:07:08] Speaker C: 100%. That's what I was about to say as well.
I think it opens the door, making them a part of that, bringing them into, I guess, the journey, the end game, the entire process.
As long as you are creating that open line of communication where it's a safe space for them to communicate with you, then it's opening up the door for collaboration, too, isn't it? Like them being able to collaborate and offer their ideas to maybe the end goal changes, maybe it is tweaked, but they're a part of that.
[00:07:42] Speaker B: Maybe we should just swap places because you keep segueing to the next point. Sorry. No, it's perfect. It's fantastic. Because the next point is actually about acknowledging their addresses and concerns.
I'm going to flip it around a little bit so that acknowledging and addressing concerns is about listening. But I think before you listen, let's just park that. So we'll take that and make that step number four, step number three, I think, is giving them the opportunity to provide input. Yes, because I remember many years ago, when I was in my early twenty s, I worked for this guy and I went to him with an idea and he said, why did you do that?
And I said, I thought. And he went, stop. I don't pay you to think, I pay you to do. So here's the deal. I'll do the thinking, you do the doing.
[00:08:42] Speaker C: Seems like a nice bloke.
[00:08:43] Speaker B: Yeah, he's a great bloke. Couldn't wait to get out of there. But anyway, what a way to stifle.
[00:08:47] Speaker C: That collaboration and motivation in that, too. How are you meant to be motivated to do, if he says, I'm paying you to do, how are you meant to be motivated to do that to your best if you're not even a part of it, or if you're just being told, if you can't use your own, I guess, ideas or intuition, or you're literally just doing what someone else says?
[00:09:12] Speaker B: Well, it's that real egalitarian approach, but it's what you and I would now call just being the smartest man in the room. And we see it. We see it. People come and approach us to work with us in mastermind, Nick. And the thing I often hear the most. No, no, Mark, you have to understand, our business is different. Well, you know what? It's actually not.
[00:09:32] Speaker C: It can't be.
[00:09:32] Speaker B: No, that's right, it's not. And whether your business is, as long as it's in a service environment, which is what we specialize in, but as long as it's in a service environment, it's really not different. You like to think it's unique, but as Michael Yardney often says, yeah, sure, you are unique. You're as unique as every other person in the.
So the thing about getting people's input is you actually have to facilitate a process for that to happen.
Yeah.
So whether that's saying my door is always open, I was sharing with our mastermind tribe this morning on one of our focus Friday sessions we run every Friday. And I was saying that I can remember working in businesses that had a suggestion box.
And in fact, in my early consulting days, I remember one of the pieces of advice that I'd often give when I'd go into a business would be, let's set up a suggestion box so the team can actually make suggestions about what they think should change in the business.
[00:10:36] Speaker C: I agree. Although I have had personal experiences with a suggestion box and I believe it would just fill up until it was overflowing and then it would just get emptied in the bid. I don't think it was actually ever listened to or followed.
[00:10:48] Speaker B: Right, so that's that link to that fourth point that we'll come to in a second about the importance of listening. So it doesn't have to be a suggestion box. Maybe it's an open email, maybe it's an open door policy, maybe it's structured meetings where you go once a month we're going to have an open meeting where we talk about opportunities and possibilities and things like that. Nick, one of the things I'm doing in the Metropole group that we're kicking off this month is the CEO open hour. So once a month I'm going to be on Zoom. And anybody can jump on Zoom and they can come on and say g'day, they can ask me a question, they can make a suggestion, they can tell me to bugger off, they can, whatever, it's just open. And really the concept of it was just to.
Because we operate remotely across three states, I can't be in three places at once. Just an opportunity for people to go, do you know what? I feel like the boss is actually listening.
[00:11:53] Speaker C: And I think that's really good for a couple of reasons. And I think one of the reasons why that's so great is because sometimes when you're not in the office, you might work in the Brisbane office, but the head office or the main office is in Melbourne or Sydney. And sometimes you feel that disconnect.
The boss comes by and visits once a month or once every couple of months, a few months. And that's really the only real interaction or time or space that you get to actually deliver ideas or have your complaints heard or whatever it may be. And you do feel that sort of disconnect. And I think that is really important to make sure that people who may be, I guess, interstate feel just as connected as the people that are around the office with you all the time as well.
[00:12:38] Speaker B: And I think also, Nick, with this remote working. We have this lot of this sort of working from home and we've got some pretty clear policies on that because we want people to be in the office and collaborate and look after their mental health and that's why we don't have a full work from home policy. But where you do have people working remotely, I think some kind of an arrangement where worst case would be an email, although I think I hate emails for that, like a suggestion box in an email. But best case would be face to face meetings. Second best prize, or second prize is a Zoom meeting, a team's meeting, whatever it might be. But that's what we're setting up and rather than putting structure to it, where we have this meeting and everybody must come with a suggestion or an idea that we're going to.
It's open. It's like an open mic night.
[00:13:23] Speaker C: Yeah, and I think you're right. The thing with emails, and that's why I don't really like it either, is because some things can get lost in translation, things can be taken out of context. So one idea that I know that some people are doing is they're actually just creating, setting up dropboxes.
[00:13:40] Speaker B: Yeah, cool.
[00:13:41] Speaker C: And getting people to just take some videos.
[00:13:42] Speaker B: Yeah.
[00:13:43] Speaker C: Take a really quick 32nd video, pop it into the Dropbox and it will all be gone over and things will be addressed.
[00:13:50] Speaker B: Or you could set up slack and communicate across slack.
[00:13:54] Speaker C: 100%.
[00:13:55] Speaker B: That's the great thing about software these days. And Nick, if you go back ten years, utilizing any of that software was really difficult. It was problematic and you'd have to pay some software engineer $100,000 to come and put it into a company. And you just download the app now.
[00:14:12] Speaker C: Yeah, that's right.
[00:14:13] Speaker B: So I like that idea. Videos, slack Dropbox shooting loom videos, whatever it might be, open mic sessions. But the important thing is you have to create structure. And I think one of the worst things that you can do is sort of say, no, my people know that they can talk to me at any time and give me ideas. I've got this process open. But the reality is if you don't have a structure around it, an actual process, they probably won't.
Because at the end of the day most people are sort of just concerned about making sure they keep their job and keep their head down, putting food on the table 100%, looking after their families. And so I can see why some people would be very reluctant to make any suggestions unless there was a really clear process. So this is just the 21st century version of a suggestion box.
[00:15:09] Speaker C: Yeah, 100%.
I think it's really important to make sure, like you were saying, most people are just trying to, I guess, get through their day, get through their week. So I think it's really important to make them feel included in the process because it's hard to get excited about something that isn't yours.
[00:15:27] Speaker B: Yeah, it's very true. It's very true.
It's 100% correct. And I think that the way that you improve on that excitement is by giving them that sense of belonging and ownership and making them a part of it. Yeah. Making them part of the journey. And I guess that's the frustrating thing that I look at, is it's not that bloody hard.
[00:15:45] Speaker C: No, it's not, actually.
[00:15:47] Speaker B: Isn't really simple. You got to put some time and effort into it. All right, so step number one, share the destination. Step number two, share the journey. Step number three, set up a process to actually facilitate input from your team. Step number four, that you spoke about a little bit earlier, was then actually listening to it. So this is the. Oh, yeah. We got these big pile of suggestions in a suggestion box, and what we're going to do at the end of the month, we're going to unlock that box and we're just going to tip it in the bin.
[00:16:13] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:16:14] Speaker B: All right. Then it just becomes. It's smoke and mirrors. Right. It's just all for show. It's all for show.
We're making an appearance that we're actually trying to do something.
[00:16:24] Speaker C: There's actually no real good intention, 100%.
[00:16:27] Speaker B: So we don't want to do that. So what we want to do is facilitate the ability for them to give that input and then for us to listen to it. And so that's where I think that concepts of, if you've got slack channels or you've got dropboxes or loom videos, then responding to it.
[00:16:42] Speaker C: Yes.
[00:16:43] Speaker B: So it's that. Listen, it's a great idea. Thank you. It may not be in range right now, it may not be possible for us right now. It might not be on our radar right now, but you've got to encourage.
It's about letting people know that they've been listened to. Yes.
So I was sharing this with one of our mastermind members just yesterday, and I was using the concept of sort of an unusual democracy, if you like, where it's everybody gets a say, but not everybody gets a vote.
So give people the say and then let them know they've been heard. And don't dismiss it. No, thank them for it. And then work out what's possible, but make it clear you've got to make the invisible visible if you want to get your team on board. You use football analogies a lot and I think they're great. But imagine if you were coaching a footy team and you'd shared the destination about getting to the premiership. You shared the journey about how we were going to train three times a week and what we were going to do so that everybody's on board. And then we have open sessions in the dressing room where they can come to you as the coach and talk to you about things. And then you never, ever told them what you were going to do with any of it and you never told them why you weren't running with their idea.
It would just fall down in a great big heap, wouldn't it?
[00:18:12] Speaker C: It's going to create some animosity.
[00:18:16] Speaker B: Yeah. But the other thing, too is I think you've just wasted a shitload of.
[00:18:19] Speaker C: Time, yours and everyone.
[00:18:21] Speaker B: Yeah. Because you've gone through all this great idea, these first three steps. So if you're listening to this now and thinking, yeah, well, I reckon I do share the destination, I do share the journey. And there is a facility. Maybe I don't listen to them, but there is at least a facility. You're just wasting your time.
[00:18:36] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:18:37] Speaker B: So you can see how each of these steps are inextricably linked.
[00:18:41] Speaker C: That stuff will be found out if you're not listening. If you're not, I guess, taking on their advice or their ideas when it comes to collaborating, then they're going to clue onto that quickly and they are going to find somewhere and someone that will listen to them and will take their ideas seriously. And how many times have we seen where someone has some great ideas or someone has these great ideas that don't get listened to? They go somewhere else and they're valued and they're cherished and they end up blowing up.
I think there's opportunities being missed there as well.
[00:19:18] Speaker B: I've seen it, man. I've certainly seen people who are really good at what they do in one environment, in one workplace, and they just wither on the vine. And as you say, they move to another workplace where the destination is shared, the journey is shared, there's a facility for them to be able to make input and they're listened to and acted upon, and suddenly they just, as you say, blossom. Yeah, blossom. Boom, there it is. And you look at them and you go, wow, at that place, they were a C grade salesperson here. They're killing it.
[00:19:53] Speaker C: Also, I think when you're giving someone pathways or some opportunities for growth and development and to be a part of the process, I guess to be seen as a bit more of a leader. And I hate to go back to the football analogies again, but it's the same thing. If you give someone a little bit of leadership or a little bit of responsibility due to the fact that they may have the experience or you may think that they may thrive off of that, you can really get the best out of your people. And I think until you actually give them that opportunity, like I said, it may be a missed one. You may miss out on actually extracting something great from your people. Yeah.
[00:20:34] Speaker B: And what a shame that is when you see those missed opportunities with really great people and you go, just a shame.
[00:20:39] Speaker C: And like I said, someone else will value it, someone else will find it, someone else will get it out of them and they will value it and benefit from it.
[00:20:46] Speaker B: And seeing as we're using footy analogies, we've seen that lots of times with football players, 100%. So a football player, I can't think of a great example right now, but a football player under one coach where they're just coached a certain way, it's my way or the highway, it's all of that sort of stuff, and next to it they move under another coach and they just turn into something amazing.
[00:21:06] Speaker C: Yeah, definitely. And I think there's people out there that you may not.
I guess from a certain point of view or a certain perspective, they may not see them in that light, but someone else does and then they bring the best out of them. So I think the biggest key to be able to get that or not miss those opportunities is to have that space. If you don't have that safe space for collaboration, if you're not listening, if you're not taking their ideas on board, then that is going to become a missed opportunity for you.
[00:21:44] Speaker B: Yeah, I was just thinking, Nick, probably the Dolphins in the NRL are a good example of that because I know they didn't finish top eight or anything in their first season, but there were a number of players they signed that a lot of commentators laughed at and said they're past their best. 100% they're past their best meaning players like Jermaine Azako.
But that is a little bit of Wayne Bennett, isn't it?
[00:22:12] Speaker C: Because he is a great people manager. He's great at getting the best out of his people.
[00:22:18] Speaker B: So he understands these principles we're talking about.
[00:22:20] Speaker C: 100% he does.
[00:22:21] Speaker B: And he not just understand it, but practice it.
[00:22:23] Speaker C: Yes. And implements.
[00:22:25] Speaker B: Yeah, definitely.
[00:22:26] Speaker C: And always has. And I think it just shows you that for someone who's been doing it for so long, it works to get the best out of your people. You have to know them, listen to them, let them collaborate with them, give them responsibility, provide development and pathways and opportunity, and that's how you get the best out of your people. And yes, it's a very, very simple method, but if you can get it right, it will work for the next 2030 years as well.
[00:22:53] Speaker B: Yeah, we've seen people blossom under his coaching. Yes. So number one, destination. Number two, journey. Number three, a process to facilitate for them to provide input to you. Number four was to actually then listen to that input and give feedback. You've got to close that loop. By the way, I was just thinking that we're talking about doing this with team members, but if you're listening to this podcast and go, yeah, but I'm a solopreneur, so I don't really have a team member, so it doesn't relate to me. Well, it does because the same principle applies to the people that in mastermind we always talk about team as being quite broad. So the same principle can apply to your suppliers, to your alliance partners, share with them where you're going and what's going on and give them the opportunity to give you feedback.
I just had a thought, though, really, the same thing applies to your clients?
[00:23:51] Speaker C: Yes, in a way it does. Yeah, that's what I was thinking as well. It definitely does. I think that if you have that same level of collaboration or openness with your clients, and the line that you mentioned before, which I do love, is making the invisible visible.
And if you have that type of communication line open with your clients, then a, you're going to, I guess, avoid a lot of dramas that you may be coming across now and b, you're going to expand your business, grow your business, grow yourself and what you know and the way that you know how to do it, because there's going to be advice and things, I guess, thrown your way due to the fact that you have that open line of communication.
[00:24:41] Speaker B: Yeah, you're 100% correct, number five.
So we've shared the destination, we've shared the journey. We've got a facility for people to be able to give input and we're listening to it. You've mentioned it a couple of times today and step number five is collaboration. But for me, this is the ability for people to collaborate with each other.
So if you have a team and you operate them in silos. And they never get to understand what everybody else does, and they never get to understand the impact that each of them has. So the analogy I always use is this. Imagine your business is a jigsaw puzzle. You've really got to do two things. Each person needs a piece in that puzzle picture.
You have to do two things. You have to flip the lid of the box over so they can see what the whole picture looks like. That's the first thing. But the second thing is they have to understand how the edges of their piece impacts on the rest of the picture. Because the truth is, that piece only fits in the picture one way.
You can turn it 90 degrees or 180 degrees or 270 degrees. It only fits in one way. And so they have to understand the impact that the edges of their role plays on the edges of other people's roles. And that applies, Nick, if there's only two of you, if you've only got a team, two in the business.
[00:26:07] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:26:08] Speaker B: So in addition to giving them the ability to give you input and for you to give them something back, close that loop, you've actually got to allow them to collaborate.
And I actually think if we take that one step further, that's where the concept of allowing even clients to collaborate, the concept of having the ability of get togethers, whether they're virtual or live, for your clients, for your alliance partners, for your suppliers. How cool is it when a company says to all of its suppliers and alliance partners, hey, let's all get together and almost brainstorm the way that we can all work together better. How can we create better collaboration? So it is about fostering that facility for collaboration.
[00:26:56] Speaker C: Yes.
Having that space for it, as you.
[00:27:00] Speaker B: Said before, that safe space.
[00:27:01] Speaker C: Yeah. And your story of, well, I pay.
[00:27:04] Speaker B: You to do what I tell you.
[00:27:06] Speaker C: To do, that clearly doesn't work. No, because it can't be all up to you either. No, you are not the best at everything. No. You might be great at some things. There are some things that you aren't great at.
[00:27:21] Speaker B: Well, the thing is, if you want to scale your business, and again, what we talk about in mastermind is scaling the business to the point where it becomes less reliant on you. So it's not about scaling it. We spoke about this in a podcast recently. It's not about scaling it to 100 x. The income, we can certainly work on that, but it's actually about scaling your business to the point where it doesn't rely on you. Now, if you are the best at everything, therefore the smartest person on your team, you are never going to look in the mirror. Well, that's right. But you're never going to reach that scaling point. You're never going to reach the point where you can go, well, actually, you know, I don't need to be here.
[00:28:03] Speaker C: Yeah, it will be forever. It will be you sloping away.
[00:28:06] Speaker B: Right? So on our Friday focus session this morning, one of our clients was saying that Steve was saying, we ask him every week what the wins are, right? And Steve said, oh, I was just in Vegas for the NRL launch and my team solved a whole bunch of really hairy problems while he was away with no input from him. How cool is. See?
[00:28:30] Speaker C: Completely capable, right?
[00:28:32] Speaker B: Exactly. But what he's done is he's followed this five process, five step process.
[00:28:36] Speaker C: And don't people step up when given the opportunity?
[00:28:38] Speaker B: Of course they do. Of course they do.
[00:28:40] Speaker C: Because you would miss that opportunity if you don't give them that opportunity.
[00:28:44] Speaker B: Yeah, that's right. If you haven't got the facilitation in place. Exactly. Cool. Good stuff. Good chat.
[00:28:50] Speaker C: Very good, George.
[00:28:51] Speaker B: There's the five steps. Let's do a really quick recap. Number one, you got to share the destination. Number two, you got to share the journey. Number three is about having a process for people to be able to give you input. Number four is to listen to that input and close that feedback loop. And then finally, number five is to create a safe space and an, and an encouraged space for collaboration among your team members, your associates, your alliances, your affiliates, your clients, whatever it might be. That's a wrap from us for this episode of the Mastermind for Business podcast.
These are the sort of things that we help our clients with all the time. If you think that this is something you would like to get some help with, Mastermind.com au, please. If you like what you've heard, subscribe to the podcast. It makes it so much easier for others to find us. If you know someone who would benefit from it, share the podcast with them. Our mission is to help as many people in business and professional practice as we can to spend more time in their life and less time in their business, which is a nice segue to say. Whatever you do between now and the next episode, please make sure you spend time with those who matter most.
[00:30:03] Speaker A: Thanks for joining us on the Mastermind for Business podcast. If you're ready to have a business that you're not a slave to, check out metropolemastermind.com au or have a chat with Mark and the team at all the w's, see what's possible today.
